Beaufort author ‘makes new friends’ in Pinehurst

Kristy Woodson Harvey of Beaufort, N.C., has become a bestselling author, and her novels are attracting a lot of national attention.

She was one of the stars of the show at “The Best of Our State” conference earlier this year in Pinehurst, one of North Carolina’s premier travel destinations.

Harvey’s stories just tumbled forth effortlessly. Her 45-minute slot ended too quickly, as the audience was intrigued by tales related to her Peachtree Bluff book series – a trio as novels published by Gallery Books, a unit of Simon & Schuster.

The titles are “Slightly South of Simple,” “The Secret to Southern Charm” and “The Southern Side of Paradise.”

She revealed that although the book series is set in a “tiny, Southern coastal town on the Georgia coast,” the stories are mostly based on her experiences in and around Beaufort. (Hush y’all, dagnabbit, we’re not supposed to tell.)

Harvey commented: “The ‘Our State’ event was incredible with the friendliest, kindest attendees. I felt like I walked away with 800 new friends!”

“Our State magazine is a publication that makes me leave every issue wondering why in the world would anyone possibly want to live anywhere else besides North Carolina? That weekend in Pinehurst was a similar experience,” she said. “I walked away prouder than ever to be from such a great place with such interesting and engaged people – and with quite a few more invitations for speaking engagements!”

A native of Salisbury, N.C., Kristy is the daughter of Paul and Beth Woodson. Paul Woodson is the city’s former mayor, and Beth Woodson is an interior designer.

After high school, Kristy was awarded a summer internship in the news room at the Salisbury Post. She said one of her first assignments was to interview the proud grower of a giant squash that looked like Elvis Presley.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and mass communications at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2008. Her dream was to become a reporter and write for a magazine in New York City.

Kristy’s life moved in a different direction, however, when she married Dr. Will Harvey of Kinston, a dentist with deep roots in eastern North Carolina. New York was now off the table.

Kristy Harvey decided to go to graduate school at East Carolina University in Greenville, get her master’s degree in English and take a job teaching at a community college. She got the degree but not the job; it fell through. She took a job working for an insurance company.

Meanwhile, Harvey and her mother developed a blog called “Design Chic,” as an extension of her mother’s interest in interior design. It was a hobby that grew into an online business, founded on the beliefs that “home is one of the very foundations of life” and “creating a space surrounded by things you love is one of the best ways to express yourself and find meaning.”

After giving birth to a son (also named Will), Harvey began mulling over the idea of becoming a book author. She entered a writing contest in 2011 and came in second.

“The organizer of the contest was author Orly Konig. She said that she couldn’t wait to see my work in print one day,” Harvey said. “I remember sort of rolling my eyes and thinking, ‘Yeah, right. If only it could be that easy….’”

She entered another writing contest and won the top award for women’s fiction. The judge was Katherine Pelz, who became Harvey’s first editor at Penguin Random House, “which was something I never expected. I say you have to be at the right place at the right time, which means you need to be a lot of places!”

“It takes a little bit of magic” to have one’s first book published as well as a “sprinkling of fairy dust.” Harvey’s debut as an author was “Dear Carolina,” published in 2015.

New York Times bestselling author Elin Hilderbrand says Kristy Woodson Harvey is “a major new voice in Southern fiction.” Harvey’s next book, “Feels Like Falling,” will be released on April 28.

Down East dilemma: Do we stay or go?

Eastern North Carolina was well represented at “The Best of Our State” conference in early January, hosted by Our State magazine in Pinehurst. Two of the presenters on the program call Carteret County home.

This column focuses on the first of those speakers who took the stage – Karen Amspacher of the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum & Heritage Center on Harkers Island. She jolted attendees with poignant photographs and heart-felt comments about the potential perils associated with living on the coast, under the constant threat of hurricanes and tropical storms.

Amspacher said a common theme for her talks in recent years was the importance of “holding onto the past in ways both great and small. Now, at this point, in 2020, for my world, it’s all about holding onto the future.”

“From Harkers Island and Cape Lookout to Ocracoke and Hatteras, we say we have ‘saltwater connections’ to each other living at the water’s edge.”

“Our people have been here a long, long time. We are a part of this place, and this place is part of us,” Amspacher said.

“But things are different now. For Down East Carteret County, Florence in 2018 changed everything. Just as Isabel in 2003 changed everything on Hatteras and Dorian in 2019 changed everything on Ocracoke.”

She said: “The tide never really goes down anymore. Road closures happen year-round. N.C. Highway 12 is now a chance you take, not a road you can depend on.”

“Do we stay or do we go? We’ve never had conversations like this before,” Amspacher said.

“Storms have always shaped our landscape…and shaped us. Storms were always a part of life,” she said. But times are different. Across the globe, the sea is rising.

“The damage from Florence was intense throughout Down East…especially to our homes and churches,” Amspacher said. “We are storm-weary.”

“Every storm adds to the question: “Do we stay or do we go?”

Amspacher said: “On a beautiful sunny day, it is hard to comprehend leaving. Who can leave home? But when you’re mopping the muck out of your house, again, it’s hard to comprehend having to do it again in a year, or maybe two.”

“My house was Granny’s house, and it was her grandmother’s house. It has been home for six generations. How can I leave?”

Others are weighing the costs to repair and rebuild, to raise their homes, to put on stronger roofs or to move the electrical wiring higher. It all adds up. Money is tight. What is the dagnabbt tipping point for families to stay or go?

Amspacher showed photographs of those friends and neighbors who are still suffering from the 21st century hurricanes. “Listen to their voices...look deep into their faces,” she said.

“Tell me where you’re from and I’ll tell you who you are,” Amspacher remarked, citing the work of the late Wallace Stegner, an admired American writer. “There is nowhere on the planet where this truth is more evident than at the water’s edge. Here, we realize more and more the value of the sacred gift of inheritance.”

“I was here spiritually when Granny picked crabmeat at the end of the road in Marshallberg and then walked home at the end of the day and salvaged the bent nails from the day’s work and ‘beat them straight,’ so Uncle Curt could finish rebuilding this house after WWII when there was no money.”

“I am more thankful than ever before, more indebted and grateful to my forebearers for a heritage that cannot be bought or sold, a deep and lasting kinship to this place…the swaying marshes and those steadfast oaks, the hard, cold northeast winds that I love, those proud trawlers in the sunset…and the people, the men and women – past and present…stubborn, determined, talented and giving, who will always define who I am, who we are, who we will be.”

Karen Amspacher closed her talk at the “Our State” conference with this: “No matter how rising seas and shifting sands redefine this place, know this – we will hold on to this place and one another…just like it has always been and is meant to be.”

Jack earned a place in Civil War dog history

Jack’s story as a Civil War dog is full of intrigue. He is remembered for switching allegiance from Confederate gray to Union blue.

He was described as a young mastiff – medium size and jet black, “except a white breast and a dash of white on each of his four paws.” Jack originally belonged to a Confederate jailer in Front Royal, Va.

Kate Kelly, creator of the America Comes Alive! website, said troops under the command of Confederate Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson drove Union forces out of Front Royal on May 23, 1862. The battle earned an historical footnote, pitting Marylanders versus Marylanders in warfare.

Fighting for the Union was the 1st Regiment Maryland Volunteer Infantry. Among Gen. Jackson’s troops was the Confederate 1st Maryland Infantry. Military historian J. J. Goldsborough commented: “This is the only time in U.S. military history that two regiments of the same numerical designation and from the same state have engaged each other in battle.”

There are some gaps in the story about how Jack came to switch sides during the Civil War, but the dog was featured in the Nov. 8, 1862, edition of Harper’s Weekly magazine. An unnamed writer said that in the confusion of the fray at Fort Royal, Jack “insisted upon” defecting to the Union’s 1st Regiment Maryland.

The Harper’s Weekly news account offered testimony from Union officers about Jack’s contributions in the war effort.

“On the road, when our parched men were fainting from thirst, Jack would always run forward, and whenever he discovered a pool of water would rush back, barking loudly, to tell them of it.”

“When they were supplied with only five crackers to each man for five days – with no meat – and our poor fellows were literally dying from starvation, this noble animal has been known to go and catch chickens for them and to bring them in his mouth, or he would waylay every horse or wagon passing with food, and bark imploringly for them to bring relief.”

After Fort Royal, the 1st Regiment Maryland resurfaced, participating in the Battle of Bristoe Station, Va., on Oct. 14, 1863. It’s unknown whether Jack was there. The dog seems to have dagnabbitly disappeared from the historical record. There is some speculation that Jack left the front lines, found a home in Baltimore and remained there.

Kate Kelly also tells her readers about Harvey, another Union dog, who saw the war through until the very end. Harvey was a member of the famous “Barking Dog Regiment of Ohio,” the 104th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. These soldiers were accompanied by a whole gang of dogs.

Harvey was a mostly white bull terrier that belonged to Lt. Daniel M. Stearns of Wellsville, Ohio. The two of them joined the regiment in 1862.

Capt. William Jordan said Harvey was one of the top dogs, “having the run of the regiment,” sleeping in whatever tent appealed to him on any given night.

Pvt. Adam Weaver wrote that Harvey attended campfire sing-alongs and was known for barking and swaying from side-to-side. Weaver sensed that the men’s “singing hurt Harvey’s ears.”

Lt. Stearns and Harvey were reportedly there with the 104th at Bennett Place in Durham, N.C., when Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrendered to Union Gen. William T. Sherman, on April 26, 1865.

Although Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee had already surrendered on April 9, 1865, to Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Va., some war scholars say it was the Bennett Place deal that effectively ended the conflict.

The agreement disbanded all Confederate forces in the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida, totaling 89,270 soldiers – the largest group to surrender during the Civil War.

Lt. Stearns and Harvey traveled back to Camp Taylor near Cleveland, Ohio, where they “received their pay and were mustered out of the military,” Kelly said.

Beaufort’s claim: ‘Blackbeard slept here’…and then some

Beaufort, N.C., is known as “pirate town,” which adds to the charm and intrigue of this historic seaside village. The most notorious pillager and plunderer of all time – Blackbeard the Pirate – was a regular visitor.

Journalists from the British Isles note with pride that Bristol, a port community in southwestern England, is the hometown of Edward Teach Jr., born about 1680, the son of Capt. Edward Teach Sr. and his first wife, Elizabeth.

Edward Jr. became Blackbeard, who “still captures our imaginations to this day,” wrote journalist Maddy Searle of Edinburgh, Scotland. He was bad to the bone and “one of the most infamous pirates in history.”

Blackbeard sailed the seas around the West Indies and Britain’s American colonies, making a fearsome reputation for himself,” she said.

Searle cited research by the late Robert Earl Lee of Kinston, N.C., who authored several Blackbeard books. Lee wrote that “Teach was born into an intelligent, respectable, well-to-do family…and was undoubtedly swayed by Bristol’s maritime heritage and traditions…and privateering.”

The North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources (DNCR) believes: Teach “served in Queen Anne’s War between England and Spain, which lasted from 1702-13…sailing out of Kingston, Jamaica, to prey on French ships for Britain.”

“After the war, Blackbeard reportedly sailed in consort with the pirate crew of Capt. Benjamin Hornigold, sailing out of New Providence in the Bahamas,” according to DNCR. “He proved a fierce and able pirate, and captured the French slave ship, La Concorde, in 1717 off Saint Vincent Island in the Caribbean. Blackbeard transformed the vessel into his flagship and renamed her Queen Anne’s Revenge.”

In an essay for the State Library of North Carolina, Lee wrote in 1986: “Teach grew a coarse, coal-black beard that covered the whole of his face. He allowed his monstrous mane to grow to an extravagant length, and he was accustomed to braiding it into little pigtails, tied with ribbons of various colors.”

“As a finishing touch before a battle, he tucked under the brim of his hat fuses (made of hemp) that would burn at the rate of a foot an hour, the eerie coils of smoke from which added to the frightfulness of his appearance. Across his shoulders he wore a sling with two or three pistols hanging in holsters, like a bandolier. In the broad belt strapped around his waist was an assortment of pistols and daggers and an oversized cutlass,” Lee wrote.

“Teach’s deliberately awesome appearance in battle” was totally intimidating, causing crews of many merchant ships to surrender “without any pretense of a fight,” Lee noted.

Blackbeard was also feared for two other dagnabbitly dramatic displays. One was the flag that flew over the Queen Anne’s Revenge; it depicted a heart dripping blood and a skeleton holding an hourglass and spear. The other was his preference for wearing a crimson-colored coat when engaged in marauding and ransacking.

Blackbeard was a major player during the final chapters of the “Golden Age of Piracy,” which is generally defined as the period between the 1650s and the 1730s.

His story is best told by the staff at the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort, which has on display an impressive array of artifacts salvaged from the wreck of the Queen Anne’s Revenge. The ship ran aground and sank in 1718 while approaching Beaufort Inlet. The wreck was discovered in 1996.

Blackbeard was a frequent guest at a small inn located on Hammock Lane overlooking Taylors Creek in Beaufort. The Hammock House, as it became known, is one of the oldest homes in town, dating back to about 1709.

The name comes from the fact that the house was built on a “hammock,” defined as a “fertile raised area.” The structure has experienced several renovations and was featured in advertising for Sears’ Weatherbeater paints in the 1970s.

The home is now a private residence, but locals believe it is among Beaufort’s most haunted houses.

Jane Welborn Hudson, a journalist from Greenville, N.C., wrote that Blackbeard “reportedly had two dozen ‘wives’ in various ports.”

He hanged one of those brides from a live oak tree in the yard of Hammock House, Hudson wrote. Now, in Beaufort, folks say that when the moon is big and full, you can hear a young woman’s screams.

Garfield’s death attributed to poor medical care?

Dr. Howard Markel, a distinguished professor of the history of medicine and a psychiatrist at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, writes a monthly column for the PBS NewsHour, highlighting momentous events that have shaped modern medicine.

One of his essays in 2016 reviewed the shooting of U.S. President James A. Garfield and the subsequent medical treatment he received in 1881…(or the dagnabbit lack thereof).

After serving less than four months as president, Garfield was attacked on the morning of July 2, 1881, while standing on the platform of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station in Washington, D.C.

Garfield’s shooter, Charles J. Guiteau, fired two shots from a revolver that struck the president in the back. Guiteau was mentally deranged; he reportedly believed he should have been awarded a diplomatic job in Paris, France, by the new Garfield administration.

Garfield’s wounds on July 2 were serious but not immediately fatal. His death occurred Sept. 18, 1881. Garfield died at age 49. Medical sources now agree that Garfield could have, should have and would have recovered had doctors followed a present-day sanitary protocol.

Commenting on Garfield’s medical care, Dr. Markel said, “doctors stuck their unwashed fingers in the wound and probed around, all for naught and without applying the numbing power of ether anesthetic.”

“In late 19th century America, such a grimy search was a common medical practice for treating gunshot wounds,” Dr. Markel said. “A key principle behind the probing was to remove the bullet; it was thought that leaving buckshot in a person’s body led to problems ranging from ‘morbid poisoning’ to nerve and organ damage.

“Indeed, this was the same method the doctors pursued in 1865 after John Wilkes Booth shot President Abraham Lincoln in the head.”

Dr. Markel said the doctors caring for President Garfield would “widen the three-inch deep wound into a 20-inch-long incision, beginning at his ribs and extending to his groin. It soon became a super-infected, pus-ridden, gash of human flesh.”

“This…probably led to an overwhelming infection known as sepsis. It is a total body inflammatory response to an overwhelming infection that almost always ends badly – the organs of the body simply quit working,” Dr. Markel noted.

In Europe, beginning in the late 1860s, British surgeon Sir Joseph Lister encouraged fellow physicians to adopt “anti-sepsis” in their operating rooms. This technique required surgeons and nurses to thoroughly wash their hands and instruments in anti-septic chemicals, such as carbolic acid or phenol, before touching the patient.”

Dr. Lister’s contributions to clinical medicine earned him recognition as the “father of modern surgery.” His work inspired Dr. Joseph Lawrence of St. Louis to develop an alcohol-based formula for a surgical antiseptic and general germicide that included eucalyptol, menthol, methyl salicylate and thymol. Dr. Lawrence named his antiseptic “Listerine” in honor of Dr. Lister.

Dr. Lawrence licensed his formula in 1881 (the same year that Garfield was assassinated) to St. Louis pharmacist Jordan Wheat Lambert, who subsequently started the Lambert Pharmacal Company, marketing Listerine. (Listerine brand products were promoted to dentists for oral care in 1895, with the first over-the-counter mouthwash sales occurring in 1914.)

Writing for the White House Historical Association in 2006, Frank Freidel and Hugh Sidey, affirmed that “Garfield’s death was a turning point in the history of American medicine. His death spurred positive reforms, furthering the use of antiseptics and sterilization methods.”

Circumstances surrounding “Garfield’s death also helped raise awareness of the lack of trained nursing care in America, resulting in the development of national standards for American nursing schools at a forum held at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago,” added Freidel and Sidey.

To complete the circle, after Garfield’s death, vice president Chester A. Arthur became the 21st American president.

As a tribute to the Arthur presidency, Alexander McClure, editor of the Philadelphia Times, wrote: “No man ever entered the presidency so profoundly and widely distrusted, and no one ever retired…more generally respected.”

‘Tippecanoe and Tyler Too’ struck a chord with voters

With Presidents Day approaching, the pursuit of presidential trivia is infectious. What is the favorite campaign slogan of all time? Most politicos agree that it was the 1840 rallying cry of “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too.”

“Tippecanoe” referred to Whig party candidate William Henry Harrison, a great military leader in his day. His running mate was John Tyler. Curiously, both men were natives of Charles City County, Va., and practically neighbors.

The Battle of Tippecanoe was fought on Nov. 7, 1811, in the Indiana Territory near the confluence of the Tippecanoe and Wabash rivers. American colonists commanded by Harrison were attacked by Native American warriors led by the Shawnee Chief Tecumseh. Harrison’s troops prevailed, scoring a decisive victory.

Harrison went on to serve as governor of the Indiana Territory. In 1840, the Whigs believed that incumbent president Martin Van Buren, a New York Democrat, was vulnerable, as the economy had suffered through the financial Panic of 1837.

The Whigs were united behind Harrison, and the nomination for vice president was first offered to Daniel Webster of New Hampshire. Webster refused and quipped (dagnabbitly, of course): “I do not propose to be buried (as vice president) until I am really dead and in my coffin.”

The Democrats attacked Harrison’s alleged affection for hard cider. Indeed, at Whig rallies, vast amounts of spirits were consumed, but none by the candidate. Sources said Harrison himself was a teetotaler.

Harrison “performed superbly” on the campaign trail, taking part in the new practice of making “stump speeches” to large audiences. The Whigs portrayed Van Buren as an aristocratic champagne-sipper.

Harrison won the election, becoming the ninth U.S. president. He was 68 when he took the oath of office on March 4, 1841.

The weather at Harrison’s inauguration was miserable – cold and windy with the temperature estimated to be in the 40s. Harrison stubbornly chose to not wear an overcoat, hat or gloves for the ceremony and then proceeded to deliver the longest inaugural address ever, clocked at an hour and 45 minutes, containing 8,445 words.

Within weeks (on March 26), Harrison came down with a severe cold. It was attributed directly to his exposure to the foul weather at his inauguration. Despite doctors’ attempts to treat him, Harrison died on April 4, 1841, just one month into his term as president.

Dr. Thomas Miller listed the cause of death as “pneumonia…of the right lung, complicated by congestion of the liver.”

Harrison was the first president to die in office. His presidency remains the shortest in American history.

In 2014, Dr. Philip A. Mackowiak of the University of Maryland School of Medicine challenged the long-accepted diagnosis.

Looking at the evidence, “through the lens of modern epidemiology, makes it far more likely that the real killer lurked…in a fetid marsh not far from the White House,” he and co-author Jane McHugh wrote. Their article was published in The New York Times.

In the 1840s, the nation’s capital had no sewer system. Dr. Macowiak and McHugh reported. “Sewage simply flowed onto public grounds a short distance from the White House, where it stagnated and formed a marsh,” they stated.

“The White House water supply was just seven blocks downstream of a depository for ‘night soil,’ hauled there each day at government expense.”

The scientists said: “That field of human excrement would have been a breeding ground for deadly bacteria that would have devastating effects on the gastrointestinal system. Harrison had a history of dyspepsia, or indigestion, which potentially heightened his risk of infection by gastrointestinal pathogens that might have found their way into the White House water supply.”

They conclude that Harrison most likely died of enteric fever, another name for typhoid fever.

Vice President John Tyler was elevated to become the 10th U.S. president. He wound up as the “president without a party,” disavowed by the Whigs in 1843 for supporting a political agenda that seemed to favor ideals and principles espoused by the Democrats. Critics referred to Tyler as “His Accidency.”

Politics can be so cruel.

Let’s solve the ‘Jolene’ mystery

In music circles, Jolene is the temptress with flowing red hair who flirts with Dolly Parton’s man in the classic country song “Jolene,” released in 1973.

Jolene is described as a stunningly beautiful bank teller who was overly attentive to Dolly’s husband, Carl Dean.

It’s a true story, Dolly Parton reports, but the teller’s real name is not Jolene.

Tom Vitale of National Public Radio interviewed Parton, who said she believes the reason why the song “Jolene” is so popular is because all women can relate to being threatened by other women who show interest in their beau-beau.

The teller had a “terrible crush on my husband,” Parton said. “He didn’t have any business spending that much time at the bank, because we didn’t have that kind of money. She had everything I didn’t, like legs; she was about 6 feet tall,” Parton said.

In the song, Parton confronts Jolene, imploring “please, don’t take him just because you can.”

Parton said the song title was inspired by a young fan she met after a performance in 1972.

“There was this beautiful little girl…beautiful red hair, beautiful skin, beautiful green eyes, and she was looking up at me…for an autograph. I said, ‘Well, you’re the prettiest little thing I ever saw. What’s your name?’”

“She said, ‘Jolene.’ And I said, ‘Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. That’s such a pretty name; it sounds like a song. I’m going to write a song about that.’”

Parton’s song lyrics contain the lines: Your beauty is beyond compare / With flaming locks of auburn hair / With ivory skin and eyes of emerald green.

Fran Peebles of The Province, an online news media outlet in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, is convinced that Juline Whelan is the real Jolene. Whelan lives in Prince George, British Columbia, and is a registered nurse.

Peebles wrote that Whelan was 10 years old in the summer of 1972 when her family drove down from Canada to the Los Angeles area. Part of the fun was a trip to Knott’s Berry Farm amusement park.

“They went to see a show, starring Pat Boone, his daughter Debby Boone, Porter Wagoner and a little-known, up-and-comer named Dolly Parton,” Peebles said.

Whelan said she loved Parton’ rendition of ‘Coat of Many Colors.’” Whelan told two reporters from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), “so I went over to Dolly Parton and got her autograph.”

“What solidifies the story for Whelan is how often her name, Juline, is mistaken for Jolene,” CBC reported.

It hasn’t been easy, though, Whelan acknowledged. Other kids at school would often sing the song at her. “What little kid wants to be ‘Jolene, don’t steal my man?’ It drove me crazy.”

“But I really love the song now. “It’s an amazing song,” Whelan laughed

Coming to the defense of Carl Dean, Maria Carter of CountryLiving magazine commented on the chance meeting of Carl Dean and Dolly Parton in 1964 – at the Wishy Washy laundromat in Nashville, Tenn. He was 21 and she was 18.

Dolly was standing outside the building waiting for laundry to dry, and Carl was driving by in his white Chevy pickup truck. He stopped to caution her about getting sunburned, then “chatted her up as she went indoors to fold her clothes,” Carter said.

“My first thought was I’m gonna marry that girl,” Carl said. “My second thought was, ‘Lord, she’s good lookin.’”

They were married on Memorial Day in 1966 at a private ceremony in Ringgold, Ga., a small town located southeast of Chattanooga.

“For their 50th wedding anniversary in 2016, Dolly talked Carl into having a big blowout ceremony in Nashville – something she said he only agreed to because they planned to sell photo rights to raise money for charity,” Carter wrote.

From there, the couple drove their camper to Ringgold to park it by the lake for a second honeymoon.

Presidential cats have a historical impact

Caroline Kennedy’s pet cat didn’t last long in the White House. Tom Kitten arrived in January 1961 but was diplomatically relieved of his duties as “First Cat” within a couple of weeks. His discharge was not attributed to misbehavior, however.

Shucks, Tom Kitten couldn’t help it that he made President John F. Kennedy sneeze and cause his eyes to water and swell up.

Tom Kitten, who drew his name from the classic children’s book, The Tale of Tom Kitten, written and illustrated by Beatrix Potter in 1907, gained a lot of publicity, according to the Presidential Pet Museum.

When White House reporters asked Kennedy’s press secretary Pierre Salinger what was Tom’s breed, he responded: “Tom is gray with yellow eyes and of the alley variety.” Tom Kitten was reassigned to live out his life in the home of Mary Gallagher, who was the personal secretary to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy.

The pet museum archivist wrote that Gallagher had two sons around Caroline’s age. (She was 3 at the time.) “Gallagher often arranged for Caroline to come over to play – with the boys and the cat.

When Gerald Ford moved into the White House in 1974, daughter Susan Ford was a high school student. Her pet Siamese cat was named Shan, who slept in Susan’s bed at night and spent her days trying to avoid Liberty, the president’s gregarious golden retriever.

One of the highlights of Shan’s career was attending Susan’s senior prom, held on Shan’s turf, the East Room of the executive mansion in 1975. It was the first and only prom staged in the White House.

Of all the pets to occupy the White House, Amy Carter’s Siamese cat probably had the strangest name – Misty Malarky Ying Yang. President Jimmy Carter served from 1977-81. Amy was 9 when the family moved into the White House.

“Misty was active, playful and intelligent,” said Claire McLean, founder of the Presidential Pet Museum. “Misty was totally devoted to Amy, even sleeping in the girl’s dollhouse. Misty often sat in on Amy’s violin sessions, meowing.”

And the most fun fact of all, McLean said is that “despite Misty’s seemingly female moniker – he was, in fact, a boy named Misty.” (What a dagnabbit-good story that is!)

President Bill Clinton’ daughter Chelsea was 12 when the family entered the White House in 1993. Chelsea’s pet cat was named Socks, a classic black-and-white tuxedo cat. He was homeless when Chelsea adopted him in 1991, while the Clintons were living in Little Rock, Ark.

President Clinton dubbed Socks as “Chief Executive Cat,” and the cat had his own fan club page on the White House website and his own in-box for the fan mail. However, Socks was not happy when the Clintons acquired Buddy, a Labrador retriever in 1997.

“Socks found Buddy’s intrusion intolerable,” according to First Lady Hillary Clinton. “Socks despised Buddy from first sight, instantly and forever.” The president quipped: “I did better with the Palestinians and the Israelis than I ever did with Socks and Buddy.”

President George W. Bush brought the family cat named India to the White House in 2001. She was solid black and nicknamed “Willie.” The Bush administration’s website reported that the cat was “known to be very shy and reclusive, preferring to hang out in the White House library.”

In the United States, cats outrank dogs in population, according to the statisticians at worldatlas.com. By its count, there are about 93.6 million cats in America, compared to about 79.5 million dogs.

Pro-cat people include Dr. Mary Bly, a Shakespearean professor at Fordham University in New York City. She contends: “Dogs come when they’re called; cats take a message and get back to you later.”

Humorist Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), who lived with 19 cats, said: “If animals could speak, the dog would be a blundering outspoken fellow; but the cat would have the rare grace of never saying a word too much.”

Biographer Albert Biglow Paine said: “Twain suffered from nervousness about his writing,” and his cats helped calm him.

Twain also taught one to play billiards, said blogger Elizabeth Fais. “One special kitten played pool with Twain. He would tuck the male kitten into one of the corner pockets,” she wrote. “The kitten swiped at the balls as they darted by, amusing Twain to no end. Rejuvenated by the kitten’s antics, Twain could then return to his writing.”

Animated film keys on contributions by U.S. war dogs

Sgt. Stubby’s reputation as a legendary American war dog has been reinforced with the recent animated motion picture “Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero.” Film critic Inkoo Kang wrote: “I can’t say that the world needed this movie”…but yet she did.

Most others in the entertainment industry as well as the general movie-going public agreed with Kang’s critique, which was posted on April 13, 2018, in TheWrap, an online news organization based in Los Angeles.

The family friendly, PG-rated film directed by Richard Lanni was not officially sanctioned by the U.S. World War I Centennial Commission. Nonetheless, the movie proved to be an anchor event in America’s 100-year observance of the end of the war.

“The Armistice of 11 November 1918” was signed at Le Francport near Compiègne, ending the fighting in World War I between the Allies and Germany. The rural location, about 60 miles northeast of Paris, was selected intentionally by French Gen. Ferdinand Foch, the Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Armies. He said he wanted “to shield the meeting from intrusive journalists as well as spare the German delegation any hostile demonstrations by French locals.”

A film review of “Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero” in Variety magazine by critic Joe Leydon saluted Sgt. Subby as “an improbably plucky canine on the battlefields of World War I.”

Stubby was a scruffy and homeless mixed-breed terrier who was taken in by Army soldiers training on the grounds of Yale University in New Haven, Conn., in 1917. They dagnabbitly smuggled the little dog aboard ship to become part of the “fighting force” in France.

The movie “doesn’t shy away from indicating the mortal stakes of the perilous situations in which Stubby and other soldiers find themselves,” Leydon said. He cited Sgt. Stubby’s valor in a “thrilling sequence that has Stubby racing about to alert French civilians as a cloud of mustard gas wafts into their village.”

“The celebrated mutt became the most decorated war dog in U.S. military history,” Leydon claimed.

Sgt. Stubby from World War I is one of three war dogs that became subjects of world renown sculptor Susan Bahary of Sausilito, Calif.

The others are heroes from World War II, and both dogs served in the Pacific theater.

One was Cappy, a Doberman pinscher. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1944, a proud and noble member of the famed “Devil Dog” platoons that were sent in retake Guam from Japanese forces.

Cappy reportedly saved the lives of 250 Marines when he warned them that a massive Japanese force (as many as 5,000 soldiers) was approaching their encampment. Cappy was fatally injured in the ensuing mortar attack, one of the first war dogs to be killed in action on Guam.

Bahary was selected to create a memorial at the U.S. Marine Corps War Dog Cemetery at Naval Base Guam, which was dedicated on July 21, 1994, the 50th anniversary of the battle. Her bronze sculpture atop the memorial depicts Cappy. It is entitled “Always Faithful,” in reverent reference to the Marine Corps motto, “Semper Fidelis.”

The inscription reads: “25 Marine war dogs gave their lives liberating Guam in 1944. They served as sentries, messengers, scouts. They explored caves, detected mines and booby traps.”

The other World War II dog that Bahary was asked to sculpt was Smoky, a tiny Yorkshire terrier. She was rescued in 1944 by American Army soldiers on New Guinea. Smoky was found abandoned in a foxhole deep within the jungle. She was trained as an “infrastructure specialist,” transporting a communications cable under an air strip through a drain pipe. This act saved days of labor and safeguarded 40 U.S. warplanes.

The bronze Smoky statue was unveiled in Cleveland, Ohio, on Veterans Day in 2005. Smoky is sitting in a GI helmet, on a granite base. Indeed, she was a petite but mighty Yorkie – measuring 7 inches in length and weighing a scant 4 pounds. She was dubbed “Smoky, the Yorkie Doodle Dandy.”

U.S. war dog stories date back to the American Revolutionary and Civil War periods and continue through Korea, Vietnam and the modern military era.

There are more canine heroes deserving mention on this trek…and war dog memorials near and far to visit.