Old Ones Dream

"Grant" by Ron Chernow

At 3 ½ pounds and 1100 pages of smallish print, this is a substantial book. Reading it in whole will build your core body strength, increase your knowledge, and improve your mind. I was drawn to this book, even though I had vowed, thirty years ago, to “…study war no... Read more →

German Prisoners of War In South Carolina: Update

Call them Hanz, or call them Ishmael. They were European men who, by accident of birth, were caught on the losing side of the Second World War and were confined behind barbed wire fences in mostly rural communities in the United States. Since “German POWs in South Carolina” was published... Read more →

The Orangeburg Massacre - February 8, 1968

This piece, originally posted by me on Medium, is a summation of “The Orangeburg Massacre” by Jack Bass and Jack Nelson (Mercer University Press, reprint 2002), both white southern journalists and Nieman Fellows at Harvard, who covered the Orangeburg Student Riots for The Los Angeles Times and The Charlotte Observer.... Read more →

John Tatum - River Pilot

My great grandfather John Tatum walked home from Virginia and arrived in late May 1865 suffering from chronic diarrhea. He had been issued a mule at the surrender and he could have ridden it home and perhaps used it to help him plant a crop—but early in the journey he... Read more →

The Near Extinction of the American Bison: Do the Math (Rev. 11/9/2015)

What Really Caused the Near Extinction of the American Bison In Hay Camp at Shade Ranch in the Little Missouri Grasslands near Medora, North Dakota, in 2013 we spoke of “Texas Tick Fever”. It had been mentioned in a program, perhaps on the History Channel, which described the devastation brought... Read more →

Yo Ho Ho and a Bottle of Rum | bothwell's blog

A Re-Blog of a Post by Cecil Bothwell No matter your politics or religious affiliation or affliction; Cecil Bothwell, the maverick Asheville City Council member, builder and prolific writer, will inform and energize your thoughts. He will also answer questions you may not have known you had, such as: what... Read more →

The Great War for Civilization - Centennial of a Calamity

June 28, 2014 - One hundred years ago today in Sarajevo, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were assassinated. By early August, Germany had declared war on Russia and France, and had invaded Belgium. Scientific American magazine, on August 15, 1914, had this to say. “It is very... Read more →

The Four Corners: Mesa Verde National Park

A Cultural Jewel of North America Mesa Verde National Park is one of the best preserved of the populated areas that were part of the large Ancestral Puebloan community known as Chaco, a civilization with trading partners from the Pacific Ocean to the Mississippi River and south to Mesoamerica. Driving... Read more →

Finding Crazy Horse: Little Bighorn in Context

As we discussed earlier, historian's estimates seem to cluster around a probable median American death toll of around 500 soldiers and civilians at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. The European American toll was certainly around 260 and the Native American toll was probably, not certainly, between 200 and 300.... Read more →

Finding Crazy Horse: The Valley of the LIttle Big Horn

Leaving Spearfish, South Dakota in June, 2010 we drove west on US 212 from Belle Fourche, South Dakota to camp at Hardin, Montana; and passed through the Northern Cheyenne Reservation at Lame Deer, Montana and onto the Crow Indian Reservation. We passed by the entrance to the Little Bighorn Battlefield... Read more →