Doris O'Brien is a retired college Speech teacher and banker. She has published two books of humor (Up or Down With Women's Liberation and Humor Me a Little) and for many years contributed light verse to the Pepper 'n Salt column of the Wall Street Journal. She is an avid writer of letters to the editors.
Doris celebrated her 50th wedding anniversary in the same year she welcomed her first grandchild. She now lives in Pasadena with a great view of the San Gabriel mountains — and the annual Tournament of Roses Parade.
She can be reached by e-mail: witsendob at (@) gmail.com
Lifelong Pursuits: Musing on the Triple Crown
Joan L. Cannnon wrote: It's been a while since I have had the unique pleasure of sitting above the common order of humanity, to become a part of the grace and strength of the horse under me. We communicated through my fingers on the reins, the nervous ears in front of my face, and the sensation of leashed energy of half a ton of controlled power on which I perched like a paper monarch on sufferance. Anyone on horseback becomes a new person somehow more important, who exists until her feet touch the ground again. more »
The Growing Outdoor Recreation Economy: Conservation of Public Lands Helps Small Businesses Thrive
A key element of the growing outdoor recreation economy — which accounts for $887 billion in annual consumer spending and supports 7.6 million jobs, according to the Outdoor Industry Association — are small businesses, especially those that operate in the gateway communities around public lands. Sure, online shopping is convenient, but it’s to a local business that most visitors turn when they need a replacement tent or last-minute supplies before heading out to camp, fish, hunt, or find solace in the outdoors. more »
Retraction Watch: A Cancer Researcher Said She Collected Blood From 98 People; It Was All Her Own
A researcher collected her own blood and forged the labels so it would appear to be samples from nearly 100 people, according to a new finding of research misconduct released today by the U.S. Office of Research Integrity (ORI). The former researcher at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center swapped her own blood samples for those taken from 98 human subjects. The misconduct affects two grant progress reports and two papers; one paper has already been retracted, and the former “research interviewer” — Maria Cristina Miron Elqutub — has agreed to correct or retract the other. more »
100 Pairs of Shoes: Walk This Way Exhibition Includes Stories of Conformity, Independence, Culture, Class, Politics and Performance
In the early 1900s, when women made up less than 20 percent of the total industrial workforce, one-third of the workers in shoe factories were women. Women became active in trade unions like the Daughters of St. Crispin, named after the patron saint of shoemakers, and the International Boot & Shoe Workers Union, participating in strikes to protest low wages and poor treatment. Considered radical for its time, by 1904 the Boot & Shoe Workers Union constitution called for “uniform wages for the same class of work, regardless of sex.” An intricately beaded shoe (c. 1915), stamped with the union seal, shows off the quality of American shoemaking. more »
