Wednesday, July 22, 1925. Battle of al-Kafr.

John Henry "Harry" Selby, legendary African big game hunter, was born in South Africa.  After a lifetime as a ph, he died in Botswana, at age 92 in 2018.

In Memoriam: Harry Selby, Hunter And Rifleman, Dies At 92

Selby was part of the post World War Two generation of professional hunters in Africa, who are more associated with guiding than market hunting.  He obtained his professional license in 1945.

The Battle of al-Kafr saw the Druze shoot down a French military aircraft and ambush a column of French soldiers, killing 111 out of 174 members.

Last edition:

Tuesday, July 21, 1925. Scopes verdict and the Great Syrian Revolt.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Court, Evolutionary Biology, French League of Nation Mandates, Great Syrian Revolt, law, Science, Syria, Tennessee, USSR

Monday, July 20, 1925. Salkhad.

Druze rebels captured the French Army garrison at Salkhad.

Sheikh Sultan el-Atrash, leader of Druze revolt in October, 1925.

The Druze have been in the news recently given a conflict between the Druze, who tend to be allied to Israel, and Bedouins.  

Nobody ever wanted the French in Syria, excepting of course, the French.

Italy and Yugoslavia signed the Treaty of Nettuno.  The treaty allowed Italians to emigrate to Dalmatia, and was opposed by the Croatian Peasant Party, causing Yugoslavia to take three years to ratify it.

Boise City, Oklahoma, was incorporated.

Last edition:

Saturday, July 18, 1925. Nazi tome and Scopes trial.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Adolf Hitler, Art, Evolutionary Biology, German Weimar Republic, Germany, law, Nazi Party, Science, Tennessee, The written word

Saturday, June 6, 1925. The Great Syrian Revolt.

Walter P. Chrysler incorporated the company that bears his name.

The Great Syrian Revolt against the French started when representatives of the Jabal Druze State were treated poorly by the French administrator.  Syrian rejection of French rule, however, had been smouldering since the end of World War One.

Indeed, this ties right into the events we've been otherwise cataloging regarding France at the end of World War One.  Syria and Lebanon had been granted near independence during the war, which France tried to renege on as soon as the Germans were defeated. Only British intervention, which nearly resulted in fighting between the French and British, stopped that from occurring and assured rapid Syrian and Lebanese independence.  French insistence on occupying the same territory at the end of the Great War nearly resulted in fighting between the same two European powers then and France had never been welcome by most of the regions inhabitants.

French attachment to the region is hard to really explain, but it is in part cultural and goes all the way back to the Kingdom of Jerusalem,1099–1187, 1192-1291, the long running "Crusader Kingdom" in the same region. Lasting almost two hundred years, the kingdom, which was mostly governed by French Crusaders, formed a strong cultural attachment to the region with the French.

The Saturday magazines hit the stands.

Last edition:

Wednesday,. June 3, 1925. Blimps and Stormy Weather.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Blog Mirror, Iowa, Lighter than air aircraft, Nebraska, Petroleum, Weather

Friday, July 14, 1944. Bastille Day.

Mortar crew in action near St. Lo, July 14, 1944.

President Roosevelt addressed the French people on it being Bastille Day:

July 14, 1944

Once again I salute, on Bastille Day, the heroic people of France.

July 14 this year is different, for we hope that it is the last fourteenth of July that France will suffer under German occupation. With full confidence, I look forward that the French people on July 14, 1945, will celebrate their great national fete on French soil, liberated alike from the invader and from the puppets of Vichy.

For the great battle of liberation is now engaged. It is a battle resolutely waged by the American, British, and Canadian forces, together with the valiant fighters of the home French, who have already contributed so greatly to the success of the operations. At the same time gallant French fighting forces are carrying on the victorious struggle in Italy, joined in traditional unity with their comrades of the American Fifth Army and the British Eighth Army.

Here, on this side o.[ the Atlantic, the fourteenth of July, 1944, offers an equally great spectacle of the indissoluble unity and the deep friendship of the American and French peoples.

Together, the French and American peoples stand today, united as they have always been when the cause of freedom was endangered.

Together, we shall win, and France shall be free!

U.S. Navy frogman began to recon Guam.

The Red Army captured Pinsk.  Vilnius was fully occupied, and Operation Ostra Brama by the Polish Home Army concluded.  Internment of the Polish partisans would start on July 15.

Sarah Sundin's blog has some interesting entries today, including that Japan started conscripting women and girls down to age 12 for war work.

Today in World War II History—July 14, 1944

The funeral of Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. occured in France.

The funeral of General Ted Roosevelt, July 14, 1944

The commander of the 10th Armored Division, Maj. Gen. Paul Newgarded was killed when the airplane in which he was a passenger in the US went down in a violent storm.

The 10th was still training in the US at the time.

Druze actress and singer Amal al-Atrash (آمال الأطرش) known by her stage name Asmahan (أسمهان) died in a tragic car wreck when the car in which she was a passenger crashed into the Suez Canal.  Her professional life had been spent in Egypt.

Last edition:

Thursday, July 13, 1944. Stuck in the Bocage.

Labels: 1940s, 1944, Armor, Army, Blog Mirror, Clothing, German Wehrmacht, Lithuania, New Guinea, Normandy, Operation Bagration, Operation Overlord, Polish Home Army, Red Army, The Holocaust, World War Two