112
votes
Accepted
Has an individual ever purchased an entire country?
In 1699, Johann Adam Andreas von Liechtenstein bought Schellenberg and in 1712 the county of Vaduz. The county was operating under feudal principles, thus perhaps might not be considered a country in ...
- 1,711
59
votes
Why did the Soviet Union have multiple airplane manufacturers?
I can't speak to the specifics of the Soviet Union, but I want to address the opening assumption of the question.
Generally, Communism believed in economic central planning, with each field being ...
- 54.9k
51
votes
Has an individual ever purchased an entire country?
In certain sense yes. Didius Julianus purchased the position of the Roman emperor in 193. This position was actually auctioned by Praetorian guards to the highest bidder, the Wikipedia article on ...
- 38.5k
47
votes
Why did the Soviet Union have multiple airplane manufacturers?
Company vs Design Bureau
It's important to distinguish between a company and a design bureau. Organisations such as MiG (Mikoyan-and-Gurevich Design Bureau), Yakolev (JSC A.S. Yakovlev Design Bureau),...
- 591
45
votes
Accepted
How did the American Civil War help the U.S economy recover from the Panic of 1857 given that civil wars are extremely destructive?
tl;dr Modern industrial warfare pushes the economy to 100% utilization; this cures the effect of an economic downturn (which is effectively suboptimal economic utilization).
Wars in general, and the ...
MCW♦
- 32.3k
45
votes
Accepted
Did any British working class men have the vote before 1918?
The film said this un-extraordinary working man had the vote, my calculations show it was possible he had the vote. But the 1918 act gave "working men the vote". So one of these 2 statements must be ...
- 97.4k
44
votes
Accepted
Has there ever been anything like the oil boom we see today?
SHORT ANSWERS
In terms of impact, the influx of precious metals into Spain (and then to the rest of Europe) from South America from the late 15th to the 16th century is hard to match. For a while, ...
- 108k
42
votes
How and when was the modern company ownership structure invented?
The governance model for early corporations is the chartered city; a community granted town privileges and, if also free, independence from feudal obligations to local sovereigns or lords and debt of ...
- 72.3k
38
votes
Accepted
Where did Japan get their oil during WWII?
Japan had a small domestic oil production, a few million barrels, but not nearly enough to meet their peacetime needs let alone war. What they did have is enough oil refineries with a capacity of ...
- 54.9k
38
votes
Accepted
Was the British Army a millionaire factory in the early 20th century?
Richard Meinertzhagen is known to be a serious liar. Refer to his Wikipedia article: for example, he stole numerous biological samples and presented them as his own in Europe.
That said, the ...
- 97.4k
36
votes
Accepted
Venezuelan crisis of 1902–03: Why is there a Russian flag on the cover of the prominent newspaper 'Le Petit Parisien'?
I think this is a color error (in reproduction, printing, fading, etc.) It is a 19th Century Venezuelan flag with the cluster of stars visible on the blue bar.
- 27.6k
33
votes
Could besieged medieval cities develop a micro-economy during wars to endure the siege for long time?
No. Cities were simply too small physically to feed themselves. Constantinople was one of the biggest cities of its time, at 2.3 sq miles. This works out to around 1500 acres. To feed a single ...
- 8,276
32
votes
How and when was the modern company ownership structure invented?
The Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie) is generally seen as the first company with stocks, shareholders and board members. It didn't have 1 director, it had 17: "De Heren ...
- 20.9k
31
votes
Has an individual ever purchased an entire country?
In 1846, The East India Company annexed the Kashmir Valley, Jammu, Ladakh, and Gilgit-Baltistan from the Sikhs, and then transferred it to Raja Gulab Singh of Jammu in return for an indemnity payment ...
- 599
30
votes
Accepted
Why didn't the Black Death result in favorable results for surviving peasants in China?
Firstly, there's no reason to think it didn't. In fact, it's fairly routine for afflicted regions to receive government subsidies in Imperial China. As early as AD 218, the Book of the Later Han ...
- 97.4k
29
votes
At the time of Sputnik, what kind of radios were common in the Soviet Union?
I suppose you are asking about real radios (wireless). They were quite bulky decorated wooden boxes. They had vacuum tubes instead of transistors. They were considered (somewhat) luxury items and not ...
- 38.5k
27
votes
Accepted
What was the economic basis for West Berlin?
how did it stay competitive with West Germany, which would be free of West Berlin's particular logistical challenges? Or were they being directly subsidized by the Federal Republic and/or the western ...
- 5,602
27
votes
Accepted
How much did a transatlantic telegram cost in 1914?
The first book google hit for "cablegram price" is The Bolsheviks: Twilight of the Romanov Dynasty
by John D. Loscher which contains a discussion of the prices and comparison to today's money. If I ...
26
votes
Accepted
Was public transportation free in the Soviet Union?
They were not free. In 1961 there was a currency reform, so the answer is about post-1961 period.
A price of ride depended on the mode of transportation. For city public transport the price varied ...
- 32.5k
25
votes
Accepted
In the first half of 20th century, how was gold inspected for authenticity?
As Denis observed in the comments above, for many countries, gold would have been traded through securities in the first half of the twentieth century. In those cases the physical transfer of the gold ...
- 77.3k
25
votes
Has there ever been anything like the oil boom we see today?
Sugar cane in the Caribbean comes to mind. The islands were sporting single purpose economies for all practical intents, much like a number of OPEC countries do.
It was extremely valuable, too. In ...
- 23.2k
25
votes
Can it be justified that an economic contraction of 11.3% is "the largest fall for more than 300 years"?
(disclaimer: I am not an economist, but I think I have got my head around this)
Two questions: is the claim correct on the basis of the data, and how plausible are those estimates?
The GDP estimates ...
- 9,112
24
votes
Accepted
What is Charles Babbage referring to when he talks about the 'College of Laputa'?
It is clearly a reference to Gulliver's recollections of the island of Laputa as relayed to us by Swift.
Their heads were all reclined, either to the right, or the left; one of their eyes turned ...
- 72.3k
21
votes
Accepted
When Adam Smith discusses "corn" to what crop does he refer?
The word corn, Wiktionary tells us, can mean:
(Britain) The main cereal plant grown for its grain in a given region, such as oats in parts of Scotland and Ireland, and wheat or barley in England ...
- 1,557
20
votes
Accepted
If the UK received the highest amount of Marshall Aid, why was it broke?
I remember being told as a boy in the 1970's that the reason our economy and industry was in such a poor state, particularly when compared with the West German "economic miracle", was that the RAF and ...
- 77.3k
20
votes
Are there any historical examples of successful price ceilings (aka price gouging laws)?
In Czech Republic (and AFAIK most of Europe), almost all medical drugs have had tightly controlled prices for the last couple decades. This price control in some senses does and in others does not fit ...
- 399
19
votes
Who was the richest person in the world at the start and end of WW2?
John D. Rockefeller Sr. was far and away the richest man in the world in 1937 at his death. But with the bulk of his wealth bequeathed to the Rockefeller (and other) foundations rather than to his son ...
- 72.3k
19
votes
Accepted
When did books first become affordable to the general population?
"Affordable to the poor" is a slippery concept.
However, books became much cheaper in the first half of the nineteenth century. Notable causes of this included steam-powered printing presses, ...
- 31.4k
18
votes
Was electricity free in the Soviet Union?
No, individuals didn't have and couldn't have electricity for free. It's clear that if there were just a limit on the maximum consumption of electricity (or water or anything else), most people would ...
- 2,732
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