This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: Library of Congress
Aug 28, 2008
Read brief summaries of past Democratic and Republican National Conventions.
Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Aug 28, 2008
Sunday marks the 205th anniversary of the day Meriwether Lewis launched his boat from Pittsburgh, beginning a landmark journey that took him down the Ohio, up the Mississippi and Missouri and on to the Pacific. This morning, a state historical marker commemorating the event was unveiled near the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.
"On Aug. 31, 1803, Capt. Meriwether Lewis launched a 50-foot 'keeled boat' from Fort Fayette, 100 yards downriver. This marked the beginning of the
Source: USA Today
Aug 28, 2008
Barack Obama's decision to move his nomination acceptance speech from an indoor arena to an outdoor stadium may be a smart effort to tap the Kennedy mystique, open up the convention and generally stir things up.
But almost a half-century later, it remains unclear whether the precedent that helped inspire the move — John F. Kennedy's"New Frontier" convention acceptance speech at the Los Angeles Coliseum in 1960 — was itself a success, or even a good idea.
Those who were there and th
Source: CNN
Aug 28, 2008
Standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on August 28,1963, Martin Luther King Jr. shared his vision for a new America:
"I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal,' " he said before a crowd of hundreds of thousands.
King's dream for a land where his children would "not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content
Source: HNN Staff
Aug 28, 2008
This was the headline in the NY Post today, a reference to the edifice erected at Invesco Field for Barack Obama's acceptance address.
Coincidentally, today the folks who run James Madison's home dispatched an email to the media about"Mr. Madison's Temple"--a real
Source: Telegraph
Aug 28, 2008
Map-reading is a dying art because of the increasing reliance on the
internet and satellite navigation systems, the country's top cartographer
has warned.
Mary Spence, MBE, President of the British Cartographic Society, said the
ubiquitous sat nav in cars means people now concentrate only on going from
A to B without noticing where they are or how they got there.
As a result the whereabouts of the thousands of churches, ancient
woodlands, stately homes and eccentric landmarks
Source: http://www.westbranchtimes.com
Aug 28, 2008
There’s a story that persists from the North Liberty Cemetery, just north
and east of Springdale, that 17 escaped slaves died and were buried along
this stop in the Underground Railroad.
Lending credence to the 150-year-old tale is that the west half of the
three-acre, fenced-in parcel of land has not a single headstone or marker
anywhere on it. Cemetery caretakers seemed to have deliberately kept this
section undisturbed.
“It’s the most unusual cemetery I’ve ever seen,” arc
Source: NYT
Aug 28, 2008
Dezie Woods-Jones plans to stand Thursday night with her California
delegation in a stadium here and listen to Barack Obama, the first black
major-party presidential nominee in the nation's history, give his
acceptance speech. Woods-Jones, now in her 60s, is one of a tiny handful
of delegates who on the same day in 1963, Aug. 28, stood with hundreds of
thousands at the March on Washington and heard a young minister, the Rev.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., deliver his soaring"I Have a Dream" s
Source: Independent
Aug 28, 2008
The rugged drovers who herded their cattle and sheep around Australia, braving dust, drought and hardship, are a central part of the Outback myth. But their iconic stock routes – known as the “Long Paddock” – are now under threat, with state governments poised to consign them to history.
The routes, a network of tracks in eastern Australia linking rural properties with shearing sheds and saleyards, helped the young country to forge a national character. Developed from the 1830s onw
Source: Telegraph
Aug 28, 2008
But the wartime prime minister inadvertently signed the death warrant of the Special Operations Executive by delaying a decision on it until after the 1945 general election, which he lost to Clement Attlee.
Lord Selborne, who as Minister of Economic Warfare headed up the service, argued against putting the clandestine force under the control of the Foreign Office, which wanted to merge it with the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS).
He argued that to do so would be "
Source: Telegraph
Aug 28, 2008
The remarkable discovery, which has yet to be confirmed by military authorities, was made by astonished trekkers walking the Kokoda Trail, a tortuous mountain path which witnessed intense fighting between Japanese and Australian forces in 1942.
"I couldn't make it out at first. It wasn't until the wind blew that you could really see (that) it is in a harness. There are goggles and it appears to be caught up in cables, so presumably it is an airman," said trekking guide Da
Source: Telegraph
Aug 28, 2008
Svergies Television, which set up cameras on Sweden's Storsjon or Great Lake, has released images of a blurry, long and narrow silhouette moving in the depths said to be the famous Swedish sea monster.
"It clearly shows that it's warm and is made up of cells, otherwise our cameras wouldn't indicate red, so it can be a sea snake or some other kind of sea animal," said a member of the film crew.
Efforts to find the monster are being stepped up amid internation
Source: McClatchy
Aug 28, 2008
Preston Marshall stared down fire hoses, billy clubs and hatred to march with Martin Luther King Jr.
Eufaula Frazier watched her Liberty City neighborhood burn after police were cleared of beating an unarmed black motorcyclist to death.
Neither thought they would ever see this day.
On Thursday, when Barack Obama officially becomes the first black presidential nominee, he will stand on the shoulders of these longtime Miamians and other African Americans who
Source: Independent
Aug 28, 2008
Anna Goeldi was executed for being a witch more than 220 years ago, the last one beheaded in Europe. On Wednesday, the Swiss cleared her name. The parliament of the Swiss canton (state) of Glarus decided unanimously to exonerate Goeldi as a victim of "judicial murder", said Josef Schwitter, a government spokesman.
Several thousand people, mainly women, were executed for witchcraft between the 14th and 18th centuries in Switzerland, and elsewhere in Europe. Yet Goeldi's tri
Source: NYT
Aug 28, 2008
It was the speech of a lifetime for the young presidential candidate: Accepting the Democratic nomination before a sea of supporters outside of the party’s convention hall, and — more critically — addressing concerns of Americans nationwide about his experience level, policy ideas and personal background.
The "New Frontier" speech by John F. Kennedy, as it came to be known, electrified the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on July 15, 1960, and it was widely regarded as succes
Source: Times
Aug 28, 2008
Two of the most important paintings in Britain could be lost to the nation unless 100 million pounds is found to keep them. The paintings, by the Renaissance master Titian, are believed to be worth 300 million pounds on the open market, but are offered at a discount to the nation by the Duke of Sutherland.
He has set a deadline of New Year’s Eve to agree the 50 million pound purchase of Diana & Actaeon, with a second 50 million pounds asked for Diana & Callisto in four year
Source: Telegraph
Aug 28, 2008
The 27-year-old slice was bought by an anonymous buyer on a telephone bid even though only the marzipan and icing remain.
It was originally given to Moyra Smith, a member of the late Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother's household at Clarence House, who preserved the topping in cling film and kept it in a metal tin.
The nine-inch square piece of icing and marzipan weighs 28 ounces, bears the royal coat-of-arms and is coloured in gold, silver, red and blue.
I
Source: Missourian
Aug 27, 2008
About 20 years ago, two men exploring 'Picture Cave' (east-central
Missouri, USA) found paintings on the rock walls and sent hand-drawn
reproductions to archaeologists Jim Duncan and Carol Diaz-Granados."These things are fake!" Duncan remembered thinking at the time. As it
turned out, the nature and location of the drawings contradicted
widely held beliefs about Mississippian culture. The figures on the
walls of the cave now provide crucial details of the prehistoric
timeline o
Source: NYT
Aug 27, 2008
From the earliest days of his presidential campaign, those around Senator Barack Obama have heard the same mantra. He repeated it after he announced his candidacy and after debates, after victories and defeats.
“I need to get better,” he would say.
In the way Mr. Obama has trained himself for competition, he can sometimes seem as much athlete as politician. Even before he entered public life, he began honing not only his political skills, but also his mental and emotion
Source: International Herald Tribune
Aug 27, 2008
With a band of traditional Korean drummers, a Latin dance
group and a martial arts exhibition, city officials broke ground Wednesday
on a small urban pocket park at the site where Robert F. Kennedy was
assassinated 40 years ago.
Few in the crowd of more than 200 knew much about Kennedy except that he
had been shot to death at the site of the old Ambassador Hotel after
winning California's Democratic presidential primary in 1968.
But many said they thought a park would be a fit
