The Top TenBy: Patrick Dale Woodworth

TEN Internet

Summary: January 1, 1983 first internet service turned on, giving the world an unprecedented amount of information.

Reason: Connected the world and established the most centered amount of information in the history of the world.

Left: The basic concept of the internet is that it’s an interconnecting series of webs.

NINE

Yellow JournalismSummary: No real date. Emerged during a media

battle between Pulitzer’s New York World and Hearst’s New York Journal. By definition, yellow journalism (AKA yellow press) is a type of journalism that presents little or nor researched topics that are usually more trumped up than it actually it is.

NINE (continued)

Reason: Though it originated in the 1890’s, it redefined American journalism and is still in effect today.

Left: A 2005 example of yellow journalism.

Right: A 1898 example of yellow journalism.

EIGHT

The Moon LandingSummary:1960, John F. Kennedy announced that

America shall make it to the moon, before any type of space program had been researched or thought of. Flash forward nine years on September 13, 1969, Apollo 11 landed on the moon and Neil Armstrong was the first man to step upon it.

Eight (continued)

Reason: Huge, technological step to uncovering more about the universe. Eventually led to the Hubble telescope, giving the first deep space pictures.

Armstrong Steps Off Shuttle:

http://mfile.akamai.com/20356/mov/etouchsyst2.download.akamai.com/18355/qt.nasa-global/apollo40/One_Small_Step__720p.mov

SEVENVietnam War

Summary: Began on November 1, 1955 and ended on April 30, 1975. It was originally intended to prevent a communist takeover in Vietnam. The country was split North and South with the U.S. backing the South.

Seven (continued)

• Reason: The most controversial war in American history, this is the first war to be ever “televised” in a way. People at home saw everything, for the most part, from footage caught by the media. This footage construed the war to the American public as a losing one. This allowed unprecedented access to military and other government operations by the press as well as cause skepticism about the federal government for the first time.

Seven (pictures)

Left: The execution of a Viet Cong prisoner.

Right: US soldiers land in Vietnam.

SIX

D-Day (Operation Overlord)Summary: June 6, 1944 a mixed invasion force of Americans, Britons, and Canadians stormed the northern beaches of France; Normandy. Over 150,000 soldiers took charged the five different beachheads. Omaha, Juno, Gold, Sword, and Utah. About 1,500 men died.

Six (continued)

Reason: Largest military invasion ever planned and executed. It led to the liberation of France and the toppling of Hitler’s regime as a second front opened up on Germany.

Five

WoodstockSummary: On August 15, 1969 over 500,000 people went to Woodstock, a massive musical festival. Over one weekend, 32 acts were performed outdoors. Bands such as Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Who, and Jimi Hendrix played.

Five (continued)

Reason: Pretty much epitomized American culture of the 60’s. Sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll. It was simply euphoric art expressed like never before.

Four

The Assassination of JFKSummary: November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas, Texas. This marked the end to one of the most beloved presidents ever.

Four (continued)

Reason: It shocked the nation to its roots as everyone watched as the most beloved president in United States history was gunned down on national television.

Above: This picture was taken only a few minutes before JFK was shot.

Above: This blurry picture was taken seconds after JFK was shot by a bystander.

Three (Part One)

Pearl HarborSummary: December 7, 1941, the Japanese

performed a surprise attack on an American military harbor in Hawaii. It crippled the American navy and was the first major attack on American soil. It took three thousand sailors lives and forced America into World War II.

Three (Part One continued)

Reason: Really the first time Americans realized we were vulnerable to attacks at home. It also forced our hand in World War II, leading to the events of D-Day, the toppling of the Third Reich, and the Manhattan Project.

Three (Part Deux [Fancy Two])

9/11Summary: On September 9, 2001, four US commercial

airplanes were hijacked by 19 al-Qaeda. Two of those planes were flown to New York and crashed into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. Both the towers collapsed, killing three thousand civilians. Another plane was flown into the Pentagon. And the last was taken over by the passengers and crashed into a field.

Three (Part Deux continued)

Reason: A global wide fear began about terrorism and its recent surge. People began to fear flying as security was beefed. Though no terrorist attack on the scale of 9/11 has occurred since then, the fear remains.

Two

HolocaustSummary: Hitler sought an “answer to the Jewish question.” The answer was the Final Solution. He gathered virtually all of Europe's Jews and threw them into concentration camps scattered across France, Austria, Poland, and Germany. These concentration camps were either labor camps or death camps… over six million Jews died, along with five million other ethnic minorities.

Two (continued)

Reason: The greatest atrocity known to mankind. An entire country persecuted and nearly eliminated an entire race for the search of racial superiority. Also, led to the founding of the U.N. and the Geneva Convention. Later in the twentieth century, a great interest in the Holocaust swept over America as we looked back at the horrors. Now, America is one of the UN’s most powerful proponents as well as had the Attorney General hold the first trial against acts of humanity at the Nuremburg trials.

Two (pictures)

Right: At the concentration camp Lager Nordhausen, a camp that 20,000 are estimated to have died. This pales in comparison with the death camp Auschwitz, where over one million died.

ONE

HiroshimaSummary: August 6, 1945, President Truman

ordered the dropping of the atomic bomb on the Japanese city, Hiroshima. The atomic bomb, Little Boy, exploded 2,000 feet above the city with a force equivalent of 17 kilotons of dynamite. In an instant, it killed 60,000 people and destroyed 90% of the city’s buildings.

• Reason: This was the first time the atomic bomb was used in actual combat. It is the most destructive weapon introduced into warfare. It created a fear during the Cold War, when both the U.S. and U.S.S.R could destroy the planet over fifty times.

ONE (continued)

Right: After the initial explosion, a fire began spreading around the city. Nearly 90% of all buildings were destroyed.