... John! <g> As I said, I have five on the list, two with asterisks because they might not, depending on how you define "continuous" and "current", qualify either.

There have been some good guesses, though (one person got three right).

I did this same thing once before on CompuServe after a fellow from Germany made some condescending comments about the "history" of the U.S. Actually, he was a good guy and came to visit me here in California at one time. But, he had the all too typical European attitude that because they live in buildings dating to the Middle Ages and drive on roads built by the Romans that they are somehow better than everyone else, especially we crass Americans. Not saying Bob Hermans feels that way or that his post was in any way inappropriate, but his comments reminded me of the earlier exchange on CS.

So, I've done some pretty good research on the issue and think I can support the conclusions I've reached.

If no one gets the right answers in a day or two, I'll post them.

----- jim o\-S