George Bush's Training Plane

I have one last Hawaii post for you from our trip last month. One of the places we visited on Oahu (so in Honolulu) was the Pacific Aviation Museum (this is on Ford Island, right near the Pearl Harbor monuments - you actually take the shuttle from the Pearl Harbor site because this is on a military base and so you can't easily drive there yourself), where I found this interesting piece of presidential history for you! Above you see a Stearman N2S-3 (that's my husband and brother in the picture - my husband is the one by the plane, in case you were wondering), which was used to train WWII pilots - including George HW Bush. You can see the plane's log - with Bush's name in it - by the airplane at the museum.

It was in this aircraft that Bush soloed as the war's youngest aviator. This article from Smithsonian Magazine (written before this museum actually opened) tells us a little more about this plane and Bush's experience in it:

A Stearman N2S-3 Kaydet, covered with a polyethylene sheet, looked as clean as it must have on October 15, 1942, when it rolled off the factory line in Wichita, Kansas. This particular Stearman, serial number 07013, was flown by a future U.S. president. In December 1942, 18-year-old Navy aviator George H.W. Bush flew a solo sortie in the airplane. Years later he recalled his feelings about flying another Stearman: “I was a little scared at first, but the plane was forgiving, and I made it through,” he wrote to a reporter for this magazine in 1994.

If you are interested in seeing this museum and won't be visiting Hawaii anytime soon, you can watch a virtual tour at YouTube (it only briefly touches on this plane).

Andrew Jackson, Jr.

Andrew and Rachel Jackson actually served as guardians for numerous children over the years, including one Native American (see Michael's post on this topic). The one they adopted, and who inherited Jackson's Hermitage, was Andrew Jackson, Jr. Now I've posted on his wife, Sarah Yorke Jackson, so I thought it was time to post a little on him:
In 1808, they took in an infant; one of a set of twins, of Rachel's brother Severn Donelson and his wife Elizabeth and raised him as their own. They named him Andrew Jackson Junior (1808-1865). Although some accounts suggest they took the child because of the mother's ill health and inability to care for her children, the reasons for the adoption are not clear. Andrew Junior and his twin, Thomas Jefferson Donelson, remained close all of their lives. Andrew Junior attended school at Davidson Academy and the University of Nashville. When Andrew Jackson became President, Andrew Junior assumed management of the Hermitage farm. Andrew Junior married Sarah Yorke of Philadelphia on November 24, 1831. Although Junior's financial woes brought Jackson grief in later years, he was always a devoted father.

I find it very interesting that they adopted one of a set of twins.

Battle of the Standards

We spent last week discussing the issue of gold vs. silver standards in my US history class as part of the Election of 1896, so I thought I'd share this fun lesson plan you can do with middle and high school students on the same topic. There are tons of links here that help students explore the issue and then discussion questions at the end as well as an interative activity.

Here is some background on the currency issue to start with:
The bitter controversy surrounding the issues of "free silver" and "sound money," so central to the 1896 campaign, has proved difficult for historians to explain. Partisans on both sides made exaggerated claims of the impact monetary policy could have on the nation's economic health. They implied that coinage of silver (on Bryan's side) or adherence to the gold standard (on the Republican side) was the single key to prosperity--and sometimes to the nation's honor.

Oddly, before 1896 both McKinley and Bryan had focused more attention on the tariff than on currency issues. Despite his party's platform, McKinley sought to emphasize the tariff and to avoid being labelled a "monometallist" or "bimetallist," leading to accusations of waffling. While he was a Congressman, Bryan allegedly once said that "the people of Nebraska are for free silver, so I am for free silver. I will look up the arguments later." His 1896 campaign became a free silver crusade.

Since the Civil War, a series of third parties had criticized Republicans' policy of contracting the money supply. Lincoln's issue of Greenbacks, the first national paper money, had helped finance the war but it also stimulated inflation. In subsequent decades, national Republican leaders sought to withdraw the greenbacks until each dollar had 100% backing in metal reserves. During the economic depressions of the 1870s and 1890s, in particular, this policy was roughly opposite to that which today's Federal Reserve might pursue in an economic downturn. It drew criticism as tending to favor bankers and lenders--who needed the value of a borrowed dollar to hold steady, or increase, until it was repaid--and detrimental to borrowers and workers.

Heirs to the Greenback Party of the 1870s believed that paper money was the solution. In post-war decades, however, the opening of vast silver veins (such as Nevada's Comstock Lode) had sharply increased the nation's silver supply. To Silver Democrats, federal coinage of silver (at a weight ratio of 16 ounces to 1 ounce of gold, hence the slogan "16 to 1") was a moderate solution to the currency problem. After all, silver was a precious metal, not mere paper. "Free silver" thus temporarily allowed a spectrum of currency reformers--from Southern Democrats to Populists--to unite. To horrified Gold Democrats and Republicans, "free silver" was an appeal for cheaper dollars. It would cheat lenders of an honest return on their money, allowing profligate borrowers to steal value from those who had extended loans.

Free silver at "16 to 1" would have expanded the money supply, but as a lone measure it would hardly have solved the nation's economic woes, and it would have (as Republicans argued) substantially raised the value of silver in relation to gold. Yet adherence of 'sound money' was not solely--or even primarily--responsible for the country's return to prosperity after 1896. To the extent that McKinley's victory reassured investors and financial institutions, whose leaders were frightened of Bryan, resolution of the issue may have had an indirect economic impact. After the campaign, however, the currency question faded quite rapidly from political debate.

What surprised me most, in discussing this in my class, was that many of my students actually believed we were still on the gold standard before last week.

The Ostend Manifesto

I have this pair of magnets on my fridge. They don’t really belong to me. I confiscated them years ago from a student. He was throwing them up in the air, and as they whizzed past each other they bumped against each other making clicking and zinging noises as they fell back towards his outstretched hands. Over and over he threw them up in the air. The young man throwing them was a very intelligent student. It was possible for him to comprehend every word I said during those few precious minutes of instructional time, BUT there were students around him that weren’t as fortunate. They were being distracted.

So was I for that matter.

I confiscated them because they were disturbing a lesson….I confiscated them because I was protecting the general welfare of my classroom. I simply grabbed them and kept on going with my lesson without missing a beat. While I continued to talk I took the few steps to the back of the room and placed the magnets on my desk.

The young man I took them from never reclaimed them. They remained on my desk for a couple of years before I finally put them in a drawer and then a couple of years after that I brought them home, and they have been on my fridge ever since.

I had to remove the magnets the other day to wipe down the surface of my fridge. Their removal prompted me to think about how they came to be in my possession, and I recalled the lesson I was teaching at the time.

We were talking about the events leading up the Civil War….all of the give and take between the free state folks and the slaveholders. Our time period was the administration of President Franklin Pierce, and I was telling the students about the Doughfaces. I wrote about the lesson some time ago here.

As I moved those magnets from my fridge to the counter I thought about President Pierce, and the American mechant ship, Black Warrior came to mind. It was seized in Havana in March, 1854. Congress saw it as a violation of the worse kind while Spanish officials in Cuba contended the ship violated custom regulations and fined the owners $6, 000. Eventually, Spain released the ship, but the Pierce administration was greatly concerned with the island of Cuba.

Under the direction of President Pierce Pierre Soule, minister to Spain, made an offer to the Spanish to purchase Cuba for $130 million. It was angrily refused.

Spain’s refusal was unfortunate for the Pierce administration. It became one of the deciding factors that led to Pierce’s failure to be elected to a second term.

So…..let me change gears here to the title of this post…..The Ostend Manifesto.

A manifesto is a public declaration of principles and intentions. Ironically, the word originates from Latin and meant “make public.” This is ironic because the Ostend Manifesto wasn’t meant for public eyes. Once it did become public knowledge President’s Pierce’s hopes for a second term were dashed.

The Ostend Manifesto.

What’s your guess? Does the document name stem from a person’s name or a location? If you guessed location you are most certainly correct.

The manifesto originated on October 9, 1854 and was drafted by Pierre Soule minister of Spain, John Y. Mason minister of France, and James Buchanan minister to Great Britain in Ostend, Belgium.

You’ve never heard of the Ostend Manifesto? I’m not exactly surprised, yet any student of United States diplomacy would tell you that the manifesto was a shift in foreign policy for the United States. It provided for the rationale for the United States to purchase Cuba from Spain, and it also had the audacity to state Cuba should be seized in the name of national security or as the document stated “justified in wresting” the island from Spain if need be.

Just like I seized those magnets for the common good.....many argued how seizing Cuba could be helpful to the United States.

We can’t really blame Franklin Pierce for being interested in Cuba. His wasn’t the first administration to discuss taking control of the island so close to American shores. John Quincy Adams and Thomas Jefferson did so as well. Pierce had even put the American people on notice when he stated during his inaugural address, “The policy of my administration will not be controlled by any timid forebodings of evil from expansion.”

In fact, Pierce did what he could to appoint men in favor of expansion in most every important post throughout Europe. He Sent Pierre Soule to Spain knowing full well that Soule was hoping the United States could annex Cuba at some point in the future.

What really caused Pierce’s downfall had to do with his band of Doughfaces……His cabinet was full of them, and in case you didn’t read through my link I gave above… Doughfaces were northerners with southern sympathies….men like Buchanan and Secretary of State Marcy…..Marcy….the man who directed the three authors of the manifesto to meet and deliver to him their findings upon examining the Cuba situation.

Soule, however, didn’t exactly make the meeting a secret and the media in Europe and the United States took the story and ran with it from the North verses South angle. The House of Representatives finally put enough pressure on the White House to publish the document , and four months later it was released to the press . They are the ones who dubbed it the Ostend Manifesto.

It was just the kind of ammunition Northerners needed in the ever growing debate over slavery. They correctly contended that some Southerners wanted Cuba seized so that it could become a slave state in the ever growing game of slave state/free state. This is true in some respects. The South also favored annexation of Cuba because they felt the Spanish officials were getting ready to free the slaves that already existed on the island. Having freed slaves that close to the United States couldn’t be a good thing…..could it? Of course, there was that economic angle and that was argued as well.

Northerners were outraged by the publication of the manifesto and saw it merely as a way to extend slavery. Soule was eventually forced to resign and of course, Pierce lost hope of staying in the White House.

The question of Cuba did not come up again for almost thirty years well after the Civil War had been fought.

You have to wonder though….what if the United States had purchased Cuba in 1854 from Spain?
Just think about it for a minute…..

This link takes you to an image of President Pierce’s order to affix the seal of the United States on a letter to the Queen of Spain that mentions the recall or resignation of Minister Soule.

Channelling George Washington

This is a rather amusing series from HNN. The author (there are three pieces, look at the bottom of the page for links to the other two) comments on modern issues as if he is interviewing George Washington. The current piece is on campaign finance:
I’m [GW] talking about the Supreme Court decision, declaring corporations and labor unions are entitled to the right to participate in elections under the First Amendment. This punches a huge hole in the sorry 150 year history of campaign finance laws.

George and Thomas Fleming (the author) go on to debate this topic further:
"Didn’t all this start out with an attempt to reserve high office for the rich?”

“It’s nice to chat with an historian. Yes, at the Constitutional Convention, there was a motion to restrict the presidency to men who had a net worth of at least $100,000. That’s the equivalent of about $5 million in your depreciated dollars. Senators, congressmen and federal judges would be required to have half that amount. Then something – or more specifically – someone wonderful intervened. Ben Franklin rose and said he opposed any measure that tended to debase the spirit of the common people. The proposal went down in a negative roar so loud, I didn’t even bother to count the votes.”

“Do you think the current campaign finance law –what’s left of it -- does that?”

“Unquestionably. It puts politicians and contributors in the hands of a squadron of bureaucrats whose decisions have left the law so complicated, only a Chinese philosopher from the age of Confucius could understand it. The thing is gobbledygook.”

The other two pieces are written in a similar style, on different topics. Just a fun way of combing modern issues with past issues.

I did rather enjoy the bit at the end of the first piece on Mrs. Washington's opinion about Thomas Jefferson and their split over the French Revolution:
"Every newspaper scribbler in the country started spitting on me after I declared America neutral. I had turned my back on the wonderful French Revolution! Secretary of State Tom Jefferson was at sixes and sevens all day every day. He came to see me one afternoon and talked for a full hour. When he finally ran out of breath, I told him: ‘Mr. Jefferson, I don’t agree with a single word you’ve said.’ He resigned a few months later and wrote that vicious letter to one of his newspaper pals, calling me a Samson in the field who’d allowed himself to be shorn by the harlot, England. I never spoke to him again. If I did, Mrs. Washington would have changed the locks on the doors at Mount Vernon and told me to take up residence in the outhouse.”

“Mrs. Washington had political opinions?”

“Of course. But the smart First Ladies confine them to the bedroom. Bess Truman was a champion in that department.”

UPDATE (2/8/10): One more of these articles came out on HNN today.

Who is with Ike?

Hopefully you all recognize President Eisenhower, but the question for today is - who is with President Eisenhower in this picture?

New 1945 Yalta Video

This article by Steven Lomazow on HNN talks about a new video from the 1945 Yalta Conference. The videos are embedded here or you can find them on YouTube. Make sure to check out the comments as well as additional information on the man behind the video is provided there.