In 1913, on this day the assassin Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (pictured) disembarked from the Krakow train at Vienna's North Terminal station. Of dark complexion, he sported a large peasant's moustache and carried a very basic wooden suitcase.

The Arrests at the Central Cafe, Part 2Inside was a passport bearing the false name Stavros Papadopoulos, because "Agent Koba" was in fact on the official bloody business of the Central Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. And so he was met at the station by a "junior" party official N.I. Bukharin whose only real involvement was that he had recently agreed to start writing for a left-wing magazine called Proveshchenie ("Enlightenment").

Bukharin took him to the lodgings of a "senior" party member - Leon Bronstein - who was inner circle, not only a powerful figure but also the editor of a radical newspaper called Pravda or "Truth". In his diary that evening he recorded the encounter "I was sitting at the table, when the door opened with a knock and an unknown man entered. He was short.. thin.. his greyish-brown skin covered in pockmarks.. I saw nothing in his eyes that resembled friendliness".

Of course to the Imperial Police tasked with maintaining law and order in polyglot Vienna, all three men where subversive intellectuals. But these members of the underworld were linked by an ulterior purpose. Because Agent Koba had been sent to assassinate Emperor Franz Joseph and in so doing drag Austria-Hungary and Tsarist Russia into an imperialist war that would overthrow the status quo.

But of course these men were only allied by the mutuality of their frustrated ambitions. When the "Usual Suspects" were rounded up in the Café Central, they decided to break with their backers and overthrow the Habsburgs their own way. In this venture, they were joined by a cell mate, Adolf Schicklegruber, who had decided to revert his family after receiving the counselling of Dr Sigmund Freud woh advocated a fresh start. And when Freud was shot dead by Austrian Police, his furious anger propelled him into the leadership of this new revolutionary cell.

In 1876, in a move that prevented open war across the Northern Plains, President Ulysses S. Grant issued an executive order extending the deadline set previously for all Native Americans to return to their reservations.

Grant Extends Indian Reservation Deadline The initial date for the deadline had been carefully calculated two months before by Grant and his generals Philip Sheridan, commander of the Division of the Missouri, and George Crook, commander of the Department of the Platte, to be unreachable by the Indians, who had settled into their winter quarters. When the Indians did not move (General Sheridan noted that the Indians would not move no matter the date, though Lakota leaders had already decided they would travel to the agencies that spring), they would march troopers into the Indian camps and force them into submissive positions on the reservations.

A new story by Jeff ProvineThe matter at the core was gold. White encroachment on Indian lands had gone on for decades, and the Indians had gradually migrated and dealt with the growing White settlement. Several wars had raged, but none were as large as the surprise attack Sheridan and Crook were planning to clear the Indians quickly and effectively out of the Black Hills, where gold had been discovered by the Custer Expedition in 1874. A gold rush was in full sway and expected to boom. The Federal government had ended stopping trespassers onto the Sioux hunting grounds as an initial part of the plan and offered to pay the tribes $25,000 and reservations south in Indian Territory. Spotted Tail summarized the feelings of the Sioux leaders who had traveled to Washington with, "You speak of another country, but it is not my country; it does not concern me, and I want nothing to do with it. I was not born there".

Yet, the land was needed both to open for the glut of would-be miners following the Panic of 1873 as well as for railroad projects. Grant had previously reversed the objectives of the Federal government, which had been anti-Indian since its founding. Johnson's order to General Sheridan years before about the Cheyenne and Arapaho had been, "I want you to go ahead, kill and punish the hostiles, capture and destroy the ponies". Grant later confronted Congress on the policies, saying, "Wars of extermination are demoralizing and wicked" and "A system which looks to the extinction of a race is too horrible for a nation to adopt without entailing upon itself the wrath of all Christendom". Despite his advances in upholding treaties, in his second term the question of the Black Hills had turned him to the same policies he had derided.

In late January, a telegram from the US Indian Agent at Standing Rock reached the president, saying that his requests to extend the deadline had been repeatedly denied despite that travel in the midst of winter was impossible. He noted that any God-fearing, decent man would be reasonable rather than start a war, and Grant felt his spark of conscious. The Whiskey Ring scandal that had implicated his secretary Orville E. Babcock had destroyed Grant's popularity among Republicans, and he decided that acting in favor of the Indians could not do any more damage, saying famously, "If I'm going to be unpopular, I might as well do the right thing".

In spring of 1876, the majority of the Indians came to their reservations as had been agreed. Sheridan and Crook were allowed to mop up the stragglers and then ordered to maintain some kind of peace amid the Indians and the swarms of prospectors centering on Deadwood. Methods of herding the remaining buffalo were organized by the Sioux and government agents, who finally were able to work a deal for the Northern Pacific Railroad giving the Indians a toll based on transport. When the gold began to give out, the prospectors deserted, and the Sioux gradually came back into control over much of the area. Conservationist Theodore Roosevelt hunted the buffalo in 1893, and his political actions back East helped give funding to rebuilding the Northern Buffalo Herd, which had been barely saved from the extinction that had struck the Southern.

Despite decades more of politics and needless violence, the White and Native Americans gradually learned to live alongside one another, perhaps best exemplified by the peaceful demonstrations at Wounded Knee in 1890 where invited government officials understood the severity of breaking up the Great Sioux Reservation and determined to honor the previous treaty.

In 2010, Darwin Catholic asked the question ~ what would things look like today if Lincoln had simply allowed the CSA to leave and recognized it as a separate country?

What If Lincoln Allowed Secession? Given Lincolns character and beliefs, this seems almost impossible to imagine, but these sorts of alternative history exercises can be an interesting diversion, if only because they make us think about the interconnectedness of history.

A few thoughts of my own:

One of the major questions there would, of course, be: Which CSA? The deep south seceded immediately after Lincolns election, but the mid and upper south didn't secede until after Lincoln responded to the attack on Fort Sumpter with a call for the states to raise militias.

Personally, I think you'd also have to imagine that a Union which let the South secede would probably have broken up further over the following 60 years. Once the precedent for peaceful secession was made, it would be an obvious answer to regional tensions between East and West, etc.

A final factor which shouldn't be overlooked: If the CSA had been left independant, Wilson would clearly never have become president of the US - and the presidency of Wilson (who said his earliest memory was of huddling with his family in the steeple of his father's Presbyterian church and watching the flames of Sherman's army passing through Georgia) was one of the formative influences on the US in the 20th century and on the modern Democratic Party.

In 1968, on this day the weirdest unrealized Beatle movie project became a psychedelic reality with the nation-wide release of the Stanley Kubrick-directed film "Lord of the Rings".

Lord of the RingoThe live-action version featured an choice of casting that in an odd kind of way reflected the natures of the musicians, with Paul McCartney as Frodo Baggins, Ringo Starr as Sam Gamgee, George Harrison as Gandalf, and John Lennon as Gollum.

Due to their megastar status, the band managed to entice a number of talented actors - most notably Peter Sellers - to provide a semblance of balance to the movie. As a result of this level of mainstream interest, plans to shoot cartoon voice overs for "Magical Mystery Tour" and the "Yellow Submarine" were scrapped in favour of an even more ambition project than LOTR: an adaptation of "The Lion, the Witch and Wardrobe" to be shot during 1969.
Click to watch the Peter Jackson Interview

In 2012, on this day James Cameron's long anticipated, blockbuster movie Avatar 2 premiered in cinemas across North America.

The premiere of Avatar 2Set in 2175, twenty five years have passed, and whilst many things have changed, some have not. Because stocks of the rare mineral unobtanium (valued at $20m per kilo) are running low back on Earth, an ultra republican US President (played by Will Ferrell) orders a re-establishment of the RDA Mining Operation on Pandora. The surprising application of unobtanium is also revealed at this time. However, on the return voyage, unobtanium is also discovered on the moons of Polyphemus and the Alpha Centauri A solar system. This peaceful outcome is of course a huge disappointment to Colonel Miles Quarich (reprised by Stephen Lang) who is out for revenge having been reanimated from DNA ("Its not over whilst I'm breathing!") after his untimely death from two poisoned Na'vi arrows to the chest.

Ironically, the Na'vi are now desirous of a such re-engagement because lacking advanced medical technology they are unable to defeat a slow-acting virus introduced during mankind's first visit. In desperation, Jake Sculley (pictured) travels to the interior of the planet to seek a cure. To add depth to the drama, flashbacks are shown - including the related events that led to Sculley's disabling injury, and the death of his brother Tommy (and by exploring the President's complicity we discover that Jake's arrival on Pandora was no accident at all).

In a dramatic final scene, Jake appeals to the mother goddess Eywa to re-animate his human body and find a cure for the Na'vi. The stage is thus set for the third movie expected before 2015.

In 1957, the following notice was published ~ following sworn testimony from his God-fearing sibling Jesse Garon, No Music Except With Human Tongue

without prejudice of family loyalty, Elvis Aaron Presley sentenced to trial by water, by magistrates of this good parish of Tupelo, Mississipi, persuant to Holy Scripture, Make No Music Except With Human Tongue Saith The Lord God refers, on this day of our Lord, 1958. Not the potter, but the potter's clay. Amen.

In 1947, having taken the pivotal decision that Frodo must die and Aragorn (pictured) should become the new Ringbearer, J.R.R. Tolkien began to redraft Return of the King (a title which now assumed a vastly different meaning, recasting Aragorn as the forsaken king who must die so his people may live).

Wizard! Part 6
LOTR, the Kick Ass EditionThe death of Frodo was the bittersweet climax to the Battle of Isengard in which Saruman's army (reinforced with the ten thousand orcs at Helms Deep) is eventually beaten by the heavily outnumbered Rohirrim after the Ent's release the dam. Entering the Wizard's Tower, Gandalf casts down Saruman and retakes the Ring. But after discovering that the dying Frodo has succumbed to a mortal wound inflicted by the Witch-king of Angmar's Morgul blade, Aragorn takes up the Ring, and vows to finish the quest.

Based on an idea from Steven FisherWith the defeat of Saruman, The War of the Ring is reduced to two combatants. Having prevailed at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, the forces of the Dark Lord move into Rohan.

In a desperate race against time to prevent the Fall of Edoras, Aragorn is forced to look for aid from the Elves and the Men of the Mountain. And learns that Faramir might be alive after all. He then travels to Rivendell where Elrond reforges Andúril, the blade that was broken.

He leaves the mustering army to journey through the Path of the Dead under the White Mountains where he uses the reforged sword of Gondor to bind the Dead men of Dunharrow to his service (they were cursed to remain in Middle Earth after they betrayed Isildur in the War of the Last Alliance). With the Sword of Isildur returned to him, he forces the Dead Men to fulfill their oath and find the Dark Lords's forces.

With the Grand Alliance in place, the stage is set for a climatic Great Battle that will decide the very future of Middle Earth (a mirror image of the close-out of the Second Age).
This article is part of the Wizard thread.

In 1835, just after leaving the East Portico of the United States Capitol, President Andrew Jackson, twice-elected to the nation's highest office, was gunned down by the deranged English housepainter Richard Lawrence.

President Jackson Assassinated Jackson had fought in the War of 1812 and in numerous altercations with Indians as well as participating in thirteen duels, but now his luck seemed to have run out. Lawrence stepped from behind a column with two pistols and fired them into Jackson's back on the unseasonably dry winter's day. Reportedly, Jackson, when shot, turned, shouted, and charged at Lawrence before he fell dead.

A new story by Jeff ProvineLawrence was apprehended by the crowd, including Congressman Davy Crockett. He was taken into custody and questioned first by police, then by doctors, whom he told that he had a great deal of money coming from the Federal Government, but was held up by Jackson. Lawrence went on to explain that he would use the money to retake his place as king of England as he was, in fact, Richard III, who had died three-and-a-half centuries earlier. When taken to trial that April, Lawrence was quickly deemed not guilty by reason of insanity, but prosecutor Francis Scott Key and the many mourners of Jackson would not let the matter rest. The trial went to the Supreme Court, where a precedent of execution for the homicidally insane would be set. Lawrence was hanged that winter, and mental asylums around the nation were purged of those deemed "dangerous to mankind". The deplorable conditions of the insane would continue for decades, prompting reformer Dorothea Dix to champion for the rights of "harmlessly mad". In her early work, she had made attempts to help all those mentally troubled, but the stigma in America ran too deeply to overcome. The policy would continue through the early twentieth century where gas chambers became popular among asylums before giving way to the experimental lobotomies and drugs in the 1940s and '50s.

Just as national mourning turned to rage at the insane, it also poured out against Jackon's enemies in politics. It was discovered that Senator George Poindexter of Mississippi had hired Lawrence some months before, and he was brought under charges of conspiracy. Poindexter was eventually declared innocent, but his political career would never recover. More notably, Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, former vice-president under Jackson, was also suspected. Though he testified to his innocence on the Senate floor, he was not reelected in 1838 and eventually moved to Texas. The new Whig Party, who had formed in 1833 opposing Jackson's assurance of Federal power over nullification, became crippled by the desertion of Henry Clay and soon ceased to be a credible political unit.

Vice-President Martin Van Buren assumed the presidency and won his own election in 1836 and again in 1840 amid chaos of the border war with Britain dubbed the Canadian War brought about by the Caroline affair and the Pork and Beans War, which would ultimately lead to a divided Canadian republic, British colony, and substantial gains in the Pacific Northwest for the Americans. He pushed for Jacksonian ideals, many of which he helped create, suppressing bids for a national bank and instead offering Free Soil and limiting slavery in the territories in aid of the poor White. Polk continued the Jacksonian dynasty with war against Mexico, expanding Manifest Destiny in the Southwest.

After fifteen troubled years, the United States seemed to settle in the 1850s. The economy rebounded with its war-speckled depression over, and immigration filled up the new territories gained. Questions over slavery still boiled, but the matter had been largely settled by legally maintaining the status quo and refusing expansion. Slavery would gradually die out as it became economically infeasible in the face of the growing Industrial Revolution and Abolitionist movement. The question of secession, of course, had been dealt with by Jackson during the Nullification Crisis in his famed "Proclamation to the People of South Carolina" stating, "Secession, like any other revolutionary act, may be morally justified by the extremity of oppression; but to call it a constitutional right, is confounding the meaning of terms, and can only be done through gross error".

While the United States enjoyed great prosperity over the latter half of the nineteenth century thanks to the strong base of Common Man economics built by Jacksonians, its laissez-faire policies would become a bed of corruption leading to fresh outbreaks of revolution as the twentieth century dawned.

In 1649, on this day that the House of Stuart sought to close the book on the Puritan Revolution in Great Britain, King Charles I's republican nemesis Oliver Cromwell (pictured left) was executed in front of the Banqueting House at Whitehall. The poet Andrew Marvell would immortalise the scene ~ "That thence the Republican actor borne the tragic scaffold might adorn: While round the armed bands did clap their bloody hands".

Did Clap Their Bloody HandsYet Charles Stuart had fatally misjudged the mood of the nation. Because Cromwell's submissive dignity on the scaffold would for ever change the character of the conflict. In short, Cromwell had become the martyr, and Charles the bloody tyrant.

"That thence the Republican actor borne the tragic scaffold might adorn: While round the armed bands did clap their bloody hands". ~ Andrew MarvellMilitary defeat in the civil war would force a sharp change in direction for the republican movement. Henceforth the leadership would be passed to the intelligentsia, a Benjamin Franklin, rather than a George Washington would drive the republican movement

That man would be the author John Milton (pictured right) who fiercely criticized the monarchy in The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. Published in 1650, the treatise expressed his support of a republican form of government ~ "If men within themselves would be govern'd by reason, and not generally give up thir understanding to a double tyrannie, of Custom from without, and blind affections within, they would discerne better, what it is to favour and uphold the Tyrant of a Nation".

And so the death of Cromwell would also shape Milton's destiny. Invited to serve as the Lord Protector after the overthrow of Charles I, it would be for Milton to build the platform of today's modern republic, by being the first Head of State to govern the British people by reason.

In 1835, President Andrew Jackson is killed when a deranged man named Richard Lawrence shot at him while he was speaking in the House of Representatives.

President Andrew Jackson AssassinatedLawrence carried two guns to make sure that he would hit the Democrat, "and end the stain of his people on the face of the nation".

President Jackson's assassination opened up hostile feelings between the northern and southern states of the nation, and led to the Civil War of 1841.