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On this day in 1828, René Caillié became the first European to enter Timbuktu and return alive. Caillié had been preceded at Timbuktu by a British officer, Major Gordon Laing, who was murdered in September 1826 on leaving the city.

Caillié was born in western France in a village near the port of Rochefort. His parents were poor and died while he was still young. At the age of 16 he left home and signed up as a member of the crew on a French naval vessel sailing to Saint-Louis on the coast of modern Senegal in western Africa. He made a second visit to West Africa two years later when he accompanied a British expedition across the Ferlo Desert to Bakel on the Senegal River.

Caillié returned to Saint-Louis in 1824 with a strong desire to become an explorer and visit Timbuktu. The Paris-based Société de Géographie was offering a 9,000-franc reward to the first European to see and return alive from Timbuktu, believing it to be a rich and wondrous city. He spent eight months with the Brakna Moors living north of the Senegal River, learning Arabic and being taught, as a convert, the laws and customs of Islam. went to Sierra Leone where the British authorities made him superintendent of an indigo plantation. Having saved £80 he joined a Mandingo caravan going inland. He was dressed as a Muslim, and gave out that he was an Arab from Egypt who had been carried off by the French to Senegal and was desirous of regaining his own country.

In 1550 Leo Africanus described the inhabitants of Timbuktu as being very rich with a king that possessed large quantities of gold. The perception of Timbuktu as a very wealthy city had been fuelled by various accounts published in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Caillié recorded his first impression of the town: “I had formed a totally different idea of the grandeur and wealth of Timbuktu. The city presented, at first view, nothing but a mass of ill looking houses, built of earth.”

After spending a fortnight in Timbuktu, Caillié left the city on 4 May 1828 accompanying a caravan of 600 camels heading north across the Sahara Desert. After six days the caravan reached Araouane, a village 243 km (151 mi) north of Timbuktu that acted as an entrepôt in the trans-Sahara trade. When the caravan left Araouane on 19 May it included 1,400 camels and 400 men. It was transporting slaves, gold, ivory, gum, ostrich feathers, clothing and cloth. Caillie reached Fez on 12 August. From Tangier he returned by frigate to Toulon in France.

Postcard by Edmond Fortier showing the house where Caillié stayed in Timbuktu as it appeared in 1905–06

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Today is the birthday, in 1940, of American singer Ronald Mundy. He was a member of The Marcels who scored the 1961 US and UK No.1 with a doo-wop cover of the ballad ‘Blue Moon’ that began with the bass singer singing, “bomp-baba-bomp-ba-bomp-ba-bomp-bomp… vedanga-dang-dang-vadinga-dong-ding…”. The record sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc. He died of pneumonia on 20 January 2017 age 76. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoi3TH59ZEs

On this day in 1907, the immigration center at Ellis Island processed 11,747 people, more than any other day.

Ellis Island was once the busiest immigrant inspection and processing station in the United States. From 1892 to 1954, about 12 million immigrants arriving at the Port of New York and New Jersey were processed there; according to one estimate, two-fifths of Americans may be descended from these immigrants.

At the time, immigrants did not need a passport, visa, or any other document to enter the country. Transportation companies were in charge of all checks; if the entry was denied, the company was fined $100 per each deported passenger, and covered the costs of their deportation. Initial immigration policy provided for the admission of most immigrants to the United States, other than those with mental or physical disabilities, or a moral, racial, religious, or economic reason for exclusion. At first, the majority of immigrants arriving were Northern and Western Europeans, with the largest numbers coming from the German Empire, the Russian Empire and Finland, the United Kingdom, and Italy. Eventually, these groups of peoples slowed in the rates that they were coming in, and immigrants came in from Southern Europe, Eastern Europe, The Middle East, and North Africa, including Jews. These people immigrated for a variety of reasons including escaping political and economic oppression, as well as persecution, destitution, and violence. Often among these groups were Swedes, Poles, Hungarians, Czechs, Croats, Serbs, Slovaks, Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Syrians, Lebanese, Egyptians, and Persians.

Following the Immigration Act of 1924, which both greatly reduced immigration and allowed processing overseas, Ellis Island was only used by those who had problems with their immigration paperwork, as well as displaced persons and war refugees. This affected both nationwide and regional immigration processing: only 2.34 million immigrants passed through the Port of New York from 1925 to 1954, compared to the 12 million immigrants processed from 1900 to 1924.

Italo-Albanian woman at Ellis Island, 1905. Original caption: This woman is wearing her native costume. At times the Island looked like a costume ball with the multicolored, many-styled national costumes.

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SIGNS AND EDITING – FAILURES…

Here’s Gloria Estafan and the Miami Sound Machine… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54ItEmCnP80

On this day in 1838, the French army captured Veracruz in the Pastry War.

During the early years of the new Mexican republic there was widespread civil disorder as factions competed for control of the country. The fighting often resulted in the destruction or looting of private property. Average citizens had few options for claiming compensation as they had no representatives to speak on their behalf. Foreigners whose property was damaged or destroyed by rioters or bandits were usually also unable to obtain compensation from the Mexican government and they began to appeal to their own governments for help and compensation.

In a complaint to King Louis-Philippe, a French pastry chef known only as Monsieur Remontel said that in 1832 Mexican officers looted his shop in Tacubaya (then a town on the outskirts of Mexico City). Mexican sources said that the officers, from Santa Anna’s government, simply refused to pay their bills. Remontel demanded 60,000 pesos as reparations for the damage (his shop was valued at less than 1,000 pesos).

In view of Remontel’s complaint (which gave its name to the ensuing conflict) and of other complaints from French nationals (among them the looting in 1828 of French shops at the Parian market and the execution in 1837 of a French citizen accused of piracy), in 1838 prime minister Louis-Mathieu Molé demanded from Mexico the payment of 600,000 pesos (3 million Francs) in damages.

When President Anastasio Bustamante made no payment, the French king ordered a fleet under Rear Admiral Charles Baudin to declare and carry out a blockade of all Mexican ports on the Gulf of Mexico from Yucatán to the Rio Grande, to bombard the Mexican fortress of San Juan de Ulúa, and to seize the city of Veracruz, which was the most important port on the Gulf coast. French forces captured Veracruz and Mexico declared war on France.

The French forces withdrew on 9 March 1839 after a peace treaty was signed. As part of the treaty, the Mexican government agreed to pay 600,000 pesos as damages to French citizens, while France received promises for future trade commitments in place of war indemnities. The damages were never paid, and this fact was later used as one of the justifications for the second French intervention in Mexico of 1861.

Épisode de l’expédition du Mexique en 1838 Scene from the Mexican Expedition in 1838, the Prince of Joinville on the poop of the corvette Créole listens to the report from the vessel’s Lieutenant, Penaud, and sees the explosion of the tower of the Fort of Saint-Jean d’Ulloa on 27 November 1838. The frigate Gloire can be seen in the background.

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Here’s a good Canadian poem…

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Here are The Seekers… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKySE1Ukupg

Today is the birthday, in 1892, of Cornelia Arnolda Johanna “Corrie” ten Boom, a Dutch watchmaker, who worked with her father, Casper ten Boom, her sister Betsie ten Boom and other family members to help many Jewish people escape from the Nazis during the Holocaust in World War II by hiding them in her home.

In May 1940, the Germans invaded the Netherlands. In May 1942, a well-dressed woman came to the Ten Booms’ with a suitcase in hand and told them that she was a Jew, her husband had been arrested several months earlier, her son had gone into hiding and Occupation authorities had recently visited her so she was afraid to go back. She heard that the Ten Booms had previously helped their Jewish neighbors, the Weils, and asked if they could help her too. Casper readily agreed that she could stay with them although the police headquarters was only half a block away.

Corrie and her sister Betsie opened their home to Jewish refugees and members of the resistance movement, and as a result, they were among those who were sought after by the Gestapo and its Dutch counterpart. The refugee work which Ten Boom and her sister did at their home became known by the Dutch Resistance, which sent an architect to the Ten Boom home to build a secret hiding place and an alert buzzer that could be used to warn the refugees to get into it as quickly as possible. Thus the Ten Booms created “The Hiding Place” (Dutch: De Schuilplaats).

They had plenty of room, but wartime shortages meant that food was scarce. Every non-Jewish Dutch person had received a ration card, the requirement for obtaining weekly food coupons. Through her charitable work, Ten Boom knew many people in Haarlem and remembered a family with a disabled daughter, whose father was a civil servant who was now in charge of the local ration-card office. She went to his house one evening, and when he asked how many ration cards she needed, “I opened my mouth to say, ‘Five,'” Ten Boom wrote in The Hiding Place. “But the number that unexpectedly and astonishingly came out instead was: ‘One hundred.'”

Ten Boom’s involvement in the Dutch resistance grew beyond gathering stolen ration cards and harboring Jews in her home. She soon became part of the Dutch underground resistance network and oversaw a network of smuggling Jews to safe places. All in all, it is estimated that around 800 Jews were saved by Ten Boom’s efforts.

On 28 February 1944, a Dutch informant, Jan Vogel, told the Nazis about the Ten Booms’ work; at around 12:30 p.m. of that day, the Nazis arrested the entire Ten Boom family. The group of six people hidden by the Ten Booms, made up of both Jews and resistance workers, remained undiscovered. Though the house was under constant surveillance after Ten Boom’s arrest, police officers who were also members of the resistance group coordinated the refugees’ escape. Ten Boom received a letter one day in prison, “All the watches in your cabinet are safe,” meaning that the refugees had managed to escape and were safe.

Corrie and Betsie were sent from Scheveningen to Herzogenbusch, a political concentration camp (also known as Kamp Vught), and finally to the Ravensbrück concentration camp, a women’s labor camp in Germany. Betsie’s health continued to deteriorate, and she died on 16 December 1944 at the age of 59. Corrie was released. Afterward, she was told that her release was because of a clerical error and that a week later, all the women in her age group were sent to the gas chambers.

After the war, Ten Boom returned to the Netherlands to set up a rehabilitation center in Bloemendaal. The refuge housed concentration-camp survivors and until 1950 exclusively sheltered jobless Dutch who had collaborated with the Germans during the Occupation, after which it accepted anyone in need of care. She returned to Germany in 1946 and met with and forgave two Germans who had been employed at Ravensbrück, one of whom had been particularly cruel to Betsie. She died on her 91st birthday, 15 April 1983, after suffering a third stroke.

Corrie ten Boom in scouting uniform (around 1921). The triangle on her uniform refers to the name of the scouting group: “the triangle girls”.

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That POST…

thanks, Debra…

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Today is the birthday, in 1965, of Linda Perry, songwriter, producer, singer, 4 Non Blondes, (1993 UK No.2 single ‘What’s Up’, 1993 UK No. 4 album ‘Bigger Better Faster More!). Wrote ‘Beautiful’ for Christina Aguilera, plus Jewel, Courtney Love, Gwen Stefani, Sugababes, Robbie Williams, Melissa Etheridge, Gavin Rossdale have all recorded her songs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NXnxTNIWkc

Today is the anniversary of the Black Sunday Dust Storm that occurred on April 14, 1935, as part of the Dust Bowl in the United States. It was one of the worst dust storms in American history and caused immense economic and agricultural damage. It is estimated that 300,000 tons of topsoil were displaced from the prairie area.

The storm first hit the Oklahoma panhandle and northwestern Oklahoma before moving south. The conditions were the most severe in the Oklahoma and Texas panhandles, but the storm’s effects were also felt in surrounding areas. Drought, erosion, bare soil, and winds caused the dust to fly freely and at high speeds. Poor farming practices had stripped the land of its native grasses and a period of drought turned the fertile soil into dust.

In 1935, after the massive damage caused by these storms, Congress passed the Soil Conservation Act, which established the Soil Conservation Service (SCS) as a permanent agency of the USDA. The SCS was created to guide land owners and land users in reducing soil erosion, improving forest and field land, and conserving and developing natural resources.

Black Sunday dust storm approaches Stratford, Texas, on April 14th, 1935.

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Cats are all alike…

Government officials stick together…

BADA BING BING BING….

I went to the bakery this morning and got day-old bread for half price. I think I’ll go by the filling station and see if they have yesterday’s gas.

I wonder what it says about our technology that both our largest aircraft carrier and our most advanced spacecraft are having problems with their toilets.

Nothing refreshes my memory of what I needed at the grocery store like coming home and unloading the groceries from the grocery store.

“I find that worrying about what might happen takes my mind off worrying about what has happened.”

If ignorance is bliss, why aren’t there more happy people?

I found a new technique to improve my memory. I quit listening to people.

I’m not sure if my girl friend has called it quits with me. I found out she’s dating this French guy named fiancée. 

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It’s getting warm, close to summer! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvUQcnfwUUM