Daily history

Good morning,


Quote of the day:

“I told my wife that I was seeing a therapist. She said that she was seeing a cab driver, two plumbers and a bartender.”

                                Rodney Dangerfield

Note: Cesar Millan's canine companion "Daddy" has died.

For some reason a particular event came to mind that I wanted to tell y’all about. Several years ago there was a bar/nightclub here in Greenville called “Al’s Pump House”. It was owned by a man named Al Threatt. Al was about 6’-8” and weighted about 280; Al was his own bouncer. He was a blues fan also, which was right up my alley. He booked some real talented blues bands/musicians. One particular night he had Toy Caldwell by himself. Toy was the lead guitarist with the Marshall Tucker Band from Spartanburg, SC. Toy got up on stage with his electric guitar and tore the house down, y’all. He played some of the most thrilling riffs that I have ever heard before or since. Three weeks later Toy put a mixture of cocaine and heroin up his nose and his heart promptly stopped and he freaking died. Damn you, Toy Caldwell, for depriving us of your God given talent. Drugs, it is always drugs.

Back in 1991 Dawn Brancheau graduated from the University of South Carolina (Go Gamecocks) with a degree in psychology. Four year later she landed a job at Sea World as an assistant trainer. The animals there in those days were bottle-nosed dolphins and seals. Eventually they captured and trained Orcas or killer whales. Dawn became an expert trainer of these 12,000 pound animals. A few days ago a Dawn was involved in a training session with Tilikum, a sometimes belligerent Orca. Suddenly Tilikum grabbed Dawn, dragged her into the water and held her under until she had drowned and then surfaced and shook Dawn like a rag doll. Not only that, when the rescuers tried to retrieve Dawn they were held at bay for a while by Tilikum. This was the third person that had died while involved with Tilikum. The friends of Dawn said that she thought of these giants as her children and would say things like “they are a little balky today.” In my research I found out that at times these trained Orcas will just refuse to perform. They are very intelligent animals and obviously have a mind of their own. Besides, who is going to argue with them? What should happen to Tilikum, if anything? He cannot be returned to the wild. He has been hand fed most of his life and lived with a very small pod.

A couple of days ago a young couple brought home a newly born baby girl. A couple of days later the mother heard the baby crying and went and found the family pit bull standing over the infant’s bassinet. The dog had bitten the infant who subsequently died. Why in the hell were the parents allowing a dog with that kind of reputation to have access to a helpless infant? I don’t care what Cesar Millan says, pit bulls were bred to fight and it is in their genetic makeup and that trait can surface at any time. Why is it that Dade county Florida will not allow pit bulls in the county? It is because they got fed up with attacks by pit bulls. You never read about attacks by Beagles or Cocker Spaniels; it is pit bulls and Rottweiler’s by a large majority. I believe that these two breeds are meant to be a one person pet and even then kept under tight control. Even at that, they have been known to attack their owners of many years.

I had a girlfriend that owned a Rottweiler that she had raised since it was 8 weeks old and was then about 7 years old. Every day for 7 or 8 years her neighbor across the street would come over for morning coffee. She normally would come through the garage into the kitchen. My girlfriend decided to have her garage floor painted and one morning the neighbor came to the front door and rang the doorbell. When my girlfriend opened the door, the dog (about 80 pounds) rushed by and hit the neighbor in the chest knocking her to the sidewalk and was at her throat in an instant. My girlfriend was able to pull the dog off and the neighbor was not injured. There is no doubt in my mind that if my girlfriend had not been there or been a little slower the neighbor would be dead. My girlfriend put the dog down because she could not trust her around her toddler grandchildren any longer. No one knows what initiated that attack but there is no question that the dog knew the neighbor. What a damned shame.

This date in history February 26

1813    Robert R. (R.R.) Livingston dies on this date. Livingston was one of those people in the history of our country that played a major role but was not well known. Robert was the eldest of nine children to a powerful judge also named Robert R. who owned vast stretches of land along with two major estates in the Hudson River Valley in upstate New York. The main estate where the family lived was Clermont the other was Belvedere. In 1766 the elder Livingston tried to impose restrictive leases onto his tenant farmers which resulted in a tenant farmer uprising who threatened to kill the elder Livingston and burn down his estates. The British army came to his rescue and his estates remained. After this, young Robert is sent to Kings College (Now Columbia University) where he graduated with a law degree. In 1777 after the elder and younger Livingstons has declared their allegiance to the Patriots, the British Army burned down Clermont and Belvedere. The younger Robert represented the Provincial New York Congress to the Continental Congress. He was selected to be the United States Secretary of Foreign Affairs and engineered the sale of the French holdings in North America to the United States. This was known as The Louisiana Purchase. This addition to the United States nearly doubled the size of our country. He was named as “chancellor” of New York. I do not know the equivalent of this office today. But from then on his nickname was “The Chancellor”. It was he that swore in our first President George Washington. There are statues of him in New York City and in the United States Capitol building.

1862    On this date Elisha Hunt Rhodes is in camp in Washington, DC. Rhodes is a soldier in the 2nd Rhode Island Regiment attached to The Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War. Rhodes was a gifted writer and kept a detailed diary for the entire four years he was in the army. The resulting book made from his diary gives us a seldom seen insight into the day-in, day-out existence to the average infantryman. There are hours of sheer boredom intermixed with moments of heart stopping terror and views of horrible after-battle carnage. On this particular day he and his friend Isaac Cooper go to hear a speech by Massachusetts Senator Henry Wilson and then the go to a fair in a Methodist church. Elisha and Isaac meet two girls at the fair and walk them home. I suppose even Yankees can get lucky from time to time. Just joking.

1993    On this cold and snowy morning in New York City a thunderously powerful explosion happens in the parking garage under the North Tower of the World Trade Center. There were six people killed and over 1,000 injured. The police had no choice but to evacuate both the North and South towers. The initial investigation indicated that it was a band of Serb that had done the deed but it was later found that this group was simply jewel thieves. From this the FBI was able to dissolve a large diamond theft organization. But the investigation continued into the bastards that were responsible for the explosion. Investigators found a piece of a van that carried the explosives that still had the serial number visible. From this they tracked the van back to a rental agency in Jersey City, New Jersey where a contract showed the van was rented to one Mohammed Salaamed. This jackass had reported the van as stolen on February 25 and told the agency that he was coming to get his $400 deposit back. There is no need for me to tell you that the FBI was waiting and arrested this towel head. A search of Salaamed’s apartment and records implicated two other towel heads. They also find a video tape on how to build bombs and are able to identify a fourth person in the video. An owner of a storage facility came forth and said that he had seen four men loading something into a rental van in one of his rental garages. The FBI investigated this site and found enough nitro-glycerin to build another gigantic bomb. Also one of the four had went to the AGL Welding Service and purchased steel hydrogen tanks. In the debris from the blast the investigators found a piece of a tank that still had the AGL logo on it. All four of these camel jockeys went on trial and were convicted. They all received sentences of 240 years each. I can only hope that all of them are taken under the wing of a 6’-9”, 375 lb. sex pervert that has a penchant for middle-eastern men.

1942    On this date US actress Joan Fontaine win the Oscar for best actress for her performance in Alfred Hitchcock’s movie "Suspicion". Right after this gossip columnist Louella Parsons writes in her column that Joan did not get the Oscar for her performances on stage but for her performances in bed with every producer west of the Rockies. By accident Louella and Joan met in the bar at the famous Brown Derby restaurant in Los Angeles and the verbal exchange between these two women went down in sailor history as a benchmark in the delivery of profanity.

1564    On this date poet and playwright Christopher Marlowe is christened in the Church at Canterbury, England. Two months later William Shakespeare was christened. Marlowe was recognized and being a bright person and was given a scholarship to Cambridge where he earned a B.A. degree. It was believed that he was a spy for Queen Elizabeth while at Cambridge and was nearly denied his masters degree until a representative of the Queen dropped by and suggested that Marlowe had better get his degree ”for services rendered.” Marlowe did indeed receive his master’s degree. During a search of the apartment that he and Thomas Kyd shared, some literature was found that smacked of treason and Kyd was taken to the Tower and tortured. Kyd finally said the literature was Marlowe’s. Marlowe was arrested but made bail and was free. Soon after Marlowe gets into a fight with a bartender over his tab and the bartender puts a knife into Marlowe’s liver and it is au revoir for Christopher. Marlowe gave us some immortal works like “Tamburlaine the Great”, “Dr. Faustus” and “The Jew of Malta” among others.

Born today:

1933    French financier James Goldsmith. He said “You pay peanuts, you get monkeys.” No comment

1802    French writer Victor Hugo is born. He said “An intelligent hell would be better than a stupid paradise.” He must have visited the campus of Clemson University.

1916    US personality Jackie Gleason. He said “Modesty is the artifice of actors, kind of like a show of passion by a call girl.” Well said, Jackie. I miss you.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow