The year was 1968. Tension was at an all-time high level. Students didn’t like the idea of going to fight a war that made no sense. Racists didn’t like the idea that there was a movement to provide equal rights to all colors of man. And the leader of the Civil Rights movement, Martin Luther…
In 1969, a talented group of highly-educated entertainers began producing a television show for the BBC. It was called Monty Python’s Flying Circus. The humor could be described as absurdist. It frequently involved men dressing up in drag, bizarre costumes, and references to philosophers (that weren’t funny unless you knew their history). Could such a…
He’s the guy who started the whole home improvement craze. He’s Bob Vila, and his PBS show This Old House, broadcast way back in the 80’s, caught the imagination of the world. Today, we have entire TV networks devoted to fixing up our houses. Today’s FamilyFirst site is bobvila.com. This Old House actually debuted in…
How common is your surname? Have you ever wondered? Well, if your name is Smith, it’s pretty common indeed. Smith is the commonest name, owned by over 1% of Americans. But what if you’re a Schwartz? You’re number 323. A Kowalski, perhaps? 2066.
Is it just me, or has there been a whole bunch of stuff on TV lately about pyramids? My staple of channels on the Ron list on my remote, which include History, History International, the various flavors of Discovery, and National Geographic have all had fascinating stories about pyramids in Egypt lately. And now PBS…
He was one of the most brilliant, if not misunderstood, minds that science has ever known. His name was Nikola Tesla. He was known as the Master of Lightning. Tesla was born in the Baltics in 1856. A prodigy who could perform calculus in his head, he soon immersed himself in studies of mechanical and…
Today, we go somewhere VERY SCARY with our FamilyFirst pick. In fact, you may find it TERRIFYING! The site is PBS.org’s Inside the Teenage Brain. If you’re a parent of teenagers, or ever have been, you are probably baffled by the behavior of adolescents. Of course, teenage thinking wasn’t so mysterious when YOU were a…
The music of our country reflects the heritage that of what has come before us. It represents the good times, the bad times, the happy times, and the sad times. Most important of all, it reflects who and what we are and have been as a nation. Today’s Family First Site looks at a site…
The 50th and most recent state of our country is Hawaii. It was admitted to the Union in 1959, after years of being a territory. But prior to that, it was an independent nation, one ruled by kings and queens. Today�s Family First Site takes a look at that monarchy and one queen in particular.
If you were asked what the most influential and important invention in the 20th Century was, what would you respond? That single question would be a great one for discussion at parties, at work, and most definitely in the classroom. There really is no right answer, but the Family First site today makes a stop…