Mr. Rager

nostalgia inc.

Just try and tell me this fit ain’t tuff. I’ll wait

Vietnam War - Long Cool Woman (In a Black Dress)

Ulysses S. Grant and James Longstreet had one of the more remarkable friendships in American history, made all the more striking because they ended up on opposite sides of the Civil War. They met as cadets at West Point in the early 1840s and became close friends despite their different backgrounds. Longstreet, a Georgian, was outgoing and physically imposing, while Grant was quieter and smaller, but they bonded over a shared dislike of military pretension and a love of horses. After graduation they served together in the Mexican-American War, where they fought alongside each other and deepened the friendship. The personal connection became family. Longstreet was related to Grant’s future wife, Julia Dent, through his cousin. Longstreet attended Grant and Julia’s wedding in 1848 and, by some accounts, served as a groomsman or best man. The two men remained close until the Civil War divided them, with Longstreet becoming one of Robert E. Lee’s most trusted corps commanders and Grant rising to command all Union armies. One of the most telling moments came in 1864, when Grant was given command of all Union armies and Confederate officers around Lee’s headquarters were dismissing him as a drunkard and a butcher who had only succeeded against second-rate Western generals. Longstreet, who knew Grant better than any man in gray, reportedly silenced the room by warning his fellow officers something to the effect of, “that man will fight us every day and every hour till the end of the war.” He told them not to underestimate Grant’s tenacity, that he was a soldier of singular determination, and that the Confederacy now faced an opponent unlike any it had met before. History proved him exactly right, the Overland Campaign that followed was the bloodiest and most relentless pressure Lee’s army ever endured. What’s most touching is what happened after the war. When the two met again at Appomattox in 1865, Grant reportedly greeted Longstreet warmly, offered him a cigar, and invited him to play a game of cards “as if nothing had ever happened.” Grant later used his political influence to help Longstreet receive a pardon and restoration of citizenship. Longstreet then committed what many former Confederates considered an unforgivable betrayal: he became a Republican, supported Grant’s presidential campaigns, and accepted federal appointments from him, including minister to the Ottoman Empire. This earned Longstreet decades of vilification from Lost Cause writers, but he never wavered in his loyalty to his old friend.

We should have never fought our cousins That war took our greatest men and buried them in the mud for nothing

Enjoying freedom

German WWI veteran describes killing a French corporal during a bayonet charge and articulates his view on war as a whole

Riff Raff's 9 Minute Lunch Break Freestyle 🤯

A M E R I C A N F O L K L O R E

He won the Civil War, broke the Klan, went bankrupt at 62, got terminal throat cancer, and wrote one of the greatest books in American literature in the final year of his life. He finished it 5 days before he died. Ulysses S. Grant was born 204 years ago today. His name wasn't even Ulysses S. Grant. He was born Hiram Ulysses Grant in Point Pleasant, Ohio on April 27, 1822. The congressman who nominated him to West Point wrote down the wrong name. Grant kept it. The "S." stands for nothing. He hated his father's tannery and loved horses. Graduated 21st of 39 at West Point. Fought in the Mexican-American War, then came home convinced it was an unjust war designed to expand slavery. He later said he believed the Civil War was divine punishment for it. He married Julia Dent in 1848, into a slave-owning Missouri family. His abolitionist father refused to attend the wedding. In 1859, broke and desperate, Grant freed the one enslaved man he'd briefly owned instead of selling him. He could have gotten a year's wages. In the Civil War he became what no other Union general was: relentless. Vicksburg (July 4, 1863) split the Confederacy in half. Lincoln then gave him every Union army. His Appomattox surrender terms: officers kept sidearms, men kept horses for spring planting, no one prosecuted. As president (1869 to 1877) he did something no president would do again until LBJ: used federal troops to crush the Ku Klux Klan. He suspended habeas corpus in 9 South Carolina counties, prosecuted Klansmen before predominantly Black juries, and broke the first Klan. His presidency was also rocked by scandal: Black Friday 1869. Crédit Mobilier. The Whiskey Ring. Belknap. Grant himself never took a dime. He was just disastrously loyal to corrupt friends. The pattern damaged his reputation for a century. After the White House, he toured the world for 2 years. Dined with Queen Victoria. Met the emperor of Japan. Then in 1884, a Wall Street partner named Ferdinand Ward ran what we'd now call a Ponzi scheme. Grant was wiped out. 62 years old. Penniless. Weeks later he was diagnosed with terminal throat cancer. Mark Twain offered to publish his memoirs. Grant wrote in agony, sometimes 50 pages a day, racing the disease to leave Julia an inheritance. He finished the manuscript July 18, 1885. He died July 23. The book made Julia $450,000, about $14M today. It's now considered one of the finest memoirs in the English language. For decades historians ranked Grant a failure. Since 2000 he's jumped 13 spots in the C-SPAN survey, the biggest rise of any president. Happy birthday, General 🇺🇸

Tommy Gwynn, a decorated Army Ranger who survived D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge, and two captures in Korea, has died at 106 in Tullahoma. The Tennessee war hero was wounded 24 times and earned dozens of medals for his service. Learn more about Gwynn and his legacy: bit.ly/496IgMC

WWII Veteran Don Graves had 300 men in his company that fought on the island of Iwo Jima. Only Don and 7 other men walked off the island. God Bless the Greatest Generation and their families 🙏

Hell Let Loose: Vietnam is releasing this summer, and some of our content creators have been sharing their thoughts on what's in store for us all. Check out their videos in the comments below! 👇 #HellLetLooseVietnam

The number of migrants in the EU has reached a record 64.2M, with Germany the top destination, increasing from 10M to 18M since 2015. Follow: @AFpost

U.S. Marines in Peiping, China readies for deployment to lift the siege in Peking during the Boxer Rebellion, c. June 1900

Arguably the funniest scene in the show, and it’s not even from a sitcom