The Amazing Nellie Bly - Part Four

What next for this amazing woman...

After a few years of enjoying her celebrity Nellie went back to doing what she did best, championing the downtrodden.  The United States was experiencing an economic crisis that became the depression of 1893.  Nellie covered the stories where strikers were fighting their companies nationwide.  She got the stories from both sides, but firmly backed the strikers.

In 1895, at the age of 31, Nellie married millionaire manufacturer Robert Seaman, who was 40 years older than she.  The company manufactured containers such as milk cans and boilers.  In 1904 Nellie's husband passed away, and she became the President of the Iron Clad Manufacturing Company.  That same year Nellie took a trip to Europe where she saw glycerin containers made of steel.  "I determined to make steel containers for the American trade."  Within a year Nellie patented her own metal barrel.

After returning to the U.S. Nellie went to work on her new idea.  "My first experiment leaked and the second was defective because the solder gave way, and then I brazed them with the result that the liquid inside was ruined by the brazing metal.  I finally worked out the steel package to perfection, patented the design, put it on the market and taught the American public to use the steel barrel."  Nellie proudly claimed, "I am the only manufacturer in the country who can produce a certain type of steel barrel for which there is an immense demand at present for the transportation of oil, gasoline, and other liquids."  Nellie's 40-gallon barrel was the model for the 55-gallon oil drum still in use today.

Nellie's company experienced huge success employing 1,500 and could produce 1,000 steel barrels daily, but then, because of embezzlement by employees and charges of fraud on their part,  it all ended in a bitterly contested bankruptcy. 

World War I had broken out, and Nellie returned to her roots.  She signed on as a reporter covering the war in Europe.  She went to the front lines and was the first female reporter to do so.  In on-the-spot news stories she wrote, "One motionless creature had his cap on his head.  Great black circles were around his sunken eyes.  Black hollows were around his nose and his ears were black.  Near him, completely covered by his coat, was a form.  Occasionally it shivered convulsively.  That was all.  Nearest us was another lying on his face.  He never moved.  Perhaps he was dead.  The soldier was in a shed with other cholera victims.  Human creatures they were, lying there in a manner our health authorities would prohibit for hogs or the meanest beasts.  I staggered out into the muddy road.  I would rather look on guns and hear the cutting of the air by a shot that brought kinder death."

While covering the war in Hungary a policeman mistook Nellie for a British spy.  The police ignored her claims that she was an American reporter until a translator arrived.  "I am Dr. Friedman", he announced. "You are English, they say."  "I am Nellie Bly of New York," I answered.  Both hands flew up above his head.  'My God!  Nellie Bly,' he cried excitedly.  "The police had cleared a space around us.  Their mouths were not open but their eyes were.  They were speechless, dumbfounded.  My new friend began to talk rapidly to them.  They listened aghast.  'I have told them every child seven years old in America knows Nellie Bly,' he said aside to me."

Safely back in the United States the year was 1913.  Nellie went straight to work covering the Woman's Suffrage Parade.  Her headline for the parade story was "Suffragists Are Men's Superiors," but she also correctly predicted in the story that it would be 1920 before women would win the vote.

In 1916 Nellie was given a baby boy whose mother requested Nellie look after him and see that he was adopted.   The child, being illegitimate and half Japanese, made him difficult to place.  He spent the next six years in an orphanage run by the Church For All Nations in Manhattan.  The plight of orphaned children became part of her ongoing efforts to improve the social organizations of the day.

In 1922 Nellie Bly, Elizabeth Jane Cochrane Seaman, at the age of 57 was admitted to St. Mark's Hospital in New York City where she died of pneumonia.  The World wrote, "Nellie Bly was THE BEST REPORTER IN AMERICA and that is saying a good deal."  She is buried in a modest grave at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.

I will end where I began, in complete awe of this woman and her accomplishments during a time when a woman's place was at home and not even allowed to vote.  Where did she find the courage and unyielding demand to be seen as an equal, a person rather than a woman?

The Amazing Nellie Bly - Part Three

"In spite of the assurance that I would be released in a few days, my heart gave a sharp twinge.  Pronounced insane by four expert doctors and shut up behind the unmerciful bolts of a madhouse was an uncomfortable position."  In spite of what she had experienced, or in her case, because of the rush she experienced, Nellie was eager for her next exciting story.

In 1873, Jules Verne published a novel called Around the World in 80 Days.  In his book a fictional hero named Phileas Fogg circled the world on a bet.  No real person had attempted this huge and dangerous feat.  The year was now 1889 and Nellie was bored and seeking adventure, so she proposed that she attempt it as a publicity stunt for the The World.  The paper's business manager told her that it would be better to send a man because he would not need a chaperon or as much luggage.  Incensed, Nellie shot back, "Very well.  Start the man, and I will start the same day for some other newspaper and beat him."  She got the assignment.

At 9:40 a.m. on November 14, 1889, and with two days notice, Nellie now only 25 years old boarded the Augusta Victoria, a steamer of the Hamburg America Line, and began her 24,899 mile journey.  All she brought with her was the dress she was wearing, a sturdy overcoat, several changes of underwear and a small travel bag carrying her toiletry essentials.  She carried most of her money in a bag tied around her neck.

Communications in 1889 were made possible by efficient submarine cable networks and the electric telegraph.  Only short messages could be sent.  Her entire stories of her progress and adventures still had to be mailed which took several weeks.  The World, in order to keep interest up between reports, organized a "Nellie Bly Guessing Match" in which readers were asked to estimate her arrival time to the second, with the Grand Prize being a free trip to Europe and spending money for the trip.  Newspaper sales soared while people in New York and the rest of the country were keeping track of Nellie Bly's whereabouts.

Nellie went through England, France, Brindisi, the Suez Canal, Colombo (Ceylon), the Straits Settlements of Penang and Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan.  While in France Nellie met Jules Verne and his wife.  His wife commented afterwards, "She is trim, energetic, and strong.  I believe, Jules, that she will make your heroes look foolish."  It is said that Jules agreed and laughed.

During her travels using steamships and existing railroad systems, she experienced some setbacks particularly in Asia .  During these stops she visited a leper colony in China and bought a monkey in Singapore.

On the returning trip headed for San Francisco on the White Star Line ship Oceanic she was two days behind the schedule she had set for herself because of rough weather while crossing the Pacific.  The World owner, Joseph Pulitzer, chartered a private train to bring her home, and she arrived back in New Jersey on January 25, 1890, at 3:51 p.m.  Nellie had circled the world in seventy-two days, six hours, eleven minutes and fourteen seconds! 

Nellie Bly was back in New York and a hero.  She had not only set the first record to beat, but the year was 1890, and she did it almost completely unchaperoned.  The overcoat she had worn during the trip became her trademark.  Nellie was now not only a celebrated journalist, but a celebrated adventurer.

What next for this amazing woman?

The Amazing Nellie Bly - Part Two

In 1887, four months after returning from Mexico, Nellie talked her way into Joseph Pulitzer's newspaper in New York City,  and at only 23 years of age accepted an assignment to go undercover into the Women's Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell's Island posing as a mentally ill girl.  The paper promised to get her out after ten days.

The first thing she had to do was convince the doctors at the asylum that she was truly insane.  After practicing deranged expressions in front of a mirror she checked into a boardinghouse.  Nellie refused to go to bed, telling the boarders that she was afraid of them and that they looked crazy.  By the next morning they were convinced that she was the crazy one and called the police.  She was taken to a courtroom and pretended to have amnesia.  The judge was convinced Nellie had been drugged.  After this, she was examined by several doctors who all agreed that she was most assuredly insane.  "Positively demented," said one, "I consider it a hopeless case.  She needs to be put where someone will take care of her."  The head of the insane pavilion at Bellevue Hospital pronounced her "undoubtedly insane."  The case of the "pretty crazy girl" attracted media attention.  "Who Is This Insane Girl?" asked the New York Sun.  The New York Times wrote of the "mysterious waif with the wild haunted look in her eyes," and her desperate cry, "I can't remember I can't remember!"

Nellie experienced all the horrors of the asylum first hand.  The food consisted of gruel broth, spoiled beef, bread that was really just dried dough, and dirty undrinkable water.  The dangerous patients were tied together with ropes.  Nellie witnessed one gray haired woman being grabbed and dragged by the hair as she shrieked and pleaded from the room, "For God's sake, ladies, don't let them beat me."   All the patients were made to sit for much of the day on hard benches with no protection from the cold.   Waste was all around the eating areas.  Rats crawled freely throughout the hospital.  The bath water was freezing cold.  Patients were treated obnoxiously and abusively by nurses telling them to shut up and beating then if they did not.

Nellie spoke with many of her fellow patients and was convinced that some were as sane as she was.  She wrote, "What, excepting torture, would produce insanity quicker than this treatment?  Here is a class of women sent to be cured.  I would like the expert physicians who are condemning me for my action, which has proven their ability, to take a perfectly sane and healthy woman, shut her up and make her sit from 6 a.m. until 9 p.m. on a straight-back bench, do not allow her to talk or move during these hours, give her no reading and let her know nothing of the world or its doings, give her bad food and harsh treatment, and see how long it will take to make her insane.  Two months would make her a mental and physical wreck."  Nellie also wrote of bath time, "My teeth chattered and my limbs were numb with cold.  Suddenly, I got three buckets of ice cold water dumped over my head. One in my eyes, nose and mouth."

At the end of the ten days an attorney for the newspaper came and got Nellie released from the asylum at The World's behest.  Her reporting, which was later published in book form titled "Ten Days in a Mad House," brought Nellie her lasting fame.  It also caused embarrassment to the physicians and staff of the hospital who would try to explain how so many professionals had been fooled.  A grand jury launched its own investigation into conditions at the asylum, and asked Nellie to assist.  The jury's report recommended the changes she had proposed, and its call for increased funds for care of the insane prompted an $850,000 increase in the budget of the Department of Public Charities and Corrections.  They also made sure the future examinations were more thorough so that only the seriously ill actually went to the asylum.

The Amazing Nellie Bly - Part One

Nellie Bly's life was so full and interesting I have decided to write a series of blogs about her.  I will cover her early life, her life as a reporter and author, and her life as an inventor and business woman.  I first discovered Nellie when I was researching the oil industry for the blog, but we will get to that part later.

Elizabeth  Jane Cochran, aka Nellie Bly,  was born May 5, 1864.  Very few people recognize her name today, but 100 years ago every American knew who Nellie Bly was.  She was named to the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1998 for many good reasons.  Nellie was an independent and strong woman for the times she lived in.  Women did not even have the right to vote until just two years before her death.

Elizabeth Jane was born in Burrell Township, Pennsylvania.  Her father taught her and her siblings the virtues of hard work and determination by example.  He started as a modest mill laborer and eventually bought the local mill and most of the land surrounding his family's farmhouse.

When Elizabeth became a teenager she wanted to portray herself as more sophisticated, so she dropped her nickname, "Pinky", and added an "e" to the end of her last name spelling it, Cochrane.  After just one year of boarding school she was forced to withdraw because of a lack of money.

In 1880, Elizabeth and her family moved to Pittsburgh.  An aggressive sexually discriminative column against working women appeared in the Pittsburgh Dispatch prompting her to write a blistering rebuttal to the editor with the pen name "Lonely Orphan Girl."  The editor was so impressed with the writer's earnestness and spirit that he asked the "man" who wrote the letter to join the paper.  When she showed up he refused to give her the job. Using her "push-and-get there" attitude and what her father had taught her, she persuaded him to change his mind.  Female newspaper writers at that time customarily used pen names, and for Elizabeth the editor chose "Nellie Bly" from the title character in a popular song by Stephen Foster.

As a writer for the Dispatch, Nellie focused her early work on the plight of working women, writing a series of investigative articles on female factory workers.  Editorial pressures soon pushed her to the "women's pages" to cover fashion, society, and gardening which were the usual assignments for female journalists of the day.

There are many things that single Nellie out as unusually independent to the times for me starting with this...Dissatisfied with the duties of the women's pages, Nellie took the initiative and traveled to Mexico to serve as a foreign correspondent.  The year was 1885, and she was only 21.  Nellie spent the next half year reporting the lives and customs of the Mexican people.  Her dispatches were later published in a book called "Six Months in Mexico."  In one of her reports she protested the imprisonment of a local journalist for criticizing the Mexican government and then dictator, Porfirio Diaz.  When Mexican authorities learned of her report, they threatened her with arrest prompting her to leave the country.  Safely home she denounced Diaz as a tyrannical czar suppressing the Mexican people and controlling the press.

Meanings Behind The Folding of The Flag

Have you ever wondered what the United States Flag draped across a soldiers coffin really means?  Here is how to understand the flag that laid upon it and is surrendered to so many widows and widowers: Do you know that at military funerals, the 21-gun salute stands for the sum of the numbers in the year 1776?  Have you ever noticed that the honor guard pays meticulous attention to correctly folding the United States of America Flag 13 times?  The 1st fold of the flag is a symbol of life.The 2nd fold is a symbol of the belief in eternal life. The 3rd fold is made in honor and remembrance of the veterans departing the ranks who gave a portion of their lives for the defense of the country to attain peace throughout the world. The 4th fold represents the weaker nature, for as American citizens trusting in God, it is to Him we turn in times of peace as well as in time of war for His divine guidance. The 5th fold is a tribute to the country, for in the words of Stephen Decatur, 'Our Country, in dealing with other countries, may she always be right; but it is still our country, right or wrong.' The 6th fold is for where people's hearts lie. It is with their heart that they pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America , and the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all. The 7th fold is a tribute to its Armed Forces, for it is through the Armed Forces that they protect their country and their flag against all her enemies, whether they be found within or without the boundaries of their republic.. The 8th fold is a tribute to the one who entered into the valley of the shadow of death, that we might see the light of day. The 9th fold is a tribute to womanhood and Mothers. For it has been through their faith, their love, loyalty and devotion that the character of the men and women who have made this country great has been molded. The 10th fold is a tribute to the father, for he, too, has given his sons and daughters for the defense of their country since they were first born. The 11th fold represents the lower portion of the seal of King David and King Solomon and glorifies in the Hebrews eyes, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The 12th fold represents an emblem of eternity and glorifies, in the Christians eyes, God the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit. The 13th fold, or when the flag is completely folded, the stars are uppermost reminding them of their Nations motto, 'In God We Trust.' After the flag is completely folded and tucked in, it takes on the appearance of a cocked hat, ever reminding us of the soldiers who served under General George Washington, and the Sailors and Marines who served under Captain John Paul Jones, who were followed by their comrades and shipmates in the Armed Forces of the United States, preserving for them the rights, privileges and freedoms they enjoy today. There are some traditions and ways of doing things that have deep meaning. 

I personally did not know what the folds stood for.  Be sure and share this with all Americans.  We need to understand our history and symbolisms.

Thank you, Sarah Hirz, for suggesting this subject for the blog.

Symbols On The One Dollar Bill

How much do you know about the symbols on the dollar bill?  How much history do you know about it?  Our Founding Fathers knew exactly what they wanted each item to symbolize for their day and for all the generations to come.

On the back of the One Dollar Bill you will see two circles.  Together they comprise the Great Seal of the United States.  The First Continental Congress requested that Benjamin Franklin and a group of men come up with a Seal.  It took them four years to accomplish this task and another two years to get it approved.

If you look at the left-hand circle, you will see a Pyramid.

Notice the face is lighted, and the western side is dark.  This country was just beginning.  We had not begun to explore the west or decided what we could do for Western Civilization.  The Pyramid is uncapped, again signifying that we were not even close to being finished.  Inside the capstone you have the all-seeing eye, an ancient symbol for divinity.  It was Franklin's belief that one man could not do it alone, but a group of men, with the help of God, could do anything.  The Latin above the pyramid, Annuit Coeptis, means, 'God has favored our undertaking.'  The Latin below the pyramid, Novous ordo Seclorum, means, 'a new order had begun.'  At the base of the pyramid is the Roman numeral for 1776. (MDCCLXXVI)

In God We Trust is on the currency.

If you look at the right hand circle, and check it carefully, you will learn that it is on every National Cemetery in the United States.  It is also on the Parade of Flags Walkway at the Bushnell, Florida National Cemetery, and is the centerpiece of most heroes' monuments.  Slightly modified, it is the seal of the President of the United States, and it is always visible whenever he speaks, yet very few people know what the symbols mean.

 

The Bald Eagle was selected as a symbol for victory for two reasons.  First, he is not afraid of a storm, he is strong and he is smart enough to soar above it.  Secondly, he wears no material crown.  We had just broken from the King of England.  Also, notice the shield is unsupported.  This country can now stand on its own.  At the top of that shield there is a white bar signifying congress, a unifying factor.  We were coming together as one nation.  In the Eagle's beak you will read, 'E Pluribus Unum' meaning, 'from many - one.'   Above the Eagle, we have the thirteen stars, representing the thirteen original colonies, and any clouds misunderstanding rolling away.  Again, we were coming together as one.

In his talons the Eagle holds an olive branch and arrows.  This country wants peace, but we will never be afraid to fight to preserve peace.  The Eagle always wants to face the olive branch, but in time of war, his gaze turns toward the arrows.

And finally, notice the arrangement of the 13 stars in the right hand circle.  You will see that they are arranged as a Star of David.

This was ordered by George Washington who, when he asked Haym Solomon, a wealthy Philadelphia Jew, what he would like as a personal reward for his services to the Continental Army.  Solomon had given $25 million to save the Continental Army to help "-our freedom and independence from England."  Solomon's answer to Washington was he wanted nothing for himself, but he would like something for his people.  The Star of David was the result.  Therein lies America's Judeo Christian beginning.

Thank you, Steve Kennedy, for suggesting this subject for the blog.

Beginnings of The Oil Industry

What is oil, and who had the first oil well?  Pennsylvania, Azerbaijan, Ontario, West Virginia, or Poland? All claim to have been the first.

Crude oil is a natural mix of hundreds of different hydrocarbon compounds trapped under ground.  The hydrocarbons were formed millions of years ago when tiny aquatic plants and animals died and settled on the bottoms of ancient waterways, creating a thick layer of organic material.  Sediment later covered this material, putting heat and pressure on it and transforming it into the petroleum that comes out of the ground today.

Indians and early European explorers had known of the oil seeps in western Pennsylvania, and had made some use of it for many years before the mid 19th century.  Interest grew in the mid 1850s as scientists reported on the potential to manufacture kerosene from crude oil if enough could be found.

Enter Edwin Drake. He was convinced there was oil, and lots of it, in Titusville, Pennsylvania. Frustrated by the limitations of existing methods of extraction, as well as problems with water seepage, Drake decided on a departure from the usual trench-digging technology. He turned to the methods used by salt-well drillers, which involved sinking a shaft straight to the source while providing more structural integrity. He also devised the drive pipe, made of segmented cast iron, as a boring tool. Drake's crew struck bedrock at 32 feet, and the drilling stalled, earning sarcastic jeers from interested observers. Even after specialized drilling tools were employed, progress remained slow.  The locals started calling the well "Drake's Folly."  Drake, however, persevered and finally, at a depth of 69.5 feet, struck oil.

The Drake well in Titusville, Pennsylvania is referred to as the first commercial oil well.  Before the Drake well, other oil producing wells in the United States were wells that were not actually drilled for oil.  They were drilled for salt brine and produced oil and gas only as accidental byproducts.  An intended drinking water well in Oil Springs, Ontario found oil in 1858, a year before the Drake, but it had not been drilled for oil.  Historian have noted that the Drake's  importance was in the fact that it caused prompt additional drilling establishing a supply of petroleum in sufficient quantity to support business enterprises.  It was responsible for the first great wave of investments in oil drilling, refining, and marketing.

On January 10, 1901, a drilling derrick at Spindletop Hill near Beaumont, Texas hit and produced a huge gusher coating the landscape for hundreds of feet that took 9 days to cap.  It signaled the beginning of the oil industry in Texas.  The Spindletop Well was struck at 1,000 feet and produced 100,000 barrels a day. Within one year there were more than 285 active wells at Spindletop and an estimated 500 oil and land companies operating in the area including Humble (now Exxon), The Texas Company (Texaco) and Magnolia Petroleum (Mobil).

Funny Tidbit of History

In searching for a subject in history to write about I came across this information.  I think it should be shared.

On January 9, 1493, Christopher Columbus was on his voyage in the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria hoping to find the western trade route to Asia.  He was sailing near the Dominican Republic and wrote that he had seen "three mermaids, and in reality they were not half as beautiful as they are painted."  It was later learned that what he saw was most likely a manatee, as they were common it that area.

That "manatee" must have seemed to be a very ugly mermaid to Columbus.

Freedom of Religion or Freedom from Religion?

Every year at this time I do a blog about the meaning of Christmas.  For the last several years I have been alarmed by the slow removal of our rights to celebrate Christmas as we have done for generations. For that reason, I feel the need to address this subject rather than my annual Christmas Blog. 

While tackling  this subject it occurred to me I would never be able to address it  as elegantly as Richard Wells, National Write Your Congressman's Western Division Manager.  Richard writes the "Patriots Perspective" for NWYC.  He generously agreed to be my first guest blogger.  Thank you Richard.  

These are his words...

Freedom of Religion or Freedom from Religion?

With the Winter Solstice upon us and snow beginning to fall, Christmas spirit begins to rise for much of the nation.  It’s a season of giving, caroling, Santa Claus, Nativity scenes and for decades now a new tradition--the tradition of lawsuits over religious expression.  This month in the news for instance, a West Point Cadet quit the academy because of religious activity and its encouragement by several officers, claiming that they were violating their oath to defend the Constitution.  Contrast that to an old tradition set by the first commander of the US military, General Washington, where he closes his final orders to the army at the end of the Revolutionary War with a prayer.  Later as President of the US and Commander and Chief of the military, he often publicly called upon God to support the nation.          

           

But this shouldn’t just be about tradition, so perhaps a few more examples can add clarity to this whole religious freedom thing.  In September of this year, the Connellsville Area School District of PA was sued in an attempt to have the 10 Commandments monument removed from the lawn of one of its schools, yet in 1935, the Supreme Court Building for the United States of America was constructed with religious references and an engraving of the Ten Commandments—law makers approved the plans.  Then in December last year the mayor of Warren, Michigan was sued for allowing a Christmas Nativity Scene in the City Hall Atrium. However, Thomas Jefferson recorded his approval that the Charlottesville Courthouse near his home in Virginia was used by the four denominations in the area for religious services.  His only concern was equal access and so the four alternated preaching every fourth Sunday and congregants from each sect attended.  In light of these diametrically opposed views on religion in the public square, which interpretation of the first amendment which guarantees religious freedom should be adopted? After all isn’t there supposed to be a wall separating church and state? 

           
Actually, the phrase separation of church and state does not appear in any of our National Documents, but comes from a letter Thomas Jefferson wrote nearly fifteen years after the Constitution was signed.  The letter was not a directive to government but was sent to a religious group.  The Constitution actually reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”  It was intended to ensure that the Federal Government (the constitution grants power to The States in this area), not designate any religion as supreme over another nor to act in anyway which prohibits the free exercise of religion.  It appears then by their actions that they didn’t want God removed from public discussion, but rather they wanted government removed from dictating the nature of that discussion.  After all, they understood their history.  They knew that valiant men like Hus, Tyndale and Rogers were all executed for translating and distributing copies of the Bible in opposition to the religious and political authorities of the day who forbade such activity.  They saw how their work and the work of many others allowed for self-study, the codification of language and a burning desire for wider religious and political freedom.  This desire was so deep that many more would risk everything to establish self-governing political and religious bodies in America.  Ironically, many of these groups disallowed religious freedoms to others outside their sect.  And so it was from this perspective that the founders set up a restriction for the government, not a censorship imposed upon the people. 

           

For more than 150 years this was the standard in the United States, until the Supreme Court ruled in the 1947 case of Everson v. Board of Education and built a “high and impregnable” wall separating church and state.  This opinion has been used to silence prayer in schools, remove religious symbols from public places and much, much more.  Regardless of your religious or non-religious belief system the question must be asked, is it right that an atheist or agnostic body of people should have preferential treatment in seeking to silence religious sentiment in the public square?  Even the US Supreme Court doesn’t think so as evidenced by a subsequent opinion in their 1952 case Zorach v. Clauson:  

“The First Amendment… does not say that in every respect there shall be a separation of Church and State. Rather…there shall be no concert or union or dependency one on the other. That is the common sense of the matter. Otherwise the state and religion would be aliens to each other…

            Municipalities would not be permitted to render police or fire protection to religious groups… Prayers in our legislative halls; the appeals to the Almighty in the messages of the Chief Executive; the proclamation making Thanksgiving Day a holiday; “so help me God” in our Courtroom oaths—these and all other references to the Almighty that run through our laws, our public rituals, our ceremonies, would be flouting the First Amendment…

            When the state…cooperates with religious authorities by adjusting the schedule of public events…it follows the best of our traditions. For it then respects the religious nature of our people and accommodates the public service to their spiritual needs. To hold that it may not, would be to find in the Constitution a requirement that the government show a callous indifference to religious groups. That would be preferring those who believe in no religion over those who do believe…We cannot read into the Bill of Rights such a philosophy of hostility to religion.

America has a great tradition founded in religious principles.  It certainly has violated the rights of minority religions and the irreligious alike and in such cases the Constitution should be called upon to protect those rights.  However, over-zealous efforts often by well intentioned people must not allow the demon of persecution to enter our society nor suppress the ideas of open inquiry, discussion and debate.  Excluding ideas, whether religious or not suppress such honest inquiry and threatens to put our society back in the dark ages.  Remember, Madison carefully worded that first amendment as freedom of Religion, not freedom from it… Now I ask you the reader to decide carefully which interpretation best honors America’s tradition of freedom?  

MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM NATIONAL WRITE YOUR CONGRESSMAN

    

Veterans Day

World War I, known at the time as The Great War, officially ended when the Treaty of Versailles was signed on June 28, 1919, in the Palace of Versailles outside the town of Versailles, France. Amazingly, fighting ceased seven months earlier when an armistice, or temporary cessation of hostilities, between the Allied nations and Germany went into effect on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. For that reason, November 11, 1918, was regarded as the end of “the war to end all wars.”

In November 1919, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed November 11 as the first commemoration of Armistice Day with the following words, "To us in America, the reflections of Armistice Day will be filled with solemn pride in the heroism of those who died in the country’s service and with gratitude for the victory, both because of the thing from which it has freed us and because of the opportunity it has given America to show her sympathy with peace and justice in the councils of the nations…"

The original concept for the celebration was for a day observed with parades and public meetings and a brief suspension of business beginning at 11:00 a.m.
The United States Congress officially recognized the end of World War I when it passed a concurrent resolution on June 4, 1926, with these words:

Whereas the 11th of November 1918, marked the cessation of the most destructive, sanguinary, and far reaching war in human annals and the resumption by the people of the United States of peaceful relations with other nations, which we hope may never again be severed, and

Whereas it is fitting that the recurring anniversary of this date should be commemorated with thanksgiving and prayer and exercises designed to perpetuate peace through good will and mutual understanding between nations; and

Whereas the legislatures of twenty-seven of our States have already declared November 11 to be a legal holiday: Therefore be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), that the President of the United States is requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the officials to display the flag of the United States on all Government buildings on November 11 and inviting the people of the United States to observe the day in schools and churches, or other suitable places, with appropriate ceremonies of friendly relations with all other peoples.

On May 13, 1938, Congress passed an Act making the 11th of November of each year a legal holiday.  It was a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated and known as "Armistice Day." Armistice Day was primarily a day set aside to honor veterans of World War I, but in 1954, after World War II had required the greatest mobilization of soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen in the Nation’s history; after American forces had fought aggression in Korea, the 83rd Congress, at the urging of the veterans service organizations, amended the Act of 1938 by striking out the word "Armistice" and inserting in its place the word "Veterans."  

National Write Your Congressman would like to sincerely thank all Veterans for their loyalty and sacrifice to our country, and to the freedoms of generations to come.