He was going to live forever, or die in the attempt.
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He was going to live forever, or die in the attempt.
Posted at 10:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
I said I still felt young, and so I am, yet what that meansEludes me. Maybe it’s the feeling of the presenceOf the past, or of its disappearance, or both of them at once —A long estrangement and a private singularity, intactWithin a tinkling bell, an iron nail, a pure, angelic clang —The echo of a clear, metallic sound from childhood,Where time began: “Oh, beautiful sound, strike again!”
John Koethe.
Posted at 09:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Preventing and ending violence creates a more equal and equitable world for women and girls, and people of all genders who experience harm.
- Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta on the reauthorization of VAWA (March 16, 2022)
I have a vested interest in legal developments in the context of domestic violence, and have been known to post about such things on occasion. Not long after I'd rebooted the ole blog, for instance, I worried that VAWA might not be reauthorized because of Senate GOP resistance to a section expanding firearm prohibitions (it did pass the following year as part of an appropriations package with some House provisions watered down).
As recently as April, I wrote about red flag laws, which are the NRA's current target (defending our historical tradition of murder-suicide?). Now SCOTUS, fresh off its latest perversions of the Constitution, is gonna weigh in:
The Supreme Court will hear oral argument next fall in a major gun-rights case challenging the constitutionality of a federal ban on the possession of guns by individuals who are subject to domestic violence restraining orders. The Biden administration had asked the justices to weigh in after a federal appeals court struck down the ban earlier this year, and on Friday the justices agreed to do so.
The announcement that the justices had granted review in United States v. Rahimi came on a list of orders released by the justices on Friday at noon...
Rahimi was charged with violating the federal ban on the possession of a firearm by anyone who is the subject of a domestic violence restraining order. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to just over six years in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
The conservative U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit initially upheld his conviction. But after the Supreme Court’s June 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, striking down New York’s handgun-licensing scheme, the court of appeals issued a new opinion that threw out Rahimi’s conviction. Despite the restraining order, the court reasoned, Rahimi was still retained his right to bear arms under the Second Amendment unless, as the Supreme Court explained in Bruen, the federal government could show that the ban was consistent with the country’s historical tradition of regulating firearms. Because it was not, the court of appeals concluded, the law is unconstitutional.
Interestingly enough, there was a proto-VAWA in the Americas as far back as the 1650s. The general laws and liberties of the Massachusets colony:
Ordered by this Court and Authority thereof; That no man shall strike his Wife, nor any Woman her Husband, on penalty of such fine not exceeding ten pounds for one offence, or such Corporal punishment as the County Court shall determine.
There were also a number firearm regulations even during the Founding Era (including one to disarm political opponents). Sadly, I haven't found an ancient statute prohibiting abusers from possessing firearms (Thomas, et al, disregard history when it suits the conservative agenda anyway), so I fear we'll continue our legal regression until we return to a perfectly Hobbesian state...
Posted at 08:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Civilians are not required to return salutes, dummy.
— Dr. Waitman Wade Beorn 🇺🇦 (@waitmanb) June 28, 2023
Go eat another box of crayons. https://t.co/Zyktg4J1lt
Not sure CMC Samuel Nicholas ever ate crayons; they don't appear to have existed in wax form at the time of our Revolution, but that's neither here nor there. Buncha nonsense this week about CPAP machines and salutes just because Biden ain't got flies on him whilst Trump is looking for attorneys wiz wit.
Since the current standard for anything to be constitutional is that it must have an "historical tradition", I think it's high time we return to military fundamentals. First, the Articles of War, approved in Congress on June 30, 1775:
Whereas his Majesty's most faithful subjects in these Colonies are reduced to a dangerous and critical situation, by the attempts of the British Ministry, to carry into execution, by force of arms, several unconstitutional and oppressive acts of the British parliament for laying taxes in America, to enforce the collection of these taxes, and for altering and changing the constitution and internal police of some of these Colonies, in violation of the natural and civil rights of the Colonies.
And whereas hostilities have been actually commenced in Massachusetts Bay, by the British troops, under the command of General Gage, and the lives of a number of the inhabitants of that Colony destroyed; the town of Boston not only having been long occupied as a garrisoned town in an enemy's country, but the inhabitants thereof treated with a severity and cruelty not to be justified even towards declared enemies.
And whereas large reinforcements have been ordered, and are soon expected, for the declared purpose of compelling these Colonies to submit to the operation of the said acts, which hath rendered it necessary, and an indispensable duty, for the express purpose of securing and defending these Colonies, and preserving them in safety against all attempts to carry the said acts into execution; that an armed force be raised sufficient to defeat such hostile designs, and preserve and defend the lives, liberties and immunities of the Colonists: for the due regulating and well ordering of which;--
Resolved, That the following Rules and Orders be attended to, and observed by such forces as are or may hereafter be raised for the purposes aforesaid.
Left as an exercise for the cadet to read all LXIX (noice!) Rules and Orders. They don't have anything about saluting, so we'll have to look elsewhere for proper directions on that score. Earliest I've found is from June 7, 1781 (some slight editing for modern readers):
When a non com officer’s party passes a commissioned [officer] they are to carry arms. A single soldier or two or three when without non com officer with their arms meet a commissioned officer, halt, front and carry arms at least six paces before the officer gets to him and remains in that position till he has passed. If a non com officer’s party, or single soldier, overtakes and passes an officer, they are to carry arms. The same if an officer is standing or sitting still. When a soldier without arms meets an officer he will halt at the same distance as with arms, front and pull off his hat or cap with his right hand letting it down the length of his arm in a graceful easy posture...
There's more, but you get the gist. Speaking of "carrying arms", now I get to tie this back to my earlier post with General J. L. Chamberlain recounting his part in receiving the surrender of General R. E. Lee's army:
At such a time and under such conditions I thought it eminently fitting to show some token of our feeling, and I therefore instructed my subordinate officers to come to the position of 'salute' in the manual of arms as each body of the Confederates passed before us.
It was not a 'present arms,' however, not a 'present,' which then as now was the highest possible honor to be paid even to a president. It was the 'carry arms,' as it was then known, with musket held by the right hand and perpendicular to the shoulder. I may best describe it as a marching salute in review.
Kinda wish he hadn't done that. There is only one salute appropriate for traitors...
Posted at 06:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Gonna ignore recent SCOTUS rulings like I'm Andrew Jackson, and turn my gaze briefly toward the war that gave us Amendments XIII-XV. This long holiday weekend I'll be watching Gettysburg (among other media), as is my wont, which brings us to the final chess moves before battle began in earnest.
General Buford (played handsomely by Sam Elliott), who understood his cavalry was the eyes of the army (unlike flamboyant Jeb Stuart), sent word of movement:
Colonel –:
Get between Gettysburg and Heidlersburg, and picket at Mummasburg and Hunterstown. Send in the direction of Gettysburg, and see what is there, and report to General Ewell at Heidlersburg. A small body of Yankee cavalry has made its appearance between Gettysburg and Heidlersburg. See what it is.J. A. EARLY,
Major-General.This was captured last night on the road to Oxford. The bearer of it said he saw Early last at Berlin. All quiet here last night. Respectfully,
JNO. BUFORD,
Brigadier-General of Volunteers.
That same day, just a couple after replacing Hooker as commander of the Army of the Potomac, General Meade issued a flurry of orders in response to a variety of intelligence. First, a little housekeeping:
Major-General Reynolds, Taneytown, will, upon receipt of this order, assume command of the three corps forming the left wing...
Motivating the troops:
The commanding general requests that previous to the engagement soon expected with the enemy, corps and all other commanding officers address their troops, explaining to them briefly the immense issues involved in the struggle. The enemy are on our soil. The whole country now looks anxiously to this army to deliver it from the presence of the foe. Our failure to do so will leave us no such welcome as the swelling of millions of hearts with pride and joy at our success would give to every soldier of this army. Homes, firesides, and domestic altars are involved. The army has fought well heretofore; it is believed that it will fight more desperately and bravely than ever if it is addressed in fitting terms.
Corps and other commanders are authorized to order the instant death of any soldier who fails in his duty at this hour.
Self-care is important:
It is not his desire to wear the troops out by excessive fatigue and marches, and thus unfit them for the work they will be called upon to perform.
Don't forget operational security (spies are about!):
The orders and movements from these headquarters must be carefully and confidentially preserved, that they do not fall into the enemy’s hands.
And everybody please remember where we parked:
The commanding general desires you to be informed that, from present information, Longstreet and Hill are at Chambersburg, partly toward Gettysburg; Ewell at Carlisle and York. Movements indicate a disposition to advance from Chambersburg to Gettysburg.
...
Corps commanders will avail themselves of all the time at their disposal to familiarize themselves with the roads communicating with the different corps.
Anyway, Happy Gettysburg Eve to all who celebrate...
Posted at 03:56 PM in History | Permalink | Comments (0)
They stayed up all night selling classified docs...
Posted at 08:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
The Mad Hatter doesn’t say that the alphabetwas first used to keep track of propertyor that for centuries people believedif women learned to writethe lost world would never be recoveredor that the Mayans believedoutsiders wrote things downnot in order to remember thembut to free themselvesinto the work of forgetting.
Rita Mae Reese.
Posted at 07:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
I showed Sadie the first ever picture taken of her, and she asked, "how big was I?" Roughly the size (and shape) of a kidney bean at 8-ish weeks. Now she's about 56 times bigger as we hurtle toward her 11th birthday.
Posted at 07:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Dylan did not play this when I saw him at Toledo's Centennial Hall in '89, but there were a few others from Blonde on Blonde. Fun fact: SNL's GE Smith was touring with him at the time.
Posted at 09:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
the rain it raineth everydaypull up the reins, rayned in by reason, rule, and reverenceif the aim is total abject embarrassmentof shiny-looking objects tenderly gathered for the pome’ssunset quinceañeraa star winked at me btwn the apricot and the cypress2 crows atop them like a punter on the mizzenmastu better step up your game, havelokby what means of studye and devocyonwhat is love but a constellationof significancesit liked to eat salmon w/ its fingers like a bearand then use thosefingers to clean its glassesit cries and it looks like a wolf I believe it wantedto cultivate this look
Julian Talamantez Brolaski.
Posted at 08:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Bush and Trump both won because Biden helped Republicans shoot down the bill that would've abolished the electoral college. Just because you don't know what you're talking about doesn't mean it isn't true. https://t.co/80s28Ssn2c pic.twitter.com/RLiAyXWU9C
— Holding Biden Accountable (From The Left) (@WaitingOnBiden) June 28, 2023
This came up in another thread, and when I asked for a link the poster provided screenshots, one of which contains an error (the resolution number!). Figured it made sense to adapt my hasty response into a slightly more coherent blog post since I already had to do some spelunking at the Library of Congress to locate original source info for S.J.Res.28 (made more difficult because of the aforementioned error and the fact that records from the era are not entirely digitized).
I found it funny to dig up a roll call from 44 years ago wherein a resolution failed with far less than the required 2/3. Not to mention, of course, you'd also need concurrence of the House (which didn't bother to vote on its version), as well as 3/4 of the states to ratify at a time when people weren't up in arms about something that wouldn't even happen again until the following century (paging Dr Manhattan).
On the last day of debate, right before the vote, Democrat Ed Muskie spake thus:
[T]o many a "direct" and "popular" election sounds more democratic. They also want to avoid the largely theoretical risk that electoral votes might elect a candidate who lost the popular vote. That could happen-but it hasn't happened since 1888. To guard against that small risk Senator Birch Bayh and 38 cosponsors of his amendment would abandon all the advantages of federal voting and run dangerous new risks.
If you'd asked me in 19fucking79 if I thought this amendment was a good idea, uh...well, I was just shy of 10 years old, so my opinion would be rightfully disregarded. Overall, it did actually poll pretty well (source paper), even in Strom Thurmond's neck of the woods, although I'll note black voters appear...skeptical.
A contemporaneous WaPo article:
Although the Senate debate over direct election has gone on since 1966 under Bayh's guiding hand -- he has held 47 days of hearings on the issue -- it was clearly an issue that never caught on.
...In a post-mortem, Bayh said yesterday's vote was heavily influenced by pressure from the Urban League and The American Jewish Congress on "progressive and liberal" senators upon whom he had relied for support.
Both organizations, in opposing direct election, had argued that the Electoral College now tends to give power to black and Jewish voters in populous states that might be diminised in direct elections.
Yesterday's floor vote on the amendment -- the first since Bayh began pushing it from his Judiciary subcommitee in 1966 -- brought together an unusual mix of conservatives, liberals, big-state and small-state senators.
Anyway, it's not like that was the last time Congress tried: Rep Gene Green of TX did in 2005 and 2009; Sen Barbara Boxer of CA in 2016. Might be others, too, but who gives a shit? They all went and got themselves dead in committee.
So yes, behold once again Dark Brandon's mighty power over space, time, and reality itself!
Posted at 08:08 PM in History | Permalink | Comments (0)
It’s not their fault, because it’s not their book.
Speaking of pride goething before the fall and whatnot, I read a lovely thread by Rabbi Mike about Sodom and Gomorrah. But first, lemme grab something I found by Reverend Dr. Gary R. Shahinian with a simple takeaway from the "clobber passages":
Inhospitality was the real sin of Sodom.
That's fine so far as it goes, but consider delving a little deeper with the good rabbi:
Inhospitality is seen as a result of arrogance by the text. It is what they were arrogant about.
Inhospitality is a fever, a general symptom; arrogance is the specific illness which is causing that symptom here. And the height of arrogance, from where I sit, is to assume that any singular interpretation of ancient text - yours or somebody else's - is correct and ought to form the basis of civil law.
Selah.
Posted at 02:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Schindleria praematurus, because Jon Anderson wanted a fish name with eight syllables to sing...
Posted at 09:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
And Now There Is No Place to Look:
And now there is no place to look,
There are no risks. Now we are familiar
With ourselves as unfamiliar things.
Stanley Moss.
Posted at 08:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
“I could say this is a classified document. Doesn’t make it true. You know how Trump is. We don’t know.” pic.twitter.com/HoNaOkIhTw
— Acyn (@Acyn) June 27, 2023
Been fun to see MAGAs try to spin the recording that Trump leaked. Much appears to be in the vein of "how can you even tell if what he's talking about is classified?" (along with "hey, he lies a lot!").
Of course, classification status has fuckall to do with the charges, just for starters. They are about National Defense Information of any stripe, which is neither a presidential or personal record, so shut up with that uncharged Presidential Records Act nonsense when this is an Espionage Act criming spree. That's why you see one of the counts of willful retention is this:
Now, I've been tossing that one out there in response to the apologists precisely because of its lack of classification marking, but more recently I've seen somebody suggest the recording could be related to another count:
ORCON signifies "originator controls dissemination and/or release of the document" (i.e., not the preznit, so I guess DoD given the subject matter), and NOFORN means not for disseminate outside US personnel.
I'd originally ignored this one, perhaps reading too much into "in a foreign country". And, like...'timeline' sounded retrospective, so maybe it detailed something that had occurred without our involvement, such as Russian activity in Syria? I also didn't put much stock in Trump's bragging that it was classified, because I'd read stuff like this:
Meadows’ autobiography includes an account of what appears to be the same meeting, during which Trump “recalls a four-page report typed up by (Trump’s former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) Mark Milley himself. It contained the general’s own plan to attack Iran, deploying massive numbers of troops, something he urged President Trump to do more than once during his presidency.”
If Milley had thrown together a little special something to show generally what contingency plans we had in our back pocket for something like Iran (ignoring the bullshit accusation that he was warmongering), maybe it wouldn't have received classified markings before Trump purloined it (I ain't an expert class/declass protocols). Yet the indictment does indicate in graf 6 (bottom of 2nd page) that it was a classified doc he was waving about, so #20 does make more sense than #11 in this context.
Whatever. As I've observed to the MAGAs, we are not in the room with Jack Smith, and thus don't know precisely what evidence he has for which specific counts. He did not, however, idly throw in the transcript (Coke, Milley, and Iran redacted) of that now-leaked audio, so presumably it is linked directly to charges, witness testimony, and other evidence. And classified or not, the civilian, not-preznit still willfully retained NDI (property of the United States).
But this is exactly why Trump leaked it. Abusive narcs love chaos and crazymaking, and he wants everybody to focus on one piece of evidence (that we already knew about) in a vacuum, when Jack clearly has connected many, many dots. That may play well with this grifter's base of stupid marks (or flying monkeys) who would gladly sell their kidneys to give him money, but it is not a legal argument.
In conclusion:
Posted at 06:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Another prompt: first album you ever bought with your own money. This one, on cassette.
Posted at 08:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Not as we are but as we must appear,Contractual ghosts of pity; not as weDesire life but as they would have us live,Set apart in timeless colloquy.So it is required; so we bear witness,Despite ourselves, to what is beyond us,Each distant sphere of harmony foreverPoised, unanswerable. If it is withoutConsequence when we vaunt and suffer, orIf it is not, all echoes are the sameIn such eternity. Then tell me, love,How that should comfort us—or anyoneDragged half-unnerved out of this worldly place,Crying to the end ‘I have not finished’.
Geoffrey Hill.
Posted at 07:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Aka Dead Scalia's Big Gay Day. To celebrate, let's just grab a slice of Tony's spleen from this date's SCOTUS opinions!
Anyway, fuck that guy. Glad he's dead. Have some rainbow cake.
Posted at 05:05 PM in History | Permalink | Comments (0)
Out of cool mystery I write you,
Out of the things that have never been before,
Out of the things that have always been.
I bring you no revelations,
No woven weathered creeds
To wrap about your naked unbelief;
No patterned scarves,
To shield your eyes
Or mitigate the unendurable;
No solaces, tender-fingered;
No promises, light-shot.
What I have won is not for you:
Hardness striking upon bone,
Shaping new contours;
Sharpness cutting flesh,
Molding new surfaces;
And that resiliency which only death defeats,
And pliancy which life alone creates—
How can I bring you these?
Out of cool mystery I write you
All this—the incommunicable.
Flora J. Arnstein.
Posted at 08:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
As I've been reading about the Hubris, er...Titan, I see a lot of stuff like this:
A former passenger of the Titan submersible said he took four dives in it, including to the Titanic shipwreck, and that there were communication issues on every one of them.
Not that it was the cause, but I keep coming back to something Feynman observed after Challenger: "The equipment is not operating as expected, and therefore there is a danger that it can operate with even wider deviations..."
There are normal times exploring the Deep Dark when communications are expected to fail. Loss of Signal is baked into any lunar mission (and always a source of anxiety until Acquisition of Signal when the spacecraft emerges from behind the Moon), for example. But generally when engaged in dangerous activity, being able to talk is pretty fucking important.
Recall that Apollo One was experiencing communication breakdown just before the fire. I was curious if that had any relationship to the disaster itself, and I discovered that Bell Labs had done some audio analysis:
In order to talk, the astronaut had to press a switch on a push-to-talk button on his “cobra cable,” so named because of its shape. There was also a toggle switch on the cobra cable to enable communication outside the cockpit. In its normal position, the capsule voice communication would be an intercom system enabling the astronauts to talk to each other when they had their helmets on. The toggle switch would then enable communication between the capsule and the ground, if that were desired.
...The audio tape recording had the slow sound of breathing, which was identified as coming from Grissom’s microphone. For some reason, his microphone was always active. There might have been a short circuit in a switch somewhere, perhaps in the push-to-talk switch on his cobra cable.
...The three astronauts were in the capsule for a long time because of ground communication problems. This delay seemed to bother Grissom, who states “How are we going to get to the moon if we can’t talk between three buildings.” There is some ground communication and periods of system noise.
A voice then broke in suddenly. Some of us believed that it said something like, “Hey [noise] oh, we’ve got a fire in the cockpit!” followed by more noise. Then this communication of about five seconds was followed by complete silence for seven seconds; there was no breathing sound from Grissom, which implied that whatever had kept his microphone activated, was resolved. This seven-second period of silence was followed by shouting and much noise for about five seconds – then total silence as all communication ceased. The initial portion of this final sequence of shouting sounded like “[garbled] caught fire.”
...At the time, I wondered whether there was a short circuit in Grissom’s cobra cable, which gradually became hot enough to ignite his space suit and cause the disastrous fire in the cockpit. But that was pure speculation on my part. Another member of our team believed that the fire initiated on the cobra cable.
In its final report, NASA believed the fire started somewhere in the electrical wiring beneath Grissom’s seat and that the cobra cable was not at fault. Although the current would be small, heat and possible sparks in the pure oxygen environment would have been a unique and unusual situation, possibly with unexpected disastrous results. But after thorough investigation, NASA never discovered definitively the real cause of the fire.
So, probably a coincidental issue, but still shows how even the most fundamental, non-life-supporting systems could be part of a larger design or implementation problem. And now I wonder, did OceanGate have a "black box" or anything else that recorded voices, captured data, whatever, or was that simply another "broken rule" because they were supremely confident nothing would fail?
I mean, how would they know if their patented "acoustic monitoring of Titan's carbon fiber hull" worked? If they detected a potentially catastrophic problem in the hull, would it be in time to react, to do anything at all to save the crew (I keep thinking of the last "uh-oh" transmission from Challenger)? Would dropping ballast to ascend be enough to avert disaster if they did sense something was wrong (even James Cameron had to cut his record-setting dive short), or could even that pressure change cause a cascade failure?
Even as somebody who firmly believes failure can be great for learning, I've never been enamored of the "move fast, break things" notion (just look at Elon's Twitter), especially when death is on the line. And I'm not sure the people who need to learn from Titan will, in fact, learn.
In conclusion: failure is a land (or sea) of contrasts. And OceanGate is one local business I shan't support. Ever.
Posted at 12:51 PM in Space | Permalink | Comments (0)
The Northern Cheyenne call this stream Hiki/maii-yohe...Greasy Grass creek, a tributary of Little Bighorn river in Montana. The grass along this stream is said to look greasy, " as if a frying pan had been emptied on it." Horses get very fat on this pasturage.
Speaking of Custer:
The Battle of Greasy Grass, June 25-26, 1876, also known as The Battle of Little Bighorn and Custer’s Last Stand, marks a great victory for the Oceti Sakowin people. The battle’s roots started with the Report on the Condition of the Indian Tribes (1867); after the report was issued, “the United States government set out to establish a series of Indian treaties that would force the Indians to give up their lands and move further west onto reservations.”...
[In 1874], Lt. Col. Custer, who had great career ambitions and was “reinventing himself as an Indian fighter”, found gold in the sacred Black Hills. In 1875, “a five-month scientific expedition was sent to confirm Custer’s report. This expedition, too, found gold, and in 1876, the gold rush to the Black Hills began.”
The promise of gold was one of the factors that led the U.S. government to attempt “the utter destruction of the Indian village, and overthrow of Sioux power will be the certain result”. Custer was supposed to drive the 7th Cavalry, with 750 soldiers and 31 Arikara and Crow scouts, along the Rosebud and go west along a trail created by the Lakota and Cheyenne and others and push them towards General Alfred Terry, who was coming from the north, expecting to drive them into a two-arm pincer from which the Indigenous soldiers could not escape.
In a previous life, I visited the site. So did good ole Neptune:
It's a family-friendly place these days:
At the time, I saw mostly markers for the 7th Cav, like the one in my photo above, but also for other combatants:
[“Cankuhanska” (Long Road), Sans Arc Lakota Sioux warrior,] was killed on June 26, 1876 while attempting to charge an entrenched position held by the 7th cavalry. Unfortunately little is known of him. Joseph White Bull, Minnenconjou Lakota recalled “Two men were killed in the fight with Reno on the bluffs that afternoon: Dog’s Backbone (Minneconjou); he was shot down right in front of White Bull. Long Road, a Sans Arc, was shot while trying to count coup on the soldiers in the trench.”
In 1909 Private Jacob Adams, Company H, 7th Cavalry, recalled “While effecting a slight change of position [on June 26] my tent-mate, Thomas Meador of West Virginia, fell with a dangerous wound in his right breast. I attempted to carry my wounded comrade back across the ridge, when another bullet struck him in the head, ending his life instantly. I dropped the body and hurried to shelter and when I happened to look back I saw an Indian [Long Road] with a long stick adorned with feathers trying to reach Meador’s form. I felt my whole nature revolt, and I assure you that Indian never attempted another such feat.” Private Jacob Adams, Company H, 7th Cavalry 1909.
Long Road was killed within the Company H line and the Lakota were unable to recover his body until sometime after the battle. The Sioux also erected a small stone cairn to commemorate the site where he bravely died trying to count coup on Private Meador. During a visit to the battlefield in 1898, Charles A. Varnum, formerly of Company A, 7th Cavalry and Custer’s Chief of Scouts during the battle, walked over the battlefield and came across a stone cairn with sticks and red cloth medicine bundles tied to them stuck into the ground at the site. This important account indicates that the Sioux continued to visit the site over the years to pay homage to the bravery of their fellow tribesman.
And now I sit in my breezeway on a lovely Sunday, recalling my own past whilst reflecting on Cankuhanska's death in defense of his home, his people, and his way of life in the face of gold-hungry colonizers who paved the way for my family to enjoy blackberries here on Sx̌ʷəbabš ancestral land...
Posted at 11:07 AM in History, Local Color | Permalink | Comments (0)
in the beginningthere was no endthe ground wewalked on wasa memoryour shadowsfalse storiesour clothingspace without timedarkness was thecolor of angelsand the stars didnot weep
Frank Lima.
Posted at 07:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)