![]()
The word amateur comes from the Latin word amator meaning lover, the verb amare, to love. And here I thought being called one was a slur when in fact it’s doing something simply for love instead of money.
On June 26, 1917 during World War I when General John J. Pershing ![]()
(1860-1948) marched into France with 14.000 American infantrymen, the French in shambles so grateful to see them, referred to them as sammies, short for Uncle Sams.
Our guys didn’t like the name much so they at once changed it to doughboys, thought to have come from pipe clay, a doughy substance used to clean the white belts worn by the men.
Nicknames flourished during what was called the Great War. Poilu (hairy one) was a term for a French soldier since many of them had beards or mustaches, while a popular term for a British soldier was Tommy, an abbreviation of Tommy Atkins, a generic name akin to John Doe used on government forms.
One of the first things that Pershing did who has a Square named after him parallel to Manhattan’s Grand Central Station, was to visit the grave of the ![]()
Marquis de Lafayette, our adopted brother serving alongside George Washington during the Revolutionary War in Paris’s Picpus Cemetery delivering his iconic line…
‘Lafayette, we are here.’ ![]()
![]()
The term farmer’s rain refers to a slight drizzle still enabling one to plow the fields without getting too wet.
The name Verity, a pivotal character in Winston Graham’s Poldark series ![]()
and the name of my friend David Stewart’s niece, comes from the Latin word, veritas, meaning truth.
(David’s impressive blog site targeting young writers) ![]()
Former President Donald Trump is spending $10,000 a day, tallying $110.000 in fines in order not to hand over the documents New York ![]()
Attorney General Letitia James requested in her ongoing investigation of the Trump Organization’s alleged? fraudulent business practices.
![]()
Imagine, $10,000 big ones a day.
Think of all the kids that much money could help. ![]()
In 1830, when former President John Quincy Adams joined the House of Representatives elected by his family’s ancestral state of Massachusetts, the only U.S. President ever to do so, was asked what party he belonged to.
Mr Adams humbly replied…
“I belong to no party, I represent the people.”
Which brings me to Elizabeth Lynne Cheney, Wyoming’s representative in the House since 2017, now notorious and harshly criticized by her own party for standing up against the desecration of the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, 2021 where ironically in 1848, Mr. Adams spent his last waking moments collapsing at his desk in what is now Statuary Hall, the very room the rioters stormed.
What does Ms Cheney and Mr. Adams have in common?
Before being a card-carrying member of the Republican Party, and the daughter of a former Vice-President few of us cared for, Elizabeth Lynne Cheney like her esteemed predecessor is an American first, representing the people.
Being the card-carrying American that I am…
I worship at both their altars.
