What's Past is Prologue
banner
wpip.bsky.social
What's Past is Prologue
@wpip.bsky.social
[Dave Woodbury] — Exploring history & historic sites (mainly American Civil War, & the West—Woodbury Historical Tours: whtours.org). Host of the Central Coast Conference, Monterey, CA (https://tinyurl.com/bdd6h6w2). Happily ensconced on the Left Coast.
Pinned
REGISTRATION NOW OPEN
3rd Central Coast Conference
SELDOM HEARD HISTORY of the CIVIL WAR ERA
Stanton Center, Monterey, California, May 1-3, 2026
Enjoy a full weekend of presentations by a stellar lineup of historians, exploring fresh perspectives on the American Civil War. tinyurl.com/3k5t6tfx
— Lotta Crabtree —
She started out in the rough and tumble mining camps of California's Gold Country, gained fame in San Francisco, and took New York City by storm. There was a time when she was the wealthiest, and most famous actress in America. She retired at age 45 and lived to be 76 [c1868, LoC]
November 25, 2025 at 3:22 AM
ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES was published on this date in 1859. First editions can still be found, but they're a little pricey. A free internet version can be read on this website, and others. #Booksky 💙📚https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1228/1228-h/1228-h.htm
November 24, 2025 at 8:59 PM
"A" is for . . .
Abandoned Adobe Abode
(San Miguel, New Mexico)
November 23, 2025 at 8:16 PM
162nd anniversary of the Battles for Chattanooga
RANGER-LED AND HISTORIAN-LED TOURS
www.nps.gov/chch/novembe...
Special Programs - Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - Chickamauga & Chattanooga National Military Park (U.S. National Park Service)
www.nps.gov
November 23, 2025 at 8:08 PM
John F. Kennedy was the youngest person to be elected president of the United States (age 43 when elected in 1960). He was murdered OTD in 1963, at age 46.

Portrait: Elaine de Kooning / Oil on canvas, 1963 / National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution / © 1963 Elaine de Kooning Trust
November 22, 2025 at 9:20 PM
Reposted by What's Past is Prologue
Socialism is what they called public power.

Socialism is what they called social security.

Socialism is what they called the growth of free and independent labor organizations.

Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people.

—Harry Truman, 1952
November 21, 2025 at 5:15 PM
Little Round Top rehabilitated
Little Round Top Restored
Recent rehabilitation of this important site at the Gettysburg battlefield provides a much improved experience for visitors.
www.americanheritage.com
November 21, 2025 at 12:14 AM
OTD 56 years ago

The official crew insignia for Apollo 12, the United States’ second lunar landing mission. The clipper ship signifies that the crew is all Navy and symbolically relates the era of the clipper ship to the era of space flight [NASA] tinyurl.com/2zxr8kxj
November 19, 2025 at 7:48 PM
OTD in 1863, 162 years ago, Honest Abe delivered the #GettysburgAddress. The American experiment survived a great civil war, and it seemed there could be no greater test, until now.

[photo: detail from the copy Lincoln gave to his secretary, John Hay, one of two copies in the Library of Congress]
November 19, 2025 at 6:52 PM
O, it sets my hart a-clickin’ like the tickin’ of a clock,
When the [squirrel] is [in] the punkin and the fodder’s in the shock!
November 19, 2025 at 3:46 AM
—how history unfolds: "People weave a web of meaning, believe in it with all their heart, but sooner or later the web unravels, and when we look back we cannot understand how anybody could have taken it seriously" —Yuval Noah Harari, Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow [Kepler's, 2017] #BookSky💙📚
November 17, 2025 at 7:52 PM
“Whatever you're meant to do, do it now. The conditions are always impossible.” ― Doris Lessing (1919-2013)

Doris Lessing
by Leonard William McComb
oil on canvas, 1999
© National Portrait Gallery, London

www.npg.org.uk/collections/...
November 17, 2025 at 7:35 PM
Reposted by What's Past is Prologue
Among the reasons Americans risked it all to get rid of a tyrannical king:
“He has obstructed the Admin of Justice…made Judges dependent on his Will…sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people…kept among us Standing Armies w/o legislatures’ Consent” www.americaamerica.news/p/what-we-sh...
What We Should Demand, What We Should Oppose
Reflecting on a president's obligations and what history tells us about rejecting tyranny and injustice
www.americaamerica.news
October 13, 2025 at 2:08 PM
— November 14 was Mamie's birthday — [Pictured: future First Lady Mamie Doud #Eisenhower, age 17. National Archives]
November 16, 2025 at 10:29 PM
OTD in 1864, William Tecumseh Sherman left Atlanta in flames, and began his March to the Sea. He promised Grant: "I can make this march and make Georgia howl!" The march, and his subsequent Carolinas Campaign, helped hasten the end of the Great Slaveholders' Rebellion. [image: by F.O.C. Darley, LoC]
November 16, 2025 at 12:27 AM
Reposted by What's Past is Prologue
@dumbbeezie.bsky.social made me think of you
A good soul under all that anger
November 14, 2025 at 6:42 AM
Patti at Moe's
#BookSky 💙📚
November 12, 2025 at 7:02 PM
Reposted by What's Past is Prologue
Book of the Day: Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong

Click here to learn more about today’s book!
Book of the Day: Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong
Click here to learn more about today’s book!
blackbirdsflight.com
November 10, 2025 at 4:14 AM
nothing to see here
November 8, 2025 at 7:03 AM
The dawning of the MAGA era arms race . . . Things are about to get messy.
November 7, 2025 at 10:04 PM
Sunrise on #Alcatraz
November 7, 2025 at 8:09 PM
Remember
Remember, the Fifth of November
Remember (Remastered 2010)
YouTube video by John Lennon - Topic
youtu.be
November 6, 2025 at 3:10 AM
SLAVERY caused a fatal rift from the start of the nation. Madison wrote: "[It's] well understood that the real difference of interests lies not between the large and small but between the northern and southern states. The institution of slavery and its consequences form the line of discrimination."
Slavery, the Constitution, and a Lasting Legacy - Montpelier
Slavery, the Constitution, and a Lasting Legacy We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defenc...
www.montpelier.org
November 3, 2025 at 11:54 PM
Happy Halloween!
November 1, 2025 at 2:56 AM
3rd Central Coast Conference
SELDOM HEARD HISTORY
of the CIVIL WAR ERA
Stanton Center, Monterey, CA
May 1-3, 2026

A weekend of presentations exploring fresh perspectives on the American Civil War.

EARLY REGISTRATION DISCOUNT
until November 15 — tinyurl.com/3k5t6tfx
October 30, 2025 at 7:12 AM