They built a time machine in Manhattan. And it is fantastic. Just fantastic.
We should see to it that every elevator has this technology.
Speaking of going back in time, journalist Ernie Pyle was killed this week in 1945. He was the kind of journalist I want to be when I grow up — the traveling all over the country and meeting people and writing about them part, not the war zone part. But Pyle could write about war. He could write about loss. He could write about minutiae in the face of tragedy. And he could write about regular people. He could write about anything.
I’d never heard this story about the piece that inspired a young Pyle:
If any one thing inspired him, during this period, it was Kirke Simpson’s news story on the burial of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington Cemetery. Simpson was an Associated Press reporter.
“I cried over that,” Pyle told friends later, “and I can quote the lead or almost any part of the piece.”
Kirke Simpson, as an old AP man, won the Pulitzer for the piece Pyle was talking about, the first wire service writer to win the Prize. And that piece is an incredible piece of literature and history. The lead Pyle mentions:
Under the wide and starry skies of his own homeland America’s unknown dead from France sleeps tonight, a soldier home from the wars.
Alone, he lies in the narrow cell of stone that guards his body; but his soul has entered into the spirit that is America. Wherever liberty is held close in men’s hearts, the honor and the glory and the pledge of high endeavor poured out over this nameless one of fame will be told and sung by Americans for all time.
Toward the end:
Through the religious services that followed, and prayers, the swelling crowd sat motionless until it rose to join in the old, consoling Rock of Ages, and the last rite for the dead was at hand. Lifted by his hero-bearers from the stage, the unknown was carried in his flag-wrapped, simple coffin out to the wide sweep of the terrace. The bearers laid the sleeper down above the crypt, on which had been placed a little soil of France. The dust his blood helped redeem from alien hands will mingle with his dust as time marches by.
The simple words of the burial ritual were said by Bishop Brent; flowers from war mothers of America and England were laid in place.
In between, and after, is a journalistic tour de force. They should read that at the tomb every Veteran’s Day.
There are photographs and more AP copy from the ceremonies here.
Something fun … this is at Birmingham’s WBRC. Mickey Ferguson is the weatherman. Swell guy, lots of fun. Wonderfully comical. And this other gentleman stole the show:
And also this, which brings two of my favorite themes together: the kids are alright and we live in the future:
Finally, spring at Samford is a wonderful time to be on campus. Here’s an example from earlier this afternoon:
Not bad, huh? Hope it is a lovely spring wherever you are.
