Martin Historical News

So today, after stopping myself from moving my grandson's birthday up one month, I thought it still might be fun to look at what made news tomorrow- October 1st- through the ages.  (Or to put it another way, "If the best I can get off Fox News is, 'Susan Olsen tells why she despised being Cindy Brady', the news is not going to be worth going through.")  So sit back while I reprogram the Tardis to find the humor in history, and away we go!  (Jo-Anne!  Get that seat belt on!)

331 BC

Alexander the Great and Darius III fight their final battle at Gaugamela.  I believe that this may have been the birthplace of Gargamel, but the name similarity could well be a coincidence.

"You idiot!  Isn't it bad enough you mix me up with Garfunkel?"

Alexander's last butt-whupping of Darius had netted him, among other items, Darius's wife, mother, and two of his daughters.  As Darius tried to talk his way out of the fight, he sent three negotiation attempts.  The first time, he got snotty and demanded Alex leave Asia and give back the family.  Not surprisingly, that didn't go well.  The second attempt, Darius felt his genitalia a bit more in the wringer, and upped the ante.  He offered the hand of a daughter (of which Alexander already had possession of the whole body), all the territory up to a certain river (of which Alex was a good 1,000 miles past), and perhaps a ransom for the ladies.  The third try, he thanked Alex for his kind treatment of Mama (wife wasn't mentioned), re-iterated the "hand of daughter" thing, moved the "you can have all the land up to" line closer to where Alex actually was, offered him a co-kingship, and offered the current equivalent of about $16-and-a-half million of silver.  But no, Alex wanted to fight, and after a hotly contested battle, Darius adjourned somewhat early and later got stabbed in the back (figuratively and literally) by one of his own guys.

366 AD

Pope Damasus (possibly NOT pronounced "Dumb-a$$-is") was named Pope.  Well, naming might be a bit rough.  You see, just 50 years after it became legal to BE a Pope, he secured his election by allowing his "proper society" supporters to hire thugs to massacre his opposition.  Apparently a master of bribing his way INTO said society, he also took advantage of things by being a bit of a ladies' man, earning him the nickname  Auriscalpius Matronarum, "the ladies' ear scratcher".  He got around the 305 AD prohibition of bishops marrying by just having adulterous affairs.  Apparently he did manage to combine brutality and lasciviousness with actual good works, and put St Jerome onto the job of composing the Latin Bible known as the Vulgate.

1553

Queen Mary (Tudor) ascends the throne of England.  She earned the sobriquet "Bloody Mary", not for the drink (since vodka was just starting to get some legs in Russia and Poland, and tomato juice was 'invented' in 1917), but for her barbecuing skills.  In her just-under five years at the helm, she held a roasting on average every 6th day- of course, the grill-ee was generally a Protestant, and no word on whether baked beans or coleslaw were available.


1800

A secret Treaty between France (under Napoleon) and Spain sent the vast territory of Louisiana back to France, who lost it to Spain after the British beat the French in the French and Indian War, in which the Redcoats and the Colonists beat the title characters, so of course Spain ended up with 1/3 of North America out of the deal.  However, since Spain ran these territories with all the skill of a Big Three Automaker exec, they were soon in debt up to their pesos, and wanted to unload land for cash.  Or at least more advantageous territory.  So they ended up giving up 828,000 sq miles of America PLUS   "...six ships of war in good condition built for seventy-four guns, armed and equipped and ready to receive French crews and supplies" , all for a vague promise of "Tuscany, or something from the Pope" so that the King's son-in-law would have somewhere to go after France gobbled up his Duchy of Parma.  Of course the problem was, France hadn't yet finished their latest butt-whupping of Austria in order to POSSESS Tuscany.  Which explains the "secret" part.

"Ah, don' get-a so mad at me.  I had to sell-a the damn thing for $18 bucks a sq mile.  I coulda got $35 for Tuscany, easy."

1908

The first Ford Model T hits the salesfloor.  It would become the 8th biggest selling car of all time, right between the Volkswagen Passat, and the Honda Accord.

" 'Passat'?  What the hell is a Passat?"

1946

Mensa, the club for the high of IQ, is founded.  Figuring a bunch of really smart people don't need a lot of rules, the founders didn't start with a whole lot of organization.  However, one of the founders soon figured out the problem with that:

However, (Roland) Berrill and (Dr Lancelot) Ware were both disappointed with the resulting society. Berrill had intended Mensa as "an aristocracy of the intellect", and was unhappy that a majority of Mensans came from humble homes, while Ware said: "I do get disappointed that so many members spend so much time solving puzzles."


Ironically, during my time at Arden Corp, the home of Mexican labor in Ft Wayne, I learned that Mensa was a slang term for a female of questionable intelligence.  So there is that...