Rosewood Massacre

The Rosewood massacre was a violent, racially motivated conflict that took place during the first week of January 1923 in rural Levy County, Florida. Six blacks and two whites were killed, and the town of Rosewood was abandoned and destroyed during what was characterized as a race riot. Florida had an especially high number of lynchings in the years before the massacre, including well-publicized incident in December 1922. Rosewood was a quiet, primarily black, self-sufficient whistle stop on the Seaboard Air Line Railway. Spurred by unsupported accusations that a white woman in nearby Sumner had been beaten and possibly raped by a black drifter, white men from nearby towns lynched a Rosewood resident. When black citizens defended themselves against further attack, several hundred whites combed the countryside hunting for black people, and burned almost every structure in Rosewood. Survivors hid for several days in nearby swamps, and were evacuated by train and car to larger towns. Although state and local authorities were aware of the violence, they made no arrests for the activities in Rosewood. The town was abandoned by black residents during the attacks. As of 2009, none have returned. Although the rioting was widely reported around the country, few official records documented the event. The massacre was the subject of a 1997 film directed by John Singleton. In 2004 the state designated the site of Rosewood as a Florida Heritage Landmark.

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Also see The Real Rosewood, (Rosewood official site) http://rosewoodflorida.com/

1998 United States embassy bombing/This Day in History

This Day In History Aug. 7 1998

In the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings (August 7, 1998), hundreds of people were killed in simultaneous truck bomb explosions at the United States embassies in the East African capital cities of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Nairobi, Kenya. The attacks, linked to local members of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad brought Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to American attention for the first time, and resulted in the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation placing bin Laden on its Ten Most Wanted list.

Along with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, and the 2000 attack on the USS Cole in Yemen, the Embassy Bombing is one of the major anti-American terrorist attacks that preceded the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Motivation and preparation

The bombings are widely believed to have been revenge for American involvement in the extradition, and alleged torture, of four members of Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ} who had been arrested in Albania in the two months prior to the explosions and extradited to Egypt.[1] On June 28, Ahmed Ibrahim Assyed al-Najr, believed to be the militant group’s commander in Albania, was arrested along with compatriot Majed Mustapha. With the help of the CIA, they were extradited to Egypt. In July, Mohammad Hassan, leader of the Foundation for Rebirth of Islamic Heritage, was arrested in Tirana and similarly extradited to Egypt. The following month, a communique was issued warning the United States that a “response” was being prepared to repay them for their interference.

The bombings were scheduled for August 7, the eighth anniversary of the arrival of American troops in Saudi Arabia, ostensibly a deliberate choice by Osama bin Laden.

Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License 1998 United States embassy bombings

Tangshan Earthquake

Deathquake Tangshan.

July 28th.1976, 3:42 a.m local time (Tangshan China), an occurance which has been deemed (due to the overwhelming number of casualties) the largest earthquake of the 20th century quite literally shook the Peoples Republic of China to the core.

The Tsangshan earthquake lasted an estimated 10 seconds, and registered a 7.8 on the R.M.S (Richter Magnitude Scale). An estimated 655K people were said to have lost their lives in the tragedy. That number has since been reduced to somewhere in the ballpark of 240K-255K.

Early Signs, Predictions

Well water in a village outside Tsangshan rose and fell three times the day before the earthquake. The S.S.B (State Seismological Bureau) analysis and prediction dept. concluded a full month and a half in advance that the Tsangshan region would be struck with significant force between the dates of July 22, 1976-Aug. 5, 1976. Efforts made entailed reporting These findings to 60 people. One listening in Qinglong was an official by the name of Wang Chunqing. His country took the report very seriously. Some sources indicate that preparations were made some two years in advance. On July, 25-26. each community within Qinglong County held emergency meetings. At which time buildings were examined, and water reservoirs were given special attention. Ran Guangqing (County Secretary in charge), risked his political career, as well as a prison term to prepare nearly half of a million people for the events that would soon follow. He ordered officials to educate the people, as well as evacuate the local population.
Wang Chunqing despite his efforts, spent the next several years in prison.
Twenty years later the U.N. concluded that early warnings and preparations paid off dramatically increasing the survival rate. As for Wang Chunqing, I was just pulling your leg. The man was/is a hero, he never served any time. The rest, of course, is history.

For more on this entry visit the link below.

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