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Today is the birthday of American journalist and poet John Silas “Jack” Reed, born in Portland, Oregon (1887). He’s the author of Ten Days That Shook the World (1919), his firsthand account of Russia’s 1917 October Revolution.

TODAY IS SUNDAY OCTOBER 22 AND HERE'S A HELPFUL QUIP FOR THE ENTRY TO "WRITER'S ALMANAC."

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"An ardent communist, Reed was indicted for sedition in 1919. He fled the United States, and made his way to Russia by way of Scandinavia. He grew somewhat disillusioned with the Russian Revolution and tried several times to return to the United States, even though he knew he would be arrested. However, he became ill and died of typhus in a Moscow hospital in 1920. He is one of only two Americans to be buried in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis.

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DON'T YOU LOVE THE PHRASE ABOVE THAT JACK REED WAS "SOMEWHAT DISILLUSIONED"? GOOD GRIEF! IT WAS FAR MORE THAN THAT. PEOPLE WERE SHOT ONE BY ONE. THERE WAS MURDER AND TYPHUS. TAKE YOUR PICK. JACK MADE THE WRONG ONE FROM THE WRONG PLACE. AT LEAST HE WAS IN A COMMUNITY HOSPITAL. WITH ALL WE HAVE HERE, JACK, YOU MADE THE WRONG CHOICE. BUT IT WAS A GOOD LESSON FOR THE REST OF US.

Thanks for the in- and out-sites from your team, GK.

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