Al Nofi's CIC
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Issue #127, May 14, 2004 |
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This Issue...
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Infinite Wisdom
"No kind of greatness is more pleasing to the imagination of a democratic people than military greatness"
| -- | Alexis de Tocqueville,
Democracy in America |
La Triviata
- At the height of World War II in Europe, an American infantry division had organic motor vehicles that possessed a total of some 400,000 horsepower.
- One of the more unusual items supplied by the United States to the Afghan mujadhadeen fighting against the Russians during the 1980 was the mule, of which 700 were delivered.
- Gen. Lucien Truscott, who commanded the Fifth Army in Italy in the last year of World War II, was married to a great-great-great-great-granddaughter of Thomas Jefferson.
- Although the U.S. Navy appointed a Chief of Chaplains in 1917, it didn't get around to creating an "Office of the Chief of Chaplains" until 1944
- The actor David Garrick, who wrote the Royal Navy's marching song, "Heart of Oak" in 1859, is believed to have been the person for whom the traditional theatrical blessing, "Break a Leg" was invented, when he became so involved in his performance in the title role of Richard III that he failed to notice he had in fact done just that during the final battle scene.
- The first corps-sized maneuvers in American history were held outside Boston in 1909, involving some 15,000 Regulars and National Guardsmen, at a cost of $500,000.
- On October 20, 1984 Irish fishery protection vessels sank a poaching 330-ton Spanish fishing trawler by gunfire, though only after expending 596 rounds.
- Cass Gilbert, who designed the famous Woolworth Building, also designed the equally famous Brooklyn Army Terminal, from which hundreds of thousands of American soldiers departed for two world wars.
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