Earlier today, someone felt compelled to leave me a comment about my anti-neo-Confederate predilection on last night’s post, which was about my second blog, which is about my life-long addiction to Philadelphia’s professional sports teams. What in the world did that have to do with the fact that I feel compelled to fight against neo-Confederate hooey? I simply don’t understand.

Because the comment wasn’t even remotely close to being appropriate to the post, I deleted it. Had it been placed in an appropriate place, I would have permitted it to stand, but it was not even close to being on point to the post where it was left, so I saw no reason to leave it stand.

I have to say that I just don’t understand the motivation of some people and why they feel compelled to do what they do…..

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Tonight, I started a second blog, just for fun. Fear not, it will not detract from this blog, nor will it compete with it.

Those of you who are long-time readers know that I am a Philadelphian by birth, and that I was cursed by being born into a family of Philadelphia sports fans. As I’ve said here more than once, I know pain, and I know suffering. We know all about living with disappointment, and we know to expect to be disappointed. It’s just a fact of life, and it’s an integral part of being a Philadelphia sports fan.

I’ve started a blog called A Philadelphia Phanatic. It can be found here, and will focus upon my addiction to the Phillies, Eagles, and Flyers, and the trials of rooting for those teams from 450 miles away. Check it often. The first post went up tonight.

I’ve added a link to the blog roll.

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I haven’t said anything about this publicly, because I wasn’t sure precisely what I was going to do with it. One thing I’ve learned about myself is that the best way for me to REALLY learn something is to research and write about it. Last year, after leading a tour of the Battles of Kelly’s Ford and Brandy Station for a busload, I realized that I didn’t know Brandy Station quite as well as I wanted. Consequently, I decided to do some more research on Brandy Station and to write about it in more detail than I’ve ever done previously.

My book The Union Cavalry Comes of Age: Hartwood Church to Brandy Station, 1863 contains three chapters, totaling about 21,000 words, on the Battle of Brandy Station. It provided me with a good starting point, so I decided to expand on it and turn it into something more substantial. After several months of work, I’ve now got about 65,000 words on the Battle of Brandy Station. I’ve actually been working on this on and off since September or so, although it hasn’t been much at all recently because of the completion of the baseball project.

The idea is to do something very similar to my book Protecting the Flank: The Battles for Brinkerhoff’s Ridge and East Cavalry Field, Battle of Gettysburg, July 2-3, 1863. That book contains a 65,000 word tactical treatment, lots of maps and illustrations, and a detailed walking/driving tour. Steve Stanley, the superb master cartographer who does the maps for the Civil War Preservation Trust, has, with the blessing of the CWPT, given me permission to use his excellent maps of the battle in the book.

What this project is NOT intended to be is the definitive work on the Battle of Brandy Station. My friend and mentor Clark “Bud” Hall has been working on that for a long time, and what I’m doing is not intended to compete with what Bud’s doing. If anything, I hope that what I’m doing will whet readers’ whistles for Bud’s project, which is nearing conclusion. Indeed, I intend to steer readers to Bud’s book. I’m hoping to donate at a portion of the royalties/proceeds to the Brandy Station Foundation for a fundraiser, and I expect that it will be sold in the BSF’s little gift shop at the Graffiti House so that the BSF can garner the profits from the sales of the book.

Bud’s reviewing the manuscript for me now, and I have yet to put together the tour. I’m planning on doing that this spring when I go to visit Bud in Virginia. Since it’s been so well received with One Continuous Fight: The Retreat from Gettysburg and the Pursuit of Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, July 4-14, 1863, I intend to include GPS coordinates in the tour. The problem is that a significant portion of the Brandy Station battlefield remains in private hands and is not generally accessible to the public, which means that I will only be able to include a partial tour.

The thing should be finished in the next couple of months. I need to find a publisher for it. It would be a natural for Ironclad Publishing’s Discovering Civil War America Series, but we’re already backed up by four books, and with the publishing business being the way it is at the moment, it’s going to be quite a while before we could publish it. I also don’t want to use Ironclad as my own vanity press. Consequently, I am looking for a publisher for this work, and I welcome any suggestions that any of you care to make. Please feel free to pass on any suggestions.

In the meantime, I will keep everyone posted as to the progress of the completion of the project and the hunt for a publisher.

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Harry Kalas, the Hall-of-Fame broadcaster whose silvery voice has been the voice of the Philadelphia Phillies since 1971, is gone. From Philly.com:

Phils announcer Harry Kalas dies

BY THE INQUIRER STAFF

Harry Kalas, the Phillies’ Hall of Fame announcer, died at 1:20 p.m. today, the Phillies announced.

Mr. Kalas was 73.

He collapsed in the press box at Nationals Stadium in Washington at about 12:30 p.m. and was rushed to George Washington University Medial Center.

The cause of the death was not announced. Today’s game against the Nationals will be played, but the team will not visit the White House tomorrow.

“We lost Harry today,” David Montgomery, the team president, said. “We lost our voice.”

Mr. Kalas, who was found unconsious, missed most of spring training after undergoing undisclosed surgery in Feburary. That surgery was unrelated to the detached retina that sidelined him for part of last season.

Senator Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) praised Mr. Kalas in a statement.

“As the voice of the Philadelphia Phillies, Harry Kalas was everyone’s friend in this region. His incisive commentaries will be sorely missed.”

Susan Buehler, president of the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of NATAS, today issued this statement upon hearing the news.

“The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences sends our heartfelt condolences to Harry’s family, his friends, his colleagues and many generations of fans. In 2002, NATAS bestowed our Chapter’s most prestigious honor – the Governor’s Award honoring his lifetime achievements. He was a beloved and respected broadcaster in the TV industry with a distinguishing voice that will resonate for years to come.”

Mr. Kalas, who turned 73 on March 26, has broadcast Phillies games since 1971. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2002 as the recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award. He is entering the final season of a 3-year contract that he signed in December 2006.

We’ve lost one of the truly great ones. At least Harry got to call and experience the 2008 World Series victory of the Phillies. Now he will be reunited with his best friend and partner, Richie Ashburn, who left us too soon in 1997. And now Harry’s “outta here”, which was his signature line. Every great broadcaster has one, and that was Harry’s.

And with Harry’s passing, so passed another piece of my childhood. I can never remember a time when Harry wasn’t calling the Phillies, through good times and bad. Jayson Stark got it right when he said earlier today that the thought of listening to a Phillies game without Harry calling it is unimaginable.

Rest in peace, Harry. You will be missed.

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Thanks to Charlie Knight for passing this along, from today’s on-line edition of the Hampton Roads Pilot.

Confederate re-enactor pleads not guilty in shooting

The Associated Press
© April 9, 2009
ISLE OF WIGHT

A Confederate re-enactor has pleaded not guilty to reckless handling of a firearm in the accidental shooting of a Union re-enactor during the filming of a Civil War documentary in September.

Joshua Owen Silva of Norfolk appeared in court Wednesday on the misdemeanor charge, which stemmed from the shooting of 72-year-old Thomas Lord Sr. of Suffolk. A June 24 trial date was set, but prosecutors say they hope to reach a plea agreement with Silva before that.

Lord was struck in the right shoulder by a .45-caliber musket ball during the filming of the “Civil War Overland Campaign Web Series Project.” He was treated at a local hospital and released.

The moron won’t even step up to the plate and accept responsibility for his stupid and irresponsible conduct at the reenactment. I hate it that this guy won’t be responsible for what he did.

As Bugs Bunny would say, “what a maroon!”

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As Michael has pointed out, the working draft of the baseball book is finished. We now have a complete draft finished. It’s 385 pages and almost 190,000 words in length. We had a great time putting it together, and now it’s time to find a publisher for it, which we’re getting ready to begin doing. I’m just tickled that it’s finally done.

And it also means that I can get back to my normal routine and resume regular posting about the Civil War.

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Many of you are familiar with the incredibly detailed and accurate artwork of Don Troiani. However, you may not be aware of the incredible collection of artifacts–mostly uniform pieces and accouterments–that Don has accumulated over the years.

In an e-mail dialogue with Don over the weekend, I learned that among the items in his collection are one of the bloody gauntlets that Ully Dahglren was wearing when he was killed, as well as his sash. The sash has two bullet holes in it, which tells us where at least two of the fusillade of bullets that killed Ulric Dahlgren found their mark.

Don was kind enough to offer to photograph the gauntlet and sash for me, to give me permission to use the photo in the upcoming bio of Dahlgren, and to grant me permission to post the photo here. Don himself took the picture that you see here.

What a find. And with just barely enough time to still include it in the book. Thanks for you generosity, Don. It’s greatly appreciated.

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…the accident at Three Mile Island occurred. The accident, whereby Metropolitan Edison’s nuclear reactor nearly melted down, happened two days after my 18th birthday. I was in twelfth grade, eager to graduate and move on. However, the loss of coolant and resulting release of a large amount of radioactivity into the surrounding environment was a big deal. Although nobody died in the accident itself, statistics suggest that there has been an increase in leukemia and other cancers in the surrounding communities situated most closely to the plant, which still operates one reactor to this day.

My parents’ house is just over 60 miles from Three Mile Island, and when the accident occurred and for the next few days, things were absolutely nerve wracking. Nobody knew the extent of the damage to the reactor, and nobody knew for sure that the nuclear reaction had been slowed enough to control it. We also didn’t know just how close we came to a full-scale meltdown of catastrophic proportions. For a few days, things were really touch and go. Gov. Dick Thornburgh, who had only been in office for about 60 days when the accident happened, had a full-scale crisis on his hands, and it was an unprecedented one. Nobody knew precisely what to do. And coming two weeks after the release of the movie The China Syndrome, a media frenzy ensued.

I remember when Pres. Jimmy Carter, a trained nuclear engineer, visited the site in an effort to calm a terrified public. Carter’s presence that day was both welcome and reassuring.

At one point, a plan to evacuate a radius of 60 miles from the crippled plant was announced. My parents’ house is just outside that radius by a mile or two, so we were debating whether to pack up and go, too. It was an incredibly stressful and uncertain time that remains indelibly burned in my memory banks. Of course, the crisis passed in a few days, and the damaged reactor was sealed in concrete. But for those few days, it was touch and go.

My alma mater, Dickinson College, is about 25 miles from TMI as the crow flies. Students had just come back from spring break a week or so before the accident happened, and after the accident occurred, the College administration made the prompt decision to shut down and sent students home for the duration. I remember arriving on campus that August and seeing students wearing t-shirts that would be real collector’s items today: they commemorated surviving what became known as the College’s 1979 “radiation vacation”. I wish I had one of those shirts.

I drive by that plant on the Pennsylvania Turnpike each time I go home to Reading to see my parents, and each time, I see those cooling towers looming over the shallow Susquehanna River. I see the steam billowing from the cooling tower of the still functioning Unit 1, and I remember those scary, wild days of my youth. It’s hard to believe that thirty years have passed since that frightening day.

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The primary reason for the lack of posts the past couple of weeks has been my being tied up finishing up my portion of the baseball project. I’ve been working hard at finishing up the last six team profiles, and now have four of those last six finished. I’ve got two to go, and then the manuscript is finished. I have yet to tackle the 1991 Cleveland Indians and the 2003 Detroit Tigers, who lost 119 games and then went to the World Series three years later.

Along the way, I’ve discovered some nifty trivia that made its way into the book. Try this one on for size. On August 18, 1960, right handed pitcher Lew Burdette, who was a very effective major league pitcher for 22 years and who won more than 200 games in the majors, threw a no-hitter against the Phillies, 1-0. Burdette, then pitching for the Milwaukee Braves, scored the game’s only run. He won 19 games that season. Twenty-eight days later, on September 16, Braves ace Warren Spahn, probably the greatest left handed pitcher to ever toe the rubber, no-hit the Phillies again, winning 4-0 with 15 strikeouts. It was Spahn’s 20th win of the season.

Thus, two different Milwaukee Braves pitchers twirled no-hitters against the Phillies 28 days apart. It had never happened before, and it hasn’t happened since. I found this nifty little tidbit last week, while doing some digging for material on the Boston Braves.

Anyway, this sort of thing is what’s been keeping me occupied. As soon as I finish up the Indians and the Tigers, the manuscript is complete. At last. I expect to finish up this week for sure.

Once it’s done, I should resume more regular posting. In the meantime, please hang in there with me.

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Today is a milestone for the blog for a couple of reasons. First, the proprietor is celebrating (if that’s the correct word) his 48th birthday today. There was a time, seemingly not all that long ago, that the thought of being 48 years old was the same as being as old as the hills but only slightly younger than the dirt. Fortunately, I don’t feel quite that old, but I do have my days…..

Second, and much more important than the 19th anniversary of my 29th birthday, is that this marks the 900th post on this blog. When I started this blog on a whim in September 2005, I never in a million years figured I would still be at this 900 posts later. This blog has become an important part of my daily routine, and I greatly value the interactions with those of you who give your valuable time to indulge what I have to say here. I’ve made new friends, re-connected with old friends, and have been rewarded immensely by doing what I do here.

Thank you to each and every one of you who give your time to indulge my rantings, and I hope you will continue to do so. I deeply appreciate the fact that you do so.

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