History & Comment for May 14, 2025

A look at historical and current events on this day, comment and humor so dry it would make a camel thirsty. 

Transcript

This is History and Comment for Wednesday the 14th of May 2025

In 1607 English settlers build Fort James, a few miles inland and up the James River in Virginia.   This became known as Jamestown, the earliest permanent English Settlement in the Americas.    Jamestown was a commercial venture, unlike the Massachusetts colonies a few years later, that were religious in purpose.    One of the products made at Jamestown was Glassware.    The vast forest, offered fuel that was in short supply back in Europe.    

Jamestown was named for King James the first of England and 6th of Scotland.    We have talked about him a few times.   He is the one that authorized the English translation of the Bible.  

Jamestown is about 2 ½ miles from the later settlement of Williamsburg,  and about twice that distance from Yorktown.  All will play significant parts in the early history of the United States.   

I really do not seek out church history stories, they are just part of the fabric of history.    In 1608, a coalition of German Protestant states form the Protestant Union.  This was to defend their personal rights, land and general safety from the more powerful Orthodox Church.    

The thing that must be remembered anytime we are discussing the Temporal Church it is very much like a mosaic.  From a great distance it looks like beautiful art.  But upon close examination it is bits of broken pottery or glass.   To focus on any single piece is to focus on the human flaws.   

Just two years later,  French King Henry the 4th is assassinated, by a Catholic zealot.    The assassin was François Ravaillac,   who might have had some issues.   Twice he was rejected from joining Preistly orders.    None the less he felt Henry was too friendly with the Huegunots or French Protestants.    Henry’s successor was Louis the 13th,   who was not yet a full 9 years old.   

Henry appears to have at least leaned more towards orthodoxy or at least was less tolerant of the Huegunots.   The tale has a few twist,  Henry died of illness on the 33rd anniversary of his becoming King.   The throne is assumed by his son,  King Henry the 14th, who was just four years old.  The 14th made a point to consolidate power and the place of the Catholic Church, persecuting the Huegunots. 

In the late 18th Century, Smallpox was a disease of great concern.   The blistering skin rash killed an estimated 400,000 people per year in Europe and survivors were often left blind.   The Frenchman Voltaire, commented that 60% of the population contracted the disease and 20% died from it.    The idea of inoculation was not new, but folks often contracted a full-blown case and frequently died from the cure.    Edward Jenner was an English doctor and had studied the disease as had others. Exactly who made the connection that milk maids who had been exposed to the far less sever cowpox did not contract small pox.     On this day in 1796, Jenner inoculates a small boy with cow pox,  and while he gets sick does not develop a sever case.  Later exposure to small pox demonstrates a resistance and the science of immology is founded.   

Today there is much debate about vaccines.   That is a latin word and has its origins in this period.   It is part of the Latin phrase, Variolae vaccinae ('pustules of the cow').  Jenner coined the phrase.     The debate is the side effects.    Historically, the vaccine, was a live virus. Then later a muted or a killed virus.  As we have developed knowledge of how the immune system works we have found ways to activate it against more viral diseases.    But there has and remains some debate of side effects.   Most recently the Covid-19 vaccines used a new and novel approach.   And that technology is believed by a large sector of folks to be as bad as the disease if not worse.    A distinct distrust in the Government’s promotion has not helped.   

The backlash is diseases that have a history of suppression from vaccines are on a resurgences.    Measles is one, that is currently in the news.   That disease has been noted back at least as far as 9th Century in Persia.    The vaccine is a live muted form and has a long history of effectiveness with few if any side effects.   

I find the debate interesting, some folks point out that the vaccines has trace amount of preservative and carrier ingredients that are lethal in large doses.  They use this as a concern.  Yet have little reservation of drinking alcohol, or using tobacco or vaping.  Just so you know,  alcohol is a poison. As are the active ingredients of tobacco.   Still, folks ingest it in large quantities.  

The 6th US Congress recesses their first session on this day in 1800.   They had met in Philadelphia.   Between now and the convening of the second session in November the Federal Government will move to the new Capitol in Washinton DC.  

 The Rockefeller Foundation begins operation in 1913 with a $100 million endowment from John D. Rockefeller.   Rockefeller had made a fortune in the petroleum business, refining the widely variable coal oil to a consistent product that had proved safe for home lighting.   The product and company was known as Standard Oil.     At the time Rockefeller was one of the world’s richest man.   The Rockefeller Foundation was second in the United States to the Carnegie Foundation.   The current endowment is more than $6 Billion dollars.  

The Foundation has focused on Public health and medical research. The first grant was to help build the Washington DC headquarters of the American Red Cross.

There is a very complex series of events playing out in 1948.   Britian and France were controlling large protions of the Middle East, this had been the case since the break up of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WW I.   It was not an easy task and had been fraught with politics.    The elephant in the room was two very diverse and opposing ethnic groups.   Arab Muslims and Jews, both had lived in the region for a few centuries.   The Jews since some point a couple of millenia in the past. The Arabs dated from about the same time, with the Muslim element dating from the 7th Century.    

The British Mandate was due to expire and the territories to be returned to locals with the hope of forming new and independent states.    The original plan was to create two states one Jewish and one Arab.  The Arab state was defined and is known today as Jordan.    The Jewish state was hotly debated.   In the vacuum, with the mandate due to expire within hours.   The modern Nation of Israel declares its status as an independent nation.   

Immediately after the declaration, the new nation is attacked on all sides by the Arab States.  Namely, Jordan, Syria, Egypt and forces from Iraq.   

The British had handled the Mandate period very poorly and played various factions for their ends.   The matter was complicated by a recent influx of Jews fleeing persecution in Europe during WW II.    

There are a few points that need to be understood.  The border of the new nation was of some debate, but the tone was the new nation was willing to accept the UN partion, flawed as it was. The United Nations had proposed a Jewish homeland that was so cut-up as to be tactically indefensible.   The Arabs contended there should not be a Jewish state in the region in any form. That last point has and remains at the center of the issues to this day.  

The Conflict will continue until a series of armisist are signed in the Spring of 1949.   This will hold until the Six day War in 1967.   That conflict can be debate, US President Johnson placed most of the blame on Egypt for blocking Israeli access to the Red Sea.   This conflict was greatly lop-sided in favor of Israel.    

The crux of the matter is simple.   Israel has been consistently willing to live along side of their Arab neighbors, frequently trading land for peace agreements.   The Arabs continue to insist on the removal of the State of Israel.    

1951,  a volunteer group in Wales begins operation of the first preservation railway. 

Film maker George Lucas is 81 today.  His impact on film far exceeds the Star Wars franchise.   Until Peter Jackson’s LOTR series, Lucas and his companies were the experts in special effects and largely remain in that position. 

Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg is 41. 

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