View allAll Photos Tagged Grieving
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
April-March 1974, Cambodia --- Since the Lon Nol coup in March 1970, two groups are fighting for control - the Khmer National Armed Forces (FANK), supported by the USA, and the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), pitted against the Cambodian People's National Liberation Armed Forces, (composed of Maoist nationalists and Khmer Rouge communists) supported by North Vietnam and the Vietcong. A soldier sits by a corpse in a village after a massacre carried out by rebels. --- Image by � Patrick Chauvel/Sygma/Corbis
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Soviet Prisoners of War Cemetery, Hörsten, Germany
Ukrainian sculptor Mykola Mukhin created the “Grieving Woman” relief sculpture for the monument, which was dedicated in November 1945. Unknown vandals destroyed the original in 1980. The original has been reassembled and is on display inside the New Documents House at Bergen-Belsen
View in 360° panorama here: tanjabarnes.com/blog.php?id=8064982803799158934
Artist Mark Grieve poses in front of his work "Archways" upon completion at the McBean Transit Center for the City of Santa Clarita, California. At the time of this photo, the center was still undergoing construction.
Architect: Cox Grieve Architects, an association of Australia's Cox Architects & Planners and Adelaide-based Grieve Gillett Architects (2001)
Location: Adelaide, Australia
The relatively coarse materials found at the entry of the center evolve into finer proportions and smoother textures at the rear. The scale of the spaces similarly progresses from the public to the personal—the grand scale of production leads to the intimate scale of wine appreciation in the tasting room.
To me this is one of the most moving memorials. As soon as I saw these soldiers boots I could not even begin to understand the grief his loved ones must continue to harbor.
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a national war memorial located in Washington , D.C., that honors members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War.
The Memorial consists of three separate parts: the Three Soldiers statue, the Vietnam Women's Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, which is the most recognized part of the memorial.
The main part of the memorial was completed in 1982 and is located in Constitution Gardens adjacent to the National Mall, just northeast of the Lincoln Memorial. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is maintained by the U.S. National Park Service, and receives around 3 million visitors each year. The Memorial Wall was designed by U.S. architect Maya Lin.
This photo is used as part of the closing credits for the film The Wall-and the Significance of the Vietnam War Experience by Michael Bukay.
دوشیزه سوگوار
نگاره سده ۱۵ ترسایی
سر لوح، سده ۱۷ ترسایی، کتاب لیلی و مجنون، خسرو و شیرین نظامی، آبرنگ، گواش و طلا بر روی کاغذ، ۲۰ در ۱۰.۳ سانتی متر
A GRIEVING MAIDEN
THE PAINTING, IRAN, 15TH CENTURY, THE HEADINGS SAFAVID IRAN, 17TH CENTURY
Opaque pigments heightened with gold on paper, by a grave in a mausoleum laid on paper between headings giving the titles of Nizami's epics Leyla and Majnun, and Khorsrow and Shirin, the reverse with four columns of text in nasta'liq script, cropped
Folio 24.8 x 15.9cm ; painting 20 x 10.3cm
Grieves with Ryan Gross and Mouse Powell with Danny T performing at Meow Wolf's music venue in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Bain News Service,, publisher.
Grieve, Mrs. Hawker, Harry Hawker
[between ca. 1915 and ca. 1920]
1 negative : glass ; 5 x 7 in. or smaller.
Notes:
Title from unverified data provided by the Bain News Service on the negatives or caption cards.
Forms part of: George Grantham Bain Collection (Library of Congress).
Format: Glass negatives.
Rights Info: No known restrictions on publication.
Repository: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA, hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.print
General information about the Bain Collection is available at hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/pp.ggbain
Higher resolution image is available (Persistent URL): hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/ggbain.28991
Call Number: LC-B2- 4948-6
My grandmother sent me a letter today. It read (or some of it did anyway):
"Study hard these next few weeks of school. High School in the fall. Can you believe it?"
Uhm. No. No I can't. xDD
Anyway, prepare for an extremely long description.
I've made it to my 100th 365 day! But since it took me so long, I’m posting this list on my 101st photo.
My 100th photo didn’t really relate to 100. But this project is about learning more about yourself, right? Sorta. Well, I thought I would take the time to write down 100 random facts about myself (and my beliefs) at the moment.
1. I'm disgusted at how huge my shadow is in my 100th picture. So I've made a new commitment of losing at least 5 pounds every month. I need to get a scale so I can track it.
2. What inspired me to lose weight was a Dove Chocolate wrapper that had a message inside. It read: "If they can do it, so can't you."
3. I believe that my soul mate could be anyone, regardless of gender (age, race, you get the picture :P).
4. "Right Down the Line" by Gerry Rafferty and "Faithfully" by Journey are two of my favorite love songs.
5. I can lip-sync to the movie National Treasure word for word.
6. I met both of my best friends online. I've known them for about 3 years.
7. I'm not very good expressing myself through talking, and I often offend people because I don't explain myself clearly.
8. I'm a very different person online and often taken advantage of the fact that no one can reach me through my computer screen.
9. I have the logic of a five year old. If you can't see it, it can't see you. That is the sentence that repeats through my head after I have watched a horror film and I'm trying to sleep.
10. Movies that animals die in (such as Mighty Joe Young and King Kong) make me bawl. But I don't cry when humans die. D:
11. I want to get snake bite piercings.
12. I watch movies online that I probably shouldn't.
13. Although I really like scary movies, I can't watch anything that has a possessed character in it (like the Exorcist). I've only seen clips of that movie and I bet I won't see it until I'm a lot older. Possession scares the crap out of me.
14. I think Dita Von Teese and Liv Tyler are two of the most beautiful women in the world. Anthony Hopkins and Joaquin Phoenix are two of the most handsome men. :P
15. Guys should have the long hair and girls should have the short.
16. When I was little, I had to get my tonsils out. I used to hide my medicine in my favorite recliner so I wouldn't have to take it. I have a fear of medicine going into my body. I even refuse to take tylenol or advil for a headache unless it's extremely painful.
17. When people used to ask me where my dad was, I would always make a story up. Two of the ones I can remember are “He drowned in his boat” and “When he was making something in his workshop he cut off his hand died.” Yes, my mind morbid even when I was young.
18. Metallica was my first ever obsession. I have posters, CDs, a t-shirt, magazines, a purse, and stickers all with their logo.
19. In my lifetime, I think I have completed only two stories that I started writing. They were both for school projects.
20. I think that serial killers are interesting. Not for what they did, but how they explain what they did and why they did it.
21. I despise cleanliness. My room is filled with clutter and I like it that way. Usually it’s not filthy (like I don’t have food under my bed and mold growing on my pillows) but I like it when there is stuff on the floor.
22. I’ve considered abandoning the thought of becoming a CSI and becoming an actress or musician instead.
23. I’m a very jealous person and I used to flip every time someone commented on my friend’s Myspace page (hence why I never will go on that site again).
24. I would like to become nocturnal but it’s nearly impossible for me to sleep during the day.
25. I spent 6 years of my life playing Neopets and I still can’t believe how much time I wasted on there.
26. When I was in pre-school, I remember I used to kiss the boys and pretend they were my boyfriends. Yes, very sad, I know.
27. I would really like to learn French and would probably make the compromise of going to public school if I could learn it.
28. If I am interested in a certain subject or person I will learn as much as I can about it/them. Hopefully it’s not considered like… stalking or something but I know a lot about certain celebrities.
29. I like having crooked teeth, but a lot of my family dislikes them.
30. Thinking about the future makes my stomach really weak. I’m often worried what this world is coming to.
31. I would like to become an old rodent lady. I want to have rabbits, guinea pigs, ferrets, rats, chinchillas, hamsters, mice… all that jazz. I really like little fuzzy things like that.
32. One of my favorite things to do when I’m in Maine is watch reality TV shows with my brother. Parental Control and Sweet 16 are two of the ones we like watching.
33. I don’t have a lot of motivation and I’m not proud of most of the things I have done that other people are proud of me for doing. I’m not even sure how I was motivated enough to get this far in my list!
34. I often have to stop myself in the middle of conversations to rethink what I was going to say without chatspeak.
35. I feel that some people take advantage of me, but I never do anything about it. Like I worry that people are just talking to me to rant to me so I can give them advice. But it stinks because then their problems become mine and I get extremely frustrated.
36. Even though I’m a very fortunate person, I often find myself wanting more or wanting to get away and lead a different life.
37. Grapes of Wrath is one of my favorite books, but I’ve only read it once.
38. One of the things that turns me off about people I meet is how they have to bring God into a conversation or they have to make everything they do somehow… revolve around God. Although I find myself to be an open-minded person, I’m somewhat offended when people think that everyone is religious and those that aren’t need to be ‘saved’.
39. Again, I find myself a very open-minded person, but two of the things I refuse to try to understand are Republican beliefs and Scientology.
40. You know how some people are racist, prejudice, sexist, etc.? Well, I’ve been told that I’m a ‘cliquest’ because strongly dislike the emo and scene styles.
41. I usually don’t finish things that I have started. For example, (like I mentioned above) I don’t usually finish stories I begin writing. I don’t finish many art projects I start, it takes me a long time to finish a movie, and it takes me a really long time to finish cleaning my room.
42. One of the reasons why I hate writing reports for school is because of the program Microsoft Word. It frustrates me greatly.
43. I consider myself to me a pretty good liar. I’m good with eye contact when I need to lie, but I usually end up blushing in the end which gives it away.
44. One of my dreams is to marry a retired actor and live in the woods in a house with a tower, away from the rest of the word.
45. I have an interest in a wide range of music. I listen to pop, R&B, metal, soundtrack stuff, rock, oldies, etc. The only genres I really can’t stand are opera, jazz, and orchestra like stuff unless it’s EXTREMELY powerful.
46. Unlike music, I don’t have a very wide range of movies I’m interested in. I like watching horrors and thrillers with this occasional comedy or romance. I’m also a sucker for any 80s film.
47. One of my worst fears is dying while I’m asleep. I like to be fully aware of what’s happening.
48. Another one of my worst fears is becoming attached to people. When I become attached to a person, it means that I’ll become very jealous if anyone else is involved with them. I worry that if they see how jealous I am, that they won’t think I’m a safe person to be around.
49. I don’t really understand why people are offended by nudity. D: Especially when they think that life is such a gift and all.
50. I dislike pretty much everything that has to do with the mouth except for the tongue. Teeth and chewing noises gross me out.
51. It’s hard for me to feel bad for people who have died during natural disasters. Like in hurricanes or tornados. I figure that there is a reason for it.
52. My dream wedding would take place on the rocks that Merry, Pippin, Frodo, Sam, Boromir, Legolas, Aragorn and Gimli (is that all of them?) grieved for Gandalf. I think the location is in New Zealand.
53. The form of my nonexistent future children’s names is a family name and a musician’s name.
54. I have a birthmark near an unmentionable place that I discovered a couple months ago. xD
55. The movie Requiem for a Dream is more powerful than D.A.R.E., and is one of my favorite movies. Seriously. If you have a teenage child you should watch it with them. That movie is one of the reasons why I will never consider doing drugs.
56. I like putting glue on my fingers and letting it dry to peel it off.
57. Another one of my favorite bands in Shiny Toy Guns. My best friend and I dubbed them ‘our band’ because it’s the only band that we both can agree we like. (I listen to the heavier stuff and he listens to more pop).
58. My step-dad says that I have a thing for guys named Andrew. I know three guys named Andrew and at some point, I’ve had a crush on each of them.
59. I have a fear of going over to other people’s houses to eat if they eat meat. Over the summer, my dad and step-mom didn’t accept that I ate meat and I had to survive off poptarts and chips. D: That’s part of the reason.
60. When I think, nearly every other word is a swear.
61. My favorite drink is a Strawberry Daiquiri. Virgin, of course. ;o
62. A video I found on YouTube narrated by Pamela Anderson is what inspired me to become a vegetarian.
63. Two of my most prized possessions are a seashell box given to me by my grandmother and Rollin’ Stone interviews with Axel Rose from May of ’92 given to me by my Mom.
64. When I was younger I used to watch a show called Big Wolf On Campus. One of the characters drove a hearse and that has been my dream car since then.
65. My aunt Lisa is my role-model.
66. I often scare my friend because I tell her the ideas I have of contraptions and traps similar to the ones in Saw.
67. My first CD ever was Britney Spears’ Oops… I Did it Again.
68. One of my favorite memories is of a day at the beach with two of mom’s friends and my old babysitters. J, I’ll call him, and I went for a walk on the beach and left our shoes in some random place. When we went to try to find them, we walked past them several times on accident because a couple had set up their spot and were making out. When J finally saw the shoes, we both couldn’t stop laughing.
69. I’ve looked into how much it costs to get pointed caps for your teeth so I could be a ‘vampire’.
70. I have glasses, but I barely wear them. They’re for reading.
71. I like to be confined into small places and don’t freak out in small areas, unless I can barely breathe.
72. AXE deodorant is the only kind that I’ve tired that doesn’t make me itch. ):
73. I often begin following trends once they’re considered ‘so last year’.
74. My guitars are named Griffin and Kadae.
75. My favorite smilie is ‘xD’ and I usually use it after every sentence when I am talking online, and sometimes even accidentally use it in my stories. xDD I’ll go through and be like, “’xD’? Why is this here? xDD”
76. I have a very strong conscience. Once, in third grade, a group of my friends (I guess you could call us the popular bullies) took a girl’s lunch box and hid it behind a trash can. I was so upset and felt so guilty that when I got him, I called the girl to tell her where her box was.
77. When I was around three or four, we lived in Maine in an apartment complex. One day while I was out playing, these teenagers decided it would be a good idea to put me in the baby swing and leave me there. I was a chunky toddler, so I got stunk in there and had to scream at the top of my lungs for my mom to come and get me. If I remember correctly my mom and the man helping to pull me out discussed calling the fire department. Since then I have always hated those swings.
78. One of my biggest pet-peeves is when people call black and white colors. Example:
Person 1: “What’s your favorite color?”
Person 2: “Black.”
Person 3: “Oh. You’re so badass. ;o”
-enters the chat- Me: “Psh. No. They’re not. Black isn’t a color.”
79. I used to walk around the house pretending to be Xena. I put a butterknife in my underwear and walked around. One time, I cut my chest and I have a bit of a scar.
80. My Top 10 most played songs on iTunes are:
I’m the Man – Anthrax (94 plays)
Du hast – Rammstein (91)
All Over You – Live (81)
Would? – Alice in Chains (74)
Touch, Peel & Stand – Days of the New (69)
Iris – Live (66)
More Than a Feeling – Boston (65)
DotA – Basshunter (50)
Music Is My Hot, Hot Sex – CSS (50)
Don’t Stop Believin’ – Journey (49)
81. My favorite food is a dish that my mom makes with pasta, peppers, black beans, onions and some other stuff. I think I’ve asked for it for my birthday the past two years.
82. One of my goals as an adult is to build a huge collection of movies. (Like, 1000+ movies.)
83. Depression started to kick in with me when I was about 11.
84. I probably think about something related to death as much as guys think about sex (studies say that’s almost every 8 seconds).
85. I’m jealous of how Canadians are so proud of their country.
86. I learned the ‘f’ word at a hockey game when I was like 8 or 9.
87. I’ve been brainstorming of ideas of what to paint on the rock in Lee for nearly 2 years.
88. Another reason why I would like to lose weight and keep it off is so I can get a huge tattoo on my back when I’m older.
89. I have a mannequin chest in my room that I stick needles into. I’ve considered dying patches of it red, but decided against it because mom might use it to model her bags.
90. I’ve nearly trained myself not to dream. For about a week, I was afraid to go to sleep because I killed someone in one. My dreams are often very clear and graphic, so I was tired of seeing the things I was and just told myself to stop. One dream I can remember was a dream of a wolf/beaver/fox thing that was chasing after me, and it has scared me for pretty much ever.
91. I’m afraid to go into my grandmother’s backroom in her house because I used to believe (and still kind of do) that there are evil white unicorn type creatures in there. They’re actually really cool, in my mind. I should try using them in a story sometime.
92. I think that 365 is one of the most challenging things that I’ve ever tried to do by myself! My set isn’t very exciting, but I am learning more about myself through my pictures and I’ve begun to see the world in a different way. Maybe that’s just because I am getting older, but I am not sure.
93. One of the first things people tell me online is “Holy cow? You’re 14? I thought you were like… 18 or something.” It gets on my nerves.
94. I’ve always wanted a dog but I’ve pretty much stopped begging my parents for one. My cats and Brooke would probably gang up on it.
95. I was in a fire when I was younger, but I can’t remember any of it. I think that’s one of the things that I’m most upset about not remembering. Maybe the smoke inhalation did something to my brain. That would explain a lot.
96. I have a blanket that I’ve had since I was a baby. Luckily it was rescued from the fire mentioned above. I seriously don’t know how different my life would be without that blanket. XD We call it the ‘ABC’ blanket because it has the alphabet all over it. It used to be really bright, but now it’s… pastel. xD
97. I purposefully burned the side of my eye to see what it would feel like. (Shoot… I don’t think I ever admitted that to mom…)
98. Even though barely anyone knows, I have a very perverted mind. I often find it very hard not to laugh at little things and have a laughing fit every time I see condoms in a store.
99. I like country/hick boys (men? I dunno if you can call them that) a lot for some reason. There are a lot of my dad’s friends that I’d probably like if they weren’t so stupid. xD
100. And… ugh. Last one. This is hard. Ohoh! My first celebrity crush was Hayden Christensen in the first Star Wars. I was so in love with that kid. 8D
Okay. This is a very boring list. If you actually made it through this all, cheers to you!
Looking down, obliquely, at the marble cover over the vault in which the Korean War Unknown is laid. This is in front of (west of) the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in front of Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C., in the United States. The memorial actually has no official name, but Arlington caretakers continue to refer to it by the clunky "Tomb of the Unknowns." Nearly everyone else uses the other name.
Arlington's first Amphitheater was constructed of wood in 1874, and soon proved far too small. Congress authorized construction of the Memorial Amphitheater on March 4, 1913. Ground-breaking occurred on March 1, 1915, and President Woodrow Wilson placed the cornerstone on October 15, 1915. It was dedicated on May 15, 1920.
Originally, the main entrance to Memorial Amphitheater had a rectangular granite plaza in front of it, from which some short marble steps led down to a slightly elliptical granite plaza surrounded by a marble balustrade. From this overlook, you could see a rectangular grass lawn 20 feet below. But this soon changed...
Memorial Amphitheater was altered forever the year after its dedication. In 1917, America entered World War I. More than 1.3 million Americans served in Europe during the war, and more than 116,516 died. Just 4,221 were unidentified or missing; the missing (3,173) were the vast majority of them. Nonetheless, 1,100 "unidentified" American war dead was a burden on the national conscience, and the media focused heavily on grieving mothers with no body to bury. Some American generals suggested in 1919 that a "Tomb of an Unknown Soldier" be created in the United States. The idea didn't gain traction at first, but in 1920 both England and France held huge public ceremonies honoring their unknown dead. These received much press attention in the United States, and on February 4, 1921, Congress enacted legislation establishing a similar memorial. Some proponents of the memorial originally proposed burying the unknown soldier in the crypt beneath the Capitol Rotunda -- a crypt originally planned for George Washington (but politely declined by his family). Worried that the Capitol might become a mausoleum, Congress instead chose Arlington National Cemetery as the site for the new memorial. On March 4, 1921, with just hours left in his presidency, President Woodrow Wilson signed the legislation into law.
In the United States, preparation for the "Tomb of the Unknown Solider" was frantically under way. The newly-formed American Legion (a congressionally-chartered veterans' lobby group) was pressing as late as May 1921 for the body to be buried in the Capitol Crypt. This debate was not resolved until mid-July, and by then very little time remained to create the monument. Where to build the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery continued until October, when it was decided that the view from the Memorial Amphitheater's plaza was the most appropriate site.
The Tomb was cut unto the center of the short steps which led down to the granite overlook. Diggers buried downward until they reached the level of the lawn below. They then continued another 20 feet below the surface. The subsurface shaft was 16 feet from east to west and 9.5 feet from north to south, and filled with solid concrete. This formed the footings for the vault above. The footings had to be that deep and that large because tons of marble were going to be placed on top of them, and the memorial could not be permitted to sink or become destabilized. The vault itself was lined with marble. The vault's walls ranged in thickness from 7 feet at the bottom to 2 feet, 4 inches at the top. A plinth (or "sub-base") was set on top of the vault walls. The plinth serves as the base of the memorial proper, and also helps to conceal the rough, unfinished top of the vault walls. The plinth was made of three finished, rectangular pieces of marble which fitted over the vault walls like a collar. These are on the north, south, and west sides of the vault, and were the only part of the substructure visible in 1921. (They remain visible today; you can just see them in this image.) Four rectangular marble pieces form the actual base of the memorial. These were mortared to the top of the plinth. A rectangular marble capstone with curved sides was placed on top of the base. The capstone was pierced with the a hole to permit the coffin to be lowered into through the base, through the plinth, and to the bottom of the grave vault. The bottom of the vault was lined with 2 inches of French soil, taken from various battlefields in France.
The World War I unknown was interred as scheduled on November 11, 1921. More than 100,000 people attended the ceremonies, including the Premier of France, Aristide Briand; the former Premier of France, Rene Viviani (who led France through the war); Marshal Ferdinand Foch (who was Commander in Chief of Allied Forces in France); President Warren G. Harding, former President William Howard Taft, and former President Woodrow Wilson. One thousand "gold star mothers" (women who had lost a son in the war) attended the ceremony, as did every single living Medal of Honor winner. The entire United States Cabinet was there, and so was the entire United States Supreme Court. Every member of the House and Senate was present (although they had to stand in the colonnade). A large number of military personnel also attended the dedication. These included General John Pershing, who had led American forces in Europe; Lieutenant General Nelson Miles, former Commanding General of the Army; Admiral of the Fleet David Richard Beatty of the United Kingdom; General Armando Diaz, Marshal of Italy; General Baron Alphonse Jacques de Dixmude of Belgium; Frederick Lambart, 10th Earl of Cavan, commander of British forces in Italy; Arthur Balfour, former Prime Minster of the United Kingdom; and Tokugawa, Prince of Japan. Also conspicuous was Chief Plenty Coups of the Crow Nation, in full battle regalia and headdress.
President Harding bestowed on the unknown soldier the Medal of Honor and the Distinguished Service Cross (the latter was never awarded again). General Jacques presented the Croix de Guerre, Belgium's highest military honor. (He took from his own chest the medal, which had been bestowed on him by King Albert.) Admiral Beatty bestowed the Victoria Cross, which had never before been given to a foreigner. Marshal Foch bestowed the Medaille Militaire and the Croix de Guerre with palm, France's highest military honor. General Diaz gave the Gold Medal for Bravery, Prince Bibescu of Romania gave the Virtuta Militaire, Dr. Dedrich Stephenek of Czechoslovakia presented the Szechoslovakia War Cross, and Prince Lubomirski of Poland gave the Virtuti Militan. When the coffin was ready for lowering into the vault, Chief Plenty Coups removed his war bonnet and tenderly placed it and his coup-stick on the coffin. He raised his hands to the sky. "I place on this grave of this noble warrior this coup stick and this war bonnet," he said, "every eagle feather of which represents a deed of valor by my race. I hope that the Great Spirit will grant that these noble warriors have not given up their lives in vain and that there will be peace to all men hereafter." An artillery battery fired, and the coffin began to be lowered. An answering a battery of fire came from the ''USS Olympia'', an American destroyer lying at anchor in the Potomac River. "Taps" were played. Once the coffin lay on the floor of the vault, the centerpiece of the capstone was put in place and the tomb sealed.
But all that existed was the base. The actual cenotaph, which you see here, did not yet exist.
Congress authorized completion of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in July 1926. The Secretary of War held a design competition, with judges from Arlington National Cemetery, the American Battle Monuments Commission, and the Commission of Fine Arts. Only architects of national standing were permitted to enter the competition, and 74 submitted designs. Five were chosen as finalists, and required to submit plaster models of their proposals. Architect Lorimer Rich and sculptor Thomas Hudson Jones won the competition. Their design imitated a sarcophagus, but really was a solid block of marble. The design included a thin rectangular base to go on top of the existing capstone. Then there was the "die block" (the main monument), on top of which was a capstone. The die block featured Doric pilasters (fake columns) in low relief at the corners. On the east side (facing the Potomac River) was a sculpture in low relief of three figures, representing female Victory, Valor (male, to her left), and Peace (female). The north and south sides were divided into three sections by fluted Doric pilasters, with an inverted wreath on the upper portion of each section. On the west side (facing the amphitheater) was the inscription: "Here Rests In Honored Glory An American Soldier Known But To God." It is still not clear who came up with the phrase, but it had been used on crosses marking the graves of unknown soldiers in Europe as early as 1925. The judges asked that the approaches to the Tomb be improved as well. Clarence Renshaw designed the steps. The balustrade was removed, and the short series of steps extended outward and downward until they reached the lawn. A small landing exists two-thirds of the way down, after which the steps continue (wider than before). Congress approved funding for the memorial and new steps on February 29, 1929, and a contract to complete the Tomb was awarded on December 21, 1929. Quartermaster General Brig. Gen. Louis H. Bash oversaw the construction, which was done by Hegman and Harris.
The Vermont Marble Company provided the marble. This proved very problematic. The Yule Marble Quarry at Marble, Colorado, was chosen as the quarry. A year passed before suitable pieces of marble could be located at the quarry and mined. Three pieces had to be mined before a piece suitable for the 56-ton die block was found. Three pieces were mined and discarded before a fourth piece was found for the 18-ton base. But once the base arrived at Arlington, workers discovered an imperfection in the marble which caused it to be discarded. A fifth, sixth, and seventh piece of marble was then mined, but only the eighth piece was suitable and brought to the cemetery. Amazingly, a piece for the 14-ton capstone was found on the first try.
Work began on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in September 1931, but stopped for three months after a flaw in the base was found. Work resumed in December, and all three pieces were in place on December 31, 1931. Fabrication was completed on-site, with sculptor Jones working five days a week. The Tomb was completed and opened to the public on April 9, 1932. There was no dedication ceremony, and the memorial has never been officially named.
Unfortunately, the Tomb began to fall apart almost immediately. Chips and spalls (pieces broken off after heating and contracting) were found coming off the base in 1933. By 1963, a huge horizontal and secondary vertical crack had appeared in the die block -- probably caused by the release of pressure after the marble was mined. Acid rain and pollution have caused the marble sculptures to wear down appreciably, such that today they are only about half as sharp as they once were. Although there is no likelihood that the monument will collapse, debate continues to rage as to whether the monument should be replaced.
Beginning on July 2, 1937, the U.S. Army began permanently stationing an honor guard at the Tomb. The 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment ("The Old Guard") formally took over these duties on April 6, 1948. It is guarded 24 hours a day, seven days a week, all year long. The guard is changed once every hour, on the hour. Out of respect for the dead, the guard carries his rifle on the outside shoulder -- away from the Tomb. The guard is not permitted to speak or break his march, unless someone enters the restricted area around the Tomb. If this happens, the guard must come to a halt and bring his rifle (loaded with live ammunition) to port-arms. This is usually enough to make the person move back. (No one has ever gone further than the sharp slap of the rifle in the guard's hands.)
In June 1946, Congress approved the burial of unknown American from World War II at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Thirteen American unknowns were exhumed from cemeteries in Europe and Africa and shipped to Epinal, France. Maj. Gen. Edward J. O'Neill, U.S. Army, chose one of these caskets on May 12, 1958, as the "trans-Atlantic Candidate unknown." This casket was transported by air to Naples and placed aboard the USS Blandy. Two American unknowns were disinterred from the National Cemetery of the Pacific in Hawaii and four American unknowns disinterred from Fort McKinley American Cemetery in the Philippines. The six unknowns were taken by air to Hickam Air Force Base. On May 16, 1958, Col. Glen Eagleston, U.S. Air Force, selected a "trans-Pacific Candidate unknown," which was placed aboard the USS Canberra. The Blandy and Canberra rendezvoused off Virginia in May 1958, at which time the trans-Pacific Candidate unknown was transferred to the Canberra. Hospitalman First Class William R. Charette, the Navy's only active enlisted holder of the Medal of Honor, then placed a wreath at the foot of the casket on his right. (The other remains were buried at sea.) This individual became the World War II Unknown.
In August 1956, Congress approved the burial of a Korean War unknown at the Tomb. The remains of four unknown Americans from the Korean conflict were exhumed from the National Cemetery of the Pacific. On May 15, 1958, Master Sergeant Ned Lyle placed a wreath on the fourth casket to choose the Korean War Unknown. (The other three unknowns were reinterred in the National Cemetery of the Pacific.)
Because so much time had passed, the World War II and Korean War unknowns were chosen at the same time. The Unknown of Korea was transported aboard the Canberra at the same time as the "trans-Pacific Candidate unknown."
After the World War II Unknown was chosen, both the WWII and Korean War remains were taken back to the Blandy, which transported them to Washington, D.C. Like the World War I Unknown, they lay in state in the Rotunda of the United States Capitol. Both were interred in vaults on the west side of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on Memorial Day, May 30, 1958. Rather than enlarge the WWI vault, new vaults were dug in the plaza on the west side of the Tomb.
Congress authorized the entombment of a Vietnam War casualty in 1973. But with advances in identification of remains, no unknown remains could be found. Pressure from Vietnam veterans' groups was making the issue politically potent by the early 1980s, especially with Republican Ronald Reagan in office as president. And that's where the scandal began... In May 1972, 24-year-old U.S. Air Force pilot Michael Blassie was shot down in South Vietnam close to the Cambodia border. In October 1972, American ground patrols found Blassie's identity card, some American money, shreds of a USAF flight suit, and some skeletal remains near where Blassie went down. The I.D. card and money went missing soon thereafter. Pentagon officials declared the remains "likely to be" Blassie's, but no firm identification was ever made. By 1980, only four sets of Vietnam War-era remains could be declared unidentified, and one of these were the Blassie remains. In 1980, for unknown reasons, an Army review board ruled that the bones were not Blassie's. Soon thereafter, all documents in the file were removed and destroyed.
On May 8, 1984, the no-longer-"likely" remains were declared "unknown." The Vietnam Unknown was selected by Marine Corps Sgt. Maj. Allan Jay Kellogg, Jr. (a Medal of Honor recipient) at Pearl Harbor on May 17, 1984. The unknown's remains were transported by the USS Brewton to Alameda Naval Base in California. They arrived on May 23, 1984, and were transported by automobile to nearby Travis Air Force Base on May 24. The remains were transported by air to Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on May 25, and lay in state in the Capitol Rotunda from May 25 to May 28. They were interred in a new vault in front of the Tomb on May 28, 1984. President Reagan presented the Medal of Honor to the unknown soldier.
The possibility that the remains were Blassie's was first raised by a man investigating missing-in-action cases. The story broke into the press in January 1998, and in April the two U.S. Senators from Missouri and Blassie's family were demanding answers. After a high-level Pentagon review, the Secretary of the Army recommended on April 26 that the remains be disinterred. The Secretary of Defense ordered exhumation on May 6, and the remains came above ground on May 13. A DNA sample was obtained from the remains on June 15, and on June 29 the remains were identified as Blassie's. Blassie was buried in his home town of St. Louis on July 10, 1998, with handfuls of soil from Arlington National Cemetery. The following month, Blassie's family asked to keep the Medal of Honor, but the Pentagon refused -- saying it was intended to go to the unknown, not to Blassie (who had not won it). In June 1999, with no further unidentified Vietnam War remains available, Pentagon officials said they would keep the vault empty. The Vietnam War crypt was rededicated on September 16, 1999.
Interestingly, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier caused some major changes to D.C. as well as Arlington National Cemetery.
The final piece of "Arlington National Cemetery" as we know it today came with the construction of Arlington Memorial Bridge, Memorial Drive, and the Arlington Memorial Entrance in 1932. The bridge, the drive, and the entrance were designed as a single project and were dedicated on January 16, 1932 by President Herbert Hoover. The U.S. Commission on Fine Arts required that the bridge act as a symbolic link between North and South.
In fact, the famous McMillan Commission (which established the National Mall and set the locations of the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials) had proposed the bridge in 1901, but no action had been taken. When President Harding dedicated the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in 1921, so many people swarmed over Highway Bridge (now the 14th Street Bridges) that it caused a three-hour traffic jam! Harding's own car had to abandon the roadway and take to the grass shoulder to get to the cemetery on time. Secretary of State Charles Evan Hughes had to walk across the bridge to make it.
The outcry over the feeble, inadequate bridges across the Potomac led to the construction of Memorial Bridge. Congress authorized its construction on February 24, 1925.
The legendary architectural firm of McKim, Meade & White -- which built some of the most notable buildings of the 20th century, like the New York Public Library, Manhattan Municipal Building, Washington Arch in Washington Square, NYC's Pennsylvania Station, the Algonquin Club in Boston, Boston Public Library, Rhode Island State House, Harvard Business School, the West Wing and East Wing of the White House, the National Museum of American History, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Bank of Montreal Head Office, and the American Academy in Rome -- designed the bridge. The Neoclassical bridge is 2,163 feet long, with nine arches. It is made of reinforced concrete clad in North Carolina granite. At the time, extensive commercial river traffic used the Potomac River from the Great Falls of the Potomac (just upriver from Washington, D.C.) all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. The bridge was built with a draw span in the center to accommodate this traffic. (It still exists, but has been abandoned.)
Flanking the eastern ends of the bridge are two monumental Neoclassical equestrian statues. "The Arts of War" by Leo Friedlander stands on the bridge itself. As you face the bridge, "Valor" (a man riding a horse accompanied by a woman with a shield) is on the left and "Sacrifice" (a woman symbolizing the earth looks up at the god Mars on a horse) is on the right. Another set of equestrian statues adorns the entrance to Rock Creek Parkway, which is just to the north of Arlington Memorial Bridge. These are "The Arts of Peace" by James Earle Fraser. As you face the parkway, on the left is "Music and Harvest" (a winged horse paws the air between a man with a sheaf of wheat and a sickle and a woman with a harp). On the right is "Aspiration and Literature" (a winged horse Pegasus is flanked by a man holding a book and a woman holding a bow). Both sets of statues, which are each 17 feet tall and made of gilded bronze, were commissioned in 1925 but were not erected until 1951. They were cast in Italy -- a gift to the people of the United States from the people of Italy.
The bridge ended in Washington Circle, and from there Memorial Drive connected the bridge to the cemetery gates. Along Memorial Drive are numerous memorials and monuments: the Seabees Memorial, the Armored Memorial, the United Spanish War Veterans Memorial (known as "The Hiker"), Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd monument, the 101st Airborne Division Memorial, and the 4 Infantry (IVY) Division Monument. (Today, the Arlington Cemetery station on Metro's Blue Line is right next to the Seabees Memorial.)
Memorial Drive ends in the Hemicycle. Carved from the hillside that culminates in Arlington House, the Hemicycle is a Neoclassical semicircle 30 feet high and 226 feet in diameter. In the center is an apse 20 feet across and 30 feet high. In total, the Hemicycle covers 4.2 acres. The Hemicycle was constructed of reinforced concrete, but faced with granite from Mount Airy, Virginia. The walls range from 3 feet, 6 inches thick at the base to 2 feet, 6 inches at the top. The accent panels and coffers in the apse are inlaid with red Texas granite. The Great Seal of the United States is carved in granite in the center of the apse, while on either side are seals of the Department of the Army (south) and the Department of the Navy (north). Along the facade of the Hemicycle were 10 false doors or niches -- some up to five feet deep, others just indentations in the wall -- which were supposed to contain sculptures, memorial reliefs, and other monuments. The apse itself held a fountain, but that was supposed to be replaced with a major memorial in time.
But the Hemicycle is a dead end. You can't stop and admire the apse. Instead, the road diverges here, north and south, passing through wrought iron gates. The north gate is the Schley Gate -- named after Admiral Winfield Scott Schley, son of Civil War Commanding General Winfield Scott and hero of the Battle of Santiago Bay during the Spanish-American War. The south gate is the Roosevelt Gate, named for President Theodore Roosevelt. In the center of each gate, front and back, is a gold wreath 30 inches in diameter. Each wreath cradles the shield of one of the armed services that existed in 1932: The Marine Corps and Army on Roosevelt Gate, the Navy and Coast Guard on Schley Gate. (The Air Force did not exist until 1947.) Each gate is divided into 13 sections by wrought iron fasces, and above six of the sections are iron spikes topped by gold stars. The granite pillars at the end of the retaining wall and the pillars on each side of each gate are topped by granite funeral urns. Also on the granite pillar of each gate is a gilded lamp.
On top of the Hemicycle was a pedestrian walkway and a terrace some 24 feet wide. Originally, access to the walkway and terrace was granted only by going to the far end of the Hemicycle (near the wrought iron gates), through a pedestrian gate, and up some stairs. Above each arched entrance to the pedestrian stairs was a granite eagle. But this never actually happened: The pedestrian gates were locked for more than 50 years!
The Hemicycle was never actually completed. Intended to be Arlington National Cemetery's ceremonial gate, it just....dead-ended. The apse and niches were never filled. There was nothing on the other side. There was no way to use the Hemicycle without crossing dangerous highways. Plop. There it is. Indeed, by the 1980s, the Hemicycle was in serious disrepair. It had never been used for any purpose, and Arlington officials largely ignored it.
Originally, the exterior rear wall of the Hemicycle was flat. But in the early 1980s, women veterans began pressing for a memorial to women in the armed services. In 1988, the National Capital Memorial Commission, the National Capital Planning Commission, and the Fine Arts Commission approved the use of the Hemicycle as a site for the Women in Military Service for America Memorial. It was the first time a memorial to the living -- rather than the dead -- had been placed on the grounds of Arlington National Cemetery. Marion Gail Weiss and Michael Manfredi won a national design competition for the memorial, and the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission of Fine Arts voted unanimously for this design on April 6, 1995. The memorial was built in 1997.
One of their own is down.
SOOC
Featured Front Page Winners Exhibition of the group To Be Still: www.flickr.com/groups/tobestill/ (September 3, 2013)
The saddest photo I have ever taken. He took one of her beds from the closet, carried it to the living room where she liked to sleep and laid down in it. I cried for 2 hours. We both miss China so much.
Architect: Cox Grieve Architects, an association of Australia's Cox Architects & Planners and Adelaide-based Grieve Gillett Architects (2001)
Location: Adelaide, Australia
The relatively coarse materials found at the entry of the center evolve into finer proportions and smoother textures at the rear. The scale of the spaces similarly progresses from the public to the personal—the grand scale of production leads to the intimate scale of wine appreciation in the tasting room.
Date --- May 8th 2010.
Without wanting to sound redundant once again I am the bearer of sad news from this part of the world.
Starting yesterday at noon conflict in the streets turned ugly, when the sun came up this morning 16 have been killed 141 injured, 7 in critical condition. These figures are changing hourly.
One Canadian photographer was shot 3 times, once in the torso, leg, and wrist.
Another photographer was shot once in the leg.
Even though grenade blasts go off most every day and night taking a life or two this latest carnage is rated right up there with the massacre of April 10th.
Sad state of affairs in the land of wayning smiles.
Sorry for this news,
D300, 70-300VR hand held.
Jon&Crew
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I can't remember why i decided to to Ufford; I think it was because it is in Simon's top ten of Suffolk churches. Of course everything is down to taste and perspective and what the day, light, or other factors at play when you visited.
I drove through the village three times looking for the church, but this was Upper Ufford; all golf clubs and easy access to the A12.
I tried to find the church on the sat nav, but that wanted me to go to Ipswich or Woodbridge, I then tried to find Church Lane, and hit the jackpot. Down through a modern housing estate, then down a narrow lane, left at the bottom and there at the end of a lane stood St Mary, or the tower of the church anyway.
In the house opposite, a young man paused doing physical jerks to stare at me as ai parked, but my eyes were on the church. What delights would I find inside?
The south wall of the church inside the porch is lined with some very nice tiles; I take a few pictures. Inside, your eye is taken to the wonderful font cover, several metres high, disappearing into the wooden beams high above. A fine rood beam stretched across the chancel arch, and is still decorated.
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Upper Ufford is a pleasant place, and known well enough in Suffolk. Pretty much an extension northwards of Woodbridge and Melton, it is a prosperous community, convenient without being suburban. Ufford Park Hotel is an enjoyable venue in to attend professional courses and conferences, and the former St Audrey's mental hospital grounds across the road are now picturesque with luxury flats and houses. And I am told that the Ufford Park golf course is good, too, for those who like that kind of thing.
But as I say, that Ufford is really just an extension of Melton. In fact, there is another Ufford. It is in the valley below, more than a mile away along narrow lanes and set in deep countryside beside the Deben, sits Lower Ufford. To reach it, you follow ways so rarely used that grass grows up the middle.
You pass old Melton church, redundant since the 19th century, but still in use for occasional exhibitions and performances, and once home to the seven sacrament font that is now in the plain 19th century building up in the main village. Eventually, the lane widens, and you come into the single street of a pretty, tiny hamlet, the church tower hidden from you by old cottages and houses.
In one direction, the lane to Bromeswell takes you past Lower Ufford's delicious little pub, the White Lion. A stalwart survivor among fast disappearing English country pubs, the beer still comes out of barrels and the bar is like a kitchen. I cannot think that a visit to Ufford should be undertaken without at least a pint there. And, at the other end of the street, set back in a close between cottages, sits the Assumption, its 14th century tower facing the street, a classic Suffolk moment.
The dedication was once that of hundreds of East Anglian churches, transformed to 'St Mary' by the Reformation and centuries of disuse before the 19th century revival, but revived both here and at Haughley near Stowmarket. In late medieval times, it coincided with the height of the harvest, and in those days East Anglia was Our Lady's Dowry, intensely Catholic, intimately Marian.
The Assumption was almost certainly not the original dedication of this church. There was a church here for centuries before the late middle ages, and although there are no traces of any pre-Conquest building, the apse of an early-Norman church has been discovered under the floor of the north side of the chancel. The current chancel has a late Norman doorway, although it has been substantially rebuilt since, and in any case the great glories of Ufford are all 15th century. Perhaps the most dramatic is the porch, one of Suffolk's best, covered in flushwork and intriguing carvings.
Ufford's graveyard is beautiful; wild and ancient. I wandered around for a while, spotting the curious blue crucifix to the east of the church, and reading old gravestones. One, to an early 19th century gardener at Ufford Hall, has his gardening equipment carved at the top. The church is secretive, hidden on all sides by venerable trees, difficult to photograph but lovely anyway. I stopped to look at it from the unfamiliar north-east; the Victorian schoolroom, now a vestry, juts out like a small cottage.
I walked back around to the south side, where the gorgeous porch is like a small palace against the body of the church. I knew the church would be open, because it is every day. And then, through the porch, and down into the north aisle, into the cool, dim, creamy light.
On the afternoon of Wednesday, 21st August 1644, Ufford had a famous visitor, a man who entered the church in exactly the same way, a man who recorded the events of that day in his journal. There were several differences between his visit and the one that I was making, one of them crucial; he found the church locked. He was the Commissioner to the Earl of Manchester for the Imposition in the Eastern Association of the Parliamentary Ordinance for the Demolishing of Monuments of Idolatry, and his name was William Dowsing.
Dowsing was a kind of 17th century political commissar, travelling the eastern counties and enforcing government legislation. He was checking that local officials had carried out what they were meant to do, and that they believed in what they were doing. In effect, he was getting them to work and think in the new ways that the central government required. It wasn't really a witch hunt, although God knows such things did exist in abundance at that time. It was more as if an arm of the state extended and worked its fingers into even the tiniest and most remote parishes. Anyone working in the public sector in Britain in the early years of the 21st century will have come across people like Dowsing.
As a part of his job, Dowsing was an iconoclast, charged with ensuring that idolatrous images were excised from the churches of the region. He is a man blamed for a lot. In fact, virtually all the Catholic imagery in English churches had been destroyed by the Anglican reformers almost a hundred years before Dowsing came along. All that survived was that which was difficult to destroy - angels in the roofs, gable crosses, and the like - and that which was inconvenient to replace - primarily, stained glass. Otherwise, in the late 1540s the statues had been burnt, the bench ends smashed, the wallpaintings whitewashed, the roods hauled down and the fonts plastered over. I have lost count of the times I have been told by churchwardens, or read in church guides, that the hatchet job on the bench ends or the font in their church was the work of 'William Dowsing' or 'Oliver Cromwell'. In fact, this destruction was from a century earlier than William Dowsing. Sometimes, I have even been told this at churches which Dowsing demonstrably did not visit.
Dowsing's main targets included stained glass, which the pragmatic Anglican reformers had left alone because of the expense of replacing it, and crosses and angels, and chancel steps. We can deduce from Dowsing's journal which medieval imagery had survived for him to see, and that which had already been hidden - not, I hasten to add, because people wanted to 'save' Catholic images, but rather because this was an expedient way of getting rid of them.
So, for example, Dowsing visited three churches during his progress through Suffolk which today have seven sacrament fonts, but Dowsing does not mention a single one of them in his journal; they had all been plastered over long ago.
In fact, Dowsing was not worried so much about medieval survivals. What concerned him more was overturning the reforms put in place by the ritualist Archbishop Laud in the 1630s. Laud had tried to restore the sacramental nature of the Church, primarily by putting the altar back in the chancel and building it up on raised steps. Laud had since been beheaded thanks to puritan popular opinion, but the evidence of his wickedness still filled the parish churches of England. The single order that Dowsing gave during his progress more than any other was that chancel steps should be levelled.
The 21st of August was a hot day, and Dowsing had much work to do. He had already visited the two Trimley churches, as well as Brightwell and Levington, that morning, and he had plans to reach Baylham on the other side of Ipswich before nightfall. Much to his frustration, he was delayed at Ufford for two hours by a dispute between the church wardens over whether or not to allow him access.
The thing was, he had been here before. Eight months earlier, as part of a routine visit, he had destroyed some Catholic images that were in stained glass, and prayer clauses in brass inscriptions, but had trusted the churchwardens to deal with a multitude of other sins, images that were beyond his reach without a ladder, or which would be too time-consuming. This was common practice - after all, the churchwardens of Suffolk were generally equally as puritan as Dowsing. It was assumed that people in such a position were supporters of the New Puritan project, especially in East Anglia. Dowsing rarely revisited churches. But, for some reason, he felt he had to come back here to make sure that his orders had been carried out.
Why was this? In retrospect, we can see that Ufford was one of less than half a dozen churches where the churchwardens were uncooperative. Elsewhere, at hundreds of other churches, the wardens welcomed Dowsing with open arms. And Dowsing only visited churches in the first place if it was thought there might be a problem, parishes with notorious 'scandalous ministers' - which is to say, theological liberals. Richard Lovekin, the Rector of Ufford, had been turned out of his living the previous year, although he survived to return when the Church of England was restored in 1660. But that was in the future. Something about his January visit told Dowsing that he needed to come back to Ufford.
Standing in the nave of the Assumption today, you can still see something that Dowsing saw, something which he must have seen in January, but which he doesn't mention until his second visit, in the entry in his journal for August 21st, which appears to be written in a passion. This is Ufford's most famous treasure, the great 15th century font cover.
It rises, six metres high, magnificent and stately, into the clerestory, enormous in its scale and presence. In all England, only the font cover at Southwold is taller. The cover is telescopic, and crocketting and arcading dances around it like waterfalls and forests. There are tiny niches, filled today with 19th century statues. At the top is a gilt pelican, plucking its breast.
Dowsing describes the font cover as glorious... like a pope's triple crown... but this is just anti-Catholic innuendo. The word glorious in the 17th century meant about the same as the word 'pretentious' means to us now - Dowsing was scoffing.
But that was no reason for him to be offended by it. The Anglicans had destroyed all the statues in the niches a century before, and all that remained was the pelican at the top, pecking its breast to feed its chicks. Dowsing would have known that this was a Catholic image of the Sacrifice of the Mass, and would have disapproved. But he did not order the font cover to be destroyed. After all, the rest of the cover was harmless enough, apart from being a waste of good firewood, and the awkwardness of the Ufford churchwardens seems to have put him off following through. He never went back.
Certainly, there can have been no theological reason for the churchwardens to protect their font cover. I like to think that they looked after it simply because they knew it to be beautiful, and that they also knew it had been constructed by ordinary workmen of their parish two hundred years before, under the direction of some European master designer. They protected it because of local pride, and amen to that. The contemporary font beneath is of a type more familiar in Norfolk than Suffolk, with quatrefoils alternating with shields, and heads beneath the bowl.
While the font cover is extraordinary, and of national importance, it is one of just several medieval survivals in the nave of the Assumption. All around it are 15th century benches, with superbly characterful and imaginative images on their ends. The best is the bench with St Margaret and St Catherine on it. This was recently on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum as part of the Gothic exhibition. Other bench end figures include a long haired, haloed woman seated on a throne, which may well be a representation of the Mother of God Enthroned, and another which may be the Coronation of the Queen of Heaven. There is also a praying woman in a butterfly headdress, once one of a pair, and a man wearing what appears to be a bowler hat, although I expect it is a helmet of some kind. His beard is magnificent. There are also a number of finely carved animals, both mythical and real.
High up in the chancel arch is an unusual survival, the crocketted rood beam that once supported the crucifix, flanked by the grieving Mary and John, with perhaps a tympanum behind depicting the last judgement. These are now all gone, of course, as is the rood loft that once stood in front of the beam and allowed access to it. But below, the dado of the screen survives, with twelve panels. Figures survive on the south side. They have not worn well. They are six female Saints: St Agnes, St Cecilia, St Agatha, St Faith, St Bridget and, uniquely in England, St Florence. Curiously, the head of this last has been, in recent years, surrounded by stars, in imitation of the later Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. Presumably this was done in a fit of Anglo-catholic enthusiasm about a century ago. The arrangement is similar to the south side of the screen at Westhall, and it may even be that the artist was the same. While there is no liturgical reason for having the female Saints on one side and, presumably, male Saints on the other, a similar arrangement exists on several Norfolk screens in the Dereham area.
Much of the character of the church today comes from it embracing, in the early years of the 20th century, Anglo-catholicism in full flood. It is true to say that, the later a parish took on the tradition, the more militant and intensely expressed it was, and the more evidence there is likely to be surviving. As at Great Ryburgh in Norfolk, patronage here ensured that this work was carried out to the very highest specification under the eye of the young Ninian Comper. Comper is an enthusiast's enthusiast, but I think he is at his best on a small scale in East Anglia like here and Ryburgh. His is the extraordinary war memorial window and reredos in the south aisle chapel, dedicated to St Leonard.
The window depicts Christ carrying his cross on the via dolorosa, but he is aided by a soldier in WWI uniform and, behind him, a sailor. The use of blues is very striking, as is the grain on the wood of the cross which, incidentally, can also be seen to the same effect on Comper's reredos at Ryburgh. The elegant, gilt reredos here profides a lovely foil to the tremendous window above it.
Comper's other major window here is on the north side of the nave. This is a depiction of the Annunciationextraordinary. from 1901, although it is the figures above which are most They are two of the Ancient Greek sibyls, Erythrea and Cumana, who are associated with the foretelling of Christ. At the top is a stunning Holy Trinity in the East Anglian style. There are angels at the bottom, and all in all this window shows Comper at the height of his powers.
Stepping into the chancel, there is older glass - or, at least, what at first sight appears to be. Certainly, there are some curious roundels which are probably continental 17th century work, ironically from about the same time that Dowsing was here. They were probably acquired by collectors in the 19th century, and installed here by Victorians. The image of a woman seated among goats is curious, as though she might represent the season of spring or be an allegory of fertility, but she is usually identified as St Agnes. It is a pity this roundel has been spoiled by dripping cement or plaster. Another roundel depicts St Sebastian shot with arrows, and a third St Anthony praying to a cross in the desert.
The two angels in the glass on the opposite side of the chancel are perhaps more interesting. They are English, probably early 16th Century, and represent two of the nine Orders of Angels, Dominions and Powers. They carry banners written in English declaring their relationship to eartly kings (Dominions) and priests and religious (Virtues). They would have been just two of a set of nine, but as with the glass opposite it seems likely that they did not come from this church originally.
However, the images in 'medieval' glass in the east window are entirely modern, though done so well you might not know. A clue, of course, is that the main figures, St Mary Salome with the infants St James and St John on the left, and St Anne with the infant Virgin on the right, are wholly un-East Anglian in style. In fact, they are 19th century copies by Clayton & Bell of images at All Souls College, Oxford, installed here in the 1970s. I think that the images of heads below may also be modern, but the angel below St Anne is 15th century, and obviously East Anglian, as is St Stephen to the north.
High above, the ancient roofs with their sacred monograms are the ones that Dowsing saw, the ones that the 15th century builders gilt and painted to be beautiful to the glory of God - and, of course, to the glory of their patrons. Rich patronage survived the Reformation, and at the west end of the south aisle is the massive memorial to Sir Henry Wood, who died in 1671, eleven years after the end of the Commonwealth. It is monumental, the wreathed ox heads a severely classical motif. Wood, Mortlock tells us, was Treasurer to the Household of Queen Henrietta Maria.
There is so much to see in this wonderful church that, even visiting time and time again, there is always something new to see, or something old to see in a new way. It is, above all, a beautiful space, and, still maintaining a reasonably High worship tradition, it is is still kept in High liturgical style. It is at once a beautiful art object and a hallowed space, an organic touchstone, precious and powerful.
Simon Knott, June 2006, updated July 2010 and January 2017
Second class holy relic from her clothing (Ex Indumentis).
American religious, virgin, and foundress of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, and patron saint of racial justice and philanthropists.
Feast day: March 3
On March 3, the Church celebrates the feast of St. Katharine Drexel, an American heiress and socialite who shocked the world when at age 31, she abandoned her family’s fortune to become a Roman Catholic nun and to found an order of sisters dedicated to serving the impoverished Blacks and American Indian populations of the United States. Using her inheritance of $7 million, she spent the next 60 years and an estimated $20 million building missions, schools and churches for Native Americans and Blacks. She is the patron saint of racial justice and philanthropists.
Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on November 26, 1858, Katharine Drexel was the second daughter of Francis Anthony Drexel and Hannah Langstroth. Hannah died about a month after Katherine's birth.
A few years later, Katharine’s father, a wealthy and prominent banker and philanthropist, married Emma Bouvier – a distant aunt to Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis. Emma was a deeply religious woman. Three years later, Emma gave birth to her own child, a third daughter whom they named Louise. The deeply religious couple taught their children that wealth was meant to be shared with others, particularly the poor.
The three siblings – Elizabeth, Katharine and Louise -- were inseparable. They traveled out west together where they encountered native American Indians who lived on reservations and learned of their plight. These travels instilled within Katharine the desire to alleviate the sufferings of poor Indians and Blacks.
When she visited Pope Leo XIII in Rome, Katharine asked him to send missionaries to the Indian missions that she as a lay person was financing. He surprised by responding, “Why don’t you go? Why don’t you become one?”
As a teenager, Katharine had considered convent life, but in a letter to Bishop James O’Connor, stated that: she couldn’t bear separation from her family, she hated community life and the thought of living with “old-maidish” dispositions, did not like to be alone, and could not part with luxuries. At that time, the Bishop discouraged her from entering the convent.
As a young and wealthy woman, Katharine Drexel made her social debut in 1879. However, after she nursed her stepmother through a three-year terminal illness, Katharine began to realize that all the money her family had could not purchase protection from suffering or death. It was then that her life changed dramatically.
As time passed, Katharine became more and more convinced that she should become a religious. She once again wrote the Bishop, stating that she wanted to give herself completely to the Lord, adding, “The world cannot give me peace.” Thus, Katharine made the decision to give herself totally to God by her service to Blacks and Native Indian Americans. On February 12, 1891, Katharine took vows as a religious, founding the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament.
St. Katharine established many ministries, founding schools for African Americans and native Indian Americans, Between 1891 and 1935 she led her order in the founding and maintenance of almost 60 schools and missions, located primarily in the American West and Southwest. Her most important achivement was the founding of New Orleans' Xavier University, the only historically Black Catholic college in the U.S.
At age 77, Katharine suffered a severe heart attack and spent the next twenty years of her life in prayer and contemplation until her death at 96 on March 3, 1955. She was canonized on October 1, 2000 by Pope John Paul II.
Katharine left a four-fold dynamic legacy to her Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, who continue her apostolate today:
– her love for the Eucharist, her spirit of prayer, and her Eucharistic perspective on the unity of all peoples;
– her undaunted spirit of courageous initiative in addressing social iniquities among minorities — one hundred years before such concern aroused public interest in the United States;
– her belief in the importance of quality education for all, and her efforts to achieve it;
– her total giving of self, of her inheritance and all material goods in selfless service of the victims of injustice.
Quotes from St. Katharine Drexel
“Union with God alone gives us life and abundance of life. We are not sufficient in ourselves.”
“The patient and humble endurance of the cross – whatever nature it may be – is the highest work we have to do.”
"If we wish to serve God and love our neighbor well,we must manifest our joy in the service we render to Him and them."
"Often in my desire to work for others I find my hands tied, something hinders my charitable designs, some hostile influence renders me powerless. My prayers seem to avail nothing, my kind acts are rejected, I seem to do wrong things when I am trying to do my best. In such cases I must not grieve. I am only treading in my Master's steps."
“O Mary, make me endeavor, by all the means in my power, to extend the kingdom of your Divine Son and offer incessantly my prayers for the conversion of those who are yet in darkness or estranged from His fold.”
PRAYER
Ever Loving God, You called Saint Katharine Drexel to teach the message of the Gospel and to bring the life of the Eucharist to Black and Native American peoples. By her prayers and example, enable us to work for justice among the poor and oppressed. Draw us all into the Eucharistic community of your Church that we may be one in you. Grant this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.