Falmanac: The Fallston Almanac of American History
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Photo: whitehouse.gov
Photo: Washington Boro, PA, Canon EOS 20D
Photo: Soldier Field, Library of Congress
(Wikipedia) -
Douglas Vernon "Doug" DeCinces (born August 29, 1950 in Burbank, California) is a former Major League Baseball third baseman. He was traded from the Baltimore Orioles to the California Angels in 1982 to make room for Cal Ripken Jr. after having been a controversial replacement for star Orioles third baseman Brooks Robinson. He played for 15 seasons (1973 - 1987) in the Major Leagues for three different teams, including nine years with the Orioles and six years with the California Angels. Continued
(LoC) - At approximately 6:10 a.m., Central Daylight Time, on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina, a Category 4 storm packing winds of 145 m.p.h., made landfall out of the Gulf of Mexico near Buras, Louisiana, and headed north towards the historic city of New Orleans, Louisiana, and the state of Mississippi. At 8:14 a.m., the New Orleans office of the National Weather Service issued a flood warning stating that the city’s Industrial Canal levee had been breached.
Within an hour, the neighborhood known as the Lower Ninth Ward was under six-to-eight feet of water. By then the 17th Street Canal levee had failed as well, and the waters began to rise relentlessly throughout the city. Other levees and floodwalls failed also. By the next day, eighty percent of New Orleans lay underwater, in some areas to a height of twenty feet. And Katrina had moved on, still bearing winds of 120 m.p.h., to wreak havoc across the central Gulf Coast of the United States. Continued
Photo by Walker Evans FSA/OWI (LoC)
ARLINGTON, Virginia (CNN) - The Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery is at the center of combat between preservationists and cemetery officials.
The giant marble sarcophagus marking the location of unknown U.S. service members has been battling the elements since it opened to the public in 1932. More than 70 years later, it is showing the scars, with cracks encircling it. Continued
Photo: John Collier 1943, FSA/OWI
(Wired) - Bell Labs' decision to abandon basic physics research marks the end of a brilliant chapter for the iconic institution. Many of the Labs' most famous discoveries, such as the transistor and the laser, originated in fundamental physics and have gone on to transform computing and technology.
They also brought Bell Labs' international glory, including six Nobel Prizes in Physics, starting in 1937 when researcher Clinton Davisson shared the Nobel for demonstrating the wave nature of matter. Continued
Photo: NASA via Wired
(Cannonba!!) - With a lineup that includes Pulitzer Prize winning Civil War author James McPherson, The Civil War Network makes its debut today on the network's web site, http://www.thecivilwarnetwork.com/.
The Civil War Network is the brainchild of 24-year professional broadcaster and life-long Civil War aficionado Francis Rose. "The mission of The Civil War Network is to inform, educate, and entertain people interested in the Civil War. This audio program is the first effort by The Civil War Network to do that," Rose says. Continued
Photo: MDRails
Image: Wikipedia
(Wikipedia) - Saint Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton (August 28, 1774 – January 4, 1821) was the first native-born citizen of the United States to be canonized.
... After some trying and difficult years, Elizabeth was able to establish a community in Emmitsburg, Maryland dedicated to the care for the children of the poor. She founded the first free school in America. Continued
(boingboing) - Photographer Meera Sethi has written a nice essay about taking photos in science museums. Sethi is part of Utata, a collective of photographers who met via Flickr. Indeed, be sure to check out Sethi's "Muse" science museum photo set on Flickr. (Seen here, "Together Forever," taken at the Harvard Museum of Natural History.) From "Photographing the Science Museum": Continued
Photo: Meera Sethi
(Reuters) - Scientists in Israel are taking digital photographs of the Dead Sea Scrolls with the aim of making the 2,000-year-old documents available to the public and researchers on the Internet.
Israel Antiquities Authority, the custodian of the scrolls that shed light on the life of Jews and early Christians at the time of Jesus, said on Wednesday it would take more than two years to complete the project. Continued
Photo: Library of Congess via Wikipedia
(NYTimes) - Are fortune cookies Chinese?
Clearly not. They are arguably more American (by way of Japan), judging by the way that people in China react to fortune cookies — with a mixture of confusion and amusement. As part of research for my book, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles, I went around China handing out fortune cookies to random people (my bellhop, people on the street, vendors) and recorded their reactions. Continued
BERN, Switzerland (AP) - Anna Goeldi was executed for being a witch more than 220 years ago — the last witch beheaded in Europe. On Wednesday, the Swiss decided the least they could do was clear her name.
The parliament of the Swiss canton (state) of Glarus decided unanimously Wednesday to exonerate Goeldi as a victim of "judicial murder," said Josef Schwitter, a government spokesman. Continued
(Wired) - On August 25, 1978, the Lego minifigure was born. This was a hugely important transition for Lego.
For many years they sold sets allowing builders to create cars or buildings, but something was missing -- a human element. The minifig gave them that humanity, and very quickly it became an iconic symbol of the company second only to the brick itself. Continued
(Smithsonian) - Richard Evans Schultes, an explorer and botanist, spent much of his career penetrating remote reaches of the Amazon, where shamans taught him the healing properties of plants often unknown to science.
In his pursuit of natural pharmacopeia, he imbibed strange brews and snorted potent snuff to personally test the effects, often donning traditional costume and participating in tribal ceremonies.
By the time he died in 2001 at age 86, Schultes had documented 300 new species and cataloged the uses of 2,000 medicinal plants, from hallucinogenic vines to sources of the muscle relaxant curare. Continued
Photo: Richard Evans Schultes
(Wikipedia) - Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore (August 27, 1637 - February 21, 1715) was the second Proprietary Governor of the Province of Maryland, inheriting the colony upon the death of his father, Cecilius Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore, in 1675.
He had been his father's Deputy Governor since 1661 when he arrived in the colony at the age of 24. Several years later, about 1667, Charles married Jane Lowe, widow of Col. Henry Sewall of St. Mary's County, Maryland. Continued
Photo: Library of Congress
(MSNBC) - In today’s fast-paced society, the Hillbilly Housewife Web site — with its traditional recipes for making cornmeal mush and tips for turning leftover rice into breakfast pancakes — would seem to be a relic of a bygone era.
But with food and gas prices rising at a faster pace than most paychecks, the site devoted to frugal ways to feed a family has recently seen traffic increase by a third, to about 300,000 unique visitors a month. Susanne Myers, who took over the site from a friend about a year ago, says she’s been deluged with e-mails from people looking for cheap ways to fill their families’ stomachs. Continued
And speaking of food, check out this local headline: New Web site to put local food on Harford tables
Photos: Library of Congress
(Cassandra A. Fortin) - Susan Wooden can work miracles with history. She can get people excited about doing ordinary tasks such as laundry, washing dishes, or hearth cooking.
"I go back to a time when there was no electricity and no freezers," Wooden said. Continued
Photo of Jerusalem Mills by Kim Choate
(LoC) - Photograph published in The Suffragist, 7, no. 14 (Apr. 5, 1919): cover.
Lucy Gwynne Branham of Baltimore, Md., was a graduate of Washington College, Md., and held graduate degrees from Johns Hopkins Univ. and Columbia Univ. She was arrested picketing for suffrage in Washington, D.C. September 1917, and sentenced to 60 days in Occoquan Workhouse and District Jail.
Branham was part of the "Prison Special" nationwide tour of NWP activists who spoke about their experiences being arrested for demonstrating for the right to vote. Source: Doris Stevens, Jailed for Freedom (New York: Boni and Liveright, 1920), 355.
(ajc.com) - Generations of students have been taught that the South lost the Civil War because of the North’s superior industry and population. A new book suggests another reason: Southerners were largely responsible for defeating the Confederacy.
In “Bitterly Divided: The South’s Inner Civil War” (New Press, $27.95), historian David Williams of Valdosta State University lays out some tradition-upsetting arguments that might make the granite brow of Jefferson Davis crack on Stone Mountain. Continued
Photo: Sculpture, Bel Air, Maryland. Courtesy of Nightening.
(UniversalYork) - A couple of weeks ago I received an email from a childhood friend who has lived in California for many years. She found a photo postcard that had belonged to her York County grandmother and wondered if I knew anything about the Brook Leaf Love Nest. I remembered that my family had one of those postcards too and that the photograph of the house in the tree had fascinated me as a child. Continued
(AP) - An underwater archaeologist who claims he found the Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley said Monday he will keep fighting for official credit for the discovery, despite a lawsuit over the matter being dismissed.
Lee Spence claimed he found the Hunley in 1970 when a fishing net snagged on the submarine's wreckage and says he has the documents to prove it. But the state gave shipwreck hunter Clive Cussler credit, saying he located the sub off Sullivans Island near Charleston in 1995. Continued
Photo: Hanover Junction, Pennsylvania with what may, or may not be, Abraham Lincoln standing on the platform
Matthew Santoni (Examiner) - Harford’s future is buried within 800 pages of legislation and spread across six binders, but critics said they hope its importance can convince the public to get excited about the dry topic of planning and zoning.
The hefty tomes — also available as a series of downloads from the county’s Web site — contain the new rules for zoning and development representing the first time since 1982 that the whole code has been overhauled.
But some say the information is tough to access and tougher to understand, making it difficult for residents to participate in the changes. Continued
While it’s fun to read the articles — the Wright brothers fly a plane over Manhattan! Admiral Dewey at home! — it’s even more fun to look at the ads. They provide a fascinating glimpse of the rise of U.S. consumerism. Continued
(YDR) - ... Today, the borough will celebrate its 175th anniversary with a parade, dancing, music and other festivities.
One of the town's gems, Dills Tavern, will recall its early roots and charm visitors.
According to the town's historians, Dills Tavern became a landmark on early maps for travelers to Baltimore, Harpers Ferry and Carlisle. Continued
Photograph of Dill's Tavern courtesy of the Northern York County Historical and Preservation Society
Turner Classic Movies is showing Laurel & Hardy films all day today (and all night too). Channel 37 on Comcast in Maryland. Link
(Wikipedia) - The 1933 Chesapeake-Potomac Hurricane was the 8th storm and third hurricane of the very active 1933 Atlantic hurricane season. The August storm formed in the central Atlantic, where it moved west-northwest. Aided by the warm ocean waters, the hurricane briefly reached Category 3 status on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale before making landfall along the Virginia/North Carolina coast as a Category 1 storm.
The hurricane caused severe damage along the East Coast of the United States. The state hardest hit by the storm was Virginia, where the center of circulation passed directly over Norfolk.
... In Washington, D.C., the storm produced a storm surge of 11.3 feet (3.4 m), rainfall of 6.18 inches (152 mm) and winds of 50 mph (80 km/h). In Maryland, the hurricane caused $17 million dollars (1933 USD, $230 million 2005 USD) in damage to crops and buildings. The storm also destroyed a railroad bridge heading into Ocean City and created the Ocean City Inlet between the town and Assateague Island. The storm killed 13 people and 1,000+ animals. On the coast, the storm damaged or destroyed several wharves and fishing piers. In Delaware, the storm caused $150,000 dollars (1933 USD, $2.03 million 2005 USD) in damage but no deaths. Continued
PHOENIX, AZ (AP) - ... Two self-styled vigilantes against typos who defaced a more than 60-year-old, hand-painted sign at Grand Canyon National Park were sentenced to probation and banned from national parks for a year.
They had removed an extraneous apostrophe and added a comma to the sign.
... The sign was made by Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter, the architect who designed the rustic 1930s watchtower and other Grand Canyon-area landmarks. Continued
Photo of the Desert View Watchtower by Ross Statham
(Wikipedia) - Tori Amos (born Myra Ellen Amos on August 22, 1963) is a pianist and singer-songwriter of dual British and American citizenship.
... Amos had sold 12 million records worldwide as of 2005 and has also enjoyed a large cult following. Having a history of making eccentric and at times ribald comments during concerts and interviews, she has earned a reputation for being highly idiosyncratic.
... When Amos was 2, her family moved to Baltimore, Maryland, where she began to play the piano. By age five, she had begun composing instrumental pieces on piano and at nine started to add lyrics to her pieces.
In 1968, while living in Rockville, Maryland, she won a full scholarship to the Preparatory Division of the Peabody Conservatory of Music at the age of 5. Her scholarship was discontinued at age 11 and she was asked to leave. Amos has asserted that she lost the scholarship because of her interest in rock and popular music coupled with her dislike for reading from sheet music. Continued
(Wikipedia) - Edward Hugh "Ned" Hanlon (August 22, 1857 - April 14, 1937) was a 19th century Major League Baseball player and manager. He was born in Montville, Connecticut.
Hanlon broke into the National League with the Cleveland Blues in 1880 and played until 1892 with several different teams. While his playing career was, for the most part, unexceptional he began what would be an illustrious career as manager when he took the helm of the Pittsburgh Alleghenys in 1889.
Hanlon moved to the Baltimore Orioles in 1892 where, despite some growing pains, he would experience his greatest success. Baltimore won the National League title from 1894 to 1896 by playing inside baseball, using innovative strategies including the hit-and-run. Continued
(Antero Pietila) - There is a true and tragic tale about how Baltimore bought the 1912 Democratic National Convention and messed it up so badly that the city has not been awarded one since.
The story is sad because in the earliest times Baltimore had such a lock on Democratic presidential nominating conventions that it hosted all six between 1832, when Andrew Jackson was selected, and 1852, when Franklin Pierce got the nod.
After that Baltimore managed to snag two more -- even as Chicago and St. Louis became the party's favorite convention cities. Continued
Photos: Library of Congress (LoC)
Photo: "Leaving Paradise" Canon EOS 20D
(Washington Post) - Ask most Marylanders where the notion of freedom of religion originated and they'll probably say New England, Susan Wilkinson said.
(LoC) - On August 20, 1866, the newly organized National Labor Union called on Congress to mandate an eight-hour workday. A coalition of skilled and unskilled workers, farmers, and reformers, the National Labor Union was created to pressure Congress to enact labor reforms. It dissolved in 1873 following a disappointing venture into third-party politics in the 1872 presidential election.
Although the National Labor Union failed to persuade Congress to shorten the workday, its efforts heightened public awareness of labor issues and increased public support for labor reform in the 1870s and 1880s.
The Knights of Labor, a powerful advocate for the eight-hour day in the 1870s and early 1880s, proved more effective. Organized in 1869, by 1886 the Knights of Labor counted 700,000 laborers, shopkeepers, and farmers among its members. Under the leadership of Terrence V. Powderly, the union discouraged the use of strikes and advocated restructuring society along cooperative lines. Continued
