This place is 7 miles south east of where I live , unfortunately now they are building houses on the site.

http://www.islandfarm.fsnet.co.uk/

This guy was taken for walks along the mountain tops I can see through my front room window !!

Generalfeldmarschall Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt

No less !!

It's always fascinated me people who live near sites of great historical significance. For example, the people who live in Gettysburg, PA. It's a small town so you know that almost everyone who lives there has seen the battlegrounds at least a couple of times.

Gettysburg is interesting. I went there on a dark December day many years ago. I was staying at an all female school in Chambersburg (another story), and we took a day trip to Gettysburg. Small town, lots of old houses, some still with bullet holes in them from the battle.

I can honestly say I got a real feeling that something bad had happened there.

Believe me, it wasn't that great. They hated having males on their campus for the first time in their history. I mean HATED it. I was there for three weeks, living in a dorm room, putting up with death stares from frankly ugly women. The food in the cafeteria was a horror. I swear, anything that didn't get eaten the first day got made into soup the second day. Including salads. Several times we said the hell with it and hiked into Chambersburg, about a half hour or so away and found a bar and ate and drank there. The steel workers at least put up with us.

Regarding that feeling of something bad happening, I don't think I've had that more than once or twice in my life. But I sure felt it at Gettysburg. And that's what it was, a feeling. I remember standing on a ridge and looking out at where Pickett's Charge had been and I shuddered. Not from the cold. I can't describe it better than that, just an intense feeling.

I was so afraid he was going to tell us about his sex change operation. I really didn't want to ask.

I skipped that part? Oops.

Wilson College, all girl school since the 1800's.

That wasn't on your resume Mr. 20mm.

20mm had a sex change operation ? I missed that.

Wouldn't have thought that. He (or do I now say she-it) seems such a regular good guy.

I guess I'm an old dinosaur about much of modern culture.

Might have something to do with why Magnum just had to get out of LA.

At least now we know why 20mm had so much knowledge in what women say vs what they mean thread.

Not there's anything wrong with that...

OK, clarification. I didn't have a sex change operation. At least, I don't think I did. I think I would remember that. Who knows?

But once upon a time, I did travel to Chambersburgh PA and lived in a dorm there for three weeks. Why? Well, I'm glad you asked. There was an auto body repair teaching facility called Vale Tech and they recently relocated to Wilson College from some hell hole in western PA. Blairsville or something. This was the first year Vale was at Wilson. Maybe Wilson needed some cash, I don't know.

It was pretty bad. The females there posted hate filled notices on the bulletin boards about us, I mentioned the death stares, especially in that crappola cafeteria. I was very happy to leave there. Oh, and I graduated first in class! WTG Mr. or Ms. 20mm!

The good things were, I got to go our nations capitol, see the White House, the Washington Monument, the Capitol Building, the Executive Office Building, some of the quick hitter museoums, and a famous bar where I'm sure Teddy Kennedy spent some time. I know this because they told me. Then, later on, we got lost on a Saturday night in the ghettos of DC and despite having one black guy in the car (who was the most concerned about our future), we made it out.

Gettysburg was the choice one though.

Ok back on topic.

I have been in Gettysburg and at Bull Run. When I stand there and look over the country side, it seems to me that it probably hasn't changed that much since the Civil War. I can imagine the troops on both sides doing battle.

Most of the time periods that really interest me are times of war. Even going back to Rome, that is the time period that I soak up knowledge about. I wonder what it says about me though.

Haven't been to Bull Run, but I can almost guarantee a solider survivor from Gettysburg would still recognize it today. It has not changed.

Clambering through the rocks and boulders in the Devil's Den I wondered what it was like for an 18 year old soldier to fight for his life and his fellow's lives in there.

Or as a Confederate in Pickett's charge, facing Yankee cannons and rifle fire.

A lot of good men, on both sides, gave their all in that three day battle. A nation so divided cannot stand.

The most recent case for me where I got a definite sense of awe from being at a historical place was when I visited Monticello back in 2000. Just the fact that I was at the home where Thomas Jefferson lived 200 years ago filled me with a sense of awe and excitement.

The valley were I live is the site of a victory of the Roman general Marius on germanic barbarians (Cimbres),protecting the town of Aix en Provence (Aqua Sextiae)...102 BC...it is said to have been an huge slaughter...and the reason why it is a very fertile valley.

PM,
I understand what you mean. To stand in the shoes of history. I've felt that in Washington DC, Springfield Illinois, Gettysburg, Pearl Harbor, many other places. Just kind of overwhelms you.

But the only other place where I felt that sense of something bad was at the World Trade Center site in NYC. I just stood there and stared at this huge cavity in the earth and thought Oh My God. I tried to picture how high the towers must have stood above the surrounding buildings and I couldn't do it. I saw a picture pre 9/11 of the towers above a layer of clouds, and they were the only structures you could see.

I don't know. I didn't expect it, but when I was there it just hit me. So many lives lost, in that one instance. I knew people who died that day in NYC and that probably had something to do with it.

Still, it is. I'll never forget it and I'm glad I went to both places.

I am lucky in that area. I live just outside of Baltimore and there are a lot of places near me that are historic. PA is an hour away. Virginia is about 90 minutes and DC is about an hour. I remember going to Fords Theatre as a kid on a field trip. It was a special thing for a bunch of different schools. They even put on a play for us to watch there. It was The Carpetbaggers. There are a lot more restrictions at Fords Theatre now.

It isn't considered a "historic" place, but if anyone ever gets the chance, go see the Vietnam Memorial. Speaking of that, also go to Arlington Cemetary if you get the chance also. I have a pass so I can drive in since my dad is buried there, but most people have to take a bus in.

I visited both when I was in DC in 2000 and it was a very emotional and exciting experience for me. Those are the kinds of experiences you dont forget.

That's for sure. It lets you see the cost of war in lives. When you see numbers, you only see that, numbers. But when I saw names and tombstones, it takes away the numbers and makes it people.

Hey Simbo. I live not to far from there. As a kid I had a look around there a couple of times, but back then no one seemed to know much about what it used to be. It was a bit boring, most of what was left was the broken down sheds. Would have been more interesting if I'd have know the history back then though.

An amusing, apparently true story (told I think on the BBC Welsh News), an SS officer was trying to make good his escape during the breakout. He was trying to sneak past a cottage late at night, when he heard footsteps and dived into a hedge to hide. The footsteps were from a local farmer who lived at the cottage, returning from the pub and rather drunk. The farmer decided to relieve himself before entering his home, and urinated into the hedge, not seeing the escaped german due to the dark. Said farmer then turned in for the night.

What happened only emerged later, when the officer was recaptured. As the story goes, the farmer is the only man ever to have pi**ed on an SS officer and not suffer severe consequences!

good one