Patty, is that You?
Hal Roth Tells All About Patty Cannon
On This Date in History: We hear of all these heinous crimes today and think that the world is going to hell in a hand basket The truth is that mankind has been anything but kind throughout its history and, though it seems we have more outlandish behaviour today, I suspect the perception is more linked to a larger population and electronic news media than anything else. In 1829, a tenant farmer on the land of the widow Lucretia “Patty” Cannon near Johnson’s Cross Roads in Delaware was plowing the field His horse “sunk in a grave, and on digging, he found a blue-painted chest.” Inside the chest was a bunch of bones that belonged to a man who had been missing for a dozen years. Turns out, the bones belonged to a slave trader from Georgia. He had been invited to supper by Patty and her son-in-law, Joe Johnson, and the 15 grand apparently burned a hole in their hearts So, right at the dinner table, they killed him, took his money and buried him in the blue chest.
The Haunted Cannon House
Turns out old Patty, who was a woman in her 60′s, was no wall flower widow. ..her ghost is said to still roam her house! See, the townfolk had long suspected that she had gained her widow status by poisoning her husband. She ran a tavern in Johnson’s Cross Roads, which was on the route of the Underground Railroad that spirited slaves from slaveholding states to freedom. Well, she took advantage of their location near the Maryland-Delaware border. She also participated in the dastardly practice of capturing free Blacks, who probably had just gained their freedom, and then selling them back into slavery for as much as $1100, which was a huge sum in the early 19th Century. Heck, these days that’s a good deal of money for me! Anyway, it was said that she and this no-good son-in-law would keep the captured people chained in their attic until they could ship them South. They had a Black agent in Philadelphia who would drug the victim and then put them on a ship, which was owned by Patty, and send them back to the Carolinas and a renewed life of slavery. Not enough? How about some more?
Underground Railroad Barely Clipped Delaware...Right Through Patty's Tavern
As the authorities dug around the field, they found more bodies that included children. Seems this not so matronly widow took to beating Black children to death with a stick because they didn’t fetch much money on the open market and were probably more difficult to keep in the attic than adults.
Well, I guess the neighbors were glad to get rid of their local menace as well as neighboring towns because in April 1829, the town crier in Seaford, Delaware wandered about the town and yelled, “Three O’Clock and Patty Cannon taken!” But, Patty Cannon cheated the executioner because on this date in 1829, Lucretia “Patty” Cannon poisoned herself to death in jail. No word on what happened to the no-good son-in-law. Somehow he escaped infamy. And the story itself is not widely told in history classes or in books about how there were many places barely in free territory along the Underground Railroad where slaves had struggled to gain their freedom only to be quickly lured back into involuntary servitude. But, the story of Patty Cannon is known in the small town in Delaware, though the town doesn’t seem to want to advertise it too much. See, the actions of Patty Cannon forced the town of Johson’s Cross Roads to change its name to Reliance, DE. While they tried to erase the history books of the towns role in the untracking of the Underground Railroad, folks in the state capital still seem to hold on.
In the early 20th Century, the body of Patty Cannon was exhumed for some reason. Before they could rebury it, the head fell off. A resident gained possession of the skull. I guess the resident had a fun-filled nephew who lent it to the Dover Public Library. At least into the 1990′s, and perhaps even today, every Halloween, the Dover Public Library put the skull on display!
SPC Wed-Thu Severe Outlook
Weather Bottom Line: Pretty much the same song third verse. Today we improve though some sunshine may trigger an isolated shower in the afternoon before the air becomes more stable as there is still come colder air aloft Kinda like how in the winter time we get a snow shower and then sunshine then a snow shower. Anyway, Tuesday looks pretty good then the most recent front comes back as a warm front on Wednesday that may bring some showers or even a t’storm. Now, the SPC has us barely in the slight risk for severe weather from Wednesday morning to Thursday morning. What we have is a cold front advancing from the northwest but I see both the NAM and the GFS have the front coming through on Thursday morning. So, my guess is that the boys at the SPC are being cautious because the moderate risk isn’t all that far from us and they may be afraid that perhaps some of those big boppers may hold together if they advance east in the late afternoon and early evening. But, I suspect that, if they develop, they would move northeast well before the line got here as the upper energy is well to our northwest. See SPC discussion below.
The front gets hung up just to our east and south on Thursday, maintaining a risk of rain and t’storms, particularly if a wave wanders across. I really don’t see too much of a threat on Friday but Saturday, another front comes through bringing another chance for storms late in the day or evening.
I Feel Like Billy Joel
People in Glass Houses Shouldn’t Throw Stones: Yesterday, I referred to a tv weather person as a “knucklehead” for saying we’d have cloudy skies late on Mother’s Day. I said we’d have high wispy cirrus clouds. Well, at 5pm I was having a Mother’s Day meal with my mother-in-law and Snow White when I looked out the window and saw my high clouds, but it was a cirrostratus deck. It was indeed cloudy. I was right, but wrong. This should serve as example and reminder to not be so quick to judge, especially in such a finicky field as weather. I shall look in the mirror next time I want to see a knucklehead.
DAY 3 CONVECTIVE OUTLOOK
NWS STORM PREDICTION CENTER NORMAN OK
0230 AM CDT MON MAY 11 2009
VALID 131200Z – 141200Z
…THERE IS A MDT RISK OF SVR TSTMS ACROSS PARTS OF IL AND MO…
…THERE IS A SLGT RISK OF SVR TSTMS ACROSS PARTS OF THE OH
VALLEY…SRN GREAT LAKES…MID-MS VALLEY…OZARKS…CNTRL PLAINS AND
SRN PLAINS…
…UPPER TO MID-MS VALLEY/OZARKS/SRN PLAINS…
AN UPPER-LEVEL TROUGH WILL AMPLIFY AND MOVE EWD ACROSS THE NRN
STATES AS A WELL-DEFINED MID-LEVEL JET ROUNDS THE BASE OF THE
TROUGH. AHEAD OF THE SYSTEM…RETURNING LOW-LEVEL MOISTURE SHOULD
CREATE A LARGE WARM SECTOR FROM THE SRN PLAINS NNEWD ACROSS THE MID
TO UPPER-MS VALLEY. STRONG LARGE-SCALE ASCENT WITH THE UPPER-LEVEL
TROUGH AND STRONG VERTICAL SHEAR PROFILES ASSOCIATED WITH THE
MID-LEVEL JET OVER THE WARM SECTOR SHOULD RESULT IN THE POTENTIAL
FOR A WIDESPREAD SEVERE WEATHER EVENT WEDNESDAY AND WEDNESDAY NIGHT.
EARLY IN THE PERIOD…AN MCS SHOULD BE ONGOING IN THE MID-MS VALLEY
WITH THIS CONVECTIVE CLUSTER MOVING EWD ACROSS PARTS OF THE OH
VALLEY. IN THE WAKE OF THE MCS…SFC-BASED THUNDERSTORMS SHOULD
INITIATE ALONG AND AHEAD OF A COLD FRONT WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON FROM
NCNTRL IL SWWD ACROSS MO INTO SE KS. MODEL FORECASTS REMAIN
CONSISTENT THAT THIS CONVECTION WILL ORGANIZE INTO A WELL-DEVELOPED
LINEAR MCS EWD ACROSS THE WRN PORTION OF THE OH VALLEY SWWD ACROSS
THE MID-MS VALLEY…NRN OZARKS INTO ERN OK WEDNESDAY EVENING. THE
GFS AND ECMWF ARE IN GOOD AGREEMENT WITH THE POSITION OF THE
UPPER-LEVEL TROUGH. THIS COMBINED WITH GOOD CERTAINTY CONCERNING THE
DEVELOPMENT OF NUMEROUS STORMS IN A STRONGLY SHEARED ENVIRONMENT
SUPPORTS THE ISSUANCE OF A MODERATE RISK IN IL AND MO WEDNESDAY
AFTERNOON AND EVENING. PARAMETERS ON FORECAST SOUNDINGS SUGGEST THE
ENVIRONMENT WILL BE FAVORABLE FOR A SIGNIFICANT SEVERE WEATHER EVENT
WITH A STRONGLY FORCED LINE OF INTENSE STORMS. SWWD ACROSS THE
OZARKS AND SRN PLAINS…THUNDERSTORMS SHOULD BE MORE ISOLATED DUE TO
WEAKER FORCING. A GRADUAL DROP OFF IN SEVERE REPORT COVERAGE SHOULD
OCCUR IN THE OZARKS AND SRN PLAINS FOR THIS REASON.
..BROYLES.. 05/11/2009
