by sumac | Jan 9, 2017 | Historical Apologies, Youth apologizes
Back in the day – the eighteenth century, I mean – Emily Fitzgerald, Countess of Kildare, set up a school for her many children (by the end she had 22). She and her husband, the Duke of Leinster, bought Black Rock, a bathing lodge south of Dublin, and fixed it up so...
by sumac | Nov 28, 2016 | Historical Apologies
When the late poet Maxine Kumin had to defend her Radcliffe thesis, the committee asked questions about the thesis – “Amorality and the Protagonist in the Novels of Stendhal and Dostoevsky” – and also questions to test her general knowledge. She called it “torture.”...
by sumac | Oct 8, 2015 | Historical Apologies
Eliza Hamilton, widow of Alexander Hamilton, had come to visit her daughter in D.C. She was chilling in the back yard with her teenaged nephew when a maid brought James Monroe’s card. (I am guessing this maid was an employee, as the Hamiltons were strongly...
by sumac | May 1, 2015 | Historical Apologies, Political Apologies
Benedict Arnold is notorious as a traitor in the American Revolution. After fighting with distinction on the American side and being promoted to major general, things started going less well. He was injured at Saratoga (1777), passed over for promotion, saw others...