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🙄OMG. I could not finish But Beautiful and am not sure I want to click on the link.

I had a history/ancient Civ teacher in high school, real hard-ass that kids joked about but he really brought the material to life and I enjoyed his classes.  Wish I could think of his name ...  He had one go-to line I can never forget. Whenever some ancient ruler executed an enemy or slaughtered a captured army, it was " and that's one way to ...  get a head." 

Thanks for forwarding! Geoff Dyer, though... I somehow managed to get to the end of But Beautiful, and this is giving me flashbacks.

After running across an old obituary for one of my Tulane history professors, I recalled a joke he shared in class. Years earlier, he had a young co-ed, Miss Minor, in a class, where he shared a joke about Paul Revere's famous ride. Dr. Esthus said, "You are aware of Paul Revere's famous ride. He rode up to the first house and shouted the alarm. A light appeared as a woman came to the window. 'Is your husband at home?' 'Yes!' 'Tell him the British are coming.' He went to the next home and a woman appeared and he asked, 'Is your husband at home?' 'Yes!' 'Tell him the British are coming.' He rode to the next home and a woman appeared and he asked, 'Is your husband at home?' 'No.' 'Whoa!'"  At that point, the co-ed, Miss Minor, wanted to share her knowledge that Revere was arrested by the British before completing his ride and she shouted out, "Dr. Esthus, do you know that he didn't go all the way?" It always got a roar, even if some of his other jokes were lame and one of his monotone lectures actually put a good friend to sleep for a few minutes next to me in the front row. I still remember the 1950s sportcoats and narrow short ties he wore, like he could have been a walk on in a 1950s sitcom.

or you can get 5LPs (57-61) on 3 CDs via Fresh Sounds (all of the above minus the Atlantic with an Argo LP "Dorothy Ashby" added) https://www.freshsoundrecords.com/dorothy-ashby-albums/5708-the-jazz-harpist-5-lps-on-3-cds.html?search_query=dorothy+ashby&results=1