It was July when I disembarked from the small ship in Russian America. The year was 1947 and the land is now called Alaska, meaning “great land” in the language of the native Aleuts. This territory...

June may be best known for the beginning of summer, school break for students, summer vacation for families – but did you know that it’s also Effective Communications Month? Every year the month...

When our youngest son was in Cub Scouts, I served as Cubmaster. On Memorial Day weekend we would join with thousands of other Scouts and leaders to place flags on the graves of the fallen at Jefferson...

Winter is gone, and spring begins to bring new life. The flowers bloom and the leaves begin to cover barren branches. The world seems renewed. Spring is a hopeful season. It brings transformation and...

March. The third month. The month named after Mars, the Roman god of war.  What does the month mean to you? For some it is the beginning of spring.  For the Irish among us, it is the time of the St....

During a thunderstorm in February 1911, lightning struck the Missouri Capitol dome.  The ensuing fire destroyed much of the building. When the Capitol building was reconstructed, the decorating committee...

Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, was reading the newspaper after his brother died and was shocked by the obituary: The story was mistakenly about Nobel himself and read, “The merchant of death...

Thanks: He came home from football practice complaining of feeling unwell. During the evening he got progressively worse and the doctor was called. The diagnosis was polio. He was rushed to the hospital...

I am sure many readers know of someone who did not vote this month. The familiar excuse is: “I am only one person. What difference can I make?” But isn’t each of us one person? Why should anyone...

My late father was not a well-educated man, since he had to leave school during the Great Depression to assist his family. But he had common sense and passed along to his children lessons to assist us...