Hall's Hill Wall

It was a late-summer walk with my daughter and granddaughter, but it became a history lesson. Yesterday I learned about Hall's Hill wall, a stark reminder of segregation in Arlington, Virginia. Bazil Hall was a 19th-century plantation owner whose first wife was so abusive to their slaves that one of them killed her. 

Although he was a slaveowner, Hall was also a unionist. He voted against Virginia's succession, and in 1861, Confederate troops set fire to his home during an attack from an adjacent site. Union troops later occupied the area. 

After the war, Hall sold off his property, some of it to formerly enslaved people. According to the Arlington Historical Society, he didn't do this because he was nice, but because he wanted to irritate his white neighbors. The Black community that resulted was known as Hall's Hill.

In the 1930s a wall was erected along the perimeter of the neighborhood to block Black citizens from entering the new subdivision of Woodlawn. It remained mostly intact until 1966, when the county tore most of it down. The vestiges still standing are a sad reminder of life in earlier times. 

Politics of Fear

Yesterday was as picture-perfect a day as that September 11th, but 23 years later, nearly a generation ago. As it happens, I spent part of it on class readings about 9/11 and the politics of fear. 

One of the points I took home from these articles was terrorism's legacy of anxiety and containment, of divisiveness — there are those who are terrorists (or look like them) and those who are not. 

In class last night, a colleague mentioned something I hadn't thought of in a long time: threat levels. Remember those colors — red, orange, yellow? They were part of the Homeland Security Advisory System, I learned from Wikipedia today. In place from 2002 till 2011, they affected the level of security at airports and public buildings. 

Some class members were babies then; they had no memory of those. The threat index they're most familiar with are air-quality levels. 

Chimney Rock

A thousand years ago, Ancestral Puebloans made their home in the desert southwest. Yesterday we trudged the trails they navigated a millennia ago as we explored Chimney Rock, a national monument celebrating Chaco culture.

These were sky-watching people, who learned that every 18 and a half years, the moon would rise between Chimney Rock (right) and Companion Rock, the two sandstone spires above. This alignment is made possible by a phenomenon known as Major Lunar Standstill, a time when the moon appears to pause for three years in its wobbly north-to-south cycle. 

It's believed that the Great House Pueblo we visited today was constructed in 1093 A.D., during one of these times. Another one is happening later this year. I wish I could be here to see it.

Last Chance Mine

When we pulled into the cramped parking lot we had gone as far as we could go. Last Chance Mine, the sign read, and that's just what it seemed. Our last chance to visit a mine on this trip, since the Creede Mine was closed. Our last chance to turn around and find the loop road that was taking us around the mountain. 

Turns out, the name had another, more colorful meaning. A long-ago prospector, Ralph Granger, having struck out on other claims, was about to give it all up, move to Denver and become a city boy. This was his last chance to hit it big, he told his cronies down at the bar. But when Granger went to collect his burro (the sale of which would be his ticket out), he couldn't find the critter. He looked around town to no avail, finally locating him 2,000 feet up the mountain. 

Granger was so angry at the wild goose chase that when he reached the burro he beat his hammer on a rock to vent his frustration. And that strike revealed the apex of a rich silver vein that ultimately yielded over $2 billion of the precious medal. 

We toured the mine yesterday, getting a taste of mining life circa 1891. It was fascinating and creepy. The best part: after an hour and a half they let us out. We made our way down to the old Wild West town of Creede, its main street dead-ending in a box canyon, and celebrated with ice cream. 

Happy Early Solstice!

Today at 4:51 p.m., the northern hemisphere of our planet officially enters its hottest season. It's the earliest solstice in 228 years, they're saying, since George Washington was president.

I've been thinking of George Washington lately, what with the discovery of 35 bottles of preserved cherries recently found at his home, Mount Vernon. Now I'll think of him again, enjoying the longest day of the year, perhaps in Philadelphia, then the capital of these United States. A few months later, he will deliver his farewell address. 

But back to the solstice, which is early this year because of leap year and our imperfect calendar. I could have waited one more day for it — savored the anticipation — but there's no way to stop a celestial body when it has made up its mind. 

And so I prepare to drain as much daylight and happiness from this day as I can. It's the longest one; it can spare it. 

(A favorite sunrise shot, the beach at Chincoteague, April 2016.)

Slipping Into History

Today is the 80th anniversary of the Allied landing on the beaches of Normandy. It is also "the moment when D-Day will slip almost entirely from memory into history," says Garrett M. Graff, author of When the Sea Came Alive: An Oral History of D-Day, a 19-hour audiobook.

My knowledge of World War II is also from oral history — Dad's stories about the 35 missions he flew in 1944, including air support on D-Day. He always insisted that his efforts were nothing compared with soldiers on the ground. 

"I don't think the American people appreciate what some of those men did," he told a newspaper reporter in 2009. "Those guys, they deserve all the honors." I think Dad was too modest; being crammed into the tail gunner's seat of a B-17 bomber carried enormous risks and responsibilities. 

Dad was one of the lucky ones. He survived to return, marry, have four children and die peacefully at the age of 90. Like him, most of the boys who stormed the beaches (or flew above them) are now under the ground. As D-Day slips into history, it's up to us to keep it alive. 

(Dad poses beside a B-17 bomber at his air base in Horham, England in 1944.)

Memorial at Ball's Bluff

I couldn't visit my parents' graves at a national cemetery in Kentucky, so yesterday I thought I'd do the next best thing: visit a national cemetery in Virginia. Arlington immediately sprang to mind ... and just as quickly left it as I thought about the traffic.

Instead, I found a small national cemetery — the third smallest in the U.S., as a matter of fact — located near a Civil War battlefield, Ball's Bluff. You can hike down to the Potomac, which Union soldiers crossed before the battle on October 21, 1861. 

The skirmish did not go well for them. The Confederates prevailed, just as they had at the Battle of Bull Run a few months earlier, and a U.S. senator,  Edward Baker, was killed. His death is commemorated with a marker, and the small walled cemetery there holds the remains of 54 Union soldiers. 

It was a warm day, but the paths were shady, and at the trail's end, the Potomac River was calm and peaceful, a contrast to that day ... and so many others.

Happy Birthday, Rhapsody

Yesterday, after the errands were run and the groceries put away, I sat down at the piano, pulled out the ancient sheet music and played the opening run. For the next 30 minutes, I bungled my way through one of the most important and beautiful pieces of American music ever written, George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue.

A hundred years ago to the day, on a snowy February 12, 1924, Gershwin played the piece at Aeolian Hall in New York City in a concert billed as "An Experiment in Modern Music." Paul Whiteman had commissioned Gershwin to write the piece, and Gershwin had done it in just a few weeks, roughing out the original idea on a train trip from New York to Boston. "I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our metropolitan madness," Gershwin said.

He had created a masterpiece. Though no one knows exactly how the piece sounded that day (it wasn't recorded and Gershwin improvised parts of it), a recording made a few months later is thought to be a close replica. The piece was an immediate success, with multiple recordings, and Paul Whiteman made the Rhapsody the theme song for his radio show. Gershwin had created an anthem for the Jazz Age. 

Later versions of the Rhapsody give it a more lush orchestral sound, but the original performance brought out the jazzy brightness of the piece in all its syncopated glory. Even hopscotching through the music as I was last night, cherry-picking the easier sections, I felt its magic in my bones. 

(Thanks to Wikipedia and The Syncopated Times for info and art, and to Hot Jazz Saturday Night for the inspiration.) 

Time and Memories

I'm reminded this morning that it's been 60 years to the day since President Kennedy was shot. The act that defined our country for many years, until the other tragedies came along. 

Now there are young adults who were born after 9/11, who have no direct or televised experience of the smoldering ruins or the silent skies. 

Time marches on; memories do not. They stay locked in place — in amber, perhaps, or something far less valuable. They define us, as a generation and as a people. 

How do we honor them and move on? Only by understanding them, I guess, by realizing the many ways they hold us in their thrall. 

Good Words

Today is the birthday of Eleanor Roosevelt, mother, teacher, writer, wife, first lady and activist, whose 2020 biography was unputdownable. 

One of Eleanor's many noteworthy traits was her capacity for growth. She was not afraid to plunge in, assess, take action, and, when necessary, reverse course. She was ahead of her time. 

Perhaps this quotation helps explain some of her courage: "You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you," she said, "if you realized how seldom they do."

Good words to take into the day. 

(Writing about Eleanor gives me an excuse to feature a Washington, D.C. photo.)

Neolithic Orkney

Today we traveled in time as well as space, touring sites which Orkadians five millennia ago would have known.

Places like Skara Brae, a Neolithic village uncovered less than 200 years ago and older than Stonehenge or the pyramids in Egypt. The Stones of Stenness rising up from the treeless plain. And the Ring of Brodnar with its 27 menhirs decked out in heather.  

What I took from this jam-packed day is that we have much in common with our Stone Age ancestors, that they, like us, sought shelter from the cold, a good meal, and something beyond creature comforts, a carving on a mace handle, a decorated saucer. 

They too, wanted to say we were here. And today, I saw that they were. 

He Died Walking

I don't read the newspaper obituaries everyday, but on Sunday one particular one caught my eye: it was about Esteban Volkov, who died at the age of 97 in Mexico. He was the grandson of Leon Trotsky.  

A mini history lesson, this article describes how Trotsky fled Russia after a power struggle with Stalin following Lenin's death. Volkov's father, a political supporter, was imprisoned and killed, and Volkov's mother, Trotsky's daughter, committed suicide. Volkov eventually ended up in Mexico City, living with his exiled grandfather. 

Volkov returned from school one day to find his grandfather dying in the arms of his wife and a security guard. After escaping assassins other times, Trotsky was killed with an icepick by a man who pretended to be his admirer. Young Volkov wasn't safe, either, once hiding under his bed as a gunman fired shot after shot into his mattress. 

Volkov promised his grandfather he'd never go into politics, becoming an engineer instead. But after the fall of the Soviet Union, Volkov, by then retired, opened a museum about Trotsky in Mexico City. It now hosts 50,000 visitors a year. 

The obituary has a noteworthy conclusion, as Volkov's daughter describes her father's many positive traits: "He liked nature, mountains, the ocean and loved music, with Shostakovich and Stravinsky his favorites. He never stopped walking and even died while walking, outside his nursing home." He died while walking, three years shy of his 100th birthday. That's something to aspire to.

(Volkov, lower right, with his grandparents. Photo courtesy Wikirouge.)

 

How the West Was Young

I write this post from the Columbia City neighborhood of Seattle, south of downtown and (from the sound of it) on the flight path to Seatac.

The hosts of this Airbnb have thoughtfully provided a local history book on Rainier Valley, so I've been learning about the history of this place, from early pioneer Isaac Ebey in the 1850s, through waves of settlement, Italians to Africans and more, to the opening of the light rail line in 2009. 

What strikes me about all of this is how recent it is. Not that I exactly live in the midst of antiquities, but compared with the East, the West is ... young. 

(Lake Washington waders in 1905)

23,000

23,000. The number flares, it burns a hole in the mind. The pain it represents. The terrible loss of life from earthquakes in Turkey and Syria and the human misery left in their wake.

The earthquake that struck Lisbon on November 1, 1755, occurred before there were ways to measure temblors, but it's estimated to have been as high as 8.0 on the Richter scale. Estimated loss of life: 30,000 to 50,000. 

The event widened an already wide rift in European intellectual life as philosophers like Voltaire challenged optimism and belief in a loving and engaged God.  

Natural events ripple through history. How, I wonder, will this current one ripple through time? 

(An engraving of the Lisbon earthquake and tsunami that followed. Courtesy Wikipedia. Four days after I posted this,  the death toll in Syria and Turkey reached 41,000.)

Taps

Over the weekend I had a chance to do something I've meant to do for years, to be part of an 8th Air Force Historical Society event, thanks to a friend who's a member. My dad flew in the 95th bomb group of the 8th Air Force and was active in both the 95th Bomb Group and 8th Air Force organizations. I cheered him on through the years but never had time to join him.

Now, of course, I wish I had. Because as much as I enjoyed meeting a couple of the WWII veterans present, all up in their 90s, of course, I only missed Dad more.

There was the familiar 8th Air Force insignia, the talk of where stationed, at some village or another in Britain's East Anglia. There were the facts and figures, amazing to recount. In 1942 the 8th Air Force had a dozen members. Two years later, there were 300,000. 

And now they're contracting again, have been for some time, at least when it comes to those who served in WWII. In a crowd of 400-plus ... only seven were veterans of the Second World War. 

Gutenberg's Bible

The Writer's Almanac informs me that on this day in the year 1452 Johannes Gutenberg finished printing the first section of his revolutionary bible.  More than a decade earlier, he had begun isolating the elements of each letter and punctuation mark (300 shapes in all) to create movable type. 

It's a technology that had begun in China centuries earlier, using porcelain. Gutenberg's type pieces were made of an alloy of lead, tin and antimony — a compound that remained in use for the next 550 years. 

Gutenberg printed around 180 bibles of which less than 50 remain, only 21 of them complete. But his printing press forever changed our technology and our culture. 

"What the world is today, good and bad, it owes to Gutenberg," Mark Twain wrote in 1900. Perhaps a little less true today, but still a statement you can hang your hat on. 

(Illustration and facts from Wikipedia, additional material from The Writer's Almanac)

The Iron Curtain

I grew up with the Iron Curtain, the dividing line between the Soviet Union and the West. A strange image, "iron curtain." Not iron wall, though the Berlin Wall was part of it. Not iron fence, though barbed wire and guard towers were part of it, too. But iron — hard and unbendable — combined with curtain — soft and pliable.

It was Winston Churchill's phrase, part of a March, 1946, address where he said, "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an Iron Curtain has descended upon the land." I didn't know he used these exact words until I looked them up just now.

But I did know that something was terribly wrong with the world, that adults were afraid of the division, that it posed harm. The Iron Curtain was not just a dividing line; it was a feeling. It was rigid and gray and hopeless, life drained of color. The Cold War. Nuclear stand-offs.

My children were born as the Berlin Wall was falling. They grew up with a far different Europe than I did. To them, Russian's invasion of Ukraine must seem preposterous. To me, it seems all too familiar.

(Prague, capital of the Czech Republic, a city I never dreamed I'd see. In the old days, it was on the wrong side of the Iron Curtain.) 

Eighty Years

Shortly after publishing yesterday's post, I realized that yesterday was the 80th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Eighty years ... 

I looked back to see what I'd written on the 70th anniversary, and there was something I'd forgotten about: a special showing of the movie "12 O'Clock High" at a Lexington, Kentucky, cinema, which Dad had organized and hosted. 

I remember that now, how excited he was about it, how he had a little display area out in the vestibule of the movie house, with uniforms and medals and other memorabilia loaned by members of the Kentucky chapter of the 8th Air Force Historical Society.

Now, the World War II veterans are almost all gone. One of the more famous, Bob Dole, just passed away at the age of 98. My dad was not one of the more famous, except to me and the rest of us who loved him. But Dad was World War II to me, and since he's been gone, I read as little about it as possible. 

(Photo: Genealogy Trails History Group)

Scott Hotel

Only time for a short walk yesterday, but I had a destination in mind: the Scott Hotel, once owned by my grandfather and great uncle. Mom and her family lived at the hotel intermittently through the years, sharing quarters with the horsemen and the tobacco farmers in to sell their crops. 

The hotel was right across from the Southern Railway Depot, a natural place to stay for a night or two if you were in Lexington on business.

It was a less likely place to house three young daughters and a son. But these were different times, harder in some ways, easier in others.

The hotel is abandoned now, has been for years. It stands in mute testimony to those long-ago lives. 

The People Behind the Pill

I've always been an earnest, note-taking reader, especially now that I'm in class again. But increasingly more I enjoy the sidetracks and detours of reading, the rabbit holes, the inefficient digressions. 

For the next paper, we're analyzing the public reception of a specific scientific discovery, and I've chosen oral contraception. It's a rich topic, so rich that I'm reading more than necessary. 

For instance, in The Birth of the Pill, author Jonathan Eig tells the stories of the four people who are most responsible for the development of the pill:

There is Gregory Pincus, a brilliant scientist with a flair for publicity searching for compounds in his ramshackle laboratory in Massachusetts; Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, who coined the term "birth control" and crusaded for women's freedom all her life; Katharine McCormick, heir to the Cyrus McCormick fortune, who funded the experiments; and Dr. John Rock, a gynecologist and devout Catholic who took on his church to help the women in his care.

Though a drug company was involved — G.D. Searle — the pill would not have been created without the  "courage and conviction of the characters involved," Eig writes. The book is a vivid reminder of how human personalities forge the technologies we inherit. It's good to be reminded of that from time to time.

(Photo of Margaret Sanger courtesy Wikipedia)