1940s

1940s, Words

Coventrate

Trench Fever reports on a seminar by Stefan Goebel on the post-war memorialisation of Coventry’s bombing in 1940. Hence today’s word for the day: ”coventrate”. It’s a good example of a word or phrase coined in a mean-spirited way (in this case, by the Germans), but which ends up being adopted by those whom it […]

1940s, Rumours

Levity through airpower

This story turned up on the urban legends website Snopes recently: Another enemy decoy, built in occupied Holland, let to a tale that has been told and retold every since by veteran Allied pilots. The German “airfield,” constructed with meticulous care, was made almost entirely of wood. There were wooden hangers, oil tanks, gun emplacements,

1940s, Contemporary

Disturbing

I haven’t yet been to the UK National Archives (well, I haven’t been to the UK at all yet …) but I probably will at some point for the PhD, and I have ordered documents from them before. So it’s more than a little disturbing to learn via Schneier on Security via Patahistory that forged

1940s, Books, Contemporary

London can take it

But of course it shouldn’t have to. It was a pointless and tragic waste of human life. References to London’s stoicism during the Blitz are all over the place: former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and Australian Labor Party foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd (“British bulldog spirit” was how he phrased it on the radio

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