Sunday, July 11, 2010

A Gem of a Website


Head over to Bijou Follies for a wonderful collection of articles, recipes, photos, and more from vintage movie magazines. The magazines are divided into sections from the 20's to the 60's. Discover Bette Davis's recipe for Boston Baked Beans, gossip columns, an article by Humphrey Bogart defending Lauren Bacall, audio clips, and so much more. It's a treasure chest of classic movie goodness!

Sunday, July 4, 2010

July 4, 1942

Happy 4th of July everyone! I hope you all had a wonderful and meaningful holiday. My mom and I hosted a farewell party for a young man at our church — he's leaving July 6th for basic training. I don't think there could have been a better day to honor his entering the army. It really reinforced the meaning of this holiday, and reminded me yet again of all the brave men and women who fight to keep our nation free.

While trying to come up with a post for today, I came across President Roosevelt's Address for July 4, 1942. I found it very powerful, and it still hits close to home. We aren't fighting WWII, but we still face so many threats to our freedoms. And we still have soldiers who are sacrificing their lives for "the assurance of the right to liberty under God--for all peoples and races and groups and nations, everywhere in the world."

July 4, 1942
President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Address

For 166 years this Fourth Day of July has been a symbol to the people of our country of the democratic freedom which our citizens claim as their precious birthright. On this grim anniversary its meaning has spread over the entire globe--focusing the attention of the world upon the modern freedoms for which all the United Nations are now engaged in deadly war.

On the desert sands of Africa, along the thousands of miles of battle lines in Russia, in New Zealand and Australia, and the islands of the Pacific, in war-torn China and all over the seven seas, free men are fighting desperately--and dying--to preserve the liberties and the decencies of modern civilization. And in the overrun and occupied nations of the world, this day is filled with added significance, coming at a time when freedom and religion have been attacked and trampled upon by tyrannies unequaled in human history.

Never since it first was created in Philadelphia, has this anniversary come in times so dangerous to everything for which it stands. We celebrate it this year, not in the fireworks of make-believe but in the death-dealing reality of tanks and planes and guns and ships. We celebrate it also by running without interruption the assembly lines which turn out these weapons to be shipped to all the embattled points of the globe. Not to waste one hour, not to stop one shot, not to hold back one blow--that is the way to mark our great national holiday in this year of 1942.

To the weary, hungry, unequipped Army of the American Revolution, the Fourth of July was a tonic of hope and inspiration. So is it now. The tough, grim men who fight for freedom in this dark hour take heart in its message--the assurance of the right to liberty under God--for all peoples and races and groups and nations, everywhere in the world.

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