Stamp of the Day

Contemporary Issues

What Should We Do with the Jefferson Memorial?

What, if anything, should be done with the Jefferson Memorial? Or, for that matter what should be done with any one of the hundreds, probably thousands, of schools and other buildings named after Jefferson, including the elementary school in Summit, New Jersey where my mother taught for over two decades. That’s the #stampoftheday question brought

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Great Talent and Bad Behaivor: Ruminating on Frank Lloyd Wright

Over the course of this almost year-long #stampoftheday odyssey, I’ve learned some delightful trivia, unearthed some amazing stories, and become more educated about stamps and the wonderfully odd world of stamp collecting. But what’s made it especially interesting, entertaining (to me), and worth continuing are the many ways that these daily stamps have given me

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Waging Peace: A Timely Lesson from Lester Pearson

“Moral force can be a bulwark against aggression and that it is possible to make aggressive forces yield without resorting to power,” said Gunnar Jahn, chairman of the Nobel Committee, at the December 1957 ceremony honoring Lester Pearson, who is still the only Canadian to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Pearson, then Canada’s secretary of

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The WHO’s Accomplishments and Unfilled Potential

The World Health Organization (WHO) is far from perfect. Nevertheless, it’s still worth paying attention to what its head said today. “While we have all undoubtedly been impacted by the pandemic, the poorest and most marginalized have been hit hardest – both in terms of lives and livelihoods lost,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, a biologist,

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Getting Past the Myths and Sterotypes of Booker T. Washington

I have been looking forward to writing about Booker T. Washington, who was born on April 5, 1856. But it seems especially timely to be writing about him today. In some ways, Washington, who founded the Tuskegee Institute and was the dominant Black political leader in the late 1800s and early 1900s, has been on

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The Happiest Place on Earth is Finland Not DisneyWorld

The happiest place on earth is…. Not Disneyland or Disney World but… …Finland? Apparently that’s the case. In fact, in 2020, for the fourth year in a row, Finland was ranked as the happiest country in the world, according to the 2021 World Happiness Report, a publication of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network that was

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Grover Cleveland Wouldn’t Have Been a Good Baseball Manager

Is it enough for leaders to be competent, honest, and principled? Or is something more needed, even if that something comes at the expense of competence, honesty, and principles? That’s a central question for people like me who are interested in both “what” gets done and “how” it gets done. Usually, this question is framed

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George Washington Carver is to peanuts as Horace Mann is to what?

If the #stampoftheday posts were like the Miller Analogies Test, I might have started today’s post by asking “George Washington Carver is to peanuts as Horace Mann is to what?” The answer would have been something like “education” though “schools” also would have been acceptable. That’s because Horace Mann, who is pictured on today’s #stampoftheday,

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