LANE: Welcome back to Touring History! I'm Lane.
DAVE: And I'm Dave!
LANE (with mounting incredulity): It's May 5th, and while millions of Americans are busy celebrating with tequila shots despite having absolutely NO IDEA what Cinco de Mayo actually commemorates, history has been having an absolute field day with this date! We've got space travel! Political sieges! Planetary alignments! And the death of a hunger striker whose story is somehow EVEN MORE depressing than it sounds! It's like history took May 5th, threw it into a blender with nihilism, and hit puree!
DAVE: Happy birthday to Karl Marx, born in 1818, a man whose ideas changed the world and whose beard remains undefeated in the category of "Most Likely to Be Worn as a Halloween Costume by College Sophomores Who've Read Exactly Three Pages of 'Das Kapital.'"
LANE: Also celebrating today is Chris Brown, a man who—you know what? Let's just skip that one entirely and move on to Adele, whose ability to make millions of people simultaneously cry in their cars remains the most impressive form of mass emotional manipulation not involving puppy commercials. Speaking of mass cultural events that people misunderstand...
LANE (increasingly animated): On May 5, 1862, the Battle of Puebla took place, where Mexican forces defeated the French army despite being massively outnumbered.
DAVE: Yes! This victory over French forces is the actual reason for Cinco de Mayo. NOT Mexican Independence Day, which is actually September 16th. But try telling that to Brad and Caitlyn who are currently doing tequila shots at Señor Frog's while wearing sombreros they bought at Party City!
LANE: That's right! Cinco de Mayo in the United States is essentially what would happen if France celebrated the Fourth of July by eating hot dogs dipped in ketchup while wearing cowboy hats. It's cultural appropriation with a twist of lime! And speaking of Americans taking something someone else did first and claiming it as their own victory...
DAVE (mock patriotic tone): On May 5, 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American in space, a mere 23 days after the Soviet Union had already put Yuri Gagarin in orbit.
LANE: America essentially showed up late to the space party, took one quick lap around the dance floor, and then shouted "USA! USA!" It's like finishing second in a race and then declaring yourself the inventor of running.
DAVE: Shepard's flight lasted just 15 minutes and reached only one-third the altitude of Gagarin's orbital mission. But did that stop America from acting like we'd just invented stars? OF COURSE NOT! Because nothing says "Cold War America" like celebrating silver medals as if they were gold! And speaking of celestial events that didn't quite live up to the hype...
LANE: May 5, 2000 saw a rare alignment of planets that doomsday prophets insisted would end civilization as we know it. Spoiler alert: We're still here.
DAVE (increasingly frantic): Yes, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Moon all lined up behind the Sun, and precisely NOTHING happened! It's almost as if the universe doesn't arrange its cosmic bodies specifically to kill humans! Who would have thought?!
LANE: People were so convinced the alignment would cause devastating earthquakes that they built bunkers and stockpiled canned goods—essentially rehearsing for 2020, which, as it turns out, would have been a MUCH better time to panic. But you know what actually WAS a legitimate crisis requiring immediate action?
DAVE: On May 5, 1980, British Special Forces stormed the Iranian Embassy in London, ending a six-day siege in what was essentially the most British response to terrorism imaginable.
LANE (terrible British accent): After six days of diplomatic tea-sipping and "perhaps we could resolve this peacefully" conversations, Margaret Thatcher basically said, "Right, we've tried being polite. Send in the chaps with the machine guns." And they did! Live! On television! It was like a reality show where the elimination was VERY literal.
DAVE: The SAS troops rappelled from the roof, blew out windows with explosives, and rescued all but one of the hostages—all while BBC cameras rolled, because apparently the British decided that storming an embassy would make for excellent teatime viewing. And speaking of European leaders making decisive moves on May 5th...
LANE: On May 5, 2002, Jacques Chirac was re-elected as French President with an astonishing 82% of the vote.
DAVE (mock impressed): Now, that sounds impressive until you realize his opponent was far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen, which essentially meant the French were choosing between "regular politics" and "Oh God, please not that guy!" It was like being asked if you'd prefer a baguette or a punch in the face—not exactly a difficult choice!
LANE: The election saw record turnout because French voters were so desperate to stop Le Pen that people literally canceled vacations to vote. Imagine caring that much about democracy! Americans look at that the way we look at people who floss twice daily—we know we should do it, but it seems like a lot of effort. And speaking of things that happened on May 5, 2002 that captured the world's attention...
DAVE: That very same day, Nike launched its legendary "Secret Tournament" World Cup ad, featuring soccer stars playing in a cage on a ship.
LANE (increasingly indignant): Yes, Nike spent millions creating an ad where millionaire athletes played soccer in what was essentially a rusty gladiatorial arena! Because nothing says "the beautiful game" like strip mining the aesthetic of dystopian fiction! It's like they watched "Mad Max" and thought, "This, but with cleats."
DAVE: The ad was scored with Elvis Presley's "A Little Less Conversation," which is ironic because it launched approximately 900 BILLION conversations about how cool it was, proving once again that with enough slow motion and dramatic lighting, we'll buy literally anything. And speaking of things we consume without question...
LANE: This historical deep dive is brought to you by Rise Doughnuts in Wilton, Connecticut—because nothing pairs better with contemplating human folly than deep-fried dough.
DAVE: Handmade, small-batch, and guaranteed to make you forget that we're all just temporarily conscious specks in an indifferent universe!
LANE: Follow @risedoughnut, show up early, and treat yourself. Because if there's one thing May 5th teaches us, it's that life is short and occasionally involves planetary alignments that don't kill us all. And speaking of ideological conflicts about our place in the universe...
DAVE: On May 5, 1925, John Scopes was arrested in Tennessee for teaching evolution, launching what would become known as the "Monkey Trial."
LANE (increasingly bewildered): That's right! A man was arrested for suggesting that humans might be related to primates, a fact now so thoroughly established that we literally test medicines on our genetic cousins before giving them to humans! It's like arresting someone for teaching that the Earth orbits the Sun, which, by the way, WE ALSO DID FOR CENTURIES!
DAVE: The trial became a national sensation pitting science against religion in what was essentially America's first culture war broadcast. Because if there's one thing Americans love more than science denial, it's turning it into entertainment! But at least this anti-science moment eventually led to progress, much like another May 5th event that pushed technology forward...
LANE: On May 5, 1977, the Apple II computer began shipping, launching a technology revolution that would eventually lead to devices specifically designed to make us stare at pictures of our friends' lunches.
DAVE (mock reverent): Yes, the Apple II, priced at a mere $1,298—or roughly $6,000 in today's money—featured a stunning 4KB of RAM. That's enough memory to store approximately one-eighth of a single modern selfie! Revolutionary!
LANE: The computer that launched Apple came with BASIC programming language built in, which means people in 1977 were learning to code while today we struggle to figure out why our phones keep autocorrecting "definitely" to "defiantly." We haven't evolved; we've just gotten lazier with better toys! Speaking of technological failures with far more serious consequences...
DAVE: On May 5, 2010, Faisal Shahzad was arrested for attempting to detonate a car bomb in Times Square—a plot that failed because he was somehow worse at terrorism than he was at parking in Manhattan.
LANE (incredulous): That's right! His bomb failed to detonate, and he left his keys IN THE CAR—basically committing the terrorist equivalent of leaving your wallet at a crime scene with your driver's license and a business card just to make sure everyone knows who you are!
DAVE: He was captured just 53 hours after the attempt, while literally sitting on a plane about to take off. It's like he studied at the "How to Get Caught Immediately University," where he graduated with honors! From incompetent terrorism to something far more somber but no less political...
LANE (somber): On May 5, 1981, Bobby Sands died after 66 days on hunger strike in a British prison, becoming the first of ten IRA prisoners to die in a protest that shook the world.
DAVE: Sands' death sparked international outrage and turned him into a symbol of Irish republican resistance. It's a stark reminder that in between planetary alignments and computer launches, real people died for political causes—some through violence, others through the violence of neglect.
LANE: His funeral was attended by over 100,000 people, proving once again that martyrdom is a powerful political tool—and that the British government's talent for creating martyrs is matched only by their talent for producing sexually repressed detective shows. And speaking of deaths that changed how we view conflict...
DAVE: May 5, 1945 saw the only deaths on American continental soil during World War II when a Japanese balloon bomb killed six people in Oregon—a tragic footnote in history that most Americans have never even heard about.
LANE (increasingly animated): Japan launched over 9,000 balloon bombs—LITERAL BALLOONS carrying ACTUAL BOMBS—across the Pacific Ocean, hoping they'd drift to America and start forest fires or just generally cause mayhem. It's like the world's deadliest birthday party decoration!
DAVE: The U.S. government kept these attacks secret to prevent panic, meaning most Americans had no idea that enemy bombs were floating over their picnics. The weather-based weapons program was basically what would happen if the Weather Channel decided to "spice things up a bit."
LANE: So that's May 5th: a day that's given us everything from balloon bombs to failed terrorists, from evolution deniers to planetary alignments that didn't kill us all—proof that history doesn't need to make sense; it just needs to be weird enough to keep us distracted.
DAVE: We'll be back tomorrow with more historical disasters and triumphs that remind us we're all just making this up as we go along.
LANE: Until then, stay incredulous...
DAVE: ...stay caffeinated...
BOTH: ...and maybe learn what Cinco de Mayo actually celebrates before ordering that seventh margarita!
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