1935: America was, like most of the world, in the midst of a long economic depression, which began with the collapse of the stock market on October 29, 1929 and lingered into the early 1940s.

1953: The United States economy finally absorbed the returning veterans from World War II, reaching the lowest unemployment rate since the war ended in 1945.

Today: The stock market reaches new highs every month, which keeps production high and unemployment low.

1935: Adolph Hitler, having become the chancellor of Germany two years earlier, began exercising the dictatorial control that would eventually lead to the extermination of millions of Jews as part of his government's "Final Solution."

1953: Josef Stalin died. He had ruled the Soviet Union Since 1928, and there are unconfirmed estimates that his government killed as many millions of citizens as were killed during the Nazi Holocaust.

Today: Mass murders by governments against various ethnic...