Smithsonian Magazine Selects Top 100 Americans in History
November 23, 2014 – Smithsonian magazine used complex computer analysis to compile their latest list of the most significant figures in American history. The ranking algorithm was applied to a data set of 15 million scanned books and more than 840,000 Wikipedia pages devoted to individuals. The magazine organized the results into 10 categories. Developers […]
Endearing Canadian Hockey Fans
November 22, 2014 – Last Tuesday night the Nashville Predators hockey team was in Toronto to play the Maple Leafs. As is customary in international games, both national anthems were sung before the game. In the middle of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the singer’s microphone malfunctioned. Watch how Canadian fans responded. Link: Time [divider]
Push for Medal of Honor for WWI Harlem Hellfighter
November 19, 2014 – A bill has been introduced in the U.S. Congress that would pave the way for an African-American World War I hero to receive the Medal of Honor posthumously. Under current law, recommendations for the award must be made within two years of the deed and awarded within three years. The new […]
Bizarre Candidates in 2014 Election
November 19, 2014 – Mickey Mouse was not on the ballot this month, but he came in first among individual invalid write-in candidates in Orange County, Florida. The biggest such vote-getter was a catch-all category that included Nobody, None of the Above, and Anyone Else, collectively receiving 565 votes. Mickey got 273 all by himself. […]
1934 Film Shows Baseball Legends on Goodwill Tour of Japan
November 14, 2014 – The Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, has digitized a 1934 home movie showing several baseball legends on a goodwill tour of Japan. The film can be viewed on the museum’s website. The tour was the brainchild of a Japanese newspaper owner who wanted to see how receptive his […]
Remembering Veterans Day
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The First SEALS
November 10, 2014 – The last surviving member of an elite World War II unit recounts his experiences in a new book, “First SEALS.” The U.S. formed the group to conduct small commando raids behind enemy lines. Frank Monteleone, 89, and his colleagues pioneered many of the tactics used by the Navy SEALS, created in […]
From Holocaust Survivor to Presidential Tailor
November 9, 2014 – Nineteen-year-old Martin Greenfield arrived in America in 1947 with hardly a penny to his name, but he had survived the Holocaust and had acquired a valuable skill amid the brutality: he had learned to sew. Four years earlier the Nazis had taken his family from their native Czechoslovakia to the Auschwitz […]
Berlin Wall – Then and Now
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Boy Donates 14,000-Year-Old Native American Artifact to Smithsonian
November 4, 2014 – A fifth grader has donated a 14,000-year-old Native American artifact to the Smithsonian. Noah Cordle, 10, found the Clovis point while boogie boarding on the Jersey Shore during a family vacation. Link: Smithsonian Magazine Additional Photos (click thumbnails to enlarge) [divider]