Unpredictable spring weather ensured that there were plenty of beautiful moments during my visit to the Lake District, especially around sunset. This HDR shot of a picturesque church in the village of Crosthwaite represents probably the most spectacular evening of the lot.

 

The most bizarre thing about this shot is the church itself, which you will notice is lit from the front even though the sun is behind it. This is because a huge misty cloud opposite the church was actually acting as a giant reflector, giving me the perfect lighting by complete coincidence.

 

Nature has a funny way of helping you out sometimes!

  

Until the 1870s this was the largest Hall in Oxford, but then the newly-founded Keble College ensured that their hall was slightly larger (legend has it by only a single metre). It was this Renaissance splendour that attracted the makers of the Harry Potter films to build a replica of the Hall in their London studios.

 

Completed alongside the kitchens in the 1520s, the Hall has been in almost constant use since the sixteenth century. Over the years, it has hosted some spectacular banquets, perhaps none more so than the Duke of Portland’s 1793 banquet, in which guests were treated to turbot in lobster sauce, followed by roast beef, lamb, duck, goose and chicken, a veal pie - and a fruit fool to finish. While the extravagances of Portland’s time are gone, the Hall remains very much in use. Members of the college can eat three daily meals here including a formal dinner in the evenings where gowns must be worn. Visitors are reminded to plan their trips around the Hall’s closures (everyday at lunchtime between 11.45am and 2.00pm).

 

Copied from:

www.chch.ox.ac.uk/visiting-christ-church/hall

Senior Airman Beau Lewis, 146th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron crew chief, does routine maintenance on a C-130J Hercules during Exercise Eager Lion May 29, 2014, at an air base in northern Jordan. During the annual exercise, more than 12,500 personnel from over 20 nations joined forces to enhance regional security and stability through various scenarios. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Brigitte N. Brantley/Released)

It started slowly at first. Shoes, of course, were a given. Socks were par for the course, though she always ensured they were as close to the original pairing as possible. Being the same colour and style wasn't enough. They needed to be of a pretty exact equal length, equally worn. At least bought at the same time, even if it wasn't possible to ensure they were a 100% matching pair from those bought.

 

She rarely owned matching knicker sets. Apart from the few sets of His Pants for Her pastel no-underwire bras and panties she had in early high school. Most days she could only match her blacks and her whites when it came to her bra and knickers.

 

So she settled for matching her tops, knickers and socks instead, where she could. If she wore a red top, you could be certain her underpants and socks were also red. If she wore a blue, black or white top, her socks and jocks would match. If she couldn't match them, she at least tried to work with complementary colours. In those days, her wardrobe consisted of blue denim and corduroy jeans, black trousers, black skirts (often worn over the trousers), a scuffed-up pair of 8-up Docs, and a navy blue pair of scuffed-up Converse One Stars. Variety in terms of colours was restricted to her tops, underpants and socks.

 

The colour-matching of socks, jocks and tops became a bit of an obsession. Sort of like a lucky charm wrapped around her to get her through the day; keep her safe. And it stretched on for many years until finally, she settled on a favourite skirt style and her mother offered to make her skirts for work based on that.

 

Standing in the fabric store with her mother she picked out various shades of blues and purples, and a burgundy. Her mother matched the material with lining and disappeared into her sewing room to make the skirts for her. Voila! A full week's worth of skirts and a variety of tops to match with them. At that point, her colour coordination obsession really started to amp up. She still had plain black or white shirts. But now whenever she went looking for more tops for work she would ensure they complemented the selection of colours from her collection of skirts.

 

Pretty soon she had her top and skirt combos down pat. A bit of switching between tops depending on the weather, the season, or her mood, but she had a colour-driven uniform. Her opaque tights and her shoes were still black, but from neck to knee she wore one colour, sometimes just one tone.

 

When she wore dresses they were vibrant and colourful vintage dresses or pastel 'granny' dresses found in charity shops. In the warm Melbourne summers she rarely wore tights, but in winter she would pair dresses with black opaque tights.

 

Until she discovered a treasure trove of vibrant and colourful opaque tights in a local mall and fell in love. By this point, the arse had literally fallen out of her last pair of secondhand men's Levi 501s. That gave her the perfect excuse to buy a pair of opaque tights in every colour (except yellow or orange, because ugh!) She even managed to overlook the misspelling of the brand of tights as 'Tention'.

 

In high school and college, she favoured black and white film for her photography. She found colour distracting from form and composition, and felt her colour work was always weaker. More likely to be 'record' shots than anything creative. In the moment, all she could see would be the colours. But when she got the prints back, all she would see was the bad composition and lacklustre images. Her wardrobe had always been pretty colourful, but that sense of colour hadn't managed to translate into her photography.

 

Now she started visualising photographic ideas with colour as the starting point. Her self-portraits and portraits were often inspired by an outfit or a setting, and without fail, that usually came with a particular colour. The colour of the material; the colour of the interior of a space; the colours of the landscape. She learnt to work with the colours first so they were integral to the image, but didn't distract from it. Remembering the colour theory she'd studied at college, she could now create a palette for a shoot before raising the viewfinder to her eye or setting up her tripod.

 

By the end of her self-portrait project, she'd fallen in love with green with red, green with pink, and pink with red. And blue with orange, blue with pink, and blue with red. And blue and green, though others told her they should never be seen without a colour in between (for what it’s worth, the sky and trees beg to differ).

 

As soon as she thought about a new-old dress she'd bought at a charity shop she could think of exactly where she wanted to set her next self-portrait. The ideas would bleed into her mind in full colour.

 

And then she moved back to London. And rediscovered Hush Puppies. And fell in love with colour even more than she already had been. Her work days were head-to-toe colour. Solid blues, reds or purples. Vibrant colour combinations. Or a single eye-catching accent colour to brighten up a black dress and shoes.

 

That obsessive colour-coordination may also have seeped into her home with linen matched to wallpaper, paint or photographs hung on the walls.

 

She surrounds herself with colour.

So these bees are quick. I took about 50 shots and got 2 or three that were decent. The bees are super busy ensuring that I will have a ton of Raspberries this year. I counted about 6 different species of honey bees.

Shibdon Pond Local Nature Reserve

 

History

In the nineteenth century this site had been a series of wetland pastures, but this changed when twentieth century mining and railway activities altered the water level and formed the pond. Between 1837 and 1951 Blaydon Main Colliery dominated the site. The capped shaft can still be seen behind Blaydon Swimming Pool. This area used to be a refuse dump, but careful planting and management of native British trees will ensure a rich new habitat for the future. The grassland provides habitat for voles and shrews which attract hunting kestrels.

 

Birds

Bird life varies throughout the year. From the observation hide you will be able to spot common birds such as tufted duck, mallard, coot and moorhen. In summer, masses of insects swarm above the pond and these can attract swifts, swallows, house martins and sand martins in large numbers. Look carefully around the edge of the pond and you should see grey herons and water rail as they search for food. In autumn, kingfisher can be seen regularly along with waders such as greenshank and common sandpiper. During cold winters numbers on the pond are boosted by visiting wildfowl from Northern Europe. In past years, a wide range of scarce species from Europe and further afield have been noted including laughing gull and green winged teal from North America, ferruginous duck from the Mediterranean and glaucous gull and Iceland gull from the edge of the Arctic Circle. Also at this time cormorants roost on the main island on the pond in large numbers.

 

Marsh

The marsh is a mosaic of reed beds and open pools which provide nest sites for birds such as sedge warbler and are ideal cover for otters visiting from the River Tyne. Where the marsh merges into grassland orchids can be seen during the summer months. The most obvious insect life is the dragonflies, damselflies and butterflies. In spring, look out for the orange tip butterfly and in summer the small skipper and meadow brown butterflies, common darter dragonfly and emerald damselfly. Heather, knapweed and yellow rattle are typical plants which grow here.

 

Scrub

Beyond the marsh areas of scrub provide cover for many birds such as whitethroat and willow warbler during the summer months. Predators such as foxes are attracted to this area by the large number of rabbits which live here.

 

Blaydon is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England, and historically in County Durham. Blaydon, and neighbouring Winlaton, which Blaydon is now contiguous with, form the town of Blaydon-on-Tyne. The Blaydon/Winlaton ward had a population in 2011 of 13,896.

 

Between 1894 and 1974, Blaydon was an urban district which extended inland from the Tyne along the River Derwent for ten miles (16 km), and included the mining communities of Chopwell and High Spen, the villages of Rowlands Gill, Blackhall Mill, Barlow, Winlaton Mill and Stella, as well as Blaydon and Winlaton. During its existence, the Urban District's fourteen and a half square miles constituted the second largest administrative district by area, on Tyneside, after Newcastle upon Tyne.

 

History

The town of Blaydon is essentially an industrial area and is not more than two centuries old. Indeed, in the 1760s there was little here but a few farms and cottages. In the latter part of the same century a smelting works was set up from which sprang the industrial growth of the area.

 

Though the town itself has a relatively short history there has been activity in the area for many centuries.

 

Early history

The earliest recorded evidence of human activity at Blaydon is a Neolithic polished stone axe found in the early 20th century. Finds and structures from later prehistoric periods include a bronze spearhead and log-boat, both recovered from the River Tyne in the 19th century. A number of Bronze Age cists[citation needed] are recorded from Summerhill and several others from Bewes Hill.

 

Little is recorded of medieval Blaydon, which appears to have been based upon the modern farm sites of High and Low Shibdon. The Blaydon Burn Belts Corn Mill, part of a row of 5 or 6 water corn mills stretching from Brockwell Wood to the River Tyne is known to have been present by the early 17th century, suggesting a healthy population at that time. It is likely that, as well as farming, many industrial activities such as mining and quarrying had begun in the medieval and post-medieval periods, well before the industrial period of the 18th to 20th centuries when Blaydon became an important industrial centre.

 

Battle of Stella Ford

Also known as the Battle of Newburn or Newburn Ford, this relatively unknown battle has recently been elevated in importance by English Heritage. On 28 August 1640, 20,000 Scots defeated 5,500 English soldiers who were defending the ford over the Tyne four miles (6 km) west of Newcastle.[6] The Scots had been provoked by Charles I, who had imposed bishops and a foreign prayer book on their church. The Scots army, led by Alexander Leslie, fought its way to Newcastle and occupied the city for almost a year before Charles I paid it £200,000 to depart. The battle brought to an end the so-called 'Eleven Years of Tyranny' by forcing Charles to recall Parliament.

 

The 18th century and the Industrial Revolution

The stimulus for industry at Blaydon and Blaydon burn, as elsewhere in the region, was the growth in coal mining and the coal trade, particularly from the early 18th century, when the Hazard and Speculation pits were established at Low Shibdon linked to the Tyne by wagonways. The 18th century Blaydon Main Colliery was reopened in the mid-19th century and worked until 1921. Other pits and associated features included Blaydon Burn Colliery, Freehold pit and the Blaydonburn wagonway. Industries supported by the coal trade included chemical works, bottle works, sanitary pipe works, lampblack works, an ironworks, a smithy and brickworks - Cowen's Upper and Lower Brickworks were established in 1730 and were associated with a variety of features including a clay drift mine and coal/clay drops. The Lower works remains in operation. Blaydon Burn Coke Ovens, also of 19th-century origin, were replaced in the 1930s by Priestman Ottovale Coke and Tar Works which was the first in the world to produce petrol from coal[citation needed] known as Blaydon Benzole.

 

In addition to the workers' housing developments associated with industrialisation, a number of grand residences were constructed for industrialists in the area, such as Blaydon Burn House, home of Joseph Cowen, owner of the brickworks. Ironically, the remains of Old Dockendale Hall, an earlier grand residence (or perhaps a superior farmhouse) of 17th century or earlier construction, was destroyed when the coke and tar works was built at Blaydon Burn.

 

Blaydon School Press

In the 1930s, pupils at the now demolished Blaydon Intermediate School, under the leadership of English teacher Mr Elliott and art teacher Mr Boyce, gradually developed a technique for producing hardback books. Their productions were highly respected and favourably compared to other successful private printing presses of the time. In one volume produced by the school in 1935, entitled "Songs of Enchantment", the pupils were successful in convincing the famous poet Walter de la Mare to write a foreword in which he praised their enterprise and efforts.

 

Stella South Power Station

The post war era of the late 40s and 50s saw a rapid rise in demand for electricity and, in the North East, the extension of existing and construction of a number of new power stations was seen as a key part of the solution. For the Blaydon area, this meant the arrival of a new power station at Stella Haugh, known as the South Stella Power Station, which helped to meet the energy demands of the North East until its closure in 1991. It was demolished in 1992.

 

Governance

Blaydon ward elects three councillors to Gateshead Council. In the House of Commons, the Blaydon constituency has been held by Liz Twist for the Labour Party since 2017. The area has traditionally been a Labour stronghold and the seat has been held by them since 1935.

 

Geography

Modern Blaydon stands close to the Tyne with the A695, a key road from Gateshead to Hexham, passing through the town centre. Between this main road and the river is the railway and beyond it, on a bend of the Tyne, is the industrial district of Blaydon Haughs. The main part of the town lies south of the railway.

 

Despite being a largely urban and industrial area, there are various rural aspects to Blaydon and the surrounding area. The area has many acres of open countryside, mostly at 500 feet (150 m) or more above sea level, and numerous farms and similar holdings. Between High Spen and Chopwell are large Forestry Commission woods, and these and other forested areas extend westward down the hillside to the River Derwent, which forms most of the metropolitan district boundary.

 

Shibdon Pond, on the eastern edge of the town at the former site of Blaydon Main colliery, is a nature reserve with many species of waterfowl. English Nature has designated Shibdon Pond as one of Tyne and Wear's Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). The subject of a regeneration campaign, Shibdon Dene (sometimes inaccurately called 'Blaydon Dene') is another recreational area consisting of a pathway between a great number of fine trees.

 

There is also a nature reserve north-west of Blaydon at Blaydon Burn, on the route of a wagon-way which carried coal to the riverside. The track, roughly a mile-and-a-half long, is used by walkers and cyclists and ends near the Path Head Watermill.

 

Demography

Blaydon had a population of 15,155 in the 2011 census, which increased from 14,648 a decade earlier.

 

Economy

Once the powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution in Gateshead, Blaydon's traditional industry was coal mining. However, since the decline of mining in the 1950s and 1960s, the economy has diversified. As well as a small number of commuting professionals, residents of Blaydon are often involved in engineering and manufacturing with many businesses operating from premises in Blaydon Haughs (or 'The Spike'), on the banks of the River Tyne.

 

Blaydon was for a time the head office of Associated Cooperative Creameries (later renamed ACC then ACC Milk). ACC Milk was sold to Dairy Farmers of Britain in 2004. On 3 June 2009, Dairy Farmers of Britain went into receivership and the dairy in Chainbridge Road closed shortly afterwards with the loss of 300 jobs. In 2010 the dairy was acquired by Medina Dairies and reopened, but closed again just a year later.

 

Blaydon has a shopping centre, known locally as the precinct. A brutalist 1970s creation, it contains the town's major shops including newsagents, Greggs, Costa, Iceland (supermarket), B & M, Blaydon Carpets and Furnishings, Ladbrokes, Superdrug, Boots (chemist), Boyes and, at the nearby car park, a McDonald's. There are also several food and grocery outlets. The precinct underwent redevelopment in 2012–2014, with the installation of a lift, and the demolition of the Geordie Ridley pub to make way for a new Morrison's supermarket, a new day-centre and doctors' surgery, and roof-top parking. There is also a Co-op Funeralcare just outside the precinct on Bridge street. Blaydon Car Boot Sale takes place every Wednesday between March and October at Blaydon RFC.

 

The area underwent a significant programme of housing regeneration between 2009 and 2014 with new developments in progress at High View on the Winlaton-Blaydon border, by the riverside on the site of the former Stella South power station and at Axwell Gardens, near to the existing Axwell Park estate.

 

Landmarks

On the west of the town and a mile inland from the Tyne is Axwell Park, once the home of the Clavering family. Axwell Hall (also Axwell House) is a Grade II* listed mansion, built for Sir Thomas Clavering by the noted architect James Paine and completed in 1761. The last (10th) baronet died in 1893 and Axwell Hall later found use as a prisoner-of-war camp during the second world war and later as an approved school. Much of the park has been developed for residential purposes and the hall itself was, after two decades of decay, restored. There are plans to convert it to residential apartments.

 

Stella Hall

Up-river from Blaydon and outside the town boundary, Stella Hall was a 17th-century mansion set in a park. The house was built by the Tempest family, and in the next century passed by marriage to Lord Widdrington and then into the Towneley family. From 1850 it was owned by Joseph Cowen, owner of the local brickworks and MP for Newcastle, who was followed by his son, also Joseph, again an MP and also the owner of the Newcastle Chronicle. The house was demolished in 1955 to make way for housing.

 

Education

Blaydon is part of the Gateshead Local Education Authority. It is home to a number of primary schools (both faith and secular schools) including Blaydon West primary and St Joseph's, a Roman Catholic primary school. It also has St Thomas More Catholic School, a high achieving Roman Catholic secondary school which serves the Roman Catholic population of the western part of Gateshead borough.

 

Religious sites

Blaydon has several churches. In the town centre, St Cuthbert's (Church of England, opened in 1845) and St Joseph's (Roman Catholic, opened in 1905 on the site of an earlier church) are opposite each other, on either side of Shibdon Road. Both are impressive structures, and the interiors still reflect the style of architecture used in their construction. Also on Shibdon Road, at the corner with Lucy Street and opposite the entrance to the roof-top car park above Morrisons, is Trinity Methodist Church.

 

There is also a Catholic church in Stella (St Mary and Thomas Aquinas, opened 1835) .

 

A brand new Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses was opened in 2013, near Cowen Road. This was built by voluntary labour as Witnesses from all over the North-East donned hard hats and work gear, working under the supervision of professional builders.

 

In Winlaton, the parish church of Winlaton opened in 1828, the Congregational church in 1829, and the Wesleyan Chapel in 1868. The latter two united to form Winlaton United Reformed-Methodist Church, but this closed in August 2015, with some members moving to join Trinity Methodist Church in Blaydon. The Primitive Methodists had opened a building in 1850, which was extended in 1895, and was later to become the Blaydon Corps of the Salvation Army; this corps closed in September 2012. St Anne's Catholic Church in Winlaton was opened in 1962.

 

Sports

The Blaydon area is the origin of the well-known traditional song "Blaydon Races", written by local musician and showman George 'Geordie' Ridley in 1862. The town's athletic club – the Blaydon Harriers – organise a road running race (called the Blaydon Race) every year on 9 June. The route of the race follows the route outlined by Ridley in his song. The traditional starting point lies outside Balmbra's pub in Newcastle's Bigg Market, and the race follows a course along Scotswood Road before crossing the River Tyne and ultimately finishing in Blaydon town centre. Local councillors, societies and notaries have in recent years organised an annual Blaydon Festival with music, sport and arts events that coincides with the week of race day.

 

As well as the Blaydon races, The Blaydon Harriers organise regular race meetings on the Shibdon Pond fields (and other venues) throughout the year. These are usually well-attended both by participants and spectators. The Harriers' colours are orange and black.

 

The rugby union club, Blaydon RFC play in the English National League 2 North, the fourth tier of the English rugby union system and a high level considering the size of the town. The Crow Trees rugby ground is situated to the east of the town, in neighbouring Swalwell. Blaydon RFC play in red shirts and white shorts. The former England international Mick Skinner played for Blaydon. Their smaller but no less illustrious neighbours, Winlaton Vulcans RFC play in Durham and Northumberland Division 2 and number Ken Goodall, the former Ireland and British Lion International, as one of their former players. They play in black shirts, shorts and socks with the club badge of an arm gripping a hammer over an anvil depicting their heritage being formed from the steelworking heritage of the area.

 

Since 2013 Blaydon has also been host to Blaydon Cycle Club, meeting weekly and throughout the week catering from novice cyclists right through to having a race team competing in local and national events.

 

Notable people

Alun Armstrong, former professional footballer with Ipswich Town F.C. and Middlesbrough FC

Peter Armstrong, the poet and psychotherapist, was born in Blaydon

Sir Thomas Clavering, 7th Baronet, owner of Axwell Hall

Joseph Cowen, 19th century politician and journalist

Graham Onions, Durham and England cricketer

Bert Tulloch, former professional footballer with Blackpool

Gavin Webster, stand-up comedian

William Widdrington, 4th Baron Widdrington, owner of Stella Hall

 

Culture

Live jazz and rock music is regularly performed at the Black Bull pub near Blaydon Bridge. Although many pubs were demolished during the refurbishment of the town in the 1970s, a number of pubs still exist in and around the precinct, along with the Staffs (formerly the Railway Staff Club). The Blaydon and District Social Club – a former working men's club – and the Blaydon House Sports and Social Club (formerly the Conservative Club), which occupied the house of the nineteenth-century Doctor Morrison, and was reputedly the oldest building in Blaydon, were both demolished in 2020–2021 to make way for housing. The façade of Blaydon House was incorporated into a new building. The Masonic Hall on Blaydon Bank was closed in 2015, with Lodge meetings transferring to Ryton Masonic Hall.

"Teegan, prepare the Hurricane for take-off! Ensure all supplies are loaded, and find Samuel, if you can!" Lord Conan's voice, a gravelly rumble, cut through the hangar's cacophony. He pivoted, his gaze settling on Brace, a man built like a fortified wall. "Brace, load the Land Rover and get it onto the plane. We're going to need it where we're going." Brace, wiping sweat from his brow, raised a questioning eyebrow. "Where exactly are we off to, Lord Conan?" A glint, like polished obsidian, flashed in Conan's eyes. He leaned in conspiratorially, lowering his voice even further. "Skull Island, my boy! To find the cursed Pink Diamond of Death!" The words hung in the air, thick with the promise of danger and untold riches, a siren song echoing in the vast hangar as the Hurricane roared to life, its propellers carving a path through the humid air. **(Now, addressing the second part about Jake's study):** I've been working tirelessly to transform Jake's study into a sanctuary of knowledge and inspiration, and I couldn't resist giving you a sneak peek! Picture this: walls lined with rich, mahogany bookshelves, their shelves groaning under the weight of leather-bound volumes, a testament to a lifetime of collected wisdom. Sunlight streams through the leaded-glass windows, illuminating motes of dust dancing in the air and casting intricate patterns on the worn Persian rug. The air itself hums with a quiet energy, a palpable sense of history and intellectual curiosity. We're almost there – just a few finishing touches – and I can't wait to unveil the complete transformation of this captivating space. Hopefully, it won't be long now.

Testing is crucial part of NASA's success on Earth and in space. So, as the actual flight components of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope come together, engineers are testing the non-flight equipment to ensure that tests on the real Webb telescope later goes safely and according to plan. Recently, the "pathfinder telescope," or just “Pathfinder,” completed its first super-cold optical test that resulted in many first-of-a-kind demonstrations.

 

"This test is the first dry-run of the equipment and procedures we will use to conduct an end-to-end optical test of the flight telescope and instruments," said Mark Clampin, Webb telescope Observatory Project Scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. "It provides confidence that once the flight telescope is ready, we are fully prepared for a successful test of the flight hardware."

 

The Pathfinder is a non-flight replica of the Webb telescope’s center section backplane, or “backbone,” that includes mirrors.

 

The flight backplane comes in three segments, a center section and two wing-like parts, all of which will support large hexagonal mirrors on the Webb telescope. The pathfinder only consists of the center part of the backplane. However, during the test, it held two full size spare primary mirror segments and a full size spare secondary mirror to demonstrate the ability to optically test and align the telescope at the planned operating temperatures of -400 degrees Fahrenheit (-240 Celsius).

 

The first cryogenic optical testing of the Pathfinder was successfully completed in Chamber A at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Chamber A was originally used to test the Apollo capsule. This test demonstrated new helium and nitrogen cooling systems installed for the Webb telescope testing which allowed the Pathfinder to achieve those frigid temperature that will simulate operating temperatures we will have at the L2 Lagrange point. The cooling system is installed in the chamber. There is a vacuum chamber with a nitrogen shroud inside of it and then a helium shroud inside of the nitrogen shroud. The Pathfinder is then inside the Helium shroud.

 

"The most significant breakthrough was the first-ever cryogenic optical alignment and testing of multiple primary mirror segments in a process known as 'phasing,'" said Lee Feinberg, Webb telescope Optical Telescope Element Manager at NASA Goddard.

 

"During the demonstration, mirrors that were initially misaligned by millimeters were aligned to each other using actuators operating at -400F to better than one-one-thousandth diameter of a human hair (or a fraction of a wavelength of light) such that the two primary mirror segments were optically equivalent to a single monolithic mirror," Feinberg said.

 

The second "first" involved the vertical orientation of the testing of the mirrors. It marked the first time a lightweight cryogenic mirror of this type had been tested in a second gravity orientation. "To understand a second gravity orientation, think of a cup," Feinberg said. "When the cup is face up so you can pour water in it, it is vertical to gravity. Now put the cup on its side and it is horizontal to gravity. Mirrors are like cups in this explanation." That allowed for successful cross-checking of the predicted zero-gravity performance of the mirrors.

 

"In another major achievement, four large super cold windmills carrying steerable cameras were able to measure the alignment of all of the mirrors and structure to better than one-tenth of a millimeter using a process called photogrammetry," Feinberg said. Photogrammetry is a technique that takes images from multiple to simulate operating temperatures orientations, combines those images, and then using triangulation algorithms to determine distances between objects in those scenes.

 

The phasing demonstration used a new metrology device developed for NASA to test segmented telescopes by 4D Technologies Corporation called a multi-wavelength interferometer and used a reflective null lens designed and built by Harris Corporation.

 

After this test completed, the flight Aft Optics System, which includes the Tertiary Mirror and Fine Steering Mirror, was installed on the Pathfinder to prepare for a second test. The full Pathfinder was then outfitted with special fiber-fed infrared optical sources that simulate star images. Those star images, or infrared sources, along with a specially instrumented infrared detector will be used during the second test to perform end-to-end testing of the full Pathfinder telescope system and ensure they function as simulated stars.

 

After that second test is complete late in 2015, all optical test systems will have been checked out.

 

A third and final precursor test called “Thermal Pathfinder” will follow in 2016 that will fully test all the test equipment needed to simulate the temperature environment of space. Once this is complete, all test equipment and procedures needed to test the actual full flight telescope and the Integrated Science Instrument Module or ISIM assembled as a unit in early 2017 will be checked-out and ready.

 

Orbital ATK fabricated the composite structure of the pathfinder backplane. The pathfinder (minus the mirrors) was tested at Northrop Grumman in Redondo Beach, California

 

The James Webb Space Telescope is the scientific successor to NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. It will be the most powerful space telescope ever built. Webb is an international project led by NASA with its partners, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.

 

For more information about the James Webb Space Telescope, visit: jwst.nasa.gov or www.nasa.gov/webb

 

For more information on the teams working on Webb, visit: jwst.nasa.gov/team.html

 

Image credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

 

Text credit: Rob Gutro

 

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This shot took less manipulation than one might think. Just played with the curves a touch to up the brightness in the window. I also increased the colour saturation (such that there is) to add a little more punch to the light. I didn't have to do anything to ensure the negative space was pitch black -- I was shooting at three in the morning and used a fast shutter speed.

 

Watcher

 

Watcher is a multi-building video installation. Viewed on the windows of a series of houses, some of which Chen inhabited during childhood, images from her memories of growing up on D'Arcy merge with imagined stories that have occurred behind the buildings' facades over the course of the area's complex, history; fact is peppered with fiction. As viewers walk from house to house, they become implicated as voyeurs in the human compulsion to not mind our own business.

 

(Taken from the Watcher, 2007 Nuit Blanche project page -- Art courtesy of Millie Chen)

 

Ellie attempts to pay homage to the numerous limestone/gritstone crags that have helped to cement the strong tradition and world wide reputation of British rock climbing and mountaineering. These outcrops virtually encircle the city of Sheffield, which ensured that the citys climbers and ramblers would be instrumental in the 1932 Kinder Mass Trespass, along with like-minded people from my home city of Manchester. This celebrated ‘Right to Roam’ protest led directly to the opening up of access to the spectacular English landscape for us all to enjoy, a hard earned right that we now take almost for granted.

David imagined Ellie hauling timber around the forests of India before arriving in the steelyards of Sheffield in 1916, and so gave the crags and boulders the texture and colouring of teak and mahogany.

Why Ellie? David’s father, Albert Elliot Hoodith, though born in British Guyana and raised in Barbados was of Indian origin and was born in 1918, as the war which brought Ellie to England finally came to an end. It was the outbreak of World War II that brought his father, whose schoolboy nickname was Ellie, to England, and so he thought it fitting to pass the name from one hard working Indian to another. He is sure his father would have approved.

 

Designed by: David Elliot Hoodith

David was born in Manchester in1950 and has now lived in The Peak District for twenty years. He is a self taught artist working with a variety of materials though Ellie is his first experience working on such a scale and in three dimensions. He exhibits his paintings at The Gallery in The Gardens in Buxton and at The New Mills Gallery in his adoptive home town.

 

Sponsored by: The Star

Auction Price: £8000

 

Summer 2016, a herd of elephant sculptures descended on Sheffield for the biggest public art event the city has ever seen!

58 elephant sculptures, each uniquely decorated by artists, descended on Sheffield’s parks and open spaces, creating one of the biggest mass participation arts events the city has ever seen. Did you find them all?

The trail of elephants celebrates Sheffield’s creativity with over 75% of artists from the city. Some well-known names include Pete McKee, James Green, Jonathan Wilkinson and Lydia Monks – each of which has put their own creative mark on a 1.6m tall fibreglass elephant sculpture. They are all very difference, take a selfie with your favourite as they will be on display until the end of September.

International artist Mark Alexander, who is currently working with Rembrandt for an exhibition in Berlin, flew to Sheffield especially to paint his elephant and international players from the World Snooker Championship signed SnookHerd, an elephant celebrating the heritage of snooker in Sheffield.

The Arctic Monkeys, famous for their love of their home city, added their signatures to their own personalised sculpture which pays homage to the striking sound wave cover of the band’s 2013 album “AM”.

By supporting the Herd of Sheffield you are investing in the future of Sheffield Children’s Hospital. Every penny raised will go towards our Artfelt programme, which transforms the hospital’s walls and spaces with bright art, helping children recover in an environment tailored to them. The programme also puts on workshops for youngsters to provide distraction during anxious moments – such as before an operation, and to breakup long stays on the wards.

This exciting Wild in Art event brought to you by The Children’s Hospital Charity will:

Unite our city – bringing businesses, communities, artists, individuals and schools together to create a FREE sculpture trail which is accessible to all.

Attract more visitors – both nationally and regionally as well as encouraging thousands of people to become a tourist in their own city.

Invest in the future – with a city wide education programme that can be used for years to come and by funding a life-saving piece of medical equipment at Sheffield Children’s Hospital from the Herd auction at the end of the trail.

Showcase our city – celebrating Sheffield’s heritage and cementing our status as a vibrant and culturally exciting city through this world-class initiative.

 

The Herd of Sheffield Farewell Weekend was held on 14-16 October and was your chance to say a last goodbye to all 58 large elephant sculptures as they gather in one place for a final send-off at Meadowhall.

This special event gave visitors a chance to see the entire herd in all its glory – from the signed Arctic Monkeys’ ‘AM’ elephant, right through to ‘SnookHerd’, autographed by a host of international snooker players including current world champion Mark Selby.

Please note that the Little Herd elephants will not be on display as they will be returned to their school for pupils to enjoy.

Meadowhall, along with its joint owners, British Land are very proud to be supporting The Children’s Hospital Charity as host sponsors for the Herd of Sheffield Farewell Weekend.

 

Auction: Hundreds of elephant enthusiasts gathered at the Crucible on 20 October for the Herd of Sheffield Auction, which raised a total of £410,600 for The Children’s Hospital Charity.

Am ensuring that a current image is up on flickr for each of my cactus. Don't remember where this cactus came from but have had it for ages. This is the first year it has started to grow like the sites show how it looks. Maybe it will bloom this year.

I remember having to suck a new nib to ensure even ink flow - they tasted awful !!!

Those special talons automatically "lock" onto the fish, to ensure that they won't drop it.....and they have a fail safe device built into them that make's it impossible to release the fish into the nest when there are babies, if the fish is still flopping about, it could knock a baby out of the nest.....so they will take it to a nearby spot and disable it first....Osprey spend summer's together, but the male and female go on separate vacations in the south. (That is how they keep their 15-20 yr. marriage going!)...Each couple has their own "decorating" style when building their nest. Some show specific preference for certain building material....One person noted "I Watched a couple two summers ago that had a thing for yellow caution tape. Every year, they go all over collecting it and wrapping their entire nest in it!" They are also the only predatory bird that can actually dive into water. Unlike eagles that snatch their prey off the surface, osprey can dive down up to 3 ft. to grab a fish. Like all birds, their bones are hollow, which makes them buoyant.

(Thank you Judy for sharing this! judecat is a contact if you would like to check out her stream

 

Food For Thought:

 

~A gentle answer turns away wrath, but harsh words stir up anger.

~The wise person makes learning a joy; fools spout only foolishness.

~The LORD is watching everywhere, keeping his eye on both the evil and the good.

~Gentle words bring life and health; a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.

~Only a fool despises a parent's discipline; whoever learns from correction is wise.

~There is treasure in the house of the godly, but the earnings of the wicked bring trouble.

~Only the wise can give good advice; fools cannot do so.

~A wise person is hungry for truth, while the fool feeds on trash.

~It is better to have little with fear for the Lord than to have great treasure with turmoil.

~A bowl of soup with someone you love is better than steak with someone you hate.

~A hothead starts fights; a cool-tempered person tries to stop them.

~Foolishness brings joy to those who have no sense; a sensible person stays on the right path.

~Everyone enjoys a fitting reply; it is wonderful to say the right thing at the right time!

~Dishonest money brings grief to the whole family, but those who hate bribes will live.

~The godly think before speaking; the wicked spout evil words.

~If you listen to constructive criticism, you will be at home among the wise.

~If you reject criticism, you only harm yourself; but if you listen to correction, you grow in understanding.

~Fear of the Lord teaches a person to be wise; humility precedes honor.(Excerpts from Proverbs 15)

 

***Hope you all are enjoying your weekend :) I sure am! Went to a great juried Art Show today at the Colosseum in Downtown, St.Pete. If you are local, it is also being held tomorrow. Thank you so much again for your constant inspiration and generous words! You are all Keepers! :)...and very talented ones at that! :)

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The Lockheed P-80 Shooting Star was the first jet fighter used operationally by the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) during World War II. Designed and built by Lockheed in 1943 and delivered just 143 days from the start of design, production models were flying, and two pre-production models did see very limited service in Italy just before the end of World War II. The XP-80 had a conventional all-metal airframe, with a slim low wing and tricycle landing gear. Like most early jets designed during World War II—and before the Allies captured German research data that confirmed the speed advantages of swept-wings—the XP-80 had straight wings similar to previous propeller-driven fighters, but they were relatively thin to minimize drag at high speed.

 

The Shooting Star began to enter service in late 1944 with 12 pre-production YP-80As. Four were sent to Europe for operational testing (demonstration, familiarization, and possible interception roles), two to England and two to the 1st Fighter Group at Lesina Airfield, Italy. Because of delays in delivery of production aircraft, the Shooting Star saw no actual combat during the conflict. The initial production order was for 344 P-80As after USAAF acceptance in February 1945. A total of 83 P-80s had been delivered by the end of July 1945 and 45 assigned to the 412th Fighter Group (later redesignated the 1st Fighter Group) at Muroc Army Air Field. Production continued after the war, although wartime plans for 5,000 were quickly reduced to 2,000 at a little under $100,000 each. A total of 1,714 single-seat F-80A, F-80B, F-80C, and RF-80s were manufactured by the end of production in 1950, of which 927 were F-80Cs (including 129 operational F-80As upgraded to F-80C-11-LO standards). However, the two-seat TF-80C, first flown on 22 March 1948, became the basis for the T-33 trainer, of which 6,557 were produced.

 

Shooting Stars first saw combat service in the Korean War, and were among the first aircraft to be involved in jet-versus-jet combat. Despite initial claims of success, the speed of the straight-wing F-80s was inferior to the 668 mph (1075 km/h) swept-wing transonic MiG-15. The MiGs incorporated German research showing that swept wings delayed the onset of compressibility problems, and enabled speeds closer to the speed of sound. F-80s were soon replaced in the air superiority role by the North American F-86 Sabre, which had been delayed to also incorporate swept wings into an improved straight-winged naval FJ-1 Fury.

 

This prompted Lockheed to improve the F-80 to keep the design competitive, and the result became the F-80E, which was almost a completely different aircraft, despite similar outlines. Lockheed attempted to change as little of the original airframe as possible while the F-80E incorporated two major technical innovation of its time. The most obvious change was the introduction of swept wings for higher speed. After the engineers obtained German swept-wing research data, Lockheed gave the F-80E a 25° sweep, with automatically locking leading edge slots, interconnected with the flaps for lateral stability during take-off and landing, and the wings’ profile was totally new, too. The limited sweep was a compromise, because a 35° sweep had originally been intended, but the plan to retain the F-80’s fuselage and wing attachment points would have resulted in massive center of gravity and mechanical problems. However, wind tunnel tests quickly revealed that even this compromise would not be enough to ensure stable flight esp. at low speed, and that the modified aircraft would lack directional stability. The swept-wing aircraft’s design had to be modified further.

 

A convenient solution came in the form of the F-80’s trainer version fuselage, the T-33, which had been lengthened by slightly more than 3 feet (1 m) for a second seat, instrumentation, and flight controls, under a longer canopy. Thanks to the extended front fuselage, the T-33’s wing attachment points could accept the new 25° wings without much further modifications, and balance was restored to acceptable limits. For the fighter aircraft, the T-33’s second seat was omitted and replaced with an additional fuel cell. The pressurized front cockpit was retained, together with the F-80’s bubble canopy and out fitted with an ejection seat.

 

The other innovation was the introduction of reheat for the engine. The earlier F-80 fighters were powered by centrifugal compressor turbojets, the F-80C had already incorporated water injection to boost the rather anemic powerplant during the start phase and in combat. The F-80E introduced a modified engine with a very simple afterburner chamber, designated J33-A-39. It was a further advanced variant of the J33-A-33 for the contemporary F-94 interceptor with water-alcohol injection and afterburner. For the F-80E with less gross weight, the water-alcohol injection system was omitted so save weight and simplify the system, and the afterburner was optimized for quicker response. Outwardly, the different engine required a modified, wider tail section, which also slightly extended the F-80’s tail.

 

The F-80E’s armament was changed, too. Experience from the Korean War had shown that the American aircrafts’ traditional 0.5” machine guns were reliable, but they lacked firepower, esp. against bigger targets like bombers, and even fighter aircraft like the MiG-15 had literally to be drenched with rounds to cause significant damage. On the other side, a few 23 mmm rounds or just a single hit with an explosive 37 mm shell from a MiG could take a bomber down. Therefore, the F-80’s six machine guns in the nose were replaced with four belt-fed 20mm M24 cannon. This was a license-built variant of the gas-operated Hispano-Suiza HS.404 with the addition of electrical cocking, allowing the gun to re-cock over a lightly struck round. It offered a rate of fire of 700-750 rounds/min and a muzzle velocity of 840 m/s (2,800 ft/s).In the F-80E each weapon was provided with 190 rounds.

 

Despite the swept wings Lockheed retained the wingtip tanks, similar to Lockheed’s recently developed XF-90 penetration fighter prototype. They had a different, more streamlined shape now, to reduce drag and minimize the risk of torsion problems with the outer wing sections and held 225 US gal (187 imp gal; 850 l) each. Even though the F-80E was conceived as a daytime fighter, hardpoints under the wings allowed the carriage of up to 2.000 lb of external ordnance, so that the aircraft could, like the straight-wing F-80s before, carry out attack missions. A reinforced pair of plumbed main hardpoints, just outside of the landing gear wells, allowed to carry another pair of drop tanks for extra range or single bombs of up to 1.000 lb (454 kg) caliber. A smaller, optional pair of pylons was intended to carry pods with nineteen “Mighty Mouse” 2.75 inches (70 mm) unguided folding-fin air-to-air rockets, and further hardpoints under the outer wings allowed eight 5” HVAR unguided air-to-ground rockets to be carried, too. Total external payload (including the wing tip tanks) was 4,800 lb (roughly 2,200 kg) of payload

 

The first XP-80E prototype flew in December 1953 – too late to take part in the Korean War, but Lockheed kept the aircraft’s development running as the benefits of swept wings were clearly visible. The USAF, however, did not show much interest in the new aircraft since the proven F-86 Sabre was readily available and focus more and more shifted to radar-equipped all-weather interceptors armed with guided missiles. However, military support programs for the newly founded NATO, esp. in Europe, stoked the demand for jet fighters, so that the F-80E was earmarked for export to friendly countries with air forces that had still to develop their capabilities after WWII. One of these was Germany; after World War II, German aviation was severely curtailed, and military aviation was completely forbidden after the Luftwaffe of the Third Reich had been disbanded by August 1946 by the Allied Control Commission. This changed in 1955 when West Germany joined NATO, as the Western Allies believed that Germany was needed to counter the increasing military threat posed by the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies. On 9 January 1956, a new German Air Force called Luftwaffe was founded as a branch of the new Bundeswehr (Federal Defence Force). The first volunteers of the Luftwaffe arrived at the Nörvenich Air Base in January 1956, and the same year, the Luftwaffe was provided with its first jet aircraft, the US-made Republic F-84 Thunderstreak from surplus stock, complemented by newly built Lockheed F-80E day fighters and T-33 trainers.

 

A total of 43 F-80Es were delivered to Germany in the course of 1956 and early 1957 via freight ships as disassembled kits, initially allocated to WaSLw 10 (Waffenschule der Luftwaffe = Weapon Training School of the Luftwaffe) at Nörvenich, one of three such units which focused on fighter training. The unit was quickly re-located to Northern Germany to Oldenburg, an airfield formerly under British/RAF governance, where the F-80Es were joined by Canada-built F-86 Sabre Mk. 5s. Flight operations began there in November 1957. Initially supported by flight instructors from the Royal Canadian Air Force from Zweibrücken, the WaSLw 10’s job was to train future pilots for jet aircraft on the respective operational types. F-80Es of this unit were in the following years furthermore frequently deployed to Decimomannu AB on Sardinia (Italy), as part of multi-national NATO training programs.

 

The F-80Es’ service at Oldenburg with WaSLw 10 did not last long, though. In 1963, basic flight and weapon system training was relocated to the USA, and the so-called Europeanization was shifted to the nearby Jever air base, i. e. the training in the more crowded European airspace and under notoriously less pleasant European weather conditions. The remaining German F-80E fleet was subsequently allocated to the Jagdgeschwader 73 “Steinhoff” at Pferdsfeld Air Base in Rhineland-Palatinate, where the machines were – like the Luftwaffe F-86s – upgraded to carry AIM-9 Sidewinder AAMs, a major improvement of their interceptor capabilities. But just one year later, on October 1, 1964, JG 73 was reorganized and renamed Fighter-Bomber Squadron 42, and the unit converted to the new Fiat G.91 attack aircraft. In parallel, the Luftwaffe settled on the F-86 (with more Sabre Mk. 6s from Canada and new F-86K all-weather interceptors from Italian license production) as standard fighter, with the plan to convert to the supersonic new Lockheed F-104 as standard NATO fighter as soon as the type would become available.

For the Luftwaffe the F-80E had become obsolete, and to reduce the number of operational aircraft types, the remaining German aircraft, a total of 34, were in 1965 passed through to the Türk Hava Kuvvetleri (Turkish air force) as part of international NATO military support, where they remained in service until 1974 and were replaced by third generation F-4E Phantom II fighter jets.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 36 ft 9 1/2 in (11.23 m)

Wingspan: 37 ft 6 in (11.44 m) over tip tanks

Height: 13 ft 5 1/4 in (4.10 m)

Wing area: 241.3 sq ft (22,52 m²)

Empty weight: 10,681 lb (4.845 kg)

Max. takeoff weight: 18,464 lb (8.375 kg)

Zero-lift drag coefficient: 0.0134

Frontal area: 32 sq ft (3.0 m²)

 

Powerplant:

1× Allison J33-A-39 centrifugal compressor turbojet with 4,600 lbf (20 kN) dry thrust

and 27.0 kN (6,070 lbf) thrust with afterburning

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 1,060 km/h (660 mph, 570 kn)

Cruise speed: 439 mph (707 km/h, 381 kn)

Range: 825 mi (1,328 km, 717 nmi)

Ferry range: 1,380 mi (2,220 km, 1,200 nmi)

Service ceiling: 50,900 ft (15,500 m)

Rate of climb: 7,980 ft/min (40.5 m/s)

Time to altitude: 20,000 ft (6,100 m) in 4 minutes 50 seconds

Lift-to-drag: 17.7

Wing loading: 51.3 lb/sq ft (250 kg/m²)

Thrust/weight: 0.249 dry

0.328 with afterburner

 

Armament:

4× 0.79 in (20 mm) M24 cannon (190 rpg)

2x wing tip auxiliary tanks with 225 US gal (187 imp gal; 850 l) each

Underwing hardpoints for a total ordnance load of 4,800 lb (2.200 kg), including

2× 1,000 lb (454 kg) bombs, up to 4× pods with nineteen unguided Mighty Mouse FFARs each,

and/or up to 8× 5” (127 mm) HVAR unguided air-to-ground rockets

  

The kit and its assembly:

The idea of a swept-wing F-80 had been lingering on my idea list for a while, and I actually tried this stunt before in the form of a heavily modified F-94. The recent “Fifties” group build at whatifmodellers.com and a similar build by fellow forum member mat revived the interest in this topic – and inspired by mat’s creation, based on a T-33 fuselage, I decided to use the opportunity and add my personal interpretation of the idea.

 

Having suitable donor parts at hand was another decisive factor to start this build: I had a Heller T-33 in store, which had already been (ab)used as a donor bank for other projects, and which could now find a good use. I also had an F-80 canopy left over (from an Airfix kit), and my plan was to use Saab J29 wings (from a Matchbox kit) because of their limited sweep angle that would match the post-WWII era well.

 

Work started with the fuselage; it required a completely new cockpit interior because these parts had already gone elsewhere. I found a cockpit tub with its dashboard from an Italeri F4U, and with some trimming it could be mounted into the reduced cockpit opening, above the OOB front landing gear well. The T-33’s rear seat was faired of with styrene sheet and later PSRed away. The standard nose cone from the Heller T-33 was used, but I added gun ports for the new/different cannon armament.

For a different look with an afterburner engine I modified the tail section under the stabilizers, which was retained because of its characteristic shape. A generous section from the tail was cut away and replaced with the leftover jet pipe from an Italeri (R)F-84F, slightly longer and wider and decorated with innards from a Matchbox Mystère IV. This change is rather subtle but changes the F-80 profile and appears like a compromise between the F-80 and F-94 arrangements.

 

The T-33 wings were clipped down to the connection lower fuselage part. This ventral plate with integral main landing gear wells was mounted onto the T-33 hull and then the Saab 29 wings were dry-fitted to check their position along the fuselage and to define the main landing gear wells, which had to be cut into them to match their counterparts from the aircraft’s belly.

Their exact position was eventually fixed when the new swept stabilizers, taken from a Hobby Boss F-86, were mounted to the tail. They match well with the swept wings, and for an odd look I kept their dihedral.

The fin was eventually replaced, too – mat’s build retained the original F-80 fin, but with all other surfaces swept I found that the fin had to reflect this, too. So, I implanted a shortened Italeri (R)F-84F fin onto the original base, blended with some PSR into the rest of the tail.

 

With all aerodynamic surfaces in place it was time for fine-tuning, and to give the aircraft a simpler look I removed the dog teeth from the late Tunnan's outer wings, even though I retained the small LERXs. The wing tips were cut down a little and tip tanks (probably drop tanks from a Hobby Boss F-5E) added – without them the aircraft looked like a juvenile Saab 32!

 

The landing gear was mostly taken over from the Heller T-33, I just added small consoles for the main landing gear struts to ensure a proper stance, because the new wings and the respective attachment points were deeper. I also had to scratch some landing gear covers because the T-33 donor kit was missing them. The canopy was PSRed over the new opening and a new ejection seat tailored to fit into the F4U cockpit.

 

A final addition was a pair of pods with unguided FFARs. AFAIK the Luftwaffe did not use such weapons, but they’d make thematically sense on a Fifties anti-bomber interceptor - and I had a suitable pair left over from a Matchbox Mystère IV kit, complete with small pylons.

  

Painting and markings:

Since the time frame was defined by the Fifties, early Luftwaffe fighters had to carry a bare metal finish, with relatively few decorations. For the F-80E I gave the model an overall base coat with White Aluminum from a Dupli Color rattle can, a very nice and bright silver tone that comes IMHO close to NMF. Panels were post-shaded with Revell 99 (Aluminum) and 91 (Iron Metallic). An anti-glare panel in front of the windscreen was painted in the Luftwaffe tone RAL 6014, Gelboliv (Revell 42).

For some color highlights I gave the tip tanks bright red (Feuerrot, RAL 3000; Revell 330) outer halves, while the inner halves were painted black to avoid reflections that could distract the pilot (seen on a real Luftwaffe T-33 from the late Fifties). For an even more individual touch I added light blue (Tamiya X-14, Sky Blue) highlights on the nose and the fin, reflecting the squadron’s color code which is also carried within the unit emblem – the Tamiya paint came closest to the respective decal (see below).

 

The cockpit interior was painted with zinc chromate green primer (I used Humbrol 80, which is brighter than the tone should be, but it adds contrast to the black dials on the dashboard), the landing gear wells were painted with a mix of Humbrol 80 and 81, for a more yellowish hue. The landing gear struts became grey, dry-brushed with silver, while the inside of the ventral air brakes were painted in Feuerrot, too.

 

Then the model received an overall washing with black ink to emphasize the recessed panel lines, plus additional panel shading with Matt Aluminum Metallizer (Humbrol 27001), plus a light rubbing treatment with grinded graphite that emphasized the (few leftover) raised panel lines and also added a dark metallic shine to the silver base. Some of the lost panel lines were simulated with simple pencil strokes, too.

 

The decals/markings primarily came from an AirDoc aftermarket sheet for late Fifties Luftwaffe F-84Fs. The tactical code (“BB-xxx” was then assigned to the WaSLw 10 as unit code, but this soon changed to a similar but different format that told about the unit’s task as well as the specific unit and squadron within it; this was replaced once more by a simple xx+yy code that was only connected to a specific aircraft with no unit reference anymore, and this format is still in use today) was puzzled together from single letters/digits from the same decal set. Some additional markings like the red band on the fuselage had to be scratched, but most stencils came from an all-bare-metal Luftwaffe F-84F.

 

After some more detail painting the model was sealed with semi-gloss acrylic paint, just the anti-glare panel and the di-electric fairings on the nose and the fin tip became matt.

  

A thorough kitbashing build, but the result looks quite plausible, if not elegant? The slightly swept wings suit the F-80 with its organic fuselage shape well, even though they reveal the designs rather baroque shape. There’s a sense of obsolescence about the F-80E, despite its modern features? The Luftwaffe markings work well on the aircraft, too, and with the red and blue highlights the machine looks more attractive despite its simple NMF livery than expected.

This is the largest building to be reconstructed in the Viking village. The museum call it the longhouse and have equipped it as the house of the village leaders. With a line of posts rising from the floor to the ridge of the roof, and several other posts similar to arcade posts in aisled building, it is based on numerous excavated buildings of the Viking and earlier periods. On the school trip my job was to ensure the children kept away from the fire on the open hearth. I sketched the view from beside the fire, including the quern stone that the children had a go at turning, by the post, and the loft in the corner. It wasn't long before I had to stop drawing and move to the quern stone.

Camperdown.

Like Noorat, Camperdown is overshadowed by a volcanic cone, Mt Leura, which ensures fertile volcanic soils suitable for dairying are found in the surrounding countryside. Camperdown has become the major regional town. It was once surrounded by some of the great pastoral properties of Victoria, most of which had grand mansions erected on them befitting the great wealth and status of the early pastoralists including:

Purrumbete (the Manifold brothers, 11,000 acres) on the main highway to Geelong; Talindert (also a Manifold property, 6,000 acres) nearer to Mt Leura; West Cloven Hills ( Nicholas Cole 22,000 acres); Meningoort ( Peter McArthur, 13,000 acres); Keilambete ( John Thomson, 26,000 acres- remember the Thomson Memorial Presbyterian church in Terang?); Gala ( John & Thomas Brown, 31,500 acres); Larra ( James Kinross - the buildings are National Heritage listed); Titanga ( James Wilson and partners, 14,000 acres;) and Mount Elephant (Chirnside family of Werribee Park –more than 12,000 acres). Of all of these families it was the Manifolds of Purrumbete and Talindert who provided significant social and civic leadership to Camperdown. Thus the Main Street is Manifold Street and when Princess Alexandra visited Camperdown in 1959 she stayed at Talindert. But by then Talindert, like all the large pastoral estates, had been broken up for closer settlement around the turn of the 20th century. It was a grand house with a small acreage of around 1,700 acres. Purrumbete historic mansion recently sold in February 2013 with just 420 acres. Manifolds have served on the town and district councils, including as President of the Shire etc. It was the Manifold family who paid for the unusual clock tower in the Main Street as a memorial for their son Thomas Manifold who was killed in a hunting accident in 1896. £1,000 was given to the shire council for its erection in 1897. The tower is 103 feet high (31.4 metres) and the clock chimes regularly. The Manifolds also gave financial support to the hospital, the road to the top of Mt Leura and the extensions to the high school. Rather than large sheep properties Camperdown is now surrounded by small dairy farms or beef cattle properties.

 

The first Camperdown settlement was actually at Timboon where the old Timboon Inn, erected around 1855 still stands. A couple of shepherds lived here and a primitive bush store opened. But the ground was too swampy and so the site was moved closer to Mt Leura. Timboon was on the leasehold of the Manifold brothers of Purrumbete but in 1852 the government resumed land from the Manifolds and surveyed a town and some small acreage blocks near Mt Leura. Camperdown was named in 1854 by Governor LaTrobe when on a hunting trip with Niel Black of Glenormiston. Houses began to appear in 1857 and by 1859 it was a small town with a hotel, stores, wool agent etc. The storekeeper at Timboon moved into Camperdown in 1860 as the town began to grow. In 1858 the first Courthouse was opened with a Police Station following in 1859 and a Post office and telegraph service in 1862. As early as 1871 a local newspaper was established for the town and an early school was built in 1858. The bluestone school was erected in 1886. It was schoolchildren who planted the English Elms in the Main Street in 1876. The railway from Geelong reached the town in 1883 with much fanfare. The old Courthouse in polychromatic brickwork built in 1887 is now the museum, Information Centre and shop for souvenirs etc.

 

The Camperdown Botanic Gardens deserved special mention. Not only were they designed by our friend William Guilfoyle but they provide a wonderful lookout over the two local volcanic lakes, Bullen Merri and Gnotuk. The two lakes although very close to each other are at different altitudes. Both are maars, or water filled volcanic cones with a surrounding volcanic scoria rim. Bullen Merri is actually two maars that have coalesced. Bullen Merri is about 60 metres deep and Gnotuk about 20 metres deep. Both lakes are the same height above sea level but with a 40-metre difference in their surface heights. Lake Bullen Merri inspired well-known colonial artist Eugene von Guerard to paint it in 1858. Look for copies on the internet. Guilfoyle’s Botanic Gardens are special because they used to contain a statue of the Scottish poet and folk hero Robbie Burns but this has now been placed indoors for safekeeping. The base remains! The gardens have some unusual plants (a typical Guilfoyle trademark) including Himalayan Oak, African Holly tree (Cassine crocea also known as Elaeodendron croceum or Saffron Wood from South Africa), and an extremely rare Quercus leucotrichophora(Blackjack Oak from India) just east of the Robbie Burns statue base. The Gardens also have many fine European Linden trees.

 

Mount Leura is yet another volcanic cone affording vistas over the hedge-divided countryside. Mount Leura was an active volcano about 20,000 years ago. The reserve here was donated by the Manifold brothers. Nearby Mount Sugarloaf is a perfectly symmetric scoria cone and very much photographed because of that. The circular sheep tracks add to its interest! Both Sugarloaf and Leura are about 311 metres tall the same height as Mt Noorat. There is a deep crater separating Sugarloaf and Leura. It is estimated that Mt Leura formed in about 20 years of constant lava eruptions from a central vent which immediately cooled into scoria pocked with air holes from where gases escaped. The highest maar or volcanic cone in Western Victoria is Mount Elephant near Derrinallum at 393 metres.

 

Miles, ensuring nobody will want to share the fruits of his labor.

  

This was created by setting up 30 plastic shot glasses into a pyramid and pouring water into the top one so it would overflow into the ones below like a fountain.

 

This was lit from below by setting up the shot glasses onto a sheet of glass which was placed over a plastic container with a desk lamp pointing upwards. The trickiest aspect was protecting the desk lamp from the water but sellotaping plastic sheets to the glass ensured that water flowed over the side of the container.

 

The whole setup was situated in a bath so the water flowed away normally.

This board in the health-safety operations office was updated by health- physicists with data from daily ionization dosimeters and other monitoring instruments to ensure that no one exceeded the legally permissible radiation exposure limits. Strict limits were imposed on the amount of radiation that employees could be exposed to over time. These limits were far below the levels that were considered to cause health risks. All personnel assigned to Plum Brook Reactor Facility were monitored for radiation exposure on a continuing basis by utilizing film badge dosimetry. The frequency of the individual readouts varied from monthly to quarterly depending on the job assignment. Since there was an inherent delay in this technology, it became necessary to have current daily estimates of exposure for personnel who routinely entered radiation areas Lifetime exposure levels were also closely monitored through regular bioassay samples.

 

NASA Media Usage Guidelines

 

Credit: NASA

Image Number: C-2001-01153

Date: 2001

Baltit Fort or Balti Fort is an ancient fort in the Hunza valley in Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan.

In the past, the survival of the feudal regime of Hunza was ensured by the impressive Baltit fort, which overlooks Karimabad. The foundations of the fort date back to 700 years ago, with rebuilds and alterations over the centuries. In the 16th century the local prince married a princess from Baltistan who brought master Balti craftsmen to renovate the building as part of her dowry. The architectural style is a clear indication of buddhist Tibetan influence in Baltistan at the time.

The Mirs of Hunza abandoned the fort in 1945, and moved to a new palace down the hill. The fort started to decay which caused concern that it might possibly fall into ruin. Following a survey by the Royal Geographical Society of London a restoration programme was initiated and supported by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture Historic Cities Support Programme. The programme was completed in 1996 and the fort is now a museum run by the Baltit Heritage Trust.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Air and Marine Operations patrol Miami waters in the Midnight Express boat ensuring safety in matters of border security.

Photographer: Donna Burton

Many thanks for your visits, faves and comments. Cheers.

 

....from a walk through Oxley Creek Common. Oxley Creek Common is home to a remarkable variety of birds. An experienced observer can find as many as 70 species in one hour of observation during the spring about 10% of all Australia's bird species and several times the diversity one could find walking the suburbs. In the past eleven years over 190 species have been recorded on the Common. (Source: University of Queensland)

 

Mistletoebird in a Broad-leaved pepper tree which is a declared Class 3 pest in Australia, as it is a native of Brazil.

Scientific Name: Dicaeum hirundinaceum

Description: The small Mistletoebird is the only Australian representative of the flowerpecker family, Dicaeidae, and is also known as the Australian Flowerpecker. Males have a glossy blue-black head, wings and upperparts, a bright red throat and chest, a white belly with a central dark streak and a bright red undertail. Females are grey above, white below, with a grey streak on the belly, and a paler red undertail. Young birds resemble females but are paler and have an orange, rather than dark, bill. These birds are swift and erratic fliers, moving singly or in pairs, usually high in or above the canopy. In cold weather, the Mistletoebird can undergo torpor, which is the slowing down of bodily functions to conserve energy.

Similar species: Male Mistletoebirds may superficially resemble Red-headed Honeyeaters or Scarlet Honeyeaters in having a red and black colouring, but these two honeyeaters have red heads, while the Mistletoebird has a black head, lacks their long, curved bills, while also being stockier and smaller overall. Mistletoebirds may also be distinguished from the red robins (Petroica species) by having a much shorter tail, a totally dark head (no contrasting cap or spot) and a red undertail.

Distribution: The Mistletoebird is found throughout mainland Australia. It is also found in Papua New Guinea and eastern Indonesia.

Habitat: The Mistletoebird is found wherever mistletoe grows and is important in the dispersal of this plant species.

Seasonal movements: Nomadic out of breeding season.

Feeding: The Mistletoebird is highly adapted to its diet of mistletoe berries. It lacks the muscular gizzard (food-grinding organ) of other birds, instead having a simple digestive system through which the berries pass quickly, digesting the fleshy outer parts and excreting the sticky seeds onto branches. The seed can then germinate quickly into a new plant. In this way, the Mistletoebird ensures a constant supply of its main food. It will also catch insects, mainly to provide food for its young.

Breeding: The Mistletoebird builds a silky, pear-shaped nest with a slit-like entrance, made from matted plant down and spider web, which is suspended from a twig in the outer foliage of a tree. The female alone builds the nest and incubates the eggs, while both sexes feed the young.

Calls: Very high-pitched single note; also repeated three-note song, warbles and some mimicry.

Minimum Size: 10cm

Maximum Size: 11cm

Average size: 10cm

Average weight: 9g

Breeding season: September to March

Clutch Size: 3

Nestling Period: 15 days

(Source: www.birdsinbackyards.net)

  

© Chris Burns 2015

__________________________________________

 

All rights reserved.

 

This image may not be copied, reproduced, distributed, republished, downloaded, displayed, posted or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying and recording without my written consent.

7576.2

REFORD GARDENS | LES JARDINS DE METIS

 

MECONOPSIS BETONICIFOLIA

 

Himalayan flower imported by Elsie Reford in the early 1930s that has since become the floral emblem of the Gardens.

  

Visit : www.refordgardens.com/

 

From Wikipedia:

 

Elsie Stephen Meighen - born January 22, 1872, Perth, Ontario - and Robert Wilson Reford - born in 1867, Montreal - got married on June 12, 1894.

 

Elsie Reford was a pioneer of Canadian horticulture, creating one of the largest private gardens in Canada on her estate, Estevan Lodge in eastern Québec. Located in Grand-Métis on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, her gardens have been open to the public since 1962 and operate under the name Les Jardins de Métis and Reford Gardens.

  

Born January 22, 1872 at Perth, Ontario, Elsie Reford was the eldest of three children born to Robert Meighen and Elsie Stephen. Coming from modest backgrounds themselves, Elsie’s parents ensured that their children received a good education. After being educated in Montreal, she was sent to finishing school in Dresden and Paris, returning to Montreal fluent in both German and French, and ready to take her place in society.

 

She married Robert Wilson Reford on June 12, 1894. She gave birth to two sons, Bruce in 1895 and Eric in 1900. Robert and Elsie Reford were, by many accounts, an ideal couple. In 1902, they built a house on Drummond Street in Montreal. They both loved the outdoors and they spend several weeks a year in a log cabin they built at Lac Caribou, south of Rimouski. In the autumn they hunted for caribou, deer, and ducks. They returned in winter to ski and snowshoe. Elsie Reford also liked to ride. She had learned as a girl and spent many hours riding on the slopes of Mount Royal. And of course, there was salmon-fishing – a sport at which she excelled.

 

In her day, she was known for her civic, social, and political activism. She was engaged in philanthropic activities, particularly for the Montreal Maternity Hospital and she was also the moving force behind the creation of the Women’s Canadian Club of Montreal, the first women club in Canada. She believed it important that the women become involved in debates over the great issues of the day, « something beyond the local gossip of the hour ». Her acquaintance with Lord Grey, the Governor-General of Canada from 1904 to 1911, led to her involvement in organizing, in 1908, Québec City’s tercentennial celebrations. The event was one of many to which she devoted herself in building bridges with French-Canadian community.

 

During the First World War, she joined her two sons in England and did volunteer work at the War Office, translating documents from German into English. After the war, she was active in the Victorian Order of Nurses, the Montreal Council of Social Agencies, and the National Association of Conservative Women.

 

In 1925 at the age of 53 years, Elsie Reford was operated for appendicitis and during her convalescence, her doctor counselled against fishing, fearing that she did not have the strength to return to the river.”Why not take up gardening?” he said, thinking this a more suitable pastime for a convalescent woman of a certain age. That is why she began laying out the gardens and supervising their construction. The gardens would take ten years to build, and would extend over more than twenty acres.

 

Elsie Reford had to overcome many difficulties in bringing her garden to life. First among them were the allergies that sometimes left her bedridden for days on end. The second obstacle was the property itself. Estevan was first and foremost a fishing lodge. The site was chosen because of its proximity to a salmon river and its dramatic views – not for the quality of the soil.

 

To counter-act nature’s deficiencies, she created soil for each of the plants she had selected, bringing peat and sand from nearby farms. This exchange was fortuitous to the local farmers, suffering through the Great Depression. Then, as now, the gardens provided much-needed work to an area with high unemployment. Elsie Reford’s genius as a gardener was born of the knowledge she developed of the needs of plants. Over the course of her long life, she became an expert plantsman. By the end of her life, Elsie Reford was able to counsel other gardeners, writing in the journals of the Royal Horticultural Society and the North American Lily Society. Elsie Reford was not a landscape architect and had no training of any kind as a garden designer. While she collected and appreciated art, she claimed no talents as an artist.

 

Elsie Stephen Reford died at her Drummond Street home on November 8, 1967 in her ninety-sixth year.

 

In 1995, the Reford Gardens ("Jardins de Métis") in Grand-Métis were designated a National Historic Site of Canada, as being an excellent Canadian example of the English-inspired garden.(Wikipedia)

 

Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Reford

 

Visit : www.refordgardens.com

 

LES JARDINS DE MÉTIS

 

Créés par Elsie Reford de 1926 à 1958, ces jardins témoignent de façon remarquable de l’art paysager à l’anglaise. Disposés dans un cadre naturel, un ensemble de jardins exhibent fleurs vivaces, arbres et arbustes. Le jardin des pommetiers, les rocailles et l’Allée royale évoquent l’œuvre de cette dame passionnée d’horticulture. Agrémenté d’un ruisseau et de sentiers sinueux, ce site jouit d’un microclimat favorable à la croissance d’espèces uniques au Canada. Les pavots bleus et les lis, privilégiés par Mme Reford, y fleurissent toujours et contribuent , avec d’autres plantes exotiques et indigènes, à l’harmonie de ces lieux.

 

Created by Elsie Reford between 1926 and 1958, these gardens are an inspired example of the English art of the garden. Woven into a natural setting, a series of gardens display perennials, trees and shrubs. A crab-apple orchard, a rock garden, and the Long Walk are also the legacy of this dedicated horticulturist. A microclimate favours the growth of species found nowhere else in Canada, while the stream and winding paths add to the charm. Elsie Reford’s beloved blue poppies and lilies still bloom and contribute, with other exotic and indigenous plants, to the harmony of the site.

 

Commission des lieux et monuments historiques du Canada

Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.

Gouvernement du Canada – Government of Canada

 

© Copyright

This photo and all those in my Photostream are protected by copyright. No one may reproduce, copy, transmit or manipulate them without my written permission.

Crews ensure a nice, smooth finish to recently poured concrete for the final roadway deck section of the new SR 520 floating bridge. More work remains as crews prepare to open the new bridge to traffic in spring 2016.

 

More information about the new SR 520 floating bridge is available on our website.

 

Bikini Swimsuit Model Goddess! Blonde California Surf Girl Laguna Beach! Pretty Blue Eyes & Pink Bikini Model Goddess! Tall, Thin, & Fit! 45SURF dx4/dt=ic 45EPIC

 

My Epic Book: Photographing Women Models!

geni.us/m90Ms

Portrait, Swimsuit, Lingerie, Boudoir, Fine Art, & Fashion Photography Exalting the Venus Goddess Archetype: How to Shoot Epic ...

 

All the photography, swimsuits, gold 45 revolver and 45surf logos, clothing designs, and lingerie are composed and designed in accordance with the golden ratio and divine proportion!

 

Dr. E’s Golden Ratio Principle: The golden ratio exalts beauty because the number is a characteristic of the mathematically and physically most efficient manners of growth and distribution, on both evolutionary and purely physical levels. The golden ratio ensures that the proportions and structure of that which came before provide the proportions and structure of that which comes after, thusly providing symmetry over not only space but time, and exalting life’s foundational dynamic symmetry. Robust, ordered, symmetric growth is naturally associated with health and beauty, and thus we evolved to perceive the golden ratio harmonies as inherently beautiful, as we saw and felt their presence in all vital growth and life. In the salient features and proportions of humans and nature alike, from the distribution of our facial features and bones to the arrangements of petals, leaves, and sunflowers seeds. As ratios between Fibonacci Numbers offer the closest whole-number approximations to the golden ratio, and as seeds, cells, leaves, bones, and other physical entities appear in whole numbers, the Fibonacci Numbers oft appear in the arrangement of nature’s discrete elements as “growth’s numbers.” From the dawn of time, humanity sought to salute their gods in art and temples exalting the same proportion by which they and all their vital sustenance, as well as all the flowers and nature’s epic beauty, had been created—the golden ratio.

 

Exalt your photography with Golden Ratio Compositions!

geni.us/eeA1

Golden Ratio Compositions & Secret Sacred Geometry for Photography, Fine Art, & Landscape Photographers: How to Exalt Art with Leonardo da Vinci's, Michelangelo's!

 

Support epic fine art! 45surf ! Bitcoin: 1FMBZJeeHVMu35uegrYUfEkHfPj5pe9WNz

 

Light Time Dimension Theory's dx4/dt=ic graces all the clothes, swimsuits, and lingerie!

 

Proof of Light Time Dimension Theory's principle of a fourth expanding dimension:

 

Proof of ltd’s principle:

1. The velocity of every object through

Spacetime is c.

2. The velocity of light through the

Three spatial dimensions is always c.

3. If light had any velocity through x4,

Light’s total velocity would not be c.

4. Ergo light remains stationary in x4.

5. Thus light tracks and traces the

Movement and character of x4.

6. As light is a spherically-symmetric,

Probabilistic wavefront expanding

At c, x4 expands at the rate of c in a

Spherically-symmetric manner,

Distributing nonlocality.

QED

 

Beautiful Angel Goddess The Birth of Venus! White Summer Dress! 45Epic 45SURF Swimsuit Bikini Model! Beautiful Golden Ratio Composition Photography Surf Goddesses! Athletic Action Portraits of Swimsuit Bikini Models! High Res Venus! Sexy Hot dx4/dt=ic !

Pretty Bikini Swimsuit Model Goddess! Beautiful Blonde California Surf Girl Beach Goddess! Sexy Hot Fitness Model! Tall, Thin, & Fit! 45SURF dx4/dt=ic 45EPIC

 

My Epic Book: Photographing Women Models!

geni.us/m90Ms

Portrait, Swimsuit, Lingerie, Boudoir, Fine Art, & Fashion Photography Exalting the Venus Goddess Archetype: How to Shoot Epic ...

 

All the photography, swimsuits, gold 45 revolver and 45surf logos, clothing designs, and lingerie are composed and designed in accordance with the golden ratio and divine proportion!

 

Dr. E’s Golden Ratio Principle: The golden ratio exalts beauty because the number is a characteristic of the mathematically and physically most efficient manners of growth and distribution, on both evolutionary and purely physical levels. The golden ratio ensures that the proportions and structure of that which came before provide the proportions and structure of that which comes after, thusly providing symmetry over not only space but time, and exalting life’s foundational dynamic symmetry. Robust, ordered, symmetric growth is naturally associated with health and beauty, and thus we evolved to perceive the golden ratio harmonies as inherently beautiful, as we saw and felt their presence in all vital growth and life. In the salient features and proportions of humans and nature alike, from the distribution of our facial features and bones to the arrangements of petals, leaves, and sunflowers seeds. As ratios between Fibonacci Numbers offer the closest whole-number approximations to the golden ratio, and as seeds, cells, leaves, bones, and other physical entities appear in whole numbers, the Fibonacci Numbers oft appear in the arrangement of nature’s discrete elements as “growth’s numbers.” From the dawn of time, humanity sought to salute their gods in art and temples exalting the same proportion by which they and all their vital sustenance, as well as all the flowers and nature’s epic beauty, had been created—the golden ratio.

 

Exalt your photography with Golden Ratio Compositions!

geni.us/eeA1

Golden Ratio Compositions & Secret Sacred Geometry for Photography, Fine Art, & Landscape Photographers: How to Exalt Art with Leonardo da Vinci's, Michelangelo's!

 

Support epic fine art! 45surf ! Bitcoin: 1FMBZJeeHVMu35uegrYUfEkHfPj5pe9WNz

 

Light Time Dimension Theory's dx4/dt=ic graces all the clothes, swimsuits, and lingerie!

 

Proof of Light Time Dimension Theory's principle of a fourth expanding dimension:

 

Proof of ltd’s principle:

1. The velocity of every object through

Spacetime is c.

2. The velocity of light through the

Three spatial dimensions is always c.

3. If light had any velocity through x4,

Light’s total velocity would not be c.

4. Ergo light remains stationary in x4.

5. Thus light tracks and traces the

Movement and character of x4.

6. As light is a spherically-symmetric,

Probabilistic wavefront expanding

At c, x4 expands at the rate of c in a

Spherically-symmetric manner,

Distributing nonlocality.

QED

  

Ensuring crew safety continues throughout the mission, including systems used to assist with returning astronauts to land. Off the coast of Atlantic Beach, North Carolina, engineers tested the crew module uprighting system (CMUS) to ensure the capsule can be oriented right-side up once it returns from its deep space missions.

Every ward had a matron. The matron was responsible to ensure that each patient was cared for with diligence and compassion. In the late 19th century there was a well know ward matron, Sally Riktus. Miss Riktus spent almost 40 years of her career on the same ward, leaving the hospital only to make a yearly trip to see her elderly mother in Syracuse.

The patients on the ward called her Sargeant Sal behind her back because of her military like way of managing the ward. She held morning and evening inspections of each patient's room. When she spotted something out of place she loudly declared the room to be in disarray and banished the patient to isolation to consider his error.

Miss Riktus had an apartment in the staff wing of the hospital. It wasn't unusual for her to take a midnight stroll through the ward to check up on the staff. Occasionally she would catch them playing cards late at night. She considered this frivolous and was known to put them to work scrubbing the ward bathrooms. It wasn't unusual for her staff to turn over every year or two.

Miss Riktus died during an unhappy day on the ward in 1903 and was buried in the cemetery behind the asylum. They say she still walks the wards, inspecting the patient's rooms and bath facilities.

 

Check this out in the light box or large on black. :D

To ensure passengers don't board the Worklink W4 with NCT tickets, the first vehicle choice for the service now is the standard fare during the week.... One of the Citylink 1 OmniDekkas, how boring!!

 

973 exits Clifton Bridge North with the 1315 departure from Nottingham to the Boots Factory. Unsure why W4 isn't shown on the display any more, anyone any ideas??

Following Governor Nathan Deal’s appointment of State Sen. Jim Butterworth as the new Adjutant General of Georgia to replace retiring Maj. Gen. William T. Nesbitt, Gen. Butterworth is meeting with current senior leaders of the organization to receive briefs on ongoing operations, missions, challenges and goals.

 

Pictured here, Maj. Gen. Jim Butterworth (Center), Georgia's incoming Adjutant General, and Russell Carlson, the new Deputy Adjutant General (center right), receive a briefing from (left to right) Col. Peter VanAmburg, Georgia Army Guard chief of staff; Chief Warrant Officer 5 Paul Huber, Georgia Army Guard command chief warrant officer; Maj. Gen. Maria L. Britt, Georgia Army Guard Commander; retired Col. (Ret.) Don Venn, assistant adjutant general-operations; and Col. Tom Blackstock, Georgia Army Guard operations and training officer.

 

Butterworth has also assembled a Transition Team to facilitate the education, establishment of relationships, and policy review necessary to ensure a smooth transition of responsibility for the Georgia Department of Defense.

 

The Transition Team met for the first time Sept. 14 at Clay National Guard Center in Marietta to begin preparing the incoming Adjutant General for the Sept. 30 Change of Responsibility ceremony.

 

"I consider the opportunity to lead the Guard a deep honor and a privilege," said Gen. Butterworth. "I deeply respect each and every one of you, and I want you to know that I will work every day to serve you and the Georgia Guard."

 

General Butterworth gave his initial intent and direction to the assembled Air and Army Guard leaders, and received briefings from them on operations, budgetary, and personnel matters necessary to keep moving through the transition.

 

“Assembling this team of Air, Army and Joint leaders has provided an opportunity for a world-class orientation of our new TAG to the organization,” said Col. Peter VanAmburgh, the Georgia Army National Guard Chief of Staff.

 

The Transition Team will continue to meet in preparation for the the Change of Responsibility ceremony to be held at the Clay National Guard Center Sept. 30, 2011.

Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.

 

Whilst her mistress is enjoying a Christmas and New Year visit with her parents at Glynes, the grand Georgian family seat of the Chetwynds in Wiltshire, Edith, Lettice’s maid is using her time before Lettice returns to give the flat a thorough dusting and clean along with the help of Mrs. Boothby, the charwoman* who comes to help Edith with all the harder jobs around the flat. Whilst Mrs. Boothby tackles the makeup stains in Lettice’s bathroom, Edith has borrowed a small ladder from Robert, the Cavendish Mews’ residential handyman, and is dusting the crystal chandelier in the dining room. She gaily hums ‘The Parade of the Wooden Soldiers’** which she had enjoyed listening to on New Year’s Eve after Frank brought a gramophone around to her parents’ house in Harlesden where they held a small party. The trade union friend Frank borrowed the gramophone from also supplied a whole range of wonderful shellac records which everyone at the party took turns selecting from to play. Thanks to his generosity, Edith and Frank had danced their way around her parent’s kitchen, foxtrotting into 1925. She smiles as she remembers the highlight of spending so much time with Frank that evening, even if her parents and friends were right there with them. She’s also glad that, thanks to Mrs. Boothby’s wise counsel, she has reconciled with the idea that if Frank is offered a job as a manager or assistant manager of a grocers in one of the new Metroland*** suburbs being bult in Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex, as his wife, she will join him. As she runs a damp cloth over the pendeloques**** and festoons***** of crystal, she wonders, and quietly hopes that Frank will propose to her in 1925.

 

“’Ere Edith dearie,” Mrs. Boothby calls from the dining room floor below. “Whatchoo ‘ummin’ so cheerfully ‘bout?” She utters one of her deep fruity, phlegm filled coughs a she speaks. “Finkin’ ‘bout Frank was you?”

 

“Never you mind what I was thinking about, Mrs. Boothby!” Edith answers back, feeling the hotness of a blush rising up her neck and filling her face.

 

“Aye! Aye!” Mrs. Boothby points a gnarled and bony, careworn finger at Edith’s blushing figure up the ladder. “So, you was finkin’ of ‘im!”

 

Edith sighs. “I just wish I knew when he was going to propose, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Ahh! ‘E will, dearie, when ‘e’s good and ready! You’ll see!”

 

“I think I need one of those clairvoyants I see adverting discreetly in the newspapers.” Edith mutters. “They’ll give me the answers I seek.”

 

“Ahh me! Always in a rush ain’t you?”

 

“What do you mean, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Just sit back and enjoy the expectation, Edith dearie! That’s the best part of bein’ in love!” the old Cockney says with another fruity cough before sighing deeply. “What it is to be young an’ in love.”

 

“Oh, you do talk some rot sometimes, Mrs. Boothby!” Edith scoffs dismissively, her face growing redder. “I’ll have you know that I was simply humming to pass the time more pleasurably.” she continues, trying to cover up Mrs. Boothby’s correct assessment of her thoughts. “Cleaning chandeliers is no easy job, you know.”

 

“Try cleaning Miss Lettice’s barfroom!” the old Cockney char exclaims, arching her back, and rubbing the base of her spine, the opening of her lungs eliciting a few more heavy coughs. “Lawd knows what’s in that muck Miss Lettice wears on ‘er face, but it marks the porcelain good ‘n’ proppa. I only cleaned in there wiv Vim****** a bit before Christmas! Whatchee done, slappin’ that stuff on ‘er pretty face for, anyroad?”

 

“Miss Lettice had a few parties to attend before Christmas, Mrs. Boothby, especially those American Carters’ Thanksgiving Christmas ball in Park Lane*******.”

 

“Were it fancy dress then, this party of ‘ers?” Mrs. Boothby asks.

 

“No, just a formal ball, although by all accounts there was quite a to do. Why do you ask, Mrs. Boothby?”

 

“Well, I just fought, what wiv all them red an’ black marks on ‘er vanity, she must ‘ave slapped on a lot of makeup an’ gone in fancy dress.” Mrs. Boothby opines.

 

“Yes!” Edith giggles girlishly. “As a clown!”

 

The two women begin laughing, a little at first, then their peals growing more raucous until Mrs. Boothby starts coughing again. Doubling over as her whole wiry body is wracked with coughing, she struggles to catch her breath.

 

Edith scrambles down the ladder. “Let me get you some water.” she exclaims, rushing through the green baize door to the kitchen before Mrs. Boothby can try to say anything. She returns a few moments later with a tumbler of water. “Here!” She thrusts the glass into the old woman’s shaking hand. “Drink this.”

 

“Fank… you… Edith… dearie.” Mrs. Boothby manages to say in a horse whisper between coughs as she gratefully lifts the glass to her dry lips and gulps the water shakily, pausing every now and then to elicit another heavy cough.

 

“Come,” Edith says kindly. “Sit yourself down here.” She pulls out one of the black japanned dining chairs from the oblong table.

 

“But.. Miss Lettice…” the old woman gasps.

 

“Miss Lettice isn’t here to worry about you sitting on one of her precious dining chairs, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith assures her. “And besides,” She guides the old woman carefully down onto the white satin cushioned seat. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind, even if she did know.”

 

The old woman settles against the wooden slats of the chair’s back and slowly catches her breath.

 

“That’s it.” Edith says soothingly, crouched before the old woman, rubbing the top of Mrs. Boothby’s hand lightly with her fingers. “Take a few deep breaths.” When the old Cockney coughs heavily a few more times, Edith pushes the glass across the black polished surface of the table. “Drink some more water, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Fanks.” Mrs. Boothby huffs.

 

Once she has finished the glass, Edith returns to the kitchen to refill it, commanding Mrs. Boothby to remain seated in her absence. When she returns with the tumbler full of fresh water again, Mrs. Boothby asks, “So what ‘appened?”

 

“What do you mean, Mrs. Boothby? “ Edith asks, taking the seat at the top of the table, diagonally across from the old Cockney charwoman. “We were taking and then, you just started coughing.”

 

“Not me, ya berk********.” Mrs. Boothby says raspily. “Miss Lettice!”

 

“What do you mean, Miss Lettice?”

 

“You said there was much ado at that fancy American party Miss Lettice went to.” Mrs. Boothby elucidates. “What ‘appened?”

 

“Well,” Edith says with a shaky intake of breath. “It was all over the newspapers the next day.”

 

“What was, Edith dearie?”

 

“Well, the hostess, Mrs. Georgie Carter used to be not so well off before she married Mr. Carter. I remember once Miss Lettice asked me to box up a few bits and pieces from her wardrobe she’d barely worn, or decided she didn’t like, and when Mrs. Carter, when she was still Miss Kitson-Fahey that is, came around for luncheon, Miss Lettice told her that she was going to give the box to charity and would Miss Kitson-Fahey please get rid of it for her.”

 

“So?”

 

“So, of course the clothes were really meant for Miss Kitson-Fahey to wear. Miss Kitson-Fahey and Miss Lettice were around the same size you see, and her clothes, even her everyday ones, were a bit shabby and old fashioned, and the next time she came to luncheon she was wearing some of them, only with the buttons changed or a new trim on them to try and disguise where they came from originally.” Edith nods. “And Miss Lettice never said anything to her.”

 

“But what’s that got to do wiv the party, Edith Dearie?”

 

“Well, now that Miss Kitson-Fahey is Mrs. Georgie Carter, well, she’s richer than Croesus********* isn’t she? So, when she wants anything now, she just gets it. And she decided that all the Bright Young Things********** like Miss Lettice at the party, should go on a scavenger hunt.”

 

“A what?” Mrs. Boothby asks.

 

“A scavenger hunt, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith replies. “You know, where the host or hostess of a party makes up a list of items and then their guests have to go and find them. Bert and I used to play it at each other’s birthday parties when we were little, with our friends and the local children who we invited. Mum would make a list of things that would be easily found, like a currant bun, because we were having them for birthday tea, or some flowers that grew in the garden, a peg from the laundry basket, or a certain toy, and we’d break off into groups and try and bring back as many things on the list Mum gave us as we could.”

 

“Sounds daft to me.” Mrs. Boothby grumbles.

 

“Well, Mrs. Carter’s list must have been daft because people from the party were caught all over London in the early morning doing ridiculous things. Two men from the party, drunk as lords*********** according to the newspapers, were arrested trying to get across to Duck Island************ in St James Park to steal swan feathers. Another party guest was detained for being a public nuisance after she tried to scale the wall at Buckingham Palace in order to steal the wellies************* of the King’s head gardener, and Tallulah Bankhead************** the American actress appearing in the West End was cautioned after she was caught trying to steal a sheep from a poor distressed farmer in the wee hours as he drove his flock up New Bridge Street to the Smithfield Markets!”

 

“What?” Mrs. Boothby’s eyes grow wide. “Daft that is! What people want to do, goin’ ‘round getting’ into trouble wiv Bobbies*************** an’ bovverin’ good law-abidin’ folk like that for?”

 

“For a lark, Mrs. Boothby!” Edith exclaims. “They were all things on Mrs. Carter’s scavenger hunt list.”

 

“What? A live sheep?” Mrs. Boothby scoffs.

 

“And swan feathers and wellies from the King’s gardener.”

 

“I ‘ope Miss Lettice didn’t go in for none of that silliness.”

 

“Well, I can’t say she didn’t, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith admits with a downward gaze. “But at least she had the sense not to end up in the newspapers like Ms. Bankhead or the others did. She got in very late that evening, or should I say early in morning after the party, because I was already up and having my breakfast when she came stumbling in through the front door with her sister Mrs. Lanchenbury, wearing a bobby’s helmet!”

 

“No!” gasps Mrs. Boothby, causing her to cough again.

 

“Drink some more water, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith insists before going on. “Miss Lettice handed me the helmet from her head when I walked into the entrance hall, and told me to dispose of it as I saw fit, as she and Mrs. Lanchenbury had no further need of it. Then they both giggled and stumbled away into Miss Lettice’s bedroom, where I found them a few hours later, fast asleep, still fully dressed, lying across her bed!” She shakes her head. “I don’t know what other mischiefs they had been up to, but Miss Lettice’s grey crêpe romain**************** frock was covered in marks and stains, some of which I can’t get out.”

 

“Well, if she flings it out, you can salvage some bits off it, I’m sure, Edith dearie.” Mrs. Boothby says comfortingly.

 

“Oh, I intend to, if she does.” Edith agrees with a shallow but emphatic nod. “Which I think she will do.”

 

“You’ll make me and your mum proud, dearie!”

 

“Waste not, want not.”

 

“Exactly! And the bobby’s ‘at?” Mrs. Boothby croaks. “Whatchoo do wiv that then?”

 

“Well, I decided I couldn’t put it in our dustbins, in case anyone found it there! I didn’t want the household involved, and I certainly didn’t want to be incriminated,”

 

“So?”

 

“So I put it in Mrs. Clifford’s dustbin downstairs instead. Myra was fit to be tied when she found it. I heard her scream all the way up the tradesman’s stairwell. Next thing I knew, she was on my threshold, helmet in hand, thumping on the door, causing quite a scene!”

 

“I ‘ope you gave ‘er what for!”

 

“I opened the door, and when she accused Miss Lettice of putting it in her mistress’ dustbin, I told her that Miss Lettice was sleeping and had been since she came home from the party, so she couldn’t have put it in there, and could she please be quiet so Miss Lettice and Mrs. Lanchenbury could sleep undisturbed.” Edith then adds with a smug smile, “And I wasn’t lying. Miss Lettice didn’t put it in her dustbin.”

 

The two women chuckle heartily together over the incident.

 

“That Myra’s a toffee-nosed snob of a maid, anyway,” Mrs. Boothby smiles.

 

“Just like Mrs. Clifford.” Edith opines.

 

“It couldn’t ‘ve ‘appened to a nicer person. She’s no…”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

The telephone in the drawing room starts ringing, stopping Mrs. Boothby mid sentence.

 

Edith looks through the double doors into the adjoining drawing room. “That infernal contraption!” she mutters.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“They ain’t goin’ away, you know, Edith dearie.” Mrs. Boothby remarks sagely. “Miss Lettice ain’t the only one wiv one of them fings in their ‘omes. They’s even turnin’ up on the streets nah, in red booths*****************, you know?”

 

Edith gets up from the table, and leaving Mrs. Boothby where she sits with her half emptied tumbler of water, walks into the drawing room and up to the black japanned occasional table upon which the silver and Bakelite telephone continues to trill loudly.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“I should knock you over, next time I’m dusting. Let’s hear you ring then, infernal contraption!”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“I can answer it for you, Edith dearie.” Mrs. Boothby offers, knowing that Edith will never accept her offer. “If you like.”

 

Edith hates answering the telephone. It’s one of the few jobs in her position as Lettice’s maid that she wishes she didn’t have to do. Whenever she has to answer it, which is quite often considering how frequently her mistress is out and about, there is usually some uppity caller at the other end of the phone, whose uppity accent only seems to intensify when they realise they are speaking to ‘the hired help’ as they abruptly demand Lettice’s whereabouts.

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“Come on now Edith!” she tells herself, smoothing her suddenly clammy hands down the apron covering her print morning dress. “It’s only a machine, and the person at the other end can’t hurt you, even if they are angry that you aren’t her.”

 

BBBBRRRINGGG!

 

“Mayfair 432, the Honourable Miss Lettice Chetwynd’s residence.” Edith answers with a slight quiver to her voice. Her whole body clenches and she closes her eyes as she waits for the barrage of anger from some duchess or other titled lady, affronted at having to address the maid. A female voice speaks down the line. “Oh Mrs. Hatchett, how do you do. What a pleasant surprise! Yes, this is Edith, Miss Chetwynd’s maid.” She smiles and her anxiety dissipates.

 

Lettice decorated some of the principal rooms of Mrs. Hatchett’s house, ‘The Gables’ in Rotherfield and Mark Cross in Sussex, in 1921. Even though Mrs. Hatchett is a little overbearing, it is only because she is enthusiastic. Edith likes her because Mrs. Hatchett, being a banker cum Labour politician’s wife, and formerly a London West End actress, has not been born with a pedigree that finds talking to the staff offensive, like so many other callers on Lettice’s telephone.

 

Edith listens. “No. No, I’m afraid that Miss Chetwynd isn’t at home, Mrs. Hatchett.” She listens to the disappointed response. “She’s still with her family in Wiltshire.” She listens. “Yes, I can have her telephone you in Sussex. I’m quite sure Miss Chetwynd still has…” Mrs. Hatchett cuts Edith short and she listens again. “Queen Anne’s Gate******************? Really? Oh congratulations, Mrs. Hatchett.” Edith listens again. “Oh! Oh well I’m quite sure she would delighted to do that for you, but not being privy to her diary, I shall have to get her to telephone you.” She listens again. “Yes, I’d just take it down. One moment whilst I fetch a pencil and paper, Mrs. Hatchett.” Edith puts the receiver down on the table next to the telephone base and brushes her clammy palms down her apron for a second time. The then picks up the pencil atop the pad of paper that Lettice left for her to jot any messages on from the lower tier of the table. Picking up the receiver in her left hand she stands poised with pencil in hand to write and says, “I’m ready for your message now Mrs. Hatchett. Please go ahead. She writes a message based on Mrs. Hatchett’s response. “Yes. Yes, I’ll make sure Miss Chetwynd receives your message when she returns from the country. Very good. Good day Mrs. Hatchett.”

 

Edith hangs up the receiver and sighs with relief. “Damn infernal contraption!” she mutters as she glares at the telephone shining brightly under the light of the electrified chandelier above.

 

“See!” Mrs. Boothby says from her place at the dining room table. “That weren’t so bad, were it, Edith dearie?”

 

“That’s only because it was Mrs. Hatchett, Mrs. Boothby.” Edith sighs. “She’s lovely in comparison to some of those toffee-nosed ladies and duchesses who telephone here.”

 

“Ain’t she the wife of Charlie Hatchett the politician?”

 

“That’s right, Mrs. Boothby. Mr. Hatchett is a Labour MP, and was part of Mr. MacDonald’s government last year.”

 

“E’s the MP for Tower ‘Amlets*******************, and that includes me!” Mrs. Boothby says excitedly. “Fancy that! Cor! What a small world. Eh?”

 

“Mr. and Mrs. Hatchett have just taken possession of a townhouse in Queen Anne’s Gate,” Edith says, perusing the note she has written down on the pad for Lettice. “And she wants Miss Lettice to redecorate the drawing room for her.”

 

“Queen Anne’s Gate, you say?” Mrs. Boothby says. When Edith nods in confirmation, the old Cockney woman eyes her sharply before going on, “It ain’t right that.” She mutters as she shakes her head.

 

“What’s not right, Mrs. Boothby?” Edith asks.

 

“That ain’t!” the old Cockney woman protests. “That fancy new ‘ouse in Queen Anne’s Gate!”

 

“Well, I suppose Mr. Hatchett needs to be close to the Houses of Parliament.”

 

“Nah, e’s supposed to be a Labour MP, ain’t ‘e?”

 

“He is. Mrs. Boothby. I just said so. Didn’t you hear me?”

 

“And that’s the workers’ party, ain’t it?”

 

“Yes, Mrs. Boothby, or so Frank tells me.”

 

“Well, Mr. ‘Atchett ain’t no lord like some of them uvver politicians.” Mrs. Boothby opines before taking another sip of water. “‘E says e’s just an ordinary man, like us, Edith dearie.”

 

“Oh, I don’t know if I’d say Mr. Hatchett was quite like us, Mrs. Boothby, even if he does.” Edith scoffs lightly as she replaces the pad and pencil back on the lower shelf of the table on which the telephone stands. “He’s a banker, or rather he was before he became a politician. That doesn’t make him a lord, but it puts him a rung or two above you and I, Mrs. Boothby.”

 

“Well ‘e said ‘e was just an ‘ard workin’ man, like anyone else.” Mr. Boothby crumples up her nose in disgust. “But I don’t fink it’s right for ‘im to say that if ‘e’s goin’ to live in Queen Anne’s Gate in a fancy big ‘ouse like them lawds, even if it is decorated by Miss Lettice, and yet some of ‘is constituents is the poorest people in the land!”

 

Edith laughs loudly. “Are you suggesting he and Mrs. Hatchett should live in an ordinary two-up two-down******************** like my parents?”

 

“That’d be a step up for me!” Mrs. Boothby retorts. “I only got two rooms for Ken ‘n’ me, and the privvy’s a shared one dahwn the end of the rookery*********************.”

 

“Somehow, no matter how egalitarian she is, I don’t think Mrs. Hatchett would like to live in a semi-detached********************** villa in Metroland*********************** like Frank and I hope to someday.” Edith shakes her head. “And I think Mr. Hatchett is a man of pretensions, so I’m sure he won’t want to live in even the best rooms available in Poplar. Queen Anne’s Gate is so close to the Palace of Westminster that it will be very handy for Mr. Hatchett to get to the House easily, and I’m sure Mrs. Hatchett will be entertaining dignitaries quite a lot as an MP’s wife.”

 

“Well,” Mrs. Boothby mutters. “I’ll be ‘avin words wiv Mr. I’m-just-the-same-as-you-‘Atchett, next time I sees ‘im out there campaignin’! I shall give ‘im a good piece of mind! Lyin’ like that to poor folk like me who can’t even ‘ave their own private privy! It’s a scandal, that is!”

 

“Yes,” Edith giggles. “Almost as scandalous as Mrs. Carter’s scavenger hunt.”

 

*A charwoman, chargirl, or char, jokingly charlady, is an old-fashioned occupational term, referring to a paid part-time worker who comes into a house or other building to clean it for a few hours of a day or week, as opposed to a maid, who usually lives as part of the household within the structure of domestic service. In the 1920s, chars usually did all the hard graft work that paid live-in domestics would no longer do as they looked for excuses to leave domestic service for better paying work in offices and factories.

 

**’The Parade of the Tin Soldiers’, also known as ‘The Parade of the Wooden Soldiers’, is an instrumental musical character piece, in the form of a popular jaunty march, written by German composer Leon Jessel, in 1897. In 1922, the instrumental version of ‘The Parade of the Wooden Soldiers’ was a hit single performed by Carl Fenton's Orchestra. Hit versions were also recorded by the Vincent Lopez Orchestra in 1922 and by Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra in 1923.

 

***Metroland is a name given to the suburban areas that were built to the north-west of London in the counties of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex in the early part of the Twentieth Century that were served by the Metropolitan Railway. The railway company was in the privileged position of being allowed to retain surplus land; from 1919 this was developed for housing by the nominally independent Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited (MRCE). The term "Metroland" was coined by the Met's marketing department in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide. It promoted a dream of a modern home in beautiful countryside with a fast railway service to central London until the Met was absorbed into the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933.

 

****The hanging crystals on a chandelier are called pendeloques, sometimes spelled pendalogues. They can also be referred to simply as prisms.

 

*****The clusters of crystal trimmings which hang down from the chandelier in a basket are known as a festoon. These can be a few strands or many clusters. Another name for them is a garland.

 

******Vim was a common cleaning agent, used in any Edwardian household. Vim scouring powder was created by William Hesketh Lever (1st Viscount Leverhulme) and introduced to the market in 1904. It was produced at Port Sunlight in Wirrel, Merseyside, a model village built by Lever Brothers for the workers of their factories which produced the popular soap brands Lux, Lifebuoy and Sunlight.

 

*******Park Lane is a dual carriageway road in the City of Westminster in Central London. It is part of the London Inner Ring Road and runs from Hyde Park Corner in the south to Marble Arch in the north. It separates Hyde Park to the west from Mayfair to the east. The road was originally a simple country lane on the boundary of Hyde Park, separated by a brick wall. Aristocratic properties appeared during the late 18th century, including Breadalbane House, Somerset House, and Londonderry House. The road grew in popularity during the 19th century after improvements to Hyde Park Corner and more affordable views of the park, which attracted the nouveau riche to the street and led to it becoming one of the most fashionable roads to live on in London. Notable residents included the 1st Duke of Westminster's residence at Grosvenor House, the Dukes of Somerset at Somerset House, and the British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli at No. 93. Other historic properties include Dorchester House, Brook House and Dudley House. In the 20th century, Park Lane became well known for its luxury hotels, particularly The Dorchester, completed in 1931, which became closely associated with eminent writers and international film stars. Flats and shops began appearing on the road, including penthouse flats. Several buildings suffered damage during World War II, yet the road still attracted significant development, including the Park Lane Hotel and the London Hilton on Park Lane, and several sports car garages. A number of properties on the road today are owned by some of the wealthiest businessmen from the Middle East and Asia.

 

********The full phrase Berkeley (or Berkshire) hunt has been shortened to "berk," which has become a milder slang word of its own, but was originally used by Cockneys. Berk means idiot, as in "you're being a berk."

 

*********This term to be richer to Croesus, implies great wealth, and alludes to Croesus, the legendary King of Lydia and supposedly the richest man on earth. The simile was first recorded in English in 1577.

 

**********The Bright Young Things, or Bright Young People, was a nickname given by the tabloid press to a group of Bohemian young aristocrats and socialites in 1920s London.

 

***********The idiom "to be drunk as a lord" is a somewhat humorous and old-fashioned expression that is used to describe someone who is extremely drunk. The origin of this phrase likely dates back to a time when the British aristocracy, often referred to as "lords," were known for their heavy drinking habits and lavish banquets.

 

************Originally built in St James Royal Park in 1665 on the site of a duck decoy, the island is both a sanctuary and a breeding ground for the collection of wildfowl and other birds. There are approximately seventeen species of bird regularly breed in the park, including mute swans and a resident colony of pelicans. Duck Island also houses the water treatment facilities and pumps for the lake and fountain.

 

*************The term Wellington boot comes from Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, who instructed his shoemaker to create the boot by modifying the design of the Hessian boot. The terms gumboot and rubber boot are both derived from the rubber modern Wellington boots are made from, with the term "gum" coming from gum rubber.

 

**************Tallulah Bankhead was an American actress. Primarily an actress of the stage, Bankhead also appeared in several films including an award-winning performance in Alfred Hitchcock's ‘Lifeboat’. In 1923, she made her debut on the London stage at Wyndham's Theatre. She appeared in over a dozen plays in London over the next eight years, most famously in ‘The Dancers’ and at the Lyric as Jerry Lamar in Avery Hopwood's ‘The Gold Diggers’. Her fame as an actress was ensured in 1924 when she played Amy in Sidney Howard's ‘They Knew What They Wanted’. The show won the 1925 Pulitzer Prize. Whilst living in London, Bankhead became one of the members of Cecil Beaton’s coterie of hedonistic Bright Young Things. She also had a brief but successful career on radio later in life and made appearances on television.

 

***************The term “bobby” is not now widely used in Britain to describe the police (except by the police, who still commonly use it to refer to themselves), though it can occur with a mixture of affection and slight irony in the phrase "village bobby", referring to the local community police officer. However, it was very common in mid 1920s London. It is derived from Robert Peel (Bobby being the usual nickname for Robert), the founder of the Metropolitan Police.

 

****************Crêpe romain is a lightweight semi-sheer luxury fabric, originally of silk with a dull lustre and a wrinkled texture.

 

*****************The first standard public telephone kiosk introduced by the United Kingdom Post Office was produced in concrete in 1921 and was designated K1 (Kiosk No.1). The Post Office had taken over almost all of the country's telephone network in 1912. The red telephone box K1 (Kiosk No.2), was the result of a competition in 1924 to design a kiosk that would be acceptable to the London Metropolitan Boroughs which had hitherto resisted the Post Office's effort to erect K1 kiosks on their streets.

 

******************Queen Anne’s Gate is a street in Westminster, London. Many of the buildings are Grade I listed, known for their Queen Anne architecture. Simon Bradley and Nikolaus Pevsner described the Gate’s early Eighteenth Century houses as “the best of their kind in London.” The street’s proximity to the Palace of Westminster made it a popular residential area for politicians.

 

*******************The London constituency of Tower Hamlets includes such areas and historic towns as (roughly from west to east) Spitalfields, Whitechapel, Bethnal Green, Wapping, Shadwell, Mile End, Stepney, Limehouse, Old Ford, Bow, Bromley, Poplar, and the Isle of Dogs (with Millwall, the West India Docks, and Cubitt Town), making it a majority working class constituency in 1925 when this story is set. Tower Hamlets included some of the worst slums and societal issues of inequality and poverty in England at that time.

 

********************Two-up two-down is a type of small house with two rooms on the ground floor and two bedrooms upstairs. There are many types of terraced houses in the United Kingdom, and these are among the most modest. The first two-up two-down terraces were built in the 1870s, but the concept of them made up the backbone of the Metroland suburban expansions of the 1920s with streets lined with rows of two-up two-down semi-detached houses in Mock Tudor, Jacobethan, Arts and Crafts and inter-war Art Deco styles bastardised from the aesthetic styles created by the likes of English Arts and Crafts Movement designers like William Morris and Charles Voysey.

 

*********************A rookery is a dense collection of housing, especially in a slum area. The rookeries created in Victorian times in London’s East End were notorious for their cheapness, filth and for being overcrowded.

 

**********************A semi-detached house (known more commonly simply as a semi) is a house joined to another house on one side only by a common wall.

 

***********************Metroland is a name given to the suburban areas that were built to the north-west of London in the counties of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Middlesex in the early part of the Twentieth Century that were served by the Metropolitan Railway. The railway company was in the privileged position of being allowed to retain surplus land; from 1919 this was developed for housing by the nominally independent Metropolitan Railway Country Estates Limited (MRCE). The term "Metroland" was coined by the Met's marketing department in 1915 when the Guide to the Extension Line became the Metro-land guide. It promoted a dream of a modern home in beautiful countryside with a fast railway service to central London until the Met was absorbed into the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933.

 

This 1920s upper-class drawing room is different to what you may think at first glance, for it is made up entirely of 1:12 size dollhouse miniatures including items from my own childhood.

 

Fun things to look for in this tableau include:

 

The black Bakelite and silver telephone is a 1:12 miniature of a model introduced around 1919. It is two centimetres wide and two centimetres high. The receiver can be removed from the cradle, and the curling chord does stretch out.

 

Edith’s feather duster, lying on the table, I made myself using fledgling feathers (very spring) which I picked up off the lawn one day thinking they would come in handy in my miniatures collection sometime. I bound them with thread to the handle which is made from a fancy ended toothpick!

 

The vase of red roses on the Art Deco occasional table is beautifully made by hand by the Doll House Emporium.

 

Lettice’s drawing room is furnished with beautiful J.B.M. miniatures. The Art Deco tub chair upholstered in white embossed fabric is made of black japanned wood and has a removable cushion, just like its life sized equivalent.

 

The Chinese folding screen in the background I bought at an antiques and junk market when I was about ten. I was with my grandparents and a friend of the family and their three children, who were around my age. They all bought toys to bring home and play with, and I bought a Chinese folding screen to add to my miniatures collection in my curio cabinet at home! It shows you what a unique child I was.

 

In front of the screen on a pedestal table stands a miniature cloisonné vase from the early Twentieth Century which I also bought when I was a child. It came from a curios shop. Cloisonné is an ancient technique for decorating metalwork objects. In recent centuries, vitreous enamel has been used, and inlays of cut gemstones, glass and other materials were also used during older periods. The resulting objects can also be called cloisonné. The decoration is formed by first adding compartments (cloisons in French) to the metal object by soldering or affixing silver or gold wires or thin strips placed on their edges. These remain visible in the finished piece, separating the different compartments of the enamel or inlays, which are often of several colours. Cloisonné enamel objects are worked on with enamel powder made into a paste, which then needs to be fired in a kiln. The Japanese produced large quantities from the mid Nineteenth Century, of very high technical quality cloisonné. In Japan cloisonné enamels are known as shippō-yaki (七宝焼). Early centres of cloisonné were Nagoya during the Owari Domain. Companies of renown were the Ando Cloisonné Company. Later centres of renown were Edo and Kyoto. In Kyoto Namikawa became one of the leading companies of Japanese cloisonné.

And so to the third of the City Churches I visited for the first time over Open House weekend.

 

St Helen's has control over two other churches, St Andrew Undercroft and St Peter Upon Cornhill, the second of those is hardly ever open, I've never found it open anways.

 

I explained to a nice Lady insode St Andrew's that the wonderful Friends of the City Churches do such a great job in ensuring many churches are open at least one day a week, it is a shame that the same could not be done for St Peter. Unbeknown to me, she was from St Helen's who listened to what I said, and maybe, it will be open more often. Once would be nice of course.

 

We walked from St Katherine Cree to St Helen's, and saw that the door was open, and once inside it was a hive of activity, full of visitors and life. Someone was making use of the state of the art audio system to describe the church, and its differences from traditional Anglican churches.

 

It's size, and width, are breathtaking. A double naved church, with side chapels and gallery, almost too much to take in.

 

I mixed in with the guided tours, took shots and soaked in the church.

 

-------------------------------------------------

 

St Helen's Bishopsgate is a large conservative evangelical Anglican church located off Bishopsgate in London.

 

It is the largest surviving parish church in the City of London and it contains more monuments than any other church in Greater London except Westminster Abbey, hence it is sometimes referred to as the "Westminster Abbey of the City".

 

It was the parish church of William Shakespeare when he lived in the area in the 1590s.[1][2] In 1608, Sir Alberico Gentili, the founder of the science of international law, was buried in the church.

 

The church of St Helen dates from the 12th century and a priory of Benedictine nuns was founded there[clarification needed] in 1210.[3] It is unusual in that it was designed with two parallel naves, giving it a wide interior.[4] Until the dissolution of the priory in 1538, the church was divided in two by a partition running from east to west, the northern half serving the nuns and the southern the parishioners.[3] It is the only building from a nunnery to survive in the City of London.

 

The priory had extensive monastic buildings; its hall was later used by the Worshipful Company of Leathersellers until its demolition in 1799. A crypt extended north from the church, under the hall.[3]

 

In the 17th century two Classical doorcases were added to the otherwise Gothic church.[3][5] In 1874 the parish was united with that of St Martin Outwich when the latter's church was demolished, and the first incumbent of the new parish was John Bathurst Deane. St Helen's church was heavily restored by John Loughborough Pearson in 1891–3, and reopened on St John the Baptist's Day in 1893 by the Bishop of London, Frederick Temple.

  

Interior of St Helen's Bishopsgate

St Helen's was one of only a few City of London churches to survive both the Great Fire of London of 1666 and the Blitz during World War II.[6] In 1992 and 1993, however, the church was badly damaged by two IRA bombs that were set off nearby.[7] The roof of the building was lifted and one of the City's largest medieval stained glass windows was shattered. The church has since been fully restored although many of the older monuments within it were entirely destroyed. The architect Quinlan Terry, an enthusiast of Georgian architecture, designed the restoration along Reformation lines.

 

Owing to parish consolidation over the years, the parish is now named "St Helen's Bishopsgate with St Andrew Undershaft and St Ethelburga Bishopsgate and St Martin Outwich and St Mary Axe". The Worshipful Company of Merchant Taylors are the patrons of the benefice.[8]

 

The church was designated a Grade I-listed building on 4 January 1950.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Helen%27s_Church,_Bishopsgate

 

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Here we are amidst the Dubai-ification of Bishopsgate, and yet the west frontage of St Helen is rather pleasing in its little courtyard beneath the Aviva building. It is a different story to south and east, however, for although the Gherkin has created a focus for St Mary Axe, the peripherals of the space are messy and ill-considered, and beside St Helen the car park entrance has all the charm of the neglected bit of a provincial shopping centre. However, all this will go for the construction of the City's tallest tower, the Undershaft building, and the two lower storeys being left open will give St Helen and its near neighbour St Andrew Undershaft the chance to talk to each other for the first time in centuries.

Uniquely in the City, St Helen has a double nave, and this is because it was the church of a Benedictine nunnery, established here in the early 13th Century. There was already a parish church on the site, and a new nave for the sisters was built to the north of the parish nave. There was a major restoration in the early 17th Century which gave the exterior much of its current character, and the church was far enough north to survive the Great Fire. The Blitz also did little damage here, and St Helen might have continued being a pleasant if rather sleepy medieval survival among the office towers were it not for two significant events.

 

The first was the Baltic Exchange bombing on the night of 10th April 1992. A one tonne semtex and fertiliser bomb was exploded by the IRA immediately to the south-east of the church, its intention to cause as much damage to property as possible. In this it succeeded, for the £800 million repair bill to the City was almost twice as much as the entire repair bill for all the other damage caused by IRA bombs in the British Isles since the current spate of Troubles began in 1969. The south wall of the church was demolished, the interior blown out by blast damage. Repairs were already underway when the second event to shape the current church occured. On the morning of 24th April 1993, a Saturday, the IRA exploded another one tonne bomb, this time of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil, on Bishopsgate, to the north-west of the church. Thus, the little church found itself exactly between the two largest terrorist bombs ever exploded on the British mainland. This time the west front was demolished, and blast damage took out all the windows and furnishings again.

 

The building's rebirth was very much a reflection of the character of its congregation. Unusually for the City, St Helen is very much in the staunch evangelical protestant tradition. The pre-1992 church had been full of the clutter of those resacramentalising Victorians, but controversially the architect Quinlan Terry was commissioned to design an interior more fitting for the style of worship at St Helen. Anti-modernist, anti-gothicist, anti-conservationist, Terry is an architect so far out of kilter with the mainstream of British design that it sometimes seems as if he is working in an entirely different discipline, running in parallel with the rest of the architectural world. Previously, his most significant church design was for Brentwood Catholic Cathedral, which has been described as having all the style, grace and charm of a shopping centre food court. It was never going to end happily, either for the conservation bodies or the City traditionalists.

 

Terry's reinvented St Helen is a preaching box for protestant worship. Memorials have been relegated to the south transept, and the rood screen moved across it to separate it from the body of the church. The two naves have been united in a cool, square, white space, the focus of the church turned to face the north wall. It is as if the Oxford Movement had never happened. And yet it is all done well, with that infuriating veneer of seemliness that so much of Terry's work conveys.

 

Well, you wouldn't want all medieval churches to be like this, but churches are constantly changing to suit the style of worship of the day, and so it seems fitting that St Helen should have been reinvented this way. Much of the outcry at the time must have been because the Bishopsgate bomb vaporised St Ethelburga, St Helen's near neighbour, a small surviving medieval church, and it was felt rather willful that another medieval church was being gutted by those who might have been thought responsible for saving it. Me, I'm not so sure. Church communities should have their head to design their churches to suit their current worship, otherwise we would not have the extraordnanry accretion of historical artefacts that the great majority of England's 16,000-odd medieval churches now contain. St Helen is a good example of what can be done by people with passion and enthusiasm in the face of apocalyptic destruction. This was true after 1945, and it was true after 1993. Mind you, I'm not sure we'd have the confidence to do the same thing now.

  

Simon Knott, December 2015

 

www.simonknott.co.uk/citychurches/028/church.htm

Early evening sunlight glints off R761's unusual train as it coasts into Berwick station.

 

On October 13th, Steamrail operated a day trip from Melbourne to Bairnsdale, in Victoria's east. To make the day trip a reality while ensuring passengers have enough time in Bairnsdale and arrive back into Melbourne at a reasonable hour, R761 was sent up the day prior with coal, water, and support crew. This process allowed a fresh loco and crew to take over from R711 after it arrived at Bairnsdale, with R711 returning to Newport early the following morning.

OAHU, Hawaii (July 3, 2014) An MH-60S Sea Hawk assigned to the “Black Knights” of Helicopter Combat Support Squadron (HSC) 4 participates in a helicopter training exercise off the coast of the Hawaiian island of Molokai. HSC 4 is attached to Carrier Air Wing (CAG) 2 embarked on the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76). Ronald Reagan is currently in Hawaii for Rim of the Pacific 2014. Twenty-two nations, more than 40 ships and submarines, more than 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel are participating in RIMPAC exercise from June 26 to Aug. 1, in and around the Hawaiian Islands. The world’s largest international maritime exercise, RIMPAC provides a unique training opportunity that helps participants foster and sustain the cooperative relationships that are critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and security on the world’s oceans. RIMPAC 2014 is the 24th exercise in the series that began in 1971. (U.S. Navy photo by Ensign Joseph Pfaff/Released)

To ensure the future, don't ever loose sight of what went wrong in the past. 11 years later, New York will forever remember... And though our children of today may have not been born yet when 9-11 happened, it's our responsibility to teach them about making a better, fairer world, not just a security-crazed police-state vault that prevents another catastrophe, but a more decent policy and humanity and diplomacy that helps at the root of the problem, to avoid that hatred that would lead people to commit such atrocities in the first place. Give the children a chance...

 

With love and respect to all the victims of 9-11 and their loved ones, and to all the innocent civilian casualties that posterior wars have brought anywhere else...

 

And kudos to finally having a change of law that will now (heartbreaking that it took 11 years!!!) finally give health coverage to all the first responders who worked on the Ground Zero site risking their lives and developed cancers from the toxic materials in the area. A small step in the right direction, to finally honor those men and women who gave so much and received so little.

 

Subway station,

New York City

September 2012

 

© Sion Fullana

All Rights Reserved

It's more than important to ensure that our teeth and gums are in very good condition and nice and healthy .... I know everyone knows that but when you struggle for a photo sometimes anything will do!!

 

High 5 ~ In A Row ~ 365 .... Healthy ....

 

Thanks to everyone who views this photo, adds a note, leaves a comment and of course BIG thanks to anyone who chooses to favourite my photo .... thanks to you all.

...To ensure a most ladylike posture! ...and to prevent an inadvertent flash!

 

This shiny wet look lycra spandex top & ruffled miniskirt (with matching thong) came from milanoo[dot]com.

I think the miniskirt has lots of possibilities playing mix'n match with some of my other shiny leotards! For this ensemble I've matched it up with my Hanes Alive pantyhose and my silver platform stocking boots with the 6" heels from electriqueboutique.com.

 

To see more pix of me in other tight, sexy and revealing outfits click this link:www.flickr.com/photos/kaceycdpix/sets/72157623668202157/

 

To see more pix of me in sexy boots click here: www.flickr.com/photos/kaceycdpix/sets/72157622816479823/

 

DSC_2804-17

The Eiffel Tower is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower.

 

Locally nicknamed "La dame de fer" (French for "Iron Lady"), it was constructed from 1887 to 1889 as the centerpiece of the 1889 World's Fair and was initially criticised by some of France's leading artists and intellectuals for its design, but it has become a global cultural icon of France and one of the most recognisable structures in the world. The Eiffel Tower is the most visited monument with an entrance fee in the world; 6.91 million people ascended it in 2015. It was designated a monument historique in 1964, and was named part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site ("Paris, Banks of the Seine") in 1991.

 

The tower is 330 metres (1,083 ft) tall, about the same height as an 81-storey building, and the tallest structure in Paris. Its base is square, measuring 125 metres (410 ft) on each side. During its construction, the Eiffel Tower surpassed the Washington Monument to become the tallest man-made structure in the world, a title it held for 41 years until the Chrysler Building in New York City was finished in 1930. It was the first structure in the world to surpass both the 200-metre and 300-metre mark in height. Due to the addition of a broadcasting aerial at the top of the tower in 1957, it is now taller than the Chrysler Building by 5.2 metres (17 ft). Excluding transmitters, the Eiffel Tower is the second tallest free-standing structure in France after the Millau Viaduct.

 

The tower has three levels for visitors, with restaurants on the first and second levels. The top level's upper platform is 276 m (906 ft) above the ground – the highest observation deck accessible to the public in the European Union. Tickets can be purchased to ascend by stairs or lift to the first and second levels. The climb from ground level to the first level is over 300 steps, as is the climb from the first level to the second, making the entire ascent a 600 step climb. Although there is a staircase to the top level, it is usually accessible only by lift.

 

The design of the Eiffel Tower is attributed to Maurice Koechlin and Émile Nouguier, two senior engineers working for the Compagnie des Établissements Eiffel. It was envisioned after discussion about a suitable centerpiece for the proposed 1889 Exposition Universelle, a world's fair to celebrate the centennial of the French Revolution. Eiffel openly acknowledged that inspiration for a tower came from the Latting Observatory built in New York City in 1853. In May 1884, working at home, Koechlin made a sketch of their idea, described by him as "a great pylon, consisting of four lattice girders standing apart at the base and coming together at the top, joined together by metal trusses at regular intervals". Eiffel initially showed little enthusiasm, but he did approve further study, and the two engineers then asked Stephen Sauvestre, the head of the company's architectural department, to contribute to the design. Sauvestre added decorative arches to the base of the tower, a glass pavilion to the first level, and other embellishments.

 

The new version gained Eiffel's support: he bought the rights to the patent on the design which Koechlin, Nougier, and Sauvestre had taken out, and the design was put on display at the Exhibition of Decorative Arts in the autumn of 1884 under the company name. On 30 March 1885, Eiffel presented his plans to the Société des Ingénieurs Civils; after discussing the technical problems and emphasising the practical uses of the tower, he finished his talk by saying the tower would symbolise

[n]ot only the art of the modern engineer, but also the century of Industry and Science in which we are living, and for which the way was prepared by the great scientific movement of the eighteenth century and by the Revolution of 1789, to which this monument will be built as an expression of France's gratitude.

 

Little progress was made until 1886, when Jules Grévy was re-elected as president of France and Édouard Lockroy was appointed as minister for trade. A budget for the exposition was passed and, on 1 May, Lockroy announced an alteration to the terms of the open competition being held for a centrepiece to the exposition, which effectively made the selection of Eiffel's design a foregone conclusion, as entries had to include a study for a 300 m (980 ft) four-sided metal tower on the Champ de Mars. (A 300-metre tower was then considered a herculean engineering effort). On 12 May, a commission was set up to examine Eiffel's scheme and its rivals, which, a month later, decided that all the proposals except Eiffel's were either impractical or lacking in details.

 

After some debate about the exact location of the tower, a contract was signed on 8 January 1887. Eiffel signed it acting in his own capacity rather than as the representative of his company, the contract granting him 1.5 million francs toward the construction costs: less than a quarter of the estimated 6.5 million francs. Eiffel was to receive all income from the commercial exploitation of the tower during the exhibition and for the next 20 years. He later established a separate company to manage the tower, putting up half the necessary capital himself.

 

The Crédit Industriel et Commercial (C.I.C.) helped finance the construction of the Eiffel Tower. According to a New York Times investigation into France's colonial legacy in Haiti, at the time of the tower's construction, the bank was acquiring funds from predatory loans related to the Haiti indemnity controversy – a debt forced upon Haiti by France to pay for slaves lost following the Haitian Revolution – and transferring Haiti's wealth into France. The Times reported that the C.I.C. benefited from a loan that required the Haitian Government to pay the bank and its partner nearly half of all taxes the Haitian government collected on exports, writing that by "effectively choking off the nation’s primary source of income", the C.I.C. "left a crippling legacy of financial extraction and dashed hopes — even by the standards of a nation with a long history of both."

 

Work on the foundations started on 28 January 1887. Those for the east and south legs were straightforward, with each leg resting on four 2 m (6.6 ft) concrete slabs, one for each of the principal girders of each leg. The west and north legs, being closer to the river Seine, were more complicated: each slab needed two piles installed by using compressed-air caissons 15 m (49 ft) long and 6 m (20 ft) in diameter driven to a depth of 22 m (72 ft) to support the concrete slabs, which were 6 m (20 ft) thick. Each of these slabs supported a block of limestone with an inclined top to bear a supporting shoe for the ironwork.

 

Each shoe was anchored to the stonework by a pair of bolts 10 cm (4 in) in diameter and 7.5 m (25 ft) long. The foundations were completed on 30 June, and the erection of the ironwork began. The visible work on-site was complemented by the enormous amount of exacting preparatory work that took place behind the scenes: the drawing office produced 1,700 general drawings and 3,629 detailed drawings of the 18,038 different parts needed. The task of drawing the components was complicated by the complex angles involved in the design and the degree of precision required: the position of rivet holes was specified to within 1 mm (0.04 in) and angles worked out to one second of arc. The finished components, some already riveted together into sub-assemblies, arrived on horse-drawn carts from a factory in the nearby Parisian suburb of Levallois-Perret and were first bolted together, with the bolts being replaced with rivets as construction progressed. No drilling or shaping was done on site: if any part did not fit, it was sent back to the factory for alteration. In all, 18,038 pieces were joined together using 2.5 million rivets.

 

At first, the legs were constructed as cantilevers, but about halfway to the first level construction was paused to create a substantial timber scaffold. This renewed concerns about the structural integrity of the tower, and sensational headlines such as "Eiffel Suicide!" and "Gustave Eiffel Has Gone Mad: He Has Been Confined in an Asylum" appeared in the tabloid press. At this stage, a small "creeper" crane designed to move up the tower was installed in each leg. They made use of the guides for the lifts which were to be fitted in the four legs. The critical stage of joining the legs at the first level was completed by the end of March 1888. Although the metalwork had been prepared with the utmost attention to detail, provision had been made to carry out small adjustments to precisely align the legs; hydraulic jacks were fitted to the shoes at the base of each leg, capable of exerting a force of 800 tonnes, and the legs were intentionally constructed at a slightly steeper angle than necessary, being supported by sandboxes on the scaffold. Although construction involved 300 on-site employees, due to Eiffel's safety precautions and the use of movable gangways, guardrails and screens, only one person died.

 

The main structural work was completed at the end of March 1889 and, on 31 March, Eiffel celebrated by leading a group of government officials, accompanied by representatives of the press, to the top of the tower. Because the lifts were not yet in operation, the ascent was made by foot, and took over an hour, with Eiffel stopping frequently to explain various features. Most of the party chose to stop at the lower levels, but a few, including the structural engineer, Émile Nouguier, the head of construction, Jean Compagnon, the President of the City Council, and reporters from Le Figaro and Le Monde Illustré, completed the ascent. At 2:35 pm, Eiffel hoisted a large Tricolour to the accompaniment of a 25-gun salute fired at the first level.

 

There was still work to be done, particularly on the lifts and facilities, and the tower was not opened to the public until nine days after the opening of the exposition on 6 May; even then, the lifts had not been completed. The tower was an instant success with the public, and nearly 30,000 visitors made the 1,710-step climb to the top before the lifts entered service on 26 May. Tickets cost 2 francs for the first level, 3 for the second, and 5 for the top, with half-price admission on Sundays, and by the end of the exhibition there had been 1,896,987 visitors.

 

After dark, the tower was lit by hundreds of gas lamps, and a beacon sent out three beams of red, white and blue light. Two searchlights mounted on a circular rail were used to illuminate various buildings of the exposition. The daily opening and closing of the exposition were announced by a cannon at the top.

 

On the second level, the French newspaper Le Figaro had an office and a printing press, where a special souvenir edition, Le Figaro de la Tour, was made. There was also a pâtisserie.

 

At the top, there was a post office where visitors could send letters and postcards as a memento of their visit. Graffitists were also catered for: sheets of paper were mounted on the walls each day for visitors to record their impressions of the tower. Gustave Eiffel described some of the responses as vraiment curieuse ("truly curious").

 

Famous visitors to the tower included the Prince of Wales, Sarah Bernhardt, "Buffalo Bill" Cody (his Wild West show was an attraction at the exposition) and Thomas Edison. Eiffel invited Edison to his private apartment at the top of the tower, where Edison presented him with one of his phonographs, a new invention and one of the many highlights of the exposition. Edison signed the guestbook with this message:

To M Eiffel the Engineer the brave builder of so gigantic and original specimen of modern Engineering from one who has the greatest respect and admiration for all Engineers including the Great Engineer the Bon Dieu, Thomas Edison.

 

Eiffel had a permit for the tower to stand for 20 years. It was to be dismantled in 1909, when its ownership would revert to the City of Paris. The City had planned to tear it down (part of the original contest rules for designing a tower was that it should be easy to dismantle) but as the tower proved to be valuable for radio telegraphy, it was allowed to remain after the expiry of the permit, and from 1910 it also became part of the International Time Service.

 

Eiffel made use of his apartment at the top of the tower to carry out meteorological observations, and also used the tower to perform experiments on the action of air resistance on falling bodies.

 

Subsequent events

Eiffel had a permit for the tower to stand for 20 years. It was to be dismantled in 1909, when its ownership would revert to the City of Paris. The city had planned to tear it down (part of the original contest rules for designing a tower was that it should be easy to dismantle) but as the tower proved to be valuable for many innovations in the early 20th century, particularly radio telegraphy, it was allowed to remain after the expiry of the permit, and from 1910 it also became part of the International Time Service.

 

For the 1900 Exposition Universelle, the lifts in the east and west legs were replaced by lifts running as far as the second level constructed by the French firm Fives-Lille. These had a compensating mechanism to keep the floor level as the angle of ascent changed at the first level, and were driven by a similar hydraulic mechanism as the Otis lifts, although this was situated at the base of the tower. Hydraulic pressure was provided by pressurised accumulators located near this mechanism. At the same time the lift in the north pillar was removed and replaced by a staircase to the first level. The layout of both first and second levels was modified, with the space available for visitors on the second level. The original lift in the south pillar was removed 13 years later.

 

On 19 October 1901, Alberto Santos-Dumont, flying his No.6 airship, won a 100,000-franc prize offered by Henri Deutsch de la Meurthe for the first person to make a flight from St. Cloud to the Eiffel Tower and back in less than half an hour.

 

In 1910, Father Theodor Wulf measured radiant energy at the top and bottom of the tower. He found more at the top than expected, incidentally discovering what are known today as cosmic rays. Two years later, on 4 February 1912, Austrian tailor Franz Reichelt died after jumping from the first level of the tower (a height of 57 m) to demonstrate his parachute design. In 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, a radio transmitter located in the tower jammed German radio communications, seriously hindering their advance on Paris and contributing to the Allied victory at the First Battle of the Marne. From 1925 to 1934, illuminated signs for Citroën adorned three of the tower's sides, making it the tallest advertising space in the world at the time. In April 1935, the tower was used to make experimental low-resolution television transmissions, using a shortwave transmitter of 200 watts power. On 17 November, an improved 180-line transmitter was installed.

 

On two separate but related occasions in 1925, the con artist Victor Lustig "sold" the tower for scrap metal. A year later, in February 1926, pilot Leon Collet was killed trying to fly under the tower. His aircraft became entangled in an aerial belonging to a wireless station. A bust of Gustave Eiffel by Antoine Bourdelle was unveiled at the base of the north leg on 2 May 1929. In 1930, the tower lost the title of the world's tallest structure when the Chrysler Building in New York City was completed. In 1938, the decorative arcade around the first level was removed.

 

Upon the German occupation of Paris in 1940, the lift cables were cut by the French. The tower was closed to the public during the occupation and the lifts were not repaired until 1946. In 1940, German soldiers had to climb the tower to hoist a swastika-centered Reichskriegsflagge, but the flag was so large it blew away just a few hours later, and was replaced by a smaller one. When visiting Paris, Hitler chose to stay on the ground. When the Allies were nearing Paris in August 1944, Hitler ordered General Dietrich von Choltitz, the military governor of Paris, to demolish the tower along with the rest of the city. Von Choltitz disobeyed the order. On 25 August, before the Germans had been driven out of Paris, the German flag was replaced with a Tricolour by two men from the French Naval Museum, who narrowly beat three men led by Lucien Sarniguet, who had lowered the Tricolour on 13 June 1940 when Paris fell to the Germans.

 

A fire started in the television transmitter on 3 January 1956, damaging the top of the tower. Repairs took a year, and in 1957, the present radio aerial was added to the top. In 1964, the Eiffel Tower was officially declared to be a historical monument by the Minister of Cultural Affairs, André Malraux. A year later, an additional lift system was installed in the north pillar.

 

According to interviews, in 1967, Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau negotiated a secret agreement with Charles de Gaulle for the tower to be dismantled and temporarily relocated to Montreal to serve as a landmark and tourist attraction during Expo 67. The plan was allegedly vetoed by the company operating the tower out of fear that the French government could refuse permission for the tower to be restored in its original location.

 

In 1982, the original lifts between the second and third levels were replaced after 97 years in service. These had been closed to the public between November and March because the water in the hydraulic drive tended to freeze. The new cars operate in pairs, with one counterbalancing the other, and perform the journey in one stage, reducing the journey time from eight minutes to less than two minutes. At the same time, two new emergency staircases were installed, replacing the original spiral staircases. In 1983, the south pillar was fitted with an electrically driven Otis lift to serve the Jules Verne restaurant.[citation needed] The Fives-Lille lifts in the east and west legs, fitted in 1899, were extensively refurbished in 1986. The cars were replaced, and a computer system was installed to completely automate the lifts. The motive power was moved from the water hydraulic system to a new electrically driven oil-filled hydraulic system, and the original water hydraulics were retained solely as a counterbalance system. A service lift was added to the south pillar for moving small loads and maintenance personnel three years later.

 

Robert Moriarty flew a Beechcraft Bonanza under the tower on 31 March 1984. In 1987, A. J. Hackett made one of his first bungee jumps from the top of the Eiffel Tower, using a special cord he had helped develop. Hackett was arrested by the police. On 27 October 1991, Thierry Devaux, along with mountain guide Hervé Calvayrac, performed a series of acrobatic figures while bungee jumping from the second floor of the tower. Facing the Champ de Mars, Devaux used an electric winch between figures to go back up to the second floor. When firemen arrived, he stopped after the sixth jump.

 

For its "Countdown to the Year 2000" celebration on 31 December 1999, flashing lights and high-powered searchlights were installed on the tower. During the last three minutes of the year, the lights were turned on starting from the base of the tower and continuing to the top to welcome 2000 with a huge fireworks show. An exhibition above a cafeteria on the first floor commemorates this event. The searchlights on top of the tower made it a beacon in Paris's night sky, and 20,000 flashing bulbs gave the tower a sparkly appearance for five minutes every hour on the hour.

 

The lights sparkled blue for several nights to herald the new millennium on 31 December 2000. The sparkly lighting continued for 18 months until July 2001. The sparkling lights were turned on again on 21 June 2003, and the display was planned to last for 10 years before they needed replacing.

 

The tower received its 200,000,000th guest on 28 November 2002.The tower has operated at its maximum capacity of about 7 million visitors per year since 2003. In 2004, the Eiffel Tower began hosting a seasonal ice rink on the first level. A glass floor was installed on the first level during the 2014 refurbishment.

 

Design

The puddle iron (wrought iron) of the Eiffel Tower weighs 7,300 tonnes, and the addition of lifts, shops and antennae have brought the total weight to approximately 10,100 tonnes. As a demonstration of the economy of design, if the 7,300 tonnes of metal in the structure were melted down, it would fill the square base, 125 metres (410 ft) on each side, to a depth of only 6.25 cm (2.46 in) assuming the density of the metal to be 7.8 tonnes per cubic metre. Additionally, a cubic box surrounding the tower (324 m × 125 m × 125 m) would contain 6,200 tonnes of air, weighing almost as much as the iron itself. Depending on the ambient temperature, the top of the tower may shift away from the sun by up to 18 cm (7 in) due to thermal expansion of the metal on the side facing the sun.

 

Wind and weather considerations

When it was built, many were shocked by the tower's daring form. Eiffel was accused of trying to create something artistic with no regard to the principles of engineering. However, Eiffel and his team – experienced bridge builders – understood the importance of wind forces, and knew that if they were going to build the tallest structure in the world, they had to be sure it could withstand them. In an interview with the newspaper Le Temps published on 14 February 1887, Eiffel said:

 

Is it not true that the very conditions which give strength also conform to the hidden rules of harmony? ... Now to what phenomenon did I have to give primary concern in designing the Tower? It was wind resistance. Well then! I hold that the curvature of the monument's four outer edges, which is as mathematical calculation dictated it should be ... will give a great impression of strength and beauty, for it will reveal to the eyes of the observer the boldness of the design as a whole.

 

He used graphical methods to determine the strength of the tower and empirical evidence to account for the effects of wind, rather than a mathematical formula. Close examination of the tower reveals a basically exponential shape.[69] All parts of the tower were overdesigned to ensure maximum resistance to wind forces. The top half was even assumed to have no gaps in the latticework. In the years since it was completed, engineers have put forward various mathematical hypotheses in an attempt to explain the success of the design. The most recent, devised in 2004 after letters sent by Eiffel to the French Society of Civil Engineers in 1885 were translated into English, is described as a non-linear integral equation based on counteracting the wind pressure on any point of the tower with the tension between the construction elements at that point.

 

The Eiffel Tower sways by up to 9 cm (3.5 in) in the wind.

 

Ground floor

The four columns of the tower each house access stairs and elevators to the first two floors, while at the south column only the elevator to the second floor restaurant is publicly accessible.

 

1st floor

The first floor is publicly accessible by elevator or stairs. When originally built, the first level contained three restaurants – one French, one Russian and one Flemish — and an "Anglo-American Bar". After the exposition closed, the Flemish restaurant was converted to a 250-seat theatre. Today there is the Le 58 Tour Eiffel restaurant and other facilities.

 

2nd floor

The second floor is publicly accessible by elevator or stairs and has a restaurant called Le Jules Verne, a gourmet restaurant with its own lift going up from the south column to the second level. This restaurant has one star in the Michelin Red Guide. It was run by the multi-Michelin star chef Alain Ducasse from 2007 to 2017. As of May 2019, it is managed by three-star chef Frédéric Anton. It owes its name to the famous science-fiction writer Jules Verne.

 

3rd floor

Originally there were laboratories for various experiments, and a small apartment reserved for Gustave Eiffel to entertain guests, which is now open to the public, complete with period decorations and lifelike mannequins of Eiffel and some of his notable guests.

 

From 1937 until 1981, there was a restaurant near the top of the tower. It was removed due to structural considerations; engineers had determined it was too heavy and was causing the tower to sag. This restaurant was sold to an American restaurateur and transported to New York and then New Orleans. It was rebuilt on the edge of New Orleans' Garden District as a restaurant and later event hall. Today there is a champagne bar.

 

Lifts

The arrangement of the lifts has been changed several times during the tower's history. Given the elasticity of the cables and the time taken to align the cars with the landings, each lift, in normal service, takes an average of 8 minutes and 50 seconds to do the round trip, spending an average of 1 minute and 15 seconds at each level. The average journey time between levels is 1 minute. The original hydraulic mechanism is on public display in a small museum at the base of the east and west legs. Because the mechanism requires frequent lubrication and maintenance, public access is often restricted. The rope mechanism of the north tower can be seen as visitors exit the lift.

 

Equipping the tower with adequate and safe passenger lifts was a major concern of the government commission overseeing the Exposition. Although some visitors could be expected to climb to the first level, or even the second, lifts clearly had to be the main means of ascent.

 

Constructing lifts to reach the first level was relatively straightforward: the legs were wide enough at the bottom and so nearly straight that they could contain a straight track, and a contract was given to the French company Roux, Combaluzier & Lepape for two lifts to be fitted in the east and west legs. Roux, Combaluzier & Lepape used a pair of endless chains with rigid, articulated links to which the car was attached. Lead weights on some links of the upper or return sections of the chains counterbalanced most of the car's weight. The car was pushed up from below, not pulled up from above: to prevent the chain buckling, it was enclosed in a conduit. At the bottom of the run, the chains passed around 3.9 m (12 ft 10 in) diameter sprockets. Smaller sprockets at the top guided the chains.

  

The Otis lifts originally fitted in the north and south legs

Installing lifts to the second level was more of a challenge because a straight track was impossible. No French company wanted to undertake the work. The European branch of Otis Brothers & Company submitted a proposal but this was rejected: the fair's charter ruled out the use of any foreign material in the construction of the tower. The deadline for bids was extended but still no French companies put themselves forward, and eventually the contract was given to Otis in July 1887. Otis were confident they would eventually be given the contract and had already started creating designs.

 

The car was divided into two superimposed compartments, each holding 25 passengers, with the lift operator occupying an exterior platform on the first level. Motive power was provided by an inclined hydraulic ram 12.67 m (41 ft 7 in) long and 96.5 cm (38.0 in) in diameter in the tower leg with a stroke of 10.83 m (35 ft 6 in): this moved a carriage carrying six sheaves. Five fixed sheaves were mounted higher up the leg, producing an arrangement similar to a block and tackle but acting in reverse, multiplying the stroke of the piston rather than the force generated. The hydraulic pressure in the driving cylinder was produced by a large open reservoir on the second level. After being exhausted from the cylinder, the water was pumped back up to the reservoir by two pumps in the machinery room at the base of the south leg. This reservoir also provided power to the lifts to the first level.

 

The original lifts for the journey between the second and third levels were supplied by Léon Edoux. A pair of 81 m (266 ft) hydraulic rams were mounted on the second level, reaching nearly halfway up to the third level. One lift car was mounted on top of these rams: cables ran from the top of this car up to sheaves on the third level and back down to a second car. Each car travelled only half the distance between the second and third levels and passengers were required to change lifts halfway by means of a short gangway. The 10-ton cars each held 65 passengers.

 

Engraved names

Gustave Eiffel engraved on the tower the names of 72 French scientists, engineers and mathematicians in recognition of their contributions to the building of the tower. Eiffel chose this "invocation of science" because of his concern over the artists' protest. At the beginning of the 20th century, the engravings were painted over, but they were restored in 1986–87 by the Société Nouvelle d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel, a company operating the tower.

 

Aesthetics

The tower is painted in three shades: lighter at the top, getting progressively darker towards the bottom to complement the Parisian sky. It was originally reddish brown; this changed in 1968 to a bronze colour known as "Eiffel Tower Brown". In what is expected to be a temporary change, the tower is being painted gold in commemoration of the upcoming 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

 

The only non-structural elements are the four decorative grill-work arches, added in Sauvestre's sketches, which served to make the tower look more substantial and to make a more impressive entrance to the exposition.

 

A pop-culture movie cliché is that the view from a Parisian window always includes the tower. In reality, since zoning restrictions limit the height of most buildings in Paris to seven storeys, only a small number of tall buildings have a clear view of the tower.

 

Maintenance

Maintenance of the tower includes applying 60 tons of paint every seven years to prevent it from rusting. The tower has been completely repainted at least 19 times since it was built. Lead paint was still being used as recently as 2001 when the practice was stopped out of concern for the environment.

 

Communications

The tower has been used for making radio transmissions since the beginning of the 20th century. Until the 1950s, sets of aerial wires ran from the cupola to anchors on the Avenue de Suffren and Champ de Mars. These were connected to longwave transmitters in small bunkers. In 1909, a permanent underground radio centre was built near the south pillar, which still exists today. On 20 November 1913, the Paris Observatory, using the Eiffel Tower as an aerial, exchanged wireless signals with the United States Naval Observatory, which used an aerial in Arlington County, Virginia. The object of the transmissions was to measure the difference in longitude between Paris and Washington, D.C. Today, radio and digital television signals are transmitted from the Eiffel Tower.

 

Digital television

A television antenna was first installed on the tower in 1957, increasing its height by 18.7 m (61 ft). Work carried out in 2000 added a further 5.3 m (17 ft), giving the current height of 324 m (1,063 ft).[59] Analogue television signals from the Eiffel Tower ceased on 8 March 2011.

 

Taller structures

The Eiffel Tower was the world's tallest structure when completed in 1889, a distinction it retained until 1929 when the Chrysler Building in New York City was topped out. The tower also lost its standing as the world's tallest tower to the Tokyo Tower in 1958 but retains its status as the tallest freestanding (non-guyed) structure in France.

 

Transport

The nearest Paris Métro station is Bir-Hakeim and the nearest RER station is Champ de Mars-Tour Eiffel. The tower itself is located at the intersection of the quai Branly and the Pont d'Iéna.

 

Popularity

Number of visitors per year between 1889 and 2004

More than 300 million people have visited the tower since it was completed in 1889. In 2015, there were 6.91 million visitors. The tower is the most-visited paid monument in the world. An average of 25,000 people ascend the tower every day (which can result in long queues).

 

Illumination copyright

The tower and its image have been in the public domain since 1993, 70 years after Eiffel's death. In June 1990 a French court ruled that a special lighting display on the tower in 1989 to mark the tower's 100th anniversary was an "original visual creation" protected by copyright. The Court of Cassation, France's judicial court of last resort, upheld the ruling in March 1992. The Société d'Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE) now considers any illumination of the tower to be a separate work of art that falls under copyright. As a result, the SNTE alleges that it is illegal to publish contemporary photographs of the lit tower at night without permission in France and some other countries for commercial use. For this reason, it is often rare to find images or videos of the lit tower at night on stock image sites, and media outlets rarely broadcast images or videos of it.

 

The imposition of copyright has been controversial. The Director of Documentation for what was then called the Société Nouvelle d'exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SNTE), Stéphane Dieu, commented in 2005: "It is really just a way to manage commercial use of the image, so that it isn't used in ways [of which] we don't approve". SNTE made over €1 million from copyright fees in 2002. However, it could also be used to restrict the publication of tourist photographs of the tower at night, as well as hindering non-profit and semi-commercial publication of images of the illuminated tower.

 

The copyright claim itself has never been tested in courts to date, according to a 2014 article in the Art Law Journal, and there has never been an attempt to track down millions of people who have posted and shared their images of the illuminated tower on the Internet worldwide. It added, however, that permissive situation may arise on commercial use of such images, like in a magazine, on a film poster, or on product packaging.

 

French doctrine and jurisprudence allows pictures incorporating a copyrighted work as long as their presence is incidental or accessory to the subject being represented, a reasoning akin to the de minimis rule. Therefore, SETE may be unable to claim copyright on photographs of Paris which happen to include the lit tower.

 

Replicas

As one of the most famous landmarks in the world, the Eiffel Tower has been the inspiration for the creation of many replicas and similar towers. An early example is Blackpool Tower in England. The mayor of Blackpool, Sir John Bickerstaffe, was so impressed on seeing the Eiffel Tower at the 1889 exposition that he commissioned a similar tower to be built in his town. It opened in 1894 and is 158.1 m (519 ft) tall. Tokyo Tower in Japan, built as a communications tower in 1958, was also inspired by the Eiffel Tower.[111]

 

There are various scale models of the tower in the United States, including a half-scale version at the Paris Las Vegas, Nevada, one in Paris, Texas built in 1993, and two 1:3 scale models at Kings Island, located in Mason, Ohio, and Kings Dominion, Virginia, amusement parks opened in 1972 and 1975 respectively. Two 1:3 scale models can be found in China, one in Durango, Mexico that was donated by the local French community, and several across Europe.

 

In 2011, the TV show Pricing the Priceless on the National Geographic Channel speculated that a full-size replica of the tower would cost approximately US$480 million to build. This would be more than ten times the cost of the original (nearly 8 million in 1890 Francs; ~US$40 million in 2018 dollars).

© yohanes.budiyanto, 2014

 

PRELUDE

The 1st of August, 2014 was such an historic day as the world finally welcomed the birth of the first in line to the Parisian throne after a painstaking and extraordinary "labor" process that took four years in creation, and almost a decade in the making. I was not talking about a French rival to baby George, but instead a newborn that has sent shivers down the spines of Paris' oldest and current Kings and Grand Dames from the day it was conceived. Yes, I was referring to The Peninsula Paris, the youngest sister to the legendary Peninsula Hong Kong (circa 1928).

 

Ever since the project was announced to the public four years ago, it has been on my top list of the most eagerly awaited hotel openings of the decade. So when the hotel announced 1st of August as an opening date back in March, I immediately issued my First Class return tickets to the City of Light, risking the usual opening delay. A man of his word, Peninsula Paris finally opened as scheduled.

 

HISTORY

The Peninsula brand needs no introduction, as it is synonymous with quality, technology, innovation, craftsmanship and sophistication, -much like a slogan for French top brands and their savoir faire. Despite having only 10 current properties worldwide in its portfolio (Paris is its tenth), each Peninsula hotel is a market leader in each respective cities, and consistently tops the chart in many bonafide travel publications and reigns supreme as the world's best, especially elder sisters in Hong Kong and Bangkok. The Peninsula model is different from other rival hotel groups, which usually expand aggressively through both franchise and managed models worldwide. Instead, the Peninsula focuses on acquiring majority to sole ownership on all its properties to ensure control on quality (Hong Kong, New York, Chicago and Tokyo are 100% owned; Bangkok, Beijing and Manila are over 75%; Shanghai is 50%, while Beverly Hills and Paris are the only two with only 20% ownership).

 

The history of the Peninsula Paris could be traced back to a modest villa aptly called Hotel Basilevski on the plot of land at 19 Avenue Kleber back in 1864, -named after its Russian diplomat owner, Alexander Petrovich Basilevski, which caught the attention of hotelier Leonard Tauber for his prospective hotel project. The Versailles-styled property was partly a museum housing Basilevski's vast and impressive collection of 19th century medieval and Renaissance art, which eventually was acquired by Alexander III, -a Russian Tsar, at the sums of six millions francs. These collections were later transported to the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, and formed the base collection for the newly established Department of Medieval and Renaissance Art. After Basilevski sold the villa and moved to a more palatial residence at Avenue du Trocadero, the property was then acquired and rebranded the Palais de Castille as the residence of the exiled Queen Isabella II of Spain in 1868, who seeked refuge and continued to live there until 1904. Upon her death, the property was later demolished in 1906 to make way for the Majestic hotel, which finally opened in 1908 with much satisfaction of Leonard Tauber, who has eyed the premise from the very beginning.

 

The Majestic Hotel was exquisitely designed in the Beaux-Art style as a grand hotel by prominent architect of that time, Armand Sibien. Together with The Ritz (circa 1898), the two became the most preferred places to stay and entertain in Paris of the time. The Majestic has attracted the well-heeled crowd, and hosted many high profile events, most notably for a particular dinner hosted by rich British couple Sydney and Violet Schiff on 18 May 1922 as the after party of Igor Stravinsky's 'Le Renard' ballet premiere, and the hotel becomes an instant legend. The guests list were impressive: Igor Stravinsky himself, Pablo Picasso, Sergei Diaghilev, and two of the 20th century most legendary writers: James Joyce and Marcel Proust, who met for the first and only time before Proust's death six months later. Since then, the Majestic continued to draw high profile guests, including George Gershwin on 25 March 1928, where he composed "An American in Paris" during the stay.

 

If the walls could talk, the Majestic has plenty of stories to tell. It was once converted into a hospital during the infamy in 1914, and the British took residency at the hotel during the Paris Peace Conference back in 1919. The hotel was then acquired by the French State in 1936 as the offices of the Ministry of Defence; and later had a stint as the German Military High Command in France between October 1940 to July 1944 during the World War II. Post war, it then became the temporary home for UNESCO from 16 September 1946 until 1958. More than a decade after, the Paris Peace talks was opened by Henry Kissinger in one of its spectacular Ballrooms in 1969 with the Northern Vietnamese. Four years later, the Paris Peace Accord was finally signed at the oak paneled-room next to the Ballroom on 27 January 1973, which ended the Vietnam War. This triumphant event has also led to another victorious event when Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize that same year.

 

The hotel continued to serve as the International Conference Center of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs until it was up for sale by the government in 2008 as part of the cost cutting program to the Qatari Diar, -which later transferred its ownership to Katara Hospitality, for a staggering USD 460 million. An excess of USD 600 million was further spent on the massive rebuilding and refurbishment not only to restore the hotel to its former glory, but also to transform it into a Peninsula with the highest standard.

 

The epic restoration work was led by prominent French architect, Richard Martinet, who has also previously work with the restoration of Prince Roland Bonaparte's former mansion into the Shangri-La Paris and also the Four Seasons George V; and involved teams of France's leading craftsmen; heritage designers and organisations; stonemasons from historic monument specialist; master glass crafters; crystal manufacturer; wood, moulding and gilder restoration experts, -many of whom are third generation, and have carried out high profile projects such as the Palace of Versailles, Louvre Museum, the dome of Les Invalides, the Grand and Petit Palais, and even the flame of the Statue of Liberty in New York. The result is truly breathtaking, and it was certainly money well spent to revive and recreate one of the nation's most treasured landmark. One of my favorite places within the hotel is the Main Lobby at Avenue des Portugais where the grand hall is adorned with a spectacular chandelier installation comprising 800 pieces of glass leaves inspired by the plane trees along Avenue Kleber. The work of Spain's most influential artist since Gaudi, Xavier Corbero, could also be found nearby in the form of a beautiful sculpture called Moon River.

 

Katara Hospitality owns 80% of The Peninsula Paris, and already has a spectacular portfolio ownership consisting some of the world's finest hotels, including The Raffles Singapore, Le Royal Monceau-Raffles Paris, Ritz-Carlton Doha, Schweizerhof Bern, and most recently, 5 of the InterContinental Hotel's European flagships, including Amstel in Amsterdam, Carlton in Cannes, De la Ville in Rome, Madrid and Frankfurt. It is interesting to note that Adrian Zecha, founder of the extraordinary Amanresorts chain is a member of the Board of Directors at Katara since September 2011, lending his immense hospitality expertise to the group.

 

At over USD 1 billion cost, the Pen Paris project is easily the most expensive to ever being built, considering it has only 200 rooms over 6 storeys. As a comparison, the cost of building the 101 storey, 494m high Shanghai World Financial Center (where the Park Hyatt Shanghai resides) is USD 1.2 billion; whereas Burj Khalifa, the current tallest building on earth at 163 storey and 828m, costed a 'modest' USD 1.5 billion to build. The numbers are truly mind boggling, and The Peninsula Paris is truly an extraordinary project. It might took the Majestic Hotel two years to build; but it took four years just to restore and reincarnate it into a Peninsula.

 

HOTEL OPENING

On a pleasant afternoon of 1 August 2014, the hotel finally opened its door to a crowd of distinguished guests, international journalists, first hotel guests and local crowds who partake to witness the inauguration and rebirth of a Parisian legend and grande dame (Many A-list celebrities and even Head of State flocked to the hotel to witness its sheer beauty). It was an historic day not just for Paris, but also for the Hong Kong and Shanghai Hotels Group as it marks their arrival in Europe with its first ever Peninsula, while the second is already on the pipeline with the future opening of The Peninsula London, located just behind The Lanesborough at Knightsbridge.

 

The eagerly-awaited opening ceremony was attended by the Chairman of Katara Hospitality, His Excellency Sheikh Nawaf Bin Jassim Bin Jabor Al-Thani; CEO of Hong Kong and Shanghai Hotels Limited (HSH), Clement Kwok; Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Development, Laurent Fabius; General Manager of the Peninsula Paris, Nicolas Béliard; and the event kicked off with an opening speech by the famous French Secretary of State for Foreign Trade, the Promotion of Tourism and French Nationals Abroad, Madame Fleur Pellerin, who clearly stole the show with her public persona. A ribbon cutting and spectacular lion dance show concluded the event, which drew quite a spectacle on Avenue des Portugais as it brought a unique display of Asian heritage to the heart of cosmopolitan Paris.

 

LOCATION

The Peninsula Paris stands majestically at the tree-lined Avenue Kléber, just off the Arc de Triomphe. Personally, this is an ideal location in Paris as it is a stone's throw away from all the happenings at the Champs-Élysées, but is set away from its hustle and bustle, which is constantly a tourist trap day and night. Once you walk pass the leafy Avenue Kléber, the atmosphere is very different: peaceful and safe. The Kléber Metro station is just a few steps away from the hotel, providing guests a convenient access to further parts of town.

 

Champs-Élysées is the center of Parisian universe, and it is just a short and pleasant stroll away from the hotel, where some of the city's most legendary commercial and cultural institutions reside. For a start, Drugstore Publicis at the corner by the roundabout has been a legendary hang-out since the 1960s, and is my ultimate favourite place in town. The Post Modern edifice by architect Michele Saee (renovated in 2004) houses almost everything: a Cinema; side walk Brasserie & Steak House; Newsagency; Bookshop (you can find Travel publications and even the Michelin Guide); upscale Gift shop and Beauty corner (even Acqua di Parma is on sale here); Pharmacy (whose pharmacist thankfully speaks English and gladly advises you on your symptoms); upscale deli (stocking pretty much everything from Foie gras burger on the counter, to fine wines & cigar cellar; to Pierre Herme & Pierre Marcolini chocolates; Dalloyau bakery; Marriage Freres tea; and even the Petrossian Caviar!). Best of all, it features a 2 Michelin star L'atelier de Joel Robuchon Etoile on its basement; and the store is even opened on Sunday until 2am. It is a one stop shopping, eating and entertainment, showcasing the best of France.

 

Further down the road, Maison Louis Vuitton stands majestically on its own entire 7 storey building, which was opened in 2005 as one of the biggest flagship stores in the world, covering a total area of 1,800m2. Designed by Eric Carlson and Peter Marino, the entire store is an architectural marvel and the temple of luxury, elegance and sophistication. This is one of the very few stores to open in Sunday as the French Labour Unions prohibits commercial stores to open on Sunday, unless if it involves cultural, recreational and sporting aspect. Initially, Maison LV was ordered by the court to close on Sunday, but LVMH finally wins an appeal in 2007 on the grounds of cultural experience; and the store has continued to draw endless queue on Sunday.

 

A block away from Maison LV is the legendary Parisian Tea Room of Ladurée, which was founded in 1862 by Louis Ernest Ladurée on its original store at 16 Rue Royal as a bakery. The Champs-Élysées store was opened in 1997 and has since attracted an endless queue of tourists and locals who wish to savour its legendary Macarons and pastries. The Ladurée phenomenon and popularity could only be rivaled by fellow Frenchmen Pierre Hermé, who has also attracted a cult of loyal fans worldwide. It may not have a flagship store at Champs-Élysées, but one could easily stop by Drugstore Publicis for a quick purchase to ease the craving.

 

For those looking for upscale boutiques, Avenue Montaigne located just nearby on a perpendicular, and features the flagship presence of the world's finest luxury fashion labels: Armani, Bottega Veneta, Valention, Prada, Dior, Versace, Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, Saint Laurent, Fendi and Salvatore Ferragamo to name a few. For the ultimate in shopping extravaganza, head down to Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré where all money will (hopefully) be well spent.

 

Champs-Élysées is the most famous and expensive boulevard in the world, yet it has everything for everyone; and myriad of crowds flocking its grand boulevards for a pleasant stroll. It has no shortage of luxury stores, but it also offers mainstream stores for the general public, from Levi's to Zara and Lacoste; to McDonalds and Starbucks; and FNAC store (French answer to HMV).

 

In terms of fine dining experience, the areas around Champs-Élysées has plenty to offer. I have mentioned about the 2 Michelin L'atelier de Joel Robuchon Etoile at the Drugstore Publicis, which was excellent. Robuchon never disappoints as it consistently serves amazing French cuisine amidst its signature red and black interior everywhere I visited, including Tokyo (3 Michelin), Hong Kong (3 Michelin), Paris (2 Michelin) and Taipei.

 

During my stay, I also managed to sample the finest cuisine from the kitchens of two, 3-Michelin Paris institutions: Pierre Gagnaire at Rue Balzac, just off Champs-Élysées; and Epicure at Le Bristol by Chef Eric Frechon on Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, which was undoubtedly the best and most memorable dining experiences I have ever had in Paris to date. It is certainly the gastronomic highlight of this trip.

 

Other 3 Michelin establishment, such as Ledoyen is also located nearby at an 18th century pavilion by the Gardens of Champs-Élysées by newly appointed famous French Chef Yannick Alléno, who previously also resided at the Le Meurice with 3 Michelin, until Alain Ducasse took over last year during the Plaza Athénée closure for expansion.

 

August is a time of misery for international visitors to Paris as most fine dining restaurants are closed for the summer holiday. When choices are limited, foodies could rely on Epicure and Robuchon, which are opened all year round; and also the 2 Michelin star Le Cinq at the Four Seasons George V. Although its food could not compete with Robuchon, Epicure and Gagnaire, guests could still enjoy the beautiful surroundings.

 

ROOMS:

On my visit to Paris last year, I was not too impressed with my stay at the Four Seasons George V, as everything seemed to be pretty basic: the room design; the in-room tech and amenities; and even the much lauded service. It simply does not justify the hefty price tag. The only thing stood out there were the ostentatious designer floral display at the lobby, which reportedly absorbed a six digit figure budget annually. When I saw them at the first time, this was what came to mind: guests are paying for these excessive flowers, whether you like it or not.

 

Fortunately, the Peninsula Paris skips all this expensive gimmick, and instead spends a fortune for guests to enjoy: advance room technology; a host of complimentary essential amenities, including internet access, non-alcoholic minibar, and even long distance phone calls. In fact, every single items inside the room has been well thought and designed for guest's ultimate comfort.

 

Ever since The Peninsula Bangkok opened in 1998 to much success, the group has used it as a template for its signature rooms for future sister hotels, which consists of an open plan, ultra-wide spacious room equivalent to a 2 bays suite, with 5-fixtures bathroom, and a separate Dressing Room, which soon becomes a Peninsula signature.

 

The Peninsula Tokyo followed this template when it opened in 2007 to rave reviews; and it was soon adopted as a model for Peninsula Shanghai, which later opened in 2009 as the flagship property in Mainland China. This layout is also being applied at The Peninsula Paris, albeit for its Suites categories, i.e. Junior Suite, which measure at an astonishing 50 - 60m2. The entry level Superior and Deluxe Rooms lack the signature layout with smaller size at 35 - 45m2, but they are already spacious for a Parisian standard; and each is equipped with Peninsula's signature technology.

 

Technology is indeed at the core of the Peninsula DNA, and no expense is spared in creating the world's most advance in-room technology. When other hotels try to cut costs and budgets on in-room technology with lame excuses, the Peninsula actually spends a fortune to innovate and set a new benchmark. In fact, it is probably the only hotel group to have its own Technology laboratory at a secret location deep inside Aberdeen, Hong Kong, where in-room tech is being developed and tested. It was here where innovative devices, such as the outside temperature indicator; my favourite Spa Button by the bathtub; or even the portable nail dryer for the ladies are invented. The Peninsula took the world by storm when it introduced the Samsung Galaxy tablet device at the Peninsula Hong Kong in 2012, which is programmed in 11 languages and virtually controls the entire room, including the lights, temperature, curtains, TV, radio, valet calls and Do Not Disturb sign. It even features touch screen Room Service Menu, hotel information, city guide, and a function to request room service and housekeeping items, thus creating an entirely paperless environment.

 

All these technological marvel are also being replicated at the Peninsula Paris, together with other 'standard' features, such as Nespresso Coffee Machine; flat-screen 3D LED television; LED touch screen wall panels; an iPod/iPad docking station; memory card reader; 4-in1 fax/scanner/printer/photocopier machine; DVD player; complimentary in-house HD movies; complimentary internet access and long distance calls through the VOIP platform. Even the room's exterior Parisian-styled canopy is electronically operated. All these technological offerings is so extremely complex, that it resulted in 2.5 km worth of cabling in each room alone.

 

Bathroom at the Junior Suite also features Peninsula's signature layout: a stand alone bathtub as the focal point, flanked by twin vanities and separate shower and WC compartments amidst acres of white marble. Probably the first in Paris, it features a Japanese Toilet complete with basic control panel, and a manual handheld bidet sprayer.

 

When all these add up to the stay, it actually brings a very good value to the otherwise high room rates. Better yet, the non-alcoholic Minibar is also complimentary, which is a first for a Peninsula hotel. The Four Seasons George V may choose to keep looking back to its antiquity past and annihilate most technological offerings to its most basic form, but the Pen always looks forward to the future and brings the utter convenience, all at your finger tip. The Peninsula rooms are undoubtedly the best designed, best equipped and most high-tech in the entire universe.

 

ROOM TO BOOK:

The 50 - 60m2 Junior Suite facing leafy Avenue Kléber is the best room type to book as it is an open-plan suite with Peninsula's signature bathroom and dressing room; and the ones located on the Premiere étage (first floor) have high ceilings and small balcony overlooking Kleber Terrace's iconic glass canopy. Personally, rooms facing the back street at Rue La Pérouse are the least preferred, but its top level rooms inside the Mansart Roof on level 5 have juliet windows that allow glimpse of the tip of Eiffel Tower despite being smaller in size due to its attic configuration. Superior Rooms also lack the signature Peninsula 5 fixtures bathroom configuration, so for the ultimate bathing experience, make sure to book at least from the Deluxe category.

 

If money is no object, book one of the five piece-de-resistance suites with their own private rooftop terrace and gardens on the top floor, which allow 360 degree panoramic views of Paris. Otherwise, the mid-tier Deluxe Suite is already a great choice with corner location, multiple windows and 85m2 of pure luxury.

 

DINING:

Looking back at the hotel's illustrious past, the Peninsula offers some of the most unique and memorable dining experiences in Paris, steep in history.

 

The area that once housed Igor Stravinksy's after party where James Joyce met Marcel Proust for the first time is now the hotel's Cantonese Restaurant, aptly called LiLi; and is led by Chef Chi Keung Tang, formerly of Peninsula Tokyo's One Michelin starred Hei Fung Terrace. Lili was actually modeled after Peninsula Shanghai's Yi Long Court, but the design here blends Chinese elements with Art Nouveau style that flourished in the late 1920s. It also boasts a world first: a spectacular 3x3.3m fiber optic installation at the entrance of the restaurant, depicting the imaginary portrait of LiLi herself. The Cantonese menu was surprisingly rather simple and basic, and features a selection of popular dim sum dishes. The best and most memorable Chinese restaurants I have ever experienced are actually those who masterfully fuse Chinese tradition with French ingredients: Jin Sha at the Four Seasons Hangzhou at Westlake; 2 Michelin Tin Lung Heen at Level 102 of the Ritz-Carlton Hong Kong; Jiang at Mandarin Oriental Guangzhou by Chef Fei; and Ya Ge at Mandarin Oriental Taipei. Ironically, the world's only 3 Michelin star Chinese restaurant, Lung King Heen at the Four Seasons Hong Kong failed to impress me.

 

The former Ballroom area where Henry Kissinger started the Paris Peace talks with the Vietnamese has now been transformed as The Lobby, which is a signature of every Peninsula hotels where the afternoon tea ritual takes place daily. The spectacular room with intricate details and crystal chandeliers has been meticulously restored, and is an ideal place to meet, see and be seen. Breakfast is served daily here, and guests could choose to have it either inside or outside at the adjoining al fresco La Terrasse Kléber, which connects all the F&B outlets on the ground floor, including Lili. Guests could choose from a Chinese set breakfast, which includes dim sum, fried vermicelli, and porridge with beef slices; or the Parisian set, which includes gourmet items such as Egg Benedict with generous slices of Jamon Iberico on top. The afternoon tea ritual is expected to be very popular as renowned Chef Pattissier Julien Alvarez, -who claimed the World Pastry Champion in 2009; and also the Spanish World Chocolate Master in 2007 at the tender age of 23, is at the helm; and the venue quickly booked out from the opening day.

 

Next to the Lobby is a small, intimate bar covered in exquisite oak panelling where Henry Kissinger signed the Paris Peace Accord back in 1973 that ended the Vietnam War. Kissinger politely declined the offer to have the Bar named after him, and instead it is simply called Le Bar Kléber.

 

On the top floor of the hotel lies the signature restaurant L'Oiseau Blanc, which is named after the French biplane that disappeared in 1927 in an attempt to make the first non-stop transatlantic flight between Paris and New York. A 75% replica of the plane has even been installed outside the main entrance of the restaurant with the Eiffel Tower on its background. The restaurant is divided into 3 distinct areas: a spectacular glass enclosed main dining room; a large outdoor terrace that runs the entire length of the hotel's roof; and an adjoining lively bar, all with breathtaking uninterrupted views of Paris' most identifiable landmarks, including the Eiffel Tower and the Sacré-Cœur at the highest point of the city at Montmartre.

 

L'Oiseau Blanc is led by Chef Sidney Redel, a former protégé of Pierre Gagnaire, and serves contemporary French cuisine focussing on 'terroir' menu of locally sourced seasonal ingredients from the region. During my stay, tomato was the seasonal ingredients, and Chef Redel created four courses incorporating tomato, even on dessert. While the food was of high quality, personally the menu still needs fine tuning, considering the sort of clientele the Pen is aiming for: the ultra rich (Chinese), who usually seek top establishments with luxury ingredients, such as caviar, black truffle, foie gras, blue lobster, Jamon Iberico, Wagyu beef, Kurobuta pork and Challans chicken.

 

LEISURE:

The Peninsula Paris features one of the best health and recreational facilities in the city, housed within the basement of the hotel, and covers an expansive area of 1,800m2. For a comparison, rival Mandarin Oriental Spa covers a total area of only 900m2 over two floors. The Peninsula Spa is undoubtedly one of the nicest urban spa that I have been to, it easily beats the Spa at the Four Seasons George V. The pool is also one of the city's largest at 22m long, -compared to both the Shangri-La and Mandarin Oriental at 15m; the George V at only 9m, which is more like a bigger jacuzzi. The only two other pools better than the Peninsula is the one designed by Phillippe Starck at the Le Royal Monceau at 28m; and the spectacular grand pool at the Ritz.

 

There is the usual 24 hours gym within two fitness spaces equipped with Technogym machines and free weights; and the locker rooms features steam, sauna, and experience shower room. There is a total of 8 treatment rooms within the Spa area, and the highlight is certainly the Relaxation Room, which is equipped with amazing day beds with specially placed deep cushions. The best part? the beds are electronically operated, much like a first class seat on a plane.

 

X-FACTOR:

The Peninsula signature technology; The Spa Button in the bathroom; VOIP technology for complimentary long distance calls; The top suites (Historic, Katara and Peninsula Suites); Xavier Corbero's Moon River sculpture at the Lobby; Lili; The Lobby and Bar where Henry Kissinger signed Paris Peace Accord; L'Oiseau Blanc Restaurant; The 1,800m2 Peninsula Spa; and the 1934 Rolls Royce Phantom II.

 

SERVICE:

There are a total of 600 staffs for just 200 rooms, so the service level is expected to be high; but it is perhaps unfair to judge the service during the opening weeks when all staffs were not at their best due to the intense preparation leading to the opening event. Furthermore, teething problems are expected for a newly opened hotel as great hotels are not born overnight, but takes a good few years of refinement.

 

Nonetheless, I was actually quite impressed with the level of service during the whole stay, as the majority of the staffs showed great attitude and much enthusiasm, which is a testament of great intense training. As one of the first guests arriving on the opening day, check-in was truly delightful and memorable as a battalion of staffs of different ranks welcomed and wished the most pleasant stay. The mood could not have been more festive as moments later, the hotel was finally inaugurated.

 

I was also particularly impressed with the service at both LiLi and The Lobby where staffs performed at an exceptional level like a veteran. There are two distinct qualities that made a lot of difference during the stay: humility and friendliness, which is quite a challenge to find, not only in Paris and the entire Europe, but even in Asian cities, such as Hong Kong. It is like finding needles in a haystack. A genuine smile seems to be a rare commodity these days, so I was happy to see plenty of smiles at the Peninsula Paris during the stay, from the signature Peninsula Pageboys to waiters, Maître d, receptionists and even to Managers and Directors. In fact, there were more smiles in Paris than Hong Kong.

 

When I woken up too early for breakfast one day, the restaurant was just about to open; and there were hardly anyone. I realized that even the birds were probably still asleep, but I was extremely delighted to see how fresh looking and energetic the staffs were at the dining room. There was a lot of genuine smile that warmed the rather chilly morning; and it was a great start to the day. One of the staffs I met during the stay even candidly explained how they were happy just to be at work, and it does not feel like working at all, which was clearly shown in their passion and enthusiasm.

 

That said, the Shangri-La Paris by far is still my top pick for best service as it is more personalized and refined due to its more intimate scale. The Shangri-La Paris experience is also unique as guests are welcomed to a sit down registration by the historic lounge off the Lobby upon arrival, and choice of drinks are offered, before being escorted to the room for in-room check-in. Guests also receive a Pre-Arrival Form in advance, so the hotel could anticipate and best accommodate their needs. During the stay, I was also addressed by my last name everywhere within the hotel, so it was highly personalized. I did receive similar treatment at The Peninsula Paris, -albeit in a lesser extent due to its size; and even the housekeeping greeted me by my last name. Every requests, from room service to mineral water were all handled efficiently at a timely manner. At times, service could be rather slow at the restaurants (well, it happens almost everywhere in Paris), but this is part of the Parisian lifestyle where nothing is hurried; and bringing bills/checks upfront is considered rude. I did request the food servings to be expedited during a lunch at LiLi on the last day due to the time constraint; and the staffs managed to succeed the task not only ahead of the time limit, but also it never felt hurried all along. Everything ran as smooth as silk.

 

VERDICT:

It was a personal satisfaction to witness the history in the making during the opening day on 1 August 2014, as the Peninsula Paris is my most eagerly awaited hotel opening of the decade. It was also historic, as it was a first in my travel to dedicate a trip solely for a particular hotel in a particular city (in this case Paris, some 11,578km away from home), without staying at other fine hotels. It was money well spent, and a trip worth taking as it was an amazing stay; and certainly a lifetime experience.

 

The Peninsula Paris could not have arrived at a better time, as two of the most established Parisian grande dames (Ritz and de Crillon) are still closed for a complete renovation, and will only be revealed in 2015; so there is plenty of time to adapt, grow and hone its skills. But with such pedigree, quality and illustrious history, the Pen really has nothing to be worried about. The Four Seasons George V seems to have a cult of highly obsessed fans (esp. travel agents) worldwide, but personally (and objectively), it is no match to the Peninsula. Based on physical product alone, the Pen wins in every aspect as everything has been meticulously designed with the focus on guest comfort and convenience. In terms of technology, the Pen literally has no rival anywhere on the planet, except from the obvious sibling rivalry.

 

The only thing that the Pen still needs to work on is its signature restaurants as all its rival hotels have at least 2 Michelin star restaurants (L'abeille at the Shangri-La; Sur Mesure at the Mandarin Oriental; and 3 Michelin at Epicure, Le Bristol; Le Cinq at the Four Seasons George V and Alain Ducasse at Le Meurice). L'Oiseau Blanc design is truly breathtaking and would certainly be the most popular gastronomic destination in Paris, but at the moment, the food still needs some works.

 

There were the expected teething problems and some inconsistencies with the service; but with years of refinement, The Peninsula Paris will no doubt ascend the throne. Personally, the Shangri-La Paris is currently the real competitor, together with the upcoming Ritz and de Crillon when they open next year, especially when Rosewood has taken over Crillon management and Karl Lagerfeld is working on its top suites. The two, however, may still need to revisit the drawing boards and put more effort on the guestrooms if they ever want to compete; because at the moment, The Peninsula Paris is simply unrivaled.

 

UPDATE 2016:

*I have always been very spot-on with my predictions. After only two years since its opening, The Peninsula Paris has been awarded the much coveted Palace status. In fact, it is the only hotel in Paris to receive such distinction in 2016. Congratulations, it is very much deserving*

 

PERSONAL RATING:

1. Room: 100

2. Bathroom: 100

3. Bed: 100

4. Service: 90

5. In-room Tech: 100

6. In-room Amenities: 100

7. Architecture & Design: 100

8. Food: 80

9. View: 80

10. Pool: 95

11. Wellness: 95

12. Location: 95

13. Value: 100

 

Overall: 95.00

 

Compare with other Parisian hotels (all with Palace status) that I have stayed previously:

SHANGRI-LA HOTEL, PARIS: 95.00

PARK HYATT PARIS-VENDOME: 90.00

FOUR SEASONS GEORGE V: 85.38

 

My #1 ALL TIME FAVORITE HOTEL

LANDMARK MANDARIN ORIENTAL, HONG KONG: 95.38

 

THE PENINSULA, PARIS

19, Avenue Kléber, Paris

Awarded Palace Status in 2016

 

General Manager: Nicolas Béliard

Hotel Manager: Vincent Pimont

Executive Chef: Jean-Edern Hurstel

Head Chef (Lili): Chi Keung Tang

Head Chef (L'oiseau Blanc): Sidney Redel

Head Chef (The Lobby): Laurent Poitevin

Chef Patissier: Julien Alvarez

 

Architect (original Majestic Hotel, circa 1908): Armand Sibien

Architect (renovation & restoration, 2010-2014): Richard Martinet

Interior Designer: Henry Leung of Chhada Siembieda & Associates

Landscape Designer: D. Paysage

 

Art Curator: Sabrina Fung

Art Restorer: Cinzia Pasquali

Artist (Courtyard installation): Ben Jakober & Yannick Vu

Crystal work: Baccarat

Designer (Lili fiber optic installation): Clementine Chambon & Francoise Mamert

Designer (Chinaware): Catherine Bergen

Gilder Specialist & Restorer: Ateliers Gohard

Glass Crafter (Lobby Installation): Lasvit Glass Studio

Master Glass Crafters: Duchemin

Master Sculptor (Lobby): Xavier Corbero

Metalwork: Remy Garnier

Plaster & Moulding Expert: Stuc et Staff

Silverware: Christofle

Silk & Trimmings: Declercq Passementiers

Wood Restoration Expert: Atelier Fancelli

  

Hotel Opening Date: 01 August 2014

Notable owners: Katara Hospitality; Hong Kong and Shanghai Hotels Group (HSH)

Total Rooms & Suites: 200 (including 35m2 Superior, 45m2 Deluxe, 50m2 Grand Deluxe, 55m2 Premier and 60m2 Grand Premier Rooms)

Total Suites: 34 Suites (including 70m2 Superior, 85m2 Deluxe and 100m2 Premier

Top Suites: Historic Suite, Katara Suite, and The Peninsula Suite

Bathroom Amenities: Oscar de la Renta

 

Restaurants: The Lobby (All day dining & Afternoon tea), LiLi (Cantonese), L'Oiseau Blanc (French), La Terrasse Kléber

Bars and Lounges: Le Bar Kléber; Kléber Lounge; Cigar Lounge; and L'Oiseau Blanc Bar

Meeting & Banquets: Salon de l'Étoile for up to 100 guests, and 3 smaller Function Rooms

Health & Leisure: 24 hours gym & 1,800m2 Peninsula Spa with 22m indoor swimming pool and jacuzzis; Steam & Sauna, Relaxation Room, and 8 treatment rooms

Transport: chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce Extended Wheel Base Phantom; a 1934 Rolls Royce Phantom II; 2 MINI Cooper S Clubman; and a fleet of 10 BMW 7 Series

 

Complimentary facilities: Non-alcoholic Minibar; Wired and Wireless Internet; VOIP long distance calls; HD Movies; Daily fruit Basket; International Newspaper; Chauffeured MINI Cooper S Clubman for Suites guests; and Chauffeured Rolls Royce for top Suites

 

paris.peninsula.com

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Sorry the title is pretty lame. taken in a car park in Reading after a corporate headshot session

Today is International Women’s Day. 💜

 

At Flickr + SmugMug + ThisWeekinPhoto, we are committed to ensuring that we are continually thinking about equity and inclusion: in our day jobs, in our personal lives, and in the lives of our customers.

 

The faces you see in today's International Women's Day blog post

are just a few of the awesome women in our company. They're amazing Support Heroes and Specialists, they're QA Analysts, members of our legal, engineering, marketing, and People teams.

 

We ask that you take a moment to read a heartfelt story on our blog from our Chief People Officer, Jill Valenzuela Schapiro, about this year's IWD2024 theme, Inspire Inclusion, and what it means to her and for our company. 🙌

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West Adams Heights

 

“Nowadays we scarcely notice the high stone gates which mark the entrances on Hobart, Harvard, and Oxford streets, south of Washington Boulevard. For one thing, the traffic is too heavy, too swift; and then, again, the gates have been obscured by intrusions of shops and stores. At the base of the stone pillars appears the inscription “West Adams Heights.” There was a time when these entranceways were formidable and haughty, for they marked the ways to one of the first elite residential areas in Los Angeles. . . In the unplanned early-day chaos of Los Angeles, West Adams Heights was obviously something very special, an island in an ocean of bungalows—approachable, but withdrawn and reclusive—one of the few surviving examples of planned urban elegance of the turn of the century.”

 

- Carey McWilliams, “The Evolution of Sugar Hill,” Script, March, 1949: 30.

 

Today West Adams Heights is still obviously something special. The past sixty years, however, have not been kind. In 1963 the Santa Monica Freeway cut through the heart of West Adams Heights, dividing the neighborhood, obscuring its continuity. In the 1970’s the city paved over the red brick streets and removed the ornate street lighting. After the neighborhood’s zoning was changed to a higher density, overzealous developers claimed several mansions for apartment buildings. Despite these challenges, however, “The Heights,” as the area was once known, has managed to regain some of its former elegance.

 

The West Adams Heights tract was laid out in 1902, in what was then a wheat field on the western edge of town. Although the freeway now creates an artificial barrier, the original neighborhood boundaries were Adams Boulevard, La Salle Ave, Washington Boulevard, and Western Avenue. Costly improvements were integrated into the development, such as 75-food wide boulevards (which were some of the first contoured streets not to follow the city grid), lots elevated from the sidewalk, ornate street lighting, and large granite monuments with red-brass electroliers at the entrance to every street. These upgrades increased the lot values, which helped ensure the tract would be an enclave for the elite.

 

One early real estate ad characterized the neighborhood stating: “West Adams Heights needs no introduction to the public: it is already recognized as being far superior to any other tract. Its high and slightly location, its beautiful view of the city and mountains make t a property unequaled by any other in the city.”

 

The early residents’ were required to sign a detailed restrictive covenant. This hand-written document required property owners to build a “first-class residence,” of at least two stories, costing no less than two-thousand dollars (at a time when a respectable home could be built for a quarter of that amount, including the land), and built no less than thirty-five feet from the property’s primary boundary. Common in early twentieth century, another clause excluded residents from selling or leasing their properties to non-Caucasians.

 

By the mid 1930’s, however, most of the restrictions had expired. Between 1938 and 1945 many prominent African-Americans began to make “The Heights” their home. According to Carey McWilliams, West Adams Heights became known “Far and wide as the famous Sugar Hill section of Los Angeles,” and enjoyed a clear preeminence over Washington’s smart Le Droit Park, St. Louis’s Enright Street, West Philadelphia, Chicago’s Westchester, and Harlem’s fabulous Sugar Hill.

 

West Adams Heights, now also known as Sugar Hill, played a major role in the Civil Rights movement in Los Angeles. In 1938 Norman Houston, president of the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company, and an African-American, purchased a home at 2211 South Hobart Boulevard. Legal Action from eight homeowners quickly ensued. During that period, other prominent African-Americans began to make Sugar Hill their home – including actress Hattie McDaniels, dentists John and Vada Summerville, actress Louise Beavers, band leader Johnny Otis, and performers Pearl Baily and Ethel Waters, and many more. On December 6, 1945, the “Sugar Hill Cases” were heard before Judge Thurmond Clark, in LA Superior Court. He made history by become the first judge in America to use the 14th Amendment to disallow the enforcement of covenant race restrictions. The Los Angeles Sentinel quoted Judge Clark: “This court is of the opinion that it is time that [African-Americans] are accorded, without reservations and evasions, the full rights guaranteed them under the 14th Amendment.” Gradually, over the last century people of nearly ever background have made historic West Adams their home.

 

The northern end of West Adams Heights is now protected as part of the Harvard Heights Historic Preservation Overlay Zone (HPOZ). The Historic West Adams area of Los Angeles (which includes West Adams Heights) boasts the highest concentration of turn-of-the-century homes west of the Mississippi, as well as the highest concentration of National Historic Landmarks, National Register of Historic Places, National Historic Districts, State Historic Landmarks, Los Angeles Cultural-Historic Monuments, and Historic Preservation Overlay Zones in the city. The entirety of West Adams Heights should be nominated as a National Register Historic District, for the quality of homes, the prominence of the architects, notoriety of the people who lived in the neighborhood, and the role it played in civil rights.

 

Perhaps a quote adapted from a fireplace mantle in the Frederick Rindge mansion best symbolizes the optimism which exists in West Adams: “California Shall be Ours as Long as the Stars Remain.”

 

01 – Harvard Street Monument – Harvard Blvd & Washington Blvd, 1902.

 

Nearly destroyed by neglect and vandals over decades of inner city decay, the Harvard and Hobart Boulevard monuments were restored in 2002.

 

02 – Frank Southerland & Grace Pirtle Hutton, and John A Pirtle Residence – 2047 La Salle Ave - 1907

 

According to the property permit, the house was built for E B Spencer in 1906. Most likely he built this house on speculation (as he did two years earlier at 2039-2041 La Salle Ave), because according to the LA County Tax Assessor’s Office, John A Pirtle purchased this property in 1907. The same year there appears an article in the LA Herald announcing the engagement of Frank Southerland Hutton to Miss Grace Pirtle, who lived with her parents at 1819 S Union Ave, and their plans to build a house in Los Angeles after their honeymoon. Another 1907 article indicates the happy couple were married and moved into their new home on La Salle Ave. But, by 1909, they’ve moved to 1827 S Normandie and John A Pirtle is shown at the La Salle house. John Pirtle was a Southern California industrialist who appears to have made his fortune in the oil fields of Tennessee, Alabama, and Texas, through a company called the Beaumont Exchange and the Oriole Oil Company. He also speculated in water, with the West Los Angeles Water Company, West Side Water Company and the Glendale Consolidated Water Company. Frank Hutton was a well-known and respected Los Angeles lawyer, a partner of the firm Schweitzer and Hutton. This 1907 house is an unassuming looking American Craftsman bungalow, which hides its actual size. Beneath the long, low slung slope of the gable is a rather large house of 2-1/2 stories. The rounded, Colonial Revival styled balcony rail is an unusual feature.

 

03 – Robert K Wilson, J Frank & Virginia N Waters, and Mark & Mamie (May) E Phelps Residence – 2039-2041 La Salle Ave – 1905 – Frank Dale Hudson and Julius W Krause

 

Dutch Colonial in West Adams Heights is a rare architectural style, probably already deemed to be passé, but two examples exist nonetheless. The other Dutch is on South Hobart, built for C I D Moore, and is turned on its side, giving it a more Cotswold appearance. This Dutch Colonial is a straight-on interpretation of the vernacular. The architect of the house is reported to be Julius W Krause. Prior to 1895 Krause was partnered with Frank Dale Hudson, of the firm Hudson and Munsell. For a time Krause was also the Superintendent of Building for the City of Los Angeles. The original builder of this house was E B Spencer, however it’s obvious he built it in 1905 on speculation (just as he did two years later the house at 2047 La Salle Ave). This house was quickly sold the same year to Robert K Wilson who Just as quickly flipped it in 1907 to J Frank Waters. Six months later Waters sold the residence to Mark and Mamie (May) E Phelps. The Phelps’s lived at this resident until Mark’s death in 1924. Mark Phelps was described as a pioneer of Los Angeles, first finding success in mining, then as a live-stock dealer. He retired just 3 months before his death. By 1926 J E Phillips who was reported to be living at this address was arrested for smuggling Moonshine Whiskey in his car. In 1943, William J Morris, a building contractor, was the resident, according to his obituary.

 

04 – Wilbur Wells & Blanche Lillian Smith Keim Residence – 2033 La Salle Ave – 1904

 

Wilbur Wells Keim graduated from the Pharmacy School at UC Berkeley in 1902. He married Miss Blanche Lillian Smith in 1903. A large reception for the couple was held at the West Adams Heights mansion of Wesley W Beckett, 2218 S Harvard Blvd. The couple began building their house on La Salle in 1904. Keim opened a pharmacy with Edward R Neill (Keim-Neill Drug Co) just a few blocks away on the Southwest corner of Washington and Normandie, at 1890 W Washington Boulevard. Their daughter, Lorraine Keim was a 1925 graduate of USC and a member of the Kappa Alpha Sorority. The house itself is a mystery. The front porch is Craftsman. The eves under the second story and the overall shape appear to be Colonial Revival. The front door with the half sidelights and smaller window openings suggest an older structure which was moved to this location and remodeled. The effect, unfortunately, isn’t quite successful.

 

05 – William A & Rose H Jenkins Residence – 2029 La Salle Ave – 1909

 

Originally the address was 1949 La Salle Ave, but a reorganization of addresses by the city to make them more uniform changed it to 2029 La Salle Ave sometime around 1909-1910.

 

06 – Frank A & Marie C Von Violand Vickery Residence – 2025 La Salle Ave – 1909

 

When Frank A Vickery passed away he left a sizable estate. Numerous properties were advertised for auction in the February 28, 2014, issue of The California Outlook, including three in West Adams Heights (1947 La Salle Ave, 2017 La Salle Ave, and 2025 La Salle Ave). Vickery had purchased these unimproved lots in 1906 from the Gopher Land Company as investments and improved the lots. Frank Vickery was a mining industrialist with many interests, including the Pan-American Hardwoods Company in Mexico and the San Gabriel River Rock Company. The Vickery’s lived at 341 Andrews Blvd (S St Andrews Pl), in a 1907 mansion they built for $25,000. According to the LA Times and LA Herald society pages, they entertained often. In May, 1910, the Vickery’s sold their St Andrews Pl home through the Althouse Brothers for $45,000, to Mrs. Frederick Fischer, and relocated to their 2025 La Salle Ave home. After Frank Vickery’s death, auction, either the house didn’t sell at auction or his wide decided to continue living at the residence. The 1923-24 Southwestern Blue Book lists her at this location, with visiting on “Third Wednesdays. “ Mrs. Vickery was also a member of the Ebell and Friday Morning Clubs. Although this house must have been smaller and less opulent than their St Andrews Place residence, it is still a handsome American Craftsman home, with only minor alterations.

 

07 – Income property owned by Frank A Vickery – 2017 La Salle Ave – 1909

 

When Frank A Vickery passed away he left a sizable estate. Numerous properties were advertised for auction in the February 28, 2014, issue of The California Outlook, including three in West Adams Heights (1947 La Salle Ave, 2017 La Salle Ave, and 2025 La Salle Ave). Vickery had purchased these unimproved lots in 1906 from the Gopher Land Company as investments and improved the lots. Frank Vickery was a mining industrialist with many interests, including the Pan-American Hardwoods Company in Mexico and the San Gabriel River Rock Company. The house is American Craftsman, and the architect and builder was the Alfred E Georgian, Co.

 

08 – La Salle Ave Streetscape

Looking South on La Salle Ave (from left to right):

A. 2047 La Salle Ave – Hutton-Pirtle Residence

B. 2041 La Salle Ave – Phelps Residence

C. 2029 La Salle Ave – Hull Residence

D. 2033 La Salle Ave – Keim Residence

E. 2025 La Salle Ave – Frank A & Marie C Von Violand Vickery Residence

F. 2017 La Salle Ave – Income Property owned by Frank A Vickery

 

09 – Stanley Frederick & Sue A Shaffer McClung – 1959 La Salle Ave – 1905 – Robert Farquhar Train & Robert Edmund Williams

 

Imagine this house as it might have been in 1905: the long sloping roof of natural shingles, which would have matched the color of the shingled siding; ornate rails along the porch, widows weep, and above the bay window; a full chimney and no bars on the windows or doors. The effect would have been striking, and will again when the house is one day restored. It’s one of the most significant surviving houses on La Salle. It was designed by the architecture team of Robert Farquar Train and Robert Edmund Williams (Train & Williams), for Pacific Mutual Secretary Stanley F McClung. He was part of the “Old Company” forced out of power in the early 1930’s along with his brother-in-law George Ira Cochran.

 

10 – Income property owned by Frank A Vickery – 1947 La Salle Ave – 1909

 

When Frank A Vickery passed away he left a sizable estate. Numerous properties were advertised for auction in the February 28, 2014, issue of The California Outlook, including three in West Adams Heights (1947 La Salle Ave, 2017 La Salle Ave, and 2025 La Salle Ave). Vickery had purchased these unimproved lots in 1906 from the Gopher Land Company as investments and improved the lots. Frank Vickery was a mining industrialist with many interests, including the Pan-American Hardwoods Company in Mexico and the San Gabriel River Rock Company. The house is a handsome American Craftsman residence, making use of horizontal siding to make it appear wider.

 

11 – Evan G & Matilee Loeb Evans and William A & Rose H Haley Jenkins Residence – 1929 La Salle Ave – 1903 – Allied Arts Co

 

This home is American Craftsman designed in 1903 by The Allied Arts Co (as was its neighbor at 1919 La Salle Ave), a prominent architecture firm responsible for many LA landmarks, including the recently restored Hall of Justice. A J Carlson was the contractor. Evan G Evans, from Chicago, IL, arrived in Los Angeles in the late 1990’s, and married Matilee Loeb in 1898. The Mr & Mrs Evans were prominent in the society pages. The second owner, William (Will) Jenkins, was like many of his neighbors, a Capitalist. Jenkins appears to have had his hand in many enterprises, including the Madera Canal & Irrigation Company. Mrs. Jenkins passed away August 5, 1933, at her home at 148 S Irving Blvd, survived by her husband.

 

12 – John H & Evangeline “Eva” Rose Clark Tupper and Thomas M & Mary P Sloan Residence – 1919 La Salle Ave – 1903 – Allied Arts Co

 

John H and Wilbur S Tupper were born in Evansville, Wisconsin, the children of John H and Mary Sophia Foster Tupper. In the 1800’s the brothers relocated in San Francisco found themselves in the insurance industry. Wilbur Tupper became Vice-President of Conservative Life and again both brothers moved to Los Angeles. Wilbur was destined for success and after the death of then-president Frederick Hastings Rindge, he became president of both Conservative Life and Pacific Mutual (founded by Leland Stanford). Wilbur’s house was located at 2237 S Harvard Blvd and John’s at 1919 La Salle Ave, within the same tract. In 1906 Wilbur suddenly resigned from the company in scandal involving another woman (not his wife). He fled to Chicago, abandoning his wife and position. His brother John probably suffered for his brother’s indiscretion, which may help explain his sudden departure from the neighborhood and the sale of his house to Thomas M Sloan. About the same time Thomas Sloan had been promoted to Assistant General Freight Agent of the Sante Fe Railroad. This transitional Victorian/Craftsman house was designed in 1903 by the Allied Arts Co, (as was its neighbor at 1929 La Salle Ave), a prominent architecture firm responsible for many LA landmarks, including the recently restored Hall of Justice. A J Carlson was the contractor.

 

13 – Charles Kraft Residence – 1913 La Salle Ave – 1913 – Earl E Scherich

 

A more modest and later addition to the neighborhood, this 1913 Craftsman Bungalow was built for Charles Kraft, Vice-President of the J C Huggins Co, a brokerage and loan company. The home was designed by Architect Earl E Scherich, and May L Greenwood, builder.

 

14 – Roland Paul Residence Gates – 1986 W Washington Blvd – 1905 – Sumner P Hunt and Arthur Wesley Eager (Demolished)

 

Between a bicycle shop and a convalescence home are the gates to 1986 W Washington Blvd, which remain the only evidence that a home designed by Hunt & Eager once stood here. Originally commissioned by Mrs. R Fitzpatrick of Pico Blvd, in February of 1905, it was quickly turned over to pioneer Col Charles F Howland, who lived around the corner at 1902 S Harvard Blvd. He attempted to sell it in September, 1905, to Walter Rose, but the deal apparently fell through. In November, 1905, Col Howland successfully sold the home to Roland Paul.

 

15 – Elizabeth L Kenney Residence – 2012 W Washington Blvd – 1906 – Philip Gengembre Hubert (Attributed)

 

When this home was built, Philip Gengembre Hubert, celebrated New York City architect, was listed as the owner. It was most-likely designed by him on speculation. His residence was already established in 1903 at 2144 S Hobart Blvd. Hubert was responsible for designing many New York City landmarks, including the Chelsea Hotel, and after nearly 40 years in practice Hubert retired to Los Angeles, where he died in 1911. This home was sold to Elizabeth L Kenney, the second female to graduate the law department at Stanford University and continued her education at Northwestern University in Chicago. Kenney became the first practicing female attorney in Los Angeles in 1897, entering into practice with her uncle. The house, unfortunately, has been mistreated with a layer of stucco and aluminum windows. We can only hope evidence of the house’s original nature lies underneath.

 

16 – Commercial Block – 2034 W Washington Blvd (formerly the home of Nathaniel Dryden, 1902 S Harvard Blvd)

 

Evidence of how quickly Los Angeles was changing in the early 20th Century can be seen in this attractive commercial block. Nathaniel Dryden, an architect and engineer who built the Brand Library in Glendale and the Robinson Mansion in Beverly Hills, built his home on this corner in 1903. Just 20 years later it had been replaced by a commercial building already. Such was the value of land in the quick-growing city.

 

17 – Clara Pitt Durant Residence – 1909 S Harvard Blvd. 1908. Sumner P Hunt and Arthur Wesley Eager

 

Barely visible from the street, the current owners prefer to be hidden by the trees and shrubs. This large Craftsman home was designed by Hunt & Eager for Ms. Clara Pitt Durant. A divorcee from Michigan, Ms. Pitt took her settlement and began a new life in Los Angeles. The history of the house is recorded at: www.invisiblemanor.com

  

18 – Charles Clifford and Belle Case Gibbons Residence – 1915 S Oxford Ave – 1903 – Frank M Tyler.

 

This house, designed by Frank M Tyler, is unusual for the neighborhood because it is completely sheathed in shingles, including the front porch columns. It is a Transitional Victorian/Craftsman in the Shingle Style, with Colonial and Tudor touches. It was built for Charles Clifford Gibbons and Belle Case Gibbons, who came to Los Angeles in 1884. Mr. Gibbons worked his way to from stock boy to general manager of Hale’s Dry Goods Store. His employer, Jas M Hale was a relation of San Francisco’s Hale’s Bros. Department Store, the national chain. C C Gibbons died in 1910 after an illness and in 1912 the house was sold to Matt and Mary Conway. Matt Conway made his business in real estate and land speculation. Coincidentally, the third owner, Jon Fukuto, was also a proprietor of a chain of Los Angeles grocery stores call Jonson’s Supermarkets (the name being a play on words, combining “Jon” and “Sons”). In 1945, after being released from the Gila Internment Camp in Arizona, Mr. Fukuto moved his family to Los Angeles where he established the business.

 

The Mount Elliott Mining Complex is an aggregation of the remnants of copper mining and smelting operations from the early 20th century and the associated former mining township of Selwyn. The earliest copper mining at Mount Elliott was in 1906 with smelting operations commencing shortly after. Significant upgrades to the mining and smelting operations occurred under the management of W.R. Corbould during 1909 - 1910. Following these upgrades and increases in production, the Selwyn Township grew quickly and had 1500 residents by 1918. The Mount Elliott Company took over other companies on the Cloncurry field in the 1920s, including the Mount Cuthbert and Kuridala smelters. Mount Elliott operations were taken over by Mount Isa Mines in 1943 to ensure the supply of copper during World War Two. The Mount Elliott Company was eventually liquidated in 1953.

 

The Mount Elliott Smelter:

 

The existence of copper in the Leichhardt River area of north western Queensland had been known since Ernest Henry discovered the Great Australia Mine in 1867 at Cloncurry. In 1899 James Elliott discovered copper on the conical hill that became Mount Elliott, but having no capital to develop the mine, he sold an interest to James Morphett, a pastoralist of Fort Constantine station near Cloncurry. Morphett, being drought stricken, in turn sold out to John Moffat of Irvinebank, the most successful mining promoter in Queensland at the time.

 

Plentiful capital and cheap transport were prerequisites for developing the Cloncurry field, which had stagnated for forty years. Without capital it was impossible to explore and prove ore-bodies; without proof of large reserves of wealth it was futile to build a railway; and without a railway it was hazardous to invest capital in finding large reserves of ore. The mining investor or the railway builder had to break the impasse.

 

In 1906 - 1907 copper averaged £87 a ton on the London market, the highest price for thirty years, and the Cloncurry field grew. The railway was extended west of Richmond in 1905 - 1906 by the Government and mines were floated on the Melbourne Stock Exchange. At Mount Elliott a prospecting shaft had been sunk and on the 1st of August 1906 a Cornish boiler and winding plant were installed on the site.

 

Mount Elliott Limited was floated in Melbourne on the 13th of July 1906. In 1907 it was taken over by British and French interests and restructured. Combining with its competitor, Hampden Cloncurry Copper Mines Limited, Mount Elliott formed a special company to finance and construct the railway from Cloncurry to Malbon, Kuridala (then Friezeland) and Mount Elliott (later Selwyn). This new company then entered into an agreement with the Queensland Railways Department in July 1908.

 

The railway, which was known as the 'Syndicate Railway', aroused opposition in 1908 from the trade unions and Labor movement generally, who contended that railways should be State-owned. However, the Hampden-Mount Elliott Railway Bill was passed by the Queensland Parliament and assented to on the 21st of April 1908; construction finished in December 1910. The railway terminated at the Mount Elliott smelter.

 

By 1907 the main underlie shaft had been sunk and construction of the smelters was underway using a second-hand water-jacket blast furnace and converters. At this time, W.H. Corbould was appointed general manager of Mount Elliott Limited.

 

The second-hand blast furnace and converters were commissioned or 'blown in' in May 1909, but were problematic causing hold-ups. Corbould referred to the equipment in use as being the 'worst collection of worn-out junk he had ever come across'. Corbould soon convinced his directors to scrap the plant and let him design new works.

 

Corbould was a metallurgist and geologist as well as mine/smelter manager. He foresaw a need to obtain control and thereby ensure a reliable supply of ore from a cross-section of mines in the region. He also saw a need to implement an effective strategy to manage the economies of smelting low-grade ore. Smelting operations in the region were made difficult by the technical and economic problems posed by the deterioration in the grade of ore. Corbould resolved the issue by a process of blending ores with different chemical properties, increasing the throughput capacity of the smelter and by championing the unification of smelting operations in the region. In 1912, Corbould acquired Hampden Consols Mine at Kuridala for Mount Elliott Limited, followed with the purchases of other small mines in the district.

 

Walkers Limited of Maryborough was commissioned to manufacture a new 200 ton water jacket furnace for the smelters. An air compressor and blower for the smelters were constructed in the powerhouse and an electric motor and dynamo provided power for the crane and lighting for the smelter and mine.

 

The new smelter was blown in September 1910, a month after the first train arrived, and it ran well, producing 2040 tons of blister copper by the end of the year. The new smelting plant made it possible to cope with low-grade sulphide ores at Mount Elliott. The use of 1000 tons of low-grade sulphide ores bought from the Hampden Consols Mine in 1911 made it clear that if a supply of higher sulphur ore could be obtained and blended, performance, and economy would improve. Accordingly, the company bought a number of smaller mines in the district in 1912.

 

Corbould mined with cut and fill stoping but a young Mines Inspector condemned the system, ordered it dismantled and replaced with square set timbering. In 1911, after gradual movement in stopes on the No. 3 level, the smelter was closed for two months. Nevertheless, 5447 tons of blister copper was produced in 1911, rising to 6690 tons in 1912 - the company's best year. Many of the surviving structures at the site were built at this time.

 

Troubles for Mount Elliott started in 1913. In February, a fire at the Consols Mine closed it for months. In June, a thirteen week strike closed the whole operation, severely depleting the workforce. The year 1913 was also bad for industrial accidents in the area, possibly due to inexperienced people replacing the strikers. Nevertheless, the company paid generous dividends that year.

 

At the end of 1914 smelting ceased for more than a year due to shortage of ore. Although 3200 tons of blister copper was produced in 1913, production fell to 1840 tons in 1914 and the workforce dwindled to only 40 men. For the second half of 1915 and early 1916 the smelter treated ore railed south from Mount Cuthbert. At the end of July 1916 the smelting plant at Selwyn was dismantled except for the flue chambers and stacks. A new furnace with a capacity of 500 tons per day was built, a large amount of second-hand equipment was obtained and the converters were increased in size.

 

After the enlarged furnace was commissioned in June 1917, continuing industrial unrest retarded production which amounted to only 1000 tons of copper that year. The point of contention was the efficiency of the new smelter which processed twice as much ore while employing fewer men. The company decided to close down the smelter in October and reduce the size of the furnace, the largest in Australia, from 6.5m to 5.5m. In the meantime the price of copper had almost doubled from 1916 due to wartime consumption of munitions.

 

The new furnace commenced on the 16th of January 1918 and 77,482 tons of ore were smelted yielding 3580 tons of blister copper which were sent to the Bowen refinery before export to Britain. Local coal and coke supply was a problem and materials were being sourced from the distant Bowen Colliery. The smelter had a good run for almost a year except for a strike in July and another in December, which caused Corbould to close down the plant until New Year. In 1919, following relaxation of wartime controls by the British Metal Corporation, the copper price plunged from about £110 per ton at the start of the year to £75 per ton in April, dashing the company's optimism regarding treatment of low grade ores. The smelter finally closed after two months operation and most employees were laid off.

 

For much of the period 1919 to 1922, Corbould was in England trying to raise capital to reorganise the company's operations but he failed and resigned from the company in 1922. The Mount Elliott Company took over the assets of the other companies on the Cloncurry field in the 1920s - Mount Cuthbert in 1925 and Kuridala in 1926. Mount Isa Mines bought the Mount Elliott plant and machinery, including the three smelters, in 1943 for £2,300, enabling them to start copper production in the middle of the Second World War. The Mount Elliott Company was finally liquidated in 1953.

 

In 1950 A.E. Powell took up the Mount Elliott Reward Claim at Selwyn and worked close to the old smelter buildings. An open cut mine commenced at Starra, south of Mount Elliott and Selwyn, in 1988 and is Australia's third largest copper producer producing copper-gold concentrates from flotation and gold bullion from carbon-in-leach processing.

 

Profitable copper-gold ore bodies were recently proved at depth beneath the Mount Elliott smelter and old underground workings by Cyprus Gold Australia Pty Ltd. These deposits were subsequently acquired by Arimco Mining Pty Ltd for underground development which commenced in July 1993. A decline tunnel portal, ore and overburden dumps now occupy a large area of the Maggie Creek valley south-west of the smelter which was formerly the site of early miner's camps.

 

The Old Selwyn Township:

 

In 1907, the first hotel, run by H. Williams, was opened at the site. The township was surveyed later, around 1910, by the Mines Department. The town was to be situated north of the mine and smelter operations adjacent the railway, about 1.5km distant. It took its name from the nearby Selwyn Ranges which were named, during Burke's expedition, after the Victorian Government Geologist, A.R. Selwyn. The town has also been known by the name of Mount Elliott, after the nearby mines and smelter.

 

Many of the residents either worked at the Mount Elliott Mine and Smelter or worked in the service industries which grew around the mining and smelting operations. Little documentation exists about the everyday life of the town's residents. Surrounding sheep and cattle stations, however, meant that meat was available cheaply and vegetables grown in the area were delivered to the township by horse and cart. Imported commodities were, however, expensive.

 

By 1910 the town had four hotels. There was also an aerated water manufacturer, three stores, four fruiterers, a butcher, baker, saddler, garage, police, hospital, banks, post office (officially from 1906 to 1928, then unofficially until 1975) and a railway station. There was even an orchestra of ten players in 1912. The population of Selwyn rose from 1000 in 1911 to 1500 in 1918, before gradually declining.

 

Source: Queensland Heritage Register.

The Path to Freedom and Love and their Significance in World. Theodora’s Prophetic Revelation

Between these two poles lies the balancing factor that unites the two — unites the will that rays towards the head with the thoughts which, as they flow into deeds wrought with love, are, so to say, felt with the heart. This means of union is the life of feeling, which is able to direct itself towards the will as well as towards the thoughts. In our ordinary consciousness we live in an element by means of which we grasp, on the one side, what comes to expression in our will-permeated thought with its predisposition to freedom, while on the other side, we try to ensure that what passes over into our deeds is filled more and more with thoughts. And what forms the bridge connecting both has since ancient times been called Wisdom. (Diagram XI.)n his fairy-tale, The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily, Goethe has given indications of these ancient traditions in the figures of the Golden King, the Silver King, and the Brazen King. We have already shown from other points of view how these three elements must come to life again, but in an entirely different form — these three elements to which ancient instinctive knowledge pointed and which can come to life again only if man acquires the knowledge yielded by Imagination, Inspiration, Intuition.From: The Bridge Between Universal Spirituality and the Physical Constitution of Man The Path to Freedom and Love and their Significance in World Events

December 19, 1920.... in english from Rudolf Steiner comments about Goethe's Work

Through the way in which Goethe lets gold flow through this fairy tale, he shows how he looks back into the time in which wisdom — for which gold also stands, hence, “The Golden King of Wisdom” — was exposed to such persecutions as those described. Now, he sought to show past, present and future. Goethe saw instinctively into the future of eastern European civilization. He could see how unjustifiable is the way in which the problem of sin and death worked there. If we wished to designate, not quite inappropriately perhaps, the nationality of the man who is then led to the Temple and the Beautiful Lily, who appears at first as without vigor as if crippled, then, from what we have had to say recently about the culture of the East and of Russia, you will not consider it unreasonable to deem this man to be a Russian. In so doing, you will almost certainly follow the line of Goethe's instinct. The secret of European evolution in the fifth post-Atlantean epoch lies concealed within this fairy tale, just as truly as Goethe was able to conceal it in his Faust, especially in the second part, as we know from his own statement. It is clearly to be seen in Goethe — we have already shown it in various respects; later it can be shown in others — that he begins to regard the world and to feel himself in it, in accord with the fundamental demand of the fifth post-Atlantean epoch.From: Inner Impulses of Evolution ...VI Ancient Cultural Impulses Spiritualized in Goethe. The Cosmic Knowledge of the Knights Templar

As he lay desperately ill, he had a momentous experience, passing through a kind of Initiation. To begin with, he was not actually conscious of it but it worked in his soul as a kind of poetic inspiration and the process by which it flowed into his various creations was most remarkable. It flashes up in his poem entitled “The Mysteries,” which his closest friends have considered to be one of his most profound creations. And indeed this fragment is so profound that Goethe was never able to recapture the power to formulate its conclusion. The culture of the day was incapable of giving external form to the depths of life pulsating in this poem. It must be regarded as issuing from one of the deepest founts of Goethe's soul and is a book with seven seals for all his commentators. Then, however, the Initiation took increasing effect in him and finally, as he grew more conscious of it, he was able to produce that remarkable prose-poem known as “The Fairy Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily”; — one of the most profound writings in all literature. Those who are able to interpret it rightly know a great deal of the Rosicrucian wisdom.

We often find that persons who have not gone far enough into the matter will ask how a man such as Goethe can on the one hand bear within him certain secrets of the human soul, and on the other hand be so often torn by passion, as he is found to be by those who read his life-story in a rather superficial way. In fact, there was in Goethe something that can be called, in a crude sense, a double nature. To a superficial view the two sides can hardly be brought into harmony. On the one hand there is the great, high-minded soul who could bring forth certain portions of the second part of Faust, and gave expression to many deep secrets of human nature in the Fairy-Story of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily; and one would like to forget everything one knows from biographies of Goethe and pay homage only to the soul who was capable of such achievements. On the other side, there appears in Goethe, tormenting him and often causing him pangs of conscience, his other nature, “human, all-too-human”, in many respects. In earlier times the two natures of man were not so widely separate in their development; they could not diverge in this way. A person with a biography comparable with Goethe's could not rise to such heights as are revealed in certain passages of the second part of Faust or in the Fairy-Story of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily, and at the same time be so divided in his soul. That was not possible in earlier times. It has become possible only in later days, because there now exists in human nature something we have already spoken of — the part of the soul that has become unconscious, and the part of the organism that has died. The part that has remained alive can be so elevated and purified that the impulse which leads on to the Fairy-Story of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily; can be nurtured there, while the other part may remain exposed to the attacks of the outer world. And because the forces described are able to make their abode there, circumstances may arise in which there is very little agreement with the higher ego of the person. It should be understood that the soul living in Goethe had once belonged to an Egyptian Initiate, and had then lived in Greece as a sculptor and a disciple of philosophy; then, between this Greek incarnation and the one as Goethe, there comes an incarnation (probably only one) which I have not yet been able to find. If we keep this in mind, we can see how a soul who in former incarnations could rule the entire man can be led downwards, and then has to relinquish a part of the total human nature, which then lies open to the influence of evil forces.

That is what is mysterious and so hard to understand in a nature such as Goethe's; but by the same token it brings to light many hidden aspects of the human soul in modern times. Everything brought about by the duality of human nature lays hold, in the first place, of the Intellectual Soul, and the Intellectual Soul divides into those “two souls”, whereof one can sink fairly deeply into matter and the other can rise into the spiritual.

The middle of the nineteenth century was a much more incisive point in man's spiritual history than people can realise today. The period before it is represented in Schiller and Goethe; it is followed by something quite different, which can understand the preceding period very little. What we now call the social question, in the widest sense — a sense that humanity has not yet grasped, but should grasp and must grasp later on — was born only in the second half of the nineteenth century. And we can understand this fact only if we ask: why, in such significant and representative considerations as those attempted by Schiller in his “Aesthetic Letters” and represented pictorially by Goethe in his “Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily,” do we find no trace of the peculiar way of thinking we are impelled to develop today about the structure of society — although Goethe in his “Tale” is evidently hinting at political forms?

If we approach the “Aesthetic Letters” and the “Tale” with inner understanding, we can feel the presence in them of a powerful spirituality which humanity has since lost. Anyone reading the “Aesthetic Letters” should feel: in the very way of writing an element of soul and spirit is at work which is not present in even the most outstanding figures today; and it would be stupid to think that anyone could now write something like Goethe's fairy tale. Since the middle of the nineteenth century this spirituality has not been here. It does not speak directly to present-day men and can really speak only through the medium of Spiritual Science, which extends our range of vision and can also enter into earlier conditions in man's history. It would really be best if people would acknowledge that without spiritual knowledge they cannot understand Schiller and Goethe. Every scene in “Faust” can prove this to you.

Looking back before the nineteenth century to the end of the eighteenth century, we can observe a significant impulse. It was the impulse working in Schiller when he wrote his Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man; this was the time, too, when Goethe was stirred by his dealings with Schiller. They led Goethe to express the impulse which lay behind Schiller's “Aesthetic Letters” in his own tale, “The Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily.” You can read about the connection between Schiller's “Aesthetic Letters” and Goethe's fairy-tale in my recent small book on Goethe.

Goethe has not left the source uncertain from whose depths he has drawn his inspiration. In another tale, The New Paris, he gives in a veiled manner the history of his own inner enlightenment. Many will remain incredulous if we say that, in this dream, Goethe represents himself just at the boundary between the third and fourth sub-race of our fifth root-race. For him, the myth of Paris and Helen is a symbolic representation of this boundary. And as he — in a dream — conjures up before his eyes in a new form the myth of Paris, he feels he is casting a searching glance into the development of humanity. What such an insight into the past means to the inner eye, he tells us in the Prophecies of Bakis, which are also full of occult references:The past likewise will Bakis reveal to thee; for even the past oft lies, oh blind world, like a riddle before thee. Who knows the past knows also the future: both are joined in To-day in one complete whole.

Hence Goethe was stirred to write his “Tale of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily,” in which not only three but about twenty powers of the soul are described, not in concepts, but in pictorial forms, open to various interpretations. They are headed by the Golden King, who represents (not symbolises) wisdom, the Silver King who represents beautiful appearance, the Bronze King, who represents power, and Love who crowns them all. Everything else, too, indicates soul-forces;The three worlds are here represented as two regions separated from one another by a river. The river itself stands for the astral plane. On this side of it is the physical world, on the other side the spiritual (Devachan), where dwells the beautiful lily, the symbol of man's higher nature. In her kingdom, man must strive if he would unite his lower with his higher nature. In the abyss — that is, in the physical world — dwells the serpent which symbolizes the self of man. Here too is a temple of initiation, where reign four kings, one golden, one silver, one bronze, and a fourth of an irregular mixture of the three metals. Goethe, who was an alchemist, has clothed in alchemic terminology what he had to impart of his mystic experiences. The three kings represent the three higher forces of man: Wisdom (Gold), Beauty (Silver), and Strength (Bronze). As long as man lives in his lower nature, these three forces are in him disordered and chaotic. This period in the evolution of man is represented by the mixed king. But when man has so purified himself that the three forces work together in perfect harmony, and he can freely use them, then the way into the realm of the spiritual lies open before him. The still unpurified man is represented by a youth who, without having attained inner purity, would unite himself with the beautiful lily. Through this union he becomes paralyzed.Goethe here wished to point out the danger to which a man exposes himself who would force an entrance into the super-sensible region before he has severed himself from his lower self. Only when love has permeated the whole man, only when the lower nature has been sacrificed, can the initiation into the higher truths and powers begin. This sacrifice is expressed by the serpent yielding of its own accord, and forming a bridge of its body across the river — that is to say, the astral plane — between the two kingdoms, of the senses and of the spirit. At first man must accept the higher truths in the form in which they have been given to him in the imagery of the various religions. This form is personified as the man with the lamp. This lamp has the peculiarity of only giving light where there is already light, meaning that the religious truths presuppose a receptive, believing disposition. Their light shines where the light of faith is present. This lamp, however, has yet another quality, “of turning all stones into gold, all wood into silver, dead animals into precious stones, and of destroying all metals,” meaning the power of faith which changes the inner nature of the individual. There are about twenty characters in this allegory, all symbolical of certain forces in man's nature and, during the course of the action, the purifying of man is described, as he rises to the heights where, in his union with his higher self, he can be initiated into the secrets of existence. This state is symbolized by the Temple, formerly hidden in the abyss, being brought to the surface, and rising above the river — the astral plane. Every passage, every sentence in the allegory is significant. The more deeply one studies the tale, the more comprehensible and clear the whole becomes, and he who set forth the esoteric quintessence of this tale at the same time has given us the substance of the Anthroposophical outlook on life.Goethe, in his Legend of the Green Snake and the Beautiful Lily, has treated the forces of the human soul as three members, or forces; Power, Appearance, and Knowledge or Wisdom — or, as the Bronze King, the Silver King and the Golden King. Many remarkable things are spoken of in this legend, regarding the governing relationships which are being prepared for the present and which will live into the future. We can point out that what Goethe symbolizes by the Bronze king, the force of Power, is that which spreads over the world through the English-speaking peoples. This is necessary because the culture of the Consciousness Soul coincides with the special qualities of the British and American peoples.From: Social and Anti-Social Forces in the Human Being A lecture by Rudolf Steiner Bern, December 12, 1918

GA 186

you can read this in a article...by Rudolf Steiner

 

Sur la voie de la connaissance, il faudrait en connaître beaucoup pour rayonner sur toutes les raisons universelles, bien collées au sol de leurs pensées vers* la terre à terre,atterré par la lumière verte vient lire les lignes courbes des chemins de vie. L'effort d'attendre un moment que le train passe et espérer un rayon vert.

*vers de terre qui laissent les rayons du soleil purifier notre terre ou vers luisant qui éclairent la nuit dans la forêt des pensées inutiles qui serpentent au fond de l'esprit; le rayon vert c'est le dernier , l'orange du couchant rassemble les signes dans un faisceau d'idées qui éclaire les serpents entre les fenêtres du tramway vert,comme un autre signe d'un lien avec le savoir, le serpent devient un pont au moment exact deux trams se croisent un rayon se forme, le serpent devient droit pour laisser passer la lumière qui l'éclaire...

McCurtain Co. Rural Water District's Ken Clagg, opens a valve to vent a pipeline, ensuring they are full and properly supplying Kiamichi Rural Water Department customers, such as the Smithville Schools and children, in Smithville, OK on Wednesday, April 8, 2015.

The water system improvements for this system were made with the assistance of U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Rural Development (RD).

Today, McCurtain Co. Rural Water District #6 customers, business owners, and governmental entities have come to Smithville, OK, on April 8, 2015, to celebrate the completion of a $25 million water project that for the first time ever provides public water to residents in Oklahoma’s Ouachita Mountains. The McCurtain RWD #6 project consisted of installing 253 miles of new water transmission and distribution lines and constructing five pump stations and three water storage tanks.

The American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) Grant provided $ 17,953,950 million through the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development (RD) Rural Utilities Service (RUS) Water and Environmental Programs (WEP), and a $5,659,000 WEP Loan. The balance was funded by collaborating with several other funding sources such as the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, Oklahoma Department of Commerce (Community Development Block Grant), Oklahoma Water Resources Board (Rural Economic Action Plan Grant) and the McCurtain RWD #6 itself.

Attending this event are U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Rural Development (RD) Oklahoma State Director Ryan McMullen and Choctaw Nation Chief Gary Batton to discuss the USDA and Choctaw partnership on USDA StrikeForce initiatives in the Promise Zones.

In an effort to lay a new foundation for economic growth, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) was signed into law by President Obama on February 17, 2009.

The Recovery Act included measures to modernize our Nation's infrastructure, enhance energy independence, expand educational opportunities, preserve and improve affordable health care, provide tax relief, and protect those in greatest need. Of the $40.7 billion in program-level Recovery Act funding obligated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Rural Development obligated more than $21.2 billion in program-level funding to administer through seven USDA programs.

For more information about this project, please see www.rd.usda.gov/newsroom/news-release/rural-development-p...

For more information about USDA RD’s role in the ARRA, please see: www.rd.usda.gov/recovery/

For more information about USDA StrikeForce, please see: www.usda.gov/wps/portal/usda/usdahome?navid=STRIKE_FORCE

For more information about USDA RD’s role in the Promise Zones, please see: www.rd.usda.gov/about-rd/initiatives/promise-zones

USDA Photo by Lance Cheung.

.. religious rituals performed on 11th day after death, to ensure safe journey for the soul to reach heaven!

 

see more POOJA images here.

 

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