The Nome Serum Run, February 2, 1925

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On February 2^nd, 1925, a team of tired, cold sled dogs and their equally exhausted musher arrived on Front Street in Nome, Alaska. The cargo the man and his dogs carried helped save possibly hundreds of lives. Theirs was the last leg of a relay race against time that is today recalled as the Great Race of Mercy or the Nome Serum Run

Nome, Alaska lies just below the Arctic Circle. In 1925, it was a town of about 1400 people, a mixture of American settlers and Inuit natives. During the winter, when daylight was scarce and temperatures could drop to almost 100 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, the only lifeline between Nome and outside world was the Iditarod Trail, a path 938 miles long that began far to the south in the port town of Seward. The trail crosses mountain ranges and drives through the vast and potentially deadly interior region of Alaska. By the 1920's, the first bush pilots were beginning to set up shop in Alaska, hoping to haul mail and other goods to remote towns and villages. This would come to pass in the next decade, but in 1925 airplanes were fragile things that did not take well to severe weather and cold. The only trustworthy way in and out of Nome was by sled.

The first sign of trouble in Nome actually came from a nearby village in the form of a young Inuit boy who was brought to the area's only doctor, Curtis Welch. Doctor Welch diagnosed the child as having tonsillitis, but he unexpectedly died the next day. Cases of what was thought to be tonsillitis cropped up in the town and surrounding area over the course of the next month, including four other children who died suddenly. The last of these children was 3-year old Bill Barnett; it was during his examination that Doctor Welch discovered not tonsillitis, but something much more sinister: diphtheria. 

The town hospital had 8,000 units of expired diphtheria anti-toxin on hand, not enough to handle a full-blown epidemic. Welch and Nome's mayor called an emergency meeting in which they announced a quarantine and put out the call for one million units of the anti-toxin. This would be enough to treat hundreds of citizens. The mayor sent radio messages to the governor of Alaska and to the US Public Health Service in Washington, DC. He told them of the need for anti-toxin, stating that an epidemic of diphtheria was "inevitable." All of northwest Alaska, with a population of about 10,000, was threatened. Without the anti-toxin, the mortality rate for those infected would be near 100 percent.

At that time, a railway ran from the southern Alaska coast north to the small town of Nenana. 300,000 units of anti-toxin were brought via train to this northern terminus from Anchorage. It was not enough to stop an epidemic, but it was enough to allow the town to hold on until more units could be brought in from the United States. It was decided that a relay of dog sled teams would carry the precious vials the remaining way to Nome, a distance of 630 miles. The mayor of Nome was pulling for aircraft to make the run, but only three planes were operating in the territory that year, all of them open cockpit biplanes that were crated for the winter. The dogs and the mushers would have to pull through.

A relay was quickly organized. The best teams from the interior were tasked with the mission and all of them accepted the risks without hesitation. Some were in the middle of mail runs and were sent back to their stations. A series of handoffs to new teams would allow the anti-toxin to travel both day and night.

The trip began at 9PM on January 27 when "Wild Bill" Shannon accepted the package of anti-toxin at the train station in Nenana. It was 50 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. By the time he reached the town of Minto at 3AM the next morning, his nose was black from frostbite and he had lost four dogs. Nonetheless, he pushed on to Tolovana, a total of 52 miles. 

Edgar Kallands took the next leg of the journey as the temperature fell to 56 degrees below zero. When he arrived at Manley Hot Springs at 4PM on the 28th, a local man had to pour hot water on his hands to unstick him from his sled's handlebar.

In the meantime, Norwegian Leonhard Seppala left Nome on January 27th and headed south for 170 miles into the teeth of a storm with a wind chill of 85 degrees below zero. The anti-toxin was still racing north, having changed hands several more times. It was with Henry Ivanoff and his team of dogs when they met Seppala heading the other way. Seppala, serum in hand, turned around and headed back north. He would travel the farthest of any of the teams, over 90 miles north after his 170 mile southbound run. He stopped at the village of Golovin, where he passed the serum to Charlie Olsen on February 1st.

The only mixup during the relay occurred when Gunnar Kaasen, having traveled through a storm so intense that he could not see his dog team in front of him, arrived at Point Safety only to find his relief asleep. Instead of waiting for the man to get his team together, Kaasen decided to make the run into Nome himself. He arrived in Nome at 5:30AM on February 2nd, 1925. Not a single vial of the anti-toxin was broken.

A second relay was run beginning on February 8th, using many of the same men who made the first trip. Unbeknownst to them, their first run had garnered front page attention in every major newspaper in the United States and even some in Europe. Some of the drivers and their teams, including Kaasen and Seppala, would tour the United States in the next few years and draw enormous crowds.

It is not known for sure how many people died as a result of diphtheria in and around Nome, Alaska that winter. While the official estimates range between 5 and 7 people, it is likely much higher due to the fact that the native Inuits did not always report deaths. Either way, the number is exponentially lower than it would have been if not for the bravery and perseverance of a few men and their dogs.

The SL-1 Accident, January 3, 1961

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On January 3, 1961, the United States experienced the first nuclear power plant accident in the nation's history. Because of it, the design of both military and civilian reactors changed. Despite its importance in the development of safe nuclear power, the SL-1 accident remains unknown to most people 51 years after it occurred. 

The Stationary Low-Power Reactor Number One, or SL-1, was an experimental nuclear reactor designed and built for the US Army. It was created to serve as the prototype model for a new class of reactor which was to be deployed at small, remote military bases. Specifically, SL-1 units were to be used to power the radar sites that the United States and her allies operated near the Arctic Circle. The reactors were designed to provide 200 kW of electrical power and 400 kW of thermal heat. The SL-1 prototype was placed 40 miles west of Idaho Falls, Idaho at the National Reactor Testing Station.

Almost all reactors in use today are pressurized water reactors. In a pressurized water reactor, the primary coolant, which is in contact with the radioactive fuel, is never allowed to boil. Instead, it's heat is transferred to the secondary coolant by use of a steam generator. The secondary coolant, which is kept at a much lower pressure than the primary coolant, flashes to steam and is then used to turn a turbine and, ultimately, produce electricity. The primary coolant moves in a self-contained loop and is shielded from the outside world by a heavily-built containment building that is often made of reinforced concrete. The secondary coolant is not radioactive, and so poses no radiation danger as it travels outside the containment building.

SL-1 was a boiling water reactor. In this type of reactor, the primary coolant is allowed to boil and the radioactive steam is used to directly provide heat or turn a steam turbine. There is no secondary system. This type of design has the advantage of being simpler than a pressurized water reactor, requiring fewer pumps and less piping. While boiling water reactors are still being designed today, the SL-1 came very early in the history of nuclear power. As such, it contained at least one critical design flaw, a flaw that would prove deadly.

On December 21, 1960, SL-1 was shut down for routine maintenance. It remained down for the holidays. On January 3, 1961, the reactor was undergoing procedures prior to startup. At 9:01PM, SL-1 went prompt critical, meaning that the number of fission events increased exponentially and rapidly. It was the nuclear equivalent of throwing a lighted match into a room full of gasoline vapors. The heat generated caused the primary coolant to vaporize with explosive force. It was later estimated that reactor power spiked at 20,000 MW, over 30,000 times it's designed output. The entire reactor vessel was propelled upward and the center control rod pushed out of the vessel, pinning one of the operators on duty to the ceiling, killing him instantly. Two other military personnel were killed as well. The three were Army Specialists John Byrnes and Richard McKinley and Navy Electrician's Mate Richard Legg. Fortunately, there was no one else present at the site.

A crew of firemen arrived on the scene nine minutes later and, at first, could find nothing out of the ordinary as the reactor building looked normal from the outside. When they approached, however, their radiation detectors spiked and the men retreated. After a medical response team arrived with the proper equipment, the men were broken into teams. Each team would enter the reactor building for one minute before leaving, and no man would enter the area more than once.

Working quickly, the teams retrieved one operator who was still breathing; he died an hour later. A second body was located but not recovered. The third body was not found for some time due to the debris strewn about the reactor building. After a quick look for the third man, it was decided to stop searching due to the potential health risks to the rescue teams. The bodies were buried in lead-lined caskets sealed with concrete and placed in steel vaults. One man, Richard McKinley, was buried in Arlington National Cemetery; the other two were buried in their home towns.

After extensive study of the accident, it was concluded that the central control rod, which was only to be moved three inches, had in fact been raised 20 inches. This allowed the reactor to instantly go supercritical and experience the gigantic power spike. The question that remained was why this had been done. The man at the top of the reactor was supposedly pulling the rod out of the reactor in order to connect it to its control motor. As mentioned, this would've taken a motion of no more than three inches. At first, it was concluded that the man moving the rod had wanted to commit suicide, although this is unlikely: during training, the technicians had been told that even the complete removal of one control rod could not cause an accident like that which occurred.

Two theories now seem more likely. First, some of the five control rods had become difficult to move in previous months---the technicians had referred to them as being "sticky". It is possible that the central rod was being sticky and that the technician on top of the reactor simply pulled on the rod too hard, causing it to come out too far. According to people who worked on the reactor, this would be very difficult to do, but not impossible.

Second, the technicians may have been exercising the rods; that is, moving them up and down so as to loosen them up. Since they had been trained that even full extraction of one rod could not cause a problem, it seems natural that they may have exercised the rods by moving them well beyond their normal lengths of travel.

After the SL-1 accident, reactor design was refined so that the removal of a single control rod could not cause a prompt critical condition. Also, all future designs included more control rods so that no single rod could have as much effect on the reactor. In addition, procedures for reactor operation and the associated documentation were expanded greatly and became more formalized than before.

The Army continued to operate small nuclear reactors for the next few years, but budget constraints and a lack of support from the upper ranks led to the abandonment of the Army's nuclear power program in 1965. As of today, the Navy remains the only branch of the US Armed Forces to utilize nuclear power.

The Mary Celeste Found, December 4, 1872

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On December 4, 1872, the Mary Celeste, a 103-foot long brigantine sailing ship, was found abandoned off the coast of Portugal. The crew of seven and the captain’s wife and daughter were missing. Abandoned ships had been found before on the open seas, but the Mary Celeste was different: her sails were set as if a crew was still on board. The mystery that began that day 140 years ago is, today, still unsolved.

The Mary Celeste was spotted that December day by the Dei Gratia, a cargo ship loaded with petroleum. Captain Morehouse, her skipper, knew Benjamin Briggs, the captain of the Mary Celeste and had, in fact, dined with him in New York several weeks before. At 37, Briggs was an accomplished sailor and ship’s commander, so when the men of the Dei Gratia noticed the sails of the Celeste grow slack over and over again as if no one was in command, they knew something was wrong. After observing the ship for two hours, Captain Morehouse sent a boarding party to the Celeste.

What the boarding party found upon searching the Celeste would become heavy fictionalized in the retelling, but the inquiry that was held later at Gibraltar discovered that there was no good reason why the ship should have been abandoned. Only one of the bilge pumps was working and there was over three feet of water in the bilge, but this was not unusual for a ship left unattended for days at sea. The entire below decks area of the ship was wet, but this was mainly due to the fact that two deck hatches had been left open. There was still six months’ worth of food aboard. The ship’s clock was not functioning and her compass was damaged, but the sextant and all the ship’s papers except for the ship’s log were missing. It was not known how many lifeboats the Celeste carried, but evidence suggested that at least one had been launched purposely and was not torn away by wind or waves. The ship’s cargo, 1700 barrels of alcohol, was intact, although later inspection would show nine of the barrels were empty. The alcohol, used to fortify wine, would become the focal point of investigation in later years.

Part of the Dei Gratia crew sailed the Celeste to Gibraltar where a prize claim was made on her. The admiralty court initially suspected the crew of the Dei Gratia of foul play, but no evidence existed to support the court’s suspicions. The court awarded prize money to the crew, but much less than might have otherwise been granted. It has been theorized that this reduced award was a signal from the court that the crew of the Dei Gratia was still under suspicion despite a lack of evidence implicating them in the disappearance. However, this is a pretty thin supposition given the fact that the admiralty court was under no obligation to grant the Dei Gratia's captain and crew any money at all.

The story of the Mary Celeste may have faded into history had it not been for Arthur Conan Doyle, the writer who introduced the world to Sherlock Holmes. In 1884, Holmes published J. Habakuk Jephson’s Statement, a short story based on the tale of the Celeste but with a great deal of fiction added to make the tale more consumer-friendly. As time went by, much of the story’s fiction began to be accepted as fact and helped keep the story alive for later generations.

We will probably never know what happened on board the Mary Celeste, but one theory has now come to the fore. If the barrels of alcohol began to leak (you’ll recall that nine of the barrels were empty), fumes may have built up in the hold of the ship. When the hatches were opened to air the interior out, the violent rush of fumes might have convinced the captain that the ship was in mortal danger. Taking most of the ship’s papers with him, he might have ordered the crew and his family into the ship’s life raft with the intention of letting the ship’s hold air out while they stayed tied to the ship’s stern but safely away from the danger. If the line parted, the ship would’ve sailed away, leaving the crew to the mercy of the Atlantic. In 1873, a lifeboat with several bodies aboard washed up in Spain. Even though the bodies were decomposed beyond recognition, an American flag was in the lifeboat with them. But the sea is telling no tales.

Butch O'Hare Disappears, November 26, 1943

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On November 26, 1943, Edward “Butch” O’Hare disappeared in the Pacific Ocean near the Gilbert Islands. Thus ended the life and career of one of the greatest naval aviators of the Second World War. O’Hare, and thousands of others like him, formed the core of the pre-war military aviation community in the United States. When the war came, they held the thin line of defense and helped train the raw recruits who would come to dominate the skies all over the world.

Butch O’Hare was born in St. Louis, Missouri in March, 1914. He entered the US Naval Academy in 1933 and spent the first two years after his graduation in 1937 as a line officer. He reported for flight training in 1939, the same year that his father was gunned down in Chicago for providing evidence at Al Capone’s tax evasion trial some years before. It was rumored that the elder O’Hare testified against Capone to ensure that his son received an appointment to the Naval Academy, but no documentation has ever surfaced linking the two events.

In Spring, 1940, O’Hare was assigned to VF-3, the USS Saratoga’s fighter squadron. His executive officer was John Thach, who would also become famous as a navy fighter pilot. Lieutenant Thach immediately recognized O’Hare’s natural flying skill and became his mentor, teaching him everything he had learned in his more than ten years of flying for the navy. Their routine was one of practice, practice and more practice, for it was clear to the men of VF-3 that the war raging in Europe would soon come to them.

O’Hare was newly married and still stationed aboard the Saratoga on the morning of December 7, 1941. Five weeks later, the ship was hit by a Japanese torpedo in the waters near Hawaii, necessitating a trip to California for repairs. O’Hare’s squadron was transferred to the USS Lexington, the ship from which he would first meet the enemy.

Today, it is hard to fathom how delicate the position of the US Navy was in the early months of 1942. The Japanese task force that had attacked Pearl Harbor contained six aircraft carriers; that was more than the US Navy had in the entire Pacific at that time. So when the navy’s carriers sailed from Pearl Harbor in early 1942, not only was each ship worth it’s weight in gold, but so were the crews on board. Although new pilots were in the training pipeline by December, 1941, precious few of them had reached the fleet. Thus, the few hundred pilots on US Navy carriers, along with the Pacific Fleet submarines, were all the nation had with which to defend herself and strike a blow at the Imperial Japanese Fleet.

The USS Lexington was preparing to strike one such blow on February 20, 1942. The ship and her escorts were 450 miles from Rabaul when radar operators spotted a group of enemy bombers. Fighters were launched from the Lexington and met the bombers. Since O’Hare and his wingman were the last craft off the flight deck and were not engaged, they were the only two in position when a group of eight Japanese bombers appeared on the other side of the task force only 12 miles away. Already outnumbered, O’Hare’s situation grew worse when his wingman announced that his guns had jammed. 27-year old Lt. Butch O’Hare was about to take on 8 Japanese bombers by himself. 

Years of pre-war gunnery training was put to good use as O’Hare, with only enough ammunition for 34 seconds of firing, went to work on the bombers’ wing fuel tanks. He made four passes over the formation, each time working to avoid return fire from the bombers’ guns. By the time he had shot down his fifth plane and damaged a sixth, the formation was within range of the task force’s anti-aircraft guns. The three remaining bombers dropped their ordnance, but scored no hits. Out of ammunition, O’Hare returned to the Lexington, only to be fired on by an over-eager gunner while on final approach. The shots missed; during the entire affair, O’Hare’s plane had only been hit by one enemy round.

It was clear to all present that O’Hare, along with the pilots who had attacked the other bomber groups, had saved the Lexington from serious damage. When the ship and her escorts returned to Pearl Harbor on March 26th, reporters and photographers scrambled to see O’ Hare. He became an instant celebrity. The Grumman Aircraft plant at Bethpage, New York, where O’Hare’s F4F Wildcat was made, sent him 1,150 cartons of Lucky Strike cigarettes. By shooting down five aircraft, he became an ace, the Navy’s first during the Second World War. He was promoted to Lieutenant Commander and was the first naval aviator to ever receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. Through it all, O’Hare maintained his modesty and seemed, to one observer, to be embarrassed by the entire fuss. At a time when the United States needed heroes, O’Hare filled the bill.

Over the next 18 months, O’Hare attended publicity shoots and parades. More importantly, he was made a squadron commander and used his experience to teach new pilots the art of aerial combat. It was not until August, 1943 that O’Hare and his squadron (now comprised of the newer F6F Hellcat) embarked on the USS Independence, an escort carrier. In his absence, the war had changed. While still a potent enemy, the Japanese were on the defensive. American industrial might had turned out new carriers and planes while young men from every walk of life had learned how to fly them. The end of the war was still a long way off, but victory for the Allies was all but assured.

O’Hare was awarded two Distinguished Flying Crosses for his actions in combat over the next few months. In September, he was made the Commander Air Group on the USS Enterprise, meaning that he would be in charge of not just the ship’s fighters, but her bombers and torpedo planes as well. At that time, it was traditional for the CAG to fly in a TBM-1 Avenger, a slower aircraft with better radios than the fighters and a crew of three. Instead, O’Hare requested and was given permission to continue flying his Hellcat. It would be a fateful decision.

Knowing that the Americans owned the skies during the day, the Japanese began sending their bombers on night missions against the carriers. The attacks were incredibly hard to defend against. O’Hare and a small group of officers began to develop counter-tactics. Instead of sending groups of fighters to search the darkness for the bombers, they began to use the Avenger aircraft and her radar set as a sort of guide plane for the fighters. Once the Japanese bombers were found by the airborne radar, the fighters would be vectored to their position. 

The first of these missions was scheduled for the night of November 26, 1943. As the CAG, O’Hare volunteered to lead the mission. It was rough from the start as the fighters had trouble finding their escorting Avenger. Then, once the Japanese bombers were found, there was difficulty giving the fighter pilots the right directions. In the confusion, a Japanese bomber ended up behind the American formation. The Avenger’s gunner fired on the bomber, which fired back. In between the two aircraft was Commander O’Hare’s plane, which was seen to fall out of formation towards the ocean below. He was never heard from again.

A search was conducted in the area of O’Hare’s last position, but nothing was found. He was reported missing in action; it was not clear if he had been hit by the Japanese bomber or friendly fire. He was declared dead one year later. He was award the Navy Cross and Purple Heart posthumously on November 26, 1944.

In 1945, a Gearing-class destroyer was named in O’Hare’s honor. After the war, Robert R. McCormick, publisher of the Chicago Tribune, suggested re-naming Chicago’s Orchard Depot Airport in O’Hare’s honor. The name change became official on September 19, 1949. Today, O’Hare International is one of the world’s busiest airports.

Marco Polo Born, September 15, 1254

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On September 15, 1254, Marco Polo was born in Venice, then an independent city-state and today part of Italy. Marco, his father Nicolo and his uncle Maffeo, while not the first Europeans to visit the area we now call China, had such a storied journey to the Far East that its telling helped inspire European journeys of discovery for centurie.

The Polo family were merchants, which in the Venice of the 13th century often meant travel to remote locations in order to secure sought-after items. Niccolo Polo and his brother Maffeo were successful traders and spent a large portion of their careers in the area around the Black Sea and as far east as modern day Uzbekistan. In 1264, the two met the brother of the Grand Khan Kublai. He was headed to the Mongol capital of Khanbaliq, which today is Beijing, China. After a journey of two years, the brothers and the traveling party reached Khanbaliq and received a gracious welcome and an audience with the Khan.

The Khan sent the men back home with precious cargo: a man who was to be the Mongol ambassador to the Pope, a letter from the Khan asking for teachers to be sent east to instruct his people about Christianity and Western life, and a small golden tablet that granted them safe passage anywhere within the Khan's lands. The ambassador left the brothers near the halfway point of the journey, but they continued on with their letter to His Holiness.

They eventually delivered the letter and were given a reply from the Pope that was to be delivered to the Khan. The brothers set out again for Cathay (as the area of China was then known) in 1271, but this time they took other travelers: Nicolo's son Marco, who was 17, and two friars. The route, which would become known as the Silk Road, contained its share of danger and disease. Marco fell ill on the way and the group had to stop in Badakhshan (an area that is now northeastern Afghanistan and southeastern Tajikistan) for a year in order for him to recover.

The Polo's journey to the Far East took several years, but they arrived safely and were granted another audience with Kublai Khan. According to Marco, he became a court favorite, so much so that the Khan gave him a job at the court as a sort of personal ambassador in his kingdom. During his 17 years of employment, Marco traveled far and wide in China, Burma and India on special missions. He became an excellent speaker who could converse in at least four languages.

In 1291, the Khan sent Marco on one final mission. He was ordered to escort a Mongol princess to her wedding. The trip took over two years, after which Marco, his father and his uncle were released from their obligations at the court and allowed to begin their trip home to Venice.

The Polos became celebrities in Venice. In an age when most people rarely if ever traveled away from the town in which they were born, tales of the Far East seemed like stories of another planet. Despite repeated tellings of the famous stories, it is doubtful that anything about the Polos would've been written down had it not been for a war between Venice and Genoa in 1298. Although the details are lost, Marco ended up in prison for several months. During that time, he dictated the story of his journeys to another prisoner, Rustichello da Pisa. When Marco was released in 1299, he had his book published with the title Il Milione, or "The Million". It was an enormous success, no easy feat in the days before the printing press.

Some historians doubt that Marco Polo and his family ever made the journey to Kublai Khan's court. As with so many stories from the Middle Ages, there is no way to know exactly what happened. Marco's book was translated to Latin and then to Italian, although it is thought to have been written in Old French. Translators of the day could be fairly liberal with their interpretations, so it is possible that the book contains inaccuracies. Regardless of it's accuracy, the book obviously inspired at least one great explorer, Christopher Columbus. Among Columbus's belongings was a copy of "The Million" with detailed notes written in the margins of almost every page.

After Marco Polo returned to Venice, his days of travel were over. He married and had three daughters, all of whom married into nobility. He died at his home at the age of 69 in January, 1324.

Jack the Ripper Kills His First Victim, August 31, 1888

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On August 31^st, 1888, the murderer who would become known as Jack the Ripper murdered his first victim in the Whitechapel area of London. Possibly the most famous serial murderer of all time, Jack the Ripper's legend has grown over the past century to the point where it is now difficult to separate fiction from the facts of the case.

Whitechapel is a section of the East End of London, a part of the city then well-known for its poverty and roughness. It contained many narrow, dark streets where prostitutes plied their trade with little concern of arrest or harassment from the local police. With this laxity also came the knowledge that these ladies of the evening had little to rely on in the way of protection from abuse, murder and rape. When discussing Jack the Ripper, it is important to remember that his crimes did not become famous strictly because they were serial murders; they became infamous because of their brutality. Violence towards prostitutes and even murder were not uncommon in the East End during the 19th century, so were it not for a few important distinctions it is possible that Jack the Ripper's crimes would have been considered run-of-the-mill crimes of passion.

Although we will never know for sure, it is theorized that Jack the Ripper killed five women, all of them prostitutes or alleged to be so. However, there are at least 12 additional women who may have fallen prey to his brutality. Little was known about the habits of serial killers in the 19th century and many forensics techniques that are common today were unknown then. Jack the Ripper's methods, though perverse enough to not be described in detail here, were not mechanically crude. It has been theorized that the murderer may have worked as a surgeon or butcher.

In September, 1888, police were searching the area of a recent murder when they found a bloodstained piece of clothing in an alleyway. Written nearby in white chalk was a message that appeared to have come from someone who was only semi-literate. The message seemed to be anti-Semitic in nature, although it is unclear how this had any bearing on the victims. Did Jack the Ripper leave a clue? We will never know, although it is possible that the scrap of cloth and the graffiti have no connection other than coincidental placement.

During Jack the Ripper's killing spree, local papers and police received a flood of letters from people who had leads or who claimed to be the killer. Three letters received serious attention, although the first one is the most believable. It was sent to the Central News Agency on September 25, 1888 and introduced the name "Jack the Ripper" to the world. Police published the letter on October 1st in the hope that someone would recognize writing style or handwriting. While nothing substantial came to light, subsequent letters copied the original's style and penmanship, making it difficult to know if more authentic letters were received.

Murders of the style of Jack the Ripper became scarce after 1889, so it is assumed that around that time the murderer moved on, died, or quit before the investigation pointed in his direction. Several men who either lived in or frequented the Whitechapel area were brought in for questioning, but all had alibis for their location during the first five murders. Modern investigators have generated more suspects, but since all of them (and any potential witnesses) have been dead for many years, conclusive proof is impossible to find.

An industry has sprung up around several conspiracy theories involving the British royal family, including one that Prince Albert Victor, grandson of Queen Victoria, was Jack the Ripper. These theories all suffer from lapses of a factual nature. As intriguing as this case remains, it is fairly certain that the identity of Jack the Ripper will never be known.

The Plot to Kill Hitler, July 20, 1944

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On July 20, 1944, a group of conspirators made an attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler during a military staff meeting at his Wolf's Lair field headquarters near Rastenburg, East Prussia. . This was the German Resistance movement’s last attempt to overthrow the Nazis and make a separate peace with the Western allies.

A plot to overthrow Hitler and his henchmen began to emerge in the German Army as early as 1938. Several high-ranking officers (including a former Army Chief of Staff) supported the idea of a coup as a means of preventing the Nazis from embroiling Germany in another world war, the second in a little over 20 years. But as a plan moved forward, many of the active duty officers began questioning the soundness of the plan. One of the requirements of success was outside support once the current government collapsed. Unfortunately, the rest of the Europe seemed uninterested in stopping Hitler. Another war was only a matter of time.

Plans were put on hold until 1941, when a new group of conspirators came to the fore. This was a tough year to plan a coup, for the German Army was still victorious everywhere it went and Hitler was immensely popular both in the military and among German civilians. But by late 1942, cracks began to show in the armor of the Third Reich. That was when a plan was hatched to place a bomb on Hitler’s plane when he made a trip to the headquarters of Army Group Centre fighting on the Eastern Front. The trip was made in March, 1943, but the bomb failed to explode, as did one set a few days later in Berlin.

By the end of 1943, it was clear to most high-level German officers that the Axis powers were going to lose the war. Their biggest fear was a Soviet invasion of Germany, for they knew that the Soviets would not be as magnanimous in victory as the Americans, British and French. The coup plotters thought that if they could overthrow Hitler and establish a new government in Berlin, they might be able to negotiate an end to the war before the Soviets reached the German border. It was during this time that the conspirators brought on board a new member----Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg.

Von Stauffenberg was born into an aristocratic Bavarian family in 1907. As was traditional for the males in his family, he pursued a military career. When Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, von Stauffenberg was not immediately set against him. He abhorred the Nazis' anti-semitism, but liked Hitler's strong nationalism. The German Army's successes early in the Second World War convinced von Stauffenberg that Hitler was a bold military leader. After the invasion of the Soviet Union in June, 1941, von Stauffenberg began to hear rumors concerning the activities of the SS troops in captured areas. Jews were being executed by the thousands along with anyone who was considered “undesirable” to the German state. While von Stauffenberg had long clung to the Teutonic concept of German colonization of Eastern Europe, his Catholic faith told him there was a higher law that all men must obey.

Von Stauffenberg was badly wounded in North Africa in April, 1943, and after months of recuperation received orders as a staff officer to the Replacement Army, the German army reserve. This put him in an advantageous position to help stage a coup, for the Replacement Army was in charge of quelling any internal unrest occurring inside Germany’s borders. If unrest occurred, Operation Valkyrie would be put into effect. Valkyrie called for the Replacement Army to take over the policing of cities and towns until order was restored. General Friedrich Fromm, head of the Reserve Army, was the only officer that could put the operation into play; thus he would have to join the conspirators or be moved out of the way.

By July, 1944, Adolf Hitler had become a difficult target for assassination. He was distrustful of nearly everyone around him and spent very little time in Berlin. The Gestapo knew that plotters were working to take over the government and were on the case. It is suspected by many historians that Henrich Himmler, head of the SS and the Gestapo, knew more about the plot to kill Hitler than he let on and did little about it. However, since Himmler committed suicide in May, 1945, the truth of what he knew will never be known.

As chief-of-staff of the Reserve Army, Colonel von Stauffenberg attended all of Hitler’s military conferences. This put him in the position of actually being able to kill the dictator when the time came. Von Stauffenberg carried a bomb in his briefcase to meetings with Hitler at least twice in early July, but the plan was not carried out because it had been decided that Henrich Himmler needed to be assassinated as well. But since Himmler rarely attended military conferences, von Stauffenberg was able to convince the other conspirators that Hitler would have to be attacked at the next available opportunity, with or without Himmler.

On July 20 just after noon, another military conference began at Rastenburg. Von Stauffenberg placed his loaded briefcase under the large table; Hitler and more than 20 officers were in the room. After 10 minutes, the Colonel excused himself and left. The bomb exploded at 12:40PM, killing several officers. Hitler was spared, possibly by one of the table’s thick legs. Von Stauffenberg made it to a local airfield and was airborne before the alarm was sounded.

By the time he reached Berlin three hours later, the conspirators were already beginning to hear rumors that Hitler had survived the blast. Many of them lost their nerve and began to take action in order to save themselves. Operation Valkyrie was ordered into action, but a short time later Himmler countermanded the order. Some reserve troops did muster and were led by officers who assumed Hitler was dead. SS officers were arrested throughout Europe and even the Propaganda Ministry was surrounded. But as word of Hitler’s survival spread, the troops were dispersed and their officers were arrested.

General Fromm, head of the Reserve Army, turned against the conspirators and had von Stauffenberg and others arrested. In order to have no witnesses to his own involvement, he set up a court-martial, found the men guilty and had them immediately shot. Fromm then told his superiors that he had suppressed the coup, but was promptly arrested.

Over 5,000 people were eventually arrested by the Gestapo. More than 200 of those were executed. Some of the people arrested had nothing to do with the plot, but were either in the wrong place at the wrong time or were on the Gestapo’s watch list for another reason entirely. The search for conspirators continued well into 1945, even as Germany collapsed as allied forces advanced on Berlin from east and west. Executions took place until the very last days of the Third Reich.