20th Century

Bus in Crater, London Blitz

In the early 19th century, this grand city became the first in the modern world* to reach a population of one million, and over the next 100 years, that number multiplied six times over.  By the mid-20th century, London was home to over 8 million people. Not that you’d thinkContinue Reading

Sir Nicholas Winton, a quiet civilian hero of World War II, has died at the age of 106. In a time of considerable disinterest in the Jewish plight, Winton rescued 669 Czech Jewish children, most of whom would have otherwise perished. In pre-World War II Europe, Jewish living conditions variedContinue Reading

Child at 9/11 rememberance

This semester, I am teaching Religions in America at UW-Oshkosh. Rather than simply being a survey course of religions, the course specifically addresses how these religions manifest in and interact with American culture. I debated long and hard whether or not I would cover Islam on Sept 11. I don’tContinue Reading

Signature of Wernher Von Braun

My grandfather was a civilian employee of the U.S. military.  He worked in the Pentagon “as the plaster was still drying.”  He wasn’t some super secret scientist or anything like that.  He was a self-educated administrator who periodically got to meet some pretty famous people. Somewhere’s there a newspaper photoContinue Reading

Auction house Vermot de Pas has cancelled the appearance of Nazi items in an April 26 auction after multiple groups objected.  Critics called the sale obscene and insisted the sale would give the items “unhealthy symbolic value that resembles cynicism and a form of moral indecency”. The Nazis and theContinue Reading