“It was my father’s film. So, it was in his basement until he passed away,” says retired Army Colonel Bill Kosco. Kosco’s father is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. When retired Captain George Kosco died in 1985 he left behind mementos from his time as a meteorologist and navigator in the Navy. “This is an album my father put together, files and photographs he obtained on board the USS Missouri.” – Breitbart

British forces under General William Howe and his brother, Admiral Richard viscount Howe, defeat Patriot forces under General George Washington at the Battle of Brooklyn Heights in New York on this week in 1776.

On August 22, Howe’s large army landed on Long Island, hoping to capture New York City and gain control of the Hudson River, a victory that would divide the rebellious colonies in half. On August 27, the Redcoats marched against the Patriot position at Brooklyn Heights, overcoming the Americans at Gowanus Pass and then outflanking the entire Continental Army. The Americans suffered 1,000 casualties to the British loss of only 400 men during the fighting. After the victory, Howe chose not to follow the advice of his subordinates and did not storm the Patriot redoubts at Brooklyn Heights, where he could have taken the Patriots’ military leadership prisoner and ended the rebellion.

General Washington ordered a retreat to Manhattan by boat. The British could easily have prevented this retreat and captured most of the Patriot officer corps, including Washington. Howe, however, still hoped to convince the Americans to rejoin the British empire in the wake of the humiliating defeat, instead of forcing the former colonies into submission after executing Washington and his officers as traitors. On September 11, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and other congressional representatives reopened negotiations with the Howes on Staten Island. The negotiations fell through when the British refused to accept American independence.

The British captured New York City on September 15; it would remain in British hands until the end of the war.

This week in 1969, the grooviest event in music history–the Woodstock Music Festival–draws to a close after three days of peace, love and rock ‘n’ roll in upstate New York.

Conceived as “Three Days of Peace and Music,” Woodstock was a product of a partnership between John Roberts, Joel Rosenman, Artie Kornfield and Michael Lang. Their idea was to make enough money from the event to build a recording studio near the arty New York town of Woodstock. When they couldn’t find an appropriate venue in the town itself, the promoters decided to hold the festival on a 600-acre dairy farm in Bethel, New York–some 50 miles from Woodstock–owned by Max Yasgur.

By the time the weekend of the festival arrived, the group had sold a total of 186,000 tickets and expected no more than 200,000 people to show up. By Friday night, however, thousands of eager early arrivals were pushing against the entrance gates. Fearing they could not control the crowds, the promoters made the decision to open the concert to everyone, free of charge. Close to half a million people attended Woodstock, jamming the roads around Bethel with eight miles of traffic.

Soaked by rain and wallowing in the muddy mess of Yasgur’s fields, young fans best described as “hippies” euphorically took in the performances of acts like Janis Joplin, Arlo Guthrie, Joe Cocker, Joan Baez, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Sly and the Family Stone and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. The Who performed in the early morning hours of August 17, with Roger Daltrey belting out “See Me, Feel Me,” from the now-classic album Tommy just as the sun began to rise. The most memorable moment of the concert for many fans was the closing performance by Jimi Hendrix, who gave a rambling, rocking solo guitar performance of “The Star Spangled Banner.”

With not enough bathroom facilities and first-aid tents to accommodate such a huge crowd, many described the atmosphere at the festival as chaotic. There were surprisingly few episodes of violence, though one teenager was accidentally run over and killed by a tractor and another died from a drug overdose. A number of musicians performed songs expressing their opposition to the Vietnam War, a sentiment that was enthusiastically shared by the vast majority of the audience. Later, the term “Woodstock Nation” would be used as a general term to describe the youth counterculture of the 1960s.

A 25th anniversary celebration of Woodstock took place in 1994 in Saugerties, New York. Known as Woodstock II, the concert featured Bob Dylan and Crosby, Stills and Nash as well as newer acts such as Nine Inch Nails and Green Day. Held over another rainy, muddy weekend, the event drew an estimated 300,000 people.

American Delegation To Attend Hiroshima Event
August 4, 2010
FoxNews.com

EXCLUSIVE: The son of the U.S. Air Force pilot who dropped the first atomic bomb in the history of warfare says the Obama administration’s decision to send a U.S. delegation to a ceremony in Japan to mark the 65th anniversary of the attack on Hiroshima is an “unsaid apology” and appears to be an attempt to “rewrite history.”

James Tibbets, son of Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., says Friday’s visit to Hiroshima by U.S. Ambassador John Roos is an act of contrition that his late father would never have approved.

“It’s an unsaid apology,” Tibbets, 66, told FoxNews.com from his home in Georgiana, Ala. “Why wouldn’t it be? Why would [Roos] go? It doesn’t make any sense.

“I know it’s the anniversary, but I don’t know what the hell they’re trying to do. It needs to be left alone. The war is over.”

Tibbets, whose father died in 2007 at the age of 92, said he receives dozens of calls from veterans every year around this time thanking him for his father’s service.

“‘If it wasn’t for your dad, I wouldn’t be here,’” Tibbets said many veterans tell him. “This has been going on since he dropped that bomb.”

Tibbets said he sees Roos’ impending visit — it will be the first time the U.S. has sent a delegation to the anniversary commemoration in Hiroshima — as an attempt to revise history.

“It’s making the Japanese look like they’re the poor people, like they didn’t do anything,” he said. “They hit Pearl Harbor, they struck us. We didn’t slaughter the Japanese — we stopped the war.”

Roughly 140,000 people were killed or died within months after an American B-29 — nicknamed the Enola Gay — bombed Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945. Three days later, roughly 80,000 people died when the U.S. dropped a second bomb on Nagasaki. Japan surrendered nine days later, bringing an end to World War II.

White House officials on Wednesday referred calls to the State Department, which did not respond to several inquiries about how the decision was made or if national veterans organizations were contacted prior to the announcement that a delegation would attend the commemoration.

During Wednesday’s daily press briefing, State Department officials defended the visit, saying Roos’ attendance at the ceremony “was the right thing to do,” spokesman PJ Crowley said.

The ceremony will begin early Friday with the ringing of a bell and the release of doves. Roos visited Hiroshima weeks after he arrived in Tokyo as a U.S. ambassador last year, and the response was generally positive.

Lt. Col. Rob Manning, director of public affairs at the Joint Force Headquarters National Capital Region U.S. Military District of Washington, which oversees ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery, said Japanese officials are “fairly frequent” visitors to the national site.

“Emperor Hirohito visited the cemetery and placed a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns in the early 1970s,” Manning wrote in an e-mail. “Most of the more recent prime ministers have also placed wreaths at the Tomb.”

Manning said Gen. Ryoichi Oriki, the Japanese Army’s chief of staff, also visited the cemetery and placed a wreath on a grave on June 24.

President Obama is expected to visit Japan in November, and calls have been growing there for him to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki, since he has spoken of his vision of a nuclear-free world.

Tibbets said he hopes Obama will decide to forgo visiting to the two cities.

“What’s his purpose? I don’t know what it’d do,” Tibbet said. “History is history, the past is the past. You can’t change it and I don’t know why he’d visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“This all sounds like, ‘Oh, we did you wrong.’ That’s what it sounds like.”

Ryan Galucci, a spokesman for AMVETS, an organization representing more than 180,000 veterans, said his organization supports the decision to send Roos, but he said the visit should not be seen as a conciliatory act.

“Considering how our relationship with Japan has evolved into a peaceful partnership over the years, we support the U.S. decision to send an envoy acknowledging the human toll of WWII,” Galucci said in a statement to FoxNews.com. “To AMVETS, the U.S. visit is an appropriate act of reciprocation for Japan’s solidarity over the years, such as last summer’s visit to the Punch Bowl National Cemetery (the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific) by Emperor Akihito, where he laid a wreath in honor of America’s sacrifices in WWII.

“However, in no way should the United States be expected to apologize for its actions, and we hope that this visit will not be misconstrued as an act of contrition.”

Paul Schalow, a professor of Japanese at Rutgers University, told FoxNews.com that Japanese media outlets are linking Roos’ visit to Obama’s desire to rid the world of nuclear weapons.

“They’re linking it to Obama’s speech in Prague,” he said. “They connect Roos being there as proof of interest by the Obama administration to reduce the number of atomic weapons worldwide.”

Schalow said Roos’ visit appears to “pave the way” for Obama to visit the two cities that were decimated by atomic bombs 65 years ago.

“I imagine the Japanese would be eager to receive a U.S. president,” he said. “The real question is the domestic reaction to it. [White House officials] are probably observing reactions of veterans’ groups to this official visit by Roos.”

Schalow speculated that Roos’ visit could be a step toward positioning the U.S. to condemn any future use of atomic weapons, perhaps by North Korea.

HIROSHIMA – (Kyodo) —Documents containing the original of the famous epitaph composed by a Hiroshima University professor for the atomic bomb monument in the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima City have been found and donated to the city’s archives office.

The brush-stroke writings, both in Japanese and English, by Tadayoshi Saika (1894-1961), are contained on a sheet of “washi” Japanese paper and three “shikishi” paper boards.

Just like on the monument itself, the epitaph is written in three separate lines, with English translations given underneath. The writings are signed by Saika without a date.

The documents show two different English translations, indicating Saika rewrote and refined the expression before the finalization of the official translation, which reads, “Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not repeat the evil.”

In the “washi” paper document, the translation for the latter part of the epitaph is “for to repeat the fault we shall cease.” This version was used in around July 1952 when the city announced the epitaph.

The translations on all three paper boards are the same as the city’s official translation being currently used.

The documents were found in April when Tsuneo Sato, 76, a hospital director in Nishi Ward in the city, was sorting through the personal belongings of his late mother, who was acquainted with the professor.

The documents are believed to be from the 1950s, based on the address and other information on their back.

“I would imagine that professor Saika, who was an expert on English literature, was refining the expression so that Hiroshima’s prayers would be conveyed to as many people as possible around the world,” said Kazuhiko Takano, head of the Hiroshima Prefectural Archives.

The epitaph was unveiled Aug. 6, 1952. As the subject of the epitaph is not made clear, it spurred a controversy in the months after the unveiling with critics saying it failed to question who was responsible for the war. **

In 1983, the city set up a board near the monument saying that the epitaph is a prayer from all the people for those who died in the bombing and that it expresses their vows not to repeat the mistake of war.

** Just a reminder exactly who was responsible for the war … We didn’t start it, but we sure as Hell finished it:

The Harris Treaty Opens Up Trade With Japan
This Week In American History
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
Chandlers Watch.com

On July 29, 1858, the United States and Japan signed the Treaty of Amity and Commerce (the Harris Treaty). Townsend Harris, the first U.S. diplomatic representative to Japan, negotiated the arrangement, which became effective July 4, 1859. A New York merchant with experience in Asia, Townsend was appointed consul general to Japan in August 1856 and began his assignment shortly thereafter. Harris was not welcomed and was ignored by the Japanese authorities for more than a year. He operated in diplomatic isolation out of the Gyokusenji Buddhist temple in Shimoda.

In 1857 the Japanese government approved Harris’ move to Edo (Tokyo); he used the Zenfukuji Temple in Azabu as the U.S. legation. His negotiations with the Tokugawa regime were aided by concessions that the British had already wrought in China. Harris convinced the Japanese that a voluntary treaty with the United States was more advantageous than a forced treaty with the Europeans.

Harris is credited with opening the Japanese Empire to foreign trade and culture. In addition to Shimoda and Hokadote, which already traded with the U.S., the Harris Treaty opened new ports to U.S. trade; granted U.S. citizens extraterritorial rights (exempting them from the jurisdiction of Japanese law); and permitted Americans their religious freedom. The tariff rates attached to the treaty favored the United States over Japan, but the treaty provided an opportunity to renegotiate in 1872. The Japanese Government also was allowed to “…purchase or construct in the United States ship-of-war, steamers, merchant ships, whale ships, cannot, munitions of war, and arms of all kinds … [as well as] to engage in the United States scientific, naval, and military men, artisans of all kind, and mariners to enter into its service…”

The Harris Treaty made reciprocal diplomatic representation possible. In 1860, a delegation of more than seventy Japanese traveled to the United States. Congress appropriated $50,000 for the visitors, who spent seven weeks touring the United States. Another trip was made twelve years later when, in accordance with the Harris Treaty, the Japanese attempted to gain concessions from the U.S. These visits are credited with helping to dispel cultural stereotypes and furthering diplomatic ties between the two countries.

The Construction Of The Great Hoover Dam Started This Week In 1930
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
ChandlersWatch.com
July 8, 2010

Eighty-years ago this week in 1930, the construction of the Hoover Dam began. Over the next five years, a total of 21,000 men would work ceaselessly to produce what would be the largest dam of its time, as well as one of the largest manmade structures in the world.

Although the dam would take only five years to build, its construction was nearly 30 years in the making. Arthur Powell Davis, an engineer from the Bureau of Reclamation, originally had his vision for the Hoover Dam back in 1902, and his engineering report on the topic became the guiding document when plans were finally made to begin the dam in 1922.

Herbert Hoover, the 31st president of the United States and a committed conservationist, played a crucial role in making Davis’ vision a reality. As secretary of commerce in 1921, Hoover devoted himself to the erection of a high dam in Boulder Canyon, Colorado. The dam would provide essential flood control, which would prevent damage to downstream farming communities that suffered each year when snow from the Rocky Mountains melted and joined the Colorado River. Further, the dam would allow the expansion of irrigated farming in the desert, and would provide a dependable supply of water for Los Angeles and other southern California communities.

Even with Hoover’s exuberant backing and a regional consensus around the need to build the dam, Congressional approval and individual state cooperation were slow in coming. For many years, water rights had been a source of contention among the western states that had claims on the Colorado River. To address this issue, Hoover negotiated the Colorado River Compact, which broke the river basin into two regions with the water divided between them. Hoover then had to introduce and re-introduce the bill to build the dam several times over the next few years before the House and Senate finally approved the bill in 1928.

In 1929, Hoover, now president, signed the Colorado River Compact into law, claiming it was “the most extensive action ever taken by a group of states under the provisions of the Constitution permitting compacts between states.”

Once preparations were made, the Hoover Dam’s construction sprinted forward: The contractors finished their work two years ahead of schedule and millions of dollars under budget. Today, the Hoover Dam is the second highest dam in the country and the 18th highest in the world. It generates enough energy each year to serve over a million people, and stands, in Hoover Dam artist Oskar Hansen’s words, as “a monument to collective genius exerting itself in community efforts around a common need or ideal.”

July 4, 2010
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz Chandlers Watch.com

Today we celebrate America’s 234th birthday. While most of us will be out with family and friends, cooking out, shooting fireworks and generally enjoying the day, we should all take a couple of minutes to appreciate and be thankful for our freedoms. Ronald Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected and handed on for them to do the same, or one day, we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

May God bless The United States as we shall bless and give thanks to God.

And God bless the troops that keep us safe everyday no matter where they may be stationed on this planet!

California’s Bear Flag Revolt Begins.
June 15, 2010

One-hundred and sixty-four years ago this week, Californians were anticipating the outbreak of war with Mexico. American settlers in California were rebeling against the Mexican government and proclaimed the short-lived California Republic.

The political situation in California was tense in 1846. Though nominally controlled by Mexico, California was home to only a relatively small number of Mexican settlers. Former citizens of the United States made up the largest segment of the California population, and their numbers were quickly growing. Mexican leaders worried that many American settlers were not truly interested in becoming Mexican subjects and would soon push for annexation of California to the United States. For their part, the Americans distrusted their Mexican leaders. When rumors of an impending war between the U.S. and Mexico reached California, many Americans feared the Mexicans might make a preemptive attack to forestall rebellion.

In the spring of 1846, the American army officer and explorer John C. Fremont arrived at Sutter’s Fort (near modern-day Sacramento) with a small corps of soldiers. Whether or not Fremont had been specifically ordered to encourage an American rebellion is unclear. Ostensibly, Fremont and his men were in the area strictly for the purposes of making a scientific survey. The brash young officer, however, began to persuade a motley mix of American settlers and adventurers to form militias and prepare for a rebellion against Mexico.

Emboldened by Fremont’s encouragement, on this day in 1846 a party of 33 Americans under the leadership of Ezekiel Merritt and William Ide invaded the largely defenseless Mexican outpost of Sonoma just north of San Francisco. Fremont and his soldiers did not participate, though he had given his tacit approval of the attack. Merritt and his men surrounded the home of the retired Mexican general, Mariano Vallejo, and informed him that he was a prisoner of war. Vallejo, who was actually a strong supporter of American annexation, was more puzzled than alarmed by the rebels. He invited Merritt and a few of the other men into his home to discuss the situation over brandy. After several hours passed, Ide went in and spoiled what had turned into pleasant chat by arresting Vallejo and his family.

Having won a bloodless victory at Sonoma, Merritt and Ide then proceeded to declare California an independent republic. With a cotton sheet and some red paint, they constructed a makeshift flag with a crude drawing of a grizzly bear, a lone red star (a reference to the earlier Lone Star Republic of Texas), and the words “California Republic” at the bottom. From then on, the independence movement was known as the Bear Flag Revolt.

After the rebels won a few minor skirmishes with Mexican forces, Fremont officially took command of the “Bear Flaggers” and occupied the unguarded presidio of San Francisco on July 1. Six days later, Fremont learned that American forces under Commodore John D. Sloat had taken Monterey without a fight and officially raised the American flag over California. Since the ultimate goal of the Bear Flaggers was to make California part of the U.S., they now saw little reason to preserve their “government.” Three weeks after it had been proclaimed, the California Republic quietly faded away. Ironically, the Bear Flag itself proved far more enduring than the republic it represented: it became the official state flag when California joined the union in 1850.

The Invasion Of Normandy 1944
By Marc Stockwell-Moniz Chandlers Watch.com
June 6, 2010

Today we remember the brave military-men of the Allied Expeditionary Force that landed on the beaches of Normandy, France sixty-six years ago today, on June 6, 1944.

With this landing, the allies began the liberation of Nazi occupied Europe.

American, British, and Canadian forces along with some free-European military units, successfully gained a foothold on the continent. This was the beginning of the end of Nazi Germany.

As the years go by, and we lose these heroes, will never lose the gratitude and love that we have for this generation of men and women who saved not only their own nations, but saved the world.

May God bless each and every one of them.

Bobby Kennedy Is Assassinated This Week In 1968

Senator Robert Kennedy was shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles after winning the California presidential primary forty-two years ago this week in 1968. Immediately after he announced to his cheering supporters that the country was ready to end its fractious divisions, Kennedy was shot several times by the 22-year-old Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan. He died a day later.

The summer of 1968 was a tempestuous time in American history. Both the Vietnam War and the anti-war movement were peaking. Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated in the spring, igniting riots across the country. In the face of this unrest, President Lyndon B. Johnson decided not to seek a second term in the upcoming presidential election. Robert Kennedy, John’s younger brother and former U.S. Attorney General, stepped into this breach and experienced a groundswell of support.

Kennedy was perceived by many to be the only person in American politics capable of uniting the people. He was beloved by the minority community for his integrity and devotion to the civil rights cause. After winning California’s primary, Kennedy was in the position to receive the Democratic nomination and face off against Richard Nixon in the general election.

As star athletes Rafer Johnson and Roosevelt Grier accompanied Kennedy out a rear exit of the Ambassador Hotel, Sirhan Sirhan stepped forward with a rolled up campaign poster, hiding his .22 revolver. He was only a foot away when he fired several shots at Kennedy. Grier and Johnson wrestled Sirhan to the ground, but not before five bystanders were wounded. Grier was distraught afterward and blamed himself for allowing Kennedy to be shot.

Sirhan, who was born in Palestine, confessed to the crime at his trial and received a death sentence on March 3, 1969. However, since the California State Supreme Court invalidated all death penalty sentences in 1972, Sirhan has spent the rest of his life in prison. According to the New York Times, he has since said that he believed Kennedy was “instrumental” in the oppression of Palestinians. Hubert Humphrey ended up running for the Democrats in 1968, but lost by a small margin to Nixon.

Lieutenant Colonel George Washington At The Forefront Of The Seven Years’ War; Also Known As The French And Indian War.

Perhaps one of the reasons why George Washington was able to defeat the British in the American War of Independence was that at one time in his life he was a British commander. The prior sentence is something to think about; don’t you think fellow historians?

This week in 1754, 22-year-old lieutenant colonel George Washington of the Virginia militia successfully defeated a party of French and Indian scouts in southwest Pennsylvania. Virginia was attempting to lay claim to this territory for its own settlers. The action snowballed into a world war and began the military career of the first American commander in chief.

The Ohio Valley had long been a contested territory among V, various Indian groups and the British colonies of Pennsylvania and Virginia. When the French began to establish fortifications along the river and refused Virginia’s written demand that they depart, Virginia’s governor, Robert Dinwiddie, dispatched Washington to complete and defend a Virginian fort at the forks of the Ohio.

Upon their arrival, Washington discovered that a scouting party led by the French ensign, Joseph Coulon de Jumonville was nearby. Fearing that Jumonville was planning an attack, Washington struck first, successfully ambushing the small party. In one of history’s murkier moments, Jumonville was murdered by Washington’s Indian ally, Tanaghrisson, while the monolingual Washington struggled to interrogate the French-speaking Canadian.

Jumonville’s murder in captivity incited a strong French response, and Washington was unable to defend his makeshift “Fort Necessity” from French forces led by Jumonville’s half-brother. Washington surrendered on July 4 and signed a French confession to Jumonville’s assassination, which he could not read.

Benjamin Franklin had drafted his Albany Plan for Union earlier that month, in the hope that united colonies could better orchestrate their own defense and governance. Colonists voted down the proposal everywhere it was presented. After Washington displayed his incompetence on the Ohio, the British decided it was time to save their colonies from themselves and dispatched two regiments of Redcoats under General Edward Braddock to America. Braddock too suffered a humiliating defeat at the forks of the Ohio; it took the British and their colonists seven years of world war to redeem themselves. The Seven Years’ War would go on to strip the French of their American empire and test the bonds of the British empire in America.

Babe Ruth Hits Last Home Run For Boston Braves
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
Chandlers Watch.com
May 23, 2010

Seventy-five years ago this week on May 25, 1935, Babe Ruth playing for the Boston Braves hit his 714th home run, a record for career home runs that would stand for almost 40 years. He hit the home run at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This was one of Ruth’s last games and the last home run of his career. Ruth went four for four on the day, hitting three home runs and driving in six runs.

George Herman Ruth was born February 6, 1895, in Baltimore, Maryland. He was the first of eight children, but only he and a sister survived infancy. Ruth’s father was a saloon keeper on Baltimore’s waterfront, and the young George, known as “Gig” (pronounced with soft g’s) to his family, caused trouble from an early age. At seven, his truancy from school led his parents to declare him incorrigible, and he was sent to an orphanage, St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys. Ruth lived there until he was 19 in 1914, when he was signed as a pitcher by the Baltimore Orioles.

That same summer, Ruth was sold to the Boston Red Sox. His teammates called him “Babe,” short for baby, for his naiveté, but his talent was already mature, and he was almost immediately recognized as the best pitcher on one of the great teams of the 1910s. He set a record between 1916 and 1918 with 29 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings in World Series play, including a 14-inning game in 1916 in which he pitched every inning, giving up only a run in the first.

To the great dismay of Boston fans, Ruth was sold by the Red Sox to the New York Yankees before the 1920 season by Red Sox owner Harry Frazee, so that Frazee could finance the musical No, No, Nanette. Ruth switched to the outfield with the Yankees, and hit more home runs than the entire Red Sox team in 10 of the next 12 seasons. “The Sultan of Swat” or “The Bambino,” as he was alternately known, was the greatest gate attraction in baseball through the 1920s until his retirement as a player in 1935. During his career with the New York Yankees, the team won four World Series and seven American League pennants. After getting rid of Ruth, the Red Sox did not win a World Series until 2004, an 85-year drought known to Red Sox fans as “the Curse of the Bambino.”

Ruth died of throat cancer on August 16, 1948. His record for career home runs was not broken until Hank Aaron hit his 715th home run on April 8, 1974, 39 years later.

May 14, 1804
Lewis and Clark Depart
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
Chandlers Watch.com

One year after the United States doubled its territory with the Louisiana Purchase, the Lewis and Clark expedition departed St. Louis, Missouri on May 14, 1804, on a mission to explore the Northwest from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean.

Even before the U.S. government concluded purchase negotiations with France, President Thomas Jefferson commissioned his private secretary Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, an army captain, to lead an expedition into what is now the U.S. Northwest. On May 14, the “Corps of Discovery”–featuring approximately 45 men (although only an approximate 33 men would make the full journey)–left St. Louis for the American interior.

The expedition traveled up the Missouri River in a 55-foot long keelboat and two smaller boats. In November, Toussaint Charbonneau, a French-Canadian fur trader accompanied by his young Native American wife Sacagawea, joined the expedition as an interpreter. The group wintered in present-day North Dakota before crossing into present-day Montana, where they first saw the Rocky Mountains. On the other side of the Continental Divide, they were met by Sacagawea’s tribe, the Shoshone Indians, who sold them horses for their journey down through the Bitterroot Mountains. After passing through the dangerous rapids of the Clearwater and Snake rivers in canoes, the explorers reached the calm of the Columbia River, which led them to the sea. On November 8, 1805, the expedition arrived at the Pacific Ocean, the first European explorers to do so by an overland route from the east. After pausing there for the winter, the explorers began their long journey back to St. Louis.

On September 23, 1806, after almost two and a half years, the expedition returned to the city, bringing back a wealth of information about the largely unexplored region, as well as valuable U.S. claims to Oregon Territory.

May 7, 2010
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
Chandlers Watch.com

This week seventy-three-years-ago in 1937, the German airship Hindenburg, the largest dirigible ever built, explodes as it arrives in Lakehurst, New Jersey. Thirty-six people died in the fiery accident that has since become iconic, in part because of the live radio broadcast of the terrible disaster.

The dirigible was built to be the fastest, largest and most luxurious flying vessel of its time. It was more than 800 feet long, had a range of 8,000 miles, could carry 97 passengers and had a state-of-the-art Mercedes-Benz engine. It was filled with 7 million cubic feet of hydrogen, even though helium was known to be far safer, because it made the flying ship more maneuverable.

The Hindenburg had made 10 successful ocean crossings the year before and was held up by Germany’s Nazi government as a symbol of national pride. Flying at a speed of 85 miles per hour, the Hindenburg was scheduled to arrive in New Jersey at 5 a.m. on May 6. However, weather conditions pushed the arrival back to the late afternoon and then rain further delayed the docking at Lakehurst. When the dirigible was finally cleared to dock, Captain Max Pruss brought the ship in too fast and had to order a reverse engine thrust. At 7:20 p.m., a gas leak was noticed. Within minutes, the tail blew up, sending flames hundreds of feet in the air and as far down as the ground below.

A chain reaction caused the entire vessel to burn instantly. The nearly 1,000 spectators awaiting the Hindenburg’s arrival felt the heat from a mile away. Some on the blimp attempted to jump for the landing cables at the docking station but most died when they missed. Others waited to jump until the blimp was closer to the ground as it fell. Those who were not critically injured from burns often suffered broken bones from the jump. Fifty-six people managed to survive.

On WLS radio, announcer Herbert Morrison gave an unforgettably harrowing live account of the disaster, “Oh, oh, oh. It s burst into flames. Get out of the way, please . . . this is terrible . . . it s burning, bursting into flames, and is falling . . . Oh! This is one of the worst . . . it s a terrific sight . . .oh, the humanity.”

World War II Monument Opens In Washington, D.C.
by Marc Stockwell-Moniz
Chandlers Watch.com

In 2004, six-years-ago this week, the National World War II Memorial opens in Washington, D.C., to thousands of visitors, providing overdue recognition for the 16 million U.S. men and women who served in the war. The memorial is located on 7.4 acres on the former site of the Rainbow Pool at the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. The Capitol dome is seen to the east, and Arlington Cemetery is just across the Potomac River to the west.

The granite and bronze monument features fountains between arches symbolizing hostilities in Europe and the Far East. The arches are flanked by semicircles of pillars, one each for the states, territories and the District of Columbia. Beyond the pool is a curved wall of 4,000 gold stars, one for every 100 Americans killed in the war. An Announcement Stone proclaims that the memorial honors those “Americans who took up the struggle during the Second World War and made the sacrifices to perpetuate the gift our forefathers entrusted to us: A nation conceived in liberty and justice.”

Though the federal government donated $16 million to the memorial fund, it took more than $164 million in private donations to get it built. Former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, who was severely wounded in the war, and actor Tom Hanks were among its most vocal supporters. Only a fraction of the 16 million Americans who served in the war would ever see it. Four million World War II veterans were living at the time, with more than 1,100 dying every day, according to government records.

The memorial was inspired by Roger Durbin of Berkey, Ohio, who served under Gen. George S. Patton. At a fish fry near Toledo in February 1987, he asked U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur why there was no memorial on the Mall to honor World War II veterans. Kaptur, a Democrat from Ohio, soon introduced legislation to build one, starting a process that would stumble along through 17 years of legislative, legal and artistic entanglements. Durbin died of pancreatic cancer in 2000.

The monument was formally dedicated May 29, 2004, by U.S. President George W. Bush. Open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it received some 4.4 million visitors in 2005.

It will always be an honor for me to show fellow patriots my card which proclaims that I am a charter member of the WWII Memorial Monument. It was a very humbling afternoon for my family and myself when we visited the memorial. You will know what I mean when you see it in person. God bless the men and women who sacrificed their lives and many others who kept us free and without a doubt, “saved the world.”