July 29, 2008

News in the Papers

Here are some interesting stories Footnote members have found in the newspapers:

Squirrel hunting accident:


Tips for shipping a package to someone in the armed services during World War II:


The Chicago way:


A little encouragement for Franklin Delano Roosevelt:

July 21, 2008

Shot Down, Caught in an Avalanche and Captured by Germans

valorc has been doing a lot of work on the Missing Air Crew Reports from World War 2.

While I was looking at some annotations, I came across this great report:



It tells the story of an American B-24H Liberator that was shot down south of Paris. 5 of the crew made contact with the French resistance. After being moved around a few times, it was decided that they would try to hike out of France over the Pyrenees.

They set out with 4 French civilians, one of whom was to act as guide. While they were hiking over the mountains they were caught in a blinding snowstorm and then in an avalanche. One of the crew, Royce E Smith, freed himself from the snow and then searched for and found the rest of the party. Francis J Thackeray, and the 4 French guides were killed.

The remaining 4 airmen (Smith, William J Donley, Edward J Gilbert and Robert H Hirsch) headed off to try to find the Spanish border, but became lost and wandered into a small French mountain village where they were taken by the local police and turned over to the Germans.

More Interesting Tales From The Atlanta Constitution

margaretann1858 continues to find great stuff in the Atlanta Constitution. Here's a letter to the paper from William Holman who was convicted of murder and scheduled to hang in 3 days.
Found on Footnote.com

July 14, 2008

Chewing Toothpicks Caused His Death

Here are a couple of great stories from the Atlanta Constitution found by margaretann1858:



Found on Footnote.com

July 11, 2008

Connecting Images on Footnote

The connection feature on Footnote allows you to point out relationships between images you find on Footnote or upload to the site.

Here are some examples of the connection feature at work:

Mickey Mantle at 19

Mickey Mantle, age 19

July 9, 2008

Found on Footnote.com

History from the People

Here's a nice website that frequently posts transcriptions of first hand accounts from the Civil War, like this one of a Union soldier's account of the surrender at Vicksburg.

Here's a letter from Benjamin Trafford to his wife Cecelia in the early days of the war, that shonagon transcribed on Footnote.

It's great to hear the stories in the voice of someone who was there.

July 1, 2008

Watches on Footnote

Today we added a new Watch feature to the site. Now you can place a Watch on items you are interested in and be notified when they are updated. You can read more about this new feature here.