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THE JOURNEY THROUGH TIME

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MY'STORY

The MOVE Fire

This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985 Philadelphia police fired thousands of rounds at the MOVE house, city officials approved dropping an explosive device on the roof, the resulting fire was allowed to burn, 11 people—including five children—died, and 61 homes were destroyed. Philadelphia City Council later called it a “brutal attack carried out by the City of Philadelphia on its own citizens” and acknowledged that no individual faced criminal consequences for the bombing. One timeline correction worth preserving for the BHP record: the major previous MOVE-police confrontation was August 8, 1978, about seven years before the bombing, not a year or two earlier. Officer James Ramp was killed, other police and firefighters were wounded, nine MOVE members were later convicted, and television cameras recorded police beating Delbert Africa during his arrest. The 1985 MOVE Commission later specifically criticized city planners for failing to adequately use lessons from that 1978 confrontation. And that actually strengthens the point you’re making: 1985 did not happen without precedent or institutional memory. There had already been a deadly confrontation with MOVE, years of conflict, negotiations and police involvement before Osage Avenue.

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BLACK FACTS
The Truths They Never Taught You...

The Violence That Helped Spark the NAACP

In August 1908, a white mob attacked Springfield, Illinois’s Black community, destroying homes and businesses and lynching two Black men. National outrage over the violence helped spur the movement that created the NAACP the following year.

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Wikipedia

Paper birch (disambiguation)

Paper birch is a common name for Betula papyrifera, a species of tree native to northern North America.

Paper birch may also refer to:

Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.

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Wikipedia

Paper birch (disambiguation)

Paper birch is a common name for Betula papyrifera, a species of tree native to northern North America. Paper birch may also refer to: Betula cordifolia, a species of tree native to eastern Canada and the northeastern United States Betula neoalaskana, a species of tree native to Alaska and northern Canada

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Wikipedia

Lake Pend Oreille

Lake Pend Oreille ( POND-ə-RAY) in the northern Idaho Panhandle is the largest lake in the U.S. state of Idaho and the 40th-largest lake by area in the United States, with a surface area of 148 square miles (380 km2). It is 69 kilometres (43 mi) long, and 1,152 feet (351 m) deep in some regions, making it the fifth-deepest in the nation and having a volume of 43,939,940 acre feet = 54 km3. The lake is fed by the Clark Fork River and the Pack River, and drains into the Pend Oreille River, as well as subsurfacely into the Spokane Valley–Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer. It is surrounded by national forests and a few small towns, with the largest population on the lake at Sandpoint. The majority of the shoreline is non-populated and all but the southern tip of the lake is in Bonner County. The southern tip is in Kootenai County and is home to Farragut State Park, formerly the Farragut Naval Training Station during World War II, of which a small part is still active and conducts U.S. Navy acoustic underwater submarine research. The surrounding forests consist of ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, red cedar, poplar, quaking aspen, hemlock, paper birch and western larch. Local animal species include white-tailed deer, elk, gray wolves, moose, mice, squirrels, chipmunks, black bears, grizzly bear, coyotes, mountain goat, cougar and bobcats, along with bald eagles, wild turkeys, osprey, owls, hummingbirds, hawks, woodpeckers, ducks, and the mountain bluebird. The lake is a home for several species of migratory water fowl.

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Wikipedia

Betula neoalaskana

Betula neoalaskana (syn. B. resinifera) or Alaska birch, also known as Alaska paper birch or resin birch, is a species of birch native to Alaska and northern Canada. Its range covers most of interior Alaska, and extends from the southern Brooks Range to the Chugach Range in Alaska, including the Turnagain Arm and northern half of the Kenai Peninsula, eastward from Norton Sound through the Yukon, Northwest Territories, British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, southern Nunavut, and into northwestern Ontario. This tree typically grows to 15–20 m (49–66 ft) tall, occasionally up to 25 m (82 ft), and achieves a trunk diameter of 30–50 cm (12–20 in), and sometimes to more than 60 cm (24 in). It grows in a variety of habitats, from wetlands to ridgetops at altitudes of 100–1,200 m (330–3,940 ft). The mature bark ranges widely in color, from pure white to red, yellowish, pinkish, or gray. Bark of twigs, seedlings, and saplings is dark, from reddish to almost black, and covered with resin glands. The leaves are triangular-ovate, 3–8 cm (1.2–3.1 in) long and 2–6 cm (0.79–2.36 in) broad, with a truncate base and an acuminate apex, and a double-serrated margin. The fruiting catkins are 2–4 cm (0.79–1.57 in) long and about 1 cm (0.39 in) broad. It is able to tolerate extreme cold, as low as −48 °C (−55 °F). Although it is diploid like its close relatives, the Eurasian Silver Birch and the eastern American Gray Birch, it frequently hybridizes with the hexaploid Paper Birch; the hybrid is known as Betula × winteri. Hybrids also occur with American Dwarf Birch, named Betula × uliginosa.

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Wikipedia

Betula occidentalis

Betula occidentalis, the water birch or red birch, is a species of birch native to western North America, in Canada from Yukon east to Northwestern Ontario and southwards, and in the United States from eastern Washington east to western North Dakota, and south to eastern California, northern Arizona and northern New Mexico, and southwestern Alaska. It typically occurs along streams in mountainous regions, sometimes at elevations of 2,100 metres (6,900 feet) and in drier areas than paper birch. It is a deciduous shrub or small tree growing to 14 m (46 ft) high, up to 25 centimetres (10 inches) thick. It tends toward epicormic growth, with many small limbs sprouting from the trunk and causing the wood to be full of small knots. The bark is dark red-brown to blackish, and smooth but not exfoliating. The twigs are glabrous or thinly hairy, and odorless when scraped. The leaves are alternate, ovate to rhombic, 1–7 cm (1⁄2–2+3⁄4 in) long and 1–4.5 cm (1⁄2–1+3⁄4 in) broad, with a serrated margin and two to six pairs of veins, and a short petiole up to 1.5 cm (1⁄2 in) long. The flowers are wind-pollinated catkins 2–4 cm (3⁄4–1+1⁄2 in) long, the male catkins pendulous, the female catkins erect. The fruit is 2–3 cm (3⁄4–1+1⁄4 in) long and 8–15 millimetres (1⁄4–1⁄2 in) broad, composed of numerous tiny winged seeds packed between the catkin bracts. The identity of similar birches in Alaska is disputed; some include them in B. occidentalis, while others regard them as hybrids between Betula neoalaskana and Betula glandulosa. A 2023 study sequenced chloroplast genomes of species from the genus Betula for phylogenetic analysis. Of the Betula species, B. occidentalis was most closely related to B. pendula purple rain and B. platyphylla. The foliage is browsed by sheep, goats, and birds; some small birds also consume the seeds. Some Plateau Indian tribes used water birch to treat pimples and sores. It is also a riverside tree found in western USA that reacts to water stress by becoming isohydric.

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TOPIC OF THE DAY

Greenwood / Black Wall Street

Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.

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TRIVIA QUESTION OF THE DAY

Which Black woman became the first elected to the United States Congress?

Shirley Chisholm, elected in 1968.