Daily history

Good morning,


Quote of the day:

“I do not have to win this war, the British have to win it. All I have to do is not lose."

                                   George Washington

Some of you are not happy with my visit with my friends in Charlotte this coming weekend. These friends helped me through the death of my father, mother and sister during the most trying times of my life and I will never forget it. It is my wish that all of you will have friends as devoted as I have been blessed with in this passage of time. If you cannot understand what I am saying, to hell with you and all you stand for, I will stay with my friends in the Queen City. By the way, I will be not writing anything this weekend.

Yesterday I neglected to mention that it was “Cinco de Mayo” translation being “the fifth of May.” Here is what is being celebrated. After getting their ass handed to them by the French army for years, the Mexican army defeated a siege on the Mexican city of Puebla by the French army who withdrew from Puebla on the "fifth of May." The French eventually regained the city of Puebla. After a number years and different members of French royalty as the kings of Mexico, the Mexicans eventually kicked out them out and became independent. It is beyond me why Americans want to celebrate an event that has nothing to do with the formation of this nation and concerns the heritage of a very small minority of our citizens. Is Cinco de Mayo celebrated in Canada, Brazil, Argentina, etc? Of course it isn’t. But let’s think about celebrating the Battle of Waterloo. This event was the death knell for Napoleon and people from Belgium, France, England, Scotland, Ireland Germany and Austria were involved. We have a hell of lot more ancestors from western Europe than we do from Mexico. This horse will never put any importance on May 5.

A couple of days ago the Burris family in Boiling Springs, South Carolina had a little trouble. It seems that 17 year old Kate Burris had been abusing her use of a cell phone given to her by her parents. Her parents gained possession of the cell phone and hid it from Kate. The enraged Kate began pulling clothes out of dresser drawers, silverware from kitchen drawers, etc. Her mother tried to restrain her and Kate began beating her up. Kate’s father intervened and Kate began beating up on him. He ended up with bruises, scratches and one black eye. Kate was arrested and charged with assault but was released after bail in the amount of $2,000 was paid. I love my kids but they knew better than to strike either me or their mother. You hurt me or mine, all bets are off. I would hope that my kids would not hit me or their mother out of fear but out of respect.

A couple of days ago the Asheville, NC police department notified the Anderson, South Carolina police to be on the lookout for forty year old Charles Bennett, Jr. of Anderson. This jackass had been in an internet chat room and solicited sex from what he thought was an 11 year old girl. The Anderson cops go on the chat room, find Bennett and pretend to be the 11 year old girl whereupon the cops set up a meet and Bennett agreed. Bennett went to the meet only it wasn’t an 11 year old girl, it was a couple of Anderson’s finest. Bennett is in the joint looking at 20 years of hard time. I like it.

This date in history May 6

1775    On this date William Franklin sends a note to William Legge, the 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, that any further engagements like those at Lexington and Concord would do nothing but never making it possible for the reconciliation of the British and the Colonists. William Franklin was the illegitimate son of Patriot Benjamin Franklin and also was the Royal Governor of New Jersey. When Ben went to England in 1757 he took little William with him and sent him to Oxford where he studied law. Ben studied social climbing and chasing skank, primarily. When William was a child he went everywhere with Benjamin and was with him when he conducted many of his experiments. When it was apparent that the colonies were going to rebel and seek independence, Ben went home to provide his assistance to his homeland. William decided to stay loyal to the British who, after all, had taken this candle makers son and educate him to the point of a Master of Arts degree from Oxford. Later on he was named as Royal Governor of New Jersey. Neither Ben nor William ever changed their stripes and Ben remained a colonist hell-bent of Independence and his son stayed loyal to the crown. Benjamin and William grew further and further apart and in 1782 after the defeat of Cornwallis at Yorktown, William sailed to England never to return. Ben saw him once after that when he stopped by for a visit on the way home from France. Ben wrote William out of his will saying that had England had won the war he would not have had anything left anyway. What a great man Benjamin Franklin was and we were very fortunate to have him on our side.

1876    The Thomas Gainsborough portrait of Georgia Spenser, better known as The Duchess of Devonshire is auctioned off in London nearly 100 years after it mysteriously disappeared. Georgia Spenser was an ancestor to Princess Diana. The public interest was aroused once again when the painting was stolen from the Thomas Agnew & Sons art gallery. It was stolen by master thief Adam Worth who needed it to provide bail for his jailed brother. But his brother was able to make bail on his own but Worth decided that he liked the painting and would keep it. Adam Worth was the 19th century’s most masterful criminal and was the model for writer A. Conan Doyle‘s master criminal Mr. Moriarity in the Sherlock Holmes series. Worth was born in Germany and raised in the United States. He joined the Union Army at the outbreak of the Civil War and was reported killed at the Battle of the Second Manassas. After this he joined several different units, took the enlistment bonus and promptly deserted. After the war Worth went to New York and joined with a group of pickpockets. He was finally caught and sentenced to three years in Sing Sing but escaped after just a few weeks and took up bank robbery. Worth was very careful and in addition to robbing banks he became very efficient in forgery and moved to England to ply his trade. He still had possession of The Duchess of Devonshire portrait. But he had two conspirators in the theft of the portrait who felt they did not get enough money for helping in the heist and went to the police. Worth refused to tell where the portrait was and he was jailed but not on charges related to the portrait. While in prison Worth decided that he would use the portrait as a bargaining tool to get out of prison or at least have his sentence reduced. It did not work and he served the entire four years and after his release he moved back to America. After a change of heart he began negotiation with the Pinkerton Detective agency for the return of the portrait. An amount was agreed upon and the painting was finally returned to England in 1901. US financier J.P. Morgan became fascinated by the story and went to England and bought The Duchess of Devonshire for $150,000. Worth did not get as much a ransom as he thought and died penniless a few years later.

1940    On this date John Steinbeck is awarded the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for his book The Grapes of Wrath. This book was about a family of poor dirt farmers from Oklahoma that were caught up in the Great Depression along with the worst drought in hundred years and were forced to pull up stakes and head for California to find work. The book was about the trial and tribulations of this family on the trip west and what happened to them once they arrived. The book was a stupendous exercise in imagination. This was not the only well acknowledged book written by this master. He gave us Cannery Row, Of Mice and Men, Travels With Charlie among several others. In his younger years he lived in the Salinas Valley in California but was determined to be a writer and moved to New York where he became a laborer and a part time journalist. While there he wrote two unsuccessful novels. Then his father gave him a small house and income back in Salinas County so he moved back home. His first book after coming home was Tannery Row which was a critical and financial success. After this, Steinbeck delivered one successful novel after another. He wrote two successful movies in Viva Zapata and Forgotten Village. He became very interested in marine biology and wrote The Sea of Cortez to wide acclaim from marine naturalists and biologists. His book Travels with Charlie was about him traveling around America in company of his poodle named Charlie and the people he met during his travels. This book earned him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962. He died in New York in 1968 leaving a gap in American literature that has yet to be filled. Larry McMurtry came close until he was the screen writer for the movie Brokeback Mountain. In my opinion any writer that was able to give us a saga like Lonesome Dove and then writes Brokeback Mountain has sold out. There are so many literary gems that he has written that there are too many to mention here. I will dedicate a column to him in the future. This one is about Steinbeck.

1937    On this date the German zeppelin Hindenburg after a successful trans-Atlantic crossing from Germany, approached the landing mast at Lakehurst, New Jersey. The zeppelin had to delay its landing earlier because of a thunderstorm in the area. As the gigantic ship approached the mooring mast, it all of a sudden burst into flame and fell to the ground destroyed killing several people on the ground and aboard the ship. The ship used flammable hydrogen rather than non-burning helium, a serious error.

Born today:

1853    US Senator Philander Knox. When speaking to President Theodore Roosevelt about the Panama Canal he said “Mr. President, do not let so great an achievement suffer any taint of legality.”

1856    Moravian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. He said “I have found little that is good about human beings. Most of them are trash.” I wonder if Will Rogers ever met Sig.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow