Sunday, May 24. 2015
Not Yours To Give - Davy Crockett on The Role Of Government (from: The Life of Colonel David Crockett, compiled by: Edward S. Elis, 1884)
A good story.
Thursday, May 14. 2015
Jack Barsky held a job at some of the top corporations in the U.S. and
lived a seemingly normal life -- all while spying for the Soviet Union
Tuesday, May 12. 2015
We recently linked Surber on Col. John Gunby. A history buff pal emailed this comment:
Saw your post about the colonel. Cowpens indeed was an interesting battle and a first class case study in the power of effective leadership and using an opponent's aggressive tendencies against him (mental jiu jitsu). The real hero there was Brigadier General Dan Morgan. He was a veteran of French and Indian War (shot through the neck, the bullet knocking out two teeth and exiting through his cheek), present at the disastrous siege of Quebec (where he served with honor and took the responsibility of surrendering when his commander was killed). He led a corps of riflemen at Saratoga (as a colonel) and then, sick and not promoted by Congress, went home to Winchester, Virginia, where his home, named Saratoga, still stands. He came out of retirement to defend the rebellion again during the calamitous situation in the South in 1780 and came up with the strategy that won at Cowpens. Among the British regiments that surrendered there was Fraser's Highlanders, the 1st battalion of the 71st regiment of foot. I own one of the 200+ Second Model Brown Bess muskets issued to that battalion, used as a foraging gun after the war.
Last week, B. and I walked the Cowpens battlefield alone with the chief park ranger on a beautiful sunny day (very unlike the January day the battle actually occurred). It was very evocative, as was the reality that practically no one visits the site anymore (history, what is history?).
The best book on the battle from a detailed perspective is A Devil of a Whipping: The Battle of Cowpens. If you would like to read it I will deliver it to your door.
Ninety Six, North Carolina, where Morgan later conducted a siege that failed through a lack of supplies, also is quite interesting. His engineer for that siege that that bridge guy: Thadeusz Kosciuszko (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadeusz_Ko%C5%9Bciuszko).
Morgan's superior at Quebec, Benedict Arnold, was wounded not killed.
Wednesday, April 15. 2015
I’m not going to paint this post with pictures or videos, but just let the words stand on their own. Today is Yom Hashoah, the day of remembrance of the millions of Jews singled out for slaughter in World War II and the heroes who fought back. Everyone says “never again”, but we all know that is a hollow pretense for almost all who say it. We have watched mass slaughters, including some specifically targeted against discrete ethnic or religious groups, and done little or nothing. As always, almost all say it’s not their business or they don’t want to get involved or similar. So, where does that really leave the Jews of Israel who are daily, openly threatened with extinction by MidEast fanatics who are gathering the means to do so, and getting closer? It leaves the Jews of Israel to do everything possible within its limited persuasion and power to protect itself. That’s the simple truth of the matter. And, the other simple truth of the matter is that the enemies of Israel have so infected this administration in Washington that it is speeding and easing the day of confrontation, in effect and in direct consequences of Washington’s weakness.
It is not surprising that some Jews in the US go along, either out of comforts or lack of ever actually feeling the wolf’s breath. There have always been such. And, although fate has not been kind to them in the past, they are an infection that is not due any excuses for their perfidy. These are simple truths. We will all face the violent outcome and consequences -- regardless of religion or national background -- either by fallout or the burning of our souls in the hell deserved for cowards. Or, we can be more forthright and outspoken and involved in doing all we can, really, to turn this administration away from utter capitulation and the prospective presidential candidates from any shadow of such policies.
Sunday, March 29. 2015
The genius of Anglo-American law and its relationship to individual freedom, property rights, capitalism, contracts, and equality under the law.
The above is a section from Alan Macfarlane's excellent, or should I say "magisterial" book, The Invention of the Modern World.
A quote from the section:
In relation to the economy, for example, Adam Smith placed ‘a due administration of justice’, alongside peace and easy taxes, as one of the three requisites for wealth. The other half of The Wealth of Nations are his recently discovered Lectures on Jurisprudence, first published in 1978. Smith wrote about how English law seemed in its certainty, its complexity and its concern with property to be ideally suited to be a foundation for commercial capitalism. He noted for that ‘there is no country in Europe, Holland itself non-excepted, of which the law is, upon the whole more favourable in this sort of industry.’1 He also writes of ‘that equal and impartial administration of justice which renders the rights of the meanest British subject respectable to the greatest, and which, by securing to every man the fruits of his own industry, gives the greatest and most effectual encouragement to ever sort of industry…
Wednesday, March 18. 2015
 A famous Cape-Codder, Lorenzo Dow Baker (scroll down a little for the story):
As the 8th & youngest child of a fisherman and his wife, Lorenzo grew up on a homestead on Bound Brook Island on the bay side of northern Wellfleet. When he was 6, his mother died and his dad married a widow with several children of her own. Needless to say, his was not an easy life. He was apprenticed to a fishing captain at age 10, became a cook on a fishing schooner at age 15 and was considered an outstanding fisherman at the age of 18. By age 20, he was captain of a fishing schooner and eventually owned his own fishing schooner, "Vineyard". He married his childhood sweetheart, Martha, when he was 21 and she was 17. They had 4 children, Lorenzo Jr., Joshua, Martha and Reuben. He was a devout Methodist and a devoted husband and family man. For nine years, he made his living as a sea captain and fisherman...
Read the rest of the story.
Friday, March 13. 2015
Driscoll.
I read that Fussell book. All of his war books, in fact. Besides war, his main focus was literary criticism but he did write Class: A Guide Through the American Status System
Wednesday, February 25. 2015
Annie Hall was on the other night. As a young teen, and to some degree even today, I remain a devoted Woody Allen fan. His personal issues, which are many, aside, he made some great films. I had forgotten this exchange, as the Alvy seeks to convince Annie to return to New York from Los Angeles:
Alvy: So what - you-you're not gonna come back to New York?
Annie: What's so great about New York? I mean, it's a dying city. You read Death in Venice.
Alvy: Hey, you didn't read Death in Venice till I bought it for ya.
Annie: That's right, that's right. You only gave me books with the word 'death' in the titles.
Alvy: That's right, 'cause it's an important issue.
Annie: Alvy, you're incapable of enjoying life, you know that? I mean you're like New York City. You're just this person. You're like this island unto yourself.
Alvy: I can't enjoy anything unless everybody is. If one guy is starving someplace, that puts a crimp in my evening.
Continue reading "New York is a Dying City"
Sunday, February 22. 2015
 J Christian Adams:
When President Obama cited the Crusades as an example of Christian bad behavior toward Islam, he wasn’t speaking with historical accuracy. But you’d never know that if you only know the conventional wisdom about the Crusades.
Instead of condemning ISIS barbarism as barbarism directed at Christians, Obama has sought to divorce the barbarism from theology. There are many reason for this, reasons covered by many others here at PJ Media and elsewhere. Among them is the fact that Obama and his movement see the world through such thick secular lenses that they are incapable of understanding the vast majority of the world (and the United States) that still sees the world through theological lenses.
Obama and his followers are a radical secular minority attempting to manage a theological world...
Saturday, February 14. 2015
From Good Wives: Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Northern New England, 1650-1750:
When Judith Somerby married Tristram Coffin in March of 1653, she was a widow with three children: Sarah, who was eight, Elizabeth, who was six, and Daniel, almost three. (Another son had died in infancy.) In the next sixteen years Judith gave birth to ten Coffin children, all of whom, remarkably, survived infancy. There is an almost saucy irony in the family name, as though some wind of Yankee humor had swept Puritan Newbury. Death seldom visited the Coffins.
By the time Judith's last baby was born in March 1669 she already had six grandchildren. From 1667 until her death in 1705 - twenty-eight years - at least one grandchild was born each year. In the most prolific period from 1686 to 1696, thirty eight infants were born, almost four a year. Judith's gravestone should probably be taken literally when its says she lived to see 177 descendants...
Thursday, February 12. 2015
Saturday, January 31. 2015
Northern North America, from Jacques Cartier's explorations (image changed to put north on top): "North is at the bottom:" Once Again We Learn That the Map is Not the Territory
Saturday, January 17. 2015
Now developed.
Here's how it was done in the Rescue Film Project
Thursday, January 8. 2015
I always wondered whatever happened to organ grinders. I'd never seen one in the US, except on cartoons or in old movies. I saw quite a few when I lived in London in 1983 (I have a picture of a particularly colorful one). I had no idea LaGuardia outlawed them, or his reasons for doing so. With the swipe of a pen, he outlawed a form of employment (beats the hell out of other forms of begging, if you ask me). But you can be assured, it was in the "best interest of the people" (and the monkeys!). I'm certain this is precisely how Mayor Bill feels about horse carriages. His views are the only ones that matter because nobody else really cares about those poor horses, right? It's in our best interest, of course. Below is a picture of one of the last legal organ grinders in NYC.
Tuesday, December 30. 2014
From Wikipedia, where I was doing some background research on various football teams:
In 1930, there were still many who questioned the quality of the professional game, claiming the college "amateurs" played with more intensity than professionals. In December 1930, the Giants played a team of Notre Dame All Stars at the Polo Grounds to raise money for the unemployed of New York City. It was also an opportunity to establish the skill and prestige of the pro game. Knute Rockne reassembled his Four Horsemen along with the stars of his 1924 Championship squad and told them to score early, then defend. Rockne, like much of the public, thought little of pro football and expected an easy win. But from the beginning it was a one-way contest, with Friedman running for two Giant touchdowns and Hap Moran passing for another. Notre Dame failed to score. When it was all over, Coach Rockne told his team, "That was the greatest football machine I ever saw. I am glad none of you got hurt." The game raised $100,000 for the homeless, and is often credited with establishing the legitimacy of the professional game for those who were critical.
The two things I find intriguing are: 1. There was a time that pro football was considered lower quality and intensity than college. 2. They raised $100,000 for the homeless during the Depression - essentially $1.4mm in today's dollars.
Not an insubstantial sum, it represented .6% of per capita government welfare spending in the New York area. Total government (federal, state, and local) spending in 1930 was $11.9bb and only $300mm was on welfare. By 1934, those totals were $12.8bb and $1.0bb. By 1940, the same figures were $20.4bb and $2.1bb.
For all the problems the NFL faces, there is still plenty to feel good about, though I don't think it would be easy to match that $1.4mm figure today, unless all the ticket receipts were just turned over.
Sunday, December 28. 2014
Bathing (and the lack thereof) in colonial New England
Wednesday, December 10. 2014
 As California struggles through its drought and we deal with a Nor'easter here in NYC, it's worth considering the amount of work that goes into supplying water for urban areas.
Sometime in 1996, I was scuba diving off the Outer Banks. Between dives, the boat captain and I had a conversation. His view was that in 20 years, water would be big business. I found that humorous, but as time passed, it struck me it has become a major industry. Or has it?
We spend little time considering something so basic, so essential, to life. It seems like something we don't really have to think about. Water is, after all, plentiful. But it takes considerable work to make it as plentiful as it is.
While water is handled as a public utility, the reality is there is a huge market for it and it is, as the captain suggested, big business. But it's always been big business, we just don't pay much attention to it because it's always available.
I had no idea the NY Public Library was built on the remains of the Croton Reservoir...
Walsh: Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown.
Sunday, December 7. 2014
Mrs. BD snapped this pic of one of the wonderful tiles in NYC's Astor Place subway station."In the mid-to late-19th century, the area was home to many of the wealthiest New Yorkers, including members of the Astor, Vanderbilt and Delano families"
Why beavers? Because John Jacob Astor, at one time the wealthiest man in America, made his fortune in beaver pelts (and wisely went on to invest his beaver wealth in NYC real estate).
Why the Waldorf-Astoria? Because Johann Jakob Astor was an immigrant from Waldorf, Germany.
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