This page features brief excerpts of stories published by the mainstream
media and, less frequently, blogs, alternative media, and even obviously
biased sources. The excerpts are taken directly from the websites cited in
each source note. Quotation marks are not used.
Source: Wa Po
August 13, 2006
STANFORD, Calif. If it is really true that Google is going to digitize the roughly 9 million books in the libraries of Stanford University, then you can be sure that the folks who brought you the world's most ambitious search engine will come, in due time, for call number E169 D3.
Google workers will pull Lillian Dean's 1950 travelogue "This Is Our Land" -- the story of one family's "pleasant and soul-satisfying auto journey across our continent" -- from a shelf
Source: BBC
August 12, 2006
The ruins of an extensive mountain village have been found on the slopes of the Sugar Loaf, near Abergavenny.
Scouts working with the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers have spent a week hacking back brambles to reveal the 25-house village.
It is thought the Y Graig settlement in Glangrwyne, Powys, was abandoned in the 19th Century after its landlord increased villagers' rent.
Conservationists believe there may be more buildings to be uncovered.
Source: Brownsville Herald
August 12, 2006
Efforts to place a marker commemorating black soldiers who served at Fort Brown and other border outposts continue.
Although the fort’s service in the U.S-Mexican and Civil wars is well-documented, black soldiers’ four decades of service to the area are less so. They served there from 1865-1906.
The fort was the home of the 25th Infantry Regiment, a black unit that was stationed there during the Brownsville Raid in August 1906. Several months later, the Army tempo
Source: BBC
August 12, 2006
A crime that has remained undetected for 1,500 years has been uncovered by an archaeological team working at the village of Sedgeford, in Norfolk.
A human skeleton was found hidden in what would have been a Roman corn drier, and experts believe the person was deliberately put inside.
The six-week excavation on the former Roman farm will end this week.
The skeleton was found by a team from Sedgeford Historical and Archaeological Research Project (SHARP).
Source: The State (SC)
August 7, 2006
South Carolina is on the cusp of racking up another Revolutionary War victory, this one 225 years after the fact.
Legislation has passed both the U.S. House and Senate, in slightly different forms, for a study that could lead to more recognition for the dozens of prominent battle sites in South Carolina.
“The Revolution was largely won after the fall of Charleston in the backcountry,” said Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., on the floor of the House last month of a bill that cou
Source: Daily Post (Wales)
August 8, 2006
THE summer drought has unearthed a treasure trove of finds for historians taking a birds eye view of Wales.
Heatwave conditions, which have parched the Welsh countryside, proved ideal for aerial archaeologists.
Last night they were described as the best for at least adecade with a host of buried sites revealed from the air.
The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales made major discoveries using light aircraft to survey the Welsh l
Source: http://www.horshamonline.co.uk
August 11, 2006
Ruins of the previously undiscovered houses, in The Causeway, Horsham, have been buried in St Mary's Church Vicarage garden for over 600 years.
A team of historians from Archaeology South East found the small settlement during an investigative dig for developer Chalvington Barns, which is set to build three new homes on the site later this year.
Senior archaeologist Simon Stevens said the team had also unearthed two quarries that would have been used from as early as th
Source: Boston Globe
August 14, 2006
The Old State House in Boston -- a grand national landmark and symbol of revolutionary Massachusetts -- needs $3 million in repairs to prevent it from rotting and crumbling, according to the Bostonian Society, the historical preservation group that manages the building.Blue scaffolding and green mesh shroud the building's exterior, as the society mounts a campaign to refurbish the Old State House by next month. Lashed by Tropical Storm Wilma in October, the venerable, 293-ye
Source: Monsters and Critics News
August 14, 2006
For some cultural warriors attending a crucial conference in Canberra this week on the teaching of history in schools, it comes down to this: Did Captain James Cook 'discover' Australia in 1770 and claim it for the British crown or did he 'invade' and steal ancient Gondwana from its dark-skinned inhabitants?Prime Minister John Howard reckons the former interpretation is the truth and decries the later as a sorry part of a politically correct 'black armband' view of Australia
Source: China Daily
August 14, 2006
China has decided to team up with the United States and Britain on putting Iris Chang's international bestseller, "The Rape of Nanking", on the silver screen, sources with the Chinese investor in the movie revealed on Monday, on the eve of the 61st anniversary of Japan's surrender in the World War II."We hope we can make the film a classic on a massacre in the Second World War, just like the Shrindler's List about the miserable experience of Jewish people duri
Source: Deutsche Welle
August 14, 2006
Nobel prize winning author Günter Grass is facing a backlash from contemporaries and commentators after he admitted that he was drafted into Nazi Germany's notorious Waffen SS elite force during World War II.The 78-year-old Grass told the daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that the stunning confession would feature in his memoir "Peeling Onions," which is due to appear in September. So far, it had only been known that the author, best known abroad for his 1959 no
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
August 12, 2006
Gunter Grass, the German-born winner of the 1999 Nobel Prize for Literature and author of such acclaimed novels as "Tin Drum," has admitted to joining the Waffen SS, a special force of the Nazi Party, as a 17-year-old.
Now 78 and preparing to publish his memoirs in September, Grass came forward with details of his past in an interview Friday with the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
Having been a member of the SS had "oppressed" him,
Source: Yahoo
August 10, 2006
YAKIMA, Wash. - A federal law governing protection of American Indian graves would be amended to allow scientific study of ancient remains discovered on federal lands if the remains have not been tied to a current tribe, under a bill proposed by U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings.
The bill marks the latest step in a dispute sparked by the discovery of Kennewick Man, one of the oldest and most complete skeletons ever found in North America. Indian tribes and researchers battled over rights to th
Source: Times Online (UK)
August 10, 2006
CHINA’S claim to have invented paper was strengthened yesterday when archaeologists announced a discovery that suggests it was in use at least 100 years earlier than thought.
A scrap of paper made from linen fibre was found by archaeologists picking through an ancient rubbish tip at the Yumen Pass, the gate between China and Central Asia.
Measuring only 1.6sq in, it is believed to have been made in 8BC, or 113 years earlier than the first known paper. Fu Licheng, the curator
Source: Independent (UK)
August 11, 2006
Fragments of ostrich eggs, perforated beads and finely shaped arrowheads have provided the first firm archaeological evidence for the "out of Africa" origins of the world's human population.
Scientists have found stark similarities in the ancient cultural artefacts made and used by Stone Age people who migrated out of Africa and into Asia more than 50,000 years ago.
It is the first time that archaeologists have been able to link African and Indian artefacts so
Source: NYT
August 13, 2006
An influential federal panel of medical advisers has recommended that the government loosen regulations that severely limit the testing of pharmaceuticals on prison inmates, a practice that was all but stopped three decades ago after revelations of abuse.The proposed change includes provisions intended to prevent problems that plagued earlier programs. Nevertheless, it has dredged up a painful history of medical mistreatment and incited debate among prison rights advocates a
Source: Sam Tanenhaus in the NYT
August 13, 2006
JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN’S DEFEAT in the Senate Democratic primary in Connecticut is a reminder that intramural contests are often the most bruising in our two-party system, and can leave the party involved vulnerable to attacks from the opposition.
Indeed, those who feared that Senator Lieberman’s defeat would be exploited by Republicans eager to portray his opponent, Ned Lamont, as a stand-in for an entire party “soft” on terrorism, were vindicated, almost instantly, in the days follow
Source: NYT
August 12, 2006
ANLONG VENG, Cambodia The site of Pol Pot’s cremation on this barren mountainside eight years ago is collapsing from neglect, its small fence broken, its low metal roof rusting and curling. But Pol Pot, who as the Khmer Rouge leader was one of the most brutal mass murderers of the last century, has become a sort of bookie for those who pray to him for numbers.
For many here in this former Khmer Rouge stronghold, he is the guardian spirit of the Dangrek Mountains, curing ailments an
Source: Yahoo
August 9, 2006
Some 30 percent of Americans cannot say in what year the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks against New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington took place, according to a poll published in the Washington Post newspaper.
While the country is preparing to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the attacks that claimed nearly 3,000 lives and shocked the world, 95 percent of Americans questioned in the poll were able to remember the month and the day of the attacks, acc
Source: NYT
August 10, 2006
From a promontory high above the Pentagon, three arching spires reach skyward, their elongated tips pointing to the infinity of space.
They appear as abstract art forms but only until their symbolism is made clear by their setting: They are the starring elements of a memorial to the United States Air Force, the only branch of the American military that has not had a prominent monument in the Washington area.
More than 14 years in planning, the memorial is in the final s
