Memorial Day: Still a War Between the States of Necessary Distraction
It was the expression those in the southern states called the Civil War, but a “War Between the States” still rages on about where the national holiday which resulted from that bloody conflict first started. In fact, just like the dispute… Read More ›
Recent Posts
-
First First Lady in Newsreels: Florence Harding’s Jazzy Moves & Love of Hollywood
-
Media Alert: Carl Anthony on C-Span First Ladies Show, Monday, May 20
As part of the extraordinarily weekly “First Ladies Show” series, I will be appearing as the guest on C-Span‘s episode this coming Monday evening, May 20. The two Administrations and three women who will be covered are: *Lucretia “Crete” Garfield,… Read More ›
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 6, At War with Newswomen
After sixteen years of waiting for a First Lady who again understood the professional needs of journalists, the Washington newswomen believed the former columnist Jackie Kennedy would be their new Eleanor Roosevelt. She wasn’t. In terms of generating almost… Read More ›
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 5, Intention & Achievement
According to her cousins Jack Davis and Edie Beale, young Jackie Bouvier always preferred the company of horses and dogs to people and would rather spend time along writing at the beach, rambling through the wild blueberry bushes than in… Read More ›
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 4, The Subversive Senate Wife
When Jackie Bouvier won Vogue magazine’s 1951 Prix-de-Paris essay contest, she later claimed that it had really been the edict of her mother which pressured her into ultimately turning down the prize of working as a junior editor at the… Read More ›
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Luncheon: Part 3, Reporter Bouvier on the Job
From her earliest years, she’d evinced a talent for acutely observing and analyzing how people behaved and interacted, and then writing about them, usually in essay or short-story form. Further, she often illustrated the more humorous tales she recounted with… Read More ›
Featured Categories
Dogs »
-
The Agoraphobic Dog: Fostercare Weimaraner #4, Baron The Dichotomus
March 25, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Dogged Influence on JFK Jr. & Canine-Themed Homes
March 1, 2013
-
The Dogs of Jackie O: Jacqueline Kennedy’s Lifetime of Canine Companions
February 28, 2013
-
To All Readers: Help These Dogs, Please.
December 29, 2012
-
Watching Whitmore: The ‘Frisco Whippet Who Brought Me Places
July 30, 2012
-
Insult Comic Dog Triumph Poised for 2012 Election
June 20, 2012
-
How A Dying Neighbor & Dying Dog Helped Each Other Live: The Tale of Snackhouse
June 3, 2012
-
A Dog hurt by Neglect: Fostercare Weimaraner #3, Beamer
June 2, 2012
-
A Dog Up For Fun: Fostercare Weimaraner #2: Weimy
June 1, 2012
-
A Dog on the Verge of Loss: Fostercare Weimaraner #1 Paddinginton
May 9, 2012
-
The White House Easter Egg Roll: Traditions, First Families & A Day for Dogs
April 4, 2012
-
Helping Yourself Help A Very Old Dog Live Longer and Well, Part II
November 14, 2011
-
Helping A Very Old Dog Live Longer and Well (Part 1)
November 11, 2011
-
The World’s Best Dog: A Tribute to Yeager the Weimaraner, 1995-2011
July 5, 2011
-
This Old Dog Dons the St. Paddy’s Green
March 16, 2011
-
An Old Dog’s Last Runyon Run? A Walk in the Park
February 9, 2011
-
When Is a Dog Old?
February 2, 2011
-
Reign of King Fido Enters Tenth Year
January 1, 2011
Facebook of the Famous »
-
Lindsay Lohan to Madame Curie: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
March 21, 2013
-
“Aunt Esther” to Queen Victoria: Three Degrees of Celebrity Separation!
May 25, 2012
-
Twilight’s Robert Pattinson & Taylor Lautner to Laurel & Hardy: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
May 3, 2012
-
Tupak Shakur to Minnie Pearl: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
April 22, 2012
-
Rick Santorum Linked to Satanic Marilyn Manson: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
February 23, 2012
-
Jackie O to Jolie: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
January 6, 2012
-
Sartre to Snookie: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
December 3, 2011
-
Evita to Elvis: Facebook of the Famous
November 30, 2011
-
Marilyn Monroe to Saddam Hussein to Brittany Spears: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
November 16, 2011
-
Mao to Fred Mertz: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
October 22, 2011
-
The Wright Brothers to the Kardashian Sisters: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
September 21, 2011
-
Abe Lincoln to Pee Wee Herman: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
August 31, 2011
-
Mao to Lady Gaga: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
August 19, 2011
-
Mae to Mao: Celebrity Degrees of Separation
August 9, 2011
First Families »
-
Obama’s Girls, Teddy’s Boys, Jackie Kennedy’s Kindergarten: School Tales of White House Kids
February 8, 2013
-
Bush Grandsons Entering Politics, Trying to Turn the Latino Vote Republican
February 1, 2013
-
President Grandpa: How The Lives of First Grandkids Play Out
January 31, 2013
-
What Happened to a Little Boy Who Defied the President?
January 24, 2013
-
Presidential Kids at the Inauguration
January 21, 2013
-
That Mysterious Woman at Obama’s Sunday Inaugural Ceremony & Historical Context
January 20, 2013
-
Ike’s Mid-Century Cold War Show & High Visibility Veep: The 1957 Sunday Inauguration, Part 6
January 10, 2013
-
A Day With No President & Lincoln’s Lost Coat: Zach Taylor’s 1849 Sunday Inauguration, Part 3
January 7, 2013
-
Monroe’s Inaudible Address & a Small Ball: The 1817 Sunday Inauguration, Part 2
January 6, 2013
-
Five First Families Celebrate New Year’s Eve
December 29, 2012
-
Christmas at the White House: First Families at Home for the Holiday, Part 4
December 10, 2012
-
Christmas at the White House: First Families & Holiday Charities, Part 3
December 8, 2012
-
Christmas at the White House: Trees, Gingerbread Houses, Mennorahs, Celebrity Santas & Other Innovations, Part 2
December 6, 2012
-
Christmas at the White House: The President’s Presents, Shopping, Giving & Getting Gifts, Part 1 of 4
December 5, 2012
-
Thanks to Presidents Giving Us Turkey Day & Pictures of First Family Thanksgivings
November 20, 2012
-
Ten Election Day Moments of Presidential Families
November 6, 2012
-
White House Halloweens: Jackie Kennedy, FDR, Reagan, Hillary & More in Costume
October 21, 2012
-
Swedish Roots: Mamie Eisenhower’s Iowa-Sprung Ancestry
September 20, 2012
-
A First Lady’s Princess Complex: Royalty, Racism & Edith Wilson’s Pocahontas Blood
September 18, 2012
-
Pat Nixon: First-Generation German-American & Her Lincoln Assassination Link
September 7, 2012
-
Ann Romney’s Atheist Immigrant Father & What Hillary Clinton Shares With Her
August 28, 2012
-
When Ann Romney & Michelle Obama Sat Down To Talk
August 27, 2012
-
Blond Bigotry, Anti-Semitism & Why a Candidate’s Wife Fabricated Her Family
August 11, 2012
-
Inside the Winter White House: The 70s Nixon Florida Home
July 20, 2012
-
Eleanor Roosevelt’s Mysteriously Missing Grandfather & was she part-Italian?
July 2, 2012
-
Keep Grandma Upstairs: Jackie Kennedy’s Family Secrets & The Lie Her Mother Told
July 1, 2012
-
Michelle Obama’s Slave Ancestry, Ann Romney’s Atheist Immigrant Father & Presidential Identity Politics
June 27, 2012
-
When Mitt Romney’s Father Ran For President
October 14, 2011
-
The Inside on the Ex-President: Always Centered
January 16, 2011
First Ladies »
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 6, At War with Newswomen
May 16, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 5, Intention & Achievement
May 9, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 4, The Subversive Senate Wife
May 7, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Luncheon: Part 3, Reporter Bouvier on the Job
May 2, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part 2, Covering First Ladies
April 30, 2013
-
Jackie Kennedy’s Mid-Century Modern Luncheon: Part I, The Kodachrome Years
April 26, 2013
-
Michelle Obama’s Chicago Speech in Historic Context
April 12, 2013
-
First Photographed First Lady: A Girl Elopes with the President & Brands Her Image
March 27, 2013
-
The first First Lady to Doll a Magazine Cover: “Hello…..Mrs. Madison.”
March 6, 2013
-
The Reagans Host Old Hollywood & New “Royalty” at the White House
February 24, 2013
-
The Untold Mary Lincoln Story Spielberg Couldn’t Show & None Seem to Know
February 22, 2013
-
The Earliest First Lady’s Recorded Voice: Theodore Roosevelt’s wife Edith Speaks
February 15, 2013
-
A First Lady Fears She Wouldn’t Shut Up: Abigail “Mrs. President” Adams, January 29, 1797
January 29, 2013
-
At the Heart of Hillary Clinton: A First Lady of the World’s Core Values
January 27, 2013
-
A Short History of First Lady Hair’Dos & its Big Bang Theory
January 24, 2013
-
Masses Crowd Two Centuries of Inaugural Balls
January 16, 2013
-
The Very First Inaugural Ball: Hot for Her, Not for Him
January 16, 2013
-
Bomb Threats, Suffragists & Wilson’s Broken Pledge: The 1917 Sunday Inauguration, Part 5
January 9, 2013
-
The Secret Ceremony of Hayes & a First Lady Who Wouldn’t Leave: The 1877 Sunday Inauguration, Part 4
January 9, 2013
-
A Centennial Gallery of Lady Bird Johnson & her “First Ladies Sorority”
December 22, 2012
-
Mamie Cakes: The First Lady Who Showed A Nation How to Birthday Party
November 14, 2012
-
The Grandsons of Bobby, Jack & Jackie Kennedy: A New Political Generation
November 7, 2012
-
Promising Chickens, Delivering an Egg: Food Helps Hoover Win Election
November 3, 2012
-
How the Michelle Obama & Ann Romney Cookie Contest Started: Blame Mrs. Harrison’s Pigs-in-a-Blanket
October 5, 2012
-
“Beerack” Obama’s Home Brew is Latest Chapter In Presidential Booze Story
September 30, 2012
-
The First President To Win With Actors: Al Jolson’s 1920 Campaign Song for Harding
September 26, 2012
-
Dynasty to Fantasy Island: An Eighties TV Star Galaxy at Ronald Reagan’s White House
September 5, 2012
-
The Road to Michelle Obama’s Convention Speech: The First Ladies & Candidates’ Wives Before Her
September 4, 2012
-
Why a First Lady Cashed In: Eleanor Roosevelt & The Equal Rights of Margarine
August 25, 2012
-
My Chats with Gore Vidal on the Presidents & First Ladies
August 13, 2012
Holidays »
-
Memorial Day: Still a War Between the States of Necessary Distraction
May 22, 2013
-
Happy Easter: Sponsored by Nature, in Blue & Purple
March 31, 2013
-
Secret Black Sheep Peep? Easter Candy Mystery, Scandal & Father of the Jellybean
March 30, 2013
-
Indy-Chinese New Year: Early Chinese-Americans & The Holiday, Hooiser Style
February 13, 2013
-
Mobile Mardi Gras: Alabama’s French Catholic Holiday First-in-the-Nation
February 12, 2013
-
The Greek Epiphany Day…in Florida
January 3, 2013
-
The Armistice, A Day My Grandfather Never Surrendered
November 12, 2012
-
McGuire or Maguire: Who Fathered Labor Day?
September 3, 2012
-
Red, White & Betsy Ross: No, She Didn’t! (Did She?) Plus Bizarre Betsyabilia
July 3, 2012
-
A Daughter’s Fight for Father’s Day & Why It Made Men Grumble
June 16, 2012
-
Flagging the Lost Holiday that Was Today & A Gallery of past Flag Day Joys
June 14, 2012
-
The Mad Men Era White House Easter Egg Roll, 1961
April 6, 2012
-
Lincoln Son’s Concern for Disabled Boy Starts White House Easter Egg Roll
April 5, 2012
-
Jack and Jackie Kennedy Home Movies & Pictures of their Presidential Easters
April 3, 2012
-
What Were Those Leprechauns Thinking?
March 17, 2012
-
New Evidence Tells Truth of George Washington’s Cherry Tree Tale
February 20, 2012
-
Kitschy, Kitschy Cute: Interpreting Old Valentine’s Day Vases
February 14, 2012
-
The White House New Year’s Day Reception: Good Riddance to a Miserable Tradition
January 1, 2012
-
Old-School New Year’s Day Food: From the South, North or Midwest – its Imported
December 30, 2011
-
Sex Lives of the Pilgrims: Girls Gone Wild, Gay Guys, An Orgy, Incest & Goodwives Chasing Native Men
November 23, 2011
-
Cracking Plymouth Rock
November 23, 2011
-
The Four Best Presidential Pumpkin Pies: From the first Adams and Johnson, Ike & Reagan
November 20, 2011
-
Mother’s Day, the Guilty Daughter and Mamma’s-Boy President Behind It
May 8, 2011
-
Earliest Image of St. Patrick’s Day Parade in New York, Recently Discovered?
March 17, 2011
Hollywood Meets Washington »
-
Another First Lady at the Oscars (& President & First Daughter)
February 24, 2013
-
Chaplin, Streisand, Sinatra & More: The Inaugural Gala That Was
January 18, 2013
-
Reagan’s 1985 Big Chill Sunday Inauguration with Videos, Part 7
January 11, 2013
-
Obama Rescues Campaign Tradition: Vote for President…with the Best Music
October 24, 2012
-
Fighting Bigotry Shaped Truman’s 1948 Campaign Tunes (& Carmen Miranda Sang One)
October 8, 2012
-
Cool but Contemplative: Jolson Jazzes with Coolidge’s 1924 Campaign Song
September 27, 2012
-
Sinatra at Jack’s Back: The John F. Kennedy 1960 Campaign Song
September 24, 2012
-
Bill Clinton’s Song: He Never Stops Thinking ‘Bout….
September 6, 2012
-
Ike, Irving, Mamie & Merman: The Hit Song Which Elected a President
August 2, 2012
-
Ronald Reagan & Bette Davis: Politically Oppositional Co-Stars
July 26, 2012
-
Miami Golf and UFOs? Why Jackie Gleason Campaigned for Nixon and a Shocking Allegation
July 19, 2012
-
Reagan Campaigns for Truman
June 28, 2012
-
JFK with the World’s Hottest Actresses and….Hazel the Maid?!
June 17, 2012
-
Super-Seventies Movie! The Nixons & John Wayne, the Gabors, Mary Tyler Moore, Glen Campbell, Lawrence Welk & More!
May 26, 2012
-
Other Photos & Stars from Marilyn Monroe’s Happy Birthday Night to JFK & His Reaction
May 19, 2012
-
The Most Shocking Truth About JFK & Marilyn Monroe?
May 18, 2012
-
Jackie’s Husband & the Onassis Mistress: When John F. Kennedy and Maria Callas Got Together (and Marilyn Monroe)
May 14, 2012
-
Silent Cal & The Silent Era Cowboy: Coolidge Mix with Tom
May 6, 2012
-
“Hello Lyndon!” How Carol Channing Helped LBJ Win the Election
April 13, 2012
-
George & George Clooney & Bush, Wars & Hurricanes
February 26, 2012
-
First Ladies & Actresses Who Played Them: Vote Your Favorite
February 25, 2012
-
Those Liberal Aristocrats Katharine Hepburn & Franklin D. Roosevelt
January 29, 2012
-
The Del Rubio Triplets in Go-Go Boots & Mrs. Woodrow Wilson in Gloves
January 20, 2012
-
Jimmy Carter and Marcel Marceau: Nothing to Say
January 2, 2012
-
Gemini Twins Jack Kennedy and Judy Garland
November 18, 2011
-
Mamie & Mame, The Rosalind Russell – Mamie Eisenhower Friendship
October 15, 2011
-
Nancy Reagan & Gary Coleman…and Clint Eastwood, Tom Selleck & Brooke Shields
September 23, 2011
-
Harry Truman & Tallulah Bankhead Bond over Bourbon…and Civil Rights, Part II
August 26, 2011
-
Harry Truman & Tallulah Bankhead Bond over Bourbon…and Civil Rights
August 22, 2011
-
Playing Presidents: The Actor JFK (and Jackie) wanted to Play him in the Movies, Part III
April 7, 2011
Legends »
-
Felix Baumgartner Left Earth Today to Free-Fall Thru the Sound Barrier…And History
October 14, 2012
-
Mae West Nude, Getting Naked, Fighting Father Time…and Living
August 14, 2012
-
Mae Day 1966: 72-Year Old Mae West Decides to Rock and Roll
May 1, 2012
-
The Greatest Forgotten Celebrity: What Did Admiral Dewey Do?
March 7, 2012
-
The Duke of Surfing Who Got the Queen Mother to Hula
August 24, 2011
-
The Heroic Astronaut: John Glenn is 90 Years Old Today
July 18, 2011
Pies of the States »
-
Lime, Salt & Peggy Lee: The Texas Margarita Pie
July 6, 2012
-
Orange Pie Here I Come: California’s Sweetest Slice of Sun
June 13, 2012
-
Hoosier Sugar Cream Finger Pie, from the Indy 500 to the Quakers: Pies of the States
May 28, 2012
-
Tennessee’s Jack & Mary Fudge Pie
May 12, 2012
-
The Saucy Pie of Granite State Skinflints
April 10, 2012
-
Marion Berry: Not the DC Mayor, the Oregon Pie
March 10, 2012
-
Gooseberry, Fool?! No, Pie – from Pennsylvania
January 31, 2011
Presidents »
-
The Double Rarity of Obama’s 2013 Sunday Second Inauguration, Part 1
January 4, 2013
-
Who Won This Election? You Might Be Surprised
November 6, 2012
-
Peanut, Big Mac & Jelly Bean: The Brief Era of Presidential Campaign Snacks
November 5, 2012
-
The Drunk Vote: Harrison Hard Cider vs. Van Buren Champagne in 1840 Election
November 2, 2012
-
Yes He Did: Originality Returns with 2008 Obama Campaign Music
October 19, 2012
-
The Twinges and Twang of George W. Bush’s 2000 & 2004 Campaign Music
October 15, 2012
-
The Echo & Dissonance of George Bush’s 1988 Campaign Music
October 13, 2012
-
A Reagan Country Song & California Classic by ABBA: His 1980 & 1984 Campaign Music
October 11, 2012
-
Nixon Then, Nixon Now, Connie Francis & His Changing Campaign Songs from 1960 to 1972
October 4, 2012
-
FDR’s Four-Times Happy Campaign Song & A Home Movie Showing Him Paralyzed
October 1, 2012
-
The Engineered Beat of Herbert Hoover’s 1928 Campaign Song
September 28, 2012
-
The First President Captured on Film: McKinley’s 1896 Campaign Song & Commercial
September 14, 2012
-
When Three Presidents Ran Against Each Other But Whiskey Won the Election: The 1912 Campaign Songs of Teddy Roosevelt, Taft & Wilson
September 12, 2012
-
Jimmy Carter’s Green “Country” Brand: His 1976 Campaign Song
September 10, 2012
-
The Last Original Campaign Song: Jerry Ford’s Bicentennial Tune
August 16, 2012
-
The Caricature-Building Comments of Ann Romney & Michelle Obama in Context
July 23, 2012
-
Washington & Monroe: No Love Lost Between the First & Last of the Virginia Dynasty
July 17, 2012
-
McKinley & Roosevelt: Teddy’s Crack Behind Mack’s Back, Egotism & Death
July 13, 2012
-
What Franklin Roosevelt & Harry Truman Thought of Each Other
June 25, 2012
-
The Munching President
June 22, 2012
-
Two Legitimate First-Generation Presidential Candidates For the First Time in History: Obama & Romney
June 15, 2012
-
Keeping Clean with the Presidents
June 9, 2012
-
The Dancing President
May 30, 2012
-
The first First Lady’s first Day
May 27, 2012
-
Coffee Break With the Presidents
April 16, 2012
-
The First Lady a Nation Never Knew: Pat Nixon in Private Taped Phone Calls & 100 Pictures on Her Centennial
March 16, 2012
-
Drinking & Smoking With the Presidents
March 2, 2012
-
George Washington’s Birthday: He Spent it Dancing
February 17, 2012
-
Presidential Princess Alice Roosevelt Longworth, Her Little Thank You Note & A Rare Recording of Her Voice
February 12, 2012
-
Jerry & Betty Ford’s Desert House: Time to Preserve It
February 9, 2012
