Tag: World War II

Honoring All Of Our Heroes, Thank You, Veterans!

Remember

by Brittany Vigoreaux

 

American soldiers sacrifice so much,

All for the freedom of our country.

Leaving their families and heading off to war,

Not knowing what the future holds.

 

Working day and night

Determined to stay strong.

Watching friends be killed every day

Letters from home inspiring them to keep fighting

 

So little is given to them

Although there is little to do,

For those who have died in war

We can still remember

 

Remember all the men who have died.

Remember all the battles fought

Remember all the tears families cried

Remember it was freedom the soldiers brought

 

To this very day soldiers are under-appreciated

Veterans Day is the day

For the dead, living, and fighting soldiers

To be remembered

*NEW* NASA Image of the Day for Sept. 20 – Sikorsky Helicopter

Sikorsky Helicopter

In this image taken in 1944, one of Langley Research Center’s Sikorsky YR-4B/HNS-1 helicopters is seen in the 30 x 60 Full Scale Tunnel. A technician sets up camera equipment for stop-action rotor-blade photos. The Sikorsky Company built hundreds of R-4 helicopters during World War II. It was the first mass-produced helicopter.

Image Credit: NASA

Did You Know……

Did you know…

From Wikipedia’s newest content:

Arbol de Piedra, a tree-like piece of rock eroded by the wind

  • … that the Eduardo Avaroa Andean Fauna National Reserve contains a “stone tree” (pictured)?
  • … that during World War II, Wyoming State Senator Robert H. Johnson flew bombing missions in support of the French Resistance against the Nazis?
  • … that although wine production is important to the economy of Tequisquiapan in Mexico, the locals do not generally consume it?
  • … that journalist Sony Esteus had his arm broken by the Port-au-Prince police while covering a story?
  • … that Hockey: Canada’s Royal Winter Game, published in 1899, was the first book on ice hockey, and only four copies are now known to exist?
  • … that Frederick Settle Barff invented a device, similar to a catalytic converter, to remove SO2 and CO2 from the exhaust fumes of locomotives in the 1860s?
  • … that reportedly haunted locations in Scotland include a tenement where bubonic plague victims were quarantined and starved to death by local councilmen?

Today’s Featured Picture

Today’s featured picture
A synagogue on D-Day A synagogue on West Twenty-Third Street in New York City remained open 24 hours on D-Day for special services and prayer. Jews in the U.S. during World War II were mostly unaware of the atrocities of The Holocaust, beyond the basic facts that Jews were being persecuted by the Nazis. Arthur Hays Sulzberger, publisher of The New York Times and a Jew himself, was anti-Zionist and downplayed much of the news. Furthermore, Jewish studio executives of major film studios did not want to be accused of advocating Jewish propaganda by making films with overtly antifascist themes.

Photo: Farm Security Administration; Restoration: Lise Broer

On this day…

On this day…

May 26: Independence Day in Georgia (1918); Mother’s Day in Poland

Dred Scott

  • 1328 – William of Ockham, an English friar who originated the methodological principle Occam’s razor, secretly left Avignon under threat from Pope John XXII.
  • 1857 – American slave Dred Scott (pictured), who had previously unsuccessfully sued for his freedom, was emancipated by Henry Taylor Blow, his original owner.
  • 1897 – Irish author Bram Stoker’s most famous novel Dracula was first published.
  • 1938 – The House Un-American Activities Committee was established to investigate alleged disloyalty and subversive activities by people or organizations suspected of having communist or fascist ties.
  • 1940 – World War II: A flotilla of “little ships” began a mass evacuation of British, French and Belgian troops cut off by the German army during the Battle of Dunkirk.

Did you know…

Did you know…

From Wikipedia’s newest articles:

Tom Lantos, the only Holocaust survivor ever to serve in the United States Congress

  • … that the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission is named for the only Holocaust survivor (pictured) ever to serve in the United States Congress?
  • … that 19th-century shipwright Thomas Morton invented the widely used patent slip because he couldn’t afford a dry dock?
  • … that the first settlers of Tell Halula brought fully domesticated forms of wheat, barley and flax from somewhere else, circa 7750 BC?
  • … that father and son Augustyn and Roman Träger were Polish intelligence agents who provided the Allies with crucial information about German testing of the V-1 and V-2 rockets during World War II?
  • … that Parks and Recreation star Amy Poehler wrote the script for the episode “The Fight“, the filming for which she called “the most fun I’ve ever had”?
  • … that Tom Sullivan is only the second head coach in UMBC Retrievers men’s basketball history to amass 100 career wins?
  • … that “unruly” diplomat Henry Labouchère was the first person to publish Truth in Britain?

On this Day……..

On this day…

May 23: Victoria Day in Canada (2011)

 
  • 1618 – In the Second Defenestration of Prague, Protestant members of the Bohemian aristocracy threw Catholic regents of Emperor Ferdinand II out the third-storey window of Prague Castle, precipitating the Thirty Years’ War.
  • 1701 – Scottish privateer William Kidd was executed for piracy.
  • 1844 – Siyyid `Alí-Muhammad Shírází proclaimed that he was “the Báb”, after a Shi`a religious concept, marking the beginning of the Bábí movement, the forerunner of the Bahá’í Faith.
  • 1934 – American criminals Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were ambushed and killed by police on a desolate road near their hideout in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.
  • 1945 – End of World War II in Europe: Reichspräsident Karl Dönitz was captured and his Flensburg Government was dissolved.
  • 2008 – To resolve a 29-year-old territorial dispute, the International Court of Justice awarded Middle Rocks to Malaysia and Pedra Branca to Singapore.

Seasons of the Witch! Ancient Holidays (and some not so ancient!)

 

Seasons of the Witch!   Ancient Holidays (and some not so ancient!)        
 
Live each Season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each. ~Henry David Thoreau (1817 – 1862)  
 
)0(  

 

Astronomy Day

 

Celebration of War Veterans Day – Azerbaijan

 

Child Care Provider Day

 

Day of Memory and Honour – Uzbekistan

 

Earls Court Day – Kansas, Virginia, Iowa, Wyoming, Minnesota

 

Feast of Artemis – Greek

 

Grand Bairam Holiday begins – Egypt

 

Green Man Festival

 

Joan of Arc Processions – France

 

Lemuria (Old Roman; Honors Ghosts of Dead without Family)

 

Lost Sock Memorial Day 

 

Memorial Day of Victims of World War II – Latvia

 

Military Spouses Appreciation Day

 

Mother’s Day – Belarus

 

National Bike To Work Day

 

National Butterscotch Brownie Day

 

National Heroes Day – Moldova

 

National Holiday – Czechoslovakia

 

National Night Shift Workers Day

 

National Teacher Day

 

National Third Shift Workers Day

 

School Family Day

 

St. Pachomius’ Day

 

VE Day – Bosnia-Herzegovina

 

Victory & Peace Day – Armenia

 

Victory Day – Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Montenegro, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine

 

 

 

Lemuria – The Romans set aside a week for appeasing the lemures (the ghosts of one’s ancestors). At midnight, the head of the household performed a ritual to summon hem, by washing his hands in spring water, casting away as many black beans as there were residents in the household, washing his hands again and clashing bronze cymbals to summon the ghosts. This ritual was repeated on the 11th and the 13th. Blackburn, Bonnie and Leofranc Holford-Strevens, Oxford Companion to the Year, Oxford University Press 1999 – Rufus, Anneli, The World Holiday Book, Harper San Francisco 1994
 
St Christopher – This saint, portrayed in the Eastern church as a man with the head of a dog, was supposedly descended from a legendary race of giants with human bodies and canine heads. When he converted to Christianity, he was given the name Christ-bearer to show he carried the divinity within. This became the source of the story of how he carried the Christ Child across a raging river in a storm, thus he is the patron of travellers, who often wear St Christopher medals for protection.

 

 

 

A French scholar, Saintyves, whose work is cited by McNeill, thought Christopher was a successor of Anubis, Hermes and Hercules. He notes that he has two festivals on May 9th (in the Eastern church) and July 25th (in the Western church) and that these dates correspond to the setting and rising of Sirius, the Dog Star.

 

 

 

At Guadalajara in Mexico, porters solicit the help of St Christopher with this prayer:

 

 

 

Dichoso Cristobalazo – Fortunate Great Christopher,
Santazo de cuerpo entero – mighty saint with sturdy body
Y no como otros santitos – and not like other saints
Que ni se ven en el cielo – Who aren’t even noticed in heaven.

 

 

 

Herucleo Cristobalazo – Herculean Great Christopher
Forzudo como un Sanson – brawny as a Samson
Con tu enorme cabezon – with your huge great head
Y tu nervoso pescuezo – and your sinewy neck

 

 

 

Hazme grueso y vigoroso – make me stout and strong
Hombrazo de cuerpo entero – a real man with sturdy body,
Y no come estos tipitos – and not like those feeble fellows
Que casi besan el suelo – who all but kiss the ground

 

 

Blackburn, Bonnie & Leofranc Holford-Strevens, The Oxford Companion to the Year, Oxford University Press 1999
MacNeill, Maire, The Festival of Lughnasa, Oxford University Press 1962

 

 

 

NOTE: Because of the large number of ancient calendars, many in simultaneous use, as well as different ways of computing holy days (marked by the annual inundation, the solar year, the lunar month, the rising of key stars, and other celestial and terrestrial events), you may find these holy days celebrated a few days earlier or later at your local temple .  

 

 
 

White and Black Magick

Magick is either positive or negative, depending on the intention of the Practitioner. Positive, white magick, brings beneficial things into your life. For example, making a talisman can bring you good luck. Negative, black magick, is used to harm people and cause negative events. Black witches use energies associated with the dark side. These negative energies aid dark, evil witches in their black magick, harmful works that are intended to bring bad luck and cause harm to the recipient.

Each of us enter The Craft do so of our own free-will and are given the choice: to go with the light or to go with the dark side. The choice is ultimately yours, but be warned, if you chose the dark side, it will eventually destroy you.

Choosing the dark side is similar to joining the mafia. Once you’re in, you’re a member for life. The initial appeal of the Dark Arts is the immediate sensation of power, but in the long-term, negativity eats at you much like it ate at Darth Vader in “Star Wars,” until he became so disfigured that he became a monster and no longer resembled a human being.

Those who subscribe to dark ways gave in to a dark polarity that at one time or another rears its ugly head in all of us. Those who adhere to positive magick represent the bright polarity, the polarity that balances the darkness and brings order to the chaos.

The light always overcomes the dark. The dawn always rises. If the darkness was more powerful and had the upper hand, then Adolph Hitler would have, without question, won World War II. But he didn’t. Those who practice the Dark Arts will find themselves on the losing end of things. A dark witch’s lack of success is due to negative energy’s preponderance to feed upon itself.

In the short run, practicing the Dark Arts will make you mean and vindictive because you have to build up a certain amount of negative energy to do black magick. This brings you some instant gratification, but in the long run you end up like Faust and darkness comes looking for your soul, at which point, you have no way out. When you turn to the darkness, you cannot turn back.