The Centre Cannot Hold » 1953

1953 – Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II

Loki — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:23:42 +0000

Technically, Elizabeth Windsor became the Queen of England as soon as her father, King George VI died on February 2 of 1952. But until her actual coronation – a lengthy religious ceremony held in Westminster Abbey – took place more than a year later.

This was necessary for political and religious purposes – without this apparently meaningless ceremony, the divine right of kings (well, queens in this case), would fall by the wayside, and that would just be unacceptable. Elizabeth has now been the Queen long enough to have become the third longest reigning English monarch.

Referenced in:

We Didn’t Start The Fire – Billy Joel

1953 – Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are executed

Loki — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 21:23:55 +0000

Julius and Ethel Greenglass Rosenberg were a married couple from New York City. Of Jewish-American origin, the two had met in 1936 at a meeting of the Young Communist League.

Julius joined in the army in 1940, where he served in the Signal Corps, working on radar equipment. He was recruited by the NKVD as a spy in 1942, and passed a considerable body of data to the Soviets, notably the proximity fuse used to shoot down Gary Powers in 1960.

But with the arrest of Klaus Fuchs at Los Alamos, the dominoes started to fall. Fuchs fingered another spy: his courier, Gold. Gold has also been a courier for David Greenglass – Ethel’s brother. Greenglass testified that he had been recruited by Julius, though he denied Ethel’s involvement.

The Rosenbergs were convicted on March 29, 1951, and sentenced to death on April 5. The conviction helped to fuel Senator Joseph McCarthy’s investigations into anti-American activities by U.S. citizens. While their devotion to the Communist cause was well-documented, the Rosenbergs denied the espionage charges even as they faced the electric chair. They were the only two American civilians to be executed for espionage-related activity during the Cold War.

Referenced in:

We Didn’t Start The Fire – Billy Joel

1953 – The Doomsday Clock is set at two minutes to midnight

Loki — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 21:23:54 +0000

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists is one of the world’s most prestigious scientific publications in the world. Its first issue, published on December 10, 1945, was only two pages in length. It has grown since then.

In June of 1947, its cover featured, for the first time, what became known as the Doomsday Clock. This would become the regular cover for Bulletin, throughout the run of its print edition, and even today’s online version, which has no cover per se, maintains the clock. The number of minutes before midnight – measuring the degree of nuclear, environmental, and technological threats to mankind – is periodically corrected; when it was first published, the clock was set at seven minutes to midnight.

In September of 1953, Volume IX, Number 7, the Clock was set to 2 minutes to midnight – the closest they had ever been. The hands remained here until January of 1960, and have never again been set so close to midnight.

Referenced in:

Two Minutes To Midnight – Iron Maiden

1953 – The East German Uprising peaks

Loki — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 21:23:10 +0000

Beginning as a strike by 300 construction workers in East Berlin on June 16, 1953, what would become known as the East German Uprising rapidly spiralled out of control of the authorities.

This led to greater and greater measures being employed to stop the uprising, which only intensified the reaction on the part of the protestors. The flames of rebellion were fanned by West German radio, which broadcast the news all over communist-controlled East Germany, leading to a wave of sympathetic strikes across the entire nation that continued for some days after the 17th.

An estimated 40,000 protestors gathered in East Berlin the next day, and numerous other rallies, strikes and protests took place elsewhere in the nation. In the capital, the protests were brutally suppressed by Soviet troops, with nearly 500 deaths caused by rioting or summary executions, and just under another 2000 people injured. More than 5000 people were arrested for their roles in the uprising.

In later years, the anniversary was celebrated as a national holiday in West Germany, under the name of the “Day of German Unity”. In East Germany, it was remembered, but celebrated rather more furtively.

Referenced in:

We Didn’t Start The Fire – Billy Joel