Latest news with #revolutionary
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Simón Bolívar's Long-Lost Firearm Surfaces for Auction as Venezuela Captures Global Headlines
Bidding War Expected for Legendary Firearm as Eyes Turn to Caracas BEDFORD, Texas, Aug. 8, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- An ornate presentation flintlock owned by South American revolutionary Simón Bolívar will be offered in Rock Island Auction Company's (RIAC) upcoming event, just as his birthplace of Venezuela finds itself thrust into global headlines. The sporting arm will serve as flagship of the company's August 15 – 17 Premier Auction, the first time the recently resurfaced item will have been available since 1962. Bolívar today is still revered for his leading role in liberating six countries from Spanish rule. This opulent shotgun was a gift to El Libertador from the Marquis de Lafayette, his North American revolutionary counterpart. The two freedom fighters clearly shared a great mutual respect, with Lafayette sending this long gun in 1825-26 at the height of Bolívar's influence. The French sporting arm remains in impressive condition with gold inlays and bright silver furniture depicting relief engraved scenes of Greek mythology's Calydonian boar hunt. Crafted in 1822 by Parisian gunmaker Baucheron Pirmet, the flintlock shotgun is a definitive example of the high quality European arms of the era. Out of the collection of noted fine arms collector Norman R. Blank, it is believed to be the last firearm of Simón Bolívar yet in private hands. The auction will mark the first time the gun has been publicly offered. Nearly 200 years after the historic presentation, the relationship between United States and Venezuela is notably less amiable. However, recent headlines do little to dim the excitement around the piece. "It's a gorgeous masterwork of the period's gunmaking, but more so a remarkably significant historic object," said RIAC President Kevin Hogan. "It's the height of Bolívar's power, and it's a symbol of South American independence." Collectors, museums, and institutions alike are expected to vie for the piece, which has previously resulted in high prices for Bolívar-owned firearms. In 2016 a lavish pair of pistols also from Lafayette to Bolívar realized $1.8 million, and in 2004, a pair of his flintlock pistols earned $1.6 million. About Rock Island Auction Company: Rock Island Auction Company is the world's no. 1 firearms auction company, and has been since 2003. Founded in 1993 by CEO Patrick Hogan, RIAC's current Bedford, Texas venue has become the world selling headquarters for fine and historic arms, hosting all the company's in-person auctions. Led by President Kevin Hogan, the company lives by its mission statement to "Elevate firearms collecting. Sell with Passion." Best known for selling headline-grabbing arms, the company's multiple auction formats cater to collectors of every experience level. For more information, please visit or call contact: Joel Kolander, (309) 797-1500 or jkolander@ View original content to download multimedia: SOURCE Rock Island Auction Company
New York Times
6 days ago
- Politics
- New York Times
I Was Banished by My Country's Dictator. What Happened to Me Is a Warning.
I knew what exile felt like, but nothing had prepared me to experience it again in my 70s. I was 26 the first time I was forced to flee a dictator. It was in 1975, and I had to escape Nicaragua for resisting the regime of Anastasio Somoza Debayle, the last ruling member of a dynasty that had ruled the country for nearly half a century. Back then, I was a committed revolutionary, ready to die for my country in the fight against autocracy. The exile I find myself in now, forced to start life anew in Madrid, is one I never could have imagined — one imposed on me by the man who helped dethrone Mr. Somoza with the promise that Nicaragua would never again suffer under a dictator's thumb. In 2023, I, along with hundreds of other Nicaraguan intellectuals and dissidents, was stripped of my citizenship by President Daniel Ortega, who has now ruled Nicaragua for the last nearly two decades. Even those of us who have sought shelter abroad no longer feel safe. Roberto Samcam Ruiz, a retired army major and vocal critic of Mr. Ortega, was gunned down inside his home in San José, Costa Rica, on June 19. No arrests have been made in connection with his killing, but he was at least the sixth Nicaraguan dissident to be shot, kidnapped or killed in Costa Rica since 2018. It is the latest step in Mr. Ortega's transformation from a onetime freedom fighter, my former comrade in the struggle against tyranny, into a full-blown dictator. Autocrats have long wielded statelessness and control over movement as tools to punish political opponents. Now, it seems as if Nicaragua can be counted among the states that reach beyond their borders to silence voices perceived as threats by those in power. It has been painful for me to watch my country backslide into violence and repression. When I fled Nicaragua the first time, it was also to Costa Rica, to escape the Somozas' iron fists. I was only able to return four years later, after the Sandinistas, the left-wing movement of which Mr. Ortega and I were both members, overthrew the dictatorship in 1979. It was a moment of hope, and I was ready to apply myself to the dream of a free and democratic country. The guerrilla war that broke out with the contras, U.S.-backed right-wing militias looking to topple the Sandinistas, soon made clear that dream was a fantasy. The conflict, over which Mr. Ortega presided during his first administration, from 1985 to 1990, left Nicaraguans exhausted from death and scarcity — and from Mr. Ortega's increasingly authoritarian tendencies, which I witnessed firsthand as an official in his government. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Car and Driver
05-07-2025
- Automotive
- Car and Driver
View Photos of the 1982 De Lorean Comparison Test
Read the full review When a car as seemingly revolutionary as the De Lorean appears, it's no surprise that the whole world wanders over to size it up.
The Herald
23-05-2025
- Politics
- The Herald
ANC struggle hero Gertrude Shope dies peacefully at home, aged 99
ANC stalwart Gertrude Shope has died at the age of 99. According to the party, Shope, also known as MaShope, died peacefully at her Gauteng home on Thursday morning. 'A lifelong revolutionary, MaShope was a leader of profound discipline, courage and humility. From her early activism to the dawn of democracy, she served the Struggle with unmatched commitment in the underground, in exile and in the democratic parliament. 'As former president of the ANC Women's League, head of the ANC Women's Section in exile, and a member of the ANC NEC, she played a pivotal role in shaping the political direction of our movement and the emancipation of women in South Africa and beyond,' said the organisation on Thursday. Shope, who was one of the oldest members of the party, is a former trade unionist and the first Women's League president. Shope had been exiled in countries like Botswana, Tanzania, Czechoslovakia, Zambia and Nigeria, where she fought for the rights of workers and women. 'Even in retirement, MaShope exudes an air of majesty and dignity as a sage of the age, belonging to the same illustrious historical galaxy of revolutionaries that includes Charlotte Maxeke, Ruth First, Fatima Meer, Helen Joseph, Sophia de Bruyn, Ruth Mompati, Lillian Ngoyi and many more,' wrote former minister Naledi Pandor in celebrating Shope's life a few years ago. Shope was born in 1925 in Johannesburg and grew up in Zimbabwe. She was 29 when she joined the ANC, leaving her work as a teacher in protest against Bantu education. As part of the Federation of South African Women, she fought to make women's struggles part of the wider Struggle for a free society. SowetanLIVE
Washington Post
19-05-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
‘The Afterlife of Malcolm X' looks at how we've remembered an icon
In January 1999, the U.S. Postal Service issued a stamp bearing the likeness of Malcolm X, acknowledging the broad popular appeal of the late Muslim minster. In a news release, the bureaucrats who had approved the stamp held Malcolm up as a man who, late in life, had turned from hatred to espouse 'a more integrationist solution to racial problems.' Many of the historians who had studied him and activists who had shaped their politics in his image, however, dismissed this characterization as not just untrue but a Faustian bargain — a dumbing down of Malcolm's true legacy in exchange for a little respectability. A representative rebuke came from one reader in the pages of The Washington Post. 'By all means let us honor Malcolm X,' he argued, 'but in doing so let us be clear about who and what he was. He was not a liberal or a conservative, a Democrat or a Republican. He was a revolutionary and an internationalist.' Men and women like that letter writer — veterans of the Organization of Afro-American Unity, doyens of the Free South Africa Movement, gang truce activists and the like — were determined to remind the country that Malcolm justified their commitments and their organizing in the here and now.
