Dr. Sean Munger

This is great, I'm curious where you found this one.

Why it’s been quiet in the Garden lately. A brief update on where this blog is going and what's happening in my life.

Here's why my blog has been a bit quiet lately. There's a lot going on behind the scenes...
www.gardenofmemory.net/why-its-been...

Inchon. Or should it be “Inchon!”?

Napoleon’s tragic retreat, pictured: Minard’s famous infographic. This one famous chart from 1869 tells the incredible story of one of the great defeats in military history.

The best infographic ever created, in my opinion, predated the invention of the internet by exactly a century. It was Minard's famous analysis of Napoleon's retreat from Moscow. A classic!
www.gardenofmemory.net/napoleons-tr...

Who has the best job in America? That’s easy, the WeRateDogs guy, obviously.

Akron, Ohio, by a wide margin.

LinkedIn, the bleakest social network: An anatomy of its failure. Why is LinkedIn so horrible? It goes even beyond the conceptual failure of most social media sites.

Of all dysfunctional social media hellsites, LinkedIn is probably the most cynical, soulless and nihilistic. Here's my letter of resignation from it and an attempt to analyze why it's so awful.
www.gardenofmemory.net/linkedin-the...

Awww!

Another one. "I can't accept research (on unrelated subject) from someone who thinks Oswald acted alone." So you only conspiracy theorists are qualified to write history, apparently.

It's amazing the number of transgressions that, in the view of YouTube commenters (collectively), disqualify me as a "real" historian. The latest? My use of the word "scab" in talking about a strike. Apparently this is "hate language." JFC, people. What the hell is wrong with you?

Don't you love those 19th century books with verbose introductions where the first thing the author does is apologize for having written the book?

This crap is what lazy reporters and pundits mean when they say we should take Tr*mp "seriously but not literally" instead of "literally but not seriously."

A group of modern members of the Goth subculture, all young teenagers, most wearing chalky makeup, black eyeliner and black PVC clothes.

Tomorrow I get to show my 7th graders this picture, and try to explain who the Goths were--the ones who were running around Europe in the 5th to 8th centuries--and what relationship they have to the ones they will encounter (or become) in high school. Always a fun class.

Those are pretty good looking tortillas for having been made from scratch. When I try it they don't come out that way!

How disappointing it must be to conservatives that Jesus is coming just as they were finally about to smash Antifa. Couldn't he have waited a few more weeks so they could savor their victory?

For some reason the default assumption is that we always work for free, or should. I'm always getting emails from crackpots who want me to research their passion projects. They get indignant when you ask how much they'll pay.

Screenshot of VesselFinder map off Astoria, Oregon, showing the blips of five ships anchored just off the city and two slightly NW off Rice Island.

The lineup of ships is nearly full off Astoria. I've occasionally seen four in the cluster off Rice Island, but this is close to the limit. All bulk carriers.

It will be simulcast in different time zones, except for a few where they couldn't get the rights. Check your local listings.

I get that from time to time, or similar. Startups that want to use your stuff to promote themselves. But they'll give you 20% of the money they plan to make once they scale up, which they never will!

Emma Thompson and Anthony Hopkins standing at a window looking out in "Remains of the Day" (1993).

Image from a film that meant something to me and stuck with me, no explanation, no context.

Do you know about how Norway's teachers stood up to Nazis? I talk about it in my new book, Why Fascists Fear Teachers. You can preorder here: www.WhyFascistsFearTeachers.com

My secret profession: Am I actually a CIA agent? Anyone who publicly refutes paranoid conspiracy theories becomes a target of the paranoiacs themselves.

Members of the paranoid tinfoil hat crowd, when they see my YouTube channel, are quick to accuse me of being a CIA agent. Do they really believe this, or is it a form of virtue signaling among conspiracy nuts? I wrote this article about the phenomenon.
www.gardenofmemory.net/my-secret-pr...

"So yes, we admit our product sucks and is functionally useless, and we can't fix it. But it's okay, right? We're still bullish on our prospects!"

This is horrible and heartbreaking. You must reverse this decision immediately. What were you people thinking? You should be ashamed of yourselves.

I object to the idea that "if you're not out in the streets protesting, you're complicit in allowing fascism to take over." Not true. Many people are doing important work behind the scenes. Don't let your outrage make you judgy of others on your side.

Some denier popped up on my channel saying that he "lost a lot of respect" for me because I asserted the "hoax" of human-caused global warming. I'm very glad to lose the respect of deniers, it means I'm doing something right.

Karl Rove walked into a library reading room where I was doing research. I wanted to crawl into a hole. Fortunately he was there only 10 minutes.

One of the greatest films ever made.

More than one person recently has prefaced a criticism of my videos with something to the effect of, "I'm not a historian, but I was in the Marine Corps." Videos have nothing to do with the Marines. So I'm confused. Do they teach a lot of history in the Marine Corps?

The mysterious “Othrys”: My encounter with an unsuccessful social media startup. Does the world need another social media platform, even a well-intentioned one? We seem to have more than we can handle now.

So, last summer I was solicited by the founder of a mysterious social media startup called "Othrys." He wanted to use my videos, for free (at first), to stock his new platform with content. I didn't take him up on it. Here's the story.
www.gardenofmemory.net/the-mysterio...