Kindness, and Amable Guion

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Today is Memorial Day.  My family, like many ordinary families, has a long history of service to the nation, and I remember everyone who is or has served our nation, not only in the military.

Today I recognize this Memorial Day in two ways, both somewhat ‘spur of the moment’, and perhaps a bit different than what is usually seen as normal.

Today’s (May 24) Heather Cox Richardson has an announcement of particular historical interest

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The first recognition:  I title this post “Kindness” thanks to about five minutes  on a recent CBS Evening News segment about  a visit to an elementary classroom about 40 miles down the Mississippi River from where I type, in Red Wing MN.  Hopefully the segment is still on line.  Here is the link.  Again, take the five minutes….  It will speak for itself.

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The second recognition relates to a person I’d never heard of til recently, who happens to be a distant part of my family tree.  He is Amable Guion.  He “died in combat on May 26, 1780, during the Battle of Fort San Carlos (a British and Native American attack on St. Louis)”.  This is a family history deal, about an event in America’s revolutionary period, and if you’re interested in family history, particularly French-Canadian, you’ll likely be interested in this.

First, the summary.

In the summer of 1980 I first became interested in the history of my Dad’s French-Canadian, and my mother’s German-American families.  I’m still at it 46 years later, and its a fascinating journey.  The big files are here.  This relates to the French-Canadian ‘side’, and relates to the ‘war’, largely between the native peoples, and the Spanish, French and English interests in North America.

For the U.S., 250 years ago, 1776, was the Declaration of Independence.  Thirteen years earlier, in 1763, the French and Indian War was settled by the Treaty of Paris, which essentially carved up the to-be United States into two huge pieces, one England, the other Spain.  Of course there were natives too, but not in the real estate business.  (Most of my story is in the links following the text.)

How Amable Guion fits into the story.

About 35 years ago my Dad and I were visiting the Gateway Arch area in St. Louis, and I came across a new book, “St. Louis: A Concise History” by William Barnaby Faherty, S.J.  At the beginning of the book, on page 5, was a sentence that drew me in: in February 1764 “Mrs. Margaret Blondeau Guion, presumably the first woman to come to St. Louis, crossed the river from Cahokia in late May to join her husband Amable who had signed up with Laclede”,

This intrigued me greatly, as an ancestor of mine who came to what is now the Minneapolis area in 1854, was Simon Blondeau, my great-great grandfather, who purchased land on the Mississippi River at Dayton MN.  My cousin, Remi Roy, documented that Marguerite Blondeau Guion and Simon Blondeau were from the same Blondeau line, two or three generations removed from each other.

So, a relative was around at the very beginning of St. Louis MO.  Neat.  I shared this at my grandsons wedding in March of this year.

I knew nothing at all about about Amable Guion .  In the last month or so, looking at another e-mail from cousin Remi, I noticed the name “Guyon” among my Collette family ancestors in Quebec.  More correspondence with Remi, and indeed Amable Guion was in another of my ancestral lines.  His bio is also linked below.

Finally comes the connection with War.

In the 1763 Treaty of Paris, England essentially got what is now the United States east of the Mississippi, including French outposts among which was Fort de Chartres, on the Illinois side of the Mississippi a few miles north of present day Ste Genevieve MO.  Spain got the area west of the Mississippi,  France was no longer a player, having been defeated by England at Quebec in 1759.  So, in 1763 the French-Canadians were in English lands, and in 1764 Amable and Marguerite and others moved across into Spanish territory, which was to become present day St. Louis.

The few French who came across the river in 1764 apparently lived freely until 1780, when Amable was killed, as described in the below link.  Marguerite remarried five months later, and lived on until her 90s, becoming known as one of St. Louis’ original settlers.

(In 1802, Napoleon purchased from Spain what a short while later became the Louisiana purchase.  (see the link “Louisiana” below.).  In 1804 the slaves in Haiti declared their independence from France.  Napoleon unloaded Louisiana to the U.S. (the “Louisiana Purchase”) not long after he acquired it, and  not long after came the Lewis and Clark Expedition and the rest is history.)

If you wish, take a quick trip through the links, and you may find something of interest, as I did.

Guion Amable history

Marguerite Blondeau history

Historical U.S. Map 1750 1763 – National Geographic map 1988 adapted by Dick

Historical US NatGeo1988001 – National Geographic maps 1775-1890

Louisiana – Council on Foreign Relations April 30, 2026

Blondeau as part of my personal family tree (pages 34-47 and 72-81)

Marguerite Blondeau Guion (about 1820 in St. Louis MO) In the Smithsonian Collection.

COMMENTS: 

from Dick: Personally, I attended the local Memorial Day at Woodbury City Hall Veteran Memorial.  It was well done, like all such observances, recognizing service.  It was well attended.  Here’s one snapshot:

Memorial Day Woodbury May 25, 2026

from Dave: Thanks for the “thoughts” today Dick. Your family has an amazing history. I was able to find you through a French website. Hope all is semi-well. My oldest daughter just visited Hawaii and spent several days at Pearl with her husband. They know the story of Max and Petey. What Kash Patel did was sacrilege. I’m trying kindness, but it’s not easy these days.

from Fred: Always a fan of early American history, particularly in the ‘west’ and ‘northwest’ and even when those regions were really not a part of America. Thankfully Manifest Destiny prevailed and the US has the contiguous 48 states, Hawaii, Alaska, Pacific holding, Caribbean presence, Greenland and Canada!

response from Dick: I just did an update on earlier post on Cuba.  This one includes recollections of three folks who actually were visitors to Cuba a few years ago.

from Jeff: Interesting family history in the Cahokia/St Louis area for sure.

Do you know if the surname Gayan is a variant of Guyon/Guion as well?  I would expect so, there were a few families of that name in Bessemer Michigan where I grew up…There were a decent amount of French Canadian surnames up in our area, and likely early settlers….a few had definite indigenous backgrounds as well….Gayan, Derosier, LaChappelle, Mortier, Antoine…were a few…I think Michigan and Maine may have the highest % of French Canadian descendants actually.


from Remi:  Yes, Gayan is absolutely a recognized phonetic variant of the surname Guyon, like Guion and Dion.

Jeff’s point about Michigan and Maine having high percentages of French Canadian descendants is spot on. I actually pulled up some census data on this, and Maine and Michigan are right at the top of the list:

  • Maine (~24% – 25%): Holds the highest concentration, especially in northern border towns like Madawaska and historic mill cities like Lewiston.
  • The French-Speaking Pockets: In some northern Maine communities, the vast majority of residents still speak French at home.
  • New Hampshire (~23% – 24%) & Vermont (~21% – 23%): Also have high percentages.
  • The Midwest Connection: States like Michigan (especially the Upper Peninsula and Detroit metro area), Wisconsin, and Minnesota have substantial populations of French Canadian descent.
  •  I think I already told you this. I have many more relatives in Minnesota than in Manitoba. My grandmother’s mother had 117 cousins on the Gervais side and a good many on the Samson side. She was the only one who moved to Canada. My grandmother was born in Minnesota. Six generations of her family lived in the United States, yet she spoke almost no English until she was married. Part of her family left Quebec in 1808. 190 years later, she still preferred to speak to me in French.

from Jeff (2):  quite interesting….what a tangled mess the Revolutionary War was in some ways….British  and Natives (including 200 Dakota Sioux from Minnesota, and Ojibwe from Michigan both tribes of course bitter enemies! ) fighting Frenchies, Americans and Spaniards in St Louis……your ancestor was amongst the 70 to 100 casualities on the St Louis side, the Brits and their native allies lost only 4 fighters!  Here’s article about the battle. [from Dick] The link is brief, yet quite an informative look at the revolutionary days situation in what is sometimes called the corridor of the Mississippi and Missouri River Valleys.  The mid-continent and west (see Lois’ comment below) doesn’t get nearly the attention as the east in revolutionary war days.  History is much more than a soundbite or photo.

 

 

Lyndon Johnson at the University of Michigan May 22, 1964

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PRENOTE: need something really positive to add to your day?  This, about teacher and students in Red Wing MN on CBS evening news last night: here.

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Heather Cox Richardson’s column overnight was specifically and totally devoted to the Commencement Address by President Lyndon Johnson at the University of Michigan, May 22, 1964.  The link is here.  At the end of the post is the link to the total address.

I hesitate to add much to this.  At the same time, I was 24 years old then, and thus able to be fully aware of the impact of the JFK/Lyndon Johnson era.  President Kennedy had been assassinated 5 months earlier, and Johnson, an astute and long time political leader in the U.S. Congress and as Vice-President was ready to take charge.

Both of my brothers are Vietnam vets, and I was two years in the Army, 1962-63, considered Vietnam era.  So I was involved too.

Of course, I was just one of the citizens as I am today.  So I can claim no first hand knowledge, any more than most anyone else can.

In 1983, with my Dad, I visited the small town where LBJ grew up – Johnson City TX – and saw the small house in which he grew up.

In later years, I have come to learn that his first post college years were as a teacher in a school in Texas where his students all spoke Spanish as their first language.

In short, in my opinion, his roots played a big part in his view of the ordinary person, even though he became one of the all-time power brokers in the rough and tumble place which is Washington.  He was the right man at the right time, which was a crucial time in American history, as today is an equally crucial time for very different reasons.

Of course, the meat grinder that was Vietnam swallowed him.

I will leave it at that

POSTNOTE: in anticipation of Memorial Day, here is a newsletter from American Experience (PBS).

And an update on the matter of Cuba, here.

I plan to do a post on Memorial Day about Amable Guion.  This is a ‘war story’ from before the revolution ary war that formed the United States.

COMMENTS

from Larry: Larry also commented below, and sent on this interesting video from personal history from about 1964.  KSTP was and is a major TV channel in the Twin Cities.

I don’t know if I sent this recently produced Youtube I did on my time at KSTP. If not here it is…btw…KSTP legal and management LIKED it…I cleared it with them before posting…LG

Cuba dos

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April 18 post was a preemptive one about administration pretensions towards Cuba.  Recent days activities are something like storm clouds gathering – you don’t know what will happen, but good to be forewarned.

from A History of Latin America 2d Edition by Hubert Herring 1963 p 405

In the earlier post I suggested reading a chapter from a early 1960s college textbook, particularly the last sentence of the chapter on Cuba.  Preceding that last sentence were paragraphs about what led to the  warning.  Take the time to think about this, in context with the present.

This is a good time to read up a bit on Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a key actor.  You might want to review the Bay of Pigs action, authorized in the Eisenhower administration and effected in the first months of the JFK administration.  A reasonable source on Bay of Pigs seems to me to be this one, though I am sure there are many others.

Over the years I have done several posts about Cuba.  The one by John Borgen and Flo and Carter Hedeen (Mar 12, 2012) is first person, by ordinary Americans who actually visited Cuba.  At least take a look.  I have also pdf’ed the chapter of Haiti Hubert Herring 1963.  I’ve been to Haiti twice, and have learned a bit, first hand, about what U.S. dominance is like.

I have no idea what’s ahead or when or even if – the question is reasonable for everyone to consider seriously.  This is an opportunity to learn.

COMMENTS:

from Brian:  Notes and three photos from his 2009 trip to Cuba

Havana 2009

 

Let me start by pasting in my journal entry when I was last in Cuba, in 2009

Tuesday, March 17, 2009  I am on a Mexicana flight from Cancún to JFK, it is 9 p.m. NY time, daylight savings.

I like this airline.  If it flew to places in the US, I would use it.  Drinks are free and the staff is friendly and there is space between the seats.

I am still reading Anne Morrow’s “War Within and Without”…I so appreciate her, a real kindred spirit.  She had the integrity and courage to fight the assholes out there that try to make you conform, including governments.  She so resonates with me.

Well, for the last several days I was in Havana, coming back to Cancún yesterday afternoon.  Cuba, unbelievably, also went on daylight time last week, so they are also 2 hours ahead of Cancún’s time.

Backtracking, on Friday, I was supposed to fly out to Havana on Mexicana at 1:35 p.m. but due to fog in Mexico City in the morning, all flights were delayed, including ours for several hours.

But, Cancun’s airport is neat to hang out at, so it wasn’t too bad waiting.

Our flight finally left around 5 p.m. and we got to Havana, two hours ahead of Cancun, in less than an hour, but at night.

I changed Canadian and US money to CUC’s, Cuba’s convertible currency, and took a friendly taxi (sort of against Castro and especially against Chávez) in his Hyundai van to the Raquel, my hotel built in 1908 in Art Nouveau style by a Jewish concern.

My first night I got a room without windows but big, so asked to transfer (same price as what the Internet had said) to one with a view.  I found the staff to be friendly, including Lisette, who checked me in, and even the bellman, John.

My paid-for guide on Saturday was Samuel.  He was formal but good, easy to get along with.  My taxi driver to La Vigía was Idolfonso, who lived near the hotel Raquel.  He had a Hyundai van he shared with another driver.  He told me about Ché driving a 60 Chevy that was at the Old Car Museum near my hotel.  The woman and her daugther I helped were Jacqueline and Calia.

Lasso (last name but everyone calls him this) was the owner of the ’55 red Chevy that I hired, and he let me drive.  We drove out to see the Hemingway Marina and the ecological park near Havana.

Martha was my cute guide at La Vigía, Hemingway’s 4.2 hectare finca.

My local travel agency in Havana was Havanatur, in the hotel Triton, tel. 537 201 9761, Isabel Toledo.  I wrote that on the back of the Cancun Plaza receipt where I stayed Thursday night before going to Havana.  I met two neat people at that hotel, Silvia and José, married 25 years.

You can still smoke in bars in Cuba.  My calèche driver was Lagarto and the horse was Marco Polo.  Patria o Muerte, fucking lie.  My masajista in the Raquel was Niurka, her husband, Brian.

Most of my journey was recorded in photos, but to continue with the Cuba narrative, as I said, I arrived Friday.  I had a Hyandai modern taxi take me into town from the airport.  I was surprised at how “uncontrolled” and open everything seemed to be.  Locals and tourists mix quite readily.

The Raquel, my hotel in Old Havana, dates back to the Art Nouveau era, either 1908 or a little later.  It has a Jewish influence, my room was Miriam, next to Ruth.  Lisette did upgrade me at no extra cost to a room with a window view.

On Saturday my guide did come, as I said, Samuel, formal and proper but good.  We walked through old Havana, his telling me about this monument or that one, and then with a driver we went to see the old fort guarding the harbor entrance, going through a tunnel to get there and also we saw Revolutionary Plaza and other Havana sights.  I was the only one on the minibus, since three Mexicans never did show up that were supposed to.   Part of the tour was an old villa where there was a 3-person band, a woman and two guys, playing just for me.  The food was pretty good.

Saturday night I did go to the Tropicana, using the hotel’s phone in my room to make my own reservation.  The phone worked just fine.  I used a taxi to get to it, since it wsa a ways out of town.  The show was well choreographed and modest, ending after midnight.  Most of the other patrons appeared to be from Europe. I sat across from a couple from Lisbon.

On Monday I went with, as I say, Lasso in the 1955 Chevy with the standard shift that would hang up in 2nd just like Betsy Blue used to do.  We visited the Hemingway Marina and an ecological park where he let me drive.

On Sunday I went with Idolfonso in a Hyanda taxi van to La Vigia, Hemingway’s farm, and also to La Terraza, the port fishing bar where he used to hang out.  I had a great paella at that bar.  At La Vigia, it was fun being with Martha, since she was so enthusiastic about Hemingway.  Idolfonso was also friendly and forthcoming, a fun person.

While in Havana I did visit Hemingway’s room at Ambos Mundos and went on the roof bar there to have a cocktail.

So on Monday, yesterday, I caught the Mexicana Fokker 100 back to Cancun, where this time I stayed downtown, at a hotel across from Margaritas.  It was more personable than the other hotel, the Linda Vista, and as I had been told, in walking distance of a lot of neat places.  I went to one place that specialized in entertaining tourists, especially American students, and played up the Mexican folklore aspect, Los Pericos.  It was actually a lot of fun.

 

“1,776 Billion”, Al Capone and Napoleon Bonaparte

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In this mornings mailbox were four columns from experts I trust.  I would recommend reading all of them, and subscribing to them.  We are at a critical time in our history as a country, and best to be well informed.  Subscribing is a thank you.

The four (click on name to access the link): Joyce Vance; Heather Cox Richardson; Robert Reich; Paul Krugman.

I like the four because they know their fields and are acknowledged as such.  I notice only one of them appear on Robert Reich’s list, including himself, and that’s okay.  If you read only one thing from the above four, read the last paragraph of Richardson’s post….

POSTNOTES: Later in today’s mail (May 20) came Robert Reich’s commencement speech to graduates at UC Berkeley.  Here is the speech.  It is powerful.

It appears, also, that it is time to dust off the recent post I did about Cuba, which seems to be the next target of our regime.  Here is the post.

Here is the Presidents niece, Mary T,  on the Presidential Slush Fund.

Early May 21:  important additions to the conversation: Heather Cox Richardson and Joyce Vance.

Tim Snyder, another of the thinkers I subscribe to has a very interesting video this morning (May 21).  It is about 13 minutes and you can watch it here.

Found in the junk at the North Dakota Farm and restored: Cover of 1920 pictorial history of WWI, Leslie-Judge New York 1920 edition.

No one, including the perpetrators, know when and how this misadventure we are living within is going to end, though it certainly will end.

I think it appropriate to study up a bit on characters of history like Al Capone and Napoléon Bonaparte.

Napoleon and Al Capone:

It is very easy to access more than you’d ever want to know about both men (or other similarly notorious men and sometimes women).  I provide only the tiniest bios here.

Napoleon (1769-1821) commissioned the Arc de Triomphe (1918 photo above) at the height of his power in 1804, about the time he had crowned himself emperor.  His reign lasted until 1814, with an abortive attempt to resume power in 1815.  He died at 51,

Al Capone (1899-1947) reached his zenith, seven years as a crime boss, during Prohibition.  He finally ended up in prison (1931-39).  He was 48 when he died.

Both men had their fans and their moment of fame.  It didn’t last for either.

At every age, humankind has been taken for fools by assorted egomaniacs who thought they had it all figured out how to outsmart the rest, and cheat accountability.  Similarly, at every age, these folks build a loyal following.

None of this succeeds in the long term, but succeeds longer than it should because good people like ourselves don’t get engaged for all of the reasons we all know.

Get on the court.

COMMENTS (more at end)

from Fred:  Thanks Dick, I read all the commentaries. Each had their own insightful view of the Dear Leader’s corruption. Same goes for your thoughts. All explore the many avenues, streets and boulevards full of rot. Will this be a bridge to far for kleptocracy, nepotism, and cronyism?

I doubt it. Many still bow the Golden Idol lodged at Mar-a-Largo, but that flock is noticeably thinning.


from Peter:  Sometimes it takes me a day or so to get to your wonderful offerings. And sometimes I think, “See you, and raise you.” The following was the highlight of my year, I think.

“…we as humans are divided; we are fragmented…”

Francesca Albanese interviewed by Miko Peled (son of an Israeli general, who has started a movement to liberate Palestine): here.

Q&A that follows includes at least one recently released from Israel’s “hospitality” on the high seas. (For those not aware, the latest Sumud Flotilla, dozens of boats carrying aid to Gaza was attacked a thousand miles from Israel in international waters, and hundreds of unarmed civilians, doctors, journalists, veterans, students, artists, etc., were kidnapped, beaten, transported to Israeli prisons and tortured, including sexual assault.)

Watching this brings great relief, and inspiration. She embodies the possibility of confronting the full truth of our predicament, and yet remaining present and grounded in peace.

Responsibility of Citizenship in a Democracy

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I have a simple ask, only for your own reflection, about yourself: In 2024 who did you vote for (including all offices, or not voting at all, and why); what have been your feelings since?  How are you going to engage in this conversation in the months preceding the Nov 3 election?

Below are three ‘snapshots’ of the 2024 election; (This is also in pdf President vote 20024 final).

Who voted in 2024?  Here is what the Census said.

Which candidate got how many votes, according to the Federal Elections Commission.

COMMENT: The opening question mentions the 2024 and 2026 elections.  2024 was the once every four years Presidential election; 2026 will be the interim two year election where every one of the 435 members of Congress will be elected to two year terms.

Of course, in each election there are numerous other positions up for election, and there are occasional elections at other times. The Presidential and Congress (House and Senate) are the two I wish to emphasize.

We each have our own feelings about the current state of democracy in the United States.  In mid-April, I wrote my own feeling about this at the beginning of my April 18, 2025, post:

“A year ago [April 18, 2025] we were about half way through the first 100 days of DJT’s second term.  Speaking only for myself, back then I was suspecting the worst, but in retrospect I was grossly underestimating the reality to come, and we’re only in the second year.”

Less than a month later I’m aware that I was underplaying the crisis we are in for our nation as a democratic republic.  We – the folks who can vote – are the only solution.

I’m only a single person, but I’ve known for a long time that I have immense power, if united with an immense number of fellow citizens, and only if I exercise my franchise.  (My dot for 2024 was Kamala Harris.)

You have as much power as I do: one vote.  So do the gaggle of super rich folks who tagged along to China recently.  Of course, temporarily, the Big Kahuna is relishing his status as the most powerful person in the world, but fame is evaporating, if the electorate makes that decision.  We’ll know in less than six months how the country feels for the next two years.

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After the 2024 election I periodically reported the vote counts in the presidential election.  Two of these tallies are above.  There were others which were essentially identical.  I felt, and still feel, that about 90,000,000 of my fellow citizens who could legally vote, didn’t vote at all in 2024.

For today’s post I checked the official tally from the Federal Elections Commission (3rd column above).  It speaks for itself.

In my initial “cut” I excluded the roughly 22% of the population under 18 years of age (about 75 million).  I estimated the number of qualified voters who didn’t vote at all.  This was roughly 176-186 million less the above 75 million. leaving 100-110 million.    Then arbitrary estimates for non-citizens, people disenfranchised (felons, for example), people who missed for reasons out of their control: accident, illness and the like.

90 million seemed (and seems) reasonable.  But I hedged it as “app” (approximate).  It is impossible to come up with an absolute number, even as an estimate, given the onslaught, now beginning, to make it as difficult as possible for certain people to vote.  Still, I can guess:  Many “immigrants” are under the age of 18, for instance.  Others in some cases will be challenged and may not be able to vote because of a suspicious name.  You know the drill.  Some won’t vote because they’re afraid to go, even if totally legal.  Games will be played with numbers, etc.  There is ‘truth’.  But don’t count on it being revealed by the people who know.

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At the minimum we can all encourage everyone qualified to at least register and vote well informed.  There is still plenty of time. An entrance portal for all states is here (Vote.Gov).  At least give it a look.

Democracy itself is under assault.  Look for challenges created by misuse of AI (Artificial Intelligence), finally tuned “alternative facts” which are not facts at all, but difficult to check, etc., etc.  You know the assault is happening in plain sight and in public.  Be skeptical about ‘facts’.  There is truth out there, but it takes more than a cursory look.

Our individual responsibility is to be better informed than ever before, and more in action than is typical.  Each of us is the person who counts the most.

I ask your involvement.

POSTNOTE:  In the process of simply thinking about this post, it comes to mind that with the increasing sophistication of communication technology the ease of deceiving a population is increasing at an alarming rate. Data can easily be manipulated by a skilled communicator (i.e. the carnival barker of the old days) and spread to a large population very easily and quickly.  A simple example: a real but heavily edited film clip of someone who appears to be evil and is made to represent an entire population by inference.  The most famous old political ad which illustrates this might be the Willy Horton ad used effectively in a 1988 presidential campaign – early in the era of mass communication.

In preparing this post, I stumbled across a graphic from the Congressional Budget Office from January, 2026. which to me had the same effect.  I noted especially the focus on immigration, which could make it appear that the country was being overrun by immigrants in the Biden years, less so in the days preceding and following, with no context whatever for the casual observer.  What the graphic shows is what the authorizer of the graphic wanted it to imply.  Reality was not necessarily the intention.

In this day and age the caution caveat emptor – let the buyer beware – is ever more appropriate.

COMMENTS (more below):

from Darleen: Your recent post on our responsibilities as citizens was very insightful and informative, Dick.  Thank you for your continued effort to keep us engaged.

from Kathy:

Not sure if you ever look at Heather’s podcast with her friend Joanne Freeman on  Saturdays called: What in the heck just happened? [The 41 minute program can be viewed here.]. But last Saturday addressed this same question about non-voters… why are folks not voting?
Thank you for continuing to post!

Mothers Day 2026

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Postcard early 1900s

Friday we attended the internment at Ft. Snelling cemetery of a man who recently died at the VA Hospital in Minneapolis.  It was a short service, few of us in attendance, officiated by VA personnel, the traditional honor guard, and rifle salute.  It was impressive and indeed moving.  We didn’t know the man, but we did know a little of the back story.  I couldn’t help but think of Alex Pretti, the VA Nurse killed in Minneapolis during the ICE surge, whose mission was to minister to patients at that VA Hospital; people with their own often difficult stories.

While awaiting our deceased veterans turn, I took this picture of part of this huge cemetery.

Ft. Snelling Cemetery, Minneapolis MN May 8, 2026

May 8, 2026 Ft. Snelling MN

There are thousands buried here, likely all military veterans.  Every single one of them had a mother and a father, and each would have their own unique story.  The parents of the veteran we honored had passed on years earlier.

The previous day, we’d been purchasing some Mother’s Day flowers at the nearby County Correctional Institution.  For a lot of years now, a work experience for inmates at this facility is to prepare plants for sale during the month of May.  Supporting the sale is a tradition for us and for many.

Sometimes an inmate assists customers, sometimes a volunteer, sometimes others doing a service project help out.  Moms are very visible volunteers.  As with those at the cemetery, every one has a mother and a father, including the inmates.  Everyone has a good idea of what the program is, and who is involved in it.  Here is the website for the volunteers.

Somehow these stories say it all for me this weekend.  To everyone who is a biological mother, and to everyone anywhere who ever has filled a mothers role in someones life, have a wonderful day.

May 8, 2026 Woodbury MN

POSTNOTE: Here’s Heather Cox Richardson’s notes on the history of Mother’s Day.

86

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PRENOTE: This post is strictly to encourage personal reflection.  I recommend also the commentaries of SAK and Jeff, which I’ve included together in a May 3 post here.   Both are long-time participants on this list, and their comments came on May 1 and 2.  I encourage other reflections to be included as posts particularly in the coming weeks.  How about yours?

1949 at Busch farm near Berlin North Dakota. Richard (Dick) oldest kid, 9, is at left on second horse, . Uncle Vince, then 24, is at far left.Four Bernard and two Pinkney cousins on the horses.  The other man is not known.

Today is my 86th birthday, not a particularly noteworthy event, except today is two months to the day from the 250th birthday of the republic of the United States of America “if you can keep it” (Benjamin Franklin, Sep 18, 1787).

The 250th birthday of my United States takes precedence over my birthday, today.

This came most clearly to mind for me on March 29, 2026, when I and nearly 20 family members attended the wedding of my Marine grandson.  Spencer and his bride Megan are in their mid-20s.

It occurred to me, then, that  I was two months from age 60 when Spencer was born in 2000.

Flowing from that was the realization that the future is for Spencer and Megan’s generation to positively build forward.  My own time is limited.  The future always falls to the young.

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My thumbnail review of US history follows, hoping to encourage your own thinking from your own individual perspective.

To facilitate my own thinking I decided on the below graphic  to help me along, and I share it with you.

Succinctly, I have lived almost exactly one-third of the history of the United States of America.

It made personal sense to divide the history of our country into thirds.  The smaller box labeled “NOW” is the most recent history.  For me, I’d say this is since 2000.  For you…?  I made a pdf of this sheet if you wish to print out: Reflection at 250 years

The approximate population of the U.S. at the breakpoints: 1776 – 2.4 million; 1859 – 31.4 million; 1942 – 135 million; 2026 – 349 million.  In 1942 the world population was about 2.2 billion; in 2026 – 8.3 billion.

I’ve written about my own past, including family history. Everyone’s history is unique.  Here are some very brief snips about the U.S.

U.S. PAST: In my opinion, the first third of our 250 years was the time of founding and expansion, with the blessings and curses, generosity and meanness that accompany every history of every person and nation.  The middle third was the time of internal chaos as we evolved and struggled through phases.  For example, every single one of my mentors in life experienced directly the Great Depression and World War II, which left indelible marks on them and subsequently their mark on me from the time I was born (1940).

The most recent third has been a confusing time in many ways.  There has essentially been constant War, from WWII, to the Cold War, to, now, Iran, on and on.  War sells.  At the same time, my third has seen the birth and survival of the United Nations and NATO, and other coalitions which have diminished the tendency to spend our time killing each other.  Right now, the struggle is which mindset will survive.

My most recent PRESENT, which I count as my retirement years since 2000, has been a time of almost constant tension and political and social division.

It is nature to challenge relationships between youth and elders.   Today, to an unprecedented degree,  we have more ways to communicate less.  It was not long ago that “drone” meant flying a model plane with remote radio control.  That was it.  “High tech” when I was 25 (1965) is laughably primitive today.  Todays could be laughably primitive 50 years from now….  Or we may no longer exist.  We desperately need to focus on the future of everyone, not just ourselves.

The technological revolution as I mark it began with Facebook (2004), YouTube (2005), Twitter (2006), iPhone (2007).  Most recently is the explosion of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The current name of the game is power and control, which ultimately always end up destroying rather than benefitting the vast majority of affected citizens, including those with the power.  We never seem to learn.

When we were young, we faced the same dilemmas as today, but not to the extent existing in todays world.  The FUTURE has to be up to the young people, and judging from personal experience and observation it will be a hard transition, but not because todays youth are different than my generation was – they aren’t.  Their lives are more complex.

The “good old days” when I grew up were really not so good if viewed from a younger persons perspective these days.  But old days did have their benefits – we grew up less likely to take things for granted.  This is for Grandpa and Grandma conversations.  We probably learned more from adversity than from prosperity.

Today, as has always been true, we don’t need unity of 100%, not even 10%.  Luckily for the future there are as many kids now as then who want to make a positive difference for the greatest number.  Now is their time.

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The below illustration shows the original 48 of the almost complete United States

Here’s the National Geographic presentation of the U.S. from 1750-1800, as presented in the 1988 Historical Atlas of the United States. U S History timeline (2) Nat Geo 1750 – 1800

Inside front cover of”A Diplomatic History of the American People” by Thomas A. Bailey copyright 1964. Does not include Alaska or Hawaii (statehood Jan 3 and Aug 29, 1959)

Personally:

I have always considered myself an optimist and, as I state in the right hand column with every post, I’m a moderate pragmatic Democrat.  At the same time, on April 18 at this space, in a column about Cuba, I began the column with these words:  “A year ago today we were about half way through the first 100 days of DJT’s second term.  Speaking only for myself, back then I was suspecting the worst, but in retrospect I was grossly underestimating the reality to come, and we’re only in the second year.”

I have said, every time the topic comes up, that we, the people, all of us collectively, own the results we are living with now.  We’re a Democratic Republic and we voted for what we’re enduring, which will likely get much worse as time goes on.  We sentenced ourselves to an outcome that will benefit nobody in the long run, including those who are now in power.

We collectively can remedy this, but we have to be, as Gandhi said, the change we wish to see in our country and our world.

If you’ve read this far, you are interested in positive change.

Below is the Presidential vote in the 2024 election.  Where is your “dot” in those numbers, including for all other elections that year as well, local, state and national.  Why did you make your mark as you did?  What will you do in coming months to change the status quo?  The ball is totally in each of our court.

COMMENTS (more at end)

from Brian:

Happy Birthday!  Interesting!  I grew up in Texas–yay!   We have had six flags over Texas, and there’s even a park now about it 🙂    Texas has been part of Mexico, France, the South, Spain,  Republic of Texas, and now the USA, yay!
Spain (1519–1685; 1690–1821), France (1685–1690), Mexico (1821–1836), the Republic of Texas (1836–1845), the United States (1845–1861; 1865–present), and the Confederate States (1861–1865).

 

SAK and Jeff on the Past and Present.

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SAK and Jeff are long-time friends of mine who have never met each other.  In fact, I have never personally met SAK, who lives in England.  Both recently filed opinions, and I asked and received permission to share their thoughts.  Their thoughts are well worth your time.


from SAK, May 1, 2026:

Congratulations on the 250th birthday! May the next 250 years be happier and even more prosperous for the United States, and if I may script a variation on a J. F. Kennedy formula, may the United States think not what the world can do for it but, as in times past, think what it can do for the world.

Looking back in order to help with the future, I thought two books by US authors would focus minds on a couple of issues that have not ceased to cause division & worse.

The first is The Virginian by Owen Wister. I came across it in the TV adaptation. That was many years ago & most probably in black & white. The whole book is available as part of the Gutenberg Project.

How could a young man resist when it tells of a “world where justice comes not so much from courts as the barrel of a gun.” Did the book start the “western” theme & craze, I don’t know? Even the western film genre progressed from black (“Indian”) & white (cowboys) to seriously dealing with issues of colonialism & racism, e.g. as in many of the films by John Ford – born to Irish parents which probably had something to do with his outlook.

A particular theme of The Virginian could be that the corrupting forces of the civilised east have diminished man, fulfilment will only come from heading west & embracing the freedom that the frontier provides. That is a bit the story of the hero as well as the eastern author who, after a nervous breakdown & being sent west by his doctor, was charmed by the land & the characters enjoying more freedom, and nobility, than the people he left back east.

In one episode, The Virginian, played by James Drury (in the TV  adaptation) is “forced” to take part in the hanging of a friend who was a cattle rustler, a grave crime at the time, which saddens him tremendously but which he says he would do again as it is the right thing to do. Compare that with the thousands of pardons to friends & supporters by you know who: another case of what the author of The Virginian points to as the corrupting influence of the civilised east, New York in this case, leading to diminished man 😉!?

Wister values the frontier spirit but at the same time laments that it is slipping away. The book & its many adaptations kept the myth nostalgically alive along with a dislike for what was replacing it. “The feel of it struck cold upon the free spirits of the cow-punchers, and they told each other that, what with women and children and wire fences, this country would not long be a country for men.” Think J D Vance & Pete Hegseth perhaps?

The author’s views on equality are readily available in The Virginian as well as in other writings of his. One chapter of The Virginian is titled Quality and Equality.

Wister: “There can be no doubt of this: All America is divided into two classes, the quality and the equality.

The latter will always recognize the former when mistaken for it. Both will be with us until our women bear nothing but kings.”

He writes:

‘It was through the Declaration of Independence that we Americans acknowledged the ETERNAL INEQUALITY of man. For by it we abolished a cut-and-dried aristocracy. We had seen little men artificially held up in high places, and great men artificially held down in low places, and our own justice-loving hearts abhorred this violence to human nature. Therefore, we decreed that every man should thenceforth have equal liberty to find his own level. By this very decree we acknowledged and gave freedom to true aristocracy, saying, “Let the best man win, whoever he is.” Let the best man win! That is America’s word. That is true democracy. And true democracy and true aristocracy are one and the same thing. If anybody cannot see this, so much the worse for his eyesight.”

According to Wister some men are born superior & democracy should allow them to rise & not enforce some sort of social equality. He thought the ways of the west – at the time – were what made America great & these ways were being betrayed. Sadly, as is often the case, this yearning for a mythological past comes accompanied with a distaste for the present along with all its diversity which Wister, along with many, consider as impurity. Thus from an essay he wrote in 1895, The Evolution of the Cow-Puncher, one can read: “No rood of modern ground is more debased and mongrel with its hordes of encroaching alien vermin, that turn our cities to Babels and our citizenship to a hybrid farce, who degrade our commonwealth from a nation into something half pawn-shop, half broker’s office. But to survive in the clean cattle country requires spirit of adventure, courage, and self-sufficiency; you will not find many Poles or Huns or Russian Jews in that district; it stands as yet untainted by the benevolence of Baron Hirsch.”’ Lament amplified by irony.

Few are spared the slurs & similarly nowadays insults of whole groups are dispensed willy-nilly by people in high, or the highest, places. Wister thus continues:

“Even in the cattle country the respectable Swedes settle chiefly to farming, and are seldom horsemen. The community of which the aristocrat appropriately made one speaks English. The Frenchman to-day is seen at his best inside a house; he can paint and he can play comedy, but he seldom climbs a new mountain. The Italian has forgotten Columbus, and sells fruit. Among the Spaniards and the Portuguese no Cortez or Magellan is found to-day. Except in Prussia, the Teuton is too often a tame, slippered animal, with his pedantic mind swaddled in a dressing-gown. But the Anglo-Saxon is still forever homesick for out-of-doors.”

The second book is Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind.

The book & film capture America’s myth of its own innocence, capture the origin of white grievance, basically that whites are the victims of black equality and victims of racial justice.

Sarah Churchwell’s book, The Wrath to Come: Gone with the Wind and the Lies America Tells, tells of how parts of America refuse to accept that it has done anything wrong. Many of the ideas below, the better ones,  are Churchwell’s.

Gone with the Wind is a big impressive lie but it doesn’t follow that it should be banned: it is literature dealing with complex issues & human dilemmas. I also wonder if any books should be banned at all?

What happens when 2 ideologies come into conflict & one wins over the other? What does the defeated ideology then do? Does it go away or does it go somewhere unnoticed & continues to develop and/or fester. I notice in the Middle East for example the Sunnis vanquished the Shi’ites way back in the 7th Century A.D. The effects of that battle are still with us!

Someone has pointed out the difference between mourning & melancholia. Mourning is linear, with time it ebbs & gives way. Melancholia persists. He pointed to something that afflicts empires etc like the British Empire & referred to it as “post-colonial melancholia”. Empires have to overcome it in order to become a normal state focused on the present & the welfare of its present citizens. The Austro-Hungarian empire seems to have done that admirably & Austria is now a happy place that knows its limitations. The British empire is less successful.  The Russian & Ottoman empires are still suffering from acute nostalgia. The US is facing a slightly different melancholia: post-slavery & perhaps even post-hegemony melancholia.

The author, Margaret Mitchell, grew up with stories of the civil war. She said that she had “heard everything in the world except that the confederates had lost the war. When I was 10 years old it was a violent shock to learn that General Lee had been defeated.” Talking of The Virginian, President Trump renamed Fort Gregg-Adams in Virginia back to its Fort Lee name. I wish he were at least honest about things but no, this is his justification: “We won a lot of battles out of those forts. It’s no time to change. And I’m superstitious. I like to keep it going, right? I’m very superstitious. We want to keep it going.” No mention of dog whistles, it just so happens that the at least seven military bases, one of which is possibly the largest in the world,  were renamed after Confederate officers.

All this propagates the myth of the “lost cause” which was developed to conquer the shame of the Confederacy losing the civil war. A bit like the “stolen election” which the President continuously hammers, facts or no facts.

Mitchell saw herself as a friend of black people & the plantation owners as doomed chivalrous romantics – not as slave owners. The black slaves in the book are not full-fledged characters but are there supporting the main heroes of the novel like Scarlet whose lives are disturbed by the civil war.

According to Sarah Churchwell, “racism is the operating system of the story, it is what it’s about. The narrator never refers to black people as people, not a single time over the course of a thousand pages. They are either called a racial category so she will use either racialised words or she will compare them to animals. So they are literally described as different kinds of dogs or many different kinds of apes, monkeys, gorillas, hounds but literally never as a human being. I went into every single depiction in the book. So it is a textbook instance of dehumanisation. They are systematically dehumanised. The sympathetic black people who are depicted positively are the ones who choose slavery. They like being enslaved. They choose to stay with their enslavers after the war. They resent the Yankees for coming & trying to liberate them and the bad black people in the story, the unsympathetic black people are the ones who assert their own freedom and who assert equality.”

Still it is a compelling novel although it is a misrepresentation. The film played in London’s Leicester Square for 4 years including during the WWII Blitz. Churchwell writes that one of the first acts of Hitler on entering Paris was to ask to see Gone with the Wind. The issue of slavery & how it was handled reflects badly on many countries aside from the US of course. Britain was complicit in the trade & it compensated slave owners for the loss of their “property”.

For a good while during our lifetimes the pendulum swung in the direction of justice and tolerance away from insistence on social purity & the superiority of certain groups. Now it seems to be swinging in the wrong direction. Let us see what the near future brings . . .

Happy birthday!

General Pershing at the Arch of Victory (Arc de Triomphe) Paris, at the end of WWI.  Cover of book found in farm junk in North Dakota.

 

From Jeff May 2, 2026:  

Its possible that I am reacting to the finishing of reading the book on the demise of the Weimar Republic just today, where there were so many possible off ramps that could have been taken by many groups and individuals to upend the rise and takeover of Hitler and the Nazis…ugh.
The book I read was “Fateful Hours: the collapse of the Weimar Republic” by Volker Ullrich.   Ullrich  is a German historian, this is a translation of his latest work into English.  Ullrich’s thesis is that from 1919-1933 nearly every step of the way things could have been done to stop Hitler and the Nazis. He points to critical moments where parties failed , individuals failed to do what was necessary. Parties and factions within failed to come together to unite and fell into disunity.

Sure, a historian has the benefit of hindsight, but he quotes journalists and others at the time who understood the gravity of several missed opportunities. 

Germany’s unique history leading up to WW1 and its aftermath greatly played into the shifting situation.  There remained a strong anti-republican group based in different regions, the  Bolshevik revolution in Russia gained strength for the Communists and labor unions were already strong, the Center was declining, much of the Lutheran and especially Catholic establishment tended toward the right wing, if not the authoritarian wing, the Social Democrats, as I said, while comprising a plurality missed the urgency of certain moments and like most liberals held faith in the “law” and the “Constitution” and the better angels!
Meanwhile Britain and especially France demanded outrageous reparations and requirements on Germany. The economy jerked around with hyperinflation then a liquidity drain after 1929 and finally huge unemployment and a government from 1930 to 1932 that was sure that austerity and cutting budgets and raising taxes was the cure (John Maynard Keynes and FDR proved them wrong of course)
Interestingly though, the book enlightened me on the German public,  they were not disengaged! Voting rates were from 75 to nearly 90 pct in national and regional elections (no tv, mobile phones or social media to distract them?)  By summer 1932 when the Nazis reached their peak in the elections, the Center Right government was not solving the economic pain, the Center Left was fractured and the Communists were not a solution as they were under the control of the Comintern and Joseph Stalin by then. 

The Nazis were able to become the party of “change”, upending the status quo, and offered a dynamic leader and understood the power of propaganda and new technologies to disseminate much more than the traditional parties.   (sound familiar?)
There was one quote that stood out to me in the book, a Social Democrat member of parliament and wounded WW1 vet named Kurt Schumacher said in 1928: “If we know anything about National Socialism, it’s that for the first time in German politics human stupidity has been successfully and completely mobilized.”
Take out the words National Socialsm and put in MAGA and its pretty much where we are today

Another parallel in the book, is that in one election where 84% turnout happened, news articles suggest there were alot of first time voters, and uninformed voters,  Ullrich uses this inference to suggest the increase in votes for the Nazis in that election…again, sound familiar?

I am far from being calm, or maybe I have finally reached that state, day after day of screaming and banging fists against a wall finally you end up with no voice and bruised and broken hands. Calmness due to inability.
I have been reading alot. Also I recommend watching light stuff on tv to relieve the mind (though since my good wife was gone in Wisc for 2 days and she cannot tolerate any serious movies {enough terrible seriousness in the news and daily life} I watched “The Secret Agent”  the Brazilian movie that won the best foreign film..its a trip and unique)  I recommend the Netflix series “Running Point” with Kate Hudson, its about a comically dysfunctional family of sibs who own what is supposed to be the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA (fictionalized of course)….2 seasons, quick dialogue, topical, yet mostly traditional.  show writer is Mindy Kaling

Law Day 2026

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Today is Law Day in the United States.

For a lot of years after I retired, I was active in an organization who was very active advocate for the rule of law.  Before that, though not a lawyer, most of my work time was spent dealing in one way or another with legal matters such as contracts, etc.

A few years ago, while going through the papers of my friend Lynn Elling, I discovered a 52 page booklet produced for Law Day from 1959, produced by the American Bar Association.  The four links are the entirety of that first booklet, now 67 years old, but more current now than ever.  (The note on the cover was by a prominent twin cities lawyer who was president of the local group.)

If nothing else, read the first two or three pages of the first link.  The booklet is the post.  Certainly share with friends you know who are in the profession of Law.

Law Day Am Bar Assoc 1959

Law Day (2) Am Bar Assoc 1959

Law Day (3) Am Bar Assoc 1959

Law Day (4) Am Bar Assoc 1959