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: Reuters
Mar 24, 2007
NEW YORK -- Debris that may have contained bits of bone from victims of the World Trade Center attacks was used to fill potholes and pave city roads, according to court papers filed on Friday.
The charge was made in an affidavit filed in Manhattan federal court in an ongoing case filed in 2005 by family members of those killed in the attacks against the city. They say the city did not do enough to search for remains, denying victims a proper burial.
Source: Times (of London)
Mar 24, 2007
Japan’s most respected elder statesman was forced yesterday to contradict an autobiographical account suggesting that as an officer during the Second World War he forced women to serve as military sex slaves.
Yasuhiro Nakasone, a former prime minister, admitted that Japanese forces forced women to serve on “comfort stations”, the euphemism for military brothels. He denied allegations, based on an account he wrote 29 years ago, that he organised brothels as a military logistics offic
Source: Press Release -- University Newswire
Mar 23, 2007
The University of Texas at Austin's Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center has opened
materials from Watergate journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's on Mark Felt, the source known as Deep Throat, to researchers, scholars and the public.
A selection of the Deep Throat materials can be viewed in an online exhibition at http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/online ,
and portions of the materials from the Felt file will be displayed on the first floor of the Ransom Center from Friday,
Source: Live Science
Mar 23, 2007
Only in science could the discovery of something old and crusty be exciting.
And researchers are very excited about finding chunks of Earth's outer crust that are 3.8 billion years old. Most stuff that old has been folded back into the planet and lost forever or spat back out after being melted into unrecognizable magma.
The discovery, detailed in today's issue of the journal Science, provides solid evidence that Earth had crustal plates way back then that were banging
Source: AP
Mar 23, 2007
JAMESTOWN, Va. —- The first permanent English settlement in North America has more personality than many historic attractions.
Capt. John Smith, the pint-sized adventurer, left a breathless narrative of his exploits.
Commerce took root here, and so did tobacco and slavery.
Then there was the cannibalism.
Still, as the nation prepares to commemorate Jamestown's 400th anniversary in May, many say this swampy outpost on the James River pales in co
Source: AP
Mar 23, 2007
ROME -- British historian David Irving, who was jailed in Austria for questioning the Holocaust, visited the Auschwitz death camp and renewed his claim that there was no proof it had gas chambers during an Italian TV program aired Friday.
In the Sky TG24 documentary program "Controcorrente" (Countercurrent), Irving is filmed walking down the remains of railroad tracks in the former death camp in southern Poland as he insists that engineering techniques back his claims that
Source: AP
Mar 23, 2007
Mel Gibson exchanged angry words with a university professor who challenged the accuracy of his film "Apocalypto" at an on-campus screening.
Gibson was answering questions from the crowd at California State University, Northridge, Thursday night when Alicia Estrada, an assistant professor of Central American studies, accused the actor-director of misrepresenting the Mayan culture in the movie.
Gibson directed an expletive at the woman, who was removed from the
Source: AP
Mar 23, 2007
SALT LAKE CITY -- Russell Martin Harris celebrated his 86th birthday Friday by giving a gift to the Mormon church -- a leather wallet carried by his great-great-grandfather in the 1830s.
That's better than it first sounds. It was that ancestor, Martin Harris, who mortgaged his farm to get the $3,000 needed to print the first 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon, the central text of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
Family folklore holds that the soft, caram
Source: Reuters
Mar 23, 2007
HAVANA -- Almost half a century of communist rule has saved Havana's eclectic architecture from the urban developer's bulldozer, but a lack of repair has taken a ruinous toll on its neo-Baroque and Art Deco gems.
Dozens of colonial buildings and beautiful squares in Old Havana have been restored since the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO designated it a world heritage site in 1982. But the rest of the city of 2.2 million people is falling into decay.
"The situation has
Source: Independent
Mar 23, 2007
HNN editor's note: This week marks 200 years since Parliament voted to abolish the transatlantic slave trade. Following is a portion of the Independent's"Big Question" column.
Should Britain be proud of its role in abolishing slavery?
Yes...
* Slave trading was a highly profitable business, abolished when Britain was embroiled in a war with France
* Abolitionists such as Wilberforce had nothing to gain from the campaign; most were motivated by religion
* Bri
Source: Reuters
Mar 23, 2007
LONDON -- What many believe to be the only painting of Jane Austen will be auctioned in New York in April by Christie's, a relation of the English author and owner of the picture said.
But Henry Rice, a"sixth generation descendant" of the writer of classics such as"Emma,""Sense and Sensibility" and"Pride and Prejudice," believes the sale of a picture that has divided experts will not be without controversy.
In 1948, a leading Austen scholar dismissed the authenticity of the portrait,
Source: UPI
Mar 23, 2007
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. -- A volunteer safecracker opened a 450-pound, Victorian-era safe in front of Connecticut news crews, but the treasure inside wasn't quite headline-grabbing.
"Like we need this now," laughed Nancy Zorena, president of the Monroe Historical Society, as she held up a slip of paper with the combination to the safe, the Connecticut Post reported.
The safe, discovered behind a Monroe church furnace in December, also contained some newspaper clippi
Source: Reuters
Mar 23, 2007
One of the last surviving communities built by freed slaves after the U.S. Civil War is on the verge of disappearing, despite long efforts to save it.The old buildings of Freedmen's Town in Houston are being bulldozed to make way for new homes in a transformation that preservationists say is wiping out an important piece of history.
The loss of Freedmen's Town is particularly significant because historians believe it was the largest of the freed slave settlement
Source: Times (of London)
Mar 23, 2007
ROSLIN, Scotland -- The medieval chapel which had a starring role in The Da Vinci Code has been awarded a multimillion-pound restoration grant.
The 15th-century Rosslyn Chapel in Midlothian has been given £4.5 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund and £2.68 million from Historic Scotland. [The total is about $14.1 million.]
Since featuring in Dan Brown’s bestseller and the subsequent film, visitor numbers have increased from 30,000 a year in 2000 to 120,000 in 2006.
Source: Telegraph
Mar 23, 2007
Kew Palace slotted an important piece of its royal history back into place yesterday when it unveiled a cabinet of jigsaw maps used to teach King George III's children.
This jigsaw map of Scotland used to teach geography to King George III's children, on show at Kew Palace
This jigsaw map of Scotland is one of many used to teach geography to King George III's children
The mahogany cabinet houses a collection of dissected maps –- precursors of the jigsaw puzzle –-
Source: International Herald Tribune
Mar 23, 2007
GURNA, Egypt -- The Egyptian authorities have evicted hundreds of peasants from this village in southern Egypt because their mud-brick houses, which have sat atop some of the world's most treasured and ancient tombs for centuries, were leaking sewage onto priceless antiquities.
The families have been resettled in a nearby planned community with running water and telephones. But 80 families are holding out, saying they want more from a government so far reluctant to use brute force.
Source: Independent
Mar 23, 2007
ROME -- Carabinieri sealed off one of the grandest houses in the ancient city of Pompeii yesterday after a tall column was found smashed into seven pieces. Officials at the site fear that the destruction is a sign that Mafia gangs are trying to intimidate them.
Pompeii is Italy's most popular tourist destination, drawing 2.5 million visitors every year. And the house of Obellio Firmo is one of its most important. The villa's owner was a leading figure in the city's political life: a
Source: New York Times
Mar 23, 2007
BRNO, Czech Republic -- From the outside, the Tugendhat House doesn’t look like one of the most important residential buildings of the 20th century: it’s just two white stucco cubes separated by an opening through which a few spiky treetops protrude. But as a tour guide led a group of 10 through this modern home in the Czech Republic’s second-largest city in early March, it was clear that there was much more to the house, the bulk of which is built on the steep hillside that drops away from the
Source: Radio New Zealand News
Mar 23, 2007
The bones of 14 Maori housed in an American museum are to be returned to New Zealand.
Dr John Terrell, curator of Chicago's Pacific Anthropology at the Field Museum of Natural History, said it had been considering returning the bones for the past two or three years, but only made the final decision on Monday.
He told Prime Minister Helen Clark of the decision when she visited the museum on Thursday as part of a week-long trip to the United States.
Dr Terrel
Source: AP
Mar 22, 2007
WASHINGTON - The Senate on Thursday approved freezing a proposed $17 million increase in funding for the Smithsonian Institution, citing excessive compensation and spending by its top official.
The budgetary amendment from Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, was unanimously approved on a voice vote.
The measure is not binding and still must be approved during the House-Senate budget process. But Grassley said it sends a message to Smithsonian Secretary Lawrence M. Small, who
