This Week's Top Stories

Krakatoa, Mount Vesuvius, the Loma Prieta Earthquake... These are among the most famous natural disasters in history. But they share a terrifying secret. Just what is that secret? Our top-notch historians have the answer.

The Source of Trouble

One of the great endeavors of intellectual life is to compose a "unified theory of everything," a grand theoretical framework that will identify the hidden connections between seemingly disparate events and phenomena. While this has proved elusive in subjects like physics and professional eating, it is nonetheless excitingly within our grasp in the field of history.

Professor Steven Mertner has, rather famously, demonstrated the link between America's five presidential assassins: each man stood well under five feet in height. This remarkable insight has changed the way we think about assassinatology, and led to revisions in Secret Service protocol (former NBA star Mugsy Bogues, for example, is no longer legally allowed to come within one mile of a sitting president). Along similar lines, Dr. Valerie Frame has done exciting research showing that each modern event tagged with the label "revolution" has somehow involved conflict over hair length (see her recent monograph, "Cuttest Thine Hair, Ye Wastrels: Toward a New Hermeneutics of Locksatology in Surviving Oral Accounts of the Battle of Hastings").

It is my proposition that such a thread can be drawn connecting a far more disparate set of historical circumstances: disasters.

History's secrets…Revealed!

Ask Dr. Professor History

Admit it: You're ignorant. But that's why you're here – you're a curious ignoramus. Surely, you have questions. How many world wars were there? Are leprechauns real? Did they ever figure out where Baby Jessica went? Dr. Professor History has the answers to these questions and more.

Ask Dr. Professor History

50% of Americans believe volcanic eruptions are caused by the Cyclops.
The other 50% are uneducated and gullible.
Oil WILL NOT mix with water. Ever.

March 4, 2008

San Francisco is destroyed by an 'earthquake.'

"Disaster" – it comes from the Latin words "disa" (tough) and "ster" (break).

What do you think of when you hear that word – bad haircuts, rained out minor league baseball games, exorbitant veterinary fees? Surprisingly, the word has a meaning beyond the everyday purposes for which most people use it.

History is absolutely littered with examples of these disasters, everything from the spontaneous combustion of beloved celebrities to preposterous fabrications that people make up just to get attention.

This week, the Vince College Review and its expert staff will examine some of the most significant disasters in history, including the big dogs that even those philistines at the Wendy's have heard about to more obscure ones familiar only to Mensa members and astronauts.

If You Could Save Yourself,
You Could Save Us All

By Stanley 'Mack' Friendly, A.S.

As you know, nearly all history happened in the past. But some day in the future, kids in a social studies class will look back on today as being a part of history. Are they morons? No! History happens all the time – and it's happening right now (at least in Western countries). You, dear reader, are a part of history.

In that spirit, the Vince College Review is pleased to offer this article from guest columnist Mack Friendly, a disaster preparedness expert who will teach you how to survive disasters so that you get a chance to be a part of one of the cool things that happens in history instead of one of history's many Great Bummers.

You've seen it in the news: "DISASTER IMMINENT – EVERYONE RUN FOR THE HILLS!"

Pipe down, Chicken Little. Let's not get carried away here. Disasters are a fact of life, as natural as birth, death and marital rape. Now, they wouldn't be called disasters if they weren't, well, disastrous, but would you believe me if I told you that most of the real meaty devastation of those disasters is easily avoidable? Would you tell me I was crazy if I told you that billions of lives could be saved each year by taking a few simple preparatory measures? Would you tug and rip my piano key tie1 if I said that you too could take these steps, and that it wouldn't even cost you a dime?

"This guy's peddling bullshit!"

Not a chance. I swear! Everything I'm telling you is the truth. Don't listen to the skeptics; they've been trying to bring me down in court for years, but for years they've failed.²

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