Friday :: 03 July 2009 :: 09:20 PM
175 days to Christmas!
Fourth Of July Fact
Why do we celebrate Independence Day on July 4?
All kinds of history books and reference books will explain that the federal holiday celebrates the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, declaring our independence from Great Britain. However, while that day is celebrated as the day of independence, it really is not. Our nation officially became independent on Sept. 3, 1783, when the British King George III and the American leaders signed the Treaty of Paris.
-- from Land Line magazine, published by OOIDA. July 2007 page 106.
This next commentary is from the same magazine and page. It is an excerpt from an article by Pete Rigney, the Silver Fox:
". . . Every time I read the original document [Ed - Declaration of Independence], I get goose bumps. I think about a little remembered delegate named Richard Henry Lee, a farmer from Westmoreland County, VA. Lee took on the whole British Empire when he introduced a motion that declared we were free from all allegiance to the British Crown on June 7, 1776. Talk about guts!
"John Adams seconded the motion. Thomas Jefferson penned the first draft based on Lee's outline. Ben Franklin and Adams made a few more changes and we were on our way with the noble experiment. Eventually we would become the most powerful nation in the world.
"Thank you, Richard Henry Lee. Thank you, signers who put it on the line for all of us. . ."
Random Humor: Another Court Room Joke
A hiker was lost in the woods for days and hungry when finally he snags a bald eagle, up and cooks it and starts to eat when suddenly an officer walks up to him. The officer listens to his story but responds that even under the circumstances he is still obligated to arrest the man.
Standing before the judge the man pleads his case explaining that he is starving and the kill was only for survival.
In sympathy the judge responds, "I really shouldn't let you go unpunished, but I am taken by your situation and am inclined to show you mercy. Case dismiss. Now tell me, I'm curious, what does a bald eagle taste like?"
"Well, your honor, it tastes kinda halfway between a California condor and a spotted owl."