March

03/04/13 - NNHS Newsletter -
March Forth on the Fourth

“March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection.
March on, and fear not the thorns, or the sharp stones on life's path.”

- Kahlil Gibran
(06 Jan 1883 - 10 Apr 1931)

March

4: 11: 19: 27:

4: 11: 19: 27:

For the Trio Strauss used an older folk melody called „Alter Tanz aus Wien“ or „Tinerl-Lied“ in 3/4 time signature (named after a then popular singer). When Radetzky came back to Vienna after winning the battle of Custoza (1848), his soldiers were singing the then popular song. Allegedly Strauss heard this singing and included the melody, this time in 2/4 time signature, into the Radetzky march. ^[1]

When it was first played in front of Austrian officers they spontaneously clapped and stamped their feet when they heard the chorus. This tradition is kept alive today when the march is played in classical music venues in Vienna, among members of the audience who are familiar with the tradition. It is almost always played as the last piece at the Neujahrskonzert, the Vienna New Year Concert...

My Word

Miss Martin and Lou Gehrig

No. 3, Baseball’s First Iron Man

By Harry M. Covert

Usually on Thursdays in the spring, Miss Martin read Homer’s Iliad to her sixth graders at John W. Daniel School. The windows were raised and we little tykes hoped a breeze would flow through the room. We didn’t have air conditioning in 1950.

Miss Martin favored white tee-shirts all the time and looked exactly like Benjamin Franklin. No kidding. When I look at a $100 bill today, I see her staring right at me. If any of us 30-plus pupils had been caught misbehaving a bit, she didn’t keep us after class, which they could do easily in those days. Instead, she had her own clever punishment — three or four long-division arithmetic problems: dividing long numbers like 899,765,343 by 1487.

This was a challenge to a 10-year-old, especially if you had to turn them in the next morning. We were a bunch of sweet attentive boys and girls, seldom if ever drawing the ire of our teacher who never missed a day.

We loved the Iliad stories as Miss Martin read to us out loud. Usually once a month, she would give a little quiz, not for grades but to see if we were paying attention about Achilles and the Trojan Horse. If we needed a little help with the answers, she could show a soft side and help us.

Miss Martin came to my mind recently when Cal Ripken Jr. visited Frederick, Md.. Gehrig was the Yankees’ famed No. 4, the first iron man who played 2,130 consecutive games from June 1, 1925 to April 30, 1939. This record remained for 61 years until Cal broke it September 19, 1998, at 2,632.

On that day, July 4, 1939 Gehrig was forced to retire because of what we know today as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. He died at age 38 in 1941.

In Miss Martin’s class some 63 years ago, I remember vividly as we pulled out the Iliad for our afternoon session. She began in a pleasant reading manner. Today it seems she reached the Trojan Horse part when I slipped in front of my book, the 1942 orange-covered biography of Lou Gehrig. As she droned on, I forgot about the Iliad. I got lost in the story where little Lou went eel fishing for his mother in the World War I era. He’d bring home his catch, his mother would pickle them and then Lou returned to Second Avenue in East Harlem, New York City, to sell the goodies.

I “traveled” that afternoon with Lou as he grew to be a star football player at Columbia and then went on to became the baseball hero of the Yankees.

Suddenly, I heard a voice, “What page are you on?” Miss Martin roared. Naturally I thought she was talking to someone else. I stuttered a bit, tried to sneak Gehrig back in my lap. She kept on, “Can you tell me about the Trojans?” Fear struck at the moment. My classmates laughed.

In my book that afternoon it was 1932, not with the Greeks. Gehrig had just hit four home runs in a game against the Philadelphia Athletics, the first player to do so in the 20th century.

Miss Martin ordered me to the front of class. She seized my Gehrig book. My penalty was to collect all of the Homer’s Iliad books from the class.

She apparently forgot to give me the long-division problems. The next morning, she allowed us to go to the library. It was  Principal Thomas E. Baines who returned the Gehrig book to me. His advice was short and sweet: don’t read it in Miss Martin’s class.”

To this day I’ve never eaten eels. ©

   Thanks so much for this delightful tale, Harry! Strangely enough, I remember checking this book out of the Magruder School library and reading it myself, though I was in the fourth grade when I did it. It's strange because I had (if possible) a less than zero interest in baseball (except for my superb collection of pretty baseball cards, of course - a separate matter altogether).  I read it because my classmate Dave Sanders was enthralled with it (and with Gehrig himself), and gave a glowing book report on it.

   Dave was an interesting boy.  He spoke with a heavy Dutch accent.  His parents were survivors of the Holocaust, and he was their only child, their only precious child.  His mama was a strikingly beautiful woman, with long thick glossy black hair pulled into a perfect bun.  A couple of years later when we were in Mrs. Doris Huffer Hutton's band class, Dave sat next to me - I on my flute and he on his violin.  His parents would often appear at the open door of the band room, and just silently watch, rarely if ever diverting their eyes from him, as the treasure that he obviously was to them.  I've never forgotten the quiet eloquence of those moments, nor the force with which they touched me.

   The family moved somewhere or other before we reached the eighth grade.  I've often wondered about them. 

   "Anyone? Anyone?"

   OOOH! Thanks, Don - you're right, I do! Ennio Morricone's music is unforgettable, and this version by the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain is delightful!

http://www.ukuleleorchestra.com/main/home.aspx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukulele_Orchestra_of_Great_Britain

   Here are a couple more of their videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTIv8hP-UIA - Medley

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfK-UzQ48JE - Shaft

Old Farmer's Advice:

Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong.

Keep skunks and bankers at a distance.

Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.

A bumble bee is considerably faster than a John Deere tractor.

Words that soak into your ears are whispered... not yelled.

Meanness don't just happen overnight.

Forgive your enemies; it messes up their heads.

Do not corner something that you know is meaner than you.

It don't take a very big person to carry a grudge.

You cannot unsay a cruel word.

Every path has a few puddles.

When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.

The best sermons are lived, not preached.

Most of the stuff people worry about ain't never gonna happen anyway.

Don't judge folks by their relatives.

Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.

Live a good, honorable life... Then when you get older and think back, you'll enjoy it a second time.

Don't interfere with something that ain't bothering you none.

Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a Rain dance.

If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.

Sometimes you get, and sometimes you get got.

The biggest troublemaker you'll probably ever have to deal with, watches you from the mirror every morning.

Always drink upstream from the herd.

Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.

Lettin' the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier than putting it back in.

If you get to thinking you're a person of some influence, try ordering somebody else's dog around..

Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply.

Speak kindly. Leave the rest to God.

Don't pick a fight with an old man. If he is too old to fight, he'll just kill you.