Hubby and I were privileged recently to help Tampa native Lula Joughin Dovi celebrate her 95th birthday. Lu’s name may be familiar to you because, despite her advanced age, she continues to practice her profession of journalism by occasionally writing a column for LaGaceta called “Tracks.” She answers her e-mail promptly, continues her lifelong support of Democrats, especially women, and manages just fine alone in her four-bedroom Carrollwood home, complete with a nice garden. A few years ago, I helped her assemble an autobiography of her fascinating life in and out of Tampa, and I decided for this week’s column to just quote from the first chapter. It will be longer than usual, but I hope you find this picture of Tampa almost a century ago to be as interesting as I do. So in Lu’s voice:  Read More 

I’ve had this fantasy for a long time, and the current times seem right to upgrade it from dream to vision. Let’s try reversing traditional gender roles for a decade, especially in government. Let men stay home and care for the next generation that phony politicians tout as so important. Let them change diapers, buy groceries, cook meals and do laundry, attend to doctors’ appointments and PTA meetings, run car pools and volunteer at schools. Most of the guys who set educational policy now haven’t been in a school in years, nor seriously talked with kids or helped with homework.  Read More 

My friend Amy Scherzer sent me via my friend Betty Castor a copy of the BBC’s magazine, “History.” Probably more than half of the TV that Hubby and I watch is produced by BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), but I didn’t know they published a magazine on history. I’m sure Amy wanted me to see it because this issue was largely devoted to women, with cover stories entitled “Games of Queens” and “The Killing of Lady Jane Grey.”  Read More 

Yes, I know I should have written this for last week’s column or maybe even the week before that, but we historians like to wait until things have settled. It turned out that no one chose to disrupt Halloween with genuine horror, which many feared. The date, however, meant more to me than Halloween as usual, as it was the 110th anniversary of my mother’s birth on a Minnesota farm. On October 31, 1907, she became the oldest of my grandparents’ eventual twelve children. Their parents had been immigrants from German-speaking provinces before there was a united Germany. Except for one family branch, they came from farming lands near the Baltic Sea, close to modern Denmark and Poland.  Read More