Thursday

                         Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“I smoke a lot of grass because it stops me from killing people.”

                                      Willie Nelson

A while back when I was working for a large engineering firm there was a female employee that got hooked on drugs. She was good at her job when she wasn't stoned not only that she was a stone fox top to bottom. One of the men on the staff took her under his wing and shepherded her through months long rehab. The day she got out of rehab her previous drug supplier contacted her, came and got her and took her to his house over in Greer, SC and loaded her up. The man that had helped her through all of this found out where she was and who she was with. He retrieved a 12 gauge shotgun, a 9mm Glock and went to the house and was beating on the door. The woman told the dealer that he had better get the hell out of Dodge because she knew what was coming. Sure enough the man shot the locks off the door and came in just as the dealer was bailing out of a window and running the hell away. The man escorted the woman out of the house and soon thereafter a fire broke out that leveled the house. The cops came to this known drug dealers house and the man told him his story. The cops suggested to the man that the fire was probably accidental and sent him on his way. God works in mysterious ways.

A while back there was a free concert by Willie Nelson. He opened with his signature song “Whiskey River.” Willie is probably the most traveled musician that ever existed. What has Willie NOT seen in his lifetime? There is rumor that after four days of I.W. Harper whiskey and grass with very little sleep, Willie was supposed to have a song for a movie ready by the end of the day when he finally sobered up. His bus driver said “Come on Willie, we have to get on the road.” Willie sat down and wrote “On the road again, we have to get back on the road again….” The song was ready in10 minutes. By the way, Willie wrote “Crazy” made famous by Patsy Cline and “Hello Walls” made famous by Faron Young among many, many others. My favorite is “Blue Eyes crying in the Rain”. What a treasure he is to us all.

             This Date in History October 19

1781 On this immortal day, after eight years of blood, sweat, toil and tears the British Army of 8,000 soldiers and sailors commanded by General Charles Cornwallis surrendered to the Patriot army commanded by General George Washington at Yorktown, Virginia essentially ending the Revolutionary War in the United States. There were a few sea battles and skirmishes elsewhere afterward but the land war in America was over. Earlier in mid-September Cornwallis had retreated with his ragged army from the Carolinas after being bled white by several engagements with US General Nathaneal Greene. Greene did not win any of the engagements but made the British pay a tall price for each victory. Cornwallis decided to head back toward New York and the umbrella of British General Sir Henry Clinton and his troops. Cornwallis decided that it would be prudent to travel north up the east coast so as to have the British Navy close by for supply and reinforcements. The only problem was that the French fleet had arrived at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay first and established a blockade the British navy could not breach which essentially isolated Cornwallis. Cornwallis and his troops dug in on Gloucester Hill near Yorktown. Washington sent the Marquis de Lafayette and 5,000 troops to cut off a retreat to the south and Washington and his troops sealed off a retreat to the north. With the French controlled Chesapeake Bay and had several warships bombarding Cornwallis' position. Cornwallis had no option but to surrender or risk total annihilation. On the afternoon of this day, Cornwallis feigned sickness and under a white flag sent his second in command, Colonel John O’Hara out with his sword. As the British troops stacked their arms their band played “The World Turned Upside Down.” In 1783 the United States and Great Britain signed the Treaty of Paris which recognized the United States as a free and independent nation.

A brief biography:

This is a short biography of a famous name in the Marine Corp. Daniel “Dan” Joseph Daly was born in Green Cove, New York in 1873 and joined the Marines in November of 1899. Daly wanted to get into the Spanish-American War but the war ended when he was in basic training. He was a small man being about 5’-6” and weighed about 130 pounds but during his career in the Marines Major General John A. Lejeune said called him “the most outstanding Marine of all time.” His commanding officer Major General Smedley D. Butler said of Daly “He was the fightingest Marine I ever knew, it was an object lesson to have served with him.”

After missing the Spanish-American War he was sent as part of Marine expeditionary force to China during the Boxer Rebellion. He was assigned the task of protecting the wall at the American legation. Left alone with only a bayoneted rifle, he was shot at by snipers and the wall was finally stormed by dozens of attackers. Daly held his ground and fought off the assault single handed. After the attackers retreated, there were 36 corpses either on the ground or lying across the wall. For his action here he received the Medal of Honor. He achieved the rank of Gunnery Sergeant making him essentially a platoon leader. His next action was in Haiti during a rebellion. Daly’s platoon was surrounded by a group of raiders and the Marines knew they were in deep shit if they did not get more firepower. That night Daly sneaked through the raider lines, located a machine gun that the Marines had abandoned the day before and brought the gun and ammo back to his platoon undetected. The next morning the raiders attacked but were met not with only the rifle fire of a few Marines but the withering fire of a machine gun. The raiders retreated post haste and Daly received his second Medal of Honor. And finally, at the age of 45, he and his platoon were part of the legendary Marine action at Belleau Wood in WWI. His platoon was pinned down by an avalanche of German artillery and getting chopped to pieces. Daly went from man to man, machine gun position to machine gun position cheering his men. Finally, Daly ordered a bayonet charge and rose up and yelled the immortal words “Come on you sons-of-bitches, do you want to live forever” and off they went. Daly was wounded three times during this campaign. He was offered a commission more than once but refused saying “I had rather be an outstanding sergeant rather than an ordinary officer.” As you might suspect, he received a hell of a lot of publicity which he scorned and called the entire hubbub “a lot of foolishness”. Daly never married and did not drink. His bride was the Marine Corp. His only known sin was that he smoked a pipe stuffed with plug tobacco. There are many other acts of bravery and valor attributed to Daly beside these few examples above, Daly was the definition of an “Iron Man”. Strangely, his commanding officer Major General Smedley Butler also received two Medals of Honor for separate actions. After retirement Daly worked as a guard in a Wall Street bank. Daniel Joseph Daly died on February 6, 1937 in Glendale, Long Island, New York. There is a US Navy destroyer named for him. His remarkable record as a fighting man is unequaled in the annuls of Marine Corp history. I thought it would be nice to remember our brave military guys in a favorable light during these difficult and trying times.

Births:

1895 US writer Lewis Mumford is born. “Men of courage do not need weapons, but they may need bail.” Nearly all of the US Marine Commandants say the same thing.

                       Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Wednesday

                           Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“You can never cross oceans until you have the courage to lose sight of land.”

                                            Christopher Columbus

I had a first recently. I was in a local sports bar watching football when a woman about 30 years old sat down beside me and ordered a gin and tonic in a tall glass. She also asked for a separate Styrofoam cup. She pulled out something that looked like a hockey puck opened it and took out a pinch of the contents and stuffed it between her lip and gum. It smelled like mint. When she wasn't looking I leaned over to see what was in the hockey puck...the label said "Grizzly" so I guess it was snuff. For the first half of the Cowboys game she would take the empty cup and spit in it every few minutes. I have never seen a woman use that disgusting shit before.

I was reading about the history of Black Panthers and their leaders. Even though nearly all of these leaders advocated the violent overthrow of the America, they were brought to their senses when Martin Luther King reminded them that the military is in command of the white man and a violent takeover is inviting annihilation. Good, bad or indifferent, that is just the way it is.

Thursday morning of last week a SCHP trooper pulled over a car traveling north on I-85 near Moore, SC. The car had Maryland tags. The trooper found several gallons of moonshine in the trunk and the occupants were arrested. Now here is what griped everybody. The trooper pulled the car over because he was doing 53 MPH in a 60 MPH zone therefore delaying traffic. The minimum posted speed is 40 MPH. The damned cop did not have probable cause to stop that car in the first place; 53 MPH was a bona fide legal speed. That part of I-85 has three lanes on each side. The driver was in the middle lane and those cars that were being delayed had two other lanes to pass. That is rotten, y’all, and all of you know it. This area of South Carolina has a serious drug and gang problem and they are freaking worried about somebody going 7 MPH SLOWER than the speed limit? No wonder we are going down the toilet here in the buckle of the bible belt.

                This Date in History October 18

1867 In March of this year United States Secretary of State Henry Seward began negotiations with the Russian government for the purchase of Alaska. It seems that Seward and President Andrew Johnson were to only people in the US Government that had any vision. They were both ridiculed for fostering this purchase even though Alaska was one fifth size of the remainder of the United States. The public called it “Seward’s Folly” or President Johnson’s “Polar bear garden”. On this date Secretary Seward handed over a check to the Russians for $7.2 Million or about two cents an acre. The Russians had decided that Alaska was too vast and spread out to defend and they did not want to start a squabble with the English so the United States was the obvious choice. The first value of this great land came in 1897 when gold was discovered in the Klondike River. Today Alaska delivers nearly 1/3^rd of our oil and nearly 50% of our seafood. I lived up there for two years and I can assure you there is not more breathtakingly beautiful scenery on this Earth. It is a sportsman paradise with waters teeming with fish and game birds and big game in the woodlands. It gets into your blood and yes, I have plans to return.

1898 I have said before the United States gained foreign territories by conquest and on this date we added another in the form of the island of Puerto Rico. At the end of the Spanish-American War Spain abandoned Puerto Rico and declared it as being free of Spanish rule. Almost immediately the American army that was already in place descended onto the island and declare it as a possession of the United States and installed a military government. In 1913 the United States declared that all the peoples of Puerto Rico were now citizens and English was the official language. But it wasn’t over yet. In 1948, after a series of actions by the Puerto Ricans aimed at independence, the United States declared Puerto Rico autonomous and would become an American Commonwealth. There were movements in 1967 and 1973 toward statehood for Puerto Rico but a public vote showed that the majority of the Puerto Ricans still preferred Commonwealth status.

1998 In the oil rich country of Nigeria on the west coast of Africa the oil is owned and controlled by several foreign companies in corporation with the Nigerian Government and the end result is the average person living in this country receives no benefits from the sea of oil below. In fact many pipe lines run through poverty ridden villages. Many of the villagers would steal a bucketful of oil from time to time from the pipeline to supplement their income. On this date a thunderous explosion occurs at a place where the villagers were tapping the pipeline. Over 600 people were incinerated instantly while others were horribly burned. Those that were burned would not go to a hospital because they thought they would be prosecuted for stealing the oil. What a damned shame.

Born today:

1785 English writer Charles Peacock. He said “Sometimes I think the purpose of science is the elimination of the human race.” Seems that way to me too, Charles, especially nuclear physics.

1865 French writer Henri Bergson. He said “The eye only sees what the mind is prepared to comprehend.” Hey Henri, I saw a woman last night that I did not comprehend.

1919 Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Once while visiting Edmonton, Alberta, Canada he said “It is not the end of the world, but you can see it from here.” Edmonton is a very remote city but there is a lot of engineering work in Edmonton. I have looked into it but the Canadian tax system makes any work there prohibitive.

                Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Tuesday

                      Musings and History

Quote of the day:

My uncle Vincent was a member of the infamous 2^nd Rangers in WWII. He was at D-Day, Huertgen Forest and the Battle of the Bulge. He was captured and tortured by the Germans twice but escaped both times. One time he escaped on his own and the second time his platoon went in and rescued him. I asked him if he believed in the death penalty and he said:

“Absolutely not, but I do believe in cruel and unusual punishment.”

                                The Damned Media

I feel like I have had a great awakening, it all seems very clear now. We the general public are being played like a piano. The maestro is the media networks. The are trying to control our thoughts and emotions for one purpose only...ratings. Ratings are the percentage of people within a certain age group that are watching a particular network. The higher the ratings the more advertising and higher price they can demand. It is for money, y'all. Make no mistake, turmoil sells...peace doesn't. They are not interested in issuing unbiased information, they want racial strife. There can be no question in your mind that the media is promoting an agenda that includes a giant conspiracy by the American police nationwide to kill black men. When was the last time you saw a news program about the cops killing a Caucasian, Latino, Middle Eastern (other than a terrorist), Native American, Asian, Greek, Italian, Turk, with or without a gun, etc, etc? You must know that there have been but these are ignored in favor of reporting in depth those killings that will cause the most angst. They are causing unrest in the long run because it is to their financial benefit. Not many people realize that they have already been turned into a parrot bespeaking what the media has taught them and believe they are free thinkers. What GOOD did showing the police video in Charlotte do? It only aroused anger and disgust to no avail. The media wants you to make a judgment on the guilt or innocence of the police AND/OR the victim. That is not your business, that is the business of the judicial system. They want you to be angry and disgusted because it diverts you attention from the real issue..and that is mind control so they can make more money. I know a person that was in the media but quit because this person realized they were governed only by their ratings...the quality of the programming be damned. Why do they only want a network news person to moderate the presidential debate? There are plenty of respected people out there that could serve without bias but no, they want to make a choice that suits their agenda. There was a movie I saw once where everyone was screaming “I AM MAD AS HELL AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE.” That's me, y'all...from now on I will get my news from BBC, Reuters, PBS or Christian Science Monitor and even then I will be alert for bias reporting.

In short, if you were not a personal eye or ear witness to a specific event then it is suspect if you are depending on the media to keep you informed, they have an agenda, y'all. They are not journalists, they are entertainers like Richard Pryor and Charlie Chaplin...only they ain't funny.

           This Date in History October 17

1859 John Brown was born in 1800 in Connecticut and was raised in Ohio by devout and hard-assed Calvinist parents. His parents were staunch anti-slavery advocates also. John spent most of his life trying to recover from failed businesses but he attended an anti-slavery rally in Cleveland and after that he was a firebrand of the anti-slavery movement and was a personal acquaintance of Frederick Douglass, the famous black orator against slavery. Brown moved to Kansas to fight the pro-slavery forces in that area. In 1856 the forces of Confederate sympathizer William Quantrill raided the town of Lawrence, Kansas killing scores of innocent civilians and burned the town to the ground. Brown became insanely incensed and went to three houses on Pottawatomie Creek and killed whomever was there with a broadsword not knowing if they participated in the Lawrence debacle or not. After this Brown decided that he was going to free the slaves single handed. In 1856 he decided that the best course of action was to capture the US arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia and distribute the captured arms to the slaves that he knew would rise up in rebellion when they heard of his actions. On this day Brown and 22 others attacked and captured the arsenal at Harpers Ferry. The only problem was that the slaves in the immediate vicinity had no clue that a successful attack had taken place and Brown did not know what the hell he was going to do with thousands of rifles, ammo and artillery. It didn’t matter though because very soon after word of the attack reached Washington, a detachment of Marines led by Col. Robert E. Lee and Captain J.E.B. Stuart surrounded the arsenal on October 19 and demanded a surrender that was not forthcoming. The Marines charged the arsenal and killed 10 of the attackers including two of Brown’s sons. The rest of the attackers were captured including Brown. Brown went to trial for treason and he was convicted and on December 2 he was hanged. Before he stepped onto the gallows he handed a note to a guard. The note read “I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away except by blood.” A prophetic statement, y'all, because the Civil War erupted 16 months later. Did y'all notice that from the time Brown was captured to the time he was hanged was 42 days? What ever happened to the good old days?

1793 Nine months earlier King Louis XVI met a date with the guillotine as a result of the French Revolution that began in 1789. On this date his wife, Marie Antoinette, was taken to the guillotine for her part in the excesses of her husbands reign. It was she that was asked how she could want more jewelry when the peasants had no bread to eat. She supposedly said “No bread, well let them eat cake.” It was this lack of sensitivity as to the plight of the populous that has cost more than one monarch his head. Anyway, on the way up the steps to the blade, Marie accidentally stepped on the executioner’s foot and said “Oh, please excuse me, Monsieur” and when she laid her neck across the block, she reached around and pulled her long hair to one side. You have to hand it to her, she had class.

1991 For reasons unknown some jackass named George Hennard drove his pickup truck through the front window of Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas. He then pulled out two semi-automatic pistols and began shooting people at random. He ran out of ammo after killing 22 and wounding 45. He saved one round that he used to blow his own brains out. There were several people in there that had handguns but they had to keep them locked in the trunk of their cars by Texas law. After this event, Texas law loosened up considerably and it became almost accepted that everybody was packing some iron. When I was in Alaska a long time ago, it was not uncommon for people to be walking around with .357 and/or .44 Magnums on their hips along with a high powered rifle leaning up against a table or the bar especially during hunting season. I do not know how it is today but I suspect the laws are not that liberal these days.

1851 On this date a true psychopath named William “Wild Bill” Longley is born in Austin County, Texas. This man was crazy and proved it time and again. By the time he had reached the age of 15 he had killed several men for the most minor of offenses. He also was a hater of blacks and they gave Bill a wide berth. Every where he went he left a trail of dead people that crossed him no matter how minor the event. He finally was captured, tried and convicted of murder and sentenced to hang. On the day of his hanging he finally got what he deserved. After the trapdoor opened and Bill dropped something strange happened. The hangman had cut the rope too long and Bill’s knees hit the ground and he stood up. The hangman called up several more men and they pulled Bill off the ground and he choked to death rather that a quick death of a broken neck. It took 11 minutes for Bill to expire. I wonder what was going through his mind.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow.

Monday

                           Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“The affair between Margot Asquith and Margot Asquith is one of the greatest love stories in all of literature.”

                                                  Dorothy Parker

Back in the mid 1500's Spanish conquistadors came ashore in California (Coronado), Mexico (Cortez) and South America (Pizzaro). They found an enormous horde of gold, silver and precious gems in the hands of the natives. Their answer was to slaughter those that resisted and enslave the others. They eventually had several ports on the Caribbean used to load cargo ships with treasure and sail them back to Spain. Word of this conveyor belt of treasure was soon discovered and the Spanish treasure ships repeatedly came under attack by pirates and privateers. Spain's response as to station warships at several places along the sea lanes back to Spain. One deal location was on the south coast of Jamaica near what is now Kingston. There was a narrow strip of land that ran out from the shore into the Caribbean enclosing an ideal harbor. The Spanish established the town of Port Royal on the tip of this peninsula along with a fort to control who comes and goes in and out of the harbor. It also became a major slave trading port. The town thrived and grew to about 3,000 permanent residences. England and Spain were at war and therefore in addition to the British navy to worry about the Spanish had to be concerned about privateers (private warships hired by England to fight its enemies) and outright pirates that were only after the treasure. The British navy launched an all out effort to capture Port Royal and was successful in kicking the Spanish out of Jamaica. With the natural harbor (one of the greatest in the world at the time) and shallow sand bars that allowed “careening” that was much traffic in and out of this harbor and the merchants in Port Royal grew very wealthy especially the bar and whorehouse owners.

Careening means the wooden ships would be pulled up to a sand bar, tilted on its side and the crew would scrape off the barnacles and seaweed and patch any cracks. Sir Henry Morgan and Sir Francis Drake had their headquarters at Port Royal.

Then on June 7, 1692 at about noon an earthquake struck Port Royal. The quake was so severe that the entire town slid in the Caribbean. The strange thing was that even when the ground was still quivering there were looters out stripping gold rings and bracelets off the dead. Many of the looters were killed when the houses they were in collapsed on them or took them out to sea and drowned them. The horror increased when several cemeteries were flooded and corpses floated to the surface and drifted around in the harbor. Naturally, cholera followed. What normally happens after an earthquake on seaside communities is, you guessed it, a tsunami. Sure enough an enormous tsunami showed up and swamped or capsized many ships in the harbor. There was one fair sized cargo ship that was lifted up, pushed inward 2 miles and deposited on a 30 foot high bluff. This ship was used as a hospital for several years. The actual number of dead is unknown because since it was a slave port there were undocumented slaves by the hundreds in the surrounding communities. It was hell for those that experienced it.

                 This Date in History October 16

1925 Angela Lansbury is born in London. Angela was the daughter of an actress and started studying acting at an early age. At the outset of WWII and the bombing of London, Angela was sent to New York. At the age of 18 she was signed by MGM and was in the movie hit “Gaslight” with Ingrid Bergman and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. She was also nominated for Oscars in “The Picture of Dorian Grey” and “The Manchurian Candidate”. She did her best work on the stage and won Tonys for “Mame” and “Gypsy”. In her later years she made the TV series “Murder, She Wrote” which is seen to this day. What a great talent.

1973 American negotiator Henry Kissinger and North Vietnamese negotiator Le Duc To are awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Kissinger rejects his by saying “True peace has not been achieved”. Henry has some class, ya’ll.

1971 In Phoenix, Arizona apartment neighbors of Agnes LeRoi and Hedvig Samuelson hear screaming in the night be do not call the police. A day or two later Agnes and fellow worker Winnie Judd uncharacteristically do not show up for work. Winnie shows up at a train station with two large suitcases dripping a dark red substance. When this is pointed out by a station agent, Winnie turns and runs away. After opening the suitcases the dismembered parts of Agnes and Hedvig are found. After a few days Winnie surrenders at the behest of her husband. Winnie tells a tale of large sex orgies orchestrated by Agnes and Hedvig in their apartment one of which got out of hand. Winnie is convicted and sentenced to life. Winnie played the lunatic most of the time in prison but was paroled in 1971 and was never heard from again. Forty years in the slammer will do that.

Births and deaths:

1891 Poet/author Oscar Wilde in born in Dublin, Ireland. Oscar received a good education including a degree from Oxford with honors. Oscar once said “To lose one parent may be considered misfortune but to lose them both seems like carelessness”.

1888 World famous playwright Eugene O’Neill is born. When asked

about critics he said “Critics? I love every bone in their heads.”

1988 Actor and companion of Susan Sarandon Tim Robbins is born. When a column writer wrote a disparaging article about Tim’s family he tactfully retorted to the author of the article “If you write another “f______g” article about my family I will find you and “f______g hurt you”. Tim was upset.

1795 Marie Antoinette died on the guillotine. Just before going to meet her maker she said “I was a queen and you took away my crown, I was a wife and you killed my husband, I was a mother and you took my children from me, all I have left is my blood, at least do not make me suffer.” They didn’t.

1997 One of my favorite authors if not THE most favorite, James Michener died. In my opinion James wrote some of the most engrossing books of all time, especially “Texas”, “Centennial” and “Hawaii”. He once said “I think it is remarkable that I write the thing I do, intricate, lengthy and with no sex or violence and have the readership that I do”. James was humble to the end. I miss him.

                  Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow                                     

Friday

                            Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“Richard Nixon is the type person that would cut down a redwood tree and then stand on the stump and make a speech on conservation.”

Adlai Stevenson

                             Political Expediency

Here is what history as told us about acts of war.

Since before recorded history skirmishes, battles and wars are not won by the side that is the most educated, the most spiritual, the most forgiving nor with the most noble of causes, they are won by the side that is the most ruthless.

In WWII the German air force indiscriminately bombed cities in England, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland, Czechoslovakia and Russia among other places without thought of collateral

damage. They did this to break the spirit of the populous making them easier prey.

The allies did the same thing by bombing cities in Germany with no other intention than breaking their spirit. In 1943 the US and British air forces raided Hamburg, Germany with incendiaries and killed over 76,000 civilians in one night. The US did the same thing in Japan and their various properties. The same principals can be applied to those that fight for ISIS. Once they are identified their families and properties would be destroyed as happened with the Roman Empire that lasted 1,500 years. This is powerful deterrent no matter the brain washing. Even if it was not a deterrent, their families know they would be targeted would take the appropriate action...or die.

Nearly all military great realize this. I think it was General “Black Jack” Pershing and General Curtis LeMay that said “The only way to win a war is to kill ALL of the enemy or prosecute the war so severely that they surrender.”

We are not fighting a nation or a country, we are fighting a religion but they still need logistics. They need money, food, water, fuel, rolling stock, firearms and ammo. It is within our grasp to attack any and all of these.

We cannot continue to sent out troops in harms way without an avenue for victory...not “containment” or “suppression” but victory. If we continue this then we would be wasting American lives for political expediency, the most disgusting and evil of all premises...and we would lose.

             This Date in History   October 13

1976 Secretary Of Defense Robert McNamara went on his 8^th fact finding mission to South Vietnam. Bob visited with General Westmoreland, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge, South Vietnam Premier Ky and President Thieu and then went back to Washington to a press conference and with his bare face hanging out declared that the war is proceeding satisfactorily. Then he went to LBJ and secretly tells him that we are in deep doodoo over there. LBJ got tired of McNamara’s vacillating and replaced him with Clark Clifford. He isn’t much better. That whole debacle was a disaster top to bottom from the git-go.

1792 The cornerstone of the White House is laid on this day. The Irish American architect James Hoban was hired to design the house and he used the Lienster House in Dublin as a model. The location for the house was made by George Washington and the first resident was President John Adams. The White House was burned by the British during the war of 1812 in retaliation for US guerillas burning the British Embassy in Canada but James Hoban was again hired to direct its restoration. The White House and the adjacent Lafayette Square are blocked off from vehicular traffic for security purposes. Over a million people a year visit the White House.

1943 26 year old poet Robert Lowell is given a one year jail term for refusing the draft because he is upset about the allies using “blanket bombing”. I wonder what Bob would have felt if he had seen what was going on at the German Auschwitz concentration camp. Anyway, Bob was born to privileged and wealthy parents and he received a good education. He wrote some very good essays and poems and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1959 for “Life Stories” which was an account of how he was dealing with his mental instabilities. In the early 60’s he read poet Allan Ginsberg’s “Howl” and was blown away by Ginsberg’s honesty and being down to earth. Bob was involved heavily in the opposition to the Vietnam War and was present at nearly all protest meetings/marches. Bob went to that great library in the sky in 1977.

1935 Doctor Buck Ruston is arrested for murder in Lancaster, England. The good doctor’s maid Mary Roberson and common law wife Isabella Van Ness had been missing for some time and an intense investigation had begun at the behest of the good doctor I guess to throw suspicion off him self. Well, investigate they did. A farmer in Scotland found several objects wrapped in newspaper on a river bank which turned out to be various body parts two of which was mutilated human heads from which all the teeth had been removed and the nose cut off one of them and had been disemboweled. All the fingertips on both had been removed also. Even though identification of the bodies was nearly impossible, Scotland Yard determined from the evidence the time of death and from the newspapers that they were issued in the good doctor’s home town. The searched the doctors home and found traces of human blood and human fat in the kitchen sink drain and therefore the doctor was tried and convicted of a double homicide. Just before going to the gallows the doctor stated that he had killed his wife in a quarrel and that the maid had walked in on him in the act and so he had to kill her too. Doctor Ruston went to meet his maker about 2 inches taller than he had been.

1845 Under the leadership of Sam Houston, the people of Texas approve a state constitution and ask that they be allowed to become a member of the United States. In 1836, again under the leadership of Sam Houston, the people of Texas had declared themselves independent of Mexico and became the Republic of Texas. The acceptance of Texas into the fold was delayed somewhat because it was to be a “slave” state and that was not palpable to some interests in the Northeastern US and Mexico had stated that if Texas became a state they would declare war on the US. Eventually Texas was admitted into the US and sure enough a war with Mexico ensued. It didn’t last long though.

Births and deaths:

1969 Ice skater Nancy Kerrigan is born. Nancy was famous for when one of Tonya Harding’s friends runs up to Nancy and pops her on the knee with a pipe so as to eliminate Nancy from the Olympic tryouts. Tonya believed that Nancy was her only competition and said so. Her friends took that as a request to stop Nancy from competing. It was proven that Tonya had no part of this attack. Tonya had dynamite legs, y'all.

1997 Movie actor Clifton Webb died. Clifton once said “Barbara Stanwick is my favorite American lesbian”. Clifton was brutal.

                   Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Thursday

                             Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“When I got married my feminist friends went mad. One of them sniffed 'Are you going to take his name?' I said 'No, because I don't think “Dave” suits me very much.”

                                                      Joe Brand

I don't know what made me think of it but here it is.

In 1978 serial killer Ted Bundy was captured in Pensacola Fla. after a life of murder with no remorse. He beheaded a few his victims (all women) and kept the heads for mementos among other unspeakable horrors. He had killed three women in the state of Florida. He went to trial, was convicted on all three counts and was sentenced to death. He was scheduled to executed in the electric chair on January 2 of 1989. A little before dark people began gathering outside the gate at Raiford prison with their charcoal grills knowing the execution would take place at midnight. They lit their cookers about 10:00p and held a tailgate party in celebration of “the frying of Ted". About 1:00 an ambulance left the prison to the yells and cheers of the celebrants while lifting their steins of ale and freshly grilled hamburgers in knowing justice had been served. I know it sounds a little macabre but it happened.

Hate Muslims? Read this:

What was the most devastating terrorist attack in America's history beside 9/11? Give up? It was the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City. There were 168 dead including at least 30 children under the age of 7 and 680 wounded of varying severity. The bombers were America born and military veterans named Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols...both were Catholic. What was next?

It was the destruction of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas. 86 killed including several children under age of 12. The leader of the compound was a man named Vernon Howell but later changed it to David Koresh. He was born in Houston, Texas and claims to have been "saved" in a Southern Baptist Church. He later changed to the Mormon church apparently because he had the hots for the daughter of a particular Mormon Church pastor. He eventually formed a splinter group known as the Branch Davidian. After a 51 day siege a tank was brought in and knocked down a wall and discharged several tear gas canisters which might have caused the fire that killed the 76 inhabitants. There were 10 others killed in earlier skirmishes including several federal officers.

               This Date in History October 12

1870 On this date one of the greatest military leaders in history died as a result of a stroke he had a month before. Former CSA General Robert E. Lee died at his home in Lexington, Virginia at the age of 63. Lee was the son of the Revolutionary War hero Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee. As with many of the leaders of the CSA, Robert E. Lee was born on large plantation in Westmoreland County, Virginia. The plantation was part of his mother’s estate that was willed to her by her father and named Stratford Hall. She was a member of the famous Custis family of Virginia. Little Robert saw little of his father during the Revolutionary War or after the War for that matter. “Light Horse Harry” was not a family man and was not well known to Robert. Robert attended West Point and graduated second in his class but in the four years there he received not one demerit. As with many of his classmates, he fought in the Mexican War and in the western theater. He also served as Superintendent at West Point. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Lee was offered command of the US forces. After anguishing about this offer, he decided that he could not make war against his home and family and offered his services to the Confederacy. He was acting as a consultant in the beginning but eventually he was given command of the newly formed, and later to become immortal, Army of Northern Virginia. Lee and his army achieved phenomenal success through most of the war but in the end he ran out of supplies and manpower and was forced to surrender at Appomattox Court House, Virginia in the spring of 1865. After the war he was at a loss as to which direction his life would take. He was offered the Presidency of Washington College in Lexington, Virginia and accepted. He was able to raise the population of the College from a few dozen to more than 300. He also improved the curriculum and the condition of the building and grounds. After he died the College was renamed Washington and Lee University. Winston Churchill said of Lee “Never in the history of human conflict has one man been loved by so many.” Indeed.

1492 Earlier three tiny Spanish ship under the command of an Italian navigator sailing from Spain arrive in the Bahamas and sighted land probably San Salvador Island. On this date Christopher Columbus came ashore in a small skiff and claimed the land for the King and Queen of Spain. Columbus thought he was in Cathay, or the Orient. He thought Cuba was Japan. Columbus was correct in assumption that European travelers could reach the Orient by sailing west, but he severely underestimated the diameter of the Earth. Columbus made three trips to the new world and tried each time to establish a settlement on Hispaniola, or the island that now is the Dominican Republic/Haiti. All settlements failed because of the wrath of the native Carib Indians who annihilated the new villages as fast as they were built. Columbus is given credit for discovering the new world but that is wrong. The Vikings had villages in present day Newfoundland 300 years before Columbus. The difference here is that the settlers that came after Columbus stayed whereas the Vikings did not stay. Some believe that the Vikings explored the North American coastline all the way down to Massachusetts and ever further. They might have but we may never know for sure. It would benefit all of y'all to read the history of the Vikings and the great accomplishments accredited to them, the rape and pillage of Europe included.

2000 On this date the American destroyer USS Cole had stopped for a four hour long refueling stop at a port in Yemen at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. While refueling, a small Zodiac boat came along side and lit off a thunderous explosion that ripped a gigantic hole in the Cole killing 17 US sailors and injuring 38. The Cole started taking on water at an unacceptable rate and was kept afloat only by the Herculean efforts of its crew. Even at this, the Cole achieved a small list but survived. Being that the Cole was only suppose to be in port for four hours and then take up the chore of blockading ships heading for Iraq, it is apparent that the saboteurs knew the time of arrival. Everyone thought that this attack was orchestrated by Muslim terrorists but that was never proven. I knew a “retired” SEAL here that disappeared the day after the attack and returned in out midst about two weeks later. I asked him where he had been and he said “Yemen”. Then I said “Did you kill anybody?” He said “Well I’ll put it this way, I went from number 158 to number 75 on Osama Ben Laden’s hit list.” I like it.

1786 On this date one of the heroes of the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson wrote a sappy love letter to a married woman. Jefferson had lost his wife earlier and obviously lovesick. He met a woman named Mariah Cosway in Paris while being the United States Council to France. Mariah was an accomplished artist and musician. She was also married. But nonetheless she and Thomas became close friends and maybe more. There is no evidence that the relationship became a sexual one. Mariah’s husband died in 1789 but there is no evidence that Thomas tried to reignite their relationship. Mariah moved to a small town in Italy and opened a religious school for girls. I guess Thomas found another love interest, beside the slave woman Sally Hemmings by which he fathered several children.

             Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow

Wednesday

                            Musings and History

Quote of the day:

“I recently had a physical examination like I have every 7 years. When the nurse weighed me I was shocked to learn how much the gravitational pull of the Earth has increased since my last visit.”

                                                  Dave Barry

I am still reading “Killing England” which is the history of the American Revolutionary War. I am on the Chapter that included that winter of 1777-78 when George Washington and the Continental army was encamped in Valley Forge, Pa. These soldiers were not an “army”. George Washington was not a military man, a great leader but he knew very little about forming, training and arming men into a combat unit. The soldiers were originally in tents but that wasn't working because they could not heat them so Washington ordered trees to be cut down and huts built with a fireplace. Most huts were about 16 X 25 feet and 6'-6” high. 12 men slept in these huts on straw thrown on the floor...no toilet and no kitchen but lots of lice. They did not have uniforms, they supplied their own. The men from the northern states were prepared for the cold but those from North Carolina and further south were not. No one had the shoes and boots needed to prevent frostbite. There was virtually no food and no sanitation. Troops were dying of cholera and literally freezing and starving to death. When one man was assigned guard duty the other men in his hut would contribute a much clothing that they could spare to try and keep him from freezing to death. Washington's aide-de-camp was Alexander Hamilton and he at one point told Washington that he believed the army would disintegrate if improvements were not made and soon. 

About that time God sent a savior in the person of Baron Von Steuben, a lifetime Prussian officer who joined Washington at Valley Forge. He was a paunchy 47 year old that had been kicked out of the Prussian army and never achieved a rank higher that captain. Why? He was a homosexual but was an expert on military tactics and training. Ben Franklin was in France trying to gain their support and he knew the Continental army was in trouble and needed a career military officer to whip them into shape. He found Von Steuben. There was a problem. He could not speak English but he could speak German and French. So Washington assigned Marquis de Lafayette as Von Steuben's aide-de-camp. Lafayette could speak French and English. Washington had forbidden his troop to scavenge from small individual farms because he knew what a hardship it would put in them but Von Steuben convinced Washington that his troops had to be in top physical shape to fight successfully. From then on the Continental army ate well. Von Steuben also introduced the American soldier to a slit trench or a latrine always placed downhill from the food and water supply and illnesses virtually disappeared. When spring came...the Continental army was ready and there was indeed a light at the end of the tunnel.

Washington wrote “Naked and starving as they are, we cannot enough admire the incomparable patience and fidelity of the soldiery, that they have not been...excited by their sufferings, to a general mutiny.”

I also read that that some of the NFL player are continuing to dishonor the national anthem because they think they have been treated unfairly.

                      This Date in History   October 11

1776 On this date a British fleet under the command of Sir Guy Carleton defeated 15 American gunboats on Lake Champlain. The American gunboats were commanded by Brigadier General Benedict Arnold. Arnold fought valiantly in delaying the British fleet to allow the defenses of New York to be completed. As we all know about the treasonable act perpetrated by Arnold later on. He was in command of the American fort at West Point, New York and offered it to the British for $20,000. He was discovered after his compatriot John Andre was arrested. No one really knows what precipitated this despicable act but the best rumor is that his new wife was from a privileged family and wanted the same lifestyle with which she had become accustom with Arnold and he did not have the means to accomplish this. So he tried to gather money by other means. But that is just a rumor.

1862 Earlier on September 17 the infamous battle of Antietam occurred which resulted in the Army of Northern Virginia, Robert E. Lee commanding, having to retreat into Virginia to rest and recover from this struggle. On October 9 the Army of the Potomac, General George B. McClellan commanding, was still in camp near Antietam. He had no intentions in following Lee into Virginia remembering that his army was nearly cut to pieces by Lee the last time he was in Virginia in the Battle of the Seven Days. So while McClellan languished, Lee sent the brash but efficient cavalry officer General J.E.B. Stuart and 2,500 troopers on a raid into Pennsylvania to try to cut The Yankee supply lines. Stuart chose to go into Chambersburg, Pennsylvania and try to destroy a railroad bridge that was necessary for the transportation of goods into the Washington/Baltimore area. On this date Stuart and company rode into Chambersburg seeking the bridge. They found the bridge but were unable to destroy it because it was made of iron. They headed back toward Virginia gathering booty as they went including 2,000 horses. They were able to pass almost within sight of McClellan’s camp without being detected and crossed the Potomac to the safety of Virginia and the Army of Northern Virginia. It is a mystery to me how Stuart, 2,500 mounted troopers and an extra 2,000 horses could go anywhere undetected, but I ain’t J.E.B. Stuart.

1923 An attempt was made to rob a Southern Pacific railroad train in Oregon. The thieves chose to use an explosive charge to blow open a mail car. As the train entered a tunnel the thieves jumped into the engine and took the fireman and engineer captive and set off the explosive charge in the mail car. They had used way more explosive than necessary and blew the rail car to smithereens killing the mail car attendant. In the following confusion, the thieves shot and killed the engineer, the fireman and the brakeman and fled. The local police only found a pile of clothes and a few scraps of paper and were at as loss for clues. They called in master detective Edward Heinrich. He examined the clothes and determined that the stains on the clothes were not grease as previously thought but it was pine and fir tar, which was typical of the lumberjacks in the area. One of the scraps of paper was a mail receipt that Heinrich back tracked and eventually discovered the three perpetrators. They were tried and convicted and given a life sentence thanks master detective Edward Heinrich.

1809 On this date one of the leaders of the Corps of Discovery, Meriwether Lewis, died in a tavern on the Natchez Trace in Tennessee. By the way, the Natchez Trace is a trail from Nashville, Tennessee to the area of Natchez, Mississippi on the river. Lewis had been given the governorship of the territory of Louisiana by his mentor, Thomas Jefferson. But Lewis was not politician and found out about crooked double dealings in short order. Also he had promised the details and maps that he and Clark had accumulated in that famous trip. Jefferson was disappointed that none of this had been delivered in three years. Lewis had stopped at Grinder’s Tavern to spend the night. Mrs. Grinder reported that she had heard Lewis pacing the floor and talking out loud. She finally heard two pistol shots and Lewis staggered out of his room and asked for help from Mrs. Grinder. She did not provide assistance because she said she was too scared. The next morning a few men went into Lewis’ room and find him slashing at himself with a razor and he eventually died. It is apparent that he committed suicide.

                Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow