Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan

On March 3, 1887, Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan met for the first time. Helen was 6 years old and Anne was 20.

Helen Keller was born in 1880 to a Confederate Civil War veteran and his wife in Alabama. When she was 19 months old, she contracted an illness which left her deaf and blind. Her parents, who wanted her to have as normal a life as possible, contacted Alexander Graham Bell, who was an authority on deafness. Bell also invented the telephone. Bell told the family about the Perkins School for the Blind, near Boston. In turn, the school recommended Anne Sullivan as a teacher for Helen.

Anne Sullivan was born in 1866 in Massachusetts, and was a student at the Perkins School. Because she has a severe visual impairment herself, she had some understanding of Helen's feelings of isolation and frustration.

Anne tried to teach Helen by using her finger to spell out words in the palm of her student's hand. Helen did not understand what her teacher was doing, and resisted, sometimes violently. A breakthrough came one day when Anne held Helen's hand under running water, and spelled out the word "water" in her other hand. At last, Helen understood! From that day forward, she wanted Anne to teach her everything she could.

Helen's love of learning flourished she was able to complete high school and go on to Radcliffe College in Cambridge, MA. She was the first deaf-blind person to receive a Bachelor's degree. She graduated from college with honors in 1904.

Helen and Anne became inseparable. Anne accompanied Helen to college and continued to help her to communicate and study. This only ended when Anne died in 1935.

Helen became an author and a public speaker. She published her first book, an autobiography called "The Story of My Life," in 1902. She was a strong advocate for the deaf, the blind, and racial equality.

Helen Keller died at her home in Connecticut in 1968 at the age of 87.

Nobel Prize

It is a great honor to win a Nobel Prize. The Prize is given to people whose work over the previous has been a great benefit to mankind. It awarded annually in the categories of chemistry, physics, medicine, literature, and peace.

The Nobel Prize is named for a Swedish scientist named Alfred Nobel. Nobel invented dynomite and other explosives. When he died in 1896, his will stated that most of his fortune should be banked and the interested should be distributed each year to the person or group of people whose work over the past year had the most benefit to mankind. It is believed that Nobel created the award because he felt guilty that his inventions were used for violence.

The first Nobel Prize was awarded in 1901, five years to the day after Nobel's death. The awards are still given each year on December 10. The Nobel Prize is considered the most prestigious prize in the world. Winners are given a cash prize, as well as the gold medal pictured above.

Past Nobel Prize winners include Albert Einstein, Ernest Hemingway, the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela.

For more information, and to find out about this year's winners, go to http://nobelprize.org/ or just watch the news today - December 10, 2010!

History and Reading - Gettysburg Address

On this date, November 19, in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln made a speech at the dedication ceremony at the Gettysburg National Cemetary. This speech, called "Lincoln's Little Speech," because of it's short length, has become famous as The Gettysburg Address. This is the text:

Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war . . . testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated . . . can endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.

We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate . . . we cannot consecrate . . . we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.

It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us . . . that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion . . . that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain . . . that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom . . . and that government of the people . . . by the people . . . for the people . . . shall not perish from this earth.

Let's look at it one paragraph at a time. Most people have heard "four score and seven years ago," but don't know what it means. A score is 20. Four score is 4 x 20, or 80. Four score and seven is 80 +7, or 87. If we subtract 87 years from the year 1863, we get 1776, the year the Declaration of Independence was signed. Lincoln was saying that, in 1863, the year he gave his famous speech, America had only been a nation for 87 years, and that our nation was founded on the principles of liberty and equality.

In the next two paragraphs, he is acknowleging that the civil war tested whether our nation was strong enough to uphold those founding principles, and that he and the other people were now gathered on part of the battlefield to dedicate the cemetary for the men who died to uphold those principles. He says they are there because it is the right thing to do.

In the fourth paragraph, the president then says that, although they have gathered to dedicate the cemetary, their efforts are small in comparison with the men who died here. The blood and bravery of those men who fought at Gettysburg had already made it hallowed, or sacred, ground. Lincoln goes on to say that in the future, people (us) will not remember the speeches that were given at the dedication ceremony, but they will always remember the Battle of Gettysburg and the men who fought and died there.

In the last paragraph, Lincoln asks that we, as Americans, dedicate our lives to the principles that the founding fathers set out for us, and that, over the years and throughout many battles, our citizens have fought to uphold: a nation where all are welcome, free, and equal.

Today in History

On October 20, 1803, the Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase Treaty by a vote of twenty-four to seven. The agreement, which provided for the purchase of the western half of the Mississippi River basin from France at a price of $15 million, or approximately four cents per acre, doubled the size of the country and paved the way for westward expansion beyond the Mississippi.

The bounds of the territory, which were not clearly delineated in the treaty, were assumed to include all the land between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains, at that time known as the Stony Mountains. Just twelve days after the signing of the treaty, frontiersmen Meriwether Lewis and William Clark set out on an expeditions to explore the newly acquired territory.

The purchase of the Louisiana Territory and the Lewis and Clark expedition marked the beginning of a century of conquest. As explorers, speculators, adventurers, and settlers pushed the territorial boundaries of the United States westward toward the Pacific coast, the notion of America as a nation always pushing toward new frontiers took hold in art, literature, and folklore.

Tip of the Week -- Division of Germany

The United States, Great Britain, France, and the Soviet Union (The Allied Nations)fought together against Germany, Italy, Japan (the Axis Powers) and during World War II. Both factions included many smaller countries, as well.

When the war was over, much of Europe was in ruins. Germany was a broken country, with it's infrastructure destroyed and its people unable to help themselves. The Allied countries, with the exception of the Soviet Union, wanted to rebuilt Germany so that she could become self-sufficient again, under the Marshall Plan. The Soviet Union wanted to annex Germany as an Eastern Bloc country, so the she would be under Soviet Rule.

As a result of this disagreement, Germany was divided into two countries, East Germany and West Germany. East Germany became a socialist Eastern Bloc country under the Soviet Union, and it's official name was the German Democratic Republic or GDR. West Germany's official name was the Federal Republic of Germany, or FRG. American, British and French troops remained in West Germany throughout the rebuilding, and in 1955, the country was declared "fully sovereign," or operating on its own, with it's own government. West Germany joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and the Allied troops maintain bases there until this day, under NATO.

Throught the 1950s, many people attempted to defect from East to West Germany. The easiest place to do this at the time was in Berlin. Although the entire city was in East Germany, half of the city was controlled by the US, Great Britain and France.

In 1961, the Soviets built the Berlin Wall on the border of East and West Berlin. They said it was to protect East German citizens, but it was most likely to keep them from defecting to the West. The Wall became the symbol of the Iron Curtain, the border between the East and the West. In 1990, Germany was officially reunified, and the Berlin Wall was taken down.

Goose Day

Today is September 29 - Goose Day!

The Medieval Period is also known as The Middle Ages. It lasted for 1,000 years, from the 5th century until the 15th century (the 400s until the 1400s). During this time, people celebrated Michaelmas, or the Feast of St. Michael, as a religious festival.

Michaelmas also happened to be the time of year when peasants paid their rent to the landowners. A peasant would come to the landlord's castle or manor house with rent, which could be paid in currency or, more often, a portion of the crops from the fall harvest. The peasant would also bring a stubble goose (a nice, fat goose), for the landlord's table, to ensure that the lease would be renewed for the coming year.

When the British began to colonize the United States in the 1600s, they brought the tradition with them. The only place in the US where it is still celebrated is in Mifflin County, Pennsylvania, where there is a large population of people with British and Scots-Irish heritage.

In modern times, Michaelmas is called Goose Day, for the traditional goose dinner Mifflin Countians have on this day. Many restaurants in the area have a "goose day special." Eating goose on September 29 is said to bring good luck in the coming year. Other festivities include a 5K run and a "Wild Goose Chase," which is a county-wide scavenger hunt in which teams of people pile into cars and head out in search of clues. Another tradition is that a police officer will pull over a random car with out-of-state license plates, tell the occupants of the car that they will need to be "taken in," and then treat them to a surprise goose dinner at a local restaurant.

Today in Science History

On September 23, 1846, the planet Neptune was discovered by Johann Galle, a German astronomer at the Berlin Obervatory. Galle discovered the planet, not by directly observing it, but through mathematical calculations based on variations in gravity on its neighboring planet, Uranus. Italian astronomer Galileo observed Neptune as early as 1612, but he thought it was a star.

Neptune, the 8th planet from the Sun, is named after the Roman god of the sea, because of its blue color. It is 4 times bigger than Earth. Neptune rotates on its axis faster then Earth does; a day on Neptune is 16 hours long, whereas a day on Earth is 24 hours long. Neptune takes longer to orbit the sun than Earth does, though, so a year on Neptune is the same as 165 Earth years. Neptune has eight known moons, while Earth only has one.

Neptune is a gas giant, meaning that it is made up mostly of gases, as opposed to rock and other solid matter. Neptune is made up mostly of hydrogen, helium, ammonia and methane.

September 21, 1866

Science fiction pioneer HG Wells was born today in 1866. Wells wrote such classics as The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and War of the Worlds, all of which later became classic films as well.

On October 30, 1938, Orson Welles directed an narrated War of the Worlds as a radio play on the Columbia Broadcast System (CBS). The play was presented as a series of "news bulletins" and without commericial interruptions. It was intended as a spooky Halloween show. Unfortunately, many Americans had missed the beginning of the show and did not realize that it was a Halloween prank. This resulted in mass hysteria across America by people who believed that space aliens were invading the planet.

Reading, Social Studies and Today in History All in One Post!

On this date, September 20, 1878, Upton Sinclair was born in Baltimore, MD. Sinclair was was a muckraker, which means he was an investigative journalist who dug beneath the surface to find the story beneath. It wasn't always pretty.

In 1904, Sinclair spent several weeks working undercover in Chicago's meatpacking industry. The result was his novel, The Jungle, which was published in 1906. It exposed the horrendous conditions, not only for the workers, but also of the food that was being produced for the American public. The novel cause such a public outcry that, with a few months of publication, the government passed the Pure Food and Drug Act and Meat Inspection Act.

If you have never read The Jungle, pick it up sometime. It will make you appreciate your food and your working conditions!

Sinclair went on to write many other novels. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1943 for Dragon's Teeth. Another of his books, Oil!, was the basis for the 2007 film, There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day-Lewis.

Upton Sinclair died in 1968, at the age of 90.

September 17, 1862

On this date in 1862, the Battle of Antietam was fought. This battle, fought during the American Civil War, is known as the bloodiest one-day battle in American history, with over 23,000 casualties.

Antietam is the name of a creek near Sharpsville, Maryland, where the battle was fought. In the south, it's known as the Battle of Sharpsville.

At the end of the day, Union Major General McClellen won the battle of Confederate General Lee. Lee's retreat prompted President Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation, which abolished slavery.

Many of the soldiers who fought at Antietam met again less than a year later at the Battle of Gettysburg.

September 13, 1814

On this day in 1814, Francis Scott Key wrote a poem. He had witnessed the bombardment of Ft. McHenry in Baltimore by the British during the War of 1812. He was amazed that the American flag was still flying over the fort the next morning. Scott's poem was set to music and became our national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner, in 1931.

Social Studies Tip of the Week -- Labor Day

We all know that Labor Day is the unofficial end of summer. We get a day off. We have picnics. It's the last day before swimming pools and amusement parks close for the season. But do you know the history of Labor Day?

It all started in 1894 in the town of Pullman, Illinois. Pullman was a factory town, and their product was Pullman train cars, which were made at the Pullman Palace Car Company. The company had lost revenue the previous year because demand for railway cars had dropped. Their answer to lost revenue was to cut workers' pay and increase their hours.

The workers were angered by the company's decision, and they held a wildcat strike. A wildcat strike is a strike that is not authorized by union officials. The American Railway Union, led by Eugene Debs, was a union of all railway workers. It was a large and powerful union. The ARU supported the Pullman worker's strike by refusing to run trains that included Pullman cars. Soon, all train traffic west of Chicago stopped. This affected both travel and trade.

President Grover Cleveland sent the U.S. military troops and U.S. Marshalls to intervene and get the trains moving again. During the clash, 13 workers were killed. These workers were instrumental in improving workers' rights in America.

As a result of the Pullman Strike in 1894, President Cleveland created Labor Day as a celebration of American Workers and their families.

Social Studies Tip of the Week: American Red Cross

The Red Cross is a humanitarian non-profit organization that provided emergency assistance for victims of disasters, community services for families in need, support to military personnel and their families, collection and processing of blood for future use, and educational services in the areas

Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross, was a teacher during the Civil War. She organized a program that helped to locate soldiers who were missing in action. After working tirelessly for many years, her doctors sent her to Europe to rest. Rather than resting, however, she became involved with the International Red Cross in the midst of the Franco-Prussian War.

When she returned to the United States, she was determined to bring the Red Cross with her. The American Red Cross was officially established in 1881, during the presidency of Chester Arthur.

One of the early major disasters for which the American Red Cross provided relief, was right here in Pennsylvania. More than 2,200 people died and thousands were injured and left homless by the Johnstown Flood on May 31, 1889. It is listed as one of the worst natural disasters in American History.

The Red Cross continues respond to disasters to this day: earthquakes, tornados, hurricanes, floods, mine disasters, plane crashes. Wherever people are in need, the Red Cross is there, thanks to Clara Barton.

Social Studies Tip of the Week - Military Statues

Have you ever been to a place like Valley Forge, Gettysburg, or Washington, D.C., that have a lot of statues of soldiers on horseback? Did you know that you can read those statues?

If both the horse's front feet are off the ground, it means that the rider was killed in battle.

If the horse has one foot off the ground, it means that the rider died from injuries received in battle.

If all four of the horse's feet are firmly on the ground, it means that the rider lived to a ripe old age and died of natural causes.

Social Studies Tip of the Week

The Great Depression began in 1929 with the Stock Market Crash, and lasted throughout the 1930s, ending with the beginning of World War II. During the Depression, the United States economy fell so sharply that unemployment reached 25%, and the Gross National Product dropped by 33%. This means that companies did not have money to pay their workers; one out of every four people lost their jobs, and had no money to buy things that were still being produced. Because of this, American factories produced fewer things that we could trade with other countries. The slowdown in trade cause the depression to spread around the world.

If the economic situation wasn't bad enough, there was a drought in the midwest, where most of our food crops are grown. It was so dry that, when heavy winds came along, there were massive dust storms that covered the fields, cars and even houses, like snow. The area, especially Oklahoma and nothern Texas, became known as the Dust Bowl. The drought meant that fewer crops could be produced, which meant less food.

The shortage of food meant that food was more expensive, and people couldn't afford to buy it. Many Dust Bowl farmers packed their families up and headed to California to look for work. They became migrant workers, continuously, following whatever crops were in season.

If you would like to read some novels that are set during the Great Depression, I encourage you to read The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck.

Social Studies Tip of the Week

Because the DLP staff was out of the office yesterday, your Social Studies Tip of the Week is a little late!

We are very lucky to live in Pennsylvania. Our state is rich with American history!
If you've never visited Gettysburg, I encourage you to check it out!

The Battle of Gettysburg took place from July 1-3, 1863. It was the turning point of the American Civil War, in which Union Major General George Meade's Army of the Potomac defeated Confederate General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. More American lives were lost at Gettysburg than during any other Civil War battle.

Gettysburg is located about 40 miles south of Harrisburg, near the Maryland border. There are many ways to see the battlefield. You may take a guided tour, or just explore on your own. There are bus tours available, but you may also drive around the battlefield. You may also choose to see it by bicycle or on horseback. For information about Gettysburg, go to http://www.gettysburg.com/.