On May 10, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski, Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator W. Craig Fugate, top executives from AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon and others convened at the World Trade Center site to announce PLAN--the Personal Localized Alerting Network. PLAN is a free service that will allow customers with an enabled mobile device to receive geographically-targeted, text-like messages alerting them of imminent threats to safety in their area. This service will be available in New York City by the end of 2011, at least two calendar quarters before the rest of the nation. When PLAN is operational, customers in an area affected by an emergency who have a PLAN-capable mobile device will receive an alert of ninety characters or less. Consumers will receive three types of alerts from PLAN: (1) alerts issued by the President; (2) alerts involving imminent threats to safety of life; and (3) Amber Alerts. Participating carriers may allow subscribers to block all but Presidential alerts. In 2006, Congress passed the Warning, Alert and Response Network (WARN) Act, requiring carriers that choose to participate to activate PLAN technology by a deadline determined by the FCC, which is April 2012. Participants that will offer PLAN at least two calendar quarters ahead of schedule in New York City are AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon. Ninety percent of New York subscribers who have a PLAN-capable mobile device in these cities will be able to receive PLAN alerts by the end of 2011. For more information on PLAN (Personal Localized Alerting Network), visit the Federal Communications Commission website at www.fcc.gov

Mason Locke Weems (1759 –1825), generally known as Parson Weems, was an American book agent and author. He is best known as the source of some of the apocryphal stories about George Washington. The famous tale of the cherry tree ("I cannot tell a lie, I did it with my little hatchet") is included in The Life of Washington (1800), Weems' most famous work. This nineteenth-century bestseller depicted Washington's virtues and provided an entertaining and morally instructive tale for the youth of the young nation. The New York Times has described Weems as one of the "early hagiographers" of American literature "who elevated the Swamp Fox, Francis Marion, into the American pantheon and helped secure a place there for George Washington". Weems' name would probably be forgotten today, had it not been for the tension between the liveliness of his narratives, contrasted with the "...charge of a want of veracity [that] is brought against all Weems's writings". The cherry-tree anecdote illustrates this point. Another dubious anecdote found in the Weems biography is that of Washington's prayer during the winter at Valley Forge. The exalted esteem in which the "founding fathers", and especially George Washington, were held by 19th century Americans seems quaintly exaggerated to their 21st century counterparts; but that Washington was so regarded is undisputed. The acme of this esteem is found on the ceiling of the United States Capitol Building in the form of Brumidi's fresco The Apotheosis of Washington. Weems' A History of the Life and Death, Virtues and Exploits of General George Washington, was a biography written in this spirit, amplified by the florid, rollicksome style which was Weems' trademark. According to this account, publicly his subject was "...Washington, the HERO,and the Demigod...;" furthermore, at a level above that "...what he really was, [was] 'the Jupiter Conservator,' the friend and benefactor of men." With this hyperbole, Weems elevated Washington to the Augustan level of the god "Jupiter Conservator [Orbis]" (that is, "Jupiter, Conservator of the Empire", later rendered "Jupiter, Savior of the World"). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parson_Weems

The New York Public Library has teamed up with Coney Island Brewing Company in Brooklyn to create a beer fit for a Founding Father – a porter based on George Washington’s handwritten “small beer” recipe, which can be found in the Library’s extensive collections. The two institutions are brewing a very limited amount of “Fortitude’s Founding Father Brew” to toast the 100th birthday of the Library’s landmark Stephen A. Schwarzman Building on 42nd Street. The brewery – maker of such craft beer favorites as Coney Island Lager, Sword Swallower and Freaktoberfest and a part of Shmaltz Brewing Company, the “Best American Craft Brewer” according to Beverage World Magazine – is creating the beer in collaboration with two local brewers, Pete Taylor and Josh Knowlton, using Washington’s own instructions, which he wrote on a small piece of paper. “To Make Small Beer,” reads Washington’s recipe. “Take a large Siffer [Sifter] full of Bran Hops to your Taste. Boil these 3 hours then strain out 30 Gall[ons] into a cooler put in 3 Gall[ons] Molasses while the Beer is Scalding hot or rather draw the Melasses (sic) into the cooler & St[r]ain the Beer on it while boiling Hot. let this stand till it is little more than Blood warm then put in a quart of Yea[s]t if the Weather is very Cold cover it over with a Blank[et] & let it Work in the Cooler 24 hours then put it into the Cask — leave the bung open till it is almost don[e] Working — Bottle it that day Week it was Brewed.” The recipe sits along with Washington’s Farewell Address and other items belonging to him and his family in the Library’s Manuscripts and Archives Division. Tastings of the beer will be served to guests at the Library’s Centennial gala on May 23 — exactly 100 years after “The People’s Palace” opened in 1911. The press will have an opportunity to taste the beer at an event on Wednesday, May 18 from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. at Rattle N Hum, located at 14 East 33rd Street in Manhattan. The public will have a chance to get a free tasting of the special brew as part of an event by Shmaltz Brewing Company at 7 p.m.
http://beernews.org/2011/05/coney-island-brewing-company-creates-george-washington-beer/

It is the image that has come to define a pivotal point in history, capturing the moment the deadly raid on Osama Bin Laden's lair was watched in awe by the White House elite. Brooklyn-based Hasidic newspaper Der Zeitung printed a story this week with a subtly manipulated version of the historic image - all the men in the photograph remain untouched but the two women in the picture have been Photoshopped out. It is thought the newspaper, which is written in Yiddish and serves a small part of the area's ultra-orthodox Jewish community, removed the women because of religious issues regarding female modesty. While Mrs Clinton is dressed in the picture in a full jacket, wearing a top beneath that covers her almost right up to her neck, the newspaper never intentionally prints any images of women at all in case they could be considered sexually suggestive. More critical observers suggest the women have been edited by Der Zeitung, which translates as 'The Time', because of an ideological objection to women holding positions of power. The Situation Room photograph shows President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and various other members of their inner circle watching Sunday night's Navy SEAL operation, which ended with Bin Laden being killed. See pictures with and without the two women at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1384847/Osama-Bin-Laden-dead-Newspaper-edits-Hillary-Clinton-Situation-Room-photo.html

Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 East Chicago Avenue, exhibits sound-oriented work of 2010 Turner Prize Susan Philipsz winner through June 12.
Her installations feature strategically placed audio speakers within a given space that transmit a cappella versions of songs sung by the artist. Philipsz deliberately selects particular pieces of music to reinterpret vocally and then separates the multiple audio tracks so that the "viewer" experiences different voices as they move through a space. Both works in this exhibition—The Internationale (1999) in the second floor atrium and the MCA Chicago commission We Shall Be All (2011) - feature songs that relate to the history of workers' collectives and their struggles for proper working conditions and sufficient wages. In The Internationale Philipsz sings the famous workers' rights anthem of the same name, popularized in the 1890s. The title of We Shall Be All is taken from the American version of "The Internationale," adapted by Charles H. Kerr (American, 1860–1944) for the Industrial Workers of the World songbook. Philipsz's 2002 sound installation Pledge is featured in a related presentation at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum through June 12. http://www.mcachicago.org/exhibitions/exh_detail.php?id=254

The Dawes Arboretum in Newark, Ohio, founded in 1929 by Beman and Bertie Dawes, now covers nearly 1,800 acres and includes eight miles of hiking trails and a four-mile Auto Tour. More than 15,000 living plants, Japanese Garden, Dutch Fork Wetlands, Observation Tower. The Dawes Arboretum is a private, non-profit organization. The grounds are open 7a.m. until dusk year-round. Closed on New Year's, Thanksgiving and Christmas days. Free admission. http://www.dawesarb.org/

William Dawes, Jr. (1745 –1799) was one of several men and a woman who alerted colonial minutemen of the approach of British army troops prior to the Battle of Lexington and Concord at the outset of the American Revolution. His great-great-grandson, Charles Gates Dawes, would serve as Vice President of the United States. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Dawes

Charles Gates Dawes (1865 –1951) was an American banker and politician who was the 30th Vice President of the United States (1925-1929). For his work on the Dawes Plan for World War I reparations he was a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He served in the First World War, was U.S. Comptroller of the Currency, the first director of the Bureau of the Budget, and, in later life, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom. Dawes was a self-taught pianist and composer and a member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, the national fraternity for men in music. His 1912 composition, "Melody in A Major," became a well-known piano and violin piece, and was played at many official functions as his signature tune. It was transformed into the pop song, "It's All In The Game", in 1951 when Carl Sigman added lyrics. Tommy Edwards' recording of "It's All in the Game" was a number one hit on the American Billboard record chart for six weeks in the fall of 1958. Edwards' version of the song also hit number one on the UK chart that year. Since then, it has since become a pop standard recorded hundreds of times by artists including Cliff Richard, The Four Tops, Isaac Hayes, Jackie DeShannon, Van Morrison, Nat "King" Cole, Brook Benton, Elton John, Mel Carter, Barry Manilow, and Keith Jarrett. Dawes is the only Vice-President credited with a #1 pop hit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Gates_Dawes

Quotes by Annie Dillard
Spend the afternoon – we can’t take it with us.
How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.
Books swept me away, this way and that, one after the other; I made endless vows according to their lights for I believed them
The dedicated life is the life worth living. You must give with your whole heart.
A schedule defends from chaos and whim. A net for catching days.
Dillard, born Meta Ann Doak on 30 April 1945 in Pittsburgh, writes primarily narrative nonfiction essays, but her literary contributions include a memoir, poems, and a novel. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974) won her a Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction in 1975.