H&I* Fires, 03 MAY 2007

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You're advertising here, we should get an ad at your place...
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Chief, looks like you need to get yourself some singles and a comfy chair, again. Stat.
(Hubert still has that phat sound system me and the zombies put into it, right? 'Bad Girl' is still in the tape deck?)
--
Bay and Carter continue their sparring here and here.
--ry

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The Armorer travels to DC today, which includes a meeting with our congressional Representative, Nancy Boyda this afternoon, followed by a small gathering this evening of friends in the area. I've got to pack and head out, so I'll leave you with these two milestones of WWII:

Stewart Clah

TSE' DAA' KAAN, N.M. (AP) _ Stewart Clah, a Navajo code talker who helped confound the Japanese during World War II and was awarded a Congressional Silver Medal, has died. He was 87.

Clah's family said he died Sunday in his sleep at his home in Tse' Daa' Kaan, an agricultural community in northwestern New Mexico.

The code talkers were an elite group of Navajo Marines who transmitted radio messages during the war in a coded version of their native language. The codes were never cracked by enemy forces; the talkers' existence was a military secret for decades after the war ended.

Twenty-nine original Navajo code talkers _ the first group to graduate from training _ were presented with the Congressional Gold Medal by President Bush in 2001. Others among the more than 300 Navajos who qualified as code talkers received the Congressional Silver Medal.

Louis G. Hill Jr.

SARASOTA, Fla. (AP) _ Louis G. Hill Jr., one of the Tuskegee Airmen who were the nation's first black military pilots, has died. He was 90.

Hill died April 25 of complications from a stroke, said his wife, Vilma.

He joined the Army in September 1941, three months before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. He later joined the Air Force program for black pilots in Tuskegee, Ala., and earned his wings in 1944, his wife said.

She said her husband was a B-25 bomber pilot and flight leader, but World War II ended before his unit deployed.

At the time he joined the military, white officers and enlisted men refused to salute the black officers, turning their heads instead, Vilma Hill said.

While he was attending officer candidate school at Camp Lee, Va., Louis Hill and 11 other black students decided not to sit together during meals as assigned. Instead, they took seats with white students in an attempt to integrate the hall, Vilma Hill said.

After the war, her husband taught high school English, chemistry and physics and lectured about his experience as a Tuskegee Airman, she said.

Both men pioneers for their people, who served *all* of us, and we do well to remember it.

Now is the time at Castle Argghhh! when we dance: In Memoriam.

H/t, Mike L. -the Armorer

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“SWWBO sez I have a better voice than Burl...”

Let’s go to the audio tape!
Armorer(on Hugh Hewitt).
Burl Ives.

Call 1-800-Cstl-John if you think the Armorer is better sounding.
Call 1-800-Cstl-Burl if you love Burl Ives.
(A 55 cent charge will apply per call. Proceeds go to feeding the moat monsters and keeping ry in stock of cheetos.)
--ry
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