Yeah, That Happened: Topics in History

[eclair]

The mom was French, so she'd say,"chant, Liebchen, chant!" And Liebchen would woo-woo-arooo along to the song.

[garnet927]

Feb 23, 2016 6:44:01 GMT -4 sardonictart said:

Apparently, the Allied troops knew this little nugget (ha!) of information about Hitler and used to sing about it to this tune. The lyrics go something like this:

Hitler has only got one ball.
Goering has two but they are very small
Himmler has something similar, and
Goebbels has no balls at all.

The first time I had ever heard this was in college in a German History class my freshman year --an "I'm not in high school anymore." moment.

[Smilla]

Ugh, I just came across this and cried. Also, literally, my jaw was on the ground when I read this. I thought I knew the worst of the worst about the Reagan Administration, but apparently, its press secretary used to joke about the AIDS pandemic.

To say that we lived in a backward time with a backward president in that era is the understatement of the century.

[smitten]

I couldn't decide where else to put this. Does anyone know where this quote came from? I can't find the source:

"Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation." -Walter Cronkite

I know quotes are misattributed all the time on the internets. I'd like to know when he actually said that before I post anything on Facebook about it. But in this time, it's very fitting.

[chonies]

Mar 22, 2016 18:15:07 GMT -4 smitten said:

I couldn't decide where else to put this. Does anyone know where this quote came from? I can't find the source:

"Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation." -Walter Cronkite

I know quotes are misattributed all the time on the internets. I'd like to know when he actually said that before I post anything on Facebook about it. But in this time, it's very fitting.

I could only trace it as far back as a quoted excerpt in the Chicago Tribune from 1993: link. It looks like it's from a transcript, and Truman State has an archive of some of CBS's news transcripts. Since they are on microfilm, that's probably a dead end. Buuuut the Briscoe Center for American History has a collection of Walter Cronkite's papers, so it might be worth contacting them.

I haven't checked out of print books yet, but Cronkite's memoirs were printed in 1997, so it's not there. Good luck!

[smitten]

Ha, thank you cho! I'm sure this is good enough. Especially if it was in the Tribune. Perfect!

[chonies]

I literally just learned about this right now: Polish Refugees in Iran, 1943.

[Deleted]

I vaguely remember reading an article that described how some Jewish refugees (probably Polish) were able to get to Palestine via Tehran during WW II. I think they were mostly groups of children who had been smuggled out. I seem to recall they had somehow made their way into Russia, so that goes along with your info, chonies. Very interesting.

[Smilla]

Okay, passionate fans of history, I need book recs for a short story I'm writing--takes place on a town along the Delaware River in the years 1775/6. I'm looking for books that would give one an eye for how to write dialogue in a quasi-realistic way (so literature from the period would be good) and for a run down of vocabulary common to daily life at the time. (I've been watching the series Turn again to get in the mood, but I think I should look to some real, actual books for help as well.)

[Deleted]

I recently read an old Revolutionary War era novel, Drums Along the Mohawk, by Walter Edmunds--mainly about farmer/settler types, so depending on your type of characters it may or may not be helpful. Maybe April Morning, by Howard Fast?