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Spalding's Official Foot Ball Guide | HathiTrust Digital Library

A guide to football as played by colleges, with rules, records from the previous seasons, team photos, commentary, and a schedule for the new season. All-American players were mainly from the Ivy League, but Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Notre Dame, and Holy Cross were also represented. Scoring consisted of 6 points for a touchdown followed by a place kick or drop kick through the goal posts, 5 points if the kick failed, 4 points for a drop kick from the field, 2 points to the other team for a "safety touchdown." Must move five yards in three downs or lose possession, and "the quarter-back, if he run with the ball, must cross the line of scrimmage at least five yards out from the point where the ball was put in play." Because this new rule lines were marked every five yards along the length of the 330' x 160' field out from the center, creating a gridiron pattern. St. John's College finished 5-4 for the season, thanks to not playing against bigger teams, mostly. They were slaughtered by Virginia 48-0, but they beat Gallaudet 22-0 in the final game of the season.

A problem of human nature. - Claremont Review of Books

Leonard Sax writes:

"Rahav Gabay and her colleagues at Tel Aviv University have identified a personality trait they call 'interpersonal victimhood.' Gabay finds that you need not have suffered any trauma yourself to manifest interpersonal victimhood. You identify with the trauma of others and claim it as your own, thereby acquiring all the moral credit ordinarily ascribed to victims. One key component of interpersonal victimhood, according to Gabay, is moral elitism, the belief that you yourself are virtuous, especially compared to those you disagree with or dislike. Gabay and colleagues find that moral elitism is highly correlated with a lack of empathy, 'the sense of entitlement to behave aggressively and selfishly.' Moral elitism enables individuals 'to feel morally superior even though they exhibit aggression.'..."

"In 1934, Adolf Hitler was popular on the campuses of Germany's top universities. Leading intellectuals such as Martin Heidegger were members of the Nazi Party. German history, from 1932 to 1937, can teach us some lessons of tremendous importance if we are prepared to learn them. But the lesson to learn is not I am such a good person, so much better than those evil Nazis. The lesson should be: Moral elitism feels good, but it is a temptation that I must resist. I must recognize and acknowledge my opponent's humanity."

Romano-Britons: a strange brand of reactionaries

From Byzantine Ambassador Henry Hopwood-Phillips:

"These theories, however, were based on a criminal omission. They missed the fact that the Britons were not crypto, sub or pseudo-Roman but Romani Britanni and conservatively so. Britain did not bask in the afterglow of the continent's late antiquity, it formed a sublime source of Romanitas. In fact, if Britain diverged from the continental path even a whisker it was because so much more of its Roman heritage survived than on the chaotic mainland where Germanics were footloose, fancy free, making polities on the hoof, and most importantly ruling over a thick sponge of passive subjects rather than roiling reactionaries....

"Britain certainly started very Roman. A villa at Woodchester, Gloucestershire, has the largest mosaic north of the Alps and the second largest in Europe (see image). Moreover, few villas were fortified giving the impression that the countryside was either exceptionally naive or free from regular violence. A dearth of mosaics can be explained by appealing to Britain's preference - given its chilly climate - for wall-hangings, carpets and patterned rugs to cold tesserae. It was also well-Christianised given the number of bishoprics in provincial capitals such as London, York, Cirencester and Lincoln, and the faith's exceptional popularity in the countryside - a rare achievement in late antiquity....

"While occasionally missing a beat in the 400s - due mainly to the piratical antics of the Irish and Saxons - the Roman heart remained strong during St Patrick's - Patricius' - lifetime. The saint, for example, was the son of decurion suggesting some form of Roman local government was retained, wrote at length in Latin, referred to lots f grammatici, and expected his readers to be cultured. Like his contemporary Sidonius Apollinaris he was a third-generation Christian and well-acquainted with the ecclesiastical hierarchy and monasticism....

Galloway's Plan of Union: Wikipedia

Union: Joseph Galloway, Plan of Union

A Candid Examination of the Mutual Claims of Great-Britain and the Colonies: with a Plan of Accommodation on Constitutional Principles, by Joseph Galloway

At the 1st Continental Congress, Pennsylvania delegate Joseph Galloway proposed a union of Great Britain and the American colonies, with an American colonial parliament called the Grand Council "for regulating the general affairs of America," under a President General appointed by the King. A similar plan was ultimately put in place for governing the overseas dominions of the 2nd British Empire.

Bulkes: The "Greek Republic" that "Never Existed"

This is a fascinating case of a place that existed briefly and within living memory (just barely) being deliberately forgotten. A Twitter reference to "wells" (πηγάδες) as a threat made by Greek Leftists against their adversaries (throwing them down a water well to die) led me to the story of Bulkes, a town in Serbia settled by Germans during the Austro-Hungarian Empire, emptied of Germans after World War II, and offered by Tito in 1945 as a haven and training camp for Greek Communists escaping setbacks in the Greek Civil War. The community, which operated as a near-autonomous community in Yugoslavia with its own schools and currency, split over the break between Stalin and Tito, and a civil war with great bloodshed broke out within the community. Yugoslav authorities intervened and the community was scattered, as people returned to Greece or headed to exile elsewhere in Yugoslavia or in the USSR. Yugoslavia, estranged from the USSR and in need of friends, sought rapprochement with Greece, and the Bulkes Republic was swept under the rug. The town was resettled in the 1950s by Serbians from Bosnia and renamed Maglić. In this article, Alexander Bilinis delved into the story in 2016, tracking down filmmaker Alexis Parnis, who had been a young man in Bulkes, writing propaganda plays that were performed at the community theater on Sundays. A film called "Operation Bulkes" by Sinisa Bosancic is in pre-production, featuring interviews with some who lived there.

RELATED: An excerpt from the book Eleni by Nicholas Gage. Gage's mother was tortured to death by Greek Communists; her sacrifice allowed her children to escape.

The Colour of Time: Leonardo da Vinci's CV letter

Leonardo was looking for work as an engineer and inventor with the Duke of Milan, so he sent a letter with 10 paragraphs describing his accomplishments, including these:

"4. I have also types of cannon, most convenient and easily portable, with which to hurl small stones almost like a hail-storm; and the smoke from the cannon will instill a great fear in the enemy on account of the grave damage and confusion.

"5. Also, I have means of arriving at a designated spot through mines and secret winding passages constructed completely without noise, even if it should be necessary to pass underneath moats or any river."

She's a thrift store detective of sorts --- she buys mementos and returns them to their rightful owners, free of charge - Sydney Page

"Brown said she is able to track down the descendants of about 80% of the items she finds, as she typically opts exclusively for things that contain some form of a clue, be it a name, date or other identifying marker. She then uses MyHeritage to build a family tree and scour for potential descendants.

"Recently, she found an old Valentine's Day card written by a woman to her husband, and returned it to the couple's granddaughter. She also returned love letters from the 1960s to the woman to whom they were originally written - marking the first time Brown gave back an item to its original owner and not a descendant. She is now working on returning a baby journal from 1908."

CITY OF DUST: Whiskey and the Devil: Taiban, New Mexico

A great "long-tail" blog post that begins with the story of the photogenic abandoned church belonging to this ghost town on US 60 between Clovis and Fort Sumner, New Mexico, and has grown over time to include photos, postcards, and more stories about this short-lived town associated with Billy the Kid and saloons.

For 20 Years the Nuclear Launch Code at US Minuteman Silos Was 00000000

"To give you an idea of how secure the PAL system was at this time, bypassing one was once described as being 'about as complex as performing a tonsillectomy while entering the patient from the wrong end.' This system was supposed to be essentially hot-wire proof, making sure only people with the correct codes could activate the nuclear weapons and launch the missiles.

"However, though the devices were supposed to be fitted on every nuclear missile after JFK issued his memorandum, the military continually dragged its heels on the matter. In fact, it was noted that a full 20 years after JFK had order PALs be fitted to every nuclear device, half of the missiles in Europe were still protected by simple mechanical locks. Most that did have the new system in place weren't even activated until 1977.

"Those in the U.S. that had been fitted with the devices, such as ones in the Minuteman Silos, were installed under the close scrutiny of Robert McNamara, JFK's Secretary of Defence. However, The Strategic Air Command greatly resented McNamara's presence and almost as soon as he left, the code to launch the missile's, all 50 of them, was set to 00000000."