Gault site: Clovis Man in Texas, 2008 dig

February 18, 2008

We owe a great debt to newspapers, especially those shunned by bloggers as MSM (“mainstream media”). This article in the Austin American-Statesman is a key exhibit.

While the minions and poobahs at the Texas Education Agency work to frustrate the teaching of evolution in science classes, real Texas scientists practicing real Texas science dig away at the Gault Site, an archaeological dig that recently has yielded 1.5 million artifacts from ancient Texans, Clovis Man, living 13,500 years ago.

So far nothing indicates any of these ancient people were Baptist or creationist. Surprisingly, perhaps, they didn’t play football, either.

Pamela LeBlanc, a digger at the site wrote the article in first person.

The pasture, named for the Gault family who once farmed the land, made its debut into professional archaeology in 1929 when J.E. Pearce, founder of the UT archaeology department, excavated here. Over the years, visitors could pay a fee to dig at the farm, hauling off what they found and leaving behind shallow craters.

Today, it’s considered the most prolific site of its kind. Gault has generated more than half of the excavated artifacts from the Clovis people, long considered the first human culture in America. Until recently, most archaeologists believed the Clovis came from Asia across the Bering Strait land bridge at the end of the last ice age about 13,500 years ago, walked down the ice-free corridor of Western Canada and slowly spread across the Americas.

Collins and others believe people arrived in the Americas much earlier, probably by boat along the North Atlantic and North Pacific shores. And they believe this site will help prove it. “What we’re trying to do here is expand on our knowledge of the peopling of the Americas,” Collins says.

Even better, you can volunteer to help out at the site, to dig for prehistoric information.

To volunteer at the Gault site, contact Cinda Timperley at ctimperley@austin.rr.com. Membership in the Gault School of Archaeological Research is not required to volunteer, but members have priority. Membership is $10 for students; $45 for adults; and $65 for families. The school also needs non-monetary donations of everything from equipment to electrical work. For more information, call 471-5982.

Not only does the Austin paper print news that sticks in the craw of Don McLeroy, they give details on how you can participate in making such news.

Newspapers. Gotta love ’em.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Remote Central.

Also see Pamela LeBlanc’s earlier story about Lucy in Houson.

Texas A&M undergrads at Gault site, Texas Archaeological Society photo

Texas A&M undergraduate diggers at Gault site, earlier; Texas Archaeological Society photo.

5 Comments | Anthropology, Archaeology, Education, Evolution, Prehistory, TEKS, Texas history | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

More carnivalia, stoned version

February 18, 2008

Oh, remember to check out the latest 4 Stone Hearth.  This carnival of archaeology was posted at Our Cultural World last week, its 34th outing.

John Hawks has a post featured about Neandertal’s roaming habits, all determined from a tooth.  Interesting archaeology, interesting anthropology, and just how can they tell all that from one tooth? Hawks’ blog has articles I’ll use in U.S. history, world history, psychology, and maybe economics.  One of the best things about 4 Stone Hearth is the way it points to outstanding sources.

Got a tagger in your classroom?  He (rarely a she) may be interested in ancient taggers — if we may call them that.

If you live on the Pacific coast, or in the Caribbean, should you worry about your local volcano?  A Very Remote Period Indeed pointed to a paper that suggests the hominids found at Dmanisi were a family killed by a volcanic eruption — perhaps your local volcano can help you become immortal, after a fashion?

Also featured is an article about language development at a blog I only recently discovered, Not Exactly Rocket Science.  It’s another blog worth watching.

Leave a Comment » | Anthropology, Archaeology, Geography - Physical, geology, Prehistory, Science, Weblogs | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Gresham’s Law: DDT disinformation crowds out facts

February 18, 2008

I love irony.

Henry VIII devised a novel way to save money. He ordered coins be minted containing silver, as during the reign of Henry VII, but he ordered that the purity of the silver be reduced. Edward VI continued the policy so that, by the time of the rule of Queen Elizabeth I, royal advisor and financier Sir Thomas Gresham observed that most of the old, high-silver content coins were out of circulation, hoarded by people against future inflation, allowing the lesser-valued money to circulate. Gresham told Elizabeth the bad money drove out the good money.

Sir Thomas Gresham (c. 1519 – 21 November 1579), British financier and advisor to Queen Elizabeth I and earlier regents. Portrait c. 1554 by Anthonis Mor

Sir Thomas Gresham (c. 1519 – 21 November 1579), British financier and advisor to Queen Elizabeth I and earlier regents. Portrait c. 1554 by Anthonis Mor.

The principle had been observed earlier by Aristophanes and others. It is known in modern economics as Gresham’s Law, since 1858 when British economist Henry Dunning McLeod decided to honor Gresham by naming the rule after him.

The bad drives out the good, the cheap drives out the more expensive, gossip drives out good information — the principle is widely observed in areas beyond economics.

And so it is that with regard to DDT, the good information about the dangers of DDT and the benefits of restricting use of the chemical has been driven out of the marketplace by bad information claiming DDT is safe, and ignoring the significant benefits reaped when massive use of DDT was stopped.

And here’s the irony: DDT-happy critics of good environmental policy now claim to be the good information driven out by the “bad” information of DDT’s harms. No kidding. A columnist named Natalie Sirkin, in a column delivering almost nothing but bad, vile information, says bad information drives out the good, never once noting the irony.

The defense of DDT was, from the beginning, a lost cause. A few of us vainly hoped that science would prevail. We soon found that Gresham ’s Law, which states that bad currency drives out good currency, applies to science as well as to economics.

No kidding it applies. Do a Google search for “DDT” today and you’ll find all over the internet the disinformation of Gordon Edwards’ ghost and junk science purveyor Steven Milloy. You will have a difficult time finding any solid study showing how DDT nearly killed off the American bald eagle, however, and you’ll have to do a targeted search to learn of any dangers of DDT — information on human toxicity is almost impossible to find, though it’s easy to find many recountings of Gordon Edwards’ bold drinking of a teaspoon of DDT before lectures.

(Natalie and Gerald Sirkin write for the American Spectator; at this writing, Google features warnings on all of their material at the time of this writing, saying the site host may try to insert “malicious software” on your computer — so I have not linked there. This problem should sort itself out, I hope.)

(The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) works to get a history of the agency up on the ‘net; a lot from the DDT ban era is now available at the EPA site for scholars; Milloy will not be happy to have factual rebuttal officially and easily available.)

Below the fold, I’ll offer a point-by-point rebuttal of the bizarre claims in favor of DDT and against the noble public officials who worked to restrict its use.

Read the rest of this entry »

8 Comments | Accuracy, DDT, Economics, Environmental protection, Geography - Physical, History, Junk science, Public health, Rachel Carson, Research, Science, War on Science | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Happy birthday, Frederick Douglass (a few days late)

February 17, 2008

Frederick Douglass didn’t know what day he was born — having been born a slave — so he picked a day, February 14. Timothy Sandefur at Freespace notes a new book on the way about Douglass, and a few other details.

Frederick Douglass

Douglass is to me the very model of an ideological reformer. He lived his beliefs 100 percent (even marrying a white woman in 1884; can you imagine?) and he, in his own words, agitated, agitated, agitated. But he was respectful, decorous, dignified, rebellious, and intelligent. He was eloquent and smart, but he knew the necessity of violence in some circumstances. And although he understood the need for occasional compromise, he compromised in the right way, never letting go of the ultimate vision and never letting his enemies forget that he knew why they were wrong, and that he would not rest until they were set right. Even then, his focus was not on defeating his opponents, but at getting to the right result. “The man who has thoroughly embraced the principles of justice, love and liberty,” he wrote, “like the true preacher of Christianity, is less anxious to reproach the world of its sins, than to win it to repentance. His great work on earth is to exemplify, and to illustrate, and to engraft those principles on the living and practical understandings of all men within the reach of his influence…. It is to snatch from the bosom of nature the latent facts of each individual man’s experience and with a steady hand to hold them up fresh and glowing, enforcing with all his power their acknowledgment and practical adoption.” That accurately describes Douglass’s own conduct in his life. He was a man of principles and a man of action.

Gotta note that for the calendar next year.

Years ago, the first significant piece I ever read on Douglass claimed that he was in the White House often enough to know his way around, and on more than one occasion was mistaken for President Lincoln by visitors unfamiliar with either man. It’s difficult to know how accurate such a claim could be, and I’ve not found it noted anywhere in the last decade or so. For my U.S. history class skeptics, however, I got a lucite cube that allowed two photos to be displayed, and displayed Douglass on one side and Lincoln on the other. Looking quickly, students often mistook which one was on display. I suppose such identity confusion is possible.

Douglass’s story is great inspiration, and a testament to the value of education. Every school kid should know it.

Resources:

Tip of the old scrub brush to Ed Brayton at Dispatches from the Culture Wars.

1 Comment | Abraham Lincoln, Biography, Civil Rights, Civil War, Heroes, History | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Meanwhile, back at the school: Carnival!

February 17, 2008

I always loved school carnivals. The elementary school versions always featured silly games and activities to appeal to kids of third grade mentality — right up my alley! Then I joined the PTA board at our kids’ elementary, and saw the numbers. The annual carnival took in several tens of thousands of dollars. A lot of that money bought new library books, some bought new science programs, all of it went for better education.

I really like a well-run carnival now.  Here are a few well-run carnival events.

Carnival of the Liberals #58 flew to England, at Liberal England. Double the posts, ten from England, ten from the Americas.  Geography and history teachers might be particularly interested in a post at Pickled Politics on whether Australia’s government will follow up with real action following their official apology to the continent’s aboriginals, for past mistreatment.

Will I ever catch up with the Carnival of Education? Teachers ought to browse this weekly — I haven’t looked at it weekly in the past month. Let’s go back to #155: Bluebird’s Classroom has a post about a teachable moment, involving her unit on weather, and the tornado warning that popped up during class. Pay particular attention to her use of the LCD projector and live television link. Odds are that your classroom can’t support such teaching, as mine cannot right now.

Hot 4 Teacher candy

The rest of Carnival of Education #155 plays out at Median Sib. But I’m much farther behind. #156 resides at Creating Lifelong Learners. #157 can be found at Colossus of Rhodey. #158 moves in at Instructify. That one features this post (from Creating Lifelong Learners) about using your iPod in class to high purpose. I’ll wager there is not a school of education in the U.S. that teaches iPod use as a tool of classroom control and educational excellence. This is why we need to read these on-line collections. (“Hot 4 Teacher” graphic borrowed from Instructify.)

2 Comments | Anthropology, Education, Education blogs, Education quality, History, Justice, Politics, Teaching, Technology in the classroom, War on Education, Weblogs | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Personal privilege

February 16, 2008

So, if you check the comments over at Neil Simpson’s blog, somebody asked about the post Simpson deleted, and Simpson answered:

  1. Marshall Art, on February 16th, 2008 at 8:56 pm Said:

    Hey, wasn’t there some environmentalist’s post here earlier? Someone defending Carson’s position? What happened?

  2. Neil, on February 16th, 2008 at 11:29 pm Said:

    That might have been the comment I deleted. I didn’t read the whole thing. The guy must have changed his email address, because my filter usually blocks him. He was the first guy I ever had to block for repeated inane arguments and personal attacks. I gave him a lot of chances but in the end he was just not worth the time to discuss anything with.

Didn’t read the thing? Heh. Figures. The comment reveals the depths of moral difficulty of the anti-Rachel Carson position — the position Simpson takes in the blog. Simpson can’t answer any of the criticisms.  No, I didn’t change my e-mail address — Simpson’s blog was just more loving of correcting dissent than Simpson.

Personal attacks? Bullbleep. Simpson thinks any correction is “a personal attack.” If one is chronically in error about the facts, and chronically belligerent about dealing with data, one gets a lot of corrections.

Here’s a challenge to Simpson: This blog is open. I’ll edit out only your profanities if you use them. But I’ll wager you can’t defend your position. I won’t go Joe Stalin on you the way you did on me.

Neil, you’re in error about Carson’s book. You’re wrong. You have a Christian duty to fix the errors. Bet you won’t.

Marshall Art, if you’re interested, you can read the remarks Simpson won’t read, here. Now you know why, in my opinion, he’s afraid to read them.  The comment isn’t even snarky, though heaven knows there’d be a right.

7 Comments | Accuracy, Censorship, DDT, Ethics, Malaria, Point of personal privilege, Rachel Carson | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Embarrassing lure of creationism

February 16, 2008

You know the syndrome: Someone is caught in a scandal relating to sex, and then they take an offer to pose nude for pornography, and end up merely as a naked embarrassment to everybody.

Same syndrome, but mercifully, without the nudism (yet): Creationists taking it just a bit too far. Two examples.

Example 1: Don McLeroy, newly appointed to the chair of the Texas State Board of Education, was embarrassed by the release of tapes of a talk he gave in a church, demonstrating for anyone who didn’t already know that he’s opposed to teaching science in biology, especially if that science involves evolution. Bad enough?

He’s posted a transcript of the tape on his own website. It almost appears he’s hoping for an appointment as a “fellow” of the Discovery Institute.

McLeroy may have posted the transcript to try to correct a statement the transcripts say he made: “”Remember keep chipping away at the objective empirical evidence.”

At McLeroy’s website, it’s listed like this: “Remember keep chipping away with the objective empirical evidence.” It’s a subtle difference, but it suggests McLeroy is ill-informed enough that he thinks there may be evidence to support creationism, rather than devious enough to urge the denial of reality. Bob, at Hot Dogs, Pretzels and Perplexing Questions, wrote:

I’m not quite sure what to make of all this. Was it a Freudian slip? Did he innocently misspeak? Or could it be that he edited the text after the fact? Either way, I don’t think it makes that much of a difference. They have no objective empirical evidence of their own to chip away with, just the objective empirical evidence they stubbornly attempt to chip away at, and to no avail. I’ll leave the discovery of any other discrepancies as an exercise for the reader, at least for now.

McLeroy shows no desire to appear neutral, as employees of TEA are now required to be toward science — or “neutered” toward science, as one might say.

Example 2: McLeroy’s Islamist partner, Adnan Oktar ( aka “Harun Yahya”), is a continuing embarrassment. This isn’t news, but I stumbled across the actual images he pirated — and they are impressive.

The Atlas of Creation purports to show that no evolution has occurred between a few fossil forms and modern forms of animals — therefore, Oktar concludes in his book, evolution could not have occurred at all. Oktar couldn’t sell the book, so he sent copies of the thing to school libraries across Europe, and then to selected people and school libraries across North America.

The book is beautifully printed and bound, with hundreds of full color plates — it must have cost a fortune to produce.

And so, Oktar had to make economies somewhere. He chose to plagiarize photos and not bother with lawyers to procure rights to print the photos. He also chose to abandon the use of fact checkers, it appears.

And so we get embarrassments, like Oktar comparing this caddis fly, below, to one caught in amber, and concluding there’s been no evolution. The problem, as you can plainly see from the photo I borrow from Forbidden Music, is that the “living” example is actually a fishing lure; Oktar has plagiarized a photograph of one of Graham Owen’s wonderul fishing lures.

Graham Owen's caddis fly fishing lure, mistaken by Adnan Oktar for a live fly

Jesus urged his followers to become “fishers of men.” McLeroy and Oktar have confused such imprecations, horribly, with the hoax P. T. Barnum line, that there’s a sucker born every minute.

Owen’s lures are designed to fool fish. If McLeroy and Oktar have their way, Texas school children may end up as ignorant as the fish, and as easily fooled.

213 Comments | Accuracy, Biology, Creationism, Plagiarism, Public education, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Textbook Selection, War on Education | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Sinclair Lewis on patriotism, the flag, and fascism

February 16, 2008

Oh, my.

Sun dog on US flag, Sinclair Lewis quote on fascism

When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross.

Sinclair Lewis

You can’t purchase the actual poster anywhere. It’s a photographic political cartoon. From our friends at Hot Dogs, Pretzels, and Perplexing Questions. (Bob, in Austin)

Did Lewis actually say that?  I’ve not sourced it yet.

Wave the flag for real:

Add to FacebookAdd to NewsvineAdd to DiggAdd to Del.icio.usAdd to StumbleuponAdd to RedditAdd to BlinklistAdd to TwitterAdd to TechnoratiAdd to Furl

4 Comments | Famous quotes, History, History and art, Patriotism, Quotes | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Epidemiologists sign on to Alma DDT conference

February 16, 2008

Meanwhile, back in reality, the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology signed on to cosponsor the conference on DDT’s effects on human health and the environment at Alma College in Michigan, set for March 14.

Logo for the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology

Logo for the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology

Religionists and conservative pundits won’t boycott the conference. But they won’t be there, either, I’ll wager. They don’t want to confuse their rants with the facts, you see.

Do we know any bloggers up Alma College way (Alma, Michigan, in the heart of the peninsula) who might attend the conference and provide hourly reports? Ed Brayton, are you close? Got a day to play blog journalist for a good cause?

1 Comment | Accuracy, DDT, Education, Environmental protection, Public education, Public health, Science | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Dangerous, anti-science, bigoted ignorance

February 16, 2008

Anti-science and anti-environment protection advocates appear to be ramping up their campaign to poison Africa with DDT. Whether it’s related to U.S. President George Bush’s last-gasp trip to Africa or something else, is difficult to determine.

The vicious campaign is popping up everywhere. Is there too much vitriol against sanity to be more than coincidence?

Religionist Neil Simpson’s poke in the eye of reason got me going this time. In “Dangerous environmentalism” he hits just about every false claim against environmentalists and every false claim for DDT in just a few paragraphs — he got it from Steve Forbes and repeated it without bothering to consider whether Forbes was engaging in ill-informed rant.

Steve Forbes doesn't know much about the history of DDT and malaria, but that never stops him from opining that others are dead wrong in what they do know.

Steve Forbes doesn’t know much about the history, science or law of DDT or malaria, but that never stops him from opining that others are dead wrong in what they do know.

The rant hits so many of the favorite punching bags of the modern angry white male bigot: Intellectuals (those scientists and environmentalists with their college degrees), women and women’s rights (Rachel Carson didn’t marry, and fought her way to prominence in fields men dominated), history (they wish it weren’t so, and if they repeat what they want history to have been, maybe Santayana’s Ghost will leave them alone — not that they are ever bothered by repeating historical error), race (never miss a chance to accuse scientists, environmentalists, intellectuals and other “liberals” with race bigotry), foreign aid (see, we can just poison Africa back to health — if you’d just stop sending them money for bed nets and good medical care, DDT is all they need).

This is the money line from Forbes:

Yet in one of history’s more murderously myopic ongoing actions, most advanced countries and international agencies discourage its use. Why? Blame Rachel Carson’s seismically influential–and now largely discredited–book, Silent Spring, first published in 1962. In it she blames DDT for imperiling birds and people, portraying it as a blight of almost biblical proportions. It ain’t so. As Dr. Elizabeth Whelan of the American Council on Science & Health once put it, there “has never been a documented case of human illness or death in the U.S. as a result of the standard and accepted use of pesticides.” The British medical journal The Lancet similarly notes that after 40 years of research no significant health threat from DDT has been found.

Count the errors:

  1. The treaty that regulates the phase out of long-lasting, environmentally-damaging and human-killing poisons has a carve-out provision that specifically allows the use of DDT for limited indoor use (see Annex B); this treaty was negotiated at the end of the 20th century, eight years ago [1999 taking effect in 2001]. It represents the official position of “advanced countries and international agencies.” The treaty position is exactly the opposite of Forbes’ claim. How many years behind is Forbes in his reading? one might wonder.
  2. No one has ever discredited any significant part of Rachel Carson’s book, Silent Spring. Exactly contrary to Forbes’ claim, the book was found to be scientifically solid by a specially-appointed group of science advisors to President Kennedy, in 1963 [full text of “Use of Pesticides,” here]; it was found solid by later research by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Discover Magazine recently noted that there are more than 1,000 follow-up references since 1962 that verify Carson’s work.*
  3. Carson’s book accurately noted the damage to birds — not a single incident she recounts has ever been seriously questioned. The stories have been distorted and wild claims made against the distortions — but there is not a single study anywhere which contradicts Carson’s claims about damage to birds. Carson worried about human health effects, but stopped far short of saying DDT kills humans. Subsequent research has won DDT a listing as a probable human carcinogen by all of the world’s most respected and conservative health agencies, every single one.
  4. Elizabeth Whelan’s career is built on slamming scientists and science. But apart from the dubious provenance of the source, look at what Forbes quotes her as saying. Never a death in the U.S. as a result of using DDT in the limited way it’s now used in the U.S. There have been deaths outside the U.S. (and my recollection is at least one in the U.S.); and the methods that have prevented deaths are the banning of DDT for broadcast use, and extremely limited use at any time. She’s right: No deaths can be attributed to the non-use of DDT. She doesn’t say DDT isn’t a poison, or that it is not carcinogenic. She doesn’t account for deaths outside the U.S. She doesn’t get close to accounting for damage to wildlife and African food supplies from DDT. Half-truth to whole lie.

(It is often useful to remind critics that DDT was not banned because of dangers to human health, but instead because of its damage to beneficial animals outdoors.  It’s also good to remind them that DDT was specifically reinserted into disease fighting by the EPA order in 1972 that banned DDT use on crops, only in the U.S.)

Then, with no sense for the irony, Simpson extols the virtues of mosquito netting.

Mosquito nets are another inexpensive solution. See Nothing But Nets if you want to help.

The Nothing But Net drive faces implicit opposition chiefly from interests who claim poisoning with DDT is a better idea.

One wishes critics of Rachel Carson would show a bit of Christian charity, calling for bed nets, but avoiding unjustified and misinformed calumny against Carson and environmentalists, who have labored intensively for 40 years to fight malaria.

One gets the idea it’s not malaria these pundits worry about.

A few words about totalitarianism below the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

88 Comments | Accuracy, DDT, Environmental protection, Junk science, Malaria, Rachel Carson, Religion, Science | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Europe is a country? Whom the gods destroy . . .

February 15, 2008

No.  Europe is not a country.
Was it Euripides who said, “Whom the gods destroy, they first make mad?”  Does stupid count as mad?  We might have some concerns for our nation.
I’ve told my history students they’d better know the answer to this one.  It will show up on the test. 

Also, see this story in the New York Times, “Dumb and Dumber:  Are Americans hostile to knowledge?”

Tip of the old scrub brush to the Wayback Machine.

8 Comments | Education success, Geography - Political, Humor, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Geography revolution, next wave: Ready in your classroom?

February 15, 2008

Depression presents a serious occupational hazard, moving back and forth between the classroom and business, classroom and internet. When do administrators and legislators get serious about catching up education?

Microsoft plans a product announcement at the end of this month. Rumors claim it’s a new version of Photosynth. Photosynth mades “3D” touring by computer possible for almost any destination.

I’ll wager not a single classroom in the nation is ready to make this work. If you disagree, I’d love to hear about the class that can make use of it.

System requirements for Photosynth won’t tax the computers that most high school gamers use, but they are beyond most of the classroom computers I’ve seen in the last five years.

Probably more to the point, curriculum designers in public schools don’t even have Google Earth on their horizons. Photosynth? I’ll wager it’s not even on the radar screens of GIS users in the nation’s Council of Governments (COGS).

Geography is an exploding discipline. GIS and computerized map programs make cell phone companies go, not to mention oil and gas exploration, coal mining, air pollution monitoring (for building new power plants, for example), and road building. GPS helps drive express shipping, and all other shipping. RFI and GPS together are revolutionizing retail.

You must know how to read a map just to get a job delivering pizza.

But 9th grade geography classes? The exciting stuff is absent today.

At the Texas Education Agency (TEA), officials fret about how to stop science from being taught in science classes, for fear the facts will skew the religious beliefs of their children. They need to worry about their children not even getting hired by the pizza delivery company for being ignorant of nature and science, and the maps that show them. In a competitive, technologically savvy world, inaction, dithering and damaging action by the TEA mean our kids won’t even have a prayer.

Relevant posts:

1 Comment | Classroom technology, Economics, Education, Education quality, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, Teaching, Technology, Technology in the classroom | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Marilyn Christian Gearing

February 14, 2008

A personal note: My cousin, Marilyn Christian Smith Gearing, died last night after fighting lymphoma. She was about 74.

Marilyn was the daughter of my father’s sister, Marion. Her father, Roland Christian, was a minister in the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, who traveled a lot. We saw him and my father’s sister about once a year, when they’d pass through our town. Other than that, we had little contact with my father’s family, and my cousins. (Isn’t that a great name for a preacher, by the way?)

So when I got to know Marilyn when I was an adult (and she about 20 years older than I), she was a constant bundle of surprises. We knew she was a nurse. Found out she was dean of nursing at Loma Linda University. Learned in one visit that she was a pilot once, the better to carry out public health missions for the State of Virginia.

Marilyn retired, and traveled. Taking up where her father left off, she’d drop in on my parents, unexpectedly, every year or so. In my father’s last two years, he was greatly pleased when she and her husband would drop in to sing at his bedside.

No, I didn’t take my own advice and debrief her fully on her life. Our history sources are leaving us. Call one of yours, today: Thank them for their contributions, and write down what you learn.

Some of Marilyn’s exploits were picked up in Loma Linda Nursing in 2003 — it’s in .pdf form, starting on page 16, with the cover photo.

Her husband, Walt, said there is a memorial service scheduled for February 16, 3:00 pm. at the University Church Chapel at 11125 Campus Street in Loma Linda, California.

More:

2 Comments | Family, Heroes, Personal, Point of personal privilege | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

America by Air, the promise of on-line history education

February 14, 2008

Looking for something else I found the Smithsonian Institution’s on-line history of air passenger travel in the U.S., America by Air.

I can easily see a time when a student with a computer terminal gets an assignment to look at some of the activities available at a site like America by Air, with on-line quizzes as the student progresses through the exhibits.

banner from Smithsonian exhibit, America by Air

How far away are we? Two questions: Does your school provide an internet-linked computer for each student? Do you have the software or technical support to give an on-line assignment and track results?

Teaching stays stuck in the 19th century, learning opportunities fly through the 21st.

Leave a Comment » | Airplanes, Classroom technology, Economics, Education quality, History, History images, History museums, On-line education, Technology in the classroom, Transportation, Travel | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Kia: Millard Fillmore down the drain

February 14, 2008

Millard Fillmore sent Commodore Matthew C. Perry to open trade with Japan, but his overtures and imprecations to trade proved less attractive to nearby Korea in 2008.

Kia Motors Co. appears to have sacked two executives responsible for the use of Millard Fillmore and Millard Fillmore soap-on-a-rope in the current Kia advertising campaign.

The 13th U.S. president was central to Kia’s upcoming “Unheard of President’s Day Sale,” honoring, in tongue-in-cheek fashion, the first commander in chief to have running water in the White House. The punchline of new TV ads promoting the sale is a soap-on-a-rope bust of President Fillmore; the automaker handed out the same soaps to reporters at its media dinner last week during the Chicago Auto Show.

New chairman not amused
But Byung Mo Ahn was not amused. The South Korea-born executive, who returned to Kia’s Irvine, Calif., headquarters nine days ago in the newly created position of chairman and group CEO of Kia Motors America and Kia Motors Manufacturing Georgia (the automotive plant currently under construction in West Point, Ga.), doesn’t like the current brand of humor in Kia’s ads, according to executives close to the matter. One of those executives said Mr. Ahn prefers to show the cars and trucks as serious contenders with good quality.

The offending ad:

Personally, I thought the offense of repeating the historical error about Fillmore and White House bathtubs was excusable for the courage to use Fillmore to advertise anything. You have to tip your back scrubbing brush to a company who thinks Americans have enough smarts to recognize historical humor, and who is brave enough to act on it.

(I wouldn’t exactly kill for one, but it sure would be nice to have one of those Millard Fillmore Soap-on-a-Rope thingies, for the Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub National Archives, of course. With my teacher’s salary, I ain’t paying the big bucks on eBay for one, either.  I’m sure the Smithsonian Institution, and the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society would love to have examples, too.)

Tip of the old scrub brush to Questioning Reality.

13 Comments | Accuracy, Business, History, History images, Humor, Millard Fillmore | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

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