Henry_H@Q wrote:

And you figured out what the rocket motor was. WOW!

Dave Kearton gets credit for that one.

I have often thought that when I find something that I think is really
important, I don't want another thousand sources that tell me the same
thing. They may well be copying each other. Or they may all be copying
the same source. So they are not truly independent.

True. Do a Google search for "medical Middle Ages" and you'll find
dozens of sites which refer to Dr. Hammond's comment on medicine
during the American Civil War.

First thing I want to see is someone who disagrees. Then you have to
pick between the arguments and see which one you believe.

That's a big part of historical studies. You can improve the odds on
making the right choice if you already know the topic. The bozoes
have a habit of leaving out any facts they don't like.

The document that was in the Freedon Train was a copy of General
McAuliffe's message to the troops on Christmas 1944. It included the
text of both the German surrender demand and the succinct reply of
General Mcauliffe. It was composed by Lt. Col. Kinnard on Christmas
Eve while General McAuliffe was attending a Catholic Mass being held
in Savy, where one on his artillery units was based. When he returned
to the HQ, General McAuliffe agreed with what Col. Kinnard had written
and it was run off and distributed to the troops. It is mentioned in
the series "Band of Brothers", episode 6. A copy of that message is
occasionally sold on eBay. I think a Google search on 'McAuliffe
"Christmas message"'will find copies of it on the Internet.

[I did look and I did find it, just like that!]

Pre-internet, looking for a transcript of the message would have
involved a visit to a good research library, checking the card catalog
for references to McAuliffe and the Ardennes Offensive . . . find the
books, check their indexes and lists of illustrations . . . strike out
there, so go to the periodicals index and hope to find something in
a journal or mass-circulation magazine . . . find out that another library
had what you needed . . . order it on an inter-library loan . . .

Google takes all the fun out of it.

I think that is as good an answer on that as one is ever going to get.
When you don't like what EB you don't get that kind of help, at least
I never have.

All sources have that limitation. I grew up in Orange County, California;
I went to a parochial high school in Anaheim--and until a few years I
had no idea that the area had been a hotbed of KKK activity in the
mid-Twenties. Given that some prominent members of Orange County
society had belonged to the Klan, it's easy to imagine why nobody
said much about Klanaheim.

What I was looking at was not "the original" (I always wondered how
the heck they managed to get it back from the Germans!)

Well, the Germans did make the mistake of losing that war . . .

--Bill Thompson