By
now, I'm sure that you've noticed that this blog is looking slightly different.
I've
changed the font of the main body - which I believe looks fantastic, and I've
also changed the font of the titles...which is exactly the same font that I
used for this blog when I debuted it five years ago.
This
is not merely a coincidence...it is planned.
I
won't have much time to do much more than that for now, but I just wanted to
drop a line and state that for the fifth anniversary of this blog in May 2016,
I'm going to be planning a month long celebration in which we're going to party
like it's 2011!
Seriously. With the exception of the Tuesday Timeline
posts and the Jem Reviewed series, every single post that I will make this
month (and yes, I'll be making one post each day in the month of May) will have
something to do with the year 2011 - the year this party began!
So,
download Angry Birds onto your iPhone 4S, challenge your pals to a game of
Words With Friends, and post your planking videos onto YouTube because this
coming month, everything five years old becomes new once more!
You're
seeing a taste of what to expect...on May 1, I reveal the blog's new look...or,
should I say...OLD look?
It's
time for the final Tuesday Timeline in April, and I have to say
that coming up in the next week, I'll be starting a celebration for the fifth
anniversary of this blog. I can't
reveal too much about what I will be doing right now, but it will legitimately
be a throwback to the past - right down to the look of this blog itself! Stay tuned for more. I'll make the changes the end of April.
For
now, it's the 26th of April, and we've got quite a bit to talk about. But as always we'll talk about the historical
events of the day that didn't quite warrant a full discussion.
1564 - William Shakespeare is baptized in
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England
1721 - Tabriz, Iran is completely destroyed by an
earthquake
1777 - Sixteen-year-old Sibyl Ludington rides 40 miles
to warn American colonial forces of the approach of the British
1803 - Thousands of meteor shards fall from the skies
over France, convincing European scientists that meteors exist
1865 - John Wilkes Booth is shot and killed by Union cavalry
troopers
1923 - The Duke of York and Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon
get married at Westminister Abbey
1933 - The Gestapo is established in Nazi Germany
1943 - The Easter Riots commence in Uppsala, Sweden
1954 - The Geneva Conference begins
1962 - NASA's Ranger 4 crashes into the face of the Moon
1965 - Rioting causes a Rolling Stones concert in
Toronto to be shut down after just fifteen minutes!
1981 - Dr. Michael R. Harrison becomes the first doctor
to perform a human open fetal surgery in the world
1989 - Comedy legend Lucille Ball dies at the age of 77
1994 - China Airlines Flight 140 crashes at a Japanese
airport - only seven passengers survive
1999 - British journalist Jill Dando is gunned down
outside of her home in London - Dando was just thirty-seven at the time of her
death
2013 - Country legend George Jones passes away at the
age of 81
2015 - Actress Jayne Meadows dies at the age of 95
And
birthday wishes go out to the following famous faces - I.M. Pei, Mac Martin, Carol Burnett, Duane Eddy, Giorgio Moroder, Claudine Clark, Bobby Rydell, Gary Wright, Nancy Lenahan, Koo Stark, Giancarlo Esposito, John Corabi, Roger Taylor, Joan Chen, Michael Damian, Debra Wilson, Jet Li, Susannah Harker, Kevin James, Marianne
Jean-Baptiste, Curtis Jones, Kate Hardie, Melania Trump, Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, Jay DeMarcus, Geoff Blum, Ivana Milicevic, Tom Welling, Avant, Stana Katic, Jason Earles, Tyler Labine, Jordana Brewster, Channing Tatum, Marnette Patterson, Jon Lee, and Jessica Lynch.
Certainly
a long list of celebrity birthdays, huh?
Okay,
so I've kept you waiting long enough.
Let's take this Tuesday Timeline back in time to the year that Peter
Gabriel released "Sledgehammer", Sigourney Weaver battled aliens once
more, and a quartet of "Designing Women" spread their Southern charm
to CBS viewers.
We're
going back thirty years to April 26, 1986. And for several people in the vicinity of the Soviet Union at
that time, it is a date that they will never forget as long as they live.
You
see, on this date was an event that was so shocking and so devastating that it
killed hundreds of people, displaced thousands more, rendered an entire portion
of the world uninhabitable, and put fear into the hearts of many people who
questioned the safety of using nuclear power.
Can
you believe that it has been thirty years since the Chernobyl Disaster? I can hardly believe it myself. I mean, I was just a few weeks shy of my
fifth birthday, so I wasn't able to process just how devastating this was. The only clue as to how it might have gone
down may have been similar to a music video released by the band Ultravox in
1984.
Okay,
so the Chernobyl reactor didn't completely melt down.But something happened within the walls of the power plant,
located within the city of Pripyat which at the time was part of the Soviet
Union - it is now considered a part of the Ukraine since the Soviet Union
folded in 1991.
The
events of Saturday, April 26, 1986 began quite normally. A systems test had been scheduled for that
morning just after one o'clock at the power plant's #4 reactor and it was
slated to be just like all of the others that had been performed since the
power plant became operational in 1977.
There was one incident that occurred in September 1982 when a partial
core meltdown occurred in Reactor #1, but the reactor was fixed and fully
operational by 1983. However, only
those who worked at the plant that day knew what had happened, as the 1982
incident was never made public until years later. I can only imagine that had more people known, perhaps the
incident in April 1986 might never have happened.
When
the test was set to begin, everything in Reactor #4 was business as usual - at
least, that is until something unexpected happened. Too much electrical power was being used and that energy caused a
massive power surge. Recognizing the
dangers of a power surge, engineers at the power plant tried everything they
could to reduce the amount of power that was being used, even triggering an
emergency shutdown of the whole reactor.
Unfortunately, that shutdown made the problem much worse, and the power
surge intensified.
The
resulting power surges caused a series of steam explosions, and ruptured the
reactor vessel which caused the reactor to ignite into flames. The fire shot out clouds of smoke that were
filled with highly toxic radioactive particles, and the clouds covered much of
the Soviet Union area, with some clouds drifting over as far as Scandinavia!
The
hardest hit areas of the disaster were Russia, the Ukraine, and especially
Belarus - where it is estimated that 60% of the nuclear fallout landed there.
At
least thirty-one people died instantly at the Chernobyl plant. It's unclear as to what the official death
toll is from the incident, as that number continues to climb, but the facts are
quite sobering.
Between
1986 and 2001, it was estimated that close to 350,000 people in the Chernobyl
area were forced to relocate to areas that were not highly contaminated from
the radiation. Further statistics
indicate that since 1986, the rate of cancer has increased among citizens of
Europe with the 2006 TORCH report stating that a prediction of up to 60,000
people will lose their lives prematurely as a direct result of the Chernobyl
disaster.
Now
certainly the world has done its best to try and help those who were the most
affected by the disaster. I know that
since the late 1980s, my town has hosted a "Children of Chernobyl"
exchange program where kids from the Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia were hosted
by a local family so that they could have the chance to experience life that
was free of radiation. I have no idea
if the program is still a go, but I can tell you that so many children had
positive experiences during the years the program went on.
And
interestingly enough, even though the land around the reactor is uninhabitable
by humans, there have been some instances in which tourists have been allowed
to visit the area - provided that they don't come too close to certain areas
that are still covered in radiation.
And over the last thirty years, while the human population has decreased
in that area, the animal population has increased and seems to be thriving.
But
don't take that news lightly. The 1986
Chernobyl Disaster made the land unsafe for humans to stay for a significant
period of time. It's said that the
radiation won't dissipate until at least fifty years from the time of the
accident. And in some areas, it may
never fully disappear. It's certainly a
monument to the worst case scenario for sure.
Perhaps
no place best describes that feeling than the once prosperous city of
Pripyat. Once home to fifty thousand
people, the population is now zero. The
city left abandoned for thirty years.
In some ways, it serves as a time capsule to what life was like back in
the Soviet Union in the mid-1980s, as children's toys, books, medical
equipment, and Soviet propaganda still decorates the walls of the now decaying
schools, hospitals, businesses, and residences within. A ferris wheel sits rusting having never
been used - the Pripyat Amusement Park was set to open in May 1986 - but as we
all know, that grand opening never came, as every citizen of Pripyat had to
evacuate the city by the 27th of April.
I can only imagine the frustration, fear, and
horror the people of Pripyat had to face that day.
Previously on Jem Reviewed, we saw Ashley attempt to be just like the Misfits, but when
Jem was about to be framed for a crime she did not commit, Ashley - with help
from Stormer - had a change of heart, pissing off Pizzazz and Roxy in the
process. Oh, and Synergy might be
dead.
This
is the end of a very long five part episode.
It's time for Episode 5 - The Battle of the Bands!
But,
wait. If Jem only exists because of
Synergy...and Synergy exploded...then how can Jem compete in the Battle of the
Bands? That Malone guy smashed Synergy
up with a chair! By all accounts, this
episode and the series should be over!
But somehow, Synergy issues a warning to Jerrica through the JemStar
earrings and Aja does a really wicked U-turn to try and get to Synergy - even
though she's already exploded.
Oh,
look! How nice of Blanche, Rose,
Sophia, and Dorothy to make a cameo appearance from "The Golden
Girls"! I love it when stars
support each other's shows! But why is
Betty White wearing JemStar earrings?
Oh,
wait! That's just Jerrica, Kimber,
Shana, and Aja using a hologram to keep Malone from spotting them. But, wait...if Synergy has been destroyed,
how can Jem's earrings continue to work?
I'd think they'd be deader than a Tamagotchi owned by a careless thirteen
year old girl!
Whatever
the case, Malone is not finished with the investigation yet. He goes to the Bureau of Records, and
demands to know who the owner of the Starlight Drive-In is so he can report
back to Eric his findings. Uh-oh...that
reminds me. He took a picture of
Synergy before he destroyed her. That
can't be good for anybody!
And
as Malone shows Eric the photo of Synergy before Malone smashed her up, Eric is
intrigued it...especially when he hears that Emmett Benton - Jerrica and
Kimber's father - is listed as the owner of the movie theatre. Although Synergy is now circuit boards,
wires, and broken glass (cue the Limp Lizards record), they must investigate it
to figure out how Emmett managed to build such a thing and what it is used for.
At
the same time, Jerrica and the others run through the holographic wall at the
movie theatre and are shocked to see Synergy in pieces. I could swear that Kimber probably thought
it was anything but outrageous. But
before they have time to mourn, Synergy announces that she projected a hologram
and that she is still safe and sound, restoring herself back to normal!
Uh...WHAT? Okay, so if the Synergy that Malone
destroyed was a hologram, shouldn't the chair that Malone swung have GONE
THROUGH IT WITHOUT DESTROYING ANYTHING?
And if Malone took a picture of the hologram of Synergy, would
it...oh...I don't know...NOT SHOW UP IN A PHOTOGRAPH? At least, they didn't back in 1985 anyway...
...this
show makes my brain hurt. But with Eric
fast approaching, the Drive-In Theatre is now a dangerous place. The girls decide to take Synergy and stash
her somewhere else where nobody else will find her. Great plan, except that Synergy is not an iPad. She's a computer that probably weighs 7,000
pounds. I'd like to see how they even
plan on getting her out of there with just the four of them.
Oh,
wait. I forgot. It's a cartoon. When cartoon characters are threatened, they have superhuman
strength.
The
girls load Synergy up in a truck as Eric and Zipper arrive at the drive-in with
Malone. How embarrassing for Malone
when he takes Eric and Zipper inside and there's no broken computer. Foiled again, it seems.
The
girls decide to rebuild Synergy in one of the many rooms inside the new
Starlight Mansion - which is to be honest a really stupid idea given that the
house technically isn't theirs thanks to Howard Sands lacking any cojones
whatsoever. And then the girls realize
that they know nothing about computers, and don't even know if they put
together Synergy correctly. But Aja
seems to be in charge of the rebuilding and she seems to be the Hologram that
has the most common sense, so how bad could it be?
Oh,
look! Synergy lives! And now it's time for another happy song
from Jem and the Holograms!
You
know, Synergy may have the power, power, she may have the power...but this song
is more of a brownout. Not the greatest
song at all, although it is marginally better than "Deception".
Back
at the Misfits hideout, Ashley decides that after Pizzazz and Roxy tried to
throw Jem in jail, she doesn't want to be a Misfit anymore, and she goes to
return the thirty dollars that Pizzazz and Roxy extorted from Stormer. Naturally, the Misfits grab the money and
Pizzazz and Roxy insult Ashley some more.
But what Ashley doesn't realize is that she may have walked into a trap.
You
see, Eric just happens to also be in the room at the time, and he orders the
Misfits to grab Ashley and lock her up somewhere. His plan is that if he kidnaps one of the Starlight Girls and
holds her for ransom, then Jem and the Holograms will be forced to drop out of
the Battle of the Bands, making the Misfits win by default. Or at the very least, he'll send them on a
wild goose chase so they miss the concert.
That is really low - but surprisingly I've heard that Eric can go even
lower than this.
In
fact, in a split screen conversation between Eric and Jerrica, he threatens
exactly that! And, naturally Jerrica is
determined to rescue her...mainly because if she doesn't, child protective
services will throw her ass in jail.
But they never really mention that.
Of
course, if you think Ashley is going to sit and be a hostage like a good little
girl, you'd be mistaken. Ashley does
her best to hide from Pizzazz and Roxy, and almost succeeds in getting away,
but in the end, she can't escape from either of them and they lock her in a
box.
Stormer,
by this point, is quite upset, and when Pizzazz and Roxy temporarily leave,
it's Stormer who tries to comfort Ashley.
For a moment, I almost think Stormer will release her.
But
before Stormer can even have the chance to do anything, Pizzazz and Roxy come
back and shame Stormer for going soft.
It's a heartbreaking moment as Stormer gives into peer pressure and
leaves Ashley behind in the trunk. I
wonder if as the show progresses, we'll understand more clearly why Stormer
went with Pizzazz and Roxy. I certainly
hope so, because you could tell that Stormer's loyalties were very conflicted.
Now,
as for where the trunk is going? I'm
assuming that it'll go to the concert venue where the Battle of the Bands is
being held. It most certainly won't be
at the Starlight Drive-In, where Jem and the others are going to be.
But
let's hold off on Jem and the others.
It's time for the Misfits to perform at the Battle of the Bands.
I
have to admit, I've been a general fan of the Misfits music moreso than Jem,
but I'm not feeling the song "Takin' It All". In fact, as of right now, I'd say this
episode has the weakest songs so far. I
definitely don't think the Misfits would win with this song, but since Jem
hasn't shown up yet, they may win by default.
Of course, Rio demands to Howard Sands that they wait for Jem to show
up, but Mr. Stickler for Rules Sands states that if Jem doesn't show up, he'll
have no choice but to award the prizes to the Misfits.
It's
too bad that Jem and the others are at Starlight Drive-In instead of the Battle
of the Bands because once they've arrived they're immediately ambushed by Eric,
Zipper, and a couple of other goons who were responsible for the robbery in Las
Vegas last episode. If this doesn't say
"We fooled you", I don't know what else they'd have to do.
Of
course, Jem tries a valiant attempt to escape by suckerpunching Eric (right
on!) and she attempts to flee before getting caught by one of Eric's goons on a
motorcycle. The only thing that Jem can
do is take off one of her earrings and throw it on the ground, leaving a
frantic Synergy wondering where Jerrica is.
Wait a minute...I thought robot computers couldn't share emotions. Oh, wait.
It's a cartoon. Never mind.
Back
at the Battle of the Bands, Rio is getting even more concerned by Jem's
lateness, and he correctly suspects that Eric is involved. And Eric strolls into the venue after making
sure that Zipper and his goons are babysitting the Holograms, where Rio grabs
him and threatens to kill him if he doesn't reveal where Jem is. Howard Sands and Danielle DuVoisin break up
the fight, but soon all four of them hear a strange noise.
It's
the trunk where Ashley is being kept hostage in! And it's about to be sent into a machine that likes to eat wooden
boxes for snack! Fortunately, Rio
manages to rescue Ashley after someone calls out a warning that she's trapped
in there. We don't see who alerted Rio,
but it sounded an awful lot like Stormer.
So, as far as I'm concerned, Stormer has redeemed herself. A bit.
But
you know who HASN'T redeemed themselves in my eyes? Howard Sands. Despite the
fact that Eric more or less had Ashley kidnapped and almost murdered, and
despite the fact that Stormer more or less gave away the whole crooked plan,
Howard Sands refuses to change the contest rules even though the Misfits have
broken every single one.
Guys...say
it with me...
GROW SOME BALLS, HOWARD
SANDS!!!
You
know what? Ashley's safe, and Rio
decides to leave the Countess and the Dopey Mr. Sands to rescue Jem and the
others from Zipper and his goons. But
if Rio is thinking that Jem is a fragile little flower, he's sorely mistaken.
You
see, Jem tossing her earring outside was actually a very intelligent
thing. Because now she can project
holograms from outside and inside the movie theatre. And she uses this gift to really mess with the minds of Zipper
and his cronies by summoning a pack of wild lions to try and scare the creeps
away.
She
also manages to create several different exits to make Zipper and his pals
crash into walls over and over again providing them with even more brain damage
than they had before.
But
as the girls really do try to make their escape, Zipper manages to grab a hold
of Kimber, and pulls her back. And
since Jem and the others decided that Kimber was an important part of the band
two episodes ago after she had a meltdown, they can't very well abandon her
now. So Jem's next plan is to create a
hologram of Eric Raymond, ordering Zipper to let Kimber go.
And
when that doesn't work, she summons Eric again and again until there's enough
Eric Raymonds to fill a haunted house.
That's a scary thought. And
speaking of scary thoughts...
Wanna
know how Eric Raymond got his name? In
this edition of "Jem" Trivia, I'll tell you. Turns out that Christy Marx - the showrunner
of "Jem" named the character after her brother! Kind of makes you wonder if Eric Raymond
Marx (or whatever his last name is) was as much a jerk as this one!
Anyway,
the multiple Erics cause Zipper to lose his mind. He shoves Kimber to the side to escape, and runs outside with the
goons to see a bunch of police cars pulling up. Naturally after all of the weirdness that they just experienced,
they expect this to be a mirage too.
It's only when Zipper gets handcuffed that he realizes - I'm goin' to
jail! I wonder if we'll see him
again...
Rio
arrives after all of the commotion has happened, and for a moment there I
almost think he's pissed off that he didn't get to play the role of hero
because Jem and the others based on his tone of voice. But that's Rio for you. It's time for Jem and the Holograms to get to
the Battle of the Bands...but to waste even more time, Jem - despite the fact that
she is clearly wearing both earrings in the above screenshot - retrieves her
lost earring that really isn't lost.
I
hate this episode. I sure hope Jem's
last song is worth all of this.
Apparently it's a song called "Music is Magic". But given the track record of the songs so
far, I'm...
...OH. MY.
GOD. This song is AWESOME! I particularly want to make note of that
high note that Britta Phillips sings at the very end. It is phenomenal.
Seriously, I think this is one case where they saved the best song for
last, and I think it'll be hard to top "Music is Magic" as the best
Jem song.
Of
course, I still have 60 more episodes to review. My opinion could change.
To
nobody's surprise, Howard Sands officially declares Jem the winners of the
contest - and even the fireworks display seems to spell out the Jem logo! OUTRAGEOUS!!!
So Starlight Mansion officially becomes Starlight Mansion, meaning that Ashley
and the rest of the girls will always have a place to live. They also get a movie contract. And with Eric presumably going to jail,
Jerrica wins back full control of Starlight Music! Seriously, this has been the greatest day of the Holograms'
lives.
Not
so much for the Misfits though. In
fact, Pizzazz now makes it her mission to take down Jem and the Holograms every
chance she gets. The rivalry between
Jem and Pizzazz is on, bitches!
Of
course, there's one last bit of housecleaning, and Rio accompanies Jerrica to
Starlight Music to take over Eric's old office. Because with Eric being charged with kidnapping, attempted
murder, and...
...WHAT
THE HELL IS HE DOING THERE?
Jerrica
is stunned that he is even there in the first place, but Eric explains his
lawyers worked miracles and that he's there to collect his personal possessions
- including the snapshots of Synergy that by all accounts probably shouldn't
even exist, but it's a cartoon.
Eric
then bids Jerrica farewell with a bitchslap across her face! Seriously.
This really does happen! How
dare he? You want to add assault to
your charges? I dare him to do that to
Pizzazz! But do you really think that
Rio will let Eric do that to his woman?
I'm
guessing this delightful screenshot will tell us no. It took me several times to get this shot too. Well worth it.
So
after Eric regains consciousness and leaves Starlight Music, Jerrica wonders if
her father would be proud of her. Rio
admits that he's already proud of her, and they kiss as a refrain of
"Music is Magic" closes off the show.
Coming
up next week, six months have passed, and the girls are ready to shoot their
movie. What could possibly go wrong?
For as long as I can remember -
in fact, I would reckon the first fourteen years of my existence on this planet
- my ears would be filled with the sounds of Prince.
I'm not going to lie. Prince was a huge part of my formative
years, and I have to admit that most of his music catalogue still holds up
years later. I can't believe it's been
thirty-four years since he released "Little Red Corvette"!
I have to say that I don't really
know what the first Prince song that I remember hearing was. For some reason, I want to say that it was
"Raspberry Beret". It
certainly makes sense. I was four years
old when that song came out, and my mother loved (and still loves) that song. I do admit that it's a fantastic piece of
pop music, but there are other songs that I remember liking just a little bit
more.
"Little Red Corvette"
was a classic tune. "1999"
certainly made you look towards the future - even though my own experiences of
the year 1999 were kind of meh. And,
the colour purple was forever synonymous with Prince, as one of the biggest
hits of his whole career was "Purple Rain".
I guess that's why I decided to
do this blog post entirely in purple today - as a little bit of a tribute to a
man many loved, but few really understood.
It still shocks me to type out
the words - that Prince Rogers Nelson has died at the age of 57. It's just the latest in a long line of music
legends who have passed away in 2016.
It certainly has not been a kind year for music, that's for sure.
But Prince's death shocked
me. The last time I was shocked by a
musician's death was David Bowie back in January. And the reason why it shocked me was because none of us knew that
he was even sick...and really, that's the way he wanted it.
Perhaps the same thing happened
with Prince. As of this writing, we've
no idea what happened, and at this point, it's hard to say if we will ever find
out.
It's just so hard to think that a
man who had so much influence in the music industry is now gone.
Certainly anybody who ever worked
with Prince knew just what kind of a man he was. He was a longtime collaborator with Sheena Easton, and they even
recorded a duet together in 1987 called "U Got The Look". By the way, do check that song out. It's quite fantastic. And if it's unreleased songs that you're
into with Prince duets, check out the collaboration he did with Madonna called
"Love Song". It appears on
her 1989 album "Like a Prayer", and it's also quite good.
Oh, and remember doing the "Batdance" right around that same time? Yep, Prince was responsible!
The one thing I liked about
Prince was that he was never afraid of controversy. Certainly his flamboyant sense of style had tongues wagging, but
really, was it any different from any of the other artists that were huge in
the 1980s?
And yes, there was that brief
moment in time where he changed his name into that funky looking symbol that
nobody ever really knew how to pronounce.
But I have to say, the fact that he had a custom made guitar in the
shape of said symbol - that was the pinnacle of coolness. And besides, it was during this time that he
released two of my all time favourite Prince songs - "7" and
"The Most Beautiful Girl In The World".
Now, by the time I entered high
school, Prince was seldom heard on the radio - well, unless you listened to
Backtrax USA or some retro 1980s station.
And I always found that really sad, as Prince recorded dozens of albums
during the 1990s and 2000s, and they were more than deserving of getting
airplay. But I think that with the
legacy he left behind, I don't think he'll ever be forgotten.
Rest in peace, Prince. I certainly hope there's lots of diamonds
and pearls where you are now...
This
edition of the Tuesday Timeline is not the most pleasant
memory out there. In fact, the subject
is quite a devastating one. But, it is
an event that anybody over the age of 30 would remember, and although it may
not be a happy moment of our past, it did shape how we feel about civil and
national security.
Before
we get to that event, we should take a look at what else happened on this date
in history.
1770 - On the same day that Marie Antoinette marries
Louis XVI in a proxy wedding, Captain James Cook sights the eastern coast of
the continent that would come to be known as Australia
1775 - The American Revolutionary War begins with the
Americans winning the battles of Lexington and Concord
1782 - John Adams secures the Dutch Republic's
recognition of the United States as an independent government
1839 - The Treaty of London establishes Belgium as a
kingdom, guaranteeing the nation's neutrality
1865 - The funeral services for Abraham Lincoln take
place
1882 - Charles Darwin passes away at the age of 73
1892 - Charles Duryea claims to have been the first
person in the world to drive an automobile
1903 - Prohibition agent Eliot Ness (d. 1957) is born in
Chicago, Illinois
1919 - The first successful voluntary free-fall
parachute jump is made by Leslie Irvin
1927 - Following her appearance in a play called
"Sex", actress Mae West is sentenced to ten days in jail on charges
of obscenity
1928 - The final fascicle of The Oxford English
Dictionary is published
1930 - Actor Dick Sargent (d. 1994) is born in
Carmel-by-the-Sea, California
1933 - Actress/model Jayne Mansfield (d. 1967) is born
in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania
1935 - Actor Dudley Moore (d. 2002) is born in
Hammersmith, London, England
1943 - Dr. Albert Hofmann deliberately takes LSD for the
first time as part of an experiment
1956 - Grace Kelly marries Prince Rainier of Monaco
1971 - Vietnam Veterans Against The War begin
"Operation Dewey Canyon III" on the same day Charles Manson is
sentenced to death for the Tate-LaBianca murders of 1969
1987 - The Simpsons make their television debut as one of
the sketches featured in "The Tracey Ullman Show"
1989 - 47 sailors lose their lives following the
explosion of a gun turret aboard the USS Iowa
1993 - The FBI siege of David Koresh's Branch Division
outside Waco, Texas comes to a tragic end as 81 people, including Koresh, die
in a fire
1997 - Grand Forks, North Dakota is devastated by the
Red River flood
2011 - Fidel Castro resigns from the Central Committee
of the Communist Party of Cuba after holding the title for four and a half
decades
2015 - Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnev
is gunned down by police in a shootout; his brother Dzhokhar is apprehended
shortly after
And
for celebrity birthdays, we have the following famous people turning another
year older; Hugh O'Brian, Larry Peerce, Dickie Bird, Elinor Donahue, Stanley Fish, Alan Price, Tim Curry, Mark Volman, Stuart McLean, Tony Plana, Ruby Wax, Tony Martin, Steve Antin, Stevie B., Robert Tyler, Suge Knight, Ashley Judd, Jesse James, Jennifer Taylor, Michael Bacall, James Franco, Kate Hudson, Alexis Thorpe, Hayden Christensen, Kasie Head, Ignacio Serricchio, Kristen O'Connor, and Sebastian de Souza.
Now
it's time to revisit a date in history that will forever be imprinted on 20th
Century history books forever.
April 19, 1995.
You
know, when it comes to the 1990s, I have to say that 1995 wasn't one of my
favourites. Sure, when it came to pop
culture events such as movies, music, and television, it was actually not a bad
year. But when it came to personal
events, it was a rough one. It was the
year both my mom and sister were hospitalized, which lead to my 14th birthday
being one of my least favourite birthdays ever. It was the year I graduated from my tumultuous elementary school
and entered an even more tumultuous high school. And all in all, I just remember 1995 being a very weird year with
O.J. Simpson getting acquitted of murder and an earthquake flattening parts of
Japan.
But
I think one moment that I will never forget happened on this date twenty-one
years ago today...and it's a date that changed the face of Oklahoma City
forever.
As
I recall, April 19, 1995 was a fairly decent day. I went to school as normal where I more than likely learned how
to conjugate the verb "faire" in French class, learned how to tell
the difference between an equilateral and scalene triangle in math class, and
played a few songs on the baritone during band practice. But when I went home for lunch that day, and
turned on the television set to watch Bob Barker give away a brand new car on
"The Price Is Right", I was instead alerted to this frightening
image.
This
was all that was left of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma
City. Just after nine o'clock on the
morning of April 19, 1995 - right around the time that my math class was on the
verge of wrapping up - a gigantic bomb that was stashed inside of a Ryder truck
parked outside of the building exploded, causing massive damage to the front of
the building, and causing parts of the building to pancake on top of each
other, crushing those who were unlucky enough to be in the path of the bomb.
By
the time the dust settled, the death toll was staggering. One hundred and sixty-eight people lost
their lives in the explosion. To make
the situation even more tragic, at least nineteen children were confirmed
casualties inside of the building - fifteen of the children alone were in the
daycare area of the building that was completely demolished in the blast.
It
would be the worst terrorist attack on American soil at that time - at least
that was until the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001. And within 90 minutes of the explosion, one of the people who was
responsible for the bombing was stopped by police.
Shortly
after 10:30am that morning, officers pulled over a 1977 Mercury Marquis driven
by Gulf War veteran Timothy McVeigh.
McVeigh was arrested for driving without a license plate and for
possession of illegal weapons, as he had a concealed weapon on his person. While McVeigh was processed for jail, his
car was searched and police found a business card inside of McVeigh's car with
a message scrawled on the back of the card.
The
message read "TNT at $5 a stick - Need More."
Further
investigation revealed that McVeigh was the one who rented the Ryder truck that
was used in the bombing - a detail later confirmed by the man who worked at the
rental place where he provided a near perfect sketch matching McVeigh's
description. Some time passed before
McVeigh's co-conspirators, Terry and James Nichols were also arrested and
charged with the criminal act.
Both
McVeigh and Terry Nichols were convicted of several counts of murder and
conspiracy. McVeigh was sentenced to
death and was executed in prison on June 11, 2001. As for Nichols, he was given 161 consecutive life sentences
without any possibility of parole.
James Nichols was also arrested but released from custody after a little
over a month in jail due to lack of evidence against him, and several other
people who had inside knowledge of the crime
So,
the question that remained is...why would McVeigh and Nichols do something so
horrendous? Why did 168 people -
nineteen of which were children no older than six - have to lose their lives?
Well, for conspiracy theorists such as McVeigh and Nichols, it was their way of
making a stand against the government - in particular, the federal
government. You see, the reason why the
date of April 19 was chosen for a specific reason. And if you take a look at some of the events I posted that took
place on April 19, you'll see that it was on the same day as the
Lexington/Concord Battle during the Revolutionary War, as well as the day that
the Branch Division fell - an event that McVeigh cited as being one of the
greatest failures of the federal government, and felt that this would be the
way to make them pay. After all, the
Alfred P. Murrah Building was the home of several government agencies, each of
whom had a significant number of people working the morning of April 19, 1995.
But
even if a person despises their government, it does NOT give them the right to
take the lives of innocent people, especially a bunch of children who did
nothing wrong to deserve this.
The
building is no more. The remains of the
building were knocked down in May 1995, and in its place lies a memorial of the
168 people who lost their lives that day - and for what purpose?