I have always liked gizmos and gadgets,
it seems a lot of males do for some reason. The world of electronics
has come a long way over the decades with all sorts of bells and
whistles – and a growing price tag. One could live with that if the
quality remained the same as, say, thirty years ago. But overall it
has not.
My mother had a toaster that lasted for
twenty years and a coffee maker (early Mr. Coffee) that lasted almost
ten years.
Today I threw out my coffeemaker that
lasted a little over two years before the electronics went haywire. I
am replacing it with an old fashioned peculator, since the toaster
hardly two years old was shorting out. What good is the UL Approved
symbol when manufacturers don't make quality products? It may have
been one that slipped by the inspector, but I think it just was not
made to last.
It is estimated that there are 90 firearms for every 100 citizens of the United States. Just as the
Constitution of the United States is unique among the nations of the
world and the history of civilization, the right to keep and bear
arms is one of the things that makes Americans stand out
internationally. Of course, with that right and those liberties comes
responsibility, just as freedom of choice comes with responsibility
of accepting the result of one's individual choice.
American Gun is a newly published book that provides detailed
information of the ten firearms that made it big in the history of
the United States and its constitutional amendment that guarantees
that right.
In
the 1930s, the problems of Europe, the building of forces led by evil
mad men, did not concern Americans, who remembered the horror of the
World War that would end
all wars.
Despite
signing a pact with Hitler, the United States and Great Britain (UK)
sided with a communist leader whose crimes of genocide and murder
almost matched that of Adolph
Hitler
– and then our leaders allowed the Soviet Union to carve up eastern
Europe creating Soviet satellite states that would usher in the Cold
War. Veterans in the United Kingdom and other places in Europe fought
against tyranny and evil only to see younger generations forget all
of it and concede to progressive socialists, self-gratification, and apathy.
Brownells
is the largest supplier of firearms accessories and gunsmithing tools
in the world and is celebrating its 75th
anniversary this year.
It is the place I procure all of my
gunsmithing tools and accessories and supplies. They have 80,000
parts with a large catalog that has added archery needs and survival
gear in the inventory as they celebrate 75 years of “A Shooting
Heritage”. The company has video shorts to help customers work on
their own firearms and videos for professional gunsmiths.
Annie Oakley was born on August
13th, 1860 in Darke County, Ohio under the name Phoebe Ann Moses, which the family simply called her Annie.
Her parents (Susan Wise &
Jacob Moses (Mauzy) were Quakers,
immigrants from England who originally settled in Pennsylvania, where they
married in 1848. They moved to Patterson Township in Ohio in 1855
where they rented a farm, which later they would mortgage. Annie's
sister, Sarah Ellen, was born in 1857. Annie would be the
sixth of seven children.
The Wild West Show originated by famous
William F. Cody, better known as Buffalo Bill, in the late 1800s and continues to this day in its
tradition. The next Wild West Show is scheduled January 10th through 25th
in 2015. It will be held in Denver, Colorado at the National Western Complex.
The Pioneer Stew mentioned
in the Chuckwagon article is based on an Old West recipe that
“Cookies” called son-of-a-bitch stew, but I gave it a more
polite name; but this recipe is the real McCoy in name and
ingredients. Before I get to the recipe, I would like to provide a
brief background of the Amish Americans.
The American West is not just a major
part of American history, but it remains a special culture that is
admired in certain European countries, like in Denmark country &
western music combined with its unique dancing style, or in Germany
and Italy. Indeed, there are cowboy ranches still in existence in
Italy.
The staple food for a hearty meal for
mountain men, pioneers and cowboys had been stew.At the end of this article is a Pioneer Stew recipe.
The Mountain Men of the Old West have
lived on in legends written in books and depicted on film, and
honored by reenactments in modern-day Rendezvous.
Behind the legends and myths there is real history. One of the best
books written about the American West and the Mountain Men is –
Virgin
Land: The American West As Symbol and Myth by Henry
Nash Smith; Harvard College, 1950. E-Text
of the books is available at the University of Virginia website, part
of the American Studies
created by Emily Zimmerman.
Today is Groundhog Day, originating in
Pennsylvania via the German immigrants where the folklore and
tradition comes from. The Pennsylvania German description is
Gundsaudagg, Murmeltiertag. It occurs every February
2nd. If it is cloudy when a groundhog emerges from its
burrow on this day, then spring will come early; if it is sunny, the
groundhog will supposedly see its shadow and retreat back into its
burrow, which means that winter weather will continue for six more
weeks.
In southeastern Pennsylvania, Grundsow Lodges celebrate the holiday with fersommlinge – social
events that include food, speeches and entertainment. During the
event only Pennsylvanian German is spoken and anyone caught speaking
English pay a penalty (nickel, dime or quarter) for every English
word spoken and the money is put into a bowl at the center of the
table.
Black History [should be called African American History] was celebrated for one week, but in 1976 it was extended to a month. The original people that occupied the Americas do not have a week or a month. They are Native Americans who were incorrectly called Indians because Columbus thought he had sailed to western India. In Canada, they called themselves the people/tribes of the First Nation.
So many tribes are now extinct and so much of their cultures have been lost. There should be a time of the year set aside to the original Americans, whose history goes back tens of thousands of years and beyond to prehistorical with Clovis man.
When the United States was formed from the original thirteen colonies becoming united states, the people who immigrated here were from various places in Europe, primarily British people. The story of the Native American is the story of America and the tragic events that occurred as the United States became a nation and expanded from 13 states to 50, treaty after treaty broken. The story of the Native American is the story of North, Central, and South America; whose culture suffered from expansion from the Old World to the New World. That "new" world was not new at all, some tribes developing a civilization and community to match the ancient Egyptians.
Forced to assimilate and discard their heritage, their story is just as, if not more so in terms of centuries, genocide, and lost history as tragic as the history of the African American; the latter people were forced to come to the New Word through slavery, while first Americans were forced from their historic homelands onto reservations under the authority of a corrupt and prejudice Indian Affairs department of the US government. Their children were sent to schools where they were forced to take "Christian" names and eliminate memories of their history and culture.
The following video, entitled 500 Nations, is one of the best that celebrates and examines the long history of the first Americans, an important part of the history of the United States and Canada ...
“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”―
George Orwell
Wearing my six-shooter riding my pony on a cattle drive.
Stealing the young girl's hearts, Just like Gene and Roy.
Singing those campfire songs - Oh, I should've been a cowboy
I might have had a sidekick with a funny name, Running wild through the hills chasing Jesse James.
Ending up on the brink of danger, Riding shotgun for the Texas Rangers.
Go
west young man, haven't you been told, California's full of whiskey,
women and gold. Sleeping out all night beneath the desert stars With a
dream in my eye and a prayer … In my heart … Oh, I should've been a
cowboy.
Much is written about Theodore
Roosevelt Jr, the 26th President of the United
States and leader of the famous Rough Riders of the
Spanish-American
Warin Cuba. He was an historian who wrote while attending
Harvard University entitled The
Naval War of 1812. Theodore was a state assemblyman, a member
of the Republican
National Convention from 1882 to 1884. He was a rancher and
cowboy whose herd got wiped out in the severe winter of 1886-1887,
when he returned to the state of New York building the Sagamore Hill
estate in Oyster Bay.
Roosevelt built a second ranch named
Elk Horn, 35 miles north of Medora,
North Dakota on the banks of the Little
Missouri River where he practiced riding western style, roping
and hunting from horseback. He said
of the cowboy:
...few of the emasculated,
milk-and-water moralities admired by the pseudo-philanthropists, but
he does possess, to a very high degree, the stern, manly qualities
that are invaluable to a nation.
