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Jastiger posted:Wasn't a carpenter just another word for day laborer back then? Like carpenters weren't experts who build scaffolding or walls or structures, but rather, folks on a work crew that happened to work with wood and brick? Lol, now I have an image of Jesus showing up on the corner of a Mesopotamian version of a Home Depot or wherever the gently caress they were and shouting the Hebrew equivalent of 'trabajo! trabajo!' except that he did shoddy work, enough to ditch the lucrative career of being a Jewish day laborer.
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Jun 14, 2016 02:58
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Cacafuego posted:Lol, now I have an image of Jesus showing up on the corner of a Mesopotamian version of a Home Depot or wherever the gently caress they were and shouting the Hebrew equivalent of 'trabajo! trabajo!' except that he did shoddy work, enough to ditch the lucrative career of being a Jewish day laborer. That scene in Dick and Jane where Jim Carrey gets rounded up by la migra outside of a home depot The parable of the lawn
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Jun 14, 2016 03:09
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syscall girl posted:That scene in Dick and Jane where Jim Carrey gets rounded up by la migra outside of a home depot So it was prequel to Bruce Almighty?
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Jun 14, 2016 03:15
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Canemacar posted:So it was prequel to Bruce Almighty? Yeah. I think Noah used the grass to sod the roof of his ark. And then Harrison Ford came along and smoked all the grass
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Jun 14, 2016 03:30
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Jack of Hearts posted:I do...is this leading up to a punchline involving "if"? I don't get the connection. I think I meant to quote someone else but I actually don't remember why I made that post
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Jun 14, 2016 17:35
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Jerningham Wakefield, NZ MPquote:Because of his increasing alcoholism his behaviour was very erratic and he was an embarrassment to his supporters. He was one of the MPs sometimes locked in small rooms at Parliament by Whips to keep them sober enough to vote in critical divisions, though in 1872 this was defeated when political opponents lowered a bottle of whisky down the chimney to him. Platystemon has a new favorite as of 01:12 on Jun 16, 2016 |
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Jun 16, 2016 01:09
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Platystemon posted:Jerningham Wakefield, NZ MP His wikipedia page shows he went to NZ after he attended a lecture by this guy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnet_Burns Who is a fun historical fact in himself.
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Jun 16, 2016 02:08
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Scrolling over the last dozen or so pages, I think I've found an un-tugged thread. What do Winston Churchill, secret agents, quotable men and can-openers all have in common? A humble Icelandic Canadian named William Stephenson, aka Agent Intrepid. The man was a telegraph boy who volunteered for the Canadian Expeditionary Force in 1916 and was a flying ace for the Royal Flying Force in 1917. He was shot down behind enemy lines in 1918, taken prisoner by the Germans and escaped later that year with one of their can-openers in tow. At the time, the (at least type) of can-opener he had stolen had only been patented in Germany, so he and another opened a hardware store to capitalize on his recovery. It wasn't successful, but he moved to England, gathered business contacts, and became rather wealthy from the royalties from a patent he had on a system that transmitted photographic images wirelessly. During this time Stephenson was sending information to British MP Winston Churchill about Hitler's growing army and ways the Nazi's were violating the Treaty of Versailles. During World War II, Stephenson was sent to the States by Churchill to establish and run British Security Coordination in New York, which would eventually be the North American HQ for most of England's intelligence agencies. In this role, Stephenson was one of few people to review raw transcripts of intercepted Enigma ciphers that had been decrypted, and he got to decide what information to pass along to other branches in the western hemisphere. Under his charge the BSC ran pro-British propaganda through North and South America, as well as the Caribbean. He also established Camp X, which was the first training school in North America and Canada for clandestine operations. At this facility, students were trained in the exciting and highly lucrative fields of silent killing, sabotage, recruitment methods for resistance movements, demolitions, map reading, use of a variety of weapons, and Morse code. It has been called "the school of murder and mayhem" by a former graduate. After the war Stephenson was made a knight bachelor by King George VI in 1945, awarded the Medal for Merit by President Truman in 1946, and made a Companion of the Order of Canada in 1979. The first time I read about William Stephenson, it stated that later in his life he had taken to spending his days feeding ducks at a local park. A young man sat next to him, and in time Stephenson would tell stories of his life to the boy. The boy was Ian Fleming, and would later incorporate Stephenson's stories into a series of books about a talented spy and secret agent named James Bond.
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Jun 22, 2016 21:58
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LawfulWaffle posted:Scrolling over the last dozen or so pages, I think I've found an un-tugged thread. What do Winston Churchill, secret agents, quotable men and can-openers all have in common? He was only ~10 years older than Ian Fleming. Fleming also served in WWII. This guy sounds cool, but whoever wrote that first thing you read about him, uh, sucked.
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Jun 22, 2016 22:19
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I thought Bond was based off of an Israeli spy with a dash of these kinds of stories mixed in?
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Jun 22, 2016 22:39
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Jack of Hearts posted:He was only ~10 years older than Ian Fleming. Fleming also served in WWII. This guy sounds cool, but whoever wrote that first thing you read about him, uh, sucked. Eddie Chapman is probably a strong Bond influence, as well. A petty criminal who defected to the Germans at the outbreak of the war, he defected back to the Brits when he parachuted into England to sabotage a bomber plant, earning him the name Zigzag. MI5 hired a bunch of theatrical set designers to create canvas overlays on the walls and roof of the plant that made it look destroyed, then set off a huge explosion nearby and planted a small article in a local paper about an explosion at the plant. The German reconnaissance were deliberate let through and dutifully reported that the plant had been destroyed. Chapman went back to Berlin and was declared the greatest spy in Germany, and was awarded an Iron Cross by Hitler himself. One of his most important contributions was when he went back to England under cover to give Germany feedback on the landing sites of V1 bombs. MI5 did elaborate simulations and gave him plausible fake coordinates for each one, making it appear they were going too far. The Germans then dialed back on the fuel and all the V1s started falling harmlessly short of London, saving thousands of lives and millions of pounds in damage. He spent some time in Norway for the Germans as well, where a Norwegian underground agent was assigned to him. They fell in love and Eddie revealed he was actually a double agent. She revealed she was also an agent, but they could not tell anyone their secrets. He had to continue pretending to be a German officer and she had to pretend to be a local girl chasing German dick. They worked together to deceive the Germans for a couple years. Pretty amazing story, overall. The film Triple Cross that came out in the '60s is a dramatization of his life.
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Jun 22, 2016 23:44
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Fleming based Bond primarily on himself and his experiences in espionage during WW2, but also included a lot of aspects from friends and acquaintances. Wikipedia posted:Fleming based his fictional creation on a number of individuals he came across during his time in the Naval Intelligence Division during World War II, admitting that Bond "was a compound of all the secret agents and commando types I met during the war". He was basically the guy Fleming wanted to be. the future is WOW has a new favorite as of 23:52 on Jun 22, 2016 |
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Jun 22, 2016 23:47
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Jack of Hearts posted:He was only ~10 years older than Ian Fleming. Fleming also served in WWII. This guy sounds cool, but whoever wrote that first thing you read about him, uh, sucked. Yeah, sounds like he does. It looks like Fleming may or may not have trained under Stephenson at Camp X. Here's something I found on the Intrepid Society's website. From the book Room 3603 by H. Montgomery Hyde posted:' Ian Fleming stated," People often ask me how closely the hero of my thrillers, James Bond, resembles a true, live secret agent. To begin with, James Bond is not in fact a hero, but an efficient and not very attractive blunt instrument in the hands of government, and though he is a meld of various qualities I noted among Secret Service men and commandos in the last war, he remains, of course, a highly romanticised version of the true spy. The real thing, who may be sitting next to you as you read this, is another kind of beast altogether. .....
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Jun 23, 2016 14:19
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Matthias Ulungura took prisoner the first Japanese soldier captured on Australian soil. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-06-24/war-hero-matthias-ulungura-honoured-with-statue/7542520 "So he crept behind a tree ... and then he just ran and took the gun off him and he poked him with his tomahawk and said to him 'stick em up, I'm Hopalong Cassidy'."
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Jun 24, 2016 14:15
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Colonel Birger Eriksen has a great quote from the first hours of the German invasion of Norway. As the German ships headed towards Oslo, the Norwegian army fired warning shots in an attempt to get them to stop. When this proved ineffective Eriksen was asked if they should fire live ammunition. His response is reported to have been: "Of course we bloody switch to live rounds! Either I'll be court martialed or I'll be decorated." The attack delayed the Germans taking Oslo for about 24 hours, allowing the royal family and the government to flee the city, and also provided the bank of Norway with enough time to transport nearly 50 tons of gold out of the Nazi's reach.
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Jun 24, 2016 15:07
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Doffen posted:The attack delayed the Germans taking Oslo for about 24 hours, allowing the royal family and the government to flee the city, and also provided the bank of Norway with enough time to transport nearly 50 tons of gold out of the Nazi's reach. so everything important escaped
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Jun 24, 2016 15:10
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Doffen posted:"Of course we bloody switch to live rounds! British secret agent spotted.
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Jun 25, 2016 08:02
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bitcoin bastard posted:British secret agent spotted. Artifact of translation. A more literal translation would be something like "Sure as the devil we'll shoot live rounds!" but it doesn't flow as well as Doffen's translation (in my opninion).
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Jun 25, 2016 08:10
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Doffen posted:"...Either I'll be court martialed or I'll be decorated."
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Jun 25, 2016 10:41
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Siivola posted:Well, which one was it? He was decorated with the War Cross with sword, Croix de Guerre and Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur.
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Jun 25, 2016 10:56
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About col. Eriksen, despite receiving decorations after the war he was not celebrated or respected by the Norwegian military right after the war. Ineed he was criticized for not being aggressive enough with the rounds, and for capitulating too early. It wasn't until the mid/late 1970's that he was started to be seen as a war hero. Edit: he was also a few month away from retirement in 1940 so we have to assume he uttered "I'm getting too old for this poo poo" at some point.
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Jun 28, 2016 09:07
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This is the dinghy he sunk, by the way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_cruiser_Bl%C3%BCcher E: The two main guns Eriksen used apart from the torpedo battery, were named "Moses" and "Aron". Take that, Hitler. Freudian slippers has a new favorite as of 15:31 on Jun 28, 2016 |
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Jun 28, 2016 15:27
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The Mentalizer posted:He was basically the guy Fleming wanted to be. Hence not being riddled with syphillis.
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Jun 28, 2016 18:52
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It took until 2004 for feudal duties to be removed from Scottish Law.BBC in 2004 posted:Laws abolishing 800 years of feudal property rights have come into force in Scotland. BravestOfTheLamps has a new favorite as of 21:19 on Jun 28, 2016 |
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Jun 28, 2016 21:12
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Speaking of things that happened way later than people would think, the last independent Mayan state, Chan Santa Cruz, only became part of Mexico in the early 1900s after the British dropped their informal alliance with them.
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Jun 28, 2016 22:20
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Oxford University was founded before the Aztec Empire. This may be a popular titbit, but I haven’t seen it in the few months I’ve been reading the thread, at least.
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Jun 28, 2016 23:26
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Harvard University was founded during Galileo's lifetime.
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Jun 28, 2016 23:38
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Platystemon posted:Oxford University was founded before the Aztec Empire. Yeah, but the Aztecs had state funded primary education for all children about 400 years before the British. 
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Jun 29, 2016 01:45
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The Magna Carta was signed two weeks after Genghis Khan sacked Beijing.
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Jun 29, 2016 02:40
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The last holdout of the Roman Empire fell thirty-one years before Columbus discovered America.
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Jun 29, 2016 02:45
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Geronimo surrendered to the US 6 months after the first motorcar was patented. More of these "two historical events which are far apart in your mind are actually really close together time wise" please.
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Jun 29, 2016 04:11
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Byzantine posted:The last holdout of the Roman Empire fell thirty-one years before Columbus discovered America. Depends on how you feel about the papal states and/or the Vatican.
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Jun 29, 2016 04:44
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In a sense, the Roman Empire continues to exist even today - The Catholic Church, an institution that gained a major amount of power in the Roman Empire with the ascension of Constantine I, i still a sovereign entity. Edit: beaten to it It's only been about 96 years since the fall of the Ottoman Empire.
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Jun 29, 2016 04:44
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Also, in that same vein of Empires, in a technical sense, the Sun actually never did set on the British Empire
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Jun 29, 2016 04:46
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hard counter posted:Depends on how you feel about the papal states and/or the Vatican. Frankish usurpery.
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Jun 29, 2016 04:56
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New York City was founded eight years after Shakespeare died. There were still woolly mammoths around when the Great Pyramid of Giza was built.
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Jun 29, 2016 05:01
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A White Guy posted:In a sense, the Roman Empire continues to exist even today - The Catholic Church, an institution that gained a major amount of power in the Roman Empire with the ascension of Constantine I, i still a sovereign entity. Edit: beaten to it The Donation of Constantine is by no means the way the Catholic Church gained all their power, but it’s a document with a fascinating history so I’m posting it here.
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Jun 29, 2016 05:02
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There was feudalism in the state of New York until a local revolution in the 1840s
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Jun 29, 2016 05:09
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Farmland Park posted:Geronimo surrendered to the US 6 months after the first motorcar was patented. Geronimo later regretted capitulating and his dying words were that he wished that he had fought to the last man.
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Jun 29, 2016 05:21
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tacodaemon posted:New York City was founded eight years after Shakespeare died. Cleopatra lived closer to the present day than she did to the building of the Great Pyramid.
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Jun 29, 2016 05:28
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