Quote of the Day (John Gray, on History, ‘The First Victim in Dictatorships’)

“[H]istory is the first victim in dictatorships. Because perceptions of the past constantly and inevitably impinge on contemporary debate, we depend on historians to provide us with a richness and variety of grounding. Historians should not be too complacent about their ability to do it….Then again most historians have led sheltered lives, few have gained the insights offered by actual experience of popular engagement, and inevitably most of the historical record they work with was created by the elite. Yet history without any realised sense of the experience of the underclass, or, say, of women, is only half a history….I wouldn’t suggest supernatural predictive powers for historians. In my part of the world [Northern Ireland], we know enough of the tyranny of biblical prediction to too readily adopt other formulaic certainties. What we can usefully do is to point to other possibilities in the face of any prevailing consensus. We will serve best if we engage in an endless process of exploration, of critical assessment of what has gone before, of self-criticism to the point where it is just still possible to write—to move our understanding of the human condition forward. In doing so we engage in the one inevitable feature of the process; that revisionism will always be followed by post-revisionism.”—Belfast social historian, civil-rights activist and former librarian John Gray interviewed by Peter Collins, “Gray’s Elegy,” History Ireland, Spring 1999

Quote of the Day (Pianist Ilya Itin, on Music ‘Created in the Being of Listeners’)

“When we gather and listen together, we experience something bigger than us. It doesn’t mean we all experience the same thing — we have different backgrounds, thinkings, emotional makeup. But there’s something when we’re in that world, music is created in the being of listeners. It’s not the performer, it is the listener.”—Russian classical pianist Ilya Itin quoted by Cody Englander, “Ilya Itin to Perform Moving Pieces by Scriabin, Rachmaninoff,” The Chautauquan Daily, July 14, 2026

The image of Ilya Itin accompanying this post was taken in 2010 by Roy Quesada.

Photo of the Day: Troy Hill Incline Steps, Pittsburgh PA

About a decade ago, vacationing to see a close relative in Pittsburgh, I visited the Duquesne Incline, one of the last remnants of a once-common form of transportation in the Smoky City. Over a week ago, I saw another one reminder of these 24 massive structures that once moved goods and people up and down this city’s many steep hills: the steps around the Troy Hill Incline.

Unlike the Duquesne Incline, which remains operational nearly 150 years after it was built, the Troy Hill Incline lasted only from 1887 to 1898. 

When I took the attached photo on my recent visit to Pittsburgh, it was easy for me to imagine the necessity for this mode of transportation and the skill required to build it.

Trust me: the Troy Hill neighborhood (part of independent Allegheny City before being absorbed by Pittsburgh) is an acrophobe’s nightmare. 

Rialto Street (nicknamed “Pig Hill”), for instance, the fifth-steepest street in the city, ascends 118 feet, with a grade or steepness level of 24%. It’s a narrow, two-lane thoroughfare Thank God I wasn’t the one driving around there.

Its incline was built by Samuel Diescher, a Hungarian-American engineer responsible for 10 inclines in Pittsburgh alone. The tracks—partly laid on the ground, partly on wooden trestles—handled both freight and passengers with a 15-ton capacity. The building cost: $94,000. 

For a while, it seemed like a godsend for workers in this blue-collar enclave who didn’t have to trudge up what must have felt like a Himalayan height at the end of a long, weary day in area mills, tanneries, breweries, and railroad yards.

In contrast to other inclines, the one serving Troy Hill didn’t shut down because of safety concerns. Instead, low ridership, maintenance costs, and competition from expanding streetcar lines combined to undercut profitability. 

The tracks were eventually removed, but the physical geography of the neighborhood makes it unlikely that the legend of the Troy Hill Incline will disappear from the minds of Pittsburgh residents.

Quote of the Day (Marie Arana, on the Accomplishments and Presence of Latinos in the U.S.)

"These [scientific advances such as the electronic microscope, birth control and developments leading to brain surgery] are accomplishments that aren't written.  They’re not in textbooks. My mission has always been to educate Americans, make ourselves known. We have been for so long, many years, so many decades, and so many centuries people have said, ‘Who are you anyway?’ and we’ve always been perceived as newcomers. We’ve been here all along."— Author, editor, journalist, and critic Marie Arana, in a talk at the Chautauqua Institution in upstate New York, quoted by Nora Smith, “Arana Presents ‘Latinoland’: ‘We’ve Been Here All Along,” The Chautauquan Daily, July 18-19, 2026

The image accompanying this post, of Marie Arana at the 2019 Texas Book Festival in Austin, Texas, was taken Oct. 26, 2019, by Larry D. Moore.

TV Quote of the Day (‘Friends,’ in an Apartment Trivia Game)

[The friends are engaged in an increasingly high-stakes apartment trivia game.]

Ross Geller [played by David Schwimmer]: “What is Chandler Bing's job?”

Rachel Green [played by Jennifer Aniston] [long pause] “Oooh... oh gosh, it has something to do with numbers...”

Monica Geller [played by Courteney Cox]: “And processing!”

Rachel: “And he carries a briefcase...”

Ross: “10 seconds or you'll lose the game.”

Monica [frantically]: “Something to do with transponding...”

Rachel: “Oh oh... he's a trans... a transponster!”

Monica: “THAT'S NOT EVEN A WORD!”—Friends, Season 4, Episode 12, “The One With the Embryos,” original air date Jan. 15, 1998, teleplay by Jill Condon and Amy Toomin Straus, directed by Kevin Bright

Spiritual Quote of the Day (St. Paul to Timothy, Praying for ‘All Those in Authority’)

“I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.”— 1 Timothy 2:1-2 (New International Version)

St. Paul had good reason to appeal to officeholders at all levels: to the extent that he was able to move about freely and preach to any extent, it was because, according to the Acts of the Apostles, he invoked at key moments his legal status as a Roman citizen as protection against the persecution already enveloping the early Christian community.

In the end he could not escape martyrdom, any more than modern Christians around the world are able to placate political authorities. Denunciations, harassment, and even death continue to await so many.

The 1612 image accompanying this post, Apostle St. Paul, was painted by the Spanish Renaissance painter, sculptor, and architect El Greco (1541-1614), and hangs in Museo del Greco, Toledo, Spain.

Quote of the Day (Robert Kaplan, on How Travel Is Like a Good Book)

“Travel is like a good, challenging book: it demands presentness—the ability to live completely in the moment, absorbed in the words or vision of reality before you. And like serious reading itself, travel has become an act of resistance against the distractions of the electronic age, and against all the worries that weigh us down, thanks to that age. A good book deserves to be finished, just as a haunting landscape tempts further experience of it, and further research into it. Travel and serious reading, because they demand sustained focus, stand athwart the nonexistent attention spans that deface our current time on Earth.”— American travel and foreign-affairs writer Robert D. Kaplan, “Being There,” The Atlantic, November 2012

The image accompanying this post, of Robert D. Kaplan speaking at the U.S. Naval War College, was taken on June 17, 2014, by Rosalie Bolender.