Over there again

If you are like us here at the DGIS Institute then you follow the important news of the day. That said, while we were reading up on Chaz Bono's sixty pound weight loss and the The Rock's emergency hernia surgery, this story fell through the cracks. I suspect we will be seeing many more like it as the World War I centennial approaches.

Over there

Seeing that we just spoke of the Red Baron, thought I would share this story that we came across today.

Dead guys in Fokkers

Ninety-five years ago today Baron Manfred von Richthofen, AKA the Red Baron, made his final flight. With eighty kills* to his credit, Richthofen was the highest scoring ace of WWI. On this date back in 1918 the Baron broke some of his own arial combat rules and followed a Sopwith camel back over enemy lines and paid for the mistake with his life.

Who killed the Red Baron is up for debate, was it a Canadian pilot or an Australian soldier shooting from the ground? According to the Discovery Channel it was the latter, a machine-gunner named Snowy Evans.

For more on the Baron and everything else you wanted to know about WWI aerial combat check out http://www.theaerodrome.com/index.php

* Not all of those pilots that the Richthofen shot down died.

The Baron

Mandatory retirement

Normally those gangsters put on the spot were spry young fellers in their 20's or 30's but todays victim, in a later era, would have qualified for the senior citizens discount at McDonald's. Sixty-five year old Frank Lauritano was called a "Well-to-do" resident of the Brownsville –East New York section of Brooklyn and had been arrested three years previously for his connection with a policy game.

After finishing dinner on this date in 1930, Lauritano took a walk to the jewelry store to have his eye glasses fixed. As he approached his house on the return trip, three men fired anywhere from four to seven shots killing him. Hearing the shots, neighbors rushed out on their porches in time to see three men running to a car, which whisked them away