My Science School

In August 1961, the German Democratic Republic began under the leadership of Erich Honecker to block off East Berlin and the GDR from West Berlin by means of barbed wire and antitank obstacles. Streets were torn up and barricades of paving stones were erected. Tanks gathered at crucial places. The subway and local railway services between East and West Berlin were interrupted. Inhabitants of East Berlin and the GDR were no longer allowed to enter the West. In the following days, construction brigades began replacing the temporary barriers with a solid wall, which stood in place for nearly 30 years. In November 1989, after weeks of discussion about new travel laws, the Berlin Wall was demolished.

Fact File: With the end of communist rule in the USSR, many of the symbols of communism, for example statues of former leaders such as Lenin, were dismantled.

 

Picture Credit : Google

After World War I, the United States and the USSR emerged as the two main powers in the world – known as ‘superpowers’. Although they had fought together to defeat Nazi Germany, differences between the two superpowers soon led to the start of the ‘Cold War’.

The Cold War started in August 1945, and it was a political war between the USSR and its communist allies, and the USA and other non-communist countries. It did not involve any fighting, although there was a threat of military action on several occasions.

Fact File: Mikhail Gorbachev introduced political, social and economic reform, known as perestroika, when he came to power in Russia.

 

Picture Credit : Google

Many Indians wanted independence from British rule, and a chance to build up industry and wealth in India itself. By the end of World War II it was clear that Britain could no longer ignore the demands of the Indian people. But negotiations were complicated by the demands of Muslims in India. Violence broke out between Hindus and Muslims, and Indians and British leaders eventually agreed to divide India into the two states of Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan.

India gained its independence in August 1947. Millions of Hindus and Muslims fled from their homes. As people tried to move to their new homes, hundreds of thousands of them were killed.

Fact File: Mohandas Gandhi was known as Mahatma Gandhi. He was assassinated in 1948, at the end of India’s long struggle for independence.

Picture Credit : Google

 

Technological advances in the machines and weapons of war were rapid during the 20th century. During World War I, inventions included the tank and the fighter aircraft. At sea, one of the major advances in military marine technology happened before the war, with the building of the battleship Dreadnought.

During World War II, the Germans used a new type of warfare, known as Blitzkreig (lightning war). But even more horrifying was the invention of the atomic bomb in the United States.

The first atomic bomb was exploded in an experiment in New Mexico, USA in July 1945. Only month later, atomic bombs were used to end the war. The bombs dropped on Japan killed about 130,000 people. Many more suffered terrible after effects such as radiation and burn injuries. This same terrifying bomb was used to bring the war against Japan to its catastrophic end.

Fact File: Both the British and the French armies experimented with tanks during World War I. These armoured vehicles were first used to effect at the battle of Cambrai in 1917.

 

Picture Credit : Google

On December, 1941, there was a surprise attack by the Japanese airforce on the United States navy base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. Although the attack crippled the US navy in the Pacific Ocean, it also drew the Americans into World War II. The USA and their Allies declared war on Japan on December 8, 1941. Japan joined Germany and Italy to form the Axis alliance.

During the summer of 1942, US forces successfully halted the Japanese advance at the battles of Midway Island, Guadalcanal and Coral Sea. After Pearl Harbor, however, Japanese forces quickly took control of much of Southeast Asia, including Singapore, Burma and the Philippines.

Fact File: On the morning of 6 June, 1944, thousands of Allied troops went ashore along the coast of Normandy in northern France, in what became known as the D-Day landings.

 

Picture Credit : Google

In March 1939, the German leader Adolph Hitler threatened to invade Poland. Hitler had already shown the seriousness of his intentions by taking over Austria (in 1938) and Czechoslovakia (in 1939). Both Great Britain and France gave guarantees to help Poland if it was attacked. So when Hitler invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, Britain and France were forced to declare war on Germany.

Under Hitler’s leadership, Germany had been well prepared for war. During 1939 and 1940, German troops scored victories in Poland, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands and France. Before the war started, Hitler had signed a ‘non-aggression pact’ with the Soviet Union, both sides promising not to attack the other. As German troops swept across Europe, Soviet troops attacked Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Finland. World War II ended in 1945.

Fact File: Winston Churchill was Britain’s wartime leader from May 1940 until just before the war ended. Here he is seen making his famous ‘V for victory’ sign.

 

Picture Credit : Google

Many people hoped that World War I was the ‘war to end all wars’. However, during the 1920s and 1930s there were a lot of political changes in many countries. In 1922 these changes led to the growth of the Fascist movement, (‘Fascism’ comes from the word fasces, meaning a bundle of branches.) fascism promised strong leadership and to restore the national economy and pride. This was a very powerful message in the years of the Great Depression, and many people in Europe supported the various Fascist parties.

Italy was the first country to have a Fascist rule. In 1922, Benito Mussolini marched to Rome and demanded that the Italian king, Victor Emmanuel III, make him Prime Minister.

Fact File: Oswald Mosley set up the British Union of Fascists after a visit to Italy in 1932. His supporters were known as ‘the Blackshirts’.

 

Picture Credit : Google

In the late 1920s, the price of shares on the New York Stock Exchange increased rapidly. More and more people bought stocks and shares in the hope of selling them again when their price had gone up – therefore making a large profit. When prices dropped in October 1929, people rushed to sell their stocks and shares before it was too late, but prices fell even further. This event is known as the Wall Street Crash. Thousands of people lost all their money, many businesses and banks shut down and unemployment soared.

Fact File: During the worst years of the Depression, many people were forced to rely on charity and government hand-outs for their most basic needs. In 1932 Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected Us present. His ‘New Deal’ aimed to create jobs and to protect people’s savings by regulating banks more closely.

 

Picture Credit : Google

As the 19th century drew to a close, there was an increase in rivalry between the different nations of Europe. They competed against each other for control of colonies, and for industrial and military power. In 1882, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy (known as the Central Powers) formed in alliance called the Triple Alliance, promising to protect each other in the event of an attack. In 1904, Britain joined with France in a similar alliance. They were joined by Russia in 1907 to form the Triple Entente. Europe was finally plunged into war by the action of an assassin in the Bosnian city of Sarajevo in 1914. Soon all the major European powers were drawn into conflict. Russia, backed by France, supported Serbia. Then Germany invaded neutral Belgium and attacked France, drawing Britain into the conflict.

Fact File: A British soldier from World War I. Typically, soldiers would spend a week or more in a frontline trench before going back to their dugout in a support trench.

 

Picture Credit : Google

 

In April 1770, Captain James Cook had sailed along the east coast of Australia. He and his crew had landed at a place called Botany Bay and claimed the land for Britain, naming the region New South Wales.

Eighteen years later, in 1788, the first ships full of settlers arrived from Britain. These settlers were all convicts, transported from Britain for their various crimes. Under the command of Captain Arthur Philip, the convicts were set to work founding a penal colony in Botany Bay. About 300,000 Aborigines were living in Australia when the settlers first arrived from Europe. They were divided into about 500 tribal groups.

Fact File: Convicts were to be transported to Australia and confined in prison ships like this one. By 1830 about 58,000 convicts had come to Australia. Many were more or less habitual urban thieves, some political, while substantial proportions were Irish.

 

Picture Credit : Google

The last tsar, Nicholas II, ruled from 1894 until his abdication in 1917. In the early years of his reign there was increasing discontent amongst ordinary Russians. Many people, including the Bolshevik leader Vladimir Illyich Lenin, followed the teachings of Karl Marx, the founder of communism. In 1905 this discontent boiled over when troops fired on thousands of striking workers outside the tsar’s Winter Palace in St Petersburg. The rebellion was quickly put down, but hundreds of workers were killed and wounded.

In early 1917 riots broke out again and this time the troops supported the rioters. Nicholas II abdicated, and a provisional government was put in place.

Fact File: Nicholas II and his family. Imprisoned by the Bolsheviks in 1917, they were most probably that the following year.

 

Picture Credit : Google

The Manchus ruled China for more than 250 years, from 1644 until 1912. This time is known as the Qing dynasty. In the early 1800’s, British merchants started to trade opium illegally from India to China. Despite the fact that the additive dangers of opium were well known, the British government backed the merchants. They wanted to force China to accept more open trade.

The first Opium War broke out in 1839, and was started when Chinese officials seized 20,000 chests of opium in Guangzhou. It ended with the Treaty of Nanjing in 1842. Under the terms of this treaty, Hong Kong became a British colony and more Chinese ports were opened up to European trade. A second Opium War (1856 to 1860) extended the trading rights of European nations in China. Under Manchu rule, all Chinese males had to follow the tradition of wearing their hair in a pigtail. It was seen as a sign of loyalty to the Qing dynasty.

Fact File: The skyline of modern Hong Kong. The island of Hong Kong came under British control in 1842, and Britain later gained part of the nearby Kowloon Peninsula. Control of Hong Kong passed back to the Chinese government in 1997.

 

Picture Credit : Google

During the 1700’s the slave trade brought misery to thousands of Africans, who were transported across the Atlantic Ocean and forced to works as slaves on plantation in the Americas. This trade also brought huge wealth to those who ran it – the shipbuilders, shipowners, merchants and traders.

Many people began to condemn the slave trade and to call for it to be abolished. The slave trade came to an end in the British Empire in 1807 and was finally abolished within the empire in 1833. Slavery continued elsewhere, however. It did not come to an end in the United States until after the American Civil War in 1865, and continued in Brazil until 1889.

In 1788 an association was formed in London to encourage British exploration and trade in Africa. Many British explorers set out to explore Africa along its rivers. Probably the most famous of all the expeditions was led by David Livingstone, who set out to look for the source of the River Nile. After being out of contact for almost three years, he was eventually found by the American journalist Henry Stanley.

Fact File: The anti-slavery movement was strongest in Britain and the USA. Many abolitionist speakers joined the struggle to gain equal rights for black people.

 

Picture Credit : Google

The Industrial Revolution, which begun in Europe in the early 1700's, saw dramatic improvements in travel and carrying of cargo.

In Britain, private roads called turnpikes were built in the 1750’s and travellers had to pay tolls to use them. But these soon became rutted and in need of repair. In about 1810, a Scottish engineer called John Macadam developed a new type of hard-wearing road surface that drained easily.

As industry expanded, greater loads of heavy goods such as coal and iron had to be taken across country. Rivers did not always go in the right direction, so canals were dug instead. The first modern canal system opened in France in 1681, and was copied later in Britain and the USA. By about 1800, there were nearly 7,000 km of canal in Britain. Steam power was the driving force of the Industrial Revolution. In 1804 an Englishman, Richard Trevithick, built a steam engine which could pull itself along on iron rails. His idea was later developed by George Stephenson, whose locomotive Rocket, was used to pull trains from 1829.

Fact File: In 1837 the English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel launched the Great Western, the first all-steam ship to carry passengers across the Atlantic.

 

Picture Credit : Google

French troops fought alongside American colonists in the American War of Independence. The cost of these wars left France virtually bankrupt. To try to raise money, the French king, Louis XVI, proposed an increase in taxes. However, most of the country’s richest people – the clergy and the noblemen – did not pay taxes. So the burden fell on the ordinary peasants. On July 14, 1789, a mob attacked the royal prison in Paris, the Bastille. Although few prisoners were released, this event marked the end of royal power in France and the beginning of the Revolution.

Fact File: A French doctor, a member of France’s National Assembly, suggested the use of the guillotine as an instrument of execution.

 

Picture Credit : Google