Monthly Archives: December 2025
There are things we take for granted these days, without ever thinking about how they came to be or the trial and error that might have been involved. On such item, and one we sometimes wish hadn’t ever been invented, is the traffic light. Of course, with so many cars on the road, the traffic light is an absolute must at busy intersections, but maybe if they hadn’t been invented there wouldn’t be a ticket for running one…unless there was an accident, of course. The reality is that traffic lights these days are vital, and we all know it, so it is good that they were invented.
On December 9, 1868, London installed the world’s first traffic light outside the Houses of Parliament. Designed by John Peake Knight, a railway engineer, this system was operated manually by a police officer who stood beside it in all weather, rotating colored glass panels by hand. That in itself is rather shocking. Imagine becoming a police 
office, planning to fight crime, only to be told that you would be standing by a traffic light changing the colors manually. The gas-powered red and green lights were meant to manage horse-drawn carriages and pedestrians at busy intersections, but the setup was both dangerous and unreliable. The traffic light featured two gas lamps…one red and one green…used to signal when vehicles should stop or go, similar to railway signaling systems. Only a month into its use, a gas leak caused the light to explode, seriously injuring the officer and damaging nearby buildings. Now, not only was their work unfulfilling, but it could be deadly. In fact, the incident was so severe that the city abandoned traffic lights altogether for more than 40 years. I suppose it was just as well, because I think it would be very hard to find a police officer willing to work that position again.
All technology takes vision and a certain amount of faith, but this failed experiment highlighted Victorian England’s struggle to adapt new technology to fast-growing cities, and showed, quite vividly, how even simple ideas can backfire without proper testing or safety measures. The first electric traffic light, created by Lester Wire in 1912, was installed in Salt Lake City, Utah, featuring red and green lights and operated manually by a police officer. While it was still not automatic, the new system couldn’t explode anyway, it did have its own set of flaws. Then, on August 5, 1914, Cleveland, Ohio, became the first city to introduce an electric traffic signal with mechanisms to prevent conflicting signals, a big step forward in traffic management.
My niece, Jessi Sawdon is, according to her sister, Lindsay Moore, “an author of fun! She always has a fun, adventurous spirit that is God given. She loves an adventure and loves to include everyone in that adventure. I love that we live so close and get to raise our girls together. They are little besties. She is a consistent presence and can be counted on to be there in the good and the hard. We love Jessi and love her birthday. Not as much as she does, but we love it nonetheless!” Jessi has always been a happy, and fun-loving person. There is nothing shy or reserved about her. That’s a big part of her charm. Where others of us might be shy, Jessi can draw us out of our shell and into the fun. When her husband, Jason’s job took them from Casper to Cheyenne, a little bit of fun went with them. Thankfully, Cheyenne is only a couple of hours away, and they get home often, so we get to see them too.
Jessi is a great organizer, and she will definitely “cut to the chase” if her mom, Allyn Hadlock is going too deeply into the details! Allyn tells me, “She is a great mom, and she has a very special relationship with Adelaide who 
is actually Jessi’s mini me. As I look at the two of them, they are so much alike, and I see Jessi in Adelaide on a regular basis!” This year, they took a few camping trips which the whole family enjoys, and their tradition is that each year, Jessi and her husband, Jason take turns on where to spend holidays. This year was Jason’s family’s turn, so Jessi, Jason, and Addi spent Thanksgiving in Michigan. The whole Hadlock family has adopted that plan, so this was an “in law” Thanksgiving, meaning all the Hadlock kids spend that holiday with their in-laws and the next holiday, Christmas, they spend with Allyn and Chris. It works out very well.
Allyn says, “Jessi is very involved in her church and regularly attends the Bible studies as well as hosting them. She is always busy with work and is very successful in her job. She has a great understanding of all the tech stuff. When it comes to social events she is very socially connected not only with her friends but also networking at work. She tells me what is going on socially in Casper, before I know what is going on in Casper. 
She knows all the events and she’s our source of info for those things! She is very fun and funny and keeps us all laughing! She’s a great blessing to all of us!” Lindsay chimed in to say, “And we had fun at Cheyenne Frontier Days this year! We even got mom on some rides!” Yikes, they wouldn’t have been able to get me on the rides!! No way!! Today is Jessi’s birthday!! Happy birthday Jessi!! Have a great day!! We love you!!
Eighty-four years ago today, one of the most devastating attacks on US soil took place. In its aftermath, the United States entered World War II, a decision that would eventually lead my dad and uncles to serve as well. Many believe the United States has a tendency to rush into war, but that’s far from the truth. At its core, this country values the principle of live and let live, yet when provoked or when another nation needs help, those who challenge us often learn it’s a choice they’ll regret.
As far as I know, my family hasn’t lost a soldier to war, going back at least to World War I, so I can’t truly imagine the pain of losing someone in combat. Still, whenever our nation is at war, I send my prayers for the safety of all our soldiers…both those I know personally and those I don’t.
There have been times when our nation was divided over whether we should be involved in a war, but when our homeland is attacked, very few people protest. It feels different…more personal…whether we knew anyone who lost their life or not. These are our people, and this is our nation, our safe zone, and we don’t take kindly to anyone violating it. The attack on Pearl Harbor shocked many, as they had been led to believe we had an agreement with Japan that would be honored. But, regardless of how things are today, that agreement was not honored then. Many paid for our nation’s trusting ways with their lives…a mistake we can’t afford to repeat.
The attack on Pearl Harbor will always be remembered by those who experienced it and those who have learned about it. Today, I want to pay tribute to all the men and women who gave their lives at Pearl Harbor and in World War II, as well as everyone who has served our country in World War II and in all the other conflicts our nation has faced. Thank you for your service. We thank you for your service. Never will we forget your bravery.
Over time, and early immigration practices, the history of surnames and even first names has been altered. When people immigrated to the United States, they were told that their names were too hard, and they would need to Americanize them. Sometimes, it was as simple as changing the name from Smythe to Smith, but other times, the names were changed so completely that their family identity was lost. If people went searching for their family history, they would hit a wall, because the grandparent had basically disappeared. Of course, the discovery of DNA helped years later, but only if the children and grandchildren of the lost ancestors chose to have their DNA tested. In time, I suppose the connection will be made. We shall see.
For those who had to go into witness protection, the problem was even bigger. Chances were that unless they had done it before, they were told or they just knew that for their own safety, they must never have their DNA tested. Not only that, but often their looks were altered to protect them. These people and their family history 
simply vanished, leaving their families behind out of necessity. To add to the confusion, families were often told that the loved one had died in an accident, so no one would go looking.
For Jewish children hidden during the Holocaust, the problem was harder. Documents were forged, and all memory of their prior lives had to be wiped out for their own safety. Older children might remember their prior lives, but the little ones would forget. Some of these were adopted by their host families, while others were taken to other countries and adopted by strangers. It was all done in an attempt to save their lives, but whether an act of kindness or simply survival, their lives were irreversibly altered. Those children had been taught to forget so that they and the people who helped them might survive. The situation was even worse for their parents. Those killed in the death camps, labor camps, and gas chambers, were listed only by their prisoner number…if they were listed at all. The Nazis were trying to hide their crimes as much as they could, 
and that meant that names were lost forever. The bodies were cremated or buried in mass graves…nameless faces in a sea of death. To make matters worse for the Jewish children, they had, out of necessity, been raised Catholic or Protestant, if they were reunited with some distant family member, they knew nothing of their prior beliefs. Some of them felt guilt for this change in belief and wondered if God still cared about them. Guilt was a heavy load among those who still remembered their prior life. Sadly, because of lost records, many never found their real families again, and history was forever altered.
Our aunt, Linda Cole, was the middle child of my husband Bob’s grandparents, Grandma and Grandpa Knox. Early in their marriage, she and her husband, Bobby, moved to Kennebec, South Dakota, where they raised their two children, Sheila Gregory and Patrick Cole. In Kennebec, Linda and Bobby owned a hotel, and when visitors came, they always had plenty of room for everyone to stay. My husband, Bob, and I took our girls, Corrie Petersen and Amy Royce, to visit them once a year. It was always a nice trip for us, and the girls got to see family too. Running a hotel didn’t leave much time for travel, so visits from family were often the only chance they had to catch up with the rest of us. Linda’s sister, Joann Schulenberg, and her husband, Walt, who are my in-laws, went often as well. We always visited in the summer, which meant it was usually very hot in Kennebec. Still, the visits were so much fun, and I have always been glad we went. 
After a fire destroyed most of the hotel, the family relocated to Winnemucca, Nevada, where Linda and Bobby both found jobs in the casinos. They enjoyed working there and liked to gamble a bit on their days off, though it wasn’t something they did often. They appreciated the warm weather and mild winters, as well as their peaceful home in the country. The quiet was a welcome change from the constant noise of the casinos.
My in-laws visited them periodically in their travels as snowbirds, and the sisters got to know each other again. For so many years they had lived so far away from each other, that they were more like acquaintances than sisters sometimes. The 
girls’ younger sister, Margee lives here in Casper. She and Linda talked on the telephone often, and they were very close. It was hard on the sisters to be so far away from Linda, but as time goes on, you get used to things. People moving away from the town they grew up in, is commonplace these days.
In May 2014, Linda lost her husband, Bobby, and then she passed away in September 2016. Years had gone by since her sisters last saw her, which made her passing even more heartbreaking. They always felt like there would be more time, but when it was gone, all that remained was the sadness of her absence. Today would have been Linda’s 79th birthday. Happy birthday in Heaven, Linda. We love and miss you very much.
As you are planning your spring garden…I know, it’s a bit early, right. Well, maybe not. While gardening is a relaxing and beautiful hobby, it does take a degree of planning and a little money. Depending on the types of plants, as well as the quantity of flowers you might choose. I suppose your location and the year might have something to do with it too. That might surprise you, but location and year did matter in 1637 in a shocking way.
It was during the Dutch Tulip Mania of 1637, that planning a garden suddenly became a very expensive venture. Tulip mania was a period during the Dutch Golden Age when contract prices for some bulbs of the recently introduced and fashionable tulip reached extraordinarily high levels. The major acceleration started in 1634 and then dramatically collapsed in February 1637. During that period, single tulip bulbs sold for prices equivalent to luxury homes, with some rare varieties commanding sums that could purchase entire Amsterdam mansions or multiple years of skilled craftsman wages. What?? Oh my goodness, that would really require some pre-planning. Or maybe it would be a good reason to forego gardening altogether!!
It was as if the people went crazy. In fact, the tulip craze in the Netherlands got so out of hand that everyday people actually mortgaged their homes, sold off family treasures, and even borrowed against future income to buy tulip bulb futures. Trading became so insane that folks swapped deeds to houses, livestock, and businesses for single bulbs of rare or striking varieties, turning flower fashion into a full-blown speculative market. It was like the stock market, but in flowers!! The people were obsessed!! I suppose that the country looked amazing as the people fought to have the best gardens with the rarest tulip varieties.
Then, as suddenly as it started, the bubble burst abruptly when it hit home that tulip bulbs had no real value beyond blooming. It was as if the people suddenly woke up. The craze left thousands of people ruined overnight. Some bulbs were so pricey they were shown off like gems at public displays, guarded by armed 
guards, with individual flowers worth more than most people earned in a year. The whole thing was insane, but then, these kinds of things always are. Tulip Mania went down in history as the first recorded speculative bubble, proving how hype and social pressure can drive people into wildly irrational financial decisions. The results were devastating.
Prior to December 1940 the sleepy little village of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, France had an approximate population of 5,000 people. The villages on the surrounding plateau had about 24,000. The population of the area was not large, nor would we consider it tiny, but it had something few other places had…Pastor André Trocmé of the Reformed Church of France, his wife Magda, and his assistant, Pastor Edouard Theis. You might not think that is such an amazing thing, but some 5,000+ Jews during the Holocaust would disagree with you vehemently. Pastor Trocmé was a visionary or maybe a prophet, who saw what was coming under the insane leadership of Adolf Hitler. One day, he preached a sermon in which he stated, “there are no Jews, there are only people.” He taught his parishioners not to allow the Nazi distinction between races to cloud their spirits. So, when the time came to hide the Jewish refugees, there were no questions asked. The people did what they needed to do as if they were one person. No one complained, no one hesitated, and no one told the authorities…ever!! The village became known as a “safe haven” for all those persecuted by the Nazis.
Because of the bravery of these villagers, many Jews, often just children were spared the horrors of “the final solution” that had been mandated by Hitler. The actual numbers of those saved or at least housed is unknown. There was no way to really keep track. The people just knew that they had to do the right thing and try to save these people. Ther came a knock on the door and when opened, they saw a poor, frightened, and starving person, and they took them in, fed them, and hid them. Yes, not everyone survived those wretched years. Some succumbed to illness, because there was no way to get medicine or doctors, but even those who died, knew that they have been loved by those who helped them, and they were grateful.
Many amazing events took place during those horrific years in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon. Times were tough. Rationing was in place, and the Jews had no ration cards. So, the town folk shared their own rations, meaning that everyone was a “little hungry” at times. The children that were housed there were taught to be silent, not to move about, not to cry or cough. Their utter silence and invisibility were vital to their survival…theirs and their benefactors. The village opened their homes, barns, hotels, farms, and schools. They created fake identification and ration cards for refugees, and sometimes even guided them across the border into neutral Switzerland. Such rescue efforts were rare during the Holocaust, especially since they involved most of the people from an entire region. That made this incident one of great importance.
Le Chambon-sur-Lignon is a village on the Vivarais Plateau in the Haute-Loire départment of the Auvergne, a hilly region of south-central France. Until November 1942, the village was part of the Unoccupied Zone of France. The history of Le Chambon and its surroundings shaped how its residents acted during the Vichy regime and the German occupation. As Huguenot (Calvinist) Protestants, they had faced persecution by Catholic authorities in France from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries and had a tradition of sheltering fellow Protestants fleeing discrimination. Many in Le Chambon saw the Jews as the “chosen people,” and when they guided those in danger 300 kilometers to the Swiss border, they knew they were retracing the same path their persecuted Huguenot ancestors had taken centuries earlier. These people knew people who had been in the situation the Jews found themselves, and they didn’t want a repeat of history. 
The rescue effort took shape in the winter of 1940, when Pastor Trocmé reached out to the American Friends Service Committee (Quakers) in Marseille to help provide relief supplies for the 30,000 foreign Jews imprisoned in internment camps across southern France. Pastor Trocmé began working with Burns Chalmers, a prominent American Quaker, who explained that while the Quakers might manage to secure releases from the camps, there was nowhere for the freed individuals to go, as no one was ready to offer them shelter. Pastor Trocmé stepped up and brought an entire village and its surrounding area with him. It was not easy. Everyone went hungry, everyone took a huge chance, but everyone agreed with the action taken. They couldn’t have lived with themselves if they hadn’t helped.
Pastor Trocmé assured Chalmers that his village, Le Chambon, would take in refugees. Chalmers was able to negotiate the release of many Jews, especially children, from some of the southern camps, including Gurs, Les Milles, and Rivesaltes. I’m not sure how they pulled off such a release, but because of that, more Jews and others in danger also found their way to the town as individuals or in small groups, simply because word of mouth identified the Vivarais Plateau as a hospitable place of refuge. Most of the refugees who came there were foreign-born Jews without French citizenship, and many of them were children. They were scattered across small, remote villages and farms in the mountains around Le Chambon. The OSE (Oeuvre de Secours Aux Enfants, or Children’s Aid Society), a French-Jewish childcare group, played a key role in bringing the children to Le Chambon and placing them in private homes, boarding houses, and seven dedicated shelters funded for their care. Groups like the Quaker organization, American Congregationalists, the Swiss Red Cross, and even governments such as Sweden helped fund the houses. Refugees were given food, clothing, and false identity papers. The children in hiding went to school and joined youth groups. To keep up appearances and hide the presence of Jews, they often attended Protestant services, though Trocmé also encouraged them to hold secret Jewish ceremonies. In essence, they were hiding in plane site…or at least some of them were. Others had to hide in attics, barns, and cellars. They had to keep very still, not speak or cry, and never show their faces in the main home. Nevertheless, it was the safest they had felt or been in a long time.
When word spread that the Vichy police or German Security Police were coming, villagers would move refugees farther into the countryside, sometimes escorting them all the way to the Swiss border. The Protestant refugee group CIMADE played a major role in finding escape routes to Switzerland, with one well-used path running from Le Chambon to Annemasse and across the border. As the Vichy authorities and Germans pursued them, more refugees, including Spanish Republicans escaping internment camps, anti-Nazi Germans, and young Frenchmen dodging forced labor, joined the Jews seeking safety in Le Chambon. The area also became a haven for French resistance members, whose activity grew in 1942. The unity of the locals often led Vichy officials to act cautiously, even giving informal warnings before searches. Then in November 1942, things changed after Germany occupied southern France. On February 13, 1943, French police arrested Pastors Trocmé and Theis, along with primary school headmaster Roger Darcissac, and sent them to a camp near Limoges. They were released after 28 days and resumed rescue work until late 1943, when the threat of re-arrest forced them into hiding, at which point Magda Trocmé stepped in to lead the effort. These brave people refused to give up.
Unfortunately, on June 29, 1943, everything blew up, when German police raided a local secondary school, arresting 18 students. Five were identified as Jews and sent to Auschwitz, where they died. Their teacher, Daniel Trocmé (Pastor Trocmé’s cousin) was also arrested and deported to the Lublin/Majdanek concentration camp, where the SS killed him. Roger Le Forestier, Le Chambon’s physician known for helping Jews obtain false papers, was arrested and executed on August 20, 1944, in Montluc prison on orders from the Gestapo in Lyon. The Free French First Armored Division liberated the Vivarais Plateau on September 2–3, 1944. It was a devastating loss!! One that none of the village people would ever get over.
In 1990, Israel honored all the residents of Le Chambon and nearby villages as “Righteous Among the Nations,” an award given to non-Jews who went above and beyond for the “chosen people.” By December 2007, 40 individuals from the area had received the designation. French President Jacques Chirac praised the village’s heroism during a visit on July 8, 2004, and in January 2007 the French government paid tribute to its 
inhabitants in a ceremony at the Pantheon in Paris. From December 1940 to September 1944, Le Chambon and surrounding villages stood as an extraordinary example of collective rescue during the Holocaust. It was a time that should never be forgotten…a time when an incredible group of people came together and sacrificed their own safety, and sometimes their lives, to save people they didn’t even know.
Even after Japan modernized its military in 1868, officers were still expected to carry a traditional Japanese sword as a symbol of their heritage and culture. As a result, a large number of these swords were produced from the end of the Meiji era (1868–1912) up until the end of World War II in 1945. Strangely, even in World War II, the Japanese actually used these swords in battle. I can understand that in hand-to-hand combat, if guns weren’t available, but to actually go against a machine guns or other modern weapons, is insane. Nevertheless, that is exactly what happened on many an occasion. 
I don’t know if the Japanese soldiers were ordered to attack with their swords, or if they just did so out of a display of honor. Nevertheless, Japanese military tradition during World War II did emphasize sword charges against modern weapons, leading to numerous instances where samurai-sword-wielding soldiers attacked Allied machine gun positions in seemingly suicidal banzai charges. Of course, these weren’t the only suicidal banzai type of attacks, as we saw at Pearl Harbor. These sword attacks were reminiscent of Japan’s bushido warrior code, which prized honor and spiritual strength over practical military tactics, trusting that pure fighting spirit could overcome technological shortcomings. That “Bushido warrior code” likely served only to get many a warrior killed over the years. To me, there is also the need for practicality and “living to fight another day” in the code of a warrior, but some of these regimes like Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, China, Japan, and Germany just didn’t feel that way. They all demanded full sacrifice no matter what the odds of victory were.
Not all troops were required to or chose to fight a machine gun with a sword, and the government often “excused” itself by saying that the swords were only supposed to be symbolic, but the troops likely knew the 
truth. Officers often carried ancestral katana passed down through generations, treating them as sacred symbols of protection in battle. Still, Allied soldiers described the chilling sight of Japanese troops charging through gunfire with swords raised, shouting battle cries, and showing no concern for their own safety. Of course, these charges were ineffective against modern weaponry, but they left a strong psychological impression on Allied forces and showcased Japan’s fusion of ancient warrior traditions with 20th-century combat. The practice persisted throughout the Pacific War, revealing how cultural values could outweigh military logic even in the face of certain defeat.
For a couple of reasons, I have always had an interest in the Lakota Sioux Native American tribe. The first is that I love visiting the Black Hills of South Dakota which is closely tied to the Lakota Sioux tribe. The other reason the Lakota have interested me is that my great uncle, John Spare was actually adopted by a Lakota Sioux chief named Walking Cloud, who had lost his son, and been impressed with Uncle John. So, he decided to adopt him, even though Uncle John was a grown man. I guess that if people can have dual citizenship, they can also have dual parentship…or whatever it might be called.
Now, I found another reason to be interested in the Lakota Sioux…the “Lakota Grandmas.” The term “Lakota Grandmas” refers to four Lakota women who, in 1953, founded the Lakota TB and Health Association to combat a tuberculosis outbreak among the Cheyenne River Sioux. These weren’t your typical grandmas, but rather were four Lakota grandmothers who took management of the outbreak into their own hands. These women…Phoebe Downing (Standing Rock), Eunice Larrabee (Cheyenne River), Alfreda Janis Bergin (Pine Ridge), and Irene Groneau (Sisseton-Wahpeton)…banded together to serve their tribal health communities by tackling a variety of health issues, including tuberculosis, mental health, and alcoholism. These women saw a serious need and took it upon themselves to work together for the common good of their people and their reservations. Their work contributed greatly to the development of the Community Health Representative programs under the Indian Health Service (IHS). These women were instrumental in shaping health programs within the Indian Health Service (IHS), including starting the Community Health Representative (CHR) program.
Apparently, Lakota grandmothers have long been valued as keepers of knowledge. To this day, they remain vital to their communities, playing important roles in healthcare, intergenerational care, and tackling social factors that impact health. Their role intensified in 1953, amid a tuberculosis outbreak. That was when the four Lakota grandmothers banded together for the common good. One of the diseases most commonly dealt with by the Lakota grandmas was diabetes. Intergenerational caregiving is on the rise as challenges like unemployment and violence put more pressure on families. That brought a need for grandmothers to step up in vital ways. Among the Lakota, grandmothers are deeply engaged in community advocacy, from boosting health literacy to guiding 
advance care planning, making sure their voices shape important healthcare decisions. The Native Americans have always placed great value on the elderly, and maybe that is a lesson we should all learn. Whether all of our elderly are in a position to make such astounding changes or not, these four women certainly were, and together, they made a difference.
