Category: Historical Tidbits

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Heartland I: The Carving Climbing Out of the Mountain

Crazy Horse carving, September 2018
“My lands are where my people lie buried.” Crazy Horse Memorial, September 2018. Photo by kajmeister.

Korczak, the sculptor, slung his drill over his back and climbed over 900 steps for almost 40 years.  He blasted bits out of the granite mountain, day after day, grinding down the 563 -foot side to lay out room for a long pointing arm. If ever there was a visual definition of the word “surmount”–to mount upon, to prevail over–this must be it.

One man, one drill, one mountain.

Crazy Horse Memorial 1974
Memorial in 1974, when I first visited. Photo by memorial staff, copy on Pinterest.

He hadn’t gotten especially far by 1973, when I first saw the Statue-To-Be, driving across South Dakota on our cross-country trip moving from Detroit to Sacramento. Now, returning back to visit some of my old haunts in Michigan, the memorial was the first big stop on our trip through the heartland, this pink-tinged grassland of our country’s center.  Korczak’s grandchildren are now in charge, and the crew is slowly but surely pulling the image of the proud warrior out of the granite. Continue reading “Heartland I: The Carving Climbing Out of the Mountain”

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Balance Restored: Ruby Slippers Found

An estimated eight billion people have seen the 1939 Hollywood film version of The Wizard of Oz.  Millions have viewed a pair of the ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland in the film, on display at the Smithsonian. Hundreds more saw another pair on loan to the Judy Garland museum in Minnesota, until it was brazenly stolen by thieves unknown in 2005. Minnesota has been on watch ever since.

Recovered ruby slippers
Recovered ruby slippers via FBI + mysterious sequin, photo at americanhistory.si.edu

But intrepid G-men, those FBI who have been criticized so much lately, were on the case. They announced this week that the slippers have been found, and they are close to apprehending the miscreants. Callooh-Callay!

Before I pontificate further on a few engrossing details in the case, I will point out that as a child of the sixties, I viewed Oz a good dozen times in black and white before ever seeing it in color. My aunt also says that she was watching the movie with my aging, Alzheimer-stricken grandmother and that at the moment when Dorothy opens her sepia-toned tornado-struck house to the colorful world of Oz, my grandmother died. So there is some deep connection between my Minnesota genes and this movie. As with that scene, there is more to the case than meets the eye. Continue reading “Balance Restored: Ruby Slippers Found”

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Sweet Sabotage

WWII chocolate bomb
Prototype of a Nazi chocolate bomb bomb, photo by Lawrence Fish at artnet.news.com

Industrial Espionage: Cookie packages shoved, hidden, to the back part of the shelf or hidden on the top by rival cookie suppliers. Supermarket owners bribed not to stock a competitor’s cola. A clone product created with a deliberate shoddy taste and marketing strategy in order to sink a successful new market entry. Chocolate bars spiked with bits of pork so that Muslim customers believe they can’t eat it. People attacked with chocolate…I mean what is the world coming to, if we can’t enjoy our sweeties in peace?!?

Cookie wars

I typically would not write two food columns in a row, but I saw a Facebook post* this week that resonated with me so much, I could not resist. Besides, what better to follow a vegetable post with than one on dessert?

Hydrox FTC complaint against Oreo's
Hydrox has filed an FTC complaint against the maker’s of Oreo’s, according to the Jewish Telegraph Agency

You can read the details at JTA above, but, in essence, Hydrox is claiming that Oreo cookie suppliers are moving Hydrox around on the supermarket shelves in order to obscure their packages. Customers have sent in dozens of pictures of random products hung in front of the boxes to cover the labels, packages pushed to the back of the shelf and another Oreo product put in front (even though the label says Hydrox), and other dastardly deeds. Continue reading “Sweet Sabotage”