The Sins of the Father: “Light Horse” Harry Lee and Robert E. Lee

In early 1862, Robert E. Lee was not yet in command of the Army of Northern Virginia. Instead, he was sent by Confederate President Jefferson Davis to inspect and improve the South’s coastal defenses. This job brought him to Cumberland Island, a barrier island off the coast of Georgia, and while there, he visited the ancestral home of Nathanael Greene, where his father was buried in the family plot. Greene was a famous and talented Revolutionary War general who led the Continental Army to success in taking back the Southern colonies. Lee’s father, “Light Horse” Harry Lee helped Greene take back the colonies, which is how they became friends. In a letter to his wife, Mary Anna Custis Lee, he discusses the visit and remarks how the grave is “marked by a plain marble slab.” At first glance, Lee seems to be a dutiful son visiting his father’s grave, but there is much more to the story. The story begins with Lee’s father, “Light Horse” Harry Lee, a Revolutionary War hero who seems to be just the type of person that Lee would look up to and aspire to be. [excerpt

The Marble Man: Images Depict Lee, His Friends, And His Legend

Robert E. Lee: An Album tells of Lee\u27s life through images. This book is an album in the literal sense, author Emory M. Thomas explains. It contains pictures, contemporary with Lee and with us, of places associated with Lee. It includes pictures of people Lee knew and pictures of Lee. Here...

Victim of Emancipation: Adams County Flustered

Republican stalwart newspaper The Adams Sentinel ran nothing in its folds hinting at the editor\u27s elation over the Emancipation Proclamation in the days following the document\u27s release. In a terse column, headed, Proclamation of the President, ran the document, unadorned with either accolades or contempt. Elsewhere in the paper\u27s folds, the news hovered back and forth over the fields around Sharpsburg and word of the lackadaisical pursuit of Lee\u27s army into Virginia. The deep meaning of one of Lincoln\u27s most momentous moments seemed to be lost on the Republicans of south-central Pennsylvania, as they eschewed the topic, pussyfooted around it and went out of their way to nearly ignore the document which sat in Washington City with its ink still drying

The Trophies of Victory and the Relics of Defeat: Returning Home in the Spring of 1865

The remains of a lone apple tree, cut down and carved into small pieces by Confederate soldiers, lay along a rutted dirt road that led to the village of Appomattox Court House. Earlier on 9 April 1865, Robert E. Lee had waited under the shade of the apple tree, anxious to hear from Ulysses S.Grant about surrendering his army. Messages between the generals eventually led to a brief meeting between Lee and two Union staff offices who then secured the parlor in Wilmer McLean\u27s house, where Grant dictated the surrender terms to Lee. As soon as the agreement was signed and Lee walked out the door, Union officers decluttered the parlor with Yankee efficiency, cutting strips of upholstery from plush sofas, breaking chair legs into small keepsakes, and appropriating candleholders and chairs until the room was left barren. [excerpt

Avian Survey of Fort Lee, Virginia 2014

Objectives of this study were to include priority to documenting avian species of management interest and their use of habitats on Fort Lee. All habitats surveyed for this project were chosen by both the Environmental Management Office and Center for Consrvation Biology staff members. Habitats that were considered priority for survey include 1) Forest interior, including deciduous, mixed pine-hardwood, and pine-dominated stands. 2) Grassland habitat 3) Urban habitat, typically dominated by sparse tree cover that is imbedded in the installation’s man-made infrastructure of buildings, roads, golf courses, and other structures 4) Shrub-scrub habitat associated with early successional forest regeneration and emergent wetlands

Virginia Earth Science Collaborative Astronomy Course for Teachers

We describe the development and implementation of a professional development course for teachers of grades 4-12 designed to increase their content knowledge in astronomy, space science, and the nature of science using interactive presentations, and hands-on and inquiry-based lessons. The course, Space Science for Teachers, encompasses the astronomy and nature of science components of the Virginia Standards of Learning for grades 4-12 [1]. In addition to increasing their content knowledge, teachers gain experience using innovative teaching technologies, such as an inflatable planetarium, planetarium computer software, and computer controlled telescopes. The courses included evening laboratory sessions where teachers learned the constellations, how to find specific celestial objects, and how to use a variety of small telescopes. Participants received three graduate credit hours in science after completing the course requirements. Space Science for Teachers was taught at the University of Virginia in Summer 2005 and 2006, at George Mason University in Summer 2006 and 2007, at the University of Virginia Southwest Center in Abingdon, Virginia in Fall 2006, and at the MathScience Innovation Center in Richmond during Summer 2005 and 2007. A total of 135 teachers participated in the courses

Application of Machine Learning to Mortality Modeling and Forecasting

Estimation of future mortality rates still plays a central role among life insurers in pricing their products and managing longevity risk. In the literature on mortality modeling, a wide number of stochastic models have been proposed, most of them forecasting future mortality rates by extrapolating one or more latent factors. The abundance of proposed models shows that forecasting future mortality from historical trends is non-trivial. Following the idea proposed in Deprez et al. (2017), we use machine learning algorithms, able to catch patterns that are not commonly identifiable, to calibrate a parameter (the machine learning estimator), improving the goodness of fit of standard stochastic mortality models. The machine learning estimator is then forecasted according to the Lee-Carter framework, allowing one to obtain a higher forecasting quality of the standard stochastic models. Out-of sample forecasts are provided to verify the model accuracy

No bursts detected from FRB121102 in two 5-hour observing campaigns with the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope

Here, we report non-detection of radio bursts from Fast Radio Burst FRB 121102 during two 5-hour observation sessions on the Robert C. Byrd 100-m Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia, USA, on December 11, 2017, and January 12, 2018. In addition, we report non-detection during an abutting 10-hour observation with the Kunming 40-m telescope in China, which commenced UTC 10:00 January 12, 2018. These are among the longest published contiguous observations of FRB 121102, and support the notion that FRB 121102 bursts are episodic. These observations were part of a simultaneous optical and radio monitoring campaign with the the Caltech HIgh- speed Multi-color CamERA (CHIMERA) instrument on the Hale 5.1-m telescope.Comment: 1 table, Submitted to RN of AA

Saturday Extra: Guerilla Civic Engagement on the Landscape

Over at Civil War Memory, Kevin Levin brought the community\u27s attention to some installations placed on the fences surrounding a few of the statues along Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia. The signs are a redress of sorts to the Confederate narrative told through granite, marble and bronze on the massive monuments. They highlight black citizens of Virginia who challenged the racist establishment of the state throughout its history. [excerpt