What a year it was!

Sometimes I fuss at the machines in our lives today. I feel that they tend to isolate us more and more from our family and friends. We can entertain ourselves all alone at our desk or in our easy chair. We don't need other people to play a game, see a show or figure out a problem.

All of that is true. But there is also the other side of this electronic age. We can be in touch with people in an instant and keep in touch with friends from the past (as long as they are computer-savvy) much better.

One special friend sent me an interesting possibility over the Internet. By hitting a certain series of numbers I can get information about the year that I was born. I found out that the year I entered this earth (at the old Ammerman Hospital on the corner of Cherry and Ash) other important things were happening to women also.

The first woman governor in U.S. history, Nellie Taylor Ross, took office as the governor of Wyoming on Jan. 5. Fay Lamphier from California was named Miss America. And Suzanne Lenglen won at Wimbledon.

Soap Operas were begun on radio during my birth year when The Smith Family was introduced. One of my favorite books, "So Big" by Edna Ferber, won the Pulitzer Prize.

Other things that happened in that year were that Ben-Hur which cost $3.95 million to produce was released.

A Tennessee school-teacher, John T. Scopes, was arrested for teaching the theory of evolution, which was forbidden by Tennessee state law.

The fact that Pittsburg won the world series was mentioned but there was no mention of any football awards or wins. I am sure that some sports fan will let me know just when football did begin to get to be popular.

Probably one of the most life-changing things for my generation was that John Logie Baird transmitted human features by television in London. Of course it was several years before it became an entertainment medium but it began the year that I was born. But then it was several years before I developed also.

Along with the facts of my natal year there was a calendar. I looked up June 2 and found that it came on a Tuesday. Instantly I remembered the little poem my mother used to recite to me (without any help from the Internet, television or radio).

It describes the personalities of the children who were born on certain days. Monday's child is fair of face; Tuesday's child is full of grace; Wednesday's child is loving and giving; Thursday's child has to work for a living; Friday's child has far to go; Saturday's child is full of woe; but the child that's born on the Sabbath day, is fair and wise in every way.

I don't know why my mother would tell me this rhyme because as a child or teenager I certainly wasn't full of grace. I can't say that I ever achieved that trait. But I did give birth to three children on Sunday so maybe I made up for my Tuesday birth by producing babies on the Sabbath!

The biggest problem that I see in this information I got on the Internet is that it didn't mention the one most important thing that happened that year. It didn't report that Carolyn Gray was born. Nevada has also been very slow in putting up the plaque on the old Farm and Home building's northwest corner proclaiming my place of birth!