No President rose from abject, desperate and humble beginnings as the 17th President of the United States, Andrew Johnson (December 29, 1808 – July 31, 1875) who served as Commander-in-Chief from April 15, 1865 to March 4, 1869. Johnson succeeded to...
Groundnut pyramids were pyramid-like structures made from groundnut sacks. The pyramids were built in northern Nigeria in cities such as Kano, where groundnut production was a key part of the economy in Nigeria’s First Republic. They were viewed as both a...
During the Nigeria-Biafra civil war, many Igbo people fled other parts of the country for the East because they were being killed and massacred wantonly and the government was doing nothing about it. Many abandoned their homes, properties and businesses for...
On the eve of the Saint Valentine’s Day preparation in 1976, Lagosians experienced the most bizarre happenings in Nigerian history in broad daylight. It was the assassination of Nigeria’s 3rd military Head-of-State, General Murtala Ramat Mohammed on his 200th day in...
Often ranked top among America’s great Presidents, Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809-April 15, 1865) served as the 16th President from 1861-1865, during the American Civil War. Lincoln was the first President to be born outside the original 13 states, the first...
On December 29, 1170, four knights of King Henry II of England murdered the Archbishop of Canterbury (the highest ecclesiastical office in England) Thomas Beckett, right there in the cathedral, just eight days after his birthday. The knights had carried out...
There were three ships which were nearby when the Titanic sunk on April 15, 1912. One of them was known as the Sampson. It was 7 miles away from the Titanic and they saw the white flares signaling danger, but because...
Oba Adeniran Adeyemi II was the Alaafin of Oyo, between 1945 and 1954, until he was forced into exile by the Action Group- led government of the Western Region of Nigeria, as a result of the death of the Deputy leader...
Justice Samuel Olumuyiwa Jibowu (August 26, 1899 – June 1, 1959) was the first African to serve on the Supreme Court of Nigeria; the first African police magistrate, the first Nigerian High Court judge and a pioneer of the Nigerian Judiciary....
James Buchanan, Jr. (April 23, 1791 – June 1, 1868) was the 15th President of the United States from 1857–1861 and the last to be born in the 18th century. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the 17th United...
Alhaji Alhassan Dantata (1877 – August 17, 1955) was a Nigerian businessman who was the wealthiest man in West Africa at the time of his death. Birth and Early Life Dantata’s father was Abdullahi, a man from the village of Danshayi,...
Lagos was originally inhabited by the Awori subgroup of the Yoruba people in the 15th century, who called it “Oko” or farm in English language. Under the leadership of the Oloye Olofin, the Awori moved to an island now called Iddo...
Nigeria’s first Prime Minister Alhaji (Sir) Abubakar Tafawa Balewa (1912- January 15, 1966) was popularly known as “The Golden Voice of Africa”. Tafawa Balewa took its name from two corrupted Fulani words: “Tafari” (rock) and “Baleri” (Black). So he grew up...
