# What historical events have slipped down the memory hole?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [December 13, 2022, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478 "2022-12-13T19:46:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 6

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**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\
**Post date:** [December 18, 2022, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/101 "2022-12-18T19:57:06Z")

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I love how to many Americans the fact that Chinese history pretends as if Mongolia, Xinjiang and Tibet didn’t really exist is a crime.

But pretending that the US exists as the simply the expansion of Plymouth and Jamestown is just fine.

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**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\
**Post date:** [December 18, 2022, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/102 "2022-12-18T21:55:36Z")

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Are you claiming Atzlan is real, it’s Albuquerque, and that 1/3 of the US population is descendents of that area?

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**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/103 "2022-12-19T01:04:36Z")

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> [@Crane](#):
>
> The history of Aztlan is the history of a third of the US.

_ **Aztlán** (from [Nahuatl languages](…: Astlan, Nahuatl pronunciation: \<… is the ancestral home of the [Aztec]… is the Nahuatl word for “people from Aztlan”. Aztlan is mentioned in several ethnohistorical sources dating from the colonial period, and while they each cite varying lists of the different tribal groups who participated in the migration from Aztlan to central [Mexico](…who went on to found [Mexico-Tenochtitlan]… are mentioned in all of the accounts._

 

_Historians have speculated about the possible location of Aztlan and tend to place it either in northwestern Mexico or the [Southwestern United States]…although there are doubts about whether the place is purely mythical or represents a historical reality._

If Aztlan existed, which is doubtful, it would be located in Mexico, not the USA.

Most of Alta California was pretty much occupied and “governed” in reality by the Indigenous tribes. The Central Government in Mexico only “owned” that area for a couple of decades, and had little or tenuous control over most of that land (mostly California). Basically, as far as the uSA goes, Az

In CA schools, we were taught quite a bit about the Missions and the Californios. However, I would agree we could cover more history of the Natives.

Basically “Aztlan” _as far as US history goes_ is a fantasy.

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**Author:** ![Crane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crane/32/3495_2.png) [@Crane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crane)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/104 "2022-12-19T13:51:44Z")

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> [@DrDeth](#):
>
> Basically “Aztlan” _as far as US history goes_ is a fantasy.

It is also used to refer to that part of Mexico that was annexed by the US.

We were taught the mission trail in California schools but not the Tierra Adentro.

If Albuquerque is too exotic for our foundation myth, how about Rhode Island. Roger Williams fled religious persecution in Massachusetts. He purchased his land from the natives and managed good relations with them. It was a place of religious freedom (except for Catholics of course). And, Rhode Island was the first state to abolish the importation of slaves and the first to declare independence from England.

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**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/105 "2022-12-19T20:07:08Z")

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> [@Crane](#):
>
> It is also used to refer to that part of Mexico that was annexed by the US.

Not by any serious Historians or Ethnologists.

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**Author:** ![Crane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crane/32/3495_2.png) [@Crane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crane)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/106 "2022-12-19T20:57:45Z")

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> [@DrDeth](#):
>
> Not by any serious Historians or Ethnologists.

Perhaps you consider [**Dr. Enrique La Madrid**](https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=Awrhdmtuz6Bjh8QJEqdXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Ny/RV=2/RE=1671512047/RO=10/RU=https%3a%2f%2fwww.amazon.com%2fAztl%25C3%25A1n-Chicano-Homeland-Expanded-Querencias%2fdp%2f0826356753/RK=2/RS=M29hEF.n5W6LjU5ZV963azYJTXg-) as a non-historian?

The term is commonly understood in the [**southwes** t](https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=AwrFNXr70KBjM3IKiwdXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Ny/RV=2/RE=1671512443/RO=10/RU=https%3a%2f%2fliveonlineradio.net%2fradio-aztlan/RK=2/RS=2AzO2uo0Q44dorYm2QWArKGnPg8-).

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/107 "2022-12-19T21:09:14Z")

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> [@Crane](#):
>
> Perhaps you consider [**Dr. Enrique La Madrid**](https://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=Awrhdmtuz6Bjh8QJEqdXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Ny/RV=2/RE=1671512047/RO=10/RU=https%3a%2f%2fwww.amazon.com%2fAztl%25C3%25A1n-Chicano-Homeland-Expanded-Querencias%2fdp%2f0826356753/RK=2/RS=M29hEF.n5W6LjU5ZV963azYJTXg-) as a non-historian?

Not a _serious_ historian. Or his name would be Richard Salisbury.

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**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2022, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/108 "2022-12-19T23:46:48Z")

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> [@DrDeth](#):
>
> In CA schools, we were taught quite a bit about the Missions and the Californios. However, I would agree we could cover more history of the Natives.

I attended grade school in California and remember the Native Peoples being covered. We even went to a Native American museum as part of a field trip. There was also more about the Spanish explorers, Sir Francis Drake, and the Russians’ attempt to colonize California (e.g., Fort Ross).

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**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/109 "2022-12-20T00:30:48Z")

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[The Bath School disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster): In 1927, forty-four people were killed by a former school board member who was angered by tax increases and financial problems. Still the largest mass killing in a school in U.S. history. It may be less remembered today because Charles Lindbergh’s flight days later pushed it off the front pages.

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**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/110 "2022-12-20T00:36:59Z")

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And, for that matter, this, which did propel a cub reporter from Dallas named Walter Cronkite into worldwide fame. It’s also the reason why natural gas has something smelly added to it, so leaks are easier to detect.

> **[New London School explosion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_London_School_explosion)**
>
> The New London School explosion occurred on March 18, 1937, when a natural gas leak caused an explosion and destroyed the London School in New London, Texas, United States. The disaster killed more than 300 students and teachers. As of 2021\[update\], the event is the third-deadliest disaster in the history of Texas, after the 1900 Galveston hurricane and the 1947 Texas City disaster.
> In the mid-1930s, despite the ongoing economic turmoil of the Great Depression, the school district in New Londo...

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**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/111 "2022-12-20T00:40:58Z")

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> [@NDP](#):
>
> I attended grade school in California and remember the Native Peoples being covered. We even went to a Native American museum as part of a field trip. There was also more about the Spanish explorers, Sir Francis Drake, and the Russians’ attempt to colonize California (e.g., Fort Ross).

Sure, but more about the Natives would be good, IMHO.

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**Author:** ![Stanislaus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stanislaus/32/3391_2.png) [@Stanislaus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stanislaus)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/112 "2022-12-20T14:22:39Z")

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> [@PatrickLondon](#):
>
> We on the UK have a very patchy notion of the history of empire - not kept “secret”, just overlooked.

There’s a whole host of events that fall under this umbrella. In part this is inevitable - we’re talking about c.300 years of history, not all of it is going to make it into public consciousness. It was a busy old time! But there are other factors too. I have a theory that WWII popular mythology - “Very well then, alone” - coupled with the rapid post WWII collapse of Empire/colonialism had the effect of drawing people’s attention away from Empire in a way that wasn’t true in, say, the 1920s or 30s.

If you’re building a myth of your nation as a plucky little country alone on the fringe of Europe, facing down a terrible invader with nothing but a pointy stick, then you’re going to want to gloss over the massive overseas resources you can lay claim to. Add to that the dawning awareness that maybe it wasn’t as glorious as we had originally been advised and you can see how it drops off the radar.

That said, I understand the the modern curriculum does have a much greater focus on empire - including the impact on the people we colonised - so the pendulum is swinging back.

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**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/779978/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats2)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/113 "2022-12-20T14:26:51Z")

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You don’t hear much about the War of Jenkin’s Ear.

Hear (snerk!)

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**Author:** ![Stanislaus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stanislaus/32/3391_2.png) [@Stanislaus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stanislaus)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/114 "2022-12-20T14:32:35Z")

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More specifically, my suggestion is going to be the “Malaysian Emergency”, a British led violent repression of communism/independence which lasted from c.1948 to c.1960 and innovated/developed many of the techniques for fighting insurgents - notably “secure hamlets” and Agent Orange - that the US would go on to use in Vietnam.

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**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/115 "2022-12-20T14:42:25Z")

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Of course, that was just one of several conflicts in colonial/imperial territories post-WW2 - Palestine, Kenya, Cyprus, Aden, and the “Confrontation” with Indonesia over North Borneo. Take it back further, and there’s a long list of them, many of which are now only remembered, if at all, as the origin of so many street names in the UK’s expanding cities.

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**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/116 "2022-12-20T14:49:49Z")

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And then of course there’s the related discussion of “historical triage” i.e. what absolutely should be taught to high school students over four years in order to give them a good understanding of history (I’m limiting it to American history because that’s what I know), but that’s obviously a different thread.

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**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/117 "2022-12-20T15:36:04Z")

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Constant issue over here: I can remember complaints that too many youngsters finish school have “done” the Romans, the Tudors and the Holocaust and not much else in history (don’t know how fair that was - my niece teaches history, and I know she’s developed a unit on slavery that’s used in a number of schools).

But also there’s the whole “culture wars” debate about whether and how you should teach the “[Our Island Story](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Island_Story)” or “[Good Thing/Bad Thing](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1066_and_All_That)” narrative, or the sort of [Arthur Bryant conventional wisdom](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bryant#Historian), or something more critical and nuanced.

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**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/118 "2022-12-20T16:00:17Z")

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> [@nearwildheaven](#):
>
> My brother moved to Kansas City about 5 years after this happened, and vaguely remembered that a big disaster had happened there and asked someone about it. He was told that it was something not brought up in polite conversation.
> 
> [Hyatt Regency walkway collapse - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyatt_Regency_walkway_collapse)

I certainly agree that this is a tragedy that has slipped down the memory hole for the general public, but it is brought up a lot in engineering schools. I used it as an example when I taught physics, and my son learned about it as an undergraduate civil engineering student.

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**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/119 "2022-12-20T16:05:42Z")

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I read about the Hyatt Regency walkway collapse in a book about engineering failure by [Henry Petroski](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Petroski). It’s been a while, but I remember the problem was that the design called for both walkways to be hung on one very long threaded rod attached to the ceiling (which was not feasible in reality) but instead the upper one was hung from a threaded rod attached to the ceiling and the lower one attached to a second threaded rod attached to the upper walkway.

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**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\
**Post date:** [December 20, 2022, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-historical-events-have-slipped-down-the-memory-hole/976478/120 "2022-12-20T16:08:57Z")

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True to the thread, I’d never heard of it, and it certainly was [quickly forgotten (or pushed away) by everyone.](https://www.mercurynews.com/2015/11/19/big-game-horror-in-1900-was-quickly-forgotten/)

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