January 12, 2007
Little Rock’s Central High School, portrayed in a postcard (courtesy of Curt Teich Postcard Archives and the University of Arkansas Libraries)
Just a postcard to remind you that the 101st Carnival of Education is up over at I Thought a Think. There is a new Congress; many state legislatures are gearing up. It’s a good time to discuss education policy. Perhaps more to the point, if we don’t contribute to the discussion now, policy changes will go on without our contribution. Read the posts, and take action.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
2 Comments | 
Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), Charter schools, Classroom technology, Education, Education blogs, Education reform, Education spending, Labor and unions, Pedagogy, Politics, Teaching, Technology in the classroom | 
Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 12, 2007
Still looking for a comprehensive — and accurate — list of states that have official pledges. The search is occasionally illuminating (as are all genuine quests for knowledge).
For example, I knew Alaska’s flag was designed by a student, Benny Benson. I had not realized that it was adopted in the Coolidge administration, though, and not much closer to statehood in 1959.
More, Alaska has a song to its flag. I suspect the song is sung less often than Texas’s pledge is made (well, Texas requires school kids to say the pledge every day). But it’s a bit more poetic, isn’t it?
Alaska’s song to the flag is below the fold. A link to an MP3 recording of the song is available here. Read the rest of this entry »
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
18 Comments | Flag etiquette, History, Music education, Patriotism, Pledge to the flag | Tagged: Alaska flag, Alaska Flag Song, State flag | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 11, 2007
Ralph Luker at Cliopatria (at History News Network) adds Alabama to the list of states with an official pledge to the state flag.
Alabama’s another one, Ed: “Flag of Alabama I salute thee. To thee I pledge my allegiance, my service, and my life.” And then I wash my mouth out with soap.
Yeah, that one’s a bit over the top, rather the shark-jumper of state flag pledges.
How many more are there? 
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
3 Comments | Flag etiquette, History, History blogs, Patriotism | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 10, 2007
Mencken's Corona Typewriter, at the Mencken Room in the Enoch Pratt Library, Baltimore, Maryland
The typewriter that belonged to H. L. Mencken. Photo by the Enoch Pratt Free Library, Baltimore, Maryland. [Update, April 15, 2007: The photo has moved, and is restricted by copyright; you may follow the links to view the original photo of the typewriter, at the site of the Enoch Pratt Free Library. E.D.]
Was this the machine upon which Mencken composed the Millard Fillmore/Bathtub hoax? Perhaps. It was used prior to 1930.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
6 Comments | Fillmore's bathtub, H. L. Mencken, Hoaxes, Journalism, Newspapers | Tagged: Enoch Pratt Library, H. L. Mencken, History, Hoaxes, Journalism, Literature, Technology, Typewriters | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 10, 2007
Excerpt from Millard Fillmore’s first State of the Union Address, December 2, 1850:
Nations, like individuals in a state of nature, are equal and independent, possessing certain rights and owing certain duties to each other, arising from their necessary and unavoidable relations; which rights and duties there is no common human authority to protect and enforce. Still, they are rights and duties, binding in morals, in conscience, and in honor, although there is no tribunal to which an injured party can appeal but the disinterested judgment of mankind, and ultimately the arbitrament of the sword.
Among the acknowledged rights of nations is that which each possesses of establishing that form of government which it may deem most conducive to the happiness and prosperity of its own citizens, of changing that form as circumstances may require, and of managing its internal affairs according to its own will. The people of the United States claim this right for themselves, and they readily concede it to others. Hence it becomes an imperative duty not to interfere in the government or internal policy of other nations; and although we may sympathize with the unfortunate or the oppressed everywhere in their struggles for freedom, our principles forbid us from taking any part in such foreign contests. We make no wars to promote or to prevent successions to thrones, to maintain any theory of a balance of power, or to suppress the actual government which any country chooses to establish for itself. We instigate no revolutions, nor suffer any hostile military expeditions to be fitted out in the United States to invade the territory or provinces of a friendly nation. The great law of morality ought to have a national as well as a personal and individual application. We should act toward other nations as we wish them to act toward us, and justice and conscience should form the rule of conduct between governments, instead of mere power, self interest, or the desire of aggrandizement. To maintain a strict neutrality in foreign wars, to cultivate friendly relations, to reciprocate every noble and generous act, and to perform punctually and scrupulously every treaty obligation–these are the duties which we owe to other states, and by the performance of which we best entitle ourselves to like treatment from them; or, if that, in any case, be refused, we can enforce our own rights with justice and a clear conscience.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Leave a Comment » | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 10, 2007
It is national Delurking Week. We all learn more in conversation, when we all listen. The comments sections at the end of each post are there so you can add what you know. A few people have provided great corrections and wonderful links. Commenters are far, far less than 1% of visitors here.
Speak up! Please.
Tip of the scrub brush to Pharyngula, and Adventures in Ethics and Science.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
3 Comments | Accuracy, Democracy, Dissent, Free speech, Freedom - Political, History blogs | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 10, 2007
I am guilty. I made a bit of an assumption that state flag pledges are rare. There were none in Idaho, or Utah, where I attended public schools. Maryland made no fuss about one while we were there. In most conversations when the issue of a state pledge comes up, people tell their shock at discovering there was such a thing for Texas, and that Texans actually say it from time to time.
Only Georgia bothered to send in correcting information.
But a search of Google finally managed to strike something, having got just the right combination of terms. Below the fold are the state flag pledges for Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Ohio and South Dakota. I note that the years of adoption are recent — some sort of competition between state legislatures with too little to do? — which leads me to suspect that there may be more state pledges out there, but they are just showing up in the civics and history books.
How many more state pledges are out there? Got something to add? Read the rest of this entry »
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
4 Comments | Flag etiquette, Patriotism, Pledge to the flag, State flag | Tagged: Flag etiquette, Patriotism, State flag, state pledge of allegiance | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
Michigan has a state pledge of allegiance, too:
I pledge allegiance to the flag of Michigan, and to the state for which it stands, two beautiful peninsulas united by a bridge of steel, where equal opportunity and justice to all is our ideal.
Michigan’s law gives credit to the author, too: Harold G. Coburn. It’s in Act 175 of 1972.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
3 Comments | Flag etiquette, State flag | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
Manchester, New Hampshire, Union Democrat,
December 8, 1852 (?); with news of Fillmore’s State of the Union Address
Millard Fillmore was a grade school drop out. He took the path to a career that many in his day did — he apprenticed, and worked his way up. Legal education in his day (circa 1815 to 1825) required that one apprentice in a law office, to “read for the law.” In that way, Fillmore, who didn’t graduate elementary school, became a lawyer.
Lawyering requires words, of course, but Fillmore was no great writer than we know, especially compared to Teddy Roosevelt, who was a newspaper reporter, or John Kennedy, in whose name a Pulitzer Prize-winning book was published (controversy for another time; Profiles in Courage, (Perennial Classics Books, 2000). We might hope that some institution will undertake a collection of Fillmore’s legal arguments as they may be spread across New York court archives, much as the Lincoln Library has scoured Illinois for Lincoln’s writings and oral arguments.
We may assume that Fillmore participated heavily in the writing of his state of the union addresses, in a day when ghost writers were not listed in the staff books of the White House. So they would contain genuine Fillmore ideas and phrases. Fillmore’s three state of the union speeches are available at the Gutenberg Project.
I’ll be mining them for accurate quotes, you may rest assured. (Does he mention bathtubs in any of the speeches? No.) Read the rest of this entry »
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Leave a Comment » | Abraham Lincoln, Accuracy, Good Quotes, Millard Fillmore, Presidents | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
For many years my colleagues in Scouting and I have mused at the great lack of interest in flag etiquette. We have collected dozens of cases of improper flag display, usually by people who were trying to honor the flag and nation, but who went about it contrary to good taste or the flag code, or both.
A couple of days after President Ford’s death I posted a short reminder of what the flag code calls for, with a photo of a flag flying at half-staff over the White House — a photo taken in 2004, after the death of Ronald Reagan, but the only one I could find at the time. That post is by now, far and away the most popular post on this blog since we started it up last July. For the past few days the number of visits to that post continued to grow.
I don’t know why the post is so popular. I hope people are getting from it a touch of flag etiquette — that would be fitting an proper especially as a result of the funeral of Gerald Ford, supreme nice guy and Eagle Scout. But there it is.
Today I found that the White House had included a photo of the White House flag at half-staff on December 26, 2006, in honor of Gerald Ford. Here it is:
A reminder again: The flag should be hoisted quickly (as always), to the peak of the pole, and then be lowered solemnly to half-mast. When the flag is retired at the end of the day, it should be raised again to the peak, quickly, and then lowered solemnly.
See also:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
1 Comment | Boy Scouts of America, Flag etiquette, Gerald Ford, Presidents | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 9, 2007
David Parker at Another History Blog updates and corrects our information on state pledges of allegiance: Texas is not alone, Georgia also has a state pledge.
Georgia does not require students to say the pledge daily, however.
These provisions are often hidden away in state laws that do not index well at the legal sites I use, Findlaw.com and the Cornell University Law Library’s Legal Information Institute. Consequently, it’s quite possible I have missed other state pledges. If you know of any others, please let me know.
And, in the meantime, go check out Prof. Parker’s post. The details make the story, as always.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
2 Comments | Current History, Curricula, Flag etiquette, Law, Patriotism | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 8, 2007
Kentucky is shopping for a new state commissioner of education. The outgoing commissioner, cognizant of the legal failures of education agencies to insert ID into curricula during the past year, advised that the new person should not be an ID advocate.
Members of the Kentucky State School Board say it is not an issue. The story is here, in the Kentucky version of the Cincinatti Post.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Leave a Comment » | Accuracy, Bogus history, Creationism, Evolution, Intelligent Design, Science, Science and faith, State school boards | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 7, 2007
Millard Fillmore was born on January 7, 1800.
Fillmore was:
- The 13th President of the United States
- The first Chancellor of the university at Buffalo now known as the University at Buffalo, the State University of New York
- The “handsomest man I ever met” according to Queen Victoria
- Namesake of one of the earliest capitals of Utah, Fillmore, in Millard County
- Almost definitely NOT the person responsible for putting plumbing in the White House, especially for the first plumbed bathtub.
Happy birthday, Mr. Fillmore! We hardly know ye, still!
(Prof. Parker at Another History Blog worked to dog down the quote attributed to Fillmore that I mentioned Friday: “May God save the country, for it is evident that the people will not.” He could not confirm the quote, but at least as good and probably better, he offers a free history database. Go see.)
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
5 Comments | Accuracy, History, History blogs, Hoaxes, Millard Fillmore | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 7, 2007
Texas is a whole ‘nother place.
Flag etiquette is a concern of mine — no, not an obsession, despite the number of recent posts — and I try to stay alert to news on that front. Hangin’ with Scout leaders today I heard another one: Texas has a law that specifies how a soiled or tattered Texas flag should be retired.
U.S. flags should be retired in a respectful fashion, according to the non-binding U.S. flag code. Texas leaves a lot less up to the imagination or to chance. The law calls for a sober ceremony, but just in case you wonder, it also provides a suggested script for the ceremony, ending with the Texas Pledge. So far as I know, Texas is the only state that has a pledge of allegiance for the state flag, separate from the national Pledge of Allegiance (if you know of others, please tell!).
The state law, in all its glory is below the fold (at least, that portion dealing with the Texas flag retirement ceremony). Read the rest of this entry »
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
12 Comments | Flag etiquette, History, Patriotism, Texas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
January 5, 2007
Texas’ regular license plate features a Space Shuttle, some stars and a crescent Moon, but a lot of Texas 8th graders are foggy on just why. I hope kids living near Houston have a better idea, since the Houston Johnson Space Center is in their area. To most kids under the age of 20 in Texas, space exploration is not a part of Texas history. I had one student in class ask why it was that in the movie version of the Apollo 13 story, the astronauts said “Houston, we have a problem.”
The drive to get a private spacecraft into commercial use has at least one company using Texas as a base. Space exploration may once again become a current event item in Texas social studies classes.
Jeff Bezos’ company, Blue Origin, tested their space craft in November, and the tardy news is bustling around the internet — and present in print and broadcast media, too. That the story is so hot on the internet should be a cue to mass media that it’s time to start paying attention.
The company’s test site is in Culberson County, in far west Texas — far away from the giant media markets in San Antonio, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth. El Paso is the closest major market, and it’s in a different time zone from the rest of the state.
This space exploration group reverses NASA’s Houston-to-Cape Canaveral style of operations — Blue Origin is headquartered in Kent, Washington, closer to Bezos’ Amazon roots.
Blue Origin is hiring engineers, by the way.
Watch that space.
Tip of the old scrub brush to Futuresheet.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
3 Comments | Current History, Geography - Physical, History, Science, Space exploration, Texas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 