Miscellany
Having surrendered at the Appomattox Court House earlier that year, Gen. Robert E. Lee in 1865 became the president of Washington College—now Washington & Lee University—where he suggested, “The study of the mother tongue in any country is an important element of polite education, and is moreover valuable for its practical utility and necessary relation to other branches of learning.” He established in 1869 a chair in English language and literature, the first of its kind in the United States.
Miscellany
In July 1947, a U.S. Army spokesman in Roswell, New Mexico, issued a press release to announce that the military had found a “flying disc” that had landed at a ranch near an air base. “It was inspected at the Roswell Army Air Field,” according to the army, “and subsequently loaned to higher headquarters.” There were no further public statements about the matter.
Miscellany
Noah Webster, creator of the first widely used American English dictionary, wrote that “the English, neglecting the beauty and regularity of their own language, adopt foreign words in their foreign spelling; thus incommoding all ordinary readers among their own citizens, and multiplying anomalies, till the orthography of their language falls little short of the confusion of tongues at Babel.”
Miscellany
In 1710 the mayor of Albany, New York, presented four American Indian chiefs at the court of Queen Anne in London. Along with their visit to Buckingham Palace, the Mohawk and Mohican men attended a performance of Macbeth at the Queen’s Theater in Haymarket. The performance was interrupted by the audience, which demanded to see the faces of the visiting chiefs.
Pages
