"New and Improved" Web Site

Did you ever think about that odd marketing phrase, "New and Improved".  My question is this: How can it be improved already if it's new?

I'll leave that question to those who stay up late at night pondering philosophical questions and various koans! Koans: I learned that word from working crossword puzzles and this is the first time I've had a chance to use it.   Merriam-Webster defines a koan as a "paradox to be meditated upon that is used to train Zen Buddhist monks to abandon ultimate dependence on reason and to force them into gaining sudden intuitive enlightenment."  Pretty good, huh!

But I write this blog to brag a little about remodeling, renewing, improving and restyling my web site, Old Bones Genealogy of New England.  It's still with Go Daddy.  Sometimes I'm happy about that and other times...they really set me off!  But it's paid for until the middle of this year, so I'll continue to give them the benefit of the doubt.  The singular reason I give them a lot of slack is that they ANSWER THE PHONE!  And the support personnel were all educated in North America. In other words, they understand me and I understand them!

But there were a few wrinkles, a few roadblocks, a few frustrations.  I never knew that I was working all this time with "version 6".  Version 6 is apparently one of the worst bits of software that Go Daddy had released on an unsuspecting customer base. I found it galactically frustrating.  (Is "galactically" a word???)  Whenever I tried to change the copy on any particluar page, it was a struggle of mind over technology!  When I tried to change a font, the color changed.  When I tried to put the color back to where I wanted it, either the whole text box would disappear or the background color would change.  And that's just for starters.

Here's the good news: The junk they called Version 6 has been replaced with Version 7!  Are you as ecstatic as I am?  I knew that 6 was junk and the jury's out on 7.  The bad news was that I had to pick a completely new template and rebuild the whole thing from scratch.  I'm not sure if I got every element in there that I had before, but I'm sure I'll be tweaking this thing into the wee hours of many mornings!

All I want to do is continue my research and help as many people as I can with theirs.  Thus the blog, the website and a lot of time putting together genealogy programs for whoever would like me to conduct a program for their institution.

So to make me feel a little bit better, please take a look at Old Bones Genealogy of New England. Let me know what you think.  And be nice!!

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Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur, Jr - Father of General Douglas MacArthur

Every once in a while, I think about all the famous people who were born or at least had lived in or near Springfield, Massachusetts.  The list is long!  We live in Chicopee, Mass which is a city that until 1848 was part of Springfield.

Springfield is the home of many well known companies: Smith and Wesson, Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance, the Springfield Armory (which is a National Historic site having been founded by George Washington in 1777 to provide arms for the Revolutionary War), Breck Shampoo, Merriam Webster Dictionary, Friendly Ice Cream Corporation, Indian Motocycle,  Milton Bradley Corp (Milton Bradley himself is buried in the Springfield Cemetery) and many others that most would recognize.  Even Rolls Royce was once manufactured here.  There are several excellent examples of the Rolls' that were built here in Springfield that are housed in the Museum of Springfield History.  Springfield is also the home of the Basketball Hall of Fame as this city is where the game was first played.

All the personalities are too numerous to mention but include Johnny "Appleseed", Samuel Bowles (one of the founders of the Republican Party), Theodor Geissel (Dr Seuss), Kurt Russell (actor), Taj Mahal (blues musician),  Timothy Leary (drug culture guru), James Naismith (inventor of basketball) and Tim Mayotte (professional tennis player).

But today, in response to a request from a fellow blogger, I'm mentioning Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur, Jr who was the father of his even more famous son, General Douglas MacArthur.  The elder McArthur was born in what is now Chicopee Falls, Mass when it was part of the larger Springfield, Mass.  I promised that the next time I drove past the memorial in the center of Chicopee Falls (and the weather was good!) that I would take a picture or two of "MacArthur's Ball" and post it here on my blog. So, here they are!

The biographies and careers of both MacArthur's are extensive which is why I've provided the links to their articles on WikiPedia.  And there is certainly plenty more than what can be found there!

The elder MacArthur was the Military Governor-General of the Philippines until he clashed with the civilian Governor, the future president, William Howard Taft.  (Taft, by the way is in my family tree somewhere but only very distantly related.) At the age of 17, he became a commissioned officer in 1862 and saw action in many battles of the Civil War for which he earned the Medal of Honor.  That was when he was 19 years old!  He became a brevetted colonel and became known nationwide as "The Boy Colonel".

After service in the Indian Wars, the Spanish-American War and the Philippine-American War, he returned to the United States as one of the last officers on active duty who had served in the Civil War.

He died in Milwaukee waiting to address a reunion of his Civil War unit.  He suffered a heart attack while on the dais.  Originally buried in Milwaukee, he is now interred at Arlington National Cemetery.  But his impressive memorial stands proudly right here in little old Chicopee, Massachusetts!