Around Oscar time, it has become routine for critics to partner with historians and scrutinize historically-based movies for their accuracy or inaccuracy regarding the facts. A documentary documents a non-fiction event(s) or person(s) usually mixing interviews, archive film, possibly recreations of an event or events, usually with a narrator who details what happened. A fact-based movie is a dramatization of...

What do we not know about Lincoln that historians and authors think we should know about the much favored 16th president? Last Sunday’s New York Times Book Review offered reviews of three new books. How many books, would you imagine, have been written about Lincoln? According to the website, The Inquisitr (yes, that’s the way they spell it), “the people...

Reading about the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, the Nazi concentration camp from World War II, reminded me of my own experience in visiting Dachau, the first of those camps. I was part of a small group of high school students visiting countries throughout Europe. On a day free from scheduled sightseeing in Munich, Germany, I took a...

Last week, the Associated Press reported (Jan. 11), that two members of the famed 100th Fighter Squadron also known as the Tuskegee Airmen, died on the same day. Lifelong friends, Joseph Shambrey and Clarence Huntley (pictured), enlisted in 1942 and were shipped overseas to Italy in 1944. Both were mechanics who kept the planes flying. “Huntley,” the AP writes, “serviced...

With the recent shootings of two police officers in New York, the Eric Garner and Michael Brown protests , the Sony “hack,” the continued terrorist threats by the self-styled “Guardians of Peace,” and ISIS, Dr. Robert Sapolsky, a professor of biology, neurology and neurosurgery at Stanford University, finds meaning in a Christmas gesture made 100 years ago. The front page...

And it only took 529 years to solve this “cold case” of the… millennium! According to a report in Nature (Dec. 2), DNA tests have confirmed that the skeletal remains found in a parking lot in Leicester, England in 2012, are, in fact, those of the infamous Richard III, the last king of the House of York and the last...

In countless letters to his wife and partner, Abigail, John Adams poured out his heart and his mind. Abigail was not just a sounding board for his political conscience; she was his moral compass in every way. Adams, 90, and Thomas Jefferson 83, while gravely ill, wanted very much to live to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of...

Every year at Oscar time, Hollywood’s best and brightest are acknowledged. And while the category of Best Documentary Short Subject is part of the annual ceremony, I’ve no doubt that most people rarely if ever, see any of the films in this category. Nonetheless, one remarkable 38-minute film has made this year’s list and needs to be seen by anyone and everyone...

Okay, I know it’s early, but I’m heading out of town for the holiday and wanted to get this posted. I also know this was posted prior to the last presidential election, but…hey, it’s about presidents, it’s funny, and I wanted to leave on a high note. So, enjoy! It’s hard to believe that the 2012 presidential campaign is at...

If you think getting people to act more ethically is tough, try convincing the world to eliminate nuclear weapons. In his 2013 book, ZERO – The Case for Nuclear Weapons Abolition, founder and president of the Nuclear Age Peace FoundationDavid Krieger makes his case through a series of compelling and common sense essays. This one, a conversation between Einstein and Socrates, is...