He Was Being Progressive

Theodore Roosevelt’s hand picked successor William Howard Taft turned out to be not the President that Roosevelt had expected. So Roosevelt had a change of opinion and decided that he wanted to have another term as President and ran as a candidate for the Republican Party in 1912.

On June 22, 1912 at the Republican National Convention held in Chicago, the party decided that the Presidential incumbent should run for reelection. Roosevelt and his supporters left the convention that evening and by August the Progressive Party was form with Roosevelt as their nominee. Many called the party the Bull Moose Party because of Roosevelt.

Roosevelt was not the only person to run for office under the Progressive banner. A number of US House of Representatives and Senate seat had Progressive candidates with a number of winners.

Woodrow Wilson was the candidate for the Democratic Party and he won the election. Roosevelt was second with President Taft coming in a distant third. There are varying opinions on whether the fracture of the Republican Party gave Wilson the election most say that the Democrats had nominated their own progressive candidate and Wilson would have won regardless.

The 1914 elections found a number of offices with Progressive candidates, but the party was already in a decline and few won. When Roosevelt refused to accept the party’s nomination for President in 1916, it was the end of the short lived Progressive Party.

Two other times there has been candidates for President for a Progressive Party. The first was in 1924 when Robert M. LaFollette, Sr. ran as a Progressive. This Progressive Party could be considered a by-product of Roosevelt’s Progressive Party while when Henry A. Wallace ran as a Progressive in 1948 there were no connections.

Top Movies of 1973

Clint Eastwood returns as Dirty Harry Callahan in Magnum Force. And like all of the Dirty Harry movies there is a catch line or sentiment that appears throughout the film. In this one it was, “A man has to know his limitations”.

The story of star-crossed lovers played by Robert Redford and Barbra Streisand is the plot of The Way We Were. The movie was not really what script writer Arthur Laurents thought was a good version of his screenplay. It played more on the romantic elements than the political elements he wrote. Still it was a very popular film at the box office and considered by film goers one of the most romantic films of all time. The film score by Marvin Hamlish and its title song by Hamlish and Alan and Marilyn Bergman swept the Academy Awards music categories.

The memoirs of convicted French Murderer Henri Charrière on his incarceration in a penal colony on French Guiana was the basis of the movie Papillon starring Steve McQueen in the title role. Whether his amazing adventures were Charrière’s or based upon stories of other convicts, it still is an amazing story of men and their incarceration in alien prison camps of the early 20th century.

If it had not been for the success of American Graffiti it’s possible that George Lucas would never had been able to make Star Wars. Lucas was a little known director, at the time his greatest claim to fame was his friendship with Francis Ford Coppola. Helooked back to his childhood and created one of the best 1960’s coming of age story featuring the night life, the cars and the music in the life of pre-1963 teen. This film was one of the Best Picture nominations.

1973 brought back together the team of actors Paul Newman and Robert Redford with Director George Roy Hill, they did the 1969 film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, to produce the year’s Best Picture The Sting. It’s the story of a pair of 1930’s con men putting ‘The Sting’ on the Crime Boss played by Robert Shaw. Although Ragtime music was no longer popular during the 1930’s, the film’s time period when Jazz was the music of the day, Marvin Hamlish used the music of Ragtime composer Scott Joplin. The film won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director.

The Exorcist based on the 1971 novel of the same name by William Peter Blatty was not only the most popular movie of 1973, it is one of the most profitable Horror film of all time. The score of the movie included many short pieces of modern (1970’s) classical music including the haunting main theme of Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells. The film was nominated for ten Academy Award winning two, one for Best Sound and Best Adapted Screenplay. It was one of the losing Best Picture nominations

Lewis And Clark Expedition

Beginning in 1801 the United States began an effort to bring New Orleans, which had just changed hands from Spanish to French rule, into the United States. After nearly 2 years of negotiation the United States, who had been prepared to pay 10 Million dollars to the cash starved French discovered that the entire region could be purchased for 15 Million. The deal was settled.

President Thomas Jefferson with hopes of finding a water route from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean and after selecting Meriwether Lewis, who had been Jefferson private secretary, to lead an expedition wrote in a letter to Lewis on June 20, 1803;

“The Object of your mission is to explore the Missouri river & such principal stream of it as by it’s course and communication with the waters of the Pacific ocean, whether the Columbia, Oregon, Colorado or any other river may offer the most direct & practicable water communication across this continent for the purpose of commerce.”

Lewis selected William Clark to share command of the expedition. Clark was technically subordinate to Lewis in rank, he exercised equal authority at Lewis’s insistence. One of his chief concentration was with the drawing of maps, Clark also management of the expedition’s supplies, and the identification of native plants and animals.

Between 1804 and 1806, the Corps of Discovery, as the expedition was officially named, explored thousands of miles of the Missouri and Columbia River watersheds. Lewis and Clark led the expedition safely across the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific and back and only loss one man, who died of apparent appendicitis.

In all there was 37 army members, Clark’s black manservant, two Indian interpreters, Sacagawea, the wife of one of the interpreters, their son born on the expedition, and Seaman, Lewis’ black Newfoundland dog.

Even though Lewis and Clark did not discover a waterway to the Pacific their exploration, notes and Clark’s final map did much to understand the region and to bring about further expansion into the area.

Lesser-known famous African-Americans

Hiram Rhoades Revels (1822-1901)
Revels was born a free man of African-American and Indian descent in North Carolina, a slave state. Revels was ordained as a minister by the African Methodist Church ministering in many states before eventually settling in Baltimore Maryland. During the Civil War he lend his support for the Union cause in Maryland. At the conclusion of the war he settled in Mississippi and in 1870 was elected to finish the Senate term of Jefferson Davis, who left it in 1861 to become President of the Confederate States, becoming the first African-American Senator. After returning to Mississippi he became President of Alcorn College, the state’s first college for African-American students.

William Harvey Carney (1842–1908)
During the Civil War assault on Fort Wagner in Charleston, South Carolina, July 18, 1863, while serving with the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry he saved the American flag holding it while the troops charged. Even though he was wounded four times he carried the flag in retreat. The flag never touched the ground. He was awarded the Congressional Metal of Honor in 1900 for his service in the battle. This was the first awarded to an African-American.

Moses Fleetwood “Fleet” Walker (1857–1924)
In the early days of professional baseball, long before Jackie Robinson, Fleet Walker was a catcher for the Toledo Blue Stockings in the American Association joining the team in 1884. He is believed to be the first African-American to play professional baseball. He faced bigotry from the beginning. He played for a number of teams, including the Newark Little Giants where he joined pitcher George Stovey forming the first known African-American battery. In 1890 the leagues both unofficially banned African-American players ending his career.

Lucy D. Slowe (1885-1937)
Slowe was an educator who organized the first Junior High school in DC (1919) and appointed principal of Shaw junior School serving in that position until June 1922. She left to become the first Dean of Women at Howard University, a post she held until her death. In 1908 she was an active member of the group that founded Alpha Kappa Alpha. She prepared the first draft of the constitution, and was elected the first president of Alpha Kappa Alpha. She also played tennis and in 1917 she was the first African-American woman to win a national title in any sport when she won the American Tennis Association (ATA) national tournament held in Baltimore.

Clifton R Wharton (1899-1990)
Wharton became the first African-American diplomat to rise through the ranks of the Foreign Service to become an ambassador. President Eisenhower appointed him in 1958 as Ambassador to Romania becoming the first African-American to head a US delegation to a European country. His son Clifton R. Wharton Jr. has had an distinguish careers in foreign economic development, higher education, and business, including being the Chairman and CEO of TIAA_CREF, the largest pension fund in the world.

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000)
Brooks published her first poem, “Eventide” in American Childhood Magazine in 1930. Her first book of poems brought her critical acclaim. Her second book of poems, Annie Allen, won the Pulitzer Prize. She was the first African-American to win the award. She spent her life bringing poetry to the people through public readings.

It’s More than Dad’s Day

We are less than a week away from Father’s Day. Have you planned on what you may want to do with your Dad?

Time passes too quickly and changes occur too fast. Enjoy the time you have with your Dad and life in general. It will all change in too quick of a time and you will wish that you had.

I lost my Dad to cancer three years ago and while the pain of losing him has faded I can say that I miss him everyday. When I was growing up my Dad was a Dairy Farmer, and for those who doesn’t know what’s involved in this profession, let’s just there was never a day off. The cows needed to be milked twice a day, first time in the morning as the sun rose and again 12 hours later.

After I became an adult, I moved away from the home town. While he did retire and spend plenty of time enjoying his days on the Delmarva Peninsula, he lived there his entire other than the two years he served n the Army, most Father’s Day it was a call and short conversation.

We did have a few Father’s Day on the Peninsula between the time I moved back home and the time he grew sick. When I look back on the days we missed, I can only think that I wished I had did things differently and spend more time with my Dad when both of us were younger.

Happy Father’s Dad to all of the Dad’s out there. To those who are sons and daughters spend some time with your Dad while you can. All will enjoy it.

Happy Father’s Day

A House Divided

One of Abraham Lincoln’s best known speech came not when he was President, but two years before the 1860 election on June 16, 1858. During his campaign for US Senator for Illinois he delivered what is known as the House Divided Speech.

A house divided against itself cannot stand.” I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided.

It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new — North as well as South.

Lincoln was running for the new Republican party with his chief rival being Stephen Douglas. During the summer and fall of 1858 the two held a series of debates in seven towns in the state of Illinois: Ottawa on August 21, Freeport on August 27, Jonesboro on September 15, Charleston on September 18, Galesburg on October 7, Quincy on October 13, and Alton on October 15.

Douglas was elected to the Senate for the first time 12 years earlier in 1846 taking office on March 4, 1847. Lincoln too went to Washington after the 1846 election as a member of the House of Representatives serving for a single two year term before losing his reelection bid.

In a close election Lincoln was defeated by Douglas who maintained his senate seat.

Even though he lost the debates by losing the Senatorial election it brought Lincoln out into the national view and helped to push him towards the Presidency that he would win against Stephen Douglas.

It wasn’t his only win against Douglas and perhaps not his greatest. Prior to Mary Todd’s meeting and marriage to Abraham Lincoln she was briefly courted by Stephen Douglas

The Would Be First Lady

The election of 1828 was not a pretty election. It was a rematch between the same candidates of the 1824 contest between John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson. Jackson felt he should have been the incumbent since he had received the most popular votes as well as Electoral votes. However none of the top four candidates received enough Electoral votes to win and for the first and only time in US election history the US House of Representatives who made John Quincy Adams President.

One of the issues that arose against Andrew Jackson, who won by a 56-44 percent margin, dealt with his wife Rachel. Rachel Donelson Jackson was born on June 15, 1762 and through a mistake may have married Andrew Jackson when she was still legally married to another man, Lewis Robards.

The 18 year old Rachel Donelson married 27 year old Captain Lewis Robards on March 1, 1785. Robards appeared to be the perfect economic mate for Rachel. By 1790 things had changed, some of it may have been because she had met and fell in love with Jackson.

What happen between 1785 and Rachel’s marriage to Lew Robards and 1794 when Jackson and Rachel married legally may never be truly determined. Whether Robards deserted his wife or Rachel left him for another man, this was unheard of in the 18th century, is clouded in mystery.

But it was an issue in the 1828 election. The press discovered that the couple may have married without benefit of a divorce to Rachel and accused her of adultery. The attacks were ruthless and provide much strain on the health of an already sick Rachel. She dearly love Jackson and wished to see him as President.

Rachel did see her husband elected President, but she was unable to join him as his First Lady in the White House. A few days before Christmas on December 22, 1828 she died and was buried on Christmas Eve in her white inauguration gown. Andrew Jackson for the rest of his life blamed his political enemies for his wife’s death.

A Political Town

Federalsburg, Maryland is located in southern Caroline county on the Delmarva Peninsula at the headwaters of the Marshyhope Creek. The creek flows into the Nanicoke River and was known in colonial times as a northwest fork of the Nanticoke River.

In 1789 a store was established there around a bridge that was used for traffic crossing the land. As would occurred many times during the 18th and 19th centuries a small village developed around the store.

As the town grew it became a commerce point. First known as Northwest Fork Bridge, or simply as the The Bridge in 1813 it would take its current name.

There was a strong Federalist presence on the Peninsula and in 1812 from far and wide Federalist came to the town for a meeting. The town’s leadership was so impressed with the enthusiasm of what was a dying party they renamed the town Federalsburg.

The town grew as a port town first using the creek/river to move commerce from the area to other points and by the mid-19th century as a railroad town. In 1868 the Pennsylvania Railroad opened a station becoming a point of commerce to northern markets in cities such as Philadelphia and New York. Federalsburg is the current home of the corporate offices of the Maryland and Delaware Railroad.

The town was incorporated in 1823 and is one of the earliest incorporated towns in Caroline County. Only the county seat, Denton incorporated in 1802, is older. With a population of around 2700 people within the city limits making it another of the friendly comfortable towns of Delmarva.

Leading to Independence

How much do you actually know about what happened on and around July 4, 1776? We all know that July 4th is the birthday of the United States, but is it really? Events that lead up to the birth of the United States started with a Resolution by Richard Henry Lee, a representative to the Second Colonial Congress from Virginia.

The Virginia House of Burgesses on May 15, 1776 resolved that “the delegates appointed to represent this colony in General Congress” be instructed to propose to that respectable body to declare the united Colonies free and independent states.”

Lee presented on June 6, 1776, a resolution to congress that read;

Resolved, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.

That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign Alliances.

That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.

Debate began on the resolution, but it was decided to wait for three week so that the delegates could send the resolution to their home colonies and receive direction on voting. It also appeared to those present that the resolution would pass and that there needed to be a suitable declaration for the resolution.

On June 11, 1776 a committee, consisting of John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Robert R. Livingston of New York, and Roger Sherman of Connecticut, was formed. They were known as the Committee of Five.

The committee delegated that Jefferson would write the draft. Jefferson and the committee worked on it from June 12 until June 27. Franklin and Adams made several minor corrections and the entire committee made additional changes and additions, a total of forty-seven alterations including the insertion of three complete paragraphs from Jefferson’s original draft. Jefferson then produced another copy incorporating these changes and the committee presented this copy to the Continental Congress on Friday June 28, 1776.

On Monday July 1st, congress started debate on the Lee Resolution. On July 2, 1776 a final vote was taken. It was passed. South Carolina still wasn’t in favor of independence, but Edward Rutledge, who opposed independence and had many motions to delay the vote, convinced the delegation that for the sake of unanimity, they should vote in favor. The New York delegation abstained, since they did not have instructions from their home government.

In a letter that John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail on July 3 he said;

The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward for evermore.

Finally at a little after 11 o’clock on Thursday morning July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was approved. This was after many hours of debate during the two days leading to the vote. There were thirty-nine revisions to the committee’s draft, including the deletion of language that denounced King George III for promoting the slave trade. John Hancock, as President of Congress, and Charles Thompson, Secretary of Congress signed the document. Again the New York delegation abstained from the vote, but did approve the Declaration five days later.

It wasn’t until July 19th that congress ordered that the Declaration to be officially inscribed and signed by its members. Congressional delegates began to sign the officially inscribed copy on August 2. It was even signed by some members who had not voted for its adoption and some who was not even present at Congress when the vote was cast.

Note:
This was originally written in 2006 and has been republished on various sites each year since then.

Famous Yogiisms – Quotes of Yogi Berra

Yogi Berra is one of the best catchers to play the game of baseball. During his career he won the American League Most Valuable player three times and with the New York Yankees appeared in fourteen World Series winning ten.

After he retired from playing the game he became the manager of the Yankees and lead that team to the World Series only to be fired at the end of the season. He moved to the New York Mets where he worked first as a coach and then as a manager leading the Mets to the World series becoming one of the few managers to lead a team from both leagues to the World Series.

He will also be remembered for his witty quotes referred to as yogiisms.

It ain’t over ’til it’s over. – Actually he said. ‘You’re never out of it till you’re out of it.’

Ninety percent of the game is mental, the other half is physical.

When you get to a fork in the road, take it.

It’s like déjà vu all over again.

It gets late early out there.

I never said half the things I said.