Like many history geeks, I've been glued to the TV from 8pm to 10pm the last couple of nights watching Ken Burns new documentary, The War. It got me rummaging through my box of family historical stuff....letters, photos, keepsakes, etc. and I came across my Uncle Steve's World War II photo album. That's him writing a letter sitting in front of his tent somewhere in Germany in 1944. That photo is screaming at me to make a painting of it don't you think? Anyway, he was a member of the 1301st Combat Engineers.

I'm sure he had some amazing stories to tell, but I never heard them. He died when I was very young. I had many uncles and aunts who had wartime experiences and I always loved their stories. Especially Uncle Ray who was in the navy. At 85, he's still telling them over gin and tonics. He's a whole blog entry in himself. But for Uncle Steve, I had to do some digging of my own in order to understand his war.

If you are ever doing research on WWII Engineers, it won't take long to get introduced to Marion Chard. Her father was an engineer and she's damn proud of it. She even has the website to prove it! I recommend a visit even if you aren't interested in engineers. There's a lot to read and look at. She even put up a page dedicated to my uncle. Through Marion's effort I've met some other members of my uncle's regiment and I can't thank her enough for that.

So what did the Engineers do? Well, Marion has that covered too. A general history is posted here and her fathers history is here. In short, they had to keep the army moving and make sure the enemy couldn't. They built amazing bridges like the one below. To do it, they also had to fix that old steam pile driver and worked around the clock while suffering the occasional air raid. They still were expected to be infantry men as well. Think of them as the offensive linemen of the Army. You can have a great halfback, but if those guys up front don't clear the way, he's not getting anywhere. They were truely multi-talented soldiers.

If it weren't for history geeks like Marion, so many interesting details of the past would be lost. I can never ask Uncle Steve what he did in the war, but now at least I have an idea. To a history geek that's like finally scratching that itch. Sadly all of Uncle Steve's siblings are gone now too. That's why it's important that someone remembers.

Ok, it's not actually the Erie Canal but I don't know any other canal songs. This is a little 5"x7" gouache study I did of the Delaware and Raritan Canal as it appears in Lambertville, NJ.

Debbie and I made the trip out to western New Jersey last weekend to check out some restaurants for her blog, Jersey Bites. In true history geek style, I found something for me too (besides great food and company that is). The D&R Canal. I plan on getting out there again in the fall to paint the foliage on this beautiful stretch of canal.

Besides beauty, history abounds on the canal too. A simple stroll along the tow path will provide the history geek with plenty of eye candy in the form of old buildings and historic architecture. At times, you can almost forget the present entirely and feel as though you are in a different era. An era where canal boats literally fueled the fire of the Industrial Revolution with coal, which made up eighty percent of the cargo hauled on the canal. The D&R remained in operation from it's completion in 1834 to it's closure in 1932. Almost 100 years.

The idea for a canal through the "waist" of New Jersey had been around a long time. As far back as 1676, William Penn signed a document giving the OK for surveyors to examine the possibility. It wasn't until 1830 that an act was passed authorizing the Delaware and Raritan Canal Company and the Camden and Amboy Railroad Company to begin work. The 44 mile, 75 foot wide and 7 foot deep canal was dug by hand. As if the back-breaking work wasn't enough, many of the Irish laborers who worked on the canal dig became vicitims of a 1832 Asian Cholera epidemic.

Nowadays, the canal is a State Park and most of it is protected. It's not the only canal in New Jersey either. Check out the Canal Society of New Jersey's website where history geeks with a love of engineering can get their fill. Or, for the rest of the country, you can go to the American Canal Society to find out where the nearest canal is in your state and revisit a time before trains and 18-wheelers moved the country's freight. A time when all along the canal was heard:

Low bridge!

Everybody down

Low bridge!

We're comin' to a town.....

Ok, I know that was corny but I'm a geek and I can get away with it.

Most americans are unaware that right now the 2007 Rugby World Cup is being played in France. I first got introduced to the sport in college where I played six seasons (2 a year) for Susquehanna University. Once I left school it became a lot harder to follow because it's never on TV here and I kind of lost track of the game. I finally managed to watch a couple of matches on satellite TV this past weekend and realized how much I miss the "elegant violence" of the sport!

I don't know why it's not popular here in the states. We love contact sports! Early American football games closely resembled Rugby, especially the first game played by Rutgers and Princeton in 1869. In fact, just five years later, in 1874, the first college rugby game in the US was played between Harvard and McGill University (of Montreal). That's according to the US Rugby official website. And the US actually won gold medals in the 1920 and 1924 Olympics. Since then, we haven't done much. Lately, the men's side gave England a good game and the women's side is making some waves as well.

Ok, so much for US Rugby. How did the game start anyway? According to tradition, in a pique of inspiration, William Webb Ellis, for whom the World Cup trophy is named, picked up the ball and ran with it back in 1823 during a soccor-type game at the Rugby School in England. Or maybe not. All Celtic tribes played an ancient rugby-ish game (called Caid in Ireland) and Ellis' dad had been in the army and stationed in Ireland. He could have gotten the idea from him.

Tribal Polynesians, New Zealanders and Eskimos also played a similar game going back to antiquity. It could have been the Viking game of Knappan or the Roman sport of Harpastum that spawned the sport. It could have been a caveman carrying a rock that another caveman desperately wanted. Kind of like "kill the guy with the ball" from grammar school playground days. Whatever the origin, for Rugby to become the popular sport that it is today, it needed rules. Standard Rules.

During the Victorian era, many British schools played a form of Rugby. They all had different rules. Sometimes there wasn't even a limit on the number of players on the field. Imagine hundred of people out there pounding away at each other! Like early American Football, these were brutal affairs. Some wanted to outlaw the sport. Then, in 1871, the Rugby Football Union was formed and the rules were standardized. Rugby became less like watching a train wreck and more like a game requiring toughness and finesse all at the same time. It became beautiful to watch and it still is.

Ok History Geeks, pick up the ball and run to the Rugby Football History website to learn more. As for me, I'm going to tune in the Rugby World Cup, pour myself a beer and try to remember a couple of those songs we used to sing at the party after the game...