Thursday

                         Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Eva was considering opening her own tree nursery, then I heard her sing “The Rose” and everything changed.”

                                  Hugh Cassidy, Eva Cassidy’s father

I saw a comedian that said he went to Iraq on a USO mission to entertain the troops. He went to Tikrit and back to Baghdad in a C-130. He flew around in an Apache combat helicopter. He was shot at, saw mortar rounds landing and machine gun tracers zooming by. He made a good observation when he said this: “Those people were not interested in killing African-Americans, Asian-Americans, Slav-Americans, German-Americans, Scots-Americans. Irish-Americans, European-Americans, American Indians, they were just interested in killing Americans. They did not differentiate, why should we?”

             This Date in History December 1

1779 Patriot commander General George Washington and his rag-tag army went into winter quarters at Morristown, New Jersey. Fortunately for Washington he was able to commandeer a fairly substantial house known as Ford House for the winter. His accommodations gave the General plenty of room and light to make plans for the next encounter with the Loyalists/British/German mercenaries. His troops had to build about 1,000 log cabins on about 600 acres to withstand one of the worst winters in American history. This was going to be a winter of not enough winter clothes, not enough food and receiving no pay. It was not much better for the civilians because the Continental treasury had all but collapsed and life was hard for them also. With the economy reduced by 40 per cent because of the war and both the Continental army and the English army raiding farms for horses and oxen to tow their artillery. This prevented the farmers from being able to till their crops which had a domino effect with the rest of the community. Even with the defeat of British General Burgoyne and the capture of nearly 8,000 British troops, this added a hardship to the colonies because they had 8,000 more mouths to feed. Even though Washington had 16,000 troops in the books, he had only 3,600 that were standing for orders; the rest had gone back to their homes. The Continental Army was on the cusp of dissolution. The British people were in a similar frame of mind. They did not share King George III in his zeal for keeping the colonies. They were fed up with the lack of trade and an exponentially decrease in their economy because of the extra costs of the war. A war of attrition had now become a war of contrition. The United States exists because of the grit, sacrifice, determination and an ocean of blood shed by our ancestors. Let us not ever forget that.

1955 On this chilly morning a black woman in Montgomery, Alabama name Rosa Parks boarded a city bus for a ride across town. She and all blacks were ordered by law to sit in the back of the bus aft of the rear door. That is unless a white, man or woman, was found to be standing and then one of the blacks had to give up their seat to the honky. Rosa was ordered by the bus driver to give up her seat to a white man that was standing. Rosa refused and was arrested and jailed. Rosa was a card carrying member of the NAACP and when word reached NAACP headquarters all hell broke loose. The NAACP ordered a boycott of the Montgomery bus system and it was successful which proved to be disastrous because the blacks represented 70% of the bus riders. This was the first time that the Rev. Martin Luther King got involved with a peaceful action against segregation. The NAACP sued the city of Montgomery because of the law that specified segregation on mass transit in the city. The US Supreme Court struck down that law as being a violation of the 14^th Amendment and 381 days after the boycott began, blacks again began riding the buses and sitting anywhere they pleased. One of the first riders on this day was Rosa Parks.

1958 On this date the grammar school named Our Lady of Angels in Chicago is hit with a disaster. The school was run by the Sisters of Charity in an old building with no fire protection like sprinklers and fire alarms. The Sisters had never held a fire drill. A small fire started in a trash pile in the basement which quickly spread to the floor of the first floor. The teachers on the first floor smelled smoke and took their students out to safety but did not alert the people on the second floor. The janitor discovered the fire and ran upstairs to pull the fire alarms but they apparently did not work which meant that the students and teachers on the second floor were trapped. Some of the students jumped out of windows to the awaiting arms of the firemen who had finally arrived. Many were injured, including the firemen. One improvising teacher told her students to get under the smoke and roll down the stairs and out the door to safety but others just stayed and awaited divine intervention. 90 students and three nuns were killed in the inferno. What a damned shame.

1884 A Mexican deputy sheriff named Elfego Baca arrests a gringo cowboy named Charles McArthur for firing for or five shots at him in Frisco (now Reserve), New Mexico. On this day about 80 cowboys show up to spring good old Charlie from the slammer. It seems this group of Texas cowboys had been using this Mexican village for their own personal entertainment by riding in and brutalizing the residents, raping the girls, etc so Baca was assigned the duty to put a stop to it and given the title of deputy Sheriff. When the 80 cowboys rode in Baca hustled the town’s people into the church where they would be safe and then ran to an old adobe house to make a stand. Baca opened up and killed one of the cowboys and wounded several. The cowboys responded with over 400 rounds into the flimsy building. Not hearing any response the cowboys thought Baca was dead. But the next morning they smelled beef stew and found out the Baca was indeed alive and cooking his breakfast. About then, two more lawmen showed up along with many of Baca’s friends and the cowboys retreated. There was no more trouble from the Texas cowboys after that, Baca went on to become a hero in the Latino community fir standing up to those gringos and enjoyed a life of peace and notoriety.

Born today:

1945 American entertainer Bette Midler. She said “They arrested Helen Reddy for loitering in front of an orchestra.” I didn’t like her either.

Died today:

1964 English scientist John Haldane. He said “I have never met a healthy man who worried about his health or a good man that worried about his soul.” Tack onto that “or a drunken man who didn’t think he is irresistible to women.”

1987 US writer James Baldwin. He said “The price we pay for pursuing an art is calling in the familiarity of the ugly side of it.” Baldwin was a chronicler of the so called “Beat Generation”.

Quotable quotes:

“Don’t believe in reincarnation, I didn’t believe in it when I was a tuna.”

                                      Shane Richey

“I am always looking for a meaningful one-night stand”

                                     Dudley Moore

“For three years things were great, then she up and left me for a guy that didn’t cheat on her”

                                               Jim Norton

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow