East German Bereitschaftsvolkspolizei (People’s Police Alert Units, a paramilitary regimen of the German Democratic Republic for riot control and counterinsurgency) non-commissioned officer Konrad Schumann was given the duty assignment on this day in 1961 to “take control and protect the border from enemies of socialism” on the third day of construction of what would become the Berlin Wall, which at the time consisted of a single coil of concertina wire. 
Standing at his post on the corner of Bernauer and Ruppiner Straรe, Schumann was berated relentlessly by West Berliners, the nineteen year old came to the realisation that he would spend the rest of life as a prison guard and a prisoner himself—solidified by witnessing a young woman hand a bouquet of flowers over the barrier to her mother, apologising for not being able to visit in person. A crowd of protesters had massed by noon and began to rush Schumann’s position, but reinforcements arrived before he had to act, armed but resolved not to open fire on the crowd. Protests continued as construction materials arrived and waiting for the right moment, Schumann stamped on a section of wire and leapt into West Berlin. The action was photographer Peter Leibing and the visual documentation is included in the opening montage of the 1982 Disney movie Night Crossing.
Thursday, 15 August 2024
mauerspringer (11. 767)
the people’s crusade (11. 766)
Though sanctioned officially by Pope Urban II to begin on this day in 1096 (the Feast of the Assumption) in order reassert Church primacy in society having lost influence under the rise of feudalism and mercantilism, restoring fealty to the faith rather than allegiance to overlords and landed-gentry, and counter Muslim influence in the Holy Land and Byzantium, armed pilgrimages were already mobilised under the charismatic French priest known as Peter the Hermit (Pierre d’Amiens) with an advance though untrained and mostly illiterate and ignorant—not knowing where Jerusalem was and reacting as if any sizeable settlement they encountered along the way was their goal—army of disaffected Christian peasants. 
The call for a crusade (against holy war) issued first during the Council of Clermont the preceding year was met with enthusiastic acclaim, particularly as tenant farmers had experienced famine and drought in recent seasons—possibly an outbreak of ergotism due to poorly stored grain—and a strongly held belief in Millenarianism (see also) and Peter’s forces gathered and set out from Flanders in April. En route, the pilgrims destroyed Jewish communities along the Rhein in unprecedentedly large and violent pogroms in Metz, Speyer, Trier and Kรถln—condemned by the Church and secular leaders and forbidden during the following Crusades. Joined by many thousands of the poor, they marched through Hungary and attempted entered Byzantine territory at Belgrade, who were refused entry due to their unexpected early arrival and unheralded commander. Eventually the crusaders we granted admittance at Niลก after making a general nuisance of themselves and pillaging local markets and proceeded to Constantinople but were massacred by the Seljuks on the road to Nicaea, the army of some hundred-thousand destroyed—although the many women, children and those who surrendered were spared. Peter and some of the remaining leadership, broken and bankrupt, continued to Palestine to join the better organised and funded First or rather Princes’ Crusade in October.
happy blogoversary to us—we are sixteen going on seventeen (11. 765)
As PfRC turns sixteen years old we wanted to once again extend our thanks and gratitude to our readership and to the members of the wider blogosphere (many of those fellow caretakers listed under our Smรธgรฅsblog) and new ones discovered for their serendipity, sustainment and inspiration that keeps the internet curious, entertaining, engrossing and engaging. Since hitting our last milestone, here’s a round-up of some of our most popular posts with a few honourable mentions from the past twelve months. Then it’s birthdays all the way down:
10. Watercolour estates of rural Manhattan
9. The 1939 World’s Fair
8. A history of book banning
1. The 1961 biblical epic Barabbas
Honourable mentions go to Three Hazelnuts for Cinderella and a return to the Wine Island of the Main.
Wishing you all the best for the balance of the year and don’t be a stranger!
synchronoptica
one year ago: our blogging birthday (with synchronoptica), Trump guilty on racketeering charges, the first Bauhaus exhibition plus the Feast of the Assumption
Wednesday, 14 August 2024
a maximal truth-seeking ai (11. 764)
The social media platform X (formerly Twitter) has introduced a new feature for its chatbot, Grok—for premium subscribers—a text-to-image generator comparable to Bing’s service (which would rather infamous refuse the prompt “please make me a picture with the winner of 2020 US presidential election) or Facebook’s but apparently with the safety protocols turned off. Whilst users can find boilerplate guidelines and guardrails, presented in the first-person, proffering caution when it comes to making deceptive, provocative or plagiarised pictures, a cursory trial yielded some messages surely none would endorse. Though all tinged by that particular, cutting-corners AI patina that’s far from a watermark, a trial yielded far more offensive and topical content ready to be shared.
a sunken dream (11. 763)
Poring through volumes of data taken over the course of four years when the Insight Lander touched down on the surface of the arid Red Planet back in 2018 shows on further analysis of the seismic survey that there are reservoirs of liquid water deep within the rocky outer crust of Mars. 
Studying the little quakes measured by the probe reveals the signature of significant pockets as it passes through various strata. Whilst there is ice at the poles and evidence of vapour in the thin atmosphere, none in liquid form had heretofore been detected outside of Earth, which too has vast subterranean aquifers. Buried some ten kilometres deep, researchers can extrapolate from Insight’s readings, which were limited to the depths directly beneath it, that there is potential enough water to form a surface ocean extending almost a kilometre down. This discovery also may hint at possible life on Mars subsurface.
synchronoptica
one year ago: La Linea (with synchronoptica)
seven years ago: a chapel of the Seven Sleepers, Male Fantasies plus never-before-seen photographs of David Bowie
ten years ago: Marie Curie goes to war
eleven years ago: insightful maps plus the etymology of drug names
twelve years ago: a look back at Peenemรผnde plus a lily in a glass
Tuesday, 13 August 2024
lethonomia (11. 762)
Incorporating the element of Lethe, the Underworld river of forgetting one’s mortal existence, via Kottke we are introduced to the term for a tendency to not recall names that falls under wider concept of Carl Jung’s lethological and loganamnosis, a compulsion to recall a specific word that’s slipped one’s mind. I can especially relate to the latter tip-of-the-tongue phenomena—a recall not limited to conversation but also research and trying to wrest something from the archives and memory banks, fishing around for a file name or increasingly a descriptor that algorithm might understand and coming up against a slew of dead-ends and googlewhacks (I had to reach to remember that one) but will keep hunting—despite sometimes feeling gaslighted when I can’t find something I know I posted about or photographed—until thoroughly exhausted.
7x7 (11. 761)
popp horlage: the network of pneumatic clocks of fin de siรจcle Paris
just get me eight-hundred thousand votes: Elon Musk interviews Trump on X—see more
home row keys: a documentary on Mavis Beacon
porte-clรฉs: the French youth craze for key-rings
josuushi: counting-markers in the Japanese language, nuanced by rank, size and sentience—see previously, see more—via tmn
homo naledi: chance discovery reveals more branches in our family tree
death-slot: revisiting broadcast television’s dumping grounds
spear-fishing: reportedly a group of hackers with ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard of Iran were able to break in to the Trump campaign’s database
us patent application 10/953212: a training regimen to harvest hyperspace energy and pass through solid items
synchronoptica
one year ago: a classic from Lynard Skynard (with synchronoptica) plus a tour through the Geratal
seven years ago: classic cartoon What on Earth?! plus diagrams of parliamentary seating
nine years ago: keeping stashed cash safe
ten years ago: Mexico ends state oil monopoly plus more humanitarian airstrikes
eleven years ago: histomaps plus ages of the US Founding Fathers
Monday, 12 August 2024
the philadelphia experiment (11. 760)
Alleged first trialled on this day in 1943 on the US navy vessel the USS Eldridge at the city’s shipyard and coming to public attention over a decade later with a detailed account by supposed witness, a former 
merchant marine Carl Meredith Allen, the secretive project involving poorly understood extraterrestrial technology carried out with the intention of cloaking an escort ship. The outcome however was unexpected: while the Eldridge did vanish, it reappeared instantly in the naval docks of Norfolk, Virginia, some four hundred and fifty kilometres away, with the crew (no one else corroborated Allen’s story) sustaining bizarre side-effects from the teleportation, returning to Philadelphia minutes later. The navy disavows any knowledge of such research and the story and conjecture gained currency in the late 1970s with the resurgence in interest of paranormal phenomena like the Bermuda Triangle and Project Montauk. The 1984 film adaptation with Michael Parรฉ added an element of time-travel and was generally not well-received by the fringe scientific community.
synchronoptica
one year ago: deadly and illegal border barriers (with synchronoptica) plus assorted links to revisit
seven years ago: sabre-rattling, crown shyness plus old neologisms
eight years ago: more links to enjoy
nine years ago: the velocity of money
ten years ago: thoughts on Dune and redundancy
