Category Archives: History

The earliest attempts to record the nations history took the form of accounts of military campaigns, summaries of state and federal legislative activity, dispatches from the frontier and other narrowly focused reports. In the 19th century, these were replaced by a master narrative of the colonial and founding era, best exemplified by the father of American history, George Bancroft, in his History of the United States, From the Discovery of the American Continent. Published in 10 volumes from the 1830s through the 1870s, Bancrofts opus is generally seen as the first comprehensive history of the country, and its influence was incalculable. Bancrofts ambition was to synthesize American history into a grand and glorious epic. He viewed the European colonists who settled the continent as acting out a divine plan and the revolution as an almost purely philosophical act, undertaken to model self-government for all the world.

The scholarly effort to revise this narrative began in the early 20th century with the work of the Progressive historians, most notably Charles A. Beard, who tried to show that the founders were motivated not exclusively by idealism and virtue but also by their pocketbooks. Suppose, Beard asked in 1913, our fundamental law was not the product of an abstraction known as the whole people, but of a group of economic interests which must have expected beneficial results from its adoption? Though the Progressives work was influential, they were bitterly attacked for their theories, which shocked many Americans. SCAVENGERS, HYENA-LIKE, DESECRATE THE GRAVES OF THE DEAD PATRIOTS WE REVERE, blared one headline in an Ohio newspaper.

As the Cold War dawned, it became clear that this school could not provide the necessary inspiration for an America that envisioned itself a defender of global freedom and democracy. The Beardian approach was beaten back by the counter-Progressive or Consensus school, which emphasized the founders shared values and played down class conflict. Among Consensus historians, a keen sense of national purpose was evident, as well as an eagerness to disavow the whiff of Marxism in the progressive narrative and re-establish the founders idealism. In 1950, the Harvard historian Samuel Eliot Morison lamented that the Progressives were robbing the people of their heroes and insulting their folk-memory of the great figures whom they admired. Seven years later, one of his former students, Edmund S. Morgan, published The Birth of the Republic, 1763-1789, a key text of this era (described by one reviewer at the time as having the brilliant hue of the era of Eisenhower prosperity). Morgan stressed the revolution as a search for principles that led to a nation committed to liberty and equality.

By the 1960s, the pendulum was ready to swing the other way. A group of scholars identified variously as Neo-Progressive historians, New Left historians or social historians challenged the old paradigm, turning their focus to the lives of common people in colonial society and U.S. history more broadly. Earlier generations primarily studied elites, who left a copious archive of written material. Because the subjects of the new history laborers, seamen, enslaved people, women, Indigenous people produced relatively little writing of their own, many of these scholars turned instead to large data sets like tax lists, real estate inventories and other public records to illuminate the lives of what were sometimes called the inarticulate masses. This novel approach set aside the central assumption of traditional history, what might be called the doctrine of implicit importance, wrote the historian Jack P. Greene in a 1975 article in The Times. From the perspective supplied by the new history, it has become clear that the experience of women, children, servants, slaves and other neglected groups are quite as integral to a comprehensive understanding of the past as that of lawyers, lords and ministers of state.

An explosion of new research resulted, transforming the field of American history. One of the most significant developments was an increased attention to Black history and the role of slavery. For more than a century, a profession dominated by white men had mostly consigned these subjects to the sidelines. Bancroft had seen slavery as problematic an anomaly in a democratic country but mostly because it empowered a Southern planter elite he considered corrupt, lazy and aristocratic. Beard and the other Progressives hadnt focused much on slavery, either. Until the 1950s, the institution was treated in canonical works of American history as an aberration best addressed minimally if at all. When it was taken up for close study, as in Ulrich B. Phillipss 1918 book, American Negro Slavery, it was seen as an inefficient enterprise sustained by benevolent masters to whom enslaved people felt mostly gratitude. That began to change in the 1950s and 1960s, as works by Herbert Aptheker, Stanley Elkins, Philip S. Foner, John Hope Franklin, Eugene D. Genovese, Benjamin Quarles, Kenneth M. Stampp, C. Vann Woodward and many others transformed the mainstream view of slavery.

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The 1619 Project and the Long Battle Over U.S. History - The New York Times

The Industrial Revolution, which began roughly in the second half of the 1700s and stretched into the early 1800s, was a period of enormous change in Europe and America. The invention of new technologies, from mechanized looms for weaving cloth and the steam-powered locomotive to improvements in iron smelting, transformed what had been largely rural societies of farmers and craftsmen who made goods by hand. Many people moved from the countryside into fast-growing cities, where they worked in factories filled with machinery.

While the Industrial Revolution created economic growth and offered new opportunities, that progress came with significant downsides, from damage to the environment and health and safety hazards to squalid living conditions for workers and their families. Historians say that many of these problems persisted and grew in the Second Industrial Revolution, another period of rapid change that began in the late 1800s.

Here are a few of the most significant negative effects of the Industrial Revolution.

WATCH: America: The Story of Us: Cities on HISTORY Vault

As cities grew during the Industrial Revolution, there wasnt enough housing for all the new inhabitants, who were jammed into squalid inner-city neighborhoods as more affluent residents fled to the suburbs. In the 1830s, Dr. William Henry Duncan, a government health official in Liverpool, England, surveyed living conditions and found that a third of the citys population lived in cellars of houses, which had earthen floors and no ventilation or sanitation. As many as 16 people were living in a single room and sharing a single privy. The lack of clean water and gutters overflowing with sewage from basement cesspits made workers and their families vulnerable to infectious diseases such as cholera.

In his 1832 study entitled Moral and Physical Condition of the Working Classes Employed in the Cotton Manufacture in Manchester, physician and social reformer James Phillips Kay described the meager diet of the British industrial citys lowly-paid laborers, who subsisted on a breakfast of tea or coffee with a little bread, and a midday meal that typically consisted of boiled potatoes, melted lard and butter, sometimes with a few pieces of fried fatty bacon mixed in. After finishing work, laborers might have some more tea, often mingled with spirits and a little bread, or else oatmeal and potatoes again. As a result of malnutrition, Kay wrote, workers frequently suffered from problems with their stomachs and bowels, lost weight, and had skin that was pale, leaden-colored, or of the yellow hue.

Workers who came from the countryside to the cities had to adjust to a very different rhythm of existence, with little personal autonomy. They had to arrive when the factory whistle blew, or else face being locked out and losing their pay, and even being forced to pay fines.

Once on the job, they couldnt freely move around or catch a breather if they needed one, since that might necessitate shutting down a machine. Unlike craftsmen in rural towns, their days often consisted of having to perform repetitive tasks, and continual pressure to keep upfaster pace, more supervision, less pride, as Peter N. Stearns, a historian at George Mason University, explains. As Stearns describes in his 2013 book The Industrial Revolution in World History, when the workday finally was done, they didnt have much time or energy left for any sort of recreation. To make matters worse, city officials often banned festivals and other activities that theyd once enjoyed in rural villages. Instead, workers often spent their leisure time at the neighborhood tavern, where alcohol provided an escape from the tedium of their lives.

Without much in the way of safety regulation, factories of the Industrial Revolution could be horrifyingly hazardous. As Peter Capuano details in his 2015 book Changing Hands: Industry, Evolution and the Reconfiguration of the Victorian Body, workers faced the constant risk of losing a hand in the machinery. A contemporary newspaper account described the grisly injuries suffered in 1830 by millworker Daniel Buckley, whose left hand was caught and lacerated, and his fingers crushed before his coworkers could stop the equipment. He eventually died as a result of the trauma.

Mines of the era, which supplied the coal needed to keep steam-powered machines running, had terrible accidents as well. David M. Turners and Daniel Blackies 2018 book Disability in the Industrial Revolution describes a gas explosion at a coal mine that left 36-year-old James Jackson with severe burns on his face, neck, chest, hands and arms, as well as internal injuries. He was in such awful shape that he required opium to cope with the excruciating pain. After six weeks of recuperation, remarkably, a doctor decided that he was fit to return to work, but probably with permanent scars from the ordeal.

While children worked prior to the Industrial Revolution, the rapid growth of factors created such a demand that poor youth and orphans were plucked from Londons poorhouses and housed in mill dormitories, while they worked long hours and were deprived of education. Compelled to do dangerous adult jobs, children often suffered horrifying fates.

John Browns expose A Memoir of Robert Blincoe, an Orphan Boy, published in 1832, describes a 10-year-old girl named Mary Richards whose apron became caught in the machinery in a textile mill. In an instant, the poor girl was drawn by an irresistible force and dashed on the floor, Brown wrote. She uttered the most heart-rending shrieks.

University of Alberta history professor Beverly Lemire sees the exploitation of child labor in a systematic and sustained way, the use of which catalyzed industrial production, as the worst negative effect of the Industrial Revolution.

The Industrial Revolution helped establish patterns of gender inequality in the workplace that lasted in the eras that followed. Laura L. Frader, a retired professor of history at Northeastern University and author ofThe Industrial Revolution: A History in Documents, notes that factory owners often paid women only half of what men got for the same work, based on the false assumption that women didnt need to support families, and were only working for pin money that a husband might give them to pay for non-essential personal items.

Discrimination against and stereotyping of women workers continued into the second Industrial Revolution. The myth that women had nimble fingers and that they could withstand repetitive, mindless work better than men led to the displacement of men in white collar jobs such as office work, and the assignment of such jobs to women after the 1870s when the typewriter was introduced, Frader says.

While office work was less dangerous and better paid, it locked women into yet another category of womens work, from which it was hard to escape, Frader explains.

Pollution from copper factories in Cornwall, England, as depicted in an 1887 engraving.

Leemage/Corbis via Getty Images

The Industrial Revolution was powered by burning coal, and big industrial cities began pumping vast quantities of pollution into the atmosphere. Londons concentration of suspended particulate matter rose dramatically between 1760 and 1830, as this chart from Our World In Data illustrates. Pollution in Manchester was so awful that writer Hugh Miller noted the lurid gloom of the atmosphere that overhangs it, and described the innumerable chimneys [that] come in view, tall and dim in the dun haze, each bearing atop its own pennon of darkness.

Air pollution continued to rise in the 1800s, causing respiratory illness and higher death rates in areas that burned more coal. Worse yet, the burning of fossil fuel pumped carbon into the atmosphere. A study published in 2016 in Nature suggests that climate change driven by human activity began as early as the 1830s.

Despite all these ills, the Industrial Revolution had positive effects, such as creating economic growth and making goods more available. It also helped lead to the rise of a prosperous middle class that grabbed some of the economic power once held by aristocrats, and led to the rise of specialized jobs in industry.

See more here:

7 Negative Effects of the Industrial Revolution - History

For 30 years, Northern Ireland was scarred by a period of deadly sectarian violence known as the Troubles. This explosive era was fraught with car bombings, riots and revenge killings that ran from the late 1960s through the late 1990s. The Troubles were seeded by centuries of conflict between predominantly Catholic Ireland and predominantly Protestant England. Tensions flared into violence in the late 1960s,leaving some3,600 people dead and more than 30,000injured.

Northern Ireland police, including members of the Ulster Special Constabulary, guarding a road near the Fermanagh/Cavan border (circa 1920s).

Bettmann/Getty Images

The origins of the Troubles date back to centuries of warfare in which the predominantly Catholic people of Ireland attempted to break free of British (overwhelmingly Protestant) rule. In 1921, the Irish successfully fought for independence and Ireland was partitioned into two countries: the Irish Free State, which was almost entirely Catholic, and the smaller Republic of Northern Ireland, which was mostly Protestant with a Catholic minority.

While Ireland was fully independent, Northern Ireland remained under British rule, and the Catholic communities in cities like Belfast and Derry (legally called Londonderry)complained of discrimination and unfair treatment by the Protestant-controlled government and police forces. In time, two opposing forces coalesced in Northern Ireland largely along sectarian lines: the Catholic nationalists versus the Protestant loyalists.

READ MORE: How Northern Ireland Became Part of the United Kingdom

In the 1960s, a new generation of politically and socially conscious young Catholic nationalists in Northern Ireland started looking to the civil rights movement in America as a model for ending what they saw as brazen anti-Catholic discrimination in their home country.

There was systematic discrimination in housing and jobs, says James Smyth, an emeritus history professor at the University of Notre Dame who grew up in Belfast. The biggest employer in Belfast was the shipyard, but it had a 95 percent Protestant workforce. In the city of Derry, which had a two-thirds Catholic majority, the voting districts had been gerrymandered so badly that it was controlled politically by [Protestant] loyalists for 50 years.

Young nationalist leaders like John Hume, Austin Currie and Bernadette Devlin refused to accept the status quo. They saw what was happening in the United States and how peaceful mass protests had drawn attention to the plight of Black Americans living under segregation and Jim Crow.

They modeled themselves on the American civil rights movement to the extent that one of the songs sung in Northern Ireland was We Shall Overcome, says Smyth, who edited a 2017 book titled Remembering the Troubles: Contesting the Recent Past in Northern Ireland.

A petrol bomb which was thrown at a police van (left) is pictured burning out in Rossville Street, Derry, Northern Ireland, October 1968.

Cain,Patterson and Thomas/Mirrorpix/Getty Images

On October 5, 1968, a protest march was planned along Duke Street in Derry. The nationalist activists wanted to draw attention to discriminatory housing policies that resulted in de facto segregation along sectarian and religious lines.

The march was banned by the Northern Ireland government, but protestors defied the order and gathered on October 5 with signs reading One man, one vote! and Smash sectarianism!

The crowd started to move, but was barricaded by a line of police from the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) brandishing batons. The police charged the protestors and simultaneously cut off their retreat. TV cameras captured disturbing footage of RUC officers beating marchers with batons and chaos in the streets.

October 5, 1968 was when the Troubles began, argues Smyth, and those TV images are etched in the peoples memory.

The police crackdown on October 5, 1968 ratcheted up tensions between Catholic nationalists and Protestant loyalists and set the stage for more violent clashes.

On New Year's Day, 1969, nationalist activists took a page from Martin Luther King Jr.s historic March on Selma and organized a march from Belfast, the capital of Northern Ireland, to Derry, the capital of injustice, as Bernadette Devlin called it. The route took them through known loyalist strongholds, where the threat of violence was palpable.

The RUC provided a police escort for the nationalist protestors throughout the multi-day march until they reached Burntollet Bridge outside of Derry. At that point, protestors recall, the police put on their helmets and shields as if expecting trouble. Thats when a loyalist mob started raining rocks down on the protestors.

The attackers, estimated at 300 loyalists, swarmed the bridge wielding clubs and iron bars. Some of them wore the white armbands of the B-Specials, an auxiliary police unit of the RUC. While bloodied protestors fled into the freezing river for protection, the RUC officers stood aside and did nothing to protect them, says Smyth.

The ambush at Burntollet Bridge was eerily similar to the events of March 7, 1965, when peaceful Selma marchers crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge and were violently beaten back by a line of white-helmeted Alabama state troopers armed with tear gas, night sticks and whips.

READ MORE: Irish Republican Army: The Troubles, Attacks, Hunger Strike

Rioters throwing rocks and stones as trouble flared following the Apprentice Boys parade through the streets on Derry, Northern Ireland, August 13, 1969.

Gary Weaser/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Some historians peg the real beginning of the Troubles to the events of August 1969, when a loyalist parade in Derry sparked three days of rioting and violent reprisals.

Across Northern Ireland, says Smyth, loyalists groups regularly organized parades to commemorate Protestant military victories dating back to the 17th century. In Derry, the local chapter was known as the Apprentice Boys and they planned a patriotic loyalist parade on August 12 that ran directly past a predominantly Catholic part of town called the Bogside.

The Bogsiders saw the Apprentice Boys parade as a direct provocation and prepared for a violent confrontation, barricading streets and readying Molotov cocktails. As expected, nationalist Bogsiders clashed with the parading Apprentice Boys and RUC officers rushed in to quell the rioting. They were met with violent resistance by the Bogsiders, who hurled rocks and Molotov cocktails.

The Battle of the Bogside, as its known, raged for three days, but some of the worst damage was inflicted in Belfast, where loyalist mobs aided by the B-Specials swarmed Catholic neighborhoods and burned 1,500 homes to the ground.

On August 14, the overwhelmed prime minister of Northern Ireland called on the British government to send in troops to restore order. It was the beginning of a decades-long deployment in Northern Ireland by the British military.

Basically the entire Northern Ireland state collapsed over a period of three or four days, says Smyth. They couldnt maintain order, so the British had to come in.

Demonstrators run after tear gas explosions on "Bloody Sunday," January 30, 1972 in Northern Ireland.

PL Gould/Getty Images

The British troops were initially welcomed by the Catholic nationalists as potential protectors, but the military soon instituted a controversial policy of internment without trial, after which hundreds of suspected IRA members were rounded up and imprisoned without due process.

On January 30, 1972, Catholic nationalists in Derry organized a march to protest the British internment policy, but the military was called in to shut it down. When protestors didnt disperse, the troops opened fire with rubber bullets and then live rounds. Thirteen protestors were killed and 17 wounded in a tragedy known as Bloody Sunday.

Its amazing that more people werent killed, says Smyth, who was among the protestors that day in Derry.

During the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, Northern Ireland suffered dozens of car bombings and sectarian attacks perpetrated by paramilitary groups on both sides like the Provisional IRA and the Ulster Volunteer Force. Hundreds of civilians were among the dead.

The Troubles came to an end, at least officially, with the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, which created a framework for political power-sharing and an end to decades of violence.

Read the rest here:

How the Troubles Began in Northern Ireland - History

New blacksmith and woodworking shop dedicated

A small group of volunteers of the Richland Early American Center for History were lauded for their contributions in honoring local history and keeping it alive for generations to come Thursday from the porchof a log cabin in South Park.

State Rep. Marilyn John, R-Shelby, presented a commendation to those individuals for the new blacksmith and woodworking shop, also known as Hawk's Nest Forge & Cooperage,during adedication ceremony. They also were lauded for an1800s log cabin named The Petersburg Cabin, and volunteers' efforts finishing the existingBlockhouse already standingin the city park.

Members of the board of trustees of the Richland Early American Center for History were on hand with community leaders for the dedication ceremony.

The 1800slog cabin was moved from Mifflin to the park.

TheBlockhouse, originally located in Mansfield's public square, was one of 11 built in the Mansfield area during the War of 1812 as a refuge from Native American attacks, and is the last surviving local structure from that era.

Sunda Peters, a founding memberof the REACH historical nonprofit group, said the Blockhouse needed a friend in the form of the two new buildings.

REACH member Kevin Wappner thanked downtown developer John Fernyak and his family for their donations of blacksmith tools and more. A long list of people, organizations, businesses, private donorsand morewere thanked for their contributions.

"Their donations (the Fernyaks) actually speared us on in this blacksmith shop," Wappner said. "We appreciate that. Sometimes getting off to a start is the hardest part."

Peters, who also is active in the OhioGenealogical Society on Ohio 97 in Bellville, also was lauded for loaning the local REACH historical group her own money to keep the historical projects at South Park moving forward.

Wappner said Thursday a donor came forward offering to match any donation REACH raises in the next few months up to $25,000.

"We're really excited about that," Wappner said. "We're not done yet.... We thank everybody for all their money."

Wappner, who said he was not speaking as a member of REACH but as a resident of Richland County, thanked Peters, chairman of REACH, for her dedication, financial contributions and more as he unveiled a plaque in her honor.

"I don't know if everyone remembers but in 2009the Blockhouse was sitting unfinished," he said.

"It sat for almost a year and people wondered what was going to happen to it and this lady (Sundra Peters) came forward said, 'I'll raise some funds. I'll find volunteers and we'll get that Blockhouse done.'

"Within a year the roof was on, the second floor was inand logs were filled in between," Wappner said. "It took us another year or so and we were ready to open to the public," Wappner said.

He said when the cabin became available in Mifflin, she again stepped up and said she would start the nonprofit.

"I'll chair it. I'll loan you the money to go get (disassemble) that log cabin and I tell you what, when things looked pretty desperate, if it wasn't for the factthat we owed Sunda, some of us might just have said, hey this is too big a projectfor us... But we weren't going to let her down because she believed in us," Wappner said. "I am so proud she served all those years and made this historic area come to fruition."

REACH member Tom Pappas thanked everyone who donated money and time to the effort from private benefactors, Local 688 International Brotherhoodof Electrical Workers, to banks, skilled tradesexperts like the stone mason who built the fireplace and chimney in the log cabin, to the shake shingle roofer,to members of the Richland County Jail inmate work crew supervised by Keith Witsky who provided labor and the crew/volunteers of REACH.

Peters said, "It has just been a labor of love for these people. We hope the city of Mansfield, the county of Richland and the state of Ohio's members, citizens will enjoy this for many, many years to come."

Local bass baritoneDalton Derr of Mansfield even performed, "The Impossible Dream," comparing the likes of Thomas Edison and the Wright Brothers to people like Pappas who all have in common big dreams.

South Park: Blacksmithing and woodworking shop being built at South Park

Mansfield: Steelworkers Local 3057 on strike after talks end abruptly with ArcelorMittal

South Park: Discover life in early America this weekend at South Park

Mansfield Mayor Tim Theaker also thanked Pappas for hisvision and the group's efforts which he feelsimproved this area and South Park.

Theaker said at one time there was just the Blockhouse and soon there will be a village.

"He said he's got another one (building) that he's ready to go to," Theaker said, to which Pappas said, "We're hoping. We need some younger help though. We're all getting too old to do this anymore."

lwhitmir@gannett.com

419-521-7223

Twitter: @LWhitmir

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'A labor of love': Local nonprofit brings history to life in South Park - Mansfield News Journal

Rutgers and Wisconsin have met only three times in their history with the Badgers taking all three meetings with ease. Wisconsin has outscored the Knights 116-27 in those contests. Lets take a look back.

2014

The best Rutgers squad since joining the BIG was looking to get a homecoming victory and get their sixth win of the year. On a rainy day, Wisconsin stuck to their bread and butter by running the ball for almost 300 yards. Melvin Gordan rushed for 128 yards and 2 touchdowns and New Jersey native Corey Clement finished with 131 yards and another 2 touchdowns. Rutgers offense was nonexistent as they were shutout for the first time since 2002. The Badgers left Piscataway with a 37-0 drubbing.

2015

Wisconsin continued its domination over Rutgers the following year in Madison. Corey Clement once again torched the Scarlet Knights for 3 touchdowns on 115 rushing yards. Rutgers offense was once again held without a touchdown. The lone bright spot was when Blessaun Austin returned an interception 50 yards for a touchdown. Wisconsin cruised to a 48-10 victory.

2018

With the season spiraling out of control, Rutgers tried to salvage its season with a victory over a Wisconsin team that was not up to par with their teams of the past. Rutgers hung around for as long as they could but the Badgers were simply too much. Ex Rutgers commit and New Jersey native Jonathon Taylor rushed for 208 yards and 3 touchdowns. Current Rutgers receiver Aaron Cruickshank had 1 rush for 3 yards for the Badgers. Wisconsin handled the Scarlet Knights 31-17.

This weekend will be the fourth meeting of the series as Wisconsin returns to Piscataway riding a 4 game winning streak.

Excerpt from:

Rutgers series history with Wisconsin - On The Banks

If it all sounds a little drab or simple, we should bear in mind the ecology of these early Ukrainian cities. Living at the frontier of forest and steppe, the residents were not just cereal farmers and livestock-keepers, but also hunted deer and wild boar, imported salt, flint and copper, and kept gardens within the bounds of the city, consuming apples, pears, cherries, acorns, hazelnuts and apricots all served on painted ceramics, which are considered among the finest aesthetic creations of the prehistoric world.

Researchers are far from unanimous about what sort of social arrangements all this required, but most would agree the logistical challenges were daunting. Residents definitely produced a surplus, and with it came ample opportunity for some of them to seize control of the stocks and supplies, to lord it over the others or fight for the spoils, but over eight centuries we find little evidence of warfare or the rise of social elites. The true complexity of these early cities lay in the political strategies they adopted to prevent such things. Careful analysis by archaeologists shows how the social freedoms of the Ukrainian city dwellers were maintained through processes of local decision-making, in households and neighborhood assemblies, without any need for centralized control or top-down administration.

Yet, even now, these Ukrainian sites almost never come up in scholarship. When they do, academics tend to call them mega-sites rather than cities, a kind of euphemism that signals to a wider audience that they should not be thought of as proper cities but as villages that for some reason had expanded inordinately in size. Some even refer to them outright as overgrown villages. How do we account for this reluctance to welcome the Ukrainian mega-sites into the charmed circle of urban origins? Why has anyone with even a passing interest in the origin of cities heard of Uruk or Mohenjo-daro, but almost no one of Taljanky or Nebelivka?

Its hard here not to recall Ursula K. Le Guins short story The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas, about an imaginary city that also made do without kings, wars, slaves or secret police. We have a tendency, Le Guin notes, to write off such a community as simple, but in fact these citizens of Omelas were not simple folk, not dulcet shepherds, noble savages, bland utopians. They were not less complex than us. The trouble is just that we have a bad habit of considering happiness as something rather stupid.

Le Guin had a point. Obviously, we have no idea how relatively happy the inhabitants of Ukrainian mega-sites like Maidanetske or Nebelivka were, compared with the steppe-lords who covered nearby landscapes with treasure-filled mounds, or even the servants ritually sacrificed at their funerals (though we can guess). And as anyone who has read the story knows, Omelas had some problems, too.

But the point remains: Why do we assume that people who have figured out a way for a large population to govern and support itself without temples, palaces and military fortifications that is, without overt displays of arrogance and cruelty are somehow less complex than those who have not? Why would we hesitate to dignify such a place with the name of city? The mega-sites of Ukraine and adjoining regions were inhabited from roughly 4100 to 3300 B.C., which is a considerably longer period of time than most subsequent urban settlements. Eventually, they were abandoned. We still dont know why. What they offer us, in the meantime, is significant: further proof that a highly egalitarian society has been possible on an urban scale.

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Opinion | What Jared Diamond and Yuval Noah Harari Get Wrong About History - The New York Times

WHAT A RICH SKI HISTORY AND HERITAGE we have, and that was celebrated anew this week as a way to share it with our local fourth-graders from five of the valleys elementary schools. Having participated Monday-Wednesday in the re-enactment of the Hannes Schneider familys arrival at the North Conway Train Station on Feb. 11, 1939 portraying Austrian skimeister Benno Rybizka to George Clevelands Harvey D. Gibson, and Hannah and Christoph Schneiders Ludwina and Hannes Schneider the first two days and with Sue and Jim Tuttle playing those roles the final day I say from the bottom of my ski-history loving heart that it was an enriching experience.

As the New England Ski Museums motto says, we were all preserving the future of skiings past in a most animated way, riding the Conway Scenic Railroads Valley Trains with the youngsters and giving them lessons on board.

The hit of the week came after our presentation in one of the cars on Wednesday, as I showed the famous arrival photo to the kids up close, making my way down the aisle.

One very sharp little boy pointed to the image of the white-capped Rybizka in the photo next to the Schneiders and Mr. Gibson and asked me, Is that you? to which I replied, Yeah, it is.

Really?, he said, concerned: Now, when did you say this photo was taken?

Feb. 11, 1939, I said.

But wait ... he said, and I could see he was doing the math. How ... old are you?

Oh, about 120 but dont you think other than my scratchy voice that Im doing pretty good for my age? I said, straight-faced.

I then set him straight, letting him know I was just a re-enactor.

Youre a very smart little boy, I told him. Youre good in math, right?

He nodded. Smart little kid!

Id like to tip my Benno white cap to organizers Betty Newton and Elaine Swanson, SAU 9 Superintendent Kevin Richard and all involved school staff, Conway Scenic Rairoads David Swirk, Brian Solomon, Adam Mosston, Jennifer Andruzzi Westerberg and staff, the New England Ski Museums Jeff Leich and staff, ardent ski history supporter Stefi Reed Hastings (daughter of late Eastern Slope Ski School fonder Carroll Reed and Kay Reed), the North Conway Community Centers Carrie Burkett, the North Conway Country Club and all the volunteers for making this happen.

A community open house will be held Nov. 30 at the North Conway Community Center, and kids will present their ski history projects.

SAD NEWS: Our hearts go out to the family of Ed Engler, who passed away Thursday following a long bout with cancer. Ed lived in Madison and was general manager of the Carroll Country Independent in the 1990s. He lived in Laconia for the past 20 years and was a co-founder of The Laconia Daily Sun along with Adam Hirshan and Mark Guerringue. He was also a three-term mayor of Laconia and was instrumental in revitalizing the Colonial Theater, a city landmark. The auditorium there is named after him

SPEAKING OF OUR SKI COMMUNITY, Ellen Chandler, executive director of the Jackson Ski Touring Foundation, invites all to come to their annual Used Equipment Ski Swap, set for today from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. at the JSTF in Jackson. Go to jacksonxc.org or call (603) 383-9355 for further information.

ESSC SKI SALE: The 51st Eastern Slope Ski Club Sale is set for Nov. 12, 2-7 p.m., and Nov. 13, 9 a.m.-noon at the North Conway Community Center. Drop-off night is Nov. 11 from 5-8 p.m.

Note that masks will be required at all times when inside the community center; hand sanitizer will be available upon entry and throughout your shopping experience; capacity restrictions will be in place, and everyone is asked to practice social distancing.

JUNIOR PROGRAM VOLUNTEERS: The ESSC is hosting a Junior Program volunteer party Sunday, Nov. 7, from noon-4 p.m. at Tuckerman Brewing Co. Its great to hear that the Junior Program will be back in all local schools this season after having a hiatus last year due to the pandemic. According to the website, All current, new or interested Junior Program volunteers must attend this meeting.

ANOTHER EXAMPLE of our community spirit this week was the groundbreaking for the MWV Rec Path project. Long in the waiting, the shovels went into the ground with a ceremony near the now-under-construction Cranmore hotel project Wednesday morning.

Well have more in our Nov. 13 edition, but a thumbs-up to Chris Meier, Larry Garland, Ted and Sharon Wroblewski, Joe Berry, Steve Swenson and all the people and organizations involved with the project. Targeted completion date is June 2023, but it could be sooner. Stay tuned for more.

ITS BACK: Were happy to report that one of our time-honored local traditions, the North Conway Rotary Radio auction, returns to the airwaves of WMWV 93.5-FM on Nov. 8-11 from 6:05-8 p.m. after a years hiatus caused by pandemic concerns, For a list of items, go to northconwayrotary.org or see the supplement published in The Conway Daily Sun.

To receive a bidding number, call (603) 356-0042 and to place a bid call (603) 447-1060. Its a great way to get your Christmas shopping done while helping the club to do good things for the community.

Plus its always fun to hear Kelly Drew, Karen Umberger, Robert Young, Dr. Frank Hubbell, Randy Guida, Carolyn Brown, Tom Smith and gang do their live radio bidding broadcasting thing.

IN HAPPY BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK, we salute one and all, including: Jean OSullivan and Amy Kennedy (today); Mud Bowl chair Benny Jesseman, Sascha Loew Blacke, mountain adventurer Melissa Nadeua and Laurie Mcaleer (Nov. 7); Kim Schroeder Steward (11-8); Kathy Walsh Black (11-9), local cooperative weather observer Ed Bergeron and Ben Miller (11-10); Scott Henley, Dave Gregory and Nancy Grant Bartlett (Veterans Day, 11-11); and Sunrise Shacks Fred Nemeth, Ginny Rogers, Jens Friends President Erik Chandler (11-12).

CONGRATS TO John Eastman of the Conway Parks and Recreation Department for being named successor to retiring Conway Town Manager Tom Holmes come Aug. 1 and thanks to Mr. Holmes for his service.

DONT MISS THE John Butcher Blues Project at the Wildcat Tavern Nov. 13. Go to wildcattavern.com for the scoop. And the Red Parka has the House Tones tonight but is closed on vacation, Nov. 8-16. Go to redparkapub.com for more. The Riley Parkhurst Project is at Tuckerman Brewing today from 2-5 p.m.

REMDAWGS PASSING: We citizens of Red Sox Nation were saddened by the passing Oct. 30 of former Red Sox second baseman and beloved BoSox game color commentator Jerry RemDawg Remy, 68.

For Red Sox fans, he was part of our extended families. His funny insights will be missed. R.I.P.

ITS GETTING colder and the snow guns have been tested, so it wont be long. In the meantime, see you at the Veterans Day Parade that will proceed Nov. 11 at 11 a.m. from John H. Fuller Elementary School down North Conways Main Street to Schouler Park for the ceremonies emceed by Navy veteran John Pandora. Well have a full story next week.

And Settlers Greens 21st Bring a Friend shopping event is taking place Nov. 5-14, with Nov. 13 being the primary day for festivities. Go to settlersgreen.com for more.

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Valley Voice: Living the ski history dream - Conway Daily Sun

This morning, the Ho-Chunk Nations flag was raised atop Bascom Hill at 10 a.m. today during a public ceremony for the first time in the University of Wisconsins history.

Chancellor Rebecca Blank, the UW Director of Tribal Relations Aaron Bird Bear, Traditional Chief of the Ho-Chunk Nation Clayton Winneshiek and Vice President of the Ho-Chunk Nation Karena Thundercloud shared their remarks about the raising of the flag. The ceremony also featured traditional flag songs sung by the Wisconsin Dells Singers and members of Sanford WhiteEagle Legion Post 556.

The University of Wisconsin occupies ancestral Ho-Chunk land. UWs campus is home to many monumental art burial sites that were created thousands of years ago by the Ho-Chunk Nation. Bascom Hill is a significant landmark for the Ho-Chunk Nation as burial mounds once existed there before an 1832 treaty forced the Ho-Chunk to cede the territory.

During the ceremony, Blank acknowledged this by mentioning the placement of the Our Shared Future heritage marker on Bascom Hill as a means to commemorate the Ho-Chunk Nations land. She emphasized the importance of the heritage marker as a means to start a conversation about the history of the Ho-Chunk Nation.

Our Shared Future heritage marker to expand learning about native narrativesA group of University of Wisconsin faculty and community members created Our Shared Future, a heritage marker, to educate UW Read

No plaque, no monument could adequately convey a complicated and very difficult history, but it would start a conversation, an intentional effort to teach that history here on our campus, Blank said. We have continued that commitment in many ways since then.

Blank then recognized the efforts the university has taken in order to acknowledge this history, like hiring the universitys first tribal relations director Aaron Bird Bear and hosting events to inform and educate the campus community about UWs relationships with native nations.

The raising of this flag was a part of the universitys ongoing efforts to educate the UW community about the history of the Ho-Chunk Nation which UW resides on, according to a UW press release.

Vice President of the Ho-Chunk Nation Karena Thundercloud mentioned the ways the raising of this flag will transform the UW campus community as well as the universitys understanding and appreciation for the Ho-Chunk Nations historical roots.

This occasion you are witnessing today is not only acknowledgement of all that is history, but a testimony that our community is intertwined, Thundercloud said. This flag will enhance the conversation, as Chancellor Blank has said, while dedicating the heritage marker 2019 that moves us from ignorance to awareness.

Ho-Chunk Nation storytelling series debuts at Madison Public LibraryThe Madison Public Library and Ho-Chunk Gaming are collaborating to host a Storyteller-In-Residence program at the library from Oct. 11 Read

Traditional Chief of the Ho-Chunk Nation Clayton Winneshiek stressed that the raising of this flag is just a start to UWs acknowledgement of the Ho-Chunk Nations history.

I was saddened that this wasnt an everyday deal where you see this Ho-Chunk Nation flag flying on Ho-Chunk land. We are finally being recognized for living on this land that was taken away from us some years ago, but to acknowledge the Ho-Chunk people Its just a start, Winnisheik said.

UW Director of Tribal Relations Aaron Bird Bear also mentioned the importance of this ceremony and the Ho-Chunk peoples involvement in this ceremony as it continues this concept of spreading awareness about this history, rather than continuing to be ignorant. Bird Bear highlighted the efforts being made over the past 18 months to educate the UW community through Our Shared Future initiatives.

Another ceremony open to the public will be held at 4 p.m. today on Bascom Hill to observe the lowering of the Ho-Chunk flag. During this ceremony, Aaron Bird Bear will share more remarks and the Wisconsin Dells Singers will perform their flag song again.

More here:

Flag of Ho-Chunk Nation flies on Bascom Hill for first time in UW history - UW Badger Herald

Thanksgiving is a holiday in the U.S. observed on the fourth Thursday in November every year. The day is usually marked by gatherings of families and friends who share a meal together.

As it is a federal holiday, most government offices are closed on the day, while some private businesses may also be shut.

Thanksgiving this year lands on November 25.

In 1789, on November 26, former president George Washington issued a proclamation for "a day of public thanksgiving and prayer," declaring it an official holiday of "sincere and humble thanks," according to the U.S. National Archives.

Washington was prompted to make the proclamation after the first Federal Congress passed a resolution in September 1789 asking the president to recommend a day of thanksgiving to the country.

Starting in 1863, former president Abraham Lincoln encouraged Americans to observe the last Thursday of November as "a day of Thanksgiving," according to the History, Art and Archives of the U.S. House of Representatives website.

Congress later passed legislation in 1870, which made Thanksgiving a national holiday. Apart from a few exceptions, most presidents followed Lincoln's example in declaring the last Thursday as a day of giving thanks.

But in 1939, former president Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the date of Thanksgiving to the penultimate Thursday in November following pressure from the Retail Dry Goods Association.

Retailers were concerned the shorter Christmas shopping season could negatively impact sales, with Thanksgiving falling on November 30 in 1939.

Following Roosevelt's proclamation, 32 states made similar declarations, while 16 states refused to accept the change and opted to keep Thanksgiving as the last Thursday in November.

So for two years, Thanksgiving was celebrated on two different dates, either the penultimate or final Thursday in November.

To end the confusion, in 1941 Congress passed legislation that officially established Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday of every November, which was signed by Roosevelt in December 1941, according to the National Archives.

Many Thanksgiving traditions can be traced back to harvest festivals, when the cultures of both the Pilgrims who sailed from England in 1620 as well as the Native Americans they encountered showed gratitude for a bountiful harvest.

A three-day harvest celebration was held in 1621 in Plymouth Colony (which forms part of Massachusetts today) and is considered the first American Thanksgiving, the website of the U.S. Embassy in the U.K. explains.

According to the U.S. National Museum of the American Indian: "In looking at the first Thanksgiving feast from the point of view of its Native participants, it is possible to understand how integral the concept of giving thanks is to Native worldviews."

The Pilgrims arrived in 1620, but didn't bring enough food and it was too late in the year to plant crops, so half of the colony died during the winter of 1620 to 1621.

But in the spring, the local Wampanoag Indians taught the Pilgrims how to grow corn and other crops as well as how to cook cranberries, corn and squash. The colonists were also taught how to master hunting and fishing.

By the fall of 1621, there was a bountiful harvest and the colonists and Wampanoag Indians came together for a feast of wild turkeys, duck, geese, fish and shellfish, corn, green vegetables and dried fruits. Wampanoag Chief Massasoit and his tribe brought venison.

The first American Thanksgiving, however, was followed by a long period of injustice and conflict between Native Americans and Europeans, the embassy website notes, and many Native Americans view Thanksgiving as a "National Day of Mourning."

The National Museum of the American Indian explains: "Sharing agricultural knowledge was one aspect of early American Indian efforts to live side by side with Europeans. As relationships with the newcomers grew into competitions for land and resources, the groups were not always successful in their efforts to coexist.

"So, the first Thanksgiving was just the beginning of a long history of interactions between American Indians and immigrants...the meal that is ingrained in the American consciousness represents much more than a simple harvest celebration. It was a turning point in history," the museum says.

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When Is Thanksgiving? 2021 Date, History and More - Newsweek

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio (WKBN) You wont believe what a crew uncovered while digging the sanitary lines in the future taproom of Penguin City Beer. It seems a piece of history was found.

Cliff Yambrovich, with the Conti Corporation, says the find is one of a kind for work crews like his. Its not too often that he and his crew find pieces of history like this one a glass beer bottle from the Smith Brewing Company, which opened in Youngstown in 1846.

They pulled the dirt up out of the hole and set in a pile in the machine. The guy looked down and said, Look at this bottle. It looks like its from the 1890s or so. And thats exactly what it was, Yambrovich said.

Bill Lawson, with the Mahoning Valley Historical Society, said there was a saloon that sat on the property where Penguin Brewing now sits. He believes the bottle most likely came from there.

I was shocked and stunned by it just because it was intact because it was underneath this industrial building, lots of concrete and all that weight that was involved, Lawson said.

Lawson is working closely with the owners of Penguin City Brewing to come up with ways to showcase the history of the city, making this find all the more exciting.

Penguin City Brewing representative Aspasia Lyras-Bernacki said she plans to showcase the beer bottle in the taproom when the brewery opens, along with the history of beer in the city.

To be able to see part of that left here in our place, its just very exciting. Its almost like it was meant to be here, she said.

Lyras-Bernacki hopes as renovations continue, more artifacts are uncovered.

Go here to read the rest:

History uncovered at Youngstown brewery construction site - WKBN.com