Cosmic Date

On Tuesday, NASA's New Horizon arrived at Pluto after a nine year journey. The small space probe was launched on January 19, 2006 when Pluto was still classified as a planet. The mysterious body at the edge of our universe was discovered in 1930 by American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh. In 1929, Tombaugh was hired by Lowell Observatory where he was tasked with searching for "Planet X," a planet that was thought to be beyond Neptune because of its gravitational effect on Uranus and Neptune. On February 18, 1930, the planet was ruled as having been discovered and was named Pluto, for the Roman underworld god who could turn himself invisible. 

Photo: NASA, New Horizons

The Pluto flyby occurred on the 50th anniversary of the Mars flyby. A flyby is classified as a spacecraft passing by an object in space without landing or going into orbit. Mariner 4 was launched on November 28, 1964 and performed its Mars flyby on July 14, 1965. On that date, Earth saw the first images of the surface of Mars and confirmed that Mars was not inhabited by lifeforms like humans.

Photo: NASA, Mariner 4, Martian surface

As New Horizons leaves Pluto, it will continue into the Kuiper Belt and will observe Kuiper Belt objects, if they are within the vicinity of the satellite. As the spacecraft travels farther and farther from Earth, its flight trajectory will no longer be able to be altered, limiting what it can observe. When it was discovered that Pluto is actually a Kuiper Belt Object, it was declassified from a planet down to Dwarf Planet status. Within the Kuiper Belt, Pluto is the largest object. 

Photo: nature.com

Battle of Monocacy

In 1864, General Ulysses S. Grant was putting pressure on the Confederacy by laying siege to Richmond. In order to draw the Union troops away, Confederate General Jubal Early and his men quietly made their way up the Shenandoah Valley until he reached Harpers Ferry, where his plan was discovered.

Photo: nps.gov (Jubal Early)

B&O Railroad President John Garrett heard reports from his men that there were attacks on the railroad in the west by Confederates. Attacks on the railroad were typical but this attack was larger and an indicator to Garrett that the Confederates were moving toward Washington, DC. The city was not prepared for a large scale attack because most of the troops protecting the capital city had been sent south to help with the siege of Richmond. Thus, it was the perfect time for Early to strike. But he was not counting on being halted.

Photo: nps.gov (John Garrett)

Major General Lew Wallace heeded the warning that Garrett brought him but was unsure as to whether the Confederates would attack Washington or Baltimore. Monocacy Junction was selected as the best location to defend: it would protect crucial railroad bridges, and Wallace figured it was the best place to defend both cities. Wallace had fewer than 7000 men to halt more than 14,000 Confederate troops.

Photo: nps.gov (Lew Wallace)

On July 9, the Battle of Monocacy began. Early sent cavalry around to attack the left flank of the Union troops while an artillery battle took place at the center of the line. The Union continued to fight throughout the day despite being vastly outnumbered. Fierce hand-to-hand combat ensued and the Union forces sustained heavy losses. By the afternoon, the Union troops could no longer hold their ground and they retreated. The road to Washington was clear for the Confederates but, weary from the trek and the rigors of the battle, they camped at Monocacy Junction for the night.

Photo: civilwar.org

The next day, July 10, 1864, they would move on to Washington, DC, which they thought to be sparsely defended. Little did they know that the delay at Monocacy had allowed time for Union troops to return to the capital where they were waiting for an attack. 

Another reason to celebrate the 4th of July

On July 4, 1867,  Stephen T. Mather was born to Joseph Mather and Bertha Walker in San Francisco, CA. For his childhood and education the family remained in California but eventually moved to New York, where both Mather and his father worked for the Pacific Coast Borax Company. Along with his friend Robert Yard, Mather developed an aggressive but effective marketing campaign but in 1903, Mather suffered an episode of bipolar disorder and left his job with the Pacific Coast Company. Instead, he went into business with a friend and they developed their own borax company from which they both became millionaires. 

Photo: nps.gov (Stephen Mather)

In 1904, he and his wife traveled to Europe where he discovered his love of nature and his wife discovered a treatment for his bipolar disorder. His experience in Europe drove him to become a conservationist and to befriend John Muir. He quickly became involved in the Sierra Club and the Boone and Crocket Club and spent time exploring National Parks. It was while he was in the parks that he noticed the deterioration of the protected lands. The Army was in charge of protecting the parks but they did not have legal authority and were vastly outnumbered by the tourists. Mather wrote a letter to Secretary of Interior Franklin Lane complaining about the state of the parks. 

Photo: nps.gov

Lane received Mather's letter and it gave him pause. The myth is that he and Mather had been classmates at the University of California together and that's why he responded to the letter but in reality, Lane was enrolled at the school after Mather had graduated. Instead, Lane recognized the name because Mather had been a reporter for the New York Sun and had then gone on to become a millionaire as a businessman thanks to his advertising campaign for borax. Lane needed someone to be in charge of the National Parks and with Mather's track record he seemed the perfect fit, so Lane wrote a response: 

"Dear Steve, if you don't like how the national parks are being run, come on down to Washington and run them yourself."

Photo: loc.gov (Franklin Lane)

Mather agreed to do so, but intended to work for just one year because he believed it would take only that much time to fix the system. In that year, Mather and Horace Albright campaigned to have an official service in charge of the National Parks. Their efforts resulted in the National Park Service Organic Act that President Woodrow Wilson signed into law on August 25, 1916. While Mather had agreed to work for the National Parks for a year, he continued to work for the newly created Park Service as its first Director until 1929. 

Photo: nps.gov

The Lost Cause

In 1866, the term "the Lost Cause" first appeared when Edward Pollard, a lawyer and journalist, published a book titled "The Lost Cause: A New Southern History of the War of the Confederates." His book was a history of the war that included the rise and progress of the Confederates and how their cause was the "most gigantic struggle of the world's history." Pollard was not the only person to take up this cause and many former Confederate officers, like Lieutenant General Jubal Early, joined him. Their stated goal was to raise the South above politics and rumors and reveal the truth of the matter.

In short, they meant to change history. (https://archive.org/details/lostcausenewsout00poll)

Photo: Edward Pollard nps.gov

Today, 150 years after the war ended, the causes of the war are still being debated. But in 1861, did the men who joined the Confederate cause misunderstand why they were going to war? The historical record is clear that this is not so.

The confusion that is found today is due to the Lost Cause and its revisionist history.

Up until the Emancipation Proclamation, the Union was fighting the war in order to preserve the nation as a whole, while the Confederacy was fighting to keep the institution of slavery. Vice President of the Confederacy Alexander Stephens stated unambiguously that slavery was the reason for secession in his "Corner Stone Speech."
(http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/cornerstone-speech/)

In addition, each state that seceded issued a statement for secession and that defending slavery was the reason, one after another in the Declaration of Causes of South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama and Texas. In their own words: (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/06/what-this-cruel-war-was-over/396482/)

Slavery was the cause of the American Civil War and the cause for which the Confederacy was fighting.

Photo: rockysmith.net (http://www.ucs.louisiana.edu/~ras2777/amgov/stephens.html)

The post-war period between 1865 and 1877 is known as Reconstruction, the time the nation took to reunite and rebuild. Some advances were made for African Americans but the rights they gained were quickly taken away by Jim Crow Laws. The states that left the Union were required to renounce their secession, to abolish slavery and to pay off war debts. South Carolina has never renounced secession and Mississippi did not ratify the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery until 2013.

Photo: usatoday.com

The war lasted much longer than anyone had anticipated and both sides had believed that they would be victorious by Christmas of 1861. Instead, the war dragged on for four years, took over 600,000 American lives and resulted in the burning of cities and destruction of property. When the war ended, the country was exhausted and ready to put the conflict behind them and move on. This allowed the Southern revisionists to quietly begin promoting the Lost Cause and they were successful to a remarkable degree. 

Photo: americancivilwarstory.com

What the Lost Causers wished to convey to posterity were the atrocities committed by the Union army, the disadvantage that the Confederates faced, their noble perseverance in the face of overwhelming odds, and, primarily, to distance the cause of war from slavery. Instead, they claimed that they simply wanted to maintain their idyllic and pastoral way of life. The Lost Cause placed the blame of the war on President Lincoln and the Union for limiting states' rights. Their efforts were advanced by the Daughters of the Confederacy, United Confederate Veterans, former President of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis's writings as well as the films Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind. 

Photo: imdb.com

Not only were their efforts successful in romanticizing the antebellum South, changing attitudes about the cause of the war and creating sympathy for the South, they also changed what the flag of the Confederacy meant. The flag that today is known as the Confederate flag is the Battle Flag of Army of Tennessee and flew above the army during conflicts.

But the flag was not widely used immediately after the war. In fact, its prominence in the South did not occur until 1948 when the Dixiecrats were running on a platform of racial segregation. As the nation moved towards desegregation, more and more Confederate flags were raised in protest. 

Photo: cwmemory.com

Today, proponents for the flag claim that it is not indicative of racism, but that it represents their pride in the heritage of the South that the Lost Cause created. However, its use over time demonstrates that it does indeed represent racism. It was flown above armies fighting to maintain the status quo and keep an entire race of people enslaved. It is used by the Ku Klux Klan, a racist hate group. And it was flown in support of segregation, a time of extreme racial hatred in America. To argue that the flag represents heritage and not hatred is to perpetuate the lie that is the Lost Cause.

Photo: newsweek.com

"It will rise again now as a place of peace"

52 years ago, the nation experienced an act of white supremacy terrorism when the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was bombed. Four little girls were killed in that bombing that Dr. King described as "one of the most vicious and tragic crimes ever perpetuated against humanity." Yesterday, another act of white supremacy terrorism took place at another historically black church, the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Photo: nydailynews.com

Also known as "Mother Emanuel," the church was established in 1818 under the leadership of Reverend Morris Brown. Brown was a free African American and a member of the Methodist Church in Charleston, but due to racial segregation he established Mother Emanuel as a church for persons of color. 4000 African Americans followed him and became the congregation of Emanuel AME Church. 

Photo: blackpast.org (Reverend Morris Brown)

In 1822, Denmark Vesey, who had bought his own freedom and tried futilely to purchase the freedom of his enslaved family, planned a slave uprising in Charleston. Ultimately, his plan was revealed to white authorities. The uprising never occurred and Vesey was caught and executed. In addition, Mother Emanuel was investigated by the authorities to discover if the church and congregation had had any role in the conspiracy, since Vesey had been a founding member. Reverend Brown was also investigated but not convicted; instead, he was banished north to Philadelphia where he took over as Reverend for AME Bethel Church. White supremacists burned Mother Emanuel.

Photo: huffingtonpost.com (Denmark Vesey)

Mother Emanuel was rebuilt but the congregation could not return because in the 1830s, all-black churches were banned. Despite the ban, services continued but were conducted in secret until the end of the American Civil War. On August 31, 1886, the church was destroyed again but this time the cause was an earthquake. It was rebuilt as a brick structure, rather than wooden, and was completed by 1891.

During the Civil Rights Movement, both Dr. King and Coretta Scott King visited Mother Emanuel and urged the congregation to become involved. 

Photo: thegospelcoalition.org

Mother Emanuel is the oldest AME Church in the South and has the oldest black congregation south of Baltimore. Mother Emanuel's history is intertwined with the African American struggle to gain equality. Violence towards African Americans for racial reasons illustrates that the end of white male supremacy is inevitable; thus, their acts of terror, hatred and fear. 

Photo: emanuelamechurch.org

Today, President Obama spoke about the shooting and offered his condolences: "Mother Emanuel Church and its congregation have risen before from flames, from an earthquake, from other dark times to give hope to generations of Charlestonians, and with our prayer and our love and the buoyancy of hope, it will rise again now as a place of peace."

Please keep the victims of the shooting and the members of Mother Emanuel in your heart during this time of pain and healing. 

Moonshine

The Appalachian Mountains are often associated with moonshine, an illegally produced whiskey. Moonshine has been tied to the region since the 1700s when the Scotch-Irish came to North America from Northern Ireland and brought their recipes with them. Oftentimes, corn farmers would turn some of their crop into moonshine in order to more easily transport their goods. But moonshine gained notoriety during Prohibition.

Photo: jamestown-ri.info

In 1920, the 18th Amendment to the Constitution was passed and alcoholic beverages were banned in the United States. However, the law was not enforced rigorously and moonshiners made a profit. The temperance movement had succeeded in officially banning the sale and purchase of alcohol, but many people did not agree with the temperance movement and, during Prohibition, an easy way to obtain alcohol was to purchase it from moonshiners. 

Photo: pbs.org

In the Catoctin Range of the Appalachian Mountains was the Blue Blazes Still. Generally, moonshine operations were small, family-owned stills, but the Blue Blazes Still was a large-scale, commercial level production facility. Despite its size, knowledge of the Blue Blazes Still was a well-kept secret, until 1929. 

Photo: thurmontfirst.com

Eventually, the Frederick County Sheriff's Department caught wind of an illegal whiskey still outside of Thurmont, Maryland. Deputy Sheriff Verner Redmond was given the task of raiding the still in order to shut it down. Redmond arranged with the informant, Charles Lewis, that two of his deputies would meet with Lewis near the still and then go and purchase a gallon of whiskey. Redmond and three other deputies would follow behind to complete the raid. 

On July 31, 1929, Deputies John Hemp and Leslie Hoffman arrived at the meeting spot with Lewis, but the informant was nowhere to be seen. Instead, the moonshiners were hiding nearby, waiting for the police. Unaware of their observers, the police advanced to the till where the moonshiners began firing guns at the police. The deputies returned fire and a fire fight ensued, in which one officer was fatally shot. After chasing the moonshiners away, the police completed the raid by destroying the still and eventually, some of the moonshiners were caught and put on trial. 

Photo: livingnewdeal.org

Today, the site of the Blue Blazes Still is in Catoctin Mountain Park. A whiskey still can be seen there, but it is not like the commercial Blue Blazes Still, which was destroyed in 1929. Instead, it is a small-scale still that represents what more typical Appalachian stills looked like. 

Photo: Hilary Grabowska

Eighteen Hundred and Froze to Death

April 10, 1815, Mount Tambora erupted in one of the most powerful volcanic eruptions in human history. This eruption was even more significant because it occurred during the Little Ice Age and contributed to climate change. 

Photo: nbcnews.com

A year later, in June, 1816, ten inches of snow fell in New England. This was not good news for farmers because it prevented their crops from growing. They had already been struggling with a persistent fog that was created by the volcano. The backwards weather continued through the summer, freezing crops and causing a food shortage. Life in New England was especially difficult because what little food they did have could not be supplemented by foodstuffs from the west, since railroads did not yet exist to connect the frontier with the east. 

Photo: faculty.washington.edu

Frost was reported in Virginia; former President Thomas Jefferson suffered crop losses at Monticello and he was thrust further into debt. While Virginia felt the affects, it was New England that suffered the most and tens of thousands of people began to leave the region, relocating to the west and helping to expand the young country. Joseph Smith was among those who left Vermont and he would go on to found the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In Europe, Mary Shelley and friends were forced to remain indoors during their Swiss holiday and challenged each other to write scary stories and it was then that Frankenstein was written. That cold summer was called "the year without a summer," and it changed the world. 

Photo: pbs.org (Joseph Smith, born in Vermont in 1805)

Photo: biography.com (Mary Shelley)