Folks,

Dux:

We have discussed the present excavations at Jamestown on several occasions. Every day something new is discovered. Until recently it was believed that the larger remains of Jamestown were lost beneath the waves of the Chesapeake. The book I mentioned is proving to be of some interest and therefor I do recommend it to you. There were indeed many skirmishes with the neighbors and plenty of sickness. More than enough, in fact, to share with those neighbors.

The book "Savage Kingdom" begins with the Spanish attempt to protect Philip's somewhat selfish claim to all of N. America. Recently, our public TV station that is part of the University of NC ran a very interesting program about the Spanish attempt to colonize here. There were 5 forts built across the south and the largest one of these has recently been located in our Moore County. The excavation of the Spanish forts has begun and many artifacts have been unearthed. One young woman is working on her doctorate studying how the Spanish influenced the native Americans and visa versa.

Could this be the first, Lost Colony? If you have always thought that Roanoke Island was the first known European colony, or settlement, in North Carolina, you’d be wrong. Archeologists from North and South Carolina worked hard and finally located Fort San Juan in the foothills of the Appalachians near Morganton, NC. This Spanish outpost (1566 and 1567), was established two decades before “The Lost Colony” at Roanoke Island. Fort San Juan may also be the site of the first European settlement in the interior of North America.

These archeologists have, with the help of an extraordinary team, unearthed numerous artifacts demonstrating the presence of Spanish Soldiers on a tributary of the Catawba River. Their discoveries have the potential of rewriting the history of European settlement in North America.

Another item of interest to ourselves and to those conspiracy theorists everywhere is a new book about the Kennedy assassination written from the perspective of Bobby Kennedy and what he was able to learn before his own untimely death stopped his probing. I am reading 4 books at once now so I have not really gotten into the meat of this particular work. Early on, it is not yet possible for me to determine if it sheds some new light or just more heat.

A VC for moi as I have said already is undeserved unless it stands for 'very contemptible'. I deeply appreciate the honor of C51's statement however I have done nothing here that was not my great pleasure to do. I should not be rewarded for there was no sacrifice. It has been entirely a labor of love. I would however accept another silver propeller or lavatory chain for my DFWC provided that Dux and C51 are awarded the same. While we are handing out sparklies, perhaps the DFWC might be awarded posthumously to our fearless founder SNAFU whom is presumed to be lost?

What say ye men of HWH?

It is gloomy and wet here in Carolina today. That is expected to continue for the next 36 hours. The good news is that the great drought is much lessened in some areas. The coming of the new year has brought much wetter weather and more than once I have broken out the rubber dinghy preparing for a flood of Biblical proportions such as we had with Hurricane Floyd. We received 24" or more of rain within a few hours with that terrible storm and more rain within a couple of weeks with yet another. It was a 100 year's flood they said. I am not quite old enough to remember that previous flood myself so I took their word for it. Once I realized that there would not be another such flood for at least another 100 years, I promptly stopped paying for those expensive swimming lessons for the cats and put away the construction plans for our ark.