May 30 Despite Voltaire's passion for clarity and reason, he frequently contradicted himself. Thus he would maintain in one place that man's nature was as unchangeable as that of animals and would express elsewhere his belief in progress and the gradual humanization of society through the action of the arts, sciences, and commerce. In politics he advocated reform but had a horror of the ignorance and potential fanaticism of people and the violence of revolution.In religion Voltaire felt that Christianity was a good thing for chambermaids and tailors to believe in, but for the use of the elite he advocated a simple deism. He opposed the atheism and materialism of Helvétius and Holbach. His line, “If God did not exist, he would have to be invented,” has become proverbial. His celebrated slogan, Écrasez l'infâme! [crush the infamous thing!], has been interpreted as addressed either against the church or against the ancien régime in general.Voltaire's influence in the popularization of the science and philosophy of his age was incalculably great. Perhaps his most lasting and original intellectual contribution was made in the field of history..."
1431 Death: French heroine Joan of Arc, at the age of 19, is burned at the stake at Rouen after being condemned as a heretic by an English-dominated church court.
1498 Christopher Columbus gets underway with six ships from Sanlucar in Spain on his third voyage of exploration to the Americas. On this voyage he will discover the South American mainland.
1527 Germany's Marburg University is founded.
1536 Henry VIII weds his third wife, Jane Seymour, 11 days after the execution of his second wife, Anne Boleyn.
1539 Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto lands in Florida.
1593 Death: Christopher Marlowe, English playwright who influenced Shakespeare, killed in a tavern brawl.
1672 Birth: Piotr Alekseevich Romanov, AKA Peter the Great, Russian czar.
1744 Death: Alexander Pope, writer. "...Pope's works were once considered part of the mental furniture of the well-educated person. One edition of the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations includes no less than 212 quotations from Pope. Some, familiar even to those who may not know their source, are "A little learning is a dang'rous thing" (from the Essay on Criticism); "To err is human, to forgive, divine" (ibid.); "For fools rush in where angels fear to tread" (ibid); and "The proper study of mankind is man" (Essay on Man). Pope's reputation declined precipitously in the 19th century, but has recovered substantially since then. Some poems, such as The Rape of the Lock, the moral essays, the imitations of Horace, and several epistles, are regarded as highly now as they have ever been, though others, such as the Essay on Man, have not endured very well, and the merits of two of the most important works, the Dunciad and the translation of the Iliad, are still disputed. The 19th century considered his diction artificial, his versification too regular, and his satires insufficiently humane. The third charge has been disputed by various 20th century critics including William Empson, and the first does not apply at all to his best work. That Pope was constrained by the demands of "acceptable" diction and prosody is undeniable, but Pope's example shows that great poetry could be written with these constraints..."
1778 Death: Voltaire, French philosopher, author; Candide. "...Voltaire returned to a hero's welcome in Paris at age 83 in time to see his last play, Irene, produced. The excitement of the trip was too much for him and he died in Paris on May 30, 1778. Stories about his death in a state of terror and despair are shown as false by some, but there is enough evidence that they are true. Because of his criticism of the church Voltaire was denied burial in church ground. He was finally buried at an abbey in Champagne. In 1791 his remains were moved to a resting place at The Panthéon in Paris.His final resting place, unfortunately, became a garbage heap. In 1814 an unknown group robbed his grave and disposed of him in a nearby garbage heap, no one the wiser (for more than 50 years) until his sarcophagus was inspected and discovered... empty. All that remains of this noble champion of the oppressed is his heart - at the Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale...In his philosophy, based on skepticism and rationalism, he was indebted to Locke as well as to Montaigne and Bayle.
1806 In Logan County, Kentucky, future president Andrew Jackson participates in a duel, killing Charles Dickinson, a lawyer regarded as one of the best pistol shots in the area. The proud and volatile Jackson, a former senator and representative of Tennessee, had called for the duel after his wife Rachel was slandered as a bigamist by Dickinson, who was referring to a legal error in the divorce from her first husband in 1791. Jackson met his foe at Harrison's Mills on Red River in Logan, and in accordance with dueling custom, the two stand 24 feet apart, with pistols pointed downward. After the signal, Dickinson fires first, grazing Jackson's breastbone and breaking some of his ribs. However, Jackson, a former Tennessee militia leader, maintains his stance and fires back, fatally wounding his opponent. It is one of several duels Jackson is said to have participated in during his lifetime, the majority of which were allegedly called in defense of his wife's honor. None of the other rumored duels are recorded, and whether he killed anyone else in this manner is not known. In 1829, Rachel will die, and Jackson will be elected the seventh president of the United States. (Bradley)
1821 James Boyd patents the rubber fire hose.
1842 John Francis makes an attempt on the life of Queen Victoria as she rides down Constitution Hill with Prince Albert.
1848 William Young patents the ice cream freezer, and names it the 'Johnson Patent Ice Cream Freezer.' The freezer is named after Nancy Johnson, who had designed the first hand-cranked ice cream freezer two years earlier but had never patented her invention.
1848 Italian War of Independence: The Piedmontese under Charles Albert defeat the Austrians under Radetsky at the battle of Goito.
1848 Under a treaty signed in February 1848 and ratified on this day by Mexico, the United States receives New Mexico and California as well as parts of Nevada, Utah, Arizona and Colorado in return for $15 million.
1854 The territories of Nebraska and Kansas are established.
1868 By proclamation of General John A. Logan (above) of the Grand Army of the Republic, the first major Memorial Day observance is held to honor those who died "in defense of their country during the late rebellion." Known to some as "Decoration Day," mourners honor the Civil War dead by decorating their graves with flowers. On this first Decoration Day, General James Garfield makes a speech at Arlington National Cemetery, after which 5,000 participants help to decorate the graves of the more than 20,000 Union and Confederate soldiers buried in the cemetery. This 1868 celebration is inspired by local observances that had taken place in various locations in the three years since the end of the Civil War. In fact, several cities claim to be the birthplace of Memorial Day, including Columbus, Mississippi; Macon, Georgia; Richmond, Virginia; Boalsburg, Pennsylvania; and Carbondale, Illinois. In 1966, the federal government, under the direction of President Lyndon B. Johnson, will declare Waterloo, New York, the official birthplace of Memorial Day. They will chose Waterloo, which had first celebrated the day on 5 May 1866, because the town had made Memorial Day an annual, community-wide event, during which businesses closed and residents decorated the graves of soldiers with flowers and flags. By the late 19th century, many communities across the country will begin to celebrate Memorial Day, and after WW1, observers will begin to honor the dead of all of America's wars. In 1971, Congress will declare Memorial Day a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Monday in May. Today, Memorial Day is celebrated at Arlington National Cemetery with a ceremony in which a small American flag is placed on each grave. It is customary for the president or vice president to give a speech honoring the contributions of the dead and to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. More than 5,000 people attend the ceremony annually. Several Southern states continue to set aside a special day for honoring the Confederate dead, which is usually called Confederate Memorial Day. (Bradley)
1883 12 New Yorkers are trampled to death in a stampede triggered by a rumor that the recently opened Brooklyn Bridge is in imminent danger of collapsing.
1896 The first car accident occurs as a Duryea Motor Wagon, driven by Henry Wells from Springfield, Massachusetts collides with a bicycle ridden by Evylyn Thomas of New York City.
1901 The Hall of Fame for Great Americans, at New York University, is dedicated and opened to the public.
1901 Birth: Cornelia Otis Skinner, author.
1908 Birth: Mel Blanc, cartoon voice Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, Porky Pig and many other cartoon characters.
1910 Volkishness: Philipp Stauff writes a letter to Heinrich Kraeger in which he mentions the idea of an anti-Semitic lodge with the names of members kept secret to prevent enemy penetration. Stauff is convinced that the powerful influence of Jews in German life can be understood only as a result of a widespread Jewish secret conspiracy, and such a conspiracy can best be combated by a similar anti-Semitic organization. (Bundesarchiv, Koblenz)
1913 Fearing a spread of hostilities in the Balkans, the major powers intervene to terminate the war with the Treaty of London, a preliminary peace treaty, under which Turkey agrees to surrender its Balkan territories and create the state of Albania. Peace in the Balkans lasts less than a month.
1915 WW1: White House advisor Colonel Edward Mandel House (above, left of Wilson) confides in his diary, " I have concluded that war with Germany is inevitable..." adding that he will persuade President Wilson to act.
1916 WW1: The German High Seas Fleet under Admiral Reinhard Scheer puts to sea, led by Hipper's scouting fleet--40 fast ships with a nucleus of five battle cruisers. Following well behind is the main fleet of 59 ships.
1916 WW1: Alerted by German radio chatter, the British Grand Fleet under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe heads toward the Skagerrak. Leading is Beatty's scouting force of 52 ships, including 6 battle cruisers and 4 new super-dreadnoughts. Following behind is Jellicoe's main fleet of 99 vessels. Overall, the British have 37 capital ships: 28 dreadnoughts and 9 battle cruisers; the Germans 27: 16 dreadnoughts, 6 older battleships, and 5 battle cruisers.
1918 WW1: Ludendorff's forces reach the Marne.
1918 WW1: The American Third Division holds the bridges at Chateau-Thierry, 44 miles from Paris, then counter attacks with the assistance of the rallying French troops, driving the Germans back across the Marne. The American Second Division checks the German attacks west of Chateau-Thierry.
1919 Volkishness: Dietrich Eckart gives a lecture to the Thule Society at the Four Seasons Hotel. The Thule rooms are a haven for many vlkish activists from November 1918 to May 1919. Thule guests include Gottfried Feder, Alfred Rosenberg, and Rudolf Hess, all to achieve prominence in the Nazi Party. (Hering, typescript 21 June 1939, Bundesarchiv, Koblenz. A list of Thule members is included in Sebottendorff, BHK)
1919 Colonel Edward Mandel House, President Wilson's chief advisor, meets in Paris with a group of American and British industrialists to discuss the founding of an institute for International affairs.
1920 Joan of Arc is canonized.
1922 The Lincoln Memorial is dedicated in Washington DC by Chief Justice William Howard Taft.
1929 The Labour Party wins the British general elections, with Ramsey MacDonald becoming Prime Minister.
1932 Weimar: President Hindenburg ousts Heinrich Bruning and appoints Franz von Papen as Chancellor. Papen, only hours before, had promised Monsignor Kaas that he would not undertake the formation of a new government. The Center Party quickly censures Papen.
1933 The Council of the League of Nations censures Germany for its anti-Jewish actions in Upper Silesia.
1937 Spanish Civil War: Anti-Franco Spanish forces bomb the German battleship Deutschland off Ibizia, killing 26 and injuring 71.
1937 10 people are killed and 90 are wounded, when police fire on steelworkers demonstrating near the Republic Steel Corporation plant in Chicago.
1938 The Japanese government arrests 1,300 alleged Communists.
1938 Hitler signs a revised OKW plan for Operation Green (Fall Gruen) against Czechoslovakia. "...It is my unalterable decision to smash Czechoslovakia by military action in the near future. It is the business of the political leadership to await or bring about the suitable moment from a political and military point of view. An unavoidable development of events within Czecho-slovakia, or other political events in Europe providing a suddenly favourable opportunity which may never recur, may cause me to take early action. The proper choice and determined exploitation of a favourable moment is the surest guarantee of success. To this end preparations are to be made immediately...The following are necessary prerequisites for the intended attack: a) A convenient apparent excuse and, with it, b) Adequate political justification, c) Action not expected by the enemy which will find him in the least possible state of readiness. Most favourable from a military as well as a political point of view would be lightning action as a result of an incident which would subject Germany to unbearable provocation, and which, in the eyes of at least a part of world opinion, affords the moral justification for military measures. Moreover, any period of diplomatic tension prior to war must be terminated by sudden action on our part, unexpected in both timing and extent, before the enemy is so far advanced in his state of military preparedness that he cannot be overtaken...Propaganda warfare must on the one hand intimidate the Czechs by means of threats and wear down their power of resistance; and on the other hand it must give the national racial groups indications as to how to support our military operations and influence the neutrals in our favour. Further instructions and determination of the appropriate moment are reserved to me..."
1938 Holocaust: The Gestapo arrests almost 2,000 Jews in raids on cafes in Berlin and Vienna. Some 1,000 Austrian Jews are sent to Dachau.
1940 WW2: German panzer forces begin to withdraw from the line at Dunkirk and move to take up positions further to the south. During the next three days, 185,000 men (more than half of the total number evacuated from Dunkirk) will escape.
1941 WW2: Rudolf Hess' British captors assign Estonian-born psychiatrist Dr. Henry Victor Dicks to pose as Hess' physician. Dicks, a Jew who wrote that he despised Hess on sight, reports directly to British intelligence. (Missing Years)
1942 WW2: May 30-31 The first 1,000-bomber raid by the RAF is made on Cologne. Much of the city is destroyed, and 45,000 civilians are made homeless.
1943 WW2: The Aleutian islands of Kiska and Attu, off the coast of Alaska, are retaken from Japanese forces by the US Army.
1943 Holocaust: SS Dr. Josef Mengele reports for duty at Auschwitz. Mengele has been persuaded to ask for this position by Professor Otmar von Verschuer, one of Europe's most eminent geneticists and a pioneer in hereditary biology at the Frankfurt University Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Purity. Verschuer's institute agreed to fund Mengele's experiments if Mengele in return would send his results and specimens to the institute "for further study." (Mengele) Note: Mengele was a former assistant to Professor von Verschuer and a visiting scientist in Verschuer's Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology in Berlin-Dahlem. Mengele's first act at Auschwitz is to send those Gypsies who are suspected of suffering from typhoid to the gas chambers. (Science)
1946 British Labour Minister of Food John Strachey, announces that bread will be rationed with the greatest allowance going to workers in heavy industry.
1946 Nuremberg War Crimes Trials: Ernst Sauckel continues his testimony. "...Not on the principle of a master race. I should like to be permitted to give an explanation of this. I personally have never approved of the statements made by some of the National Socialist speakers about a superior race and a master race. I have never advocated that. As a young man I traveled about the world. I traveled in Australia and in America, and I met families who belong to the happiest memories of my life. But I loved my own people and sought, I admit, equality of rights for them; and I have always stood for that. I have never believed in the superiority of one particular race..."
1958 Unidentified soldiers killed in WW2 and the Korean conflict are buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
1959 The first hovercraft flight, a full-sized experimental hovercraft, built by Saunders-Roe, takes place at Cowes, Isle of Wight.
1960 Death: Nobel Prize winning author Boris Pasternak, at 70.
1961 Death: General Rafael Trujillo, dictator of the Dominican Republic, cut down by machine gun fire on his way to his farm.
1969 Gibraltar attains autonomy.
1971 The American space probe Mariner 9 is launched in the direction of Mars. It will become the first craft to orbit another planet, returning many images of Mars. The images will reveal what appear to be ancient dry riverbeds on the surface, suggesting the presence of water on Mars at some point in the past. Mariner 9 will photograph the entire surface of Mars.
1972 Three Japanese terrorists kill 24 people, and wound 72, with automatic weapons at the airport in Tel Aviv, Israel.
1982 Spain becomes the 16th member nation of NATO.
1990 Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev arrives in Washington for his summit with President George H.W. Bush.
1992 The United Nations Security Council votes to impose sanctions against Serb-led Yugoslavia in a bid to halt the fighting in Bosnia.
1993 Ross Perot runs a 30-minute commercial on television denouncing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which President Clinton supports.
1995 In a letter to UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic demands guarantees of no further NATO air attacks and de facto recognition of a self-styled Serb state.
1995 The United States announces that it has moved seven ships and 12,000 marines and sailors to the Adriatic Sea in response to the Serbian hostage-taking of UN peacekeepers.
1997 The National Transportation Safety Administration announces that it is setting up a privately funded airline disaster response center in New York City to coordinate the release of information to the victims' relatives and the public following an air crash.
1998 Pakistan conducts another underground nuclear test, despite condemnation from many leading countries and the imposition of US economic sanctions.
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2002 US Attorney General John Ashcroft announces that the FBI will have expanded powers to monitor religious, political and other organizations as well as Internet and other media as a guard against possible future terrorist attacks.
2002 The massive cleanup of the ruins of New York's World Trade Center, destroyed in the 11 September 2001 terrorist attack, is completed.
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