Hello: We don’t much of a design yet, but I should have something more presentable in a few days. In the meantime, feel free to register so you can begin posting anyway.

Instructions on how to post are available.

Welcome to our new look.The redesign and recoding of the new Route One site is progressing. We’re slowly transferring the material from the old site over to the new redesign. Right now there’s not much to look at other than the Blog and the Photo Gallery, but you are welcome to poke around and check out all of the empty digital file cabinets about to be filled with UM campus lore.

There are still a few bugs in the system, but hopefully we’ll be ready to make the new version of the Route One site public by the end of September. Some of the Blog comments didn’t come over quite right, so we’ll try to track down the problem. Then it’s on to the next stage of organizing and digitizing the mass of material that has been donated.

The ethnic and religious conflicts that are taking place across the Middle East prompted me to think about my own family’s ethnic history. The Simpsons are primarily Scottish with a bit of English and Irish tossed in just to make things interesting. The family name is actually derived from the name Fraser whose origins lie in the north of France and apparently meant “strawberry”.

A little bit of Scottish history— The Fraser name came from a 12th century Norman warlord called Simon Fraser who moved into the northeastern part of the country sometime after the Norman invasion of Britain.

Northwest Branch is a stream that runs through the suburban Piedmont country of Montgomery and Prince George’s County down to the Anacostia River. Much it is parkland and offers residents and visitors a narrow, but rich ribbon of green space through what is a highly developed region.

I spent my teenage years near Northwest Branch during the 1960’s--- a couple miles south of Route 29 in Hillandale. For kids in the neighborhood, the Branch was a both a playground and a quick shortcut to Woodmoor and the more distant downtown Silver Spring.

A simple proposal for solving the mideast crisis, now and forever, followed by how I really feel about the mess that we’re in.

Israel is a small country of around 6 million inhabitants.