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FReeper Canteen ~ Ernie Pyle ~ May 17 2004
LindaSOG

Posted on 05/16/2004 8:19:32 PM PDT by 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub

Edited on 06/26/2004 4:19:52 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]

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"No man in this war has so well told the story of the American fighting man as American fighting men wanted it told. He deserves the gratitude of all his countrymen."
President Harry S. Truman
Ernie Pyle was born on Aug. 3, 1900, in a little white farmhouse near Dana, Ind., the only child of William and Maria Taylor Pyle.

They were simple people, content to spend their lives in the little white house on the dusty Indiana country road, as William Pyle's parents had spent their lives.

Ernest--they always called him that, and never "Ernie"--seemed destined to plod along in much the same way, except that he was restless, and his thoughts strayed from the family acres to far horizons.

"There was nothing macho about the war at all. We were a bunch of scared kids who had a job to do."

Ernie was shy in the country school house, apt to sit apart from classmates during games, and later, in high school and in Indiana University, went off for lonely walks.  He worked on The Indiana Daily Student in the one-story brick building where the paper was put together, and sometimes he strayed down to the Book Nook, the Greek candy kitchen on the campus, but not often.

He took journalism, incidentally, not because he had any burning desire for a career in it, but because it was rated then as "a breeze." He had no flaming ambition for anything.  Ernie quit college in 1923, a few months before graduation, to work as a cub on The La Porte (Ind.) Herald-Argus and moved on a few months later to a desk job on The Washington (D. C.) News.

If any one thing inspired him, during this period, it was Kirke Simpson's news story on the burial of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington Cemetery. Simpson was an Associated Press reporter.

"I cried over that," Pyle told friends later, "and I can quote the lead or almost any part of the piece."

Ernie stayed on at The Washington News as copy editor from 1923 to 1926, had a year in New York on The Evening World and on The Evening Post and did aviation for the Scripps-Howard papers from 1928 to 1932.  


"Suddenly out of this siesta-like doze the order came. We didn't hear it for it came to the tanks over their radios but we knew it quickly for all over the desert tanks began roaring and pouring out blue smoke from the cylinders. Then they started off, kicking up dust and clanking in that peculiar "tank sound" we have all come to know so well.

They poured around us, charging forward. They weren't close together - probably a couple of hundred yards apart. There weren't lines or any specific formation. They were just everywhere. They covered the desert to the right and left, ahead and behind as far as we could see, trailing their eager dust tails behind. It was almost as though some official starter had fired his blank pistol. The battle was on."

Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

Ernie was managing editor of The Washington News from 1932 to 1935, when he wearied of desk work and started a roving assignment, writing pieces as he went.

Ernie traveled to Canada and wrote of the Dionnes. He visited Flemington, N. J., and recalled the Hauptmann trial there; toured through drought-throttled Montana and the Dakotas, and pictured all he saw.

 

In 1937 he was in Alaska, writing of simple folk and of their labors, their hopes, their desires. He went 1,000 miles down the Yukon, sailed Arctic seas with the Coast Guard.

Each day's experience was material for a column--a letter home to farm-bound or pavement-bound poor people and invalids who could never hope to make such journeys.  He wrote simple, gripping pieces about five days spent with the lepers at Molokai, and put his feeling on paper: "I felt unrighteous at being whole and clean," he told his readers when he came away.

He wrote of Devil's Island, of all South America, which he toured by plane. He covered some 150,000 miles of Western Hemisphere wearing out three cars, three typewriters; crossed the United States thirty-five times.


"The way to have a nice ditch is to dig one. We wasted no time.

Would that all slit trenches could be dug in soil like that. The sand was soft and moist; just the kind children like to play in. The four of us dug a winding ditch forty feet long and three feet deep in about an hour and a half.

The day got hot, and we took off our shirts. One sweating soldier said: 'Five years ago you couldn't a got me to dig a ditch for five dollars an hour. Now look at me.  "You can't stop me digging ditches. I don't even want pay for it; I just dig for love. And I sure do hope this digging today is all wasted effort; I never wanted to do useless work so bad in my life. Any time I get fifty feet from my home ditch you'll find me digging a new ditch, and brother I ain't joking. I love to dig ditches.'"Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

In the fall of 1940 he started for unhappy London. "A small voice came in the night and said go" was the way he put it, and his writings on London under Nazi bombings tore at his readers' hearts.

He lived with Yank troops in Ireland and his descriptions of their day-by-day living brought wider reception. When he went into action with the Yanks in Africa, the Pyle legend burst into flower.


"...the thing I shall always remember above all the other things in my life is the monstrous loveliness of that one single view of London on a holiday night - London stabbed with great fires, shaken by explosions, its dark regions along the Thames sparkling with the pinpoints of white-hot bombs, all of it roofed over with a ceiling of pink that held bursting shells, balloons, flares and the grind of vicious engines. And in yourself the excitement and anticipation and wonder in your soul that this could be happening at all.

These things all went together to make the most hateful, most beautiful single scene I have ever known."

Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

Ernie's columns, done in foxholes, brought home all the hurt, horror, loneliness and homesickness that every soldier felt. They were the perfect supplement to the soldiers' own letters.

Though he wrote of his own feelings and his own emotions as he watched men wounded, and saw the wounded die, he was merely interpreting the scene for the soldier.

 

In one of his first columns from Africa he had told how he'd sought shelter in a ditch with a frightened Yank when a Stuka dived and strafed, and how he tapped the soldier's shoulder when the Stuka had gone and said, "Whew, that was close, eh?" and the soldier did not answer. He was dead.

Ernie never made war look glamorous. He hated it and feared it. Blown out of press headquarters at Anzio, almost killed by our own planes at St. Lo, he told of the death, the heartache and the agony about him and always he named names of the kids around him, and got in their home town addresses.

By September, 1944, he was a thin, sad-eyed little man gone gray at the temples, his face seamed, his reddish hair thinned. "I don't think I could go on and keep sane," he confided to his millions of readers.

He wrote, "I am leaving for just one reason . . . because I have just got to stop. I have had all I can take for a while."


When our troops made their first landings in North Africa they went four days without even blankets, just catching a few hours sleep on the ground.

Everybody either lost or chucked aside some of his equipment. Like most troops going into battle for the first time, they all carried too much at first. Gradually they shed it. The boys tossed out personal gear from their musette bags and filled them with ammunition. The countryside for twenty miles around Oran was strewn with overcoats, field jackets and mess kits as the soldiers moved on the city.

Arabs will be going around for a whole generation clad in odd pieces of American Army uniforms.

Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

Ernie's books "Here Is Your War" and "Brave Men," made up from his columns, hit the high spots on best-seller lists, made Hollywood. He was acclaimed wherever he dared show himself in public.

He loafed a while in his humble white clapboard cottage in Albuquerque, but the front still haunted him. He had to go back. Fortune had come to Ernie Pyle -- something well over a half- million dollars the past two years -- and his name was a household word. He might have rested with that.

He journeyed to Hollywood to watch Burgess Meredith impersonate him in the film version of his books and in January he left for San Francisco, bound for the wars again--the Pacific this time.  

He had frequent premonitions of death. He said: "You begin to feel that you can't go on forever without being hit. I feel that I've used up all my chances, and I hate it. I don't want to be killed."  "But I can't," he wrote. "I'm going simply because there's a war on and I'm part of it, and I've known all the time I was going back. I'm going simply because I've got to--and I hate it."


"Jack is only twenty-two. He has two younger sisters. He went to Texas A & M for two years, and then to the University of Houston, working at the same time for the Hughes Tool Company. He will soon have been in the Army two years.

It is hard to conceive of his ever having killed anybody. For he looks even younger than his twenty-two years. His face is good-humored. His darkish hair is childishly uncontrollable and pops up into a little curlicue at the front of his head. He talks fast, but his voice is soft and he has a very slight hesitation in his speech that somehow seems to make him a gentle and harmless person.

There is not the least trace of the smart aleck or wise guy about him. He is wholly thoughtful and sincere. Yet he mows 'em down."

Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

Ernie journeyed to Iwo on a small carrier and wrote about the carrier crew. Then he moved on to Okinawa and went in with the Marines. He had post-war plans. He thought he would take to the white clean roads again  and write beside still ponds in the wilderness, on blue mountains, in country lanes, in a world returned to peace and quiet. And these were the dreams of the soldiers in the foxhole as much as they were his own.

"Now to the infantry - the God-damned infantry, as they like to call themselves.

I love the infantry because they are the underdogs. They are the mud-rain-frost-and-wind boys. They have no comforts, and they even learn to live without the necessities. And in the end they are the guys that wars can't be won without."

Listen to this column read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University

But Ernie knew that death would reach for him. 

The slight, graying newspaper man, chronicler of the average American soldier's daily round, in and out of foxholes in many war theatres, had gone forward early morning to observe the advance of a well-known division of the Twenty-fourth Army Corps.

He joined headquarters troops in the outskirts of the island's chief town, Tegusugu. Our men had seemingly ironed out minor opposition at this point, and Mr. Pyle went over to talk to a regimental commanding officer. 

Suddenly enemy machine gunners opened fire at about 10:15 A.M. (9:15 P.M., Tuesday, Eastern war time). The war correspondent fell in the first burst.


"It is only when I sit alone away from it all, or lie at night in my bedroll recreating with closed eyes what I have seen, thinking and thinking and thinking, that at last the enormity of all these newly dead strikes like a living nightmare. And there are times when I feel that I can't stand it and will have to leave.

But to the fighting soldier that phase of the war is behind. It was left behind after his first battle. His blood is up. He is fighting for his life, and killing now for him is as much a profession as writing is for me.

He wants to kill individually or in vast numbers. He wants to see the Germans overrun, mangled, butchered in the Tunisian trap. He speaks excitedly of seeing great heaps of dead, of our bombers sinking whole shiploads of fleeing men, of Germans by the thousands dying miserably in a final Tunisian holocaust of his own creation.

In this one respect the front-line soldier differs from all the rest of us. All the rest of us - you and me and even the thousands of soldiers behind the lines in Africa - we want terribly yet only academically for the war to get over. The front-line soldier wants it to be got over by the physical process of his destroying enough Germans to end it. He is truly at war. The rest of us, no matter how hard we work, are not."

read by Owen V. Johnson, Associate Professor, School of Journalism, Indiana University


1943
Bob Hope with Ernie Pyle at Palermo, Sicily
Ernie Pyle    Click the pic for more of Ernie Pyle's Columns

 



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Photograph, Medal of Honor and Flags

 

*PILILAAU, HERBERT K.

Rank and organization: Private First Class, U.S. Army, Company C, 23d Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division. 

Place and date: Near Pia-ri, Korea, 17 September 1951. 

Entered service at: Oahu, T.H. 

Born: 10 October 1928, Waianae, Oahu, T.H. 

G.O. No.: 58, 18 June 1952. 

Citation: Pfc. Pililaau, a member of Company C, distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and outstanding courage above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. 

The enemy sent wave after wave of fanatical troops against his platoon which held a key terrain feature on "Heartbreak Ridge." Valiantly defending its position, the unit repulsed each attack until ammunition became practically exhausted and it was ordered to withdraw to a new position. Voluntarily remaining behind to cover the withdrawal, Pfc. Pililaau fired his automatic weapon into the ranks of the assailants, threw all his grenades and, with ammunition exhausted, closed with the foe in hand-to-hand combat, courageously fighting with his trench knife and bare fists until finally overcome and mortally wounded. When the position was subsequently retaken, more than 40 enemy dead were counted in the area he had so valiantly defended. His heroic devotion to duty, indomitable fighting spirit, and gallant self-sacrifice reflect the highest credit upon himself, the infantry, and the U.S. Army.

 

PITTMAN, JOHN A.

Rank and organization: Sergeant, U.S. Army, Company C, 23d Infantry Regiment, 2d Infantry Division. 

Place and date: Near Kujangdong, Korea, 26 November 1950. 

Entered service at: Carrolton, Miss. 

Born: 15 October 1928, Carrolton, Miss. 

G.O. No.: 39, 4 June 1951. 

Citation: Sgt. Pittman, distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action against the enemy. 

He volunteered to lead his squad in a counterattack to regain commanding terrain lost in an earlier engagement. Moving aggressively forward in the face of intense artillery, mortar, and small-arms fire he was wounded by mortar fragments. Disregarding his wounds he continued to lead and direct his men in a bold advance against the hostile standpoint. During this daring action, an enemy grenade was thrown in the midst of his squad endangering the lives of his comrades. Without hesitation, Sgt. Pittman threw himself on the grenade and absorbed its burst with his body. When a medical aid man reached him, his first request was to be informed as to how many of his men were hurt. This intrepid and selfless act saved several of his men from death or serious injury and was an inspiration to the entire command. Sgt. Pittman's extraordinary heroism reflects the highest credit upon himself and is in keeping with the esteemed traditions of the military service.

 

If there be any glory in war, let it rest on the shoulders of men like these" -- Audie Murphy

Thank you to all the military heroes, past and present, who have given me my freedoms.  You are my heroes and I pray for God's blessings on you today.

 You will not be forgotten.

 

 

     

Graphics and information from the Medal of Honor website.

81 posted on 05/17/2004 5:32:56 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: IPWGOP

Linda Excellent!


82 posted on 05/17/2004 5:34:18 AM PDT by Diva Betsy Ross (Every heart beats true for the red,white and blue)
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub

On This Day In History


Birthdates which occurred on May 17:
1444 Sandro Botticelli Italian painter (Birth of Venus)
1741 John Penn US attorney (signed Declaration of Independence)
1749 Edward Jenner England, physician, discovered vaccination
1768 Caroline Brunswick, Queen Consort of King George IV
1812 Joseph Warren Revere Brigadier General (Union volunteers), died in 1880
1836 Joseph Norman Lockyer discovered Helium/founded Nature magazine
1846 Edmund Bishop English secretary of Thomas Carlyle
1850 Antonio Scontrino composer
1867 Gerrit Mannoury Dutch mathematician/philosopher
1878 Conway Tearle US actor (Klondike Annie, Should Ladies Behave?)
1886 Alfonso XIII Borbón King of Spain (1902-31)
1900 Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini Iran's spiritual leader (1979-89)
1908 Zinka Milanov Zagreb Yugoslavia, soprano (Ljublama Opera 1927)
1911 Maureen O'Sullivan Boyle Ireland, actress (Tarzan, Pride & Prejudice, The Quiet)
1912 Archibald Cox 1st Watergate special prosecutor
1923 Peter Mennin[i] Erie PA, composer (Moby Dick)
1931 Dewey Redman jazz musician
1934 Earl Morrall NFL QB (Lions, Giants, Colts)
1936 Dennis Hopper Dodge City KS, actor (The Shining, Blue Velvet, Easy Rider)
1941 Malcom Hale trumpeter
1942 Taj Mahal New York NY, singer/songwriter (The Real Thing)
1945 D A S Pennefather Major-General/Commandant (General Royal Marines)
1953 Kathleen Sullivan Pasadena CA, newscaster (ABC-TV, CBS Morning Show)
1956 "Sugar" Ray [Charles] Leonard Palmer Park MD, welter/middle/light-heavyweight boxing champion (Olympics-gold-76)
1963 Brigitte Nielsen actress (Red Sonja, Rocky IV, Domino)
1974 Marcia Turner Cambridge MA, Miss America 1976 Peter Devine New York NY, fencer-foil (Olympics-96)



Deaths which occurred on May 17:
1050 Guido van Arezzo Italian music theorist, dies
1510 Sandro Botticelli [Alessandro di Mariano del Filpepi] painter (Birth of Venus), dies at about 65
1575 Matthew Parker archbishop of Canterbury (1559-75), dies at 68
1606 Forges Dimitri czar of Russia (1605-06), murdered
1727 Catherine I Empress of Russia (1725-27), dies
1729 Samuel Clarke theologian, dies
1838 Charles-Maurice duke of Talleyrand-Périgord French bishop, dies at 84
1930 Herbert David Croly US founder (New Republic), dies at 61
1964 Otto V Kuusinen President of Karelo-Finnish Soviet Republic (1940-56), dies 82
1969 Joseph Beran Czechoslovakia, archbishop of Prague/cardinal, dies at 80
1981 Jeannette Ridlon Piccard 1st US woman free balloon pilot, dies
1985 Bobby Ewing (Patrick Duffy) killed off on Dallas
1992 George Hurrell Hollywood photographer, dies of cancer at 87
1992 Lawrence Welk conductor/accordionist (Lawrence Welk Show), dies at 89
1992 Leonardo del Ferro [Keyser] US epic tenor, dies


Reported: MISSING in ACTION

1966 DEERE DONALD T.---SNYDER TX.
1967 DODGE RONALD WAYNE---SAN DIEGO CA.
[PHOTO SEEN IN PARIS PAPER, REMAINS RETURNED 07/08/81]
1967 LEWIS CHARLIE G.---FAYETTEVILLE NC.
1968 YOUNG CHARLES L.---NEW YORK NY.
1969 STEWART VIRGIL G.---BATON ROUGE LA.
1970 WESTWOOD NORMAN P. JR.---WEST HARTFORD CT.
1971 PEARCE DALE A.---MENTOR OH.
1971 SOYLAND DAVID P.---RAPID CITY SD.

POW / MIA Data & Bios supplied by
the P.O.W. NETWORK. Skidmore, MO. USA.


On this day...
0218 7th recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet
0352 Liberius begins his reign as Catholic Pope replacing Julius I
0884 St Adrian III begins his reign as Catholic Pope
1527 Pánfilo de Narvaéz departs to explore Florida
1536 Anne Boleyn's 4 "lovers" executed
1544 Scottish Earl Matthew van Lennox signs secret treaty with Henry VIII
1579 Artois/Henegouwen/French-Flanders sign Treaty/Peace of Parma recognizing Spanish duke van Parma as land guardian
1620 1st merry-go-round seen at a fair (Philippapolis, Turkey)
1630 Italian Jesuit Niccolo Zucchi, 1st to see 2 belts on Jupiter surface
1631 Earl Johann Tilly attacks Maagdenburg
1648 Emperor Ferdinand III defeats Maximilian I of Bavaria
1672 Frontenac becomes Governor of New France (Canada)
1673 Louis Joliet & Jacques Marquette begin exploring Mississippi
1733 England passes Molasses Act, putting high tariffs on rum & molasses imported to the colonies from a country other than British possessions
1742 Frederick great (Emperor of Prussia) beats Austrians
1756 Britain declares war on France (7 Years' or French & Indian War)
1787 English slave ship Sisters, from Africa to Cuba, capsizes
1792 24 merchants form New York Stock Exchange at 70 Wall Street
1803 John Hawkins & Richard French patent the Reaping Machine
1804 Lewis & Clark begin exploration of the Louisiana Purchase
1809 Papal States annexed by France
1814 Denmark cedes Norway to Sweden (National Day)
1814 Norwegian constitution passed by constituent assembly at Eidsvoll
1845 Rubber band patents
1846 Saxophone is patents by Antoine Joseph Sax
1862 Battle of Princeton WV, ends, about 128 casualities
1863 Battle of Big Black River Bridge, Mississippi
1864 Battle of Adairsville GA, Union forces Confederates to retreat
1872 Bohemian Club incorporated
1875 1st Kentucky Derby: Oliver Lewis aboard Aristides wins in 2:37.75
1876 7th US Cavalry under Custer leaves Fort Lincoln
1877 Edwin T Holmes installs 1st telephone switchboard burglar alarm
1881 7th Kentucky Derby: Jim McLaughlin aboard Hindoo wins in 2:40
1881 Frederick Douglass appointed recorder of deeds for Washington DC
1881 Revised version of New Testament
1883 Buffalo Bill Cody's 1st wild west show premieres in Omaha
1884 Alaska becomes a US territory
1890 Comic Cuts, 1st weekly comic paper, published in London
1904 Maurice Ravel's "Shéhérazade" premieres in Paris France
1909 White firemen on Georgia RR strike to protest hiring blacks
1915 Cubs George "Zip" Zabel relieves with 2 outs in 1st & winds up with 4-3 19-inning win over Brooklyn in longest relief job ever
1915 National Baptist Convention chartered
1916 British Summer Time (Daylight Savings), 1st introduced
1920 1st De Havilland double-decker flight (London) lands in Schiphol
1920 1st flight by Dutch airlines KLM (Koninklijke-Luchtvaart-Maatschappij)
1923 Fire during closing day ceremonies at Grover Cleveland School (South Carolina)
1924 50th Kentucky Derby: John Mooney aboard Black Gold wins in 2:05.2
1925 Cleveland Indian Tris Speaker gets his 3,000th hit
1926 Chiang Kai-shek is made supreme war lord in Canton
1930 56th Kentucky Derby: Earl Sande aboard Gallant Fox wins in 2:07.6
1932 Congress changes the name "Porto Rico" to "Puerto Rico"
1938 Congress approves Vinson Naval Act, which funds a two-ocean navy
1938 Radio quiz show "Information Please!" debuts on NBC Blue Network
1939 1st sports telecast-Columbia vs Princeton-college baseball
1940 Germany occupies Brussels, Belgium & begins invasion of France
1942 Dutch SS vows loyalty to Hitler
1944 Allied air raid on Surabaja, Java
1944 Chinese/US arm forces take Myitkyina Airport, Burma
1944 General Eisenhower sets D-Day for June 5th
1945 2 US P-47 Thunderbolts bomb Kiushu
1946 KVP Labor/Communists win 1st post-WW2 Dutch parliamentary elections
1946 President Truman seizes control of nation's railroads to delay a strike
1948 Israel liberates Acre, Nebi Yusha & Telel-Kadi
1948 Soviet Union recognized Israel
1949 British government recognizes Republic of Ireland
1953 Yanks & Browns use record 41 players in a game
1954 Supreme Court unanimously rules on Brown v Topeka Board of Education reversed 1896 "separate but equal" Plessy Vs Ferguson decision
1957 Prayer Pilgrimage, biggest civil rights demonstration to date (District of Columbia)
1958 Emergency crisis proclaimed in Algeria
1959 Sam Snead sets PGA record for 36 holes at 122
1960 1st atomic reactor system to be patented, JW Flora, Canoga Park CA
1961 Castro offers to exchange Bay of Pigs prisoners for 500 bulldozers
1963 Bruno Sammartino beats Buddy Rogers in New York, to become WWF champion
1967 Dylan's 1965 UK Tour is released as the film "Don't Look Back"
1969 Baltimore, Cleveland & Pittsburgh agree to go from NFC to the AFC in the NFL
1970 Hank Aaron becomes 9th player to get 3,000 hits
1970 Thor Heyerdahl crosses the Atlantic on reed raft Ra
1971 Stephen Schwartz' musical "Godspell" premieres off-Broadway
1971 Washington State bans sex discrimination
1973 Senate Watergate Committee begins its hearings
1973 Stevie Wonder releases "You are the Sunshine of my Life"
1975 NBC paid $5 million for rights to show "Gone with the Wind" one time
1977 Menahem Begins Likoed-party wins election in Israel
1978 Lee Lacy hits record 3rd consecutive pinch-hit homerun
1979 -12ºF (-11ºC), on top of Mauna Kea HI (state record)
1980 Major race riot in Miami FL - 16 killed, 300 injured
1983 Israel & Lebanon sign a peace treaty
1985 Les Anderson, catches record 97 lb 4 oz Chinook Salmon, off Alaska
1987 USS Stark hit by Iraqi missiles, 37 sailors die
1991 Lupita Jones, 23, of México, crowned 40th Miss Universe
1992 Expos Gary Carter is 3rd to catch 2,000 games (joins Boone & Fisk)
1993 Intel's new Pentium processor is unveiled
2000 Prosecutors in Birmingham, Ala., charged two longtime suspects in the deaths of four little girls in a church bombing in 1963 that became a watershed event in the civil rights movement.


Holidays
Note: Some Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"

Cuba : Agrarian Reform/Peasant Day
Norway : Independence Day/Constitution Day (1814)
US : Armed Forces Day (Saturday)
World Telecommunications Day
National Hospital Week ends
International Pickle Week (Day 2)
Cold Feet Monday
National Tavern Month


Religious Observances
Roman Catholic : Commemoration of St Dunstan, archbp of Canterbury, patron of jewelers
Roman Catholic : Commemoration of St Paschal Baylon, lay brother
Feast of St. John Nepomucenus.
St. Madron Feast Day


Religious History
352 Liberius was elected 36th pope of the Early Church. During this time the dispute between Arius and Athanasius was at its height, and after vacillating earlier, Liberius vindicated himself as a champion of Nicene orthodoxy.
1291 Scottish medieval Franciscan philosopher John Duns Scotus, 25, was ordained. He believed in "divine will" rather than "divine intellect," and founded a scholastic system called Scotism. In the Catholic Church he is known as "the Subtle Doctor."
1844 Birth of Julius Wellhausen, the German biblical scholar who, in his 1878 "History of Israel," first advanced the JEDP Hypothesis, claiming that the Pentateuch (i.e., the first five O.T. books) was a compilation of four earlier, literary sources.
1881 The Revised Version (EV or ERV) of the New Testament was first published in England. The Old Testament was completed in 1885. In 1905 the American Standard Version (ASV) ÀÀ based on the textual foundation of the ERV ÀÀ was published in the U.S.
1947 The Conservative Baptist Association of America (CBAA) was formally established at Atlantic City, NJ, as a breakaway movement from within the American Baptist Convention.

Source: William D. Blake. ALMANAC OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1987.


Thought for the day :
"The reason people blame things on previous generations? There's only one other choice!"


Actual Newspaper Headlines...
Enfields Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide


Why did the Chicken cross the Road...
Louis Farrakkan:
It wasn't one chicken, you lying white devils! It was TEN MILLION chickens!


Fun things to do when driving...
Look behind you frequently, with a very paranoid look.


What The Company Really Means...
"SEEKING CANDIDATES WITH A WIDE VARIETY OF EXPERIENCE:"
You'll need it to replace three people who just left.


83 posted on 05/17/2004 5:35:15 AM PDT by Valin (Hating people is like burning down your house to kill a rat)
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To: Diva Betsy Ross

Good Morning, Diva Betsy!

I agree, May is a great time for Birthdays. I willbe sure to show Caitlin the Pink Panther when she arises and graces us with her presence. She was up til almost midnight playing PlayStation with Daddy last nigh....;-)

Thank you!


84 posted on 05/17/2004 5:35:40 AM PDT by tiamat ("Just a Bronze-Age Gal, Trapped in a Techno World!")
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub
I always love to point out that George Bush was the Governor of Texas at the time these statements were made. He was hardly in any position to mislead the then President.. or anyone else with intelligence briefings on a National Level.
85 posted on 05/17/2004 5:36:21 AM PDT by Diva Betsy Ross (Every heart beats true for the red,white and blue)
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub; All
Good morning Troops, Veterans and Canteeners . . . enjoy your Monday.

I pledge allegiance to the Flag
of the United States of America,
and to the Republic, for which it stands;
one nation UNDER GOD,
indivisible,
with liberty and justice for all.


86 posted on 05/17/2004 5:37:21 AM PDT by HopeandGlory (Hey, Liberals . . . PC died on 9/11 . . . GET USED TO IT!!!)
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To: StarCMC
STAR!!!

Happy Monday...

87 posted on 05/17/2004 5:37:58 AM PDT by Old Sarge
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To: tiamat
 

Happy Birthday, Caitlin!

 

88 posted on 05/17/2004 5:38:59 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: Hondo1952

Dear friend.. ping to 85! Have a good day!


89 posted on 05/17/2004 5:39:28 AM PDT by Diva Betsy Ross (Every heart beats true for the red,white and blue)
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To: tomkow6

Good Morning, tomkow!

Thanks so much for your kind birthday greeting to Caitlin! I will be sure to show her later when she manages to make it out of bed.

Hope you have a fun time tormenting the people at the courthouse.

TTYL!


90 posted on 05/17/2004 5:41:26 AM PDT by tiamat ("Just a Bronze-Age Gal, Trapped in a Techno World!")
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To: Old Sarge

Morning Sarge - you know how to start my day off right! HUGS backatcha!! :o)


91 posted on 05/17/2004 5:41:37 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: StarCMC

Good Morning, Star!

How are you?

When the Diva arises from her slumbers, I will be sure to show her your baloons and kind message!


Thank you!


92 posted on 05/17/2004 5:43:52 AM PDT by tiamat ("Just a Bronze-Age Gal, Trapped in a Techno World!")
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To: StarCMC

And now the 2yo tornado is up and I gotta get her breakfast and get headed to work. See ya'll in a bit!!! HUGS!!


93 posted on 05/17/2004 5:44:06 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: Old Sarge

I pity you having to go to Ft. McCoy!!!


94 posted on 05/17/2004 5:44:24 AM PDT by kjfine (Home, and loving it!!!)
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub
At 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub's request, I am posting a private e-mail preceeded with some background:

Yesterday, 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub posted the following on FReeper Canteen ~ Guest Military Chaplain ~ May 16 2004(emphasis mine):

From Delta21
I got this email earlier this evening through one of my Coastie buddies. I dont know the guy in the pic or the names in the email but it looks legit.

My home e-mail is FUBAR and my web space is down so I cant post pics and I thought you could post it in the Canteen or on FreeRepublic somewhere for all to see.

I think its pretty cool!

"Attached is a picture of one of my best friends in the Army, Mike M. We were privates together in 1990-1994. He stepped on a landmine in Afghanistan Christmas 2002. President Bush came to visit the wounded in the hospital. He told Mike that when he could run a mile, that they would go on a run together.

True to his word, he (GWB) called Mike every month or so to see how he was doing. Well, last week they went on the run, 1 mile with the president. Not something you'll see in the news, but seeing the president taking the time to say thank you to the wounded and to give hope to one of my best friends was one of the greatest/best things I have seen in my life

===

Here's my previously private reply which 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub wanted me to share with you all:

To the Left, the picture of GWB running with the amputee is one of the principle reasons why they believe that GWB has to be removed from the Presidency by any means necessary - he is a man of his word to each and every man. If GWB will "take a break" from being the most powerful man on the planet for 10-15 minutes to uphold a promise to "an average GI", just imagine the sincere effort he puts into keeping his promise to protect and defend the united states against our enemies foriegn and domestic.

There is amazing power in honor and truth which is the reason why the Left spends so much time and effort compensating for their deficit in both.

95 posted on 05/17/2004 5:44:34 AM PDT by jriemer (We are a Republic not a Democracy)
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To: kjfine; Old Sarge

I told him you'd feel that way!! LOL!!!! It' being your FAVORITE place and all. Of course, it's not in the dead of winter for him!!


96 posted on 05/17/2004 5:46:52 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub; LindaSOG; Brad's Gramma; Kathy in Alaska; All

Thank you for today's wonderful FLASHBACK THREAD!! WooHoo!!

Thanks Goddess!
Thanks for posting it Mr.Tonkin!

Also, I'd like to thank everyone in the Canteen and elsewhere for the wonderful contributions that we have been receiving these past few weeks from everyone.

The contributions have been fabulous. Each item sent is greatly appreciated. Thank you to the Canteen for sponsoring it.

We will probably never meet any of our Troops that will receive the items, but we should all take comfort in knowing that these items are going to help in their recovery.

God Bless everyone!

Happy Monday!!


97 posted on 05/17/2004 5:47:09 AM PDT by MoJo2001 (?sdrawkcab siht gnidaer eb uoy dluow esle yhW .derob eb tsum uoY)
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To: jriemer

AMEN!

Thank you!


98 posted on 05/17/2004 5:47:55 AM PDT by MoJo2001 (?sdrawkcab siht gnidaer eb uoy dluow esle yhW .derob eb tsum uoY)
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To: MoJo2001

Me?


99 posted on 05/17/2004 5:48:44 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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To: MoJo2001

Me?


100 posted on 05/17/2004 5:48:45 AM PDT by StarCMC (Please pray for the 2/7 Marines and Josh.)
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