HistorTweet Week in Review - W/E April 24, 2010

[SFX: CHURCHBELL] Greetings, History Lovers! Welcome to This Tweet in History, the Week In Review, podcasting to you on tape delay from our North American Studios.

Here are your top stories for the week ending April 24, 2010:

[SFX: SOUND827]World: DATELINE Haiti, April 22 1971 - Papa Doc, Haiti's president for life, reaches the end of his term: http://bit.ly/cby3ct [SFX:] Haitian dictator, Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier, first came to fame as a beloved doctor. He came to power after opposing a military coup, elected president in 1956. Once he was in, he began consolidating power, immediately exiling his enemies, and, ultimately, through voodoo and his private militia, the TonTons Macoute, instilling fear in the populace, dissolving one house of legislature and going outside the country’s constitution by seeking a second term as president, in an election which he, the sole candidate, won with a tally of 1,320,748 to nil. A year later, he had himself declared, with 99.9% of the country’s vote, “President for life.” When that life ended, in 1971, Papa Doc’s son, Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, succeeded him. [SFX:]

[SFX: SOUND827]Sports: DATELINE Boston, April 21 1980 - Rosie Ruiz's ruse riles runners in Boston's renowned race: http://bit.ly/9vUiXB The Back-Story: [SFX:I Ran All The Way Home; Blues In The Night] To say that Rosie Ruiz came out of nowhere to win the Boston Marathon would be an unforgivably bad play on words. The largely unknown runner qualified for the Boston Marathon with what turned out to be falsified times from the New York Marathon. When she crossed the finish line in Boston, in record time, and three minutes ahead of the next female to cross, she didn’t seem fatigued. Further, no one saw her earlier in the race, nor did she appear on videotaped footage. Some even reported having seen Ruiz insert herself into the race at the last mile. Ultimately, Ruiz was stripped of her title, Canadian Jacqueline Gareau was named the winner, and The Boston and other marathons added video surveillance and electronic monitoring at checkpoints throughout the course. [SFX: I’m a Loser]

[SFX: SOUND827]: In other news: DATELINE Atlanta, April 23 1985 - Some things never change. Coke should've been one of them.: http://bit.ly/b2zwXn
The Back-Story: [SFX:That’s Just The Way It Is; Just the Way You Are;Changes;Don’t Change for You] In the era of the Pepsi challenge, Coke was losing market share. All of a sudden, they discovered a long-lost “original” formula for their soda, and began market-testing it. Sure enough, it was preferred, and, in short order, the new formula was pushed out to the world. The company, however, underestimated its consumer-base’s loyalty, who were outraged at the change. Eventually, Coke re-released the former formula, re-branded as Coca Cola Classic. When all was said and done, the result of the fiasco was what Coke had sought in the first place: A revitalization of the brand.[SFX:Get Right Back to Where We Started From; Do It Again]

[SFX: SOUND827] This week’s birthdays:[SFX: In the Club]

April 18: Conductor Leopold Stokowski
April 19: Tennis star Maria Sharapova
April 20: Jazz pioneer Lionel Hampton http://www.uiweb.uidaho.edu/hampton/
April 21: Author Charlotte Bronte
April 22: Soviet premier Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
April 23: Conductor Sergei Prokofiev, and
April 24: Designer Jean-Paul Gaultier

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