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A Scheme to Feminize the Fuhrer, and Other Strange Historic Plans

Khalid Elhassan July 16, 2024 30 min

Scheme - A womanly Hitler was thought to be a less effective Hitler — A womanly Hitler was thought to be a less effective Hitler. Open Art

11. The Plan to Populate America With Elephants

Aside from in his home country, relatively few people these days know of King Mongkut, titled Rama IV of Siam – today’s Thailand. Of those who recognize the name, most probably recall it as that of a character in The King and I, a 1950s musical remade into a movie about a relationship with an English governess. Rama IV (1804 – 1868) was actually a real life nineteenth century monarch who ruled the kingdom of Siam from 1851 until his death in 1868.

Rama IV was a modernizer. He opened his kingdom to Western influences, and initiated the cultural and technological modernization of Siam. So much so that he became known as his country’s “Father of Science and Technology”. Rama’s modernization held off Western encroachments – at least temporarily. He sought recognition as an equal among the world’s rulers, and corresponded with many of them. As seen below, in one of those correspondences with an American president, he offered to populate the US with elephants.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.