# History's greatest ironies **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 17, 2002, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401 "2002-12-17T20:22:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/21 "2002-12-18T02:28:45Z")
“[They couldn’t hit an **elephant** at this distance](http://www.civilwarhome.com/sedgwickdeath.htm)…” Preemptively, I’ll go ahead and post the Snopes link [refuting](http://www.snopes.com/history/american/linckenn.htm) the similarities between Lincoln and Kennedy’s assassinations. ---
**Author:** ![Roadwalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e19b73/32.png) [@Roadwalker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roadwalker)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/22 "2002-12-18T02:29:02Z")
Correst me if I’m wrong, but the assasen who shot the Archduke in Serbia was not Serbian. Yet his act caused Austria to declare War on Serbia. This touched of WWI. ---
**Author:** ![Blackeyes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f6c823/32.png) [@Blackeyes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blackeyes)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/23 "2002-12-18T03:28:36Z")
They named an airport after the president who fired all the air traffic controllers. ---
**Author:** ![Blackeyes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f6c823/32.png) [@Blackeyes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blackeyes)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/24 "2002-12-18T03:31:32Z")
Lincoln saved the life of the brother of John Wilks Booth, or some oddity similiar to that. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/25 "2002-12-18T03:36:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Blackeyes \* > \*\*Lincoln saved the life of the brother of John Wilks Booth, or some oddity similiar to that. \*\* Hrm. I think it was that Robert Lincoln (who, poor guy, was at the scene of THREE Presidential assassinations) saved the life of Edwin (I think it was?) Booth, highly respected actor, brother of another highly respected actor and ladies’ man… ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/26 "2002-12-18T03:43:26Z")
> [@](#): > > Correst me if I’m wrong, but the assasen who shot the Archduke in Serbia was not Serbian. Yet his act caused Austria to declare War on Serbia. This touched of WWI. Gavrilo Princip wasn’t a citizen of the Kingdom of Serbia, but he was an ethnic Serb. Specifically he was a Bosnian Serb ( Bosnia being a Austro-Hungarian controlled province at the time ) and a member of _Mlada Bosnia_ ( “Young Bosnia” ), a Bosnian Serb group that advocated expulsion of the Hapsburgs and a merger of Bosnia and Serbia. - Tamerlane ---
**Author:** ![stockton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5a626/32.png) [@stockton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stockton)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/27 "2002-12-18T03:43:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Xavier \* > \*\*No, I suppose he was Corsican and Jewish? \*\* But he was fluent in Elbaonics! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/28 "2002-12-18T03:59:04Z")
Um, I thought Princip was a member of the Black Hand-that was the group that was behind the assassination. Later their leader was executed for allegedly trying to assasinate the Prince Regent of Serbia, (who became King Alexander of Yugoslavia, who I have a huge crush on). ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/29 "2002-12-18T04:52:24Z")
Notwithstanding the “Thousand Year Reich”, and within a half generation therefrom, Germany divided _for_ a generation, with one half posing as posterboys for the ‘Reds’. ---
**Author:** ![Blackeyes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f6c823/32.png) [@Blackeyes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blackeyes)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/30 "2002-12-18T05:33:49Z")
"And know you know, the _rest_ of the story. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/31 "2002-12-18T06:16:43Z")
> [@](#): > > Um, I thought Princip was a member of the Black Hand-that was the group that was behind the assassination. They were associated ( Mlada Bosnia and the Black Hand that is ). Mlada Bosnia is sometimes referred to as a Bosnian satellite branch of the Black Hand, but appears to have been more of a separate ( and tiny ) organization with similar goals that the Black Hand then subsumed. It was the Black Hand that provided the bombs, pistols, and perhaps in part the impetus for the specific attack. But it was Mlada Bosnia members that carried it out. - Tamerlane ---
**Author:** ![jkirkman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ac8455/32.png) [@jkirkman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jkirkman)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 6:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/32 "2002-12-18T06:19:43Z")
That a Republican, Pro-NRA, Chief Executive is trying to convince the world that Weapons are evil (weapons of mass destruction), not the people (Iraq and North Korean governments) who pull the trigger? Sorry, I know this is GD land, and I honestly cannot figure out right from wrong myself here, but… Ya gotta admit it IS ironic… ---
**Author:** ![calm\_kiwi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@calm\_kiwi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/calm_kiwi)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/33 "2002-12-18T06:53:39Z")
That G W Bush is concerned that Saddam _might_ start a war with his weapons of mass destruction. Also that England sent all it’s horrible nasty criminal types to Oz and now they all want to go there. ---
**Author:** ![brianjedi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3be4f8/32.png) [@brianjedi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brianjedi)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/34 "2002-12-18T07:18:25Z")
Miss Piggy doing a commercial for Denny’s where she has sausage and bacon on her plate. Oh, I’m sorry, this is history’s **GREATEST** ironies. Sorry. -brianjedi ---
**Author:** ![lokij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/5e9695/32.png) [@lokij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lokij)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 8:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/35 "2002-12-18T08:13:03Z")
In 1789 the French Revolution begins, set to herald in a new era of democracy and equality for France. The people reject the tyranny of the crown and remove the King from power… putting into his place… an emperor… in 1804, err… yeah… huh. Proving not only does France occasionally lose it’s wars but also it’s revolutions. ;\> ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/36 "2002-12-18T10:55:23Z")
“Every revolution evaporates, and leaves behind the slime of a new bureaucracy.” — Franz Kafka Here’s another: according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports, the periods of greatest homicides and violent crime in United States history have been during Prohibition and the War on Drugs. ---
**Author:** ![kiwiboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/35a633/32.png) [@kiwiboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kiwiboy)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/37 "2002-12-18T17:45:21Z")
\*\*Tamerlane’s \*\* reference and explanation of \*Mlada Bosnia \* has now made me very spooked now… Lets see, I can re-arrange those letters to end up two letters short of a certain person. Given that both the organisation and the person use non-Roman alphabets this is way too close for my liking. Then: Gavrilo Princep, fires gun supplied by shadowy terror cell named Mlada Bosnia shoots Austro-Hungarian Diplomat, leads to a war which destroys three major empires, results in the regime change of a third and hastens the decline of two others. Now: Certain person organises vicious campaign of terror, with end result still uncertain. May have to change Christmas plans slightly, if anyone needs me I’m just popping out the back to start digging in… ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/38 "2002-12-18T20:39:40Z")
Another Columbus one: If Columbus had never existed, the New World would have been discovered by Europeans a mere 8 years later. Pedro Cabral, heading for India from Portugal, sailed too far west and hit Brazil in 1500. It has been disputed whether this was completely by accident, or whether Cabral had heard tales from Portuguese fishermen who had ventured that far. But there’s little doubt that the Americas would have been discovered sometime around 1500, even if Columbus hadn’t conned Isabella into financing his voyage. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/39 "2002-12-18T20:47:17Z")
Neo-fascist websites that use the freedom of the internet to advocate establishing a government that would eliminate the freedom of the internet. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401/40 "2002-12-18T21:28:34Z")
King George III’s diary entry for July 4, 1776: “Nothing of significance happened today.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historys-greatest-ironies/143401.md?page=3)