Category Archives: History

~Submitted by The Bedford Historical Society

The Haunted History of New Englandpresentation melds historical fact together with legend and myth to produce an interesting, fascinating, and sometimes shocking new look at events that really happened and the stories of haunting that followed them.

The topics addressed in the lecture will be Mercy Brown The Vampire of Exeter Rhode Island, the cursed Freetown State Forest in Massachusetts, The horrors of the Lizzie Borden House in Fall River Massachusetts, a haunted forest in the wilds of Connecticut, the ghostly happenings at Mount Washington Hotel in New Hampshire, and evidence of ghosts at the John Alden House in Duxbury Massachusetts.

This is a one hour slide presentation that also incorporates video footage. The event is free and open to the public in the Great Room (3rd floor) of Old Town Hall starting at 2 p.m. on October 23.

About Christopher Daley

Mr. Daley is a historian and published author. He has been presenting talks on historical topics all over New England for over 25 years. He has been a history teacher in the Silver Lake Regional School District in Kingston Massachusettsfor 24 years. He has been involved in several historical organizations both public and private, including the Pembroke Historical Commission and Historical Society as well as the John Alden Historical Site in Duxbury.He and his wife Cathy live on the South Shore of Massachusetts during the winters and spend their summers at their house in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

The rest is here:

The Haunted History of New England Presentation ~ October 23 - thebedfordcitizen.org

Everyone in Ironton knew about the bones at St. Rosalie.

The 200-acre plot in Louisiana, where oak trees spread a canopy over wafting grasses, was once a sugar plantation where enslaved people labored in the 1800s. Residents of Ironton, where everyone is Black, can trace their roots directly to those people a rare genealogical feat within the diaspora.

Not everyone treated St. Rosalie with reverence. In 2019, an energy company tried to build a sprawling oil complex on the plot, which could have desecrated the remains of Irontons founders and poisoned their living descendants with toxic emissions.

The company tried to hide the worst effects of its plan from Irontons residents, state permitters, and anyone who might stop them. Had it succeeded, it would have become the latest act of cultural erasure against Black residents whove resisted brutal segregationist leaders, greedy fossil fuel corporations, and countless threats to their existence.

Andrea DeClouet, photographed in Ironton, Louisiana.

L. Kasimu Harris for Earthjustice

But thats not how this story ended. The people of Ironton fought for their right to preserve their history precious evidence of a long line of survivors. They were aided by an Earthjustice attorney who helped expose the projects hidden impacts by decoding a suspiciously empty phrase, and Louisiana environmental advocates who are fighting the oil industrys last gasp in the Gulf. And, Ironton advocates say, by the protective spirits of the dead themselves.

Somebodys always going to tell a dead mans tale, says Andrea DeClouet, who lives in Ironton. The dead will do that for themselves anyway, especially when you walk up on a relic like that.

In January of 2020, Earthjustice attorney Mike Brown read a phrase that made no sense.

He was going through an environmental assessment produced by a Kansas-based oil company, Tallgrass Energy, which was pushing to build a 20-million-barrel oil storage facility at a site along the Mississippi River, about 40 minutes south of New Orleans. Building the tank farm involved constructing a new pipeline from Oklahoma to transport fracked oil to the site and creating a colossal port accessible to Very Large Crude Carriers.

The other side of the St. Rosalie site houses a 2,400-acre Phillips 66 oil refinery. An independent contractor hired to assess the projects emissions made an astonishing calculation: Together, the two facilities would unleash large amounts of benzene, a deadly carcinogen, over the people of Ironton.

You have all these interlocking air pollution issues, says Brown. Folks in Ironton would suffer excessive levels of cancer risk just from that one pollutant. To add insult to injury, the project would also have threatened efforts to restore coastal wetlands and made the community even more vulnerable to spills during climate-change-intensified hurricanes.

This project was wrong on so many levels, Brown says.

Representing the Sierra Club and Healthy Gulf, who were aiding Ironton residents in challenging Tallgrass, Brown and his team prepared an argument using the Clean Air Act that contested Tallgrasss creative science, which falsely lowered the terminals projected emissions.

As he went through Tallgrasss assessment, Brown remembers, he found that in typical fashion, the company filed this very boilerplate document that talked around every issue including these vague references to cultural resources.

The phrase raised an immediate red flag in Browns head.

The oil and gas industry survives on three things: the sacrifice of marginalized people, the complicity of politicians, and the legal cloak of empty statements. Brown made some records requests and discovered what was really going on: Tallgrass had uncovered two unmarked cemeteries with human remains and over 12,000 artifacts likely belonging to enslaved people whose descendants lived across the oaks in Ironton.

The people of Ironton have resisted attempts to erase their existence for over a century.

In the late 1800s, people who were emancipated from the St. Rosalie sugar plantation settled in a nearby woodland and built the community of Ironton. Others arrived from nearby plantations, making Ironton one of the most important settlements of formerly enslaved people west of the Mississippi. Spanning four blocks connected by a forking dirt road, Ironton grew into a tightknit Black haven, forged through shared history and a determination to thrive through adversity.

Ironton was full of people, homes, children running, says Pearl Sylve, a lifelong resident of Ironton who is now in her 80s. Her father was among the last generation of people who labored at St. Rosalie before making a new life in Ironton. Peaceful. People always greeted each other. As a child, Id go out on the levee and slide up and down on a pasteboard box with my siblings.

DeClouet, who works at a library in the neighboring town of Belle Chasse, is a history lover. She has spent many hot afternoons on the porches of Irontons elders listening to their stories. The towns history, she summarizes, is one of self-sufficiency.

Our founders were freemen who bought this property with whatever money they earned and saved, recounts DeClouet. They established Ironton for themselves, built their own homes, had their own businesses. They had their own midwives to birth the babies.

Ironton resident Wilkie DeClouet, the husband of Andrea, holds a family photograph.

L. Kasimu Harris for Earthjustice

Ironton persisted through decades of brutal segregation. From the 1920s through the 1960s, Plaquemines Parish, where Ironton is an unincorporated community, was controlled by Leander Perez, an infamously racist political boss and oil tycoon. As district attorney and council president, Perez passed laws to keep schools segregated, engaged in voter suppression, fraudulently pocketed millions of the states oil royalties, and even tried to imprison a Black teenager without a jury trial for touching a white teenager.

As a Black town in a mostly white parish, Ironton has long been targeted for the oil industrys heaviest-polluting projects. It is surrounded by the 2,400-acre Phillips 66 Alliance oil refinery, a grain terminal, and two coal export terminals that fling coal dust onto residents homes and send petcoke debris the size of a fist floating down the Mississippi. In 2015, locals prevented a third coal export terminal from being built near Ironton. Tallgrasss facility would have fit into a century-old narrative of environmental exploitation.

Houses in Ironton, photographed in July 2022.

Alison Cagle / Earthjustice

When DeClouet tried searching the librarys archives for records of Ironton during Perezs reign, there were virtually none.

The periodicals, magazines, newspaper articles everything was white, she recalls. That shook me to the core. I came home from work to my husband nearly in tears. I said: Its like Black people never had a beginning in this parish until this man died.

Black Americans exclusion and excision from documented history has spanned centuries, with terrible consequences. The erasure of genealogical records was a key tool for enslavement. Even before making the deadly Atlantic crossing, African families abducted from their homelands were purposefully separated and their tribal affiliations broken, to emotionally dislocate individuals who might otherwise unite against their oppressors.

In the face of such historic erasure, the survival of Black towns like Ironton, whose inhabitants can trace their lineage back nearly two centuries, is an audacious victory for the preservation of Black cultural memory. The relics at St. Rosalie are a rare genealogical treasure making Tallgrasss obfuscation an insult that is deeply rooted in supremacist oppression.

Mike Brown and a community advocate from Healthy Gulf, Michael Esealuka, shared Tallgrasss discovery with Ironton residents at the town church. People were outraged and disgusted, though not surprised.

It was another slap in the face for them, Esealuka recalls from the meetings. Slavery set us up for a plantation economy, and some areas of Louisiana are still operating in that mindset. Oil companies are building factories in the same plots where the plantations were.

While Esealuka gathered public comments and Brown fought Tallgrass in the court of law, Ironton residents skewered Tallgrass in the court of public opinion. They vocally denounced the project to New Orleansbased media and called out parish leaders who supported it. Local officials began backing out, claiming that Tallgrass and the port had hidden the discovery of the burial sites in bad faith.

Earthjustice attorney Mike Brown.

L. Kasimu Harris for Earthjustice

Tallgrass relentlessly pushed ahead with its air permit application, key to the projects approval, but gave assurances that now it would respect the burial site. Ironton residents werent having it, and Brown got ready to appeal the states expected approval of the project.

Amid the fight in the summer of 2021, disaster struck Louisiana. Hurricane Ida smashed ashore and obliterated over half the homes in Ironton. The storm surge flooded the streets, upending any building that wasnt elevated. Caskets rose from the oversaturated ground and ended up in peoples driveways. After the hurricane, Earthjustice attorneys joined Healthy Gulf volunteers to gut Irontons church, where the original 1870s floorboards had rotted away. Physical records of Irontons milestones births, deaths, marriages were lost.

A few months later, Tallgrass withdrew its permit application. The company cited environmental concerns and cultural considerations. In the words of Ms. Pearl: It was too hard for them to deal with the Black people in the end. We stood up for our rights.

Andrea DeClouet looks over the sanctuary of Saint Paul Missionary Baptist Church in Ironton, which was damaged by Hurricane Ida in 2021.

L. Kasimu Harris for Earthjustice

When asked why they chose to fight the oil terminal, Ironton residents say they had to protect not just their health and homes, but also their right to thrive within a society rooted in oppression.

All of us are close, says Nadine Black, a nurse. She is one of less than a dozen residents left in Ironton; everyone else was forced to flee after the hurricane. Nearly a year later, residents are still waiting for the government to provide emergency funds to rebuild the town.

We family; thats how it is, Black says. We built this community for ourselves. Why am I going to leave?

Ironton resident Nadine Black.

L. Kasimu Harris for Earthjustice

Read more:

An Oil Company Planned to Bulldoze Black History. This Community Fought Back. - Earthjustice

Theres a new tourist attraction in northern Michigan and this one takes a look back at the past of Manistee.

Origin is an educational sculpture walking experience that looks at the history of Manistee. From its roots with the Anishinaabek people, to where it is today.

The Manistee County Visitors Bureau worked closely with the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians and the Manistee County Historical Museum to come up with the idea for Origins.

Executive Director for the Manistee County Visitors Bureau Sammie Lukaskiewicz says she expects it to be a great educational experience for tourists and the community.

Travel has changed in general, and tourists expect more of the places they go. And places like [Origins} make them want to come back again and again, Lukaskiewicz states.

The sculpture walk follows the natural pathways of Douglas Park and the Riverwalk. Each piece gives a peek back at the history of Manistee and features influential people like Tribal Elders and past community leaders.

The Executive Director for the Manistee County Historical Museum, Mike Fedder, says he didnt want Origins to just be lumberjacks. He says it was very important for Origins to represent the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians.

Its very important that the people visiting Manistee know the history of it. Manistee was a very big industrial city later on. It played a big role in the formation of the state of Michigan. And all of that is highlighted on this walk, Fedder explains.

They say theyre excited to share Manistees past while they look forward to the future.

A piece like this is always going to be growing. There could be the next set of silhouettes on here of people who are leading our community right now, Lukaskiewicz says.

More:

New Tourist Attraction to Educate Tourists, Community on Manistee History - 9 & 10 News - 9&10 News

The Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway featured a history-making ARCA Menards Series West race on Friday night when the first mother-daughter duo took the track.

Bridget and Sarah Burgess left the mark at the Star Nursery 150. Both drivers were able to finish the race, though they lost to Taylor Gray in the No. 71 DGR Ford. Bridget Burgess got the better of her mother, finishing in 12th place while Sarah finished in 17th.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM

Nov 6, 2021; Avondale, Arizona, USA; NASCAR ARCA Menards Series driver Bridget Burgess during the Arizona Lottery 100 at Phoenix Raceway. (Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports)

But the result didnt matter. It was all about sharing the experience on the racetrack and having some fun as well.

"Im so happy for her. I hope we do it again," Bridgett Burgess told NBC Sports after the race. "I hope the next one is a road course because thats what I love. Im really happy for my mom and I know its tough because she has zero experience on oval racing, so to be in an ARCA car at the Bullring, Im really impressed. I think wouldve struggled because in modified before ARCA, so I give a lot of props to my mom on that.

Sarah Burgess was just as elated to have competed next to her daughter.

Team owner Sarah Burgess talks with Bridget Burgess, driver of the #88 HMH Construction Chevrolet, before the ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 on March 11, 2022, at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, Arizona. (Kevin Abele/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

TONY STEWART UPSET WITH NASCAR'S PENALTY, 'SUPER GLAD' HE'S AT NHRA EVENT RATHER THAN PLAYOFF RACE

"Im amazed. This has been such an amazing experience. The racing was phenomenal. I had so much fun out there. There was one time I was actually right next to Bridget on the restart, and I thought, God, I hope someones got a picture of that, because that was actually really cool," she said.

The Burgess family is originally from Australia but moved to the U.S. to focus on their racing dreams. Sarah Burgess is the owner and crew chief of the race team based out of Tooele, Utah.

Bridgett Burgess has had four top-10 finishes this season.

Bridget Burgess, driver of the #88 HMH Construction Chevrolet, lines up before the ARCA Menards Series General Tire 150 on March 11, 2022, at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, Arizona. (Kevin Abele/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

The ARCA Menards Series West will conclude the 2022 season on Nov. 4 at Phoenix.

Ryan Gaydos is the sports editor for Fox News Digital.

View original post here:

Mother-daughter race duo make history in Las Vegas: 'I hope we do it again' - Fox News

Saturday afternoon at Citizens Bank Park, thousands of Phillies fans likely saw something they've never seen before -- at least not in person. Phillies catcher J.T. Realmuto sent a shot to deep center field. Braves center fielder Michael Harris made a valiant effort in attempting to secure the catch, but came up short. The ball caromed off the wall toward right field, and, well, you've read the headline. You know what's coming.

J.T. Realmuto hit an inside-the-park home run:

That was the 18th inside-the-park home run in playoff history and the first since Red Sox third baseman Rafael Devers pulled it off in 2017. No Phillies player had ever previously done it. Nor had any catcher. (Source: Stathead search)

Realmuto is, of course, no ordinary catcher. He can run. He stole 13 bases last season and 21 this year. Per Statcast measurements this season, Realmuto was at the 86th percentile in sprint speed among all major-leaguers.

Still, that wasn't all speed. Realmuto had to put the ball in the deepest part of the ballpark and still needed that weird bounce off the wall. There wasn't much Braves left fielder Eddie Rosario could have done to help Harris and Ronald Acua, Jr. hadn't moved much from his position in right.

Simply, in order for an inside-the-park home run to happen these days, between smaller ballparks and faster players with better arms than ever, a play needs to come together like a perfect storm. It did here for Realmuto and the Phillies.

See the rest here:

WATCH: Phillies' J.T. Realmuto hits inside-the-park home run, first catcher in postseason history - CBS Sports

This week in history as reported by The Summit County Journal the week of Oct. 14, 1922.

The cattle roundup that has been happening on the hills surrounding Breckenridge the past two weeks will be completed sometime next week.

During the past summer, the Hanks Bros. Commission Co. ranged a thousand head of fine steers near Breckenridge. During the roundup, many of these steers were found even about timberline and many miles from where they had started to range. As a whole, the herd seemed to have done very well.

The owners intend to round them up in one herd at their ranch on the lower Blue and then drive them to the Denver market.

Several of the members of the Blue Valley Cattle Growers Association have already made their shipments and were disappointed in the condition of the market, as a bunch of cows brought only $3.25 and $9.25 was the top price for fine steers.

The hay crop on the Blue this year is short, and from current indications not many of the cattle will be held over. At this time, many of the ranchmen have carried their stock from last year because of the low market.

The inhabitants of the little hamlet of Breckenridge who retired early last evening awoke to find a white blanket of snow covering the green fields and highways this morning.

The snow fell last evening and throughout the night. In town, it no more than covered the ground and disappeared as soon as the sun struck it.

This is really the first storm of the winter to cover town, and evidently came at this time in answer to the prayers of the deer hunters.

The various placer workings operating during the summer in and around Breckenridge have suspended for the winter. The cold weather, particularly the nights of the past few weeks, have caused the mines to cease operating.

Among those closed down are J.W. Hales, who has been operating the Mecca in French Gulch, Charles Sislers in the Washington placer and Jack Sherman and E.S. Metys on the Cucumber Gulch district.

The big copper mining companies of the Southwest have announced an increase of 10% in miners wages effective Oct. 1.

The increase is voluntary and is based on the better outlook for the copper mining and melting industry in the copper belt.

Originally posted here:

This week in history Oct. 14, 1922: Winter arrives and slows seasonal mining business - Summit Daily

In the time it's taking you to read this sentence, LeBron James has probably broken an NBA record. He has so many of them at this point that it's hard to keep track. And this season? He's going to continue rewriting the record books. In fact, he's on track to pass two of the greatest players in NBA history.

By the end of the season, LeBron James will, in all likelihood, pass Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the leading scorer in NBA history. Much faster than that, he'll pass Magic Johnson for sixth place on the all-time assists leaderboard. So with the season mere days away, let's check in on LeBron's pursuit of history. How long will it take him to reach Magic and Kareem? Who else does he stand to pass in the record books? Here's where James stands as the 2022-23 season gets set to begin.

James has scored 37,062 points in his regular season career. That puts him just 1,325 points behind Abdul-Jabbar, who scored 38,387 in his illustrious career. That gap might look big, but remember, James has failed to reach that threshold in just one season in his entire career: the injury-riddled 2020-21 campaign. If James is remotely healthy, he is going to break the record this season.

But how long will it take him? Well, that depends on what you're using to set a pace:

Ultimately predicting the exact night James makes history would be futile. He'll miss games here and there. His average will fluctuate. But at some point this winter or spring, he will, in all likelihood, become the leading scorer in NBA history. Far earlier than that, he'll jump to No. 6 on the all-time assists leaderboard.

James is chasing only Kareem when it comes to points. As for assists? He's got a few milestones ahead of him. With 10,045 of them for his career, he sits just 96 shy of Johnson for the No. 6 slot. At his career average of 7.4 of them per game, he'll get there in only 13 games.

But Johnson isn't the only player he'll pass this season. No. 5 Mark Jackson (10,334) and No. 4 Steve Nash (10,335) are also well within range. At his career pace, he'd rack up over 600 assists this regular season if he managed to play 82 games. That would comfortably push him to fourth place all time. However, it's unlikely he gets into the top three any time soon. Chris Paul owns that slot for now, and like James, he is still adding to his total. Jason Kidd (12,091) is a viable target for future seasons, but John Stockton's career record of 15,806 assists is likely unbreakable even to James.

As a perimeter-oriented player, James doesn't rack up rebounds quite as frequently as the big men ahead of him on the all-time leaderboard have. Coming into the season, he ranks 42nd all-time with 10,210 rebounds to his name. If he were to maintain last season's average of 6.2 per game over 60 games, he would move up to 35th place, passing Julius Erving, who has 10,525. James has a chance of sneaking into the top 25 when his career comes to a close, but it is highly unlikely that he seriously pursues all-time leader Wilt Chamberlain, whose 23,924 rebounds more than double what James has thus far amassed.

Please check the opt-in box to acknowledge that you would like to subscribe.

Sorry! There was an error processing your subscription.

It won't be long now until James is one of the 10 career leaders in steals. At present, his 2,136 steals sit just 26 behind Hakeem Olajuwon for the No. 10 slot. No. 9 Clyde Drexler, with 2,207, is also in play this season. Once again, though, Stockton has set an overall mark that will not be broken. With 3,265 career steals, no one is even with 500 of the former Jazz point guard.

James won't ever reach the top 10 in all-time blocks, but he moved into the top 100 last season. If he averages one per game this season and plays 60 games, he'll pass Bob Lanier at No. 82, who currently has 1,100.

James already holds the all-time record for minutes played when you include the postseason, but he sits in third place on the regular season leaderboard. Up next for him? Second-place Karl Malone, whose 54,852 minutes give him a 2,713-minute lead over James. LeBron hasn't crossed 2,700 minutes since 2018, so it's unlikely that he passes Malone this season, but if he plays several more, he'll almost certainly pass Abdul-Jabbar's record 57,446.

As for games played? James is surprisingly ranked only 15th. With 1,366 games played, he has a reasonable shot at the top 10 this season. He'd need to play 45 games to pass Jason Terry, who is in 10th place at 1,410. Assuming James plays several more years, he should have a good chance of passing Robert Parish for first place with 1,611 games played.

See the rest here:

LeBron James record watch: Where the Lakers star stands in history books before the season - CBS Sports

Quinsippi Island, originally called Towhead Island, separates Quincy Bay from the Mississippi River. In the early 19th century, it was used for training during the War of 1812. Later logs were floated down the river to sawmills on the east side of Quincy Bay. In the winter ice was harvested from the bay. The island, which once was used and owned by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad as part of their bridge system to cross the river, was given to the city in the 1960s. Today it is a 130-acre park managed by the Quincy Park District.

The first railroad bridge in Quincy was constructed by the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in 1868. Trains to and from Missouri to Quincy ran on a one lane railroad bridge, crossing the Mississippi River traveling onto the island, then across the Lower Swing Bay Bridge where it looped around, stopped at the station, and returned on the Upper Swing Bay Bridge. A new bridge with wagon lanes was built in 1899. It was also a drawbridge that allowed barges to pass but caused long delays for the trains. The third railroad bridge, no longer a drawbridge was built in 1960, bypassing the Island. The railroad then donated the island, the steam engine locomotive 3007 and the old upper bay bridge, no longer a swing bridge, to the city of Quincy. The large steam engine was deemed a tourist attraction and sat on the only remaining railroad track on the island.

After the gift of the island, the Quincy Park District began the long process of turning it into a tourist destination. Tourists were coming to Hannibal, Mo., and Nauvoo but bypassing Quincy. The park district wanted to turn the island into a family fun park. First, they had to fill in the swampy areas of the island and raise the level so that there was less flooding. Then they had to remove squatter cabins and debris that had collected on the south end of the island.

The next improvement to the island was constructing a boat marina which meant involving the Army Corp of Engineers, dredging a slough which had been filled by the railroad, and finding the funds to support the plan. It took over ten years to complete the project. Renters and visiting boats began to use the marina facility in 1967.

The park district named the east bay side across from the island the All America Park in 1961, to go along with the All-America City Award. A city bond issue had failed so the park district decided to finance improvements to the island through a revenue bond issue of $500,000. The bond issue would be paid off by fees they hoped to collect from the tourist attractions planned for the island. The first two attractions talked about were a Sky Cruise Tramway and a narrow-gauge railroad. In the meantime, The Quincy Herald-Whig and Quincy Broadcasting Company gave the island park the Quinsippi Queen excursion boat for daily cruises on the river. In 1966, the Little Q railroad began to cross the bay on the old upper bay bridge and continued on a three-mile trip around the island. The steam engine powered a nine-car train on 15-inch tracks. In 1968 the tramway opened which took passengers from a parking lot at Third and Jersey Streets to the island terminal. Next came the Mississippi Valley Antique Car Society automobile museum, managed by volunteers and placed on the east side of the bay.

In 1970, the American City magazine awarded a citation to the park district for its development of Quinsippi Island. They particularly cited the Quinsippi Queen excursion boat, and the narrow-gauge railroad. The Sky Cruise tramway, nature trails, and a river beach, were among other features mentioned. By then the island had a small zoo, and a log cabin village. Ads in the newspaper in 1973 listed what was available to see and do on the island and on the bay side park. Highlighted was the Marina, the Sky Cruise, a train depot and a round house for the Little Q railroad, a souvenir shop, Erroke Indian Museum, a picnic area, and a Log Cabin Village. The auto museum, the carousel sponsored by the Kiwanis Club, and the Ferris wheel sponsored by the Rotary Club, on the east side of the bay in the All-America City Park were also listed.

The Erroke Indian Mounds Museum, which opened in 1962 in Indian Mounds Park in Quincy, had closed at that location by the end of the decade. The burial mound was covered over, and the building used by the park district. The contents of the museum were then housed in a new building on Quinsippi Island.

But by 1980, the Museum on the island was outgrowing its facility. They negotiated a one-year lease to use the Newcomb Stillwell mansion as a site for their collection, which had recently been put on the market by Quincy University. The plan was to evolve the museum into the Quincy and Adams County Museum. By 1983, the museum was called the Museum of Natural History and Art, then the Museum of Natural History, and finally the Quincy Museum on Maine Street.

All of the attractions on Quinsippi Island and the All America Park had been targeting tourist traffic. Unfortunately, the tourists never came in large enough numbers to support the costs of maintaining the parks and the attractions. Both the Sky Cruise and the Little Q narrow-gauge railroad failed in the mid-1980s due to high maintenance costs and low ridership which was exacerbated by the floods of 1969 and 1973. The equipment was sold at auction in 1988. Little by little all the other attractions closed, except the Log Cabin Village, which you can visit today at Adams Landing on Quinsippi Island.

Aerial Ride Planned For End Of May. Quincy Herald-Whig, March 31, 1968, 36.

American City Citation. Quincy Herald-Whig, February 10, 1970, 6.

Author unknown. Story of Quinsippi Island. Document file, Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County. N. D.

Bradshaw, Bill. Effort to Buy Stillwell Hall Gains Support. Quincy Herald-Whig, May 11, 1980, 8.

Bradshaw, Bill. Quincy-Adams County Museum taking Form. Quincy Herald-Whig, December 28, 1980, 10.

Erection Bids To Be Asked Soon. Quincy Herald-Whig, May 29, 1967, 18.

Ferris Wheel For Park Approved. Quincy Herald-Whig, May 7, 1970, 26.

Husar, Edward. History of CB&Q Railroad Celebrated In Newly Published Book. Quincy Herald-Whig, January 11, 2016.

Husar, Edward. Quincyans Buy Sky Cruise, Little Q Rail Equipment. Quincy Herald-Whig, October 6, 1988, 20.

Island Opens Doors Sunday. Quincy Herald-Whig, April 9, 1971, 18.

Kramer, Ken. "Quinsippi Island. Illinois Parks and Recreation. November 10, 1973. ip731110.html (niu.edu)

Lane, Beth Quincys Railroad Tragedy. Quincy Herald-Whig, December 25, 2016.

Magazine Citation For The Park District. Quincy Herald-Whig, February 10, 1970, 3.

Weeks, John A., III. Quinsippi Island Bridge, Quincy, IL (johnweeks.com)

Arlis Dittmer is a retired health science librarian and current president of the Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County. During her years with Blessing Health System, she became interested in medical and nursing historyboth topics frequently overlooked in history.

The Historical Society of Quincy and Adams County is preserving the Governor John Wood Mansion, the History Museum on the Square, the 1835 Log Cabin, the Livery, the Lincoln Gallery displays, and a collection of artifacts and documents that tell the story of who we are. This award-winning column is written by members of the Society. For more information visit hsqac.org or email info@hsqac.org."

See more here:

The history of Quinsippi Island | History | whig.com - Herald-Whig

This is an opinion column.

Dale Thornton embodies what can happen when a child is raised by an empowering example. Now, he wants to be one.

Dale is the son of Larry Thornton, a man who is a gifted artist, an inspiring author and speaker, one of Alabamas most successful entrepreneurs, and a respected board member at several prominent companies, including McDonalds and Coca-Cola. A man, too, who gained custody of his 10-year-old son following a divorce, who attended PTA meetings, washed and folded clothes, who hugged his son all while birthing his first McDonalds franchise. A man who taught and showed his son how to be.

I wanted, the father says, to shape his thinking.

I was able to see it firsthand, Dale tells me separately. Being on time, looking people in the eye, being a man of your word. I was able to see him grow as I grew. Its been a great journey to be on with him. I consider myself very blessed and lucky.

Together, the two men yes, men, Dale is 41 now, with a son, too own seven McDonalds franchises in the Birmingham area. Larry opened his first in 1992; Dale followed his fathers path: After learning at his fathers hip, initially earning $1 an hour for his time in the store, the son opened his first McDonalds franchise at the age of 25. He was then the youngest franchise owner in the chains vast system.

Because he had an example.

In 2011, Larry bequeathed $1,000,000 to his alma mater, Alabama State, the largest such donation by an alum in the institutions history.

Now, Dale is treading in his fathers footprints again and hoping others will follow.

A graduate of Miles College, Dale is bequeathing $500,000 to his alma mater. Hes slated to publicly announce it Saturday morning, just ahead of the schools homecoming game against Lane. The amount, too, is the largest donation by an alum in that institutions history.

Dale didnt know that when he settled on the amount. Because, youve had Dr. Bill Cosby [make a donation], youve had Charles Barkley, but theyre not alums, so, wow. Thats pretty cool.

You almost wouldnt have heard about it, but that, he was persuaded, wouldnt have been an example to other Miles alums and other young graduates of historically Black colleges and universities.

I wouldve just donated anonymously, Dale said. But my goal is to get other Miles and HBCU alums to do something similar maybe not the same amount. Look back at what Miles has given us. Many hands make light work. What if people gave $10,000, $15,000, $20,000, when theyre 40 or below, relatively healthy, not on too many medicines.

Thats how the University of Alabama, your predominantly white institutions do it with endowments. This is something were just not privy to. Theres nothing wrong with us. Its just lack of education. If you dont know, you dont know. Imagine what we could do not just for Miles but for Alabama A&M, for Alabama state, for Morehouse. Because the HBCU is in trouble.

Hopefully, I can be a catalyst.

Larry (center) and son Dale (left) Thornton own seven McDonald's franchises in the Birmingham area. As the father was an example for the son, Dale is striving to be for his son, Tre (right).

Army pivot

Born in North Birmingham and raised in Center Point, Dale Thornton originally wanted to join the Army after graduating from Chelsea High School. That wasnt the thinking Larry was trying to shape. My father kept throwing my [mailings] away, the son says with a laugh. Im glad he did; I wouldnt have made it.

Larry knew then-Miles President Dr. Albert Sloan and arranged an interview. The school captured Dale with a video presentation narrated by Christopher Kid Reid of the popular hip-hop due Kid N Play, who attended Miles. After that, I ended up falling in love with the school, he said. It was like magic.

Dale wasnt much of a scholar, he admits. But like many who attend HBCUs, he was massaged by attentive, available professors and other services, like counseling and tutoring. Services certainly available at non-HBCUs but often more embracing for young Black students still searching for their path. Miles shaped a lot of who I am today, Dale says.

Shaped in many ways. During his sophomore year, he fell in love with a fellow student and they had a child, a boy. They named him Tre. That focused Dale even further, just trying to buy diapers and pay for day care, he says. There werent any more Jordans, expensive jeans or partying. It was buying Similac and making sure he was taken care of. That was my first priority because I didnt want my parents or hers to have to [help us].

So, my career path was pretty much I was just gonna go to school and figure it out as I went.

Larry didnt stop shaping his sons thinking, of course. Didnt stop being an example. Dale and Larry were talking one day. I asked him what it would take for me to get into the franchise development program.

Bequest breakdown

Dale Thorntons bequest is a creative compilation, anchored by a $250,000 life insurance policy, of which Miles is the beneficiary. That wont be good until I pass, which I hope is not for a long time, Dale says jovially. Dale and Larry will contribute a portion any speaking they receive to the school. Additionally, several Miles students will receive a paid, immersive management training experience in all aspects of the franchises, shadowing Larry and Dale (much like Dale shadowed his father), along with Director of Administration Marko Herbert and Marketing Director Stephanie Drew and others. Finally, McDonalds corporate is contributing $50,000.

Dale will give another $5,000 to the Miles band, money from the National Black McDonalds Operators Thurgood Marshall Fund.

Hes done the math on the potential impact of his challenge to other alums. Miles has about 10 graduate chapters around the nation and many chapter presidents, as well as the national chapter president, are scheduled to join him on Saturday. I want to see how I can get people in the Birmingham chapter [to contribute] first, he says, then move to Atlanta and other bigger cities. I want to shine a light on this [challenge] because as we get older, the people on whose shoulders we stood wont be here. Its my eras responsibility to make Miles and HBCUs significant fifty to a hundred years into the future.

Miles grad Dale Thornton (left) $500,000 donation to President Bobbie Knight and Dr. Steven Hairston, VP Institutional Advancement

In the last three years, Dale and Larry added three franchises to their portfolio.

To be honest with you, Im not done, Dale shared. It is not for more money. Its just to be able to give better benefits and other things. I dont want to have 20 and all that. I dont want to get that big. I can use a couple of more, because we can do scholarships, theres another Mayor Randall Woodfin out there, another Dale Thornton. We want to be able to cultivate them. We cant wait for our students to get to high school because by that time, theyve already made the decision and theyre already doing what theyre going to do. We can do more for the community.

They can be. They can be examples.

More columns by Roy S. Johnson

Was USFL in Birmingham worth the $3 million the city, county, CVB invested? ,

Former Auburn star on Tuberville reparation remarks: Unnecessary, wrong, ugly

Alabamas SCOTUS lawyer gets critical race history lesson from Ketanji Brown Jackson

If Brett Favre is sacked by the Mississippi welfare scandal, this one could really hurt

Alabamians are struggling to eat; state officials must ensure all are fed.

Gov. Ron DeSantiss people-as-pawns stunt backfired; it showed our humanity

Want to reduce crime and recidivism? Invest in this re-entry program

Roy S. Johnson is a 2021 Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary and winner of 2021 Edward R. Murrow prize for podcasts: Unjustifiable, co-hosted with John Archibald. His column appears in The Birmingham News and AL.com, as well as the Huntsville Times, the Mobile Press-Register. Reach him at rjohnson@al.com, follow him at twitter.com/roysj, or on Instagram @roysj.

Continued here:

Miles grad makes largest alum donation in school history, hopes to be catalyst for giving to HBCUs - AL.com

Optimism among stock market investors has dropped to one of the lowest levels, according to a survey by the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII).

The AAII Sentiment Survey showed optimism declining, remaining unusually low, according to an Oct. 13 post by AAII. Bullish sentiment for the week is among the 60 lowest readings in the surveys history. Pessimism rose slightly and continues to be unusually high. Bullish sentimentexpectations that stock prices will rise in the next six monthsfell by 3.6 percentage points to 20.4 percent. It is below the 38 percent historical average for the 47th straight week.

Meanwhile, bearish sentiment rose 1.2 percentage points to 55.9 percent. It is above the 30.5 percent historical average for the 46th out of the past 47 weeks.

The bull-bear spread (bullish minus bearish sentiment) is 35.6 percent and is unusually low for the 32nd time in 38 weeks. This weeks reading ranks among the most negative in the surveys history. The breakpoint between typical and unusually low readings is currently 11.0 percent, the post said.

According to AAII, unusually low readings of bullish sentiment and bull-bear spread have been followed by the S&P 500 realizing above-average and above-median returns in the following six to 12-month periods.

The decline in investor optimism comes as consumer and business outlooks about the economy remain negative.

The latest survey by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) found that the proportion of owners expecting business conditions to improve in the next six months fell by two points to a net negative 44 percent.

A consumer survey by the University of Michigan found peoples expectations of year-ahead inflation rose in September while their expectations of the economy dipped.

The S&P 500 has fallen by close to 25 percent year-to-date while the Dow is down by over 18 percent. The most recent week saw the Dow shed over 400 points while the S&P 500 fell by 2.37 percent to 3,583.07. Inflation remains a top concern in the minds of investors.

As inflation remains elevated for longer and the Fed hikes further, the risk increases that the cumulative effect of policy tightening pushes the U.S. economy into recession, undermining the outlook for corporate earnings, UBS global wealth management chief investment officer Mark Haefele said in a note, according to CNBC.

Last month, Goldman Sachs lowered its S&P 500 year-end target for the fourth time this year to 3,600, which is 29 percent below the 5,100 level it had forecast back in February.

Analysts at Morgan Stanley are expecting the S&P 500 to fall to 3,400 by the end of the year. But in case the U.S. economy slips into a recession, the index is projected to fall up to 3,000.

Follow

Naveen Athrappully is a news reporter covering business and world events at The Epoch Times.

Original post:

Investor Optimism Drops to One of 60 Lowest Readings in History - The Epoch Times