Since the death of Radio Free Texas, banned books take on even more importance in the history of freedom and free thought, in Texas.
This is the state where, still, even the governor and the State Board of Education carry on unholy crusades against books and ideas, like evolution, racial equality, and voting rights. Moyers knows what he’s talking about.
It’s almost gone, and I haven’t even posted on it yet: Happy Banned Books Week!
We’re celebrating this week from September 30 to October 6 — you’ve got two more days.
Can you identify each of these banned books?
Courtesy of Bookman’s, a book store in Arizona.
A two-minute video produced by Bookmans, an Arizona bookstore, is helping launch a national read-out from banned and challenged books that is being held on YouTube in conjunction with Banned Books Week, the national celebration of the freedom to read (Sept. 30-Oct. 6). The video presents Bookmans’ customers and staff urging people “to turn on the light” by celebrating freedom of expression. With light bulbs burning brightly above their heads, each of them reads a single line from a banned or challenged book that testifies to the importance of reading, books and freedom of speech. “It is a wonderfully creative and inspiring video,” said American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression President Chris Finan. “We hope all supporters of Banned Books Week will use social media to share it with their friends and the rest of the world, giving a big boost to this year’s read-out.” More than 800 people posted videos on YouTube during Banned Books Week last year. More information about the read-out, including updated criteria and submission information, is available here.
Hidalgo himself was captured by the Spanish in 1811, and executed.
Statue of Father Hidalgo in Dolores, Mexico.
It’s a great story. It’s a good speech, what little we have of it (Hidalgo used no text, and we work from remembered versions). It’s important to Texas history, too — it’s difficult to imagine Tejians getting independence from Spain in quite the same way they won it from Mexico.
Why isn’t there a good 10- to 15-minute video on the thing for classroom use? Get a good actor to do the speech, it could be a hit. Where is the video when we need it?
Update from 2008: Glimmerings of hope on the video front: Amateur videos on YouTube provide some of the sense of what goes on in modern celebrations.
The Grito de Dolores (“Cry of/from Dolores”) was the battle cry of the Mexican War of Independence, uttered on September 16, 1810, by Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, a Roman Catholic priest from the small town of Dolores, near Guanajuato, Mexico.
“My Children, a new dispensation comes to us today…Will you free yourselves? Will you recover the lands stolen 300 years ago from your forefathers by the hated Spaniards? We must act at once.”
Although many mistakenly attribute the Cinco de Mayo holiday as the celebration of Mexican independence, Sept. 16 was the day the enthusiastic Indian and mestizo congregation of Hidalgo’s small Dolores parish church took up arms and began their fight for freedom against Spain.
Portals to the World contains selective links providing authoritative, in-depth information about the nations and other areas of the world. Resources on Mexico include information on the country’s history, religion, culture and society to name a few.
September is also a notable month for Hispanic culture with the celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month Sept 15 – Oct. 15. Sept. 15 is significant because it is the anniversary of independence for Latin American countries Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition to Mexico’s independence day on Sept. 16, Chile recognizes its independence day Sept.18. Also, Columbus Day or Día de la Raza, which is Oct. 12, falls within this 30-day period.
The theme for the 2009 Hispanic Heritage Month was “Embracing the Fierce Urgency of Now!” To coincide with the celebration, the Library and several partners present a website honoring Hispanic culture and people. [Nice idea, calling it “Heritage Month” instead of “History Month;” maybe we can change February to “Black Heritage Month,” and study Hispanic and black history every day.]
Specifically on the Grito de Dolores, see the Library of Congress’s American Memory Project:
Cry of Dolores
My Children, a new dispensation comes to us today…Will you free yourselves? Will you recover the lands stolen three hundred years ago from your forefathers by the hated Spaniards? We must act at once.Cry of Dolores, attributed to Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, September 16, 1810.
Early on the morning of September 16, 1810, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla summoned the largely Indian and mestizo congregation of his small Dolores parish church and urged them to take up arms and fight for Mexico’s independence from Spain. His El Grito de Dolores, or Cry of Dolores, which was spoken—not written—is commemorated on September 16 as Mexican Independence Day.
Father Hidalgo was born into a moderately wealthy family in the city of Guanajuato, northwest of Mexico City, in 1753. He attended the Jesuit College of San Francisco Javier, received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Mexico in 1774, and was ordained into the priesthood in 1778. He soon earned the enmity of the authorities, however, by openly challenging both church doctrine and aspects of Spanish rule by developing Mexican agriculture and industry.
In 1803, Hidalgo accepted the curacy of the small parish of Dolores, not far from his native city of Guanajuato. Between 1803 and 1810, he directed most of his energy to improving the economic prospects of his parishioners. He also joined the Academia Literaria, a committee seeking Mexico’s independence from Spain.
In September 1810, Spanish authorities learned of the group’s plot to incite a rebellion. On September 13, they searched the home of Emeterio González in the city of Queretaro where they found a large supply of weapons and ammunition. Warned of his impending arrest, Hidalgo preempted authorities by issuing the ElGrito de Dolores on the morning of September 16. Attracting enthusiastic support from the Indian and mestizo population, he and his band of supporters moved toward the town of San Miguel.
The rebel army encountered its first serious resistance at Guanajuato. After a fierce battle that took the lives of more than 500 Spaniards and 2,200 Indians, the rebels won the city. By October, the rebel army, now 80,000 strong, was close to taking Mexico City. Hidalgo, fearful of unleashing the army on the capital city, hesitated, then retreated to the north. He was captured in Texas, then still a part of the Spanish empire, and executed by firing squad on July 31, 1811. After ten more years of fighting, a weakened and divided Mexico finally won independence from Spain with the signing of the Treaty of Córdoba on August 24, 1821.
Learn more about Mexico:
View the Huexotzinco Codex, one of the Top Treasures in the Library of Congress’ American Treasures online exhibition. The codex is an eight-sheet document on amatl,a pre-European paper made from tree bark in Mesoamerica. It is part of the testimony in a legal case against representatives of Spain’s colonial government in Mexico and dates to 1531, ten years after Mexico’s defeat.
Read the Today in History feature on the Mexican holiday Cinco de Mayo, which celebrates Mexico’s defeat of French troops at the town of Puebla in 1862. This event is also widely celebrated by Latinos in the U.S.
Hispanic Heritage Month.gov, from the Library of Congress, National Gallery of Art, National Endowment for the Humanities and several other federal agencies and institutions
To locate resources for the study of Mexico and its history, search the Handbook of Latin American Studies, an online bibliography of works selected and annotated by scholars of Latin American history and culture, or visit the Hispanic Reading Room, which also offers a portal for online information on Mexico.
Not a chess game that really happened, but a virtual chess game with the highest stakes ever:
Caption from George Mason collection: In this game Stalin‘s main opponent would be Harry Truman, the board Germany, and the opening gambit would occur in Berlin. Image by Leslie Illington. Source: National Library I of Wales.
Stalin’s pieces include “Eastern Bloc,” and “Berlin Blockade.” Trumans pieces include a knight, “Air Lift,” and a piece looking a lot like Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, “Atlantic Alliance.”
But as part of a wider reform programme introduced by President Thein Sein, the old media rules have gradually been relaxed. For several months many editors have no longer been required to submit articles for prepublication censorship on such subjects as the economy. The latest announcement removes the need to submit articles on more sensitive topics, such as politics or Myanmar’s ethnic conflicts.
The country’s journalists welcome the news, but they also give warning that this by no means ends restrictions on press freedom. These remain numerous and burdensome. In particular, two bits of repressive legislation remain: the Printers and Publishers Registration Act, dating from the start of military rule in 1962, and the 2004 Electronic Transactions Law. Under the first, publications can lose their licences if they supposedly harm the reputation of a government department, threaten peace and security, and much else. Under the second, a person can be imprisoned for up to 15 years for distributing via the internet information that the courts deem harmful to the state. Meanwhile, the censor board itself seems likely to remain in business, ready to punish reporters or editors who overstep the mark.
Residents of Berlin awoke on August 13, 1961, to discover that the Soviet-dominated East Germany had begun constructing a wall across Berlin, to keep East Berlin residents from escaping the clutches of communism and walking to freedom in West Berlin.
This year I saw a mock up of part of the Berlin Wall next to an exhibit honoring Winston Churchill at the Trout Museum of Art in Appleton, Wisconsin. A few days later I saw actual portions of the wall, mounted for permanent display at the National Churchill Museum on the Churchill Center in Fulton, Missouri. A few days later, I saw more sections of the wall, with one of the 300+ guard towers, at the Newseum, in Washington, D.C. On Each occasion I was reminded of my own trip to the Wall in 1987, finding next to the boarded-up Reichstag eight wreaths, honoring the eight people who were known to have died trying to cross the wall in the previous six months.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall. That something is freedom.
Think American Institute. “We’re Fighting to Prevent This.” Rochester, New York: Kelly Read, 1943. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress
Both Republicans and Democrats might make a claim on this poster, today.
Propaganda for patriots, from World War II, from collections now held by the Library of Congress.
Today, June 15, 2012, is the 797th anniversary of the signing of the Magna Carta. The document laid a foundation for freedom, almost 800 years ago, upon which we stand today.
What event critical to western history and the development of the democratic republic in the U.S. happened here in 1215?
A teacher might use some of these photos explaining the steps to the Constitution, in English law and the heritage of U.S. laws. Other than the Magna Carta, all the events of Runnymede get overlooked in American studies of history. Antony McCallum, working under the name Wyrdlight, took these stunning shots of this historic meadow. (He photographs stuff for studies of history, it appears.)
Maybe it’s a geography story.
View of Runnymede Meadow from Engham Village — Wyrdlight photo through Wikimedia
Several monuments to different events of the past millennium populate the site. The American Bar Association dedicated a memorial to the Magna Carta there — a small thing open to the air, but with a beautiful ceiling that is probably worth the trip to see it once you get to England.
Wikipedia explains briefly, with a note that the ABA plans to meet there again in 2015, the 800th anniversary of the Great Charter:
Magna Carta Memorial
The Magna Carta Memorial & view towards the ‘medes’
Engraved stone recalling the 1985 ABA visit
Situated in a grassed enclosure on the lower slopes of Cooper’s Hill, this memorial is of a domed classical style, containing a pillar of English granite on which is inscribed “To commemorate Magna Carta, symbol of Freedom Under Law”. The memorial was created by the American Bar Association to a design by Sir Edward Maufe R.A., and was unveiled on 18 July 1957 at a ceremony attended by American and English lawyers.[5]
Since 1957 representatives of the ABA have visited and rededicated the Memorial renewing pledges to the Great Charter. In 1971 and 1985 commemorative stones were placed on the Memorial plinth. In July 2000 the ABA came:
to celebrate Magna Carta, foundation of the rule of law for ages past and for the new millennium.
In 2007 on its 50th anniversary the ABA again visited Runnymede and during the convention installed as President Charles Rhyne who devised Law Day which seeks in the USA an annual reaffirmation of faith in the forces of law for peace.
The ABA will be meeting at Runnymede in 2015 on the 800th anniversary of the sealing of the original charter.
The Magna Carta Memorial is administered by the Magna Carta Trust, which is chaired by the Master of the Rolls.[10]
In 2008, flood lights were installed to light the memorial at night, but due to vandalism they now lie smashed.
I’ll wager the lights get fixed before 2015.
Detail of ceiling of the Magna Carta Memorial detailing play of light, and star pattern, Runnymede – Wikimedia image
I would have sworn I had posted this earlier. I can’t find it in any search right now.
So, here it is:
Hans Rosling does a program on BBC showing, among other things, great data displays. In this one he shows how the development of trade and free enterprise economics lifted most of the world out of dismal, utter poverty, over the course of 200 years.
“200 countries, 200 years, in 4 minutes – the Joy of Statistics”
How can you use this in the class, world history teachers? Economics teachers? Does freedom mean you can get rich? Or does getting rich mean you get freedom? Can a nation achieve riches without freedom, or freedom without riches?
More about this programme: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00wgq0l
Hans Rosling’s famous lectures combine enormous quantities of public data with a sport’s commentator’s style to reveal the story of the world’s past, present and future development. Now he explores stats in a way he has never done before – using augmented reality animation. In this spectacular section of ‘The Joy of Stats’ he tells the story of the world in 200 countries over 200 years using 120,000 numbers – in just four minutes. Plotting life expectancy against income for every country since 1810, Hans shows how the world we live in is radically different from the world most of us imagine.
Designed to promote democracy versus communism, and free enterprise (capitalism) over communism’s totalitarian governments then in vogue in the Eastern Bloc, this film was targeted to young college students who did not have the opportunity to fight for freedom in World War II. “Make Mine Freedom” was produced by Harding College in 1948, preserved by the Prelinger Archives.
Is it a bit heavy handed? Is this an accurate portrait of economic or political freedom? Are the characters in this animated short movie quite stereotyped?
In Blogylvania, the movie has been seized on as a sort of parable for our times. Thosebloggerswhosayitisaparablesee a lot more in the movie than I do. Almost any Lewis Hine photograph of child labor should be a good rebuttal. Some say it seemed far-fetched in 1948 (then why did anyone bother to make it?). It’s much, much more far-fetched now.
It’s a good departure point for discussions about propaganda in the Cold War.
Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment. Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.
Intellectual freedom—the freedom to access information and express ideas, even if the information and ideas might be considered unorthodox or unpopular—provides the foundation for Banned Books Week. BBW stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints for all who wish to read and access them.
The books featured during Banned Books Week have been targets of attempted bannings. Fortunately, while some books were banned or restricted, in a majority of cases the books were not banned, all thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, booksellers, and members of the community to retain the books in the library collections. Imagine how many more books might be challenged—and possibly banned or restricted—if librarians, teachers, and booksellers across the country did not use Banned Books Week each year to teach the importance of our First Amendment rights and the power of literature, and to draw attention to the danger that exists when restraints are imposed on the availability of information in a free society.
Remember that the weekend was a Crazy Liberal Idea™, and that union men and women died for the right to have them.
See this and more at PoliticalLoudmouth.com
Text of the poster: “The weekend was a crazy liberal idea. In 1886, 7 union members in Wisconsin died fighting for the 5-day work week, and 8-hour work day.”
August keeps handing us these dates: How should the 50th anniversary of the construction of the Berlin Wall be remembered?
AP reports in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that the current mayor of Berlin said we must use the Wall to remember that we must stand up for democracy. Ceremonies in Berlin marked the anniversary and the creation of a new museum there. I wrote before:
August 13 . . . [marks the 50th] “anniversary” of the erection of the Berlin Wall, the totem of the Cold War that came down in 1989, pushing the end of the Cold War. Residents of Berlin awoke on this day in 1961 to find the communist government of East Germany erecting what would become a 96-mile wall around the “western quarters” of the city — not so much to lay siege to the westerners (that had been tried in 1948, frustrated by the Berlin Airlift) as to keep easterners from “defecting” to the West. The Brandenburg Gate was closed on August 14, and all crossing points were closed on August 26.
From 1961 through 1991 1989, teachers could use the Berlin wall as a simple and clear symbol for the differences between the communist Eastern Bloc, the Soviet Union and her satellite states, and the free West, which included most of the land mass of Germany, England, France, Italy, the United States and other free-market nations — the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries. I suspect most high school kids today know very little about the Wall, why it was there, and what its destruction meant, politically.
This era of history is generally neglected in high school. Many courses fail to go past World War II; in many courses the Cold War is in the curriculum sequenced after the ACT, SAT and state graduation examinations, so students and teachers have tuned out.
But the Wall certain had a sense of drama to it that should make for good lessons. When I visited the wall, in early 1988, late at night, there were eight fresh wreaths honoring eight people who had died trying to cross the Wall in the previous few weeks (in some places it was really a series of walls with space in between to make it easier for the East German guards to shoot people trying to escape) — it’s an image I never forget. Within a year after that, East Germans could travel through Hungary to visit the West, and many “forgot” to return. Within 18 months the wall itself was breached.
The Wall was a great backdrop for speeches, too — President John F. Kennedy visited Berlin in June 1963, and expressed his solidarity with the walled-in people of both West and East Berlin, with the memorable phrase, “Ich bin ein Berliner,“ which produced astounding cheers from the tens of thousands who came to hear him. There are a few German-to-English translators who argue that some of the reaction was due to the fact that “Berliner” is also an idiomatic phrase in Berlin for a bakery confection like a jelly doughnut — so Kennedy’s words were a double entendre that could mean either “I am a citizen of Berlin,” or “I am a jelly doughnut.” [Be sure to see the comments . . . from Vince Treacy (9/28/2010).] Ronald Reagan went to the same place Kennedy spoke to the Berlin Wall, too, to the Brandenburg Gate, in his famous June 1987 speech which included a plea to the Soviet Union’s Premier Mikhail Gorbachev: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
What do we do appropriately with such memory?
What does the Berlin Wall, and its demise, mean to us today? What should it mean?
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Some of the more astute students in our high school classes ask questions about everything. For example, they ask: “What does the Pledge of Allegiance mean, when it says, ‘ . . . and to the Republic for which it stands?'”
Is the Pledge all that important? Is the flag all that important?
Maybe. How would you answer that question, really?
Penn and Teller offer a demonstration:
What do you think? Did they burn a flag? Should that sort of performance be legal?
What if Penn and Teller burned a flag in the White House?
An exercise in ambiguity: A fictional drama about a sleight of hand, illusionary performance. (Best line: The answer to the question, “Did you go to law school?” For the record, yes, I did go to law school. I’m an amateur clown.)
Or, until that account is unsuspended by the forces supporting Donald Trump: Follow @FillmoreWhite, the account of the Millard Fillmore White House Library
We've been soaking in the Bathtub for several months, long enough that some of the links we've used have gone to the Great Internet in the Sky.
If you find a dead link, please leave a comment to that post, and tell us what link has expired.
Thanks!
Retired teacher of law, economics, history, AP government, psychology and science. Former speechwriter, press guy and legislative aide in U.S. Senate. Former Department of Education. Former airline real estate, telecom towers, Big 6 (that old!) consultant. Lab and field research in air pollution control.
My blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub, is a continuing experiment to test how to use blogs to improve and speed up learning processes for students, perhaps by making some of the courses actually interesting. It is a blog for teachers, to see if we can use blogs. It is for people interested in social studies and social studies education, to see if we can learn to get it right. It's a blog for science fans, to promote good science and good science policy. It's a blog for people interested in good government and how to achieve it.
BS in Mass Communication, University of Utah
Graduate study in Rhetoric and Speech Communication, University of Arizona
JD from the National Law Center, George Washington University
Posted by Ed Darrell 
![Viva la república! Viva el Cura Hidalgo! Una página de Gloria, TITLE TRANSLATION: Long live the republic! Long live Father Hidalgo! A page of glory. Between 1890 and 1913. Prints and Photographs Division. Reproduction Information: Reproduction Nos.: LC-USZ62-98851 (b&w film copy neg.), LC-DIG-ppmsc-04595 (digital file from original, recto), LC-DIG-ppmsc-04596 (digital file from original, verso); Call No.: PGA - Vanegas, no. 123 (C size) [P&P] Catalog Record: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/ppmsc.04595](http://www.loc.gov/wiseguide/sept09/images/Mexican_A.jpg)
![A street in Guanajuato, Mexico. Between 1880 and 1897. Prints and Photographs Division. Reproduction Information: Reproduction No.: LC-D418-8481 (b&w glass neg.); Call No.: LC-D418-8481 <P&P>[P&P] Catalog Record: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/det.4a27131](http://www.loc.gov/wiseguide/sept09/images/Mexican_B.jpg)
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 