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THIS WEEK IN PEOPLE’S HISTORY, JAN 22–28  
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_ The Long, Long, Road to Revolution (1905), ‘Can’t Nobody Lick
Us’ (1940), Voter Suppression Meets Its Match (1965), Fluoride’s
Safe to Drink, Period (1945), Designing the Trail of Tears (1825) _

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_THE LONG, LONG, ROAD TO REVOLUTION_

JANUARY 22 IS THE 120TH ANNIVERSARY of the beginning of the end for
one of the world's few remaining absolute monarchies, the 183-year-old
Russian Empire. In January 1905 the Russian people began a 12-year
process of forcing the Czar to give up his throne. 

During the weeks before Jan. 22, tens of thousands of St. Petersburg
workers had gone on strike, in part to demand the rehiring of workers
who had been fired for political reasons, and in part to protest wages
and working conditions that were under the Czar's control. The strike
shut down hundreds of businesses including both the St. Petersburg
electricity supply and the city's newspapers. 

The Czar put the city under martial law, and the strikers planned a
march to petition the Czar for an 8-hour day and increased minimum
wage. When the unarmed workers' procession neared the Winter Palace,
it was fired on by the palace guard. At least 200 protesters died in
what is known as Bloody Sunday, and the toll may have been five times
that number.

The news that hundreds of peaceful protesters had been killed caused
public support for the Czar and his army to evaporate. Efforts to end
the autocracy were not new, but the bloodletting gave them a new
immediacy. For the next nine months Russia was rocked by massive
anti-government strikes, mutinies, land-takeovers and demonstrations,
until the Czar bowed to the pressure and promulgated a new, reformist,
constitution, under which he would, for the first time, share power
with an elected legislature.

Bloody Sunday was the first step in a process that forced the Czar to
abdicate 12 years later in 1917.
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_‘CAN’T NOBODY LICK US’_

JANUARY 24 IS THE 85TH ANNIVERSARY of the release of The Grapes of
Wrath, a cinematic masterpiece directed by John Ford and starring
Henry Fonda and Jane Darwell. 

Based closely on John Steinbeck’s novel, it is filmed in the style
of a documentary about the plight of the Joad family, Oklahoma
sharecroppers who have lost their farm in the Great Depression and
been forced on an arduous journey that takes them to California’s
Central Valley in search of work.

The Joads’ struggle to survive is depicted with enormous sympathy
for their plight. The film also makes it easy to understand Tom
Joad’s radicalization and his resulting determination at movie’s
end to devote himself to the fight for workers’ rights.
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_VOTER SUPPRESSION MEETS ITS MATCH_

JANUARY 25 IS THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY of an electrifying moment in the
struggle to end Jim Crow voter suppression.

In 1965 the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s voting rights
campaign in Selma, Alabama, was only three weeks old when Sheriff Jim
Clark tried to shove a group of activists away from the county
courthouse. One of the protesters, 54-year-old Annie Lee Cooper shoved
back and then punched Clark in the face. When several deputies grabbed
Cooper and held her down, Cooper yelled at Clark. “I wish you would
hit me, you scum!” 

Clark responded by smashing his nightstick against Cooper’s face, an
image that was captured by an Associated Press photographer. The photo
of the Sheriff clubbing a pinned-down demonstrator appeared on the
front pages of many newspapers and was featured in televised news
reports. 

Less than two months later, as demonstrations and sometimes brutal
arrests at the courthouse continued, a bill to outlaw racist voter
suppression was introduced in the U.S. Senate.  After it passed both
the Senate and the House by substantial majorities, it became law on
August 6, 1965. [link removed]
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_FLUORIDE’S SAFE TO DRINK, PERIOD _ 

JANUARY 26 IS THE 80TH ANNIVERSARY of the beginning of the first
experimental addition of a small amount of fluoride to drinking water
to determine if it would result in a significant reduction of tooth
decay.

The 1945 experiment was conducted in Grand Rapids, Michigan, by
investigators working for the U.S. Public Health Service. By 1956 it
was clear that Grand Rapids residents born after the experiment began
had a 60 percent reduction in tooth decay. 

It was suggested in 1990 that fluoridated water might cause cancer.
The possibility of a link between fluoride and cancer has been
examined intensively and repeatedly for more than 30 years, and no
evidence of such a link has been
discovered. [link removed]
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_DESIGNING THE TRAIL OF TEARS_

JANUARY 27 IS THE 200TH ANNIVERSARY of a “special message” in
which President James Monroe asked Congress to adopt the policy of
compelling Native Americans to resettle west of the Mississippi
River. 

Monroe’s 1825 message of 1825 was the first formal expression of
what by 1830 became the U.S. government’s settled policy of using
negotiation or, when negotiation failed, military force, to exclude
unassimilated Native Americans from the eastern third of the country.
Monroe’s message outlined the policy and asked the House and the
Senate to write legislation that would turn the policy into law. 

Not all members of Congress were in agreement with Monroe’s
proposal. It was not until 1830 that the House and the Senate passed
the Indian Removal Act, which ratified the policy Monroe had advocated
in 1825.   

Carrying the policy out resulted in the Trail of Tears, which
compelled some 75 thousand Native Americans to begin the arduous
journey to the west of the Mississippi. At least ten thousand died
before reaching their destination.
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For more People's History, visit
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* Russian Revolution
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* The Grapes of Wrath
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* Voting Rights Act
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* Fluoride
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* Indian Removal Act of 1830
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