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HISTORY: unwrapped – April 2007

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April 30, 2007– King of the Wild Frontier

A number of celebrities and lesser knowns threatened (promised?) to leave the United States if George W. Bush was reelected president in 2004. But before Bush, there was Martin Van Buren, and before today’s political malcontents, there was Davy Crockett (1786–1836), “king of the wild frontier” as the popular 1955 politically incorrect “Ballad of Davy Crockett” described him. In a letter written to Charles Shultz dated December 25, 1834, Crockett complains about Andrew Jackson’s influence over American voters. He describes them as “Volunteer Slaves” and declares his plan to leave the United States and move to Texas if Martin Van Buren, Jackson’s vice-president, is elected to office.

The western and southern men dare not to sustain Jackson in his mad Caesar [like rages], and when they refuse all the blood in the nation will be let loose on them.

The time has come that virtue is expected to be transferable and as negotiable and a promissory note of hand in these days of glory and Jackson and reform &c. Little Van [Martin van Buren] sits in his chair and looks as sly as a red fox, and I have no doubt but that he thinks Andrew Jackson has full power to transfer the people of these United States at his will and I am afraid that a majority of free Citizens will submit to it and Say amen. Jackson done it, it is right. If we judge by the past, we can reach no other calculations.

I have almost given up the ship as lost. I have gone so far as to declare that if Martin Van Buren is elected that I will leave the United States, for I never will live under his Kingdom. Before I will submit to his government, I will go to the Wilds of Texas. I will consider that government a Paradise to what this government will be. I never will submit to his government. In fact, at this time our Republican Government has dwindled almost into insignificance. Our boasted land of liberty has almost bowed to the yoke of bondage. Our happy days of Republican principles are near at an end when a few is to transfer the many. These are Van Buren principles. There are more slaves in New York and Pennsylvania than there are in Virginia and South Carolina and they are the meanest kind of slaves there are—Volunteer Slaves. [At least] our Southern slaves are of some use to their owner.

Van Buren won, and Davy Crockett moved to Texas and fought and died at the Alamo on March 6, 1836. His tombstone reads: “Davy Crockett, Pioneer, Patriot, Soldier, Trapper, Explorer, State Legislator, Congressman, Martyred at The Alamo. 1786–1836.” Unlike today’s political malcontents, Crockett did what he said he would do. He followed the dictates of his own motto: “Be Sure You’re Right, and Then Go Ahead.”

April 27, 2007– In Search of a Wife

John Calvin, the Reformer, thought little of marriage until he lived for a short while with a pastor and his wife whose home was known as “the inn of righteousness.” Their happy marriage made an impression upon Calvin, and he realized that he needed someone to take care of him. He told his associates he was in the market for a wife who was not too fussy or fastidious, who was economical, patient, and interested in his health. Soon after giving up his search for a wife, a friend encouraged him to consider a widow in Calvin’s church. It wasn’t long before Calvin, Idelette, and her two children became a family. Though they only had nine years together before tuberculosis took Idelette, Calvin grieved that his best life’s companion had been taken from him, and he never remarried.

April 26, 2007– For the Love of Peanuts

It is a mystery as to why no one has ever done a full-length film of George Washington Carver. The story of this great scientist is extraordinary. He was born in 1864 in Missouri on the farm of an elderly white couple, Moses and Susan Carver. While yet an infant, George and his mother were kidnapped by Confederate night-raiders. Moses tried to locate George and his mother after the war, but he was only able to find George and traded a horse to get him back. After enduring resistance in securing an education in a segregated world, Carver entered Simpson College in Iowa. He studied piano and art since the college offered no science classes. He transferred to another college and earned a Bachelor of Science degree and a Master of Science degree in bacterial botany and agriculture. Carver became the first black faculty member of Iowa College.
Carver served as Director of Agriculture at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama where his teaching career established him as a world class scientist. Carver remained on the faculty until his death. He gained fame but no fortune in the development of multiple uses for ordinary and everyday foods like the peanut and sweet potato. His work attracted Franklin Roosevelt, Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison. While George Washington Carver was deeply attracted to his scientific work, it was his devotion to Jesus Christ that sets him apart from many in the scientific field.

April 25, 2007– Lewis and Clark’s MVP

The Shoshone woman Sacajawea had been kidnapped and sold to a French-Canadian fur trader. The fur trader was hired as interpreter for the Lewis and Clark expedition, and Sacajawea and her newborn son also joined the party. She collected plants, nuts, and berries which were used for food and medicine. When a boat nearly capsized, she retrieved important books and instruments before they floated away. Clark wrote that the Indians believed they were friendly when they saw the Indian woman and her baby. During meetings with Indian chiefs, Sacajawea was the interpreter. Her vote counted when it was determined where the party would spend the winter. Lewis and Clark honored Sacajawea for her efforts in making the expedition a success by naming a river in her honor.

April 24, 2007– The Comic Book Police

Dr. Fredric Wertham, a prominent psychiatrist, made his mark in cultural history when he decided to take on the comic book industry in the late 1940s and early 1950s. He claimed there was a direct link between reading “crime comics” and juvenile delinquency. A number of magazines—Reader’s Digest and Scouting—published articles by Wertham and other comic critics warning parents of the dangers of the pulp stories. In the September 1954 issue of Scouting, the official publication of the Boy Scouts, Wertham stated his thesis: “The keynote of crime-comic books is violence and sadism. This is featured in the illustrations and in the text. In one typical crime comic . . . one story alone has ten pictures of girls getting smacked in the face, beaten with a whip, strangled, choked by hand, choked with a scarf. In addition, two men are killed and one man is crippled."

While these articles caught the notice of parents, it was an excerpt from a forthcoming book by Wertham in the November 1953 issue of the Ladies’ Home Journal that put the comic book industry on notice that things were about to change. Early in 1954, he followed up the article with the publication of Seduction of the Innocent, a book-length indictment of the industry. In addition to his attacks on crime and horror comics, Wertham even claimed that Batman and Robin were having a homosexual relationship and Wonder Woman was a lesbian role model!

There was such a hue and cry against these graphic comics that Congress got into the act. Hearings were called by the Senate subcommittee on juvenile delinquency to look into the matter. Publishers were in a panic. Some comic book publishing houses went out of business. Those that remained joined forces and created the Comics Code Authority that served as a self-censoring agency within the industry. Nearly every book written on the history of comics mentions Frederick Wertham. He was the devil incarnate, the Joe McCarthy of the comic industry.

William M. Gaines, publisher of The Vault of Horror, Tales from the Crypt, Weird Science, Haunt of Fear, Weird Fantasy, and a humorous comic titled Mad, refused to capitulate to the strong-arm tactics of Wertham and the Senate. Even so, enough bad publicity had been generated that Gaines had to suspend publication of his horror and suspense titles. A late addition to his comic library of titles was Mad. Because it was not singled out by Wertham and the Senate committee, Mad slipped under the radar. Gaines did an end-run around the Comics Code by turning Mad into a magazine. The newly formatted comic became known as Mad Magazine.

There’s one more twist to this story. William Gaines inherited the comic business from his father Max Gaines who died in a tragic boating accident. The elder Gaines drafted a set of guidelines for artists and writers, something his son avoided like the plague and denounced when the Comics Code Authority was established:

“Never show anybody stabbed or shot.”

“Show no torture scenes.”

“Never show a hypodermic needle.”

“Never show a coffin, especially with anybody in it.”

Max Gaines also published Picture Stories from the Bible, Picture Stories from Science, Picture Stories from American History, and Picture Stories from World History.

Most comic book publishers have dropped the Comics Code, and the comics that William Gaines published are now worth a lot of money. I guess he’s having the last laugh on poor Dr. Wertham.

April 23, 2007– America's First Celebrity

“I was honored with having a few stones, dirt, rotten eggs, and pieces of dead cats thrown at me.” In spite of these distractions, George Whitefield continued to preach for three hours. He had the most recognizable name in America, drawing thousands of listeners wherever he preached. Brutal mobs sometimes attacked Whitefield and his followers, and once he was stoned until nearly dead. He preached in fields rather than churches and even without amplification, could be heard by 30,000 or more. He pushed himself so hard and preached with such intensity, that afterward he often became ill. After preaching at Harvard it was reported that “The College is entirely changed. The students are full of God.” Praised as “the greatest preacher that England has ever produced,” George Whitefield lived each day doing what God had called him to do.

April 20, 2007– The Moon-Landing Hoax

The Central and Union Pacific Railroads joined their construction efforts on May 10, 1869 in Promontory, Utah, with the ceremonial driving of the Golden Spike into the track that joined East and West. One hundred years later, on July 20, 1969, two Americans landed on the moon. While railroads transformed commerce, communication, and travel in the United States, Moon landings abruptly stopped with no commercial benefits after six missions. Bill Kaysing thinks he knows why.

Kaysing claims in his book We Never Went to the Moon that the missions were a scam. After a number of technological mishaps, NASA realized it did not have the expertise to make President Kennedy’s dream of putting a man on the Moon before the close of the decade a reality. To avoid shutting down NASA, losing funding, and giving the Soviet Union a reason to believe that America was behind them in missile design, an elaborate hoax was supposedly concocted to fool the world. Taking a page from Hollywood, Kaysing claims that an elaborate Moon-set was constructed somewhere in the Southwest region of the United States. What we saw on television during those eventful days was special effects, “a near seamless piece of performance art.” The only real things the public saw were an empty Saturn V rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral and the return of the astronauts in a sealed “dummy space capsule that was dropped from a C5-A transport plane.”

Nearly everyone was in on the hoax, even Walter Cronkite! Anyone who tried to blow the lid off the planned ruse would pay the ultimate price. As a warning, so Kaysing theorizes, three astronauts were killed in a launchpad “accident” on January 27, 1967, mostly to keep Gus Grissom quiet. Grissom had been complaining about safety issues and threatened to go public. Again, this is according to Kaysing. If any of this story sounds familiar, you might remember the 1978 movie Capricorn One, starring O.J. Simpson, Telly Savalas, Elliott Gould, and James Brolin. The movie was about a faked mission to Mars. The only difference is that these astronauts had a conscience and wanted to get the true story out to the world.

There are millions of people who believe Kaysing is on to something. Mistrust of the government runs deep. But if it’s all true, why have so many people been able to keep the secret for so long? This is where all conspiracy theories break down. Too many people have to keep too many secrets for too long.

April 19, 2007– Not a Ghost of a Chance

Harry Houdini's real name was Ehrich Weiss (1874–1926). He changed it to Houdini as a tribute to French illusionist Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin, adding an “I” to the name to make it his own. While Houdini is best known as a physical magician for escapes from straight jackets while suspended in midair and an illusionist, he is also famous for exposing fake mediums and spiritualists. When his beloved mother died, Houdini became interested in the possibility of being able to contact her in the spirit world. Because of his knowledge as an illusionist, he recognized the techniques that mediums used to fool people into believing that they had special powers to contact the dearly departed. Houdini became a one-man crusader against these charlatans who used grief to bilk family members out of their money. Houdini was such a well known public figure that he had to attend seances in disguise so as not to be discovered. Houdini was a good friend of Arthur Conan Doyle (1859–1930), creator of the famous fictional character Sherlock Holmes. Doyle believed that Houdini had magical powers, that his escapes were accomplished supernaturally. Doyle devoted a chapter of his book The Edge of the Unknown to a detailed argument that Houdini had genuine psychic power.In fact, Doyle believed almost any story that claimed that supernatural powers were at work. He insisted that fairies actually existed. He wrote a book called The Coming of the Fairies (1921) that supposedly chronicled their existence, and even included photographs to prove it! In reality, he had been duped by two teenage girls who staged the whole thing. Even so, Doyle went to his grave believing that fairies were real. Ironically, Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes character was the epitome of rationality and would have dismissed the obviously staged evidence as fraudulent. But Doyle wanted to believe so much that he put his usually rational mind in neutral.

April 18, 2007– The Fugitive Translator

If England were ever to be evangelized, William Tyndale was convinced that it would take place only if people could read the Bible in their own language. His efforts to get permission to translate Scripture failed, so Tyndale left England. He settled in Antwerp where he worked translating the Bible. When his English Bibles were smuggled into England, Tyndale became a hunted man. For seven years Tyndale eluded his pursuers who eventually tracked him down. At his trial, Tyndale was condemned to die. But the story does not end there. After his death, the king was presented with one of Tyndale’s New Testaments and he proclaimed without realizing the translation’s source, “In God’s name let it go abroad among the people.” Two years later, every church in England displayed one book of the whole Bible in English as directed by the king.

April 17, 2007– Politically Incorrect Jefferson

The modern-day image of Jefferson as a social and political liberal would be shattered after a single reading of his Bill for Proportioning Crimes and Punishments. Capital punishment is maintained for murder and treason while rescinded for all other crimes. Even so, other crimes receive some rather harsh and politically incorrect penalties. Consider these examples:

•"If any person commit petty treason, or a husband murder his wife, a parent his child, or a child his parent, he shall suffer death, by hanging, and his body be delivered to Anatomists to be dissected" (Sec. IV).

•"Whosoever committith murder by poisoning, shall suffer death by poison" (Sec. V).

•"Whosoever shall be guilty of rape, polygamy, or sodomy with man or woman, shall be punished; if a man, by castration, a woman, by boring through the cartilage of her nose a hole of one half inch in diameter at the least" (Sec. XIV).

•"Whosoever committith a robbery, shall be condemned to hard labour four years in the public works, and shall make double reparation to the persons injured" (Sec. XX).

•"All attempts to delude the people, or to abuse their understanding by exercise of the pretended arts of witchcraft, conjuration, enchantment, or sorcery, or by pretended prophecies, shall be punished by ducking and whipping, at the discretion of a jury, not exceeding fifteen stripes" (Sec. XXIX).

Ouch! Considering these views, there is no way that Thomas Jefferson could ever run for political office today.

April 16, 2007– Get Out the Vote

During the 1600s in colonial America, Massachusetts required property ownership in order to vote. A potential voter also had to prove that he was “sober and peaceable” and “orthodox in the fundamentals of religion.” Connecticut required church membership. Rhode Island permitted only professing Christians. Landholders could vote in New York, but Pennsylvania required voters to believe in Jesus Christ and own property. Free white men who owned their homes could vote in Virginia. Quakers could not vote in Massachusetts, and Baptists were barred in several colonies. Roman Catholics and Jews were disfranchised in many others. Blacks and women could not vote at all. Nearly every American citizen has the right to vote today and should take the opportunity to exercise this freedom given to us by the framers of our Constitution.

April 13, 2007– Botched Bibles

Several English Bibles published in the seventeenth century get their nicknames because of typographic errors. The so-called Murderer’s Bible misprints “murderers” instead of the correct word “murmurers” in Jude 16. Mark 7:27 was made to read: “Let the children first be killed” (instead of “filled”). The Wife-Hater Bible tells a man to hate his own wife: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father . . . yea, and his own wife also.” Of course, “wife” should read “life.” The first edition of the King James Bible correctly has Matthew 26:36 stating, “Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane…” The second printing reads, “Then cometh Judas with them unto a place called Gethsemane.” The Adulterer’s or Wicked Bible, a 1631 King James Version, leaves out an essential “not” and commands “Thou shalt commit adultery.” King Charles fined the printer Robert Barker the enormous sum of £300 and took away his license to print Bibles. An Oxford edition of 1717 was known as the Vinegar Bible because the chapter heading to Luke 20 had “Vinegar” for “Vineyard” in the title “The Parable of the Vineyard.” A 1716 KJV Bible made a common typographical mistake by transposing letters.  Instead of John 8:11 reading, “Go, and sin no more,” it read, “Go and sin on more.” The Printer’s Bible laments that “printers” (not “princes”) “have persecuted me without cause” (Ps. 119:161). Considering how these botched Bibles got their name, the Psalm might not be too far off.

April 12, 2007– A Modern-Day Cincinnatus

Buildings in Washington D.C., with their columns and facades, are reminiscent of Classical architecture. In addition, some American political writers called themselves by Latin names like Cato and Publius. The authors of The Federalist, a collection of essays written in favor of the Constitution, did not use their real names. The 85 essays were attributed to the pseudonym “Publius,” but in actuality were written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. Publius Valerius Publicola (“friend of the people”) was a Roman consul. George Washington was known as “Cincinnatus,” a Roman general and patriot (519–439 B.C.) who gave up supreme power and went home to his farm after rescuing the Roman army which had been besieged by hill tribes. You can even see an enormous marble sculpture of our first president—wearing a toga! Our early constitutional framers looked to some elements of the Roman Republic and its form of civil government—not to the Roman Empire and its pagan religious practices—as a model for their political ideas. The word “Senate” is also borrowed from the Romans

April 11, 2007– Washington's Vanishing Chef

George Washington faced a personal dilemma with political overtones when the nation’s capital moved from New York to Philadelphia. Disappointed with the food served in the new capital, Washington brought Hercules, his Mount Vernon chef. Hercules was accomplished in the culinary art, and he managed Washington’s kitchen with style and discipline. But the black chef posed a problem. Pennsylvania required that slaves be freed after six months of residency. Washington tried to get around this law by returning his household slaves to Virginia just short of the deadline. After several weeks, the slaves would be returned to Philadelphia. The president had vowed never to purchase another slave, but he nearly faced going back on those words when Hercules disappeared. Eventually a white housekeeper, who could also cook, took the place of the runaway chef. The flamboyant Hercules was never heard from again.

April 10, 2007– 19th Century Terrorists

Terrorist foes are not new to the United States. Two centuries before 9/11, our country sought to protect its citizens from a foe who held allegiance to no country, the Barbary pirates of North Africa. Capturing ships and demanding a ransom for the crew provided a steady income for the pirates. Many seamen became slaves when the ransom couldn’t be paid. The newly elected president, Thomas Jefferson, was forced to confront the continued attacks. Many wished to avoid conflict at any cost. Jefferson believed that continued payment to the terrorist pirates would only encourage more demands, so he refused to pay. The U.S. Navy was formed during 4 years of war in the Mediterranean. Our naval victories in 1815 led to treaties which ended all tribute money paid by the United States.

April 9, 2007– Yale Grad Makes Good

As a Yale graduate, Eli Whitney (1765–1825) was known for his “handiness” and is best remembered for his cotton gin invention (1793), which brought great wealth to many but gave Whitney a meager return on his investment. The cotton engine, “gin” for short, automated the separation of cottonseed from the short cotton fiber. It was such a simple machine that it was easily duplicated and reproduced.Whitney also introduced a technique that proved to be the most revolutionary invention in American history. In 1798, he built a firearms factory near New Haven, Connecticut. Unlike many American industries of his day, Whitney did not build from the top down. He first built all the machinery he would need for his method of production and devised a system of interchangeable parts for muskets. This new technique was adopted all over the country as a defense measure and soon was being applied to other inventions paving the way for mass production and the industrial revolution.

April 6, 2007– Jefferson's Secretary

When President Thomas Jefferson needed a private secretary who could be trusted completely, he chose Captain Meriwether Lewis. Jefferson did not choose Lewis for his secretarial skills. The president had a dream of exploring the land that lay beyond the Mississippi River. Nine years earlier, he had attempted an exploration, and Meriwether Lewis had begged to join. Jefferson refused, thinking Lewis was too young. That expedition was abandoned. Now that he was president, Jefferson was determined to send explorers west, and he hinted to Lewis of his plan. Lewis was prepared to ask a friend, Lieutenant William Clark to join him if the president’s dream became a reality. The Lewis and Clark Expedition would cover 3,700 miles and include lands that would eventually become eleven states.

April 5, 2007– From Slave to Poet

The eighteenth century exhibited a high degree of literacy among Americans, and it was not confined to just one class of people. Phillis Wheatley, a seventeen-year-old black servant in Boston, wrote a eulogy for the popular minister of the Great Awakening, George Whitefield, which was published. Phillis worked for the family of John Wheatley as a personal servant and had been permitted to be educated, which was most unusual for someone who was a slave and a woman. Her one and only book, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, was published in 1773, the year she was freed from slavery. One of her poems reflected her thankfulness at being brought to America and learning of her Savior, Jesus Christ. Phillis Wheatley was acclaimed as the “African poetess.”

April 4, 2007– Giving Thanks to God

On Thursday, September 24, 1789, the First House of Representatives recommended the First Amendment to the states for ratification. Congressman Elias Boudinot proposed that Congress jointly request that President Washington proclaim a day of thanksgiving for “the many signal favors of Almighty god.” He “could not think of letting the session pass over without offering an opportunity to all the citizens of the United States of joining, with one voice, in returning to Almighty God their sincere thanks for the blessings he had poured down upon them.” The colonists of another era were aware of the many instances of thanksgiving found in “holy writ.” Thanksgiving, as it was practiced by the colonists, was a religious celebration that shared the sentiments of their biblical forerunners, giving thanks to God for His faithful provision. “Twice en route the passengers [aboard the Arabella] participated in a fast, and once a ‘thanksgiving.’”

One of the earliest recorded celebrations occurred a half century before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth. “A small colony of French Huguenots established a settlement near present-day Jacksonville, Florida. On June 30, 1564, their leader, René de Laudonnière, recorded that ‘We sang a psalm of Thanksgiving unto God, beseeching Him that it would please Him to continue His accustomed goodness towards us.’” May we do likewise this day as we gather together with our families and thank God for continuing to bless our nation.

April 3, 2007 – Meeting the Final Judge

Clarence Darrow is remembered as the lawyer who defended teaching evolution in the 1925 case that became known as the “Monkey” Trial. A year earlier, Darrow saved two wealthy students, accused of kidnapping and murder, from the death penalty by arguing that they were products of their environment. When asked how he would sum up his life, Darrow quoted the Bible, a book he had publicly ridiculed most of his life. He then said, “I have lived a life without purpose, without meaning, without direction. I don’t know where I came from. And I don’t know what I’m doing here. And worst of all, I don’t know what’s going to happen to me when I punch out of here.” Darrow’s accomplishments would give him no assurance and comfort when he stood before the Judge of the universe in the only courtroom that mattered.

April 2, 2007 – The Black Yankees

The myth that there was no slavery in New England has been shattered as more evidence has come to light. The enslaved men and women of New England elected their own governors and kings, and elected officials carried authority in the black community and mediated disputes. Blacks worked in fishing, trade, shipbuilding, dock work, and construction. Many of them became success stories like Samuel Gipson who began his own business. When he died, he left his estate to a young clerk he employed. Gipson’s amazing story of success is more remarkable because he had spent most of his life as a slave, and his heir was the son of the man who had owned him! The new evidence is proving how much the black community contributed to the development of the cities of New England.