Hither and Thither...and give your dog a bone!

Another source of Memorial Day

KNOW YOUR HISTORY: Memorial Day was started by former slaves on May, 1, 1865 in Charleston, SC to honor 257 dead Union Soldiers who had been buried in a mass grave in a Confederate prison camp. They dug up the bodies and worked for 2 weeks to give them a proper burial as gratitude for fighting for their freedom. They then held a parade of 10,000 people led by 2,800 Black children where they marched, sang and celebrated.

Thanks to Abstrakt Goldsmith for this nugget of history that most of us never learned in school.
Source: The Blue Street Journal

May 27, 2013 at 1:39pm ·

More children gathered together below...

Remember when children could play in the streets when they flooded?

Well, I don't either.  But here those little guys are, with their shoes and socks in bundles, and trusting their bare feet to the snakes and fish and whatever else might swim in ankle deep water, not to mention the leavings of horse drawn vehicles.  Oh my! Come check others' posts at Sepia Saturday HERE.

Another flood, that apparently is happening right now in Ellicott City, MD (May 28, 2018)

And western North Carolina where I now live, is also being hit by rain from tropical storm Alberto...on top of other rain we've already had all week.  Floods are happening on all our creeks and rivers.  Roads are closed in many places.

US 221 washed out between Blowing Rock NC and Linnville. 5.28.18

US 70 (that's 4 lanes plus a turning lane) at Ingles Warehouse (taken from the warehouse) in Black Mountain NC...closed where the muddy water crosses over all 5 lanes. 5.29.18 before noon, but it opened again later. (That is a low building, not that much under water...but the lake in front of it is where the highway should be, on the other side of the horizontal line of the railroad tracks.

Here's the Black Mountain Police Dept version of this spot.

Flat Creek over it's banks at Ole Guacamole's Restaurant 5.29.18 at noon. Photo by Elena Delatore

Just upstream from Ole's, here's Flat Creek still just barely under the bridge behind the Primary School.

People have been evacuted from low lying mobile home parks as Flat Creek and Swannanoa River go higher and higher, 4 pm, 5.29.18 by Black Mountain Police Dept.

 Later that night, Ole's Guacamole Restaurant was flooded by Flat Creek...the whole parking lot under water.  That's got to be 4-5 feet over the usual water level. I was awake till 1 am looking at the various videos on Facebook of my neighborhood, and then even hearing of closing of the Interstate 40 from a landslide near me...at least for a while.  When I woke up in the morning I could again hear traffic going by, though with springtime leaves on trees, couldn't see it.

 Just down Blue Ridge Rd (my street, but I'm up on the hill) the road usually goes over the Swannanoa River next to this little strip mall...but last night the river came into its parking lot, and of course the bridge closed. The Flood Gallery was well named, wasn't it?

Another shot of Ole's as the creek flooded it's parking lot.

As the day went by, I opened my living room windows and if the rain got heavy, it splashed off the leaves of the trees about 10 feet outside, a second story window on a hillside.  I could see rushing water all day long, only getting heavier at times, and when sunlight peeked through a few times, the water on top of the mud just kept going down hill, right into the Swannanoa River.

On a lighter note, how about this Children's Marching Song? Beware, this forms the habitual ear-worm, which will follow you throughout the day until you try another catchy tune, perhaps more modern.

The Children's Marching Song Lyrics 

by Mitch Miller

This old man he played one
He played nick nack on my drum
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played two
He played nick nack on my shoe
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played three
He played nick nack on my tree
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played four
He played nick nack on my door
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played five
He played nick nack on my hive
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

[Whistling and drums interlude]

This old man he played six
He played nick nack on my stick
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played seven
He played nick nack up in heaven
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played eight
He played nick nack on my gate
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played nine
He played nick nack on my vine
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

This old man he played ten
He played nick nack on my hen
With a nick nack paddy whack
Give a dog a bone
This old man came rolling home

Songwriters: CECIL SHARP, MALCOLM ARNOLD, SABINE BARING-GOULD

The Children's Marching Song lyrics © EMI Music Publishing

Do you remember hearing it first in the movie The Bridge on the River Kwai?