July 3, 2001: Arsenal sign Sol Campbell

Sol Campbell with the FA Cup (in his right hand)

and the Premier League trophy (in his left)

July 3, 2001, 25 years ago: Arsenal Football Club sign Sol Campbell. The centreback had been Captain of their North London arch-rivals, Tottenham Hotspur F.C., and had led "Spurs" to the 1999 League Cup. But, his contract having run out, he was not given any assurances by team management that they would bring in new talent to improve the team.

In contrast, Arsenal offered the 26-year-old East Londoner the chance to stay in London, and play Champions League games. After he had rejected all overtures by Spurs, and from European giants FC Barcelona, Internazionale Milano and Bayern Munich, Campbell signed with Arsenal. Spurs' Captain was now the rock of Arsenal's defense, ready to replace the aging team Captain, Tony Adams.

Tottenham fans were livid, turning as red as their rivals' shirts. Not with embarrassment, as they should have, but with rage.

Result? In his 1st season with Arsenal, they won the Premier League and the FA Cup -- the Double. 2nd season? The FA Cup again. 3rd season? An unbeaten League season, clinching the title at, of all places, Spurs' White Hart Lane. 4th season? Another FA Cup. 5th season? Arsenal reached the Champions League Final, and Sol scored in the game, although Arsenal lost.

He then left Arsenal, signing with Hampshire team Portsmouth FC. In 2008, Portsmouth made an unlikely run to win the FA Cup, with Campbell as Captain.

To this day, Spurs fans sing about Sol being "Judas," and that's one of the more printable things they say. But he says he has no regrets.

Since he made the North London switch, Spurs have won just 2 major trophies, and that's if you consider the League Cup to be a "major trophy," doing so in 2008, meaning that Campbell still outdid them that season by leading Portsmouth to the FA Cup; and the Europa League to be one, doing so in 2025.

July 3, 2001 was a Tuesday. Folarin Balogun, a Brooklyn native of Nigerian descent who has played for Arsenal, AS Monaco, and the U.S. National Team, was born on this day.

July 1, 1946: Superman vs. the Ku Klux Klan

July 1, 1946: The Ku Klux Klan, America's leading proponents of bigotry, face one opponent they cannot defeat: Superman.

Superman, of course, is a fictional character. He does not exist in real life. He beat the Klan, anyway. With help.

In 1946, Stetson Kennedy, a human rights activist, 29 years old and a native of Jacksonville, Florida, infiltrated the KKK and other racist/terrorist groups. Concerned that the organization had links to the government and police forces -- which, in the Southern States, it most certainly did -- Kennedy decided to use its findings to strike at the Klan in a different way. (Note: William Stetson Kennedy, his full name, was not related to the Kennedy political family of Massachusetts.)

He contacted the producers of the Superman radio show, which was recorded at station WOR in New York, and syndicated nationally over the Mutual Broadcasting System. He proposed a story where the superhero, voiced by actor and game show host Bud Collyer (born Clayton Johnson Heermance Jr.), battles the Klan. Looking for new villains, and unable to reproduce the effects of some Superman opponents from the comic books due to budgetary reasons, the producers eagerly agreed.

Kennedy provided information, including details of Klan rituals and the like to the writers. The result was a series of episodes, "Clan of the Fiery Cross," in which Superman took on the Klan. The trivialization of the Klan's rituals and natures had a negative impact on Klan recruiting and membership numbers. According to one source, it "led to a steep decline in membership from which the KKK never recovered."

Reportedly, Klan leaders denounced the show, and called for a boycott of Kellogg's products, which sponsored the radio show. However, the story arc earned spectacular ratings, making Superman the most highly rated kids' radio program, and the food company stood by its support of the show. They later sponsored the TV show The Adventures of Superman, starring George Reeves.

Bud Collyer lived until 1969; Stetson Kennedy, until 2011. In 2019, Chinese-American writer Gene Luen Yang and the Japanese-American artist team calling itself Gurihiru adapted the story into a comic book series, Superman Smashes the Klan, setting it in 1946 like the original radio series, and making Chinese-Americans the focus, with assistance from African-Americans, the Daily Planet newspaper, and Superman himself.

July 1, 1926: The Benjamin Franklin Bridge Opens

July 1, 1926, 100 years ago: The Delaware River Bridge opens, connecting Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Camden, New Jersey, over the river in question. For the next 3 years, it is the longest suspension bridge ever built.

The name was changed to the Benjamin Franklin Bridge in 1955, named for Philadelphia's favorite son, since the Walt Whitman Bridge, to the south and also over the Delaware, had been approved.

It connects the downtowns of Pennsylvania's largest city and southern New Jersey's largest city, and carries Interstate 676 and U.S. Route 30, and the PATCO Speedline subway railroad. Because it's close to downtown, it's often used for panoramic photographs of the city.

It was preceded as a Delaware River bridge by:

* 1884: The Calhoun Street Bridge in Trenton.

* 1896: The rail-only Delair Bridge.

* 1903: The Morrisville-Trenton Railroad Bridge.

* 1913: The West Trenton Railroad Bridge.

And it has been followed by:

* 1928: The Lower Trenton Bridge, the one with the big letters on each side, reading, "TRENTON MAKES THE WORLD TAKES."

* 1929: The Tacony-Palmyra Bridge, N.J. and Pennsylvania Route 73.

* 1931: The Burlington-Bristol Bridge, N.J. and Pennsylvania Route 413.

* 1951: The original, now-eastward span of the Delaware Memorial Bridge, Interstate 295 and U.S. Route 40.

* 1952: The Trenton-Morrisville Toll Bridge, U.S. Route 1.

* 1956: The Delaware River-Turnpike Toll Bridge, part of the Pearl Harbor Memorial Turnpike Extension, connecting the New Jersey Turnpike with the Pennsylvania Turnpike, Interstate 276.

* 1957: The Walt Whitman Bridge, Interstate 76.

* 1961: The original Scudder Falls Bridge, which was eventually bannered as Interstate 95.

* 1968: The 2nd, westward span of the Delaware Memorial Bridge.

* 1974: The Commodore Barry Bridge, U.S. Route 322.

* 1976: The Betsy Ross Bridge, N.J. and Pennsylvania Route 90.

* 2019: The new Scudder Falls Bridge.

Although not as famous as the Brooklyn Bridge in New York or the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, both of which tend to get destroyed in disaster movies, the Ben Franklin Bridge was shown seriously damaged in the 2023 film Shazam: Fury of the Gods.

July 1, 1876: The Dewey Decimal System

July 1, 1876, 150 years ago: The publication Library Journal publishes its 1st issue, in Boston. It is founded and largely written by Melvil Dewey, a 25-year-old librarian originally from Adams Center, New York, on Lake Ontario. In this issue, Dewey explained his new cataloguing system for library books, which has come to be known as the Dewey Decimal System.

Dewey was also a believer in the metric system, as it was also a base-ten system. But that's never caught on in America.

Dewey, identifying himself as "the author," explained his system as follows, with my editing:

The plan of the following Classification and Index was developed early in 1873. It was the result of several months' study of library economy as found in some hundreds of books and pamphlets, and in over fifty personal visits to various American libraries.

In this study, the author became convinced that the usefulness of these libraries might be greatly increased without additional expenditure. Three years practical use of the system here explained, leads him to believe that it will accomplish this result; for with its aid, the catalogues, shelf lists, indexes, and cross-references essential to this increased usefulness, can be made more economically than by any other method which he has been able to find. The system was devised for cataloguing and indexing purposes, but it was found on trial to be equally valuable for numbering and arranging books and pamphlets on the shelves.

The library is first divided into nine special libraries which are called Classes. These Classes are Philosophy, Theology, &c., and are numbered with the nine digits. Thus Class 9 is the Library of History; Class 7, the Library of Fine Art; Class 2, the Library of Theology.

These special libraries or Classes are then considered independently, and each one is separated again into nine special Divisions of the main subject. These Divisions are numbered from 1 to 9 as were the Classes. Thus 59 is the 9th Division (Zoology) of the 5th Class (Natural Science). A final division is then made by separating each of these Divisions into nine Sections which are numbered in the same way, with the nine digits. Thus 513 is the 3d Section (Geometry) of the 1st Division (Mathematics) of the 5th Class (Natural Science).

This number, giving Class, Division, and Section, is called the Classification or Class Number, and is applied to every book or pamphlet belonging to the library. All the Geometries are thus numbered 513, all the Mineralogies 549, and so throughout the library, all the books on any given subject bear the number of that subject in the scheme.

Where a 0 occurs in a class number, it has its normal zero power. Thus, a book numbered 510, is Class 5, Division 1, but no Section. This signifies that the book treats of the Division 51 (Mathematics) in general, and is not limited to any one Section, as is the Geometry, marked 513. If marked 500, it would indicate a treatise on Science in general, limited to no Division. A zero occurring in the first place would in the same way show that the book is limited to no Class.

The classification is mainly made by subjects or content regardless of form; but it is found practically useful to make an additional distinction in these general treatises, according to the form of treatment adopted. Thus, in Science we have a large number of books treating of Science in general, and so having a 0 for the Division number.

These books are then divided into Sections, as are those of the other Classes according to the form they have taken on. We have the Philosophy and History of Science, Scientific Compends, Dictionaries, Essays, Periodicals, Societies, Education, and Travels,--all having the common subject, NATURAL SCIENCE, but treating it in these varied forms. These form distinctions are introduced here because the number of general works is large, and the numerals allow of this division, without extra labor for the numbers from 501 to 509 would otherwise be unused. They apply only to the general treatises, which, without them, would have a class number ending with two zeros.

A Dictionary of Mathematics is 510, not 503, for every book is assigned to the most specific head that will contain it, so that 503 is limited to Dictionaries or Cyclopedias of Science in general. In the same way a General Cyclopedia or Periodical treats of no one class, and so is assigned to the Class 0. These books treating of no special class, but general in their character, are divided into Cyclopedias, Periodicals, etc. No difficulty is found in following the arithmetical law and omitting the initial zero, so these numbers are printed 31, 32, etc., instead of 031, 032, etc.

In other words:

* 000: Computer Science, Information and General Works

* 100: Philosophy and Psychology

* 200: Religion

* 300: Social Sciences

* 400: Language

* 500: Pure Science, not covered under any of these other categories

* 600: Technology

* 700: Arts and Recreation

* 800: Literature

* 900: History and Geography

Most entries on this blog would fall under 700, with Music coming in at the 780s, Movies and Television at 792, and Sports at 796; or 900, under History, with 920 being Biography, the 930s for the History of the Ancient World (not coverable here), the 940s for the History of Europe, the 950s for Asia, the 960s for Africa, the 970s for North America, the 980s for South America, and the 990s for "Other Areas," like Oceania (Australia, New Zealand and Pacific islands) or the polar regions.

A book with a Dewey number of 000 would be for computer science. A book with a Dewey number of 999 would be for "extraterrestrial worlds." If the sports entries in this blog were published in book form (unlikely to happen in my lifetime), the sticker on the spine would read 796 PAC, for sports and the 1st 3 letters of my surname. If I included only those entries relating to baseball, it would be 796.357 PAC.

In 1897, when the present Library of Congress building opened, it instituted its own system, the Library of Congress Classification. While some libraries have adopted it, the Dewey Decimal System remains considerably more popular. 

From 1883 to 1888, Melvil Dewey was the chief librarian at the Columbia College Libraries; then, through 1906, the director of the New York State Library. In 1895, at Lake Placid, New York, he and his wife Annie founded the Lake Placid Club, which, by 1924, helped to establish the Winter Olympics, which have been hosted in Lake Placid in 1932 and 1980. In 1926, he moved to Florida, and established a town named Lake Placid there. He died there in 1931.

In the years since his death, unsettling revelations about him have reached the public, including racism, anti-Semitism, and sexual harassment of women. His System has been of great help to anyone using a library, either employee or visitor; but he must be forever consigned to the realm of, "Yes, but... "

Conservatism Is a Racist Ideology

Today, the Supreme Court of the United States upheld "birthright citizenship."

In a case abbreviated as Trump v. Barbara, the Court recognized that it is explicitly guaranteed to anyone born under the legal "jurisdiction" of the U.S. federal government by the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, adopted on July 9, 1868), which states: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."

The vote was narrow as hell, though: 5-4. As expected, Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Katanji Brown Jackson, liberals appointed by Presidents of the Democratic Party, supported birthright citizenship. But so did Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, both conservative Justices appointed by Presidents of the Republican Party -- including Barrett, appointed by Donald Trump.

The other four Associate Justices, all archconservatives appointed by Republican Presidents, voted against it: Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.

Once again, the Supreme Court matters. Trump -- or, if something happens to him, Vice President JD Vance taking his place -- has two and a half years left in his term. And Thomas is 78 years old, Alito is 76, Sotomayor is 72, and Roberts is 71. There's a huge chance that whoever is President between now and January 20, 2029 will have to replace one of them, and a good chance that he'll have to replace at least two. The President elected on November 7, 2028 and taking office on January 20, 2029 will almost certainly inherit those new Justices, and, if not, have to replace them and the others.

Since taking office for a 2nd term as President on January 20, 2025, Donald Trump has demanded that the U.S. Supreme Court ignore this vital part of the Constitution, and declare that only children born to parents who are both citizens of the U.S. shall be recognized as citizens of the U.S.

This is anti-immigration rhetoric, aimed largely at black and Spanish-speaking people. It is racist. It is disgusting. It is immoral. It is un-American. And, while the 1st Amendment means that this shouldn't be an issue, so many people claiming it to be true also lie and say they follow Jesus, so I'm going to add this: It is un-Christian.

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Conservatism is the ideology of racism. From 1837 onward, after the populist Andrew Jackson left office, the Democratic Party was the party of conservatism. Then, after the American Civil War, without Abraham Lincoln to keep an eye on them any longer, the members of the Republican Party saw how much money they'd made on railroads and armaments, and decided they didn't want to pay taxes on that income, and became conservative. This led to the Compromise of 1877, which ended Reconstruction, and thus ended the official move for civil rights in America, for black people and for women. (Hispanics weren't even being considered, although there were moves, even then, to limit immigration from Asia.)

So, at this point, we had two conservative parties, to the point where the Republicans threw former President Theodore Roosevelt out in 1912, when he campaigned to return to the office, on things like universal health coverage and old-age pensions -- essentially, what became Social Security.

Starting in 1932, with Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal, the Democratic Party returned to liberalism, except for their Southern wing, which, while taking in the money from New Deal's liberal projects, remained racist and conservative.

In 1964, the outside-the-South Democrats joined with reasonable Republicans to pass the Civil Rights Act. The most conservative Republicans appealed to the Southern Democrats, and say, "You don't like it? Join us." And they did. And that's where we are now.

So when Republicans call the Democrats the party of racism and the party of the Ku Klux Klan, it's no more true today than the Republicans being the party of Lincoln. Today's racists are united in their support of the Republicans, and of Donald Trump.

And let's drop this myth of "Conservatism is opposed to big government." Conservatives have always believed in big government when it comes to fighting their enemies. Since World War II, they've never had a problem with expanding the Department of Defense, or the CIA, or the FBI. Because that involves spending taxpayers' money. The only time they want smaller government is when bigger government makes them spend more of their own money.

June 29, 1986: Argentina Win the World Cup Dubiously -- Again

June 29, 1986, 40 years ago: The World Cup Final is played at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City. It features perhaps the last 2 teams that most neutrals wanted to see: Argentina, 1978 winners of the World Cup and the team of Diego Maradona, whose handball gave them a win over England in the Quarterfinal; and West Germany, whose style of play is defensive-first and generally considered boring.

César Luis Menotti managed Argentina to that 1978 World Cup win. A Socialist, the opposite of his country's government at the time, he said:

There's a right-wing football and a left-wing football. Right-wing football wants to suggest that life is struggle. It demands sacrifices. We have to become of steel and win by any method... obey and function, that's what those with power want from the players. That's how they create retards, useful idiots that go with the system.

In contrast, by 1986, the ruling military junta was gone, and Argentina had a more liberal government. Its World Cup team was managed by Carlos Bilardo, a physician who had played as a midfielder who helped Estudiantes de La Plata win 3 straight Copas Libertadores (South America's version of the European Cup/UEFA Champions League) in 1968, '69 and '70. He had been a league winner with Estudiantes as a player in 1967, and as their manager in 1982.

Like Menotti, he believed in free-flowing football; and, in Maradona (who starred with Boca Juniors and Italian team Napoli), Jorge Valdano (a forward for Real Madrid, known as "The Philosopher of Football"), and Jorge Burruchaga (a midfielder who starred for Avellenada team Independiente, now with French team Nantes), he had the team for it.

Franz Beckenbauer had starred for Bayern Munich, and captained West Germany to the 1974 World Cup. Now, he was their manager, and they were not merely loaded, but fired up to win the World Cup, after losing the 1982 Final to Italy.

Bayern presented Die Mannschaft with midfielder Lothar Matthäus, and their former forward, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, was now at Italy's Internazionale Milano, and served as the Captain. Werder Bremen produced forward Rudy Völler. Hamburger SV produced forward Felix Magath. And goalkeeper Harald Schumacher came from FC Köln in Cologne.

The Germans survived Group E, which also had Scotland, Denmark and Uruguay, whose manager, Omar Borrás, described it with a term used in the previous World Cup held in Mexico, in 1970: << Grupo de la muerte. >> "Group of Death."

NBC broadcast the game live in America. Argentina had taken a 2-0 2nd half lead, on goals by José Luis Brown of French club Stade Brestois in the 23rd, and Valdano in the 56th. Rummenigge scored in the 74th minute, and Völler scored in the 81st, and West Germany had tied the game.

No team had ever blown a 2-goal lead in a World Cup Final before, and it was just desserts for Argentina, due to Maradona's "Hand of God" in the Quarterfinal. But Burruchaga spared his homeland's blushes by scoring the winning goal in the 84th minute.

Argentina had now won 2 World Cups -- both under incredibly dubious circumstances. And least this one was won while they had a democratic government.

The teams played each other again in the 1990 Final, with Germany winning that one. It remains the only Final ever to be a rematch of the preceding World Cup's Final. A unified Germany faced Argentina in the 2014 Final, and Germany won.

Argentina won the World Cup for a 3rd time in 2022, beating France on penalties. 

June 29, 1956: The Interstate Highway System

June 29, 1956, 70 years ago: President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, creating the Interstate Highway System.

"Ike" had wanted such a highway system for America since the Summer of 1919, when, as a 28-year-old Lieutenant Colonel, he participated in the U.S. Army's first Transcontinental Motor Convoy across the country. The convoy left the Ellipse south of the White House in Washington on July 7, and went to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. From there, it got on the Lincoln Highway, and went to San Francisco. But there were mudpatches that vehicles got stuck in, and bad bridges that the Army rebuilt. The convoy reached San Francisco on September 6 -- 61 days later. Ike thought that was unacceptable.

The Federal Highway System was begun in 1926, with proper paving. But Ike didn't think it was enough: He wanted highways without traffic lights, without having to go through big cities or small towns, rather providing access to local roads leading into them. As a General in World War II, he had seen the Germans' Autobahn system. In a book he wrote after leaving office, he said, "The old convoy had started me thinking about good, two-lane highways, but Germany had made me see the wisdom of broader ribbons across the land."

Ike got his bill, sponsored in the House of Representatives by George Fallon of Maryland, and in the Senate by Albert Gore of Tennessee, both Democrats.

Though Eisenhower is sometimes described as having advocated for the highways for the purpose of national defense, scholarship has shown that he said relatively little about national defense when actually advocating for the plan, instead emphasizing highway fatalities and the importance of transportation for the national economy. In the event of a ground invasion by a foreign power, the U.S. Army would need good highways to be able to transport troops and material across the country efficiently. Following the completion of the highways, the cross-country journey that took the convoy two months in 1919 was cut down to five days.

The numbered system followed a pattern: North-South highways would be odd-numbered, increasing the further East; while East-West highways would be even-numbered, increasing the further North. Thus, my home State of New Jersey has Interstates 76, 78, 80 and 95.

Three-digited highways have a system as well. If starting with an odd number, they are spurs to main highways: Thus, Interstate 195 extends east from I-95. If starting with an even number, they are "beltways," going around a major city. Thus, Interstate 278 forms the Belt Parkway around Brooklyn and Queens, with an extension into New Jersey; and Interstate 287 loops around New York City within New Jersey, before linking up with I-87, the New York State Thruway; and Interstate 295 loops around Trenton and Philadelphia.

The New Jersey Turnpike is bannered as I-95 from Exit 6 on north. But neither the Garden State Parkway nor the Atlantic City Expressway is part of the Interstate System.

While some older freeways were adopted into the system, most of the routes were completely new. In dense urban areas, the choice of routing destroyed many well-established neighborhoods, often intentionally as part of a program of "urban renewal." In the 20 years following the 1956 Highway Act, the construction of the freeways displaced over 1 million people. This resulted in new forms of racial segregation, as "the wrong side of the tracks" became "the wrong side of the freeway."

The Cross Bronx Expressway cut through Bronx neighborhoods, devastating the Borough. And the New Jersey Turnpike cut sections of Newark and Elizabeth off from the rest of those cities, hurting them badly. Both would become part of I-95. And I-676, the Vine Street Expressway, seriously messed with Center City Philadelphia.

Many of the Interstates paralleled older Federal highways. Examples: I-95, U.S. Route 1; I-87 in New York, U.S. Route 9; I-90 in New York and the Midwest, U.S. Route 20; I-84 in the Northeast, U.S. Route 6; I-5 in California, U.S. Route 101. The famous U.S. Route 66 was essentially replaced by I-10, I-15 and I-40 in California, I-40 from San Bernardino to Oklahoma City, I-44 from OKC to St. Louis, and I-55 from St. Louis to Chicago.

Many communities on Federal highways like Route 66 got bypassed, and suffered economically as a result, since people waited until the next big city to get off and eat and/or use the bathroom, or get a place to stay the night, instead of the next town coming up. Route 66 was decommissioned in 1985, although some States rebannered their sections as State Route 66. There is an Interstate 66, but it runs mainly in Washington, D.C. and its Virginia suburbs, and again from Kentucky west to Kansas.

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June 29, 1956 was a Friday. Dominican baseball All-Star Pedro Guerrero was born. And actress Marilyn Monroe married playwright Arthur Miller. Each would end up married 3 times, and divorced 3 times.