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: Defense Department
Dec 16, 2005
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a U.S. Navy seaman missing in action from the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor have been identified and will soon be returned to his family for burial with full military honors. He is Seaman 2nd Class Warren P. Hickok of Kalamazoo, Mich. The family has not set a date for his burial.Hickok was assigned to the Light Mine Layer the USS Sicard when the Japanese atta
Source: Romanesko
Dec 16, 2005
Robert Novak is finished with the network on Dec. 31. CNN/U.S. president Jon Klein says: "Through the years, Bob has offered incisive analysis for much of CNN's programming, including Crossfire, The Capital Gang, Inside Politics, Evans and Novak, The Novak Zone, and Novak, Hunt and Shields. Bob has also been a valued contributor to CNN's political coverage. We appreciate his many contributions and wish him well in future endeavors."
Source: Palm Beach Post
Dec 16, 2005
Next month will be the first annual American Jewish History Month if President Bush accepts a resolution the U.S. House passed late Thursday. The measure passed unanimously with a 423-0 vote. The non-binding resolution sponsored by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat from Pembroke Pines, urges Bush to designate by executive order the month of January each year as American Jewish History month, similar to the way February has been designated Black History Month.
Source: Scotsman
Dec 16, 2005
A massive archive detailing the history of medieval medicine is set to be made homeless. The archive, weighing around four tonnes, is the work of archaeo-botanist Dr Brian Moffat, who has spent the past 20 years investigating the work of medieval monks at the former Soutra Hospital site at Soutra Aisle, Midlothian. Dr Moffat has housed his archive at the nearby former Fala Primary School, Fala, for the past three years, since he was forced to move it from its original home a
Source: The Australian
Dec 16, 2005
MOROCCO'S King Mohammed VI has ordered the release of a report probing three decades of rights abuses, including killings and torture, while his human rights panel called on the state to apologise and end impunity.
The king has "taken note of the nature of the final report of the Equity and Reconciliation Panel (IER) and commanded that it be published and brought to the knowledge of the people," a palace statement in the north African kingdom said.The
Source: Chicago Sun-Times
Dec 16, 2005
For thousands of years, the brutal battle had been lost to history. Around 3500 B.C., just across the Iraqi border in present-day Syria, an invading army from the south laid waste to a strategic city.
The invaders showered the city with hundreds of small clay missiles, knocked down fortification walls, burned buildings and perhaps took inhabitants captive.
This clearly was no minor skirmish," said Clemens Reichel of the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute. &
Source: Network of Concerned Historians
Dec 16, 2005
The Writers in Prison Committee of International PEN reports about the trial of author Orhan Pamuk today, which was suspended. Pamuk faces up to three years' imprisonment for expressing an opinion about the Armenian genocide of 1915 and the Kurdish insurrection of 1984- 2000. PEN also highlights a dozen similar cases. INTERNATIONAL PEN
PEN OBSERVERS DESCRIBE "UGLY AND VIOLENT" SCENES TRIAL OF ORHAN PAMUK
16 December 2005
Source: AP
Dec 15, 2005
Morgan Freeman says the concept of a month dedicated to black history is "ridiculous."
"You're going to relegate my history to a month?" the 68-year-old actor says in an interview on CBS' "60 Minutes" to air Sunday (7 p.m. EST). "I don't want a black history month. Black history is American history."Black History Month has roots in historian Carter G. Woodson's Negro History Week, which he designated in 1926 as
Source: Wa Po
Dec 15, 2005
While investigating a proposed site to erect the 1,700 year old obelisk returned recently by Italy, archaeologists using high-tech imaging equipment discovered a major network of underground royal tombs. The discovery of more ancient artifacts has launched renewed interest in Aksum, a powerful kingdom that ruled the Horn of Africa from the 1st to the 6th century A.D. and was one of the four great civilizations at that time, alongside Rome, China and Persia.
But the historical finds
Source: Baltimore Sun
Dec 15, 2005
A Carroll County man's collection of President John F. Kennedy memorabilia, including a gold watch, one of his rocking chairs and flags from his presidential limousine, is among thousands of personal items from a number of collectors that are scheduled to be sold in a three-day auction that begins today in New York City.Robert L. White, a retired cleaning-supply salesman whose collection of 350,000 items relates to the life of the 35th president, spent more than 40 yea
Source: BBC News
Dec 15, 2005
A computer has been used to decipher the enigmatic smile of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, concluding that she was mainly happy.
The painting was analysed by a University of Amsterdam computer using "emotion recognition" software.
It concluded that the subject was 83% happy, 9% disgusted, 6% fearful and 2% angry, journal New Scientist was told. The computer rated features such as the curvature of the lips and crinkles around the eyes.
Source: NYT
Dec 15, 2005
There is renewed interest in redesigning Weimar, Germany, creating a 21st-century concept for an 18th-century city.
When a fire swept through the rococo library in this fabled city of Goethe and Schiller last year, the loss of some 30,000 books, manuscripts and irreplaceable, handwritten musical scores from the 16th to the 18th centuries was clearly incalculable.
But it turns out, a commission appointed by the German government reports, that faulty wiring in the library, the assu
Source: Toronto Star
Dec 15, 2005
Ancient tools found in Britain show humans lived in northern Europe 200,000 years earlier than was previously known, scientists announced yesterday.
The 32 black flint artifacts, found in river sediments in Pakefield, England, date back 700,000 years and represent the earliest unequivocal evidence for human presence north of the Alps, said the scientists, whose discovery is detailed in the science journal Nature.The finding dashes the long-held theory that human
Source: AP
Dec 14, 2005
The 200th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln is expected to pave the way for a series of one-cent coins to honor the martyred 16th president from the nation's Midwest.
Legislation calling for the honor in 2009 was given final congressional approval last night by the House and it is expected to be signed by President Bush.
The Senate -- where sponsors included Illinoisans Dick Durbin and Barack Obama -- passed the legislation last month.
Source: NYT
Dec 14, 2005
Archaeologist William Saturno said Tuesday he was awe-struck when he uncovered a Maya mural not seen for nearly two millennia. Discovered at the San Bartolo site in Guatemala, the mural covers the west wall of a room attached to a pyramid, Saturno said at a briefing.
In brilliant color, the mural tells the Maya story of creation, he said. It was painted about 100 B.C., but later covered when the room was filled in.
Source: CBS News
Dec 14, 2005
Bob Schieffer hosted the CBS Eveneing News tonight from Philadelphia. He was there to honor Ben Franklin whose 300th birthday comes next month.
In the lead-in to the story CBS declared: "Of all the founders, it was Ben Franklin – his wit, charm, and that practical side which produced so many of his inventions – who would have been most at home in modern America."
CBS built its story around an extended intervioew with Franklin biographer Walter Isaacson.
Source: National Security Archive
Dec 14, 2005
The Bush administration's new Executive Order on the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) acknowledges that federal FOIA systems are currently in need of great improvement and heightened responsiveness to members of the public seeking information through the FOIA. Thomas S. Blanton, executive director of the National Security Archive responded to the new Executive Order by stating, "After five years of throwing sand into the gears of the FOIA, the Bush administration is fi
Source: BBC News
Dec 14, 2005
The team studying one of Wales' most important archaeological finds will receive an extra £799,500 in funding. The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) grant will help pay for the project to examine the medieval ship buried in the banks of the River Usk, Newport. The money will also fund public exhibitions, talks and workshops about the 15th century ship.
Source: Jewish Telegraphic Agency
Dec 14, 2005
A documentary exploring the Iraq-Nazi connection will air on a U.S. cable station. “Saddam and the Third Reich,” which will first be broadcast Sunday on the History Channel, will be repeated throughout the Saddam Hussein trial. The documentary includes rare footage of the mufti of Jerusalem as the nexus between the Nazis and Iraqi fascists and the Ba’ath Party. One of several featured speakers is investigative author Edwin Black, whose book “Banking on Baghdad” revealed the role of the mufti of
Source: Cliopatria, HNN Blog
Dec 14, 2005
Reacting to the the French National Assembly's dabbling in history and colonial memory, prominent French historians released this statement:
"... The historian is not a slave to current events. The historian does not dump contemporary ideological schemes on the past and does not introduce to past events today's sensibilities. ..."
