Monday Open Thread | Dirty Dancing Soundtrack

Posted on November 25, 2013 by SouthernGirl2

Dirty dancing5Dirty Dancing is the original soundtrack of the 1987 film Dirty Dancing. The album became a huge commercial success in the United States. It spent 18 weeks at #1 on the Billboard 200 album sales charts and went multi-platinum.[2] It spawned a follow-up album entitled More Dirty Dancing (1988). The original 1987 album went on to sell 32 million copies worldwide and is one of the best-selling albums of all time.

About SouthernGirl2

A Native Texan who adores baby kittens, loves horses, rodeos, pomegranates, & collect Eagles. Enjoys politics, games shows, & dancing to all types of music. Loves discussing and learning about different cultures. A Phi Theta Kappa lifetime member with a passion for Social & Civil Justice.
This entry was posted in Current Events, Movie Soundtracks, Music, News, Open Thread, Politics and tagged , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

62 Responses to Monday Open Thread | Dirty Dancing Soundtrack

  2. Ametia says:
    November 25, 2013 at 4:38 pm

    Disrupt 11/24/13

    Are there rules to feminism?

    Columnist Michelle Cottle called Michelle Obama a “feminist nightmare,” but are there any such things as bad feminists? Joan Walsh and Sophia Nelson discuss.

    Video: http://www.msnbc.com/disrupt

    Reply
  3. Ametia says:
    November 25, 2013 at 3:30 pm

    Fox Host: Unlike “Katrina Or The Iraq War,” Obamacare “Is Something That Touches So Many People’s Lives Across The Country

    http://mediamatters.org/video/2013/11/25/fox-host-unlike-katrina-or-the-iraq-war-obamaca/197041

    Reply
  4. Ametia says:
    November 25, 2013 at 3:20 pm

    John Boehner’s Socialism: Taxpayers Pay 75% of His Premiums and His Wife is On Medicare

    “Next year Mrs. Boehner will be on Medicare.” This news is brought to you by Michael Hiltzik at the LA Times, in the midst of his fact-checking of John Boehner’s claims to be paying tons more money post-ObamaCare (shockingly a lie).

    Also, “Boehner’s premiums are partially covered by his employer, the federal government, which pays up to 75% of employee premiums, up to a cap of $426.14 a month (for 2014).” This is confirmed by Factcheck.Org, which finds that the government pays on average 72% and up to 75%.

    Not only do we, the taxpayers, fund 75% of Boehner’s premiums, but his wife is going on Medicare.

    http://www.politicususa.com/2013/11/25/tax-payers-fund-75-john-boehners-premiums-wife-medicare.html

    FLOTUS-THROWS-SHARE!-tumblr_mgzxsvmYOQ1rc826vo1_r1_250

    Reply
  5. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 1:57 pm

    potus and valerie j in seattle
    President Obama looks at the view of Mount Rainier at sunset with White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, right, upon their arrival at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Nov. 24

    Reply
  6. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 1:29 pm

    Black re-enactors honor U.S. Colored Troops’ contribution to American History
    By Donald Gilliland | dgilliland@pennlive.com
    Email the author | Follow on Twitter
    on November 24, 2013 at 12:15 PM, updated November 24, 2013 at 7:35 PM

    Black Civil War re-enactors – like their forebears 150 years ago – don’t fit easily into the popular conception of the war and its modern-day traditions, but they exist, and they were in Gettysburg for Remembrance Day on Saturday.

    After the parade, they gathered in the Goodwill Cemetery – an old cemetery several blocks from the big National Soldiers Cemetery reserved for blacks – for a small service honoring the 30 veterans of the United States Colored Troops buried there.

    Despite the important role the U.S.C.T. played in winning the Civil War, they rarely got their due – then or now.

    A plaque honoring those troops dedicated Saturday afternoon notes they were “denied burial” in the National Cemetery nearby, despite the fact white Union soldiers who had not fought in Gettysburg were buried there.

    Only two black soldiers of the Civil War are buried in the National Cemetery; when the second was moved there in 1936, the family of the white soldier in the grave next to him had the white soldier exhumed and moved to a plot in Harrisburg.

    “For years they have not ben mentioned, but they had just as big a role in the war,” said Jean Green, one of the organizers of the event on Saturday. “It’s high time they got their recognition.”

    http://blog.pennlive.com/gettysburg-150/2013/11/black_re-enactors_honor_us_col.html

    Reply
  7. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 1:24 pm

    Y.U.N.G. Harlem: Positive Leadership For New York Youth
    Comments: 6 | Leave A Comment
    Nov 22, 2013
    By D.L. Chandler

    Tiffany Bender & Alize Beal, Co-Founders of Y.U.N.G. Harlem

    Base Of Operations: Harlem, N.Y.

    Why are they Community Heroes: Y.U.N.G Harlem is an organization created by Bender and Beal to address the needs of young Black people in and around Harlem and to provide “positive leadership” by way of guiding them towards college and solid careers.

    In response to a deadly spate of violence in Harlem in the summer of 2008, then college freshmen Tiffany Bender and Alize Beal co-founded the Y.U.N.G. (Youth Under New Guidance) Harlem organization. Together, Ms. Bender and Ms. Beal employ a hands-on approach in turning around the fortunes of young Black men in Harlem and have aims to expand their outreach efforts across the entire city.

    “Young Black men between 14 and 24 make up just 2 percent of the population, and they make up 20 percent of the homicides in this area [Harlem],” explained Bender. “That’s crazy to me. It’s happening in the mecca of Black culture and I want to do what I can to fix even a little corner of it.”

    Y.U.N.G. Harlem’s programs are focused on creating a bridge between three key areas: the community’s youth, young professionals, and local businesses in the area. The organization works primarily in school settings, offering lectures and encouraging students to consider higher education. Y.U.N.G. Harlem also works in some of the city’s housing projects, urging schoolchildren to finish high school and apply to some of the vaunted Ivy League schools as well.

    “We’re going to the project and telling kids not only do you need to finish high school, but you need to apply to these Ivy League and private schools because they want you just as much as you want them,” said Bender.

    http://newsone.com/2787203/y-u-n-g-harlem-positive-leadership-for-new-york-youth/

    Reply
  8. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 12:46 pm

    SG2,

    I hope you and yours are safe in the storm they say is blowing through Texas right now.

    Reply
  9. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 25, 2013 at 12:00 pm
    Reply
  10. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 25, 2013 at 10:38 am
    Reply
  11. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 25, 2013 at 10:09 am
    Reply
  13. Ametia says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:45 am

    How’d this get by us?

    Reply
  14. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:22 am

    California, Here We Come?
    By PAUL KRUGMAN
    Published: November 24, 2013

    It goes without saying that the rollout of Obamacare was an epic disaster. But what kind of disaster was it? Was it a failure of management, messing up the initial implementation of a fundamentally sound policy? Or was it a demonstration that the Affordable Care Act is inherently unworkable?

    We know what each side of the partisan divide wants you to believe. The Obama administration is telling the public that everything will eventually be fixed, and urging Congressional Democrats to keep their nerve. Republicans, on the other hand, are declaring the program an irredeemable failure, which must be scrapped and replaced with … well, they don’t really want to replace it with anything.

    At a time like this, you really want a controlled experiment. What would happen if we unveiled a program that looked like Obamacare, in a place that looked like America, but with competent project management that produced a working website?

    Well, your wish is granted. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you California.

    Now, California isn’t the only place where Obamacare is looking pretty good. A number of states that are running their own online health exchanges instead of relying on HealthCare.gov are doing well. Kentucky’s Kynect is a huge success; so is Access Health CT in Connecticut. New York is doing O.K. And we shouldn’t forget that Massachusetts has had an Obamacare-like program since 2006, put into effect by a guy named Mitt Romney.

    California is, however, an especially useful test case. First of all, it’s huge: if a system can work for 38 million people, it can work for America as a whole. Also, it’s hard to argue that California has had any special advantages other than that of having a government that actually wants to help the uninsured. When Massachusetts put Romneycare into effect, it already had a relatively low number of uninsured residents. California, however, came into health reform with 22 percent of its nonelderly population uninsured, compared with a national average of 18 percent.

    Finally, the California authorities have been especially forthcoming with data tracking the progress of enrollment. And the numbers are increasingly encouraging.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/25/opinion/krugman-california-here-we-come.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&_r=1&

    Reply
  15. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:15 am

    Dylan Welch @dylanwelch
    Follow
    BREAKING US Nat Sec Advisor Susan Rice reveals she is in #Afghanistan and will visit Karzai tonight amid speculation over future of #BSA.

    6:03 AM – 25 Nov 2013

    Reply
  17. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:14 am

    Bobfr @Our4thEstate
    Follow
    If President Obama was white the 22nd Amendment would now be being repealed. Period. cc @davidaxelrod @davidplouffe @Lawrence @TheReidReport

    1:17 AM – 25 Nov 2013

    Reply
  18. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:13 am

    @NerdyWonka
    Yet Bibi pulled media stunt. What a hypocrite. RT @ABC: Obama advised Israel, Netanyahu of #Iran talks in September: http://abcn.ws/17TQwNX

    Reply
  22. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:05 am

    gn

    Look at how Chuck “it’s not my responsibility to correct GOP lies” Todd is reporting the disaster ensuing because GOP governors refuse to accept the ObamaCare Medicaid expansion:

    @chucktodd
    In states not expanding Medicaid, some hospitals having to shut down. States and Feds pointing finger at each other. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/…

    Whenever he has some flaw to report about Dems, especially POTUS, it’s “PRESIDENT OBAMA AND DEMS HAVE SCREWED UP.” When there’s negative fallout from an overt action by the GOP: “this bad thing is happening; both sides are probably to blame.” This is unreal.

    Reply
  23. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 8:01 am

    Sunday, November 24, 2013
    Obamacare Is Working In Kentucky
    Posted by Zandar

    In the states where Obamacare is allowed to work without GOP sabotage, it’s an incredible system. There’s no greater example of this than right here in Kentucky.

    Places such as Breathitt County, in the Appalachian foothills of eastern Kentucky, are driving the state’s relatively high enrollment figures, which are helping to drive national enrollment figures as the federal health exchange has floundered. In a state where 15 percent of the population, about 640,000 people, are uninsured, 56,422 have signed up for new health-care coverage, with 45,622 of them enrolled in Medicaid and the rest in private health plans, according to figures released by the governor’s office Friday.

    If the health-care law is having a troubled rollout across the country, Kentucky — and Breathitt County in particular — shows what can happen in a place where things are working as the law’s supporters envisioned.

    One reason is that the state set up its own health-insurance exchange, sidestepping the troubled federal one. Also, Gov. Steve Beshear (D) is the only Southern governor to sign on to expanded eligibility parameters for Medicaid, the federal health-insurance program for the poor.

    The real benefit here is Medicaid expansion. Kentucky has already knocked more than a full percentage point off the number of uninsured, tens of thousands of people. In just a month, a sizable dent has been made in the state’s uninsured population. This is what Obamacare was supposed to do all along: give states the tools to control their health costs and to help their people.

    It’s Republicans who have refused the program and wrecked the ship. You can complain about the federal website all you want, but the real issue is Republicans are making this fail for millions on purpose and are complaining about why it’s not working. It’s not working because they’ve done everything they possibly can to make it not work in more than half the states.

    Where it is working? Kentucky. Think about that.

    http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2013/11/obamacare-is-working-in-kentucky.html

    Reply
  24. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 7:59 am

    The 10 Times I Was the Biggest Hater During the American Music Awards

    [ 11 ] November 25, 2013 | Luvvie

    Last night was the American Music Awards (AMAs) and I already wasn’t really looking forward to it. I really only watched because of Twitter (as often). Also, I didn’t feel like being nice (a day you can also called “any given Sunday”) so I am here with my questions. I seemed to gather all the supply of hateration that was readily stocked in my dancerie for the evening. Below are ten times when I ODed on haterade during the AMAs.

    When it started – I missed the first 10 minutes of the show because the remote control was 10 feet away from me and I was too unconcerned to get it. They really need to start making remotes we can control with their minds. OR maybe they need to make remote controls that we can control with our phones. But what happens when our phones are far? Laziness inception. It’ll be like a cycle of “well it’s all the way over there.” Meh. In comparison, on Thursday nights, I sit my remote next to me and leave the TV off all day so such confusion won’t happen. But yeah… I just REALLY didn’t care much to watch the AMAs. And when I finally did, I had roast tourette’s.

    * Anytime I saw Taylor Swift – I can’t help it. Taylor just brings out the ultra petty in me (not like it’s laying dormant much). She came to the awards as Carrie Underwood. Good for her! And she seems to be maturing. She finally stopped that “OMG I CAN’T BELIEVE I WON ARE YOU SURE WHATTTTTTT” face. Again, go Taylor. She, of course, won a bunch of awards because MUSIC TODAY SUCKS! But whatevs. Yay.

    * When Marc Anthony was on stage – I saw Marc Anthony more last night that I’ve seen the dude in at least 2 years (not like he’s my neighbor or nothing. I’m just saying. He’ont be at awards). And I wondered why he was dressed like he was about to go chop wood. Maybe he was tryna add some macho to himself. Weighing a buck ten as a grown man must be a burden. I FEEL YOU, MARC! Skinny people problems are real and sometimes we gotta wear flannel to be taken seriously!

    * When I saw Macklemore – I don’t know why my spirit ain’t here for Macklemore. It could be because his eyebrows don’t show up and I’m judgey but I just scrunch my nose at him. And whoever first said he looks like Roger from Doug should be given ALLL the awards because it’s so true that we should call him Rogermore henceforth. Yes.

    * Nelly’s Country Performance – Some country music dudes performed on stage and then Nelly joined them and they did a countrified version of “Ride Wit Me.” And my side-eye was activated and I wondered how much Nelly needs for whatever it is. Because can we Kickstarted it instead of whatever that was?? Somewhere Murphy Lee and Chingy are butthurt talmbout “until you do right by us…” Chile… he’s lucky he FAHN.

    * Rihanna’s Doobie – I’m glad Rihanna came up for hair from Instagramming herself next to pools (I’m hating) to come to the AMAs. Homegirl got up on stage and performed in the key of T-Boz like we expected her to and I love watching her sing on mute. Antywho, Bajangal Riri wrapped her hair last night and didn’t comb it down. Because real Gs named Rihanna show up to award shows rocking a doobie. To further show us how few dambs she gives, the piece de resistance on the style were the bedazzed bobby pins holding her coiffure in place. SHINE BRIGHT LIKE THE DIAMOND BOBBY PINS IN RIH-RIH’S HAIR!

    http://www.awesomelyluvvie.com/2013/11/american-music-awards-hateration.html

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      November 25, 2013 at 9:12 am

      Funny. Music is pretty much over in this country as far as I’m concerned. Anything good that we get now will be an aberration. Thank God the 20th century produced enough to keep me going for the rest of my life.

      Reply
  25. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 7:52 am

    Long Read: Heritage Devoured by Weasels from Within

    Posted by Anne Laurie at 10:20 pm Nov 242013 Could not happen to a more deserving parasite, of course. This putz Michael Needham, once again, strutting his stuff as a comer in the Wingnut Wurlitzer Sweeps. This time it’s a TNR profile by Julia Ioffe, “… Think Republicans have been making fools of themselves? Blame Michael Needham“:

    … Needham is the 31-year-old CEO of Heritage Action, the relatively new activist branch of the Heritage Foundation, the storied Washington think tank that was one of the leaders of the conservative war of ideas ever since it provided the blueprint for Ronald Reagan’s first term. Although DeMint is Heritage’s president, it was Needham who had designed much of the defund Obamacare strategy. Beginning in 2010, when Heritage Action was founded, Needham pushed the GOP to use Congress’s power of the purse to eviscerate the Affordable Care Act. He formed a grassroots army, which he used to keep congressional Republicans in line. “They make six hundred phone calls and have a member of Congress in the fetal position,” says one GOP congressional staffer.

    After months of furious lobbying, Needham sold, at most, 20 members of the House on his plan of attack. In the end, this was enough to cement the party line—and lead the GOP to a spectacular, deafening loss.

    Sorting through the wreckage, Washington conservatives can barely contain their anger at Needham for his ideological inflexibility and aggressive, zero-sum tactics. “Their strategic sense isn’t very strong,” griped a prominent Republican lobbyist. “They’ve repeatedly been wrong about how to handle this.” Says a senior House Republican aide, “Mike Needham played a large role in defeating ideas that would have worked out better.”

    But the wrath is not solely reserved for Needham; his employer now inspires plenty of disgust among conservatives, too. Increasingly in Washington, “Heritage” has come to denote not the foundation or the think tank, but Heritage Action, Needham’s sharp-elbowed operation. Instead of fleshing out conservative positions, says one Republican Senate staffer, “now they’re running around trying to get Republicans voted out of office. It’s a purely ideological crusade that’s utterly divorced from the research side.” (“If Nancy Pelosi could write an anonymous check to Heritage Action,” adds the House aide bitterly, “she would.”)…

    Like all good revolutionaries, Michael Needham had a sterling upbringing, the kind that allows a young man to pursue ideological purity free from worry about consequence or reality. Needham’s mother is a former Saks Fifth Avenue executive; his father runs a boutique investment bank. The future Tea Party rabble-rouser grew up on the Upper East Side. He attended Collegiate, a prestigious New York prep school, then Williams. As a political science major and, eventually, the editor of the college newspaper, Needham loved to provoke his liberal classmates, arguing that Social Security was unnecessary and that the minimum wage hurt the working poor. “It’s amazing how little reflection he’s given to his privilege,” says a classmate. “It was all kind of a game to him. It was an experiment in winning.”…

    …When DeMint was finally hired, Heritage veterans understood that they had lost their last chance to stop the Heritage Action china-busting revolution. “At the end of the day, that was really an affirmative decision to double down on the political model,” says the scholar. “The battle was over.”

    DeMint was known nationally as a warrior for purity, spending more of his time seeking out like-minded candidates for the U.S. Senate rather than passing legislation. But, at Heritage, DeMint found kindred spirits in Saunders and Needham, who created a Heritage Action scorecard to grade Republican members of Congress on their ideological mettle. (The standard is so high that, at this writing, the House Republican caucus gets a paltry 66 percent rating.)

    DeMint also shared another bond with the two men: unlike the Heritage ruling class of yore, none of them had Ph.D.s. All three, however, had MBAs. Their preference for incentivizing behavior on the Hill with scorecards and primary challenges was “a very MBA approach to politics,” the former scholar noted ruefully. “There’s really no room there for deliberation or argument.”…

    The biggest casualty of the takeover has been Feulner’s crown jewel: Heritage’s legendary relationships on the Hill. On issue after issue, Needham’s ideological flame-throwing has made Heritage Action enemies in even the most conservative corners of Congress. Says the House GOP aide, “People on the Hill are very much rubbed the wrong way by a former Giuliani staffer who is around thirty years old, running around and determining whether they’re conservative or not.”

    Shortly after this summer’s farm bill debacle (Heritage Action pushed members to rid the bill of its food-stamp half, then still sent out a “no” alert on the revised bill, hanging out to dry members from agricultural districts), the outrage was such that the Heritage Foundation was bannedfrom the weekly lunches of the Republican Study Committee (RSC), a conservative caucus of House Republicans. This was particularly ironic as the RSC and Heritage were once interwoven: In the 1970s, Feulner had been the RSC’s first executive director. “It really speaks volumes about a betrayal of trust,” says the Republican strategist. The House GOP aide puts it more starkly: “There are over two hundred thirty bridges to be burned in the House. Over two hundred of them are burned, and they maybe have about thirty more left.”…

    http://www.balloon-juice.com/2013/11/24/long-read-heritage-devoured-by-weasels-from-within/

    Reply
  26. rikyrah says:
    November 25, 2013 at 7:46 am

    Obama: House Republicans Are ‘Biggest Barrier’ To Progress
    NOVEMBER 25, 2013, 6:39 AM EST

    President Barack Obama on Sunday blasted House Republicans for prioritizing their re-election prospects over their duty to legislate.

    “The biggest barrier and impediment we have right now is the Congress, and in particular the House of Representatives, that is not focused on getting the job done for the American people and is a lot more focused on trying to position themselves for the next election,” Obama said at a fundraising dinner for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee held outside of Seattle, as quoted by the Washington Post.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/obama-house-republicans-are-biggest-barrier-to-progress

    Reply
  27. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 7:16 am

    A little-known World War II atrocity at last rises to the surface.

    http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/07/wereth-black-soldiers-battle-of-bulge-army-world-war-ii-history/3465059/

    Excerpt:

    By the time Army Capt. William Everett examined the 11 bodies, they had been on the frozen ground for more than a month, covered only by a shroud of snow.

    “On 15 February 1945, I personally examined the bodies of the American Negro soldiers listed below,” Everett wrote. In a single-spaced, one-page memo, the assistant regimental surgeon chronicled their wounds. Most had been killed by blows to the head with a blunt instrument, probably a rifle stock. They had been stabbed repeatedly with bayonets. The finger of one man was almost completely severed. The soldiers had been shot multiple times.

    There was little time to pursue justice. The Allies were advancing on Germany, and the European war was drawing to a close. “The perpetrators were undoubtedly SS enlisted men, but available testimony is insufficient to establish definite unit identification,” the report concluded. The investigation was closed and marked secret.

    Back in the USA, the wives and parents of the 11 soldiers received letters saying their husband or son had died in combat. Most went to their graves believing that.

    Nearly 70 years later, as another Veterans Day approaches Monday, the mystery of what happened to the 11 men in Wereth, Belgium, is unraveling, revealing a remarkable tale that has shed new light on the contribution of black Americans in World War II’s European theater. The story of the 11 men would probably have remained buried in a dusty file in the National Archives if not for the efforts of a Belgian man who was a 12-year-old boy when he saw the 11 Americans marched out of the tiny hamlet by a handful of SS soldiers. Unable to forget that image, in 1994, he quietly placed a cross on the site where the black Americans were brutally murdered. From there, a network of amateur historians, relatives of the soldiers and military officers worked to uncover what had taken place.

    Thanks to those efforts, families have learned for the first time that their relatives were killed in a war crime. “It was overwhelming to know,” said Renna Leatherwood, who is married to the grandson of Jimmie Leatherwood, one of the men killed at Wereth.

    Regina Benjamin, the former U.S. surgeon general, whose uncle was a member of the same battalion and was captured during the Battle of the Bulge, said, “These 11 guys deserve to be remembered.”

    BATTLE OF THE BULGE

    On Dec. 16, 1944, the Germans launched a furious offensive aimed at punching a hole in Allied lines. They concentrated their efforts on a wooded area near the Germany-Belgium border that was defended by an American division untested by combat.

    Supporting the 106th Division was the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion, an all-black unit. Unlike the inexperienced outfit it supported, the battalion consisted of combat veterans who prided themselves on being able to pick off German tanks at great distances with their 155mm howitzers.

    The 106th Division was overrun in what was one of the worst American defeats of the war. Many of its members would join columns of American prisoners marched back to Germany, said Norman Lichtenfeld, a Mobile, Ala., physician who has helped lead efforts to uncover the story of the 11 men. Among the prisoners were the black soldiers in the 333rd.

    Benjamin said her uncle described hearing the German advance as tanks rumbled through the woods, driving right up on to American positions. “All of a sudden, the earth started shaking,” she said.

    The unit was decimated. “We were all either killed or captured,” said George Shomo, 92, a veteran of the 333rd who lives in Tinton Falls, N.J.

    Eleven members of the 333rd managed to escape. For hours, they trudged through waist-deep snow, staying away from roads and hoping to avoid German patrols. They carried only two weapons.

    Exhausted and hungry, the men stumbled upon the tiny Belgian farming hamlet of Wereth shortly before dusk. They were waving a white flag, recalls Tina Heinrichs-Langer, who at the time was 17 years old.

    Tina’s father, Mathias Langer, didn’t hesitate to offer help. He invited the men into his home, seating them at the family’s rustic kitchen table, where he gave the grateful soldiers hot coffee and bread.

    Harboring the Americans was a risky move for the Langer family. Wereth was a town of divided loyalties. It had been part of Germany before World War I, and some of its residents still identified themselves as German.

    But Mathias Langer was unwavering in his support of the Allies. He hid deserters from the German army and sent his own sons away to avoid having them conscripted.

    CAPTURED BY SS

    The men hadn’t finished eating when a military vehicle pulled up to the house. The Americans knew there was nowhere to go and may also have wanted to save the Langers from trouble. They emerged from the house with their hands up.

    A couple of German soldiers, members of the Waffen SS, entered the Langer home to make sure no one was hiding. Then they ordered the 11 Americans to sit on the damp ground behind the house. It was growing dark, and the men began shivering.

    Mathias Langer asked the Germans if the Americans could wait somewhere warmer. The Germans scoffed, saying the men would warm up when they started running.

    Tina and her younger brother Hermann watched as the exhausted men ran with the German soldiers following in their vehicle. It would be the last time they saw the Americans alive.

    In the following weeks, the villagers huddled in their homes while fighting raged around them. It was the last gasp for the Germans, as their enemies closed in on them.

    By early February, the fighting had subsided enough for people to venture out. Mathias and his wife, Maria, were walking to church when they saw hands emerging from the ground. The snow had receded, and the bodies were visible where they had been slaughtered, not far from the family home.

    The villagers reported the bodies, prompting an investigation.

    Over the years, the massacre was rarely discussed in the village. The people in the war-ravaged area simply wanted to get on with their lives, said Anne-Marie Noel-Simon, president of the Wereth memorial organization.

    But Hermann, the young boy who had seen the Nazis march the men off, never did shake the vision. “He saw the fear in the eyes of the soldiers,” Noel-Simon said of Hermann, who died this year.

    In 1996, more than 50 years after the killing, Hermann Langer quietly placed a cross at the site of the massacre, a cow pasture, and sought the names of the 11 Americans his father had sheltered for a short time before their death.

    “Hermann never thought it was right that no one remembered those men,” Lichtenfeld said. “He never forgot it.”

    Reply
  28. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 6:34 am

    Pioneers brought their southern food traditions

    BY AMY JO EHMAN
    http://www.thestarphoenix.com/life/Pioneers+brought+their+southern+food+traditions/9209006/story.html

    In the settlement of Saskatchewan, more pioneers came from the United States than any other country. But many of them, or their parents, originated in Europe. Not so the black pioneers. By 1912, an estimated 1,500 African Americans, most of them from Oklahoma, had homesteaded on the prairies.

    In 1906, the Lafayette brothers settled near Rosetown. In 1910, a group of 12 families led by Joe and Mattie Mayes homesteaded near Maidstone. That same year, the Smiths settled at Lashburn. Many more went to Alberta.

    Why Oklahoma? In 1907, Oklahoma became a state and began passing laws to discriminate against its African-American citizens. Vitriol and violence were not uncommon.

    At the same time, Canada was advertising for farmers. For the black pioneers, some of whom had known slavery, Canada was the Promised Land.

    Of course, they brought their southern food traditions with them – fried chicken, sugared ham, button bone ribs, boiled greens, minted carrots, biscuits and gravy, corn bread, ice cream, molasses cookies, cinnamon rolls, sweet potato pie. Some of those ingredients weren’t available in Saskatchewan a century ago, but the cooks made do.

    Like many pioneers, they hunted rabbits and other wild game, planted large gardens and ate a lot of potatoes. They adopted sauerkraut and saskatoon pie. Sweet potato pie became, quite humbly, just potato pie.

    Calgary author Cheryl Foggo, a descendant of Saskatchewan’s black pioneers, provided her mother’s (and grandmother’s) recipe for potato pie, inspired by a recipe from Mattie Mayes and still a staple at family gatherings.

    Potato Pie

    Calgary author Cheryl Foggo, a descendant of Saskatchewan’s black pioneers, provided her mother’s (and grandmother’s) recipe for potato pie, inspired by a recipe from Mattie Mayes and still a staple at family gatherings.

    1 1/2 cups evaporated milk 2 1/2 cups cooked, mashed potatoes 2 eggs slightly beaten 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 3/4 cup sugar 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp nutmeg 1/2 tsp lemon extract or zest of one lemon 1/2 cup melted butter Unbaked pie shell

    Put evaporated milk in an ice cube tray and freeze for 20 minutes, then beat the cold milk until it stands like whipped cream.

    Blend the whipped milk into the potatoes and beat until smooth.

    Mix the remaining ingredients. Stir into potatoes and milk.

    Pour into unbaked pie shell. Bake at 425F for 15 minutes.

    Reduce oven temperature to 350F and bake another 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in centre comes out clean.

    Cool pie.

    Serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

    Reply
  29. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 6:24 am

    Black re-enactors honor U.S. Colored Troops’ contribution to American History

    http://blog.pennlive.com/gettysburg-150/2013/11/black_re-enactors_honor_us_col.html

    Reply
  30. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 6:23 am

    Williams, a strong voice in community, determined to make a difference

    by Jenna Lyons

    http://www.gainesville.com/article/20131124/ARTICLES/131129754

    After Rosa Parks sat, Rosa Williams walked.

    It was the late 1950s, back when blacks and whites in Gainesville had different water fountains, different restaurants, different schools. African-Americans went to the Negro library on Northwest First Street, where the shelves were stocked with books with missing pages and coloring in the margins.

    “I refused to go down there,” Williams recalled. “I wanted to go downtown like everybody else.”

    She walked downtown to the library for white residents, but she couldn’t get a library card.

    “I figured if I kept going down there, they’d probably end up giving me one,” Williams said recently. “Get tired of seeing me.”

    Six or seven visits later, she became the first black person to get a card at the old downtown library on East University Avenue.

    That might have been the last thing Williams ever did for her own benefit.

    Williams, who celebrated her 80th birthday in September, plans on retiring next year from her post as director of volunteer service at Tacachale, a residential facility for people with developmental disabilities.

    For Williams, retirement just means she’ll have more time to devote to all her community service work, particularly Gainesville’s Black on Black Crime Task Force.

    Williams was born in Starke and lived a short while in Gainesville but grew up in Bronson after her mother remarried. She knew little of her father, Lucious Williams, and was raised by her mother, Catherine Hayes, and her stepfather, Roosevelt.

    After Rosa Williams graduated from high school, she and her family moved back to Gainesville.

    In her early years, Williams said, she would come home late after a night out with friends. Her mother would not be happy, she said.

    After about the third or fourth warning, Williams came home one night to find her clothes sitting on the porch. She tried the door. It was locked.

    She was 19 years old when her mother put her out.

    “That was the best thing she could’ve did for me,” Williams said. “I think it hurt her more than it hurt me.”

    But Williams said she “had really good parents,” and her mother taught her responsibility. She lived with a friend until she found a room for herself.

    Williams made $13.50 a week at her first job running the elevator at Alachua General Hospital, the now-razed facility that for decades was Gainesville’s primary public hospital. She cleaned houses on the weekends, working as a maid for Jane and Deborah Stearic until the beginning of the ’70s.

    The Stearics encouraged her to join them at meetings to help the black community, where she met former Gainesville Mayor Jean Chalmers.

    “In those days, the black part of town didn’t have running water,” Chalmers said. “It was tough to be black.”

    The group met the third Sunday of every month at the Negro library. In 1959, Chalmers met a quiet woman with a strong country accent who came to meetings with the Stearics.

    “They recognized that Rosa was extraordinarily intelligent,” Chalmers said. “She didn’t say very much, but when she did say something, it was pretty darn profound.”

    In 1963, the Gainesville Women for Equal Rights formed, and Chalmers asked Williams to come on board. Sometimes the two of them visited restaurants in Gainesville to see if they would be served. Usually, the owners refused to serve Williams.

    Williams started going to NAACP meetings and was the first vice president of the Gainesville chapter. Back then, members packed into Mount Carmel church every Sunday night.

    After leaving the Stearics, Williams worked as a cook at the Bell Nursery Daycare Center and as supervisor of outreach at the Community Action Agency, from which Hawthorne Daycare Center, the High Springs Daycare Center, the Archer Daycare Center, the Newberry Daycare Center and the Northeast Daycare Center got started.

    “I came up as a very, very poor person,” Williams said. “I was interested in helping out young people.”

    She quickly became the voice of Gainesville’s poorer neighborhoods, working with the Community Action Agency to provide cooking classes, tutoring and other programs for Gainesville’s youth and senior citizens.

    She’s a tiny woman with thick glasses and short, curly hair, but when Williams told the community how to vote, Chalmers said, they would listen.

    “She went from housekeeper to social worker almost overnight,” Chalmers said. “No one would run for office without sitting down with Rosa.’’

    Williams has helped politicians like Leveda Brown, Charles Chestnut, Kate Barnes and Neil Butler with their elections. She threw barbecues at her house for Florida’s state legislators. Once, former President Jimmy Carter visited her home.

    Former state representative and city commissioner David C. Flagg remembers Williams’ time on the Shands Board of Directors in the 1980s. Educated people, with degrees and white coats, would try to figure out policy and managerial information at meetings, Flagg said. Then Williams, who took a few classes at Santa Fe College, would speak up: “Well, is it good for the people?”

    “The room went quiet,” he said.

    Flagg met Williams in 1985 while campaigning for a City Commission seat, and they “hit it off right away.” In the early stages of his campaign, he visited her house and introduced himself.

    “I’ve been told if I want to have any chance of winning the commission race, I needed you on my side, Miss Rosa,” Flagg said, as he began telling her his beliefs and platform.

    “She said, ‘OK. I like you,’ ” Flagg said, adding that she immediately recommended a prominent pastor in the community to meet.

    Flagg asked Williams about the separation between church and state. “She responded, ‘David, you want me to help you or not?’ ” Flagg remembered.

    Flagg was elected to Gainesville’s City Commission that year, and Williams helped him with his state legislative campaign when he was elected to the House of Representatives in 1988.

    Although she was the former chairwoman of the Democrat Club, Williams never wanted to run for office herself. Her pride and joy remains her involvement with a long list of community programs, including United Gainesville Community Development Center-Porters’ Community, Gainesville Commission on the Status of Women and the Gainesville Neighborhood Housing board. Reichert House Youth Academy, a program started in 1987 to support at-risk, predominantly black males, was one of her biggest endeavors.

    After the Community Action Agency and Bell Daycare Center, Williams worked for Alachua County Coordinated Childcare until she started her current job at Tacachale.

    Now, she helps process volunteer applications and gets people to come out to activities for Tacachale residents like bingo games and dances. Throughout the year, residents at Tacachale participate in sports ranging from swimming to basketball.

    Williams heads to the bowling alley every Tuesday when the Tacachale residents play. “I like to get them out in the community and let people see they are just like we are,” she said.

    Williams has no children, but she treats her nieces and nephew like her own. Her sister lives in Gainesville and her nephew makes trips from Flemington about three or four times a week.

    Williams was married “a long, long, long time ago, and that was goodbye and good luck,” she said. “If I had a husband, I don’t think I would be able to do what I do.”

    The darkest moment in Williams’ life came in 1972, when her mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died 2½ months later.

    “I believe in the Lord,” Williams said, “What’s gon’ happen gon’ happen.”

    After her mother’s death, Williams took a few classes on community service at Santa Fe College. In 1995, her work in the community was recognized with a scholarship in her name. The Rosa B. Williams scholarship is given to African-American employees of UF Health Shands Hospital (and dependents) who seek a degree in a health-related program at Santa Fe College.

    Although she plans on retiring in February or March, Williams said she’s still fighting for change in Gainesville, particularly “getting these teenagers outta all these gangs they’re in.”

    As chair for Gainesville’s Black on Black Crime Task Force, she works with the community to combat the violence where it starts: in the neighborhood.

    The first Wednesday of every month, about 60 to 70 people, black and white, meet at the police department or other locations to explore different factors of crime in Gainesville. Throughout her time as chair, Williams said, Police Chief Tony Jones has taught her a few things about the community.

    “Oh God, it’s possibly been greater than 25 years ago,” Jones said of the first time he met Williams at a community meeting. “She was pretty much about business.”

    While he brought her information from a law enforcement standpoint, Williams was instrumental in the police department’s efforts to adopt a community-policing strategy instead of traditional policing, Jones said.

    Instead of fact-driven, traditional policing, community policing encourages officers to sit down and talk with people about their issues, Jones said.

    But despite Williams’ work for others, Jones said she has never sought out any recognition. If anyone wanted to give her something, “you almost have to do it by surprise.”

    But that didn’t stop Chalmers. During her time as mayor, Chalmers made the old Negro library at 524 NW First St. the Rosa B. Williams Recreation Center.

    Chalmers still remembers the conversation the two had in the early ’60s, preparing for the first time black and white people gathered to eat dinner in Gainesville at the library.

    “What if everyone brings meat?” Chalmers asked Williams. “What if everyone brings desserts?”

    “Jean, if you do the Lord’s work, you’ll distribute the food,” Williams told her.

    “That’s been almost a guide for me my whole life,” Chalmers said. “Rosa says she doesn’t remember it, but I remember it.”

    Williams is always so busy remembering other people she hardly finds time to remember herself, her friends say. She has lived at the same house on Northwest Fourth Street for 25 to 30 years but she said more often than not she doesn’t go home after work — she’s off to some meeting.

    In her 80 years, she knows change doesn’t come from waiting. Sometimes you have to get up and walk, she said.

    “If I go in one door and that door is slammed in my face, I’ll go right on to the other door,” Williams said.

    “I’ll find some way to get that door open.”

    Reply
  31. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 6:20 am

    SPECIAL EDUCATION: Connecticut minorities labeled disabled at slightly higher rate than whites

    New Haven Register – 11-24-2013

    http://www.nhregister.com/social-affairs/20131124/special-education-connecticut-minorities-labeled-disabled-at-slightly-higher-rate-than-whites

    Reply
  34. Yahtc says:
    November 25, 2013 at 6:16 am

    Good Morning Everyone :)

    Reply

Leave a Reply to AmetiaCancel reply