Good Morning & God Bless To Every One !
Today is May 9, the 129th day of 2014 and there are 236 days left this year where it is another Blessed Day in the pleasure of our service for our Lord here at:
For God’s Glory Alone Ministries !!!
I was Just thinkin! –
“When an older person dies, it’s like there’s a library burning down!”
– Rick Stambaugh, 2014
Alex was Just thinkin! –
The Foundation Of A Nation: “If it were to be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws — the first growing out of the last. … A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.”
– Alexander Hamilton, Essay in the American Daily Advertiser, 1794
So, What Happened Today In 1997?
Former Prisoner of War becomes first United States Ambassador to Vietnam since the end of the war
Twenty-two years and 10 days after the fall of Saigon, former Florida Representative Douglas “Pete” Peterson becomes the first ambassador to Vietnam since Graham Martin was airlifted out of the country by helicopter in late April 1975. Peterson himself served as a U.S. Air Force captain during the Vietnam War and was held as a prisoner of war for six and a half years after his bomber was shot down near Hanoi in 1966. Thirty-one years later, Peterson returned to Hanoi on a different mission, presenting his credentials to Communist authorities in the Vietnamese capital on May 9, 1997.
Normalization with America’s old enemy began in early 1994, when U.S. President Bill Clinton announced the lifting of the 19-year-old trade embargo against Vietnam, citing the cooperation of Vietnam’s Communist government in helping the United States locate the 2,238 Americans still listed as missing in action during the Vietnam War. Despite the lifting of the embargo, high tariffs remained on Vietnamese exports pending the country’s qualification as a “most favored nation,” a U.S. trade-status designation that Vietnam could earn after broadening its program of free-market reforms.
In July 1995, the Clinton administration established full diplomatic relations with Vietnam. In making the decision, Clinton was advised by Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona, an ex-navy pilot who spent five years as a prisoner of war in Hanoi. Brushing aside criticism of Clinton’s decision by some Republicans, McCain asserted that it was time for America to normalize relations with its old enemy. In 1996, Clinton terminated the combat zone designation for Vietnam and nominated Democratic Congressman Pete Peterson as the first U.S. ambassador to Vietnam. Confirmed by Congress in the next year, Ambassador Peterson began his mission to Vietnam on May 9, 1997. In November 2000, Clinton became the first president to visit Vietnam since Richard Nixon’s 1969 trip to South Vietnam during the Vietnam War.
Other Memorable Or Interesting Events Occurring On May 9 In History:
1457 (BC) – Battle of Megiddo (15th century BC) between Thutmose III and a large Canaanite coalition under the King of Kadesh. It is the first battle to have been recorded in what is accepted as relatively reliable detail;
1386 – The ‘Treaty of Windsor’ between Portugal and England is enacted and is the oldest diplomatic alliance in the world which is still in force today;
1671 – In London, Thomas Blood, an Irish adventurer better known as “Captain Blood,” is captured attempting to steal the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. Blood, a Parliamentarian during the English Civil War, was deprived of his estate in Ireland with the restoration of the English monarchy in 1660. In 1663, he put himself at the head of a plot to seize Dublin Castle from supporters of King Charles II, but the plot was discovered and his accomplices executed. He escaped capture. In 1671, he hatched a bizarre plan to steal the new Crown Jewels, which had been refashioned by Charles II because most of the original jewels were melted down after Charles I’s execution in 1649. Tower guards apprehended and arrested all four of the perpetrators lead by Blood and Blood was brought before the king. Charles was so impressed with Blood’s audacity that, far from punishing him, he restored his estates in Ireland and made him a member of his court with an annual pension. Captain Blood became a colorful celebrity all across the kingdom, and when he died in 1680 his body had to be exhumed in order to persuade the public that he was actually dead;
1754 – The first newspaper cartoon in America appears when a political cartoon is printed in Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Gazette which depicted a snake cut into eight pieces, each section representing a part of the American colonies; the caption read, “JOIN, or DIE”;
1785 – British inventor Joseph Bramah patents the beer-pump handle;
1791 – Francis Hopkinson, signer of the Declaration of Independence and the first American secular composer, dies suddenly of a seizure in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was elected as one of New Jersey’s delegates to the Continental Congress in 1776 and soon after signed his name to the Declaration of Independence. As the American Revolution raged, Hopkinson returned to serve in the colony of his birth in 1777, first on the Navy Board at Philadelphia, then as treasurer of the Continental Loan Office in 1778 and finally with a seat on the Admiralty court in Pennsylvania in 1779. He joined Pennsylvania’s ratification convention in 1787, and served on the bench of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania from 1789 until his death. In addition to his contributions to American history as a politician and jurist, Hopkinson is known as the father of American secular music, a talent complemented by his skills as a poet, playwright and harpsichordist. Some of his compositions reflected his patriotism, including The Battle of The Kegs, which described the Patriots’ early attempt to mine the Delaware River using barrels filled with powder. Hopkinson also played a significant role in designing the first American flag;
1860 – James Barrie, creator of Peter Pan, is born in Scotland on this day. In 1904, he wrote Peter Pan. Although he wrote many other plays, few are still performed today, and none had the staying power of Peter Pan. In 1913, he was made a baronet and in 1922 received the Order of Merit. He became president of the Society of Authors in 1928 and Chancellor of the University of Edinburgh in 1930. Barrie died in London in 1937;
1864 – During the American Civil War, Union General John Sedgwick is shot and killed by a Confederate sharpshooter during fighting at Spotsylvania in Virginia. His last words are: “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this dist–”;
1864 – During the American Civil War, Union troops secure a crucial pass during the Atlanta campaign. In the spring and summer of 1864, Union General William T. Sherman and Confederate General Joseph Johnston conducted a slow and methodical campaign to seize control of Atlanta. Pushing southeast from Chattanooga, Tennessee, toward Atlanta, Sherman continually tried to flank Johnston, but Johnston countered each move. On May 3, 1864, two of Sherman’s corps moved against Confederate defenses at Dalton, Georgia while another Yankee force under James McPherson swung wide to the south and west of Dalton in an attempt to approach Johnston from the rear. It was along this path that McPherson captured Snake Creek Gap, a crucial opening in a long elevation called Rocky Face Ridge. Seizure of the strategic pass was a brilliant Union move, as Rocky Face Ridge served as a key geographic feature for Johnston and his army. It was a barrier against Sherman’s army that could neutralize the superior numbers of Federal troops. When the Yankees captured the gap, Johnston had to pull his men much further south where the terrain did not offer such advantages;
1887 – Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show opens in London, giving Queen Victoria and her subjects their first look at real cowboys and Indians. A well-known scout for the army and a buffalo hunter for the railroads (which earned him his nickname), Cody had gained national prominence 15 years earlier thanks to a fanciful novel written by Edward Zane Carroll Judson. Writing under the pen name Ned Buntline, Judson made Cody the hero of his highly sensationalized dime novel The Scouts of the Plains; or, Red Deviltry As It Is.” In 1872, Judson also convinced Cody to travel to Chicago to star in a stage version of the book. Cody broke with Judson after a year, but he enjoyed the life of a performer and stayed on the stage for 11 seasons. In 1883, Cody staged an outdoor extravaganza called the “Wild West, Rocky Mountain, and Prairie Exhibition” in North Platte, Nebraska. When the show was a success, Cody realized he could evoke the mythic West more effectively if he abandoned cramped theater stages for large outdoor exhibitions. The result was “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West,” a circus-like pageant celebrating life in the West. Though his Wild West show waned in popularity in the 20th century because of competition from thousands of local rodeos that borrowed his idea-Cody remained on the road with the show for 30 years;
1914 – President Woodrow Wilson issues a presidential proclamation that officially establishes the first national Mother’s Day holiday to celebrate America’s mothers. The idea for a “Mother’s Day” is credited by some to Julia Ward Howe (1872) and by others to Anna Jarvis (1907), who both suggested a holiday dedicated to a day of peace. Many individual states celebrated Mother’s Day by 1911, but it was not until Wilson lobbied Congress in 1914 that Mother’s Day was officially set on the second Sunday of every May;
1926 – According to their claims, polar explorer Richard E. Byrd and co-pilot Floyd Bennett fly over the North Pole on this day in the Josephine Ford, a triple-engine Fokker monoplane. It would have been the first time an aircraft flew over the top of the world. The pair had taken off from Spitsbergen, Norway, and reportedly covered the 1,545-mile trip to the pole and back in 15 hours and 30 minutes. For the achievement, both men were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor and acclaimed as national heroes. Despite claims the flight was actually 150 miles short of the pole, Byrd’s place in polar exploration is firmly set when in 1929 he established a U.S. base in Antarctica and late in the same year, accompanied by aviator Bernt Balchen, he made the undisputed first aircraft flight over the South Pole as well;
1941 – During World War II, the German submarine U-110 is captured at sea along with its Enigma machine by the Royal Navy giving the allies the ability to break German coded messages;
1945 – Following the end of World War II, Herman Goering, commander in chief of the Luftwaffe, president of the Reichstag, head of the Gestapo, prime minister of Prussia, and Hitler’s designated successor is taken prisoner by the U.S. Seventh Army in Bavaria. He was tried at Nuremberg and charged with various crimes against humanity. Despite a vigorous attempt at self acquittal, he was found guilty and sentenced to be hanged, but before he could be executed, he committed suicide by swallowing a cyanide tablet he had hidden from his guards;
1950 – Lafayette Ronald Hubbard (1911-1986) publishes Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. With this book, Hubbard introduced a branch of self-help psychology called Dianetics, which quickly caught fire and, over time, morphed into a belief system boasting millions of subscribers: Scientology. By 1953, Scientology expanded on Dianetics by bringing Hubbard’s popular version of psychotherapy into the realm of philosophy, and ultimately, religion. In only a few years, Hubbard found himself at the helm of a movement that captured the popular imagination. As Scientology grew in the 1960s, several national governments became suspicious of Hubbard, accusing him of quackery and brainwashing his followers. Nonetheless, Hubbard built his religion into a multi-million dollar movement that continues to have a considerable presence in the public eye, due in part to its high profile in Hollywood;
1951 – The United States conducted its first thermonuclear experiment as part of Operation Greenhouse by detonating a 225-kiloton device on Enewetak Atoll in the Pacific nicknamed “George”;
1955 – During the (first) Cold War, ten years after the Nazis were defeated in World War II, West Germany formally joins the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). It marked the final step of West Germany’s integration into the Western European defense system. The Americans, British, and French held zones of occupation in Western Germany and West Berlin; the Soviets controlled Eastern Germany and East Berlin. Although publicly both the Americans and the Soviets proclaimed their desire for a reunited and independent Germany, it quickly became apparent that each of these cold war opponents would only accept a reunified Germany that served their own nation’s specific interests. On May 5, 1955, the American, French, and British forces formally ended their military occupation of West Germany, which became an independent country. Four days later, West Germany was made a member of NATO. For U.S. policymakers, this was an essential step in the defense of Western Europe. Despite the reluctance of some European nations, such as France, to see a rearmed Germany—even as an ally—the United States believed that remilitarizing West Germany was absolutely vital in terms of setting up a defensive perimeter to contain any possible Soviet attempts at expansion. For the next 35 years, East and West Germany came to symbolize the animosities of the Cold War. In 1990, as the cold war came to an end, Germany was finally reunified and the new German state remained a member of NATO;
1969 – In the Vietnam War, William Beecher, military correspondent for the New York Times, publishes a front page dispatch from Washington, “Raids in Cambodia by U.S. Unprotested,” which accurately described the first of the secret B-52 bombing raids in Cambodia. Within hours, Henry Kissinger, presidential assistant for national security affairs, contacted J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, asking him to find the governmental sources of Beecher’s article. During the next two years, Alexander Haig, a key Kissinger assistant, transmitted the names of National Security Council staff members and reporters who were to have their telephones wiretapped by the FBI;
1970 – During the Vietnam War, between 75,000 and 100,000 young people, mostly from college campuses, demonstrate peacefully in Washington, D.C., at the rear of a barricaded White House. They demanded the withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Vietnam and other Southeast Asian nations. Afterwards, a few hundred militants spread through surrounding streets, causing limited damage. Police attacked the most threatening crowds with tear gas;
1971 – The last original episode of the sitcom The Honeymooners, starring Jackie Gleason as Brooklyn bus driver Ralph Kramden, airs. Although a perennial rerun favorite in syndication, The Honeymooners actually aired only 39 episodes in its familiar sitcom format, running for just one season in 1955-56. The show debuted on October 5, 1951, as a six-minute sketch on the variety show Cavalcade of Stars, hosted by Jackie Gleason. Cavalcade of Stars evolved into The Jackie Gleason Show in 1952, and Gleason continued the sketches, playing the blustery Ralph Kramden. Regular cast member Audrey Meadows soon replaced the original casting choice, Pert Kelton, as Ralph’s long-suffering wife, Alice, who deflated his get-rich-quick schemes but often saved the day. Art Carney played Gleason’s friend and sidekick, Ed Norton, from the beginning, and Joyce Randolph was the most memorable incarnation of Ed’s wife, Trixie.Despite its brief life as a traditional sitcom, The Honeymooners remains one of the most memorable TV comedies of all time, rivaled only by I Love Lucy in its pioneering role in television history. Its influence has stretched into modern-day sitcom classics. The devotion of Honeymooners fans throughout the years has bordered on cultish worship, including the formation of a club known as RALPH: Royal Association for the Longevity and Preservation of the Honeymooners;
1974 – During the Vietnam War, the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee opens impeachment hearings against President Richard Nixon, voting to impeach him on three counts on July 30. The impeachment was the result of the scandal involving the bungled burglary of the offices of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate apartment complex in Washington, D.C. on June 23, 1972 and as a result he resigned the presidency on August 8, 1974. His resignation had a major impact on the situation in Vietnam. Nixon had convinced South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu to consent to the provisions of the Paris Peace Accords by personally promising that the United States would re-enter the conflict if the North Vietnamese violated the peace agreement. However, when Nixon resigned, his successor, Gerald R. Ford was not able to keep Nixon’s promises. Ford could not, despite Thieu’s desperate pleas for help, get Congress to appropriate significant funds to help the South Vietnamese. Having lost its sole source of aid and support, South Vietnam fell to the North Vietnamese in April 1975;
1978 – The body of former Italian prime minister Aldo Moro is found, riddled by bullets, in the back of a car in the center of historic Rome. He was kidnapped by Red Brigade terrorists on March 16 after a bloody shoot-out near his suburban home. The Italian government refused to negotiate with the extreme left-wing group, which, after numerous threats, executed Moro on May 9. He was a five-time prime minister of Italy and considered a front-runner for the presidency of Italy in elections due in December. Aldo Moro was regarded by many as Italy’s most capable post-World War II politician. A centrist leader of the Christian Democratic Party, he served five times as prime minister in the 1960s and 1970s and promoted cooperation between Italy’s disparate political parties. His body was found on Via Caetani, within 300 yards of the headquarters of the Christian Democrats and 200 yards from the Communist Party headquarters. According to a wish expressed by Moro during his abduction, no Italian politicians were invited to his funeral. During the next decade, many Red Brigade leaders and members were arrested, and the organization was greatly weakened;
1980 – 35 people were killed when a freighter rammed the Sunshine Skyway Bridge over Tampa Bay in Florida, causing a 1,400-foot section of the southbound span to collapse;
1989 – Vice President Dan Quayle says in United Negro College Fund speech: “What a waste it is to lose one’s mind” instead of “a mind is terrible thing to waste”;
1999 – During a bombing run over Belgrade, NATO accidentally bombs the Chinese embassy, killing four which launches massive protests throughout China;
2001 – During a soccer match at Accra Stadium in Ghana, an encounter between police and rowdy fans results in a stampede that kills 126 people. This tragedy was the worst-ever sports-related disaster in Africa’s history to that time;
2002 – A 38-day stand-off in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem comes to an end when the Palestinians inside agree to have 13 suspected militants among them deported to several different countries;
2004 – A bomb planted by Caucasus rebels destroyed the VIP section at a stadium during a Victory Day celebration in the Chechen capital of Grozny, killing some two dozen people, including the province’s president, Akhmad Kadyrov;
2006 – George Preca is canonised as the first Maltese saint in history;
2009 – Pakistani warplanes pounded the Taliban-held Swat Valley in what the country’s prime minister called a “war of the country’s survival”;
2013 – A 72-foot-long, high-tech catamaran sailboat capsized in San Francisco Bay while practicing for the America’s Cup races, killing English Olympic gold medalist Andrew “Bart” Simpson;
2013 – A report reveals that hackers using fraudulent ATM cards in February, 2013, stole $45 million;
2013 – It was one year ago TODAY!!!
Number 4 of 50 beautiful pictures from 50 beautiful states:
Hawksbill Crag/Whitaker Point, Ozark Mountains, Arkansas
To close as I
A thought
Give honor to whom honor is due! This biblical principle is most certainly true of women, and especially those who are godly mothers. Let’s make sure we praise the key women in our lives today!
Brings a verse
A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies… She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her.
– Proverbs 31:10 27-28
That leads to a prayer
Dear Father GOD, I want to thank you for the women of character and grace, tenderness and fire, love and tenacity, who have helped shape my life in a way which helped me find, follow, and faithfully serve you. Please bless them this day. I ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen
Until the next time – America, Bless GOD!!!
