The Longest Assignment in the History of the World

[Ninmast]

Imagine an essay 24 pages long, discussing history in detailed context from the Civil War to Present Day. Imagine every segment having to be written as journal entries, and then written again as a detailed summary of that time period.

Imagine the Longest Assignment in the History of the World.

This was the assignment given to my class in American History, and I am providing it for you today. I am splitting it into sections to avoid putting too much in a single post due to its incredible length.

[Ninmast]

The Civil War
The Bloodiest War Ever To Be Fought On American Soil



Entry 1



On this day of the trip, we will be visiting Antiem. This creek was the location of the single bloodiest day of the Civil War.

In September of 1862, Confederate General Robert E. Lee led 45,000 troops into Maryland. Lee planned to attack Washington D. C. from the north in an effort to destroy Northern Morale. Instead of advancing in one large group, he split his army into two forces. General George McClellan, who was ordered to protect Washington D. C. by staying between Lee and the capitol, rushed frantically to keep Lee out of the capitol.

Discovering Lee’s Plans, General McClellan attacked him on September 17, 1862, at Antiem Creek, near Sharpsburg, Maryland. By the end of the day, McClellan had forced Lee to retreat back into Virginia. Lee’s Confederate troops suffered 11,000 casualties, but McClellan lost even more, and did not have enough forces to pursue Lee and finish him.



Entry 2



On this day of our trip, we will be visiting New Orleans, Louisiana.

Today, New Orleans is known for wild parties and drinking during Marti Gras. Few people, however, seem to remember New Orleans’ role in the Civil War. In April of 1862, in an effort to gain control of the Mississippi River, Union Flag Officer David Farragut received the order to capture New Orleans. To reach New Orleans, however, Farragut had to move twenty-four large warships up the river past two Confederate forts. Farragut attempted to simply destroy the forts and move on. However, he was unable to do so. Giving up on that method, he decided to lead his warships under the cover of darkness. Unfortunately, Nature, herself, was against him that night, as, when the maneuver began, the clouds broke and the moon rose. Seeing the ships trying to pass by them, the Confederates opened fire. After an hour and a half of fire fighting, twenty of the twenty-four ships made it past the forts, and New Orleans fell to Farragut without firing a single shot.




Entry 3



On this day of our trip, we will be visiting Richmond, Virginia.

During the Civil War, it was the site of the final showdown between Union General Ulysses S. Grant and Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

In March of 1865, Grant had finally cornered Lee in Richmond and was squeezing in on him like one might squeeze the juice from an orange. The long chess match between the two ingenious generals was finally coming to an end.

Lee, realizing that he was facing Checkmate, informed Confederate President Davis that he was unable to hold Richmond, the Confederate capitol.

Of course, when General Robert E. Lee says that something cannot be done, you believe him. The Confederate government fled south and Lee’s army evacuated the city. Only days later, Grant cut Lee off again before he could reunite with other armies.

Grant urged Lee to surrender before anyone else was killed. On April 9, 1865, the two men met at the Appotmattox Court House.

Grant let the Southern soldiers go home. He let the officers keep their pistols as long as they were their own property, and he let all of the men keep their horses. In addition to this very generous offer, he gave Lee and his troops food to ease their stomachs, as they had been eating little or nothing since the abandonment of Richmond. The bloodiest war ever to be fought on American soil had finally come to an end.




Civil War Unit Summary



Dredd Scott was a slave who was taken into territory closed to slavery by the Missouri Compromise by a former master, and brought back to Missouri again. Scott spent more than ten years suing for his freedom afterward, saying that living in a territory where slavery was outlawed made him a free man. On March 6, 1857, however, Chief Justice Roger Taney delivered the ruling that it didn’t matter if Scott was right or not. This was because he was a black man, and black men did not have the right to sue in a Federal court.

This decision did nothing to settle the slavery dispute. In fact, if it did anything, it made it worse. Northerners, especially Republicans, opposed the decision. If it was allowed to stand, the Republican party would cease to exist, because the basic principle of the Republicans, the belief that slavery should be kept out of the territories, had been declared unconstitutional. Southerners, on the other hand, insisted that the North abide by this decision, otherwise, they threatened, they would secede from the Union.

As the election of 1860 approached, the political parties once again split over the issue of slavery. Northern Democrats backed popular sovereignty. Southern Democrats backed the Dredd Scott decision. The Constitutional Union party avoided slavery completely. All of the divisions left the Republican party free to take the election, making Abraham Lincoln President. The South took this as a sign that the abolitionists were gaining too much power, and began to secede. By the time Lincoln reached Washington D. C., only eight slave states were left in the Union.

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861, when Southern troops attacked Fort Sumter, a federally controlled military post in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina. The war was fought across the continent from Southern Pennsylvania in the Northeast to New Mexico in the Southwest. Close to 3 million soldiers fought on both sides of the war.

This five-year war was the end of many things that were typical of war, such as muzzle-loading rifles, horse cavalry, and chivalrous respect for the enemy. By the same token, however, it was the beginning of things that would change the face of war forever. Railroads allowed for faster transportation of supplies. Ironclad ships turned the tide of battle on the seas, and observation balloons provided a different method of reconnaissance. The Civil War also saw the introduction of Conscription, the drafting of men for military service. It became the world’s first major total war, in which civilians as well as soldiers were directly affected. It would end in the reuniting of a nation, the freedom of an entire race, and the assassination of a great man that cared for his country and did everything in his power to strive for peace.

[Ninmast]

Westward Expansion
The Beginning of Manifest Destiny


Entry 4


On this day of our trip, we will be visiting Chimney Rock. Chimney Rock served as a landmark for travelers traveling along the Oregon Trail. The Oregon Trail played a very important part in the opening of the American West to settlement. Established around 1840, the trail connected the edge of the frontier at Independence, Missouri with the unsettled, rich frontier farmland of the Willamett River Valley in Oregon.

Traveling along the trail tested the resolve and endurance of thousands of Americans seeking new opportunities in new lands. The trip of over 2,000 miles took normally 6 months to complete and proved fatal to many of the travelers. Hardships included everything from springtime blizzards to countless days of over 100-degree summer temperatures. Travelling through wilderness lands, the emigrants had to contend with hostile Native Americans, shortages of food and supplies, fatigue and illness.

History has shown that the Oregon Trail was a key event that led up to further settlement of the West. Information collected by the emigrants helped many successive waves of emigrants on later journeys. The travelers who braved this adventure demonstrated an American ideal to take risks in an effort to better oneself and to make the further brighter for posterity.


Entry 5


On this day of our trip, we travel by train to Promontory Point, Utah, and the far end of the first transcontinental railroad.

Building railroads in the West went at a furious pace during the Civil War. The most dramatic achievement was the first transcontinental line in 1869.

At least 10 routes were surveyed during the 1950s, and Congress made the Gadsden Purchase from Mexico to provide land to build on. At first, however, sectional rivalry caused delays. Both sides wanted the eastern terminal to be located on their side of the country. The South wanted it at New Orleans, but the North wanted St. Louis or Chicago. In 1862, however, when the South was temporarily refused representation in government, Congress passed an act to encourage the building of a Pacific Railroad.

They hired two companies: The Union Pacific Company, and the Central Pacific Company. The U. P. C. was to build west from Omaha, while the C. P. C. was to run lines east from Sacramento. They received $16,000-$48,000 per mile, according to the terrain, and land grants averaging 640 acres per mile.

On May 10, 1869, the “wedding of the rails” took place at Promontory Point, Utah. The whole country celebrated as a transcontinental telegraph reported the blow of a silver sledgehammer driving a golden spike to complete the railroad.




Westward Expansion Unit Summary



The entire drive of the Westward Expansion movement was based on the ideal of Manifest Destiny. This is the idea that it was the destiny of the United States to stretch “from sea to shining sea.” This ideal was influenced by the decrease in available farmland and property on the East coast.

The people sat in their crowded cities, moaning and complaining about the lack of enough room to so much as lift their own elbows. Then, one day, one of those people stood up and looked to the West, and saw all of the land stretching as far as the eye could see, with not a person on it besides the Native Americans. That person gathered his family together, packed all of his belongings, and went out into the West. Other people followed the first traveler’s insight, and they left, as well. They went for the wide, open plains, and for the rich farmland the frontier had to offer.

Space wasn’t the only motivation for migration. Another factor that encouraged settlement in the West was simple greed. Greed fueled by the discovery of gold, silver, and other precious metals on the Western coast.

There were many trails created in the wake of millions of feet and thousands of wheels traveling from one side of the continent to the other. Most were minor ones from people who just started walking. Others were well traveled indeed, and will probably remain visible long after their meaning fades into the mists of time.

One such trail, and perhaps the most famous of all of the trails that went West, is the Oregon Trail that ran from Independence, Missouri to the Willamett River Valley in Oregon. The Oregon Trail was traveled so often and by so many people that it can be seen from orbit in outer space.

Of course, trails weren’t the only way to travel. During and after the Civil War, railroads carried people and cargo across the United States in a relative fraction of the time it took to take the trail, and with much more safety and comfort.

As great as these advancements were, they had very negative impacts on the local wildlife and the Native Americans. When the settlers first started traveling West, they basically took whatever land they wanted, without regard to Native American claims to the land. When the Native Americans found themselves suddenly forced from land that they had lived on for centuries, it is no wonder that they became violent and tried to chase the settlers away.

When the railroads came, it got even worse. At first, due to a shortage of their own food, workers hunted the buffalo that the Native American nomads used for food. Then, when the railroads were complete, rich people hunted them for sport. Soon, it was discovered that their fur coats made a valuable trading item. At their lowest point before measures were taken to stop the endless butchering, it was estimated that there were only a few hundred buffalo left in the Canadian forests.

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Overseas Expansion and Imperialism
Manifest Destiny takes on a new and larger meaning



Entry 6



On this day of our trip, we will be going to the Yukon in Alaska. A cold, barren, and desolate place, it is inhabitable only by polar bears, white wolves, and humans that are brave, stubborn, or just plain stupid enough to stay there.

This underdeveloped territory was originally held by Russia. Although, because Alaska was almost a frozen wasteland and produced nothing of value, the czar saw no reason in keeping it.

In 1867, the Russian minister to the United States told Secretary of State William H. Seward that the czar wanted to sell Alaska. Seward, who believed in Manifest Destiny, and envisioned a great empire, and wanted to annex Canada, Hawaii, and several Caribbean islands, jumped at this opportunity to add Alaska to America. In a few hours, Seward arranged a treaty in which America would buy the land, which was twice the size of Texas, for a paltry $7,200,000, coming out to less than 2 cents an acre. After four months of selling the idea to Congress, the transaction was completed, unwittingly giving America one of the largest sources of oil in the world.



Entry 7



On this day of our trip, we travel to the land that is the polar opposite of the polar land of Alaska. Today, we travel to a land synchronous with flower necklaces, coconut drinks, and little umbrellas on toothpicks. Today, we travel to Hawaii.

American missionaries and traders first ventured to Hawaii in the early 1800s. When the land was found to be rich and fertile, American sugar growers followed. By the 1890s, Hawaii was closely tied to America through commerce and the many Americans living there. By this time, however, Hawaii had no power in its government. American businesses controlled everything. Hawaiian rulers couldn’t even swallow without the permission of the American Business Community. That is, until the Hawaiian Queen Liliuokalani came to power in 1891, and was determined to return control to her people. In response, some American business owners, with the assistance of Marines from the Cruiser Boston, took over the government. President Cleveland, however, deciding that such actions were against national honesty, withdrew American troops from Hawaii, and tried, but failed, to put Liliuokalani back on her throne.



Overseas Expansion and Imperialism Unit Review



In the middle of the 1800s, the standard idea of Manifest Destiny was expanded to include land outside the present territory of the United States. It developed into the belief that the United States should be a great empire covering the entire continent, as well as the surrounding islands. This was encouraged by a developing sense of Imperialism, or the policy of establishing colonies and building empires. This, in turn, developed in a large part in response to the writings of Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan.

Mahan believed that all nations should strive to be the greatest sea power, and a nation could not be a true sea power without colonizing land outside of its country because a true sea power needed remote sources of supplies for its ships, since large amounts of supplies could not be carried for an entire voyage. While commercial shipping required these supply stations, an armed navy needed them even more. The most important supplies, according to Mahan, were, “first, fuel; second, ammunition; last of all, food.”

As nations switched from sail to steam power at the turn of the century, the need for fuel became inescapable. No steam-powered ship could travel very far away from its home port without refueling. A fleet that wanted to trade or fight very far beyond its home waters needed coaling stations in distant lands.

Despite how this might sound, Mahan did not favor unchecked expansionism. Too many supply and fueling bases in foreign lands, he warned, could drain the resources of the parent country and could become “a source of weakness, multiplying exposed points, and entailing division of force.”

The United States had made some great advancements earlier in the century. One of these was the development of ironclad ships during the Civil War. However, after the war, the United States saw no reason to continue to build up its navy, and allowed its navy to deteriorate.

Mahan’s ideas provided a real motivation to change. Influenced by Mahan’s concepts, Congress passed the Naval Act of 1890, which set aside additional money for battleships. By 1900, the United States had the naval power it needed to back up an expanded role in foreign affairs.

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World War I and the 1920s
The War to End All Wars



Entry 8



On this day of our tour, we will be visiting Columbus, New Mexico. This city was the location of a Mexican raid that rose tensions between the United States and Mexico that eventually led to our involvement in World War I.

In the 1880s, Porfirio Diaz rose to power in Mexico as a dictator. He brought stability to the nation’s economic development, as well as encouraged foreign investment. However, when he was overthrown in 1991, Mexico entered a period of political chaos that put Francisco Madero in power.

Investors, however, feared that Madero would not allow foreign development, and, collaborating with the Mexican army, overthrew Madero. By the time President Woodrow Wilson took office in 1913, General Victoriano Huerta had seized power, and Madero had been murdered, and most people presumed it was on Huerta’s orders.

While American capitalists and other countries with large investments in Mexico supported Huerta because they believed that he would support their business interests, Wilson refused to recognize the new government because he was convinced that he would be overthrown.

When Huerta remained in power, as well as in popular favor, Wilson looked for a reason to intervene. When American sailors on shore leave in Tampico clashed with Mexican authorities in April 1914, Wilson saw his chance and sent marines to seize the Mexican port of Veracruz. Despite popular opposition, he continued to intervene, and with the support of the ABC powers, replaced Huerta with Venustiano Carranza.

Mexican forces opposed to Carranza conducted raids into the United States. Led by Pancho Villa, guerrillas burned the town of Columbus, New Mexico, killing 18 Americans. Wilson sent 6,000 troops across the border to find and capture Villa, but failed to find him. Tension finally eased in January 1917 when Wilson recalled the troops out of concern about the war in Europe.

Entry 9

On this day of our tour, we will be going to Seattle, Washington. High prices in postwar America caused many workers to go on strike.

In January 1919, only 2 months after the armistice, 35,000 shipyard workers went on strike in an attempt to force employers to raise their wages. The next month, union workers in all of Seattle’s industries walked off of their jobs in support of the shipyard strikers. Many city residents viewed the strike as revolutionary. They responded by hoarding food and fuel and by purchasing guns. Seattle’s mayor blamed the situation on dangerous radicals and after 5 days used the state militia to bread the strike.



World War I and the 1920s Unit Review



In 1913, President Woodrow Wilson was an idealist who believed in fair play, wanting the United States to stop using military force and economic pressure as a tool of foreign policy. However, when he didn’t like Mexican’s ruler, Wilson sent troops in and forced him out, replacing him with someone that he did like. By the time the War began in Europe, he had ended up imitating his Republican predecessors by sending American troops into the Caribbean. Latin Americans came to resent his “moral imperialism” as much as Theodore Roosevelt’s “Big Stick.”

When World War I erupted in Europe in 1914, the United States declared neutrality. However, British and French propaganda, American business interests, and unrelenting German submarine warfare persuaded Americans to side with the Allies, breaking their long-standing friendship with Germany.

An apparent conspiracy between Mexico and Germany against the United States and the sinking of four American merchant ships ended American neutrality. Congress declared war on Germany in April of 1917, while promising and reassuring the German people that their war was against the leaders of Germany, and not the people.

The Allies, however, did not expect the United States to participate in combat because, in the spring of 1917, American forces numbered only 200,000, and the army possessed only 1,500 machine guns, 55 obsolete airplanes, and no heavy artillery.

Even though they were completely and utterly unprepared for war, Americans mobilized the United States into a formidable war machine at an incredible speed. The production of armaments became a tip priority. The government agencies such as the War Industries Board reorganized the economy to meet this priority. The draft was reinstated and propaganda was produced to influence public opinion. The government raised money for the war effort through raising taxes and selling bonds.

On July 4, symbolically recalling the American-French partnership during the
American Revolution, Colonel Charles E. Stanton stood at the tomb of France’s great war hero, Marquis de Lafayette, and said, “Lafayette, we are here.” More than 2 million American soldiers comprising 42 infantry divisions reached France before the war ended. This vast new reservoir of military strength was an important factor in the Allied victory.

When the balance of the war tipped in favor of the Allies, an armistice was signed in November 1918. The Allies rejected most of President Wilson’s peace plan because, while Wilson’s plan wanted to preserve peace, the Allies wanted to take German land and make the Germans suffer as miserably as possible.

After the war, however, shifting the economy from war machine to peacetime producer was difficult, and the economy couldn’t support it. For a time, the United States experienced economic and social unrest, punctuated by strikes and race riots.

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The Great Depression
Want in the Land of Plenty



Entry 10



On this day of our tour, we will be visiting the Naugatuck Valley region of Connecticut, known as the “Brass Valley,” as it was one of the largest sources of brass in the nation.

Once started in the early 1920s, the Great Depression took on a momentum of its own. Individuals with mortgages on their homes, who had bought cars and other products on credit and who had purchased stocks on margin, “lost their shirts.” They stopped buying a lot of the luxuries that they had been buying beforehand. For example, they stopped buying radios, causing radio manufacturers to close down plants or run them only part-time. Thousands of workers were laid off in other lines of works as orders were canceled for copper, wood, cabinets, and glass radio tubes. Montana copper miners, Minnesota lumberjacks, and Ohio glassworkers in turn lost their jobs.

Because these jobless workers could not meet mortgage payments or repay loans, they lost their property. Banks that had lent them money failed, wiping out the savings of their own customers. Such chain reactions closed down more and more factories, drove more and more firms into bankruptcy, and put more and more Americans out of work.


Entry 11


On this day of our tour, we return to the city of Seattle, Washington, just one city of millions that had “Hoovervilles” on the outskirts of the city during the Great Depression.

Throughout the nation, families who could not pay their rent or make their mortgage payments were evicted from their homes. Some moved in with relatives if they could, but the less fortunate, however, ended up in makeshift communities dubbed “Hoovervilles.” These were miniature cities where all of the “houses” were literally thrown together with whatever they could get their hands on. A whole family might live in a piano box, or in the rusted body of an old car.

People who were even less fortunate slept in doorways or on park benches. Desperate men dug around in trashcans to try to find food with which to feed their families.

Many jobless Americans banded together in hunger riots, smashing into grocery stores and grabbing whatever food they could carry. Begging increased greatly, and the song, “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” became a bitter reminder to veterans who remembered fighting a war to protect American values and democracy.



The Great Depression Unit Summary



On September 5, 1929, economist Roger Babson predicted that, “sooner or later, a crash is coming . . . factories will be shut down . . . men will be thrown out of work . . . the result will be a serious business depression.” However, most analysts assured Americans that the stock market was healthy and thriving.

In the late 1920s, the value of stocks on the New York Stock Exchange climbed to dizzying heights. To take advantage of the boom, investors borrowed money to buy stocks, a practice known as buying on margin.

In other words, speculators were using their own money to make a relatively small down payment, usually about 10% of the total price, on the stock and borrowing the remainder of the purchase price from a stockbroker. The broker in turn borrowed the money lent to the speculator from a bank.

The 1920s seemed to be a period of never ending prosperity. The values of common stock had been increasing steadily year after staggering year. In 1926, more than 450 million shares of stock were traded on the New York Stock Exchange. In 1927, the total rose to more than 570 million. Speculators believed that they could make a quick profit in the market. Bankers knew they could make money by lending to brokers. Brokers knew they could come out ahead by lending to customers. Everyone, it seemed , was trying to get rich quick.

The boom could last only as long as investors added money to the pool. By 1929, everyone with money to invest had bought into the market, and it ran out of new customers. Prices stopped rising. People sold shares to pay the interest on their loans. As shares ere sold, prices fell. Panicked investors tried to minimize their losses.

On October 29, 1929, less than two months after Babson’s prediction, the market crashed. The crash was the final symptom, not the cause, of the Great Depression.

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World War II
The Second War to Cover the World



Entry 12



On this day of our tour, we will be visiting Pearl Harbor. This was the location of the first direct attack on American soil since the Civil War. It was the motivation the United States needed to enter the war.

On November 20, 1941, negotiations between Japan and the United States were opened in Washington, D. C. Representing the United States was Secretary of State Cordell Hull. Ambassador Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura and special envoy Saburo Kurusu represented Japan.

When negotiations remained in a stalemate, however, Roosevelt realized that war was inevitable. On December 6, the President appealed for peace directly to Japan’s Emperor Hirohito. American officials did not know that, on November 26, a Japanese fleet had put to sea, headed for the United States’ main navel base in the Pacific, Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

With little warning, Japanese bombers attacked the American fleet based at Pearl Harbor. Shortly after noon on Sunday, December 7, 1941, President Roosevelt had just finished lunch when he received an urgent telephone call from Frank Knox, the secretary of the navy. The secretary had just received a wire from Hawaii: “Air Raid on Pearl Harbor. This is no Drill.”

In 2 hours, Japanese planes sank many vessels, including 5 battleships and 3 destroyers, and heavily damaged many others. The attack also destroyed about 250 airplanes, and about 4,500 people were killed or wounded. Only the fleet’s aircraft carriers, out of the harbor on maneuvers, escaped the devastation.



Entry 13



On this day of our tour, we will be visiting Warm Springs, Georgia. This is the city in which President Franklin D. Roosevelt died.

When he reported to Congress on his Yalta trip, Roosevelt looked tired and pale. Two months later, on April 12, 1945, the President died suddenly at Warm Springs, Georgia. The nation he had led for more than 12 years was shocked, and newspapers that printed daily lists of soldiers and sailors who had died in action added the name: “Roosevelt, Franklin D., Commander in Chief.”





World War II Unit Summary



During Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first and second administrations, the Good Neighbor policy committed the United States to a policy of nonintervention in Latin America. In Europe, F. D. R. recognized the Soviet Union and sought to maintain neutral relations with other nations.

When war in Europe broke out in 1939, German victories prompted the United States to aid the Allied nations of Britain and France. In 1941, after Japanese planes bombed Pearl Harbor, the United States declared war on Japan and Germany. For the second time in 25 years, the American economy converted to war production and transformed the nation’s way of life.

By the time an ailing Roosevelt was reelected to a fourth term, Germany and Japan had suffered major defeats on all fronts. Germany surrendered in May of 1945. Japan surrendered after American planes dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Before the war ended, the United Nations formed in hopes of maintaining international peace and cooperation.

Now for more on the atomic bomb. Rumors that the Nazis might develop an atomic bomb spurred American and British efforts to build one. Scientist Albert Einstein wrote President Roosevelt urging that a major research program begin at once so that the nation would be the first with the bomb.

The secret project, later called the Manhattan Project, was carried out mostly in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and Los Alamos, New Mexico. American Physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer was the director, and he persuaded many top physicists to join the project. On July 16, 1945, the bomb was tested atop a steel tower in a lonely desert track at Alamogordo, New Mexico, aptly named Jornada del Muerto, or Journey of Death.

President Truman did not know the bomb existed until a few weeks before his decision to use it. Truman, who had taken office after President Roosevelt’s death on April 12, received word of the test results in Potsdam, Germany, where he was in conference with Churchill, Stalin, and their top advisers. Roosevelt had told Churchill about the bomb. Although some historians disagree about why atomic bombs were dropped on Japan, and about the ethical issues involved, President Truman believed the bombing was Justified. He said in their defense, “The dropping of the bombs stopped the war, and saved millions of lives.”

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The Cold War
A War of Words and Scares



Entry 14



On this day of our tour, we will be visiting San Francisco, California. This was the location at which Japan accepted Western reforms and gained back its independence.

In July 1945, shortly before the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the leaders of Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union met in Potsdam, near Berlin. They discussed how they would deal with Germany and Japan after the war.

This agreement provided for Japanese militarists to be punished and for Japan, itself, to be disarmed and its government to be split up to their home islands. Also, the Japanese were to be reeducated so a democratic Japanese nation could be formed. American troops would occupy Japan until these aims were accomplished. To carry out this Potsdam Declaration, General Douglas MacArthur was named Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers.

Under MacArthur’s leadership, Japan’s military was dismantled. Under American direction, a new constitution provided for elected representative government and woman suffrage.

MacArthur encouraged economic opportunity and trade unionism, and he attempted to redistribute large rural tracts to landless Japanese. A reorganized school system taught democratic values. Japan received nearly 2 billion dollars in aid. The Japanese people accepted the reforms. In a treaty signed in San Francisco in 1951, the country gained back its independence. Japan achieved a remarkable recovery, eventually establishing itself as the leading economy of Asia.


Entry 15


On this day of the tour, we will be visiting Detroit, Michigan. This city was one of many Northern cities that saw a dramatic increase in African American population from 1910 to 1950.

African Americans moved in search of greater economic opportunity and a better life than the drought, boll weevils, racism, and poverty they were accustomed to in the South. This trend was so popular that, at one point, Detroit alone saw an increase of over 600 percent.

Although actual gains were limited by racial prejudice, they were better than they were in the South, and African Americans acquired a political voice. Their migration forever changed the face of American politics and society.



The Cold War Unit Review



After World War II, the Soviet Union drew an “iron curtain” between Eastern Europe and the rest of the world. An intense war of words, rivalry, and confrontation soon developed between the West and the Soviet Union. Suddenly, one of our greatest allies during the second World War had become one of the greatest threats to democratic freedom in the world. This battle of wits was termed “The Cold War” by newspaper columnist Walter Lippmann as the title of his book that argued that it would be impossible for the United States to contain the Soviet Union everywhere. Such a policy, he said, would require the United States to defend all anticommunist governments, no matter how repressive or unpopular they might be. The title of his book was meant to refer to a state of war that did not involve actual bloodshed. However, it came to be used by everyone, including the President, to describe the icy rivalry that existed between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Western fear that communism would spread led to a policy of containment. The Marshall Plan also gave massive economic aid to war-torn Western Europe. The United States, Canada, and nations of Western Europe established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, otherwise known as NATO, in an effort to provide a combined offensive against any threat to any member nation. Essentially, any attack against any nation was considered an attack against them all. In response to the united Western European and American organization, the Eastern European communist countries responded with the Warsaw Pact, which was basically the same thing as NATO, only with Eastern European members.

Meanwhile, the Cold War spread into Asia. In 1949, Mao Zedong established a communist government in China, despite American efforts to prevent it. In Korea, Americans fought a “hot war” to stop a communist takeover of the peninsula.

At home, the Truman administration pushed for economic and social reform. Inflation was rising, and labor resorted to strikes to increase wages. Fear generated by the cold war led to a search for communists in the federal government.

In the early 1950s, the country began a long period of economic prosperity, accented by new technologies such as the television and the computer and new medicines such as vaccines for polio, and cures for pneumonia, tuberculosis, and diphtheria. Life expectancy in the United States increased. While cancer and heart disease continued to be serious threats to the lives of Americans, researchers made important advances in diagnosing and treating these diseases. The growing economy created millions of new jobs. Encouraged by their new economic strength, African Americans began to lobby for their civil rights.

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The Vietnam Era and the 1960s
A Despised War



Entry 16



On this day of our tour, we are going to visit an I-Max theatre in Tennessee to watch the J. F. K. Conspiracy theory. We will learn more about J. F. K. and why most people think he was assassinated. We will also learn what brought about the conspiracy of J. F. K.

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s aims in foreign policy were much like those of Truman and Eisenhower. People didn’t believe in their ways. John F. Kennedy had one major concern, and that was the threat of communism. He had declared that he would not relax efforts to contain it. This was one of the reasons starting the conspiracy towards J. F. K.

Some people believe that the CIA had a part in this. The CIA also that an invasion of Cuba by these exiles would touch off a popular uprising against Castro. The Castro movement was known as “Fidelismo.”

When we see the movie, you will understand more. You will also be able to come up with your own theory.



Entry 17




On this day of our tour, we will visit “The Wall.” This “Wall” is for fallen heroes of the Vietnam war. While we are in Washington D.C., we will also see statues of these fallen heroes.

In setting United States policy in Vietnam, both Kennedy and Johnson were torn between a want to limit involvement of America in a country almost half way around the world, and fear of communists victory that would swallow up all of Southeast Asia.

During the Kennedy years, the Soviet Union gave us support to ears of National liberation. The wars of National Liberation were wars to free a nation from the control of another country. They took place in many economically developing nations.

Kennedy took office in 1961. When he did, the Southeast Asian nation of Laos was in danger of falling to Communist Guerilla forces.

When worst came to worst, Kennedy avoided war.






The Vietnam Era and the 1960s Unit Review



One hot spot for fighting during the Cold War was Vietnam, a former French colony in Southeast Asia. It had been spit into two governments. North Vietnam was controlled by the communist government of Ho Chi Minh. South Vietnam was controlled by a noncommunist government supported first by France and then by the United States.

Kennedy’s Vietnam policy was complicated because the leader of South Vietnam’s government, Ngo Dinh Diem, was a corrupt and unpopular dictator, a French-educated, upper-middle-class Catholic who ruled a largely Buddhist country. Needless to say, middle- and lower class Buddhists didn’t trust either Diem or the West.

By the time President Johnson entered the White House, South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem had just been assassinated. Within three months, another revolution took place in South Vietnam. This was followed by a series of governments, as one military faction after another gained power and was overthrown in South Vietnam.

In an effort to stop North Vietnam, Johnson reported that North Vietnamese torpedo boats fired on two American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin on August 2 and 4, 1964. Calling these attacks unprovoked, he asked Congress for authorization to bomb North Vietnam.

On August 7, the Senate and House quickly passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing the President to “take all necessary steps, including the use of armed force” to prevent further aggression. To put it simply, Congress, with only two dissenting votes, handed its war powers over to the President.

Johnson, however, had kept important information from Congress. The two American destroyers had been assisting the South Vietnamese military in conducting electronic spying on North Vietnam. It was unclear whether the ships had been attacked. Furthermore, Johnson did not reveal that a draft of the resolution had been prepared three months before the attack, in case such an event occurred.

At the end of 1967, General William Westmoreland, American commander in Vietnam, had assured the country that the end of the war was in sight. American forces expanded the “search and destroy” missions. American bombers destroyed North Vietnamese factories, roads, bridges, and cities. Secretary of State Dean Rusk said the enemy “was hurting very badly.”

Despite such optimistic remarks, January 30, 1968 marked a turning point in the war. The supposedly exhausted communist guerrillas abruptly launched major offensive strikes. Early that morning, a handful of Vietcong soldiers attacked the United States Embassy in Saigon, the very center of American power in South Vietnam. Together, the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese then launched massive attacks on all United States bases in South Vietnam and on most of South Vietnam’s major cities and provincial capitals. Taken by surprise, the Americans and South Vietnamese took heavy losses, but managed to drive the communists back, and on April 3, 1968, North Vietnam accepted Johnson’s offer to begin peace negotiations. The Vietnam War was over.

[Ninmast]

Current History
What’s Happening in your life?



Entry 18



On this day of our trip we will be visiting Ground Zero. Ground Zero is the place where the World Trade Center buildings once stood. Ground Zero now serves as a “shrine” or memorial for the everyday heroes who had their lives taken by a cowardly group of terrorists. This day is known as 9-11.

On a very normal morning, families around the country were getting ready for work and school, much like any other day. Then, reports of a commercial jet flying very low came in. Home videos caught the first plane crashing into the first World Trade Center building. People and debris went flying. Fire fighters from all over New York City came to the rescue.

This horrifying day, we lost policemen, mothers, daughters, fathers, sisters, brothers, and sons. Families watched in horror as the second commercial jet came crashing into the other building. Devastatingly so, more precious lives were taken due to the cowardly acts of terrorism.

These acts of hatred have changed the United States and all of its loyal citizens. It has brought everyone closer together, and it has taught us how to love one another. Even though it has been a year since 9-11, the wounds have yet to heal, and when they do, they will undoubtedly form scars. May those scars not cause our hearts to be hardened, but for our eyes to be opened. Let us not become comfortable and reassured in our own power and glory. God has blessed us with great things, but they are things that the world will try to take from us. If we become too self confident, we will lose everything we have worked for 226 years to earn, but if we will rest in God’s arms, and rely on him as we did in the beginning, then we will have nothing to fear. There will be no force in the world that will be able to touch us. After all, “If God is for us, who, then, can be against us?”

Let us remember those who gave their lives for their brothers and sisters. Let us remember the pain of this tragedy, not in sorrow, but in vigilance. Let us remember to always stay alert. Let us be once again like the snake on the colonists’ flags. Let us forever stay on the lookout for the inevitable threats that come from countries who would take the gift that God has given us.

As impossible a task as this must seem, it may very well be beyond our capabilities, but if we go back to God, who gave us such great gifts in the first place, we will find that we are able to do all things through Christ, who strengthens us. With the power of God on our side, we can once again be able to say to the world, “Don’t Tread On Me!” Without Him, we will continue to be the target of endless assaults from the Enemy who wants to destroy us. May our paths side with God’s always.






Current History Unit Review



A very intelligent History teacher once said that History is exactly that – His Story. It is the story of Man, from his days wandering the frozen wasteland of the last Ice Age to his present day achievements in technology and medicine. But it is more than just facts, dates, and places. It is the people who were there, who took a stand, or didn’t, and changed the face of the world forever. Some were mere grains of sand, and some were meteors, but all have had an effect on history.

Some might say that rapists are a relatively small thing when it comes to history, and, overall, they are. However, these same “small fries” have also caused women to be more careful when they are by themselves, and have caused parents to keep a close eye on their kids. This is just one example of small things having large effects on society. There are people all throughout history that did very small things, but produced large effects.

However, the things that society remembers is the big things. We don’t remember how Theodore Roosevelt couldn’t bring himself to shoot two bear cubs, therefore inspiring a toy maker to design the first “Teddy Bear.” We don’t remember how George Washington used wooden dentures. But we do remember Theodore Roosevelt’s role in the Great Depression and George Washington’s role in the Revolutionary War.

What concerns me is that the important things that have happened in our time will remain the same way. Will we only remember that Usama Bin Laden ordered his men to fly into the World Trade Center, and that George W. Bush immediately sent out troops to hunt him down to make him pay for what he did? Or will we remember the police officers, fire fighters, and countless civilians who perished trying to save the lives of others? As this assignment, appropriately dubbed, “The Longest Assignment in the History of the World,” comes to a close, I feel that I must throw off the act that the assignment has placed on me, and profess my worries in all of the seriousness that they entail.

I fear that such important events, like other such events in history, will fade, and lose their significance to humankind. My greatest fear is not death, poverty, or shame. My greatest fear is that some day, maybe 10, 100, or even 1,000 years from now, some kid will be sitting in front of his computer, or whatever they have in its place by that time, doing an assignment just like this, or at least very similar. I fear that, when he gets to the time period called, “The Turn of the New Millenium,” he will write about such events as the Oklahoma City Bombing and 9-11, but he will review them emotionlessly. I fear that he will write a dry, boring essay about it, complaining about the assignment, just as we do today. I fear that he will not know the pain that such events cause, pain that I, myself, am just now coming enough out of shock to recognize. I fear that the pain, sorrow, pride, honor, dignity, and the lessons that they taught will be lost to him. I fear that they will be lost in the mists of time forever, never to be recovered, and forced to be learned again, perhaps the next time at a much steeper price. May such terrors as we have already faced in our history, in Man’s Story, never have to be relived again.