Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
In 1943, James Joseph “Jim” Leftwich became the youngest known enlistee in the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG). Leftwich, a member of the Chickasaw Nation (a federally recognized tribe), was only 14 at the time. In a 1968 interview with Baltimore Sun reporter Alan Z. Forman, Leftwich addressed how -- despite being younger than the legal... Continue Reading →
Charles Robinson, who had a longtime career with life-saving stations in his home state of Michigan, was born on May 5, 1874, in the city of Grand Haven on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan and in the west-central section of the Wolverine State’s Lower Peninsula. Robinson was partly of Odawa ancestry. The Odawa --... Continue Reading →
August 22, 1978 Appledore II, a privately owned two-masted wooden schooner, was launched from the coast of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. This vessel -- with an overall length of 86 feet (26 meters) -- is larger than her sister ships Appledore I, III, IV, and V. All of these ships were constructed for Herbert and Doris... Continue Reading →
August 25, 1866 Shipbuilder and naval architect Fop Smit died in the town of Niewe Leckerland (now known as Nieuw Lekkerland) in the Netherlands. He was 88. Smit had been born on October 11, 1777, in the Dutch town and municipality of Alblassderdam. His father Jan Foppe Smith (1742-1807) and uncle Jacques Foppe Smit (1756-1820)... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 