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Report reveals Anne Frank's family tried escaping to US but was thwarted by 'bureaucracy'

Edward Helmore
The Guardian
Sun, 08 Jul 2018 18:08 UTC
Anne Frank Otto
© Dave Caulkin/APOtto Frank in 1971 holding the Golden Pan award, given for the sale of one million copies of The Diary of Anne Frank in London, Great Britain.

New research says the family twice tried to obtain US immigration visas but were thwarted by red tape

The family of the diarist Anne Frank twice tried to obtain US immigration visas but were thwarted by red tape, according to a new report published 76 years after they were forced into hiding in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam.

The report, issued by the Anne Frank House and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, details the challenges faced by Jewish families looking to escape the anti-semitic Nazi grip on Europe and negotiate anti-refugee sentiment then building in the United States.

Gertjan Broek, a researcher at the Anne Frank House, and Rebecca Erbelding from the USHMM wrote in their report that Otto Frank, Anne's father, began seeking ways to escape to the US as early as 1938. At the time, the US had no specific refugee policy, but enforced quotas based on national origin.

Comment: It's likely no coincidence that this story is coming out now, given the fierce immigration debate currently dominating the headlines. Whether the comparison of Anne Frank's situation to the current one is fair, we'll leave up to the reader.

See also:

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Dig

Is 8,000 year old Tappe Sialk in central Iran the world's oldest civilisation?

Arghavan Shamsara
Press TV
Wed, 04 Jul 2018 17:22 UTC
Tappe Sialk
The file photo shows a view of the Tappe Sialk prehistoric site in central Iranian city of Kashan.
With a history of nearly over 8,000 years, Tappe Sialk prehistoric site in Iran's central city of Kashan in Esfahan Province is believed to be the probable birthplace of the world's oldest civilization, oldest fixed settlement, oldest architecture, oldest ziggurat, oldest pottery kilns and oldest metal furnaces.

Following climate changes at the end of the seventh millennium BC, which led to formation of grasslands, the cave dwellers of the Iranian Plateau started living in plains, among which Tappe Sialk site is probably the oldest location discovered so far.

The entire Sialk civilization is thought to have originated from the pristine large water sources nearby which still exist.

A large number of farm animal bones discovered at the site suggest that the dwellers of Sialk were meat eaters of domesticated animals.

Artifacts excavated from the site, including some very fine painted potteries, are currently on display at the Louvre, he British Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the National Museum of Iran and some others are at private collections.

The ancient site comprises two hills, nearly 600 meters apart, in the northern and southern sides. The northern mound is 25 meters high and the southern one is six meters high.

Comment: While Tappe Sialk may indeed hold treasures that have not yet been discovered elsewhere, its title of the world's oldest civilisation is questionable since there is evidence for other equally accomplished communities all around the world:

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2,000 year old mummy dressed in silk and jewels emerges from Siberian reservoir


The Siberian Times
Sun, 22 Jul 2018 12:00 UTC
siberian silk mummy
© Marina KilunovskayaThe ancient woman was buried wearing a silk skirt with a funeral meal
Archeologists hail extraordinary find of suspected 'Hun woman' with a jet gemstone buckle on her beaded belt.

After a fall in the water level, the well-preserved mummy was found this week on the shore of a giant reservoir on the Yenisei River upstream of the vast Sayano-Shushenskaya dam, which powers the largest power plant in Russia and ninth biggest hydroelectric plant in the world.

The ancient woman was buried wearing a silk skirt with a funeral meal - and she took a pouch of pine nuts with her to the afterlife.

In her birch bark make-up box, she had a Chinese mirror.

Near her remains - accidentally mummified - was a Hun-style vase.

Comment: Siberia is certainly turning out some interesting finds of late:

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Bomb

The eves of destruction: 250 videos of declassified US atomic tests hit the internet


RT
Fri, 06 Jul 2018 17:36 UTC
Nuclear explosion
© US Defense Department/ReutersThe Bomb
More than 250 videos of previously classified US nuclear bomb tests have been uploaded to YouTube this week, providing a fascinating but terrifying glimpse into the United States' nuclear program.

Digitized and uploaded by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, the videos document secret atomic bomb tests between 1945 and 1962. The organization says that it hopes that the videos will help dissuade humanity from further use of nuclear weapons in the future.

"I think that if we capture the history of this and show what the force of these weapons are and how much devastation they can wreak, then maybe people will be reluctant to use them," a physicist working for the lab said after a similar batch of videos was released last year.

The videos feature dozens of tests from once-classified chapters in US nuclear history, including Operation Dominic, which consisted of 31 nuclear tests in 1962, and Operation Teapot, during which 14 bombs were dropped in Nevada in 1955. A similar series of tests, known as Operation Sunbeam, was conducted at the Nevada National Security Site in 1962.

The [following four] visually stunning but harrowing videos vary in length, although most of them are approximately one minute long and begin at the moment of detonation.


Comment: Deto'nation': The history we wish we never had...

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Dig

Ancient Chinese skull suggests humans may have come out of Africa AND Asia

Colin Barras
New Scientist
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 15:49 UTC
dali skull
© Sheela Athreya
The origins of our species might need a rethink. An analysis of an ancient skull from China suggests it is eerily similar to the earliest known fossils of our species -found in Morocco, some 10,000 kilometres to the west. The skull hints that modern humans aren't solely descended from African ancestors, as is generally thought.

Most anthropologists believe, based on fossil evidence, that our species arose in Africa around 200,000 years ago. What's more, genetic studies of modern humans indicate that we are all descended from a single population that left Africa within the last 120,000 years and spread around the world. This African group is the source of all modern human genes, barring a few gained by interbreeding with other species like Neanderthals.

However, the Dali skull may not fit this story. Discovered in China's Shaanxi Province in 1978, it is remarkably complete, preserving both the face and the brain case. A study published in April concluded the skull is about 260,000 years old.

When researchers first described the Dali skull in 1979, they assumed it belonged to Homo erectus. This hominin species arrived in South-East Asia 1.8 million years ago and probably disappeared from the region by about 140,000 years ago. That fits with the standard story.
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Dig

The strange 175,000-year-old circle structures built by Neanderthals in French cave

Colin Barras
New Scientist
Wed, 25 May 2016 16:10 UTC
Neanderthals circle cave
© Etienne Fabre/SSACMade by Neanderthals – but what were they for?
They worked by torchlight, following the same procedure hour after hour: wrench a stalagmite off the cave floor, remove the tip and base, and carefully lay it with the others.

Today we can only guess as to why a group of Neanderthals built a series of large stalagmite structures in a French cave - but the fact they did provides a rare glimpse into our extinct cousin's potential for social organisation in a challenging environment.

Gone are the days when we thought of Neanderthals as crude and unintelligent.

Archaeological evidence now suggests they were capable of symbolic thought, had a basic knowledge of chemistry, medicine and cooking, and perhaps some capacity for speech. They may even have taught modern humans new artisanal skills when the two species met and interbred.

A reassessment of evidence from Bruniquel cave, near Toulouse in south-west France, suggests even more Neanderthal sophistication. In one chamber, 336 metres from the cave entrance, are enigmatic structures - including a ring 7 metres across - built from stalagmites snapped from the cave floor.

Natural limestone growths have begun to cover parts of the structure, so by dating these growths a team led by Jacques Jaubert at the University of Bordeaux could work out an approximate age for the stalagmite constructions.
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Info

3.3-million-year-old hominid child foot is "humanlike"

Bruce Bower
Science News
Wed, 04 Jul 2018 03:11 UTC
Fossil Foot
© J. DeSilva and Cody PrangTINY WALKER - A fossil of an ancient hominid child’s foot (shown here from different angles) suggests that members of Lucy’s species, Australopithecus afarensis, walked upright early in life.
Walking was afoot long ago among toddler-aged members of a hominid species best known for Lucy's partial skeleton.

A largely complete, 3.3-million-year-old child's foot from Australopithecus afarensis shows that the appendage would have aligned the ankle and knee under the body's center of mass, a crucial design feature for upright walking, scientists report July 4 in Science Advances.

"The overall anatomy of this child's foot is strikingly humanlike," says study director Jeremy DeSilva, a paleoanthropologist at Dartmouth College in Hanover.

But the foot retains some hints of apelike traits. Compared with children today, for example, the A. afarensis child - only about 3 years old at the time of death - had toes more capable of holding onto objects or anyone who was carrying her, the team found. Those toes included a somewhat apelike, grasping big toe. "Young children having some ability to grasp mom could have made a big energetic difference for Australopithecus afarensis adults as they traveled," DeSilva says.

Scientific debate about whether A. afarensis, which may have been ancestral to humans, primarily walked upright or hung out in trees has raged for nearly 40 years. Accumulating lower-body fossils, including foot bones (SN: 3/12/11, p. 8), as well as ancient footprints (SN: 1/21/17, p. 8), point to an adept two-legged stride among A. afarensis adults. But little was known about whether A. afarensis tykes walked early in life or slowly developed a stride-worthy stance.
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Георгиевская ленточка

Egor Kholmogorov: Nicholas II - Tsar of normalcy, competence and humanity

Anatoly Karlin
The UNZ Review
Tue, 03 Jul 2018 00:00 UTC
Nicholas II and Family
© Colorized by Olga.Nicholas II & family, 1914.
Translator's Foreword (Fluctuarius Argenteus)

As the perfect companion piece to his takedown of Stalin, here's Egor Kholmogorov's appraisal of Nicholas II, styled an "anti-Stalin", written during his recent trip to Crimea, which provoked another round of teeth-gnashing among Neo-Stalinists and Sovietophiles. It should also be norws that a recent poll shows that Nicholas II has overtaken Stalin as the most positively-regarded Russian historical figure of the 20th century.

AK's Foreword
If you appreciate these translations, please feel free to give Kholmogorov a tip here.
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Nicholas II: The Tsar of Normalcy

Original: Николай II становится для нас анти-Сталиным

"Here's where Nicholas II would go to visit his uncle. Yulia, get over here, grab a photo of him at this very place, I'll take a picture of you...", says a middle-aged man to his young daughter, two meters away from the spot where I am writing this article.
Nicholas II in Kharaks Crimea.
Nicholas II in Kharaks, Crimea.
I found the above photo just three weeks ago, when all the social media feeds were overflowing with the Emperor's portraits on his birthday. I've never seen so many photos and such warm comments before.

The political "exchange rate" of Nicholas II in our historical memory is on the way up. Previously, monarchism used to be retrospective and slightly abstract: sure, we respect the Russian historical statehood in general, Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality and all that stuff, and, given that this particular Tsar turned out to be the last one and died as a martyr, we'll respect him as well while taking note of his multiple foibles.

But these days I sense more and more of a markedly personal sympathy for the Emperor and his family among the people, going hand in hand with a more level-headed appraisal of his reign, gradually freed from Communist and Liberal propaganda clichés.

Comment: Further reading:

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Better Earth

Australian tribes 10,000 year old tales of ancient sea rise are accurate

John Upton
Scientific American
Fri, 26 Jan 2018 12:00 UTC
Australia ancient
© Patrick Nunn / Nicholas ReidMap of Australia showing the 21 coastal locations from which Aboriginal stories about coastal inundation are described in the Australian Geographer paper; also shown is the extent of the continental shelf that was exposed during the low sea-level stage of the Last Glacial Maximum, about 20,000 years ago. Image credit:
Melbourne, the southernmost state capital of the Australian mainland, was established by Europeans a couple hundred years ago at the juncture of a great river and a wind-whipped bay. Port Phillip Bay sprawls over 750 square miles, providing feeding grounds for whales and sheltering coastlines for brine-scented beach towns. But it's an exceptionally shallow waterway, less than 30 feet in most places. It's so shallow that 10,000 years ago, when ice sheets and glaciers held far more of the planet's water than is the case today, most of the bay floor was high and dry and grazed upon by kangaroos.

To most of us, the rush of the oceans that followed the last ice age seems like a prehistoric epoch. But the historic occasion was dutifully recorded - coast to coast - by the original inhabitants of the land Down Under.

Without using written languages, Australian tribes passed memories of life before, and during, post-glacial shoreline inundations through hundreds of generations as high-fidelity oral history. Some tribes can still point to islands that no longer exist - and provide their original names.

Comment: All around the world there are actually a great many myths which record the deluge which led to the rise in sea levels:

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Book

The chronicles of Nearchus: Fatal first contact between ancient Greece and the tribes of the Indus river

Mark Oliver
Ancient Origins
Tue, 26 Jun 2018 13:44 UTC
Alexander the Great Mosaic
© Public Domain1893 Reconstruction of the Alexander Mosaic.
Colonialism hasn't changed much.

More than 2000 years ago, when Alexander the Great conquered the Persia, he sent an ancient explorer named Nearchus to sail down the Indus River and map the lands ahead. It was a voyage filled with some strange and unnerving echoes of the explorers of the world to come.

Like the men who first journeyed into the heart of the Congo, Nearchus sailed down a great river, discovering new tribes the Greek world never knew existed. And just like the explorers of the Congo, he called them "savages" and he killed them all.

Nearchus's Journey Down the Indus River

Nearchus was an admiral in Alexander the Great's army . He helped lead the Greek fleet into battle with Persia and helped them advanced through their lines. And when Persia had fallen on their feet, Alexander the Great sent him to travel down the Indus River and write down everything he saw.

He was an explorer thousands of years before the Age of Exploration - one of the forgotten early men who ventured out into uncharted territories and came home with incredible stories of exotic animals and civilizations the likes of which the world had never seen.

Read the rest of the article here.
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