Demolition by Neglect

This past week I performed a little experiment. I threw the word “history” out to various people–friends, waitresses, store clerks, even a couple of surprised strangers–and asked them to tell me what immediately popped into their minds.

Various words were thrown back to me–events, dates, maps, wars, battles–and the list goes on.

None of the responses really surprised me, but there are other words to parallel with the word history. Words like preservation, remember, and trust come to mind and unfortunately, the words failure, greed, demolish, surrender, neglect, and ignore are on the flipside as I continue examining the winding path of history a cotton mill where I live has taken.

I shared the story over at Douglasville Patch last week where I have a weekly column regarding how Douglasville ended up with the cotton mill and how important the mill was to our economic health over most of the last century. You can see my column from last week here.

Now I want to share the rest of the story regarding how history can be neglected and forgotten by the very people we trust to preserve it. Sometimes in their attempts to improve the lives of citizens in the here and now they actually betray the trust handed to them by citizens who took their leave a long time ago. They also end up cheating future generations regarding our historical record.

History can also be used by folks who are just looking for easy outs in business in order to leverage property or satisfy some misguided need to collect historic properties, and then allow them to die a slow death of neglect for some strange reason I simply cannot fathom.

You can see the entire article here.

August History Carnival

The History Carnival is up over at Culture and Stuff.  

A blog carnival is a blog post with various links to other blogs that follow the same topic.  In this case the topic is history.   Think of it as the blogosphere’s version of Reader’s Digest with a different blog within the history community hosting each month.

It’s always a great read!!

I intend to enjoy it one little morsel at a time.  J

Enjoy!!!!

Another Academic Year Begins

So…in my neck of the woods many had the first day of school while other had their first day of pre-planning.  

What was it for you?

A fellow teacher and friend of mine posted this last night on Facebook, and I felt I needed to share it here.  You may have seen variations of this on the web or in one of those emails that tend to end up in your inbox that has been forwarded hither and yon.

My friend tells me she changed a few things here and there to match her own situation.

I say BRAVO!.....and may everyone involved in education from the board office to the bus drivers have a most wonderful year!!!

T'was the night before school starts

And all through the place,

Not a smile was seen

On any teacher’s face.

Our bags were all stuffed

With tea bags and glue,

And rulers and pencils

With erasers to chew.

Mournfully we

All crawled into bed to sleep tight,

But we know that the good life is way out of sight.

Then the hubby cames in whistling

And kissed me goodnight,

With a bright cheery voice

That didn't seem right.

The night dragged on slowly

I just couldn't sleep,

For fear that my students

Would all be real creeps.

Or maybe Principal Pollard

Would give me a shove,

Or even more evil things

Than I could think of.

When from in the next room

There arose such a clamber,

When my husband starts yelling,

"I'm free 'till next summer!"

This must be a plot

By conspiring foes,

Who just want a break

While they pamper their toes.

Oh, must I go through it?!

How can I go on?

I want to escape

Run off to Saigon!

Ten months is too long

To suffer through school

The class is so rough

And students so cruel.

"Come Donald! Come Conner!

Come Henry VanStation!

Come up to the board,

Do your multiplication!"

"And Julie, stop talking!

And Jimmy, wake up!

And Mary, right now,

Don't you make me say shut-up!

And so every year

About this same time,

I lie in bed sleepless

And just moan and whine.

Until morning comes,

And I hear my hubby say,

"Good luck with your school!

And have a nice day!"