Historical and Literary Essays

These selections reflect my academic interests deriving from my Master's Degree in Liberal Studies, with a concentration in History and Literature.  

 

Historical Essays: Primary and secondary source research covering a broad span of history.

• Adolf Hitler: A Rhetorical Analysis  
• Arthur of the Britons: The Complete Series
• Audio Documentary: News from the Front: Memories of a World War II Refugee
• Battle of the Little Bighorn Video Library
• Early Czech History
• František Palacký (1798-1876): Early Years
• František Palacký: From the Pan-Slavic Congress of 1848 to his Death and Legacy
• Green Grass and Rainbows: The Murder of Doreen Gaul, November 1969
• Hildegard von Bingen: Her Life and Music
• Hitler: The Whole Story (1989)
• Paleo-Indian Artifacts from the Hannacroix Creek
• PBS Frontline: Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald?
• Photo: Unknown Italian Army Unit Circa Early 1940s
• Rechel Miller's Letter to Her American Sister: Hawick, Scotland, May 1888
• Take This Statue Down!
• The Antikythera Mechanism: A Relic of Ancient Greek Science
• The Assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald
• The Bloodied Face of Democracy: Tiananmen Square 25 Years Later
• The Impact of the Repeal of the Fairness Doctrine on Talk Radio
• The Lost Voice of Radio Beijing
• The Mystery of the Little Bighorn Battlefield
• The Nazi Seizure of the German Peoples’ Community
• Vlad Dracula: The Dragon’s Shadow, 1431-1460
• Vlad Dracula: The Dragon’s Shadow, 1460-1476

Retro-Vision History: This series of articles explore how the past viewed itself and the future by reviewing archival audio and film from business, education, news media, and television.

• 1971 Coca-Cola Commercial: I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke  
• 1971 Keep America Beautiful PSA: The “Crying Indian”  
• 1971 Radio Free Europe PSA: “The IN Sound from Outside”  
• Apollo 11: As It Happened
• Chronicles of Change (1975): NYS Museum Educational Film
• Duck and Cover and DIE!: Rehearsing for the Nuclear Holocaust
• Early Experiments in Computer-Generated Imagery (1957 – 1976)
• Ephemeral Films (1931-1960): A Look Back on an America That Was
• Howard K. Smith Commentary on Television and the Apollo 11 Moon Landing, July 20, 1969
• In Search of . . . Atlantis
• In Search of . . . The Bermuda Triangle
• In Search of . . . Inca Treasure
• In Search of . . . The Dark Star
• In Search of . . . The Easter Island Massacre
• James Burke: Balanced Anarchy — The Day the Universe Changed
• JFK Assassination: As It Happened
• Mego 1970s Action Figure and Games Toy Commercials
• NASA Space Reports Video Compilation
• National Geographic: The Violent Earth (1973)
• Radio Documentary: The Cool Rebellion with Howard K. Smith
• Rare Video: ABC News Panel on Moon Landing with Howard K. Smith, July 1969
• Rare Video: Sci-Fi Writers' Round Table - July 1969
• Retro TV Commercials: A Resource for Historical Study
• The Futurists: CBS News — McGraw Hill Educational Film (1967)
• The Making of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1966)
• The Voyager Spacecraft Golden Record
• The Westinghouse Total Electric Home (1960)
• Victory at Sea: The Complete Series
• Year 1999 A.D. (1967)

Literary Essays: Reviews of rhetoric, language, and classic literature in book, film, TV and radio.

• Beats on Film: 1959
• Class and Social Stratification in Jude the Obscure
• Frank Zappa vs. John Lofton: A Rhetorical Analysis of the 1986 Crossfire Debate
• How to Speak Hip (1959)
• Interview with Jack Kerouac on The Ben Hecht Show, October 1958
• Isaac Asimov: Five Books by the Master of Science Fiction
• Jack Kerouac: Readings from On the Road and Visions of Cody
• Lord of the Flies (1963)
• Medieval Meditations on Death
• Mercutio’s Dream — The Queen Mab Soliloquy: Romeo and Juliet: Act I, Scene IV
• Neoclassicism, Romanticism, and the Norman-Saxon Conflict in Ivanhoe
• October in the Railroad Earth: Jack Kerouac and Steve Allen
• Poetics in the Post-Modern Age
• Radio Documentary: “Footloose in Greenwich Village” WNYC FM (1960)
• Review: Edward Dorn's Gunslinger
• Review: Ian McKellen's Richard III
• Romeo and Juliet at the Movies
• San Francisco Scene (The Beat Generation) — Jack Kerouac
• Symmetry, Symbolism, and the Industrial Age in Lady Chatterley’s Lover
• The Beatnik Café
• The Greenwich Village Poets: Charles Kuralt Reporting

 

The Literature of the Copernican Revolution: My master's degree thesis project, this series of academic essays surveys the scientists who led Europe out of the Middle Ages and revolutionized Western scientific study and theory.

• Introduction: The Galilean Parallax
• Galileo Galilei (1564-1642): The Starry Messenger
• Isaac Newton (1643-1727): Peering Inside the Mind of God
• Johannes Kepler (1571-1630): The Secret of the Universe
• Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1593): Father of the Modern Universe
• Tycho Brahe (1546-1601): The Noble Dane 

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