RANDOM THOUGHTS - Friday, September 25, 2026

 Shade comes free with the tree … Costco displayed a pinball machine at $4999.99, so don’t expect one from me … Today in 1965, the ageless 59 year-old Satchel Paige pitched three innings of one-hit ball … One hundred years ago in 1926 Henry Ford announced an 8-hour, 5-day workweek for workers at Ford Motor Company … A balanced diet means having a cupcake in each hand … Can’t argue facts, but we can argue the conclusions drawn from them … Cronkite as a reporter said when assigned to ride a bomber over Germany, “Scared all the time,” George McGovern, a bomber pilot over Germany, told me he was “scared all the time” … Life gets mighty precious when there’s less of it to waste … A person who won’t read is no better off than one who can’t … We plan to check out the North Dakota Book and Arts Festival tomorrow …

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Do you think the interstate highway system was always here? No? Here’s the story in a nutshell. In 1919 Lt Col Dwight Eisenhower led a convoy of 300 men and 81 vehicles cross-country fromWashington, DC to San Francisco, basically just to find out if it could be done. They found a very poor system which in some places was non-existent. Then in Europe during World War II Eisenhower noted and admired the great German auto-bahn system, and in 1956, when he became president strongly advocated to have one built here. The Federal Aid Highway Act was born in Congress that turned out to be the largest public works project ever attempted. Our economy had begun slowing after the Korean War and workers needed employment. Almost 48,000 miles was built and many people had been employed. The official name became the “Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways.”