Maxine Kumin, who experienced many different views of the world through travel, feels the most comfortable in New Hampshire, her rural home. In any area that she travels, she always makes a similarity to her home, as expressed in her poems. In her poem, “The Long Approach”, she is driving in her Saab hatchback from…
Gandhi was one of the gentlest of men, a devout and almost mystical Hindu, but he had an iron core of determination. Nothing could change his convictions. This combination of traits made him the leader of India’s nationalist movement. Some observers called him a master politician. Others believed him a saint. To millions of Hindus…
It was May 25th 1978, Terry Marker was on his usual patrol on campus at the University of Illinois. This earmark package addressed to an engineering professor at Rensselaer from a material science professor at Northwestern, was found in a parking lot. What seemed like an insignificant misplaced parcel was about to start a reign…
Robert Bork’s The Right of Privacy examined the landmark case Griswald v. Conneticut. Bork’s “originalist” view proclaimed that Justice Douglas erroneously interpreted the right of privacy from the Constitution. The originalist view is that judges must strictly adhere to the language of the Constitution, thus people do not have a general right to privacy because…
In 1936 when Marijuana was made illegal it was considered a medicine in good standing with the American Medical Association. At the time Marijuana could be found in twenty eight different medical products and countless other consumer products. On November 5th, 1996 California and Arizona passed propositions allowing the return of medicinal Marijuana use. The…
The Indians were the main focus of the history of New France, and influenced the Europeans in the period before 1663. The Indians, being numerous compared with the Europeans, came into frequent contact with them. The Indians and Europeans traded items with one another, which led to various events and actions that contributed greatly to…
The Nile River is known almost universally by historians as the cradle of medicine because it passes through the great region of Egypt. Egypt greatly contributed to western civilization. Their knowledge was far superior to any previous civilization, and many civilizations to come. One of their greatest achievements was in the field of medicine because…
Nothing distinguished the dawn of June 2, 1942, from countless other dawns that had fallen over tiny Midway atoll in the North Pacific. Nothing, that is, except the tension, the electric tension of men waiting for an enemy to make his move. On Midway’s two main islands, Sand and Eastern, 3,632 United States Navy and…
In 1494 the armies of the French king, Charles VIII, invaded Italy to capture the kingdom of Naples. They swept through the country and bombarded and destroyed many castles. This invasion signaled the end of the castle as a stronghold of defense. For centuries it had been the dominant fortification in Western Europe for the…
Leonardo Da Vinci is one of the greatest and most ingenious men that history has produced. His contributions in the areas of art, science, and humanity are still among the most important that a single man has put forth, definitely making his a life worth knowing. Da Vinci, born on April 15, 1452, is credited…
Life in the 1900s was depressing and was an era filled with extremely hard and strenuous work that didn’t offer any future for the average Canadian to do better. If you were an average wage earner you would be virtually stuck in the same job for the rest of your life, while the rich maintained…
A little over a century ago a gruesome double murder was committed, in the 2-½ story house at 92 Second Street, in Fall River, Massachusetts. This crime shocked the nation as Lizzie Borden, a 32-year-old Sunday school teacher, went on trial for the murder of her father and her stepmother. An all male jury eventually…
Born in August 1901 (not Independence Day 1900, as he was always told and believed), Louis Armstrong sang on the New Orleans streets in a boyhood quartet and in 1913 was admitted to the Colored Waifs’ home for firing a gun into the air. In the home he learned the trumpet, and within four years…
“Ku Klux Klan” The Ku Klux Klan, or KKK as known today, was started in the winter of 1865. Six Confederate veterans formed a social club in Pulaski, Tennessee. This KKK only lasted a short six years, but left tactics and rituals that later started in generations. (Ingalls, 9) The Klan was a small group…
Marco Polo was born in c.1254 in Venice. He was a Venetian explorer and merchant whose account of his travels in Asia was the primary source for the European image of the Far East until the late 19th century. Marco’s father, Niccolò, and his uncle Maffeo had traveled to China (1260-69) as merchants. When they…
“If this country is preserved in tranquility twenty years longer, it may bid defiance in a just cause to any power whatever; such in that time will be its popularity, wealth and resources,” stated by George Washington in response to demonstrators over the Jay Treaty. 1 Washington’s remark was regarding the public’s uproar following the…
CONCENTRATION CAMPS The first concentration camps were set up in 1933. In the early days of Hitler, concentration camps were places that held people in protective custody. Victims for protective custody included those who were both physically and mentally ill, gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah Witnesses, Jews, and anyone against the Nazi regime. “Gypsies were classified as…
During World War One, the role of airplanes and how they were used changed greatly. At first planes were only used for sport, but people started realize that not only could airplanes be useful but they could even influence an outcome of the war greatly. Soon the war was filled with blimps, planes, and tethered…
Throughout history, crime has existed in many different forms and has been committed by not only individuals, but by groups as well. Crime is something that knows no boundaries; it exists in all cultures, is committed by all races, and has existed in all time periods. Crime exists as a part of the economic institution…
James Buchanan was born in April 23, 1791 in a cabin in Cove Gap, Pennsylvania. James father came to America as a Scotch-Irish in 1783. At the age of six his family moved to Mercersberg PA. Where his father would open a general store. James was the second of eleven in his family. James was…