Henry Dora, One of Bay City's First Pilots

 When we first moved to the house I grew up in, there was a lady that lived behind us for a while.  It turns out that her husband used to be a pilot.  For that matter, it turns out that he was one of the first pilots in Bay City (not the first though).

Henry Dora was born on October 30, 1892 in Hampton Township in Bay County.  Henry started as a mechanic.  He ended up trading his repairs for flying time.  He made his first solo flight in August of 1912.  It was from Curtiss Farm which is now known as James Clements airport.

During World War I, he served in the field artillery (which I think is where the aviation units were).  After the war, he ended up buying a surplus Curtiss Jenny.  Using that, he would do barnstorming and general promotion of aviation.  He also operated a flying school and helped to build the James Clements airport.  He would become the first manager for 15 years.  Afterwards, he ran a machine shop.  He holds one of the earlier pilots license and an even earlier mechanics license.

Anyway, it was pretty cool meeting his wife because she had all sorts of pictures from when he was a pilot.  Sadly, she didn't live there long enough and I didn't get to know her as well as I would have liked.

The USS Liberty

Yesterday marked the 50th Anniversary of when the USS Liberty was attacked by the armed forces of Israel.  There is still a great deal of controversy surrounding this attack and it still stings to many people.

 The USS Liberty started her life as the SS Simmons Victory.   She was one of many Victory ships that was built during World War II.  There were over 500 of these ships built during World War II and at one point, we were building these ships faster than they could be sunk.   She was built at the Oregon Shipbuilding Company in Portland, Oregon and construction was completed in May of 1945.  She was used as an ammunition ship at the end of the war.  She also served in this capacity during the Korean War.  After the Korean War, she served as a commercial vessel in the Pacific.
In 1958, she was transferred back to the Navy and placed in reserve.  In 1964, she became a technical research ship but the thing she was researching was various electronic emissions (radio in particular) of other countries.  She spent much of her time in the Mediterranean Sea.

During the Six Day War between Israel and several Arab Countries, she was sent to the Eastern Mediterranean in order to collect signals from the various countries (especially since many of the Arab nations used Soviet equipment).  At the start of the War, Israel announced that it would attack any ships that approached its coast line in order to protect itself.

On the morning of June 8th, 1967, the Captain of the ship said that she was overflown several times by aircraft of the Israeli Air Force.  Presumably, they were attempting to identify the ship.  One of the planes was even a propeller plane that flew so close the crew of the plane could wave to the crew of the ship.  There was some deal of confusion at the time because Israel was at war.  At one point, she was identified as an American ship and at another she was reported as hostile.

At 2:00 local time that afternoon, the Israeli Air Force was cleared to attack the ship.   During that attack, the Captain radioed that his ship was under attack.  Eight men were killed and another 75 were wounded.  About a half hour later, the Liberty was attacked by Israeli Torpedo boats.  At about 3:00, Israeli helicopters finally determined she was an American ship.  An hour later, the Israelis informed the Americans that they had accidentally attacked a US Ship.

The Liberty was heavily damaged, but the crew was about to repair the ship well enough to get her out of the area under her own power.  After all of the attacks, 34 men were killed and 171 were wounded.  The ship was so damaged that she was eventually scrapped.

The Israelis vehemently deny that they deliberately attacked the ship.  The crew of the Liberty claim that they were deliberately attacked.  The official inquiry into the incident was inconclusive.  After some hemming and hawing, the Israelis finally apologized for the attack and paid for damages to the ship and crew.  There are actually a few interesting books about this incident.

The pictures for this article come from the US Naval Historical Archives.

The Ship that Got Underway

Normally I like to use my own photos in posts but since I can't go back in time to take these, I will have to rely on the US Navy Historical Archives.

Today is the 75th Anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.  This was the action that finally drew us into World War II although I am still of the opinion that the United States would have been in the war within 6 months to year of Pearl Harbor had it not happened.  As it was, the United States was slowly inching its way to war with Germany.

There were eight battleships docked at Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7th, 1941.  Seven of these ships were in what was called Battleship Row.  The other ship, the USS Pennsylvania was in drydock at the time but she wasn't spared from attack.  Of the seven ships that were docked in battleship row, only one of them managed to get underway on that fateful morning.

The morning of December 7th, 1941 was like any other morning for the nation prior to her entry into World War II.  As the sun rose over the Hawaiian Islands, the USS Nevada raised her colors and her band played the Star Spangled Banner.  The end was sped up as the Japanese planes started to drop bombs on the harbor.  The USS Nevada was not alongside any other ships and this led her to her special place in history.

But first....let's go a little further back in time....

 On March 4, 1911, Congress authorized the $5,895,000 that would be required to build the new battleship.  She would become the first second generation battleship in the US Navy.  She was twice the size of the USS Connecticut that was built in 1904.  The was the first US battleship to be equipped with triple gun turrets.  She was also the first US battleship to be fueled by oil instead of coal.  This gave her a much longer range than other battleships.
Her keel was laid at the Fore River Shipbuilding Company in Quincy, Massachusetts in November 1912.  She was launched in July of 1914 and her sponsor was Miss Eleanor Anne Seibert who was the niece of Governor Tasker Oddie of Nevada.  There were also several other people in attendance including the Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

 Her sea trials began in November of 1915 and after completion of those, she was sent to the Boston and New York Navy Yards for the rest of her equipment.  She was commissioned in March of 1916 at the Charlestown Naval Yard with her Captain William S. Sims.

 She would not see much service in World War I as there was a fuel shortage in Britain, so many of her coal fired sisters were used.  She was used to escort the George Washington who was carrying President Woodrow Wilson to the Paris Peace Conference in 1918.

In the between the two wars, she would serve in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.  In 1930, she was modernized, and given the superstructures in the picture above.  She also received scout planes and her armament was improved.  She would then serve in the Pacific for the next 11 years.

 On the morning of December 7th, her officer of the deck Ensign Joe Taussig (son of an Admiral) ordered a second boiler to be fired off.  The plan was to switch power from one boiler to the other around 8:00 in the morning.  As the engineers started to raise steam, the first Japanese aircraft struck.  It wasn't long after that when the Nevada's gunners started to man her anti-aircraft guns.  She was hit by a torpedo but her gunners managed to shoot down the plane that hit her.  The torpedo caused some damage and a slight list, but her damage control party was able to counterflood and right the ship.

She was able to get underway around 8:40 in the morning, by that time her gunners had shot down four planes.  Ensign Joe Taussig lost his leg during the fighting but played a large role in all of this.

As she made her way towards the channel to leave Pearl Harbor, she attracted the attention of Japanese pilots who tried to sink her there in an attempt to bottle up the harbor.  It probably wouldn't have worked as the channel was too wide and water was too deep.  After taking several bomb hits, it was decided it would be better to beach her rather than lose her in deep water.  Over the course of the morning, she lost 60 men and another 109 were wounded.

She was refloated in February of 1942 and temporary repairs were made so that she could sail to Puget Sound Naval Yard for permanent repairs and modernization. In 1943, she sailed up to Alaska where she was used for shore bombardment in the retaking of Attu.  In June of 1943, she sailed to Norfolk, Virginia for further modernization.

 After Norfolk, she was used on convoy duty for a while.  Older battleships were used to protect convoys in case the Germans decided to dispatch a capital ship to deal with them.  That never happened.  In April of 1944, she sailed to Britain where she prepared for the Normandy Invasion.  She was used as Rear Admiral Deyo's flagship for the operation and also for shore bombardment.  She was also used against German shore defenses.  She was praised for her highly accurate fire.  The Nevada was the only battleship at both Pearl Harbor and the Normandy Invasion.
Later in 1944, she was used to support the Allied Landings in Southern France.  There she participated in a battle against one of the French Fortresses and defeated it.    She then returned to New York to have her guns relined.
In March of 1945, she was used as fire support for the Okinawa invasion.  It was during that battle, that she was hit by a kamikaze which killed 11 men and wounding another 49.  She also lost a turret.  She remained on station though.  In August of 1945, she was positioned off the Japanese mainland but never bombarded them.  After the war, she returned to Pearl Harbor and was declared too old to continue service.

It would be nice if such a decorated ship had a happy ending but that's not the case.  She was designated to be a target ship for the Bikini Atoll atomic tests in July of 1946.  This test was to see the effectiveness of atomic bombs against ships.  The Nevada was designated to be the bombardier's target for the test, as a  result she was painted the color seen above.  Even though, she was painted as above, the bomb missed it's target by 1,700 yards and struck a transport instead.  She also survived the second blast which was detonated from below.  She was heavily damaged and irradiated.

She was later towed to Pearl Harbor and decommissioned on August 29, 1946.  In July of 1948, she was used as target practice for the Iowa and two other ships but was not sunk.  She was administered the final blow by an aerial torpedo on July 31, 1948.  She quietly slipped beneath the waves.

Standard Time

If you like the idea of standard time zones, you can thank the railroads for that.  Today is the anniversary of the first implementation of standard time zones on November 18, 1883.

Prior to that day, communities would have different times depending on when the sun would appear directly overhead at noon.  This meant that for every degree of longitude, there was a four minute difference in time.  So if it were noon in Detroit, it would be 11:56 in Ann Arbor.  This was fine for a time when travel was by foot or horseback but trains could travel great distances in a matter of hours. 
As a result, the railroads introduced four time zones across the United States.  All locations in that zone would share the same time and there would be an hour difference between those zones.  This idea was quickly adopted by the public but Congress wouldn't make it a law for another 35 years.
The railroads were also responsible for introduce more accurate and reliable timepieces.   A rail industry committee was responsible for setting the standards for this timepieces and they were made of the best materials at the time.  It was also mandated that railroad operators keep their timepieces to within 30 seconds of a standard time.
Currently the official time is regulated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) via an atomic clock.  This clock is so accurate it is estimated it will lose 1 second every 100 million years.  If you are interested in the official time you can go to time.gov.  If you have a shortwave radio, you can listen to 5, 10 or 15,000 kHz to WWV (or WWVH if you are close to Hawaii).

New Era, Michigan

Every so often as you wander out and about, you see a town name that catches your fancy.  And you often wonder where the name came from.

 New Era was founded in 1872 as told by the sign as you enter the town.  I speculated that it was named so because of the relatively new era of the railroads.

 The name was determined by Doctor Spaulding, who was owner of the Spaulding Saw Mill.

 The village pretty much follows the standard Midwestern village template.

 The local feed mill.

 The Hart-Montague Trail passes by town.  It was one of the first rails-to-trails projects in the state of Michigan.  In 1894, there was a train wreck near here where 7 men were killed. 

 I kind of liked the looks of this building.

And there was a church at the edge of town.

The Great Midwestern Fires

As  I said, I was on a quest for history.  As I was mentioning it in a few of those posts, you wouldn't think that there would be a connection, but sure enough there was.

 Pretty much everybody has heard of the Great Chicago Fire.  The fire there started at about 9:00 P.M. on October 8th of 1871 in or around a small barn belonging to the O'Leary family.  Legend has it that it was started by a lantern kicked over by one of their cows.  That spot is somewhere in the left hand side of this picture of Chicago.
A combination of dry weather and the fact that many of the structures in Chicago at the time were built of wood caused the fire to spread.  Not only were some of the buildings made out of wood but many of the sidewalks were as well.  This was compounded by the fact that Chicago only had 171 firefighters that manned 17 horse drawn fire engines.   The firefighters were sent to the wrong locations and the fire spread.
As the fire spread, the city's water main was destroyed.  After a gallant effort by the city's fire fighters, it was put out on October 10th.  By that time, 3.3 square miles of city was destroyed and up to 300 people were killed.
The O'Leary legend was pretty much debunked although it's still not clear was caused the original fire.  One main result of the fire was that Chicago was remade using more modern city planning techniques, hence the fact that it is pretty much a grid.

 On the same day as the start of the Chicago fire, the city of Port Huron would also find itself on fire.  This fire would cause fires that spread across the thumb region of Michigan.  This particular fire would consume 1.2 million acres of land and kill up to 200 people (of which 50 were from Port Huron).

 Also on October 8, 1871, the town of Manistee, Michigan would find itself engulfed in flame.  One of the casualties was the original lighthouse that was built on the pier to the left.  The city was pretty much destroyed but rebuilt.

 Probably due to the droughts that was plaguing the other towns, the city of Holland would find itself on fire from October 8th to October 9th of 1871.

Sometimes, when I am doing posts like this, I have to use other people's pictures.  This particular picture comes from Wikipedia.  On October 8th, 1871 (notice a pattern here?), the town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin would find itself swallowed by flames.  There were a series of forest fires to the west of the town that were directed to the town by the winds at the time.  This fire was probably the deadliest of the four fires that started on that day as 1,200 to 2,500 people perished as a result of that fire.  They were unable to identify hundreds of residents and they were buried in a mass grave near the city.  This was probably the worst fire in the United States.

Not on the same day, but a few days later, the City of Windsor, Ontario would find itself surrounded by flames.  This fire would end up destroying the center of the city.  I would guess that Windsor was probably suffering the droughts that were plaguing the rest of the towns that burnt during that period of time.

Now, this is were the history takes a turn for the bizarre.  In 1836, the village of Singapore, Michigan was founded by Oshea Wilder.  He was hoping to build a city that would rival Chicago or Milwaukee in size.  At its height there would be three mills, two hotels, some general stores and Michigan's first schoolhouse.  The sign above is one of the few clues that there was a town here.

I can only guess about why the city was called Singapore.  If I were going to take a stab, I would say that it was a town located at the end of a peninsula like Singapore. 

This sign provided by the Michigan Historical Society is another clue of Singapore, Michigan.  In 1838, the Bank of Singapore was created.  This was known as a wildcat bank that was allowed to print its own money before the Federal Government stepped in and stopped that practice.  It would have $50,000 of Singapore Bank notes in circulation at its earliest point.  Shortly after the Civil War, the bank was involved in a scandal as the Federal Government added the requirement that banks had to be able to cover 1/3 of the notes they had in circulation.

In 1842, there was a forty day blizzard that would have wiped out the city had there not been a shipwreck that supplied the city during that period.  In 1846, the town would change ownership.

By 1871, the town would boast a harbor and several hundred residents.  I think one of the ships in this pictures was the schooner Octavia and that was used to carry lumber over to Chicago.  This particular picture comes from the Historical Museum in Saugatuck.

Now, what does a town with a banknote producing bank, a schooner and a lumber mill have to do with the fires you might ask?  Well, Chicago, Peshtigo and Holland all needed to be rebuilt.  And rebuilding would require lots of lumber.  Singapore had lots of lumber to sell.  Unfortunately, they sold too much lumber and pretty much deforested the area.  If you didn't notice, there are lots of dunes along the Lake Michigan shoreline.  That's because it gets pretty windy.  Because the protective forests were gone, it took almost three years for the city to be buried in the sands of what are now known as the Saugatuck Dunes.  This made this one of the more interesting ghost towns in Michigan.

Eventually, many of the residents of Singapore would move across the river over to Saugatuck.

I guess one of the things that I like about history is that there are many lessons that can be applied to modern times.  One of the lessons here is that we shouldn't mess with nature too much.  Sometimes, nature has a way of biting us back.  The other lesson is that you can under prepare for major fires.  It seems like there is a current trend of cutting fire fighters and I have a feeling that may come back to bite us.  Another thing about history is that sometimes unconnected events can react in unimagined ways.  Who would think a series of fires would lead to the disappearance of an unrelated town?

The Grange

It's funny what you remember sometimes.  When I was growing up, I used to watch Little House on the Prairie.  I actually used to enjoy that show sometimes.  Anyway, I remember one episode when they were talking about the Grange.

 Officially, the Grange is referred to as the National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry.  Grange comes from an old British word for farm.  The Grange itself was an organization formed in 1867 as an advocacy group for farmers.  Nominally, it had it's start in the South after the Civil War when Oliver Kelley was commissioned by President Johnson to evaluate the conditions of farmers in the south.  The first meeting was held in Fredonia, New York, the founders were seven men and one woman.
The Grange was active in regulating the railroads and grain warehouses in getting fair prices for farmers.    It was also active in getting rural mail service.  They also were responsible for the direct election of Senators and the woman's vote.

The Pittsfield Grange was formed in 1901 and continues to exist today.  It allows more than farmers though.  The Grange is still an active group nationwide but not as powerful as it used to be. 

The Distance Between Towns

One of the aspects of doing this blog is that I do a fair amount of traveling around the state.  Some of that is on rural highways because that is my only choice.  Sadly, the picture only sort of goes with my tale.

One day as I was travelling on M-29 from Algonac to Port Huron, I noticed that many of distances between towns was about 8 miles.  I didn't really think about it until I was traveling elsewhere and noticed the same thing.  Again, it sat on the back burner as I thought about it.

I tried to look it up and the closest thing I could see was that was about the distance that a person could walk and back in one day.  I guess I could see that as towns would typically spring up along the trading routes.   Before the invention of railroads, you would either have to walk or ride a horse.  I can't imagine that a ladened horse would move much faster than a person.

Then I got to thinking about another thing.  It seems like county lines are about 30 miles apart and maybe the towns are arranged along a grid within those counties.  But I would imagine the county organization would come after the formation of some towns.

Honestly, I'm not sure but it is a good though exercise.

Stuckey's Restaurants

As a kid, I seem to remember seeing these restaurants all over the place.  It seemed like they were always along the freeways.  I don't think I ate at one when I was a kid though but I did eat at one on a business trip a few years ago.  It wasn't very good.

 Anyway, the chain got its start in the 1930's, when its founder W.S. Stuckey Sr. decided to sell candies made from his pecans along US-23 in Eastman, Georgia.  I think his specialty product was the pecan roll.

 Until World War II began, with its sugar rationing, he was starting to expand his stores into Florida at a pretty steady pace.

 After the war and with the creation of the interstate, his business took off.  At the peak, there were 350 Stuckey's and they spanned from coast to coast.  But like many things, it underwent a serious decline and there were 75 stores in the late 70's.

 In 1985, the business was bought back by W.S. Stuckey Jr. and there are currently 200 stores but I think they are mostly in the south.

 This particular one served as a winery for a while but it is now out of business.

I would like to see one of these again because I would like to see what all the fuss was about.

September 11, 2001 Attacks - The Aircraft

I don't like to use other people's pictures on the posts that I use on here but since I don't have personal pictures of these aircraft, I will use them.  The pictures come from airliners.net and if you are looking for pictures of airlines, I highly recommend that page.  These are pictures of the aircraft that were used to carry out the terrorist attacks.

 At 7:45A.M., American Airlines Flight 11 was scheduled to leave Boston's Logan Airport and was supposed to go to LAX in Los Angeles, CA.  The flight was carrying 81 passengers (including the 5 hijackers) and 11 crew.  It is believe that the hijacking of the aircraft occurred around 8:15 in the morning.  The plane was told to ascend to it's cruising altitude of 35,000 but it remained at 29,000 feet.  At 8:21, the planes transponder was turned off.  This plane was carrying Mohammed Atta who was believed to be the ringleader of the hijacking attempts.   It is also believed that one of the passengers attempted to stop one of the hijackers but was killed.

At 8:46 A.M., the plane slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.  It was carrying nearly a full load of fuel and hit between the 93rd and 99th floors.  The North Tower burned for 102 minutes before collapsing to the ground.  All people on the plane were killed, along with approximately 1,600 that were either in the tower at the time or responders who came to fight the fire.

 United Airlines Flight 175 was scheduled to leave Boston's Logan Airport at 8:00A.M. and was originally heading to LAX in Los Angeles, CA as well.  It was also a 767.   It was carrying 56 passengers and 9 crew members.  It is believed that the hijacking of this aircraft took place at roughly the same time that Flight 11 slammed into its target.  The pilots were killed immediately.  The hijackers did not turn the aircraft's transponder off.  Around the time the plane was turning towards New York, it nearly collided with Delta Airlines Flight 2315.

At 9:03 A.M., Flight 175 slammed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center.  It was flying at nearly full speed and almost full of fuel.    The tower collapsed after 56 minutes.  All people on board the aircraft plus another 900 people that were in the towers or responding to the emergency.

When this plane slammed into the World Trade Center, it was certain that something was amiss.

 American Airlines Flight 77 was scheduled to depart Washington's Dulles Airport for Los Angeles, CA at 8:10 A.M.  The flight was carrying 58 passengers and 6 crew at the time of departure.  It was a Boeing 757 Aircraft.  It is believed that the aircraft was hijacked at approximately 8:50A.M.  It's transponder was disabled.  At this time, Air Traffic Controllers knew something was up, but they weren't sure.

At 9:37 A.M. the plane slammed into the side of the Pentagon at pretty much full speed.  The damage to the Pentagon wasn't quite as severe as the damage to the World Trade Center.  At the time of the crash, there were 125 people in the building because it was a section that was just remodeled.  All of those were killed along with the passengers of the aircraft.

United Airlines Flight 93 was scheduled to depart Newark Airport at 8:00 but did not leave until 8:42A.M. because of heavy congestion.  It was scheduled to go to San Francisco, CA.  It is believed that the hijacking of the aircraft occurred at 9:28.  Unlike the other three planes, the passengers were getting rumblings that something was wrong and were starting to organize an effort to retake the plane.

It is believed the passengers struck back at 9:57 with the phrase, "Let's Roll".  There was a struggle and the plane crashed near Shanksville, PA six minutes later.  It was uncertain what the hijacker's intended target was.  Speculation was either the Capitol Building or the White House.  If you get a chance, watch the movie called "United 93" and that gives a pretty good description of the events.  It is also a pretty jarring one because you can put yourself in that situation.

Allegedly, had the passengers not retaken Flight 93, there was a pair of F-16's on a training mission out of Selfridge that were prepared to crash into the Flight.  It was not until 10:20A.M. that any official orders to down hijacked aircraft was given.  This picture is my own.

 

Almost immediately after the attacks, all aircraft in the air were ordered to land at the nearest airport.  Any planes that were headed to the United States were told to land outside the US borders (either Canada or Mexico).  Planes were kept on the ground for at least a week (if I remember correctly).  One thing I do remember is that it was an odd day.

 

On a side note, I do not subscribe into any of the conspiracy theories surrounding this event.  But then again, I don't subscribe to the conspiracy theories surrounding Pearl Harbor, the Moon Landings or the Kennedy Assassination.  I think conspiracy theories are a way that people deal with things they can't fathom.

June 6, 1944

Today is the 70th Anniversary of the Allied Invasion of France.  The proper name of this invasion was Operation Overlord but in common vernacular, it has become known as D-Day.  D-day is simply the word the Army uses to indicate the planned day of attack.

Fairly extensive planning went into the Allied invasion.  They did not want to recreate the failures of the earlier Dieppe raid.  There were also extensive forces used in the operation.  This post is just about a part of that overall force.

In the early morning hours of June 6, 1944, US and British transport aircraft take off from various airfields around England.  They would be transporting elements of the British 6th Airborne Division, the US 82nd Airborne Division, and the US 101st Airborne Division.  These movements would signify the opening of one of the largest amphibious invasions ever taken.  The British division would land behind the British Beaches and the US divisions would land behind the US beaches.  It was the first time that a night-time Airborne assault was undertaken (and the last time I believe until one of the opening moves in the Iraq Invasion).

 The British Airborne objectives on D-day were to capture the two bridges across the River Orne and the Caen Canal.  The Allied forces wanted these bridges intact because otherwise efforts to break out of Normandy would be seriously hampered.

The British forces were successfully in capturing the bridges intact.  In fact, the Caen Canal Bridge was renamed the Pegasus Bridge in commemoration of the British Airborne Insignia and the other Bridge was renamed Horsa Bridge after the name of the gliders used by some of the troops.

In the overall scheme of the invasion, these were small actions but they were critical to the success of the operation.  I used the British example because we in the United States tend to focus on our efforts in World War II but it was truly an Allied effort.

Another Fateful November Day

Tomorrow marks the 50th Anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy.  There's not really too much that I can add to the conversation other than I don't think it was a conspiracy.

The picture is the cockpit of the first 707 version of Air Force One.  It was commissioned in 1959 but was replaced in 1962, so it carried Kennedy but not on that particular day.  If I remember correctly, that particular Air Force One is at the Air Force Museum.  I also seem to remember that there is a notch that was cut in the plane to accomodate his casket.  The above cockpit was taken at the Seattle Museum of Flight.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy was certainly an inspirational figure in history but I think his accomplishments were cut short by the assassination.  There are certainly some memorable speeches from him and he did have the lasting accomplishments of the Peace Corps and the Special Forces.  He had some negative legacies too, namely the Vietnam War.  It's hard to say how that would have gone down had he not been assassinated.  If nothing else, that particular day in November was the spark in a chain of events that have darkened the faith in our country.

I hear some of his speeches and I wish that we had leadership now that could inspire us like that.

To quote Mr. Spock, "He's not dead as long as we remember him."  This picture is from when I visited Arlington a couple of years ago.  I think it is kind of cool that they built an eternal flame for him.

The Woman's Life Insurance Society

Another neat building in Port Huron is the Woman's Life Insurance Society Building.  I've passed it a number of times but I never really focused on it before.  It looks like there is some pretty cool architecture in Port Huron but that of course means that I have to stop and pay attention to it.

 In 1892, the Woman's Benefit Association was founded by a 25 year old school teacher named Bina West.

 I believe this building was built in 1917.

 There are some pretty architectural details on the building itself.

 I kind of wish I would have had this door a little straighter.  I guess I'll have to try this again with better weather.

Some more of the details on the building.