Canister!
Small stories that don’t warrant full posts of their own:
- The 2015 Lincoln Funeral Train Project (above) is facing a big fundraising challenge, but it will be a remarkable commemoration if they can pull it off.
- In Ohio, volunteers are working to document evidence of the Civil War prison camp at Johnson’s Island.
- A U.S. Senate candidate in Kentucky attends a rally and gives a fiery speech in support of states’ rights; afterward swears he had no idea it was a rally for the legalization of cockfighting. Even Joe Scarborough can’t get his head around how that happens.
- A monument to Robert E. Lee was vandalized in Charlottesville. This doesn’t help whatever cause you think you’re pushing, dumbasses.
- The bronze Union soldier atop a GAR monument in Sioux Falls, South Dakota disappeared back in the 1960s, but his head has returned.
- Comic Jim Gaffigan has a theory about why we southerners move slowly.
- I’m only halfway through Matthew Goodman’s Eighty Days, but it’s a wild romp, made better by being true.
- The Thomas Jackson Letters is a collection of correspondence from a British-born ropemaker in Reading, Pennsylvania, who wrote extensively during the war to encourage his former countrymen to abandon their support of the Confederacy.
- Still no resolution on getting the conservation lab for artifacts from U.S.S. Monitor going again.
Got any more? Put ’em in the comments below.
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Dead Confederates, A Civil War Era Blog 
Interesting piece. Thanks for posting. IMO, a couple of them might have warranted a separate post. As for the Lincoln Funeral Train piece, just what is the value of spending thousands of dollars to create a reproduction of the original? Financing that project is going to be tough. A number of engines pulled the “Funeral Train.” So which engine are they replicating? As for the “United States,” so little was thought of it a hundred years ago that it was parked on a siding near Minneapolis/St. Paul where flames from a grass fire destroyed it. And a question. Several Internet sources indicate that Lincoln DID use the car on some occasions. ????
As for the vandalism in Charlottesville, I agree with you. DUMBASSES!!!
The Jim Gaffigan piece is very funny. Love his pieces, especially the ones on bacon. IIRC, he was here in Grand Rapids some years ago as part of the Gilda’s Club Grand Rapids “Laughfest” event. Hilarious man.
As for the U.S.S. “Monitor” conservation lab? It’s sad for those of us who are Civil War “nuts” but probably won’t mean much, if anything, to most Americans. Hell, most states (Michigan for one) don’t even teach the Civil War in U.S. history classes anymore. Sad but true. Also one of my pet peeves (ask Brooks Simpson).
Take care. Always look forward to your posts.
I may have to read “Eighty Days” myself …
It looked like a fun read, and so it is. I was vaguely aware of Nellie Bly’s trip around the world, but I had no idea that she was racing another female reporter, Elizabeth Bisland, at the same time. (Nellie Bly didn’t know either, at least during the first half.)
Since the comments are closed I guess I can’t comment on plans in the Ryan budget to eliminate the National Endowment for the Humanities, but I would like to point out that when I learned that I have a Civil War ancestor ten years ago I was prompted to travel eleven time zones in order to visit the Washington County Historical Society in Wisconsin, the state Ryan represents in Congress. I had quite a limited supply of clues to follow to learn more about my great great grandfather and his service in the 27th Wisconsin. One of those clues was the regimental roster for his unit. He enlisted on October 18, 1864, with five other men who traveled from the village of Beechwood to the town of Hartford to sign their papers. Those five men survived the war. My ancestor didn’t. The great granddaughter of one of those men wrote a book about her ancestor called ‘Before the Colors Fade’ which has never been published. The manuscript was typed by the author herself, photocopied and assembled in a loose leaf binder. It’s roughly one hundred and fifty pages and is kept on a shelf with other donations to the Society’s historical library. I didn’t have time to read the entire manuscript on a visit that lasted less than an hour, but I did ask the volunteers there to make a photocopy of the book and mail it to me in return for a fifty dollar donation. I received it in the mail in less than a week. The book makes no mention of my great great grandfather, but there is a nice account of the wedding of the author’s mother. The wedding march was played by my great great grandfather’s granddaughter. The book provides a wonderful portrait of the township where my ancestors lived during the Civil War, including a township plat map identifying all of the homesteads by family name.