Homework helper

52 thoughts on “Homework helper”

1. If I recall, one of the first large scale uses of computers was for developing trajectories for shells. In the past, folks would use pencil and paper to handle the precise mathematical calculations necessary to determine the settings on weapons. Computers allowed quicker recalculation and development of tables to use for the settings.
   And, no, I’m not old enough to remember this firsthand although I am one of the baby boomers.

2. Several important differences exist between WW II and the Iraq war. In WW II everyone was involved, the military was not a volunteer force. The majority of all males were drafted and for the first time large numbers of women worked outside the home. There were shortages of food and gasoline because supplies were rationed and diverted to the war effort. In WW II. General Motors stopped making new cars and made tanks instead. Today, the Iraq war is fought only by volunteers. Soldiers were sent to Iraq without proper armor and communication equipment. “Private contractors” sometimes over-rule Army commanders. And private contractors make a profit supporting the war. Nowadays the only citizens sacrificing for the war effort are warriors and the families who miss them.

   My father was stationed in Hawaii during WW II. He was in his twenties and a long way away from his home in PA. Hawaii was not a state back then. He remembers when Oahu had few roads. He spent 2 weeks with a squad sleeping in tents on the beach of Waimea Bay. They were installing the first local telephone lines. There was no town there then, and no road. Ten years after WW II, men were trying to decide if it were “manly” to wear shorts in the summer. My dad had been surrounded by soldiers wearing shorts, so he knew it was sufficiently masculine and ok to wear shorts in the suburbs (suburbs were also a result of WWII!).