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fandomhigh2009-12-11 07:10 am
makesfaces.livejournal.com) wrote in fandomhigh2009-12-11 07:10 am
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Humorous History: Friday, Period 1, Class 13
"Hey, last week before finals. And because of that, we're going to be learning about a truly special event in world history," Jim said.
""The Pig War was a boarder skirmish between America and Britain over land between what we now know as Canada and the US. No people were killed, only one shot was fired, and the entire thing started because of a pig, as you might expect."
"There are a group of islands by the Washington-British Columbia border called the San Juan Islands. By the 1850's, America and Britain hadn't come to an agreement over who owned those islands, but both sides were pretty much convinced they did. It wasn't really a pressing matter, though, so they just argued about it up and back when they didn't have anything better to do. The tricky part was that both sides were establishing farms on the islands."
"Then on June 15, 1859, an American farmer named Lyman Cutlar found a pig eating the potatoes he was growing, so he shot it. That's the only death in the entire war, by the way. The pig was owned by Charles Griffin, an Irishman who was running a sheep farm for a British company and who also had a bunch of pigs that he let run wild."
"Cutlar offered ten dollars compensation, Griffin demanded one hundred dollars, Cutlar took his offer off the table because he thought Griffin should have kept the pig off his land, and Griffin told Cutlar - and I quote - 'It is up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig.'"
"British authorities on the island wanted to arrest Cutlar for shooting the pig, so the Americans on the island called the US Army, who sent sixty-six soldiers. The British Navy didn't like this, so they sent three warships with over two thousand men. The governor of Vancouver Island tried to get the British Rear Admiral, Robert Baynes, to attack the Americans, but Baynes refused because he wouldn't - again, I quote - 'involve two great nations in a war over a squabble about a pig.'"
"Basically, both sides dug in with the same orders. They were able to shoot back the moment they were shot at, but they absolutely couldn't fire the first shot because nobody wanted to be the guy who started the war over a dead pig. And so they started insulting each other to see if they could get the other guys to fire the first shot. But that didn't work, so they waited until US General Winfield Scott was sent in to negotiate with Governor Douglas."
*****
After class, Jim gave the camera a serious look. "Winfield Scott was apparently a fantastic negotiator, if Wikipedia can be believed. He was absolutely no relation to Michael Scott. Believe me. I checked."
*****
"In the end, they agreed to a joint military occupation of no more than one hundred soldiers on each side and a promise that they'd get back to figuring out the boundary later on. Which they did. Twelve. years. later. By that time, Canada was already becoming Canada and America had fought the entire Civil War. America got the land, by the way."
"So, now that we've gone through that, we have two options. We can either do some clever activity involving thinking and work on the last day of the semester before finals, or we can start to watch a movie about a cute little talking pig."
Jim turned the TV on and the lights off. They were watching the cute pig movie.
""The Pig War was a boarder skirmish between America and Britain over land between what we now know as Canada and the US. No people were killed, only one shot was fired, and the entire thing started because of a pig, as you might expect."
"There are a group of islands by the Washington-British Columbia border called the San Juan Islands. By the 1850's, America and Britain hadn't come to an agreement over who owned those islands, but both sides were pretty much convinced they did. It wasn't really a pressing matter, though, so they just argued about it up and back when they didn't have anything better to do. The tricky part was that both sides were establishing farms on the islands."
"Then on June 15, 1859, an American farmer named Lyman Cutlar found a pig eating the potatoes he was growing, so he shot it. That's the only death in the entire war, by the way. The pig was owned by Charles Griffin, an Irishman who was running a sheep farm for a British company and who also had a bunch of pigs that he let run wild."
"Cutlar offered ten dollars compensation, Griffin demanded one hundred dollars, Cutlar took his offer off the table because he thought Griffin should have kept the pig off his land, and Griffin told Cutlar - and I quote - 'It is up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig.'"
"British authorities on the island wanted to arrest Cutlar for shooting the pig, so the Americans on the island called the US Army, who sent sixty-six soldiers. The British Navy didn't like this, so they sent three warships with over two thousand men. The governor of Vancouver Island tried to get the British Rear Admiral, Robert Baynes, to attack the Americans, but Baynes refused because he wouldn't - again, I quote - 'involve two great nations in a war over a squabble about a pig.'"
"Basically, both sides dug in with the same orders. They were able to shoot back the moment they were shot at, but they absolutely couldn't fire the first shot because nobody wanted to be the guy who started the war over a dead pig. And so they started insulting each other to see if they could get the other guys to fire the first shot. But that didn't work, so they waited until US General Winfield Scott was sent in to negotiate with Governor Douglas."
*****
After class, Jim gave the camera a serious look. "Winfield Scott was apparently a fantastic negotiator, if Wikipedia can be believed. He was absolutely no relation to Michael Scott. Believe me. I checked."
*****
"In the end, they agreed to a joint military occupation of no more than one hundred soldiers on each side and a promise that they'd get back to figuring out the boundary later on. Which they did. Twelve. years. later. By that time, Canada was already becoming Canada and America had fought the entire Civil War. America got the land, by the way."
"So, now that we've gone through that, we have two options. We can either do some clever activity involving thinking and work on the last day of the semester before finals, or we can start to watch a movie about a cute little talking pig."
Jim turned the TV on and the lights off. They were watching the cute pig movie.
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