THERE’S AN OLD JOKE ABOUT A COMPANY’S NEEDING TO hire a new accounting firm. The chief executive invites the heads of eight firms to come in for interviews and he hires one right away. A friend asks him how he did it. “Simple,” the chief executive replies. “I just asked each of them one question. How much is two plus two?”
“That’s easy,” the friend says.
“Sure it is. Seven of them said four. So I gave the job to the eighth. He said, ‘What number do you have in mind?’”
RECENTLY, ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS, the American public has been made aware of evidence of plagiarism practiced, alas, by celebrated American historians. This is regrettable, but nothing new. All kinds of writers have borrowed and, worse, stolen from others through the ages. Plagiarism is a forgery of sorts, a little like the forging of a signature on a work of art. Other forgeries are less easily detectable. Moreover, the purposes of a historian’s plagiarism and of a historical forgery are different. The purpose of the first is personal: the attribution of another person’s work to oneself. The purpose of the latter is far broader: to revise accepted notions of history, for political or ideological reasons.
Unconventional warfare “is not only a mission,” writes CoI. Michael Kershner, deputy commander of the Army Special Forces Command; it is “an environment, a mind-set, a capability driven by unique skill sets, and a framework for action.” This is made clear in the U.S. Department of Defense’s definition of unconventional warfare: “a broad spectrum of military and paramilitary operations, normally of long duration, predominantly conducted by indigenous or surrogate forces who are organized, trained, equipped, supported and directed in varying degrees by an external source. It includes guerrilla warfare and other direct offensive, low visibility, covert or clandestine operations, as well as the indirect activities of subversion, sabotage, intelligence activities, and evasion and escape.”
AT ZITO’S BAKERY ON BLEECKER STREET, a Greenwich Village institution, there are two framed photographs on the wall behind the counter. One is a picture of the Pope. The other is a picture of Frank Sinatra smiling broadly and holding a loaf of Zito’s bread.
BOTH THOMASVILLE’S WELCOME Center (229-227-7099) and its Web site ( www.thomasvillega.com ) tell of the town’s history by pointing to Its museums and other attractions. Among these are the Lapham-Patterson House, open to visitors who wish to explore a remarkably preserved example of the mansions that sprang up in town in the 1880s. Events held throughout the year include theatrical productions and concerts, a rose festival that gives Thomasville its nickname, the Rose City, and a gala plantation ball held each April at Pebble Hill. “African-American Life on the Southern Hunting Plantation” is available from Jack Hadley at 229-228-6983 or by e-mailing Arcadia Publishing at sales@arcadia publishing.com.
AS SEEN ON THE CUSP of spring, Thomasville, Georgia, might be any small town in the Deep South. But beneath the sultry perfume and soft palette of wisteria and azalea, wisps of Spanish moss drifting from gnarled live oak trees, and big, white-columned houses, lies an unusual story.
IN 1970 THE FUTURIST Alvin Toffler proclaimed that “making paper copies of anything is a primitive use of machines and violates their very spirit.” Five years later the head of Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center began to see the paperless office on the horizon and ventured that in the future “I don’t know how much hard copy I’ll want in this world.”