NewMexiKen

Eric Alterman makes some recommendations:

[B]ut for those who want a fuller picture of Reagan’s life and times, I’d recommend Lou Cannon’s fair-minded biography, President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime, a book that can be admired by honest fans of Reagan as well as honest opponents. The most interesting meditation on Reagan’s character and presidency can be found, in my view, in Garry Wills’ Reagan’s America: Innocents at Home. An extremely useful perspective on Reagan’s role in the end of the Cold War can be found in Frances Fitzgerald’s Way out There in the Blue.

From Gallup, average job approval rating during term:

Kennedy 70%
Eisenhower 65%
Bush I 61%
Clinton 55%
Johnson 55%
Reagan 53%
Nixon 49%
Ford 47%
Truman 45%
Carter 45%

June 7th Thursday 1804 [Clark]

Set out early passed the head of the Island opposit which we Camped last night, and brackfast at the Mouth of a large Creek on the S. S. of 30 yds wide Called big Monetou, from the pt. of the Isd. or Course of last night to the mouth of this Creek is N 61° W 4½ ms. a Short distance above the mouth of this Creek, is Several Courious Paintings and Carveing in the projecting rock of Limestone inlade with white red & blue flint, of a verry good quallity, [7] the Indians have taken of this flint great quantities. We landed at this Inscription and found it a Den of rattle Snakes, we had not landed 3 minutes before three verry large Snakes wer observed on the Crevises of the rocks & Killed— at the mouth of the last mentioned Creek Capt. Lewis took four or five men & went to Some Licks or Springs of Salt water from two to four miles up the Creek on Rt. Side the water of those Springs are not Strong, Say from 4 to 600 Gs. of water for a Bushel of Salt passed Some Small willow Islands and Camped at the Mouth of a Small river called Good Womans River this river is about 35 yards wide and Said to be navagable for Perogues Several Leagues Capt. Lewis with 2 men went up the Creek a Short distance. our Hunters brought in three Bear this evening, and informs that the Countrey thro: which they passed from the last Creek is fine rich land, & well watered.

Source: Journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition Online June 7, 1804

The above took place near where I-70 crosses the Missouri River west of Columbia, Missouri.

first looked west from Cumberland Gap into what is now Kentucky on this date in 1769. The Kentucky Historical Society celebrates June 7 as “Boone Day.”

Boone was not the first person through Cumberland Gap; he wasn’t even the first European-American. He was, however, instrumental in blazing a trail, which became known as the Wilderness Road. According to the National Park Service:

Immigration through the Gap began immediately, and by the end of the Revolutionary War some 12,000 persons had crossed into the new territory. By 1792 the population was over 100,000 and Kentucky was admitted to the Union.

During the 1790s traffic on the Wilderness Road increased. By 1800 almost 300,000 people had crossed the Gap going west. And each year as many head of livestock were driven east. As it had always been, the Gap was an important route of commerce and transportation.

It is right to honor those brave warriors who stormed the beaches at Normandy 60 years ago, but I hope in doing so we don’t think they were any more brave or honorable than the Americans at Trenton in 1776, or Gettysburg in 1863, or Saint-Mihiel in 1918, or Iwo Jima in 1945, or Iraq today.

NewMexiKen long thought the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences should present Reagan with an Oscar. The Academy should have honored him for bringing distinction to the industry they represent by rising to this country’s highest office. But they also should have done it because, whatever the policies he promoted, Reagan knew how to act like a president, and in that he brought honor to us all.