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Monday, August 31, 2015

Titanic's last lunch menu

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The menu was saved by a passenger aboard the "Money Boat" – so-named for the unfounded rumors that one of the first-class passengers bribed crew members to quickly row the boat away from the sinking ship rather than rescue others.
The Titanic’s last lunch menu is expected to bring in between $50,000 and $70,000 at auction.
NYP.ST

Auschwitz museum gas chamber shower

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Israeli visitors who stopped by the Auschwitz concentration camp museum in Poland on Sunday were surprised to find mist showers that resembled Holocaust...
THEWEEK.COM

Bronze Age village

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The remains of a Bronze Age village have been found off the coast of Greece.
(University of Geneva)

The Battle of Blair Mountain

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The Battle of Blair Mountain, America's largest labor conflict, took place 94 years ago this week. Archaeologists studying the battlefield have reconstructed the events of the bloody clash.
(Photo Courtesy Kenneth King)

Sunday, August 30, 2015

The Harrison Act Of 1914

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Ad published in American Druggist and Pharmaceutical Record, volume 36, number 6, March 25, 1900.
Ad published in American Druggist and Pharmaceutical Record, volume 36, number 6, March 25, 1900.

By 1900, use of narcotics was at its peak for both medical and non-medical purposes. Advertisements promoting opium- and cocaine-laden drugs saturated the newspapers; morphine seemed more easily obtainable than alcohol; and widespread sale of drugs and drug paraphernalia gained the attention of medical professionals and private citizens alike.1 State regulations failed to effectively curb distribution. 
December 17, 1914, Congress approved the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act. The Act’s passage critically impacted drug policy for the remainder of the century, and the habits of physicians with regard to prescribing and dispensing medicine. read on ...




On the one hand, the medical establishment held that addiction was a disease and that addicts were patients to whom drugs could be prescribed to alleviate the distress of withdrawal. On the other hand, the Treasury Department interpreted the Harrison Act to mean that a doctor's prescription for an addict was unlawful. The United States Supreme Court quickly laid the controversy to rest. In Webb v. U.S., 249 U.S. 96 (1919), the Court held that it was not legal for a physician to prescribe narcotic drugs to an addict-patient for the purpose of maintaining his or her use and comfort. U.S. v. Behrman, 258 U.S. 280 (1922), went one step further by declaring that a narcotic prescription for an addict was unlawful, even if the drugs were prescribed as part of a "cure program." The impact of these decisions combined to make it almost impossible for addicts to obtain drugs legally. In 1925 the Supreme Court emphatically reversed itself in Linder v. U.S., 268 U.S. 5 (1925), disavowing the Behrmanopinion and holding that addicts were entitled to medical care like other patients, but the ruling had almost no effect. By that time, physicians were unwilling to treat addicts under any circumstances, and well-developed illegal drug markets were catering to the needs of the addict population. Read more: here ...

WOMEN AND DRUGS: 1850-1914 .... As early as 1782, it was common practice for women of Nantucket Island to take “a dose of opium every morning” (De Crevecoeur 1981). Anecdotal evidence of increasing use of opium by women was provided by writers such as Baltimore physician A.T. Schertzer (1870) and Massachusetts surveyist F.E. Oliver (1872, pp. 162-177), who quoted a physician who said, “The use of opium has greatly increased, especially among women.” Dr. J.B. Mattison (1879a), who wrote and lectured extensively about drug use in the United States, expressed his concern about laudanum addiction: “How many women are to-day sitting in a similar shadow is beyond our knowing; but it is known that they swell largely the ranks of opium habitués. . . . My personal experience is entirely confirmatory of this statement.” 
The use of opiates by Victorian women, especially upper-class women, was generally accepted by society and their physicians. In 1871 one physician specifically found that opiate addiction “among women in high places is incredibly large” (Calkins 1871, p. 165).  In 1867 Ludlow called attention to the increase in opiate use among “our weary sewing-women” (Ludlow 1867, pp. 377-387; Day 1868, p. 283), and Day (1868, p. 7) listed “women obliged by their necessities to work beyond their strengths” as heavy opiate users. read on ...  

HURRICANE KATRINA

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The tropical depression that became Hurricane Katrina formed over the Bahamas on August 23, 2005, and meteorologists were soon able to warn people in the Gulf Coast states that a major storm was on its way. 


During the past century, hurricanes have flooded New Orleans six times: in 1915, 1940, 1947, 1965, 1969 and 2005.

Hurricane Katrina: Facts, Damage & Aftermath

First Jamaican Sprint Star

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The Jamaican world of sprinter hasn't always been dominated by the vast collection of stars we know...
YOUTUBE.COM

golden age of Blackpool:

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The golden age of Blackpool: Nostalgic 1950s photos show tourists relaxing on the beach in a more innocent time when resort attracted 17MILLION a year (and there's not a stag do in sight)

1950s photos show Blackpool tourists relaxing on the beach
The photos, which were taken over the August bank holiday weekend of 1954, show holidaymakers relaxing in Blackpool - then one of the most popular and successful British seaside resorts. But within 10 years of the images being taken, the resort had gone into decline thanks to the advent of cheap air travel and the beginning of package tourism to France and Spain. In recent years, Blackpool has enjoyed a minor renaissance and its star is in the ascendant once more. These charming pictures, from more than 60 years ago, show a woman in a retro swimsuit perched on a wooden rowing boat in front of the pier (left), beauty queens on the hunt for entrants for that year's Blackpool Bathing Beauty competition (centre) and a man dozing in a deckchair (right). Others show holidaymakers enjoying an ice cream, sunbathing on the sands and clambering onto a donkey - albeit with a little help from its owner. Often described as 'the archetypal British seaside resort', Blackpool's tourism boom had begun 100 years earlier, with visitors flocking in from newly industrialised northern cities such as Manchester and Liverpool.

Saturday, August 29, 2015

Nazi gold train

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Nazi gold train could contain ornate £250m 'Amber Room' given to Tsar Peter the Great by the King of Prussia - and missing since it was looted during WWII 

Nazi gold train may contain 'Amber Room' given by Tsar Peter the Great to King of Prussia
The room, crafted out of amber, gold and precious jewels, was stolen from a Russian palace just outside St Petersburg in 1941, and taken to a Nazi-held castle in what was then East Prussia. But the precious room (replica, left) was never seen again after the city, now Kaliningrad, was marched on by the Red Army in 1945. Yet some have claimed the Nazis secreted it away - which has led author Tom Bower to hope it might be concealed on the 'gold train', hidden in a tunnel like this one (right) in southern Poland.

Thursday, August 27, 2015

Vintage Jamaica

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In 1967 with Kingston College and EXCELSIOR then Minister of Development and Welfare and Finance, Edward Seaga, presents medals for the VTHS track program

Eugene Jacques Bullard

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‎Ask a Slave: The Web Series
Eugene Jacques Bullard was the first African-American fighter pilot in history, he was also a national hero; his life, an incredible story.
Bullard was an expatriate living in France when World War one began. He joined the French Infantry but was seriously wounded, France awarded him the Croix de Guerre and Medaille Militaire.  In 1916 he joined the French air service, he first trained as a gunner and later as a pilot. 
When American pilots volunteered to help France and formed the famous Lafayette Escadrille, Bullard requested leave to join but by the time he became a qualified pilot, they were no longer accepting new recruits. He joined the Lafayette Flying Corps instead and served with French flying units, completing 20 combat missions.
When the United States joined the war, Bullard was the only member of the Escadrille or the French Flying Corps NOT invited to join the US Air Service. At that time, the Air Service only accepted white men.
After WWI Bullard became a jazz musician in Paris and would own a nightclub, ‘L’Escadrille.’  When the Germans invaded France during WW2, his Club, and Bullard himself, was hugely popular with German officers. What they did not know was that Bullard, who spoke fluent German, was working for the Free French as a spy. He eventually joined a French infantry unit but was badly wounded and forced to leave the service.
By the end of the war, Bullard had become a national hero in France. Later, when he moved to the U.S., he was completely unknown. No one in the United States knew in 1959, when the French government named him a national Chevalier or Knight.
In 1960, the President of France, Charles DeGaulle, on a state visit to the United States stated one of the first acts he wished to do was to meet Bullard. White House staff scrambled, most had never even heard of him. He was finally located in New York City and DeGaulle traveled there to meet him personally. At the time, Eugene Bullard was employed as an elevator operator.
Not long after Bullard's meeting with the French President, he passed away.  
Today too few Americans know his incredible tale.

Nazi 'gold train' found

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Nazi 'gold train' is found... but may just contain military equipment, say Polish officials


The hunt has captivated the world since two men came forward last week claiming to have found a World War Two train packed with gold near the Polish city of Walbrzych.

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

Elizabeth Taylor

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Elizabeth Taylor
Happy National Dog Day!

Tuesday, August 25, 2015

GWTW

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Monday, August 24, 2015

Vintage Pet Love

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Very first GSD, it was 1959. 

Origins of Jewish Names

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A look back at how Jewish surnames were chosen in 18th century Europe.
BUSINESSINSIDER.COM

Proposal for Jewish Exile to Madagascar

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In the years before the beginning of the Holocaust, the Nazi government launched an audacious plan to exile European Jews to the island of Madagascar.
WWW.HISTORY.COM

Creation ... Jewish View

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JEWS WERE OFTEN CALLED "LAZY" by other peoples because of the observance of Shabbat..but even our bodies tell us it is time to rest.. PREPARE.. because in six days Elohim created the heavens and earth and all that was in them..on the SEVENTH he completed his work and rested..

Jewish Vintage ~ Jamaica

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Ardella James nee Myers, far right (according to her granddaughter), was a Jewess from Myersville, near Santa Cruz in St. Elizabeth.

The Disabilities Act

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The Disabilities Act that stated Jews could not join Parliament was eventually done away with in England and was applied to Jamaica as many Jews in Jamaica entered Parliament at the same time that Jews in England were granted the right to enter Parliament - this short story expllores how the Disabilities Act was removed.

Jews traced to four women

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About 3.5 million of today’s Ashkenazi Jews — 40 percent of the total Ashkenazi population — are descended from just four women, a genetic study indicates.
WWW.NBCNEWS.COM

Jewish Cemeteries of Manhattan

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There’s a small Jewish cemetery tucked away on an unlikely block in Manhattan, behind some condominiums on West 21st Street. It’s just a few...
TABLETMAG.COM

Jewish communities of Shavei Israel

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This section of our website is the place to learn about other Jewish communities around the world where Shavei Israel is not specifically involved. Below you’ll find these communities organized according to region and country. So far, there are only two regions listed – we’ll be adding others over t…
SHAVEI.ORG

Sephardic genealogy

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Image result for Sephardic genealogy
Sephardic genealogy at Sephardim.com - see our list of names, recipes, and other resources.
SEPHARDIM.COM