Honoring heroes: Armed Forces Day 2007

May 19, 2007

1951 poster for Armed Forces Day

May 19, 2007, is Armed Forces Day. Fly your U.S. and state flags today.

Great Irony: The Defense Department website for Armed Forces Day is not exactly up to date, and suffers from lack of attention (just try to find events in your area from the page set up to do just that).

Which only makes the point: We have to support our troops — heaven knows the current government isn’t going to. Write a letter to the troops; join an event run by your local American Legion or Veterans of Foreign Wars — or an event to support the troops in a way the American Legion and VFW don’t support, but which is okay, too. Fly your flag. Do the right thing to honor those we send into harm’s way, for little pay and not enough thanks. (That site is much better maintained than the Armed Forces Day site.)

History stuff for classrooms, below the fold. Read the rest of this entry »

8 Comments | Ethics, Flag etiquette, Freedom - Political, Harry Truman, Heroes, History, Iraq, Patriotism, Presidents, War, World War II | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Celebrating April 19: Paul Revere, “shot heard ’round the world”

April 20, 2007

April 19. Does the date have significance? Paul Revere's ride, from Paul Revere House

Among other things, it is the date of the firing of the “shot heard ’round the world,” the first shots in the American Revolution. On April 19, 1775, American Minutemen stood to protect arsenals they had created at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, against seizure by the British Army then occupying Boston.

April is National Poetry Month. What have we done to celebrate poetry?

What have we done to properly acknowledge the key events of April 18 and 19, 1775?  Happily, poetry helps us out in history studies, or can do.

In contrast to my childhood, when we as students had poems to memorize weekly throughout our curriculum, modern students too often come to my classes seemingly unaware that rhyming and rhythm are used for anything other than celebrating materialist, establishment values obtained sub rosa. Poetry, to them, is mostly rhythm; but certainly not for polite company, and never for learning.

Poems slipped from our national curriculum, dropped away from our national consciousness.

And that is one small part of the reason that Aprils in the past two decades turned instead to memorials to violence, and fear that violence will break out again. We have allowed darker ideas to dominate April, and especially the days around April 19.

You and I have failed to properly commemorate the good, I fear. We have a duty to pass along these cultural icons, as touchstones to understanding America.

So, reclaim the high ground. Reclaim the high cultural ground.

Read a poem today. Plan to be sure to have the commemorative reading of “Paul Revere’s Ride” in your classes next April 18 or 19, and “The Concord Hymn” on April 19.

We must work to be sure our heritage of freedom is remembered, lest we condemn our students, our children and grandchildren to having to relearn these lessons of history, as Santayana warned.

Texts of the poems are below the fold, though you may be much better off to use the links and see those sites, the Paul Revere House, and the Minuteman National Historical Park.

Read the rest of this entry »

18 Comments | 1776, Accuracy, America's founding, Education, Famous Battles, Famous quotes, Heroes, History, Santayana's ghost, Teaching, TEKS | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

National embarrassment, national tragedy

April 17, 2007

Celebrate the hero, please.

He survived the Holocaust, arrested by the Nazis and sent to a concentration camp to die — he survived, instead. He survived the Communists, refusing to bow to demands he join the Communist party in post-war Romania; though a good engineer, his career was short-circuited by his stand on principle. He finally escaped Romania in 1978, emigrated to Israel, and then took a sabbatical to teach engineering at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. And he stayed on.

Yesterday, on Holocaust Remembrance Day, Liviu Librescu used his own body to jam the doors into his classroom, yelled at his students to leave through the windows, and gave up his life to a depressed kid bent on murder. Prof. Librescu was 76 years old. He was the oldest victim, and a hero.

Survived the Nazis, survived the communists. Died to the excesses of the Second Amendment and a culture that seems to create enough disturbed people to make mass murder a serious problem, not a rare event. Librescu was already a hero. It’s embarrassing he had to rise to heroic actions to protect his students. It’s embarrassing to us that he died the victim of an act of senseless violence.

It’s a national embarrassment. Survived the Nazis. Survived the communists. Killed by an out-of-control student with a gun in the U.S.

It’s a national embarrassment. What are we going to do about it?

12 Comments | Current History, Freedom - Political, Heroes, History, Holocaust, Leadership, War, World War II | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Richer historians, richer history: The Pulitzers

April 17, 2007

Columbia University unveiled the Pulitzer Prize winners yesterday.

In U.S. history, the prize went to The Race Beat:The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation, by Gene Roberts and Hank Klibanoff (Alfred A. Knopf). Cover, The Race Beat, Roberts & Klibanoff, Pulitzer 2007

Other finalists for U.S. History were: Middle Passages: African American Journeys to Africa, 1787-2005 by James T. Campbell (The Penguin Press), and Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War by Nathaniel Philbrick (Viking).

Roberts and Klibanoff share $10,000.

In Biography, the $10,000 first prize was awarded to The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher, by Debby Applegate (Doubleday).

Finalists for the biography prize included two other great books: John Wilkes: The Scandalous Father of Civil Liberty by Arthur H. Cash (Yale University Press), and Andrew Carnegie by David Nasaw (The Penguin Press).

In the category of general non-fiction, where evolution has triumphed over anti-science bigotry in recent years, history is rampant in 2007, also. The prize for general non-fiction was snagged by The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11″ by Lawrence Wright (Alfred A. Knopf). Other finalists for the general non-fiction prize were Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness by Pete Earley (G.P. Putnam’s Sons), and Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq by Thomas E. Ricks (The Penguin Press).  Cover, The Looming Tower

High school history and other social studies teachers would do well to read each of these winners and the finalists.  They will be significant additions to any serious history curriculum, or government, and perhaps economics.

2 Comments | Bill of Rights, Books, Civil Rights, Heroes, History, Iraq, Journalism, Justice, Leadership, School desegregation, War | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

History on the hoof: Richardson in North Korea

April 10, 2007

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, taking time out from his trailing presidential campaign to try to get remains of American soldiers from North Korea, appears to have won an agreement from North Korea to stop production of nuclear weapons.

1. Praise to the Bush administration for making necessary arrangements on financing.

2. Can we send Richardson to Iraq, Iran, Syria and Palestine? Soon?

More seriously, this is a key bit of history in process. High school teachers woud do well to watch newspapers over the next few days to gather stories which will reveal background from the Korean War, foreign policy history going back at least 30 years, and stories about nuclear proliferation which may come in handy for several years before textbooks can catch up.

Somewhere the ghost of Lloyd Bucher is smiling, I think.

7 Comments | Atomic Bomb, Cold War, Current History, Geography - Political, Heroes, History, Leadership, Nuclear weapons, Peace, War | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Tuskegee Airmen medal ceremony set for March 29

March 23, 2007

Tuskegee Airmen in Europe, Library of Congress photo

Congress voted to award the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor to the Tuskegee Airmen as a group. The ceremony is set for Washington, D.C., in the Capitol Rotunda, for March 29, 2007.

This is another great story of Americans, otherwise held down in their daily life, who rise to meet a monstrous challenge. They not only met the challenge but achieved a degree of triumph beyond what anyone had hoped. The story is a natural segue to the post World War II civil rights movement, and it fits nicely into studies of the war or studies of civil rights. News items around the time of the ceremony should update the history of the Tuskegee Airmen and provide good photos for classroom presentations.

“It’s sort of an open validation of the Tuskegee Airmen, that we fought stereotypes, overcame them and prevailed,” said Roscoe Brown, an 85-year-old Riverdale, N.Y., resident who graduated from the Tuskegee program in 1944. “This is the ultimate when your nation recognizes you.”

The gold medal, equivalent to the Presidential Medal of Freedom, is awarded to individuals or groups for singular acts of exceptional service and for lifetime achievement. The Tuskegee fliers will join a distinguished group of recipients that includes George Washington, Winston Churchill, Rosa Parks, the Wright brothers and former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., and Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., introduced identical bills in the House of Representatives and the Senate in 2005 to give the airmen the congressional medal. The Senate bill passed in October 2005 and the House followed in February 2006. President Bush signed the bill into law last April.

It is also a story of racism and bureaucratic bungling delaying appropriate recognition to heroes for 60 years.

Lee Archer, 87, of New Rochelle, is America’s first black flying ace.

“It shows the country is trying to right an old wrong,” Archer said. “I never thought we would get it, but we would have done it without any recognition … . My family is very excited. I am, too.”

Of the 994 black aviators who got their training at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama beginning in 1942, fewer than 385 are still alive. On March 4, Edgar L. Bolden, 85, who trained at Tuskegee and flew P-47s, died in Portland, Ore.

More information:

Tip of the old scrub brush to Resist Racism.

Leave a Comment » | Civil Rights, Current History, Curricula, Freedom - Political, Heroes, History, Leadership, Patriotism, War, World War II | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

“Penetration however slight”: More on a good and noble hoax – the U.S.S. Pueblo

March 9, 2007

1968 brought one chunk of bad news after another to Americans. The year seemed to be one long, increasingly bad disaster. In several ways it was the mark of the times between the feel-good, post-war Eisenhower administration and the feel-good-despite-the-Cold-War Reagan administration. 1968 was depressing.

What was so bad? Vietnam manifested itself as a quagmire. Just when Washington politicians predicted an end in sight, Vietcong militia launched a nationwide attack in South Vietnam on the Vietnamese New Year holiday, Tet, at the end of January. Civil rights gains stalled, and civil rights leaders came out in opposition to the Vietnam war. President Johnson fared poorly in the New Hampshire primary election, and eventually dropped out of the race for the presidency (claiming he needed to devote time to making peace in Vietnam). Labor troubles roiled throughout the U.S., including a nasty strike by garbage collectors in Memphis. It didn’t help to settle the strike that the sanitation workers were almost 100% African American, the leadership of Memphis was almost 100% white, and race relations in the city were not so good as they might have been – the strike attracted the efforts of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and Martin Luther King, Jr. – who was assassinated there in early April. In response, riots broke out in 150 American cities.

More below the fold, including the key confession to “penetration.” Read the rest of this entry »

6 Comments | 1968, Dissent, Elections, Free speech, Freedom - Economic, Freedom - Political, Heroes, History, Hoaxes, Space exploration, Vietnam | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

A fine, patriotic hoax — the U.S.S. Pueblo

October 8, 2006

Commander Lloyd Bucher

Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher and the Pueblo on the cover of Time Magazine, February 2, 1968 (substituted for the official portrait of Bucher, which is no longer available)

A good hoax? It could happen, right?

It did happen.

A U.S. spy ship, the U.S.S. Pueblo, under the command of Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher, was captured by North Korea on January 28, 1968 — the beginning of a very bad year in the U.S. that included Viet Cong’s Tet Offensive that revealed victory for the U.S. in Vietnam to be a long way off, the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., the assassination of presidential candidate Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, riots during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, a bitter election — and a wonderful television broadcast from astronauts orbiting the Moon on Christmas Eve.

North Korea held the crew of the Pueblo for eleven months. While holding the crew hostage — there was never any serious thought that the ship had in fact strayed into North Korean territorial waters, which might have lent some legitimacy to the seizure of the ship — North Korea (DPRK) tried to milk the event for all the publicity and propaganda possible. Such use of prisoners is generally and specifically prohibited by several international conventions. Nations make a calculated gamble when they stray from international law and general fairness.

To their credit, the crew resisted these propaganda efforts in ways that were particularly embarrassing to the North Koreans. DPRK threatened to torture the Americans, and did beat them — but then would hope to get photographs of the Americans “enjoying” a game of basketball, to show that the Americans were treated well. The crew discovered that the North Koreans were naive about American culture, especially profanity and insults. When posing for photos, the Americans showed what they told DPRK was the “Hawaiian good luck sign” — raised middle fingers. The photos were printed in newspapers around the world, except the United States, where they were considered profane. The indications were clear — the crew was dutifully resisting their captors. When the hoax was discovered, the Americans were beaten for a period of two weeks. Read the rest of this entry »

39 Comments | 1968, Cold War, Heroes, History, History images, Hoaxes, Justice, Korea, veterans, Vietnam | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Ann Richards, you warned us

September 14, 2006

 

Former Texas Gov. Ann Richards, and a sample of a Texas barbecue rib. Photo by Elecro-Fish Media (Austin, Texas)

Ann Richards died yesterday. It’s sad for me to think what might have been, had she been able to hold off one more charge by the Texas Republicans, had she defeated George Bush in her second campaign for governor of Texas.

Gov. Richards was a gracious and graceful woman who was simply fun to know — while quietly and forcefully inspiring others to do good deeds. In a former time, a candidate who defeated someone like Richards would have the good sense to keep her in government in some capacity, just for her wisdom and experience. It will be a tribute to Richards when civility is returned to politics.

Ann Richards was a public school teacher, clearly of the highest caliber. We can only hope there are more like her teaching in Texas schools today.

Update, September 17, 2006: Molly Ivins, perhaps America’s best political columnist, was a close friend of Ann Richards. Her column well reflects the special qualities of Richards, why we will miss her so badly, and why we should worry that there are so few like her around today.

 

1 Comment | Heroes, History, Leadership, Politics, Teaching, Texas | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Joe Rosenthal – Iconic Iwo Jima photo revealed a lot about war and Americans

August 22, 2006

Photo by Joe Rosenthal, Associated Press

 

Joe Rosenthal died. He took the photo of the U.S. flag-raising atop Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima that became an icon of the Pacific War, of dedication to duty, and of the deeper, sometimes darker currents of war and life in the U.S.

The Los Angeles Times captured the basics of the story, noting that the photo Rosenthall took was the second raising of a larger flag, a smaller one having been raised a bit earlier. (Other worthwhile stories include those in the Seattle Times, Scotsman.com, and The San Francisco Times.)

Mt. Suribachi, though little more than a large mound on the island, is the highest point there and visible all around the island. The raising of the flag on that spot was a morale booster for U.S. troops and a morale-buster for holdout Japanese troops engaged in one of the nastiest, bloodiest battles of a nasty, bloody war. As the LA Times noted, a third of all U.S. Marines to die in the war died on Iwo Jima: 5,931. Nearly 7,000 U.S. servicemen died, in total — and, fighting to the death from deeply hidden tunnels, nearly all of the Japanese defenders died. Read the rest of this entry »

8 Comments | Atomic Bomb, Famous Battles, Flag ceremony, Flag etiquette, Heroes, History, Patriotism, World War II | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

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