Joe's Daily U.S. History Lesson -- April 12

APRIL 12 1945-Yeah, so Americans didn’t know that President Roosevelt’s health a rapidly deteriorating. So you can imagine how it shocked the world when he died. He looked good. A couple months earlier he flew to Egypt and met with King Farouk I, and Haile Selassie, emperor of Ethiopia. He had a historic meeting on February 14th with King Abdulaziz, the founder of Saudi Arabia, In fact in James Macgregor Burns 1956 article in the Easton Press titled Roosevelt, that meeting is believed to impact America’s relationship with Saudi Arabia to this day. He spoke with American ambassadors to Britain, France and Italy. At Yalta, Lord Moran, who was Winston Churchill’s physicist spoke on Roosevelt’s ill healthy, saying that he was a dying man. FDR returned to the United States, addressed Congress and opened his speech by saying “I hope that you will pardon me for this unusual posture of sitting down during the presentation of what I want to say, but …it makes it a lot easier for me not to have to carry about ten pounds of steel around on the bottom of my legs.” In March he accused Russian leader Josef Stalin of breaking his Yalta commitments over Poland, Germany, prisoners of war, and other issues. Stalin accused the western Allies of plotting a separate peace with Hitler behind his back, and FDR said, “I cannot avoid a feeling of bitter resentment towards your informers, whoever they are, for such vile misrepresentations of my actions or those of my trusted subordinates.” The Squire of Hyde Park went back to Warm Springs, GA to rest before his next conference, and on April 12 he was sitting for a portrait painting when he said “I have a terrific pain in the back of my head,” and collapsed, having a massive cerebral hemorrhage, and was pronounced dead at 3:35 that day. Harry Truman had flags at half mast for 30 days. The New York Times said, “Men will thank God on their knees a hundred years from now that Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House.”

1861- Fort Sumter is fired upon, …and we all know what happened after that. Four of the bloodiest years in American history. Let me just back up a bit. Since 1858 the discussion stopped being so much about whether slavery would be allowed, and turned to a discussion of a unified separation from the United States. By 1860, the south was threatening to secede the states if the Republicans, a newly-formed anti-slavery party, won control of the White House. When Republican Abraham Lincoln won, South Carolina was first to secede by passing the “Ordinance of Secession” which declared that “the Union now subsisting between South Carolina and the other states, under the name of the United States of America, is hereby dissolved.” Brigadier General P.G.T. Beauregard, the first general officer of the newly formed Confederate Army, was placed in Charleston. Abe Lincoln gave S. Carolina governor Francis Pickets an ultimatum, But it was too late. Major Robert Anderson for the Union, who was holding down Fort Sumter, were fired upon. Anderson refused to surrender but ultimately were outgunned and after 34 hours of of engagement, Anderson had to evacuate. Ironically enough, no one died in battle on this day, though it would be, as I said four very bloody years up ahead.

1954-Bill Haley and the Comets record “We’re Gonna Rock Around the Clock”. The guitarist only got paid $31 by the way. So this isn’t the first rock record, nor the first popoluar rock record. It is credited for bringing Rock and roll into the mainstream, however. It was a B-Side to Thirteen Woman (And Only One Man in Town). It almost just fizzled away and only sold 75,000 copies. But actor Glenn Ford was getting ready to star in Blackboard Jungle and was looking for a song that embodied the 50’s rebellious youth attitude, and his ten year old son Pete suggested he use it. Rebellious? Yeah. And on april 12 2002 Ozzy gets a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.