Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
JANUARY 16, 2020 – Recently I was asked to handle a business transaction involving a party with an H1b visa. Concerned about the effect the contemplated event might have on such a visa, I called my good friend Jurek, an immigration lawyer. A few years ago, our offices used to be on the same floor …
JANUARY 5, 2020 – We aren’t the only ones to have mucked up the Middle East. First prize goes to Britain, but Russia, the Ottomans, and the French also starring roles in the historical muck-up. Yet don’t forget the locals themselves, whose tribal and internecine religious rivalries have created ample havoc apart from the influence …
DECEMBER 28, 2019 – I must confess: I’m a skimmer. With an exception now and again (ask me how the Torrens Assurance Fund works under Minnesota law—a few years ago I had to learn it), I’m very much a generalist. Whenever I decide to “go deep” on one subject or another, I soon discover I’ll …
DECEMBER 7, 2019 – As President Franklin D. Roosevelt said famously in his address before a joint session of Congress, December 7, 1941 is “a date which will live in infamy.” He certainly welcomed the opening of the “door war” that had been closed so long and firmly by isolationists. Japan’s attack served as a …
NOVEMBER 30, 2019 – Occasionally, I look up from my shoes to survey my surroundings. Amidst the detritus of human activity I see wondrous works produced by human minds, hearts, and hands. One endeavor for which I have special admiration is academic scholarship. As my blog readers know, I’m a sometime student of history. However …
NOVEMBER 24, 2019 – There’s no greater anti-addiction advocate than a former addict. Political addiction, as most forms of addiction, doesn’t “go away.” The addict has to work fiendishly at keeping the addiction “at bay.” This ongoing process is called euphemistically, “recovery.” Backsliding is so common, so likely, that the addict must obsess about it …
NOVEMBER 22, 2019 – I remember the fall day decades ago. It was just before noon as I walked from my office building—the First National Bank Building in downtown St. Paul—to the St. Paul Athletic Club, where I launched my daily (running) workout. Next to the club was a parking lot, and standing there were …
NOVEMBER 19, 2019 – Perhaps you’ve read Theodore Rex by Edmund Morris, acclaimed biography of one of our “greatest” presidents, “greatest” defined as “face chiseled in granite.” Or, as I did last weekend, maybe you’ve watched Ken Burns’ documentary, The Roosevelts. At least you’ve heard of Teddy Roosevelt and even seen his likeness chiseled out …
NOVEMBER 13, 2019 – My friends who support Trump offer the following reasons: Tax cuts; Deregulation; Court appointees; Attempted invasion by illegal immigrants; Democrats are so corrupt. Among my Trumpster friends, their pick of the foregoing reasons outweighs Trump’s “unlikability.” Meanwhile, friends who share my disdain for Trump struggle to explain his support. The most …
NOVEMBER 12, 2019 – Yesterday was “Veteran’s Day,” because Armistice Day was “so far away.” And yesterday, World War I was on my mind, since my grandfather Nilsson was a veteran of The Great War, which ended on Armistice Day—officially, at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month—a long, long time …
OCTOBER 2, 2019 – I am well into a nearly 900-page work of scholarship and analysis by historian Richard White entitled The Republic for which it Stands. The book is not for the faint of heart (or short of attention). It provides a detailed account of Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, and for me, anyway, fills …
SEPTEMBER 21, 2019 – Yesterday evening my wife and I joined 20 others to hear one sensationalist artist, Steve Copes on violin, accompanied by another phenomenon, Hanna Hjunjung Kim, deliver a pinnacle performance of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No. 1. For 35 minutes, our lower jaws were in dangle mode. At the end, we were …
SEPTEMBER 6, 2019 – Our family first crossed paths with David in July 1967, when my mother responded to an ad he’d placed in the Minneapolis Star. He was off to the Army and had to sell his beloved year-old collie, Björn. We crossed paths with David again in 1996, not knowing it was the …
SEPTEMBER 2, 2019 – Friday, while at historic Fort Snelling just outside Minneapolis, I was struck by a map of Minnesota on which just a handful of names appeared—neither of the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and Saint Paul) being among them. The map depicted important sites in the lore and history of the Dakotah Indians who …
AUGUST 31, 2019 – Yesterday we took our international guests on a boat ride down the Mississippi River and then to the historic Fort Snelling at the confluence of the Mighty Miss and the Minnesota River. Much water had flowed since I’d last seen the old fort, built in 1820. It’s staffed by engaging, knowledgeable …
AUGUST 4, 2019 – The next day was another hot, sunny day. Starting around 10:00 in the morning, we jumped on our bikes and patrolled the beach end of Rice Street. Occasionally we’d take a spin around the block. By 11:00 a sizable crowd of swimmers and sunbathers had gathered. Time to strike. I felt an …
AUGUST 3, 2019 – I went to work on my clump of clay: Jedediah Carson passed by here in the year 1845. Bobby watched closely. When I finished, he asked, “What should I write?” I thought a bit and recalled the American Heritage article about the Kensington Runestone—the large stone uncovered by a farmer in rural …
AUGUST 2, 2019 – It was in early August before fifth grade. I’d been down at the beach most of the day. For a change of pace, I went home, hopped on my bike and rode figure eights in the street in front of our house. Something—boredom?—triggered a thought. I pulled out of a figure eight …
AUGUST 1, 2019 – Every good story involves a little background: FIRST: By the age of eight, I was hooked on history. My dad ensured that. He read aloud to me books like William Prescott’s Conquest of Mexico and articles out of his bi-monthly issues of American Heritage magazine. History fired up my imagination. SECOND: Our house …
JULY 10, 2019 – In the news again is talk of reparations to descendants of American slavery. I say, “No.” If the answer were to be “Yes,” we’d lose our way in weeds and never emerge. Hear me out. At the outset we’d face a definitional question: who qualifies? According to DNA testing as part …
JULY 8, 2019 – From August 28 to September 13, 1981 my travels led to Poland. For a year that country had been in the news—Solidarność, the illegal workers union, had started a revolution against the Communist regime, and the world watched nervously to see how the Soviet Union would react. Would it invade and …
JULY 4, 2019 – As go Christmas, Thanksgiving, and Presidents Day, so goes the Fourth of July. In other words, the fashion in which we celebrate these holidays is quite detached from the historical reality of their origins. In the case of Independence Day, where is the meaning in fireworks, local parades, fireworks, backyard barbecues, …
JUNE 10, 2019 – Recently I watched Ken Burns’ acclaimed documentary, The Civil War—the ultimate oxymoron. I’d read and studied much about that seismic event, and I’d been riveted to the first showing of the aforesaid documentary nearly three decades ago. But this time around, the Civil War looks more tragic, more cataclysmic, more baffling …
MAY 8, 2019 – I once heard an historian say that a probative history can’t be written until the subject matter is at least 50 years in the past. By extension, I suppose, the historian would caution us against making any judgments about the (always) tumultuous present. If you think hard enough about those correlative …