Wednesday OYSTERS

Good morning,

Quote of the day:

“There is no doubt that it is around family and the home that all the greatest virtues, the most dominate virtues in human society, are created, strengthened and maintained.”

                                 Winston Churchill

Keep Sir Winston's thought in mind when reading about people committing capitol crimes...or crimes of any kind for that matter.

I saw this last night on the Hallmark channel.  It was a movie staring Willie Nelson and Harry Connick, Jr.  There was this exchange.  Willie "Do you know what ties a family together?  It is not blood, it is not the same last name it is the memories."  Harry "But I have so many bad ones".  Willie  "You can't do anything about those...but you can about the good ones."  Good advice for us all.  

A friend got tired the trouble she was having with her Toyota Avalon and traded it for a new Mercedes sedan. Two weeks ago she was in a fender bender and the other driver drove off. A cop was tapping on her window within a couple of minutes. He said that he was two cars back and saw the whole thing and got the tag number of the other car. He directed her to a parking lot a few blocks away to clear the intersection. She pulled in and a new pickup truck pulled in beside her along with the cop. The pickup contained the involved driver and his son. They were both Latinos. The cop went over an chatted with them and watched them drive off. The cops said that in spite of the fact that the father was the driver, could not speak English but his son could, did not have a drivers license because he had no social security number and was an illegal alien with no insurance he let him go because he was polite and cooperative. Keep this in mind when you given a ticket for going 7 MPH over the speed limit, paying that insurance bill or renewing your driver's license.

On Monday's blog I wrote about a neighbor of a hunter that was offended by him hanging and butchering a deer in his back yard.

On Tuesday a long time friend sent me this notice from a newspaper. It said “To all you hunters that hunt for meat, shame on you. You should go the supermarket where they make the meat and nothing gets hurt.” Keep in mind that these people are out there on the streets driving, voting and worst of all...they are walking around in Walmart with us.

Speaking of the National Security Agency hacking in on the communications of our allies, this is not the first time this has happened. Back in the early 1900's Germany decided to conquer all of Europe and WWI erupted. Germany was not an ally of the United States but neither were they an enemy. Germany felt that they could conquer Europe as long as the United States stayed out of it and indeed the United States refrained from joining the fray until the disclosure of the “Zimmerman memorandum”. In this memorandum a German ambassador named Zimmerman sent a telegraph to the prime minister of Mexico encouraging him to attack the United States. The German government felt that if the United States was busy protecting itself from Mexico they would not join the allies against Germany. The Mexicans wanted no part of this and told the Germans “Not no, but hell no”. This message was intercepted and sent to the United States spy agency of the time. Very soon thereafter, the United States ramped up their munitions and men and entered the war in Europe and Germany was severely beaten down...for a while.

     This Date in History   November 4

1801 US Patriot William Shippen died in Germantown, Pennsylvania. He was a member of the powerful Shippen family of Philadelphia that could trace their ancestry back to the earliest settlements in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts. William went to medical school at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. William and his brother Edward were successful physicians in Philadelphia and were instrumental in the upbringing of their community. William was present at the founding of the Benjamin Franklin Public Academy that eventually became the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) and served as a trustee for 24 years. He also was part and parcel of the founding of the College of New Jersey that became Princeton and served as a trustee there also. Now here is where the fun starts. Edward’s daughter Margaret (Peggy) Shippen flirted heavily with one John Andre and his close friend Benedict Arnold. But Peggy chose Benedict Arnold for a husband. Soon thereafter, Andre was captured at a road block and in his boot was a document detailing the surrender of West Point, New York to the British by US General Benedict Arnold for 20,000 pounds Sterling. When Arnold found out the Andre had been captured he and Peggy hightailed it to the British warship H.M.S Vulture for refuge. Arnold was made a commander of a British combat unit and fought against his countrymen for the remainder of the war. Andre was hanged as a spy, as well he should have been. After the surrender of British General Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown, Arnold and Peggy fled to Canada then England. He died in London 1801 in relative obscurity and poverty with Peggy at his side. There are those that believe that Arnold betrayed his country because he got his feeling hurt when a junior officer was promoted ahead of him, but in retrospect I think he needed the money to keep up the “high maintenance” Peggy in the lifestyle that she was accustomed. I have a niece that is “high maintenance” so I know what it means.

1928 The notorious gambler Arnold Rothstein is shot and killed at the Park Central Hotel in Manhattan. Arnold was found at a service entrance of the first floor bleeding heavily. He had been upstairs playing poker with his friends when the shooting occurred. One of the players was “Hump” McManus. A few weeks before, Arnold and Hump had been playing in a poker game and Arnold lost a cool $306,000 to Hump but refused to pay saying the game was rigged. It was Hump that invited Arnold to come and play in this game although the actual murderer was never determined. After Arnold was found bleeding, the police tracked the blood trail back upstairs to a room where four men were sitting around a table playing pinochle like nothing had happened. The cops went back down to Arnold and asked him who had done the shooting. Arnold just held a finger up to his lips and shook his head no and he was gone. Arnold was most famous for the “Black Sox Scandal” whereby Arnold financed the rigging of the 1919 World Series. There is no question that Arnold was involved, the actual players that took money and played badly will always be in question. One of those was a man from Greenville, SC named Joseph “Shoeless Joe” Jackson. He was banned from baseball for life by baseball commissioner Judge Kennesaw Landis. Joe played around in amateur leagues for a while but he eventually became too old and bought a liquor store in Greenville. On one occasion Ty Cobb who was traveling from Detroit to his home near Royston, Georgia stopped by Joe’s liquor store to say hello. After Ty walked in Joe acted like he did not know him and Ty said “Joe, don’t you know who I am?” And Joe said “I know who you are Ty, but I didn’t think you would want to know me.” What a sad tale.

      Thanks for listening  I can hardly wait until tomorrow