01 April 2001 This was written on a day of some minor significance. It was April Fools, first of that month, and we were getting ready for summer. Not quite the same this morning. Back then, the cherry blossoms were coming out around the Tidal Basin, across the placid Potomac from the grand old wreck […]

April 2, 1903   Hotel “Cecil” Thursday evening   We hired a two-wheel carriage for 3 horses to attend to our business., secure staterooms, call at the store, Ludgate Circle, Cooks, Post Office, Cable home, sightseeing, and at this hotel- we have a fine large room, to brass beds and meals outside one each for […]

1903, Part I: Pennsylvania to London onboard the good ship SS Mesaba Editor’s Note: These words, composed of digits harvested in the 21st Century, reflect the private thoughts of the owner of a general merchandise shop in SE Pennsylvania just around the turn of a previous century. He writes in small notebooks with crimson leather […]

Discussion. We rose on The Patio to some bad news. A fellow up in Maine took out more than twenty other citizens for some reason known best to himself. We know more about him than other recent malcontents because he is suitable for framing as part of everything that is at issue in our social […]

(Detroit’s Ford Rotunda building was more than a brick-and-mortar structure. To the residents and visitors of Motor City, it was a symbol of Detroit’s economic vitality, cultural significance, and shared community memories). We warned you, Gentle Readers, that the Grand Tour of 1903 was going to visit you again. We had a part in saving […]

William E. Socotra took the “Grand Tour” of Europe in 1903. That was the year that humankind first took powered flight, and the glitter of the colonial empires gave no proof that Europe, and the world over which it stood as Master, was ten years away from complete implosion. I don’t know what he would […]

The Snake Ranch Papers is one of those things that has followed us around since 1981. There was a time when triplicate forms were used in order to provide “carbon” and “file” copies to normal correspondence. That limited distribution to a very small group and provided safety that would have saved at least one career […]

The Chief Executive of a big nation made impromptu remarks on his return from Israel the other evening. We had not intended to view the show, but like other events in this amazing comprehensive political campaign it did not work out that way. Instead, the program was run twice more over last weekend and we […]

Wish something would break in some kind of easement to peace, you know? We woke to expect more announcements of conflict this morning. You know what we are talking about. The unsettled nature of who is at war with whom with still hot, and we could sure use an epiphany. We will see how this […]

We couldn’t avoid talking about some of the people we used to talk about this morning. It was funny about the timing of some of the whimsy about the latest war that made us think of an earlier one. Not a hysterical response, mind you, but the mid-1970s were years we shared at the start […]