Travel: Historic tours of NZ Northland and Angkor Wat in 1930/40s

Two film documents of travel 70-80 years ago from the Travel Film Archive (link below) that has many other history film documents from places around the world.

The first one is a tour of the ancient Cambodian temples of Angkor Wat and Bayon in the 1930s. If you recently had a chance to visit these wonders of the world, you will realize from watching the film how much this place has deteriorated within about 80 years.

The second film (in color) shows you around the New Zealand Northland popular with many tourists touring from Auckland. Many places there are now…

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History: Kristallnacht - German pogrom of 1938

Tonight it is 70 years ago, that in the night of November 9th synagogues, Jewish shops and houses were destroyed throughout Germany and Austria. Almost a thousand Jews were murdered that night and 20-30,000 deported to concentration camps.

Sadly these days it looks like the extreme right wing thugs are creeping into society across Europe again. Where do you think that substantial amounts from all those Billions disappearing from military and so-called humanitarian aid programs are ending up?

This time it might not be the Jews, but will the majority of people again look to the other side and profit from…

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Film: MAHATMA - Life of Gandhi, 1869-1948

If you’re looking for some quiet time this weekend and want to learn something about history, have a look at this 5 hour documentary of Mahatma Gandhi’s life by the GandhiServe Foundation.

The film in black and white includes many visual records of Gandhi’s life and of events during this important period of India.

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Today: Remember Hiroshima

On this day in 1945 80,000 people were killed instantly and thousands more have died from injuries or illness attributed to the nuclear attacks on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later with the bombing of Nagasaki ten thousands more of mostly civilian population in Japan was killed with the second atomic bomb dropped by the US…

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RIP: Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Much can be said about Alexander Solzhenitsyn who died this weekend in Russia, and many will certainly do. With a courageous person like him having left us a few words by us might be allowed as well. He was…

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Weekend Activity: Browse the National Archives with Digital Vaults

The National Archives have put 1,200 of its 20 Billion documents online for access through an 2D search interface. Digital Vaults as the Adobe Flash interface is called allows you to explore photographs, documents and video clip plus the connections between them.

Once all interface elements are loaded, the application presents you with a series of starting point, click one and the image for the selected topic will be shown in the center of the window surrounded by related items.

Additional information is available for each of the items by clicking on them and…

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Quote of the day: Learning from History

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
George Santayana (1863–1952), U.S. philosopher

“…Studying history is necessary to avoid repeating past mistakes. This saying comes from the writings of George Santayana, a Spanish-born American author of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries…“

New York: Historic Bus and Subway Maps

The New York City Subway Resources site nycsubway.org has many historic subway and bus transit maps - most of them in high resolution format.Some of the maps are dating back to 1888.
Also have a look at their “Subway Art Guide” with a list of over 125 artworks in New York City Subway Stations. Maps, more [...]

USA: 100 most influential Americans of all time

US long standing political magazine The Atlantic will be publishing its “Most Influential Americans issue” later this month on November 21, but until then you can cast your vote online.
The Atlantic has compiled the list with the help of a panel of historians. The list will be officially released online the week of November 13.More [...]

Game on: Huge interactive computer game exhibition in London

From today you can explore the history and culture of computer games at the London Science Museum huge interactive computer game exhibition Game On. More then 120 classic and modern games - from the world’s first computer game of 1962 up to the latest of todays advanced computer games - will be shown and [...]