Category Archives: History

By Tara Templeman, The History Center

It was a Saturday March 2, 1935 that the Cedar Rapids Gazette reported artists Grant Wood and Sara Sherman Maxon were to be married that night in Minneapolis.

Maxon was at least seven years older than Wood who was 44 at the time and an artist in her own right, as well as a singer, teacher and pioneer in regional music.

The two were married at the home of Maxons son and daughter-in-law with no guests in attendance.

Both had been born in Jones County, and Maxon had two sisters in Cedar Rapids, Mrs. Edward W. Haman and Mrs. Glenn Averill.

Recent publications have debated the circumstances around Woods short-lived and perhaps platonic marriage, but we know their friends disapproved of the union.

Shortly after the marriage, Wood left his comfortable home at 5 Turner Alley in Cedar Rapids. The couple bought and renovated a home at 1142 E. Court St. in Iowa City. Just seven months after the marriage, Woods mother, Hattie. died.

Wood and Maxon divorced in 1939 after less than four years of marriage. Wood died of cancer a few years later, in 1942, at age 50.

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Tara Templeman is curator at The History Center. Comments: curator@historycenter.org

By Tara Templeman, The History Center

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Piece of History: Grant Wood got married then divorced nearly four years later - The Gazette

Gracie Mansion, the official residence of New York City mayors, is getting a new tenant next year.

The Little White House has been Mayor Bill de Blasios home for seven years, but when he retires from mayorship next year, the 220-year-old mansion will be occupied by whichever candidate New York elects on Nov. 2.

Whoever wins, the pale yellow-ocher-colored home is expected to continue hosting teas, fashion shows, fund-raisers, tours, meetings, protests and parties.

The white-trimmed, green-shuttered buildings address is at the corner of East 88th Street and East End Avenue and located in Carl Schurz Park on the east side of Manhattan.

While the coronavirus pandemic has halted a historic tradition of live tours through the mansion, the de Blasio administration has offered virtual tours on Zoom.

Explore the busy buildings history including facelifts, restorations, famous visitors and, yes, scandals through the photos below.

The NYC homes yellow paint was chosen by former mayor Michael Bloomberg for historical accuracy, based on the coloring of a painting of a nearby house.

The gracious wraparound porch, restored in 1983, is actually the historic site where the New York Posts founder Alexander Hamilton recruited investors for the budding New York Evening Post in 1801, according to the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation.

Its yellow front door has a wooden frame carved like seed pearls. It is flanked by leaded glass windows and topped with a semicircle window. The interior is a mix of modern and historical artifacts strewn across a ground-level floor plan that includes a foyer, parlor, kitchen, library and dining room.

Inside, the foyer has tan-and-white striped wallpaper and a faux marble painted floor, a style called trompe-loeil that was popular in the 1800s. The center of the floor has a compass pattern and is overlooked by a chandelier.

An ancient grandfather clock has ticked in the corner since at least 1942. Above the fireplace, a gold-framed mirror is flanked by light fixtures.

A winding staircase leads upstairs to the bedrooms, which are closed off to visitors. The second floor has five rooms which, for various tenants, have been configured as bedrooms, sitting rooms and dressing rooms.

A patent yellow parlor sits to the right of the foyer and nods to the homes early history with a cannonball on the fireplace mantel. The cannonball was excavated from the site of the mansion, where a British loyalist home once stood until it was destroyed in September 1776 perhaps by that very cannonball, according to NYC.gov.

The parlor also has a circular convex mirror with an ornate gold frame and six candle sconces built into the fixture. The convex mirror maximizes light in the room, a trick that might have been used in the house before the installation of electric lights.

But the parlor also celebrates a side of history less often told. Under the de Blasio administration, the house has been filled with art by diverse talents. The yellow parlor most recently displayed art from Japanese artist Tk Shinoda and New York City collage artist Baseera Khan.

Behind the parlor is a kitchen that received a $1.4 million facelift under Mayor Bloomberg in 2012, according to the Observer.

To the left of the foyer is a very teal library. The carpets are teal, the sofas are teal, the walls are teal you get the idea. Even the curtains, installed by Mayor John Lindsay in the 1960s, are a floral chintz pattern with a blue background.

The library is also noted for its historic figurines of George Washington but, in a nod to more recent history, the library window is etched with the name Caroline, a mark by ex-Mayor Rudy Giulianis daughter in a tradition of children marking up the house.

The library fireplace mantel features art entitled Raise Up, a 2014 installation by Hank Willis Thomas that shows the heads and arms of 10 black men raising their arms; above them two posters say, I am a man.

Raise Up reflects on the American legacy of slavery and lynching as well as todays mass incarceration. The repeating hands-up gesture is a nod to the vulnerability of African-American men in the face of systemic racial injustice, wrote the Gracie Mansion Conservancy on Instagram.

Through the library, a carpeted dining room is famous for its ornate French wallpaper.

The covering depicts a landscape garden scene and was manufactured in the 1820s by Zuber et Cie and installed under the Edward Koch administration to reflect the original style of the house.

The wallpaper actually does not reach the ceiling of the room, and the area above the wallpaper was painted to match the sky of the landscape, according to the conservancy.

Mayor Robert F. Wagner Jr., who served from 1954 to 1965, installed an entire new wing to the house for entertaining in an attempt to create more privacy and safety for his family in the main house a balance that has proved difficult for mayors throughout their residency in the hybrid public-and-private space.

She started to complain that people found their way upstairs, Paul Gunther, executive director of the Gracie Mansion Conservancy, said in a 2017 lecture. She said, Sometimes I have to get dressed in my closet. They took ashtrays, pipes, lipsticks and jewelry. The solution became a new wing.

But Wagners wife wouldnt live to see the completion of the $800,000 renovation designed by architect Mott B. Schmidt. Even as the 54-year-old selected silks and decor for the addition, she secretly battled lung cancer. She died at Gracie Mansion in 1964, and the renovation was completed in her name in 1966.

Today, guests enter the blue foyer in the Wagner Wing through heavy wooden doors topped with an ornate semicircle window.

An ornate chandelier and crown molding overlook the room, as does another golden convex mirror topped with a bald eagle sculpture and installed by Bloomberg that was used for maximizing light in the space during historical times. The mirror hangs above a historic fireplace taken from the Bayard home where Alexander Hamilton died following his ill-fated duel with Aaron Burr.

Through Sept. 8, 2021, the wing is displaying CATALYST: Art and Social Justice, a show of artwork by photographers Gordon Parks and Martine Fougeron.

Next to the foyer, carved white doorways lead to the blue room, an even bolder blue space equipped with a large bookshelf once owned by a Revolutionary War officer, an ornate chandelier, a fireplace, a convex mirror and a circular mahogany table with four chairs that originally belonged to descendants of Scottish shipper Archibald Gracie, who commissioned Gracie Mansion as a country house (that part of Manhattan was not yet developed) on the site in 1799, according to the conservancy.

Speaking of privacy, theres the matter of the fence a criticism even older than the tradition of mayoral residence at Gracie Mansion.

When the NYC Parks department acquired the home in 1896, they installed the propertys first fence, maintaining fencing until former mayor Fiorello LaGuardia began his residence in 1942, conservancy director Gunther recently told The Post.

LaGuardia, the first mayor to live in Gracie Mansion, installed a wrought-iron fence, and ODwyer moved it 25 feet further away from the house for privacy. Lindsay added a yellow pine stockade fence just inside the wrought-iron fence, and Koch had a double fence as well. Most recently, De Blasio built an additional privacy fence inside a brick wall and a wrought-iron fence.

Inside the fences, the homes gardens have featured centuries of careful cultivation. The original residents of the house had shade trees and flower beds, according to the National Archives Catalog.

Today, the front of the house is flanked by tulips, when in season. They offer free seeds for edible or flowering plants to the public in a small seeds library.

The grounds are used to teach local students and young parents why and how fresh foods advance healthy living in a greenhouse collaboration with Project EATS, according to the conservancy.

British Loyalist Jacob Walton built a house on the site in 1770. His home was commandeered during the Revolutionary War for its strategic position near the water and was destroyed in September 1776, according to the NYC Parks website.

Historians believe Archibald Gracies house was built in part by slaves of Ezra Weeks, who is believed to be the builder, along with John McComb Jr., who also built City Hall, according to amNY.

Gracie lived there with his eight children, his wife Esther and three indentured servants. New Yorks Gradual Emancipation Act passed the year Gracie Mansion was built. Among other measures, the act mandated that slaves would be called indentured servants, but essentially still treated them as slaves. Gracie finally released them from bondage in 1801. He completed a side addition on the house in 1811 before he ran aground with debts.

During the Napoleonic period, fighting on the high seas increased, embargos were imposed, and finally the war with England broke out in 1812. Gracies ships were in trouble and so was Gracie. He was a man so well-liked in the community that friends and associates tried to assist him financially, but in spite of their efforts, his company failed in 1819, reads the National Registry of Historic Places application.

That year, Federalist statesman Rufus King, who signed the Declaration of Independence, took ownership of the house in exchange for loans he had given Gracie, according to the application.

Gracies son-in-law, a merchant named Joseph Foulke, bought the house from King in 1823 and sold it in 1857 to Noah Wheaton, who decorated the house in the Victorian style, according to the application.

The house still bears the mark of the Wheaton family. Amelie Hermione Quackenbush, Wheatons granddaughter, etched her name into a window with a diamond ring in 1893, and the mark still remains today beginning the tradition of children marking their stint in the home.

The citys parks department took over the house when Wheaton, who hadnt paid his taxes, died in 1896.

The house became a public bathroom and concession stand for Carl Schurz Park before the Museum of the City of New York took it over in 1923, according to the museum website.

In 1934, the Parks Department began a $25,000 restoration of the house to a residence. Until then, mayors had lived in private residences.

LaGuardia began his mayorship at 1274 Fifth Ave., but he made Gracie Mansion his new home in 1942.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, famed city planner Robert Moses convinced LaGuardia to move into the space for security reasons during his third term. In preparation, the city added modern features like heating and electricity, juxtaposing them with 18th-century furniture.

The petitioner told him [the briber] to drop up to Gracie Mansion, the official residence of the Mayor of New York.

During his tenancy at the mansion, it was filled with items on loan from local museums, plus the familys own personal household items.

Mayor William ODwyer wasnt in the house very long, but he managed to get divorced and remarried during his residency. He resigned in 1950 because of bribery allegations. In fact, some of the bribery occurred at Gracie Mansion, according to legal documents.

After Mayor ODwyer resigned, acting Mayor Vincent Impellitteris wife, Elizabeth Agnes McLaughlin, said she planned to make no changes to the house when they moved in and, in fact, her only complaint was that there werent enough ashtrays, according to historical reports.

The Wagners are the darlings of Gracie Mansion history simply because they loved the house and not only through the addition of the Wagner Wing.

Susan, who died in Gracie Mansion before the end of their tenancy, painted the living room pale blue and added eggshell damask upholstery. The home was littered with globes, radios, toy soldiers and roller blades, according to historical reports.

Susan took her children Robert and Duncan into consideration in the design, tossing a landscape in the drawing room that her children disliked and repainting Roberts room light blue because he said he couldnt sleep in a dark red room. She also converted the homes elevator into a coat room, fearing it would be unsafe for the children.

Fun fact: In the 1600s, the site was a Dutch farm and later a tavern called the Horns Hook.

Susan Wagner died in 1964, and Robert remarried in 1965 before the end of his term. But he and his new bride, Barbara Joan Cavanagh, did not make Gracie their home. Wagners new wife became a champion of Susans work, defending her when the Lindsay family criticized the condition of the house when they moved in.

The Lindsays did not love their stint at Gracie Mansion, to say the least. John and Mary Annes loud dissatisfaction offended the Wagners, especially since renovations had been done in the name of the late Susan Wagner.

Fun fact: Gracie Mansion was actually bugged during the Lindsay administration, which was during the same time period as the Watergate scandal, though no connection was ever found.

Susan was ill for a year before she died how was she going to worry about curtains and carpets? I felt miserable because of Susan, and have ever since. And no one seems to answer back on it. So I will, Wagners new wife Barbara Joan Cavanaugh said in 1966.

To be fair, the Lindsays had their fair share of woes at Gracie Mansion. The couples move-in was delayed by the Wagners renovations, and they found plenty of work left to do when they finally moved in.

The bedroom door often jammed, causing the couple to have to climb out the window and re-enter the house from another bedroom window, Gunther recently confirmed to The Post.

The windows were rotted with water, the floors were dull, the carpets had holes burned by cigarettes, and Lindsays wife objected to the outdated style. They discovered fire code violations and occasionally lost heat, said Gunther.

But by 1966, Cavanaugh said that she and Lindsay had kissed and made up.

Nonetheless afterdepartingat the end of 1973, theformerfirst lady said that despite the wear and tear of a nearly 200-hundred-year-oldhouse, We had awonderfultime,' Gunther recounted.

But Gracie Mansion found itself redeemed under the Abraham Beame administration, which added the house to the National Register of Historic Places for its architectural merit.

The mansion is one of the finest Federal-style country seats remaining on the Island of Manhattan from that early period. It is a remarkably distinguished example of the Federal architecture and, as the home of the Mayors of the City of New York, it possesses a distinction in keeping with its architectural qualities and its historical renown, said original application in 1978.

Susan was ill for a year before she died how was she going to worry about curtains and carpets?

For Mayor Edward Koch, Gracie Mansion was a slow burn.

The bachelor mayor started off his term living in Gracie Mansion part-time while spending weekends at his Greenwich Village rent-controlled apartments.

But he eventually moved in full-time and even established the Gracie Mansion Conservancy to care for the house. Today, the nonprofit spends $400,000 of privately-raised money annually to run and manage the house, according to tax documents.

By the end of his first term, Koch had solicited private donations and loans from museums and other collectors to furnish the home in the Federal style of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, said Gunther.

Koch also borrowed some notable and strange artwork for the house during his residency, including a 44-inch-high, black-and-white rabbit sculpture in the bedroom. The wooden, polyester-resin-coated work was selected by his art curator, Henry Geldzahler, Gunther confirmed.

Fun fact: Over the past two centuries, the mansion has played host to John Quincy Adams, Washington Irving, General Lafayette, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Frederick Douglass and countless other history-makers.

David Dinkins was the citys first black mayor, serving from 1990 to 1993, and while the couple didnt make many changes to the house his wife, Joyce Dinkins, took on the role of special projects organizer at Gracie Mansion, with a focus on children and literacy, according to her obituary.

Former mayor Rudy Giulianis then-wife Donna Hanover barred Giulianis then-girlfriend, Judith Nathan, from visiting the house.

The disagreement prompted a torrent of legal and personal drama that eventually prompted Giuliani to leave the mansion before his term ended.

During Giulianis administration, the house fell into disrepair with peeling paint, according to complaints at the time.

The house is crying, former mayor Koch said, according to Vanity Fair. The house wants to be loved.

Giuliani actually did have the house repainted as part of regular maintenance, and he also re-carpeted the floors, the conservancys Gunther told The Post. The homes location near East River winds and Franklin D. Roosevelt Drives fumes may have accelerated the need for renovations.

Giuliani married Nathan on the lawn of Gracie Mansion in 2003.

When Mayor Bloomberg took office in 2002, a peeling, drafty mansion didnt seem to be the luxurious life he was accustomed to.

Bloomberg was the only mayor since LaGuardia not to live in the house but, rather than let it rot, he poured $7 million into its restoration, calling it The Peoples House and opening it up for tours, meetings and events.

With the help of designer Jamie Drake, Bloomberg repainted, added mahogany and faux-bamboo furniture in the Federal-century style, installed French bronze chandeliers, re-carpeted and re-upholstered the furniture to be historically accurate, according to Architectural Digest.

When de Blasio moved in, he found the mansion to be more like a museum than a home particularly the bedrooms, which Bloomberg had not lived in and were filled with antique furniture for tours.

De Blasio received a donation of at least $65,000 in furniture from the multi-billion-dollar Brooklyn-based furniture chain West Elm in 2014 for the familys bedrooms, putting some of Bloombergs period furniture in storage.

When the presentadministration chose in 2014 to revive the residential role as envisioned by both the Parks Department and the GMC, the late 18th and early 19th century (often fragile) antique furnishings had to be placed in collections storage for future resident consideration. Thus these bedrooms were suddenly empty with immediate need to make them habitable for a 21st century family, said Gunther.

In the public spaces, the home furniture remains unchanged and now offers even more historical and cultural education opportunities through first lady Chirlane McCrays art exhibitions.

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Inside Gracie Mansion, then and now: A history of the NYC mayor's home - New York Post

Every day he works from the Oval Office, President Joe Biden stares across from his desk at the portrait of Franklin Delano Roosevelt he selected to hang above his fireplace.

His aides passed around biographies and historic accounts of the 32nd president before taking over the West Wing, a person familiar with the preparation said.

And Biden consulted a panel of presidential historians in the East Room shortly after taking office, demonstrating what one participant described as a depth of knowledge about not only the architect of the New Deal but another Democrat, Lyndon B. Johnson, whose expansive view of government Biden hopes to emulate.

It was interesting to hear these historians talk about what other presidents have gone through, and the moments, and who were the people who stepped up to the ball, and whos the people that didnt, Biden said during a CNN town hall last month.

As he travels to Pittsburgh on Wednesday to unveil the next chapter of his massive effort to transform the country though long-sought progressive priorities, Biden is deeply conscious that it is now his moment to step up. He is looking to the bold actions favored by Democrats decades earlier to inform the opening days of his presidency, determined that small steps cannot match the current moment.

The plan he will unveil in Pittsburgh on Wednesday includes $2.25 trillion in direct spending, with an additional $400 billion in clean energy tax credits, a person with knowledge of the matter said. The $2.25 trillion would include $650 billion for physical infrastructure, $300 billion for housing infrastructure, $300 billion for manufacturing, $300 billion for the electric grid and $400 billion for home caretakers and care for the elderly and disabled.

Part two of the proposal which is likely to include child care, early education and health care funding will be announced in April and is still being drafted, though sources said it could come in at roughly the same price tag.

Instead of mimicking the last Democratic administration, in which he served as vice president, Biden hopes to model the more transformational change offered by his acronymd 20th-century predecessors, FDR and LBJ.

He believes his party has more fully embraced progressive causes since he was last in the White House, according to officials, and thinks the dual health and economic crises caused by Covid-19 have lent an urgency to passing major pieces of legislation. And he has not been shy to point out areas he believes President Barack Obama fell short and where he will strive to be more ambitious.

Hes clearly conscious of being in a big, historic moment, said a senior administration official involved in the Presidents deliberations over his legislative agenda. These few months are his best chance to make his mark and he wants it to be one that people will remember for a long time.

Through it all, he has taken lessons from the history books on which of his predecessors met the moment and how they went about it.

Its a matter of timing. As youve all observed, successful presidents better than me, have been successful in large part because they know how to time what theyre doing, he said during a news conference last week. Order, deciding priorities, what needs to be done.

For Biden, that now means a sweeping plan on infrastructure that moves well beyond simply repairing roads, making airports nicer or preventing bridges from falling apart though he wants to do that, too.

Instead, Biden views the package as an opportunity to drive the fight against climate change, to strengthen the federal safety net and to make the United States more competitive against China.

Perhaps more than anything, however, he wants to prove a bigger role for government is not a relic of the last century but one that works today.

I think the President views this as an opportunity to boost American competitiveness, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Monday of the Presidents infrastructure roll-out. Safe to say were going to be looking at millions of jobs, and maybe, most importantly of all, a chance to restore Americas leadership role, at a time where, right now, we run a very real risk of being left behind because of the cost of disinvestment in our infrastructure.

For Biden, its a posture relatively few would have predicted hed hold when he launched his campaign for president. He is, after all, the same man who after a 36-year Senate career and eight years as vice president, made of calling himself a transitional figure inside the party while pushing the idea of long-lost bipartisan comity.

But that same campaign produced some of the most progressive economic policy proposals in a generation and officials repeatedly make the point that his policy rollouts largely mimic those far-reaching goals. They also make clear Biden has no intention of backing off of them.

Instead, he envisions a moment one where a country ravaged by the pandemic has seen fragilities in the economy exacerbated to a level of unseen hardship where he can usher in a transformative era. The acronyms of former presidents who hold that mantle arent just a messaging strategy, officials say. In the White House, they are embraced by the President himself.

This is the first time weve been able to, since the Johnson administration and maybe even before that, to begin to change the paradigm, Biden said in March.

Bolstered by a coterie of economic advisers who for years have embraced the idea of dramatically shifting the approach of the federal government, the so-called transitional figure now has clear aims at becoming a transformational one.

Bidens focus on history has caught the attention of some progressive groups. On Tuesday, descendants of FDR including his grandson and members of the Cabinet that helped enact the New Deal wrote a letter to Biden to commend your focus on the urgency of big, bold action to create jobs to help America build back better.

Meeting with historians last month at the White House, Biden asked a series of questions about how his predecessors timed their agendas and capitalized on moments, according to a person familiar with the conversation. He appeared knowledgeable about some of the decisions FDR and LBJ faced in enacting major changes over short periods of time, and wanted to know more about what made them successful, the person said.

Presidents love historians, press secretary Jen Psaki said last week. I think its important to learn from what worked and didnt work in the past and gain perspective from people who study that.

One administration Biden doesnt require a historian to scrutinize is the one he served in last. He has been open about the mistakes he believes were made in passing the 2009 stimulus, including a failure to sell its qualities to the American people. Many Biden aides, who also served in the Obama administration, believe perceived concerns from Republicans kept the package too small.

Biden is aiming to pass his sweeping infrastructure and jobs proposal this summer, according to White House officials, setting an ambitious timeline to achieve his next major legislative goal.

If passed, the bill could amount to a transformation of the American economy amid continued recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. So, too, could the way it is paid for advance longstanding progressive goals of shifting tax burdens more on the wealthy and corporations.

The first prong of the White House proposal, which will include more than $2 trillion in spending, will be financed in large part through business tax increases, including raising the corporate rate to 28% from its current level of 21%, and increases in the global minimum tax, the ending of federal subsidies for fossil fuel firms and a requirement that multinational corporations pay the US tax rate.

Internal debates on how much of the proposal to pay for have been ongoing for several weeks, with White House officials keenly aware of potential inflationary risks, officials said. Psaki told reporters the proposal laid out on Wednesday would include mechanisms to finance the entirety of the package over time.

While he entered office vowing to work across the aisle, Biden has shown little more than surface-level interest in hewing to demands from Republicans. Officials do believe infrastructure projects have more potential for GOP appeal and plan to make their case on Capitol Hill.

But theyve shown limited interest in dramatically scaling back their ambitions in search of GOP votes when the mechanism exists to pass their package with Democrats alone. From the campaign to now, White House officials have embraced the idea that more than anything else, people just want stuff to get done. That is an animating feature of their push to pass sweeping initiatives even when it largely cuts Republicans out of picture.

Bidens first legislative victory was instructive, aides say. While they made no significant effort to trim their initial proposal, Biden reached out to Republicans in both public and private. He will do the same in the coming weeks and months, officials say.

Repeatedly, officials say, polls have shown Biden got credit for bipartisan outreach during the consideration of the Covid-19 relief law. And while he failed to secure the support of a single Republican, that package is now law. Its a lesson, White House officials say, they will not soon forget.

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With an eye on history, Biden moves on big, bold and progressive infrastructure package - ABC17NEWS - ABC17News.com

Sanctions on Myanmar's military need to get tougher as the regime escalates violence on the ground, the country's special envoy to the United Nations told CNBC this week.

"We need immediately international targeted, coordinated, tougher sanctions, both economically and diplomatically," said Dr. Sasa.

Beyond punishing sanctions, the UN Security Council also needs to send a "unified and strong message" to stop this "crime against humanity" in Myanmar, he said.

The Southeast Asian country has been in turmoil since the military seized power from a democratically elected government on Feb. 1. Thousands have taken to the streets to protest against the coup for weeks, and more than 500 have died, according to advocacy group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

What they are doing is terrorizing 54 million people of Myanmar every day, every moment, every second.

Dr. Sasa

Special envoy to the United Nations

Countries around the world have condemned the violence, while the U.S. and Europe have sanctioned individuals or companies related to the military.

Sasa also called on Russia and China to halt arms sales to Myanmar's army.

"It's very clear they should stop selling the weapons to Burmese military generals," he told CNBC's "Street Signs Asia" on Tuesday.

"What they are doing is terrorizing 54 million people of Myanmar every day, every moment, every second," he said.

He said Moscow and Beijing, which have close ties with the junta, have the power to stop the violence.

"It's for them to decide right now," Sasa said. Otherwise, it is a "shame" for the two countries, the international community and the UN Security Council, he said.

MANDALAY, MYANMAR - MARCH 27: People gather to continue their protest against military coup and detention of elected government members in Mandalay, Myanmar on March 27, 2021.

Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images

China and Russia, along with India and Vietnam, have helped to soften the UNSC's criticism of the military regime. They requested that a UNSC statement remove references to a coup and the threat of further action.

"History will judge us harshly, there's no doubt," he added. "They have to make decisions. They will have to live with the decision that they make."

The council is meeting on Wednesday to discuss the situation.

Asked why he believes the military would cave to pressure, Sasa said international sanctions would help cut off income.

He said the military is taking money from national companies to buy bullets and weapons, and economic restrictions would mean less money, fewer weapons and fewer deaths of civilians.

Sasa also said a national unity government will be formed in the coming days and "will not rest" until democracy and freedom is restored in Myanmar.

"We will work hard bilaterally. We will be working very closely with our friends and our (allies) around the world," he said, adding that there will be "no future" for the military generals when the country achieves democracy.

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'History will judge us harshly': Myanmar special envoy to the UN calls for tougher sanctions - CNBC

Hayfields Slaathaug delivered as a new arrival, while Matti carries on a Viking tradition

HAYFIELD It is just two days after the Viking boys basketball team clinched its first state berth in eight years and just a handful of days before that state tournament and practice is just wrapping up. Senior Ethan Slaathaug knocks down a three-pointer to end the intersquad scrimmage and the smack talk starts.

Players are going back and forth about how having Slaathaug is an unfair advantage and its too easy to win with him. Eventually the playful bickering turns into laughter and everyone is friends again.

Thats the way it is with this bunch; they go out and give it their all on the court and then they hang out for supper or watch a college basketball game together.

After averaging 30 points per game in the Section 1A tournament, the spotlight has been shining bright on Slaathaug. That light has been on Slaathaug ever since he moved to Hayfield from Fulda as a freshman.

Slaathaug came to Hayfield as the son of Hayfield High School superintendent Gregg Slaathaug and he was thrust on the varsity team as a freshman due to a need for players.

We knew Ethan was going to be a good player, but nobody knew that he would turn into this, Hayfield head coach Chris Pack said. Hes put a lot of work into it and hes grown quite a bit.

While Slaathaug has excelled as a newcomer to town, Hayfield sophomore Isaac Matti has taken his game to new heights this season as well. Matti is the grandson of Doug Matti, who was an assistant coach on the Hayfield teams that went to state back when Minnesota had just one Class back in 1968 and 1969. He went on to coach the Vikings for 16 seasons.

Pack is well aware of Hayfields history and he has done his fair share as well as he has coached the Vikings to state in 2013 and now 2021. Hayfield has a total of five state tournament appearances.

Ive heard a lot about those teams from Doug and from Ron Evjen, who used to be our superintendent, Pack said. Its pretty neat to be able to have that perspective and Doug is a wealth of knowledge. He bleeds basketball and blue and gold.

The Slaathaug family moved to Hayfield in 2017 when Gregg took over as the schools superintentendent. Gregg and Tina have the three children Ethan, Payton and Drew. Photo Provided

The big transition

Ethan Slaathaug wasnt always the unstoppable 6-foot, two-inch scoring guard that he is today. When he showed up to Hayfield, he was a five-foot, eight-inch kid who missed his best friends from Fulda, which is 170 miles west of Hayfield, while trying to blend in at a new school.

At first it was a little weird, because some of the kids and teachers look at you like youre the superintendents kid and you feel a little bit judged, Ethan said. You just want to be like everyone else and fit in. The last few years have been great. Ive met a lot of people and its been fun.

Being the superintendents son also has its benefits as Ethan always has the keys to the school when he wants to head to the gym for a shootaround. He also has the bonus of a dad who has basketball knowledge as Gregg coached the Fulda girls basketball team for 16 years winning over 300 games, two state championships and four section championships. Gregg also coached Ethan in over 100 games between AAU and youth contests.

Hes more than confident in his abilities, Gregg said of Ethan. His mom Tina is a competitor and Im a competitor. We have set very high expectations for our children and theyve set high expectations for themselves. Outside pressure doesnt really rattle us.

Gregg, who was a principal, athletic director and teacher at Fulda, also missed out on coaching his daughter Payton during her final years as a basketball player. That was tough, but it was also tough for him to say goodbye to Fulda especially because Ethans two best friends were his teammates.

The hardest day will always be the day that I had to tell Ethans two best friends that were leaving, Gregg said. They were boys I had coached since they were in third grade. That will hands down be the toughest day we ever had in the transition.

Ethan keeps up with those Fulda friends by texting, but it was hard for him to leave for Hayfield, even though he knew it was best for his family.

It was tough to tell my friends. I said I know weve grown up for the first 14 years of our lives, but Im moving away now, Ethan said. It was tough, but it was the right move for our family. I text those guys often and I keep in touch with them.

Gregg, who is originally from Wilmot, South Dakota, said that Hayfield already feels like home after four years, especially after this crazy year of living through a pandemic.

It was a really good chapter in our lives in Fulda and the last four years in Hayfield have been a phenomenal chapter. We feel like weve lived here a lot longer than four years. This is home. knowing we still have friends in Fulda, who we will cherish for the rest of our lives, Gregg said. This year has been stressful and its been hard on everyone. I think its a metaphor for life. Life throws things at you and you try to make the best of every situation. Our entire community, school board and kids have done a phenomenal job this year.

Hayfields Isaac Matti poses with his grandpa Doug after the Section 1A title game last week. Isaac helped the Vikings get to their fifth state tournament in school history and Doug was an assistant coach on the Hayfield boys teams that went to state in 1968 and 1969. Photo Provided

50 years of knowledge

Doug Matti is used to his phone ringing at 5:30 a.m., and he always answers it. After all, not every grandpa has a grandson who wants to go to the gym with him and shoot some hoops.

The Hayfield players have put a lot of hours into whatever is happening today, Doug said. There were many mornings in the last year where I would get a call at 5:30 in the morning and Isaac would ask if we could go out to Kramers Shed and shoot. Then he would go lift weights, he would go home and then get to school. That happened many, many times.

Isaac has many motivations to get better. He wants to make up for the lost time of his older brother Nick, who tore his ACL twice and never had much of a chance to compete for the Vikings, he wants to get better to compliment Slaathaug and he also wants to add to the history his grandpa helped start at Hayfield.

Isaac has read up on the accomplishments of those Hayfield teams from the late 1960s from his grandpas press clippings and the book entitled A Viking Miracle, that was written by Les Evjen.

I saw that they beat Austin and I thought that was pretty sick, Isaac said. They had to go through the big schools like Minneapolis North. That would be really tough for us to do.

Isaac is well known amongst a lot of the basketball old-timers in the area and they are all in his corner.

A lot of my grandpas friends will text me after games and give me advice, Isaac said. They know me because they know him and it brings a lot of energy. My dad has also spent a lot of time in the gym with me.

Doug considers himself old school, which he also describes as having common sense, and he is proud of what Isaac has done on and off the floor. As Isaac has made vast improvements from his work ethic, he has also kept it together in the classroom and the community.

Im super proud of Isaac. Hes a gentleman off the court, which I demand of any team Im associated with and hes got a fun team. We have a lot of them at our house and we feed them super noodles and snacks, Doug said. Isaac and I have spent hours and hours together in the gym since he was in third grade. Hes reaping the profits of many hours. Ninty percent of it was motivated by him.

Doug said that todays Vikings are just as competitive as the group he used to coach, but he has seen a change in high school sports over the years.

Theyre missing a lot of the thrills, Doug said. Theyre missing the bands, the cheerleaders, the signs in town and the TV specials. It was just different then.

While some things have changed in Hayfield, others remain the same. For instance, those that don the blue and gold are going to give it their all and do it with class just like the Vikings of the late 60s.

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ETSU rewrites the history books with dominating victory over VMI - WJHL-TV News Channel 11

Angela introduced Nev online to an 8-year-old prodigy painter, a 19-year-old seductress, and a whole cast of supporting characters composed of MP3 fragments, online video, photographs, text messages, and nearly a dozen Facebook profiles. Schulman at 24 had his worldview blown open when he fell hard for the seductress, who in pictures looked like Jennifer Lawrence. Only when he and his brother's film crew, suspecting something was up, drove to Michigan's Upper Peninsula to door-stop Angela did the scales truly fall. Angela, who does not look like Jennifer Lawrence, was playing all the characters. Nev was first annoyed, then impressed, then grateful. He told me that Angela is still the greatest catfish he has ever encountered.

Catfish makes obvious what most adults know: Romantic love is shot through with projection. Our phones mirror to us our fondest hopes; into the text bubble we pour our yearnings.

Ultimately, Marriott uses catfish to describe anything or anybody that introduced into life the queer, unpleasant, disturbing touch of the Kingdom of Heaven. Angela's husband, Vince, who likely came to the catfish allegory by way of the popular Christian writer Joel Osteen, puts his own spin on it. They used to tank cod from Alaska all the way to China, he says, mixing up the geography. By the time the codfish reached China, the flesh was mush and tasteless. So this guy came up with the idea that if you put these cods in these big vats, put some catfish in with them and the catfish will keep the cod agile. And there are those people who are catfish in life. They keep you on your toes. They keep you guessing, they keep you thinking, they keep you fresh.

Thus is the catfish brought full circle. The person of Angela recalls the fictional Mary: Each is an intriguing and maddening woman who shakes up the existence of another.

Not long ago, Schulman's MTV show became a podcast. Schulman and a cohost help a range of young lonelyhearts, who fear they've fallen for digital specters, determine fact from fiction. Over and over the show features catfish victims who have been daydreaming into their phones, shoring up fragmentary missives from outer space to create alternate lives.

Privacy has become so unbelievably rare, Schulman told me. There's been a pendulum swing. Young people are desperately looking for something private in their lifejust for them. The people who appear on Catfish don't want to be relieved, right away, of their illusions of intimacy; they want to live in the fantasia a while, juice it for self-knowledge. But by the time they contact Schulman, it's because, as he told me, something isn't quite right. It's grown and grown as a pit in their stomach.

The love objects are almost always a mirage. The catfish almost never look like their profile pics. Sometimes they're of another gender or race. Generally they're less successful, less rich, more lost, more incarcerated.

Schulman on the podcast shows something like admiration for anyone sweetly naive enough to end up in the catfished seat, his seat. At the same time, he's surprised that many guests don't know he was once nabbed. They never saw his movie. People in this situation are people who don't do their research, he told me. Right on.

Catfish makes obvious what most adults know: Romantic love is shot through with projection. Our phones mirror back to us our fondest hopes, and into the text bubble we pour all our yearnings. I can't wait to fill my fingers with your hair, Schulman once texted his catfish. My body is craving your touch tonight, wrote Angela. It's cringe-hyperworthy now. But it's what infatuation sounds like. You're always writing to a half-imagined other. Every sexter is a poet.

But Catfish never fails to end in disappointment. Inevitably, the second they see them they have an instantaneous drain of affection, Schulman said.

Back to The Catfish, 1913. Though George and Mary are both married to other people by the end of the book, George discovers in a flash that he and Mary have something beyond love, as only his catfish can keep him honest. Before he could be straight with himself he had to have it out with herand all his life he had shirked it. The catfish is not the pretender. Quite the contrary, she's the spur to drop all pretense. In talking to Mary, George is finally talking to himself, the self he's been suppressing. He's liberated. Some of the participants on MTV's Catfish find the same thing: that once they have it out with their catfish, they are, in Marriott's words, free to love elsewhere.

In profound gratitude, George turns back to his beloved wife with renewed passion. The provocations of the catfish have been enlightening, but real love is serene. And sometimes all you want is a person who, in not looking like their ravishing selfie, looks better.

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Bed Tricks, Cod, and the Hidden History of Catfishing - WIRED

Donald Trump has launched a new website celebrating his time as US president that includes a very selective retelling of the history of his time in office.

45office.com is billed as a platform for his supporters to stay in touch and a place where Trump will continue his America first campaign.

The centrepiece of the site is an 885-word history of the Trump presidency, listing the achievements of what it describes as the most extraordinary political movement in history.

In a hyperbolic opening paragraph, it says he dethroned political dynasties, defeated the Washington establishment and overcame virtually every entrenched power structure.

The history does, however, omit several significant moments from Trumps presidency.

On the economy, the site says: President Trump ushered in a period of unprecedented economic growth, job creation, soaring wages, and booming incomes. Trump frequently described his administration as building the greatest economy in the history of our country, a claim repeatedly debunked. It also fails to note that during the pandemic last year the US economy suffered one of its worst financial crashes.

The US recorded the worlds largest coronavirus death toll on Trumps watch, but the website describes his handling of the pandemic as a success, saying: When the coronavirus plague arrived from China, afflicting every nation around the globe, President Trump acted early and decisively. It neglects to mention that Trump had in fact described coronavirus as a problem thats going to go away five times in March 2020, even as case numbers rose.

Also absent is that Trump became the first US president in history to twice face impeachment trials in Congress. And that he was the first US president in over one hundred years to lose the popular vote twice. Hillary Clinton secured 2.8m more votes than Trump in 2016, and Joe Bidens 2020 margin of victory was even larger, at 7m votes.

Nor does it mention that he became the first major world leader to be banned from social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter while in office after they deemed he had used their sites to cite an insurrection. The Capitol riot, which led to the loss of five lives, also does not warrant a mention.

The websites homepage boasts that the office of Donald J Trump is committed to preserving the magnificent legacy of the Trump administration, while at the same time advancing the America first agenda.

It also promises that through civic engagement and public activism, the office of Donald J Trump will strive to inform, educate, and inspire Americans from all walks of life as we seek to build a truly great American future.

Trump retains significant influence over the Republican party despite his loss in the 2020 election and has hinted at a possible presidential run in 2024. He has also started actively backing Republican candidates who may be able to unseat fellow party members Trump feels were disloyal to him by failing to back his baseless claims of election fraud last year.

In an interview with Fox News this month, Jason Miller, a former Trump campaign spokesperson, said that following his bans from Twitter and Facebook, Trump would launch his own social media platform in the next few months.

Excerpt from:

Donald Trump uses new website to rewrite history of his presidency - The Guardian

Reading the best books can feel like time travel, no matter when the story is set. Most bookworms have experienced the unique disorientation of sitting down to read and only emerging from their book-induced reverie hours later, having let the world pass by while they explored whole new worlds in those pages. Historical fiction can compound this effect, especially when it's based on real-life events. History buffs may already know the joys of learning about the past through a fictionalized retelling, but even those who fell asleep during that class in high school may want to give the genre another try. The best historical fiction doesn't read like a textbook at all, but a gripping account of a moment in time through another person's eyes. And especially in the case of books about women, BIPOC and other marginalized or underrepresented voices, reading historical fiction can broaden your mind with fresh perspectives on historical happenings or even accounts of entire events that aren't taught in the classroom. There's also a great read for every time period, from the very earliest blush of human history to the very recent past. Give these wonderful reads a try and then hop on over to the GH Book Club for more literary standouts.

1The Poisonwood Bible

$26.00

Evangelical Baptist Nathan Price moves his wife, four daughtersand all the contents of their householdto theCongo in 1959, during a calamitous fight for independence from Belgium. The historic turmoil sets the backdrop for a powerful story of a family struggling to survive across three decades in a tale that feels both epic and familiar.

RELATED:Here Are the Very Best Books to Read in 2021 (So Far)

2The Underground Railroad

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, National BookAward and all of our hearts, this gripping novel chronicles a young enslaved woman's struggle toward freedom. In Colson's telling, the underground railroad is no metaphor, but an actual railroad that Cora has to travel through space, time and the horrors of the antebellum South.

3The Book of Longings

Ana, the daughter of a wealthy Galilee man and sister to a man named Judas, has always been ambitious and creative. So when she's promised to an older widower, she can't stand the thought. She meets a young Jesus and the two flee to his mother Mary's house in Nazareth. What follows is a reverential tale of a woman who survives against the odds, introducing us to a different side of a very familiarcast of characters.

4In the Shadow of the Banyan

The story of a girl who comes of age during the Cambodian genocide, this istale of hope and perseverance amid staggering loss. As the Khmer Rouge brutalizes the populace and her world is thrown into turmoil, seven-year-old Raami finds solace in the folk stories her father taught her even as her world is enveloped in horror.

5Atonement

When 13-year-old Brionny witnesses a flirtation between her sister Cecilia and her childhood best friend and Robbie, she doesn't fully understand what she's seen. And as a result,she sets in motion a devastating crime that reverberates through all of their lives. Set before, during, and after WWII, it's a meditation on family, class, love and jealousy that's masterfully timeless.

6Girl with a Pearl Earring

Even if you haven't read the book, you probably know the Vermeer painting. This classic takes readers inside the relationship between the Dutch painter and anonymous girl who was his muse in a stirring portrait of a bygone era.

7How Much of These Hills Is Gold

When their father dies unexpectedly,siblingsLucy and Sam are left orphaned in their dicey Gold Rush-era mining town. They steal a horse, grab the body, and take off on a journey to find a safe place to lay him and their own pasts to rest. This gorgeous novel marries Chinese symbolism with a uniquely American sensibility and the timeless force of familial love.

RELATED:30 Entertaining and Enlightening Books by Asian Authors

8The Name of the Rose

$12.00

A highly secretive monastery in the year 1327. Suspected heresy within the Italian elites. Seven mysterious deaths and a monk-turned-detective following symbolic clues that become increasingly sinister the more he learns. This is part historical fiction, part delicious mystery and totally absorbing.

9The Night Watchman

It's 1953 andThomas Wazhashk works as a night watchman at a jewel factory near the Turtle Mountain Reservation. Patrice works there too, saving up to follow her sister Vera off the reservation to the big city, but she gets more than she bargained for when she travels to find her. All the while, there's a bill working its way through Congress that threatens the Chippewa's rights to their land, as well as the very identity of this memorable cast of people.

10Things Fall Apart

Told through the voice of an Igbo warrior in the late 1800s, this first in a series of three explores his community's resistance to British colonialism and the European presence on the continent as a whole. It vividly captures life in a pre-colonial African village, as well as takesa hard look at the tragedy of whatis lost under imperialism.

RELATED:20 Powerful Black History Books to Add to Your Reading List

11A Long Petal of the Sea

With Spain in the throes ofcivil war, two refugees embark for Chile on a ship chartered by the poet Pablo Neruda to start a new life in exile. A story of hope, of finding love amidst horrible circumstances and the promise of home, this one is poetically beautiful.

12The Sympathizer

Part spy novel, part page-turning historical fiction, this Pulitzer Prize-winner follows a man who comes to Los Angeles after the Fall of Saigon to build a new life among other Vietnamese immigrants. But the former army captain issecretly a communist double-agent.

13The Rose Code

Three very different women arrive towork as code breakers at Bletchley Park, untangling German messages to help Britain fight the Nazis. But as the war grinds on, their bond frays with it. Years later, the friends-turned-enemies arereunited by an encrypted letter, a mysterious traitor and the thrilling, dangerous work ofbreaking one last code.

14Vera

Vera Johnson has grown up between two worlds: The corruptglamour of her bordello-owner mother and the squalor and danger of the family paid to raise Vera in her stead. But after the great earthquake of 1906 levels San Francisco, Vera has to assemble some unlikely allies to build a new kind of life from the rubble.

15Pachinko

This sweeping epic that spans four generations of a Korean immigrant family starts with a pregnant teenage Sunja making the difficult choice to reject her son's powerful but duplicitous father in favor of a sickly but kind minister. Her decision ripples through the ages in this stunning story of sacrifice, loyalty and ambition.

16Half Life

In a time when many of us are more tuned in to scientific advances than we've ever been before, this reimagining of what might happen if pioneering scientistMarie Curie had taken a different path is just what the doctor ordered. In parallel timelines, the book explores Curie's actual path and an alternate lifetime, as well as its consequences for the world.

17One Hundred Years of Solitude

Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, this expansive work follows the rise and fall of the fictional Macondo. Alive with vibrant characters, the tragedies and triumphs of human life and everything that comes with it, this is a must-read.

18The Four Winds

Eerily resonant during the COVID-19 pandemic, this story set during the Great Depression is a testament to women's resilience. Elsa marries a man she barely knows to escape a spinster's uncertain future.But when drought devastates the Great Plains, she has to make difficult choices not only in the face of arocky marriage, butthe threat toher family's very survival.

19Swimming Back to Trout River

During the tumultuous years of China's Cultural Revolution, 10-year-old Junie receives a letter from her parents in the United Statespromising to come retrieve her before her 12th birthday, but Junie doesn't want to leave her grandparents or the Chinese countryside. Her reluctance could derail her parents' plan, especially sincelong-buried family secrets and their individual struggles have already driven them apart.

20Beloved

Sethe was born an enslaved person and escaped to Ohio, but she's still haunted by the hideous things that happened on the farm that she left. Not to mention the ghost of the baby who died there, whose grave is marked with one word: Beloved.

21The Orphan Collector: A Heroic Novel of Survival During the 1918 Influenza Pandemic

Set during the spread of the 1918 flu epidemic, this book feels especially resonant today. Pia ventures out into a Philadelphia under quarantine to seek supplies for her family, and finds herself in St. Vincent's Orphan Asylum after collapsing in the street. Meanwhile, neighbor Bernice sees Pia leave and makes a decision that will have long repercussions for them all.

22Homegoing

In the 1800s, two half-sisters are born in two different Ghana villages. One grows up to marry an Englishman and lead a comfortable life, while the other gets sold into slavery after a raid on her village. This story follows their lineage through eight generations from Ghana to the plantations ofMississippi, to Jazz Age Harlem.

23The Dovekeepers

Almost 2,000 years ago,900 Jews held off Roman armies on the ancient mountain of Masada, but only a handful survived.This breathtaking story follows four women who got there by very different paths, all keeping both doves and secrets about where they came from and where they hope to go.

24The God of Small Things

After their young cousin Sophia arrives, the world of 7-year-old twins Estha and Rahel changes forever. Set in the growing unrest of 1960's India, this is a piercing story of family conflict, illicit liaisons and political drama.

25The Mountains Sing

Trn Diu Lan flees herfamily farm in Vietnam with her six children as the Communist government rises in the North. Years later, her youngest granddaughter comes of age as her parents and uncles take to theH Ch Minh Trail to fight in a conflict that tore both her family and their beloved country apart.Sweeping, epic and beautifully lyrical, this book is as poetic as it is stirring.

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25 Best Historical Fiction Books - Novels Inspired By History - GoodHousekeeping.com

Legionnaire Jerry Nelson was in awe of the beautiful bouquet of flowers he recently received at home. The sender was expressing appreciation to Nelson and American Legion Post 681 in Lakota, Ohio, for the Department of Ohio Educator of the Year for 2020 nomination an award Dr. Tisha Grote accepted March 13 during the departments leadership conference in Columbus.

The last year, 2020, in a global pandemic has been extremely challenging on all fronts, said Grote, an AP U.S. government and politics teacher at Lakota East High School. This nomination and award have meant a lot to me in a year that has tested my resolve. I am forever grateful to Mr. Jerry Nelson and Post 681.

The relationship between Grote and Nelson transpired in 2007 when American Legion Post 681 was revitalized. The post wanted to be involved with the community, We wanted to work with the Lakota School Systems to promote ourselves in the community and get everyone to know us that were out there, said Nelson, the Americanism chairman at Post 681. So, he contacted Lakota East High School and found out who the AP government teacher was.

That was 14 years ago. Since then, Grote and Nelson have formed a very good relationship. She has been indispensable for our post to accomplish the goals set forth in the Americanism pillar. So, I really wanted to honor her for the accomplishments shes had with The American Legion and her students.

Nelson visits Grotes classroom four to five times throughout a school year. He has the entire class period to talk about and promote Department of Ohio programs that Post 681 supports the Americanism and Government Test Program, Buckeye Boys State, Auxiliary Girls State, and the Oratorical Contest. He also brings another member from the post with him to speak about their military service such as Air Force nurse and Ohio Rep. Jennifer Gross.

Thats quite a sacrifice for a teacher to give up that much time; however, its been very effective, Nelson said.

The effectiveness of Nelsons visits to Grotes classroom have resulted in:

- Over 60 young men sponsored by Post 681 to attend Ohio American Legion Buckeye Boys State three have gone on to attend American Legion Boys Nation in Washington, D.C.

- Over 45 young women sponsored by Post 681 to attend Ohio Auxiliary Girls State.

- Six students being accepted into a military service academy following high school graduation.

- Six students being winners of the Department of Ohios Americanism and Government Test Program for the past six years. About 60,000 students in grades 10-12 statewide take the Americanism and Government Test Program every year; the 18 winners chosen each year receive a five-day, all expenses paid trip to Gettysburg, Pa., and Washington, D.C., with American Legion Department of Ohio leadership and Auxiliary leadership.

I think this is remarkable. Absolutely remarkable, Nelson said. This is a testament to how well she teaches. She goes out of her way to teach these kids Americanism and government.

Nelson believes Grotes drive for Americanism comes from her father, a point man in the Vietnam War.

Growing up, I do not remember my father ever speaking much of his time in this war, Grote said. It was not until I became a government teacher in the 2001-2002 school year that I invited my dad to come into my classroom and speak on Veterans Day. The stories he told were the first time I was hearing them. He brought in photos and a few other items he was allowed to keep from his time serving. I had never seen them before. He continued to come into my classroom on Veterans Day until 2012. At that time, we recognized that he was showing signs of dementia.

It is important to me and my students that veterans have their stories heard. They have much to teach students of U.S. history, world history and U.S. government. I have enjoyed creating a space in my classroom for those stories to be heard.

Students get to spend time with Post 681 members outside of the classroom as well. The post has a dinner celebration to honor the students they sponsored to Boys and Girls State, who participated in the oratorical contest, and who won the Americanism and Government Test. Grote and the parents of the students also attend.

It is a wonderful opportunity for my students and their family members to meet all the members of the post, Grote said.

It is only during this celebration dinner that Nelson brings a special family memento his fathers World War II pocket Bible. During his fight in the Battle of the Bulge, Nelsons father was hit with shrapnel that struck his Bible but stopped before piercing through it. That Bible was in his field jacket pocket thats over his heart, said Nelson, who joined The American Legion in effort to support his sons military service in the Afghanistan war. Thats the Bible we place on the POW/MIA table.

Grote is the first teacher that Post 681 nominated for Educator of the Year.

Dr. Grote has certainly aided our post, her students, the Lakota School System, the community and nation, Nelsons said. Shes helped us promote ourselves in the community, and the community knows The American Legion post to a good degree through her efforts. We hold her in high regards.

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Ohio Educator of the Year teaches Americanism, military history in the classroom - The American Legion