The National Cryptologic Museum is the National Security Agency's principal gateway to the public.  It shares the Nation's, as well as NSA's, cryptologic legacy and place in world history.  Located adjacent to NSA Headquarters at Ft. George G. Meade, Maryland, the Museum houses a collection of thousands of artifacts that collectively serve to sustain the history of the cryptologic profession.  Here visitors can catch a glimpse of some of the most dramatic moments in the history of American cryptology: the people who devoted their lives to cryptology and national defense, the machines and devices they developed, the techniques they used, and the places where they worked.  Being the first and only public museum in the Intelligence Community, the Museum hosts approximately 50,000 visitors annually from all over the country and all over the world, allowing them a peek into the secret world of codemaking and codebreaking.  The National Cryptologic Museum has had an adjunct reference library since it opened in 1993.  The library not only supports the exhibits, but also encourages visitors to research various areas of cryptologic history.  The Museum Library maintains a collection of unclassified and declassified books and documents relating to every aspect of cryptology.  Read much more and link to hours, directions and exhibits at https://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic-heritage/museum/

The most popular sport in the US may be American football, but the most popular sport in the world is association football, which Americans call “soccer.”  The kicker?  As different as they are today, these sports share a linked heritage.  Once upon a time, groups of men were running around fields, kicking, carrying, throwing, and punching a ball, with little in the way of organized rules.  This sport was dubbed “football,” possibly because the game was played on foot, rather than on horse.  In the early 1800s, the sport began to factionalize in England between those who preferred to handle the ball with hands and those who did not.  The former became known as rugby football, the latter becoming association football (in reference to the associations that collaborated to play the sport).  “Soccer,” a convenient abbreviation for “association,” began as a European term.  When soccer became more popular in Europe than rugby football, the nomenclature was dropped, while it stuck in the US, where football more commonly referred to American football.  And football in America didn’t look too different from soccer and rugby before they split; players brutally fought to get the ball past the opposing team by any means necessary.  The ball was even round.  American football grew through competition between colleges.  As more colleges collaborated to play the sport, the rules developed more into what we recognize today.  The game began to look more similar to rugby than it did association football, but for reasons not entirely clear, Americans continued to brand it as football.  By the turn of the 20th century, association football, rugby football, and American football—originating as variations of the same game—had become distinct and incompatible.  “Football” might seem like a misnomer for the American sport today, but the historical game involved plenty of kicking.  Johsua T. Garcia  http://knowledgenuts.com/2013/11/17/american-football-soccer-rugby-started-as-the-same-sport/  See also http://www.rugbyfootballhistory.com/originsofrugby.htm and http://www.hornetfootball.org/documents/football-history.htm and http://www.fifa.com/about-fifa/who-we-are/the-game/

Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) was a social activist, first lady and the wife of US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  Find her quotes (Will people ever be wise enough to refuse to follow bad leaders or to take away the freedom of other people?), disputed quotes (The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.) and misattributed quotes (I am who I am today because of the choices I made yesterday.) at https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Eleanor_Roosevelt

A syllable is a single unit of written or spoken word, an unbroken sound used to make up words.  One-syllable words are known as monosyllabic.  Two-syllable words are known as disyllabic.  Three-syllable words are known as trisyllabic.  Words with more than three syllables are known as polysyllabic.  https://www.youngwriters.co.uk/terms-syllable

United States trivia  Q.  What state name has only one syllable.  A.  Maine.  Q.  What is the highest number of syllables in the name of a state?  A.  5:  Louisiana, North Carolina and South Carolina.  Q.  How many names of state capitals start with the same letter as that of the state name?  A.  4:  Dover, DE, Honolulu, HI, Indianapolis, IN and Oklahoma City, OK.

12 nouns that are always plurals by Simon Thomas  http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2015/05/12-nouns-that-are-always-plurals/

Mary Ellen Best (1809–1891) was an English artist.  Most active in the 1830s, she usually worked in water-colour, commonly painting scenes of domestic life.  She painted a number of water-colour images of her home in Castle Gate, York, including interior portraits of the drawing room, dining room (painted in 1838), and one of herself working in her painting room.  After marrying Johan Anton and moving to Nuremberg,Frankfurt, Worms, and Darmstadt, she continued to paint the houses they lived in.  Between 1828 and 1840, two thirds of Best's portraits were commissioned by women.  Caroline Davidson, who wrote a biography of Best, calculated that she produced more than 1,500 paintings in total.  Some of Best's drawings were handed down to her great-granddaughter, and 47 were sold in January 1983 in New York City.  Others were sold by her great-grand-nephew a year later.  Read more and see pictures at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ellen_Best

Carla Hayden made history on July 13, 2016 as the Senate voted to approve her nomination as Librarian of Congress, making her both the first woman and the first African American to hold the post.  The Librarian of Congress job was once a lifetime appointment.  Last year Obama signed a law imposing a 10-year term limit, making Hayden the first to serve on a limited term (and only the 14th librarian since its founding in 1800).  Hayden is currently the chief executive of the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, where she earned praise for keeping the library open during unrest in the city after the shooting death of Freddie Gray.  The library became a community meeting space for people in search of information—and even food—during the protests.  She previously served as president of the American Library Association, and earlier in her career she worked in the Chicago Public Library system, where she first met President Obama.  She holds a PhD in library science from the University of Chicago.  http://time.com/4405062/carla-hayden-confirmed-as-first-black-woman-to-be-librarian-of-congress/

The landmark Longaberger Headquarters, known as the "Big Basket," will no longer house any employees as the company consolidates after July 14, 2016.  The  remaining dozen or so office workers will move into office space at the company’s manufacturing plant in Frazeysburg.  When the Newark, Ohio basketmaker was approaching its glory days and opened the 180,000-square-foot building with 500 employees enjoying the homey feel of their new digs.  The company has struggled since the death of Dave Longaberger in 1999.  A combination of bad economic times and changing tastes in home decor sent sales from a peak of $1 billion in 2000 to about $100 million in 2014.  Longaberger Co. seemed to be on the path to recovery after CVSL (now called JRJR Networks), a holding company of direct-sales firms, bought a 51.7 percent stake in Longaberger in 2013.  But financial problems persisted:  Longaberger Co. owes $577,660.05 to various local taxing entities related to the cost of roadwork, lighting and other improvements made when the Big Basket was built.  If delinquent taxes aren’t paid, the county has the power to foreclose on the property and offer it at a sheriff’s sale, Licking County Auditor Mike Smith said, but that isn’t likely.  Newark “does not have a desire to own the building,” said Newark Mayor Jeff Hall.   “We’re still marketing the building,” Guagenti said.  “The challenge is, it’s large,” Hall said.  “It’s in great shape.  It was built wonderfully.  If someone got it for maybe $5 million, that’s a heck of a deal.  The taxes plus utilities are about $750,000 a year.”  Tim Feran  http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/business/2016/07/14/1-last-day-arrives-for-longaberger-and-big-basket.html  See also World's Largest Basket (In Transition) with pictures and statistics at http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/10658  The Big Easter Basket up in Lorain, OH--on the shore of Lake Erie on West Erie Avenue--is not a Longaberger creation, and it is a tad amateurish when compared to the other big baskets.  Still, at 9 ft. high and 10 ft. wide, it suggests that big baskets have something to do with the soul of Ohio, not just the market-savviness of the Longaberger Basket Company.

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1497  July 15, 2016  On this date in 1799, the Rosetta Stone was found in the Egyptian village of Rosetta by French Captain Pierre-François Bouchard during Napoleon's Egyptian Campaign.  On this date in 1971, Richard Nixon announced that he would visit China the following year.  (Later, John Adams wrote an opera called Nixon in China.)  Read an October 25, 1987 review of its premiere in Houston, Texas at https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/jan/19/from-the-classical-archive-nixon-in-china-john-adams-premiere-oct-1987