history Tag

14 Dec

Posted at 13:04h in Newsletter

GENEALOGIST- ONE KILLING LEADS TO ANOTHER 20 YEARS LATER We’ve all seen various lithographic recreations of Lincoln’s assassination. We know the stories related to the fates of the President, the First Lady, and John Wilkes Booth. What about the other two people in the image? Future Brevet Colonel Henry Rathbone (1837-1911) and his fiancé Clara Harris had known each other for 15 years. Henry’s widowed mother had married Clara’s widowed father, so they were stepsiblings who met at ages 11 and 14 and became close friends. Both families were prominent, with Henry's father in 1845 leaving him $6.3 m in today’s dollars....

01 Dec

Posted at 12:59h in Newsletter

GENEALOGY- BRAVE ABOLITIONISTS CARRIED THE MORAL ARGUMENT FORWARD AGAINST SLAVERY. WHAT ABOUT THE ECONOMIC DILEMMA? When Britain abolished slavery in 1833 through the Slavery Abolition Act, it essentially "bought the freedom" of enslaved people by paying a large sum of compensation, amounting to £20 million, directly to the slaveholders. This represented 40% of the government's annual budget, equivalent to roughly 5% of the British GDP. The argument is made that parliament did not do this to reward the slaveholders but to reduce their incentive to oppress the freed people post-slavery through other methods because the enslavers would not feel economically hurt. Whether...

17 Nov

Posted at 14:32h in Newsletter

IN CASE SOUTH DAKOTA NEEDS MORE MONUMENT HERITAGE I wrote an article in 2023 called Dejavu at the Ballot Box . Dejavu election that showed the number of times we had the same choice for president on the same ballot. Of course, with President Biden dropping out, that did not happen. We did, however, for the second time, have a president elected to a non-sequential second term. Of course, we have seen many mentions of Trump doing a Grover Cleveland. Think of Grover in his grave, wondering why it took so long for him to become a verb. By the way, Grover Cleveland...

05 Nov

Posted at 19:46h in Newsletter

ANCESTOR- LINCOLN STARTED THE TREND OF BEARDED PRESIDENTS Some noise was generated this election when a bearded V.P. candidate (J.D. Vance) was chosen by a major party. Beards were not a feature from 1789-1861 among the first 15 presidents. After Lincoln wore his, and of the next seven presidents only Johnson and Cleveland did not have beards as Grant, Hayes, Garfield, and Harrison all sported beards. Likely just a leftover fashion trend created by Civil War Generals. Other than Lincoln all of them were Civil War Generals, who as Commander-in-Chief outranked all of them. I even included a picture of my bearded distant...

19 Oct

Posted at 13:17h in Newsletter

RUTHERFORD B. HAYES PURSUED HIS ANCESTRY Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822 – 1893) was the 19th president of the United States, serving from 1877 to 1881. An attorney in Ohio, Hayes was Cincinnati's city solicitor and a staunch abolitionist. During the Civil War, he joined the Union Army, earning a reputation for bravery and rising to brevet major general. Post-war, Hayes became a prominent Republican, serving in Congress and as governor of Ohio. Despite losing the popular vote, Hayes won the 1876 presidential election (see the last article) against Samuel J. Tilden through the Compromise of 1877. The deal ended federal support for...

06 Oct

Posted at 11:44h in Newsletter

ACCORDING TO THIS GENEALOGIST THIS IS NOT THE FIRST TIME A MAYOR OF NEW YORK HAS BEEN CHARGED WITH A FEDERAL CRIME WHILE STILL IN OFFICE There has been a lot of press lately about Eric Adams, the first Mayor of New York City ever to be indicted for a crime while in office. However, I doubt Adams will face execution. My wife’s sixth-time Great-Uncle, David Mathews, was appointed Mayor of New York City in February 1776 by the British Governor of the Province of New York. That same year, Mathews was implicated in a plan to kidnap George Washington, the Commander in...

21 Sep

Posted at 13:35h in Newsletter

THANKS FOR DOING MY GENEALOGY, NOW YOU MUST DIE! In Bergen, Norway, we took a walking tour of the city, and the guide took us to the statue of Snorri Sturluson (1179 –1241). He was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as lawspeaker of the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He is commonly thought to have authored or compiled portions of the Prose Edda, which is a major source for what is today known about Norse mythology and alliterative verse, and Heimskringla, a history of the Norse kings that begins with legendary material in Ynglinga saga and moves...

07 Sep

Posted at 10:16h in Newsletter

ANCESTOR- MY 3X GREAT GRANDPA WILLIAM I. NEVIUS HAD 4 SONS WHO FOUGHT IN THE CIVIL WAR; TWO CAME HOME 1) John Rowland (1838-1914) served in Company D, 83rd Illinois Infantry without incident. He is pictured above with his brother Henry Wilbur in their uniforms. 2) William Dill (1840-1862) served in Company E, 9th Illinois Infantry, and was killed on April 6, 1862, at Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, during the Battle of Shiloh. He is pictured above in his uniform. _" The 9th was at Shiloh, Tennessee, on April 6, 1862, when the Confederate Army of the Mississippi struck at dawn. Some Union regiments...

24 Aug

Posted at 10:53h in Newsletter

ANCESTRY- AN URBAN MYTH LED TO SPENDING $20 BILLION OVER 25 YEARS The Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, historically known as the Chicago Drainage Canal, is a 28-mile-long (45 km) canal system that connects the Chicago River to the Des Plaines River. It reverses the direction of the Main Stem and the South Branch of the Chicago River, which now flows out of Lake Michigan rather than into it. The related Calumet-Saganashkee Channel does the same for the Calumet River, which is a short distance to the south, joining the Chicago Canal about halfway along its route to the Des Plaines....

10 Aug

Posted at 12:09h in Newsletter

KATE THOMPSON SMUGGLED A $200,000 STOCK RECEIPT THROUGH UNION LINES We covered the “Confederates on the Great Lakes” on July 13, 2024, Confederates on the Great Lakes and the Mystery of the Silver Teapot” in the June 29, 2024, edition Mystery of the Silver Teapot. We gave you a glimpse into the activities of Jacob Thompson, former Secretary of the Interior and Confederate representative in Canada. During the war, Jacob Thompson’s Oxford, MS home was torched by the Union Army (picture of Union Army soldiers in Oxford), even though Kate and her daughter-in-law were still living in the house. The daughter-in-law had...

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