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Category: Uncategorized

Socialstudious – May 19, 2014 – Do We Care About All the People of the World??

Sometimes I feel really guilty, the reason is that I many of the things that I own were made by people who were exploited. I bet more than one of my shirts was made either in China or Southeast Asia by workers who are paid next to nothing and who work in buildings that are in many cases unsafe, my running shoes and my iPhone, too. It would be great if we could do something as a country to enforce safety requirements on the companies that create conditions like these…… Read More

This Day in Philly Sports History – Game 6 of the 1980 NBA Championship!

So 1980 was probably the best year ever in Philadelphia sports history. all four of the major sports 1980 Pihilliesfranchises went to their respective finals.  The outcomes of three out of those four series were not what us fans wanted though. The Flyers lost to the New York Islanders, The Eagles lost to the Jim Plunkett led Oakland Raiders. The Phillies though did win the city a world championship in only their second appearance in the World Series!! Of course that’s two appearance in about a hundred years of existence!!! The Sixers led by Dr J., Bobby Jones and Maurice Cheeks and Andrew Toney played the Lakers in the finals. After beating Boston to chants of “Beat LA” the Sixers went down 3 games to 2 to the Kareem Abdul Jabbar led Lakers. But there was hope, Kareem had twisted his ankle and would be unable to play in Game 6  Philadelphia. LA didn’t even bring their champagne to Philly!! We thought we had it!! Back to LA tied…. Rookie Magic Johnson would have to play center! And all he did was rip the heart out of the city! Putting on a show, Johnson scored 42 points, grabbd 15 rebounds and dished out 7 assits on – MAY 16th 1980!! And we sports fans grieved again ! Read More

This Day in History -May 15, 1990 – Van Gogh Painting Sells, for What?? and 1702 – The Spanish Game of Thrones Begins!!

300px-Vincent_van_Gogh_-_Dr_Paul_Gachet_-_Google_Art_Project

So on this day May 15, 1990 Vincent Van Gogh’s Portrait of Dr. Gachet sold at auction in New York for a mere 82.5 million dollars!! The portrait that sold was the first of two authenticated versions of the portrait that were painted by Van Gogh in June of 1890. Dr Paul Gachet took care of Van Gogh at Auers-sur-Oise during the final months of Van Gogh’s life. Both of the portraits depict Gachet sitting at a table with his head leaning on his right arm but they vary in color and style. Read More

These Days in History – May 13-15th – The Civil War Battle of Resaca was fought!

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Battle of Resaca, by Kurz and Allison, 1889.

Starting on May 13, 164 through May 15th The Battle of Resaca was fought as General William T. Sherman began his March to the Sea. When I first read the one sentence about this battle starting yesterday, I thought “Where the hell is Resaca?” I assumed it was somewhere in Georgia and probably in northeast Georgia as Sherman started his movements toward Atlanta. Read More

This Day in History – May 14, 1853 – Gail Borden applies for a patent for making condensed milk!

220px-Gail_BordenOn  May 14, 1853 Gail Borden applied for a patent for condensed milk. Now that makes sense, since the name everyone associates with condensed milk is Borden! But I must admit that I had no idea that the inventor of condensed milk was Gail Borden. Not only was Mr Borden an inventor but he was also a surveyor, cattleman, customs agent, newspaper editor, real estate salesman, and civic official!! As a surveyor Borden co-plotted the cities of Houston and Galveston in 1836. As a newspaper man along with his brother John he was a founder of the Telegraph and Texas Register which first appeared on October 10, 1835, days after the Texas Revolution began Their twenty-first issue was published on March 24.[This contained the first list of names of Texans who died at the Battle of the Alamo Read More

This Day in Music – April 8, 1968 – Petulia and an Interracial Touch – Oh My!

PetulaiOn this date April 8th in 1968, (there’s that tumultuous year again only four days after the assassination of Martin Luther King) ) NBC aired Petula Clark’s TV Special, aptly named “Petula”. One of the guests on the show was the great Harry Belafonte. Belafonte and Clark were to perform a  duet on an antiwar song that Clark had written titled “On the Path to Glory” While they were taping the performance Clark spontaneously put her arm around Belafonte’s arm. This caused the show’s sponsor Chrysler to freak out! Chrysler feared that the interracial touch would be too much for their southern viewers! Petula and her husband (the show’s executive producer) Claude Wolff’s response to Chrysler was great!! They had all the other takes destroyed, so that they had to air “the touch”, which actually became the first interracial contact broadcast on American Television!! The show met with high ratings and critical acclaim. Clark was the hostess of two more specials, another one for NBC and one for ABC. To commemorate the 40th anniversary of the original telecast of Petula, Clark and Wolff appeared at the Paley Center for Media in Manhattan on 22 September 2008, to discuss the broadcast and its impact, following a broadcast of the program! Way to Go Petula and Claude!! Read More about Petula at Wikipedia Here is the performance,….

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March 30, 2014 – Today’s Reads – The Takers uh the Makers take , Connecticut raises Minimum Wage to Pete Seeger “Which Side Are You On?”

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, tell me again you takers uh. makers. how if we give you lots of tax breaks that the economy will really start rolling and good times will trickle down to all!!Oh yeah right – the last time that happened was when labor unions were strong in the US and you had to pretend to care abo ut the workers – you know the ones you guys left high and dry when you moved their jobs to Asia and south of the border! You know the ones whose jobs you stole and now the jobs they can get don’t pay anywhere near the money they previously made and oh they don’t have any security either — but just like Charlie Brown keeps believing that Lucy isn’t going to pull that football out from under him – we’ll keep believing that you care about your employees….. and our wages will stagnate while you reap big rewards!! Read More