`And they pay you to do this?'
Queensbury Town Board asked to support ERA amendment
Please consider supporting The Front Page with a paid subscription: HERE
NEW ORLEANS
There on the floor of the U.S. Freedom Pavilion at the National World War II Museum I listened as the young man in front of me explained about the parachutes air crews wore while on bombing runs in Europe.
The program was called "Hands On History" and was part of a larger community event at the museum complete with refreshments and food while the vintage World War II aircraft hung overhead. Those that listened were interested, wanted to know more and asked probing questions.
It's inspirational when you see people connecting and embracing their history.
I took a few photos of the exhibit, then started taking a video of the young man, because, well, the guy answering the questions really seemed to know his stuff.
Maybe a bigger part of it was the pride I felt because the young man was my son, Joseph.
The volunteer working with Joseph at the end of the evening, a veteran from the Vietnam War twice his age, wanted me to know how much they enjoyed working with him.
That wanted to keep him in New Orleans.
My loss, I suppose.
When Joseph was in junior high, I made a call to the New York State Military Museum and asked if they took student volunteers.
They told me they had a docent program.
"He's kind of young," I said. "But he really loves history."
"How young?"
"Twelve," I answered.
They took him on and it wasn't unusual to see him following visitors around the exhibits and pestering them to ask questions.
That was 16 years ago. He has come a long way.
Whenever I visit him in New Orleans, I still marvel at his job at a world class museum where he is a public engagement specialist and develops tours and programs to help visitors understand the war and its ramifications.
Inevitably, sometime during the visit, I'll look at him and ask, "And they pay you to do this?"
And he smiles.
He often quotes a history teacher at Queensbury, Bob Hummel, who had a sign on his classroom wall that read: "Find what you love and do what you love and you'll never labor a day in your life."
I think that's Mark Twain. It's also great advice.
My motivation here is not to brag about my only child, but it is a reminder that our history is important and we need the best and the brightest to consider that as a career as well because it is important.
When Joseph told people he was majoring in history in college, there was some surprise as if he should aspire to something greater.
They didn't see the future in that, not like engineering, medicine or law school. And certainly not the paycheck.
His start at the military museum in Saratoga led to volunteer tours at Grant Cottage in Wilton where they eventually asked him to join the Board of Directors - at 17.
Four years of college - majoring in history - led to a paid internship at Gettysburg, then summer gigs at Gettysburg with the National Park Service there.
Joseph's passion for history resonated with one enterprising professor and asked to see his resume, then asked if he thought of getting a master's degree in public history.
So he enrolled at West Virginia University - got a full ride too - and after graduation spent a couple years at the National Park Service in San Antonio and Lowell, Mass. before landing his dream job at the World War II Museum.
Which brought me back there again Wednesday night underneath all those planes and watching him in action - the proud papa - with that type of passion and enthusiasm you just can't fake.
So if you know some young person who loves history, who wants to make a career of it, encourage them, get them to volunteer because sometimes majoring in history can lead to your dreams coming true.
There are careers to be had out there, but more important - as I saw first hand Wednesday night - fulfilling, passionate careers where you love going to work every day and go home satisfied over a job well done.
ERA on ballot
On the back of your ballot when you vote in New York this year will be "Proposition One."
I didn't realize it was on the ballot until two Queensbury residents reminded the Town Board Monday.
Jean Lapper and Mary Enhorning both addressed the Town Board about the importance of passing the New York Equal Rights Amendment and asked the board to add its endorsement.
Supervisor John Strough said he would draw up a resolution for the Town Board to address at the next Town Board meeting.
If passed, the New York ERA will give the state the strongest equality provisions in the country.
The proposition states:
No person shall be denied the equal protection of the laws of this state or any subdivision thereof. No person shall, because of race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, creed [or], religion, or sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy, be subjected to any discrimination in [his or her] their civil rights by any other person or by any firm, corporation, or institution, or by the state or any agency or subdivision of the state, pursuant to law.
Nothing in this section shall invalidate or prevent the adoption of any law, regulation, program, or practice that is designed to prevent or dismantle discrimination on the basis of a characteristic listed in this section, nor shall any characteristic listed in this section be interpreted to interfere with, limit, or deny the civil rights of any person based upon any other characteristic identified in this section.
The New York State Republican Committee has come out against the proposition.
West Wing anniversary
The presidency was never more popular than when Jed Bartlet's was president in the late 1990s.
It's been 25 years since Aaron Sorkin introduced us to terms like "POTUS" and gave us a weekly civics lesson in government and politics as we watched earnest public servants try to make the country better for its citizens.
James Poniewozik, the chief TV critic of the New York Times, weighed in on "The West Wing" television show and what we as citizens actually are looking for from our government.
"In Bartlet’s America, voters reward you for fighting lies and fear mongering with facts and reason," Poniewozik wrote. "Good intentions and great oratory win the day. Well-meaning people reach across the aisle and reason with their colleagues. Politics is an earnest battle of ideas, not a consuming war of all against all."
It was the ideal.
What we thought the Founding Fathers envisioned.
But Poniewozik's concludes that We the People like something better in our politics - We want the fight.
"There was not, in fact, a deep and broad desire among people of good faith to recognize their commonalities and solve problems together. People wanted a fight. Barack Obama may have sounded a “West Wing”-ian note in his appeals to a united purple America, but he got backlash and birtherism, and politics only grew more polarized, ugly and tribal," Poniewozik reminds us. "No Bartletian respect for the sanctity of government kept the Jan. 6 mob from trashing the Capitol when an election didn’t go their way. Those rioters, of course, fought under the banner of Donald J. Trump, whose cutthroat reality-TV launchpad "The Apprentice" arrived on NBC in 2004, just as “The West Wing” and similar network dramas were losing ground to the likes of “The Bachelor.”
"Times and sensibilities change, in Hollywood and in Washington.," he concludes. "There always was an elegiac undertone to `The West Wing,' a sense that it was calling back to a bygone era of politics, a bygone spirit of sacrifice, a bygone kind of TV drama."
Sadly, I miss those times.
Ken Tingley spent more than four decades working in small community newspapers in upstate New York. Since retirement in 2020 he has written three books and is currently adapting his second book "The Last American Newspaper" into a play. He currently lives in Queensbury, N.Y.
Dear Ken,
Not only is history important to learn and to assess past and current events, it is essential on the part of every citizen to find the truth versus the whitewashing of our history. Lately it has been both edifying and thoroughly disturbing to be reminded of past misdeeds and crimes against basic civil rights by our governmental agencies. Take the murder of Emmett Till and it's ramifications or the mass subjugation of Native American and Asian people and women in general. It is important to know these things and to fight, as you and Will do, to expose, correct and not repeat these misdeeds. Thank you for including the details about the ERA on the ballot. You note the rejection of this proposition by Republicans. I have hope that not all Republicans are so close-minded or even hypocritical to reject this long awaited statement for equal rights. Your pride in your son is well deserved. I am confident that you have instilled the same values of truth-telling that you have.
I can't believe that we are even discussing Prop 1. It should have been done a long time ago.