It’s hard to believe that the summer is half over and parents and
students are running around buying school supplies and clothes
already. I must admit, I do not miss those days in the least and
have a lot of respect for the families who are enduring this. Though
I do remember how fun it was to get new shoes or clothes or that
“Trapper keeper” way back when.
First, I would like to thank everyone for their patience and
continued support of the TNT. I realize I have been somewhat absent
from contributing these past couple months, but it’s not because I
haven’t cared. I’ve been in somewhat of turmoil as to the future of
the TNT. Yes, it’s true…the bad economy has taken a very strong hold
on the newspaper, like many others in the industry, and the constant
struggle to keep it afloat has been a challenge.
While this piece is not necessarily a good-bye, it is a sincere
thank you for all of the support we’ve received from readers,
advertisers and the local communities. Without you, the Toano-Norge
Times would never had turned a page, made headlines or felt like a
member of your families. The TNT is not the only business struggling
and we wish only the best for those who have already closed or are
on the brink. One has to think and believe that things happen for a
reason and we just need to move forward.
So with that in mind, not wanting to give up completely, the TNT
will stay in the headlines and begin publishing only once a month;
it’s either that or shut down completely. Because this will
establish a new time line for the TNT, there will be some changes in
the format and content. We will no longer publish classified ads or
a calendar of events as in most cases those items are time sensitive
and cannot endure the span of a full month. We will however, be
offering free classifieds on the TNT website with a program which
will allow you to post your classifieds at any given time. In
addition, there will no longer be a limit of the merchandise value
being $5,000 or less. You will be permitted to post any item,
personal or business. Yes, if you own a business you may post your
classified for free. This is our way of saying thank you for your
continued support and offering your business a break during these
hard times. So if you’re a realtor and would like to post a listing,
if you’re a business looking to post a job offering, it will be
free. It’s the least we can do.
We also hope to offer a calendar of events online in the future;
that is still a work in progress.
With our monthly issue of the TNT, we plan to bring you the same, if
not better, stories on your community and the people and events that
make it what we are so happy to call home. So continue to email me
with your story ideas and contributions.
And while publishing once a month will undoubtedly leave me with a
significant amount of time on my hands, it is done so with the
purpose and hopes of my finding a job so I can pay my bills.
Therefore, I humbly throw out to any of you who are looking to hire,
please consider giving me a call. Whether it is full-time,
part-time, special projects, a newsletter for your church, I’m happy
to help. I realize I join thousands of unemployed people right now
and I am hoping we all find work very, very soon.
The next issue of the TNT will be available August 21 and we will
publish every third Friday of each month until further notice.
Deadlines for all issues will be the second Friday of every month.
God bless us everyone.
Behind the Yellow Chair
And the second law of robotics is?
by Patricia Rowe
If you have been watching the news lately, you have probably noticed
that it has been dominated by two things. First, that pop star
Michael Jackson died and continual updates on this which pretty much
amount to letting us know that his condition has not changed in the
intervening weeks. And, two, the shocking new that the US Congress
has been unable to put together a comprehensive health care reform
bill. Go figure. So you may have completely missed the latest in
robot news.
It seems Fox News reported that the military has funded research
into battlefield robots that could fuel themselves by foraging for
organic matter. The robot is nicknamed EATR - pronounced çt-r and
because of this Fox News came to the logical conclusion that organic
matter may well just include human bodies since they would,
presumably, be readily available on a battlefield. It didn’t take
long for the news of a flesh eating robot to make its way around the
Internet.
Now for those of us who grew up at a time fully expecting, thanks to
magazines like Popular Science and Walt Disney’s Tommorowland, to
rocket off to work each morning in a rocket car and to have a
personal robot at home, this comes as quite a shock. We expected our
robots to be friendly, low-paid domestic helpers that we didn’t need
to worry about making sure they had the proper documentation. We
didn’t expect them to be hungering for human flesh.
Our robots would be like Robbie, the Robot who first appeared in the
1956 movie Forbidden Planet and went on to have a long TV and movie
career lasting until 2006. I don’t remember much of what Robbie did,
but I am pretty sure it didn’t include eating any humans since
Robbie took the First Law of Robotics which states a robot may not
harm a human or allow them to be injured seriously.
Then, of course, there was Rosie, the Jetsons maid. Now this was the
kind of robot you wanted. She wasn’t particularly attractive, in
fact she looked a lot like a slot machine with a frilly apron and an
oversized tin can perched sideways on her neck. She did all the
cooking and cleaning which couldn’t have been that easy considering
she scooted around on what looked like a single roller skate with
three wheels. Now, Rosie, apparently, did not take the First Law of
Robotics quite as seriously as Robbie because I do remember her
chasing George Jetson, or Mr. J as she called him, around the house
with a broom. Still, whacking a human over the head with a broom is
a far cry from sneaking up behind you and chomping on the back of
your calf when they are feeling a little peckish.
Anyway, as it turns out Fox News did not get the story quite right.
Due to all the bad publicity the manufacturer of EATR was forced to
issue a statement assuring the public that EATR was completely
vegetarian. Fox immediately corrected their error by completely
deleting the original story and replacing it with one that did not
include references to human bodies.
In more robot news: there is good news coming out of North Carolina.
Researchers at North Carolina State University report putting the
finishing touches on a new robot bat. Hopefully, the robot bat does
not have the capacity of transforming into a bloodsucking vampire.
But, if it does, I am sure Fox News will quickly report the
development and then, just as quickly, remove the story from their
web-site.
And finally, this in from Japan, the National Institute of Advanced
Industrial Science and Technology unveiled Miimu, the worlds first
model fashion model. No matter what Fox News may have to say, I
don’t think we need worry about Miimu having a hankering for human
flesh, since like most fashion models she would need would a radish
every other day or so.
I was sitting in my favorite spot tightening some button holes and
watching TV for a little while. It was amazing to me how many
commercials advertising medicine are sent out over the air waves in
one hour. It seems that the advertisers assume that people depend on
their pills in order to stay alive. Medication was originally
intended to be a quick answer to pain, wasn’t it? Not to form a
habit forever. Now, the pharmaceuticals are telling the patients to
ask their doctors if a specific medicine is for them.
Do some people die from overmedication? That question has been
answered many times recently. If a person goes to a different
specialist for every malady, is there not a big chance of dangerous
side effects? I heard one ad which warned certain people not to take
the strange-sounding medicine: if they had liver or kidney problems.
(The ad warned of many other possible complications as well.)
Aren’t those two organs considered to be the main ones which control
the state of a lot of health issues? One lady told another in
conversation that she had to decide whether she would buy groceries
or her medicine. She sounded convincing. A whole book could be
written about the ramifications of her decision.
I think it is amazing how medical research and development have
brought changes to the lives of people with spinal cord injuries.
Special studies in diet management have improved the lives of people
with varying diseases, the leaps of growth in ocular and audio
treatments have affected people of all ages. All these improvements
I applaud. But I sat there feeling that I was not bringing about any
change at all.
TV watching and reacting to opinions of passionate people we do not
know, can cause new problems when using a needle. I’m afraid it can
be as wearisome as taking a bad pill. About the time I tucked my
needle into a pin cushion, my good friend called and asked, “What
are you doing?” Well now, she wasn’t really being nosey. She was not
needing to know everything. But our conversation ebbed and flowed. I
told her about the commercials paying for the news program I was
watching, about my thoughts on what I call an excessive use of
medicine and she said, My goodness Flora, where have you been? as
though I live with my head in the sand. She told me that her
neighbor says that medicine has become the Messiah. Well, perhaps to
some people.
After we closed out our conversation, I sat there listening a few
minutes more and the subject ran into to a lot of talk about how
important it is to have Universal Health Care. The crowd on Capitol
Hill? Shouldn’t it be protecting the options we have in our country?
But, I am really concerned that the trends are changing and not
always to our interests.
This sounds like As The World Turns a soap my mother watched without
missing an episode, her kind of addiction with no cost or harmful
after affects. If her soap’s advertisements were pills and other
forms of medication, she paid no attention to them, because that
lady took no medicine.
I want to be like her.
Flora Bolling Adams retired from the Montgomery County Public
Schools in Maryland. She is an active member of the Williamsburg
Poetry Guild and she enjoys writing for children. She has published
three books, one of poetry A Penny on the Stair and two prose works
Alvin Comes to Visit and Interprising Will, appropriate for the
child in all of us.
The Skimino Quakers: Blisland Parish’s reluctant members
By Martha W. McCartney
In 1699, when much of the territory between Skimino and Ware Creeks
was part of New Kent County, not James City, a tiny group of Quaker
converts began meeting there for worship. At first they gathered in
private homes. In time, they gradually gained momentum and by 1774,
local Quakers had built a small meetinghouse near what became the
Lightfoot interchange of Interstate 64, just across the York County
line.
Courage of conviction was a requirement for members of the Quaker
faith in 17th and 18th century Virginia. As dissenters from the
Church of England (the state-sanctioned denomination), they were
actively persecuted for their beliefs. Quakers’ refusal to bearing
arms was an important part of their doctrine and their failure to
attend militia musters brought substantial fines and ostracism.
Their refusal to take oaths of loyalty prevented them from holding
public office and their open criticism of the Established Church
alienated loyal Anglicans. What’s more, Quakers’ failure to pay
their church levies (or taxes), as required by law, sometimes
resulted in the seizure of their personal belongings, such as their
household furnishings and livestock, which could be sold. Blisland
Parish’s colonial records reveal that the vestry frequently
dispatched the county sheriff to the homes of those whose church
dues were delinquent!
Virginia Quakers’ meetings were not silent. Any member who spoke
with spiritual conviction could be recognized as a minister by the
regional meeting group to which local congregations belonged. To
faithful members of the Church of England, Quaker religious
practices, which excluded the rites of Baptism and Holy Communion,
seemed heretical. Quakers’ failure to show up at church, at a time
when attendance was obligatory, put them at odds with the law. When
they did attend, the men sometimes refused to remove their hats as a
sign of reverence. The Quakers’ quaint patterns of speech and
conservative attire further set them apart from their neighbors.
Later, when Quakers began abstaining from alcohol and freeing their
slaves, they seemed even more “different.”
The number of Quaker converts grew rapidly in the years immediately
prior to the American Revolution, probably because Quakerism became
a symbol of dissent against the Crown. However, after the war,
membership declined. Many Quakers joined denominations whose rules
were less strict. Some simply moved away. Thus, a small group that
had burst upon the local scene receded into the landscape.
Historian Martha W. McCartney is a longtime resident. She has
written six books and has received five historic preservation
awards. Her passion for the area is obvious with her endless
research and contributions to the community.
Grandma Moses
By John L. Lunsford
Mothers and grandmothers are lovingly honored with bouquets, candy
and cards in our country every Mother’s Day. Perhaps one of the most
revered examples of motherhood in the United States and Europe, and
who raised a family in Virginia, deserves to be officially
recognized as Virginia’s adopted grandmother? She was, without
doubt, a truly remarkable woman.
Anna Mary Robertson was born shortly before the American Civil War
began in 1861 and lived to see the 35th President of the United
States elected in 1961. During her amazing lifespan of 101 years,
she received an award from President Harry S. Truman, was
interviewed by the celebrated television news commentator Edward R.
Murrow, appear-ed on the cover of Life magazine, was the subject of
a commemorative U. S. postage stamp, and honored not only in her own
country as prominent American woman but admired worldwide as an
unusually gifted artist of “…more than 1,000 nostalgic, naively
executed scenes of turn-of-the-century rural farm life.”
Life on a hard scrabble New York farm in the 1860’s was demanding
and twelve-year-old Anna was necessarily “hired out” to a
neighboring farmer as a servant, by her parents. She spent the next
fourteen years “in service” before marriage to Thomas Moses,
described as a “God-fearing hired man, two years her junior.”
Originally intending to seek tenant farming opportunities in the
Carolinas, friends persuaded the newlyweds to settle instead in
Virginia’s beautiful Shenandoah Valley.
The couple subsequently found farm work near Staunton, VA as tenant
farmers and years later bought their own land. They lived a total of
18 years in Augusta County, VA before finally returning NY after
fire destroyed their home. Five of their ten children were born and
buried in Virginia. The structural remnant of the Moses’ two-story
brick home (Mt. Airy) is currently located within a twenty-acre
Staunton industrial park and is regarded by The Association for the
Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (APVA) as one of Virginia’s
“most endangered historical sites.”
This untrained farm girl, when widowed at 67, turned to painting
when diminished eyesight ended her love for embroidery. In the
1930’s she became recognized as the foremost American “primitive”
artist and rose to become a true American icon.
It is surprising that this widely acclaimed centenarian, known to us
simply as “Grandma Moses,” has yet to be officially recognized by an
historic commemorative marker in Virginia.
John L. Lunsford, a Williamsburg resident, is a freelance writer
who submits pieces of interest to local newspapers.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR POLICY: The policy of the TNT throughout election time for letters to the editor
with political content must be accompanied with author’s full name, address
and phone number for verification purpose. Letters should be concise and
will be subject to editing. All letters published will be up to the
discretion of the publisher and space availability. The deadline for
editorial content is Monday at 10 a.m., the week of publication. Political
candidates submitting news items during this time will not be published
unless submitted as paid advertising. Any questions can be directed to
Rosemary at 757-250-3195.
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