Mrs F's Help with History Tuition

On this day in 1960, The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first birth control pill. Before the introduction of the pill, most women were expected to stay at home and raise an expanding family while men went out to work. Nowadays, women can choose to have children, further education and a career on their own terms. Initially the pill was prescribed mainly to older women who already had children and did not want any more. The government at the time did not want to be seen to be encouraging promiscuity or "free love". That all changed in 1974 when family planning clinics were allowed to prescribe single women with the pill. Economists George Akerlof, Janet Yellen and Michael Katz argue that "the pill encouraged the delay of marriage through routes such as reducing the necessity of marrying to have s*x and lowering the incidence of shotgun marriages." Without the pressure to get married, many couples turned to co-habiting. In Britain in the early 1960s, fewer than one in 100 adults under 50 were estimated to have cohabited, whereas nowadays about one in six do.

25 years ago today, Tony Blair became prime minister of the United Kingdom. He was the youngest person to hold the office since Lord Liverpool in 1812. He attempted to promote a youthful, modern image of Britain symbolised by BritPop, BritArt and the Millennium Dome. Important constitutional changes happened quickly, with Scottish and Welsh devolution, reform to the House of Lords, the Human Rights Act and a Freedom of Information Act. One of his biggest achievements came in 1998 with the Good Friday Agreement. The 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001 were a defining moment for Tony Blair and his legacy. He allied with the USA and President Bush over the need to confront militant Islamism, first in Afghanistan in 2001 and then, much more controversially, in 2003 with the invasion of Iraq. The case for war in the UK had been built around the widespread belief that Saddam harboured weapons of mass destruction (WMD), which were not subsequently found. Doubts over the legality of the UK’s involvement led the previously popular Tony Blair to become a divisive figure. Despite this, Blair was re-elected in 2005, in an unprecedented third consecutive term for a Labour prime minister. Blair stepped down in June 2007 and was succeeded as prime minister by Gordon Brown.

On this day in 1915, the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) landed at Gallipoli during the Dardanelles Campaign of World War I. Allied success in the campaign could have weakened the Central Powers, allowed Britain and France to support Russia and helped to secure British strength in the Middle East. But success depended on Ottoman Turkish opposition quickly crumbling. Instead, trench warfare quickly took hold at Gallipoli, mirroring the fighting of the Western Front. Casualties mounted heavily and in the summer heat conditions rapidly deteriorated. Sickness was rampant, food quickly became inedible and there were vast swarms of black co**se flies. In December, the decision was made to evacuate. Gallipoli has become a defining moment in the history of both Australia and New Zealand, revealing characteristics that both countries have used to define their soldiers: endurance, determination, initiative and 'mateship'.

On this day in 1906, at 5.12 a.m, a massive earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.9 shook San Francisco, California. Though the quake lasted less than a minute, its immediate impact was disastrous, and it is considered one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history. The earthquake ignited several fires around the city that burned for three days and destroyed nearly 500 city blocks. The earthquake and fires killed an estimated 3,000 people and left half of the city's 400,000 residents homeless. Despite the utter devastation, San Francisco quickly recovered from the earthquake, and the destruction actually allowed planners to create a new and improved city. San Francisco had grown in a haphazard manner since the Gold Rush of 1849 so the city was rebuilt with a more logical and elegant structure.

On this day in 1979, Ugandan dictator Idi Amin fled the Ugandan capital of Kampala as Tanzanian troops and forces of the Uganda National Liberation Front closed in. Amin, chief of the Ugandan army and air force from 1966, had seized control of the African nation in 1971. He launched a genocidal program to purge Uganda of its Lango and Acholi ethnic groups and in 1972 he ordered all Asians who had not taken Ugandan nationality to leave the country. The 60,000 Indians and Pakistanis who fled comprised an important portion of the work force, and the Ugandan economy collapsed after their departure. Amin launched an unsuccessful attack on Tanzania in October 1978 in an effort to divert attention from Uganda’s internal problems. He escaped to Libya after fleeing Uganda and eventually settled in Saudi Arabia, where he died in August 2003. The deaths of 300,000 Ugandans are attributed to Idi Amin.

On this day in 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by James Earl Ray. In the spring of 1968, while preparing for a planned march to Washington to lobby Congress on behalf of the poor, King was called to Memphis, Tennessee, to support a sanitation workers’ strike. At 6:05 p.m. on 4 April, King was standing on the second-floor balcony of the Lorraine Motel when a sniper’s bullet struck him in the neck. He was rushed to hospital, where he was pronounced dead about an hour later, at the age of 39. News of King’s assassination prompted major outbreaks of racial violence, resulting in more than 40 deaths nationwide and extensive property damage in over 100 American cities. Amid a wave of national mourning, President Lyndon B. Johnson urged Americans to “reject the blind violence” that had killed King. He also called on Congress to speedily pass the civil rights legislation then entering the House of Representatives for debate, calling it a fitting legacy to King and his life’s work. On April 11, Johnson signed the Fair Housing Act, a major piece of civil rights legislation that prohibited discrimination concerning the sale, rental and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin or s*x. It is considered an important follow-up to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

On this day in 1939, Francisco Franco captured the capital city of Madrid en route to his overthrow of the Spanish republic. On the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War Madrid was under the control of the Popular Front government. Emilio Mola and Francisco Franco were anxious to capture the capital city of Spain as soon as possible but the siege of Madrid lasted two and a half years. It became a mythic subject in the popular imagination during the Spanish Civil War. The besieged capital of Spain, with the enemy so close, yet unable to take the city for so long, became the subject of songs such as Los Emboscados. The highest military awards of the Spanish Republic, the Laureate Plate of Madrid and the Madrid Distinction were named after the capital of Spain because the city symbolised valour and the antifascist resistance.

On this day in 1556, Thomas Cranmer, the first Protestant archbishop of Canterbury, was burned at the stake for violating heresy laws revised under the Roman Catholic queen Mary I. Mary may well have been partly motivated by a desire for revenge since Cranmer had annulled her parents’ marriage and subsequently married King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn. During his imprisonment Cranmer made five recantations, submitting himself to the authority of the monarch and recognising the Pope as the head of the church. He even participated in the mass and asked for sacramental absolution, which he received. However just before his ex*****on, Cranmer renounced his recantations, saying that the hand he had used to sign them would be the hand that would be punished by the fire first. Indeed it is said that he placed his right hand into the flames as they licked around him. Interestingly, Cranmer has been recognised as a martyr by the Catholic Church and was beatified by Pope Leo XIII in 1886. He was also considered as a potential candidate for sainthood by the Church of England but this never happened due to his ex*****on on charges of heresy and treason.

On this day in 1794, American inventor Eli Whitney received a patent for the cotton gin. It revolutionised the production of cotton by greatly speeding up the process of removing seeds from cotton fibre. It also transformed the American economy. For the South, it meant that cotton could be produced plentifully and cheaply for domestic use and for export, and by the mid-19th century, cotton was America’s leading export. For the North, especially New England, cotton’s rise meant a steady supply of raw materials for its textile mills.

The most significant effect of the cotton gin, however, was the growth of slavery. While it was true that the cotton gin reduced the labor of removing seeds, it did not reduce the need for enslaved labour to grow and pick the cotton. In fact, the opposite occurred. Cotton growing became so profitable for plantation owners that it greatly increased their demand for both land and enslaved labour. In 1790, there were six "slave states"; in 1860 there were 15. Because of the cotton gin, enslaved people labored on ever-larger plantations where work was more regimented and relentless than ever before.

On this day in 1965, state troopers used nightsticks and tear gas to attack American civil rights activists as they crossed a bridge in Selma, Alabama, during their attempted march to the state capitol in Montgomery. Amelia Boynton was beaten unconscious. John Lewis suffered a skull fracture from the attack, and later later said he thought he was going to die that day. In total, more than 60 marchers were injured on would become known as “Bloody Sunday."

Martin Luther King and his supporters staged another march along the same route on 21 March. Once in Mongomery, King gave a speech to a crowd of 25,000. Within hours of this speech, a white 39 year old civil rights campaigner, Viola Liuzzo had been murdered.

The murder outraged President Johnson, who commented, "Mrs Liuzzo went to Alabama to serve the struggle for justice. She was murdered by the enemies of justice who for decades have used the rope and the gun to terrorise their neighbours." Because of the powerful impact of the marches in Selma, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was presented to Congress on March 17, 1965. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the bill into law on August 6, 1965.

On this day 100 years ago, Egypt was declared an independent country. From the sixteenth to the start of the twentieth century Egypt had been governed by foreign powers, and this included the British and the Ottoman empires. The status of Egypt had become highly convoluted ever since its virtual breakaway from the Ottoman Empire in 1805 under Muhammad Ali Pasha. From then on, Egypt was a self-governing vassal state of the Ottoman Empire with its own hereditary monarchy, military, currency, legal system, and empire in Sudan. From 1882 onwards, Egypt was occupied by the United Kingdom, but not annexed.

In 1914, the legal fiction of Ottoman sovereignty was ended, and the Sultanate of Egypt (which the Ottomans had destroyed in 1517) was re-established. Though the United Kingdom did not annex Egypt, it made the restored sultanate a protectorate, thereby formalising the role that it had exercised in Egypt since 1882. The continued control of Egyptian affairs by the United Kingdom sparked the Egyptian Revolution of 1919.

By issuing the Unilateral Declaration of Egyptian Independence on 28 February 1922 the United Kingdom avoided seeking the agreement of the Egyptian government and thereby granted to itself "reserved" powers in four areas central to the governance of Egypt: foreign relations, communications, the military, and Sudan. These reserved powers, to which the Egyptian government did not consent, meant that nationalist grievances against the United Kingdom continued and would contribute to the causes of the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 three decades later.

On this day in 1965, Malcom X was assassinated. He had left the Nation of Islam the previous year due to ideological differences with leader Elijah Muhammad. He formed the secular Organization of African American Unity, blaming racism, rather than the white race, for injustices and adopting a more moderate stance on civil rights.

The separation from the Nation of Islam prompted the group to make death threats against Malcolm. On February 14, 1965, Molotov cocktails were thrown through the windows of his Queens home as he and his family slept inside. The family escaped but he told reporters, "I live like a man who is dead already." Just a week later he was gunned down by three men at the Audubon Ballroom.

Mujahid Abdul Halim was shot in the leg by a security guard, held and beaten by the crowd, and was arrested at the scene, while two other gunmen escaped. Five days later, Muhammad A. Aziz was arrested, and Khalil Islam was arrested on March 3, 1965. All three men were members of the Nation of Islam and were indicted on first-degree murder charges.

During the 1966 trial, Halim confessed to the crime and eventually testified that Islam and Aziz were innocent. Still, all three men were found guilty on March 11, 1966, and were sentenced to 20 years to life in prison. Aziz was released from prison in 1985, Islam was released in 1987 and Halim was granted release in 2010.

Doubt was cast on the verdict against Aziz and Islam for decades. On November 18, 2021, Aziz and Islam were exonerated after an investigation that included the discovery of key FBI documents withheld from the defense and prosecution during the trial. Aziz was 83 at the time of the exoneration but Islam had died in 2009.