A Timeline of 9/11-- Part 4: Flight 77 Crashes Into the Pentagon and South Tower Collapses

Times are Eastern.

**  9:21 am:  The New York Port Authority closes all bridges and tunnels in the New York City area.

**  9:24 The FAA notifies NEADS of the suspected  hijacking of Flight  77 after some passengers and crew aboard the aircraft are able to contact family members on the ground.

**  9:31:  Speaking from Florida, President Bush calls the events in New York City an "apparent terrorist attack on our country."

9:37:  Terrorists aboard Flight 77 crash the plane into the western facade of the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., killing 59 aboard the plane and 125 civilian and military personnel inside the building.

9:42:  For the first time in history, the FAA grounds  all flights over the continental United States.  Over the next two and a half hours, some 3,300 commercial flights and 1,200 private planes are guided to land in airports in Canada and the United States.

9:45:  Among escalating rumors of other attacks, the White House and U.S. Capitol building are evacuated along with numerous other high-profile buildings, landmarks and public spaces.

9:59:  The South Tower of the World Trade Center collapses.

I conducted my regular class schedule for first period.  It ended at 8:45 am (9:45 Eastern) and that is when I learned about what was going on from another teacher.  I went back inside the room (we had to watch the halls during passing time) and tried to get reception on my 12-inch black and white TV, but couldn't, so turned on the radio.

Second period started at 8:50.  We listened to that radio and talked about what had happened the rest of the day in my next four classes.

Marking the 11th Anniversary of This Blog

This is the 4417th post of this blog which I began in late 2007.  It grew out of my Down Da Road I Go blog when I noticed that so many posts there were about the thing in my life that really motivates me and that is ANYTHING HISTORY.

I have been interested in history ever since my dad took me to Fort Fisher, North Carolina, and had to explain to me why we weren't on the North's side in the war since we lived in North Carolina and North America, which I had learned as a member of the second grade class in Raleigh.

That launched me on what became my employment for 33 years as a social studies teacher, and, of course, all seven of these blogs.

Got To get a Life.  --Cooter  (Cooter because that is not a real serious history thing.  I took the name from that guy on the "Dukes of Hazzard.")

Looking Back to 1916: A Schoolhouse Accident

From the March 2, 2016, MidWeek (DeKalb County, Illinois) "Looking Back."

1916, 100 Years Ago.

"On Friday of last week as Miss Ruth Gochenour was attending the stove in the county school of which she is a teacher, she suffered an accident that will cause her some inconvenience for some time.  She stooped to shake the grate and when opening the small door, the accumulation of gas in the fire pot exploded and her face was burned.

"She wore a sweater and this she pulled over her head and probably saved her from being terribly burned."

The Perils of Teaching Back Then.  --Cooter

Fanny Patterson: A Black Pathfinder-- Part 2

I had never heard of this woman so looked her up on the internet.

From the NIU Black Alumni Council "Fanny Patterson Scholarship Award.

Miss Fanny Patterson was born August 14, 1892 and graduated from Hinckley High School and, at the age of 21, entered NI State Normal School (former name of NIU back then) and took classes in arithmetic, reading, grammar, methods, and a state course.

Upon graduation in 1915, she was noted by then NIU President John Watson Cook as "an excellent girl, having good looks, good taste, extreme modesty of demeanor and a good mind."

She then went downstate and taught four years before dying of pulmonary tuberculosis on Feb. 17, 1920 at the young age of 28.

She was a brave, unique, an innovator at NIU.

Quite an Accomplished Woman.

Looking Back to 1916: Fannie Patterson, a Black Woman, Gets Teaching Job

From the March 6, 2016, MidWeek (DeKalb County, Illinois) "Looking Back."

1916, 100 Years Ago.

Fannie Patterson of Hinckley has been engaged at a good salary to teach a two-room suburban school of colored children in Cairo, Illinois.  When Miss Patterson graduated from Hinckley high school a couple years or so ago she had the distinction of being the first colored graduate in the history of the institution."

Quite an accomplishment for a black woman back then.

I'll Do a Follow Up On Her.  She Had Quite the NIU Connection As Well.  --Cooter

My First and Last Field Trip to An Amusement Park With Students: Battered in the Bumper Cars

A memory brought back because of the last post.

Back when I was teaching, my group of student sections went on a math/science field trip out to Great America amusement park in Gurnee, Illinois.  The park was closed as it wasn't summer and the kids were there to use math and science to determine height of rides and how they worked.  They all had work sheets to fill out in the process.

I taught social studies, but they needed chaperones, so I was essentially along for the ride. A few of the rides were open and afterwards, the kids got to spend some time on them.

One of those rides was my all-time favorite, bumper cars.  I had always considered myself as an excellent bumper car driver, able to inflict great hits on other drivers.  I got the brilliant idea that it might be fun to get on and slam into some of my students.

So, I get in a bumper car and was anxiously awaiting the electricity to be turned on.  I had several in particular in my sights.  Such was my intent, that I didn't notice that the ride instantly filled up they were all looking at me.  (No one wanted to ride on it before as it was too lame in their minds.)

The power was turned on and I went through probably the worst several hours of my life.  At least it seemed like hours.  Little did I know in advance, but when those kids saw me getting in the bumper car, they all had the same thought, "Time to get old teach!"

I was hit steadily and often several times at once.  I was battered mercilessly and they all had bug smiles on their faces.  I didn't think it was possible to get hurt on bumper cars, but I sure found out different that day.  I mean, I was sore when I got off.

Imagine getting a shot at your teacher and not getting in trouble for taking it.  And, they really wanted me to go back on it for another round.  I respectively declined.

The Hunter Becomes the Hunted.  --DaSoreCoot

Ten Things You Might Not Know About Teachers-- Part 4

As the Chicago school strike enters its second week.  Of course, our strike in Round Lake, Illinois, back in 1994 went for 38 school days and was an early attempt by Republicans and their ilk to break our union.

8.  Teacher GUIDEBOOKS stress avoiding offending students and their parents.  A student is not "lazy."  He is "a reluctant scholar."  A student isn't spoiled, she "only responds positively to very firm handling."  And, the dice you use in math class are "probability cubes" to avoid upsetting parents opposed to gambling.

I used a die in class to pick students to answer the Daily Challenge.  First roll picked the row and second one the student.

And you definitely can't say what you really think to the parent of a trouble-maker, "Sir, you child is a little _______."


9.  Kiss bassist GENE SIMMONS of the long tongue and funny make-up, was once a 6th-grade teacher in Spanish Harlem and said, "I did it for six months, and I wanted to kill every single kid."  In another interview, he said: "Children need to learn to be selfish, to put themselves first and not care what other people think."

I would have loved to see a parent-teacher conference with him in full Kiss regalia as the teacher.  And then, stick that tongue out.  The parent would have to be taken to the hospital.


10.  FEMALE INSTRUCTORS in Chicago became more active in the women's suffrage movement in the 1890s after school board member William Rainey Harper (also president of the University of Chicago) rejected the idea of raises for teachers, noting that they already made more money than his wife's maid. he also sugested a compromise to raise male teacher salary only.


Sadly, his view is one of the reasons teachers had to form unions.  The public thought they were great people, but wouldn't pay them a fair salary for their effort. 

Another reat job, Jacob and Benzkofer.

It's a Teacher Thing, You Wouldn't Understand.  --Cooter

Ten Things You Might Not Know About Teachers-- Part 3

5.  When future president LYNDON JOHNSON taught speech at Sam Houston High School in Houston, he drove his debate team relentlessly, putting them through 50 practice competitions.  The team easily won the city and district competition, but lost at the state level, upsetting Johnson so much that he ran into the bathroom and threw up.


6.  AN ITALIAN CONNECTION:  Famed educator MARIA MONTESSORI left Italy and went into exile because of philosophical clashes with a former teacher--  Italian dictator BENITO MUSSOLINI, whose students nicknamed him "il tiranno" (the tyrant).  (Couldn't you have just imagined a lecture by Adolf Hitler had he been a teacher.  No way you could have fallen asleep in that class.)


7.  Teachers are HEROES everyday, but espcially when violence erupts.  SHANNON WRIGHT shielded a studnet and was fatally shot during a school massacre in Jonesboro, Arkansas.  In 1998, DAVE SANDERS was killed while helping students to safety at Columbine High School outside Denver in 1999.  When a student started setting off pipe bombs at a school in San Mateo, California, in 2009, KENNET SANTANA tackled him.

Three More to Come.  --Cooter

Ten Things You Might Not Know About Teachers-- Part 2

2. When AMERICANS are asked which occupations contribute the most to society's well-being, they answer teachers, second only to military personnel according to a 2009 Pew Research survey. (Scientists were third and medical doctors fourth.) Generation Next (born 1981-1988) has an even higher regard as twice as likely to name a teacher when asked for a list of people they admire.


3. Teenage outlaw JOHN WESLEY HARDIN, wanted for killing four men, hid for three months in the late 1860s by working as a teacher at his aunt's school in Texas. A schoolgirl recalled that he prayed before class each morning.


4. Educators in 19 states, including Indiana and Missouri, can still discipline a student by paddling. Most states allowing corporal punishment are in the South, but is also legal in Idaho and New Mexico. Earlier in 2011, New Mexico became the most recent state to ban the practice.

A 2010 bill in the House of Representatives to ban corporal punishment in the whole nation died in committee.

More to Come. --DaCoot

Ten Things You Might Not Know About Teachers-- Part 1

From the August 28, 2011, Chicago Tribune by Mark Jacob and Stephan Benzkofer.  These guys are a pair of great researchers to be able to come up with all this interesting stuff.

Of course, this was from a year ago, before the Chicago teachers went out on strike, now entering its third day.  Of note, yesterday, Der Mitt went to Lake Forest, Illinois, to raise $4 million from some of his rich buds in that millionaires' conclave, and while there blasted Obama for "his" Chicago teachers' strike.  This morning, the Lake Forest teachers went on strike.  Coincidence?

1.  PINK FLOYD'S 1979 song "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II"--  with lyrics such as "We don't need no education" and "Hey, teacher, leave them kids alone" put an unwelcome spotlight on a maverick London high school teacher known for chain-smoking in class.  Of course, with these lyrics, perhaps "them" kids needed some grammar (or is it grammer?).

Music teacher Alun Renshaw brought 23 students to the studio to record the song's chorus for Pink Floyd, but failed to secure his boss' permission.  The school got lots of criticism, the music department got 1,000 pounds, and Renshaw got out of the country, moving to Australia.

When Liz and I retired and had our last annual End-of-the-Year Party, this was one of our two "Theme Songs" along with "School's Out" by Alice Cooper.

"Hey, Teacher, Leave Them Kids Alone!"  We Sure Did.  --Cooter

And You Thought You Had an Old Teacher

Shirley Shechtman has been alive a long time and teaching a really long time. At age 83, she has been teaching for 61 years!!!!!

Starting as a physical education teacher in 1946 and still works a six hour day plus another three days a week at an after school program. Currently, she is teaches at Hibbard Elementary School on Chicago's northwest side.

She is Chicago's longest-serving teacher, but Winifred Lowery is the oldest at age 86, but she didn't begin teaching until the late 1980s. There are two other teachers in Illinois who are in their 80s.

Right now, schools are coming to face the increased retirement of baby boomers. In the last five years, 5,938 teachers have retired (Liz and I are two of them).

What makes Shechtman's tenure even more remarkable is that she attended school at Hibbard in the late 1930s when her aunt was a teacher there. After getting her teaching degree at age 22, she taught a short while at Hibbard before transferring to Belden School. In the 1950s, while raising her family, she shifted to substitute teaching.

In 1964, she returned to full-time teaching.

She has seen lots and lots of educational ideas come and go, including the current No Child Left Behind.

In 1964, I was starting 8th grade. I taught from 1973 to 2006 and retired at age 55, not even as old as Ms. Shechtman has been teaching.

From December 23, 2007 Chicago Tribune "Over 60 years, teacher a study in nurturing" by Carlos Sadovi.

One Amazing Person. Now Here is Someone Who Remembers the Old Mimeograph Machines.--The Old Coot is Out Old-ed!!!