Catherine Conner
Forgotten History
The Thirteen Virtues of Benjamin Franklin
Jun 17th
Centuries before the self-help movements began, people already understood the basic need to better themselves. Benjamin Franklin created what we would call a “to-do” list of 13 areas of his life he wanted to improve; he even charted his progress weekly. I think everyone will find at least a few of these familiar. It’s heartening to learn that even the best of us are human — we all struggle against some of the same tendencies as those of our ancestors.
Ben Franklin’s Thirteen Virtues (quoted from Franklin’s autobiography)
Germans and Colors
May 26th
This post via BoingBoing has everything I could want in one article — a discussion of linguistic and cultural differences between German and English, a sprinkling of medieval history, and beer:
Hildegard von Bingen: Sybil, Saint, and Scientist
Mar 23rd
This post is written in honor of Ada Lovelace Day, celebrating the achievements of women in science and technology.
Hildegard von Bingen (born 1098 – died 1179) is probably best known as a medieval religious visionary, literary author, and composer. But she was a woman of many more talents, including natural philosophy and medicine. More >
Letters of Note
Jan 13th
The academic study of history makes a strong distinction between “primary” and “secondary” sources. While secondary sources are narratives, opinions, or analysis produced after the fact, primary sources are the real artefacts of the time in question: contemporary documents produced by those with direct experience of events. Primary sources are as close as you can get to experiencing the time during which they’re created; they are snapshots of a few droplets of water rushing along in the ephemeral river of time. You hope as a historian to be able to view as many of these multi-faceted drops as you can to formulate a theory as to the shape of the river’s path.
I’ve just stumbled upon this blog which features a wonderful varied collection of such sources. Letters of Note “is an attempt to gather and sort fascinating letters, postcards, telegrams, faxes, and memos.” Take a moment to peruse a few of these prismatic pieces of history. Fascinating!
Letters of Note: Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience
Was Hael: Happy (Medieval) Christmas
Dec 25th
A wonderful article by a medievalist I’ve been following for years now, explaining the delights of a medieval Christmas. Some traditions might look familiar (evergreens, gifts, mistletoe), others not so much (frumenty, Twelfth Night, liturgical dramas). Most fascinating to me is how the various Viking, Druid, and Celt pagan traditions are combined with the Christian to become our modern holiday.
Snapshot of a Tudor Sailor: the Mary Rose Museum
Oct 22nd
I strongly believe that history is not only the story of one-off big events, larger-than-life characters, and impossible-to-memorize dates. It is the story of everyday people and their daily hopes, dreams, struggles, and passions – set against the backdrop of different times, places, and beliefs than our own. Unfortunately the study of history does not often present opportunities to experience their stories, until the rare occasion they suddenly appear in front of us.
In 1545 the flagship of Henry VIII’s navy, the Mary Rose, sank with almost all hands. A tragedy for the volatile monarch and for the souls lost. But in 1982, her discovery and raising provided a complete snapshot of the life of a Tudor sailor. Certainly there are weapons to delight the military historian, but also thousands of more personal items (shoes, bags, tankards) that provide us a glimpse into the daily life of a Tudor sailor. A not always pleasant life, to be sure, as evidenced by the tools to inject warm mercury into sailor urethras – treatment against the syphilis rampant among sailors at the time.
With luck, the new Mary Rose Museum will open in 2012, and I for one hope to be among the visitors.
Compact Mirrors and Tudor Man-Bags: Mary Rose Gives Up Her Treasures
Remembering Women Who Deserved to Go Into Space
Oct 12th
I thought I knew the history of the American space program. But I was shocked to learn that NASA had a program for women astronauts long before the first women actually made it into space. In honor of those women whose performance was equal to (in some cases better than!) their male counterparts, but because of contemporary social norms and prejudices did not participate in the glory that became “The Right Stuff”, I encourage everyone to read this article.
“They were all extraordinary women and outstanding pilots and great candidates for what was proposed,” said Donald Kilgore, a doctor who evaluated both male and female space flight candidates at the Lovelace Clinic, a mid-century center of aeromedical research. “They came out better than the men in many categories.”
…
Women are lighter than men, requiring less fuel to transport them into space. They’re also less prone to heart attacks, and Lovelace considered them better-suited for the claustrophobic isolation of space.
Right Stuff, Wrong Sex: NASA’s Lost Female Astronauts: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/10/mercury-13/ (via Neatorama)
