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]
Rumble in the Jungle 40 Years Ago
October 30, 2014 – Forty years ago today Muhammad Ali fought George Foreman in Zaire to regain the heavyweight boxing title. The bout was billed as “The Rumble in the Jungle.” After spending much of the fight on the ropes, Ali unleashed a flurry of blows near the end of the eighth round that sent […]
WWII German U-boat Found Off Carolina Coast
October 23, 2014 – A German submarine that sank 72 years ago has been found resting on the ocean floor just 240 yards from the merchant ship it torpedoed 30 miles off Cape Hatteras. In July 1942, U-576 attacked an Allied convoy heading to Florida from Virginia. An armed merchant ship counterattacked using its deck gun and U.S. […]