Goodness gracious, my how time flies.

A significant anniversary was coming up. At the radio station where I worked it was decided that we would mark the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor by playing President Roosevelt's speech to Congress asking for a declaration of war against Japan. 

 

We were going to start playing the speech on December 7 at the time the attack commenced, California time. As that came up during my shift, I was to play the speech. That speech, and the attack that precipitated it, had happened many years before. It was history from a time long before I was born. Playing that speech was reflecting a bygone era.

Yes, the recording of that speech was very old when I played it -- on December 7, 1981.  It was forty years old. Now it has been forty years since I played the President's speech on the air. The speech was originally made eighty years ago. Going back eighty years from the time of that speech would be going back to the early days of the American Civil War.

Speaking of President Roosevelt, I have long known of his death in April, 1945. Again, this seemed like almost ancient history of an event that happened before I was born. 

On March 30, 1981, we were having a station meeting. The news director came running in saying that President Reagan had been shot. The meeting broke up immediately. The news department spent the afternoon gathering information and handing it to me so I could read it on the air. To be honest, I don't remember much of that information; it seemed to go in my eyes and out of my mouth without making an impression in between. About the only thing I seem to recall was something about the report that Press Secretary James Brady had died. Whether it was the report that he had died or it was the correction to that report, I don't remember.

Since I experienced that day, it always seemed to be a recent event. Then I realized the period of time between the death of President Roosevelt and the shooting of President Reagan was just shy of thirty-six years. As of now, the shooting of President Reagan was over forty years ago.

I grew up during the sound era of motion pictures. While there were many black and white movies when I was young, they all had sound. While not the first motion picture to have a synchronized sound track, the film that is considered to have ushered in the sound era was Al Jolson's 1927 film, The Jazz Singer. I don't know when I first heard of that movie, but I have long known of its importance in film history. It always looked old. The images were somewhat blurry and the audio was terrible. It was an artifact from the past. That film was released in February, 1928, making it forty six years old when I graduated high school -- almost forty-eight years ago.

 

One of the most famous tourist attractions in Seattle is the Space Needle from the 1962 World's Fair. There is an observation deck at the top. To get to it, you take an elevator that faces out. When you first get in to the elevator, you are able to see maybe fifty feet. As the elevator goes up, you see farther and farther. On a clear day you might see over one hundred miles. Getting older is like going up the elevator on the Space Needle; you don't necessarily feel much different, but you are amazed at how much farther you can see. 

History does not seem as old as your originally thought once you have seen a fair amount of it yourself.

Lest We Forget

In Flanders Fields

John McCrae - 1872-1918

• 
• 
• 

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
    That mark our place; and in the sky
    The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
    Loved and were loved, and now we lie
        In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe: 
To you from failing hands we throw
    The torch; be yours to hold it high. 
    If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
        In Flanders fields.

Some thoughts after the Hawaii missle scare

A few days ago someone accidentally sent a real alert about a missile strike heading towards Hawaii. The latest thing I read about this incident was that there was a menu of items to select from. Some of those items on the menu used plain English, some used government acronyms.

It should be realized that if there is a way to screw something up, someone will find a way of doing it. This is not the first time something like this has happened. Apparently someone got confused and selected the wrong item.

Years ago, the government system for warning against missile attacks was tested every Saturday morning. A message would be sent out on AP and UPI news teletypes. Radio stations would check the message, which consisted of two words, with the list of test phrases. If they matched, the system was presumed to be working.

Radio stations have, or used to have, a red envelope. If a message came down and it was not the test time, or if the message did not match the test list, someone at the radio station was to open the red envelope. Inside the red envelope was a list of words. If the message on the teletype matched the words in the red envelope then the message was authenticated as a real alert and the system was to be activated.

One Saturday morning in 1971 someone at the control center "pushed the wrong button," sending the real message. No one acted on the alert, figuring that someone must have pushed the wrong button as it came at the same time as the weekly test. Now if someone at a small mom and pop radio station in Kentucky knew the test happened at the same time every Saturday morning, don't you think that the Kremlin knew the test happened at the same time every Saturday morning? There was a reason the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on a Sunday morning.

In 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake (the "World Series" quake) struck the San Francisco area.



Many people felt that it showed the weakness of the old Emergency Broadcast System. There was a limited number of people who could activate the EBS system and no one activated it after the earthquake. Because of that a new system was designed. This new system, the Emergency Alert System (EAS) was designed to overcome those weaknesses. Many more people were now in a position to activate the system. The new system would automatically take control of "downstream" broadcasters rather than rely on someone knowing what they were doing at those stations. (A few years ago, someone activated a test of the system but forgot to release it for several hours, meaning all radio stations in the chain were stuck relaying the primary station's audio that entire time.)

So radio stations had to spend several thousand dollars on the new EAS system because we did not want another earthquake to occur without the system being activated.

There was an earthquake in the Seattle area in 2001. While it was not as big as the Loma Prieta earthquake, it was still a big one. I had been through several earthquakes before. Usually they just come, shake things up for 5-10 seconds, then go away. This one shook for at least 45 seconds.



By this time the new EAS system was in place. It was not activated. The system that was designed because the old system was considered a failure because it was not activated after an earthquake was not activated after an earthquake. Why not? It was felt that since it was an earthquake, and everyone knew it was an earthquake, then why activate it to tell everyone there was an earthquake?

"Hi. I'm from the government and I am here to help."

DUNKIRK

Just go see it.  In IMAX.  Brilliant movie.  The soundtrack and cinematography are superlative.  Should be compulsory viewing for anyone born after 1980.

I had a recurring thought throughout this movie, that the horror of WW11 could almost be justified.  That is until Europe caved without resistance to the islamic invasion of their continent.   For shame.

A Day in Pompeii

This is amazing. You'll want to watch it full screen.




H/T: Realm of History

How The West Was Won

While we are eagerly anticipating a wonderful family post (hint hint) from the lovely and brilliant Magic Fayre, who is currently acrost yon pond, I thought I would whet your appetite for history and historic things. This is a bio of a pioneer woman, written by her daughter in 1921. I will post it as I found it, without editing:

Shoah

For the past week I have been watching Claude Lanzmann's 1985 documentary Shoah. I've had to view it a little at a time; it's too overwhelming to do anything else. I'm on part 3 of 4, and feel emotionally raw. In 2010, Roger Ebert said:

"For more than nine hours I sat and watched a film named "Shoah," and when it was over, I sat for a while longer and simply stared into space, trying to understand my emotions. I had seen a memory of the most debased chapter in human history. But I had also seen a film that affirmed life so passionately that I did not know where to turn with my confused feelings. There is no proper response to this film. It is an enormous fact, a 550-minute howl of pain and anger in the face of genocide. It is one of the noblest films ever made."

Don't bother making popcorn for this movie. You won't eat it.  God help us all.

Modernity Has Not Been Kind to the Celt

From the pen of Apollon Zamp: 

"Throughout history, the denizens of rural Appalachia have been at a high risk of death from gunshot wounds, stabbings, and blunt force trauma. This is the seeming end result of piling too many Scots-Irishmen together and expecting them to co-exist peacefully (cf. a certain six counties of Ulster). Those causes of death have been replaced by the much less mediapathic,[1]but no less lethal, trio of diabetes, heart disease, and high blood pressure.[2] Fast forward a couple of centuries and the main threat facing a mountaineer is the face he looks at in the mirror every morning. In the immortal words of the comic strip Pogo, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”The singular question any intelligent and curious observer is left with is: Why?Or, in other words: What happened to the Appalachia of yesteryear? Who’s responsible for its decline? How did it come to this?

The best answers I can provide are, respectively: it’s dead; the Federal government; and the inevitable progress of the welfare state."

I know most of you aren't into the American anthropology thing like I am, but I think you'll really enjoy this article. Thanks to the Baron at GOV for sharing this.

Shalom

By popular request (and if you didn't request it, you still get it!) Some fine photos taken by radiomattm during our trip to Israel! In the beginning, we arrived in Tel Aviv. This is what a middle eastern dessert looks like after you allow a bunch of Jews to ride roughshod over it for the last 68 years:

Ben Gurion Airport:

A view of the Mediterranean from our hotel:

The Kosher pizza joint where we dined with the wonderful Annie:

Erase the SPLC

The foot-stamping little trolls of the SPLC, a pillar of today's elite class, are championing a cultural pogrom against the eviiiiil racist haters raters hatists of the South. They, the elites who KNOW BETTAH, seek to choose our heroes, our holidays, the names of our schools, our monuments, our flags, and what is written on the gravestones of our ancestors.

Because all the lootin' pollutin' rooty-toot-tootin' gang bangin' cop shootin' riot burnin' stealin' rapin' rappin' crappin' uneducated unemployed anti-social money-suckin' dumb fuckin' black mobs are all our fault.

Morris Dees, bless his pea-pickin' little fascist heart...

Um...What?

Can someone please explain to me why England is begging to hang on to Scotland?  Isn't Scotland the Detroit of the British Empire? Any illumination you all can give me would be greatly appreciated. I'm lost.

"Together We Shall Achieve Victory"

I fear the world will never see their like again. I am humbled by their sacrifices. Thank you seems so inadequate, but thank them I do.

Operation Overlord

In January 1944, General Dwight Eisenhower (1890-1969) was appointed commander of Operation Overlord. In the months and weeks before D-Day, the Allies carried out a massive deception operation intended to make the Germans think the main invasion target was Pas-de-Calais (the narrowest point between Britain and France) rather than Normandy. In addition, they led the Germans to believe that Norway and other locations were also potential invasion targets. Many tactics was used to carry out the deception, including fake equipment; a phantom army commanded by George Patton and supposedly based in England, across from Pas-de-Calais; double agents; and fraudulent radio transmissions.

A Weather Delay: June 5, 1944

Eisenhower selected June 5, 1944, as the date for the invasion; however, bad weather on the days leading up to the operation caused it to be delayed for 24 hours. On the morning of June 5, after his meteorologist predicted improved conditions for the following day, Eisenhower gave the go-ahead for Operation Overlord. He told the troops: “You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you.”

Later that day, more than 5,000 ships and landing craft carrying troops and supplies left England for the trip across the Channel to France, while more than 11,000 aircraft were mobilized to provide air cover and support for the invasion.

D-Day Landings: June 6, 1944

By dawn on June 6, thousands of paratroopers and glider troops were already on the ground behind enemy lines, securing bridges and exit roads. The amphibious invasions began at 6:30 a.m. The British and Canadians overcame light opposition to capture beaches codenamed Gold, Juno and Sword, as did the Americans at Utah Beach. U.S. forces faced heavy resistance at Omaha Beach, where there were over 2,000 American casualties. However, by day’s end, approximately 156,000 Allied troops had successfully stormed Normandy’s beaches. According to some estimates, more than 4,000 Allied troops lost their lives in the D-Day invasion, with thousands more wounded or missing.

Less than a week later, on June 11, the beaches were fully secured and over 326,000 troops, more than 50,000 vehicles and some 100,000 tons of equipment had landed at Normandy.

For their part, the Germans suffered from confusion in the ranks and the absence of celebrated commander Rommel, who was away on leave. At first, Hitler, believing the invasion was a feint designed to distract the Germans from a coming attack north of the Seine River, refused to release nearby divisions to join the counterattack. Reinforcements had to be called from further afield, causing delays. He also hesitated in calling for armored divisions to help in the defense. Moreover, the Germans were hampered by effective Allied air support, which took out many key bridges and forced the Germans to take long detours, as well as efficient Allied naval support, which helped protect advancing Allied troops.

In the ensuing weeks, the Allies fought their way across the Normandy countryside in the face of determined German resistance, as well as a dense landscape of marshes and hedgerows. By the end of June, the Allies had seized the vital port of Cherbourg, landed approximately 850,000 men and 150,000 vehicles in Normandy, and were poised to continue their march across France.

Courtesy: History Channel

Off The Beaten Path

Here is a really cool article about arrows. Giant arrows.

And planes!

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

He Had A Dream

Too bad it was squandered by opportunists, snake doctors and reprobates.  Dr. King is probably weeping instead of dreaming.

"I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity. But 100 years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land.

And so we've come here today to dramatize an appalling condition. In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a cheque. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of colour are concerned. Instead of honouring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad cheque which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we've come to cash this cheque - a cheque that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.  We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.

Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. 1963 is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.

There will be neither rest nor tranquillity in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges. But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: in the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvellous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny.

They have come to realise that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back.  There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights: "When will you be satisfied?"

We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating "For Whites Only". We cannot be satisfied and we will not be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed - we hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal. I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today! I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama little black boys and little black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today! I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. This is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new meaning: "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring." And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California.

But not only that.
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!" 

Snippets of American History

I know that everyone here is a bit of a history buff, so I thought I'd post something a little different today. I hope you enjoy the narrative and the old photographs!

----------------

John Bloom was the son of Ira Bloom and Esther Dunn. He was born in Adams County, Ohio in 1827. He married Lucy, and the family began their trek west sometime before the Civil War, and settled for a time in Xenia, Illinois. His oldest child Emma Inozelle Bloom married Franklin Holman in 1872, and the couple had six children.  A terrible tuberculosis epidemic swept through the area, first claiming Emma in 1885, then Franklin in 1886. The grandparents gathered up the six children and continued westward by covered wagon, joining their son Mortimer on the Oregon frontier. Things did not get easier for this family:

At about 9 oclock am on the morning of the 15th (one of our extremely cold mornings), the residence of Mr. John Bloom caught fire from the stove pipe in an upper room and was soon wrapped in flames and consumed--with almost all their household furniture. Mr. Bloom and wife are in the decline of life and have a number of orphan grandchildren dependent upon them which makes their misfortune still heavier. At present the family are scattered among kindly neighbors who are already taking steps toward lightening their misfortune. The people of Pine have proved their kind and sympathetic natures on several instances of the kind in the last two years.     

---Oregon Scout Newspaper, Union, Oregon, Jan 27 1888

When this devastating fire occurred, the Bloom grandchildren were still kids; the oldest, Elmer was 14. Ethyl was 13. The twins, Lorenzil and Ora, were 8. Lucy was 7, and the baby of the family, Clarence, was only 4.

The orphans grew into adulthood, married, and had children of their own.  The strength and resilience of the early American pioneers never ceases to amaze me.

Mortimer and Isudora Bloom with family

Brothers Clarence and Elmer (in hats), with family

Ancient Torah Scroll

What an amazing discovery! I'd love to see it in person.

Although the Leningrad and the Aleppo bibles – both of them Hebrew codexes, or books – pre-date the Bologna scroll by more than 200 years, this is the oldest Torah scroll of the Pentateuch, the five books of Moses, according to the Italian professor of Hebrew in the University of Bologna’s cultural heritage department.

Such scrolls – this one is 36 meters (40 yards) long and 64 centimeters (25 inches) high – are brought out in synagogues on the Sabbath and holidays, and portions are read aloud in public.

I wonder why this scroll resides in a dusty old library instead of a synagogue? Doesn't it belong to someone?


 

Obama Fatigue And The Modesty of George Bush

The wheel of time (with apologies to Robert Jordan) grinds forever forward until we're back where we started, only better.

From the pen of Peggy Noonan:

In all his recent interviews Mr. Bush has been modest, humorous, proud but unassuming, and essentially philosophical: History will decide. No finger-pointing or scoring points. If he feels rancor or resentment he didn't show it. He didn't attempt to manipulate. His sheer normality seemed like a relief, an echo of an older age.

And all this felt like an antidote to Obama—to the imperious I, to the inability to execute, to the endless interviews and the imperturbable drone, to the sense that he is trying to teach us, like an Ivy League instructor taken aback by the backwardness of his students. And there's the unconscious superiority. One thing Mr. Bush didn't think he was was superior. He thought he was luckily born, quick but not deep, and he famously trusted his gut but also his heart. He always seemed moved and grateful to be in the White House. Someone who met with Mr. Obama during his first year in office, an old hand who'd worked with many presidents, came away worried and confounded. Mr. Obama, he said, was the only one who didn't seem awed by his surroundings, or by the presidency itself.

There's more. Read it all. Twice even! Is this a flickering glimmer of sanity from the left? Or am I just dreaming?

An expression of faith and love...

Margaret Thatcher planned her own funeral.  She wished it to be "an expression of faith and love".

I hope that the British authorities keep the anarchists in check on the day.  One of the hyms will be the beautiful and  patriotic "I Vow To Thee, My Country".

Thank you Maggie, and RIP.

History and Culture

Courtesy of the Utah State University digital library, here is a wonderful book about the four-corners area of the American southwest. I hope you enjoy the stories and the old photographs!

Bibi

29 year old "Ben Nitay" in 1978. Just as smart, erudite and handsome then as now.

Go Bibi!



PS Ben Nitay is the Anglicized version of Benjamin Netanyahu.