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“What a piece of human trash.” “Should have put him in front of a wall and shot him.” “This dude is a fucking monster — the kind of person that nightmares are made of.” “He’s a cruel, twisted, sadistic scumbag.” “I wanna reach through the screen and strangle him.” “Lying…
Read moreWhen I was eight, I saw a vision of my future. According to Argosy magazine, by the time I was thirty I would be getting around with a jet pack. I would be rocketing off to work with 500 pounds of thrust on my back. At night I would be…
Read moreIt was awful, one of the most disgraceful examples of urban blight imaginable. Block after block of gorgeous buildings gone to seed, paint peeling, plaster crumbling, porches sagging, weeds, filth and decay. And there on the porches impoverished retirees clinging to the last vestiges of life, sick, dying, tubes sticking…
Read moreIn the months following the murder there was scarcely an hour when the earth did not shake. The sound of it was like distant thunder, which gave way to cracks and explosions like muskets being fired. The smell of sulfur and brimstone hung over everything. They said it was retribution…
Read moreJust after 4:00 in the morning of April 15th, 1865 two men appeared on horseback at the home of Dr. Samuel Mudd near present day Waldorf, Maryland. One man was suffering a broken leg and needed help. Dr. Mudd helped the injured man into his house, cut away his boot…
Read moreDeath from spinal fracture was the final verdict for Otto Lilienthal. Displaying a heady mixture of audacity and ingenuity, Lilienthal, a German engineer, had developed a heavier than air glider, flown it several times, tweaked its design and was working on a way to power it when the accident occurred….
Read moreI like to watch the Amazing Race. It’s one of my favorite shows. With each new episode the show’s producers must find interesting and compelling new challenges for the race’s contestants, tests of grit and fortitude that have included everything from diving off a 30-foot platform into frigid water to…
Read moreWhen they came to Wirz with the offer, he refused them. He was not a man to play games. He had already told them he knew nothing that would implicate President Jefferson Davis in the calamity that was Andersonville, but they kept pressing him, thinking he would crack, thinking he…
Read moreHistory cannot be forced on a people. In 1983 the people of Africatown tried to get their neighborhood declared a National Historic Park. It was a non-starter. Not only was their plan opposed by the adjacent International Paper Co. plant, which was reportedly eyeing the land for possible expansion, but…
Read moreFew places in America are as interesting as the Mississippi Delta. Stretching 250 miles from Memphis in the north to Vicksburg in the south, and about 80 miles wide, the Delta is a pancake flat alluvial plain bordered by the Mississippi River on the west and the Mississippi hill country…
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