Author: Helen Quach

05/20/11

Lower East Side Tenement Museum

For the Extra Credit I went to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. The Lower East Side Tenement Museum is a historical landmark of the immigrants that lived in 97 Orchard Street during 1863. If you ever decide to visit the Tenement Museum they have many tours that will tell you the history of the people that lived there. The tour that I went on is called Piecing It Together, which told the story of two specific families. During the tour I learned that many of the people that lived in 97 Orchard Street were Jewish immigrants trying to make a living. The Levine family was one of the families that I learned about and they were Jewish immigrants that made a living in their own home. The Levine family had a Garment factory right in their own home. Many people either owned a Garment factory or worked in one, and one of the most infamous events that happened during this time was the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire.

05/17/11

The September 11 Digital Archive

After going through the 9/11 Digital Archive website, I found it pretty easy to use. The moment I saw the homepage it looked very organized. When you read the homepage it gives you a brief description of the website. One strong point of the website is that it explains a few of the many tabs that they have on the website. To me the strongest point is the organization. If I wanted to fine stories, or images, instead of me having to go search all I have to do is click on the Browse tab. To be honest I don’t really think there is any weakness to the website. It has a lot of information that is well organized, the interface is very simple and easy to figure out, overall the website is easy to use.

For future historians the website can be very useful. By going through the website they can obviously learn about the history of 9/11 but they can also learn about the people. With the many stories on the website it can give historians information on how 9/11 affected the people. The website also has a vast amount of images, videos, facts, and many more to help historians learn about 9/11.

05/10/11

Tough On Crime

According to Eric Foner, during the 1970’s, crime rates were rising, political parties of both sides decided to change the way they deal with crime. They wanted to be “tough on crime” and that criminals should be lock up in prison for a longer periods. The government started to increase the penalties for crime, like treating drug addiction as a violation of law instead of a disease. This tactic became very successful, and the number of Americans imprisoned rose dramatically.

Since the 1970’s to 1990’s, crime rate dropped dramatically after the new “tough on crime” attitude. In return the population at prison reached over 2million people, which was ten times that amount during 1970’s. Since there was an increase in prison population struggling communities took this as an opportunity. They saw prisons as a source of jobs and income, between 1990 and 1995 over 200 new prisons were built.

04/29/11

War is good for nothing~

The first song I chose is called War by Edwin Starr which is a protest song about the Vietnam War, and this song came out around the 1960’s. In the song War their is a famous line “War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothin’!” which basically meant that war is pointless. If you look at the lyrics of this song it talks about how war causes so much destruction and pain to everyone. The second song I chose is called Boom! by System of a Down which is a protest song about war and militarism. In Boom!’s lyrics it talks about why do we have to waste money on build bombs and other things to kill out own kind.

In the song War their is a couple of the lyrics that stood out to me “Ohhh, war, I despise, Because it means destruction, Of innocent lives”, “War means tears, To thousands of mothers eyes, When their sons go to fight, And lose their lives” these lyrics shows how bad war is causing pain to everyone.  Even though these two songs talk about war they differ in a way. In Boom! the lyrics aren’t entirely about war its more about how we spent so much money on build weapons instead of using that money to save lives. Some examples are “Unnecessary deaths, Nobody gives a fuck, 4000 hungry children leave us per hour, from starvation, while billions spent on bombs, creating death showers” the song is still about how war is unnecessary but it is more about how we waste our money.

04/19/11

The Poor Will Prevail

According to Foner, during Johnson presidency he took initiatives of 1965-1967,  known collectively as the Great Society, provided health services to the poor and elderly in the new Medicaid and Medicare programs and poured federal funds into education and urban development. Unlike the New Deal the Great Society was a response to great prosperity. The mid-1960’s were a time of economic expansion and Johnson thought that economic growth will help improve the quality of life.
Great Society centerpiece was Johnson’s response to poverty, he tried to eradicate it. According to Michael Harrington’s book The Other America around 40 to 50 million Americans lived in poverty. This alerted political leaders to take action in stopping poverty. The War on Poverty didn’t directly eliminate poverty Johnson concentrated on equipping the poor with skills to help themselves. The new Office of Economic Opportunity provided job training, legal service, and scholarship for poor college students. The War on Poverty didn’t really eradicate poverty it helped empower the poor to take control of their lives.

04/9/11

Working Women

During World War II most of the men in America went to fight for their country leaving the women behind at home. Women didn’t just stay at home tending to their children they went out working industrial jobs. Women started to work in factories or taking over work on the farm. Since women started to work the famous “Rosie the Riveter” was the symbol for the most common job for women at the time.

After World War II things changed again for women. Most women had lost their jobs in the factories but they still continued to work. The level of employment for women had increased since World War II, working part-time to help support their family. Eric Foner book says “Despite the increasing number of wage earning women, the suburban family’s breadwinner was assumed to be male, while the wife remained at home.” Even though women try hard to work films, Tv shows, and advertisement portrayed that marriage life is the dream for every women.

04/3/11

Korean War

During the Korean War it was a battle between South Korean and North Korea. The North wanted to take over all of Korea and change it into a communist country. Of course America would not let this go and intervened preventing North Korea to advance any further by launching a  counterattack at Inchon. This pushed the North Koreans back to the border between the North and South of Korea.
I think that if America never intervene during the Korean War the world today would be very different. Communism would have spread through all of Korea turning it into a communist country. I think that it would have caused a Domino Effect causing other counties turning communist. The way this would impact my life is that I would be in great fear. I would be afraid that communism would spread world wide and eventually hit America.

03/16/11

New Deals – Farm

During the Great Depression farmers and farms were having a very difficult time. Many farmers were having trouble making money because of the Great Depression consumers didn’t have enough money to buy food. Many farmers lost their farms and went bankrupt for over producing food and being unable to sell it.

The cartoon is trying to portray how bad farms were doing in the Great Depression and how F.D.R was going to use the New Deal help farmers. The way the New Deal help farmers is by setting up the Agricultural Agreement Act (AAA) The AAA told farmers to produce fewer products and sell it for a higher price in order to get money and bring the farms back to what they once were.

03/11/11

Great Depression

A Normal Stock market, Just what he wanted. Wish denied. This Cartoon is fro 1929.
Artist: William Kemp Starrett, appeared in Life Magazine.

The Stock Market crash in New York of 1929.

The Great Depression started in October 1929 with the stock market crash in New York.
The first image shows how people wanted the stock market to go back to normal. Like shown on the picture, they wanted it as a gift just like how Santa Claus would be able to give them that. The second picture is more of a realistic form of the stock market crash. All the people in front of the Stock Market wanting to take back their money. These two pictures show how the Stock Market Crash was the very cause of the Great Depression.

03/10/11

Hooverville

Hooverwille a place filled with poor people who are forced to live in shacks because of the great depression.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfylLnHjcu0

During the great depression things got really difficult for people. Million of people started to lose their jobs and everyone who suffered. Since many became jobless soup kitchens popped up everywhere in order to feed the people as much as they can. The people started to also build their own houses out of cardboard and wood called shacks, and later on became known as Hooverville. Everyone was affected by the Great Depression especially the children. The children had to stop going to school to help provide for their family.

03/3/11

Nationalism

Nationalism is one of the causes of World War I.  Nationalism is what made people become proud of their country. It also makes them support and fight for their country. Including imperialism and militarism, countries started to increase their armies power. Countries like Italy, Germany, Russia, and France became great powers. Nationalism encourage countries to be independent. Other countries that weren’t a great power like Serbia wanted to be independent because of Nationalism. They wanted to form their own country and be separate.

02/28/11

Zimmerman Telegram

Zimmerman Telegram is one important reason why the U.S went to World War I. Foner talks about how the Zimmerman Telegram was made public by the British spies in March 1917. He says how the German foreign secretary  Arthur Zimmerman call on Mexico to join the war against the U.S and promised to help recover their territory lost in the Mexican War of 1846-1848. I think that Foner basically covered most of what the Zimmerman Telegram was.
A revolution in Russia overthrew the czar and established a constitutional government making it more plausible to believe that the U.S would be fighting on the side of democracy. The war resolution was passed the Senate 82-6 and House of Representative 373-50.

02/25/11

Fordism

This is a picture of Henry Ford between 1863- 1947. Ford developed the techniques of production and marketing that brought in the reach of ordinary Americans. He established the Ford Motor Company in 1905. The Model T and assembly line innovations revolutionized American society and molded the world we live in today. Henry Ford used the assembly techniques to produce cars so that everyone can afford it.

02/18/11

Journey to America.

Picture of Japanese brides coming to U.S. to help Japanese men find a wife. Early 1900s

These two documents were taken from two different sites. The first picture is black and white which shows a larger portrait of the place and the womens migrating. This helped Japanese men that were already in U.S find their overseas wives. The picture shows up clearer than the second one. The second one has colors  but it isn’t as clear as the first one. The second picture was after the Gentlemen’s agreement.

02/11/11

The Fourteenth Amendment – 1868

According to “Give Me Liberty!”, the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified on July 9th, 1868. It is the principle of citizenship for all persons born in the United States, and which empowered the federal government to protect the rights of all Americans. This includes the former slaves that were recently freed. It also forbids states from denying any person “life, liberty or property, without due process of law” or to “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Section 1 states that all persons born in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States. No state can make or enforce any law that will abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.

Section 2 states that representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed.

Section 3 states that no person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elctor of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state.

Sources:
http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/primarysources/fourteenth-amendment.html
http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=43#

02/6/11

Remember the History

The book review “Race and Reunion” by David Blight sounds like a interesting book. This book is interesting because people can know how others remembered the history of the Civil War. Just like what the review said, these studies is the conviction that memory is a product of history. It is being constructed and in many ways political. I think that most people can benefit from this reading because we can learn about black Americans that were often denied in works. Blight believes that “how we think about the Civil War has everything to do with how we think about race and its history in American life.”

This book review shows how race plays an important role of historical memory. During the Civil War, Northerner fought for the freedom of slavery. The  Southerner fought to keep slavery. In the book review it says how slavery was not part of the Civil War. This shows two different sides that people saw during that period.
Another event that was remembered in many different ways was the Vietnam War.  During the Vietnam War, the United States fought North Vietnam in order to contain communism and stop it from spreading to South Vietnam. Many believe that if we did not fight this war communism might have spread even further than Vietnam. The other point of view is that many Americans thought it was a waste of our military soldiers and a waste of time. U.S.A spent many years in Vietnam and lost a great deal of soldier during the war only to have lost. I think that some memories are politically motivated since we have different points of view can may motivate others.

02/1/11

Your information is exposed!

In today’s society technologies are more advanced than it was back then. We are able to put information electronically instead of storing them as books or documents. When Historians need to do research on information that they need, they no longer have to go through books. Instead they can simply go on any archive that is stored electronically and get the information.

For example, the link about Twitter has me thinking that if I were to use a Twitter account and tweeted almost every minute of what I did in a day,  in the future if a Historian wanted to check back on me because of some odd reason, he would just need to look through the Twitter archives. There is no need to ask the people around me about what type of person I am, the things I did and how I lived my life. A Twitter archive can have many benefits for future Historians but it also has a drawback. Having a Twitter archive remove privacy from people, things that people might not want others to see will be seen by all.

With all these new technologies in today’s society, there is no need to worry about losing information because it is safely stored and backed up in case of any problems. This also gives us the fact that we have no privacy since we do not think of all the people that may see our post or blog. There is always an access to most of the things that we use.

In the website Wiki Leaks, we can get so many information about our histories. Wiki Leaks is a type of media that publish original sources along with their stories so readers and Historians can see evidence of the truth. I think that Wiki Leaks is a great site for future historians to look through and gather information for their research. Future Historians would most likely be able to have a more convenient way of accessing information.