Woodbury Historical Tours

12/12/2024

162 years ago, on December 12, 1862, the USS Cairo hit a Confederate mine and quickly sank below the surface of Mississippi's Yazoo River. The partially-salvaged and reconstructed wreckage can be see at the Vicksburg National Military Park.

12/07/2024

THIS IS NOT DRILL

Naval dispatch from the Commander in Chief Pacific (CINCPAC) announcing the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, 7 December 1941.

[This is a copy of the dispatch sent to the Commander in Chief Atlantic (CINCLANT) and received by the USS Ranger, an aircraft carrier that was returning to Norfolk, Virginia, from an ocean patrol when the attack occurred.] Library of Congress.

12/04/2024

"There are only two locations in the world where loess (wind-blown dust) has accumulated to a significant amount – Western Iowa and along the Yellow River in China. As wide as 15 miles and about 200 miles long, this unique landform runs from north of Sioux City, Iowa, to outside of St. Joseph, Missouri."

According to a 2015 story in the “Des Moines Register,” Walter Ordway Jr. was known to be a wanderer.

He was also known as a lot of other things, too – an organic farmer in Western Iowa, not far from the Missouri River, an artist, an international traveler who visited at least 104 countries, and a visionary naturalist who believed in protecting the scenic western edge of Iowa.

The Loess Hills, seen and visited by the Corps of Discovery in 1804 and 1806, are strangely out of place in a state where, due to today’s corn and soybean production, the mentality is the flatter the land the better. These hills are made almost entirely of windblown soils, from as far back as the end of the last ice age. Soils that were ground by glaciers as fine as flour and blown into dunes along the eastern side of the ancient waterway we know as the Missouri.

There are only two locations in the world where loess (wind-blown dust) has accumulated to a significant amount – Western Iowa and along the Yellow River in China. As wide as 15 miles and about 200 miles long, this unique landform runs from north of Sioux City, Iowa, to outside of St. Joseph, Missouri.

Walter Ordway understood the value of this diverse landscape and he was instrumental in preserving these natural formations through the establishment of the Loess Hills National Scenic Byways program that’s enjoyed by many people today.

It’s easy to understand why Walter was a wanderer and naturalist – he was a fourth generation direct descendent of John Ordway, sergeant in the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Image: Karla Sigala and Iowa Tourism

Image Description: Two photos: A marker honoring Walter Ordway near the scenic overlook in Monona County, Iowa, and a section of the Loess Hills with the National Scenic Byways roadway sign.

12/04/2024

Coming in 2025 — Santa Ynez Chumash
Museum and Cultural Center

In honor of we invite you to learn more about the history of our tribe, the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians.

You can find a wealth of resources and information available through our website, chumash.gov; and when it is ready we look forward to welcoming you to the brand new Santa Ynez Chumash Museum and Cultural Center. You can find updates and additional information about our new museum at: sychumashmuseum.org.

We have waited nearly 50 years to open a museum of our very own, and we appreciate your patience while the finishing touches are underway.

12/03/2024

The grave of John "Liver-Eating" Johnson (Johnston), Cody Wyoming. His life as a mountain man was the inspiration for the movie, "Jeremiah Johnson." See this brief online bio at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West (tinyurl.com/32hraay5), or pick up Raymond Thorp's biography, "Crow Killer."

12/01/2024

OTD in 1955
Rosa Parks' Fingerprint File

The fingerprint card of Rosa Parks was produced in association with her arrest for refusing to obey orders of a bus driver on December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama. [Image by U.S. District Court for the Northern (Montgomery) Division of the Middle District of Alabama, Courtesy National Archives]

11/30/2024

OTD 160 years ago
The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee

"Hood lost more men killed at Franklin than Grant at Cold Harbor or McClellan in all of the Seven Days. A dozen Confederate generals fell at Franklin, six of them killed. . ." —McPherson, "Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era" (pp. 812-813).

We at the American Battlefield Trust are re-releasing our original set of Animated Battle Maps with brand new openings and narration. Enjoy learning more abo...

11/30/2024

11/29/2024

160 Years Ago
Sand Creek Massacre, November 29, 1864
Eugene Ridgely Sr. (Northern Arapaho) “Sand Creek Massacre,” 1994. Acrylic on buffalo hide.

11/27/2024

"Radiocarbon dating confirmed that the gun dated back to the time of the Coronado expedition."

The 500-year-old bronze cannon was part of Spanish conquistador Francisco Vázquez de Coronado’s doomed 16th-century campaign in the American Southwest.

11/26/2024

161 years ago OTD

On November 25, 1863, combined forces under Ulysses S. Grant—spearheaded by troops in George Thomas' Army of the Cumberland—stormed the Confederate position on Missionary Ridge, east of Chattanooga. One Rebel officer later called this U.S. victory, "the death knell of the Confederacy." [Map: NPS park brochure showing Missionary Ridge]

11/22/2024

Within the lands called Comancheria by the Spanish, those early colonizers did not have the necessary strength or resources to subdue the powerful Comanches. Of the described warlike Comanches, the St, Louis Enquirer in the early 1820's had noted that the Spanish frontier settlements were overpowered by their warriors. The Enquirer had stated:

"The Spaniards have never been able to do anything with them, and have almost relinquished the country to their possession. From St. Antonio, in Texas, to Santa Fe, in New Mexico, the Camanches roam at large, the undisputed masters of the soil."

With regard to the Santa Fe Trail, the presence of Comanches allowed them to have the greatest connection to the historic trail. The American William Becknell had traveled the trail from Missouri through Raton Pass to Santa Fe in 1821 and established the trade route. Additionally, Becknell used an alternate route called the Cimarron Cut-off. In 1822, he led the first wagon train on this shorter route. By the 1840's, thousands of people in wagons, numerous freights wagons, oxen, mules, horses, and carriages headed west tearing up the prairie sod with side-by-side ruts on the trail. They were traveling into the territory of the Comanches.

A remarkable landscape picture of the landmark Point of Rocks in Morton County, Kansas. Situated on the Cimarron Cut-off of the Santa Fe Trail, the natural bluff overlooks the Cimarron River Valley. The trail ran below the Point of Rocks. Photograph courtesy of the U. S. National Park Service. Additional information from the National Park Service and the Oklahoma Historical Society, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

11/21/2024

Sierra Nevada

Mt. Williamson (14,379 ft) is the 2nd highest peak in the Sierra Nevada, and 6th highest in the lower 48. In the 40s, the mountain was captured by Ansel Adams, and Japanese American internees at Manzanar. 1) Ansel Adams, 2) Manzanar Block 18, F.M. Kumano. 3) hospital, by unknown

11/21/2024

An analysis of newly released 19th-century census records offers more insight into the conflict’s costs.

11/19/2024

"Unbound: Narrative Art of the Plains" celebrates the full expression of narrative art among Native nations of the Great Plains. The exhibition juxtaposes historical hides, muslins, and ledger books with more than 50 contemporary works commissioned by the museum.

The NMAI fosters a richer shared human experience through a more informed understanding of Native peoples.

11/19/2024

OTD in 1863, 161 years ago, Honest Abe delivered the Gettysburg Address. The American experiment survived a great civil war, and it must have seemed there could be no greater test.

But today, in the 2020s, we're learning anew that things we took for granted are not assured, and that if we do not vigorously resist the anti-democratic assaults on our system of government, it likely will "perish from the earth."

[photo detail from the copy Lincoln gave to his secretary, John Hay, one of two copies in the Library of Congress]

11/18/2024

a damn fine tree . . .

Around 255 years ago, Spanish explorers in California took note of a particular tree, and camped nearby. The tree is still there today, on the edge of the Stanford campus, on the border between Palo Alto and Menlo Park.

Extensive new research by Palo Alto resident Jeff Watt, an electrical engineer with a dogged devotion to facts, is separating truth from fiction.

11/18/2024

Today is the birthday of the nation's first astronaut, Alan Shepard. 🔭🌙⭐️

In 1961, Shepard rode the Mercury capsule Freedom 7 into space history. This was not his only feat, he also famously played a round of golf on the moon. 🏌🏻‍♂️

🖼: "Alan Shepard" by Everett Raymond Kinstler, 1965. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Everett Raymond Kinstler. © 1965 Everett Raymond Kinstler