History
Imagine finding a ship, sitting fully intact on the bottom of a lake, as if the ship was built there. That is exactly what happened in 2019, when researchers from the marine sanctuary partnered with Ocean Exploration Trust, the group known for finding the Titanic in 1985, and embarked on a mapping expedition. The mission was sparked by the discovery of SS Ohio on the bottom of Lake Huron, in an area known as Shipwreck Alley. They knew that SS Ohio had gone down in the area following a collision with the schooner barge, Ironton, so it followed that if they had found SS Ohio, the Ironton must be nearby. Still, while they expected to find the wreck of the Ironton, what they actually found was…stunning!!
Ironton and SS Ohio, both sank in September 1894, following a collision that claimed the lives of five of the ship’s crew. The facts of the loss were only known because if the first-hand accounts of the wreck’s two survivors. Were it not for these survivors, the location might never have been known. Still, the wrecks sat on the lake floor for over a hundred years, waiting for a time in history when we had the technology and equipment necessary to actually go down and find the wrecks. What everyone who sailed the Great Lakes knows is that they are deep, and can be treacherous, especially in the winter…and “Shipwreck Alley” is an area of Lake Huron well known for its treacherous waters that have claimed the lives of many sailors.
On that fateful September day in 1894, the 190-foot steamer Charles J Kershaw departed Ashtabula, Ohio, on Lake Erie. She was towing the schooner barges Ironton and Moonlight. The vessels sailed empty, and they were destined for Marquette, Michigan, on Lake Superior. Things were going well, until at 12:30am on Sept. 26, while sailing north across Lake Huron under clear skies, Kershaw’s engine failed, leaving the ship without 
power. This was the beginning of disaster. They might have been ok, had it not been for the notorious winds in “Shipwreck Alley.” The Kershaw was a few miles north of the Presque Isle Lighthouse, when a strong south wind pushed Moonlight and Ironton toward the disabled steamer. The crew attempted to avoid the impending entanglement and a possible collision. Moonlight’s crew cut Ironton’s tow line, detaching the steamer from the schooner barges. Still, the winds were not letting up, and now the ship and the barges were at their mercy.
When Ironton was cut loose, the crew suddenly found themselves adrift in the dark fighting the wind and praying that they didn’t hit anything. They fought with all that was in them to regain control of the ship. Under the direction of Captain Peter Girard, they fired up the vessel’s auxiliary steam engine to help set the struggling ship’s sails, but even with their best efforts, Ironton, being propelled by the wind from astern, veered off course into the path of the southbound steamer Ohio. The Ohio, a 203-foot wooden freighter was enroute to Ogdensburg, New York, from Duluth, Minnesota, loaded with 1,000 tons of grain.
The night was dark, so by the time Ironton’s crew spotted the approaching Ohio through the darkness, it was too late to avoid a head-on collision with the steamer. William Wooley of Cleveland, Ohio, a surviving crew member of Ironton, said, “At this time we sighted a steamer on our starboard bow. She came up across our bow and we struck her on the quarter about aft of the boiler house. A light was lowered over our bow, and we saw a hole in our port bow and our stem splintered.”
SS Ohio was found upright in 2017, over 122 years after her sinking in over 200 feet of water off Presque Isle, 
Michigan. It was at this point that the search began for Ironton, which was expected to be nearby. In March, 2023, it was announced that Ironton had been located in 2019. The searchers waited to announce the finding, while they explored the vessel, hoping to discover how she could be in such pristine condition. The cold freshwater of the lake has kept the Ironton intact. According to Michigan Radio’s Jodi Westrick, an anchor is still connected to the ship, as are its three masts. In addition, a lifeboat remains tied to the vessel, a chilling reminder of how the ship’s demise played out on a harrowing night in 1894. It is as if time stood still for 1894 to the present day. Amazing!!
Our government is made up of three branches. The three branches of the United States government are the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. According to the doctrine of separation of powers, the United States Constitution distributed the power of the federal government among these three branches and built a system of checks and balances to ensure that no one branch could become too powerful. This is a long-standing system that has served the United States well, as long as it isn’t being abused.
The judicial branch came into being when The Judiciary Act of 1789 was passed by Congress and signed by President George Washington, establishing the Supreme Court of the United States as a tribunal made up of six justices who were to serve on the court until death or retirement. Sometimes I’m not sure how I feel about the “until death or retirement” part, but I’m sure they had their reasons. To me, there are some justices, like some members of congress who far outstay their welcome. Nevertheless, on that day, President Washington nominated John Jay to preside as chief justice. He further named John Rutledge, William Cushing, John Blair, Robert Harrison, and James Wilson to be associate justices. On September 26, all six appointments were confirmed by the US Senate, and with that, we had our first Supreme Court. 
The US Supreme Court was established by Article 3 of the US Constitution. Article 3 granted the Supreme Court ultimate jurisdiction over all laws, especially those in which their constitutionality was at issue. In addition, the high court was also designated to oversee cases concerning treaties of the United States, foreign diplomats, admiralty practice, and maritime jurisdiction. The first session of the US Supreme Court was held on February 1, 1790, in New York City’s Royal Exchange Building.
The US Supreme Court quickly grew into the most important judicial body in the world in terms of its central place in the American political order. The Constitution allows Congress to set the size of the court…another part of the system that I don’t think I agree with, simply because a corrupt congress could take advantage of that ability by stacking the courts to rule in their favor. I’m sure that Washington and the founding fathers planned for the justices to be honest and trustworthy. I’m sure too, that the fact that they were Supreme Courts justices for life or until retirement, was planned to allow them to make their rulings without fear of being fired. Of course, there is more that one way to get a justice removed, because dead can come by more than one means, including murder. And justices could be threatened or have 
their families threatened, causing them to vote in a specific way. In a perfect world, justices would act according to the Constitution, and vote their conscience, bringing about an honest and fair ruling, but that is not always the case…sadly. The number of justices varied during the 19th century before stabilizing in 1869 at nine. While this number can be changed at any time by Congress, so far, it has not, and I believe that the Constitution should be amended to make the number nine, permanent. In times of constitutional crisis, the Supreme Court has always played a definitive role in resolving, for better or worse, the great issues of the time, and the number nine has worked well. It should not be changed.
In 1945, a Japanese scientist named Shiro Ishii devised a plan of attack on civilians in the United States called Operation PX, also known as Operation Cherry Blossoms at Night. The plan was intended to wage biological warfare upon civilian population centers in the continental United States during the final months of World War II. The plan was devious, and heinous. Ishii planned to spread plague-infected fleas over Southern California using airplanes. The original operation was abandoned shortly after its planning on March 26, 1945. Then, with modifications, it was finalized and placed back of the table to be carried out. The plan was to be carried out on September 22nd, 1945. Unfortunately for Japan, their formal surrender date was August 15th, 1945, and the war was over.
Originally, the Japanese Naval General Staff, led by Vice-Admiral Jisaburi Ozawa proposed Operation PX in December 1944. The code name for the operation came from the Japanese use of the code name PX for Pestis bacillus-infected fleas. The navy partnered with Lieutenant-General Shiro Ishii of Unit 731. Ishii possessed extensive experience on weaponizing pathogenic bacteria and human vulnerability to biological and chemical 
warfare, and he was an extremely evil man, willing to use his knowledge for the murders of millions of people, especially if he thought it would bring him more power.
In Ishii’s plan, they would use Seiran aircraft launched by submarine aircraft carriers upon the West Coast of the United States, targeting specifically, the cities of San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The attack was to be utilizing weaponized bubonic plague, cholera, typhus, dengue fever, and other pathogens in a biological terror attack upon the population of the United States. The original plan was to have the submarine crews infect themselves and run ashore in a suicide mission. When the operation was shelved in March of 1945, it was because Umezu could see the future ramifications, and conveyed as much, when he said, “If bacteriological warfare is conducted, it will grow from the dimension of war between Japan and America to an endless battle of humanity against bacteria. Japan will earn the derision of the world.”
The idea of suicide attacks was tabled, due to opposition from Yoshijiro Umezu and Torashiro Kawabe, who did not want Ishii to die in a suicide attack and asked him to instead “wait for [the] next opportunity calmly”. It was then that Ishii devised a final plan using of the biological weapons and fleas…an attack that never took place either. The world never knew of the planned attack until long after the war, when Operation PX was first 
discussed in an interview by former captain Eno Yoshio, who was heavily involved with planning for the attack. He first spoke of it in an interview with Sankei on August 14, 1977. According to Yoshio, “This is the first time I have said anything about Operation PX, because it involved the rules of war and international law. The plan was not put into actual operation, but I felt that just the fact that it was formulated would cause international misunderstanding. I never even leaked anything to the staff of the war history archives at the Japanese Defense Agency, and I don’t feel comfortable talking about it even now. But at the time, Japan was losing badly, and any means to win would have been all right.” That interview goes to show how horrible some regimes can be.
Normally, in a monarchy, the successor is determined by bloodline. In a Republic, the successor is determined by an election. There are a number of people who seriously dislike monarchies, and then there are those who prefer it…they think it gives their nation stability and continuity. Be that as it may, when enough people decide to end a monarchy, they can get the job done. Such was the case in Revolutionary France, when the Legislative Assembly voted to abolish the monarchy and establish the First Republic.
Things had been going downhill for King Louis XVI and a year before the Legislative Assembly voted, he has no other choice but to approve a new constitution that stripped him of much of his power. This was the beginning of the end for King Louis XVI. Louis ascended to the French throne in 1774 as all monarchs do, by inheritance. From the 
start, he was unsuited to deal with the severe financial problems that he inherited from his predecessors, along with the throne. Unfortunately, not all those who would inherit the throne of a nation are suited for that leadership.
The situation continued to escalate, and in 1789, food shortages and economic crises led to the outbreak of the French Revolution. By August of 1792, things escalated to a boil. At that point, King Louis and his queen, Mary-Antoinette, were imprisoned and in September the monarchy was abolished. Soon after their imprisonment, 
evidence of Louis’ counterrevolutionary activity with foreign nations was discovered. He was put on trial for treason. I don’t know the details of the case for treason, but of course, he could not have been put on trial before the changes that were forced upon him in the changing of the constitution. It is also possible that there were no legitimate charges to used, until they forced the changing of the constitution. I’m sure there are opinions on both sides of the issue.
Louis was convicted and condemned to death by a narrow majority in January of 1793, and on January 21, 1793, he walked steadfastly to the guillotine and was executed. His head was held high, and he proclaimed his innocence to the very end. Nine months later, his queen, Marie-Antoinette followed him to the guillotine. Neither of them ever confessed to the crimes for which they were committed, and I don’t suppose we will ever know the truth about the matter.
When we think of a president of the United States, we think of one each term. In reality, on inauguration years, there are actually two…the outgoing president, and the incoming president. Of course, if the president has won a second term, there would actually be only one in that inauguration cycle. That is the common fact of presidential inaugurations, but could there be three? The answer is actually, yes. There have been two times in history when there were three presidents in one year. I suppose that potentially there could be more than this, but the reasons would almost be too awful to contemplate.
On September 20, 1881, Chester Arthur became one of those two “third” presidents, when he was inaugurated that day, becoming the third person to serve as president in that year. The year 1881 began with Republican Rutherford B Hayes in office. Hayes 
had just completed his first and only term as president, and with the inauguration of James A Garfield, Hayes had officially turned over the reins of government to the new president, who happened to be a close friend of his, in March 1881. Then, the unthinkable happened, when just four months into his term, on July 2, Garfield was shot by an assassin named Charles Guiteau. Guiteau said that he killed Garfield because he refused to grant Guiteau a political appointment. The attack left Garfield with wounds to his back and abdomen. He struggled to recover throughout the summer. Though it appeared he would pull through in early September, Garfield deteriorated by mid-September and finally died on September 19th. An autopsy report revealed that the internal bullet wound contributed to an aneurism that ultimately killed Garfield.
On September 20, 1881…the next day, Vice President Chester Arthur was sworn in as 
president, making him the third man to be sworn in as president in 1881. Garfield’s assassin then actually had the nerve to write to the new president from jail, and actually taking credit for vaulting Arthur into the White House. While President Arthur was president, not everyone felt like he was a good president. Former President Hayes, said of the Arthur administration, that it was best known for “liquor, snobbery and worse.” Of course, Hayes could have been angry about not being elected to a second term, or he could have been making an honest evaluation. that may be a good subject for a future story. Either way, Chester Arthur served only one term from 1881 to 1885.
While this was a very unusual year, it was not the first time this had happened. It was actually the second time in American history that three men served as president in one year. A similar situation occurred in 1841, when Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, and John Tyler all held the office, but that is a different story for another day.
Many people have had to switch from their dominant hand due to an accident, stroke, or amputation, but we rarely think of a president find himself in that position. Nevertheless, Thomas Jefferson had to do just that. It can happen to anyone really, but like many a young man, Thomas Jefferson was out to impress a girl. The strange part was that when it happened, Thomas wasn’t a young man. He was, nevertheless, trying to impress a girl. Thomas was 42 years old. He wasn’t the president of the United States yet, but he had been married. He married Martha Wayles in 1772, but she passed away in 1782, so he was alone. He and Martha had six children. Of the six children born to Thomas and Martha, only two survived to adulthood, Martha and Mary. His wife, Martha died four months after the birth of her last child. He had been happy, but his marriage was short. Thomas Jefferson was not perfect, and in fact he made lots of mistakes, and even had children with his slave, but he was a good president…and which of us is perfect, after all.
In 1785, Thomas was in Paris, and he met a woman named Maria Cosway, who was a married woman. Thomas Jefferson took a liking to her, and he was trying to impress her. Well, he shouldn’t have been doing what he did. He knew it, and we know it to this day, but he did try to impress her, by trying to jump over a fence. In the ensuing accident, whereby he fell, Thomas Jefferson broke his right wrist. The surgeon set his wrist, but he didn’t really do a good job of it. After they set his wrist bones, he suffered chronic pain in his left hand for the rest of his life. He was really unable to use his left hand much at all after that. 
The accident forced Thomas Jefferson to stay in his house for a month, during which time, his secretary, William Short, had to write his letters for him. For a few months, he used his left hand to write letters including the famous “Head and Heart” letter on October 12 to Maria Cosway. The broken wrist caused him to have to cut short the planned sightseeing trip with Maria Cosway, and it also cause him to have to postpone his journey to the south of France. In the end, his wrist finally healed, but it was never to the point that he could use it as his dominant hand, so he had to switch out his dominant hand and live the rest of his life as a lefty. I suppose some might have said that his infatuation with Maria Cosway cost him the use of his hand, in a sort of “repercussion for bad behavior” scenario, but I don’t believe in the “God will hit you with a lightning bolt” kind of punishment. I know that it likely wouldn’t have happened if he had left Maria Cosway alone, but I just think God tries for grace first.
Probably one of the deadliest weapons the Nazis ever created, was the German U-Boat. With their code system, it was hard to track a U-boat, and so they snuck up on ships and sunk them. The U-boat wasn’t a ship. It was a submarine, so the ships didn’t know it was there until they saw the torpedo coming at them…if they saw it coming. Often, they didn’t see it coming, it just hit, and it was over. On September 12, 1942, a U-boat sunk the British troop ship, the RMS Laconia, killing more than 1,400 men. The commander of the German sub, Captain Werner Hartenstein, then realized that Italians POWs were among the passengers.
Like many other cruise ships, the Laconia, a former Cunard White Star ship was put to use to transport troops, including prisoners of war during World War II. RMS Laconia was in the South Atlantic bound for England when 
it encountered U-156. The sub attacked, sinking the troop ship and imperiling the lives of more than 2,200 passengers. But as Hartenstein, the sub commander, was to learn from survivors he began taking onboard, among those passengers were 1,500 Italian POWs. Of course, it wouldn’t look good for Hartenstein to be responsible for endangering the lives of so many of his fellow Axis members, so he quickly put out a call to an Italian submarine and two other German U-boats in the area to help rescue the survivors.
Upon hearing of the incident, one French and two British warships rushed to the scene to aid in the rescue. The German subs immediately informed the Allied ships that they had surfaced for humanitarian reasons. The Allies wisely assumed it was a trap. With that, an American B-24 bomber, the Liberator, flying from its South Atlantic base on Ascension Island, saw the German sub and bombed it…despite the fact that Hartenstein had draped a Red Cross flag prominently on the hull of the surfaced sub. The U-156, damaged by the air attack, immediately 
submerged. Admiral Karl Donitz, supreme commander of the German U-boat forces, had been monitoring the rescue efforts. He ordered that “all attempts to rescue the crews of sunken ships…cease forthwith.” Consequently, more than 1,400 of the RMS Laconia’s passengers, which included Polish guards and British crewmen, drowned. This marked the end of taking POWs from torpedoed ships. There were often men who survived these attacks, but they were given no chance of survival after the attack. I suppose war is war, and death is expected. On March 8, 1943, U-156 was sunk by PBY “Catalina” aircraft from Patrol Squadron Fifty-Three (VP-53), in the Atlantic Ocean, east of Barbados. There were five survivors from U-156.
As we come up on 22 years since the September 11th terrorist attacks on our nation, I find myself feeling strangely shocked that the children born after the attacks are almost 22 years old. I know that is just logical, and shouldn’t be shocking at all, but it is. How can so many years have gone by since the 2,977 people from 102 countries, lost their lives in those senseless attacks? Many of those children might even be parents themselves by now. I’m sure the hole left by the dad they lost, feels massive. They have been robbed of their dad and very likely a grandpa for their children, and then of course there are all of the sons, daughters, parents, siblings, grandparents, friends and coworkers.
On September 11, 2001, nineteen terrorists took it upon themselves, and instructions of their evil leaders, and attacked a nation and a people who had done nothing to them. Hate is like that. There is no reason for it, they just look at different as something to hate. Sadly, that is the way of the world we live in. The attacks of 
September 11 reminded us so clearly that we must always stay alert. The evil people around us will take any opportunity to act upon their hate if the people around them are not watchful. That is also why it is so important to secure our boarders, and properly vet anyone who is to be given any kind of a visa here. These terrorists came is as “students” to learn to fly, or actually crash planes into the buildings in our nation. They were never interested in learning to land, because they had no intention of landing.
We had long ago stopped our careful watch concerning hijacking planes, because we didn’t believe that hijacking was something that happened anymore…until it happened, and the attackers had our planes with no intention to take them anywhere but into destruction. We can never again afford to let our guard down. As the old saying goes, “Evil flourishes when good men do 
nothing.” That is so very true, and evil did flourish, because we didn’t stop it. It may be 22 years since the last attack on our nation, but we can never stop being on our guard, because the world we live in is looking for a way to take us out, and it is our job to protect those around us. We must “Never Forget” the 9-11 attacks, nor the lives we lost in that horrific attack. Continuing to pray for the families of those we lost.
If you’ve ever been to the Smoky Mountains, then you know…you know just how beautiful they are. I’ve seen them, and they are beautiful. Nevertheless, there are things about the Smoky Mountains that I didn’t know. I love history and I love ghost towns, and now I find out that there is another one in the Smoky Mountains. It’s Daisy Town, Tennessee, and it has an interesting past. It was a century ago, when Daisy Town was thriving, that the Knoxville elites flocked to the Elkmont area. Sadly, today, the abandoned summer homes of Daisy Town make up a ghost town.
Elkmont started out in the 1830s, as a logging area, and so the moving into the area, and the area began to thrive. By the early 1900s, a lumber company built a railroad to transport the logs, and with that came people too, of course. When people saw that the area was going to make them rich, the affluent people who were living in Knoxville also began to visit the mountains finding them absolutely beautiful. They started building summer homes for themselves, and Daisy Town was born. By the 1920s, Elkmont was a summer playground for the city’s well-to-do population. Of course, if you wanted to spend your summers there, you would need money, so it was really an exclusive area.
The first thing built was the Appalachian Clubhouse, which was a social hub for the prominent members of 
society, and with that and all the activities, came the cabins and cottages lining the one-lane road to the club. It was specifically this area that became known as Daisy Town. The club hosted dances, games, bingo, and horseshoes, through the 1920s and into the 1930s. Other areas, that had larger houses to draw the very wealthy, were nicknamed Millionaires Row and Society Hill. Nevertheless, time changes things, and even the fancy places like Daisy Town, Millionaires Row, and Society Hill have simply become the “Elkmont Ghost Town” and are nothing more than a tourist attraction for those of us who find ghost towns fascinating. It doesn’t detract from the beauty of the area, and for history buffs, like me, it probably adds to the attraction.
The whole decline of Daisy Town began in 1934, with the creation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It didn’t happen overnight, of course, but the Elkmont area fell within the new park’s borders. The people who owned the homes weren’t forced out but were rather given a lifetime lease. Unfortunately for the families, the lease was not transferable, and as each owner died, the home was transferred to the park service. The slow end to Daisy Town and all the Elkmont vacation spots was complete by the early 1990s, leaving the park with 70 abandoned structures. Without proper care, the buildings began to decay, until all that was left was the eerie reminders of their heyday, such as is common to ghost towns.
All is not lost for Daisy Town, however. While the cabins and cottages are closed to the public, you can look inside and picture happier times. The Appalachian Clubhouse was given a different fate. The park service decided to restore it so that it could be used for events. Not only that, but nineteen other structures around Elkmont are slated for renovation by 2025, something I think is very cool. It’s sad to see these parts of our history being allowed to fall apart and disappear. For now, the walk along Jakes Creek Trail will provide view of this historic little area where you can still see chimneys, walls, and other remains of 1920s cabins. It’s an area I hope to visit one day.
The first power-driven airship was built by a French inventor decades before the Zeppelin was developed by German inventor Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin in 1900. The Zeppelin was a motor-driven rigid airship. The earlier airships were smaller, but Hilter always wanted the most innovative, largest, and deadliest designs of everything, with was likely the reason for the Zeppelin’s size. It was by far the largest airship ever constructed. Hitler didn’t care that size was exchanged for safety. The heavy steel-framed airships were vulnerable to explosion, because they had to be lifted by highly flammable hydrogen gas instead of non-flammable helium gas.
During World War I, the Zeppelins were used as bombers, and the Germans had great success bombing the British Isles with the Zeppelin over the course of 1915 and 1916. The first such 
attack on London came on May 31, 1915. That bombing killed 28 people and wounded 60 more. The Germans killed a total of 550 Britons with aerial bombing by May 1916. During one such attack, on September 8, 1915, Heinrich Mathy was the commander of the famed German Zeppelin L13, bombing Aldersgate in central London. His bombs killed 22 people and causing £500,000 worth of damage.
While Mathy was waiting on repairs to his ship, following a bombing run on August 24-25, 1916, he received word that the British had managed for the first time to shoot down a Zeppelin, using incendiary bullets. While he was a fearless pilot, Mathy saw the writing on the wall, and said, “It is only a question of time before we join 
the rest. Everyone admits that they feel it. Our nerves are ruined by mistreatment. If anyone should say that he was not haunted by visions of burning airships, then he would be a braggart.” I’m sure he knew that the Zeppelin was a dangerous ship anyway, especially in a crash, but this new danger made matters much worse. As Mathy had predicted, his Zeppelin L31True to his prediction, Mathy’s L31 was shot down during a raid on London on the night of October 1-2, 1916. He is buried in Staffordshire, in a cemetery constructed by the British for the burial of Germans killed on British soil during both World Wars.
