A collection of the interesting and sometimes unusual events that happened this week in Arizona history.June 12On this date in 1888, an Apache Indian who had fired one shot that killed two men was tried for murder in one of the deaths and acquitted. He later was tried again for the murder of the second man and convicted on precisely the same set of facts.On this date in
Death of the Sweet Waters: The Politics of Pollution theatlantic.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from theatlantic.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
America’s sweetheart, Judy Garland, interjected a wistful tone when singing “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” in the 1944 hit screen musical, “Meet Me in St. Louis.” She longed for a better day. Garland sang…
Michael Knox Beran s WASPS: The
Splendors and Miseries of an American Aristocracy
explores the scandal s of US society exploring figures including Francis Sedgwick and Babe Paley
Outside a few holiday resorts, authentic WASPs have mostly disappeared from view. Since
Gilligan s Island introduced Thurston Howell III, most Americans know them only as comic figures in brightly colored holiday attire.
In his perceptive new book,
WASPS: The Splendors and Miseries of an American Aristocracy, Michael Knox Beran shows that this caricature is deceiving. The WASPs legacy is still with us even though their accents and rituals have become punchlines. They may have lost much of their privilege and cohesion, but their creations including the administrative state, elite education, and charitable foundations remain dominant influences on American life.
The term WASP was never quite accurate. This strand of the American elite was uniformly white, but not Anglo; Dutch, French, and sometimes more exotic blood flowed through its veins. Its members were mostly Protestants, but some were not. And the vast majority of American Protestants did not belong to