Historical Background
1199: Death of King Richard the I, better known as Richard the “Lionheart”. The Barbary Lion becomes the national animal of England and will continue to be seen throughout the heraldry of the nobility that followed.
1898: C.S. Lewis is born
1914: The Great War begins with the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a group of Serb, Bosniak and Croats seeking the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian stranglehold of the Balkans.
1915-1917: The Western Front of the war is at a stalemate, Trench Warfare reigns supreme. Over 15 Million civilians and soldiers will die from total war.
1916: Battle of the Somme, over 1.2 million British, French and German soldiers will die fighting over 5 miles worth of land. The battle is inconclusive.
1917: C.S. Lewis along with a few other friends join the British Army. Stationed in the Somme region of France. Lewis will be injured and two of his closest friends will be killed by a British shell that missed its mark.
1918: Austria-Hungary, Germany and the Ottoman Empire agree to armistices with their belligerents
1919: The Treaty of Versailles is signed, the “war to end wars” is over.
1933: Adolf Hitler comes to power in Germany, with promises to bring justice to those who betrayed the Germans in the First World War, and bring prosperity to the Fatherland
1935-1937: European Leaders led by Neville Chamberlain use policy of appeasement with Hitler. They will reward him a great deal of territory in Austria(Anschluss) and Czechoslovakia(Sudetenland) which he claims is German by right as many in the regions were of German descent.
1939: After Hitler realizes diplomacy will no longer work in his sights of expansion, his forces invade Poland. World War 2 has begun.
1940: France Surrenders to German and Italian forces, leaving the United Kingdom alone to fight the war.
June 1940: Operation Pied Piper was put into effect. Due to the air raids on a nightly basis by the German Air Force, children from across the southern coast of the United Kingdom would be evacuated to the rural north. C.S. Lewis will care for children in his home known as The Kilns.
June 1941: Germany invades U.S.S.R, over 5 million will die in the combat.
December 8th 1941: The United States joins the war to fight the Japanese. Adolf Hitler declares war on the United States.
June 6, 1944: Largest military invasion in known history D-Day. The Allies storm the Beaches of Normandy with eyes on Berlin.
April 16-May 2, 1945: Battle of Berlin, Adolf Hitler commits suicide in his underground bunker on April 30th.
May 8, 1945: V-E Day. The War in Europe is over as Germany unconditionally surrenders.
1950: C.S. Lewis completes The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe which encompasses much of the history that C.S. Lewis had been through
1963: C.S. Lewis died of renal failure
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.2 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including vocabulary specific to domains related to history/social studies.
Information by Julian Valdez
From Page to Stage 