I appreciate both your points of view and I respect them. I meant no disrespect to our southern heritage nor even its quirks in pronunciation. I speak in my home area to chapters of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, and I greatly respect their tireless efforts at locating and appropriately marking neglected Confederate war graves here in Missouri. As I wrote earlier in this thread, "I'm not making fun," and I mean that sincerely.

Alan, if I offended you with my remarks, I sincerely apologize and I ask forgiveness. If you found my humble sentiments even careless or ill-advised, I apologize for that, as that was not my intent. I was raised better than that.

My point was not to belittle what is obviously near and dear to us. Too many do that already, and I have seen careless or even purposely hurtful sentiments totally destroy two Civil War Internet forums over the last several years to the point they are either gone entirely or so feeble that hardly anyone uses them. That is why I respect the way this set of message boards is managed and maintained, where people's viewpoints find respect as long as they respect the views of others. I notice managers like you, Bryan, clean out the occasional SPAM that tries to creep in, as well, and you work hard to head off problems before they start. It is noticed.

Sincerely,

Bruce Nichols