
Summer is here! |
July 30, 2000
We went to Jacksonville yesterday and Charles was so generous as to give each of us a certificate! We had a great party.
Today Denise worked all day. At 3PM a storm came up and they all got wet from the spray from the waves! They got back all right, but they thought it was shades of the “Three Hour Tour” of Gilligan!!
July 25, 2000
Pictures from David!





July 24, 2000
Happy birthday David!!!!!
July 23, 2000
Denise was part of this recital today!
You should have seen the people clap and cheer when she played “Old Joe Clark”, “Soldiers Joy” and “Redwing”. Everyone was falling asleep when the 35 others were up, they all came alive when Denise came onstage though! Amazing, her first performance had everyone up and smiling. Several people came up to her afterwards congratulating her. One lady told her “You have the spirit honey”, another lady said “You have made my husband inspired, he has always wanted to play the violin, now he is going to do it!’
We have completed our Guardian ad Litem (GAL) training and now are waiting to see if they will use us. We received a thank-you package with the following things in it:
It also came with a handwritten note:
“On the street I saw a naked child
hungary, and shivering in the cold
I became angry and said to God
“Why do you permit this?
Why don’t you do something?”
For a while God said nothing
That night he replied
He said, “I certainly did something
I made you.”
July 22 addendum
Jim Herrick had a link on his page for a testing center for computer skills. I checked it out and took one test (the one I failed while attempting to get my MCSE). I passed it! Click here for the results. I am just a beginner though, compared to Jim!
July 22, 2000
I found another Herrick Home page, Jim Herrick has a business doing web pages!
His can be found at Jim.Herrick.net Thanks to him I have a new Herrick Coat-of-Arms on the genealogy page.
Pictures from Joe’s Change of Command:
Joe cutting cake with his sword….Beautiful Angelyne and Joey
Denise (godmother) and Angelyne
Family suppport!
The music masters (after Mom L. was done entertaining everyone on the piano!).
July 21, 2000
We are looking forward to the weekend!
July 20, 2000
Try this page if you need a quick spreadsheet for something: Spreadsheet
Sorry, this only seems to work on Windows 2000, or has anyone else been able to get it to work?
July 16, 2000

We had a great time up at Suzanne and Joe’s. Joe’s change of command was very impressive. Joe has quite a challenge ahead. For the next two years he will be in command of a great warship the USS Maine. Our 45 foot sailboat could have fit crossways inside such a submarine, mast and all! He regailed us with stories as to how the ship can carry a great armory and how the weapons work. What a great opportunity for Joe!
Both of the parties were great! Thank you so much Joe and Sue for the great signed pictures in the frame! What a great present!!



My friend and author Roger Bansemer has been commisioned to write a new book about the R.M.S. Titanic. He needed to do some research to write the book and draw the pictures for the book….so…..he will be going out and down to the ship on August 9, 2000!!!
He will be inside the diving sub MIR 1 as it goes down to try to recover some artifacts before the ship breaks up (the steel of the Titanic is 20% eaten up already). Roger says the sub is filled with pure oxygen, which scares him because that is how the astronauts died, it is also very cold ( 32ºF or 0º C). They have special suits but it will be a cold trip nontheless.
Roger also says that the captain is ready with a syinge of drugs to render anyone on the sub unconcious in case they panic!! I guess they have to think of everything! It takes 2 1/2 hours to drop to the bottom, then they have to find the ship. Sounds very exciting! Maybe Joe could pilot his sub over and retrieve them if they get into trouble!!!



I was surfing the net today and found another John Herrick, he is a computer person too!



July 13, 2000
Nathan and Christine sent new pictures of little Nate!
See the rest on the Baby Page
We had a great trip canoeing down the Alafia river, we took a "one time" waterproof camera (and glad we did because it went in the water a few times!). We saw an animal Denise thought was a horse, then a cow , but it turned out to be a giant wild pig! It was huge! We also saw an alligator that had to be 8 feet long. It saw us, stood up and launched itself into the river. As we passed over the spot where he went in my heart was in my throat, he was huge! We saw a lot of fish, a placostamus, mullet, etc.
July 4, 2000
Declaration of Independence
Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776?
Five signers were captured by the British and charged as traitors. They were tortured and killed.
Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned
Nine fought and died during the Revolutionary War.
Two lost sons during the War and another had two sons captured.
What kind of men were these?
Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists.
Eleven were merchants.
Nine were farmers and plantation owners.
All were men of means and well educated, but they signed the Declaration of Independance knowing that the penalty for doing so was death. They pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their honor to this quest.
Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships taken by the British. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts and died in rags.
Thomas McKean was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. All his posessions were taken and he died in poverty.
Vandals and soldiers looted the properties of another eight of the signers:
Ellery, Hall, Claymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Rutledge, and Middleton.
While at the Battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson, Jr. noted that the British had taken his family’s home. He urged General Washington to open fire anyway. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.
The home of Francis Lewis was destroyed. The British jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.
John Hart was driven from the bedside of his dying wife. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and gristmill were destroyed. For more than a year, he lived in forests and caves, upon returning home he found his wife dead and his children gone. He died shortly thereafter, heartbroken.
Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution. These were not wild-eyed, rabble rousing ruffians. They were soft-spoken men of means and education. They had security, but they valued liberty more. Standing tall, straight and unwavering, they pledged: "for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of the devine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."
They gave us a free and independent America.
So, while you are enjoying the 4th, take a few minutes and silently thank these men for their heroic contributions. Freedom was not free, it was gained at a great price.
Below are two very important works of the CONGRESS of July 4th and 6th, 1776.
1. The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies
In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
And
2. Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of taking up Arms
In CONGRESS, July 6, 1776
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies
In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained, and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: | |
For protecting them by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: | |
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world: | |
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: | |
For depriving us in many cases of the benefits of Trial by Jury: | |
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences: | |
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies: | |
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments: | |
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. |
He has abdicated Government here by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms. Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren.
We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. | |
We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. | |
We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. |
They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by the authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare.
That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown,
and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is and ought to be totally dissolved;
and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce,
and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.
And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.
The signers of the Declaration represented the new states as follows:
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton




























































And even more revealing as to the state of concern:
Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of taking up Arms, July 6,1775 |
![]() ![]() John Hancock president |
July 2, 2000
I spoke to Amy last night, she has company for the weekend and is doing fine.
Dad H. has a new e-mail address, Allan’s and Alicia’s email came back, anyone have the correct e-mail for them? For all the e-mails see the Family Data Page.
Denise is off to work tonight on an evening charter, she is loving every minute!
I just spoke to Christine and her dad on the internet, she and little Nate are in California. Her dad got the computer working to see me and hear me, and I could hear them exceptionally well! They have a new computer and will be switching over to that one soon.
We have been very busy, we ordered a new matress and box spring, it should be delivered tomorrow. We sold our little boat the second day after we placed an ad, maybe we will have such good luck selling the bed!
I work tomorrow, but have the 4th off. I hope Denise can get off on the 4th so we can have a day together!
