Most of us think of chemical weapons as a twentieth century phenomenon. But did you know that one existed in the medieval world as well? We call that chemical weapon Greek fire. For many, the term chemical weapon has negative connotations. We recall the gas mask as an essential piece of equipment for World War […]
Month: April 2022
The Return by Nicholas Sparks – Should I Read This Romance Novel?
The Return by Nicholas Sparks is a recent book. It’s not historical fiction, either; in fact, the story takes place between 2014 and 2019. This makes it a bit of a departure for me. The narrator is Trevor Benson, a graduate of the Naval Academy and a veteran of Afghanistan. He’s a doctor who sustains […]
The Orangeburg Massacre – One More Killing the US Has Forgotten
My last post described the sit-in movement that began in Orangeburg, South Carolina in 1960. Today’s post is the story of how participation in the civil rights movement grew deadly, resulting in the Orangeburg Massacre in 1968. It ranks among the greatest losses of life of any event in the civil rights movement. Events Leading […]
The Orangeburg Sit-Ins – Revealing More Racist Injustice in America
The year 1960 was an important one throughout the South. It witnessed the beginning of the sit-in movement. Sit-ins began in Greensboro, North Carolina. They spread quickly and eventually included such places as Rock Hill and Orangeburg in South Carolina. What happened in the Orangeburg sit-ins sheds light on many key aspects of the Civil […]
Steinbeck’s East of Eden, is it Worth My Time? Rob’s Expert Review
There’s little I can write about John Steinbeck’s East of Eden that no one’s written before, I realize. The classic is about to reach its sixth decade since publication. But that doesn’t mean that you’ve read it. So, hopefully this review will be new to you. The book is about as epic as books get. […]
The Carroll County Courthouse Massacre – Its Startling, Tragic End
It’s true I write about civil rights on my blog often. This entry on the Carroll County Courthouse Massacre (Carroll County, Mississippi) is in that vein, too. Why? Because most readers have no idea how deeply-rooted this issue is in American history. The country has witnessed far more massacres and killings than most of us […]