Military History Channel Goof

[john snelling]

Today when I was watching the Military History Channel a short info story was on the Spad XIII in the American service but, the file footage showed a Nieuport 28. If they do not know the difference they need to play Wings of War or become a member of the Aerodrome!

[CappyTom]

That's funny. I'll look for it.

[bsmith13]

My wife has threatened to stop paying for cable if I don't stop arguing with the TV when I watch History/Military channels. As it is, she usually gets up and leaves the room, because I get so obnoxious with my constant corrective comments.

Sad, isn't it?

[bsmith13]

My wife has threatened to stop paying for cable if I don't stop arguing with the TV when I watch History/Military channels. As it is, she usually gets up and leaves the room, because I get so obnoxious with my constant corrective comments.

Sad, isn't it?

[David Manley]

Mine's the same, especially when we watch anything with battleships (the footage of barham exploding has been featured as just about every battleship lost in action from what i can see). Still, I get my own back when she's watching dramas and they get stuff like bankruptcy and accountancy details wrong. she ticks just as much as I do.

It doesn't help that one of her favourite films is "Air Force 1" (or is that Air Farce?) - I do love ripping in to that one when its on :)

[john snelling]

It irks me when they get so much wrong. Why don't they hire a advisor with some knowledge. On the truth about Blackhawk down they did not even mention that around 200 Delta Force was axed before arriving and that C-130 gunships were cancelled also. What a difference the C130 gunship would have made keeping the mob at bay. There is my rant. Back to my favorite subject of the year "WW1 aircraft".

[tuladin]

That kind of mistake bothers me too, though I realize the documentary makers have to use the footage that is available. If they would just put a caption in to identify a mismatched image (The Spad XIII replaced Nieuport 17s like these for example), they'd be doing our blood pressure a big favor.

Thanks for not naming this thread with the trendy Military History Channel Fail! :):):)

[Max Headroom]

This thread would be endless if you listed all the historical gaffs and blunders on TV, let alone movies! You do have to wonder when they spend so many millions making a film how they cannot spend a few dollars on hiring a decent historical advisor...

[Charlie3]

My wife has threatened to stop paying for cable if I don't stop arguing with the TV when I watch History/Military channels. As it is, she usually gets up and leaves the room, because I get so obnoxious with my constant corrective comments.

Sad, isn't it?LOL...you should be in the same room with my father and myself...muttering and snorting abounds...I don't think my father owns a history book that he has not written corrections in for captions or discriptions of events...he even adds additional reading and sources! I used to have to keep my history books at school to keep him from "DEFACING" them as the school system calls it. Funny now I find myself doing the same thing! In the end we are our parent's children:rolleyes:

[Diamondback]

You think that's bad, you should see me as a former accredited journalist arguing every time I'm exposed to some bit of BS from the Lamestream Media... and that includes FOX News right alongside ABC, NBC, SeeBS and Commie News Network. (Especially when guns and gun-related subjects come up... *rolls eyes*)

[The Cowman]

This thread would be endless if you listed all the historical gaffs and blunders on TV, let alone movies! You do have to wonder when they spend so many millions making a film how they cannot spend a few dollars on hiring a decent historical advisor...

That is funny, MY FLGS owner and I were just discussing that the other day... I said basically the same thing, and we all know that I am certainly no History Expert... I probably should not even have rights to post in this thread... so If I can see the stuff the media misrepresents about History, I can't even imagine what it does to someone who is super-passionate about History...

[csadn]

Hands up, everyone here who during their 8th-grade class trip to Washington DC utterly humiliated a painfully-ill-informed and overly arrogant National Air and Space Museum tour guide.

[raises hand]

[csadn]

Hands up, everyone here who during their 8th-grade class trip to Washington DC utterly humiliated a painfully-ill-informed and overly arrogant National Air and Space Museum tour guide.

[raises hand]

[Diamondback]

How 'bout in like 3rd Grade doing the same at the Museum of Flight in Seattle? (It's like, "Surprise, pal... don't screw with a Life Member whose membership card was issued before even his birth-certificate!" LOL :D )

Have I ever mentioned how a lot of so-called "educators" really hate-Hate-FRICKIN' HATE it when a kid comes along that is demonstrably smarter than they are?

"Being the smartest kid in the room is like being the only kid in the room."--SSA Dr. Spencer Reid, FBI BAU

[Charlie3]

How 'bout in like 3rd Grade doing the same at the Museum of Flight in Seattle? (It's like, "Surprise, pal... don't screw with a Life Member whose membership card was issued before even his birth-certificate!" LOL :D )

Have I ever mentioned how a lot of so-called "educators" really hate-Hate-FRICKIN' HATE it when a kid comes along that is demonstrably smarter than they are?

"Being the smartest kid in the room is like being the only kid in the room."--SSA Dr. Spencer Reid, FBI BAUYup...had a American Civil War "History" teacher who supposedly did a thesus on the conflict try to flunk me because I called him to the mat on something, and could prove I was right...Darn kids!

I only passed because he couldn't re write my test answers.

[Charlie3]

Hands up, everyone here who during their 8th-grade class trip to Washington DC utterly humiliated a painfully-ill-informed and overly arrogant National Air and Space Museum tour guide.

[raises hand]Can't raise my hand on that one, but I did have some people start following my 8 year old son's school group and I around that location because they thought I was a tour guide based on the information I was giving them. I had to laugh when someone asked me where the bathrooms were and I said I had no idea.

[csadn]

Yup...had a American Civil War "History" teacher who supposedly did a thesus on the conflict try to flunk me because I called him to the mat on something, and could prove I was right...Darn kids!

BTDT. Do you remember exactly what he tried to call you on?

Of course, if schools were about actual education, instead of instilling blind obedience to Authoritah.... :P

[Guntruck]

Hands up, everyone here who during their 8th-grade class trip to Washington DC utterly humiliated a painfully-ill-informed and overly arrogant National Air and Space Museum tour guide.

[raises hand]

Does the National Aviation Museum in Ottawa count? Had a goof for a guide round the storage facility a couple of years back who wasn't quite up to scratch. I got the "Do you have to do that every museum we go to" lecture from the Senior Officer Home Forces afterwards.

[Diamondback]

In a way, we could be said to be on a crusade... trying to ensure that history is accurately preserved--much as with justice delayed, history distorted is history denied; IMHO we owe it to both generations yet unborn and those who were there and participated in shaping it, especially those who gave their lives in fighting totalitarianism along with the victims us such regimes, to ensure that the record is kept as accurately as possible, and to do anything less is to both dishonor their memory and do an indescribable disservice to our children and grandchildren and their descendants.

This is pretty much the only thing aside from the lives of my loved ones that I functionally approximate a "religious zealot" over, so please excuse my waxing philosophical.

[csadn]

In a way, we could be said to be on a crusade... trying to ensure that history is accurately preserved--much as with justice delayed, history distorted is history denied; IMHO we owe it to both generations yet unborn and those who were there and participated in shaping it, especially those who gave their lives in fighting totalitarianism along with the victims us such regimes, to ensure that the record is kept as accurately as possible, and to do anything less is to both dishonor their memory and do an indescribable disservice to our children and grandchildren and their descendants.

Those of us taking History classes at UNO had a saying: "Those who Can, Do; those who Can No Longer, Teach; those who Cannot At All, Get Journalism Degrees" -- an unkind comment on how many journos either flat-out Did Not Do The Research when writing their stories, or acted as unpaid hagiographers for one party or another.

To give you an idea of how these people have influenced history: If Benedict Arnold had been equipped with the sort of journos who followed Washington, Gates, and others so slavishly, he'd have received the laurels he deserved, and thus would not have tried to sell out to the British. Think about *that* for a while.... >:)

[Diamondback]

Tell me about it, I used to be a journalist back in college!LOL (Though that was only my "cover" to hide that my real role was Executive Protection... I don't think most of the campus would've taken the idea of an armed predator--my boss's ex--stalking a member of their community, to say nothing of the idea of an armed-and-with-Security's-blessing gunfighter--me--between Dirtbag and his intended target.)

[Charlie3]

BTDT. Do you remember exactly what he tried to call you on?

Of course, if schools were about actual education, instead of instilling blind obedience to Authoritah.... :PTo keep it short, he said that Atlanta could not have been the Main Railroad hub of the south and used a map that listed railroads up to 1960 to prove it, I provided him with a map that only went to 1869 to prove it was.

[csadn]

To keep it short, he said that Atlanta could not have been the Main Railroad hub of the south and used a map that listed railroads up to 1960 to prove it, I provided him with a map that only went to 1869 to prove it was.

Well, the map in next month's _Trains_ shows four lines heading out from ATL, and I don't see any with more than that....

[David Manley]

Going a bit off-topic here, but this page looked interesting and relevant to the Atlanta question.....

http://railroads.unl.edu/documents/view_document.php?id=rail.str.0243

[Max Headroom]

Makes ya wonder if the history we read before our personal sphere of first-hand account information is actually the history that happened! They say, "history is only written by the winners."

[MayorJim]

History is written by the victors...so one has to keep a jaundiced eye on what is read, watched on TV, or reported in the news...

[LGKR]

History is written by the victors...so one has to keep a jaundiced eye on what is read, watched on TV, or reported in the news...

That's not always true, sometimes it's wriiten by the conquered, Like the Christian Monks in the dark ages who wrote of the hoards of horned devils that came out of the sea. The first Viking attacks were pobably no more than 30 or 40 men, but the monks made seem like thousands.

[Charlie3]

Well, the map in next month's _Trains_ shows four lines heading out from ATL, and I don't see any with more than that....And those 4 lines connected with nearly all the lines along the atlantic coast as I remember. I'll have to see if i can borrow that book from my father and scan the map.

[Charlie3]

Going a bit off-topic here, but this page looked interesting and relevant to the Atlanta question.....

http://railroads.unl.edu/documents/view_document.php?id=rail.str.0243Ah! I really need to read down farther before I post...Thanks for the assist Dave!

[csadn]

And those 4 lines connected with nearly all the lines along the atlantic coast as I remember. I'll have to see if i can borrow that book from my father and scan the map.

Chattanooga, Pensacola, Savannah, and Charleston -- tho' those last two connected to a series of coastal lines which stretched from the "border" with the North down to just short of the Florida/Georgia border. However, no Gulf-Coast-equivalent line existed; to get from Pensacola to Mobile by rail, one had to go up to Chattanooga, across northern Alabama to Corinth, then south through Columbus and Meridian. Getting to New Orleans was even worse.

So, I could argue that your prof was correct, just not in the way he intended -- Atlanta wasn't a true rail hub because it was sodding-near-impossible to get anywhere by rail in the South to start with! :)

(Side note: I'm working on a presentation for the next World SF Convention on "Practical Ways The South Could have Won The Civil War" -- one of them involves Not Building A Handful Of Ironclads, And Using The Iron To Upgrade Their Rail Network. :) )

[Charlie3]

Chattanooga, Pensacola, Savannah, and Charleston -- tho' those last two connected to a series of coastal lines which stretched from the "border" with the North down to just short of the Florida/Georgia border. However, no Gulf-Coast-equivalent line existed; to get from Pensacola to Mobile by rail, one had to go up to Chattanooga, across northern Alabama to Corinth, then south through Columbus and Meridian. Getting to New Orleans was even worse.

So, I could argue that your prof was correct, just not in the way he intended -- Atlanta wasn't a true rail hub because it was sodding-near-impossible to get anywhere by rail in the South to start with! :)

(Side note: I'm working on a presentation for the next World SF Convention on "Practical Ways The South Could have Won The Civil War" -- one of them involves Not Building A Handful Of Ironclads, And Using The Iron To Upgrade Their Rail Network. :) )At the time these rail lines were like our highways of today. Atlanta actually was the main hub of the entire Confederate rail system. By 1854 Atlanta was connected by rail to the Western & Atlantic Rail Road to Chattanooga and the Midwest, the Georgia Railroad to Augusta and South Carolina, the Macon and Western Railroad toward the coast, and the Atlanta and West Point Railroad. Atlanta boasted one of the largest locomotive roundhouses in the country which belonged to the W&A confusingly called the Chattanooga Roundhouse,
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As well as having 3 of these giant indoor freight houses.
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It was also the site of a major locomotive and equipment repair center for most of the railroads of the south. When the American Civil war broke out, Atlanta became a key military target due to its importance in shipping supplies to the Confederate troops. More important were Atlanta's manufacturing facilities. Commissary, quartermaster, and ordnance stores were all manufactured and warehoused throughout the town. Scofield and Markham's Atlanta Rolling Mill was one of only two in the South that could produce rails. The mill also turned out plating for the ironclad gunboats.

The Civil war is considered the first “Modern War” due to all the innovations first used in it. Not least of which was the common use of the Railroads to move men and materials, which had never been used to this extent before. The first battle of Bull Run was won by the Confederates because they rushed troops there by rail, and if you check closely a large number of the battles in the southern states took place over or near the locations of major railroad locations. When Sherman started his drive across the south, he took with him units that were specially trained to quickly repair the track and bridges of railroads the Confederates destroyed behind them so that he could advance quickly keeping his supply lines open. When Atlanta fell, the south lost a major manufacturing, supply and shipping hub, as well at their ability to maintain their rail system.

It wasn't a perfect rail system but it was better than horse carts and walking:D

[john snelling]

I do not mind the Thread veering off because, I learned something. The photos of Atlanta were interesting. Thanks.

[gully_raker]

:) G'day Chaps. The very worst so called History Doco that I have seen was one made by a German Co. History Films under the Title "The Red Baron" It was a 2 x DVD set with supposedly 6 Archival Films. Many of the members of the WW1 Aerodrome Forum got it from Amazon but what a HUGE dissapointment!
They intergrated some original footage & still shots into clips from prewar German Movies & had Fokker DV11's in the section about MvR's fight with Lanoe Hawker & showed Dolphins along with early Albatross & never explained that some shots were Movie Clips & some real WW1 footage. Also the story was so full of holes & when it finished I thought I had just seen a German WW1 Proaganda Film. A lot of it was based on Bodenchatz (who was MvR's adjedent) book.
Finally the so called Archival Films were modern Colour clips of Cemetaries & one of Cappy Airfield that mainly showed the Road & Trees around it & only at the very end did you get a glimpse of the Village & a quick look at a farmers field full of Crops!

Do NOT fall for buying this one. It is absolute Rubbush!:mad: