Month: March 2020
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The Battle of Horseshoe Bend – March 27, 1814
Much of what we learn about Andrew Jackson and the War of 1812 centers almost exclusively around the 1815 Battle of New Orleans. However, what is now the Lower South was the site of some of the most sanguinary fighting of the war. It was on this date in 1814 that militia forces under the…
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The Great Midwest Flood of 1913
Easter Sunday, March 23, 1913, is generally considered to mark the beginning of a five-day period during which the Ohio River and its major tributaries overflowed their banks, causing cataclysmic flooding across its entire watershed. When the local waters began to recede and Mississippi helped carry away floodwaters, more than a thousand people were dead.…
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Pauli Murray says no to Jane Crow
While we know Rosa Parks wasn’t the first African American woman who refused to surrender her bus seat as dictated by Jim Crow, most have never heard of Pauli Murray. More than twenty years before Claudette Colvin, inspired by stories of other women of color who fought for civil rights, was arrested for violating the…
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Carnage on Deer Lick Creek – 1824
Several waves of temperance movements throughout the 19th century are often seen today as quaint extremism by a vocal minority. However, hard liquor was a significant contributor to a number of social ills including wanton killings. On March 22, 1824, heavy drinking combined with generations-old hatred of Native-Americans as the mass killing of nine persons…