Welcome to the December History Carnival, a potpourri of the best in history blogging for the month of November. I am happy to present for your reading pleasure a selection of nominated posts and some curator’s choices. Only at the History Carnival can you find in one place readings on letter writing, bloodletting, the extinct Dodo Bird, the Bee Gees, and Occupy Wall Street. There’s even a tale of a gender bender thrown in for good measure. Most importantly, it’s just in time for the holiday season, so replenish your historical knowledge so you too are able to give unsolicited facts and opinions to family and friends at holiday gatherings. They’re going to love it! You’re welcome….
The Chicago History Museum Blog’s highly entertaining three part series Ellis Glenn’s Queer Story features a turn-of-the-century woman masquerading as a man and swindling money and hearts across the U.S.
Fëanor, from Jost A Mon, introduces us to A Gibb in India and the indigent and military ancestry of the Bee Gees.
Stephanie Dray enlightens us with How Rain, Grain, and Cleopatra’s daughter fed the Roman Empire.
In The Last Dodo: The Feast That Led To Extinction, Giles Milton at Surviving History teases us with the possibility that mariner Volkert Evertszoon and his shipwrecked crew may have eaten the Dodo Bird into extinction.
Posting at Madame Guillotine, Christopher Scott’s Apotheosis of Mary Jane Kelly
shows us that no matter how much you think you know about a Jack the Ripper victim, you are always eager to read one more article on the subject.
David Turner from Turnip Rail shares his thoughts on Slavery and the Financing of Britain’s Early Railways.
Mike Rendell, posting for the English History Authors, shares with us the fascinating details and peculiarities of the postal system and letter writing of 18th and 19th century England in The Humble Envelope.
The always fascinating and obsessively prolific blog Executed Today tells us about Haitian General Jacques Maurepas and His Entire Family who were tortured and executed by Napoleon’s minions towards the end of the Haitian Revolution.
At the Chirurgeon’s Apprentice, Lindsey Fitzharris’ article Lancets and Leeches and Cupping! Oh, My! Bloodletting Practices in Early Modern England proves there is always more to be learned about leeching and bloodletting.
Jonathan Dresner from Frog In A Well: Japan gives us his book review of Seppuku: A History of Samurai Suicide and makes me wish I had taken more Far Eastern art history classes in grad school.
In The Strangest Dream – Reykjavik, 1986, Jonathan Hunt writing for Not Even Past, reminds us that even though it was in most of our lifetimes, the historic implications of that famous meeting between two political super powers is lost on today’s younger generation.
The next two posts exemplify the golden rule of History: the more things change, the more they stay the same. Alan Flower at History and the Sock Merchant traces the violent and revolutionary history of Egyptians in Trouble in Cairo: The Force of History. And the Tenement Museum’s blog educates us on Occupy Wall Street’s Historic Precedent.
Scandalous Women offers us two posts this month on “women behaving badly.” Gillian Bagwell introduces us to Jane Lane: The Girl who Saved the English Monarchy. Elizabeth Kerri Mahon, in The Mysterious Disappearance of Aimee Semple McPherson, features one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in American history.
On the anniversary of The Crystal Palace Fire, Sarah J. Young contemplates the mystique of the building by digging up a vintage newsreel and comparing descriptions of the event.
Madame Guillotine tells us of The Escape of Princess Henrietta, who at age 3, was spirited away by her entourage and traveled 95 miles by foot to Dover, England to escape to France.
And finally, Mike Cosgrave shares the challenges of teaching, world politics, and gaming in Gaming Reality History.
Chick History 