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The Stolen Celebration 

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You might have gathered if you read Wednesday’s entry that I was a little peeved that our President torpedoed the national celebration of our country’s 250th birthday.

A few days ago, Sabrina Haake, a federal trial attorney from Gary, Indiana specializing in First and Fourteenth Amendment defenses, wrote this piece that appeared on Altnet. She also has The Haake Take on Substack. It explains and amplifies my resentment at President Trump’s hijacking the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.  Here she reports on an investigation into those events.

Trump just robbed America of a sacred reckoning that may never come again | Opinion

House Democrats on the Natural Resources Committee have released a report describing how the  White House cheated the American public on its 250th birthday. It outlines interim findings that the Trump organization put together a shell company to supplant the Congressionally-created commission, America 250, with a partisan one, Freedom 250, defrauding donors and pilfering donations along the way.

In 2016, ten years in advance of the country’s 250th birthday, Congress created a nonpartisan commission called America 250 to plan and orchestrate the largest commemoration in U.S. history. Its mandated purpose was to encourage all Americans to ‘remember the nation’s past, celebrate the present, and look forward to building a promising future.’

America250 spent ten years organizing events, volunteer campaigns, and educational initiatives across all 50 states to celebrate our Semi-quincentennial. America250’s slogan, “350 for 250- Engaging all 350 million Americans in celebrating our nation’s 250th anniversary,” stresses civic inclusivity devoid of politics.

But last year, after his attempts to pack America250 with loyalists were unsuccessful, Trump created a competing commission, Freedom 250,  via executive order. Falsely describing Freedom 250 as the “national, non-partisan organization leading the celebration of our Nation’s 250th birthday,” Freedom 250 was incorporated as an LLC in October 2025. Under the National Park Foundation, governed by a board of Trump loyalists, Freedom 250 solicited pay-to-play from companies with major federal contracts pending— including Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Oracle —to financially support Freedom 250 instead of America250.

Defrauding the nation on its 250th birthday

The report describes how Trump demanded that his name and name-branded politics should dominate the historic celebrations. When America250 pushed back on Trump’s plan as too partisan, he supplanted the commission by creating his own.

After Freedom 250 hijacked federal planning activities, most scheduled performers withdrew from the celebration. They had agreed to perform at a national, nonpartisan concert, but cancelled when they found out it was overtly partisan. Other activities planned by Trump’s Freedom 250 included the very on-brand Military Parade for Trump’s birthday and this year’s White House UFC cage fight, along with the controversial Great American State Fair.  The latter featured partisan exhibits complete with a confederate flag; the 16-day event caused extensive damage to the lawns and the National Mall. Meanwhile, Freedom 250 continues the Trump-centric assault, planning construction on his  250-foot-tall “triumphal arch.”.”

Trump illegally billed his July 4 culminating speech on the National Mall as a “TRUMP RALLY,” making himself—not the nation, not our history— the central figure of America’s only 250th birthday celebration. Trump’s rally, replete with partisan rhetoric and fearmongering about Democrats, concluded with “the largest fireworks display ever,” costing taxpayers an estimated $45 million..

Millions for Trump’s cronies

A separate report from Public Citizen describes how a “Trumpified series of events at the public’s expense” awarded over $100 million in no-bid contracts to celebrate our 250th birthday to a network of Trump-affiliated political allies. One of those contracts awarded tens of millions of dollars to Event Strategies, Inc., the same firm behind the J6 attack on the U.S. Capital.

Out of $120 million in public funds Congressionally earmarked for America250 planned celebrations, over $100 million was funneled directly to entities with political ties to Trump, essentially turning it into Trump’s slush fund with little or no transparency, accounting, or public reporting. Overall, Trump’s Freedom 250 received between $65 and $80 million of the funding Congress allocated to America250.

Alas, the fraud and self-dealing didn’t stop there. Aside from the deceptive rebrand, awarding hundreds of millions in no-bid contracts to Trump cronies, inviting pay to play federal contractor donations, and diverting Congressional funds to Trump’s partisan commission, public donations intended for America250 were purposely diverted to Trump’s organization.

Wire fraud and deception are not Presidential activities entitling Trump to criminal immunity

According to interim findings, donors who tried to send money to America250 were misled and given Freedom 250’s banking information, meaning contributions solicited in the name of the Congressionally mandated commission were routed instead to the President’s substitute entity. As yet unverified, the facts suggests that America250 donors were defrauded through wire transfer instructions, bank account numbers, and routing numbers that funneled their donations to Trump’s Freedom 250 commission.

Trump converted America’s once-in-250-years celebration into a parade of self-regard and personal enrichment, embodying our founders’ warning about men like him. Assuming the evidence matches the allegations, his tactics constitute criminal fraud, and the evidence won’t be hard to track down. Electronic records of online donations and routing can’t be erased; metadata will prove what was sent, by whom and when, and how it was diverted to Freedom 250. Such deception also likely constitutes wire fraud as well as charitable solicitation fraud.

Democratic lawmakers are now demanding a full accounting of diverted donor records and contracts, while Republican leadership has largely blocked information, shielded people involved, and refused to hold hearings on the matter. Democrats, in the minority, have diminished subpoena power, but that is likely to change in November.

Trump’s criminal immunity will be challenged after the midterms; even now, it only applies to “presidential acts” arising from core constitutional duties. Establishing an entity to compete with the Congressionally mandated America250 commission was illicit, extra-judicial, and purely partisan, and very likely exceeds any official, constitutional, or statutory authority. Trump billing our 250th July 4 celebration on the national mall as a TRUMP RALLY sealed the deal.

Trump robbed Americans of a sacred commemoration that won’t come again for many generations, if ever. He wanted to make our nation’s 250th birthday all about him. History books will likely oblige.

85

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I have seen more than I will see,

Done more than I will do.

But there is today.

I have loved more than I will love,

Been loved more than I will be loved.

But there is today.

I have gone more than I will go,

Flown more than I will fly.

But there is today.

I have harmed more than I will harm,

Been harmed more than I will be harmed.

But there is today.

I have lived more than I will live,

Written more than I will write,

Sung more than I will sing,

Said more than I will say.

Learned more than I will learn,

But there is today.

There always will be today.

To be more;

To do more;

To love more;

To write more;

To live more;

To learn more;

To sing more;

Be.

Do.

Live.

Sing.

Learn

Love.

Today.

Tomorrow?

Another Day?

Let me have this day.

We shall deal with tomorrow

When it comes.

(copyright 2026  Bob Priddy)

CC250

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I was a member of the Cole County 250 Committee that was convened to celebrate the nation’s birthday.  Fifty years ago (have trouble being comfortable with starting a sentence about something I’ve done with such a phrase—I find it easier to say, “In 1976….”) I was Secretary of the Jefferson City American Revolution Bicentennial Committee.

My role with the CC250 commission was minimal compared to the work done by our leaders who worked tirelessly to make sure every community in the County was involved.  At the end, we four survivors of he JCARBC couldn’t help but compare this celebration to the one we pulled off in 1976.

In 1976, we had a national ARBC that funded projects and programs and events and helped develop and coordinate events in each state.  We hosted a statewide conference for local Bicentennial events. We opened a little store that sold tickets to our attractions (the main one being the American Freedom Train’s visit) or sold Bicentennial flags of varying sizes and mementoes, and publicized the events we coordinated locally.  On July 4th weekend, we had a big blowout downtown on Saturday and Sunday, concluding with the first major fireworks show at the Capitol—establishing an event that has been done every year since.

Restoration of Lohman’s Landing, one of the few surviving steamboat commerce sites still in use along the Missouri River, was a state-designated a state American Revolution Bicentennial Project. We installed a time capsule there.

Our Cole County group this year was led by people connected with the Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution but included several others. We have planted trees in Cole County communities that we hope will grow tall and strong and beautiful, symbolizing our nation’s growth by the time the 300th anniversary comes alone. We have done programs about the American Revolution at our library. We sponsored a poster contest for our school children with the winning poster going to a national competition.

Saturday, July 4, we had booths on the Avenue of History—Madison Street in front of the Governor’s Mansion—-that included local historical and civics organization until storm clouds gathered and we decided to bail out.  The high winds that struck our area were not something we wanted to deal with.

The city had a parade and a fireworks display—-at the Capitol—when the storm had passed.

I’m proud of the work CC250 did.  The city, the county, and the state might have done more had the same kind of commitment been seen from the national commission formed to celebrate the anniversary.

Congress created the United States Semi Quincentennial Commission in 2016. It was to be like the 1976 commission—bipartisan and nonpartisan. It was given a $150 million budget to coordinate the nationwide celebration. There even were plans to pull one of the three locomotives used in the 1976 Freedom Train away from a museum in Baltimore, restore it, and use it for a 2026 Freedom Train.

The legislature in 2022 established The America 250 Missouri Commission to “plan, promote, and implement public celebrations and commemorations of the anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Intendance.  The next year the legislature authorized the state commission to coordinate with the federal commission as well as other state and local programs for the occasion.

Then came Donald Trump.

He established the White House Task Force on “Celebrating America’s 250th Birthday. It was to organize events in Washington, D.C. while the America 250 was left in charge of coordinating national events. But by the middle of this year, the America 250 Commission had received only about $25 million of the $150 million originally approved by Congress.

While funding dried up for the Congressionally-approved commission, Trump’s task force was getting $68 million in taxpayer money from the Department of the Interior run by Trump appointee Doug Burgum.

In April, the American Freedom Train Foundation 250 announced there would be no national train tour for this anniversary.

Its news release did not directly blame Trump while saying, “Coming out of the tumultuous period at the start of this decade, planning for the Quarter-Millennial was behind schedule in relation to planning for the spirited Bicentennial. In an effort to honor America’s history and heroes, Ross Rowland, the visionary behind the 1975-76 Bicentennial version of the American Freedom Train, sought to get the train back on the tracks for the Quarter-Millennial celebrations. Following Ross’s unexpected passing in June 2025, others stepped up and worked to realize his goal.”

… The team was unable to secure the necessary operating agreements with railroads, and there was insufficient interest on the part of corporate America in sponsoring the train. These challenges, in combination with the tight timelines involved, proved to be insurmountable.”

The kind of national celebration of the anniversary we had in 1976 was replaced by the Trump show on the Mall in Washington that did not come close to the hype and the expenditures the president trumpeted.   His speech was hardly inspirational and as usual was delivered as if he were seeing the copy for the first time.

And so our nation’s 250th birthday fizzled despite the record amount spent on fireworks over the mall (which left the damaged reflecting pool littered with trash and fireworks debris and caused enough severe air problems that several people went to the hospital).

We did well in Cole County by way of honoring the 250th anniversary.  It was dignified and it left behind a series of trees to remind our descendants that some people sought more than the self-indulgent events on the National Mall that had less to do with the Declaration of Independence than it did for a president’s ego. But for some of us—and I want to emphasize that am not demeaning the things this year’s committee accomplished—a spark was missing.

Friday, we turn to a report revealing whole stole it and what might happen next.

But tomorrow we have a special message

Sports: Homer King, Draftees, Hall of Famers, and some speed

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by Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(ALL-STAR GAME)—The All-Stars play tonight. But last night was reserved for the homer boys and the fourth guy from the left won it all.

(L-R: Ben Rice, Yankees; Wilson Contreras, Cardinals; Joe Caglianone, Royals; Jordan Walker, Cardinals; Murakami, White Sox; Caminero, Rays; Harper and Schwarber, Phillies.

Cardinals outfielder Jordan Walker could be in line for some major endorsement money from the chewing gum company whose product he was enthusiastically working over last night when he beat one of the biggest home runs guys in baseball to become the first Redbird and the second youngest competitor  to win the All Star Game’s Home Run Derby.

Walker, watching his winning home run fly into the stands in Philadelphia, beat hometown star Kyle Schwarber 12-11 on his last swing to take home the trophy.  He had matched former Cardinals catcher Willson Contreras’ 13 home runs in the first round and won his second-round matchup 6-5 against Junior Campanero of the White Sox, setting up the final slugfest.  He cleared the fence with his last six swings to take the trophy—-and the $1 million prize, some $300,000 more than he is to earn from the Cardinals this year.

It would not be a surprise if some of that money was a tip for the guy who threw all of those fat pitches last night: Cardinals bullpen catcher Kleininger Teran.  Teran was no stranger to the job. He pitched to Albert Pujols, the last St. Louis participant in the event, in 2022.  He also has thrown a lot of batting practice to Walker in his still young career.

Walker faces real pitching tonight in the All Star game.

Royals outfielder Jac Caglianone had eight home runs in the first round, not enough to advance, but he put on an impressive power show.  He was the only competitor to hit the ball into the stadium’s upper deck with one of his shots measured at 477 feet.  His father was his pitcher.

(BABY BIRDS)—The St. Louis Cardinals have chosen two dozen futures in the MLB draft. They had the most picks—seven—in the first four rounds. None of these players is obligated to sign a contract and none is forever linked to the team. Some might want to wait another two or three years to finish their college education and improve their skills in hope of moving up in a future draft.

The first choice was Georgia high school outfielder Trevor Condon, the first high schooler taken as the number one pick by St. Louis since another Georgia player who has turned out pretty well—Jordan Walker. Condon finished his last high school season hitting .504 with nine home runs, 42 RBIs and 15 stolen bases. He has committed to playing college ball at Tennessee.

The second choice played for Tennessee this past season, Tegan Kuhns, a 6-3 righthander with a big curve and a 98 mph fastball.

The Redbirds’ third choice was Rocco Maniscalo, an Alabama high school shortstop who is only two months into his 17th year.  Scouting Director Randy Flores says he has “current” tools which puts him ahead of players drafted for their hope and projectionables.

Outfielder Andrew Williamson, was next. He played for Central Forida next year.

Other picks;

Kansas State shortstop Dee Kennedy, who hatted .357 with 10 homers in 114 college games.

Right-handed pitcher Dawson Montesa, who plans to skip his last year at West Virginia University to join the Cardinals system.

Left hander Luke Harrison from the University of Texas.

First Baseman Jack Gurevitch from San Diego State.

Southpaw Cade Crossland from Oklahoma; Righty Ethan Young from East Carolina; Hawaii outfielder Matthew Miura; Pitcher Payton Graham, a righty, from Gonzaga; Penn State shortstop ryan Weingartner; Third Baseman Michael Dattalo, who played for Dallas Baptist last season; Stetson University Ty Van Dyke, a right-handed pitcher; Texas shortstop Jalin flores; Northern Kentucky right-handed pitcher Kaden Echeman; Righty Jake Shelagowski from Saginaw Valley State.  Later choices are Iowa RHP Anthony Watts; Stanford SS Trevor Haskins, Kansas City right-handed pitcher Alex Breckheimer,  Austin Peay outfielder Cameron Nickens, right-handed pitchers Dylan Driessen from South Dakota State and Liam Best from Appalachian State and the final choice (number 624), Central Missouri catcher Chase Heath

(FUTURE ROYALTY)—Thirteen of the Kansas City Royals 16 picks are pitchers but their first choice was a surprise:

Louisville outfielder Zion Rose who is described as having “elite contact skills, speed, and power.”  He finished the recent hitting .417, two dozen stolen bases, six homers and 47 ribbies.  Rose had been listed 30th in MLB’s pipeline.

The second choice was the 40th-ranked prosect, Ole Miss right handed pitcher Taylor Rabe, who has a fastball of 96-100 mph and strong control.

Third was 17-year old Jack Slightom, who has committed to playing for Cincinnati University, followed by West Virginia lefty Maxx Yehl who is said to have an “MLB-ready arm.”  Their last pick in the first round was Oswego East High School (Illinois) left-handed hitting outfielder Dominic Battista. He missed part of his last high school season with a broken bone in his wrist but batted .242.  Scouts say he’s just coming into his own at the plate but “has defensive instincts and speed.”  He’s expected to forego his freshman year at the University of Illinois-Chicago.

Kansas City started the second day with Arkansas lefty reliever Ethan McElvain, who went 6-0 this season with a 1.88 ERA and made the SEC second all conference team followed by Clemson left-handed pitcher Jack LeGuernie, who was on the national Pitcher of the Year watch list. 4.69 ERA in 19 appearances.

Others chosen by the Royals are Georgia right-hander Dylan Vigue, a junior starter for the Georgia team tied for third in the College World Series.  He was 4-1 in eighteen appearances including 16 starts—63 IP, 77K, 36BB, 4.43 ERA.

Florida Gulf Coast lefty Hunter Possehl went in the 8th round with Oklahoma third baseman Camden Johnson (.293, 9 HR, 48 RBI) picked up in the 9th round.

LSU right-hander Grant Fontenot went in the tenth round. Last year he was in 21 games (4 starts) got 42Ks in 32.1 innings. He was followed St. Mary’s outfielder Tanner Griffith who his .342 in his last season, had a .477 OBP, was an All-WCC second teamer. He plans to play his last collegiate year for TCU, though.

Others; College of Central Florida right handed pitcher Lance Hartley; Nicholls State righty dalton Hill; catcher Banks Wickersham of Fort Dorchester High School in South Carolina, a commit to the College of Charleston. In his senior year of high school he hit .459; Virginia Tech left hander Madden Clement from Virginia Tech; and Troy University Righty Dylan Alonso.

They finished up with right-handed pitcher Richie Roman of Houston; New Mexico southpaw Cooper Cockrean, who has announced he’s going to the University of Kentucky next year; Pitcher Hudson, a righty from Mooresville High School in Indiana, a commit to the University of Alabama, and—finally—Riley McDonald from the State College of Florida, a reliever.

(MIZZOUHOF)—Six former Tiger Athletes are the newest members of the MU Sports Hall of Fame—

Football players Nick Bolton of the Kansas City Chiefs and Drew Lock of the Seattle Seahawks, along with player and later coach Andy Hill as well as  softball player Ashley Fleming, wrestler Daniel Lewis and Nicki Weber Moore, who ran cross country and other track and field events. They’ll be honored during a ceremony October 9.

Now: Fast Times in Atlanta

(NASCAR)—A late, soggy nail-biter at Atlanta ended with Ryan Blaney dominating the race but needing every inch of his car’s nose to win the race that ended just before 2 a.m., Atlanta time.  Rain and lightning had stopped the race for three hours just before the halfway mark.

Blaney—who was racing to lead his 171st lap in the 263-lap race—Bubba Wallace, Christopher Bell, and Carson Hocevar came out of the last turn in a dogfight for the finish line and Blaney crossed the line just ahead of Wallace.

Wallace, however, saw his second place finish taken away by NASCAR, which penalized him for dropping below the yellow line marking the inside of the track on the last lap, and moved Wallace to 29th place as the official last car on the lead lap.  Wallace objected, noting he had been pushed below the line by teammate Bell and did not gain a position because of it.  But as of press time, the penalty stood.  Bell is officially second by less than seven-hundredths of a second.

Six races remain before the ten-race playoffs begin with the top 16 drivers in the points competing for the NASCAR Cup.  Wallace’s penalty, instead of solidifying his position well within the runoff field, puts him 13th in the points standings, 55 points ahead of three-time Cup champion Joey Logano, who is the first out at this point.

(INDYCAR)—The Silly Season has arrived for IndyCar in a big way with the Arrow McLaren team announcing that two of its drivers this year will be replaced by a couple of bigger names next year. Gone are Christian Lundgaard, a two-race winner this year  who is third in the points, and Nolan Siegel who is in his second year with the team. Siegel has yet to develop, never finishing higher than 23rd in the standings in his first two seasons. He is 21st in this, his third year, in IndyCar.

O’Ward won the most recent race with Lundgaard second.

Replacing them are two bigger names—this year’s Indianapolis 500 winner, Felix Rosenqvist, moving over from Meyer Shank Racing, and one of the sport’s most prominent figures—Scott Dixon.

Dixon is leaving Chip Ganassi Racing after 24 years of full-time racing, six series championships (second to A. J. Foyt’s seven), 59 wins (only Foyt has more, with 67) and the 2008 Indianapolis 500. It appears, however, that his longtime sponsor, PNC Bank, will stay with Ganassi. Team owner Chip Ganassi says he oftered Dixon a multi-year offer that would have let him finish his career with his team, but Dixon chose to go a different direction.

Dixon and Rosenqvist will be teamed with Pato O’Ward, one of the most popular drivers in the series.

(photo credits: Walker—Instagram; Condon—Condon family;  Rose—USA Network; Home Run Derby—MLB; Blaney—NASCAR; Dixon—Rick Gevers at Indianapolis)

Sports: The Sports Society Page; The top 100 in the NFL; The Three W’s as All-Star Selections, and our weekly dose of speed.  

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

 

This has been the most famous kissing photo in New York history—Alfred Eisenstadt’s image of a sailor and a nurse celebrating in Times Square the end of WWII.  Now there’s a rival (although, not really. It’s just an image inspired by historic one.)

 

For the society-watchers, here are some details reported by various media of the wedding of the year so far, the Swift/Kelce nuptials held in a quaint little chapel called Madison Square Garden:

The officiating officer was comedian Adam Sandler whose 2025 movie sequel Happy Gilmore 2 included a cameo by Kelce, whom Sandler called “a gentle, nice guy, and funny as hell…a great actor and a real human.” He told TIME magazine Swift is “incredible” and “ridiculously nice to his children.”  They didn’t have a lot of maids of honor and male counterparts. Her brother, Ausin, was “man of honor,’ and Kelce’s brother, Jason, was the best man.

VARIETY reported Kelce’s boss, Andy Reid found the advice given the couple by Sandler to be “really touching.” (Sandler told them, “Kiss every chance you have. Every day. Whether  you’re going to bed or going to work. Whenever, go ahead and kiss her.”)

An immediate honeymoon does not appear to be on the horizon, according to knowledgeable Swift-Kelce constant observers.

So, it’s official. The All-American jock and the homecoming queen are no longer just a couple. They’re a MARRIED couple. We hope they have the strength to endure the heat of the spotlight and the expected tabloid headlines forecasting the worst.

Now we can get on with the less important stuff.

(CHIEFS)—-CBS Sports has put out a list of the 100 best players in the NFL. Kelce isn’t on it but the Chiefs have three percent of that list—Parick Mahomes, center Creed Humphrey, and Defensive Lineman Chris Jones.  Mahomes is number 7 on the list, Humphrey 23rd, and Jones is 62nd.

The list was put together by CBS’ Pete Prisco, who has covered the NFL for thirty years. He says of Mahomes, who was number one last year, “He’s still one of the best – if not the best – quarterbacks in the league.”

Humphrey, who allowed zero sacks and only seven pressures in 708 pass-blocking snaps last year “was the best center in the league again last season, displaying the ability to move people in the run game and excel in pass protection. Patrick Mahomes has to love having him as his center.”

Jones’ 63 quarterback pressures last year ranked him third in the NFL. He was 18th on last years list and Prisco comments, “He’s not the player he was a few years ago, but he’s still capable of being a force inside. The sack numbers have declined in recent years, and he hasn’t had double-digit sacks since 2023.”

His top five players are Rams Defensive End Myles Garrett (whose 23 sacks last year set a new record), Rams QB Matthew Stafford, the MVP last year, Bills QB Josh Allen, Cincinnati WR Ja’Marr Chase, and Bengals QB Joe Burrows, who, like Mahomes, missed a chunk of games las year with an injury.  The only other player rated above Mahomes is Detroit Offensive Tackle Penel Sewell

(HARDY)—The most recent report on Missouri Tiger running back from Coach Drinkwitz is that he is ahead of schedule in recovering from a gunshot wound to his leg but he still has a lot of recovering to do.

His situation has not kept him from being listed as a pre=season All-American by the Walter Camp Foundation. On the list with him is Kewan Lacey of Ole Miss, who started his college career at Mizzou before transferring in 2025.

The Tiger PR machine reminds us we are about 58 days away from the first game of the 2026 season opener with Arkansas Pine Bluff.

(UFL)—Almost two dozen players from the recently-finished United Football League season have been given a chance to make a National Football League roster.  Two of them are from the St. Louis Battlehawks—receiver Hakeem Butler, who led the league receiving yards, and Corner Back Sean Fresch Jr.  Both are going to get looks from the Denver Broncos.

Baseball—-

(ALL-STARS)—We are a week away from baseball’s All-Star team. Missouri’s teams have one position player starter, Kansas City shortstop Bobby Winn, and one reserve position player, Jordan Walker of the Cardinals.

Royals starting pitcher Michael Wacha, a former Redbird, is on the AL pitching roster. Wacha is 5-6 for one of the worst teams in baseball this year. He’d have a much better record if he had better run support from a generally punchless lineup. His ERA is a decent 3.45. He has 91 strikeouts in 114.1 innings. He leads the league in innings pitched.

As always, there are those whose absence sparks some comment. The biggest might be former Cardinals pitcher Sonny Gray, who leads the American League in wins, at 10-1 and is second in ERA (2.61) to Tampa Bay’s Nick Martinez, who also didn’t make the AL roster.

Gray’s teammate from St. Louis also with the Red Sox, first baseman Willson Contreras, might make the team after all because chosen starter Vladimir Guerrero Jr., is having back issues and says he’ll sit out.

The Cardinals’ only representative on the National League All-Star roster is outfielder Jordan Walker, who ways he was near tears when manager Oliver Marmol announced to the team in the locker room that Walker had made the squad. Marmol says, “Part of the message wasn’t so much just the fact that he’s produced over three months, it’s three years of perseverance to get to this point.”

Cardinals first baseman Alec Burleson is not on the National League roster although he started this week tied for third on the RBI list (four behind Jordan Walker’s 67). Some also think St. Louis DH Ivan Herrera should have made the team. He had ten homers and 58 RBIs at the start of this week.

The game is a week from tonight. It’s the 96th one. The American League leads 48=45 with two ties. The game will be in Philadelphia.

Moving along with those who move along—-

(NASCAR)—Joe Gibbs Racing rolled up a 1-2-3 finish at Chicagoland last weekend with Chase Briscoe outrunning Christopher Bell with Denny Hamlin getting the best view of their last lap fight.

Hamlin started from the pole

Briscoe, Bell, and Hamlin were joined by four other Toyotas in the top ten, the best 1=10 finish in Toyota’s history in NASCAR Cup races.

Briscoe’s remark in victory lane, “I feel so American winning in the Bass Pro Shop’s Red, White, and Blue car, 4th of July weekend, 250 years,” while driving a Japanese-badged car might seem a little odd to some. However, Toyota’s larges Camry manufacturing plant in the world is in Georgetown, Kentucky, where it had been producing cars for 38 years.

(INDYCAR)—The IndyCar title chase has tightened with Pato O’Ward’s win at Mid-Ohio ahead of teammate Christian Lundgaard, the first time Arrow-McLaren has finished 1-2 in its long IndyCar history.

O’Ward got past Lundgaard, who was headed for his second straight win, when Lundgaard went wide on a turn and O’Ward got under him. He stretched the lead to almost a full second at the end. At one time he had a 2.5 second lead on Lundgaard but ten laps later, with ten to go, the lead had been whittled to a second and a half.

O’Ward has ten wins in the series on nine different tracks and is only the second driver to win ten or more games for the team since Johnny Rutherford picked up 18 driving for the team 1973-79.

Kyle Kirkwood joined O’Ward and Lundgaard ont he podium. Points leader Alex Palou finished fifth and saw his lead over Kirkwood to shrink to  still-substantial 56 points after eleven of the 18 races IndyCar will run this year.

(Photo Credits: Times Square Kiss—Google Images; Wedding—JJ’s House; Walker, Witt and Wacha—MLB; Briscoe—NASCAR; O’Ward—Bob Priddy at WWTR

 

From the Wonderful Folks Who Want to Hijack Our History

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The hijacking of our nation’s 250th birthday party by Donald Trump continues, a man who seems motivated to make sure he has a big place in American history.

His place seems assured—potentially as this country’s worst President.

The latest shameful step is his demand that National Park Service employees buy and wear—or the NPS buys and gives employees to wear==Trump’s Freedom 250 pins instead of the decorations from the Congressionally-established America 250 Committee. Mother Jones reports any worker refusing the do so could face disciplinary action.

It means that NPS employees working on the National Mall for the “Trump rally” better be wearing pins from which the President will make a profit—or else.

Trump already has turned the National Park Service into his history propaganda machine. His removal of signs, exhibits, films, and other portrayals of our history and replaced them (if he replaced them at all) with Trump-politically correct versions of history. Court filings indicate at least 37 NPS sites have been affected.

A federal judge had ordered the restoration of the items to their original places by July 3. An NPS spokesman says the agency is not sure that’s enough time to get it all done.

The arrogance of Trump’s Ozymandic quest was put on huge public display a few days ago when a giant poster was unfurled on the Theodore Roosevelt Federal Building showing TR’s face and a quotation attributed to him: “Courage is not having the strength to go on; it is going on when you don’t have the strength.”

The problem is that Co-Director Michael Patrick Cullinane of the Theodore Roosevelt Center told Huff Post, “What I can say for certain is that the quote did not originate with Theodore Roosevelt.”

The Washington Post did an article about it, which prompted a representative of the Office of Personnel Management, that occupies the building, to say the quotation “is commonly attributed to Roosevelt and captures the spirit of the federal workforce.”

(or at least what is left of it after the Trump-Musk eviscerating of numerous federal agencies.)

The comment from OPM’s Laurine Pinover is reminiscent of a quote attributed to President Warren Harding: “I love Paul Revere, whether he rode or not.”  (Paul Revere was one of two riders who rode to Lexington to warn John Hancock and Samuel Adams that the British Army was advancing in that direction.  Revere was captured early in the event, questioned, and freed after being questions.  William Dawes was the one who spread the alarm but who is forgotten because his last name does not rhyme with “Listen my children and you shall hear…”)

Pinover dismissed the article: “As excited as we are about America 250, it’s surprising the Washington Post has taken such an interest in our small agency’s building banners.”

The newspaper notes that there’s another banner alongside Roosevelt’s image that promotes Trump’s Freedom 250 efforts to rewrite history in general.

The Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library gives us a far better statement that he really did make—to the Iowa State Teachers’ Association in November, 1910:

“Nothing in this world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty. No kind of life is worth leading if it is always an easy life. . . . I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life; I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well.”

It’s not something Donald Trump—who has had an easy life but has made the lives of millions of people difficult—would understand. But this one is true, something else Donald Trump doesn’t understand, either.

Notes From a Quiet Hill (data intensive version)

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(“Notes” is a series of irregularly published miscellaneous comments that didn’t quite reach the level of full blogitude*.)

Drove past a yard sign the other day saying “Garage Sale.”   Not for the first time, I thought, “There’s only one letter difference between “garage” and “garbage.”

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One of the great artists of the American West, and a favorite of mine, was St. Louis-born Charles M. Russell. We give much praise to the discoveries of Lewis and Clark on their trip to the Pacific but Russell offered a different perspective on them and their discoveries.

You see, the Native Americans already knew all the things Lewis and Clark “discovered.”  The big thing for Native Americans was the discovery of Lewis and Clark—the title of Russell’s painting.

And that brings us back to a frequently contested idea that this country was founded as a Christian Nation. It already was a nation of numerous religions or interpretations of creation and principles for living in harmony. Christianity was only an addition to the spiritual traditions that existed here already.

As in Russell’s painting, the First Nations people discovered the Christians, who became just added another spiritual tradition here. Christianity is just another interpretation of universal truths that have existed far longer than the New Testament.

Here in Missouri, some missionaries opened Harmony Mission in the western part of the state, an effort to “civilize” the savages.  It closed after several years with nary a convert.  The story is told of one of the missionaries telling the natives the story of Jonah and the Whale, after which one of the leaders of the group wrapped himself in his blanket, told the minister, “We know the White Man lies, but that is the biggest lie we have ever heard,” and stalked away.

Followers of our Euro-Christian traditions, as those who followed after Lewis and Clark, might consider toning down their conceit and remember they were not founders but instead were late-comers to nation of religious traditions, some many years older than theirs.

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Anybody care to guess how much Ashli Babbit’s family could have gotten from the Trump slush fund that was going to pay the peaceful tourists of January 6?  Ten figures?  More?

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We don’t know what to think about data centers.  But there’s so many things these days that we don’t know what to think about. Data centers are one of the biggest topics now and their use of water seems to be a big issue.  I guess they process so much data that they have to water-cool their computers.

This sounds like a great diversification opportunity for Ameren, our electric company. It runs the state’s only commercial nuclear power plant, in Callaway County.  Maybe Ameren should add data centers to their properties, even buy more land if needed.  Ameren uses a lot of Missouri River water in its cooling tower.  Why not recycle that water through some nearby data centers before dumping it back into the river as it does now?

This is an example of knowing what we think but not thinking we know anything about an issue, which probably makes us a typical citizen in these confusing times.

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If the Democrats seize control of both houses of Congress in November, when will they have time to work on a budget and other issues because they likely will be too busy doing house-cleaning impeachments?

They probably will be emboldened because the House Speaker will be a D, and the Speaker is third in the line of succession. For reference, The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 lists: Vice President, Speaker of the House, President pro tempore of the Senate, Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of Defense, Attorney General, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Commerce, Secretary of Labor, Secretary of Health and Human Services, Secretary of Education, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Secretary of Homeland Security—all of whom probably would be gone quickly if the D’s decide the top two in line need to hit the road.

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The President’s plan to turn the nation’s 250th birthday into a celebration of himself has become a struggle for him. We frankly prefer that he show as much interest in being part of the event as he showed about attending his son’s wedding.

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*”blogitude” is a phrase not found in any dictionary known to man except in this writer’s personal lexicon.

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Some Reflections on Memorial Day, Part Four:

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Hundreds of people were at the Speedway as I drove out of town last Monday morning. A few were at the start-finish line—Felix Rosenqvist, his owners and crew for the annual victor’s picture taking. The rest, armed with brooms, shovels, and other equipment, were cleaning up the 500 tons or so of trash left behind by Sunday’s huge crowds. The speedway pays volunteer groups $125 per person to do the cleanup work.

 

Several years ago, I narrated Aaron Copeland’s A LINCOLN PORTRAIT with the Jefferson City Symphony and some of the words began to come back to me as I drove through the rich, flat prairies of the two states.  “He was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, and grew up in Illinois….” 

The way to Indianapolis on I-70 takes people through Vandalia, once the state capital of Illinois.  The old capitol still stands, and the House of Representatives where Lincoln began his political career has been recreated.

I wanted to go on a northern route home that would take me through Springfield, where Lincoln lived and owned the only house he would ever own, where he prospered as a railroad lawyer, and from which he left to become President.  This trip, however, was to take me to the little village to the west where he grew up.

New Salem.

Lincoln struck out on his own after his brief stay in the Decatur area and spent several years in this little village as a laborer, and as an unsuccessful store owner.  It was in New Salem that he began the study of the law and began to practice as a lawyer.  It was in New Salem that Ann Rutledge entered his life and departed from it, a relationship romanticized by many through the decades.

Abe Lincoln was a quiet man; Lincoln was a quiet and a melancholy man.

However deep the Lincoln/Rutledge relationship was, it has been recorded that her death left Lincoln deeply depressed, depression being a condition he dealt with throughout his life.

One of the recreated buildings in the little village is the Rutledge Tavern where Lincoln stayed—a “tavern” being a place offering room and board for visitors and travelers (Missouri’s first official state historic site is the Arrow Rock Tavern, if you want to see what a tavern was in the early 19th Century).

The park was closed the day I stopped on the way home, “closed” meaning the visitors center, restrooms, and the village buildings were unoccupied by staff and reenactors.  But visitors could take a quiet walk among the businesses and homes, the mill and the gardens and the stores.  And I did.

Copeland’s narration and his music went with me.  The composition was created in 1942 but its passages from Lincoln’s speeches seemed appropriate that day as I walked where he had walked. I remembered pieces of the narration and when I got home I pulled the script from that performance with the symphony.

The first segment:

Fellow Citizens, we cannot escape history.  That is what he said. That is what Abraham Lincoln said.

Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation…. We — even we here– hold the power, and bear the responsibility.

The second:

He was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, and grew up in Illinois. And this is what he said. This is what Abe Lincoln said:

The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.  

Both were from his 1862 message to Congress, what we call the State of the Union today.  The third segment:

When standing erect, he was six feet four inches tall. And this is what he said:

It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, “You toil and work and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.” No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.

Lincoln said that during his last debate with Stephen A. Douglas, in Alton, Illinois in 1858. Lincoln lost the race for the U. S. Senate that year but his debates with Douglas brought him national attention.

Segment four:

Abe Lincoln was a quiet man; Lincoln was a quiet and a melancholy man. But when he spoke of Democracy, this is what he said. He said:

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.

Again, from 1858.

And the concluding segment:

Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of these United States, is everlasting in the memory of this country.  For on the battleground at Gettysburg, this is what he said:

From these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

“That cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion,” he said—-referring not to the war but to the re-commitment to the document that created the Union, that created a government “by the people, for the people,” the Declaration of Independence.

I have had a front row seat to the operation of the people’s government for many decades and as I walked the quiet streets where Abraham Lincoln walked I was reminded that the people’s government requires a people’s responsibility whenever there is a “stormy present…piled high with difficulty.’

“We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country,” Abe Lincoln said.

Today, it seems, we are locked in “the eternal struggle of these two principles—right and wrong…The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings.”

“Disenthrall:” —to free ourselves of the present condition, “and then we shall save our country.”

This, again, is what Abe Lincoln said to us in 1862:

The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation…. We — even we here– hold the power, and bear the responsibility.

Tens of thousands of ours have died creating this country, creating and defending a nation that can celebrate its holidays with great noise, great drama, and frivolity while pausing for a few minutes to be grateful for their sacrifices and recommit to keep their faith—–

From these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

After about an hour or maybe an hour and a half, I resumed my drive home. I crossed the Mississippi River with my dashboard telling me I had seventeen miles worth of gas left in the tank. A hundred yards from the bridge at Louisiana Missouri, I put 15.6 gallons of cheaper Missouri gas into a tank that’s supposed to hold 15.5 gallons.

And then I came home.  I had decorated no graves on Memorial Day but I was glad that I lived in a country that those in their graves protected for us, a united nation despite our differences that  pauses for a  gaudy celebration of its existence even in a “stormy present,” knowing that we have the power to restore our nation to one that is of the people, by the people, and has the ability to be made better—-

—-for the people.

(Various prominent people are on YouTube narrating A Lincoln Portrait. I suggest you look at one, or some, of them.)

(Picture credits: City of Vandalia; Bob Priddy)

 

 

Reflections on Memorial Day, Part three  (5/30/26)

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Sunday, things got very serious.

And incredibly intense.

And scary.

The 350,000 fans who would watch the Indianapolis 500 (or just have a big party) had started arriving days earlier, many setting up their tents and mobile homes in the numerous parking lots around the track, some spending the night before the race in their cars on 16th Street.

They began surging through the gates when they opened at 6 a.m., many wearing shirts for their favorite drivers, shirts for cars’ sponsors, and shirts commemorating the event about to unfold before them. The souvenir facilities quickly were swarming with people wanting to buy memories of what they were about to witness.

The grandstands were filling by the time the Borg-Warner trophy was moved to the start-finish line for the race about 9 a.m.

The cars were rolled to their starting spots at 10:30, drivers soon to follow, passing through a few thousand reporters, guests, sponsor representatives and car crews.

Pulses start to quicken with each step of the opening ceremonies saluting veterans and first responders with the presentation of colors, a prayer by Indianapolis Archbishop Charles Thompson, a fourteen-gun salute and taps. Indiana composer, singer, and band leader Emphraim Owens did “America,” and Grammy Nominee Jordin Sparks performed the Start Spangled banner ending with a flyby over the main straightaway by F-16s from the South Dakota National guard.

And then comes the goosebumps moment for thousands—Jim Carnelison’s annual performance of the state song, “Back Home Again in Indiana,” punctuated by a return, east to west by one of the F-16s.

And at last, Roger Penske’s order, “Drivers, Start Your Engines.”

Should you want to share the entire opening ceremonies:

2026 Indy 500 Opening Ceremony | INDYCAR

Weather forecasters for several days had warned that rain could interrupt or even shorten the 110th running of the Indianapolis 500.  The race would become official after 101 of the 200 laps. The pressure was on from the drop of the green flag for drivers to get everything them could get before the rain ended the race. The rain generally stayed away although enough drops fell to pause the race for a few minutes before the intense race against rain resumes.

More than one-fourth of the race was run under caution, the cars circulating at 90-95 mph while crash debris and car remnants were removed from the track. The green flag was out for 149 laps.  The intensity of the competition is reflected in these statistics:

There were seventy lead changes, a record.  Even more telling is this:

One-hundred and thirty seven of the 149 full-throttle laps produced a margin between first and second place of less than one second.  Cars lapped at better than 220 miles an hour, weaving in and out of lines, passing and re-passing.  Thirty-three started; 24 were still challenging one another at the end of the race. Eighteen were on the leader’s lap, the top four within four-tenths of a second of each other.

If you have the endurance, here is the entire race as seen from Rosenqvist’s car—and hear his spotter and his conversations with his crew chief (be prepared to be seated for more than three hours):

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=rosenqvist+cockpit+video&view=detail&mid=3BB33C474F5056FF64F83BB33C474F5056FF64F8&

Marcus Amstrong took the lead at the start of the last lap with contenders  David Malukas and  teammates Pato O’Ward and Felix Rosenqvist and David Malukas tightly behind racing at speeds forty miles an hour faster than the takeoff speed of my son’s Southwest Airlines 737.

The race evolved into a 23-second duel between Malukas and Rosenqvist. Want to take a white-knuckle ride with Rosenqvist on that last lap?

https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=felix+onboard+for+the+last+lap+of+the+500&refig=6a18ca50d02f4504805071

Malukas led out of the fourth turn but Rosenqvist had the momentum.

Rosenqvist by 0.0223 second, the smallest victory margin in Speedway history.

The win was worth $4.3 million of the record $30 million purse.  By the time Rosenqvist took the ceremonial last lap around the track, in the back of a pickup truck, so the crowd could appreciate what he had done, and he and his crew knelt at the start/finish line for the traditional kissing of the bricks, a light rain was falling.

The finish was bitter for Malukas, who wept when he stepped out of his car. He had finished second to Alex Palou last year by 1.142 seconds, meaning he has been separated from two straight wins in the Indianapolis 500 by a combined 1.7 seconds. But he wasn’t the only one disappointed.

 

Santino Ferrucci, whose uniform reflected the nation’s patriotic 250th anniversary theme of the day, finished in the top ten for the eighth straight year. Pato O’Ward, racked up his fifth straight top five including two runner ups.  O’Ward was only 0.4271 seconds behind Scott McLaughlin, finishing fourth. Ferrucci was 8th, 1.571 behind.

Will their time come for Malukas, Fdrrucci, and O’Ward?  Or will they join the long list of men who year after year were within reach of being immortalized on the trophy but never made it.

They’re all yet young and God willing, there will be more chances for their faces to join those of Rosenqvist and 76 others on the big trophy.

Shortly after the 500 ended, the longest race of the NASCAR season was helping Charlotte, North Carolina, observe Memorial Day.  In a few weeks, those cars will roar around the first race track in the world to use the word “Speedway” to describe itself. The cars will be bigger and one-third slower but the fans will be as devoted to them as IndyCar fans are devoted to their cars and drivers, and the competition for a prestigious Brickyard 400 victory at the greatest race track in the world will be equally fierce.

The great track is silent now. But in a few weeks a new roar of engines will be heard as the great track once again knows he heat of racing cars being driven by people doing heroic things.

For me, it was time for a long, quiet ride home, hoping I could make it back to Missouri before having to buy more of that awfully expensive Illinois gas. I found myself thinking of the era that gave us this holiday. After all, I was going to spend the day in the land of the man who was the central figure in it all.

Join me in that ride, if you wish, on Monday.

(picture credits—Bob Priddy and Rick Gevers; Borg-Warner; Finish—The Guardian)

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Some Reflections on Memorial Day, Part One 

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This was a Memorial Day that has taken some time for us to process.  The holiday’s origins are easily overlooked each year by the rush of noisy celebrations that seem far removed from the original intent of the day.  I was awash in those contrasting “celebrations” that have overshadowed the “observance” and “commemoration” originally intended. But I found toward the end in a closed state park a quiet reminder of why Memorial Day is and should be recalled for its origins—and why this contemporary noisy version of Memorial Day anticipates the next great holiday that this year will challenge our honesty about who we have become.

This might be written more for my benefit more than for yours and I hope you will excuse me for these ruminations.  I didn’t plan on them stretching into four chapters but a lot was going on, not the least of which was “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”

We’ll talk about the race but this series is not all about racing for the race is only part of the story.

The weekend had been spent in a city that observes/commemorates Memorial Day throughout the entire month of May. I know of no other city that rivals Indianapolis’s Memorial…..Month.

Indianapolis is a prototype that diminishing cities might use to reinvent themselves.s  through the course of several decades and several setbacks, Indianapolis has emerged as a dynamic, livable place of major league proportions in spirit and enterprise. And each year it throws one big party in May.

Reconciling the big party in that prototype city with the solemnity the holiday was originally created for, reconciling what men and women in the military died for in the war that created Memorial Day dwith what we are and what that the city is provided the ingredients for a lot of thinking on the long drive back to Jefferson City on Monday that took me through a lot of American history and some of my own.

I was born in Decatur Illinois, a town where Abraham Lincoln’s family briefly lived after moving from Indiana. I was raised in two small central Illinois towns, Mt. Pulaski (population about 1,500) and then Sullivan (a bigger place of about 3,300 when we moved there in fourth grade). Abraham Lincoln practiced law in both places as a circuit-riding attorney.

Lincoln scholars point to 1843 as the first time Lincoln and a couple of friends first quoted the phrase from three of the Gospels that “a house divided against itself can not stand” as they helped organize the Illinois Whig Party.

Fifteen years later, he spoke them again in accepting the nomination to run against incumbent Senator Stephen A. Douglas: “If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. . . .A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.”  He lost that election but it paved the way to the presidency two years later and the great test that followed that determined the correctness of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and by 1858 Abraham Lincoln.

A civil war that tested that assertion took Lincoln to Gettysburg on November 19, 1863, where more than seven-thousand soldiers from both sides had been killed and more than forty thousand had been wounded. He paid tribute to those who died defending the Declaration of Independence’s proclamation that our nation had been “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

He called upon the nation that day to complete what he called the “unfinished work”  and “the great task remaining before us,” not referring to the war but to the words of the Declaration. He called for the people to recommit themselves to that cause so the nation should have a “new birth of freedom” flowing from, by, and for the people—a united people, a house NOT divided.

A 1904 newspaper article reported that in October 1864, almost a year after Gettysburg and about six months before the Civil War ended, three women in Boalsburg, Pennsylvania decorated the graves of Union soldiers.  Boalsburg, an unincorporated area of 4,600 today, makes the disputed claim that the event was the earliest documented observance of a memorial day.

On May 1, 1865, just three weeks after Lee’s surrender and two weeks after Lincoln’s death, as many at 10,000 people in deeply Confederate Charleston, South Carolina dedicated the graves of Union soldiers who had died in a Confederate Prison. Reports tell us many in the audience were Black.

Waterloo, NY claims to have held the first FORMAL annual observance of a memorial day on May 5, 1866. Local druggist Henry Welles is credited with thinking of the event.

The first national observance was on May 30, 1868 when former Illinois white supremacist John A. Logan, who had become became strong Lincoln supporter at the start of the war and abandoned his racist sentiments after fighting alongside black troops, issued a national proclamation calling for “for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country. ” Logan, a wartime Union General, was the Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, an organization for Union Army veterans such as my great grandfather. The day originally known as “Decoration Day” was expanded after World War I to honor all of our country’s military dead. It officially became Memorial Day in 1971 when it became a national Monday holiday that now is most often considered the unofficial beginning of summer.

Logan County, where Mt. Pulaski is, was named after Logan’s father. My great grandfather enlisted in the Union Army in Moultrie County, where Sullivan is.

My journey Monday, the now designated Memorial Day, took me back through that area of Lincoln and Logan, and Private Robert T. Priddy—who served under General Sherman at Vicksburg—where Logan was with another Union Army unit.  I had been thinking a lot about the cacophony that the holiday weekend had become as the miles of pavement disappeared beneath my car, I found myself in a quiet place that helped me put the day, the weekend, into a context.  I’ll take you from the cacophony to the quiet in succeeding chapters.

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