Valentine's Day Challenge: Part II

Personally, I never knew the history of Valentine’s Day until now. I figured it was some ploy by large corporations to make money but using a holiday. It was interesting to learn how it started back in era of the Roman Empire and how it evolved throughout the years.

I looked at four different websites, each having similar and different information regarding Valentines Day history. The websites:

http://www.theholidayspot.com/valentine/history_of_valentine.htm, http://www.allaboutpopularissues.org/history-of-valentines-day.htm, http://www.infoplease.com/spot/valentinesdayhistory.html, http://www.essortment.com/valentinesdayh_rygc.htm, based the origins of history on the bishop Valentine and Claudius II.

I found it interesting how historical figures and their actions could cause a yearly holiday as in the case of Valentines Day. For one I don’t know much about the Roman Empire its complex array of politics and culture. These websites were helpful in giving me an idea of how the beliefs of just one man, Claudius II, would change the lives of many people.

The content in these websites are adequate for casual viewers interested in Valentine’s Day history. On the other hand, those looking for primary sources are going to have to look for elsewhere. There is minimal content on these websites, with miniscule links and references. The lack of these options massively hurt these websites as an ideal place to gather more information on this subject.

Finding historical information for Valentines Day was not that difficult for me. As I looked at various site, I would read through each one and chose the ones that offered different content. Some sites were very short on content while others had more information that went beyond the Roman Empire. I decided to focus on the Roman Empire aspect of Valentines Day because it was the foundation from where the holiday started and it was far more interesting.

Overall, I enjoyed gathering information on this subject. It is always fun to learn something new. It is the perfect conversation stimulator for anyone who has a Valentine. Just having some knowledge is not only beneficial for historical knowledge but to also impress a special someone.

Valentine's Day Challenge: Part I

The origins of the Valentine’s Day holiday had its beginnings towards the end of the Roman Empire 270 A.D. In fourth century B.C., the Roman empire had annual drawings where teenage girls put their names in a box and were randomly selected by young men. Young Roman men had to do this has a rite of passage for the God Lupercus. For eight hundred years, this practice continued until early church fathers sought to end it. For it was the bishop, Valentine, who helped end it.

The Roman Empire’s era of power began to unravel when the lack of quality administrators led to frequent civil strife. Internal conflicts began to wear down the Roman Empire. Outside pressure from the Gauls, Huns, Turks, and Mongolians began to put pressur on the boundaries of the Empire. In order to protect his empire, Claudius, the emperor of the time, realized that the army needed to be upgraded. Claudius believed that unmarried men would make better soldiers, so he decided to make a law that young men could not marry.

Seeing that many young soldiers were demoralized by this law; Valentine took it upon himself to help them. Valentine would secretly perform marriage ceremonies for the young soldiers. Valentine risked his life on a continual basis knowing that what he was doing was against Roman law. His scheme was eventually discovered was taken into custody. Claudius, impressed with Valentine’s dignity and conviction, offered to spare his life if he converted to worshipping Roman gods. Valentine refused the offer was sentenced to execution on February 24, 270.

While in prison, Valentine met a jailor named Asterius, who asked if he could heal his blind daughter. Asterius’s daughter had her vision miraculously restored by Valentine. Before his execution Asterius wrote a farewell message to Asterius’ daughter, “From your Valentine,” a phrase that lived ever after.

Valentine would become a patron saint which would eventually lead to a festival honoring him. The festival involved young Romans offering women they admired, and wished to court, handwritten greetings of affection on February 14. Thus making Valentine’s Day celebrated around the world.

Website Evaluation: Cold War.org

For many years, the U.S. government was at odds with Russia when they were known as the Soviet Union. Animosities between the two sides were so high that they constantly spied on one another even coming close to nuclear war. Known as the Cold War, this animosity brought a new level of intelligence gathering that laid the foundation for what is used today. In order to better understand the Cold War since it is such a broad topic, I chose to evaluate http://www.coldwar.org/ to learn more.

Upon entering the website, it tells you from the very beginning that that is part of the Cold War Museum. To learn more about the Cold War museum I clicked on the large link, “Enter the Museum.” Apparently money is being raised to help build this museum in the Washington D.C. area in order to teach people about the Cold War and its impact on U.S. and foreign policy.

Since the information in this website is so broad I have decided to focus my evaluation on the 70’s aspect of the cold war. On the homepage of the website, viewers such as me can choose various links dealing with the subject. There are links such as a Trivia Game, Spy Tour, Resources, Contact, Search, and other links typical of any history website. What would be the main area of interest in this website would be the timeline located at the bottom of the homepage. It is overall a very user-friendly website. There is always an option to return to the homepage by having a link present and also links to other areas of the website are always present.

Since I have chosen the 60’s link of the websites, http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/index.asp, I focused on the content that is in that link of the website. Once I clicked on the link, instead of giving a brief description of the time period during the Cold War, there is just a list of links of people and events pertaining to that time period. From the U2 Incident http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/u2_incident.asp to the USS Pueblo http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/pueblo.html . The content seems to vary from link to link with mixed results. For instance, The Bay of Pigs, http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/bay_of_pigs.asp, had minimal information but had a link to sent me to another page that has another set of links, http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/links.asp. These links were not very helpful for in-depth information regarding the Bay of Pigs, with the exception of one which had primary information such as declassified documents, http://www14.homepage.villanova.edu/david.barrett/bop.html. Overall, I am not surprised with the minimal amount of content in this section of the website. Since the site is for a Cold War museum, the information would obviously be kept at a minimum in order to garner more attention for the museum.

The scholarship in this website is valid with well written information including references of the information being displayed at the bottom of the page. In the Lyndon B. Johnson link of the 60’s section, http://www.coldwar.org/articles/60s/johnson.html, information about him focused mostly about his involvement in the Cold War. This piece was written by Kathleen Johnson, a Cold War Museum volunteer. As any good historian, she referenced her information which is helpful for viewers to learn more about Lyndon B. Johnson and the Cold War.

The presentation and the use of media is kept at a minimum on this website. Compared to the National Museum of American History website, the Cold War website is the complete opposite. What the Cold War website lacks in pizzazz, they make up for an abundance of links that is full of information for people who are interested in the Cold War. There is large amount of media in this website such as pictures, videos, and podcasts, http://www.coldwar.org/museum/exhibits.html. It would have been helpful if more podcasts and videos are added because of the growth of television and radio during its time period.

Looking back, this website caters to the people who wish to do a straightforward, basic research, not so in-depth. I found the content to be overall helpful for casual viewers of the Cold War. Some people might be turned off because of its lack of presentation and media. These are factors that do not deter how helpful this website is for Cold War researchers.