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Panic of 1873 Eerily Similar to Today's Economic Problems

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I'm a regular reader of the American Historical Association blog, and every Thursday they have an article called What We're Reading.  This week they have an interesting link to an article in The Chronicle Review called The Real Great Depression.  The author says we shouldn't be comparing today's economic problems with the depression of 1929, but instead should look at the Panic of 1873.  He then goes into a good description of the 1873 problems and I think he's correct.  The Panic of 1873 contained elements similar to our current problems and the whole mess actually sounds quite scary, and almost sounds like what is going on today.

If you want further reading causing you to want to stuff your mattress with cash, look at the following links:

The Guilded Age:  The Panic of 1873 - Northern Illinois University 

The Panic of 1873 - The History Box

Panic of 1873 - Wikipedia

Our Financial Troubles; The Government and the Panic in America - New York Times, Nov 15, 1873

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Interesting World War I Blog

If you notice on my left sidebar there is a widget called Blog Rush showing links to other blogs supposedly in the category I selected - history.  This doesn't always work the way it should, but every now and then I find a blog like WWI:  Experiences of an English Soldier.  The unique part about this blog is explained in it's subtitle "This blog is made up of transcripts of Harry Lamin's letters from the first World War. The letters will be posted exactly 90 years after they were written. To find out Harry's fate, follow the blog!"  Harry was a fairly prolific letter writer and you can see his story unfold almost on a daily basis.  The blog author also includes scans of the letters, postcards and also maps Harry acquired during the time he served in the war.  For those new to Harry's adventures, there is a convenient link on the left sidebar taking you to the very first post where you can begin at the beginning.

I enjoy this blog because it allows me to experience the war from an historical perspective just as Harry did 90 years ago.  On another level it's given me an idea on what to do with the scores of letters I have of my mother's during her Navy service in WWII.  There may be a new blog in my future...

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For Those Interested in All Things Italian

Another short post.  I'm suffering from a lack of inspiration again and can't seem to break out by writing anything more than a couple of paragraphs.  Usually once I get an idea and start writing it kind of just flows, but not recently.  Someday I hope to catch up with all of those posts I had planned to write for the various Carnivals and memes out there currently.  Right now about all I can crank out is a short description of a cool blog I just found.

Th blog I found is called The Annotico Report.  It looks like it got started in January 2007 and 830 posts later is still going strong.  I find this amazing because it took me a little over a year to get 400 posts and this blog has doubled mine in about the same amount of time.  The author describes the blog as "a commentary by Richard Annotico on current news of interest to those of Italian Ancestry, that appear in US, Italian, and international publications."  The author kind of has my style where he comments on the stories he highlights.  I've only read a few of his posts up to now, but I like what I've read.  He appears to have a wide variety of subjects so most will find something of interest whether you're Italian or not.  You can check out Richard Annotico's bio to learn a bit more about him.

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Wanted: Volunteer Indexers at Ancestry.com

Just read an interesting post on 24/7 Family History Circle where Ancestry.com is seeking volunteers to index and transcribe new records collections.  This is a curious effort for a commercial company.  All voluntary indexing programs I know of belong to sites offering their records for free.  Will volunteer indexers get free access to Ancestry.com?  I'm tempted to sign up to see what it's all about, but I just don't have the time to do the work.  Like I said - a curious effort by a for profit company.

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Blog Discovery - Scandalous Women

I stumbled upon a blog today perfect for the Women's History theme during March.  It's simply called Scandalous Women.  Now, this is not a porn site...it's a biography blog with fascinating stories about  women "...who were considered scandalous in their day.  Women who weren't afraid to dare or to stand up for what they believed in."  The blog stories only go back to September 2007, but the author, Elizabeth Kerri Mahon is a very engaging writer and I had a hard time tearing myself away from her blog.  Check out her first post as she explains why she choose her subject.  In addition to all the great stories, the blog also has a good links section to history blogs, historical fiction writers, and historical biographers. 

The truth is there aren't many blogs out there truly different from all the rest - including mine.  To me, Scandalous Women is different...which is the reason I'm writing about it.      

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About.com: Genealogy - Top Blogs

I was looking at my blog stats yesterday and noticed an unusual spike in visitors and most of these came from Kimberly Powell's About.com: Genealogy.  I clicked on one of the referring links and saw she had a list of 10 Genealogy Blogs Worth Reading...and no, mine wasn't in the list of 10, but it was under "And the Rest..."   I'm in good company and happy Kimberly listed me in her post at all.  Her post says they are not in any particular order, but she does have Randy Seaver's Gena Musings listed first and I have to agree he belongs in the top position.  I think there was only one blog in Kimberly's list I haven't seen before and most of the other's I visit regularly.  I think she's captured a great bunch of blogs and I appreciate her mentioning me.  As Kimberly says, this is not an all inclusive list - check out the blog rolls on each and you will get a taste of the vast genealogy blogosphere. 

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More on Irish Genealogy

I just read a very interesting post on 24/7 Family History Circle about an aspect of Irish genealogy I never thought about - the immigration of the Irish to England, Scotland and Wales.  According to the article, Irish Migration to Britain by Sherry Irvine, the numbers of Irish immigrating to Britain was second only to the United States.  This really made sense as I thought about it because industrialization in England was the engine that drove the British Empire, and labor was needed to keep it going.  Since life in Ireland was still hard, and jobs plentiful a short distance away, immigration to England, Scotland and Wales seems like a logical decision for many Irish to make.  The only places I've searched for my Irish ancestors are Canada, the US and Ireland - I now have another avenue to study.         

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Lincoln at Ford's Theater

I was over at the Civil War Memory blog and found a funny video I though I'd share.  I have to warn you though there is a bit of crude language involved, but it's not too bad.

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Blogger in the News - Sandusky History

Find Your Ancestors In Civil War Documents 

I've had a pretty interesting career.  Became an Army Officer, traveled the world, and participated in some interesting events.  Even now after I became a retired Soldier, I still work for the Army as a civilian and generally like what I do.  However, can you guess what my dream job would be?  Working in a local library or museum and having the opportunity to dig into the collections, and blog about my interesting finds.  That's what it looks like the folks at the Sandusky Library get to do according to an article I found about the Library and Blog.  While I'm sure the blog writers have other duties at the library, I just imagine how fun it is to find all of those interesting local stories and share them with everyone via the internet.  I have visited this blog before and they write great stories about Sandusky, Ohio and the surrounding area.  The blog also posts  photos collected over the years that captures moments in history, but unfortunately the stories behind many of them are lost - here's an example of one of the many interesting photos in the blog.  Maybe I need to visit my local library to see if they have any job openings....

Better Google Searches and Much More

When I start a new line of family research I usually don't go to a genealogy site - I go to Google.  The problem with this strategy is unless you know exactly what you are looking for, you waste a lot of time weeding through many irrelevant hits.  While using Google to find a more efficient way of using Google, I found a blog called dumb little man with a subtitle of "tips for life" that provided the answer.  This blog is anything but little.  It has a subscriber count of over 65,000, and has hundreds of articles that gives you tips on just about anything you can think of.  The article that caught my eye was written by guest author Leo Babuata and titled  20 Tips for More Efficient Google Searches. 

Genealogy Gems - You've Got to Check this One Out

I'm sure most every genealogy nut viewed Rootstelevision's "Wild Roots" video contest back in June. There was one video in that contest that just cracked me up...I bet it portrays perfectly how genealogy fits into many of our lives. This video is called "Our Summer Vacation" and it took second place in the contest...I think it was the best of the bunch. I was excited to learn later that the producer, director and star of that video has a website called Genealogy Gems, but there's a twist - instead of writing about our favorite subject, she talks about it in podcasts.

The Thinking Blog Award - Late As Usual

Search for your ancestors

Because I took so long to list the 5 blogs that make me think, every single one I would have chosen was already listed by someone else - sometimes twice.  I thought instead I would list the top ten blogs I read every day.  If I read them every day they have to make me think...at least that's my reasoning.  Now I know some might consider this a cop-out and that may even be true, but I really couldn't list just 5.  Here they are listed in no particular order...I visit each of these blogs regularly...sometimes daily:

Gena-Musings

Civil War Memory

AnceStories

GeneaBlogie

Cow Hampshire

kinexxions

Creative Gene

The Genetic Genealogist

The Genealogue

Eighty Deuce On The Loose In Iraq

Digital History

World History Blog

Ok, so I listed 12...I would have kept going, but I have to get ready for work.