A Brief History On August 9, 1854, Henry David Thoreau published his book, Walden; or, Life in the Woods, a book about his life with nature and self-reliance, a reflective story of his own philosophy of Transcendentalism. Digging Deeper A leading proponent of Transcendentalism was Ralph Waldo Emerson, who along with Thoreau and other Americans decried the then current state of society in what they saw as senseless conformity and instead urged people to find their own individual way in the universe. The Transcendentalists also developed an aversion to the institution of slavery. Emerson praised Plato, Moses, Jesus, Luther, Copernicus,…
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A Brief History On August 5, 2015, Colorado found out the hard way that the Federal Government is capable of massive blunders even when they are trying to “help,” when the EPA managed to spill three million gallons of wastewater and heavy metal tailings from the Gold King Mine into the Animas River. Digging Deeper Tasked with keeping our air, water and land safe, the Environmental Protection Agency was created in 1970. In the Gold King Mine disaster, the EPA was working with a private company, Environmental Restoration LLC, to minimize environmental damage from toxic waste created by the closed…
A Brief History On August 4, 2020, one of the largest explosions of something not meant to be an explosive occurred in a warehouse in the port of Beirut, Lebanon, when 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate went up in an explosion that rivaled a small nuclear weapon. Digging Deeper A fire resulting from welding at the warehouse was the cause, and over 200 people died with an additional 7,000 injured, leaving a crater over 400 feet across and over 140 feet deep! Incredibly, 300,000 people were made homeless by the double blasts 30 seconds apart and homes 6 miles aways…
A Brief History On August 3, 1900, Firestone Tire and Rubber Company was founded in Akron, Ohio, joining Goodyear Tire and Rubber in Akron as the two preeminent tire makers in the US for the next 75 years. In 1988, Japanese tire maker, Bridgestone, bought Firestone. Digging Deeper While Goodyear is still an American company, other US tire companies have been acquired by foreign firms, including General Tire now owned by Continental AG of Germany, and BF Goodrich tire division is now part of Michelin based in France. Once one of the “Big Three” US car companies, Chrysler Corporation is…
A Brief History On August 1, 2004, about 400 people died and another nearly 500 were injured when a supermarket in Asunción, Paraguay, caught fire. Managers had fire exits blocked to prevent theft, which resulted in the mass casualties. Digging Deeper Something as mundane as grocery shopping can be deadly, and here are some ways incidents prove the point: In 1967, an F-4 fighter jet crashed into an Arizona grocery, with 15 feared dead and 12 injured. In 2013, a store in Riga, Latvia, suffered a roof collapse, burying people under tons of debris, leaving 54 dead and 41 injured.…