Daily history

Good morning,


Happy Birthday to Jill Duncan!

Quote of the day:

“Limitations live only in our minds. But if we use our imaginations the possibilities are limitless.”

Jamie Paolinetti

A friend sent me a vignette about the US Marines and it reminded me of this story. When I was an air traffic controller in Greenville I had a supervisor named Ralph that was a Marine pilot in WWII. He told me that on one occasion he was doing gunnery practice out over the Pacific Ocean and the target was a flag towed by another aircraft using a long cable. The target was stabilized by a large lead weight in the front of the flag. Ralph had not been scoring well in gunnery and he was determined to make this practice count. He said that he bored in so close to the flag that the lead weight struck the oil cooler on one of the wings and the engine froze immediately. He was flying an F4U Corsair fighter. Ralph bailed out and was rescued by a destroyer that was on station for just that purpose. I asked him if he was scared. He said “A nineteen year old Marine is not afraid of anything.” Ralph was back in the air the next day doing gunnery practice over the Pacific Ocean. He was aboard the aircraft carrier USS Franklin when it was hit by a bomb while on station near Okinawa. The Franklin was fatally wounded. Ralph said that he was in a briefing room when the bomb hit and all the lights went out. All of the people in the room held hands and felt their way to a ladder and climbed out onto the flight deck, ran across the deck and jumped over the side. He was rescued by a destroyer again. The Franklin sank a flaming wreck. I asked Ralph if he was scared that time. He said that he did not remember anything after they grabbed each other’s hands. But when he was picked up by the destroyer he determined that he had to have done all that maneuvering to have ended up where he was. It is amazing how the human mind protects itself when the occasion warrants it.

My brother and sister-in-law asked me if I had been watching the winter Olympics. I confessed that I had not because I was not interested in it. What I did see in the news is the media’s unending pursuit of drama, scandal and disappointment. They are disgusting.

I guess y’all saw where Marie Osmond’s 18 year old adopted son committed suicide by jumping off a tall building. The item said that the boy had been struggling with depression most of his short life. I wonder why some people have fits of depression and others don’t. It has to be a chemical imbalance in the body. It seems that in these days of high technology that imbalance could be corrected by something other than a drug that turns a person into a zombie, it is depressing.

A few weeks ago five soldiers in training at Fort Jackson South Carolina had let it be known that they were thinking about poisoning the food in the mess halls. In response US Representative Joe Wilson (he is the one that called Obama liar) launched an investigation. To no one’s surprise the five men were found to be Muslim although American citizens from northern Virginia. This past week four of the men were “administratively released”. This means they were kicked out of the Army with neither an honorable nor dishonorable condition. One of them was sent back to a National Guard unit in northern Virginia. We cannot assume that all people that are American citizens are Patriots. Be aware.

This date in history March 1

1781    In November of 1777 the United States Congress had signed the Articles of Federation and sent out to the respective states for ratification. The Articles of Federation outlined the processes taken by the federal government. The nearly four year delay in ratification came because Virginia and Maryland were squabbling over lands on their western borders. Finally, these two states settled their differences and the Articles of Federation were ratified on this date. This document was the precursor to the United States Constitution. The Federal Government and the individual states knew that the Articles of Federation would not suffice and began working on a better instrument soon after the Articles were ratified. The main difference in the two documents was the sovereignty of the states. The Articles begin with “To all to whom these Present shall come, we the undersigned Delegates of the States ...” Compared to the opening line of the Constitution “We the people of the United States....do ordain and establish this Constitution for the people of the United States.” The Article II of Articles of Federation says “Each state shall retain its sovereignty, freedom and Independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” Out forefathers were so fearful of another King taking power that they essentially made each state its own monarchy. As I said, early on some very wise men, Thomas Jefferson for one, saw that the Articles were unworkable and began carving out another one. Our forefathers struggled under the Articles until the present day Constitution was graciously ratified and delivered to us in 1789. But even then, there were those that were still fearful of a takeover by a king that they added further amendments to it guaranteeing additional personal liberties and protection. These addenda to this day are known as The Bill of Rights. We went from sovereign King, to an assembly of sovereign states, to a sovereign nation under guidance of some very intelligent men of vision and lovers of freedom that, in my humble opinion, were not here by accident.

1864    The United States Congress chooses to promote Major General Ulysses S. Grant to Lieutenant General effective on this date. Grant is an interesting study in success. He was born in Ohio in 1822. He graduated from West Point in 1843 an unimpressive 21st out a class of 39. He was assigned on the western frontier and fought in the Mexican War. He resigned his commission and became a manger of a clothing store for several years in Ohio. After the attack on Fort Sumter Grant reenlisted and was given the rank of Colonel and assigned to the 21st Illinois Brigade. In the fall of 1861 he was promoted to Brigadier General after he brilliantly captured the Confederated strongholds of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson on the Tennessee River, which virtually gave the Union the control of the entire state of Tennessee. After a series of successes, and some failures, he was able to neutralize the city of Vicksburg which was a Confederate bastion on the Mississippi River giving the Union control of that great artery and the essentially split the Confederacy in half. After this he was brought back east to capture or destroy the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, CSA General Robert E. Lee commanding. After a series of ferocious battles, Lee ran out of food and ammo and eventually surrendered to Grant in April of 1865. There were only two other three star (lieutenant) Generals in the United States Army up to that time, they were Grant, Washington and Henry Halleck. Halleck’s rank was more an honorary one. He never was in command of a military unit in the field with that rank. Grant was the only commander of the Union military that understood his advantage over the Confederate Generals. He could afford to lose more men than the Confederacy. He had more cannon fodder. He was willing to sacrifice his men just so he could take out some of the Confederates knowing that they had few if any replacements. He fought a war of attrition and won.

1932   On this date the 22 month old baby of Charles and Anne Lindbergh show up missing from her crib and a ransom note written in barely readable English demanding $50,000 was found nearby. Someone had put up a ladder to the second floor window of the Lindbergh’s Hopewell, New Jersey home and left muddy footprints in the baby’s bedroom floor. The police found nothing. It was Charles Lindbergh that flew non-stop from New Jersey to Paris in the airplane “The Spirit of Saint Louis”. A few days later a letter arrived and demanded $70,000. It wasn’t until April that a drop point was identified and a go-between delivered the money. The kidnapper left a note saying the baby was in a boat named the “Nellie” off the Massachusetts coast. No such boat was ever found so the police go back to the scene of the crime to investigate more. They found the baby’s corpse just a short distance from the house. About two years later a man buys some gas for is car and pays the attendant with a bill that looked like it was marked. The attendant took down the license number and gave it to the police who tracked it down to a German immigrant name Bruno Hauptman. They searched his house and found $13,000 of the ransom money. Hauptman claimed that he was given the money but he went on trial and was convicted on the slimmest of circumstantial evidence. Two months after the conviction Hauptman was executed in the electric chair.

Born today:

40ad    Italian writer Marcus Maritalus. He said “There is no glory in outstripping donkeys”. He must have been conversing with some Clemson grads.

1922     Jewish statesman Yitzak Rabin. He said “Don’t make peace with your friends, make peace with the most unsavory of your enemies.” Rabin was an exemplary leader that was gunned down in his prime.

1880    English writer Lytton Strachey. On his death bed he said “If this is dying, then I don’t think much of it.” Arrogance at its peak.

Quotable Quotes:

“I’d move to Los Angeles if Australia and New Zealand were swallowed by some gigantic tidal wave, if there is bubonic plague in Europe and if Africa disappeared from a Martian attack.” Russell Crowe

“In Canada a gay marriage is one where the husband does not watch hockey” Conan O’Brien

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow