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#nowspinning a little evolution of Hip Hop. Sugarhill Gang - Sugarhill Gang (1979) Run DMC - Raising Hell (1988) Biz Markie - Just a Friend (1989) Notrious B.I.G. - Greatest Hits (2007) (Originally 1994-2005) Fugees - The Score (1996) Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (1998) Slick Rick - The Art of Storytelling (1999) Talib Kweli - Quality (2002) Outkast - Speakerboxxx/The Love Below (2003) Mos Def - The Ecstatic (2009) Eminem - Recovery (2010) Janelle Monae - The Archandroid (2010) Kendrick Lamar - good kid, m.A.A.d city (2012) (at Exeter, New Hampshire) https://www.instagram.com/p/CEXk1T1MBOA/?igshid=521zzayxt2ux

#nowspinning

NEW YORK (AP) — Ever since the historical musical "Hamilton" began its march to near-universal infatuation, one group has noticeably withhel

Not sure a "Christmas Carol" style play (!?) is the right answer, but Hamilton is, indeed, terrible history and it has a dramatic impact on students.

As more folks are aware of and celebrate Juneteenth this year, it's worth drawing our attention to what the holiday commemorates--both the slow and sometimes painful process of emancipation and the role played by people of African descent in that process. For example, the famous illustration pictured here from the political cartoonist Thomas Nast appeared in Harper's Weekly to celebrate emancipation in January 1863 as the Emancipation Proclamation confirmed publically freedom as a Union war aim, but the news of emancipation did not reach Galveston, Texas until June of 1865 (the event celebrated on Juneteenth). For more on the role of freedpeople in this process consider this essay I give my students yearly from the great historian Manisha Sinha: https://tinyurl.com/yctmqt9y https://www.instagram.com/p/CBnuWXupAhT/?igshid=1ltwsdgza6etc

Message from a former student. Being a teacher can be good sometimes. https://www.instagram.com/p/B_94KG1nXaM/?igshid=9ekkcn7veo5z

Happy V-E Day! https://www.instagram.com/p/B_7gi3InMZP/?igshid=1awpcrh10pke8

Happy Birthday to Ulysses S. Grant born on this day in 1822. Grant was the architect of Union military victory in the Civil War and truly dedicated himself to the rights of freedpeople and the eradication of the KKK during Reconstruction. He was also something of a "speed demon." In 1872, Grant was arrested along with some of his friends speeding in their carriages on M Street in Washington. In an interesting irony, the arresting officer was a former black Union soldier named William West. West had pulled the President over the previous evening and given him a warning. When he stopped him again the next night, West told him he was "bound to arrest" him. Grant was released on 20 dollars bail and failed to show up for trial. https://www.instagram.com/p/B_fCodqjsKp/?igshid=jm96wz7rjz7t

On this day in 1865 the Civil War largely came to its conclusion with the surrender of the largest Confederate army in the field to U.S. Grant. (Though the war would not officially end until August of 1866 largely thanks to continuing resistance to federal control in Texas.) Grant was magnanimous in victory and famously pronounced "the rebels are our countrymen." Less commonly cited are these words from Grant's masterful Personal Memoirs (ghostwritten by his close friend Mark Twain): "I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly, and had suffered so much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which a people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse." https://www.instagram.com/p/B-wyOtojK9y/?igshid=t9c1rsvv41lp

The Civilian Conservation Corps was founded on this day in 1933. If you've been to any of the National Parks that existed in the 1930s, you have probably benefited from the work of this federal work relief program as many of the projects they completed are still being used today. Part of the Roosevelt administration's plan for pump-priming federal spending, the CCC hired unemployed, unmarried young men to work on "conservation" projects that ranged from road construction to erosion abatement to preservation of historical sites. Run with "military-style" discipline, there were CCC camps in every state and the program employed 5% of all men in the US at its height. https://www.instagram.com/p/B-mcr04nBdO/?igshid=5p1ibeq26ojw

Augustus Saint-Gaudens was born in Dublin in 1848 and immigrated to the United States when he was 13. After training at Cooper Union in New York and the Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris, he became one of the most celebrated sculptors in American History. In particular, he helped to define the grammar of American monuments and memorials with his work representing the heroes of the Civil War generation in the aftermath of the conflict. In 1885, Saint-Gaudens moved to Cornish where he was a central figure in the Cornish Colony of artists and worked in his studio overlooking what the artists in black humor called "Blow-Me-Up Creek." (In a bit of bonus history, the stone wall for the swimming hole seen here was reconstructed by a nearby CCC camp during the Depression.) Seen in this post are copies of the plasters for Saint-Gaudens' design of the grave marker for the wife of historian Henry Adams in Rock Creek Cemetery in DC, his monument to the 54th Massachusetts on Boston Common, his monument to Admiral David Farragut in New York and his monumental sculpture of Lincoln in Chicago's Lincoln Park. (at Saint-Gaudens National Historical Park) https://www.instagram.com/p/B-Da4Ven_KP/?igshid=1m9lh1ni1h50k

50 Post Office Square, Boston. The New England Telephone and Telegraph Building. Completed in 1947 from a design by the architects Cram and Ferguson. New England Telephone and Telegraph Company was one of the first telephone companies in the United States in the 1870s. It merged with a number of other companies to create the American Bell Telephone Company which then merged again in 1899 to create the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T). The Telephone industry was a prime example of the horizontal integration of business in the Gilded Age. It also became an example of the postwar use of anti-trust legislation as it was broken up in 1984 by government lawyers. After the breakup of the Bell System in 1984, what was New England Telephone and Telegraph merged with New York Bell to become NYNEX, which was later rebranded as Verizon. So, your two major cell phone companies both have roots in this building. (at Post Office Square, Boston) https://www.instagram.com/p/B0qNBQXH619/?igshid=1sjw14f4icxbf

Back to work in earnest. (at The Derryfield School) https://www.instagram.com/p/B0G3X-_nnk0/?igshid=e5w79ivpo0gm

Billings Estate in Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Site. This estate was home to Frederick Billings whose purchase and sharing of photographs of the Yosemite Valley helped to inspire the National Park movement. It was also here that the conservationist George Perkins Marsh (who my Environmental Studies students read as an introduction to the discipline) was inspired to write some of his most influential work about the relationship between humans and nature and the meaning of "wildness." The many carriage roads on the property were used to take visitors high up the The Pogue, a beautiful mountain pond that helped to make the case for conservation. After passing through the Rockefeller family in the 20th Century, the home of this progenitor of the National Parks was taken over by the Parks Service. (at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park) https://www.instagram.com/p/BzgT1KdHlwC/?igshid=85wccgouv59k

Bug Light and South Portland Liberty Ship Memorial in the fog.

The shipyard here was one of the five largest emergency shipyards in the country during the Second World War. It built more than 200 Liberty Ships. Called “ugly ducklings” by FDR for their simple and brutal design, they were instrumental in carrying the millions of tons of materiel necessary for the successful Allied war effort. The last two images in this set show the Shipyard at its height during the Second World War. (at Bug Light Park) https://www.instagram.com/p/ByLxHprn7R_/?igshid=r1zz0q8veb91

“The big doors of the country barn stand open and ready, The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon, The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged, The armfuls are pack’d to the sagging mow.

I am there, I help, I came stretch’d atop of the load, I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other, I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy, And roll head over heels and tangle my hair full of wisps.”

-Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself,” 1892 Version.

Walt Whitman was born on this day 200 years ago. https://www.instagram.com/p/ByIdhJnHHFT/?igshid=1pifwj5ymogix

Passed on this day in 1830, the Indian Removal Act would lead to the forced migration of thousands of native people. Despite the decisions of the Supreme Court in Worcester v. Georgia and Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, the process of removal proceeded apace. Andrew Jackson is reputed to have responded to the news of the Court's rulings by saying "John Marshall has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it." Ironically, Jackson would shortly embrace Marshall's doctrine of judicial supremacy in the Nullification Crisis and would hail Marshall as a hero upon his death. Of course, this did not help the Cherokee or any other native people removed under the Indian Removal Act. https://www.instagram.com/p/ByAtzxRnRhv/?igshid=riapvu2sbzq6

Laudholm Farm in Wells, Maine. Purchased as a summer retreat by George Lord, President of the Boston and Maine Railroad, in 1881, it was transformed by his sons Robert and Charles in the early 20th century into a model farm. A number of technologically innovative farming methods including a semi-automatic water pumping system for the farm's water tower were demonstrated here. A good walk to Barrier Beach as well. (at Wells Reserve at Laudholm) https://www.instagram.com/p/BxnOx3rl27e/?igshid=4gla28bhqx4z

65 years ago. https://www.instagram.com/p/BxlQRyxlWnG/?igshid=co17t8vyrlgu

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