Between 1450 and the late 1800’s, it is estimated that between 10 and 15 million Africans were kidnapped, and sold into slavery. The slave trade was incredibly profitable, but very cruel too. For over 300 years, slaves were captured along the west coast of Africa, often with the active help of African kings and merchants. Slaves were traded for beads, textiles, brandy, horses, and guns. Slavery was illegal in the United States after the Civil War, but slaves continued to be traded in Central and South America for another 40 years, until finally slavery was declared illegal in Central and South America as well.
Slavery existed not only in America, but in other parts of the world as well. Denmark was the first European country to abolish slavery in 1804, while Britain abolished slavery in March 1907. In the United States, slavery was one of the main issues in the Civil War between the North and the South. The last day of legal slavery in the USA was 31st January, 1865, while the world wide abolishment of slavery took place only in 1926.
Pompeii was a large and prosperous city in Ancient Rome. It was located in the Bay of Naples, at the foot of the volcano, Mount Vesuvius. It was the biggest of three cities – the other two were the neighbouring cities of Herculaneum and Stabiae- that were completely destroyed by the mighty eruption of Vesuvius on 24th August 79 AD.
The ancient Phoenicians had an arrow-like symbol in their alphabet. It was the seventh letter, and called ‘zayin’. The ancient Greeks adopted this symbol from the Phoenicians as the sixth letter of their alphabet in 8000 BC. They called it ‘zeta’, and gave it its present form. The Romans adopted it from the Greek alphabet in 100 AD, and Z is the last letter of the Roman alphabet to this day. ‘Z’ is pronounced as ‘zed’ by the British and as ‘zee’ in America. If you are sending a Morse code, you will have to send two dashes and two dots to present ‘Z’! Another interesting fact about ‘Z’ is that it was used to represent the Roman number 2000 in medieval times.
Do you know what a penal colony is? It is a settlement of prisoners who have been exiled from their homeland as a punishment, and transported to a far away location. Britain started sending convicts to America from 1597 onwards. The practice was stopped in 1776, with the American War of Independence. British prisoners were sent to Western Australia instead, and new penal colonies were established there. Twenty per cent of these first convicts were women. A system of labour was established in which people, whatever their crime, were employed according to their skills – as brick makers, carpenters, nurses, servants, cattlemen, shepherds, and farmers. Educated convicts were set to the relatively easy work of record – keeping for the convict administration.
In 1804 the first steam-powered engine, carrying some iron, ran in Wales, in Britain. But it was almost twenty five years later, in 1829, that George Stephenson, a British engineer, designed the ‘Rocket’ – a steam engine that created history. Trials were held by the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company, to find the best locomotive engine for a railway line that was being built to serve these two English cities. On the day of the trials, some 15,000 people came along to see the race of the locomotives. During the race, the Rocket reached speeds of 24 mph during the 20 laps of the course. This was due to several new design features. The Rocket paved the way for steam locomotives all over Europe, Asia, and America. The era of steam engines is often called the ‘golden age’, of railways. Gradually though, steam engines were replaced by diesel and electric locomotives. The beginning of the end for steam engines began in the 1950’s. America’s last steam engine ran in 1958, while the last steam engine in Britain was retired from use in 1968.The last steam powered land speed record was set on 23rd January 1906, at Dayton beach in the USA, when Fred Marriot, an American, reached an amazing 127.659 mph in his steam powered car