Plans

Alternate Historian says, construction work continues at the Academy. We realise of course that no one's really done innovation properly since the Osmonds reinvented themselves as a Heavy Metal band and released Crazy Horses in '72, but we're going to try something almost as different...

Our ambition is for each storyboard entry to be a mini blog post, an idea we've started with the wide format & yellow shaded area. For 2008, we're going to add hyperlinked metadata tags e.g. author, character, 5 x keywords etc after each storyboard entry. In order to get your feedback, today's first story is in the new format. In so doing we thread the posts together (a great idea of the Reverend's) using the search feature so that one click details all the storyboard entries in that thread. A source link to where we erm.. liberated the idea from. Ditto five keywords, though if you click vampire you might find we've done it to death, if you excuse the pun.

Please email Alternate Historian with your comments on the already underway developments, or better still some new ideas! And if you ever figure what got into the Osmonds.... my theory, a postal typo got them the Osbourne's next song.. Sorry Ozzy!!

In 2002, the White House put the final touches on plans for a major reorganisation effective in just eight weeks time. Unfortunately, the staff plan was running late, delaying a new appointment for a National Director who would be given ultimate responsibility for protecting the United States from attacks and responding to disasters. President George W. Bush had reluctantly accepted the recommendations for a new cabinet super-department. Frustrated by the lack of co-ordination between government agencies, Bush now understood fully that a single, unified command structure was required given the insiduous threats the Country now faced in the War Against Terror. W was confident he could persuade Tom Ridge to become the 1st Secretary of Internet Security.

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In 1970, the musician Eric Clapton found and purchased a left-handed Stratocaster guitar which he gave to his friend Jimi Hendrix the very next day. The Voodoo Child was in poor shape to receive the gift. He had taken nine Vesperax sleeping pills and drunk excessive wine with his German girlfriend, Monika Dannemann. However his powers of recovery were legendary. Hendrix and Clapton put some fine riffs together which brought fierce joy to discerning music lovers around the world. The best product of a thousand centuries of human civilization was secure for the future.

~ entry by Alternate Historian

In 1970, the musician Eric Clapton found and purchased a Gretsch 6120 electric guitar he planned to give to his friend Jimi Hendrix the very next day. Forty-eight hours later, the Voodoo Child was dead. The incident was the latest in a series of inexplicable tragedies associated with the owners of the guitar. Twenty-one year old Eddie Cochran had died in a traffic accident in a taxi travelling through Chippenham, Wiltshire, England on the A4. The taxi crashed into a lamp post on Rowden Hill. There was no other car involved. Songwriter Sharon Sheeley (Cochran's fiancée) and singer Gene Vincent survived the crash. The car and other items from the crash were impounded at the local police station until a coroners' inquest could be held. At that time, David Harman, later known as Dave Dee of the band Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich, was a police cadet at the station, and taught himself to play guitar on Eddie's impounded Gretsch. An unknown rock 'n' roll fan called Mark Feld had carried the same guitar to the limo from a London gig the night before. Feld later changed his name to Marc Bolan and became one of the stars of the British Glam Rock scene of the 1970s. Marc Bolan also died in a car crash in 1977.

~ entry by Alternate Historian

Joe Cocker	"What would you think if I sang out of tune, would you stand up and walk out on me ? Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song and I'll try not to sing out of key. Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends Mm, I get high with a little help from my friends" ~ Joe Cocker, musician
Musician

Before Joe Cocker toured Australia on his Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour. Cocker and six of his entourage were arrested in Adelaide by police for possession of marijuana. The next day In Melbourne, assault charges were laid after a brawl at the Commodore Chateau, and Cocker was given 48 hours to leave the country by the Australian Federal Police. This caused huge public outcry in Australia, as Cocker was a high-profile overseas artist and had a strong support base, especially amongst the baby boomers who were coming of age and able to vote for the first time. It sparked hefty debate about the use and legalisation of marijuana in Australia. This event took place just before the 1972 Australian Federal election, where progressive left-wing Prime Minister Gough Whitlam came to power and Australia saw the end of 23 years rule of conservative governments in Australia. A transcript of the lyrics to this 1968 classic are provided at Lyrics Online

~ quotation by Alternate Historian

Ian Henderson	In 1952, the Mau Mau Uprising began in Kenya with an insurgency by members of the the Kikuyu, Embu and Meru tribes against the British colonial administration. The British military presence was considerable, including the Lancashire Fusiliers, King's African Rifles, Royal Air Force and the cruiser Kenya came to Mombasa harbor carrying Royal Marines.
Britain's conduct of the war criminalized as oath-taking and witchcraft played an unpredictable part in the struggle. Portable gallows were used for summary justice, executing both innocent and the guilty alike, cursing Britons with their dying breath. In 1955, British Labour Party Member of Parliament Barbara Castle visited Kenya to investigate charges that white policemen had tortured and killed innocent Kikuyu with government approval. She concluded that the entire system of justice in Kenya had a “Nazi” attitude toward Africans. “In the heart of the British Empire there is a police state where the rule of law has broken down, where murders and tortures of Africans go unpunished and where the authorities pledged to enforce justice regularly connive at its violation.”. With the appointment of “the Butcher” Ian Henderson to the post of Witchsmeller Pursuivant the following year it became clear that Britain was in for the long-haul, totally committed to the white settler states of southern Africa which remain in power to this day.
~ entry by Alternate Historian

In 1944, Airborne troops parachuted into Holland as the "Market" half of Operation Market Garden, an Allied military operation in World War II. Its tactical objectives were to secure a series of bridges over the main rivers of the German-occupied Netherlands by large-scale use of airborne forces together with a rapid advance by armoured units along the connecting roads, for the strategic purpose of allowing an Allied crossing of the Rhine river, the last major natural barrier to an advance into Germany. The operation was successful with the capture of the bridges at Nijmegen and Arnhem. Tactics developed for “Market” were re-used in Operation Downfall when the British 1st Airborne Division parachuted into Kyushu on X-Day, November 1, 1945.	Market Garden
~ entry by Alternate Historian

Count Bernadotte	In 1948, on this day in Jerusalem the Lehi also known as the Stern gang failed to assassinate Count Folke Bernadotte while pursuing his official duties. The Count was a brilliant Swedish diplomat noted for his negotiation of the release of about 15,000 prisoners from German concentration camps during World War II. In 1945, he received a German surrender offer from Heinrich Himmler, though the offer was ultimately rejected. After the war, Bernadotte was unanimously chosen by the victorious powers to be the United Nations Security Council mediator in the Arab-Israeli conflict of 1947-1948 which he brought to a peaceful diplomatic conclusion.
~ entry by Alternate Historian

In 1916, Manfred von Richthofen, a flying ace of the German Luftstreitkräfte won his first aerial combat near Cambrai, France. The true story of the Bloody Red Baron was told by biographers Janet Title and Kim Newman in 1995. The ultimate hunter was cross-fed by several vampire elders to create the ultimate aerial combatant, a winged vampire armed with powerful hand-machine guns.	Bloody Red Baro..
Not only must the Allied pilots fear a violent death in a fireball or a screaming nose-dive to earth, they must be wary of being plucked from their pilot-seats and eaten alive. The vision of the vampire-squadron taking off from a high tower, with strains of Wagner echoing from Dracula's Zeppelin-flagship is a defining moment of the biography.
~ entry by Alternate Historian

The Day

Buddy Holly	In 1959, suffering from exhaustion Charles Hardin “Buddy” Holly, Jiles P Richardson - known as the Big Bopper, and Ritchie Valens cancelled the remainder bookings on their Winter Dance Party Tour. Holly had set up the gruelling schedule of concerts - covering 24 cities in three weeks - to make money after the break-up of his band, The Crickets, the previous year.
Band

Preferring to 'keep it loose like a long-necked goose', Bopper had decided to return to radio, where he had been a record-breaking DJ - with a 122-hour marathon stint – reaching number six in the American charts with his record Chantilly Lace.

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Margaret Thatcher	In 1972, Prime Minister Edward Heath dismissed his Minister of Education, Margaret Thatcher over the milk-snatching row. Until recently, Mrs. Thatcher had denounced her critics easily: 'People who resort to personal attacks usually do so because their arguments are so weak. I will not be hounded. I will never be driven anywhere against my will. Though her critics may be numerous, Prime Minister Edward Heath is not one of them. He recently rejected a demand for her resignation and said that her regime had been a period of remarkable achievement.
Milk Snatcher

It was a wise decision that would scarely trouble his old age when he later became a fierce critic of Thatcher. The London Sunday Express called her the lady nobody loves, and the Sun declared: 'She is the most unpopular woman in Britain.' Edward Britten, the general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, has said that her policies had produced chaos. To former Laborite Education Minister Edward Short, she is a national disaster. In playgrounds, children taunt her for cutting off their free milk by chanting: Mrs. Thatcher, milk snatcher!. The target of these angry accusations was Margaret Thatcher, 46, a blue-eyed blonde who for nearly two years had served as Britain's Minister of Education. Some criticism of the Conservative Cabinet's only female member centers on her genteel mannerisms—her Establishment tweeds and her cool, monotonous voice. I've had everything thrown at me, she protested. I'm too soft; I'm too hard. I think people really do resent it when you know the answers.

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In 4591, Emperor Chengzu grants women full and equal protection under the law. This decree is even more controversial than the visionary Emperor's space program, but it lays the groundwork for democratization in the next century.

In 1979, the Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Ruhollah Musavi Khomeinii is assassinated on his arrival in Tehran by CIA Agents. CIA Director George Bush's justification for this clandestine activity was that some troubles you just need to nip in the bud, after all, the US could not afford another Castro in the Middle East.

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In 1861, Texas secedes from the United States, but doesn't join the Confederacy or send troops to aid its cause. Instead, the reconstituted Republic of Texas fortifies its borders and waits out the civil war between the Confederate States and the Union. When the Union wins in 1863, Texas sues for peace and recognition as an independent nation; President Lincoln, unwilling to spill more American blood capturing another rebel state, formally recognizes them and grants their request for independence.

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Fall of Gondolin	In 1925, John Ronald Reuel Tolkien mapped out the Fall of Gondolin in the 'Sketch of the Mythology'. Whether he knew it or not, the epic struggle of the little people was an expression of his own disempowerment from World War I. Gondolin represented the citadel of his own shattered integrity. And the refuge to which the Eldar fled was the military hospital where Tolkien recovered from combat stress. Thus led by [Tolkien] the remant of the Gondolin passed over the mountains, and came into the Vale; and fleeing southward by weary and dangerous marches they came at length to the great river. There [military hospital] they rested a while, and were healed of their hurts and weariness; but their sorrow could not be healed. ~ 'Fall of Gondolin'.
Citadel of Integrity

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In 1924, the United Kingdom recognized the Union of Soviet Vampire Republics (USVR) founded by the undead nosferatu Vladimir Lenin and his blood-sucking spawn.

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In 1908, King Carlos of Portugal is assassinated by rebels in the streets of Lisbon. His son, Luis Filipe, is wounded, but survives and succeeds him on the throne. Luis Filipe decides to follow the course of England, and transitions Portugal into a constitutional monarchy rather than face the possibility of revolt and abdication or execution. With his assistance, Italy's Social Democrats gain power against the Fascisti, and Spain's Republican forces win the civil war in 1936 against the Nationalists. The three nations usher in a new democratic era for southern Europe.

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Storms	In 1953, violent storms claim hundreds of lives up and down the East coast of Britain. The background to the rising waters was simply put. The invasion of earth had recently entered a third phase as aliens started melting the ice caps, causing sea levels to rise. Historian John Wyndham described the ultimate victory of humanity in the Kraken Awakes. The super-weapon defeated the invasion, yet left the Earth as a significantly reduced landmass. Historian wondered if similar attempts had been made before in the distant past.
Kraken

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In 1984, in a humour reference to Monty Python, the BBC reported that the Half pound coin had met its maker - 'Britain's least-loved currency is to leave the nation's purses after 13 years of almost universal unpopularity'. Rampant inflation in the 1970s meant that even basic items cost hundreds of new pounds, and there was absolutely no need to think in terms of pennies.

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In 1952, with the announcement of a Test drive for TV detector vans, a new method for tracking down users of unlicensed television sets was unveiled in the UK. The first TV detector van was demonstrated in front of Postmaster-General, Lord De La Warr and Assistant Postmaster-General Mr Gammans. The quality of terrestrial television was consider appalling by both Gammans and the British public. It was important to identify those rare individuals of sloth and indolence who would sit on a sofa all night watching non-entertaining broadcast.

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Columbus	In 2003, BBC News reported that Columbia shuttle disintegrates killing seven - the US space shuttle Columbia has broken up as it re-entered the Earth's atmosphere killing all seven astronauts on board. The Domination of the Draka has issued a formal statement, in which the Archon re-affirms the Strategos' policy that intrusion into Drakan air space would not be tolerated.
Shot down

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In 2003, the President asphyxiated after choking on a pretzel whilst watching the game alone. The VP had never sought the Presidency, and truth be told was incumbent out of duty to an old man.

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In 1931, Sir Oswald Mosley, disappointed by the two main parties in British politics, founds the New Party. Arguing for elections based on class lines rather than geographical location, the New Party is unpopular until the full effects of the Great Depression hit England. Mosley's ranks swell with the unemployed, and he is elected Prime Minister in 1932. He makes common cause with continental fascists Mussolini of Italy, Franco of Spain and Hitler of Germany during his premiership, but where they are all gone by the end of the decade, Mosley's rule of Britain has only begun.