In the Digital Age, Beulah Elizabeth Richardson (1920 – 2000: stage name Beah Richards) is largely remembered as an award-winning actress, but it has widely been forgotten that she was also a poet and playwright. The attached poem is an honest expression of her reaction to the tyranny experienced by too many African Americans.
During the closing days of the Okinawa campaign, Japanese infantry decided to treat the much-ballyhooed Bushido warrior code as if it was a plate of week-old sushi.
“The mass-surrenders were a circus for our troops. It became a race to see which outfit could take the most prisoners. And Major General Lemuel C. Shepard’s Sixth Marine Division won the championship with 3,279 prisoners, while Major General Archibald V. Arnold’s 7th Army Division was runner-up with 2,627.”
More about the Battle of Okinawa can be read here.
During the closing days of the Okinawa campaign, Japanese infantry decided to treat the much-ballyhooed Bushido warrior code as if it was a plate of week-old sushi.
“The mass-surrenders were a circus for our troops. It became a race to see which outfit could take the most prisoners. And Major General Lemuel C. Shepard’s Sixth Marine Division won the championship with 3,279 prisoners, while Major General Archibald V. Arnold’s 7th Army Division was runner-up with 2,627.”
More about the Battle of Okinawa can be read here.
U.S. Senator David Reed (1880 – 1953) chose to take another victory lap as he recalled the glories of the legislation he co-authored in 1924 (the Johnson-Reed Bill, that placed restrictive quotas on immigration based on the 1890 Census). He explained why the legislation was introduced:
“The diagnosis showed that we were getting more immigrants than we could digest…we still harbor foreign colonies in our midst, animated by alien ideals, owing first loyalty to some other country, and giving only lip service – and not always that – to the land to which they have come to make their homes.”
If you thought progressive education was a scourge that existed only in the digital age – you’d be wrong; the apostles of progressive education have simply been able to gain traction in our era where leftism has been enjoying greater momentum. Progressive education policies, intent on preserving the student’s “sense of self” over their genuine education, have been around for decades – and the attached article seems no different from much of the criticism that is leveled at them today.
“Critics of progressive education insist teachers don’t place enough emphasis on achievement in their fear of harming the child’s personality.”
“For three consecutive years, 1946 through 1948, Betty Grable was the highest salaried woman in the world. For the past ten years she has never left the list of the nation’s ten biggest box office attractions. She also gets more fan mail (from 3,000 to 10,000 letters a week) than any other star in the motion picture industry. Oddly enough, most of it comes from women hungering for the Betty Grable beauty secrets.”
Like the Penitent Thief who was crucified next to Jesus, Ernest Gaither (1924 – 1947), also found salvation during the closing moments of his life. While biding his time on death row, Gaither was taught a neat little trick that all doubters should try, God showed up and Gaither learned of his worth.
Hallett Abend (1884 – 1955) was an American journalist who lived in China for fifteen years. He covered the Sino-Japanese War during its early years and had seen first-hand the beastly vulgarity of the Japanese Army. After Pearl Harbor, the editor at Liberty turned to him in hopes that he would explain to the American reading public what kind of enemy they were fighting:
“In four and a half years of warfare [in China], the Japanese have taken almost no prisoners… Chinese prisoners of war are shot.”
We like to think that if the Christians who call themselves “Christian Nationalists” today were aware of what that term meant decades ago, they would immediately insist that the name be changed. The organization discussed in the attached article was the brainchild of Gerald L.K. Smith (1898 – 1976), a hate-filled man, an alleged minister of the Gospel, who denied the Jewishness of Christ and all His lessons.
“What kind of a man is Joseph Stalin? How does he get along with his family? How does he treat them? I can tell you. Because for many months I was the French tutor of Stalin’s daughter, Svetlana, At Stalin’s country home. I met Stalin himself numerous times.”
“The attempt to enforce the draft in the city of New York has led to rioting. Men have been killed and houses burned; worst of all, an orphan asylum – a noble monument of charity for the reception of colored orphans – has been ruthlessly destroyed, and children and nurses have lost everything they had in the world.”
In this 1940 article, Eleanor Roosevelt (1884 – 1962) argues for a benevolent government that would see to the prenatal needs of expectant mothers and their growing children:
“But all children, it seems to me, have a right to food, shelter, an equal opportunity for education and an equal chance to come into the world healthy and get the care they need through their early years to keep them well and happy.”
For the first time since the Balfour Declaration was decreed, the Jews in British Palestine organized an avenging force and attacked numerous Arab villages after suffering random murders for 23 years. This happened in May of 1939; Collier’s ran the attached article a year later – it concerned the slow-burn that was heating-up Jerusalem.
Attached herein are a few pages from 12 Million Black Voices by Richard Wright (1908 – 1960). The book, published in 1942, is a poetic account of the challenging lives lead by African Americans both before the great migration and after their arrival in the North. The editors of Coronet showed their sympathies for this minority by publishing these pages, but they also showed their total racial insensitivities by running crude pigeon English captions beneath each of the accompanying photographs.
Click here to read about the first Black Marines.
Having surrendered to the Nazis during the closing weeks of the war, General Maurice Rose of the Third Armored Division, was shot dead by a German tank commander.
The U.S Marine Corps is not in the practice of sending their oldest members into harm’s way – they aren’t now, and they weren’t in 1942. But when they imparted this information to Gunnery Sergeant Lou Diamond (1890 – 1951), he would have none of it – the mere idea that the world was to be at war, and he would be excluded: not going to happen:
“Lou roared his way through the battles of Guadalcanal and Tulagi and did much to back up the Marine Corp’s contention that he is far and away the the most expert mortar sergeant in any branch of the service.”
“For risking his life twice to save his platoon when they were pinned down by Jap fire during the Battle of Finegayan on Guam, Pfc. Frank Peter Witek, USMCR, has been posthumously awarded the Congressional medal of Honor.
The editors at Yank (an Army possession) seldom wrote about the Marines – and they loved dissing their weekly magazine, The Leatherneck. However, they did recognize an historic moment when they saw one. As remarked in another article on this site, the Navy was the most prejudiced of all the branches of service, and the Marines had previously rejected all Black recruits, but that changed in 1942, and this article served to introduce their readers to this consequential lot. The first African American Marines trained at Camp Montford Point in Jacksonville, NC from August 26, 1942 until the camp was decommissioned in 1949. The greatest number of black Marines to serve in combat during the Second World War was during the Battle of Okinawa (2,000 strong).
