Born this day, America’s great poet, possibly its greatest, Emily Dickinson (1830-1886). Whitman has come to mean a lot to me,but I think that she is possibly more significant. Her finicky, profound and bird-like scratchings capture not just the heart and the intellect but the eye. One doesn’t just hear the words, but you kind of walk away remembering the visual lay-out of the poem, they possess…

Seen (again) in 2020:

January 30 was the birthday of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945). This is far from the best photo of FDR. It depicts his last address to Congress, in March, 1945, and he looks as old and frail as he was. I chose it because of what’s in front of him, microphones from all of the national radio networks. NBC and CBS you recognize, I’m sure. MBS was the Mutual Broadcasting System. And BLU was…

Six Flicks on Tricky Dick (A Look at Richard Nixon in the Movies)

Here’s an image you can’t unsee; a picture of President Richard M. Nixon (1913-1994) playing the piano, singing, and apparently trying to feel something. Nixon was second only to Truman as a piano playing President; and he was fairly good — competent, anyway. It was his substitute for a personality, and I think it probably helped him a little politically, offsetting his image as a dry, somewhat…