Brief narratives about people and events in the American past.
“How bad was our war management? Well, until recently there were three levels of wartime incompetence: Bad, Very Bad and War of 1812 Bad.”
Joel Achenbach in a short, humorous essay about the War of 1812.
Achenbach concludes: “That’s rock bottom. That’s what we mean by War of 1812 Bad. And maybe in a few years, historians will be able to tell us if there’s a new standard.”
Ozzy Osbourne is 58.
Daryl Hannah is 46 today. So is Julianne Moore. Together they have four Oscar nominations, two for leading actress and two for supporting actress. All are Moore’s, of course.
Brendan Fraser is 38.
Illinois was admitted to the Union as the 21st state on this date in 1818.
George B. McClellan was born on this date in 1826. McClellan was the commander of Union forces in the east during much of the first two years of the War of the Rebellion. He loved to organize and feared to fight. McClellan was the unsuccessful Democratic candidate for President in 1864, receiving 21 to Lincoln’s 212 electoral votes. For his unabashed hubris, McClellan rates right up there as one of the great asses of American history.
Jozef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski was born on this date in 1857. Born in the Ukraine of Polish descent, Joseph Conrad learned English in the British merchant marine in his twenties. He began writing in the 1890s and published his first novel, Almayer’s Folly, in 1895. Lord Jim (1900) and Heart of Darkness (1902) are his most famous works.
The first human heart transplant took place in Cape Town, South Africa, on this date 39 years ago (1967). The patient, Lewis Washkansky, survived 18 days before he died from double pneumonia, a result of anti-rejection drugs suppressing his immune system.
With this colder weather it’s important to save energy. Accordingly, here’s some stuff from NewMexiKen from December 1st of last year:
Fifty years ago today. It’s 51 years now since Rosa Parks resisted.
27 years ago today. Twenty-eight since President Jimmy Carter preserved all that land in Alaska.
Allen Stewart Konigsberg was born in Brooklyn on this date in 1935. That makes Woody Allen 71 in 2006. Here’s Some words of wisdom from Woody Allen.
Bette Midler was born on this date in 1945. So she’s 61 in 2006.
American Heritage’s editors and contributors survey the historical offerings of recent months, and pick their favorites from a field wide enough to include movies, restaurants, furniture, cocktails, hotels, cookies, wristwatches—and artifacts retrieved from the staterooms of the Titanic.
… was first published on this date in 1849. It bills itself as “The West’s Oldest Newspaper.”
Debby, official younger sister of NewMexiKen, sends along a recipe she came across for Union Army Civil War era homemade liquor:
bark juice
tar-water
turpentine
brown sugar
lamp oil
alcohol
And this was for Billy Yank. Lord only knows what Johnny Reb was drinking.
The surprise attack on Black Kettle’s village of Southern Cheyenne at the Washita River in Indian Territory (now western Oklahoma) took place on this date in 1868. This is the attack portrayed in the movie “Little Big Man.”
Just before midnight, they crawled to the edge of a bluff which overlooked a river valley. One of the scouts announced he could smell smoke. The other heard a dog bark. Custer could not see anything, and he did not smell smoke or hear the dog. But in the quiet moments of listening, he heard a baby cry. He had found his Indians.
Custer divided his command into four detachments, which would surround the village, north, south, east, and west, and wait for dawn. On his command, they would charge from the four directions.
At first light, Custer turned to the band leader and directed him “to give us ‘Garry Owen’ [his favorite song]. At once the rollicking notes of that familiar marching and fighting air sounded forth through the valley, and in a moment were re-echoed back from the opposite sides by the loud and continued cheers of the men of the other detachments, who, true to their orders, were there and in readiness to pounce upon the Indians the moment the attack began. In this manner the battle of the Washita commenced.”
The “battle” in the village was short, barely fifteen minutes. The soldiers drove the people from their lodges barefoot and half naked, shooting them in the open. Many of the warriors managed to reach the trees, where they began to return fire; a few of them escaped, but after a couple of hours, the firing ceased and 103 Cheyennes lay dead in the snow and mud. Custer reported that they were fighting men, but others said that ninety-two of them were women, children, and old people. Black Kettle, the sixty-seven-year-old leader of the band, and his wife, Medicine Woman Later, who had survived nine gunshot wounds at the Massacre of Sand Creek four years before, had been shot in the back as they attempted to cross the Lodge Pole or Washita River. Their bodies, trampled and covered with mud, were found in the shallow water by the survivors.
The soldiers seized everything in the village—guns, bows and arrows, decorated clothing, sacred shields, tobacco, dried meat, dried berries, robes, and fifty-one lodges—and burned it. In addition, they captured 875 horses and mules. Custer gave the order to slaughter these animals by cutting their throats, but the horses feared whiteman smell and shied away, and after several attempts, the men grew tired. Custer gave the order to shoot the animals instead. Custer himself slaughtered camp dogs. Then the 7th Cavalry took its captives, mostly women and children and old ones, and headed north to its base of operations, Camp Supply.
Custer’s attack on the village of Southern Cheyennes was hailed as a great victory in the Indian wars.
Excerpt from Killing Custer by James Welch
This was almost eight years before Little Bighorn.
[Reposted from last year.]
… of William F. Buckley, 81.
“Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.”
… of Oscar Robertson, 68.
Whenever basketball discussions turn to naming the greatest player in history, Oscar Robertson’s name is always prominently mentioned. Red Auerbach, who coached a slew of Hall of Famers with the Boston Celtics, rates Robertson as the best, most versatile player he has ever seen. Most other basketball experts would agree: the “Big O” could do it all. He was an unstoppable offensive player; one who could score from every spot on the court and in any manner he saw fit. Robertson’s offensive prowess changed the point guard stereotype from simply a passer and “floor general” to a scorer and offensive weapon. Robertson truly had a presence on the court.
A three-time All-State selection at Indianapolis’ Crispus Attucks High School, the “Big O” was heavily recruited and opted to remain close to home at the University of Cincinnati. Robertson’s collegiate career (1957-60) was historic: he established 19 school and 14 NCAA records and led the Bearcats to a 79-9 record and two straight NCAA tournament third place finishes in 1959 and 1960. A three-time College Player of the Year and national scoring leader at Cincinnati, Robertson scored 2,973 points (33.8 ppg), placing him seventh all-time in NCAA history. (Basketball Hall of Fame)
… of Pete Best, 65. Best was the orginal drummer in The Beatles, fired in 1962 to be replaced by Ringo Starr.
… of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Donald ”Duck” Dunn, 65.
The group came together in the early Sixties at Stax Records, a studio and record store on East McLemore Avenue in Memphis. By 1962, guitarist Steve Cropper, organist Booker T. Jones and bassist Lewis Steinberg were established session musicians at Stax. They were joined on a recording date for Billy Lee Riley (of “Flying Saucers Rock ‘n’ Roll” fame) by drummer Al Jackson, with whom Steinberg had played in the house band at Memphis’ Plantation Inn. It was during some down time at the Riley session that this lineup recorded the classic Sixties soul instrumental “Green Onions.” The definitive version of Booker T. and the MGs (which stood for “Memphis Group”) was completed in 1963, when bassist Donald “Duck” Dunn – a former schoolmate and bandmate of Cropper’s who’d been touring with the Mar-Keys, another Stax backup group – replaced Steinberg. This lineup lent instrumental fire and uncluttered rhythmic support to countless soul classics. Particularly fruitful was their relationship with Stax’s biggest star, Otis Redding. In addition to playing on virtually all of his records, the band backed him at his legendary performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 (along with the Mar-Kays), and guitarist Cropper co-wrote his best-known number, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay.” Cropper also shared writing credits on such soul standards as Wilson Pickett’s “In the Midnight Hour,” Sam and Dave’s “Soul Man,” Eddie Floyd’s “Knock On Wood” and Albert King’s “Born Under a Bad Sign.” (Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum)
… of Stanley Livingston, 56. He was Chip, the original third son on my three sons. Later Stanley’s brother Barry Livingston played even younger son (when oldest brother Mike played by Tim Considine left the show).
… of Katherine Heigl, 28. That’s Dr. Isobel “Izzie” Stevens to you. NewMexiKen hopes I never get sick, but if I do I want to go to the hottie doctor hospital.
Conclusion from a thoughtful and thorough article in The Christian Science Monitor (November 27, 2002).
There are many myths surrounding Thanksgiving. Here are nine things we do know are true about the holiday.
1. The first Thanksgiving was a harvest celebration in 1621 that lasted for three days.
2. The feast most likely occurred between Sept. 21 and Nov. 11.
3. Approximately 90 Wampanoag Indians and 52 colonists – the latter mostly women and children – participated.
4. The Wampanoag, led by Chief Massasoit, contributed at least five deer to the feast.
5. Cranberry sauce, potatoes – white or sweet – and pies were not on the menu.
6. The Pilgrims and Wampanoag communicated through Squanto, a member of the Patuxet tribe, who knew English because he had associated with earlier explorers. [In fact, Squanto (or Tisquantum), had spent several years in Europe and England.]
7. Besides meals, the event included recreation and entertainment.
8. There are only two surviving descriptions of the first Thanksgiving. One is in a letter by colonist Edward Winslow. He mentions some of the food and activities. The second description was in a book written by William Bradford 20 years afterward. His account was lost for almost 100 years.
9. Abraham Lincoln named Thanksgiving an annual holiday in 1863.
And this, The Year We Had Two Thanksgivings.
There’s a discussion at American Heritage Blog about The Atlantic’s 100 Most Influential Americans. Participants include John Steele Gordon, a member of the panel that selected The Atlantic’s list.
You could try following the debate at the American Heritage Blog main page (scrolling down to the first entry), but here are the six postings to date.
The 100 Most Influential Americans
The 100 Most Influential Americans II
The 100 Most Influential Americans III
The 100 Most Influential Americans IV
The 100 Most Influential Americans V
The 100 Most Influential Americans VI
The 100 Most Influential Americans VII
The 100 Most Influential Americans VIII
The 100 Most Influential Americans IX
Taken 43 years ago today. Click image to see larger version from The Smoking Gun.
YouTube has the Zapruder film in slow motion. Not for the faint-hearted!
Some interesting omissions, of course (from The Atlantic 100).
No Hispanics (Serra, Kino, Cesar Chavez)?
No American Indians (Sequoyah, Pontiac, Sitting Bull, Joseph)?
No explorers other than Lewis and Clark (Carson, Fremont, Powell)?
Several from film, but no one from broadcasting (Sarnoff, Pat Weaver the creator of Today and Tonight shows, Ed Sullivan)?
Just sayin’.
Here’s my take on another list of 100.
The Atlantic also has a list of the most influential living Americans. Here’s the top 10.
1. Bill Gates (No. 54 on the Top 100)
2. James D. Watson (No. 68)
3. Ralph Nader (No. 96)
4. Bob Dylan
5. Steve Jobs
6. Steven Spielberg
7. William F. Buckley Jr.
8. Muhammad Ali
9. Sandra Day O’Connor
10. Oprah Winfrey
From The Atlantic. NewMexiKen thought the last five of the 100 most influential figures in American history was interesting.
96 Ralph Nader
He made the cars we drive safer; thirty years later, he made George W. Bush the president.97 Stephen Foster
America’s first great songwriter, he brought us “O! Susanna” and “My Old Kentucky Home.”98 Booker T. Washington
As an educator and a champion of self-help, he tried to lead black America up from slavery.99 Richard Nixon
He broke the New Deal majority, and then broke his presidency on a scandal that still haunts America.100 Herman Melville
Moby Dick was a flop at the time, but Melville is remembered as the American Shakespeare.
This time from The Atlantic and a panel of ten eminent historians. Here’s the top 10 “most influential figures in American history.”
1 Abraham Lincoln
He saved the Union, freed the slaves, and presided over America’s second founding.2 George Washington
He made the United States possible—not only by defeating a king, but by declining to become one himself.3 Thomas Jefferson
The author of the five most important words in American history: “All men are created equal.”4 Franklin Delano Roosevelt
He said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” and then he proved it.5 Alexander Hamilton
Soldier, banker, and political scientist, he set in motion an agrarian nation’s transformation into an industrial power.6 Benjamin Franklin
The Founder-of-all-trades— scientist, printer, writer, diplomat, inventor, and more; like his country, he contained multitudes.7 John Marshall
The defining chief justice, he established the Supreme Court as the equal of the other two federal branches.8 Martin Luther King Jr.
His dream of racial equality is still elusive, but no one did more to make it real.9 Thomas Edison
It wasn’t just the lightbulb; the Wizard of Menlo Park was the most prolific inventor in American history.10 Woodrow Wilson
He made the world safe for U.S. interventionism, if not for democracy.
Amazing, four Virginians and no sign of John Warner.
It is too true, however disgraceful it may be to human nature, that nations in general will make war whenever they have a prospect of getting anything by it; nay, absolute monarchs [and presidents with control of both houses of congress] will often make war when their nations are to get nothing by it, but for the purposes and objects merely personal, such as thirst for military glory, revenge for personal affronts, ambition, or private compacts to aggrandize or support their particular families or partisans. These and a variety of other motives, which affect only the mind of the sovereign, often lead him to engage in wars not sanctified by justice or the voice and interests of his people.
The Federalist Papers: No. 4, John Jay (November 7, 1787)
Found as part of an essay on the draft by Glenn Greenwald.
Pentagon officials are considering a substantial but temporary increase in troops in Iraq, known by some as a “surge option.”
When the Germans tried a substantial but temporary increase in troops in December 1944, it was known by some as the Battle of the Bulge.
In the Battle of the Bulge there were an estimated 85,000-90,000 casualties on each side in six weeks.
Just sayin’.
Executive Mansion,
Washington, Nov. 21, 1864
Dear Madam, –I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts, that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.
I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.
I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom. Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
A. Lincoln.
[As it turns out, this letter, made even more famous when read in the film Saving Private Ryan, may have been written by John Hay, Lincoln’s secretary. Further, only two of Mrs. Bixby’s five sons had died in battle. One was honorably discharged, one was dishonorably discharged, and another deserted or died in a prison camp. Not that losing three sons in whatever way isn’t horrible enough.]
Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier and François Laurent, the marquis d’ Arlandes, flew in a untethered hot air balloon over Paris for 20 minutes on this date in 1783. The balloon was made of silk and paper and was constructed by Jacques Étienne and Joseph-Michel Montgolfier, who first took notice that smoke (i.e, hot air) would cause a bag to rise. The Montgolfiers experimented with paper bags before sending a balloon aloft with a sheep, a rooster and a duck (September 19, 1783). De Rozier went up in a tethered balloon on October 15.
But November 21, 1783, is the date man first flew, untethered to the earth.
The winds have welcomed you with softness,
The sun has blessed you with his warm hands
You have flown so high and so free,
That God has joined you in laughter,
And set you gently again,
Into the loving arms of mother earth.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate — we cannot consecrate — we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
On November 18, 1883, four standard time zones for the continental U.S.A. were introduced at the instigation of the railroads. At noon on this day the U.S. Naval Observatory changed its telegraphic signals to correspond to the change. Until the invention of the railway, it took such a long time to get from one place to another that local “sun time” could be used. When traveling to the east or to the west, a person would have to change his or her watch by one minute every twelve miles.
…At twelve o’clock noon on November 18, 1883, as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) was transmitted, the U.S. Naval Observatory began signaling the new time standard. Authorities in major cities and managers of the railroad reset their clocks. All over the United States and Canada, people changed their clocks and watches in synchronization with their zone’s standard time. In one moment the many different standards of time that had caused conflict and confusion, were resolved into four simple standards.
Don’t let Arizonans read about this “sun time” thing; surely they’d want to reinstate it.
Parisian Boulevard, Daguerre, 1839.
Click image for larger version. Note the man who stopped to shine his shoes near the lower left. Most moving objects were not captured by the lengthy exposure needed. So far as known, that individual is the first human ever “photographed.”
If you’d prefer, you can hear Garrison Keillor with the following:
It’s the birthday of the man who helped invent the art of photography, Louis Daguerre, born just outside of Paris, France (1789). He studied to be an architect as a young man, but instead he went into theater set design. He was famous for the lifelike detail of his work, and he began to experiment with hand-painted translucent screens and elaborate lighting effects. He could use his screens and lights to create the illusion of a sunrise or a sudden storm onstage.
At the time, most painters were using a device called a camera obscura, which could cast a silhouette of an image onto a canvas for the artist to trace. But in the early 1800s, many scientists were looking for a way to capture the projected image forever. Daguerre wanted to do the same thing, and in 1829, he met an amateur inventor named Joseph Niépce, who had developed a light-sensitive pewter plate that could hold the image projected onto it. But the images took eight hours to develop, and the quality was extremely poor. Niépce died before he could improve the process.
Daguerre spent the next few years expanding on Niépce’s experiments, and he eventually came up with a combination of copper plate coated with silver salts that could be developed in about 30 minutes with the application of mercury vapor and table salt. He then set out to take a series of pictures of Paris, capturing images of the Louvre and Notre Dame. The camera needed about 15 minutes of exposure time to capture an image, so most of Daguerre’s early pictures don’t show any people. The one exception is a picture of a boulevard that shows a man in the foreground who has stopped to shine his shoes. He was the first human being ever caught on film.
Daguerre announced his invention in 1839, and the images he produced became known as daguerreotypes. It wasn’t photography as we know it today, because it only produced a single unique image, rather than multiple copies of the same image. But people were amazed at the level of detail it could reproduce.
Louis Daguerre said, “I have seized the light. I have arrested its flight.”
“I celebrated Thanksgiving in an old-fashioned way. I invited everyone in my neighborhood to my house, we had an enormous feast, and then I killed them and took their land.”
Jon Stewart
This is Mack’s first Thanksgiving in school, so of course he’s hearing the public school version of the First Thanksgiving story. Schools Some teachers don’t use the correct name for the indigenous people near Plymouth — Wampanoags — or even the preferred generic term — American Indians. No, they use the presumed politically correct name — Native Americans.
That’s what the teacher says, but what do the children hear?
Mack’s mother Jill reports:
“At school, Mack is learning about the first Thanksgiving. He came home today with a short story about it, which I asked him to read to me. It went well until he got to the first reference to what he called the ‘Made Up’ Americans.”