We lost a great musician early when Jiles Perry Richardson, Jr., better known as the Big Bopper lost his life along with Buddy Holly and Richie Valens in a plane crash Feb.3, 1959. His watch was not found at the crash site until spring when the snow melted in Iowa. This beautiful song by the Big Bopper’s […]
DYK: Did you know? Around 1542, when the phrase first appeared, “to go to pot” was to be cut up like chunks of meat destined for the stew pot. When farm animals outlived their usefulness such as a hen that no longer laid eggs would literally go to pot. It was cooked and eaten. Such […]
The Coffren Store in Maryland is a rare example of a well-preserved, mid 19th-century general merchandise store. Small local stores of this type one-room utilitarian structures including a Post Office once commonly dotted the rural landscape of the county. Most have long since disappeared, and the few others remaining have been altered. The Coffren Store […]
SILHOUETTES by Dorothy Graham Gast Silhouettes have been used as a means of representing images of leaders for thousands of years as evidenced by coins bearing the likenesses of their rulers. In the Bible Jesus responded to those Jewish leaders trying to trap him by asking if the Jews should pay taxes. His response was […]
Erosion of land was a major problem in Georgia during the 1930’s along with the depression. Marion Post Walcott visited Georgia and documented the economic difficulties residents had with photographs Her photographs provide a glimpse of life in rural Georgia in 1939. The descriptions included with the photographs are hers. Farmer in overalls pointing toward eroded […]
A Night I Can’t Remember by Joyce Ray Wheeler A cyclone is a low pressure area in the atmosphere in which winds spiral inward. All cyclones have two characteristics. The atmosphere pressure is lowest at the center. The winds spiral inward at the center. (Why in the world am I defining cyclones?) There are very few of my Ray family left. My dad was born into a family […]
The phrase, ‘Plain sailing’ is used to describe a process or activity that goes well and is easy and uncomplicated. Actually it is another nautical phrase and derives from 17-18th century, originally ‘plane sailing’, the term for a quick method of navigating short distances, when positions and distances could be plotted as if on a flat plane […]
The Great Depression and Dust Bowl were difficult years in United States History. Many people left their farms and became migrant workers due to the Dust Bowl and traveled to California to pick vegetables and fruit. This song Why don’t you write a letter home? was performed by Sam Bell in Tuolumne County, California on […]
You’ve probably heard the story of the robbers, Bonnie and Clyde, but have you ever heard of the Blonde Bandit? This story reminds me of the play and movie Chicago. In February 1930, twenty-year-old Sally Joyce Richards, branded the “Blonde Bandit,” was found guilty of first-degree robbery and sentenced to twenty years to life in […]
THE ALABAMA LANDING by Jon R McKinnie Hernando DeSoto’s expedition In 1541-1542, Spanish explorer Hernando DeSoto’s expedition included the first white men to explore this particular area of north Louisiana. They had traveled throughout mid-America from the Mobile, AL starting point and, in time, to south Arkansas and north Louisiana. Expedition journals record they spent […]
