June 13, 1956: The 1st European Cup Final

Francisco Gento with the 1956, 1957, 1958,

1959, 1960 and 1966 European Cups

June 13, 1956, 70 years ago: The Final of the 1st European Champion Clubs' Cup is held at the Parc des Princes in Paris, France.

On April 27, 1895, for the 1st time, the Champions of 2 different European soccer leagues met. It was an All-British affair, played at Tynecastle Park in Edinburgh, Scotland. The hosts, Scottish Champions Heart of Midlothian, a.k.a. "Hearts," took on the English Champions, Sunderland, from the North-East. Actually, it was an All-Scottish contest: Known as "The Team of All Talents," every one of Sunderland's players was Scottish. (The Wearside city is less than 60 miles from the England-Scotland "border.") Sunderland won, 5-3.

In 1897, the Challenge Cup was founded, competed for by teams from across the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which included not just the entirety of present-day Austria and Hungary, but all of present-day Czechia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia, and parts of present-day Poland, Ukraine, Romania and Italy. Vienna Cricket and Football Club won the 1st one. The tournament ran until 1911.

The Mitropa Cup was founded in 1927. As the name suggests -- "Mitropa" is an abbreviation of "Mitteleuropa," or "Middle Europe" -- it was played for by teams in Central Europe only. Sparta Prague won the 1st one. This tournament continued despite the rise of the European Cup and other tournaments, until 1992, when the European Cup became the Champions League.

In 1930, the Coupe des Nations was founded, held in Geneva, Switzerland, and was won by Újpest of Budapest, Hungary. But the Great Depression doomed this early effort at a continent-wide soccer championship tournament.

In 1949, with the Depression and World War II behind them, France, Spain, Portugal and Italy came together and founded the Latin Cup. Barcelona won the 1st one. This tournament did not long survive the establishment of the European Cup, being dissolved in 1957.

But the real key came in 1948, with the South American Championship of Champions, won by Vasco da Gama of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Gabriel Hanot, editor of the French sports-themed newspaper L'Equipe, wanted such a tournament for Europe.

Once again, Hungary had a major role. After beating England badly, both home and away, and reaching the Final of the 1954 World Cup, Hungary's national team was established as a power. On December 13, 1954, a small measure of revenge was taken when England's titleholders, Wolverhampton Wanderers, beat Hungary's, Honvéd of Budapest, 3-2 in Wolverhampton, outside Birmingham. "Wolves" manager Stan Cullis called his team "Champions of the World."

Since the rest of Europe was sick of hearing England brag about their teams, both club and national, especially after their pathetic performances in the 1950 and '54 World Cups, the "football associations" of the various European countries finally listened to Hanot's request for a real European championship, to be played in the 1955-56 season, by each European country's 1954-55 Champions.

Wolves did not compete in the tournament -- because they didn't win England's Football League Division One in 1954-55. Chelsea, of West London, did. But they also chose not to compete. Of the 4 British "Home Nations," only Scotland sent their Champions. With some irony, it was Hibernian, a.k.a. Hibs, Edinburg rival of Hearts, who set everything in motion 60 years earlier.

Only 16 teams competed. So there were only 4 rounds, with home-and-away legs, of this single-elimination tournament. In the Round of 16, Partisan of Belgrade, Yugoslavia, beat Sporting Clv.ube de Portugal, of Lisbon; Vörös Lobogó of Budapest, now named MTK, beat Anderlecht of Belgium; Real Madrid of Spain beat Servette of Switzerland, hosts of the 1930 Coupe des Nations; Hibernian beat Rot-Weiss Essen of West Germany; Djurgården of Stockholm, Sweden beat Gwardia Warszawa of Warsaw, Poland; Stade de Reims of France beat Aarhus of Denmark; Rapid Wien of Vienna, Austria beat PSV Eindhoven of the Netherlands; and AC Milan of Italy beat Saarbrücken, of the Saar Protectorate, a section of Germany then governed by France, but soon returned to West Germany.

In the Quarterfinals, Hibs beat Djurgården; Reims beat Vörös Lobogó; Real Madrid beat Partizan; and Milan beat Rapid. In the Semifinals, Reims beat Hibs, and Real Madrid beat Milan.

The Final was set for June 13, at the Parc des Princes in Paris. The original stadium on the site opened in 1897. This was the 2nd, opening in 1932. A 3rd was built on the site, and opened in 1972. Today, it is the home of the leading "football club" in France, Paris Saint-Germain.

The 1932-1972 version of the Parc des Princes

Reims, wearing red shirts with white sleeves like North London team Arsenal, were managed by Albert Batteux, captained by Robert Jonquet, and featured the best player in France, a son of Polish immigrants, Raymond Kopa.

Raymond Kopa, in uniform for France

at the 1958 World Cup

Real Madrid, dressed in all white, and thus known as Los Blancos and Los Merengues, were even more loaded. Manager José Villalonga could call on Captain Miguel Muñoz, and the man who may have then been the best player in the world, the Argentine forward known as El Saeta Rubia (The Blond Arrow): Alfred Di Stéfano.

Alfred Di Stéfano, in the all-whites of Real Madrid

Arthur Ellis of England, the referee at the Final of the 1950 World Cup, was chosen to officiate at this match as well. With 38,239 paying customers looking on, he blew his whistle at 8:30 PM local time -- also 8:30 PM in Madrid, 7:30 PM in London, and 2:30 PM in New York -- and the match was on.

Reims, with a lineup of all Frenchmen, didn't waste any time showing Real Madrid that they belonged on the same pitch. Michel Leblond scored just 6 minutes into the match. Jean Templin made it 2-0 in the 10th minute. But the Spanish side, all Spaniards except for Di Stéfano, were unfazed: The Arrow himself tallied in the 14th minute. Héctor Rial equalized at the half-hour, and it remained 2-2 at halftime.

Michel Hidalgo, a Normandy native with a Spanish father, gave Reims the lead shortly after the hour. But Marcos Alonzo Imaz, a centreback known as Marquitos, made it 3-3 in the 67th minute. It began to look like a replay might be necessary, until the 79th minute, when Di Stéfano made it 4-3 in Real's favor.

And so it remained when Ellis blew the final whistle. Real Madrid were the 1st true Champions of Europe, and could make a case for being the best side in the world. It would take until 1960 for an Intercontinental Cup to be founded, to be contested by the winners of the European Cup and the South American continental championship, now named the Copa Libertadores.

In 1992, the Union of European Football Associations renamed their signature tournament the UEFA Champions League, although the trophy retains the name "European Cup" (and the nickname "Ol' Big Ears," because of its large handles). In 1998, UEFA began admitting teams that had finished high in their leagues, but had not won them.

Real Madrid won the 1st 5 European Cups, and have won it more than any other team, 15 times, most recently in 2024.

Francisco "Paco" Gento played on each of those 1st 5 winners, and also on their next in 1966. He was the 1st man to play on 6 European Cup winners. He was also the last survivor of both the 1956 and 1957 European Cup winners, living until January 18, 2022.

When Real Madrid won the 2024 Champions League title, it added 4 players to Gento's formerly unique status of playing on 6 European Cup winners: Team Captain Nacho Fernández, Luka Modrić, Dani Cavajal and Toni Kroos. Kroos had won 1 with Bayern Munich, 5 with Real Madrid. The others each won all of theirs with Real Madrid.

May 17, 2006: Arsenal's Champions League Robbery

Top row, left to right: Sol Campbell, Jens Lehmann, Gilberto Silva,

Emmanuel Eboué, Kolo Touré, Robert Pires.

Bottom row, left to right: Aliaksandr Hleb, Cesc Fàbregas,

Freddie Ljungberg, Thierry Henry, Ashley Cole.

May 17, 2006, 20 years ago: North London soccer team Arsenal FC reach the UEFA Champions League Final for the first time, at the Stade de France in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis.

The fact that Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger got a team with Emmanuel Eboué at right back, Aliaksandr Hleb at left midfield, and the weak-minded (and not yet 19-year-old) Cesc Fàbregas in central midfield into the Final shows that he was a better manager than Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho, Pep Guardiola and Jürgen Klopp could ever be.

FC Barcelona were managed by Frank Rijkaard, who had won the Champions League, then known as the European Cup, as a player with AC Milan in 1989 and 1990, and with Ajax Amsterdam after the tournament's name change in 1995.

This team was absolutely loaded, with the great Brazilian forward Ronaldinho; Cameroonian forward Samuel Eto'o, rising Spanish stars Xavi and Andrés Iniesta, Swedish star Henrik Larsson; and national Captains Carles Puyol of Spain, Giovanni van Bronckhorst of the Netherlands, and Rafael Márquez of Mexico.

(Lionel Messi had already made his debut for Barcelona, but was not listed as a starter or a substitute for this game. Former star and future manager Josep "Pep" Guardiola was wrapping up his playing career elsewhere.)

When Arsenal goalkeeper Jens Lehmann was sent off with a straight red card in the 18th minute by referee Terje Hauge -- dubiously, if not incorrectly -- and Wenger had to send in backup goalie Manuel Almunia, later so bad he was nicknamed "The Clown" by his own team's fans -- he had to take off an attacking player to meet the down-to-10-men requirement, and he chose Robert Pires. A massive mistake.

Arsenal actually went 1-0 up in the 37th minute, thanks to a header by Sol Campbell. And they held that 1-0 lead into the 76th minute. And then...

Well, you didn't expect FC Barcelona, one of the dirtiest sports teams on the planet, to let that pass without cheating, did you? Eto'o's equalizer was clearly offside, but Hauge gave the goal. And then, in the 80th minute, Juliano Belletti put Barça up, 2-1. That was the final score.

Juliano Belletti

This turned out to be the last game for Arsenal for Pires, Campbell, the tapped-up Ashley Cole, and the retiring Dennis Bergkamp. And it was the beginning of the end at Arsenal for Thierry Henry, who captained Arsenal in the game, and picked the worst possible time to have a bad game. He did win a Champions League title... with Barcelona in 2009. By that point, Guardiola was managing them to tainted glory, and Messi was, along with Cristiano Ronaldo of arch-rival Real Madrid, being called the best player in the world.

I hadn't yet become an Arsenal fan. Which is a good thing. This game, known to Arsenal fans as "Heartbreak In Paris," the closest they have ever come to winning the Champions League, came just 6 days after my grandmother's death. I did not need this added to the list of things on my mind.

Arsenal would also be knocked out of the CL by Barcelona, albeit in earlier rounds, in 2010 and 2011, the latter being one of the most dubious games in team history, worthy of its own post, which I have written. Arsenal reached the Semifinals in 2009, but were knocked out by Manchester United; and 2025, knocked out by Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), who went on to win the Final.

In 2026, Arsenal have finally reached the Champions League Final again. It will be played on May 30, at the Puskás Aréna in Budapest, Hungary. The opponent will be PSG -- with some irony, the team that plays its home games at the Stade de France, site of Arsenal's heartbreak 20 years ago.

December 15, 1925: New York's 1st NHL Team & The Death of Battling Siki

"Bullet" Joe Simpson

December 15, 1925, 100 years ago: For the 1st time, a National Hockey League game is played in New York City. But the home team is not the New York Rangers. A few hours before the new, later "Old," Madison Square Garden held its 1st boxing card, it hosted a matinee of a brand-new hockey team, the New York Americans. In their 5th game, they lost to the Montreal Canadiens, 3-1.

The NHL began to expand into America the season before, with the Boston Bruins. This expansion continued in 1925-26, with the Americans and the Pittsburgh Pirates, who would also end up failing; then, in 1926-27, with the New York Rangers, the Detroit Red Wings and the Chicago Black Hawks.

The Americans' 1st game was on December 2, against the Pirates, at the Duquesne Gardens in Pittsburgh, and they won, 2-1, with Charlie Langlois scoring the winner, 3:10 into overtime.

The Americans were owned by Bill Dwyer, a bootlegger who was making money during Prohibition, and the hockey team became the toy he spent his money on. If that seems odd, let the record show that another major league sports team debuted in New York City that season: The football version of the New York Giants, and they were founded and owned by Tim Mara, who was a bookmaker at a time when that was legal in New York City.

Bill Dwyer

George "Tex" Rickard, builder and owner of the new version of Madison Square Garden -- eventually to be known as "The Old Garden" -- made so much money on the Americans' rent and concessions that he wanted his own team. The media called them "Tex's Rangers," and they immediately became more successful than the Americans. The Rangers became known as the "classy" team, while the Amerks were the "blue-collar" or "working man's" team.

When Prohibition ended in 1933, Dwyer's hockey ownership was doomed. The League took over ownership of the franchise in 1936, and let its head coach, one of their former players, run it: Norman "Red" Dutton. It didn't change the image of either team: The Rangers were seen as the team of classy people, the Americans the team of the working class, struggling through the Great Depression.

The Americans made the Playoffs for the 1st time in 1929, but lost -- to the Rangers. They didn't make it again until 1936, beating Chicago before losing to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the Semifinals, coming within 5 wins of the Stanley Cup. In 1938, the Americans beat the Rangers in the Quarterfinals, with Lorne Carr scoring in overtime to win the deciding Game 3, before losing to Chicago in the Semifinals, again coming within 5 games of the Cup. They made the Playoffs again in 1939, losing to Toronto; and in 1940, losing to Detroit.

As New York teams would later tend to do, the Americans became a haven for great players looking for one last payday, including Boston Bruins legend Eddie Shore. But they had some Hockey Hall-of-Famers that they could call their own: Center Billy Burch; left wing David "Sweeney" Schriner; defensemen Bullet Joe Simpson and the aforementioned Red Dutton;, and, at 5-foot-3 the shortest player in NHL history, and thus nicknamed "Shrimp," but the winner of the Hart Memorial Trophy as league Most Valuable Player in 1929, and the Vezina Trophy as best goaltender in 1931, Roy Worters.

Roy "Shrimp" Worters

By the 1939-40 season, Canadian players were going off to fight for the British Empire in World War II. The Americans missed the Playoffs in 1941. In 1941-42, still bogged down by lingering debt from the Dwyer era, Dutton had to sell off his best players for cash.

Red Dutton

At his wit's end, Dutton changed the team's name to the Brooklyn Americans. He intended to move the team to Brooklyn, but there was no arena in that borough suitable enough even for temporary use. As result, they continued to play their home games at The Garden, while practicing in Brooklyn. They barely survived the season, finishing dead last for the second year in a row with a record of 16–29–3.

St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1942, was no lucky day for the New York Americans. New York City's original National Hockey League team loses to the Boston Bruins, 8-3 at the Boston Garden. Since the Amerks did not qualify for the Playoffs, this was their last game of the season. Two days earlier, they had played their last home game, at the old Madison Square Garden, and won, beating the Maple Leafs, 6-3. Murph Chamberlain scored a hat trick.

The Amerks suspended operations for The War's duration. In 1945, a group emerged willing to build a new arena in Brooklyn, and Dutton was ready to resume operations. But in 1946, the year Bill Dwyer died, the NHL reneged on previous promises to reinstate the Amerks, and canceled the franchise.

Legend has it that Dutton blamed the Rangers for canceling the Americans' franchise, and placed a curse on them, saying they would never win the Stanley Cup again for as long as he lived. They had won it in 1928, 1933 and 1940. Dutton died in 1987, and the Rangers had not won the Cup again. But the New York Islanders, founded as an expansion team in 1972, had won 4 straight Cups, from 1980 to 1983.

The Rangers finally won the Cup again in 1994. The New Jersey Devils, founded when the Colorado Rockies moved to the Meadowlands in 1982, won the Cup in 1995, 2000 and 2003. Since the Americans were cut off in 1942, the won-loss records of the New York Tri-State Area's teams in the Stanley Cup Finals -- keeping in mind that it was only the Rangers from 1942 to 1972 -- are 1-4 for the Rangers, 4-1 for the Islanders, and 3-2 for the Devils.

The Americans' records and trademarks are still owned by the NHL. The Islanders have never worn "throwback uniforms" in their style. I don't know if they've ever even asked for permission to wear them.

*

As I said, December 15, 1925 was the night that the 1st fight card was held at "The Old Garden," which became known as "The Mecca of Basketball," and "The Mecca of Boxing." Paul Berlenbach, the Light Heavyweight Champion of the World, won a decision over Jack Delaney. This Garden would be replaced in 1968.

Battling Siki would never get to fight at this Garden. The same night, he was found shot and killed on 42nd Street, where the Port Authority Bus Terminal would later be built. He was 28, and may have been shot by a policeman for drunk and disorderly conduct.

He was born as Louis Mbarick Fall on September 16, 1897 in Saint-Louis, in Senegal, the West African land that had been a French colony since 1677, during the reign of King Louis XIV. He began boxing at the age of 14. When World War I broke out in 1914, he joined the French Army, serving in the 8th Colonial Infantry Regiment. He was decorated for bravery in battle with the Croix de Guerre and the Médaille Militaire.

After the war, he moved to Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and resumed his boxing career, under the name Battling Siki. He was romantically involved with a Dutch woman, Lijntje van Appelteer, who became his common-law wife, and, in 1921, the mother of his son, Louis Fall Jr.

From 1919 to 1922, he was 43 out of 46 fights, with 1 loss and 2 draws. He earned a fight against the Light Heavyweight Champion of the World, a white Frenchman named Georges Carpentier, a war hero who had famously lost a bout for the Heavyweight Championship to Jack Dempsey in 1921.

The fight was set for September 24, 1922, at the Stade Buffalo in Paris. The venue, normally a cycling track or "velodrome," was named for Buffalo Bill Cody, who had brought his Wild West Show to the site many years before. Ernest Hemingway, not yet world-famous but already known to the Paris literati, was in attendance.

Siki claimed that he had agreed to take a dive, but when Carpentier knocked him down, he was outraged: Although he had agreed to throw the fight, he did not intend to get beat up doing so. In the 6th round, Siki hit Carpentier with a powerful right uppercut that appeared to put him down and out for the count.

The referee, however, claimed Siki had tripped Carpentier, and awarded the bout to the unconscious champion on a foul. Fearing a riot from the aroused crowd, the three ringside judges overruled the referee, and Siki was declared the champion.

Like many boxers before and after, Siki let his newfound fame go to his head. He would walk down the Avenue des Champs-Élysées in Paris, wearing a tuxedo and top hat, and walking a pet lion. His carousing in postwar Paris knew no bounds, and his appetites for champagne and white women seemed endless. Had he acted like that in America, as had the 1st black Heavyweight Champion, Jack Johnson, his end might have come sooner.

He refused offers to come to America and fight boxers such as Dempsey and Harry Greb. He stayed in Europe, and lost his 1st title defense, to Mike McTigue, in Dublin, Ireland on March 17, 1923. He had been the champ for less than 6 months.

Later that year, he came to America, fighting at the soon-to-be-replaced Madison Square Garden at 26th Street and Madison Avenue, and also in Philadelphia, Buffalo, Memphis, New Orleans, Minneapolis, Rochester, Columbus, Syracuse and Baltimore. His partying had badly caught up with him: In 25 fights in America, he went 9-15-1.

He also married Lillian Werner, a white artist from Memphis who was 7 years older. His friends were under the impression that he was still married to Lijntje. With America under Prohibition, he would go into speakeasies, refuse to pay his tab, and fight his way out.

On December 15, 1925, a policeman saw him drunkenly staggering down 42nd Street. He told the cop he was on his way home, and walked off. That was the cop's story. Later that night, Siki was found dead, shot twice in the back at close range. No one was ever arrested for the crime.

He was buried in Flushing Cemetery in Queens. In 1993, his remains were repatriated to Senegal, which gained its independence from France in 1960.

March 3, 1875: The Premiere of "Carmen" & The 1st Indoor Hockey Game

Georges Bizet

March 3, 1875, 150 years ago: Carmen, an opera by French composer Georges Bizet, premieres, at the Opéra-Comique in Paris. It is based on the 1845 novella of the same title, by French writer Prosper Mérimée. He died in 1870, and so did not live to see the opera.

The opera is not comic: It is set in southern Spain in 1820, in the wake of the country's devastating defense of itself against Napoleon in the Peninsular War, and with the loss of its Latin American colonies in progress.

Don José, a naïve soldier, is seduced by the wiles of the fiery Romani woman Carmen. (She is referred to as a "gypsy," but that term for the Romani is now considered a slur.) He abandons his childhood sweetheart, and deserts from his military duties, but loses Carmen's love to the bullfighter Escamillo, after which José kills her in a jealous rage.

The depictions of proletarian life, immorality, and lawlessness, and the tragic death of the main character on stage, broke new ground in French opera, and were highly controversial. It has become part of the trope that every opera is a tragedy, which is far from true.

Bizet died just 3 months after the premiere, on June 3, 1875, at 36, from a lingering fever and 2 heart attacks.

Just as most 20th Century Americans came to know "The March of the Swiss Soldiers," the end of the the Overture to Gioachino Rossini's 1829 opera William Tell as the theme from the 1949-57 TV show The Lone Ranger, many Americans came to know the songs "Habanera" and "The Toreador Song" from their inclusion in the 1976 baseball film The Bad News Bears.

*

On the exact same day, across the Atlantic Ocean, but also in a French-speaking city, the first recorded indoor ice hockey game took place.

Just as a young man named James Creighton was the 1st great pitcher in baseball, before a bizarre injury took his life at the age of 21, another James Creighton organized the 1st indoor hockey game. He put it together at the Victoria Skating Rink in Montreal, between a local team and the Victoria Skating Club, a team captained by Creighton.

The game featured 9 players on each side, as opposed to the modern 6. And here is the entire report of the game, from the next day's Montreal Gazette -- originally a single run-on sentence, but I've added paragraphs for easier reading, although this writer uses the term "shinty" instead of the more common "shinny":

HOCKEY – At the Rink last night a very large audience gathered to witness a novel contest on the ice. The game of hockey, though much in vogue on the ice in New England and other parts of the United States, is not much known here, and in consequence the game of last evening was looked forward to with great interest.

Hockey is played usually with a ball, but last night, in order that no accident should happen, a flat block of wood was used, so that it should slide along the ice without rising, and thus going among the spectators to their discomfort. The game is like Lacrosse in one sense – the block having to go through flags placed about 8 feet apart in the same manner as the rubber ball – but in the main the old country game of shinty gives the best idea of hockey.

The players last night were eighteen in number – nine on each side – and were as follows: – Messrs. Torrance (captain), Meagher, Potter, Goff, Barnston, Gardner, Griffin, Jarvis and Whiting. Creighton (captain), Campbell, Campbell, Esdaile, Joseph, Henshaw, Chapman, Powell and Clouston.

The match was an interesting and well-contested affair, the efforts of the players exciting much merriment as they wheeled and dodged each other, and notwithstanding the brilliant play of Captain Torrance's team Captain Creighton's men carried the day, winning two games to the single of the Torrance nine. The game was concluded about half-past nine, and the spectators then adjourned well satisfied with the evening's entertainment.

Artist's depiction of the game

What the Gazette didn't report was that there was a fight after the game -- not between players, as would become so common in the sport, but between the players and the fans, as some members of the Skating Club didn't like that their rink, so used to the leisure of skating, was being used for a competitive sport, and causing damage to the ice.

Creighton went on to become the law clerk for the Canadian Senate in Ottawa, and lived until 1930. 

The Victoria Skating Rink opened in 1862, on a block bordered by Drummond Street, St. Catherine Street, Stanley Street and Dorchester Boulevard (now Boulevard René-Léveseque). In 1886, it became the home of the 1st amateur hockey league, the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada. In 1894, it was the location of the 1st Stanley Cup Playoff games. (The Cup was a challenge trophy, and when the Montreal Amateur Athletic Association won the AHAC title in 1893, no champion of another league challenged them, so there was no playoff that 1st season.)

Moving the sport indoors forced, for the 1st time, a standardized rink size, which became 200 feet long by 85 feet wide. On March 3, 1925, 50 years to the day after the 1st game, the last game was held there, a tournament semifinal for an amateur league. But times had changed: The Rink was in bad shape, and, a mile to the west, the Montreal Forum had opened the previous November. The Rink was soon demolished, and a parking garage was built in its place. The garage still stands.

No, it doesn't look much like a historical site. But, while not the place where hockey was "invented," it can legitimately be called "the place where hockey as we know it was born."

August 25, 1944: The Liberation of Paris

August 25, 1944: The Allies liberate Paris, the capital of France, ending the Nazi occupation after 4 years and 2 months. The City of Light sees its darkness come to an end.

The city had fallen on June 14, 1940. For 4 years, the French Resistance did whatever they could to disrupt the occupiers, giving the lie to the later idea that the French "easily surrendered." They had been overwhelmed, so they changed tactics. They lost a lot of people, but they took a lot of Nazi bastards with them.

From D-Day on June 6, Allied troops made their way from the English Channel coast eastward and southward, and arrived on the outskirts of Paris on August 19. Street fighting was fierce, but the Nazis were dealing with guys who fought on the streets of New York, Philadelphia, Chicago -- London, Montreal, Toronto, Sydney, Bombay (Mumbai), Johannesburg -- and so on. And now, those street fighters had jeeps, tanks and machine guns. The Nazis retreated, and surrendered on August 25. It had been 82 days since D-Day.

The people of Paris were in no condition to party on November 11, 1918. On August 25, 1944, they were more than ready. The wine flowed, and so did the kisses and more of French women to the Allied men.

It was no longer a question of if the Nazis would lose World War II, but when.

July 11, 1924: The True Story Behind "Chariots of Fire"

Eric Liddell

July 11, 1924, 100 years ago: Eric Liddell, a 22-year-old Scotsman, wins the Gold Medal in the 400 meters at the Olympic Games in Paris.

It was not originally his intention to compete in the 400. He had wanted to compete in the 100 meters. But he found out that the heats for them were going to be held on a Sunday. As a devout Christian -- perhaps excessively so -- he refused to compete on a Sunday, and chose to compete in the 400 instead.

Great Britain did win the 100, through Harold Abrahams, who was Jewish. Among the runners he defeated was Jackson Scholz, an American who also competed in the 200 meters, and won that.

Liddell had been born in China to Scottish missionaries. In 1925, he returned to China and went into the family business. He was captured by the Japanese during World War II, and died in an internment camp in 1945. He is often considered a martyr to his faith.

Abrahams became a lawyer, and a reporter on track and field events, both for print media and BBC Radio. He was present at Oxford University in 1954 when Roger Bannister became the 1st man to break the 4-minute mile. He also became President of the Jewish Athletic Association, and lived until 1978.

In 1981, the film Chariots of Fire was released, and would win the Academy Award for Best Picture. It is best remembered for its opening sequence, showing British runners on a beach, to the theme song written by Greek composer Vangelis. Despite being an instrumental, the song would hit Number 1 on the American charts the following year.

Ian Charleson played Liddell. Like Liddell, he was a Scot and a graduate of the University of Edinburgh. However, the film gets the facts wrong, saying that Liddell didn't find out that the heats for the 100 meters would be on a Sunday until he was about to board the boat that would take the British Olympic team across the English Channel, giving him very little time to prepare for the 400 instead. In reality, he found out months in advance, and was able to properly prepare for the 400.

The film also shows the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VIII and the Duke of Windsor, played by David Yelland, personally intervening to try to get Liddell to change his mind and race on Sunday. There is no evidence that this occurred. The film's portrayal of the religious struggles of Liddell and Abrahams were accurate, however, including Scholz handing Liddle a slip of paper with an encouraging verse of Scripture written on it.

Jackson Scholz

Abrahams was played by Ben Cross, and Scholz by Brad Davis. In 1984, in preparation for the Olympics in Los Angeles, Cross did an American Express "Do you know me?" commercial with the real Scholz, who lived another 2 years.

July 11, 1924 was a Friday -- not a Sunday. Actress Brett Somers, best known as a panelist on the TV show Match Game, was born. 

January 18, 1871: The Unification of Germany

Kaiser Wilhelm I

January 18, 1871, 150 years ago: The member states of the North German Confederation and the south German states, aside from Austria, unite into a single nation-state, known as the German Empire. It would later be retroactively called the Second Reich. (The Holy Roman Empire, of AD 962 to 1806, was the First Reich.)

The Empire is proclaimed not in Germany, but in conquered territory: The Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles, outside Paris, France.

Wilhelm Friedrich Ludwig, King of Prussia, is declared Wilhelm I, Deutscher Kaiser – Emperor of Germany. (Like the Russian term "Czar," the German term "Kaiser” is derived from the ancient Roman term "Caesar." We pronounce it "SEE-zer," but the Romans pronounced it "KIGH-zer.") The Constitution of the German Confederation comes into effect, abolishing all restrictions on Jewish marriage, choice of occupation, place of residence, and property ownership.

Otto von Bismarck

Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg, was proclaimed the 1st Chancellor of Germany. "The Iron Chancellor" would serve for 19 years, outlasting Kaiser Wilhelm I and his son Kaiser Friedrich I, before being dismissed by Friedrich's son, Kaiser Wilhelm II. Thanks to the ambitions and incompetence of Wilhelm II, the Empire ended after only 48 years.

France replaced its Second Empire with its Third Republic. That would be ended in 1940, by Germany's Third Reich.

Bonne Chance, Armée de l'air

France has deployed a weapon against ISIS.

No, not Zinedine Zidane. Though he is known for having launched a missile that beat Bayer Leverkusen for Real Madrid in the 2002 Champions League Final.

French jets have launched an attack on an ISIS stronghold in Raqqa, Syria, a site identified by U.S. intelligence, in retaliation for Friday night's multi-pronged attack in Paris.

That attack included a suicide bomber who tried to get into the Stade de France for the match between France and Germany.

The murdering bastards killed at least 129 people, the majority in a theater where an American rock band was performing, before police stormed in and killed 8 of them. Allegedly, there is still 1 of them on the run (not one of those in the theater).

Bonne Chance, Armée de l'air. Go get 'em!