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: CNN
Jun 1, 2010
Marilyn Monroe's sultry rendition of "Happy Birthday" sung for President John F. Kennedy's 45th birthday celebration marked the actress's last major public appearance before her mysterious death in August 1962.
Tuesday, which would have been Monroe's 84th birthday, marks the public debut of a rare image of Monroe with President Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy together after the May 19, 1962 party.
The black and white photograph, taken by White House photog
Source: BBC News
Jun 1, 2010
Conservationists are in the Dominican Republic attempting to save one of the world's most strange and ancient mammals - the Hispaniolan solenodon.
While trying to track down one of these creatures, The Last Survivors team is also trying to find out exactly how this animal has been able to survive for a remarkable 76 million years.
It is pitch black.
Splashes of light from our torches illuminate patches of the vast cavern we are standing in, every now and th
Source: BBC News
Jun 1, 2010
A study of discarded oyster shells has reinforced the idea that the first British colonists in America had to endure an unusually severe drought.
Founded in 1607, Jamestown in Virginia was the first successful English settlement in North America.
Chemical analysis of shells thrown away from 1611-1612 shows that the James River where the oysters were harvested was much saltier then than it is today.
This was due to decreased flow from surrounding freshwater
Source: BBC News
Jun 1, 2010
French-born American sculptor Louise Bourgeois has died in New York, at the age of 98.
Based in New York since 1938, Bourgeois gained fame late in her long career and kept working to the end of her life.
Her giant spider sculptures have been exhibited around the world and earned her the nickname of Spiderwoman.
Her abstract explorations of themes such as birth, sexuality and death made her one of the world's most influential contemporary artists.
Source: BBC News
May 31, 2010
You only really start to understand the place when you get a feel for its past. And a nation's history isn't only to be found on its battlefields, or in the ruins of its castles. It also lies in the bones of its culture - in its poems, in its music, and in the stories your neighbours might tell you.
The door-handles of my old Berlin apartment are beautiful. Brass, art nouveau and engraved with flowers worn smooth by more than 100 years of hands - the hands of those who lived here be
Source: David Firestone in the NYT
May 31, 2010
[David Firestone writes for the NYT.]
Few members of the Tea Party have endorsed Rand Paul’s misgivings about the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but a surprising number are calling for the repeal of an older piece of transformative legislation: the 17th Amendment. If you don’t have the Constitution on your smartphone, that’s the one adopted in 1913 that provides for direct popular election of United States senators.
Allowing Americans to choose their own senators seems so ob
Source: Science News
May 31, 2010
Oyster shells excavated from a well in Jamestown, Va., the first permanent British settlement in North America, bolster the notion that the first colonists suffered an unusually deep and long-lasting drought.
The shells reveal that water in the James River near the colony, where many of those oysters were harvested, was much saltier then than along that stretch of the estuary today, says Howard Spero, a geochemist at the University of California, Davis. For the water to have been so
Source: NYT
May 31, 2010
A long lost manuscript, one of the most important in the history of modern biology, has resurfaced as part of a dispute over its ownership.
The manuscript is the account by Gregor Mendel of the pea-breeding experiments from which he deduced the laws of heredity and laid the foundations of modern genetics.
Mendel read his paper in 1865 at two meetings of the Natural History Society of Brünn. He was then an Augustinian monk, later the abbot, in the Abbey of St. Thomas in
Source: WaPo
May 31, 2010
On April 1, 1917, a crewman aboard the German submarine U 46 spied a vessel riding low in the water off the northwestern coast of France. It was the American steamship Aztec, and it carried what the Germans considered a contraband cargo.
The United States had not yet entered the Great War, but the U-boat commander considered such freighters a provocation. He gave the order to fire a torpedo. Aboard the Aztec, manning one of the three-inch guns that had been hastily installed as a de
Source: WaPo
May 31, 2010
When he came home in 1967, he gathered everything from that time -- clothing, photographs, letters to his mother that she had carefully saved -- and he threw it all out. He set out to forget....
But as he got older, he wondered how much he had really moved on. He began to think that the path to healing might lie not in forgetting but in a meandering journey through all 50 states, visiting hundreds of memorials dedicated to those who had died and to those who had lived only to face o
Source: WaPo
May 31, 2010
Pop quiz: Does the school curriculum adopted in Texas really wind up in textbooks nationwide? If you answered yes, you might get a failing grade.
As the second-largest purchaser of textbooks behind California, the Lone Star State has historically wielded enormous clout in deciding what material appears in classrooms across the country. That's why the state school board's recent decision to adopt new social studies standards was closely watched far beyond Texas.
Critics
Source: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
May 31, 2010
Edward Brennan Healy, 39, was the oldest man in his Navy squadron. He was almost the age of his pilot’s father. That, and the fact that he had eight children back home, probably helped earn him the nickname “Pop.”
A gunner on a B-24 bomber based in the Solomon Islands, Healy flew off into a South Pacific morning on his 67th mission on March 9, 1944. During the flight, he and the 10-man crew sent out a distress signal, then disappeared, somewhere near Kapingimarangi in the Caroline I
Source: AP
May 31, 2010
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is the scene of a solemn ceremony Monday where the names of six American servicemen were recently added to The Wall.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, will remember the men and women who have fallen in service to their country during the annual observance.
The Memorial Fund website says the Memorial Day ceremony is hosted yearly by the Fund and the National Park Service to pay tribute to members of America's armed for
Source: Toledo Blade (Ohio)
May 31, 2010
Sweating bullets beneath the blazing sun, Matthew Glover, 17, was gunning for the enemy.
"All our guys took hits," the Toledoan said yesterday afternoon, shortly after a swift skirmish with German soldiers near a quarry in the village of Whitehouse.
Matthew, who will graduate this week from Start High, has engaged in World War II battle re-enactments for nearly five years, fighting to make sure no one forgets the sacrifices made by America's Greatest Generatio
Source: BBC News
May 31, 2010
The remains of 12 Mexican independence leaders have been exhumed in a solemn military ceremony led by President Felipe Calderon.
Bands played and crowds threw white flowers as the bones were paraded through Mexico City in glass caskets.
The crypts were opened as part of celebrations to mark 200 years since the start of Mexico's war of independence from Spain.
The bones will be studied to determine their authenticity.
"Today we pay tribute
Source: CNN.com
May 31, 2010
Cemeteries are known for telling the stories of the people buried there. But the symbols on headstones and monuments can tell a different story: how our view of death has changed over time.
“Historic cemeteries really function as outdoor museums,” says Steve Estroff, education manager at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.
A skull with wings, an urn or a tree were popular on headstones in America during the 17th and 18th centuries.
The Puritans “look
Source: Newsweek
May 31, 2010
Between the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the Allied victory in 1945, New York City was a choke point for the nation’s war effort, and America’s enemies did everything they could to choke it. U-boats ventured so close to Manhattan that German sailors could see the skyline’s glow. Nazi spies prowled Times Square. The most vulnerable part of the city—and the most important—was the port: 650 miles of miraculously productive waterfront that dispatched 3 million troops and even more tons of matériel to
Source: BBC
May 31, 2010
Letters from cricket legends WG Grace and Ivo Bligh are being auctioned to raise money for a new cricket museum in Cardiff.
The museum at the Swalec Stadium will tell the 122-year history of Glamorgan County Cricket Club.
"The letters are truly unique," said Richard Madley of auctioneers Dreweatts.
Other lots include a set of Wisden Cricket Almanacs from 1864 to 1970, which could raise £2,000-3,000 each.
It is hoped the auction wi
Source: BBC
May 31, 2010
A nun from Brighton who helped hide persecuted Jews, Communists and Poles from the Nazis in wartime Rome is being considered for sainthood.
Mother Riccarda Beauchamp Hambrough was baptised as a child at Brighton's St Mary Magdalene Church.
She later became a nun and saved the lives of more than 60 people by smuggling them into her convent in Rome.
The Pope is to make her "a servant of God" - two steps away from sainthood.
Source: AP
May 31, 2010
Russia on Monday handed over to Poland copies of cockpit conversation recorders and other materials related to the investigation into the plane crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski.
Polish Interior Minister Jerzy Miller thanked Russian investigators for their cooperation, but said Poland needed access to all documents related to the crash in order to conduct its own probe.
It was not immediately clear how much information remained to be handed over, but Rus
