2010 Lincoln Shield Cent series begins 2000 Sacagawea Dollar begins 1965 Silver content in US Half Dollar drops from 90% to 40%. Quarter and Dime went clad. 1950 Key Date Jefferson Nickel 1950 D is minted 1935 Peace Dollars are minted for the last time Other historical anniversaries 1995 Oklahoma City bombing 1990 Iraq invades Kuwait Operation Desert Shield begins, Cold War ends, Germany reunited 1980 Hostage crisis, Russia invades Afghanistan prompting boycott of Moscow Olympics, Miracle on Ice 1975 Jimmy Hoffa vanishes, Vietnam War ends 1970 Apollo 13 1955 Disneyland opens in California 1945 Atomic bombs dropped on Japan, World War II ends, Cold War begins, FDR dies in office 1940 Germany invades France 1935 Social Security goes into law 1890 Wonded Knee 1875 2nd Sioux War begins, Kentucky Derby begins, Treaty with Hawaii 1865 US Civil War ends, Lincoln assassination 1850 President Zachary Taylor dies in office 1825 Erie Canal opens 1775 American Revolution begins
Coins taught me everything I know about world history. Sorry, Mr. Vose and Mrs. Wheeler. Y’all were good teachers, but when I took your classes, they never held my attention like an old coin would.
Independent reading was my best teacher of history but I will say my American History teacher (Mr, Meyer) in 11th grade was exemplary.
The Mr. Vose I mentioned was my 11th grade History teacher. He was a former Navy Lieutenant Commander, and though he was an older guy, we considered him one of the “cool” teachers. He used to slip up and swear in front of the class sometimes. For whatever reason, Mr. Vose hated the Kennedies. He’d be in the middle of a lecture and then snap and say something about the blankety-blank Kennedies, much to the shock and amusement of us high school kids. He used to drive a Lotus Esprit sports car to school, like the one in one of the James Bond movies. So yeah, Mr. Vose made an impression. But my coin collection still taught me far more about history. PS- speaking of history- in the same high school I attended, one of the later teachers (after I had graduated and gone) was Heinz Guderian’s son. The elder Guderian was one of the top German generals who spearheaded the Blitzkrieg in WW2. Would’ve been interesting to hear his son’s lectures.
My older siblings had a HS history teacher similar to yours. I never had the "pleasure" of being in his class as he passed away when I was in 8th grade but heard a lot of stories about him from my siblings none very good. He was smart but a poor speaker and very stubborn in his beleifs. He would defend Nixon to the death. All you had to do was yell out "Nixon's a crook" and he would stop his lesson and spend the rest of the class hour going on about how Nixon was framed etc. Like your teacher he also hated Kennedy in addition to FDR, LBJ, and Carter. He even knocked Carter's post presidency humanitarian work. Looking back on it I wonder if he may have had conspiracy theorist tendencies.
I had another teacher- a math teacher this time- who was a Korean War veteran. One wiseacre guy in my class (one of the football players, I think) freed us from a math test by asking at the beginning of the class: “Hey, Mister Krewer- how cold was it in Korea?” Whereupon Mr. Krewer went into “war stories” mode and spent the entire hour talking about Korea and the snow and ice and all the hardship they’d gone through there. He was still going when the bell rang, and he completely forgot about giving us the math test!
I’m glad someone had a good 11th grade teacher. I was bored to death. He spoke in a monotone voice for everything and was more interested in the golf club than teaching me US history. Which I learned elsewhere.
