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T-R (Tribal Reports) brings News Items, Historical Notices and Other Relevant Information from Nations
amongst whose population we find a significant proportion of Israelites from the Ten Lost Tribes.
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TR-54
"Ten Tribes Tribal Report"
Scotland, Switzerland, Scotland.
17 January 2012, 22 Tevet 5772
Contents:
1. Scotland and the Immortalized Worse
Poet of Britain.
William Topaz McGonagall
2. Swiss helping Nazi victims finally cleared by government.
3. A Shortened List of Selected Scottish Achievements.
1. Scotland and the Immortalized Worse
Poet of Britain.
William Topaz McGonagall
HE HAS long been cast as a bit of a joke figure and is routinely described as
the worst poet in the history of the English language.
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/
heritage/culture/bard_poetry_more_
like_bad_poetry_as_scots_prepare
_to_celebrate_alternative_burns_
night_1_20578445.6/10
A New Temperance Poem, in Memory of My Departed Parents, Who Were Sober Living &
God Fearing People
My parents were sober living, and often did pray
For their family to abstain from intoxicating drink alway;
Because they knew it would lead them astray
Which no God fearing man will dare to gainsay.
Some people do say that God made strong drink,
But he is not so cruel I think;
To lay a stumbling block in his children's way,
And then punish them for going astray.
No! God has more love for his children, than mere man.
To make strong drink their souls to damn;
His love is more boundless than mere man's by far,
And to say not it would be an unequal par.
A man that truly loves his family wont allow them to drink,
Because he knows seldom about God they will think,
Besides he knows it will destroy their intellect,
And cause them to hold their parents in disrespect.
Strong drink makes the people commit all sorts of evil,
And must have been made by the Devil
For to make them quarrel, murder, steal, and fight,
And prevent them from doing what is right.
The Devil delights in leading the people astray,
So that he may fill his kingdom with them without delay;
It is the greatest pleasure he can really find,
To be the enemy of all mankind.
The Devil delights in breeding family strife,
Especially betwixt man and wife;
And if the husband comes home drunk at night,
He laughs and crys, ha! ha! what a beautiful sight.
And if the husband asks his supper when lie comes in,
The poor wife must instantly find it for him;
And if she cannot find it, he will curse and frown,
And very likely knock his loving wife down.
Then the children will scream aloud,
And the Devil no doubt will feel very proud,
If he can get the children to leave their own fireside,
And to tell their drunken father, they won't with him reside.
Strong drink will cause the gambler to rob and kill his brother,
Aye! also his father and his mother,
All for the sake of getting money to gamble,
Likewise to drink, cheat, and wrangle.
And when the burglar wants to do his work very handy,
He plies himself with a glass of Whisky, Rum, or Brandy,
To give himself courage to rob and kill,
And innocent people's blood to spill.
Whereas if he couldn't get Whisky, Rum, or Brandy,
He wouldn't do his work so handy;
Therefore, in that respect let strong drink be abolished in time,
And that will cause a great decrease in crime.
Therefore, for this sufficient reason remove it from society,
For seldom burglary is committed in a state of sobriety;
And I earnestly entreat ye all to join with heart and hand,
And to help to chase away the Demon drink from bonnie Scotland.
I beseech ye all to kneel down and pray,
And implore God to take it away;
Then this world would be a heaven, whereas it is a hell,
And the people would have more peace in it to dwell.
William Topaz McGonagall
2. Swiss helping Nazi victims finally
cleared by government.
Excerpts:
SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 29 Dec.'11:'Swiss Acknowledge Those Who Helped
Jews Flee Nazis', Agence France Presse
Switzerland said Wednesday [28 Dec.] it had finally finished the
process of rehabilitating more than a hundred people punished during WWII
for having helped Jews escape Nazi persecution.
But only one of the 137 people vindicated by the report actually lived to
see their name cleared.
"All these people are today dead," Alexandre Schneebeli, the secretary of
the Swiss parliament's rehabilitation commission, told AFP.
And of them only Aimee Stitelman lived to see her name officially cleared,
several years ago.
In 1945, a Swiss military court ordered her detained for 15 days for having
helped 15 Jewish children who were fleeing the Nazis, some of them orphans,
enter Switzerland.
The rehabilitation commission struck down the conviction in March 2004, when
she was 79 years old. She died a year later.
The committee was set up in 2004 to acknowledge the injustice done to people
in Switzerland who took it upon themselves to help Jews escape Nazi
persecution.
The Swiss courts punished those they caught on the grounds that their
actions had violated Swiss neutrality.
According to historians, several hundred people lost their job, were fined
and in some cases even jailed for having sheltered Jews hiding from the
Nazis.
Thus a 25-year-old commercial traveller was jailed for two and a half months
by one court for having helped a Viennese Jew get into the country. The Jew
he helped was also jailed for two months -- and then sent back over the
border.
While Switzerland helped nearly 300,000 refugees from Nazi-occupied Europe
during the war years, it also turned back 20,000 of them, most of them Jews.
A committee of historians concluded in 2001 that the policy pursued by the
Swiss between 1933, when Hitler came to power in Germany and 1945, when he
was finally defeated by the Allied forces, had been "excessively
restrictive."
The Swiss parliament adopted the rehabilitation law as a result. But the
official recognition that their actions were right and proper does not
include any compensation.
Of the 137 people rehabilitated, 59 were Swiss, 34 French, 24 Italian, six
German, three Polish, with one Czech, one Hungarian, a Spaniard -- and
several others who at the time in question were stateless.
According to the work of the researchers some of them acted for purely
humanitarian reasons and others out of a sense of patriotism, while some
were also motivated by the money that refugees offered them.
The commission completed its work after eight years, having started in 2004,
Wednesday's statement from parliament said.
Its research had brought an important chapter of the country's history to
public attention, publicizing the actions of people who until now were
unknown, Wednesday's statement said.
"This recognition was essential in the eyes of the people concerned and
those close to them," the statement added.
SourceAgence France Presse.
--------------------------------------------
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
Website: www.imra.org.il
3. A Shortened List of Selected
Scottish Achievements.
Received from:
From: surfer11 <surfer11@iprimus.com.au>
Subject: [origin of nations] 101 of the innovations Scotland gave the world
Extracts from:
So, what have the Scots ever done for us' Just 101 of the innovations Caledonia
gave the world
THE INDEPENDENT
SUNDAY 15 JANUARY 2012
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/
this-britain/so-what-have-the-scots
-ever-done-for-us-just-101-
of-the-innovations-caledonia-
gave-the-world-6289832.html
Adam Smith
Misappropriated as the philosophical father of our money, money, money culture,
the absent-minded Scottish Enlightenment philosopher spent a decade writing The
Wealth of Nations. He studied at the Universities of Glasgow and Oxford ' and
considered the teaching at the former superior.
Bank of England
Sir Mervyn King has Sir William Paterson to thank for the second-oldest central
bank in the world. The Scottish trader proposed the idea of the BoE. In 1694,
Charles Montagu, Earl of Halifax, adopted his idea, founded the bank and was
appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. Where did we keep the gold before'
Bicycles
Blacksmith Kirkpatrick Macmillan made a pedal cycle based on a hobby horse, with
horizontal pedal movement. He would "cycle" the rough roads in Dumfriesshire,
but never tried to profit from his invention. Unlike the Lycra industry.
Canals
While canals date back to Roman times, we have Thomas Telford, from
Dumfriesshire, to thank for the design of the Ellesmere and Shrewsbury canals,
as well as the Caledonian canal.
Carnegie Hall
Andrew Carnegie's ascent from weaver's son to billionaire steel magnate is one
of the greatest rags-to-riches tales ever. Of course, he had to leave Scotland
to make his fortune, heading for America with his parents in 1848, aged 13. But
he did put a lot back, giving oodles of money to his home town of Dunfermline to
build a library and a park, and to New York for Carnegie Hall.
Chloroform
Sir James Y Simpson, a professor of midwifery, was his own guinea pig,
experimenting with chloroform on himself and later on his friends in 1847. He
went on to use it as an anaesthetic to ease the pain of childbirth, leading to
its acceptance in modern medicine. If only you could use it during a debate on
the Barnett formula.
Colour photography
Those Kodak moments were only possible thanks to 19th-century Scottish scientist
James Maxwell, who invented the "three-colour method". His theory, based on
mixing red, green and blue colours of light, led him to present the world's
first colour photograph ' inevitably of a tartan ribbon ' in 1861.
Criminal fingerprinting
It wasn't until 1880 that Dr Henry Faulds, a Scottish surgeon working in Japan,
realised he had the secret to catching criminals at his fingertips. He published
his idea of recording fingerprints with ink, and was the first to identify
fingerprints left on a glass bottle. Which is why all good criminals wear
gloves.
David Cameron
He hides it well, but the Prime Minister is of Scottish stock. His
great-great-grandfather, Alexander Geddes, made his fortune in the US before
returning to Scotland in the 1880s. And the Camerons had an ancestral home in
Aberdeenshire, Blairmore House, for decades before selling up in 1931. Expect
him to mention this more in the next couple of years.
Decimal fraction
The 16th-century mathematician John Napier's discovery of the logarithm has
brought misery to countless generations of maths students. And Napier, the 8th
Laird of Merchiston, also invented "Napier's bones" ' an abacus to calculate
products and quotients of numbers.
Driving on the left
It was Scotland, not England, that pioneered driving on the "wrong" side of the
road. Driving on the left entered Scottish law in 1772, more than 60 years
before England and Wales adopted it in 1835. If only the rest of the world had
followed suit.
Dunces
Pointy-hatted class clowns, thickos and anyone caught pulling girls' hair should
have spent their time stood in the corner of the classroom cursing 13th-century
Scottish theologian John Duns Scotus, who was ridiculed by humanists and gave
the word dunce to the world.
Eloping
In 1753 a law was passed in England saying that under-21s had to have parental
permission to marry. It didn't apply in Scotland, and the legend of Gretna
Green, the first village people came to when crossing the border on the old
coaching route from London to Edinburgh, was born. Just don't tell your mum.
Faxes
Long screeds of wafer-thin, slippery paper, the beep-beep-chrchrch, the
catchphrase "number of pages including this one". Hurrah for inventor Alexander
Bain from Watten in Caithness, who came up with the world's first facsimile
machine. We might think of it as an icon of the 1980s, but it was in 1846 that
Bain reproduced graphic signs using a clock to synchronise the movement of two
pendulums to scan a message. How would we ever cope without it' Oh.
Flushing toilet
Eighteenth-century watchmaker Alexander Cummings was the first to patent a
design of the flush toilet. In 1775 he invented the, S-trap ' still in use today
' which uses standing water to prevent nasty smells backing up out of the sewer.
Gallows humour
Laughing in the face of death, literally, has its origins in the taunts made at
public executions in Scotland and elsewhere. Now Scottish humour is a byword for
gallows humour ' especially when it comes to the regular ritual of seeing the
national football team getting trounced.
Gin and tonic
The drink of millions worldwide, but it would not exist had it not been for
Edinburgh-born George Cleghorn, an 18th-century doctor who discovered that
quinine could cure malaria. The quinine was drunk in tonic water, but it was so
bitter that gin was added to make it more palatable. Bottoms up!
Golf
Scotland is the birthplace of golf ' with the first written record in 1457, when
James II banned it as an unwelcome distraction from learning archery. Since
then, it's given us plus fours, Pringle jumpers and Tiger Woods's colourful
private life. The Old Course at St Andrews dates to the 16th century. Fore!
Gospel singing
The singing of psalms in Gaelic by Presbyterians of the Scottish Hebrides,
according to Yale University music professor Willie Ruff, evolved from "lining
out" ' where one person sings a solo before others follow ' into the
call-and-response of what we now know as the black gospel music of the southern
US. Hallelujah.
Hallowe'en
The word (from Hallows Evening) is Scottish in origin ' arising out of ancient
Celtic celebrations of Samhain ("summer's end") that signalled the end of the
harvest season. Some Scots would leave an empty chair and a plate of food '
believing that ghosts would come out on Hallowe'en.
Hypnotism
From losing weight to giving up smoking and Paul McKenna stage shows, this just
won't go away. The Kinross-born surgeon James Braid was the first to experiment
with hypnotism, using candles to get people into a trance-like state. And,
presumably, eat an onion while clucking like a hen.
Hypodermic syringes
Anyone who has seen Trainspotting shouldn't be surprised that Scotland's
connection with syringes goes back a long, long way. The Edinburgh-based
physician Alexander Wood is credited with inventing the hypodermic syringe in
1853. And 143 years later, Danny Boyle's underground hit would chart Renton's
bid to kick his heroin habit on the streets of Edinburgh.
James Watt
Without this Glaswegian engineer, the Industrial Revolution might never have
happened. He developed a way of making steam engines efficient, to speed trains
along. The rail replacement bus service came later.
Kaleidoscopes
The dancing coloured shards seen through a kaleidoscope have entertained
children and drug-addled teenagers for generations. The Edinburgh-based
physicist Sir David Brewster first came up with the concept in 1815, but never
made a penny from it as he didn't register a patent in time.
Kelvin scale
Glasgow University academic William Thomson, Lord Kelvin to his friends,
discovered there was a lower limit to temperature, which he called absolute
zero. His rescaling of temperature to start at this point (-273C) was named
after him and is still used today. Brrr.
King James Bible
To traditionalist English Anglicans, there are few things more faith-affirming
than the King James translation of the Bible. It is poetry compared with the New
International Version. Only trouble is ' England's James I was Scotland's, and
was born in Edinburgh Castle. A scholar and author of several works, he was
nevertheless called "the wisest fool in Christendom". By an Englishman, of
course.
Lime Cordial
How peculiarly British it is, like lemon barley water and Vimto. In fact, it is
specifically Scottish, first bottled and sold by the son of a Leith shipbuilder,
Lachlan Rose. It had grown in popularity on ships as a way to prevent scurvy on
long journeys. Today, Rose's remains the leading brand.
Loch Ness Monster
Conspiracy theorists have had years of pleasure ruminating over the possibility
of a monster living at the bottom of Loch Ness. Snaps of the snake-like beast,
with those famous double hoops poking out of the water, have fuelled fantasies
worldwide, and helped the local economy not a little.
Long John Silver
Shiver me timbers, the meanest baddest pirate on the high seas was the
brainchild of Edinburgh-born Treasure Island author Robert Louis Stevenson. With
a parrot on his shoulder and a wooden leg, he has become the image of
swashbucklers the world over. And Scotland's links to piracy go beyond
literature ' Captain Kidd, executed in 1701 for piracy, was born in Dundee.
Mary Queen of Scots
"Don't die before you've lived," is a suitable motto for one of the largest
characters of 16th-century Europe. At one point, Mary Queen of Scots presided
over four nations: Scotland, France, England and Ireland. But a lack of
political prowess, three failed marriages and an intense rivalry with the Queen
of England meant she died almost as dramatically as she lived: executed in 1587,
with all her possessions burnt by order of the English government. But her son
united the crowns.
McDonald's
Descended from a Scots-Irish family, brothers Dick and Mac McDonald changed the
way the world ate after they opened the first branch of McDonald's in San
Bernardino in 1938. Now 64 million people are lovin' it....
Microwave
Ready-meals would be a distant dream if the magnetron had not been developed by
Scotland's Robert Watson-Watt. These short-wave radio waves are now used as the
source of heat in microwave ovens ' essential for students, exhausted parents
and rubbish cooks the worldwide.
Nova Scotia
Scotland didn't only give one of Canada's most beautiful spots its name (the
translation from Latin is "New Scotland"), but also many of its people. The
largest non-Canadian ethnic group in the province is the Scottish, who make up
almost a third of the population.
Paraffin
After noticing that oil was dripping from the roof of a coal mine, Glaswegian
chemist James Young discovered that by using heat you could distill coal to make
paraffin. Homes without electricity could be lit and heated, thanks to his
invention.
Penicillin
If Ayrshire-born Alexander Fleming hadn't been such an untidy scientist we would
never have the life-saving drugs we have today. His discovery of a mould growing
in one of his culture dishes that killed the surrounding bacteria prompted one
of the greatest medical breakthroughs of the 20th century.
Piano foot pedals
East Lothian-born carpenter John Broadwood is credited with developing the
foot-pedal method for sustaining the pianoforte's sounded notes. Broadwood also
revolutionised the instrument's boxy design, coming up with the grand piano in
1777.
Pneumatic tyre
Where there's a hit, there's a writ. So, the question of who invented the
inflatable rubber tyre had to be fought out in a legal battle between two Scots.
Veterinary surgeon John Boyd Dunlop, who patented a bicycle tyre for his son's
tricycle in 1888, is commonly credited with the invention.
Porridge
Parritch, as it is correctly known, has been described as the "backbone of many
a sturdy Scotsman" and was made famous by the Highlanders of the 18th century.
Eaten for breakfast and left to harden into slabs for consumption later, it was
a symbol of a life led simply.
Postage-stamp adhesive
Imagine a world without those little damp sponges for people who are too
busy/posh/dry-mouthed to lick their own stamps. Thanks to James Chalmers, from
Dundee, we don't have to. He wrote proposing the idea to Robert Wallace, then MP
for Greenock. It is not clear how he made sure the stamp stayed on his letter.
Propeller
The screw, or a mechanical type of fan that produces a force by converting a
rotational motion into thrust, is credited to Scot James Watt, who first applied
it to a steam engine on board ships in 1770.
Radar
Developed in secret during the Second World War, the object-detection system
that uses radio waves to determine the location and speed of an object evolved
under Angus-born Robert Watson-Watt in 1936 and later tracked aircraft in the
Battle of Britain.
Raincoats
First sold in 1824, the Macintosh coat is named after its Glaswegian inventor,
Charles Macintosh. He designed one of the first waterproof fabrics by
rubberising sheets of material in his textile factory.
Refrigeration
Considering the wintry temperatures recorded in Scotland, you would not think
refrigeration was utmost in people's minds, but it was here that physicist and
chemist William Cullen demonstrated the first method of artificial refrigeration
in 1748. However, he did not put it to practical use.
Rock music
You ain't nothin' but a Highland terrier, or so the song might have gone, had
Elvis known he was a Scot. Yes, even the father of rock was a Jock, as a fan
discovered when he traced his idol's ancestors back to Lonmay in Aberdeenshire
in the 1700s. Without The King, we'd all still be listening to tea dances, so
thank goodness for Lonmay.
Sir Walter Scott
Thanks to his poems such as The Lady of the Lake, and novels including Ivanhoe
and Rob Roy, the Scot is still considered to be one of Britain's literary
greats. Waverley, published in 1814, is often credited with being the first
historical novel.
Steam hammer
A power-driven hammer used to shape large pieces of wrought iron was invented in
1837 by Scot James Nasmyth. His hammers were said to be able to crack the top of
the shell of an egg placed in a wine glass, without breaking the glass. If only
the same could be said of the glass in Glasgow pubs.
Stereotype
Forget Rab C Nesbitt and The Simpsons' Groundsman Willie, a Scot was actually
behind the original stereotype ' a type of printing plate in which a whole page
of type is cast in a single mould and was invented by William Ged in 1725.
Tarmacadam
Ever wondered where the word "tarmac" came from' Add "tar" to the surname of
Scot engineer and road builder, John McAdam, and you have it. His process, "macadamisation"
developed smooth, hard-surfaced for roads in around 1820.
Telephone
"Mr Watson ' come here ' I want to see you," are the famous first words that
Scottish inventor Alexander Bell uttered to his assistant during his invention
of the first practical telephone in the 1870s. He rushed his design to patent
within hours of another inventor. It took another two years before he could get
Mrs Bell off it.
The King of the wild frontier
In 2010, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton acknowledged Davy Crockett as one
of a number of "trail-blazing Scottish-Americans" in a message to mark St
Andrew's Day. The frontiersman and politician died in the battle of the Alamo
during the Texas Revolution.
Ae, a village near Dumfries and Galloway, boasts the claim to fame of having the
shortest place name in the UK. Situated in a conifer forest, it lies near the
Water of Ae, a tributary of the River Annan.
The Tartan Army
Football's finest export anywhere. Ambassadors, more than fans, men, women and
children who carry the good name of the nation abroad, by road, rail, bicycle,
foot, and even once, when making it to Argentina, by submarine ' allegedly ' cf
England's thuggish boors.
Uncle Sam
The Americans have Greenock to thank for the personification of their country as
Uncle Sam. Popular theory suggests Uncle Sam was named after New York
meat-packer Samuel Wilson, whose parents originally came from the Scottish town.
US Navy
Sailor John Paul Jones is known in America as a founder of the country's naval
force. Born on the estate of Arbigland near Kirkbean, southwest Scotland, he
later emigrated and fought against Britain in the American War of Independence.
US presidents
An astonishing 23 presidents of the United States have Scots or Scots-Irish
heritage, including many of the most distinguished: Theodore Roosevelt, Ronald
Reagan, Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton. The George Bushes, senior and junior,
also originate from Scotland, though obviously it was Texas that made them that
way.
Wee ginger people
If Scots have a reputation for being short, it might be because they are:
research last year showed Scottish men (averaging at 1.73m) are two centimetres
shorter than men in south-east England. There are also statistically more
redheads in Scotland than England.
Whisky
Not to be confused with Irish whiskey, the first evidence of the production of
the "water of life" in Scotland is recorded in 1494, although distillation dates
back centuries before. James IV was said to be rather partial to the tipple.
Sl'nte!
Spending a penny John Nevil Maskelyne was an English stage magician but for the
Scots his greatest disappearing act came in the form of the lockable toilet,
requiring the insertion of a penny. Its contribution includes the well-worn
euphemism of "spending a penny".
The pencil For most of the 17th century the only source of this soft, greasy
allotrope of carbon was a mine at Borrowdale, Cumbria. The French spoiled
everything by developing graphite powder.
Bagpipes What' You mean that dreadful whine isn't Scottish' Nope. Evidence
suggests the instrument first appeared in the Middle East, in about 1000BC. And
bagpipes even make an appearance in the Bible. The Highland bagpipe is now mass
produced in Pakistan.
Getting off scot free 'Scot' is a actually a Scandinavian word for a tax '
levied hundreds of years ago ' and the phrase is used to describe people who
have got away without paying a price of some sort.
Kilt The Scots may have developed the kilt during the 16th century; English
Quaker Thomas Rawlinson may have made it wearable in the 1720s, but the orgins
of the kilt lie in ancient Egypt, where the shendyt was worn
Meanness The joke that copper wire was invented by two Scots pulling at opposite
sides of a penny has done little to dispel the myth that the Scottish are
frugal. But a myth it is: in a recent poll by Readers Digest, Scottish people
are reported to give more to charity per head, than anywhere else in the UK.
Scotch mist To the English ' and the rest of the world ' it is rain, but in
Scotland, well, it is still rain, yet to assert their hardiness, the Scots call
it mist. The expression is now used as an impatient description of something
obvious which another has failed to grasp.
Tartan The pattern has roots cast as far afield as China. Tartan-like leggings
were unearthed in western China, strapped to the "Cherchen Man", a 3,000
year-old mummy. by Pharaohs. Today it just makes it easier to spot a Jock at a
wedding.
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