Kamila Pigiel (1899 - 1971)

Refresh this page to see various historical events that occurred during Kamila's lifetime.

In 1899, in the year that Kamila Pigiel was born, the meaning of Chinese "oracle bones" was rediscovered. Farmers in China had been turning up the bones in their fields for generations but most often they were ground up and sold as medicine. The chancellor of the Imperial Academy and a friend noticed, before they ground the bones, that they had writing. The bones had been used around the second millennium BC for divination.

In 1909, when she was merely 10 years old, the NAACP was founded by W. E. B. Du Bois. The organization focused on legal strategies designed to confront the critical civil rights issues of the day - which included lynching and segregation in schools. The goal was to secure for all people the rights guaranteed in the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the United States Constitution.

In 1929, at the age of 30 years old, Kamila was alive when American Samoa officially became a U.S. territory. Although a part of the United States since 1900, the Ratification Act of 1929 vested "all civil, judicial, and military powers in the President of the United States of America".

In 1942, at the age of 43 years old, Kamila was alive when due to World War II, automobile production in the United States was stopped on February 1st. A tire rationing program had begun the month before. Detroit - the main hub of car manufacturing - was ordered to free up assembly lines for military production. The president of the Automobile Manufacturers Association said “The automotive industry is in this war all the way". Some dealerships had to close and others expanded their repair shops. The used car market boomed (as did a black market in used cars).

In 1971, in the year of Kamila Pigiel's passing, on May 3rd, 10,000 federal troops, 5,100 officers of the D.C. Metropolitan Police, 2,000 members of the D.C. National Guard, and federal agents assembled in Washington DC to prevent an estimated 10,000 Vietnam War protesters from marching. President Nixon (who was in California) refused to give federal employees the day off and they had to navigate the police and protesters, adding to the confusion. By the end of a few days of protest, 12,614 people had been arrested - making it the largest mass arrest in US history.