musca depicta (13. 665)

Subject to various interpretations by art historians, as Boing Boing informs, the “painted fly” was a somewhat of a viral meme in early Renaissance paintings on Europe. Ranging from an emblem of mastery, an in-joke, a symbol of the worthiness and dignity even in small pests to secularise the subject and conversely a symbol of sin, corruption and mortality—included as a form of apotropaic magic, the detailed fly as a conspicuous element features in over twenty extant works from various artists in the Low Countries, Germany and Italy. The pictured Portrait of a Woman of the Hofer Family by an unknown artist (the identity of the sitter is also lost to time) dates from circa 1470 from the Swabian region and currently resides in London’s National Gallery, acquired by Prince Albert and gifted to Queen Victoria in 1863.  The fad seems to have ended around 1510.

synchronoptica 

one year ago:  asymmetrical appeasement (with synchronoptica) plus assorted links to revisit

two years ago: a history of Elvis-officiated weddings

three years ago: sculptor Vinnie Ream plus more links to enjoy

four years ago: Eilean Donan plus the palace of Linlithgow

five years ago: your daily demon, more links, a minor supervillain plus a Yugoslav space opera

six years ago: artist Léon Spilliaert, cartoonist R Sikoryak, even more links plus advances in fusion technology

legionella pneumophila (13. 661)

Recognised in retrospect by epidemiologists as the first outbreak of the lethal atypical pneumonia and upper respiratory tract infection, the first delegates who had attended the America Legion convention of US veterans of foreign wars concluding a couple of days prior at the luxury Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in central Philadelphia began dying from a mysterious disease on this date in 1976.  A total of one hundred eighty two cases, resulting in twenty nine fatalities, the only common factor among the identified infected was presence at the hotel, whose occupancy rate plummeted subsequently due to negative publicity and would close permanently in November of the same year. Over the next months, public health researchers identified the reservoir and vector of the illness as a particularly pertinacious, hitherto unknown bacterium in a symbiotic relationship with amoebae that thrive in industrial water systems like water tanks, hot tubs or in this case the evaporative condensers of large air conditioning units. Despite lessons gleaned from this deadly event, many cases of legionellosis have occurred throughout the world—including outbreaks in an apartment complex in Murcia, Spain, a nursing home in Toronto, a hospital in Lisbon and prison in northern California, all traced to contaminated rooftop cooling towers for climate control systems. 

synchronoptica

one year ago: Dashiell Hammett’s anti-heros and Trump loyalists (with synchronoptica) plus RIP humorist Tom Lehrer 

two years ago: American theocracy plus a lunar archbishopric 

three years ago: the Indian diamond exchange plus cities with signature psychological disorders

four years ago: lesser known lochs plus assorted links to revisit 

five years ago: a banger from Stevie Nicks,  Nick at Nite’s line-up, portrait photographer Masayoshi Sukita, Maneki-Neko, English’s inconsistencies, Avant Garde magazine plus AI generated Tarot cards

six years ago: Saint Pantaleon, Bugs Bunny’s catch-phrase (1940), more non-words plus GIF-artist Katy Daft 

gestion des déchets (13. 642)

Having always snickered a bit at the French signage for a waste bin, I recently disabused of my bemusement upon discovering the etymology having nothing to do with poo but rather the namesake of compulsory use of garbage containers, lawyer and diplomat Eugène-René Poubelle—a proposal considered so innovative for late-nineteenth century Paris that his surname is synonymous with the term for trash cans. In 1884, Poubelle decreed as the city’s préfet, essentially holding the authority of the mayorship, that landlords must provide tenants with three covered containers for household refuse to be sorted into classes of compostable and recyclable refuse—encouraged to call them Boîtes Poubelle by the newspaper Le Figaro, meeting stiff resistance by building owners for their cost and upkeep (plumping and drainage was also championed) and regarded by chiffonniers (traditional rag-and-bone men) as a threat to their profession. Likewise, we were surprised to learn, the English, American word for a movable waste container (skips or scows being more common outside of North America), designed to be brought and taken away by specially designed garbage truck lifts originated as sort of a portmanteau for the Dempster Dumpmaster, the company run by three brothers, George Roby, Thomas and John, in Knoxville Tennessee who patented and standardised a system (see also) of bulk trash removals in the mid-1930s with their dumpster model. George Roby Dempster was also a city manager, philanthropist and politician, initially motivated to support the demolition and construction wing of the family business.

rwa faustin ii. wirkus (13. 634)

Ruling until 1929 when transferred by the corps back to the United States mainland, abruptly ending his reign, Polish-American Marine stationed in Haiti during the occupation of Hispaniola (1915-1934), Lt Faustin Edmond Wirkus, was crowned co-regent of the island off the west coast of La Gonâve by Queen Ti Memenne on this day in 1926. Posted to the country since the beginning of the military regime—the National City Bank of New York (Citibank) had convinced president Woodrow Wilson (previously) take control of Haiti’s political and financial interests during a period of socioeconomic instability after the execution of tyrannical president Vilbrun Guillaume Sam imperilled US business interests, eventually reinstituting enslavement, the republic having gained independence through its hard-won petition for emancipation—Wirkus as commander of a regimen of native troops on La Gonâve, the satellite just off the coast of Port-au-Prince honouring a locally recognised matriarchy given a large degree of autonomy even during the US military government, arranged the release of a young woman in distress detained on charges related to practising Vodou. Unbeknownst to Wirkus, the individual he assisted was the queen and in gratitude proclaimed her rescuer King Faustin II in Vodou ceremony. Though born Palestine Weirkus in Rypin in the Congress Kingdom of Poland within the Russian Empire, his regnal name was an auspicious coincidence and sign for the queen, bearing the same given name as former Haitian emperor Faustin-Élie Soulouque and believing Wirkus was him reincarnated. The population of La Gonâve accepted his appointment as a just ruler in his dual role. Tolerance for the monarchy ended after Wirkus’ reassignment and the republic assumed control in the same year.

dig dug (13. 624)

Neatorama contributor Miss Cellania directs us to Randall Munroe’s latest xkcd webcomic (previously) comparing the depth of the Earth’s holes, manmade and naturally occurring. Chocked full of information, one will want to peruse the full-sized version and there’s even a dedicated wikia, Explain xkcd, that fully annotates and dissects the joke, though not to its detriment and sends one further down the rabbit hole with superlative mines, wells, tunnels and caves, including several record-setting above ground holes. We had no idea that the Kola Superdeep Borehole goes further underground than the Mariana Trench, and learned about the Glomar Challenger oceanic bore that extends two kilometres into the floor of the Pacific and the catastrophic Retsor Salt Mine, which collapsed in 1995 due to groundwater seepage, causing sink locals and draining regional aquifers. This company town, a small hamlet in upstate New York, was established and ran by the mining operator William Forester, Jr, who creatively (see also) reversed the spelling of his last name for the geographic anadrome, generally done to satisfy postal regulations.  Other places named with anagrams and ananyms include El Jobean, Florida after its civil engineer and property developer Joel Bean, Nada, Kentucky after the Dana lumber company that operated the town’s sawmill, Rednaxela Terrace in Hong Kong, transcribing ‘Alexander’ right to left, Orestod and Dotsero, Colorado, two towns on the terminuses of a short railroad line—the later itself derived from dot-zero, a important junction between Denver and Salt Lake City, Tesnus, Texas—sunset backwards and again after a train logo, and Tensed, Idaho, attempted namesake of nineteenth Flemish Jesuit missionary Pieter-Jan De Smet to the Native American peoples of Iowa territory, who as a friend and confidant of Sitting Bull persuaded the Sioux chief to negotiate with the US government and accede to the Treaty of Fort Laramie—a very bad deal for the Lakota, Dakota and Arapaho nations, the US almost immediately violating the terms and annexing their lands—the residents of the Coeur d’Alene reservation wanting to honour the priest (affectionately known as De Grote Zwartrok, the Great Black Skirt) but upon learning that the neighbouring community of De Smet had beat them to it, tried to reverse it but botched up the spelling during the registration process. I wonder if any other traditions have employed anadromes in their toponymy. Do write in and let us know, especially if they involve holes.

the tyranny of small decisions (13. 620)

Via Kottke, we learn of the best and worst paradox, eponym of computer scientist and physicist Edward Fredkin, known for advances in deterministic, reversible programming in the tradition of Konrad Zuse and experiments with cellular automata, which proffers that the more attractive two alternatives seem, the harder it can be to choose between them—no matter that, in the same degree, the choice can only matter less. Though unclear what the context was for the formulation of Fredkin’s Paradox—probably frustration over coding architecture—it explains why nothing seems to get done with the most time and effort going to decisions of least consequence, and whilst an intuitive solution would be to match each point in planning with the importance of the decision (see also) but that leads to a further spiral and vicious cycle with the optimisation of the optimisation and so on ad infinitum.

synchronoptica

one year ago: a cinematic lexicon of infrequent words (with synchronoptica) plus Cyberstress! (1997)

two years ago: a storied gay bar in Seattle, the Great White Way, an unavailable lecture by Grace Hopper plus assorted links to revisit

three years ago: a Talking Heads’ album, molecule of the month, social summarisations plus Marie Antoinette 

four years ago: Dr Spock’s baby book plus assorted links worth the revisit 

five years ago: the coat of arms of Black County, Fortress Kronoberg, roadside attractions in Götaland plus camping in Vadstena

six years ago: filmmaker Kenneth Anger 

meta incognita (13. 612)

On this day in 1576, having weighed anchor around a month earlier with Queen Elizabeth’s financial backing, explorer and privateer Martin Frobisher, whilst on the first of three voyages to the New World, in search of the Northwest Passage to Cathay and the East Indies, spotted the coast of Greenland, although assuming it was the non-existent phantom island Frisland (also called Fixland or Portlandia) that appeared appeared on virtually all maps of the North Atlantic for a century, dissuaded from claiming it for the Crown as chartered territory. Landing in the eponymous bay on Baffin Island in the present day Qikiqtaaluk region of Nunavut (it was that then too), Canada, Frobisher failed to find a new route but was encouraged and petitioned for follow-on excursions, having brought back an interesting rock specimen and influenced during his service in Africa’s Gold Coast, having managed to seize a lode of precious specie that the Portuguese had procured. Although metallurgical experts told Frobisher that his souvenir was hornblende, not classed as a specific composition, like Fools’ Gold, but a category of otherwise worthless rubble that appears like ore-bearing substrate. Dissatisfied with this assessment from the assayers, Frobisher brought the sample to a Venetian alchemist living in London, one Giovannia Battista Agnello, whom had previously convinced Elizabeth to debase small coinage with a teston of lead plated with copper (see previously), whom, arguing that one must know how to flatter nature—“Bisogna sapere adulare la natura”—claimed there was gold in it. For his second voyage, the queen lent Frobisher additional ships with a compliment of Cornish miners, which was more devoted to collecting rather than discovery. The expedition returned to Milford Haven in September of 1577, carrying two-hundred short tonnes of valueless rock. Despite the disappointment, Elizabeth retained a strong faith in the potential of the new colonies and authorised a third trip to this Unknown Shore, which she named herself. The territory of Nunavut’s was also named after Frobisher from devolution in 1942 until 1987 when it was renamed ᐃᖃᓗᐃᑦ (Iqaluit, place of many fish).

notes on notes (13. 607)

With correspondence to our contemporary online landscape of anonymous and atomised enthusiasts and such projects like From the Depths of Wikipedia and a host of niche, speciality sub-Reddits, we discover Notes & Queries—a venerable journal founded in 1849 by House of Lords clerk and researcher William Thorns as a digest for amateur scholars, himself counted among those and a reminder that they do it for love of the subject, and a platform for Victorians to share academic discoveries (notes) and expound on them (queries). The weekly publication’s one time motto was the catch-phrase of Captain Cuttle or Dickens’ Dombey and Son, “When found, make a note of it.”  Still in existence today under the aegis of the Oxford University Press, established as a “medium of inter-communication for literary men [folklorist Eliza Gulch was one of the biggest contributors], artists, antiquaries, genealogists, &c.,” the submitted briefs and replies has held to the original format, with many emulators including a section in The Guardian with the same name. Where do you find the most elaborate pith of his researches? Much more from Public Domain Review at the link above.

synchronoptica

one year ago: subterranean rescues (with synchronoptica) plus a Trump chaos omnibus

two years ago: scanning code from magazines, the artistic side of Samuel Morse plus Surrealistic logos

three years ago: Quintette du Hot Club plus assorted links to revisit 

four years ago: Escape from New York (1981) plus more links to enjoy

five years ago: the equal sign, Afternoon Delight (1976) plus our first stop in Sweden

six years ago: Roman Moselle plus at the foot of the Burgen

an american in paris (13. 593)

Courtesy of Messy Nessy Chic via a link roundup that celebrates the US’ special relationship with France as told though its expatriates and exiles, we learn about American Air Force veteran and expert archer Erika Eiffel (née LaBrie) whom married the famous tower in a commitment ceremony in 2007. Polyamorous by nature, Eiffel first discovered her unique subcategory of paraphilia after an attempted sexual assault by a fellow cadet in the academy, rebuffing her attacker with a training sword, which she was reluctant ever to be without, then credits her skill with archery to her relationship with her bow, Lance. After her first visit to the tower in 2004, Eiffel felt an immediate connection on several levels and was inspired to found an organisation for those with similar feelings for inanimate objects (see also here and here) and advocate how love is reciprocated and empowering, as she explained in an interview with Good Morning America and the Tyra Banks’ Show. Aside from the mythical sculptor Pygmalion and Quasimodo’s love for the bells of Notre Dame, real life examples include a Swedish woman who wed the Berlin Wall in 1979 and an Australian woman who married Le Pont du Diable in Hérault in 2013.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronoptica)

two years ago: returning via Switzerland plus a new Labour government for the UK

three years ago: a banger from Janet Jackson, more links to enjoy, Tynwald Day in Manx, the Tiny Awards plus pull-tabs for canned beverages

four years ago: Saint Zoe plus a passport for the stateless (1922)

five years ago: points of departure 

six years ago: Thomas Cook travel agency (1841), a 90s music festival generator plus even more links

karlstadt am main (13. 590)

 

 

Next we travelled further into the Franconian wine-growing region of Main-Spessart to Karlstadt facing the Karlsburg, the village of Mühlbach hosting the castle ruins (destroyed during the Bauernkrieg in 1625) and harbour on the opposite bank of the river. The thirteenth century town on the eastern shore was founded by the bishopric of Würzburg to defend its territories against the marauding Counts if Rieneck, the streets of the Altstadt laid out like a chessboard.

 

We hiked up to the remains of the spur fortress, built sometime before the eighth century, perhaps at the direction of Charles Martel, situated on the broad rocky promontory overlooking the river and valley below, the landscape of fields, pastures and vineyards now dominated by huge silos where agricultural products are stored, staged and loaded onto barges.  Though I did not capture it in the best light, we appreciated the photogenic signage that the town had on display at the river bank, like they have for Amsterdam, Gdańsk, etc.

a syntopicon (13. 581)

Coined especially for the two volume with the Neo-Latin term meaning a collection of topics, the two volume register of one hundred two great ideas of the Western canon, was compiled and catalogued by philosopher and professor Mortimer J Adler, published by Encyclopaedia Brittanica Press in 1954 as an index to accompany the fifty-four library of Great Books of the Western World, covering literature and though from Homer to Freud. I can recall seeing these books near the circulation desk at my alma mater as well as the shelves of the volumes in was made to guide at home, though I don’t think I was tempted to consult it to investigate how the individual works corresponded and overlapped, which is a bit of travesty considering the amount of effort and hours of reading it took to synthesise the writing of some seventy authors and something I will have to peruse. Like a Wikipedia gloss, it is a footnote and a hyperlink, and not just a cross-reference of themes or concordance but rather an instrument of liberal education itself for discovery and research and finding the unity in ideas that sometimes can be muddled and masked by language, examining each entry from multiple different angles, breaking each into several sub-topics. Afterwards, Adler edited the single volume Propædia or “Outline of Knowledge” as an appendix for the venerable encyclopaedia marshalling human knowledge into a logical frame work from 1974 to 2010, when the last print edition was issued.

synchronoptica

one year ago: unblogged Breton (with synchronoptica)

two years ago: Lago Delio 

three years ago: assorted links to revisit plus a registry of Americana

four years ago: more links to enjoy

five years ago: your daily demon, Mario theme inspiration, the year’s midpoint, a banger from Tracy Chapman plus a visit to Oberwaldbehrungen

six years ago: even more links, Airplane! (1980) plus the US Civil Rights Act (1964)

deep blue something (13. 574)

Via Quantum of Sollazzo and deliciously reminiscent of the harried and hued colour profiles appearing in the Paris Review and the Awl right before folding, we are directed to this delightful project chasing down the paper trail of pigments, one colour per day with its chemistry, provenance and poison. There are over two-hundred fifty already indexed, like the pale jade glaze originally from ancient Chinese ceramic-making techniques, this greenwear copied by Korean and Japanese artisans (the greyish shade comes from oxidising iron during the firing of kilns, Fe₂O₃→FeO, and the Western namesake is from a character in a popular seventeenth century French pastoral novel, L’Astrée by Honoré d’Urfé, who dressed in light green garb—no relation to the Celadons Ovid’s Metamorphoses or International Klein Blue, a synthetic ultramarine with connections to the Nouveau réalisme movement and among the first pigments to be successfully patented. Each entry has adjacent palettes and new specimens are posted Sundays. I feel like this is site I will return to often.

kilroy was here (13. 559)

Via Web Curios, we quite enjoyed this well-researched history of one of the first proto-memes (see also here and here) of modern times in the graffito tag propagated by US and British service members during WWII, to mark the arrival of forward units in far-flung bases and for the soldiers to come, a phatic communion—anonymous and a gesture of camaraderie, in Kilroy was Here. The long-nosed figured peering over a fence, drawn on walls, equipment and any other bare surface also went by the other monickers—with strong resonance for contemporary meme culture—in Chad and the Goon, with the more nuanced UK-format captioned, according to context, with the snowclone, “Wot, no X?” as a way to complain about supply shortages at the front and rationing back home. Hitler and Stalin were supposedly convinced that Kilroy was some sort of codeword used by Allied intelligence. The lament over wartime austerity is considered one possible origin of the figure this side of the Atlantic, another being a shipyard inspector in Quincy Massachusetts, one James J Kilroy, who marked his seal of approval with the phrase in crayon on riveters’ work—yet another suggestion, the character might have started with a case of pareidolia in electricians over circuit schema—in any case, the versions merged, incorporating the different elements of the lore and was an early modern example of memetic forces, underpinned by repetition, variation and driven by the collective logistics of the war effort.

forget it, jake—it’s chinatown (13. 536)

As our faithful chronicler informs, the neo-noir classic directed by Roman Polanski and starring Faye Dunaway, Jack Nicohson, John Huston, Diane Ladd and Burt Young was released on this day in 1974 to critical acclaim. Over the milieu of the California water wars, a series of political conflicts over water rights at the turn of the last century with the expansion of Los Angeles and the construction of aqueducts to divert resources from Owens Valley and Mono Lake used by ranchers and farmers, a woman, calling herself Evelyn Mulwray, engages a private detective to keep on whom she says is her husband, a civil engineer with the California public utility department. The investigator photographs the subject with another woman, exposing their apparent affair, but then is confronted by the engineer’s real wife, concluding that the impostor set up her husband in order to discredit him and prevent the discovery of a complex conspiracy to hoard water whilst the city is experiencing a drought. Parallel to Dunaway’s scripted revelation “My sister! My daughter!”—the film could be read as a retelling of Oedipus Rex, a plague exploited to gain power ultimately reflecting the endemic corruption of society, misidentification, and a maimed protagonist who realises the truth too late to affect the outcome—genealogists working for Time magazine informed Nicholson after the making Chinatown that his sister was, in real life, was actually his mother, raised by his grandparents as their own son when the actor was born out of wedlock to showgirl June Frances Nicholson. On learning this fact at age thirty-seven, he acknowledged it was a “pretty dramatic event but it wasn’t what I’d call traumatising…I was pretty well psychologically formed.”

i spy with my little eye (13. 529)

The latest from Neal Agarwal (previously), Wiki Spy, invites one to explore nearly forty-thousand images from Wikipedia (see also) as chaotic collages that reshuffle with every visit. Clicking on the picture brings one to the source article, as in off-centre, William Hogarth and his pugnacious pug, Trump, who has his own entry and category in the Commons. Let us know what pops out for you and piques your curiosity.

synchronoptica

one year ago: a visit to Verdun (with synchronoptica)

two years ago: hair shavings as battery components plus more mysterious monoliths 

three years ago: Rocky Horror Picture Show (1973) plus assorted links to revisit 

four years ago: more links to enjoy, Juneteenth, SS Gervasius and Protasius plus designer Lutz Colani

five years ago: rendered realities plus generative textile patterns

six years ago: unclergyable offenses, more dazzle camouflage, Trump censored on social media plus the dance of the queen bee

the battle of guantánamo bay (13. 500)

After four days of fighting, a battalion of US marines, conducting training exercises in the Florida Keys whilst awaiting orders, on this day in 1898 landed in the strategically chosen, for protection during hurricane season, forward operating base in the commercially important harbour to begin the liberation of Cuba from the Spanish with invasion and subsequent occupation. Though regular forces and pro-colonialists guerrilla fighters held Guantánamo City, the railhead and nearby sugar mills, the American forces, four companies of around six hundred-fifty men, arrived without opposition on the ridge above a fishing village, burning down the huts and a blockhouse—noting that the only sound to be heard was peaceful cooing of mourning doves, later learning that it was a signal used amongst partisans. Despite some resistance, the marines and pro-independence fighters were able to rout Spanish forces. America established GITMO in this location and has leased the property ever since from the Cuba government, though no remittances have been deposited.

leval ii (13. 489)

 

For the first time on a return trip, I think, we stayed again at the campsite outside the village of Leval near the German border for the last overnighter before getting back home, prepared this time now to try to capture some images of the brooding stork nests that seemed to occupy every available eave and column of the little town.

The wading birds are considered a symbol of Alsace of course—we hadn’t encountered such a preponderance of them before—and the subject of many legends and folktales, like the tradition of the Easter bunny that also originated here, first described by fifteenth-century botanist (see also) Georg Franck von Franckenau of Strasbourg, and though their association with fertility and expectant mothers go back to Ancient Egyptian myth, the lore was especially articulated in the Middle Ages, with storks said to retrieve babies from a nursery hidden inside caves and dropped them down the chimney (chimney-sweeping also understood psychoanalytically as an expression wish fulfilment or magical-thinking) of desirous households.

synchronoptica

one year ago: curating the Apocalypse (with synchronopticæ) plus Elton John’s debut album

fifteen years ago: misused tools plus macroeconomic woes

sixteen years ago: the year of the Tiger 

 

 

via rhôna (13. 487)

 

Our intermediate stop on the way back home brought us again to the banks of the Drôme, staying at a municipal campground on les Îles de Silon directly on the confluence of the the Galaure and Rhône rivers on the outskirts of the village Saint-Vallier. A Gallo-Roman station, called Ursuli, at least since the reign of Claudius on the Via Agrippa, the town is now stop on the EuroVelo cycle route that runs from Lake Geneva to the Mediterranean, following the river valley.

These step-up bivouacs are specially made to accommodate bikers and we thought we could manage such a construction at the edge of our property for bikers passing through—addressing the lack of real pitches in our village. Saint-Vallier’s most famous daughter was the fourteenth century courtesan Diane de Poitiers, who wielded much power and influence as Henri II’s royal mistress and adviser. Killed in a jousting accident, the king’s widow, Catherine de’Medici, had de Poitiers exiled after his death and Catherine’s unpopular regency for the legitimate heirs was highly unpopular and destabilising, leading to the French Wars of Religion.

betz mystery sphere (13. 486)

Discovered in late March by a family of three whilst investigating a small brush fire on their property on Fort George Island, Florida, the bowling ball sized spherical object weighing ten kilograms was first thought to be an artefact of New World conquistadors, a canon ball, despite discrepancies in the metallurgy and general pristine state. Before consigning the object to a trunk, brought out occasionally to show friends and neighbours the curiosity, family members reportedly observed the sphere reacting to the sound of guitar playing, rolling about on its own and following people around the house. Though earlier examination by the US navy concluded that the sphere was nothing more than an oversized ball bearing used as a check valve in a paper mill, the Betz’ find was again the subject of study on this day in 1974 of attendees of a scientific conference sponsored by the National Enquirer, the tabloid offering an honorarium for any object proven to come from outer space. The expert panel agreed with the previous assessment though the lore persisted for decades, the sphere’s movements ultimately attributed (see also) to its machined balance and the unevenness of the Betz’ home.

synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronopticæ), seeing is not believing, graphic design of the Incas, Merz meets with Trump plus Musk and Trump’s public falling out

fourteen years ago: monster of the week 

seventeen years ago: Friday afternoon deadlines 

in search of… (13. 479)

Polymath and multi-hyphanate, Dr Robert Harvey Rines, whom helped develop the Microwave Early Warning System in the Cold War after serving as an officer in the army signals corps, as trained a jurist for intellectual property, prolific inventor, librettist penning musicals about the life of HL Mencken (previously) among others, violin prodigy playing a duet with Albert Einstein at age eleven at a summer camp in Maine, and adjunct professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the last forty five years of his career, is probably best known for leading the American expedition, sponsored by the US Academy of Applied Sciences and the The New York Times, the quest for Nessie, the most thorough and comprehensive search for the Loch Ness Monster up to that time, that commenced on this day in 1976. Becoming obsessed with the mystery of a possible cryptid after a visit to the area four years, Rines launched a scientific safari provisioned with sophisticated sonar and photographic, many instruments of his own design, and whilst garnering a great deal of publicity for his efforts, including several intriguing but blurry photographs, after six months, the project was halted due to lack of hard evidence. This famous “gargoyle head” image was later discovered to be a rotting tree stump on the silty bottom of the loch, since located and put on display in the Nessie gallery at Drumnadrochit on the western shore. Rines for his part never stopped believing that there was more to the legend and kept up the exploration, albeit on a smaller scale, for the next decades.

synchronoptica

one year ago:  automated purging of US government workers (with synchronopticæ) plus a Star Trek: TNG superfan

fourteen years ago: looking forward to our Norway holiday 

fifteen years ago: Ascension Day 

sixteen years ago: the Deepwater Horizon oil spill