First, Trump is attempting to get his supporters to intimidate and ultimately control the mainstream media. If and when that happens, so that the alt-right controls information, then White Rose gets smashed. That's a very big IF, I don't see how he can achieve it. But surely that is the (inarticulated) plan.
March 2nd, 1904 -- The birth of Theodore Geisel, otherwise known as Dr Seuss. This is the day that the NEA has chosen to be the date of Read Across America: http://www.nea.org/grants/read-across-background.html We had a book draft back in the day and this was my third round pick. Famously, the result of a bet between Geisel and Bennet Cerf, this book has a vocab of exactly 50 words (The Cat in the Hat had 275). Children's literature has never been the same since. Edit: Oh, and here are the 50 words: a, am, and, anywhere, are, be, boat, box, car, could, dark, do, eat, eggs, fox, goat, good, green, ham, here, house, I, if, in, let, like, may, me, mouse, not, on, or, rain, Sam, say, see, so, thank, that, the, them, there, they, train, tree, try, will, with, would, you.
2004 Val1 found out that someone with zero posts on BigSoccer had taken the nom de net of Val before him.
1975 -- Arthur Ashe wins Wimbledon If you want to see a particularly cool moment, check at the 15:50 mark where Ashe thinks the ball has gone out, and instead of pitching a fit, he just refuses to get ready for the next point and looks questioningly at the linesman. Not glaring, but just staring. Wonderfully understated.
I couldn't find this thread yesterday, which I was going to post about a random day in Viet Nam 50 years ago. CBS field reporter Don North had a piece in the NYT yesterday https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/04/opinion/vietnam-war-con-thien.html A Little Piece of Hell: At Con Thien in 1967, American commanders failed to recognize that loyalty should flow downward as well as upward. The commanders’ loyalty should have been to their Marines facing the North Vietnamese Army as much as to their superiors in Washington. American Marines died in droves at Con Thien; they deserved better of their commanders. I covered some of the fiercest fighting, in the summer of 1967, as an ABC News correspondent. Ironically, perhaps, some of the bloodiest engagements came on and around July 4. My team — our cameraman, Nguyen Van Quy; our sound man, Nguyen Xuan De; and myself — didn’t want to go, but it’s the assignment we drew. My weeks spent at Con Thien revealed, to me at least, some fundamental truths about the Vietnam War: that our soldiers and Marines fought bravely; that the North Vietnamese were relentless; and that our military and political leaders had committed us to a war we couldn’t win, and prosecuted it in the most inept way possible. Take, for example, the McNamara Line. Secretary McNamara, ever on the lookout for clever, logical and arms-length solutions, floated the idea of the barrier in March 1966, at a meeting of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. . . . It was a bad idea on many, many levels... And the conclusion... Fifty years later, I am reviewing my scripts from my days at Con Thien. I see now that the anger I felt at the misguided strategy and the compassion we felt for the Marines’ suffering were not fully expressed. My script should have been much clearer in saying that American strategy was not only flawed but resulted in an unnecessary waste of lives. I am reminded of an observation by Chris Hedges, a former war correspondent for The New York Times: “Reporters who witness the worst of human suffering and return to newsrooms angry see their compassion washed out by layers of editors who stand between the reporter and reader. The creed of objectivity and balance,” he wrote, “disarms and cripples the press and transforms reporters into neutral observers or voyeurs.” Con Thien showed American Marines at their best and American political and military leaders at their worst. As the Marine historian Eric Hammel concluded, “Americans were bound by the moral poverty of their political leaders, and the North Vietnamese were bound by the intellectual inflexibility of their Communist doctrines. The soldiers of each side suffered mightily in the stalemate that ensued.” Anyone seeking glory in battle did not find it in the mud and heat of Con Thien, but those who seek tales of extraordinary valor need look no further.
1517 Martin Luther kicks off the Protestant Reformation by nailing his 95 Theses onto the door of a church in Wittenberg. Or did he? https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...hing-to-a-church-door/?utm_term=.9c09535c1977 Here are the 95, otherwise known as the Disputation on the Power of Indulgences: http://www.luther.de/en/95thesen.html
On this day in 1927.... Papa mio and Mama mia tied the knot in Norwich Ct when they eloped to escape Mama mia's Mama. The reception dinner consisted of whatever one was able to score from Trick or Treating.
Today is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Douglass. Actually, it's not. Douglass was a slave, so of course no one gave a crap about him and we don't know his birthdate. He was listed on a slave roll for February and he picked the 14th to observe his birthday since 14 is the halfway point of the month. I figure there are three African Americans that every school kid knows: MLK, Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass. And my little backwater here on the Eastern Shore of Maryland is home to both Tubman and Douglass. It's kind of neat. The pic above is the statue that was erected in front of our courthouse a couple years back. Part of it's placement was to counter a Boys-of-the-Confederacy statue that is across the walk from this statue.
This statement would be correct if you said: "Tiger Woods, LeBron, and Barack Obama." Not because it should be, but because I think we are failing to teach about important historical figures. If nothing else, that would be a reason to put those 3 on our currency. Thanks for the reminder though. I learned something new and useful today.
Back in my day they were Joe Louis, Jackie Robinson and Sugar Ray Robinson. All three were exceptional fighters!!
No way on Tubman, and not Douglass, either. Just MLK. He's become the go-to guy for conservative concern trolls. I've lived in two towns where nothing was taught about Douglass or Tubman in at least one private secondary school. I don't speak from personal experience in either case, only heard it from people who left the private school to teach at the school I was teaching at. I won't argue that there was any "caring", but some slave info was maintained, depending on the slaveowner. Entered into the Good Book on the table in the living room, lol
Sorry to thread drift. I went to a private Catholic HS and agree. Tubman and Douglas were glossed over compared to MLK. However prominent AA from the area were brought up in Social Studies/History classes. Muhammad Ali and Garrett Morgan were ones that still come to mind. One for being, well, The GreatestTM. The other one invented the traffic light and an early type of mask used for firefighters. There was also one who was the first Navy diver who I am too lazy to look up. He had a forgettable movie made about him.
No love for George Washington Carver? In my history classes, he was one of the Big Three, along with Tubman and Douglass.
Booker T. Washington made regular cameos during my school years. Which in retrospect tells me they were trying to tell my black classmates something.
For me, it was George Washington Carver, Booker T Washington, and I was actually in grade school when MLK was assassinated. Of course, growing up in Brooklyn, the Jackie Robinson story was well known to everyone. William E.B. Dubois was born in the town I moved to from the 8th grade onward. I had never even heard of him until Black History Month in high school. Now, you'd think that if a significant historical figure who was white was from our town, there'd be a big deal about it, considering it was a small-ish town of 7,000 people. The only other figure of any stature from our town was George Stanley, the guy who was a rival of Thomas Edison for inventing the light bulb. Our town was the first to have AC-based streetlights. The drummer for John Mellencamp's band didn't come along until much later. Anyway, "Black" history should be just "history." It shouldn't be ghettoized into the shortest month of the year.
I was 7 years old, and I don't remember that event at all. I think it felt pretty remote to Scandanavian-dominated Seattle. I sure recall Bobby Kennedy's assassination 2 months later, now that was a big deal.
I blame the Oxies that some moron has been taking. In February 2017, President Donald Trump repealed a regulation from former President Barack Obama that made it more difficult for those with mental illness to have a gun. In wake of the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, Trump has attacked the mentally ill, implying they are the vast majority of those responsible for mass shootings.
It helps limit discussion of how the atrocities happened, and what demographic was responsible. Most history classes of any type in this country have a bunch of cheerleader shit grafted onto them by state boards looking to erase America's true history. Most years I ignored it completely. If you've never taught, you'd probably be surprised at how little space is given to the slave trade, Jim Crow and the thriving results of those institutions. Gotta pimp Goober and Otis and the rest of the Founding Fathers, lol
Was Mrs. Chambers still at CHS when you were there (I'm thinking she had probably left for Chamblee at that point)? In her AP history class, we read The Peculiar Institution and excerpts from Douglass's autobiography. Great teacher, still friends with her to this day.