DOES HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF??

DOES HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF??

I was reading my latest issue of Smithsonian… The story I read was titled…  IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE..  which is actually a book written by Sinclair Lewis.  But the article is about much more..

The article was about two men of the 1930’s. Father Charles Coughlin an

Radio priest and his impressing of listeners with tales of anti Jewish… and how they effected our country.   Sinclair, due to his book on fascism and his wife the journalist who was a writer in Germany before the war.  She was kicked out of German after an unflattering article of about Hitler. Both were alarm at the rise of Nazism and now, how it was effecting the times of USA.

Father Coughlin was a radio priest  who had over 16 million followers. He was so popular that the minister in the area rescheduled services and high schools football had to be over before he came on. He called bankers and financiers SHYLOCK because they were mostly Jewish and he praised Nazi and Italian fascist.  There was the brown shirts who were German American Bund (not band) Then there was the Silver shirts.  Kind of a paramilitary militia .. started by a man called William Dudley Pelley. 

IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE .. is a book written  by Sinclair Lewis who was concerned  about such men in the United States.. and with the reports from his wife who was the reporter in Germany, he decided to write the book.. which later became a play.. put on with several other plays… by the Federal Theater …(a government project to have out of work actors have a job during the depression).

It was a novel, meaning it was based on real life happenings.  It was based on the men like Coughlin..  It was about a Senator who was promoting a radical man like Coughlin, for President.. They promoted martial law, had militia  Minute Men type…..using them for overriding courts and Congress.  The book sold for over 300,000 copies and is still for sale.. they said.. Amazon had it on the top 10, 6 years ago..  The article  went on to after telling of the Government Federal Theater Project, that Lewis fears faded out on the public front…. Thankfully, it did not happen… but they also said not so much in France and Spain  of today.

They say that history repeats itself.   Scary times, my friend.. Be careful of who you believe in.