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The Battle of Tannenberg was an engagement between the Russian Empire and the German Empire in the first days of World War I.
It was fought by the Russian Second Army against the German Eighth Army between 26 August and 30 August 1914. The battle resulted in the almost complete destruction of the Russian Second Army. A series of follow-up battles destroyed the majority of the First Army as well, and kept the Russians off balance until the spring of 1915.
The battle is notable particularly for a number of rapid movements of complete German corps by train,allowing a single German army to concentrate forces against each Russian army in turn.
Although the battle actually took place close to Allenstein (Olsztyn),General Erich Ludendorff's aide, Colonel Max Hoffmann, suggested naming it after Tannenberg, in the interest of Pan German ideology,to counter the defeat of the Teutonic Knights at the Battle of Grunwald (Tannenberg) in 1410 by the Poles, Lithuanians and Russians.
As pointed out by Christopher Clark, the actual Tannenberg is some 30 km (19 mi) to the west, and there was no intrinsic reason—other than the historical battle and its emotive resonance in the narrative of German and Slavic nationalism—to give its name to the 1914 battle.
Cold dead hands – this title may be cliché’ but the lyrics are anything but. The guitar riff from Steve Parnell mixed with lyrics of Wesley Michael Hayes speaks to your American pride! This is a song that will get your patriotic blood pumping and ready to fight! Straight from the heart to your ears COLD DEAD HANDS embodies what most American men and women are feeling in this country right now. When you hear the guitar lick and the hook you’ll be throwing a left and right hook for the American man and woman!
Wesley Michael Hayes
As a true holder of the title "Okie from Muskogee," Wesley Michael Hayes grew up a country boy with a passion for sports and music. Working to promote his first single, “Love In Pictures,” to Texas Radio and planning the release of the EP, BENT, Hayes is a self-described “underdog who loves going against the grain and doing things that others are afraid to do.” Having lived a “broken and patched life” that includes all the trappings of a true country song, Hayes is counting on his traditional sound and style to resonate with those looking for realism and raw honesty.
“My mom’s people were bootleggers and outlaws who would play music on the porch and such after some shine runnin’. That’s where the music talent comes from,” he said. “I was given a ’71 Alvarez guitar by my Uncle Harley at one point and my love for playing grew from there.”
At the age of 10, Hayes began playing drums debuting just two years later with a solo of "Wipe Out" at Coweta High School. With influences that range from rock to traditional country, Hayes’ father took him to a Jethro Tull concert as a child and they often cruised around listening to Stevie Wonder, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Earth, Wind & Fire; at home with his mother and grandparents he watched “Hee Haw.”
Carrying a melody inside at all times, Hayes pursued sports, another passion passed on from his family, during an emotional and unstable youth. Using the activity to escape the feelings of loss and grief when his parents divorced at 5 and, at 11, he lost his grandfather (the man he considered his “source of stability”), he excelled in high school and as a basketball player at Northeastern State University. Admitting to developing a lot of rage as the anger and hurt consumed him, Hayes recalled the many times he could be found “wearing the silver bracelets for drinkin’ and fightin’ and all the things outlaws are known to do,” as he tried to cope from many years of holding his feelings inside.
Music only became front and center when Hayes' life changed dramatically in 1998 as he and his wife, Brandy, lost their infant son, Jacob, just 16 days after his birth. Needing an outlet once again for the pain that ensued, Hayes looked to songwriting for healing. Influenced by Merle Haggard, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and David Allan Coe, Hayes' difficult upbringing, the loss of his son, and other trying life experiences served as the backdrop to his traditional storytelling.
“You carry those dark days with you always and, sometimes, the darkness has nowhere to go but to the heart,” he said. “When that negative energy is born, if you don’t channel it the right way you will go crazy. I had always had music in my bones so I channeled it into music.”
As life on the road beckoned and opportunity came knocking, Hayes began playing in Branson, Missouri with the Bluegrass band, Goldwing Express, and taking gigs that would grow his career. Releasing his first CD, YESTERDAY, in 2012, he has been honing his craft for the last several years writing each song to be “something unique in and of itself.” With the uncanny ability to tell stories from many walks of life, Hayes’ talent for songwriting has no limits. Tackling subjects that range from politics to love his lyrics tell of loving someone you hardly ever see with “Love In Pictures” or of a man being taken in by a crooked call girl in “Memphis.” A mixed bag of rollickin’ tales and many emotions, “Bent,” which is Hayes’ anthem, is perhaps the most heartfelt song on the EP. “I have walked through many things and I write about life,” he said. “Most people love country music because they can relate to it; George Jones made you feel the hurt in ‘He Stopped Loving Her Today’ and ‘The Grand Tour’ and that is what I bring to the table. I aim to make you want to fight, love, drink, cry, laugh or just feel good all over. I think it’s my job to offer people a chance to get lost, maybe go to a happier time or maybe realize that time is the happiest for them right where they are!”
Away from music, Hayes is a history teacher and a coach at a middle school. He and his wife, Brandy, are the proud parents of a 20-year old son, who plays drums with Outlaw Territory, and a 13-year-old daughter. With the full support of his family behind him, Hayes honesty and genuine nature are transparent as he chases his dream.“You have to believe in what you are doing,” he said. “Nobody else is going to believe it or dream it for you. I am a fighter, survivor, and I just don’t sit around and wait for somebody else to do it or to hand me something. There is no substitute for hard work and I take that notion with me every time I hit the stage.”
US soldiers defy North Korean propaganda by teaching defectors English
Col. Maria Eoff, centre, talks with a South Korean teacher, second from right, and North Korean defectors taking an English class in Seoul, South Korea, March 26, 2016. Photo: New York Times
SEOUL — When Captain John Ellerbe introduced himself to his new students last year, he said, one of them seemed unable to believe her eyes.
“She said she had never seen a US soldier before,” Cpt Ellerbe said of the woman, who was taken aback by his friendly demeanour. “In North Korea, they taught that we were like baby killers and we were basically out to get them.”
The Army captain’s students were defectors from North Korea now living in the South and doing what countless young South Koreans do for a leg up in life: Studying English. And in meeting Cpt Ellerbe and other volunteer tutors from the main US military base in Seoul, they were getting an additional lesson.
“When I heard that I had to learn English from the American soldiers, I was so afraid of and difficult to receive the fact,” a defector, Ms Oh, 23, said in imperfect English during a recent class, reading a short speech she had written. “Because I had learnt that the American is very bad enemy to North people when I lived in North Korea.”
Ms Oh was putting it mildly. (She asked that her full name be withheld to protect relatives still in the North, where the government often punishes defectors’ families.)
From kindergarten onward, North Koreans are steeped in government propaganda, much of it intended to stoke fear and hatred of Americans — especially soldiers from the United States. North Korean troops conduct live-fire drills using mock American soldiers as targets. Defectors from the North, more than 1,000 of whom settle in the South each year, have said that a common school activity is for children to beat effigies of US soldiers with sticks.
Such indoctrination is countered for two hours every Saturday at the English classes in southern Seoul, where Americans like Cpt Ellerbe, along with English-speaking soldiers from the South, tutor 20 or so defectors ranging in age from their teens to their 50s. The programme is supported by the Korea Hana Foundation, an organisation funded by the South Korean government that helps defectors adjust to life here.
“This is a way of strengthening our alliance with South Koreans,” said Colonel Maria Eoff, commander of the Yongsan US Army Garrison in central Seoul, where Cpt Ellerbe and the other American tutors are stationed.
Mr Choi Hyun-joon, who came to South Korea in 2008 and now leads a defectors’ organisation, Unification Future Solidarity, said he had the idea for the classes after he met with US soldiers to discuss his experiences in the Ministry of State Security, the North Korean secret police.
The ministry’s responsibilities included keeping foreign influence, like American movies and English-language publications, from reaching ordinary North Koreans. Now, Mr Choi is doing the opposite. (His organisation provides the office space for the classes.) He said the news that defectors were learning English from American soldiers had reached the North, by way of students talking to relatives and friends back home.
“They just wouldn’t believe it,” Mr Choi said.
North Korea’s government uses the spectre of a constant American threat in its domestic propaganda to justify its authoritarian rule, according to experts on the isolated country. The propaganda draws heavily on memories of the Korean War of 1950-53, when American bombers devastated much of the North, and it accuses US soldiers of grotesque acts of violence against civilians during the conflict.
In 2014, North Korea’s leader, Mr Kim Jong Un, called US soldiers “cannibals” during a visit to the Sinchon Museum of American Atrocities south of Pyongyang, the capital, which depicts what the government claims was the killing of tens of thousands of civilians by US soldiers and their South Korean “running dogs” there. The museum has been renovated to present even more graphic renditions of violence that the North accuses “American imperialist wolves” of committing in late 1950. (Historians say that most of the killings in and around the town of Sinchon were carried out by anti-communist Korean militias and that pro-communist forces also perpetrated atrocities that go unmentioned in the propaganda.)
“As visitors move between scenes, each complemented by screaming sound effects, their senses are assaulted by what I can only describe as a pornography of violence,” a recent visitor to the museum wrote on the website 38North.org. “Women having spikes nailed into their heads; breasts being cut off; children being torn from mothers’ arms; mothers and children burned alive, buried alive and tossed from a bridge; men being blown up by dynamite inside caverns — the horrors are unrelenting in number and variety.”
Decades of such propaganda left defectors like Ms Kim Kwang-ok, 31, a student, unprepared for the congeniality of the US soldiers in civilian garb who have been teaching her English in Seoul.
“But I am embarrassed to admit that when I talk about them in Korean, I still inadvertently call them ‘miguknom’,” Ms Kim said, using the Korean word for “American scoundrels”. “That was the only way we referred to them in the North.”
“In North Korea, when you put yourself in a situation where everyone else criticises you, you jokingly say, ‘I am an American jerk’,” said Mr Park Nam-il, 37, the secretary-general of Unification Future Solidarity.
Ironically, one of the most common desires of defectors who settle in the South is to learn English, the language of their homeland’s sworn enemy. Over seven decades of separation, the two Koreas’ versions of Korean have diverged considerably, with the Southern version acquiring many English words. “Lipstick”, “brakes”, “cafe” and “Americano” are all new to defectors. When they play soccer with South Koreans, linguistic chaos ensues.
In North Korea, schools offer English, Chinese and Russian, as foreign-language options starting in fourth grade. “But there was no desire to learn a foreign language we would never use,” said Madam Chung Kyong-hee, 53.
In a recent class for beginners’ English, Madam Chung and several other middle-aged North Korean women painstakingly copied words like “airport”, “luggage” and “bus stop” onto their notepads. They chuckled when they came upon an English word they all knew: “money”. “How much is this?” they repeated after Corporal Seo Young-wook, a South Korean soldier based at Yongnam.
The classes are also an education for the American tutors, giving them a chance to see what ordinary people in North Korea — the country they are trained to be ready to fight — are like.
“It’s also good because we get to relearn English as it’s supposed to be spoken, as opposed to all the slang we usually use,” Cpt Ellerbe said. NEW YORK TIMES
Nowadays, the name "John Carter" is synonymous with "flop" in Hollywood. Behind-the-scenes problems led to a ballooned budget of $250 million, and when it was released in March 2012 it only managed to make $73 million at the domestic box office. As the movie moved around the globe, an international take of $211 million certainly helped, but the legend of the disappointing blockbuster was written by that point, and the film found itself at the center of lots of jokes and ridicule. But that particular failure doesn't mean that the titular hero's time on the big screen is finished.
PR Web has published a press release announcing not only that the rights to John Carter of Mars have reverted back from Disney to the estate of author Edgar Rice Burroughs, but that there are future plans to bring the character back to the big screen. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. is currently looking for another studio to keep the adventure going, and if this press release is any indication, they're still marketing the idea with the fact that the original novels inspired some of the greatest bits of pop culture made in the last century. Said James Sullos, president of the company, in a statement,
“John Carter of Mars was the creative stimulus behind such movie classics as Superman, Star Wars and Avatar. Edgar Rice Burroughs was the Master of Adventure and his literary works continue to enjoy a world-wide following. We will be seeking a new partner to help develop new adventures on film as chronicled in the eleven Mars novels Burroughs wrote. This adventure never stops. Along with a new TARZAN film in development by Warner Bros., we hope to have JOHN CARTER OF MARS become another major franchise to entertain world-wide audiences of all ages.”
The question is, who would actually make the movie? The John Carter brand was definitely stained by the 2012 Andrew Stanton-directed movie - which critics didn't exactly love either - and a good portion of audiences might just write off the idea ofJohn Carter 2 as a joke. That being said, I do wonder if perhaps Universal might be an option. In the past decade or so they've been the company to make sequels to potential film franchises that other studios dropped. They picked up Hellboy from Sony and made Hellboy II: The Golden Army; they made Kick-Ass 2 after Lionsgate decided that they were done after part one; and most recently they agreed to makeDumb and Dumberer after Warner Bros. dropped it. Perhaps they could be the ones who gamble on more John Carter movies? They do now have Legendary Pictures at their back...
I'm almost certainly in the minority when I say that I actually kind of liked John Carterand wouldn't necessarily mind seeing a sequel, but what do you guys think? Tell us your thoughts and feelings in the comments below.
Huge deserted beaches surrounded by dunes, where boats masks have forgotten the company only the remains of unfortunate creatures are called skeletons Coast. This side of the Atlantic, east of Namibia, is the gateway to the Namib Desert, which follows the Kalahari. There we find groups Bushmen and Himba, atavistic residents of these arid regions.
The Bushmen demonstrate their integration in the most hostile of friendly means by hunting and gathering techniques. Joining them pursue their prey poisoned arrows wounds on an expedition lasting several days and observe the survival of an entire clan in the harsh dry season.
The Himba us their nomadic life, in which everything revolves around the goats and cows grazing. Among its strongest features see the symbolism of their hair and body ornaments, his main artistic expression, know the rules that govern the formation of polygamous marriages, and will attend the rituals "esuko" where women gain maturity within the tribe
1959 - Westbound - Randolph Scott; Virginia Mayoby cldickjrIn 1864 Cavalry Captain John Hayes reluctantly follows orders to become the civilian boss of the Overland Stage Line, which keeps the flow of Western gold to the Union and will help it win the Civil War. Headquarters for the stage line is a small Colorado town with Southern sympathizers who will do anything they can to sabotage his mission. Resistance to his efforts is led by former friend ad colleague Clay Putnam, who has taken advantage of Hayes' absence and married his former sweetheart. - Written by - duke1029@aol.com
HansChristianAndersen (Danish: [ˈhanˀsˈkʁæsdjanˈɑnɐsn̩]; oftenreferred to in Scandinavia as H. C. Andersen; April 2, 1805 –August 4,1875)was a Danishauthorandpoet.Although a prolificwriter of plays,travelogues,novels,andpoems,Andersen is bestrememberedforhisfairytales.Andersen'spopularity is notlimited to children;hisstories—calledeventyr, or "fairy-tales"—expressthemesthattranscendageandnationality.
Andersen'sfairytales,whichhavebeentranslatedintomorethan125languages,[1]havebecomeculturallyembedded in theWest'scollectiveconsciousness,readilyaccessible to children,butpresentinglessons ofvirtueandresilience in theface of adversityformaturereaders as well.[2]Theyhaveinspiredmotionpictures,plays,ballets,andanimatedfilms.[3]
Early life
"Itdoesn'tmatteraboutbeingborn in a duckyard, aslong as youarehatchedfrom a swan'segg"
HansChristianAndersenwasborn in thetown of Odense, Denmark, onTuesday,April 2, 1805. He was an onlychild.Andersen'sfather,alsoHans,consideredhimselfrelated to nobility.Hispaternalgrandmotherhadtoldhisfatherthattheirfamilyhad in thepastbelonged to a highersocialclass,[4]butinvestigationsprovethesestoriesunfounded.[4][5]TheoriesthatAndersenmayhavebeen an illegitimateson of King Christian VIIpersist.[4]Nevertheless,King Frederick VItook a personalinterest in him as a youthandpaidfor a part of hiseducation.[6]
Andersen'sfather,whohadreceived an elementaryeducation,introducedAndersen to literature,readinghimArabianNights.[7]Andersen'smother,AnneMarieAndersdatter,waseducatedandworked as a lawyerfollowinghisfather'sdeath in 1816,remarrying in 1818.[7]Andersenwassent to aboardingschoolforrichchildrenwhere he received an advancededucationandwasforced to supporthimself,working as a bankerand,later,for a doctor. At 14, he moved to Copenhagen to seekemploymentas an actor.Having an excellentsopranovoice, he wasacceptedintotheRoyal Danish Theatre, buthisvoicesoonchanged. A colleague at thetheatretoldhimthat he consideredAndersen a poet.Takingthesuggestionseriously,Andersenbegan to focus on writing.
A blue lobster is a one in two million find. (Photo: Reuters)
Blue lobster. (Photo: YouTube/Screenshot)
A blue lobster was caught -- and promptly released -- off the
coast of Nova Scotia, a Maritime province of Canada just a short trek
from the U.S. state of Maine, on Friday. The surprise catch of the
extremely rare lobster shocked fisherman Sheldon Trenholm who, after
snapping a few photos to prove his rendezvous with the neon shellfish,
returned the blue lobster back to the ocean.
"At first I couldn't figure out what was in there, it was like a blue flashlight flashing on and off," Trenholm told the National Post. Like Us on Facebook
What are the odds of catching a rare and brilliant blue lobster? According to the University of Maine, the average chance of encountering the elusive crustacean is one in two million. Lobster Population Declines
According to National Geographic, lobsters, which are closely related
to crabs and shrimp and are found in all the world's oceans, are one of
the most heavily harvested
marine creatures. The business of lobster trapping is a
multi-billion-dollar industry, and more than 200,000 tons of lobster are
pulled from the sea every year.
Overfishing of clawed lobsters (the most familiar of which are the
American and European species) has depleted their numbers. Also, as our
oceans become more acidic because of warmer temperatures along the ocean
floor, the lobster's shells are getting softer because they're not getting the calcium they need.
National Geographic notes that the largest lobster ever caught was
off the coast of Nova Scotia, the same area that the blue lobster was
captured last Friday, and weighed 44.4 pounds. The enormous shellfish
was between 3 and 4 feet long, and was believed to be over 100 years
old.
And Trenholm's blue lobster catch isn't the first blue lobster news
to make headlines. In 2009, fisherman Bill Marconi hauled in a cobalt-blue colored lobster, which he first thought was a bright blue beer can, off the coast of New Hampshire. It weighed one-and-a-half pounds.
"I was wicked surprised," Marconi told the Los Angeles Times.
And in 2011, two blue lobsters were caught off the shores of Prince Edward Island in Canada. What Makes Blue Lobsters Blue?
The blue hue of the rare blue lobster, MSN reports, is the result of a genetic defect that makes the lobster produce an abundance of a certain protein that makes their shells turn neon blue.
"Blue lobsters are better at processing astaxanthin, an antioxidant
in the food they eat, which results in their shells favoring a blue
pigment rather than the normal brownish color," Los Angeles Times reported.
And rare lobsters don't just come in blue. They've also been seen in
yellow, orange and even white. Yellow lobsters are one of the rarest --
you have only a 1 in 30 million chance of encountering one of those.
Henrietta Howland Green; Another Look at the “Witch of Wall Street”
Henrietta Howland Green; Another Look at the “Witch of Wall Street”
Henrietta Howland Green aka the “Witch of Wall Street” (Wikipedia)by Joe Silvia Separating the chaff
Generally speaking there are two groupings of folks when the name Hetty
Green is uttered. One side – the most common one – can be summed up in
the quip “Ah….the Witch of Wall Street.” The other is the “I know the
name. Just unsure about who she was.” group.
Some will bring up her son Colonel Green, perhaps a mention of a
“dish” on an island, and almost always what follows are a few anecdotes;
a mixture of truth and urban legend, none of which paints her in a
decent light. Here are the most memorable:
“Isn’t that the rich lady that spent a a night trying to find a 2 cent stamp?”
“That’s the mean bitch that tried to have her son Ned admitted to a
free clinic, to save money, and his leg ended up being amputated!”
“She refused to use heat or hot water.”
“That’s the lady that saved money on laundry detergent by only having the soiled portions of her clothing washed.”
“Hetty Green is the tight-fisted lady that was once carrying
$200,000 in bonds on an omnibus, yet when a passenger mentioned that she
would have better been served with a personal coach she replied with ‘Perhaps you can afford to ride in a carriage—I cannot.’“
Funny how people are remembered for the mundane things. The appearance that contributed to her infamous moniker (N.B. Whaling Museum)
I bring these things up first to clear them out of the way, so we can
get to some real “meat.” There is a wealth of literature out there
discussing these stories. Volumes have been written. Wikipedia, YouTube,
and Google cover the same old ground: Hetty Green the miser, the witch,
the shrew. If you grew up in the region, and have clicked on this
article, you likely have read up on our “antagonist” Henrietta Howland
Robinson.
You’ve heard the anecdotes and urban legends. To cover what is
readily available is to insult the readers and practice redundancy. So,
perhaps we can cover those things less oft mentioned. Not unavailable.
Not unknown, or secret. Just rarely focused upon.
I won’t take a revisionist angle and try to paint Hetty as a
misunderstood, philanthropic angel. Those ill words aren’t untrue ones.
They’re pretty accurate for the most part – urban legends excluded. The
truth about many historical figures -excepting the Hitlers, Pol Pots,
and Stalins of the world – is somewhere in the middle. Rarely are the
highlights the genuine article. I’d like to drag her somewhere closer to
the middle. Not dead center – because that would be overcompensation
and false – but somewhere else beside the extreme right. Let’s focus on a
different element of the bouquet.
An unusual upbringing
The woman Henrietta Howland Robinson, was born to Edward Mott Robinson
and Abby Howland right here in New Bedford in 1834. This was a time,
where a male-led society deemed women incapable of a business mind-set,
or financial matters. There was no shortage of men that simply felt
women just couldn’t handle math, especially within the context of
economics. Some men were downright hostile to the idea of a woman
holding a higher position within a company, let alone having a major
presence in the larger regional or national economy.
This historical context is often left out of the recounting of
Henrietta’s life. How was a woman to gain rank within a business
environment with the societal obstacles of the day? Certainly, politely
pussy-footing about wouldn’t be sufficient. Asking nicely would get one
nowhere. Having a special knack, high intelligence, or high academic
degree wasn’t enough. Liquid capital wouldn’t even suffice.
What the
time needed was a pit-bull, a Godzilla, a witch. Only this “monster”,
stoically and steadfastly, could break these rigid barriers down. Only a
Witch of Wall Street could set a precedent in a male dominated society.
Armed with finances, a woman with a specific disposition and traits,
born in a family with financial leanings created a “perfect storm” of
sorts. She may have been the “Witch of Wall Street”, but she was also
the boon for feminine societal progress. Here’s our Henrietta dragged
slightly closer to center. Green Counting House – Union & Front Streets (Spinner Pub.)
She didn’t start out as a “witch.” In fact, there is quite a bit of
mention about her rather attractive appearance in her younger years. She
had fair skin, “angelic blue eyes”, and was referred to as “…a good-looking woman.”
Further illustrating a personage that isn’t accurately portrayed as a
wretched miser, she would earn the moniker “the pride and pain” of
Bellows Falls, Vermont the hometown of her eventual husband Edward Henry
Green.
By age 20 there were attempts by her father to “present” her to
society armed with the finest wardrobe to attract suitors. Showing the
frugality and shrewdness that she would be legendary for, she sold those
clothes and invested the money in the stock market. So how did an “angelic” attractive woman turn into a “witch”?
Henrietta Robinson was raised by her grandfather Gideon Howland and
father, the aforementioned, Edward Mott Robinson. This Quaker family
owned a rather large whaling fleet and made substantial profits in trade
with China. She was surrounded by financiers and businessmen. It was an
environment saturated with investments, deals, and accounting and it
left a indelible mark on her. Indeed, by the time she was eight years of
age, she had already established her own personal bank account.
History shows that her mother, Abby Howland, was sick on a relatively
constant basis. When her father’s eyesight began to fail, and because
illness made her mother incapacitated, Henrietta by the age of 6 began
reading financial papers to her father. Surely there was a soaking up
his experience and wisdom. By age 13, she rose within the family’s
business and attained official rank as the bookkeeper. At 15 years of
age, she gained schooling in Boston.
In 1864, at age 30, her father passed away. He left her between
6-$7.5 million dollars in liquid assets, equivalent to $100 million
dollars today. According to the times, the inheritance should be placed
into a trust fund and managed by – get ready for it – a male. Preferably
someone trusty, like a relative. So cemented was this idea, that even
Henrietta’s own family fought her to make her abide. Here was some more
“fertilizer” to grow a witch. Henrietta had to battle the standards of
the day and her own family to get what was rightfully hers.
The setting
was molding Henrietta and pressuring her into a set direction. She
eventually procured a portion of her inheritance and began to
immediately invest in Civil War war bonds.
A few years later, in 1867 she wed wealthy Vermonter Edward H. Green
on the terms that their finances were kept separate, even in case of
divorce. Having full control over her own finances, Henrietta was now
positioned within history and ready to earn her name the “Witch of Wall
Street.” She would have been named the “Miser of Wall Street” or
colloquially (and perhaps chauvinistically) called the “Bitch of Wall
Street”, if it were not for her general appearance. Hetty Green at 18 years old (Whaling Museum)
She commonly wore the Quaker garb that her family was brought up in.
Outdated long black dresses, which were said to actually be so worn and
unkempt that they began to turn a shade of green. Her personal hygiene
was so poor and her body odor so foul, that her desk had to be
maintained at a distance from others. Henrietta was sailing her own boat
and simply wasn’t concerned with other people’s opinions of how she
carried herself.
One has to wonder if her appearance and hygiene was partly due to her
frugality and shrewdness and partly because of its intimidation factor
as a woman among men in a male dominated business environment.
Wicked Witch of the East?
Being a “witch” worked within the historical context. She then would
pursue a variety of careful, conservative, long-term investments in real
estate (New York, St. Louis, & Chicago), railroad industry and
government bonds. She would also float loans. She purchased movie
theaters, office buildings, hotels, railroads, even cemeteries and
churches. She was extremely calculated in her approach to determine what
to invest her money on or what to purchase. Every investment was
heavily researched. In spite of what many men thought, this woman
excelled at math and economics. She was as capable if not more capable
then her peers. Stereotype be damned.
Through a number of economic crashes, particularly those of 1857,
1873, 1893, and 1907, she was at her most frugal. This is when she would
float her loans and snatch up any buying opportunity that presented
itself because of the economic hardship. When it came to nearly all her
financial dealings her general policy was to buy low and cash out when
they reached a relative high. In 1905 she was quoted in the New York
Times as saying “I buy when things are low and nobody wants them. I keep
them until they go up and people are anxious to buy.”
Through this manner of dealing, her frugal disposition, and over the
course of 50 years, she turned that early inheritance of a few million
dollars into over $100 Million dollars. Historians have estimated that
to be anywhere from half a billion to $4 billion dollars today. She was
financially involved and networked across 48 states at some level making
her the richest women on the planet.
Henrietta’s Family Life and Legacy
Henrietta bore two children, a son Edward Howland Robinson “Ned” Green
on August 23, 1868, and daughter Hetty Sylvia Ann Howland Green on
January 7, 1871. In spite of keeping their finances separate, her
husband Edward was given special privileges and even loaned money based
on who he was married to. His financial house John J. Cisco & Son
benefited not only by who he was married to, but also because Henrietta
was one of those who actually invested in the company. Investors thought
that the husband of the richest woman on earth who also had a financial
interest, wasn’t someone you would have to be concerned about
defaulting on a loan on. When the house began to collapse, it was
learned that the firm had actually loaned Edward money based on who he
was wed to. Her primary bank tried to recover some of Edward’s debts by
seizing some of her assets. They certainly didn’t know who they were
dealing with! Wedding Portrait of Hetty Green, new husband Matthew Astor Wilks, and daughter Sylvia
Henrietta withdrew her money immediately and deposited it in Chemical
Bank, a leading consolidator of the banking industry. This economic
fiasco, caused them to separate and Edward to move out. However, as I
mentioned earlier, we’re here to cover the lesser highlighted aspects of
Henrietta’s life; she reconciled with him later in life and personally
took care of him in the last years of his life when his health failed.
Not good press for a “witch.”
Henrietta passed away at age 81, in 1916 after a lengthy period of
strokes. She willed her entire massive fortune to her children. Her
children did not inherit her shrewdness and frugality. Her son Ned did
work under her managing some of her properties in Chicago, but liked to
spend money and amassed one of the largest and finest stamp collections
in the world at that time. History records him as living rather
lavishly, but it appears he lifted off of the interest of his $100
million dollar inheritance, which hovered somewhere around $1 million
dollars per year. Daughter Sylvia married minor heir to the Astor
fortune, Matthew Astor Wilks. Her mother of course, made her force a
prenuptial agreement on Matthew.
Both children maintained their inheritances and finances through the
Great Depression, surely using the tactics, and conservative methods of
their matriarch. Ned, of course, owned the Round Hill estate with its
famous WMAF radio transmitters and prototype atom smasher. Sylvia left
her $200 million (excepting $1.3 Million) to 64 different charities
primarily involving churches, hospitals, and universities.
Henrietta Howland Green was the “Witch of Wall Street.” That will
never change, but she also paved the way for women in the world of
finance, or in the workforce period for that matter. She showed that a
woman was more than capable to do the job of a man and even do it
better. She was a loving wife and in spite of being a miser, left her
children her entire fortune. She employed thousands, supporting an
untold number of families. This is the other element of the bouquet that
is the Hetty Green personage. Perhaps “witch” is too harsh a word. How
about “Honey Badger of Wall Street”?
Nah. “Witch of Wall Street” has a nice ring to it.
2 YEARS AGO
