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THE QUESTION: Besides the Holocaust, what other historical event recent or distant, do you feel is in danger of being forgotten? Why should we never forget this event? Why, to you, is it so important?
ALSO, don't forget to answer the questions for Maus (see previous post) for this week, due no later than Friday. E-mail me with any questions!
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ReplyDeleteOne historical event that I feel is in danger of being forgotten is the Trail of Tears. We should never forget this event because millions of Native Americans were forced from their homelands and were made to travel thousands of miles to their new home in Indian Territory. Many Natives also died during travel to Indian Territory. I believe this is important because the Trail of Tears was a significant event in the history of America but also in Indian Country as well. Many of our ancestors and traditions died along the way and we need to teach the younger generations of what happened before, during, and after the Trail of Tears.
Delete^^ Amber
DeleteOne historical event I feel we need to make sure we don't forget is the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in our very own state of Oklahoma. This event occurred on April 19, 1995 and the 25th anniversary of it is coming up soon. This event was a heartbreaking time and personal in a way for me because my dad was on his way to this very building before this event took place. Had he been there, things would be very different. It's saddening to know that many people lost their lives during this awful time. I just want people to be encouraged to visit the museum that honors these individuals and keeps this historical event alive. I know that as time goes on, we tend to forget things that happen in the past. I would never want this to be forgotten.
ReplyDeleteYes, great response...1994 was so long ago for most people, so it's something long past, and long forgotten. Luckily we have a monument to it in downtown OKC so people can still be present at the site. Unless we can see and touch and somehow re-create the event (in a book or movie, too) we quickly lose it. It's why people build memorials in general, and why we built the WWI pillars on ECU's campus--to remember and to 'touch' history.
Delete^^this was Holly.
ReplyDeleteI believe one historical event that may people don't talk about is the Great Depression. The Great Depression occurred from 1929-1939. The Great Depression was an economical time of struggle. The depression affected a great amount of families. I have a great grandmother named, Flora. She experienced life in the depression. To this day she shares her point of view on how the depression took a toll on herself, as well as her family and friends. She was not very old at the time, but the Great Depression had such a tremendous impact that those experiences will remain forever.
ReplyDelete-Caitlin Lynn
Yes, this is a great moment in our history, and one that we're coming close to experiencing again. By remembering what went wrong, and how we fixed it, we're better able to face new situations and struggles--such as the current pandemic. But since so few people alive experienced it, we tend to forget how impactful it was, and how it changed our nation forever.
DeleteThe My Lai Massacre, which resulted in the death of 500 unarmed Vietnamese civilians, which was committed by the U.S Army on March 16th, 1968. The commanding officer in charge at the time, Lieutenant William Calley Jr. was charged with the deaths of twenty two villagers, was originally charged with a life sentence but was reduced to just three and a half years of house arrest. There have been numerous massacres like this throughout history committed by the United States military. From the Wounded Knee massacre in 1890, which resulted in 300 dead Lakota Indians, to the No Gun Ri massacre in 1950 during the Korean War which resulted in 250-300 dead South Korean refugees, all the way up to recent history in the Haditha Massacre of 2005, where 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians where shot at close range. I think all of these horrific events prove the fact that the United States military operate under a "shoot first, ask questions later" attitude, where the amount "acceptable casualties" has no meaning, and only helps the government cover up the deaths of innocent civilians.
ReplyDelete^ Stelon Beene
DeleteYes, great response--there have been so many massacres and virtual genocides, though we tend to bury it in the pages of history, since it tells the wrong story. We can love our country and still confront the horrors of the past, but if we don't, we're also dishonoring the memory of other Americans who had to sacrifice their lives in the name of injustice and inhumanity.
DeleteThis is Connie. COVID-19 would be a great example as a current historical event. I believe every generation has their own major occurrence. For instance our grandparents had the World wars, our parents the market crash, and our generation the Corona Virus. Although this isn't as significant as the World Wars it definitely has an impact. For example our stock market has dropped significantly. Even going to the grocery store to buy food is a task and the lack of sanitary materials is insane. My mom is a nurse at Norman and she was telling me about how her workplace has taken extra precautionary measures to maintain outbreaks and people walking in freaking out about possibly having the virus. This may not be as terrible as other events that have happened in our history, but it is one to talk about.
ReplyDeleteGreat response--this will definitely be a defining event in all of our lives, one we won't soon forget, yet I'm sure kids who are too young to understand it will have trouble remembering why it was important. We'll need to keep this event alive--and how we united to face it--so we can better confront the next one, and the one after that. Like World Wars, this might be a pandemic with sequels. :(
DeleteI believe that a historical event many people are forgetting or have already forgotten the severity of is the Trail of Tears. While it is a big part of Oklahoma history, many people have little information about it. Like Auschwitz, it was a horrible event that changed the course of history. Although it was on a smaller scale, the Native Americans were dehumanized and treated like cattle being herded much like the Jews. Outside of Oklahoma not much information is taught about this event in history. Even in Oklahoma many schools don't teach the gruesome details or the severity of this event. It is important to me because I see that, even recently, some schools have made signs at football games or other sporting events that say things similar to,"Trail of Tears Round 2" when playing against a school with a native mascot. It is incredibly insensitive and racist to say something like that. With the the tragedy that occurred on that trail, it is not a joking matter. I personally just think the amount of cruel treatment Native Americans received is being quickly forgotten. People are forgetting all the lessons to be learned from that event. This is Addi Walls
ReplyDeleteYes, this is a great point--we've had our own Holocaust here, and the fact that we still make light of it is not only horrific, but shows how little we understand the past (and the suffering of other human beings). To replace suffering with a mascot is the height of insensitivity, and shows the blinders our society still carries with them every day.
DeleteThe Tulsa Race Riots of 1921 are in danger of being forgotten. In most other states, students don't even learn about the riots. Details about the government's involvement in the incident are still obscured from history. Despite killing 39 people and destroying an entire town, the Tulsa Race Riots are slowly being erased from memory and are ommitted from many curriculums. This is a mistake. Though today the people who were impacted directly from the events have passed, their stories still live on. The best we can do as modern US citizens is to hear their stories and preserve the history of the event. The struggle of the citizens of Tulsa should not be lost. The 39 people who have died cannot have died in vain. It is our duty as a generation to bring awareness to the event and learn from the past. The implications of the race riots still play out in the modern day and must not be forgotten.
ReplyDelete-Seth Nelson
In Turkey between 1914 and 1923 1.5 million Armenians were killed by the Ottoman government. This was carried out in two phases being the killing of any able-bodied male through massacres or subjection into army conscripts, the other phase being the deportation of Armenian women, children, elderly and infirm on death marches leading to the Syrian desert. This Historic event is not often talked about and could soon be entirely forgotten by the rest of the world. We must always remember these horrific events so we can learn from them and never make these mistakes ever again as a species. - Michael Lewis
ReplyDeleteI think the Oklahoma City Bombing is in danger of being forgotten. The people that were around when it happened all know about it but the I do not think that the younger generation has learned much about it. It is a important part of Oklahoma's history and a good example of how Oklahomans can come together and support those in need.
ReplyDelete^^ This is Chandler Beck
ReplyDeleteOne event that I believe is important and in danger of being forgotten is the Chernobyl Disaster in Ukraine in 1986. In the Chernobyl power plant, a nuclear reactor exploded due to overheating, killing 42 of the workers there and releasing radiation for a 19 mile radius. The radiation killed and poisoned thousands. This event is important because it shows what can happen when these facilities are not maintained and operated correctly. This event should not be forgotten because we are moving more and more into nuclear options for power and for weaponry. We need to remember incidents like this in order to better understand and use nuclear energy.
ReplyDelete- Jorden Green
A historical event i'd like to discuss is the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building which happened on April 19, 1995, in Oklahoma City, a place where most of us have at least traveled through. This event hits closer to home, yes, being in OKC, but also because a family member to my best friend was one of the 168 that where killed. I got the opportunity to visit the memorial with my best friend and her family, it put an impact on me seeing what such a tragic event had done to a family I knew personally. I think it's important to know the historical events of places we visit. As a young generation it's our job to spread the knowledge of these events to others as our superiors have done for us, because as time moves on, so does historical events, which have, can, and may affect our families and home. I'd hope we wouldn't let something so close and recent feel so far and less valuable.
ReplyDeleteOne great event that’s worth remembering, and that should be very topical right now, is the Black Plague. It serves as a reminder of what happens when highly contagious and deadly outbreaks go almost totally unchecked. The people of the 13th century understood next to nothing of diseases and how they spread, and thus roughly one fourth of the world’s total population perished. Many people today seem to under-evaluate the severity of something like the COVID-19, and exactly how much our modern day medicines and enforced restrictions in this crisis are helping us.
ReplyDeleteIt’s also worth noting that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre closed about a week ago, for the first time in 671 years, since it’s last time closing for the Black Plague.
-Conner Davis
The Civil war is a war that is fading away. It was between the Nigerian government and the Biafra forces. It started as muslims killing the christians in the Igbo tribe. The igbo tribe fled east were they were more dominant and formed the biafra forces. 7 years later they declared war on Nigeria. It was every tribe against the Igbo. The igbo faced over a million casualties from malnutrition caused by war alone. This is important to me because I am Nigerian. My tribe is Yoruba, and we are very close to the Igbo tribe. I also have many friends that are Igbo.
ReplyDeleteI feel that the Dust Bowl was a important event that occurred and affected multiple states. It started in 1930 and lasted for about a decade. The Dust Bowl affected many people such as farmers with the amount of dust, causing most to lose their homes. Soon leading to the Great Depression. I feel like this was important to me because I relate to it on a agriculture basis, not being able to provide for animals since there was no grass, and not able to plant crops to make an income.
ReplyDelete- Ashley Hayes
I think an event that is being forgotten is the invasion on Normandy during World War II. Most people have heard about D-Day but I think the gravity of the situation is lost often times. Art is a great way to tell a story and there are plenty of pieces of art that tell the story of D-Day but I think the best depiction comes from the 1998 film, Saving Private Ryan. The opening scene is the landing of US troops on the beaches of Normandy. You see the gunfire and mortar fire that the troops faced before even reaching the shore. Some troops jumped over the side of the boat to swim to shore but their gear made this almost impossible because the average soldier could be carrying at least 75lbs of gear. As a result, many wounded soldiers drowned because the weight was too much. After making it to shore, many of the troops faced heavy gunfire and many lost their lives in an attempt to invade Normandy. This battle became the turning point of World War II that ultimately lead to the Allied forces saving Paris and kept the German forces out of Russia. The next year Hitler committed suicide and the war officially ended the following month.
ReplyDelete