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CHICAGO - A Chicago Italian-American group on Monday called for the permanent removal of statues of Christopher Columbus from the city.

Italian American Heritage Society of Chicago president Gabriel Piemonte says Columbus as a

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Eddie Haskell R.I.P.

Explosion of USS Mount Hood, November 10, 1944

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The Vermont Republic

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The Honorable Justice Clarence Thomas

He withstood the Left's onslaught
Tuesday, February 4, 2020 

A new documentary sheds light on the life and judicial philosophy of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

This was the setting in 1991: a conservative appointment to the Supreme Court; reflexive opposition from the left; a contentious hearing followed by last minute, conflicted, and dubious allegations of sexual misconduct that almost derailed the nomination. While that describes the more recent confirmation hearings of now-Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh, 27 years earlier Clarence Thomas

Black Monday: The Eighth Air Force's 250th Combat Mission

One of the greatest speeches in American history!

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.

In a sense we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked “insufficient funds.” But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check — a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. They have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.

As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating “For Whites Only”. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning, “My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

WBBM Channel 2 - News Special - "Decision at 83rd Street" (1962)

Largest Military (1816-2019)

New life for Chicago Harbor Lighthouse?

Renowned Chicago artist Theaster Gates — known for repurposing old buildings for community use — is one of the people considering breathing life back into the deteriorating building.

By Mitch Dudek Dec 8, 2019, 10:45am CST

The Chicago Harbor Lighthouse, located a mile into Lake Michigan, doesn’t need a lighthouse keeper — automation has rendered that job unnecessary. Ever since the federal government handed it over to the city in 2010, local officials have waited for the right idea to come along to breathe new life into the building. Mitch Dudek/Sun-Times


It’s the city’s coolest building that no one talks about.

And understandably so.

The Chicago Harbor Lighthouse, located a mile into Lake Michigan, is mostly the stuff of touristy

The True Story Behind ‘The Irishman’

56 years ago today

President John Fitzgerald Kennedy

The Ultimate 1950's Airplane

Do The Irish Speak Irish, Gaelic, or Celtic?

The special love-hate relationship between Irish and Italian Americans

Frances Mulraney@FrancesMulraney 

Oct 14, 2019

Is the Irish and Italian love/hate relationship a good premonition for struggling migrant groups currently moving to the US?GETTY

How the newly immigrated Irish and Italians fought openly in the street but came to live peacefully together. A lesson for us all, even today?

In his 1970 book “The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight,” columnist Jimmy Breslin wrote, "Among

South Side Churchs

Stony Island Church of Christ, 1600 E. 84th St.:This small, modernist church is located next to bustling Stony Island Avenue. It was designed by Ray Stuermer, an architect who once was chief of design for industrial designer Raymond Loewy. Lee Bey

Chicago South Side architecture: an excerpt from Lee Bey’s new book ‘Southern Exposure’

Stony Island Church of Christ, Liberty Baptist Church, First Church of Deliverance and St. Gabriel Catholic Church are among the standouts, the former Sun-Times architecture critic writes.

By Lee Bey | For the Sun-Times Oct 11, 2019, 6:00am CDT

This is an excerpt from the new book “Southern Exposure: The Overlooked Architecture of Chicago’s South Side” (Northwestern University Press, $30) by Lee Bey, former architecture critic for the Chicago Sun-Times.

Located at Eighty-Fourth Street and Stony Island Avenue, Stony Island Church of Christ, built in 1959, has yet to be listed on any architectural survey, which is a shame. The modernist edifice is a very fine little building by Chicago architect Ray Stuermer, who was once chief of design for Raymond Loewy, the celebrated 20th century industrial designer whose work ranged from the iconic Lucky Strike cigarette packaging to the zoomy and va-va-va-voomy Studebaker Avanti sports coupe. The small church, built for a congregation of 200, was produced on a modest $125,000 budget. In today’s dollars, that would be just over $1 million. But with that tight budget, Stony Island Church is a standout: a sleek, impressive and reverent work with an angled granite facade that is divided by a slender, two-story glass entrance.
Stony Island Church of Christ, 1600 E. 84th St.: A side view of the church reveals a raised-brick pattern

Irish Famine studies in the US should be mandatory, like the Holocaust

IrishCentral Staff @IrishCentral
Oct 10, 2019






Bridget O'Donnell, the first victim of the Famine interviewed by the press.

An Irish studies lecturer at the University of Southern Maine has insisted that the Great Famine should