I think the public at large was more divided in the late 60s and early 70s than they are now. That time marked a huge cultural clash between the regimented WWII generation and their free-thinking children. It was a culturally and socially tumultuous time when you think about how much this country changed between 1960 and 1970. It was a cataclysmic shift In almost every aspect of American life.

The public may have been more divided, but, there was no megaphone for the folks on the fringes.  There were few members of Congress for instance really representing those fringes.  Most votes in Congress were still bipartisan in those days.  All of the loudest voices were for trying to meet in the middle on those differences.

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My fellow southpaw Mark Brunell will probably always be my favorite Jaguar.

That sounds intriguing. We always seem to hold these fellows up to such lofty standards, and for good reason for the most part, but they were just as human as we are. I may have to look into this. I haven't read a book based on history in a couple of years.

If you want to read a good history book, read "Washington: A Life" by Ron Chernow.   It's a very long book, but the life of George Washington is so impressive, really an astoundingly impressive life of great courage, sacrifice, and achievement.  Chernow makes him a real human being, warts and all, brings him down off that marble statue.  But after reading that book I was convinced that George Washington was one of the greatest people ever.  He led a rag-tag army against the greatest superpower of the age for eight years, held the American revolution together through enormous hardships by sheer force of will and great leadership, then willingly gave up power when people were offering him a crown, which set us up for the elected civilian leadership we have today, then went on to become unanimously elected first President, and set all the precedents that our Presidents operate under now, and then willingly gave up power again and retired.  He was the greatest American ever.

He may have been the greatest and most impactful person of his lifetime worldwide.
Consider this: one reason the British were able to defeat the French in what we call the French and Indian War was they had much more ammunition.  The British had managed to get massive new supplies of gunpowder from India.  They did not really dominate all of India yet at that time, but they were able to extract a lot of stuff.  
So the question in my mind is, what if a man of Washington's character and stature had been born in India, rather than in America?  Would America end up more like Mexico, so divided and so corrupt, while India might be rich, and united, with much less religious prejudice?  How much really turns on one man? In this case, I think, quite a bit.

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My fellow southpaw Mark Brunell will probably always be my favorite Jaguar.

Here's a great book.  Sometimes, when a novelist sits down to write a true history book, you get a really entertaining history book.  

https://www.amazon.com/Waterloo-History-...124&sr=8-1

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Oh and how could I forget Dune.  I read the first three Dune books and half of God Emperor of Dune in the last few years.  The first three Dune books are great.  Deep storytelling that's heavy on fantasy for sci-fi.  But book four is a punishment.  The book has a 3,000 year old character, and the entire text seems to be an object lesson on why no one should want to live that long.

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My fellow southpaw Mark Brunell will probably always be my favorite Jaguar.

Thread resurrection.

I just finished The Taking of K-129. It's about project Azorian. In the early 70s the CIA designed and constructed a huge ship to raise a sunken Soviet sub from nearly 3 miles down in the Pacific Ocean. It was only partially successful when part of the apparatus used to grapple the sub broke apart only 3000 feet from the surface. They were able to recover only about a third of the sub. 

I saw this on part of a documentary a few years ago and it was absolutely fascinating. Most of the details and footage is, and you would have thought, likely to remain highly classified. 

There seems to be at least a train of thought that they retrieved more of the critical parts of the sub than they ever let on to the soviets ... However, they eventually had to 'trade' information about what they had recovered and the sailors that were inside As they were keen on finding out what the Russians knew about 'lost Vietnam vet's in exchange! As you say though ... A remarkable feat!

When it comes to books I've been reading a considerable amount on our local history here which I'm sure would be of no interest to anyone, couple of books on how the locals took to the mountains to repulse the Normans after 1066, Wainwrights guides to the lake district,

However, in terms of stuff people may have heard of I've also recently finished reading some of the collections of first world war poetry from Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, before that I read a couple of dissertations on the jfk and mlk assassinations and on a more light entertaining bent ... from time to time I always come back to the Flashman novels and the 'complete mcauslan' short stories! Written by a lad from our parish, a work of brilliance and still make me laugh every time!

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I’m about halfway through Wool which is the first book in the series that the show Silo is based on for Apple TV. MarleyJag mentioned it in another thread and it sounded like something I like to read. It’s pretty good, so far.

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