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MARCH 30 — 1867 Seward’s Folly; 1855 Border Ruffians interfere with Kansas election; 1981 Reagan is shot; 1999 Ed Galloway’s Concrete Totem Pole becomes historic landmark
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MARCH 30
1867-Seward’s Folly.
A gigantic ice cube called Alaska was up for sale by the Russian Empire and had originally approached US President James Buchanan. However negotiations at that time were stalled by the outbreak of the American Civil War. After the War, Secretary of State William H. Seward, who was big on territorial expansion was practically frothing at the mouth a the notion of acquiring this giant land that was about 1/5 of the size of the rest of the United States.
And the Senate laughed at him. Oh silly Seward, they said. Seward’s Icebox. President Andrew Johnson’s Polar Bear Garden. They laughed and laughed and laughed.
But fellas! It’s only 2 cents per acre! And they laughed some more. Finally the Senate ratified the treaty by a margin of just one vote on April 9, 1867 and sex months later, Alaska was formally handed over from Russia to the U.S. Well who’s laughing now. This territory weakened both Britain and Russia as rivals to American commercial expansion in the Pacific region! It also threatened British control of its Pacific coast colony in Canada. There’s tons of natural resources there including…wait for it….gold! You thought I was going to say oil, didn’t you? Well there’s plenty of that there too.
Who’s laughing now.
1855-Borer Ruffians interfere with the Kansas election.
The Border Ruffians were pro-slavery activists from the slave state of Missouri, who in 1854 to 1860 crossed the state border into Kansas Territoy, to force the acceptance of slavery there by force. The violence imposed by the Border Ruffians led to the phrase Bleeding Kansas and helped to bring on the American Civil War.
This was the Kansas territory’s first election and about 5,000 armed Ruffians invaded from western Missouri and forced the election of a pro-slavery legislature. Even though the number of votes cast exceeded the actual number of eligible coverts in the territory, Kansas Governor Andrew Reeder reluctantly approved the election to prevent further bloodshed.
1981-The Gipper gets shot.
As President Ronal Reagan and his entourage were walking out to the limo after addressing a labor meeting at the Washington Hilton Hotel, he ran across psycho John Hinckly Jr., who fired six shots before being pinned down and subdued. White House Press Secretary James Brady was shot in the head and critically wounded, by the way this would eventually lead to Brady’s advocation of gun control, which from there led to 1993 congressional passing of The Brady Bill, which established a five-day waiting period and background checks for prospective gun buyers.
But getting back to the shooting. Secret Service agent Tim McArthy was shot in the side, and District of Columbia policeman Thomas Delahaney was shot in the neck. The president was shot in the left lung with a .22 caliber bullet and walked into the George Washington University Hospital with his usual sense of humor. He told his wife Nancy he forgot to duck. Then he said to his surgeons, Please tell me you’re Republicans; now THAT doesn’t surprise me, because that sounds like something Dutch would say.
Reagan was fine. A little surgery, good to go. The next day in fact, he resumed some of his executive duties and signed a piece of legislation from his hospital bed. Bad Ass, man. Yeah, don’t worry about the Gipper. The Jelly Bean Man was fine. The one you gotta worry about his Hinkley. Because he was far from okay. He got the motivation, according to his lawyers, to shoot Reagan after watching a Jodie foster movie Taxi Driver where the main character attempts to assassinate a fictional senator.
1999 Ed Galloway’s Concrete Totem Pole becomes legit.
Born in Missouri in 1800, after serving for the U.S. Army in the Philippines where he was influenced by Japanese and Eastern art, returned to Oklahoma where he sculpted tree trunks into fish and reptiles. He began working Charles Page in 1914, founder of the Children’s Home orphanage of Sand Springs in Oklahoma. There, he taught manual arts; you know, woodwork, sculpting, that kind of thing.
In 1937, he retired now, for most of us men, retirement means, a few hotrods in the garage, or building a backyard extension, or fly fishing, or jigsaw puzzles. Oh no, not Mr. Galloway. As a tribute to the Native American Tribes, he built a 90’ totem pole, mixed with 28 tons of cement, six tons of steel, 100 tons of sand, to build this magnificent, colorful and respectful tribute to the aborigines of the land.
It took him eleven years, features four 9’ Native Indians representing different tribes. It has 20 different carvings on its front, its base is about 18’ in diameter, and it has owl carvings, and based on the back of a turtle. I’m not sure what the significance of the turtle is because I’m just a stupid white European settler who goes to baseball games and shouts ‘Murcia. But I digress.
Ed Galloway died of cancer in 1962, but he dedicated his park to the Boy Scouts, and anyone else who wanted to learn or pay tribute to our beloved predecessors of the land.
1962 – Rock N Roll history, thank you Chubby Checker. The Russian newspaper Pravda warns communist youths about the dangers of dancing “The Twist.”
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