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The Flavian Amphitheater, better known as the Colosseum, stands as one of the most spectacular architectural monuments of the ancient world. Built in the first century A.D., its largely remembered as the site of blood-sport entertainment involving gladiators, wild animals and more. But as one of ancient Romes best surviving and most iconic structures, it remains an enduring monument to one of the most influential dynasties of the Roman Empireand a marvel of architecture and engineering.

After Vespasian became Roman Emperor in 69 A.D., his Flavian Dynasty which included his sons, Titus and Domitianlaunched a vast building program to restore Rome, which had been ravaged by fire, plague and civil war. During the Flavian Dynastys 27-year reign, it renovated buildings, statues and monuments throughout the city. In 70 A.D., Vespasian ordered the construction of the new amphitheater in the city center, funded with the spoils from the Roman siege of Jerusalem during the First Jewish-Roman War. The Colosseum, dedicated 10 years later, served as a dramatic political symbol of the citys resurgence.

It was also an innovative architectural and engineering wonder, the largest and most complex permanent amphitheater of the ancient world. Made primarily of concrete, 3.5 million cubic feet of travertine, and similar amounts of marble, stone and timber, the Colosseum rose to 157 feet (roughly the height of a 15-story building), with capacity for an estimated 50,000 to 80,000 people.

The Colosseumwas part of an entire complex of buildings that Vespasian and his sons were building throughout Rome as part of a bigger program to erase [their predecessor] Neros mark on the cityand to champion their own achievements, says Nathan Elkins, deputy director of the American Numismatic Society and author of Monument to Dynasty and Death: The Story of Romes Colosseum and the Emperors Who Built It.At its dedication, Titus presided over 100 days of games, which included gladiatorial combat and animal entertainments.

WATCH: The HISTORY Channel series Colosseum premieres Sunday, July 17 at 9/8c. Watch a preview now.

Builders situated the Colosseum on the site of Neros estate, Domus Aurea, which featured an artificial lake and a 98-foot bronze statue of himself, the Colossus of Nero. They filled in the lake to build the Colosseum, which took its name from its proximity to the statue. When Nero committed suicide in 68 A.D., Vespasian, one of his generals, rose to power after a civil war.

Building the Colosseum offered a clever way for the Flavian Dynasty to satisfy the dictates of Roman societys rigid social hierarchy, says Elkins. Nero had made his estate accessible to all, but the senators didnt like the access he was allowing for common people in the center of the city. But by building this massive amphitheater, [Vespasian and his sons] keep this area a place for public enjoyment with games and also use it to reinforce Roman social order with hierarchical seating, Elkins says.

In the Colosseum, social status, wealth and gender determined where people sat. The best seats, closest to the arena, were reserved for the Emperor and senatorial nobility. Above them sat the Equestrian order, former cavalry members who had become established merchants, artisans and bureaucrats. Above them, in the nosebleed seats, sat the other 95 percent of Romes population: women, foreigners, and poor and enslaved Romans.

To facilitate the orderly flow of people throughout the structure, builders gave the Colosseum four entrances for the political and religious leaders and 76 for the ordinary citizens. Corridors separated social groups from one another, barring spectators from moving freely within the structure. But while seating wasnt equal for all Roman citizens, the Colosseums elliptical architecture gave everyone visibility to the action on the arena floor.

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Gladiators, animals and soldiers, who engaged in all types of combat within the Colosseum, were transported from the understructure of the arena via a complex system of lifts, trap doors and pulleys. The amphitheater could even be flooded to allow naval reenactments to take place.

Douglas Pearson/Corbis

Throughout ancient Rome, most amphitheaters were built as temporary structures made of wood for gladiatorial games and other amusements. The earliest known permanent amphitheatera stone structure built for some 20,000 spectatorsdates to 80 B.C.E. in Pompeii.

The architect of the Colosseum remains unknown. The Colosseums form is deeply connected with earlier structures used to entertain crowds, such as Greek theaters, wrote art historian Peter Louis Bonfitto in his book World Architecture and Society: From Stonehenge to One World Trade Center. Its grand design employs an impressive series of columns, arches and barrel vaults.

The Colosseums greatest innovation, says Elkins, was its use of concrete. The concrete construction is really what allows the Colosseum to be built, he said. It was probably the most widespread use of engineering and construction with concrete in that period of time.

According to contemporary engineers, the Colosseum remains standing after 2,000 years because of its solid concrete foundation. Building in a wetland area near the Tiber River, with poor soil conditions, forced builders to dig a deep and strong foundation to stabilize the structure, according to Engineering Rome, a University of Washington program that explores Roman and Italian engineering.

It featured other innovations as well, including a sophisticated drainage system used to siphon off water used to stage mock sea battles in the arena. Sailors were employed to operate an overhead retractable awning, which could be rolled out to protect spectators from rain or Romes blistering heat. The complex network of chambers and tunnels beneath the arena floor, called the hypogeum, housed props, scenery and participants when not in action. And the amphitheaters ingenious system of trap doors, pulleys and lifts facilitated dramatic entrances for scenery and combatants alike, allowing even elephants to appear as if from nowhere.

WATCH: Gladiators: Blood Sport on HISTORY Vault.

While its unknown what it cost to build the Colosseum in antiquity, many scholars believe the Colosseum was partly financed with the booty taken by Roman soldiers during the empires raid of the Jerusalem Temple during the First Roman-Jewish War that ended in 70 A.D. An inscription at the Colosseum reads: The Emperor Titus Caesar Vespasian Augustus ordered the new amphitheater to be made from the (proceeds from the sale of the) booty.

For generations, the conventional wisdom has been that the labor to build the Colosseum was carried out by 100,000 Jewish slaves captured during the Siege of Jerusalem, but Elkins isnt entirely convinced. Its the kind of thing Romans might do to add insult to injury, Elkins said. You not only sell them into slavery, but then you make them build something that is financed by the destruction of their temple.

But the assertion, he says, is unsupported by an ancient source. It came from a 20th-century archaeologist, and it has been repeated over and over again. A significant amount of slaves would have been used, but we dont know 100 percent where those slaves came from.

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Beyond functioning as a window into ancient Rome and its social structure, the Colosseum is also the father of all modern outdoor sports stadiums. The Colosseums use of arches to support the structure, the elliptical shape and the organizational system used to control the entry and exit of fans based on the location of their seats are staples of most modern stadiums.

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How the Colosseum Was Builtand Why It Was an Architectural Marvel - History

When Baltimore took Ben McDonald with the top choice in the 1989 draft, it was just one small part of a thrilling season for the Orioles.

They had the No. 1 pick because the previous year had been terrible, but by the time they actually made the selection, the Orioles were in first place in the AL East, on their way to becoming one of baseball's classic underdog stories. In fact, McDonald was drafted on June 5, 1989 -- the same day Baltimore won a season-high eighth game in a row.

Sound familiar?

This year's Orioles are suddenly drawing comparisons to that '89 team. After entering the season in the midst of a difficult rebuild -- Baltimore will pick first in the draft Sunday for the second time in four years -- the Orioles have become one of the game's biggest surprises over the past few weeks. A 10-game winning streak put Baltimore briefly above .500. As the All-Star break approaches, the Orioles have almost as many victories (46) as they did all of last year (52).

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A playoff spot still seems unlikely, but at this point, Baltimore is only 2 games behind the final wild card in the American League.

"It's been fun to watch this team, man," said McDonald, a right-hander who pitched nine seasons in the majors and is now part of Orioles TV broadcasts. "It reminds me a lot of that '89 team in some ways, where they got some confidence and then took off."

The 1989 team occupies a special place in the hearts of Baltimore fans. The 1988 Orioles lost 107 games, and that didn't do justice to what a laughingstock they were after an 0-21 start. There wasn't much reason to expect a quick turnaround in '89, but shockingly, Baltimore led the AL East by 7 games in the middle of July.

The division ultimately came down to the final series of the season in Toronto. The Orioles lost the first two games, allowing the Blue Jays to clinch the title. Baltimore did win the finale, with McDonald -- who was already in the majors the same year he was drafted -- earning his first career victory.

The current Orioles rose from similar depths as that '89 team. Baltimore dropped 110 games last year, including a 19-game skid that nearly tied the 1988 team's mark for the longest losing streak in American League history. Even before this July surge, the Orioles looked more competitive, thanks in part to an improved-but-still-fairly-anonymous bullpen.

Then Baltimore began its winning streak with a victory at Minnesota before sweeping series against the Rangers, Angels and Cubs. It's been a pleasant surprise for Orioles fans, who figured to spend much of the season monitoring the progress of minor league prospects and looking to the draft and trade deadline as opportunities to add more of them.

"I think that we're in store for a lot of good stuff here for the next few years," general manager Mike Elias said. "I'm very happy that it's kind of reflected right now during this stretch of play so plainly for our fans."

This run by the Orioles might actually complicate the rest of the month for Elias. Baltimore figured to be a seller at the deadline -- 30-year-old Trey Mancini could have some value, and Rougned Odor and Jordan Lyles are on one-year contracts -- but in the midst of the team's first really successful stretch in a while, there could obviously be a temptation to ride it out and chase the postseason.

With the expanded playoffs, it's not unheard of for a team to pick No. 1 in the draft and then make the postseason in the same year. Minnesota did it in 2017.

"Everything that I do, or that we do, has tradeoffs," Elias said. "All I can say is, we do everything from a very global, very thoughtful perspective, about what is the right thing to do for the health of the Orioles franchise. And all that's being taken into consideration for the draft, but also for the trade deadline."

For all the excitement of 1989, it was basically an outlier. The Orioles sank back under .500 the next year and lost 95 games in 1991. Baltimore traded Pete Harnisch, Steve Finley and Curt Schilling -- all of whom were part of the '89 team -- for slugger Glenn Davis in a move that backfired badly.

The lesson is that, while Baltimore's long winning streak was a fun story for fans to rally around, the Orioles still need to make smart roster moves if they're going to build on it.

Elias hasn't said too much to tip Baltimore's hand heading into the draft, but he did say there's a general feeling in the industry that the first player taken will be a position player, not a pitcher.

Whatever happens over these next few weeks, the good news for Baltimore is that there seems to be more help on the way. In right-hander Grayson Rodriguez and infielder Gunnar Henderson, the Orioles have two of the game's top five prospects, according to MLB Pipeline. Rodriguez has been sidelined with a lat injury, but Henderson has hit well at Triple-A.

Catcher Adley Rutschman, the top pick in the 2019 draft, made his big league debut with Baltimore earlier this year.

"I think this organization is in a very healthy spot, and a lot of that is the players, and the way that they're playing up here at the major league level right now," Elias said. "Then obviously having an excellent group of minor league prospects behind them."

Continued here:

Baltimore Orioles reliving history with season surge and top pick in draft - ESPN

At the entrance to Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv, a bronze relief of the face of Mykhailo Hrushevsky stares out towards the red-painted portico. A historian by training, and a key figure in Ukraines national revival in the early 20th century, Hrushevsky served briefly as the head of Ukraines revolutionary rada or parliament in 1918.

Taras Pshenychnyi, deputy dean of the history department, pauses to examine the image of his distinguished forebear, and to reflect on the extraordinary times the university is seeing since the Russian invasion.

The dean of history and five other professors from his department are serving in the military, he says, along with 15 students, one of whom has been killed in the fighting.

But for people like Pshenychnyi, another, subtler, battle is being fought away from the artillery exchanges on the frontlines. It is a bitter war of memory between two versions of Ukraines past and its relationship to Russia, of which Ukraine was a part for centuries until it gained independence in 1991 as the Soviet Union collapsed.

On one side, as Mark Galeotti writes in his recent book A Short History of Russia, is a crude cut-and-stitched version of history promoted by Vladimir Putin. Galeotti describes the Russian president as unwisely considering himself an amateur historian of note who has used history both to justify his war against Ukraine and to make his own battle plans on the basis of his misunderstanding of it.

Putin has argued that Ukraine has no experience of genuine statehood outside the USSR and that, by seeking to abandon its Soviet legacy, it has delegitimised itself.

You wanted to decommunise, Putin threatened Ukraine before the war. Well show you what decommunisation really means.

Echoing and amplifying a view of history held by Russian elites going back to the Bolsheviks and before, the Putin version views Ukraine as not a proper country and Ukrainian as not a real language; rather, it is a place to be fought over, dominated and periodically plundered.

All of this has required Ukrainians to follow Hrushevsky and promote their own history. Russia uses history as a weapon, says Pshenychnyi, who wrote his doctoral thesis on the devastating famine the Holodomor that Stalin created in Ukraine in the early 1930s, which claimed the lives of more than 3 million people and was itself suppressed from Soviet history.

It has done it before. This is why the conflict is happening now: because Russia has stolen and misinterpreted the history of Ukraine.

And it is a history that, in the last century at least, is full of grim echoes. Pshenychnyi points to the Russian grain thefts of today as repeats of the Bolshevik and then Stalinist monopolisation of Ukraines grain that twice led to famine. He points to the suppression of Ukrainian culture. And to deadly persecutions for using the Ukrainian language and symbols.

[Putins] manipulation of history has created a fake space in Russia to allow the perception of Ukraine as something like a Nazi state, he says. He is referring to one of the Kremlins main talking points: that its special military operation is required to denazify Ukraine.

And in the midst of a brutal conflict and oppressive occupation, Ukraines war of memory is not just academic. Several museums, including one in Kharkiv that celebrated 18th-century philosopher Hryhorii Skovoroda, have been destroyed, and Russian history books are being imposed in occupied regions.

Our main task is the fight against Russian pseudo-historic narrative, says Pshenychnyi. But a second task is to create a new historical space cleared from Russian narratives, because since 24 February [when Russia launched its invasion], there has been a wholesale change of national perception.

Now my students want to know about the Soviet Unions history, about totalitarianism. One of the courses I teach is about protecting Ukraines cultural heritage.

For some, however, the desire to recast history is more populist and trenchant: in a trend that has been apparent since independence in 1991, they see reclaiming Ukrainian history in more explicitly nationalist terms.

In his Cossack-themed restaurant, Valery Galan, founder of the Museum of the Establishment of Ukrainian State, has signs insisting to customers and staff: We speak Ukrainian. Language matters.

An amateur historian who admits to admiring Stepan Bandera head of the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, which collaborated with the Nazis during the second world war, who was assassinated by KGB agents in Germany in 1959 he sees the instrumentalisation of history in more brutal terms.

My hope is that after this horrifying aggression, people will open their eyes. Museums are weapons against fake history. History is not like a rifle that you fire only once. It is a weapon that lasts for decades.

Theres still a certain part of our society ethnic Russians or those who supported Russia who should have been educated sooner.

Galan, who served as an officer in the Soviet Armed Forces, has a new project: a series of museums and exhibitions commemorating the current war. He takes me to a back room where he is collecting artefacts for this new venture, including a spent Javelin anti-tank missile.

Our language was forbidden. Our Cossacks were sent to Siberia. We need to show people our achievements. How, since the Golden Horde [the period of Mongol rule until 1502], we have stood as a buffer for Europe.

For Yaroslav Hrytsak, a historian at the Catholic University in Lviv, the practice of history during a war of national survival is less demagogic: I would say that the main function of the historian now is to provide stability, and assurance that Ukraine has legitimate claims and is bound to win.

History serves a therapeutic function. The main aim of Putin is to create chaos and confusion. He uses history. To counterattack is to restore real history. The thing is, Putin knows he is lying. But he thinks that everyone is lying, and there is no truth. But there is such a thing as historical truth. I spent half of my life under the Soviet Union. What is important to remember is the extent of historical amnesia imposed on Ukraine.

I had no idea about the Holodomor because it was erased. The Holocaust was played down to suggest that Soviet Jews were killed not because they were Jews, but because they were Soviet citizens. And while history was treated differently in different Soviet republics, the suppression of history was extreme in Ukraine.

Ukraine and Russia have two entirely different strategies to the past. For Russia, its about making Russia big again, and its doing that by turning to history. I have a friend who is a Russian liberal intellectual. He says Russia is like an SUV driving on dirt roads. The windscreen is covered in mud, so all it can see is whats in the rear view.

Ukraines view of history is different. It wants to leave the past where theres nothing but great suffering and war and revolution behind. For Ukraine, history is about never needing to go back again.

Excerpt from:

Russia stole our history: Ukraines bitter struggle to keep the truth alive - The Guardian

The invasion of Ukraine caught many analysts of Russia off guard. Russian President Vladimir Putin had long been thought of as rough, tough, and brutalbut also calculating and cautious. The wild and reckless Ukrainian adventure seemed out of character.

Some observers believe Putin has changed as a result of his deep isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic or that he has some secret illness that renders him irrational. Both U.S. President Joe Bidens former press secretary, Jen Psaki, and Republican Sen. Marco Rubio have observed that Putin seems different since the pandemic, and rumors about a hidden illness are circulating in Russia and among Russian migrs. But Putins personal history reveals that his decision to go to war is entirely in characterand that he is very likely to continue it indefinitely.

Putin has justified his invasion by citing a long list of grievances against the West, especially NATOs expansion into the former Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, and against Ukraine itself. Pandemic isolation may have warped his thinking. But the roots of Putins recklessness go back to a tendency he has shown since childhood to lash out when he has felt wronged or betrayed. Later passages of his life are more than stages he has lived through; they are layers that have built on one another, turning a boy who brawled his way through adolescence into a man who has directed his wrath against a U.S.-led West that he once tried and failed to get along with and that he now blames for betraying him.

LAYER ONE

Putins family barely survived the siege of Leningrad during World War II, and although his father was a factory worker and Communist Party member, they were stuck after the war in a large, run-down apartment complex framing a central courtyard frequented by neighborhood toughs. Little Volodyaa diminutive of Vladimir used by friends and familyfound a way to defend himself. If anyone ever insulted him in any way, a friend of his recalled, Volodya would immediately jump on the guy, scratch him, bite him, rip his hair out by the clumpdo anything at all never to allow anyone to humiliate him in any way. Putins wrath became even more dangerous when, at age 11 or 12, he discovered judo and the Soviet-developed martial art of sambo. He was standing at a tram stop in the eighth grade, another friend remembered, when two huge drunken men got off and started trying to pick a fight with somebody. They were cursing and pushing people around. Vovka calmly handed his bag over to me and sent one of the men flying into a snowbank, face-first. The second man started screaming, What was that? A few seconds later, he was lying there next to his buddy. If there is anything I can say about Vovka, his friend continued, its that he never let bastards and rascals who insult people and bug them get away with it.

Putins grade-school teacher, Vera Gurevich, noticed a similar pattern: Volodya never forgives people who betray him or are mean to him.

LAYER TWO

The KGB, which Putin joined in 1975, codified the pattern that Gurevich described. The KGB and its predecessors (the Cheka, the NKVD, and others) had defended the infant Soviet republic in a bloody civil war, carried out massive purges that killed millions of people under Joseph Stalin, and persecuted post-Stalinist dissidents. Externally, they targeted foreign intelligence services in a bitter, decades-long struggle. But internally, the secret police was plagued by intense competition for advancement and other bitter internecine squabbles.

The result was a pervasive cynicism. The only former KGB chief who rose to become supreme Soviet leader, Yuri Andropov, was theoretically open to the liberalization of the regime he headed. In 15 to 20 years well be able to allow ourselves what the West allows itself now, Andropov once told a Soviet diplomat, freedom of opinion and information, diversity in society and in art. But only in 15 to 20 years, after were able to raise the populations living standards. But Andropov, a veteran party apparatchik who took over the KGB in 1967, wasnt a KGB-lifer. Much more representative was Stalins longtime secret police chief Lavrenty Beria, who was so entirely cynical that the hyper-suspicious Stalin was quite right to fear that Beria was plotting against him. Berias predecessors Genrikh Yagoda and Nikolai Yezhov were executed under Stalins orders: Beria would meet the same fate in the power struggle after Stalins death.

By the time Putin joined, the KGB was less murderous, but its office politics were both brutal and cynical. The KGB expanded Putins childhood instincts into the world of adulthood: Politics, whether international or domestic, is a dog-eat-dog struggle. Everybody lies, cheats, and steals. Everyone is suspect. One must always be on guard, ready to fight fire with fire. That is the way of the world. When U.S. leaders portray themselves as holier than thou, they are hypocrites.

Putin didnt distinguish himself in the KGB. Beginning as a lowly spy-chaser in Leningrad, he was then assigned to Germanynot to West Germany, a prime target of Soviet espionage, but East Germany, where he ran agents operating in the West and kept his eye on the Stasi, the dreaded East German intelligence service, which KGB agents didnt trust any more than they trusted each other. But he worked hard, played by the rules, and found a way to please his bosses rather than trying to outshine them. Ironically, these habits and skills equipped him to adapt to post-communism when what was left of the Soviet Union collapsed at the end of the 1991.

LAYER THREE

As East Germany collapsed and moved toward reunification with West Germany, Putin returned from Dresden to Leningrad. He rose rapidly to become deputy mayor of post-Soviet St. Petersburg and then, astoundingly, to become post-Soviet Russias second president. The skills he had cultivated in the KGB turned out to be needed in the turbulent decade that followed the Soviet collapse. St. Petersburg Mayor Anatoly Sobchak needed hard-working, efficient, disciplined aides, and he chose Putin, who was not only competent, resourceful, and loyal but admirably unprepossessing. He struck Sobchak as someone who does not like to stand out, as a person devoid of vanity, of any external ambition, but inside he is a leader.

Putin dealt with politicians and foreigners of all sorts in St. Petersburg. But he trusted most his old Leningrad friends, many of them from the KGB, such as Nikolai Patrushev and Aleksandr Bortnikov, who are still his closest associates today. He distrusted almost everyone else, his biographer Steven Lee Myers concluded. He always remembered acts of loyalty just as he never forgave betrayals.

These same qualities impressed President Boris Yeltsin in Moscow. Yeltsin was charismatic, bombastic, and anti-communist but an erratic administrator who needed competent aides, especially those inconspicuous enough not to pose any threat to his own power, image, and authority. He also needed a successor who would protect him after he retired from charges of corruption while in office. So he continued to promote Putin, who became head of the KGBs successor, the Federal Security Service; then prime minister; and, finally, acting president of Russia, when Yeltsin himself, ailing and depressed, stepped down.

In 2005, Putin famously labeled the Soviet collapse a major geopolitical disaster of the 20th century. He didnt miss communism itself, but his preference for a strong Russian state was already obvious. Russia needs strong state power and must have it, he wrote in December 1999 in a 5,000-word manifesto published just days before he became acting president. But Putin also sounded open in the long run to democracy: I am not calling for totalitarianism, he wrote. History proves all dictatorships, all authoritarian forms of government, are transient. Only democratic systems are lasting.

Putin also seemed to welcome a kind of alliance with the West. He was the first foreign leader to phone U.S. President George W. Bush after the 9/11 attacks. He helped Washington get men and supplies to Afghanistan. Russia knows firsthand what terrorism is, he declared on Russian TV. I would like to say that we are with you. We entirely and fully share and experience your pain. He even suggested that one day Russia might join NATO. That helps to explain, if not excuse, Bushs infamous appraisal: I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. We had a very good dialogue. I was able to get sense of his soul.

LAYER FOUR

Its tempting, in retrospect, to see Putins openness to democracy and to the West as pure dissimulation at a period of relative Russian weakness. But if they were real, although partial, attempts to adapt to post-communism, they eventually brought a bitter disillusionment between 2002 and 2007and with it a deep sense that he had been betrayed by the West.

At the core of this was the steady expansion of NATO. Putin has contended that Western leaders had promised Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990 that NATO would not expand one inch to the east. This isnt true. U.S. Secretary of State James Baker did orally promise not one inch but never in writing, and he later claimed he was referring to East Germany, not barring a more general eastward expansion; West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher declared more broadly that NATO would not expand to the east. But U.S. President George H.W. Bush shut down such talk, telling Kohl, To hell with that. We prevailed, and they didnt. We cant let the Soviets clutch victory from the jaws of defeat.

So NATO incorporated Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in 1999 and added Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, plus three former Soviet republics, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, in 2004. Worse still would be George W. Bushs insistence in 2008 that NATO remain open to Ukraine and Georgia, too.

But Putins list of grievances went much further: the NATO bombing of Belgrade; the U.S.-led war in Iraq; and two critical color revolutions in other post-Soviet statesthe Rose Revolution in Georgia, leading to the 2004 election of pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili, followed by the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, which prompted an election redo and brought to power pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko over his pro-Russian opponent Viktor Yanukovych. Putin saw these upheavals as having been created and manipulated by Washington, with the Georgians and Ukrainians playing an essentially passive rolepart of his pattern of detecting the U.S. hand behind everything, a view that gives the CIA too much credit but is a natural product of his KGB background.

By 2007, Putin had had enough. At the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy that February, he issued a blazing indictment of the United States, citing unilateral and frequently illegitimate actions, almost uncontained hyper use of force, overstepping its national borders in every way, military operations that are killing peoplehundreds and thousands of civilians, and substituting NATO or the EU for the U.N., which is the only mechanism that can make decisions about using military force as a last resort.

LAYER FIVE

Putin could have followed these bitter complaints with a burst of actions against the United States. But 2008-2012 marked a lull in the growing tension, resulting from changes in both Russian and U.S. leadership.

The Russian Constitution barred Putin from serving a third consecutive term as president. He wasnt prepared to ignore that restriction (although he later arranged to eliminate it and thus clear the way for him to serve as president until 2036), so he chose his prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, to replace him for the next four years. Although Medvedev was effectively his puppet, Putin allowed him to set a more liberal tone and gave him one more chance to improve U.S.-Russian relations. The new U.S. president, Barack Obama, set out to do likewise.

In response to Obamas attempt to reset relations, Medvedev agreed on a new nuclear arms control treaty, New START, that extended limitations on intercontinental missiles for another 10 years. He refrained from vetoing a U.N. resolution authorizing the use of force to prevent Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi from obliterating opponents in the city of Benghazi.

Obama spokesperson Robert Gibbs summarized the presidents view of Medvedev this way: He genuinely feels like they can sit down or call each other and work through a series of issues in a very frank and honest way, that each side is always negotiating in good faith, and that theres a level of confidence and trust also thats built up in the two sides working together. In contrast, Obama regarded Putin, whom he saw slouching behind Medvedev in Moscow, as looking like the bored kid in the back of the classroom, a taunt that apparently infuriated Putin. Perhaps it reminded him of his childhood struggles.

Putin remarked later that he found the U.N. resolution on Libya, which Medvedev failed to veto, flawed and inadequate, allowing the United States and its allies not just to protect Benghazi but to pursue and destroy Qaddafi. As for Saakashvili, Putin told French President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2008, Im going to hang him by the balls. Why not? The Americans hanged Saddam Hussein.

LAYER SIX

In 2011, Medvedev and Putin announced that Putin would stand for the presidency in the 2012 election. The fact that the two men alone dared to decide such an important matter (although voters later reelected Putin), along with grievances over 2011 Russian legislative election results, sparked mammoth protests in Moscow. Putin blamed U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She set the tone for some of the actors in our country and gave them a signal, he said three days after the 2012 vote. They heard the signal and with the support of the State Department began active work.

The term active work, used by the KGB to describe ongoing intelligence operations, underlined Putins charge that the protests were the result of CIA meddling. In response, he cracked down on dissent at home and stepped up military assistance to Bashar al-Assad as the Syrian dictator attempted to crush his own opposition. Obama warned that any use of chemical weapons by Assad would cross a red line and trigger strong U.S. counteraction. But when Assad did just that, Obama retreated. Putin apparently took that as a sign that he could increase pressure on Ukraine, where Yanukovych, who was elected president in 2010, had been ousted by massive protests in 2014 and replaced by a pro-Western government.

In an echo of Cold War thinking, Putin saw the world as a chess game in which Washington and Moscow were the real players. He regarded the Ukrainian upheaval in 2014, too, as inspired and directed by Washington. His response thenseizing Crimea and grabbing more territory for Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukrainewas harsher and more daring, as if his growing thirst for vengeance had prompted him to take greater risks. The fact that he got away with it makes his moves seem less risky in retrospect than they were. The West did respond with sanctions against close Putin associates. But oligarch Vladimir Yakunin explained at the time that Putin would reject any effort by them to resist him as yet another betrayal: He will not forget thator forgive that.

Putin lashed out more angrily than ever against the United States in 2014. The U.S. policy of containment had supposedly been devised after World War II to restrain the Soviet Union, but in fact, he charged in a presidential address that December, for many years, always, for decades, if not centuries, its real target was Russia itself. Putins recollection of how he had tried to befriend the United States in the 1990s, only to be betrayed, blended self-pity and rage. He continued: Despite our unprecedented openness back then and our willingness to cooperate in all, even the most sensitive issues, despite the fact that we considered our former adversaries as close friends and even allies, the support for separatism in Russia from across the pond was absolutely obvious and left no doubt that they would gladly let Russia follow the Yugoslav scenario of disintegration and dismemberment. With all the tragic fallout for the people of Russia. It didnt work. We didnt allow that to happen. Just as it did not work for [Adolf] Hitler.

LAYER SEVEN

Yet shortly after he lashed out so strongly, Putin found himself facing a new U.S. president who seemed so well disposed to Russia as to spark suspicions that Donald Trump was actually in Putins employ.

According to Fiona Hill, the Putin biographer who became a Trump expert while working as his lead Russia specialist on the National Security Council staff, Trump was not intentionally doing something for Putin or for anyone else. Trump was only ever concerned with himself. But Trump helped Putin by fomenting poisonous divisions in the United States that Putin himself had been seeking to widen with Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

In March 2017, Putin broached a broad normalization of U.S.-Russian relations, beginning with the restoration of diplomatic, military, and intelligence channels that had been cut off after Russian incursions in Ukraine and Syria; continuing with talks on information security and on Ukraine, Iran, Afghanistan, and the Korean Peninsula; and then, after meetings between the CIA, FBI, National Security Council, and the Defense Department with their Russian counterparts, a Trump-Putin summit. But the main thing that came out of this initiative was the infamous Helsinki summit, during which Trump declared that he trusted Putins word (that he had not interfered in the 2016 election) more than the conclusions of the United States own intelligence agencies.

Whether because Trump didnt follow through or because harder-line U.S. officials resisted his efforts to appease Putin or because Putin himself soured on Trump, this latest attempt to reset relations with Washington, or at least to pretend to do so, led nowhere. Putin held his fire as long as Trump was in office, but he had had enough and was about to boil over.

LAYER EIGHT

Ukraine, as we now know, was the target. In Putins mind, it had no independent history of its own. It had long been part of the Russian Empire, Putin declared in a speech three days before the invasion began, and it must become that again. It had never been a real nation or state, and now the allegedly sovereign Ukraine had allowed neo-Nazis to gain power and commit genocide. Moreover, he charged, Ukraine had been placed under external control of the West, was being pumped with arms, was determined to join NATO, and intends to create its own nuclear weaponsafter which it would serve as an advanced bridgehead for a strike against the missile systems of its main adversary, Russia. Americans just do not need a big and independent country like Russia around, Putin continued, and NATOs one and only goal is to hold back the development of Russia.

And if Ukraine wasnt truly a country, it also couldnt be in control of its own actions. Once again, Putin compared the United States to Hitler: The Soviet Union had tried to appease Hitler ahead of World War II, he said in a speech on Feb. 24 just before Russian troops moved into Ukraine, but we will not make this mistake the second time. For our country, it is a matter of life and death, a matter of our historical future as a nation.

So it is for Putin himself. He sees his own standing, his own reputation, his own future on the line. He had been patient too long. The bastards who insulted him and humiliated him and betrayed him again and again would now get what they deserved. Whoever tries to stand in our way, he warned in his Feb. 24 speech, must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.

Putins many grievances against the West, his revivified nationalist ideology and dream of resurrecting the Russian Empire, his recent isolation during the pandemic, and perhaps a hidden illness, too, if he really has one, all help explain his bloody war against Ukraine. But all are baked into the layers of a man whose main theme of life is a fierce determination to avoid defeat by lashing out against those who humiliate and betray him.

LAYER NINE

How will the Russia-Ukraine war endif it ever does? One scenario assumes continuing Russian setbacks so severe as to lead Putin to be overthrown or to concede defeat before he can be ousted. But as a biographer of Nikita Khrushchev and Gorbachev, I can testify that Putins power exceeds even that of those Communist leaders. The Communist Politburo dethroned Khrushchev not once but twice. The first time, in 1957, he managed to turn the tables on his opponents; the second time, in 1964, they ousted him.

In August 1991, top party, government, military and secret police officials mounted the abortive coup that paved the way to Gorbachevs eventual ouster in December. So far there has been no such constraint on Putin, nor does one appear likely. There exists no body like the Communist Politburo or Central Committee with at least the theoretical authority to depose him, and there is no enduring precedent in Russian or Soviet tradition of military coups against supreme leaders, let alone free and fair elections.

As for Putin himself conceding defeat, his whole life testifies to his determination not to do so.

A second scenario imagines Russia defeating Ukraine. This, obviously, is what Putin expected. But it hasnt happened so far, and if massive Western support continues to flow to Kyiv, this scenario, too, seems highly unlikely.

A third scenario is the kind of compromise that former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has suggested and that Western European leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron seem to favorthat is, a settlement based on the status quo ante with a return to front lines existing on Feb. 23. Would this be acceptable to Putin? Probably not, unless, using his huge propaganda apparatus, he can portray it as a victory. But even if he could, would Ukraine, having been brutalized so savagely, be willing or able to agree?

A fourth scenario is that the war continues indefinitely. This is, alas, the most likely scenario because it fits Putins personality. It also appears to be what most Russians expect. Whether it continues at the present level or becomes a frozen conflict, as has happened in Georgia and between Armenia and Azerbaijan, isnt clear. But after all the savage bloodletting in Ukraine, and the bitter enmity it has created there and in Russia, its hard to see the fighting fading away entirely.

Unless, in a fifth scenario, Putin opts to break a stalemate, or ward off a seeming defeat, by going nuclear. In the past, few observers would have expected him to do so. But then again few (including this writer) expected him to invade Ukraine, even after he massed nearly 200,000 troops on its border. The reason is that his decision to launch such a war seemed so out of character. But if, as I have argued, it was in fact so squarely in character, then who is to say that going nuclear would not be? Whether Putin does so depends on many factors. Will he actually apply the much-disputed idea in Russian military doctrine of escalating to de-escalate? Will he be sufficiently certain that exploding a small tactical weapon wont trigger an all-out nuclear exchange? Will he break the taboo that has prevented any use of nuclear weapons since 1945? Let us hope not. But if he decides that such a move is the only way to avoid a humiliating defeat, then the once unimaginable will be all too likely.

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Vladimir's Putin's History of Vengeance Against The West - Foreign Policy

Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum, left, sings a traditional Mohegan song while he and Phil Yellow Hawk Russell lead a boat tour Saturday, July 16, 2022, about the history of the Mohegan Tribe along the Thames River. The event was hosted by the Thames River Heritage Park. (Dana Jensen/The Day)

Al Grant of Uncasville, daughter Kady of Queens, N.Y., and his wife, Judi, blocked from view, and others listen to Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum on Saturday, July 16, 2022, during a boat tour about the history of the Mohegan Tribe along the Thames River. The event was hosted by the Thames River Heritage Park. (Dana Jensen/The Day)

Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum, left, speaks while he and Phil Yellow Hawk Russell, second from right, lead a boat tour Saturday, July 16, 2022, about the history of the Mohegan Tribe along the Thames River. The event was hosted by the Thames River Heritage Park. (Dana Jensen/The Day)

Vinnie Cusano, right, runs the water taxi along the Thames River Saturday, July 16, 2022, during a boat tour led by Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum and Phil Yellow Hawk Russell about the history of the Mohegan Tribe. The event was hosted by the Thames River Heritage Park. (Dana Jensen/The Day)

New London Bruce Two Dogs Bozsum, former chairman of the Mohegan Tribal Council and Mohegan Sun casino, opened the Saturday afternoon boat tour on the Thames River by piping the Gilligans Island theme song into the sound system hed carried with him onto the water taxi.

But this was not a three-hour tour like the one in the famous 1960s sitcom, nor did it end in a shipwreck. Instead, the excursion on the Thames River Heritage Park boat took just over an hour from New Londons City Pier toward the casino and back again on a mild summer day. And while Bozsum did his best to keep things light, there was seriousness that could not be avoided as he told roughly a dozen passengers about the Mohegan Tribes centurieslong fight for its life along the Thames.

Bozsum and fellow Mohegan Tribal Council of Elders member Phil Yellow Hawk Russell introduced themselves as cousins, both descendants of Uncas a revered chief, statesman and warrior who led the tribe at the time of its inception more than 400 years ago.

Were 13 generations of that man, Bozsum said.

Uncas tribe became the Mohegans, or Wolf People, after a split from the Pequot Tribe due to what the Mohegans describe as different ideas about how to deal with European conflicts. Ultimately, the Mohegans helped the British defeat the Pequots.

The Pequots went to the east side of the river and the Mohegans went to the west. Thats how their respective casinos Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun are situated now.

Thats where our family split, Bozsum said. And we remain that way forever.

The boat turned around in the vicinity of the Yale boathouse and Horton Point, where Uncas used to sit on rocks now known as Uncas Chair. The spot, overlooking the rivers narrow turn toward the present-day Mohegan Sun casino, was where the chief is said to have watched closely for enemies attempting to broach the Mohegans side of the river.

In describing Uncas as the tribes first sachem, or chief for life, Bozsum also invoked the name of its newest sachem: Many Hearts Marilynn "Lynn" Malerba in June was named the 45th treasurer of the United States, the first Native American to hold the position. She also heads the Treasury Departments newly established Office of Tribal and Native Affairs.

Bozsum marveled that a Mohegan signature is going to be on all the money in the United States.

The other night she gave a speech and said I will carry you all in my hearts, he recalled. And I said, were going to carry you in our wallets.

Bozsum spent nine years as the Tribal Council chairman, a tenure that included an audience with the queen of England and a starring role in an episode of the reality television show "Undercover Boss.

The boat tour was part of a full summer calendar of events through the Thames River Heritage Park, which its coalition of organizers describe as a park without boundaries. The group uses water taxis repurposed surplus Navy utility boats to link almost 20 historical and culturally significant sites in New London and Groton.

In its sixth full summer season, the park has grown from offering hop-on, hop-off boat rides to also offering themed tours. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the tours in their first year regularly sold out on topics related to the regions important military history from pre-Revolutionary War days through the advent of nuclear submarines. Offerings were soon expanded to include forays into womens history, whaling history, native history and the importance of sailors of color to the regions maritime heritage.

The park last year forged a partnership with the Mohegan Tribe, resulting in numerous popular tours in which tribal members in native dress sang, displayed native objects and told stories highlighting their heritage.

Russell, who has served as an environmental services supervisor for the tribe, talked about the shellfish and shad that sustained his ancestors and his own generations efforts to restore such a source of livelihood.

We stocked the whole river again with oysters and clams, Russell said. They came back pretty well.

Bozsums contributions included singing, flute playing and the recitation of a blessing. The undulating, syncopated melody of his song was part of a mens thunder dance to get everyone going for war, he said. The blessing thanked the Creator for the beautiful day and good things that have come.

Earlier, as the boat started off amid the industrial sprawl of the Groton-New London riverfront, he asked: Can you imagine how beautiful it was with none of this here years ago?

Now, the member of the Tribal Council of Elders remains committed to preserving history through the spoken word. He started the tribes language restoration program in 1998; now his daughter runs it.

According to the tribes website, Fidelia Fielding was the last fluent speaker of the Mohegan language when she died in 1908. Mohegans stopped teaching the language to their children for fear of retribution by teachers in public schools, the tribe said.

The modern Mohegan language has evolved through fragments found in written documents owned by various tribal members, including Fielding and anthropologist Frank Speck from over a century ago, the tribe said. Members also work with neighboring tribes that have similar dialects.

We have a beautiful language, Bozsum said after reciting the blessing in its original tongue. I love speaking it all the time.

Other boat tours include White Sails, Black Hands: The African American Experience on Connecticut Waters; Submarines, Battlefields, and Betrayers: Military Stories on the Thames; and Well-Heeled and Wannabes: The Gilded Age on the Thames. They run on weekends through mid-September.

More information is available at thamesriverheritagepark.org.

e.regan@theday.com

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Floating through 400 years of Mohegan history - theday.com

There is little doubt that Shaq is one of the most dominant forces this league has ever seen. In fact, more than a few folks would be more than willing to agree that the Los Angeles Lakers icon stands second to none when it comes to his dominance during his time in the NBA.

If you ask ONeal, however, the Hall of Fame big man doesnt only believe that he was once a truly commanding presence on the basketball court. In his mind, Shaquille ONeal also claims that he is the most decisive player whos ever picked up a basketball:

I am the most decisive player in NBA history, Shaq said, via Carlos Sacristan of Marca. Have you heard of Hack-a-Shaq? If not look it up. I was a force to be reckoned with because I was a dominant big man.

Fair point from Shaq. If you followed this man throughout his career, then its easy to realize how he has a pretty solid argument here. Nobody changed the nature of the game like Shaq did back in his day. For an entire league to come up with an entirely new tactic to try and stop ONeal, aka the Hack-a-Shaq, simply speaks volumes of how much of a groundbreaking superstar he truly was.

In this light, Shaq also said that he is of the belief that Golden State Warriors talisman Stephen Curry is the biggest problem in the NBA today. Their games could not be more different, but its clear that ONeal sees a lot of similarities between himself and the greatest shooter of all time.

Excerpt from:

Shaq reveals why he is the 'most decisive' player in NBA history - ClutchPoints

By The Associated Press

Todays Highlight in History:

On July 16, 1969, Apollo 11 blasted off from Cape Kennedy on the first manned mission to the surface of the moon.

On this date:

In 1790, a site along the Potomac River was designated the permanent seat of the United States government; the area became Washington, D.C.

In 1862, Flag Officer David G. Farragut became the first rear admiral in the United States Navy.

In 1945, the United States exploded its first experimental atomic bomb in the desert of Alamogordo (ahl-ah-moh-GOHR-doh), New Mexico; the same day, the heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis left Mare (mar-AY) Island Naval Shipyard in California on a secret mission to deliver atomic bomb components to Tinian Island in the Marianas.

In 1951, the novel The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger was first published by Little, Brown and Co.

In 1956, Last Ringling Bros, Barnum & Bailey Circus under a canvas tent.

In 1957, Marine Corps Maj. John Glenn set a transcontinental speed record by flying a Vought F8U Crusader jet from California to New York in 3 hours, 23 minutes and 8.4 seconds.

In 1964, as he accepted the Republican presidential nomination in San Francisco, Barry M. Goldwater declared that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice and that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.

In 1980, former California Gov. Ronald Reagan won the Republican presidential nomination at the partys convention in Detroit.

In 1999, John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette , died when their single-engine plane, piloted by Kennedy, plunged into the Atlantic Ocean near Marthas Vineyard, Massachusetts.

In 2004, Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months in prison and five months of home confinement by a federal judge in New York for lying about a stock sale.

In 2008, Florida resident Casey Anthony, whose 2-year-old daughter, Caylee, had been missing a month, was arrested on charges of child neglect, making false official statements and obstructing a criminal investigation. (Casey Anthony was later acquitted at trial of murdering Caylee, whose skeletal remains were found in December 2008; she was convicted of lying to police.)

In 2015, a jury in Centennial, Colorado, convicted James Holmes of 165 counts of murder, attempted murder and other charges in the 2012 Aurora movie theater rampage that left 12 people dead. A gunman unleashed a barrage of fire at a recruiting center and another U.S. military site a few miles apart in Chattanooga, Tennessee, killing four Marines and a sailor before he was shot to death by police; authorities identified the gunman as Kuwaiti-born Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez of Tennessee.

In 2016, Republican presidential nominee-apparent Donald Trump formally introduced his running mate, Mike Pence, during an event in New York, hailing the Indiana governor as his first choice and his partner in the campaign a day after announcing the selection on Twitter.

Ten years ago: Singer Kitty Wells, whose hits such as Making Believe and It Wasnt God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels made her the first female superstar of country music, died at age 92.

Five years ago: Ten people died at a popular swimming hole in Arizonas Tonto National Forest after a rainstorm unleashed a flash flood. Roger Federer won a record-breaking 8th Wimbledon title, beating Marin Cilic (CHIHL-ihch) 6-3, 6-1, 6-4. British actor Jodie Whittaker was announced as the next star of the long-running science fiction series Doctor Who the first woman to take a role that had been played by a dozen men over six decades.

One year ago: A federal judge in Texas ruled illegal an Obama-era program that prevented the deportation of thousands of immigrants who were brought into the U.S. as children. Rapper and DJ Biz Markie, known for the 1989 song Just a Friend, died at the age of 57. The Eiffel Tower reopened to tourists for the first time in nearly nine months, even as France introduced new rules aimed at warding off a fourth surge; they included mandatory COVID-19 passes to enter restaurants and tourist venues.

Todays Birthdays: Soul singer William Bell is 83. International Tennis Hall of Famer Margaret Court is 80. College Football Hall of Famer and football coach Jimmy Johnson is 79. Violinist Pinchas Zukerman is 74. Actor-singer Ruben Blades is 74. Rock composer-musician Stewart Copeland is 70. Playwright Tony Kushner is 66. Actor Faye Grant is 65. Dancer Michael Flatley is 64. Actor Phoebe Cates is 59. Actor Paul Hipp is 59. Actor Daryl Chill Mitchell is 57. Actor-comedian Will Ferrell is 55. Actor Jonathan Adams is 55. College and Pro Football Hall of Famer Barry Sanders is 54. Actor Rain Pryor is 53. Actor Corey Feldman is 51.

Rock musician Ed Kowalczyk (Live) is 51. Rock singer Ryan McCombs (Drowning Pool) is 48. Actor Jayma Mays is 43. Retired soccer star Carli Lloyd is 40. Actor AnnaLynne McCord is 35. Actor-singer James Maslow is 32. Actor Mark Indelicato is 28. Pop singer-musician Luke Hemmings (5 Seconds to Summer) is 26.

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Today in History: Today is Saturday, July 16, the 197th day of 2022. - wausaupilotandreview.com

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Who are the most intimidating players to ever turn out for the Carolina Panthers throughout franchise history?

The game of football is arguably one of the most physical in all of sports and the best of the best usually make it to the National Football League.

Throughout the history of the NFL, weve seen quite a range of players. From Mean Joe Greene to Lawrence Taylor, a lot of those players are ones that you didnt want to mess with or let get the best of you.

When thinking of intimidating and scary players, many automatically think of big defensive players or offensive tackles. However, many more players brought this persona while not being the nastiest.

With the NFL being around so long, different generations of fans probably have varied opinions about who the scariest players in league history are.

The Carolina Panthers have yet to win a Super Bowl in their history. But theyve had more than a handful of scary players make their way through the Queen City.

Some only played with the Panthers for a short time while others spent their entire career here.

As we finish up the dog days of summer and approach the 2022 season, who are the top five most intimidating players in Panthers history?

Lets take a look.

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Ranking the 5 most intimidating Panthers players in franchise history - Cat Crave

With faint light painting strange shadows on the wall, on that pre-dawn morning, Russias last tsar led his wife and children down to the basement, with the scarce concept of what would happen next.

In a merchants house in the Urals that was seized by the Soviets, a family was mysteriously moved in, and their existence kept secret from the world. What became of them would remain shrouded in mystery for decades to come.

The 1917 October Revolution cast a shadow across Russia that extended to all reaches of the globe. The merciless manner in which the communists would achieve their ends in the decades to follow was indelibly typified on a pre-dawn morning at a house in the Urals 104 years ago.

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The Darkest of Russia's Secrets Traces Back to This Day in History 104 Years Ago - The Epoch Times

Denver's Historic Five Points and Curtis Park neighborhoods have a rich history of being home to many different kinds of people. Now, a new interactive mapping project and exhibition is telling the story of one group of these Americans.

Denver experienced a boom in Japanese culture and businesses after World War II and the closure of Colorados internment camps, which imprisoned over 10,000 people of Japanese descent. Today, in Denvers Five Points neighborhood, an interactive story-sharing, web-based app takes visitors back in time for a unique neighborhood tour of what that time was like.

The project titled Stories of Solidarity: Japanese Americans in Five Points is a collaboration between the Japanese Arts Network, Mile High Japanese American Citizens League, and is supported by Arts in Society, but for creator Courtney Ozaki it's personal.

"This project came out of an interest in my personal family history. My parents grew up in the five points neighborhood, Ozaki said. Both sides of my family ended up in Five points following World War II and the closing of the Japanese incarceration camps that they were living in for a number of years."

Many Japanese Americans resettled in the Five Points neighborhood, both during and following World War II, because then Colorado governor Ralph Carr had the uncommon stance that incarceration of Japanese Americans was unconstitutional.

Ozaki says the project explores the convergence of the African American, Latinx, and Japanese American communities.

"Through that, we were able to identify really inspiring stories of beautiful moments of community coming together and those specific places where these stories occurred have ended up being sites of interest on the tour," Ozaki said.

The project includes oral histories from community elders still living in the area.

Richard Yoshida grew up in the neighborhood and attended Manual High School. He recalls how neighbors found a way to be neighbors.

"My grandmother would go back in the backyard and then there's a neighbor, on the other side of the fence, all she knew was how to speak Spanish. And all my grandmother knew was how to speak Japanese, Yoshida said. But they would yack, yack, yack and chat for, I don't know how long, you know, using their own language and they would understand each other. So there's some kind of special feeling in there that comes out to be able to understand each other.

Marge Taniwaki, who also attended Manual High School, remembers how diverse the neighborhood was.

"We used to call ourselves the little United Nations, because there were so many of us from varying backgrounds. The white kids came from Elyria-Swansea of course, we had Latinos and African Americans and Asians, and we all got along, Taniwaki said. And I know that I still have many lifelong friends back from that time."

Charles Ozaki, Courtney Ozaki's father, says the shared experience for all the people in Five Points reflects societal values during the time that united the residents.

It had the effect of pulling people together, but it also had the effect of separating people, Charles Ozaki said. A lot of the people who were separated were impacted by continually being disadvantaged in our society.'

These elders have more to share than just charming memories, however; they want to identify lessons for today.

There were so many different ethnic backgrounds, people of different color, including white, black, brown, whatever it was, but we were all able to get along together, Yoshida said. And, I think that is a very important lesson in light of the things that are happening in the world today."

Taniwaki hopes sharing this part of Denver history will have a political and economic impact namely that it will help slow gentrification.

"And so if they learn what the area was like when we were growing up, I'm hoping that it will sway some people to stop building the kinds of apartment buildings that are only affordable to the rich and are pushing out the longtime residents who deserve to be there, to retain the history of their longtime family associations with that area as have been for us," Taniwaki said.

For Courtney Ozaki, the history of people in the area is one that may not be apparent to many people just walking around. She says she hopes it forces people to consider their relationships with others.

"You know, there aren't any landmarks really that tell anybody that there was a Japanese presence in the Five Points area, Courtney Ozaki said. And I think the contributions both economically, as well as the relationships built were very important to future generations.

The free mapping project tour can be accessed online at the Japanese Arts Network website. A limited run in-person exhibit will be shown at The Savoy Denver in Curtis Park at select times on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from July 9-23.

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Japanese Americans in Denver's Five Points neighborhood have a long history. A new exhibit remembers them - Colorado Public Radio