While not the first global war (that honor belongs to what we in the United States label The Seven Years’ War), the carnage that was produced was ineffable. Much poetry was generated out of this conflict. Some of the best sites include: First World War Digital Poetry Archives that contains thousands of poems and artifacts, learned essays, and numerous links to educational resources; the Poetry Foundation’s The Poetry of World War I presenting a lengthy chronological, linked list of poems; Twelve great First World War poems; and Reframing First World War Poetry from the British Library.
Archive for August, 2016
Find Out Where NJCU Ranks in the 2016 Edition of Washington Monthly’s College Rankings
We are in the Northeast “Best Bang for the Buck” section
House Task Force Accuses CENTCOM of Manipulating ISIS Intel
Initial Findings of the U.S. House of Representatives Joint Task Force on U.S. Central Command Intelligence Analysis states that:
The Joint Task Force finds that the changes made at the CENTCOM Intelligence Directorate starting in mid-2014 resulted in the production and dissemination of intelligence products that were inconsistent with the judgments of many senior, career analysts at CENTCOM. Across the four campaigns analyzed by the Joint Task Force, these products also consistently described U.S. actions in a more positive light than other assessments from the IC and were typically more optimistic than actual events warranted….
In addition, “Survey results provided to the Joint Task Force demonstrated that dozens of analysts viewed the subsequent leadership environment as toxic, with 40% of analysts responding that they had experienced an attempt to distort or suppress intelligence in the past year. (11)
Historic Black Newspapers
On the Chronicling America site from the Library of Congress, one can find 55 black newspapers from various states and times. You can examine what issues the Library possesses as well as read some detailed histories on most of these papers. A great primary source.
Why the Middle East Is the Way It Is Today
No one piece of writing can actually detail how the Middle East is now an area in so much turmoil, but reading this – Fractured Lands: How The Arab World Came Apart from The New York Times Magazine– can offer some insights. (N.B. This is the only time in the magazine’s history that it has devoted the entire section to a single story.)
Our Newest National Monument
In honor of the National Park Service’s 100th anniversary, President Obama has declared this 87,000 acre preserve in Maine as our newest national monument. The difference between a national park and a national monument is explained here. A report in The Smithsonian provides links and background information.
Online Primary Sources for American History: Early Diplomatic Correspondence
Before the United States was the United States, it operated under the Continental Congress and the Articles of Confederation, a less than effective central government. However, it still needed to have relations with foreign powers if only to secure needed military supplies and other forms of aid. Representatives were dispatched to Europe, among them Benjamin Franklin, to engage in diplomatic negotiations. Their various writings and other documents are collected in The revolutionary diplomatic correspondence of the U.S. under direction of Congress (6 volumes, 1889) and The Emerging nation: a documentary history of the foreign relations of the United States under the Articles of Confederation, 1780-1789 (3 volumes, 1996).
Historical Books/Journals on American Agriculture
Suffice it to say, farming has been one of the central industries in this country. (Look at the Census of Agriculture dating back to 1840 and visit the National Agriculture Statistics Service). The Core Historical Literature of Agriculture from Cornell University has digitzed over 2,000 important farming books, along with various farming journals. You can peruse a 1623 treaties on the “historie of bees” or leaf through 1840s issues of the Central New-York Farmer. And what you will find is that what was important to agriculture then is just as important today.
Soldier Newspapers in the Civil War
This site from the National Endowment for the Humanities features examples of newspapers run and printed by soldiers for soldiers. Access to issues of the newspapers, as well as detailed histories of each one, are provided. A marvelous research tool for boots-on-the-ground perspectives.
U.S. Intelligence Reforms in the 1970s
As this 2005 report from the CIA states: “To understand the Intelligence Community as it exists today thus requires some grounding in how it has evolved from World War II into its present complex, diffuse, and often bewildering form. It is this paper’s purpose to explain the evolution of today’s Intelligence Community by examining the principal reform efforts that various surveys, study commissions, and task forces have undertaken since 1947.”(1) This report lists the main reform projects undertaken and offers a summary of their respective findings. To augment this report, having recourse to the following Foreign Relations of the United States volumes will provide valuable primary sources: Organization and Management of U.S. Foreign Policy, 1969–1972, Volume II; Organization and Management of Foreign Policy; Public Diplomacy, 1973–1976, Volume XXXVIII, Part 2; and Organization and Management of Foreign Policy, Volume XXVIII.
Bibliography on ISIS
ISIS Bibliography (Part 1 and Part 2 from Perspectives on Terrorism) provides access to hundreds of references, links provided where possible, to this terrorist group. Books, articles, websites, theses, bibliographies and the like are all included in this almost 90-page work. A great resource.
The U.S. Army in the Civil War
When we last visited this series – U.S. Army campaigns of the Civil War – only three volumes of the series had been published. Now, the series has concluded with a volume on Reconstruction; there are now fifteen accessible, illustrated works on that struggle. A good introduction to that conflict.
What Are Regional Price Parities?
RPP measures “… the differences in the price levels of goods and services across states and metropolitan areas for a given year. RPPs are expressed as a percentage of the overall national price level for each year.” Another way of explaining this is the cost-of-living in various regions/areas of the country. For example, using 100 as the base point, the RPP for the New York area is 122.3, while the RPP for Beckley, WV is 79.7, meaning it would cost someone in the New York area $122.30 to purchase $100 worth of goods or services, while in Beckley $79.70 would purchase $100 worth of goods/services. Use this interactive feature to arrive at the RPP for state-level data as well as metropolitan/non-metropolitan data.
Online Primary Sources for American History: Connecticut
The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut is a 15-volume compilation of laws, conveyances, land grants, council minutes from 1636-1776. In addition, the following also provide information on this time period:
NEW HAVEN
Records of the colony and plantation of New-Haven, from 1638 to 1649; Records of the colony or jurisdiction of New Haven, from May, 1653, to the union. Together with the New Haven code of 1656; Ancient town records [New Haven, 1649-1769].
GOVERNORS’ PAPERS
A complete biographical listing of governors is here.
The Winthrop papers [John Winthrop the Younger, Governor, 1657-1658, 1659-1676; Fitz-John Winthrop, Governor, 1698-1707); The Talcott papers; correspondence and documents (chiefly official) during Joseph Talcott’s governorship of the colony of Connecticut, 1724-41; The Law papers [Jonathan Law, Governor, 1741-1750]; The Pitkin papers [William Pitkin, Governor, 1766-1769]; The Fitch papers : correspondence and documents during Thomas Fitch’s governorship of the colony of Connecticut, 1754-1766; The Trumbull Papers [Jonathan Trumbull, Governor, 1769-1776]; and Letters from the English kings and queens Charles II, James II, William and Mary, Anne, George II, &c. to the governors of the colony of Connecticut, together with the answers thereto, from 1635 to 1749.
Many additional sources – letters, journals, extracts, muster rolls, etc – can be found in the Collections of the Connecticut Historical Society of which the first ninetten volumes are accessible online.
National Security Reports – July 2016 Update
Ransomware in 2014-2016 (Kaspersky Labs); Report of the Iraq Inquiry; Modernizing Crime Statistics: Report 1: Defining and Classifying Crime (National Academies Press); Going Dark, Going Forward: A Primer on the Encryption Debate (House Homeland Security Committee); Missing Chapter of 9/11 Report (House Intelligence Committee); and Security Cooperation and the FY2017 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), The Islamist Militant Threat in Bangladesh, Federal Assistance for Victims of Terrorism or Mass Violence: In Brief, NATO’s Warsaw Summit: In Brief, “Right-Sizing” the National Security Council Staff?, Diversity, Inclusion, and Equal Opportunity in the Armed Services: Background and Issues for Congress, and Sanctuary Jurisdictions and Criminal Aliens: In Brief (all CRS).
Some Concerns About the Olympic Games
This CRS report – The 2016 Olympic Games: Health, Security, Environmental, and Doping Issues – provides an informative overview of the salient points of concern about these current Games.
New York Area Companies’ Historical Annual Reports
Want to read annual reports from Abraham & Strauss from 1926 through 1942; how about late 19th century reports from the Edison Electric Illuminating Company? These and 33 other New York area companies are highlighted in this project from Columbia University – Columbia Historical Annual Reports. More than 700 reports comprised of 18,000+ pages are made available. You can search by company name or by industrial sector. The 1890 report from Edison Electric provides all sorts of insights into life in New York City at the turn of the century: how many customers, the number of lamps installed, the geographical distribution of the company’s products, revenue, and some comparisons going back to 1884. Presents unique primary source material.
Podcasts from “Science”
A weekly offering from Science, these podcasts can last up to half an hour and usually concentrate on three separate stories. Of late, the program descriptions provide links to Science stories/articles on the topics at hand. A nice way to keep abreast of current research.
What’s In a Name?
Well, plenty. The Dictionary of Medieval Names from European Sources provides documentation for first (given) names from numerous sources. It traces the appearance of names from 500 to 1600 as they appear in various countries. The diversity of the spellings of names is never more evident than in this tool; for example, “Frederick” and its many variants are cited hundreds of times from dozens of tomes. This site also gives the date of the first appearance of a name (or its variant) in the countries examined so far. Western European sources have been culled for their information; Eastern European sources are now being scrutinized. All in all, a fascinating project showing the richness and history of names and their development over time. FYI: It appears that the first mention of “Frederick” occurred in 814 with the spelling “Friderici”.
Congressman Frank J. Guarini Library Blog 