Joseph Francis

Although Joseph Francis was considered one of the most well-known heroes of the 19th century, his popularity waned with the decrease in maritime accidents and he is virtually unknown today.

Joseph Francis (March 12, 1801 – May 10, 1893) was a 19th-century American inventor who devoted his life to improving maritime equipment, especially life-saving tools. His most famous invention, the metallic life-car, rescued thousands of stranded passengers and crew from shipwrecks near the shore.

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Sebastian Cabot

 

Mr. French!

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The Centennial of the Salanga Massacre

Location of Sirajganj District in Bangladesh

The Salanga massacre is commemorated annually in Bangladesh in memory of an event in which several hundred protesters were killed, on January 27, 1922, when fired on by British Indian police.  Bengali independence activist Abdur Rashid Tarkabagish, then 21, was leading a non-violent protest at the Salanga bazaar in Raiganj Upazila in what was then the Bengal province of British India. The area is now within the Sirajganj District of Bangladesh. 

Interest in the event, not well documented, was revived with the rediscovery in the late 20th century of "a rarely found account of Abdur Rashid titled 'Shadhinota Shangramer Rakta Shiri Salanga (Salanga: The Blood Stained-Step to the Struggle for Independence)"  which stated that thousands of people died and that the bodies were thrown into the Bangali river or buried in a mass grave. 

According to one researcher, relying on local literature at the Maulana Abdur Rashid Tarkabagish Memorial Library in the area, the number of deaths ranged from 1,500 to 4,500 people.  A mass graveyard remains near Salanga Bazar at Rahmatganj and January 27 is annually observed in the Sirajganj District as Salanga Day, the centennial of which will be on January 27, 2022. 

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