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Just a few musical history facts for February 26 1955 — February 26 On this date, 45 rpm records outsold 78 rpm discs in the United States for the first time, marking a major shift in recorded music consumption. The “45” speed originated from the difference between Columbia’s 33⅓ rpm long-playing format and the older…
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On 2 March 1943, a train with 1105 people left camp Westerbork for the then-unknown Sobibor extermination camp. After a three-day journey, the train arrived on the 5th of March. It was the first transport from the Netherlands to this camp. The first transport, like the second, was carried out by passenger train. Then cattle…
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This is just my opinion and there is no scientific research done on this, at least not as far as I am aware, but I think the Holocaust can be categorized as organized randomness. On a large scale the industrialized murder of millions was organized efficiently, however on smaller scales the treatment of mainly Jews,…
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The Holodomor comes from the term moryty holodom which translates as “death inflicted by starvation.” A man-made famine that convulsed the Soviet Republic of Ukraine from 1932 to 1933, peaking in the late spring of 1933. Millions of Ukrainians were killed in the Holodomor, engineered by the Soviet government of Joseph Stalin. The primary victims…
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The above photograph sent shivers down my spine. Not because it is a horrific image but because the opposite is true. Three young girls walk into town, pushing a pram. Why I find it so disturbing is—I know that street very well. I have walked the same route many times. In fact, all my Dutch…
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On 3 October 1934, George van den Bergh, one of the initiators of the Jewish Work Village, stated, “Then perhaps a simple stone will be placed here with the words ‘Here stood the Jewish Work Village Nieuwesluis.’ Then may all passers-by […] behold that stone with reverence,” after that, James McDonald, High Commissioner of the…
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There is an Iron Maiden song that has the line, “Only the good die young, all the evil seem to live forever.” There was a time when I thought this to be true, but luckily this is not the case. Sometimes the good ones live a long time. Traute Lafrenz Page died ten days ago,…
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Primum non nocere is the Latin phrase for “First do no harm” It is part of the Hippocratic Oath including the promise “to abstain from doing harm” . The Hippocratic Oath is an oath historically taken by physicians. It is one of the most widely known of Greek medical texts. In its original form, it requires a new physician to…
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It is not often I am speechless but that is exactly what I was when I saw some of these advertisements and products from days of yore. You would not get away with it by today’s standards. Vintage newspaper ad for heroin Who doesn’t like a bit of cocaine on their candy. Stay fit and…
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This story is both heartbreaking and uplifting — heartbreaking because it tells of a mother who knew she was going to die, and uplifting because her final words revealed remarkable courage and hope in the face of certain death. Olga Bancic was born on May 10, 1912, into a large Jewish family in Bessarabia, then…
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History of Sorts 