Commando 450

Our shower at home leaves a lot to be desired. The city that we live in and particularly the area, for some reason does not have good water pressure. If for some reason, some other appliance that utilized water is being used at the time of the shower, you barely get a dribble. In good times when you have the water supply to yourself, you get enough water to get clean but never a manly flow. By that, I mean a shower that skips the soap and just peels the outer layer of skin off your body. One that will pin you to the back wall of the shower or perhaps knock you clean out of it like the Commando 450 does in that Seinfeld episode.

So it was with great surprise that I turned on the shower head up at our apartment in the city and was pinned back against the wall. I count myself extremely fortunate that the shower head had been pointed straight towards the back wall so I didn't lose an eye or perhaps lower where more valuable stuff is located. I was so surprised by the force that the intial cold blast of dregs left in the pipes from the previous shower didn't even faze me. I fought my way back to the front of the shower and knocked the nozzle to the side to give me a chance to evaluate the situation.

I'm six foot two inches tall and for some reason, the shower head on the standard shower seems to be five feet at best. Now with a normal flow shower head, I just stoop over to wash my hair and other parts above five feet. At home, I even eliminated this by adding an extension that made our shower head closer to six and a half feet. However, turning the Commando 450 nozzle down so that the fire hose spray lands somewhere in the tub opens up sensitive vital organs to being cleaned plumb off the body they were attached. Aiming it up above the sensitive areas means that I have to stand in the blast or it will hit the back wall and flood the bathroom with the resulting spray. After much trial and error, the only solution I could find was to turn it to the tiled side so that it doesn't spray out of the shower and doesn't hit any vital organs. I am left with sticking in parts of my body one at a time and even then they come out red from the force applied.

Perhaps even worse is that the spray coming out of the Commando 450 is of such volume, it overwelms the normal sized drain in the bottom of the tub. I can take a shower of under five minutes and the water is already part way up my shin, my ankles long since submerged. In fact, I calculate that if I didn't finish the shower in about ten minutes or less, it would completely fill the tub and spill over the sides. I don't take long showers so this doesn't bother me too much but it does kind of bother me to have to stand in a pool of my own filth that I just sluiced off my body while I am trying to get clean. I thought I might just stand in their after I had turned off the water and give my feet a quick rinse once the drain caught up but that seems like an eternity.

In the end, I have decided that as manly as the Commando 450 showerhead is, I just can't hack it. I am planning on stopping by a hardware store to see if I can get another one of those extension type heads so that I don't have to stoop. With the pressure we have at the apartment, the direct downward flow that is quite a bit more dispersed should feel quite nice, especially on the sensitive areas.

What does a Kindle smell like?

One of the greatest feelings in my world is opening a brand new book for the first time followed closely by the feeling of looking at my rather large collection of unread books and pondering which one I would like to read next. One action takes place before the order but I guess feelings have no order. Opening up the book with the crisp new pages and the unmistakable odor wafting up, every bit as identifiable as that of a new car, just has no equal.

Dust jackets on hardcover books just never made sense. I gather they are to keep the dust and dirt off the hardcover to protect them but if I had my druthers, I would rather the dust jacket look better. It is after all the one you see first and we all know first impressions are everything. I've bought many a book by its cover and later discovered I judged wrong but I still continue doing so because what other choice do I have short of sitting down and reading the book in the store. So I always begin a new book by taking off the dust jacket and placing it in the bedroom nightstand drawer to prevent dirt and dust from destroying it and not worry about the inevitable dirt stains that always seem to find their way to books that I am reading.

Books have been obsolete since shortly after Al Gore invented the Internet. I have tried reading several books over the Internet but have never made it more than a chapter or so into them. It just isn't the same. A computer is ones and zeros and stark white backgrounds that needs lots and lots of batteries, charging, or backlighting just to read them. Books can be read just as easily laying in bed, reclined in that easy chair by a nice warm fire, or during takeoff on a flight when all your electronics must be shut off. There is something comforting about closing a book and checking how much I have read by gauging my bookmarks progress from the front to back cover, something that I can't do with a Kindle. I'm sure it has electronic bookmarks and tells how many pages are read out of how many total but a picture is worth a thousand words. Besides, what would I do with my old leather bookmark with the hand painted words faded into obscurity that I received as a gift so many years ago? I used to go through bookmarks pretty fast and thus resorted to using a Kleenex but I haven't lost my leather one. You tend to pay more attention to treasured items.

Once you finish with your electronic copy of the book you are reading, where does it go? Do you file it away on some electronic bookshelf to gather electronic dust? I like to collect my books, especially the good ones where I judged the cover correctly, and reread them from time to time. I can also write my name on the inside of the cover and loan it out to family and friends so that they may get enjoyment from them as well. Something that I probably couldn't do with an electronic copy due to copyright infringement.

Those books with expired copyrights that are written in text that no computer can decipher, our now being deciphered by you and I and put on the web for all to read. Did you know this? Some kid created a program that he sold to various websites that uses pictures of words a computer program couldn't automatically translate as authentication codes to prevent spammers, much like blogger does. There was a problem verifying that what we typed in as a "translation" was correct if the computer couldn't understand the word to begin with so his program has you translate two words, one known by the computer and one unknown from some book. As a results, hundreds of thousands of books have been automatically translated onto the web by you and I as we type in those silly codes to show those websites we are a spambot. I don't think I can be annoyed by this loss of two or three seconds of my time any longer. It's for humanity.

Will humanity evolve, as predicted, to permanently forego paper books and become a true paperless society? Will a Kindle become as ubiquitous as Kleenex or toilet paper? It took society nearly a hundred years to pay for toilet paper when the Sears and Roebuck catalog that came in the mail was free, true story. I hope not. I so enjoy that smell of a new book and the crisp new pages, something that the sterile plastic of a Kindle could never provide. Besides, how can I judge a book by its cover if it has no cover?

Come Hike With Me: Indian Creek

For the more adventuresome hiker, someone who is not afraid to get dirty or hike a rugged sometimes non-existent trail, my all time favorite hike down Indian Creek fits the bill. Indian Creek starts high up on Mount Sherman in the Buffalo River National Park and winds through a steep canyon down to the Buffalo River itself. In all my years, I have mostly hiked this from Mount Sherman to the river and only once from the river up. Though technically more difficult (it is always more difficult going down than up) it is much easier on the lungs. The large majority of people and descriptions of this hike that I have found start from the river and go up… part way. Here is a complete rundown of the hike from top to bottom.

To access the top, you have to head northeast out of Ponca, Arkansas on U.S. Highway 74 and drive past the "town" of Low Gap. Past that around several bends, there is a dirt two track that leads north off the highway across a small pond dam and down into the trees. Though I have driven my little Honda Civic down to a clearing/parking area, it is extremely difficult to avoid getting high centered in the huge ruts that have washed out the road. I recommend a high centered vehicle such as a truck or parking up close to the highway and hoofing it in.

From the parking lot, I generally just start hiking down hill until I am gradually pulled by gravity into the Indian Creek canyon. When I first started going on this hike, the first part was extremely technical as you climbed down several areas where the creek has created large vertical drops from overhanging rock shelves. Not only was it kind of spooky but also it was very unsafe. Over the years, a trail has been formed that contours the east side of the creek for a ways before it drops down a very steep but not very dangerous nose down into the creek. I think the last time I hiked this, it had been extended further to a side drainage that was even easier to climb down and you entered the main channel right by one of the largest sycamore trees I have ever seen.

There is no trail once you enter the creek bottom because the easiest way is to hike around and over house-sized boulders lodged there. You wind your way down until a sheer rock face blocks the flow except for a large funnel shaped hole at the bottom leading through it. This is the Eye of the Needle. I have always wanted to "thread" the needle but it is too steep to do so without rope and so I take the alternate route which is a steep, root pulling, boot slipping scramble up and around this formation. At the top before you start down the other side, you can climb another thirty feet up directly above the "eye" where you have a commanding view of the valley below. I have spent many an hour sitting there eating lunch, contemplating the world and perhaps grabbing a little nap.

Above the Eye of the Needle

The backside of the Eye of the Needle is every bit as steep as it was climbing up. I prefer to sit down on one boot with another boot stuck at in front of me and commence and controlled slide grabbing onto anything I can to steady myself. Others choose to just plant their behind in the dirt and slide with all four appendages being utilized for control. Once down, I generally hike back upstream a short ways to the base of the Eye of the Needle and look back where I had been. It seems a shame to do all that vertical gain and then loss just to go around forty feet of slick rock.

Below the Eye of the Needle

The next formation you will come to if you don't miss it is the Bat Cave. If you do miss it, you will almost immediately be rim rocked by a 40 or 50 foot vertical drop and know that you've gone too far. For many years, you could hike down into it during certain months of the year when gray bats weren't weaning offspring. However, I have heard that it is now permanently closed all year long, as the gray bats are an endangered species. For a decade and a half, I would climb down in this cave as far as I could see and then climb back out. One trip, I thought to take a flashlight for a more thorough exploration and discovered that the cave is actually a tunnel that comes out of the Arkansas Cave (thus named for the shape of the opening) opening further downstream.

Bat Cave Entrance

Arkansas Cave Entrance (at the other end of the tunnel)

Since the "trail" through the caves is no longer an option and a rather larger vertical drops blocks all those that can't fly, the only option is to backtrack up the creek from the Bat Cave opening and find a trail contouring the bluff on river left. This trail contours around a bend to what has been named the Crawl Through. The Crawl Through is essentially that, a place where you can crawl through a natural arch in the bluff and into a large rock overhang. As you can see from the picture, you have to traverse some pretty narrow rock ledges at the edge of the overhang to get to a spot where you can climb back down into the creek bed. This climb is another steep hang on to anything you can hike down with the last 15 vertical feet ending at a little sheer cliff. This is the technical part about going down for you can't see where to put your feet. Fortunately there is a nice sized sapling that grows from an intermediate ledge about 5 or 6 feet below the rim and you can grab onto that and lower yourself down to the intermediate ledge. From there, you can grab onto its roots for some nice solid handholds and lean back to see where you need to put your feet to lower yourself down the rest of the way.

Again you allow gravity to carry you downhill until you get rim rocked once again. During really dry weather, you can hike in slots carved by the creek and pass by this obstacle but when the creek is flowing, the only option is to backtrack once again upstream looking for a trail on river left. This trail will take you up and around a 100 feet sheer bluff and down a nose downstream of the bluff back to the creek bed. Be forewarned though that this trail makes the Goat Trail that I described in an earlier post look like a freeway. Fortunately, it is among lots of vegetation that you can hang on to maintain your balance but keep track of where you place those feet.

Back where you rejoin the creek, you can hike back upstream a ways to a nice slick rock section of the creek where there are plenty of nice places to relax to the gurgle of passing water and perhaps nap some of the day away. At this point, the rest of the journey downstream is pretty easy and in the recent decade has a pretty well defined path that avoids the loose rocks of the streambed. You will eventually meet up with the Buffalo River Trail that you can follow to Kyle's Landing, one of the few access points along the Buffalo River. There is a little offshoot trail along here that leads down to the bank of the Buffalo directly across Gray Rock Rapids. Back in the day, Gray Rock Rapids was one of the most feared rapids on the river and I personally witnessed it eat many boats. I myself, a pretty good boater, got close enough to kiss it a time or two if I hadn't been too busy paddling for my life. However, a big flood has flushed out the inside of the bend by the rapids turning it into not much more than a riffle that even a novice can navigate. This is generally where I take my third and last nap of the day dreaming of the good old days.

A few hundred yards away, you walk into the campground at Kyle's Landing where you have conveniently paid someone (used to be $20) to have your vehicle shuttled there and waiting. You did remember to do that didn't you? If not, it is a long steep hike back up to the top of the canyon. This hike is an all day hike by the time you arrange for your shuttle, drive to the top of the canyon, hike the canyon napping along the way, and the long drive back up the mountain.

Political Mish Mash

Why is so much breath wasted on Sarah Palin? The latest polls show that seven out of ten Republicans would vote for her. Is this a vote for her or that two of the leading contenders have recently been outed as having marital affairs and there isn't much of a choice? Sarah Palin's speaking ability makes George Bush seem like a Shakespearean poet! Not to mention, she seems to have the political ethics of a Chicago mobster that just found several cases of fine booze packed in wads of cash. If that is the best that the Republican Party can drag up in the next three years, I think I will probably attending the democratic caucus instead.

*****

Did anyone else see those clips of Putin on the news a few days ago? One clip showed him visiting a grocery store and commenting on the high prices. The storeowner immediately said they were going down tomorrow. Another clip showed a factory owner who had just laid off all his workers because he went bankrupt. Putin slid over a contract, tossed him a pen and told him to sign it. The contract stated that he would rehire every worker back tomorrow. When I look into Putin's eyes, it scares the heck out of me. I would not want to see what goes on behind closed doors with that guy. He would probably make Saddam Hussein seem like saint material.

*****

I didn't vote for the current occupant because I knew he would be very hard on my wallet. It seems as if that guy has no limits to the amount of money he is willing to spend. Cash for clunkers? But all that money pales in comparison to what it might cost each of us to bail out California, the biggest spending state in our nation.

*****

Years ago, a very vocal faction of our community wanted to build a huge civic center for the local arts. Problem was, we are only a town of less than 10,000 and only a small fraction of those are interested in cultural things that occur inside a civic center. In other words, the audience that would support such an endeavor is very limited. We had a small amphitheater built in vacant warehouse that worked just dandy and I often went there. However, it seemed to me as if the same 50 to 80 people showed up time after time and so I was a little bit leery, along with thousands of other citizens, that we could support such a place. Never fear the vocal faction said, it would be build from all private money with over a $1 million in a slush fund just in case. It was approved. The city stepped in and donated land and cleared it all at taxpayer expense, doubly so since the new structure was made tax exempt. They ran out of money building the massive structure and received grants from the state, i.e. more of my tax dollars, to finish it. Less than two years ago it opened up and has lost massive amounts of money ever since. Now they want the city to take it over or for the county to designate tax revenue to be used for its up keep. Part of the problem is we could never afford it even when times were good and we certainly can't afford it now. The other part is that they charge admission of around $40 per person to see a show when I used to see the ones out in the vacant warehouse for $5 and that included a drink and a cookie. I'm voting to let it go bankrupt and default back to the bank that lent them the money.

*****

Evidently, governments down the line learn from example from those further up the line. Unemployment is high in our town and many factories have lain off hundreds of people. Those of us still employed have received, unpaid time off, pay decreases or at best, no pay increases. We scrapped plans to build a new multi million-dollar school because nobody would buy the bonds to finance it. Yet, our city officials have given themselves raises upwards of 5% and our teachers even more, some of them getting bonuses of $5000. This after a big to do when the state warned our school system that we were overspending and needed to cut back. This after they rammed a one cent tax increase down our throats during an off-election cycle after it had been handily voted down three times previously. I don't think they have listened and I don't think they are listening still.

City Ruminations

Since I've been spending a lot more time recently at our apartment in the Big City (population around half a million), I've noticed something. Noise. I don't know if it is the farm boy in me that is used to a silence that makes even a small town person weep with anxiety or if it is the current small town side of me but noise is ever present in the Big City.

For instance, whenever we are out and about driving down the road with our windows up and air conditioner on full blast, we are constantly assaulted by the booming base of passing a donk and even those too poor to make their vehicle into a donk but rich enough to afford some custom audio equipment. The only custom stereo that I have bought and put in a car replaced the eight-track stereo in the car and then only when it quit working. I also bought speakers for the very same car but only after the standard issue speakers quit working and those were some little jobbies that slipped underneath the front seats. All my other vehicles have had very satisfactory sounds systems in them and could be heard without disturbing those in cars three vehicles ahead of me at a stop light. One car that we sat by at a stoplight was so old and the base so overwhelming that all I could marvel at was the undertone of rattles from the various pieces of cars. The boom of the base was followed by a metallic vibration of all the other parts of the car. I wondered how many bolts were falling out from vibrations never imagined by engineers.

My most recent stay in the Big City for four days happened to coincide with the 80/35 music festival with one of the venues being just five scant blocks away. So for about twelve hours of the day, our line of sight apartment was assaulted by various artists late into the night. So although the temperatures were unseasonably cool, we spent the who weekend running the air conditioner just because the fan on it would make a Harley owner weep with envy. At least it was a steady noise with no beat.

Perhaps most disturbing to me is just the complete lack of silence. I can't shut off the air conditioner in the apartment even with no music festival going on and hear absolute silence. I definitely can't be anywhere outside and here silence. There is always noise, so much that I'm guessing those that haven't experienced different, don't even realize it. To them it is probably like a white noise. To me it is just noise.

Despite the noise, I am enjoying this experience and the chance it is giving me to explore the Big City in small chunks of time. Mostly it has been culinary experiences so far but as we grow more comfortable and have less settling in to do, I'm sure we will be exploring other aspects as well.

Come Hike With Me: Big Bluff/Jim Bluff Traverse

When I want to take someone on a classic hike in one of my favorite places in the Midwest, the Buffalo River National Park, I will take them on what I have termed the Big Bluff/Jim Bluff Traverse. It's big on beauty and something that someone in half way decent shape can do albeit at a slower pace than someone in better shape.

The hike normally begins at the Center Point trailhead up the mountain from the small town of Ponca, Arkansas and directly across the road from where Fire Tower Road (locals pronounce it Far Tar Road) T's into the main highway. From there, it is almost all downhill, at least until you want to return. The trail itself mostly follows an old road that inhabitants to the area used before the area was turned into a Wild and Scenic designated park. The road itself was blocked off and for the last forty years it has been a foot trail. It winds down the mountain and eventually down to a pass where you have two options. You can see this trail marked in red from the upper left of the picture above to where it branches. The ex-road/trail continues on due east dropping off one side of the pass and there is a little single-track trail dropping off the south side. I normally drop off the south side in the direction of Big Bluff on what is locally known as the Goat Trail.

The Goat Trail receives its name due to the steepness and exposure you will find on this trail. Within a couple hundred yards, a vertical face hems you in to the east and a vertical drop of around 300 feet just a few paces to the west. With a good jump, you could perhaps make one bounce and end up in the river below sure to feed the fish population with what remains of your mortal body. About this time, you come to an alcove in the rocks where the ancient river eroded a layer of softer rock and thus left the Goat Trail. The alcove is generally my first stopping point on the tour after having walked about three and a half miles downhill at this point. You get a nice commanding view to the west, both upstream and downstream of the river. If you are lucky, you can sometimes glimpse some of the local elk or deer populations using the old river trails to cross the stream below.

Continuing on south along the Goat Trail from the alcove, things narrow up fast. Soon, there are several places where the trail narrows down to about three feet wide. You definitely want to mind where your feet are being placed and hug the cliff during this portion. After about 50 or so feet of this, the trail slowly begins to open up and you find yourself contouring around to the nose on the southeast side of Big Bluff. I generally follow the trail down the nose a short distance and then head due east as I have marked on the above map. The trail itself winds off to the west and down to the river at the base of the bluff but there isn't much to see except a hard bushwhack through tangled river debris so I take my shortcut.

The big caveat to the shortcut is that you must find a specific spot or you will end up rim rocked with no way down but to backtrack up and around. But at one spot along the 20-foot ledge or rock that stretches around the backside of Big Bluff, a chunk of the ledge has slumped off away from the rim a couple feet. Over the years, gravity, rain and dirt has silted in this crack creating a natural ramp. I call this feature Abbey's Crack. Holding your backpack above your head, you can turn sideways and shuffle down this ramp to the forest below. From there, it is a short though bramble filled hike down to the flood plain where you come across the remains of an old farmhouse. When I first pioneered this route, the house stood and you could go inside. It has long ago collapsed and is quickly being consumed by the surrounding flora but still obvious to the passerby. Below the house you quickly come to another trail that follows the river bottoms and is mostly used by horse packers. You follow it north until where it crosses the Buffalo River and then staying on the same side, bushwhack through an open forest to Jim Bluff.

Jim Bluff is a bench of layered rock that butts up against a deep pool on the Buffalo and is overhung by a huge shelf of rock. I don't know who Jim is/was but someone has painted that name on two of the larger flat rocks that have fallen from the overhanging portion onto the shelf portion. Years ago, there used to be a cable tied to a tree on top of the overhanging shelf that allowed people to swing out over the deep pool and release yourself at what seemed an absurdly high distance above the surface of the water. Probably for legality reasons, it was long ago removed. The Abbey's can sometimes be found there during the dog days of summer swimming and trying to soak up generally as much water as possible.

I have several memories of this place that I will quickly share. On one of my first trips to Jim Bluff when my dog Ted was along, he misjudged the crystal clear water for being shallow and attempted to run across it. He was quickly submerged and I can vividly remember him below water still running and a stream of bubbles coming out of his nostrils. Fortunately he was able to reach the far side in the swift moving current and after finding a shallower spot further downstream, able to swim back across. The second memory was hiking down one winter day and soaking in the south facing exposure that acts just like an oven when I found a tomato plant growing in a crack of the rocks with one ripe tomato, probably grown from a seed dropped from a sandwich of a passerby. I picked that tomato and ate it later in a sandwich of my own and think of that every time I am down there. The last remembrance happened on a hike down there one winter morning to find huge, sometimes twenty feet long, icicles clinging to the overhang. I think I about died and went to heaven chucking rock after rock up at them and listening to the resulting boom of a ton of ice shattering upon the rocks below echoing up and down the canyon.

On the northeast side of the bluff, there is a straight up rock scramble up and around the backside of the bluff where you rejoin the trail that led down from the previously mentioned saddle had you kept walking east instead of south. You can follow it a couple hundred yards on downhill to another cabin that is remarkably well preserved and former home of one of the last occupants in what is now that park. It has a beautiful view, a large orchard and rich river bottomland so I can see what attracted the former occupants. From there you can hike onto the largest waterfall between the Appallation and the Rocky Mountains but that is a through hike so we turn around and head back up the trail to the Center Point Trailhead 4.5 miles away. Round trip, this hike it about ten miles and can be done in an easy short day. It is a spectacular hike during leaf color or generally any nice sunny winter day when highs reach into the 50's.

The Story Behind the National Anthem

[Reposted from my archives. Happy birthday America!]



The Story Behind The National Anthem
By an unknown speaker

There was a lawyer once. His name was Francis Scott Key. He penned a song that I'm sure you're aware of. You've seen it; it's in most hymnals throughout our churches. It's called the National Anthem. It is our song as an American.

We go, however, to a ballgame; we stand in our church services and we sing the words to that song and they float over our minds and our lips and we don't even realize what we're singing. Most of us have memorized it as a child. But we've never really thought about what it means. Let me tell you a story.

Francis Scott Key was a lawyer in Baltimore. The colonies were engaged in vicious conflict with the mother country, Britain. Because of this conflict (and the protractiveness of it), they had accumulated prisoners on both sides. The American colonies had prisoners and the British had prisoners. And the American Government initiated a move. They went to the British and said let us negotiate for the release of these prisoners. They said, "We want to send a man out to discuss this with you." They were holding the American prisoners in boats about a thousand yards offshore. And they said, "We want to send a man by the name of Francis Scott Key. He will come out and negotiate to see if we can make a mutual exchange."

On the appointed day, in a rowboat, he went out to this boat and he negotiated with the British Officials. And they reached a conclusion that men could be exchanged on a one-for-one basis.

Francis Scott Key, Jubilant with the fact that he'd been successful, went down below in the boats and what he'd found was a cargo hold full of humanity. Men.

And he said, "Men, I've got news for you tonight, you're free!" He said, "Tonight I have negotiated successfully your return to the colonies." He said, "You'll be taken out of this boat, out of this filth, out of your chains."

As he went back up on board to arrange for their passage to the shore, the admiral came and he said, "We have a slight problem." He said, "We will still honor our commitment to release these men, but it'll be merely academic after tonight. It won't matter."
Francis Scott Key said, "What do you mean?"

He said, "Well Mr. Key, tonight, we have laid an ultimatum upon the colonies. Your people will either capitulate and lay down the colors of that flag that you think so much of, or -- you see that fort right over there -- Fort Henry?" He said, "We're going to remove it from the face of the earth."

[Key] said, "How are you going to do that?" [The admiral] said, "If you will, scan the horizon of the sea." As [Key] looked, he could see hundreds of little dots. And [The admiral] said, "That's the entire British war fleet." He said, "All of the gun power; all of the armament is being called upon to demolish that fort. [The fleet] will be here within striking distance in a matter of about two and a half hours." He said, "The war is over; these men would be free anyway." [Key] said, "You can't shell that fort!" He said, "That's a large fort." He said, "It's full of women and children." He said, "It's predominantly not a military fort."

[The Admiral] said, "Don't worry about it. They said we've left them a 'way out'"

[Key] said, "What's that?"

[The Admiral] said, "Do you see that flag way up there on the rampart?" He said, "We have told them that if they will lower that flag, the shelling will stop immediately...and we'll know that they've surrendered...and you'll now be under British rule."

Francis Scott Key went down below and told the men what was about to happen. And they said, "How many ships?", and he said, "Hundreds." The ships got closer. Francis Scott Key went back up on top and he said, "Men, I'll shout down to you what's going on as we watch."

As twilight began to fall.and as the hays hung over the oceans as it does at sunset, suddenly the British war fleet unleashed.

Bam!

He said, "The sounds were deafening." He said, "There were so many guns, there were no reliefs." He said, "It was absolutely impossible to talk or hear." He said, "Suddenly, the sky, although dark, was suddenly lit." And he says from down below, all he could hear, the men, the prisoners saying was, "Tell us where the flag is. What have they done with the flag? Is the flag still flying over the rampart? Tell us!"

One hour. Two hours. Three hours into the shelling. Every time the bomb would explode and it would be close to the flag, they could see the flag in the illuminated red glare of that bomb, and Francis Scott Key would report down to the men below, "It's still up! It's not down!" The admiral came, and he said, "Your people are insane." He said, "What's the matter with them?" He said, "Don't they understand this is an impossible situation?"

Francis Scott Key said he remembered what George Washington had said. He said, "The thing that sets the American Christian apart from all other people in the world is he will die on his feet before he'll live on his knees."

The Admiral said, "We have now instructed all of the guns to focus on the rampart to take that flag down." He said, "We don't understand something. Our reconnaissance tells us that that flag has been hit directly...again...and again...and again, and yet it's still flying. We don't understand that." "But", he said; "now we're about to bring every gun, for the next three hours, to bear on that point."
Francis Scott Key said the barrage was unmerciful. All that he could hear...was the men down below...praying. The prayer: "God keep that flag flying...where we last saw it."

Sunrise came. [Key] said there was a heavy mist hanging over the land, but the rampart was tall enough...there stood the flag...completely nondescript...in shreds. The flagpole itself was at a crazy angle. But the flag was still at the top. Francis Scott Key (went aboard and) immediately went into Fort Henry to see what had happened. And what he'd found had happened was that that flagpole and that flag had suffered repetitious direct hits...and when it had fallen...that men, fathers...who knew what it meant for that flag to be on the ground...although knowing that all of the British guns were trained on it, walked over and held it up...humanly...until they died. Their bodies were removed and others took their place. Francis Scott Key said what held that flagpole in place at that unusual angle...were patriots' bodies.

He penned the song.

"Oh say, can you see...by the dawn's early light...what so proudly we hailed...at the twilight's last gleaming...for the rocket's red glare...the bombs bursting in air...gave proof through the night...that the flag was still there! Oh say, does that star spangled banner yet (fly and) wave...for the land of the free...and the home of the brave." The debt was demanded. The price...it was paid.

(Actual lyrics)
The Star Spangled Banner
O say can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight
O'er the ramparts we watch'd were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bomb bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there,
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream,
'Tis the star-spangled banner - O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore,
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a Country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footstep's pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave,
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

O thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their lov'd home and the war's desolation!
Blest with vict'ry and peace may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the power that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto - "In God is our trust,"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.