Posts by Rick Chromey
Columbine Shootings Begin New Era
TweetShareShare Today is a day that will live in infamy for the Personal Computer/Cellphone (b. 1980 – 2000) and Net (b. 1990 – 2010) generations. Also commonly known as “Millennials,” the tragic school shooting in Columbine was the beginning of several that would tattoo these generations. From a kindergarten in Sandy Hook to a high…
Read MoreThe American Revolution Begins!
TweetShareShare Today was the day that America had enough. A single shot set off a revolution that changed thirteen colonies into thirteen “united states of America.” It also changed the world. In a year dozens of founding fathers would gather to formally declare independence from Great Britain (July 4, 1776). The American story was just…
Read MoreBaseball’s First Pitch!
TweetShareShare Although connected to British games like “rounders” and cricket, American baseball was a novelty. A boys game that men played on a “field” in the cities. It’s a game without a clock. A game of “threes” and “three squared” (bases, outs, innings, players). It’s the only game where the defense controls the ball. It’s…
Read MoreWalter Cronkite Debuts!
TweetShareShare If you grew up in the 1960s and 1970s, television anchor news was summed up in a few names…Brinkley, Smith, Rather, Reasoner…and “Uncle Walter” Cronkite. Cronkite proved the most trusted and durable. He was there for Kennedy’s assassination and man’s moon walk. He was there for the civil rights and women’s rights movement. He…
Read MoreBoston Marathon Bombings!
TweetShareShare A terrorist attack by two Muslim young men upon one of America’s greatest sports traditions instilled new fears into a culture still recovering from September 11, 2001. The reality is the Net (1990 – 2010) and iTech (2000 – 2020) generations have grown up in an age of domestic terror. From Oklahoma City to…
Read MoreThe First McDonalds Restaurant Opens!
TweetShareShare “Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame seed bun.” This famous 1970s commercial ditty put McDonalds on the map, helped by the clown Ronald McDonald, the Hamburglar and, for the Millennial generation, PlayLands. Today the “golden arches” are one of America’s most iconic visual brands. And it all…
Read MoreJackie Robinson Makes a Hit!
TweetShareShare In 1947, in many U.S. places (from Birmingham to Philadelphia, Cincinnati to Little Rock), black Americans were segregated into “ghettos” and separated in public life. In the South, especially, blacks had to use different bathrooms, eat at different restaurants (or on different chairs), sleep at different hotels, ride at the back of the bus,…
Read MoreThe Dust Bowl Cometh
TweetShareShare The “Dust Bowl” got its name on this date (a.k.a. “Black Sunday”) when a huge windstorm blanketed the midwest. America was in the heart of a Great Depression at the time. Could life be more miserable? The Dust Bowl would have one benefactor: California. With news of work and a better life in the…
Read MoreTitanic Sinks!
TweetShareShare The sinking of the Titanic was a huge blow to industrial science and the promise of machines making life faster and better. The Titanic was the fastest and best. It was reputed to be unsinkable, but it still sunk. For the oldest members of the Transportation and Telephone (TNT) Generation–born 1900 to 1920–this tragedy…
Read MoreAbraham Lincoln Assassinated
TweetShareShare The assassination of Abraham Lincoln was an unexpected first for America. Four sitting presidents have been killed: Abraham Lincoln (1865), James A. Garfield (1881), William McKinley (1901), and John F. Kennedy (1963). Additionally, two presidents have been injured in attempted assassinations: Theodore Roosevelt (1912; former president at the time) and Ronald Reagan (1981). Every…
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