March 15

March 15 is the 15 day in March.

Events

44 BCE — Roman strongman Julius Caesar assassinated. Author of Commentaries on the Gallic War.

1649 — England: John Milton appointed Secretary of Foreign Tongues by the new Commonwealth government. [1]

1723 — One of the important German lyric poets of the period, Johann Christian Günther dies in Jena, Germany.

1810 — Aernout Drost, Dutch writer whose historical novels are the first important works of the 19th-century Romantic movement in The Netherlands, lives, Amsterdam. His first novel, Hermingard van de Eikenterpen ("Hermingard of the Oak Burial Mounds," 1832), portray the conversion of a Germanic woman to Christianity in 4th-century Holland.

1812 — England: Luddites attack Mr Vickermanʼs establishment, Taylor Hill, Huddersfield destroyed.

1820 — In his journal Lord Byron calls John Keats, "A tadpole of the Lakes."

1830 — France: Radical geographer, anarchist, Élisée Reclus lives (1830 — 1905), Sainte-Fay-la-Grande. alt; Élisée Reclus, Elisee Recluse; Reclus, Elisée

1830 — Paul von Heyse (1830 — 1914) lives. German writer, who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1910. Head of the Munich circle of writers, who refused to portray the realistic side of life. [2]

1834 — At age 24 (exactly), Aernout Drost, Dutch writer of historical novels, dies in Amsterdam. His posthumously published works include Schetsen en verhalen ("Sketches and Stories," 1835).

1844 — England: Lord Ashley introduces Ten Hours' Bill into House of Commons.

1869 — First federal womenʼs suffrage amendment ever introduced in US Congress.

1873 — Italy: The Italian Congress of the International meets, Bologna.

1874 — France assumes 'protectorate' over Annam (Vietnam).

1877 — Ben Fletcher lives. Black Industrial Workers of the World organizer of longshore locals in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1887 — Painter's International Union formed.

1891 — Italy: Aldino Felicani (1891 — 1967) lives, Tuscany. Italian-American anarchist, typographer, editor, and publisher ("Rompez les rangs," "Libertarian Youth," "The Social Question," "l'Agitazione," "The Lantern" and, until his death, "Controcorrente / Countercurrent").

1894 — France: Belgian anarchist Jean Pauwels dies while attempting to blow up the Madeleinechurch in Paris. His bomb exploded prematurely. Pauwels is also suspected of being responsible for the explosions of February 19 on rue Saint Jacques and rue du Faubourg Saint Martin, using bombs made by Emile Henry.

1897 — United States of America: First indoor fly casting tournament opens, at Madison Square Garden. [3] [4]

1898 — United States of America: Mid-March, Emma Goldman (still on her speaking tour of February—June, addressing 66 meetings) delivers three lectures in Cleveland, including a well-attended meeting of the Franklin Club. (Also, just weeks before his death on March 31, Emma visits the ailing Robert Reitzel in Detroit.)

1900 — Writer, sociologist, and leader of the Northeastern School, Brazilian Gilberto de Mello Freyre lives, Recife. His best known work is Casa-grande e senzala (The Masters and the Slaves, 1933), depicting the relationship between Brazilʼs Portuguese colonizers and their African slaves. [5]

1908 — Spain: José Peirats lives (1908 — 1989), Vall d'Uxó, Castellón. Wrote Anarchists in the Spanish Revolution and other books on Spain. [6] [7] [8]

1911 — Russia: Skriabinʼs The Poem of Fire performed at the Bolshoi.

1914 — Matti Kuusi (1914 — 1998) lives. Finnish folklorist, writer, professor. Works include collection of poems, memoirs, studies of Kalevala, African popular tradition and other folk poetry.

1914 — United States of America: Emma Goldman, in Yiddish, among speakers at an afternoon celebration of the ninth anniversary of the publication of Mother Earth and a commemoration of the Paris Commune; other speakers include Alexander Berkman, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Harry Kelly.

1916 — United States of America: Calvary mounts its moral high-horse once again, gallops into Mexico in pursuit of the ever-elusive Pancho Villa. "Black Jack" Pershingʼs Punitive "Expedition" is bogged down within five weeks due to Mexican hatred for the beloved gringo invaders, unfriendly terrain, etc. Pershing publicly proclaims success, though privately whined that President Wilson dealt him a bad hand. [Shades of Korea! Vietnam! Iraq! Manifest Destiny!] First US tactical air unit in the field, the 1st Aero Squadron commanded by Capt. B. D. Foulois, began operations with General Pershingʼs invasion of Mexico. Aeronautics and Astronautics Chronology, 1915-1919, [9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pancho_Villa_Expedition [10]

1917 — United States of America: Supreme court approves Eight-hour Act under threat of a railway strike.

1917 — Russia: Czar Nicholas II abdicates as revolution sweeps his country. Marxist-Leninists will predominate over the long haul despite all opposition. [11]

1918 — Richard Ellmann, critic/biographer (James Joyce), lives, Highland Park, Michigan.

1920 — Italy: The council movement in Turin begins a strike, combined with occupation of the factories and resuming production under their own workers' control. By April the strike spread through much of northern Italy. The government had to use warships to land troops at Genoa to march on Turin. While the councilist program was supported by the anarchists, the Socialist Party and the unions succeeded in sabotaging the strike: when Turin was besieged by 20,000 soldiers and police, the party newspaper "Avanti" refused to print the appeal of the Turin socialist section.

1920 — Russia: Mid-March, Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman return to Petrograd to secure work in support of the revolution. Ninth Congress of the All-Russian Communist party is held in Moscow; militarization of labor stirs much debate. Source: Emma Goldman Papers

1929 — D. H. Lawrence, in Paris looking for a publisher for Lady Chatterley's Lover, meets Harry Crosby of The Black Sun Press, with whom he has corresponded for more than a year; they disagree violently about everything they discuss. Source: See Geoffrey Wolff, Black Sun (Random House, 1976). [12] [13]

1936 — England: Emma Goldman speaks on "The Russian Theatre" to a 1,000 members of the Coventry Repertory Circle, one of the most successful meetings she has ever had in England.

1937 — Crackpot fantasist H.P. Lovecraft dies, Providence, Rhode Island.

1938 — Poet Dick Higgins lives (1938 — 1998), Cambridge, England. Higgins studied at Columbia University, New York (where he received a bachelors degree in English, 1960), the Manhattan School of Printing, New York, and the New School of Social Research, 1958-59, with the anarchist John Cage and Henry Cowell. He attended Cageʼs composition class, where he met George Brecht, Allan Kaprow, Al Hansen and other future Fluxus artists….

1938 — Spain: Lincoln Brigadists retreat into Caspe, about 70 kilometers east of Belchite; of the 500 Lincolns who left Belchite, only 100 remain. [14]

1939 — Hitler occupies Bohemia.

1944 — Sly Stone, guitarist/founder of Sly and the Family Stone, lives.

1945 — Spain: Cenetista David Antona Domínguez (1904 — 1945) dies. Secretariado del Comité Nacional CNT. Militant anarcho-syndicalist, freed from prison in July 1936. [15] [16]

1953 — Russia: Joseph Stalin dies in his sleep, Moscow. [17]

1955 — Colonel Tom Parker becomes Elvis Presleyʼs manager. Parker manages Presley all his life and after his death. Some people die more than others.

1964 — United States of America: Atomic Energy Commission admits that an unplanned release of radiation from an underground nuclear test spewed fallout over Las Vegas. During the 1950s and 1960s, more than 200 US nuclear explosions send huge radioactive clouds into the atmosphere. Since 1962, the atmospheric tests have been replaced by underground tests like the one near Las Vegas. The National Association of Radiation Survivors estimates that victims number 886,000. A 1980 report by a U.S. House of Representatives committee finds: "The Governmentʼs programs for monitoring the health effects of the tests was inadequate and, more disturbingly, all evidence suggesting that radiation was having harmful effects, be it on sheep or people, was not only disregarded but actually suppressed." [18] [19]

1966 — United States of America: Teens riot. Arrest of a black high school student for throwing bricks and stones at passing cars touches off a wave of looting and burning in Watts, California. Two killed and 25 injured in the riot, the second major disturbance to break out in the Los Angeles ghetto in less than a year (see 11 August). After a morning inspection tour (of the 1965 Watts LA riots) one investigator said that he had found the "holiday atmosphere" among the looters most repelling. “These rioters don’t have any leaders.” [20]

1966 — Jean Biso (1881 — 1966) dies. Anarcho-syndicalist, Secretary of the Syndicat des Correcteurs in Paris, participant in support groups for Sacco and Vanzetti, Spanish Revolution of 1936.

1966 — United States of America: Thomas C. Lynch, Attorney General of the State of California, condemns the use of LSD and other drugs in a statement to the State Senate Judiciary Committee in Sacramento. Except for alcohol, of course. Source: [Frisco History Archive] [21] [22]

1968 — Diocese of Rome announces it deplores but wonʼt prohibit "rock and roll masses" at the Church of San Lessio Falconieri.

1968 — England: Six protesters ejected from shipyard at launch of Britainʼs 4th Polaris nuclear submarine, Birkenhead.

1968 — United States of America: Blood, Sweat and Tears opens at the Avalon Ballroom in Frisco. Source: [Frisco History Archive]

1968 — Choque entre un tren y un tractor en Santa María de la Alameda. 26 muertos y 80 heridos. [23]

1969 — England: Alan Barlow (1928 — 2004) and Phil Carver arrested immediately following a powerful explosion at the Francoist Banco de Bilbao, Covent Garden, London. In their possession is a letter claiming the action on behalf of the "1st of May Group." [24] [25]

1970 — United States of America: 78 protesters arrested during a second attempt by Native American activists to occupy Fort Lawton, demanding that Seattle give the unused facility back to Native Americans.

1970 — Tarjei Vesaas (1897 — 1970) dies, in Vinje. Norwegian novelist/short story writer.

1971 — Chatrooms make their debut on the Internet.

1971 — Louis Louvet (1899 — 1971) dies. Anarcho-syndicalist, in the Syndicat des Correcteurs d'imprimerie since 1937.

1972 — Los Angeles Radio station KHJ raided by police after calls from listeners who feared there'd been a revolution at the station from 6:00 to 7:30 in the morning. DJ Robert W. Morgan had played Donny Osmondʼs "Puppy Love" over and over. The police left without making any arrests.

1980 — Penobscot Indians in Maine win major land claim.

1980 — Hélio Oiticica (1937 — 1980) dies. Brazilian painter, performance artist, and anarchist. Grandson of the anarchist Jose Oiticica, whose ideas and activities were an important influence. Hélio Oiticica; source, Anarcoefemèrides Created environmental, participatory events—among them Parangolé (1964), Tropicália (1967) and Apocalipopótesis (1968) — either in art centres or in the street. One of the leading exhibitors in the exhibition Nova objetividade brasileira (Rio de Janeiro, 1967), which reactivated Brazilʼs avant-garde.

1982 — Nicaragua: CIA-trained and equipped forces dynamite bridges.

1982 — Italy: Agenti dei NOCS (Nuclei operativi centrali di sicurezza) sono accusati di torture e violenze nei confronti di persone arrestate con l'accusa di terrorismo. [Source: Crimini e Misfatti]

1983 — Irish-born British novelist Rebecca West, 91, dies, London, England. "I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat, or a prostitute."

1985 — United States of America: Two-to-one vote against construction of new nuclear power plant, Bakersfield, California.

1986 — England: The most successful picket at Wapping in the News International dispute: forty yards of fence are torn down, lorries are held up for five hours and parts of the country have to do without their Murdoch Sunday papers.

1991 — United States of America: Local 234 begins successful 19-strike preventing introduction of part timers.

1993 — United Nations "Truth Commission" concludes most of the human rights abuses in El Salvador during its civil war had been committed by the U.S.-backed Salvadoran government.

1995 — Jean Meckert, aka Jean or John Amila, (1910 — 1995) dies. Libertarian novelist and antimilitarist.

1995 — United States of America: "New York Times" publishes 50,000th edition today. Source: ’Robert Braunwart’

1997 — England: Activists across Britain stage supermarket protests against genetically engineered foods.

1997 — Switzerland: First International Day Against Police Brutality [DAPB]. This day of protest initiated in response to Swiss police beating two children, aged 11 and 12, by the Black Flag in Switzerland, with the help of COBP from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Over 50 groups within 14 countries participate. "The strong arm of the State, the police, is a repressive instrument, which at every opportunity violates the very laws that it is supposed to respect. It abuses its power on a daily basis without suffering any consequences. The police spy, harass, imprison, torture, and kill. Their primary victims are the "undesirables" of society; the poor, the homeless, the marginalized, immigrants, people of color, sex workers, activists, student activists, and unionized workers. In response to the general deterioration of living conditions and the ever-increasing rise of poverty, governments invest in police forces in an attempt to maintain order and social peace by any means necessary." [26] [27]

2001 — Germany: Fermin Rocker Show closes, Berlin. Paintings by Fermin Rocker (1907 — 2004), at Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, Franz Mehring Platz. Fermin Rockerʼs paintings convey the memory of his father, the famed anarcho-syndicalist parents, Rudolf Rocker and Milly Witkop Rocker. Too modest to be called a working-class hero, Rudolf fought against the Nazis in Germany and militated with the workers in England and later in the United States. Ferminʼs powerful characters convey a sense of the conflicts and sufferings of the age, carrying their grief with dignity. [28] [29]

2002 — Finland: 5th Black and Green days, 15th—17th.

2003 — United States of America: Hundreds of demonstrations across the nation in opposition to President Bushʼs relentless pursuit for a war against Iraq. In Seattle, protesters surround the Federal Building. TV news broadcasts later in the day include focus bits on the Singing Grannys (singing!) and long-time anti-authoritarian Robbie Barnes (wrapping the building with "crime scene" tape, anarcho-Christo-fashion). [30] [31]

2003 — Spain: In Madrid, CNT and antiwar groups protest the American war in Iraq. [32]

External link

• The Daily Bleed: Anarchist Calendar