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Un'automotrice del gruppo SZ 813-814 non modificato, effettua il locale 7705 Herpelje/Kozina - Rakitovec nel tratto sloveno della ferrovia istriana.
Zazid (SLO), 13 marzo 2008
Rose-breasted Grosbeak RBGR (Pheucticus ludovicianus)
Kincorth Street
Carmichael, Saskatchewan, Canada
DSCN1443
I was excited to see this bird
Now that i review this photo ... the bill looks oddly dark for species
and a bit small?
9476 passes behind the newly build community library at Moe, with G512 and X31 leading 9476 through the platform rather calmly. 20th June 2016
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Stazione Mobile | Mobile station | Mercedes-Benz Sprinter | BX-553NX
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El casco antiguo de Graz fue declarado Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la Unesco en 1999.
A orillas del río Mur se encuentra una colina llamada Schlossberg, que tiene una altura de 475 metros.
Hace más de 1.000 años se construyó un castillo que dio el nombre a la ciudad (que se deriva de la palabra eslovena gradec, que significa "pequeño castillo"). Desde el año 1125 la colina albergó una impresionante fortaleza. En 1809 Napoleón ordenó destruirla. En dicha colina se edificó en 1560 la Torre del reloj, uno de los símbolos de la ciudad. Entre las diferentes calles que forman parte del distrito Innere Stadt destaca la calle Sporgasse. La calle es más antigua que la ciudad ya que fueron los romanos, los primeros que trazaron una vía que iba desde el valle del río Mur hasta la ciudad romana de Savaria (actual Szombately, en Hungría). Los artesanos que trabajaban en esta calle son los que dieron el nombre a la calle. En la actualidad, la Sporgasse es una calle dedicada al comercio.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casco_histórico_de_Graz
Innere Stadt (German pronunciation: [ˈɪnəʀə ʃtat]) is the 1st district of the Austrian city of Graz, capital of the federal state of Styria. It is the part of the Old Town (in German: Altstadt) containing the Schloßberg and the city park (Stadtpark). The district borders are formed by the Mur river between Radetzkybrücke and Keplerbrücke, the Wickenburggasse, the Glacis, Jakominiplatz and the Radetzkystraße. The district covers an area of 1.16 km² and -as of 2011- has a population of 3,545.
In 1999, the Old Town was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innere_Stadt_(Graz)
Graz [ˈɡʁaːt͡s] es una ciudad austríaca, capital del estado federado de Estiria (en alemán, Steiermark). Con una población de 269.997 habitantes (1-1-2014) es la segunda ciudad más grande del país. Ciudad universitaria por excelencia, fue nombrada Capital Europea de la Cultura en el año 2003.
Graz está situada a orillas del río Mura al sureste de Austria. Se encuentra a 189 kilómetros de Viena, la capital de país.
La primera mención de la ciudad apareció en un documento escrito por el margrave de Estiria Leopoldo I. En la actualidad no se dispone del original aunque existe una copia del siglo XV.
El último representante de la dinastía Otakar fue Otakar IV de Estiria, margrave de Estiria y duque desde 1180. Otakar no tenía descendencia y había contraído la lepra. En el año 1186 Otakar se reunió con el duque Leopoldo V, de la Casa de Babenberg, en la localidad de Enns donde firmaron el Pacto de Georgenberger mediante el cual Otokar designaba a los Babenberg como sucesores.
En 1379 Graz se convierte en la residencia de los Habsburgo al ser nombrada capital de la Austria interna (en alemán Innerösterreich), territorio que comprendía Estiria, Carintia, Carniola y algunas posesiones en Italia. La estancia de la familia imperial se prolongó hasta 1619.
El 10 de abril de 1797, las tropas francesas hicieron su entrada en Graz por primera vez. Dos días más tarde, Napoleón llegó a Graz, donde permaneció unos días hasta su marcha a Göss, cerca de Leoben. El 14 de noviembre de 1805, el ejército francés, al mando del general Marmont, invadió la ciudad por segunda vez. La ocupación finalizó el 11 de enero de 1806 con la retirada de las tropas galas. El 30 de mayo de 1809 se produjo la tercera incursión de la legión francesa, esta vez bajo las órdenes de MacDonald. El 4 de enero de 1810 los franceses abandonaron Graz definitivamente.
Durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial el 16 % de los edificios fueron destruidos y 1788 personas perdieron la vida como consecuencia de la ofensiva. El casco histórico no se vio afectado por los ataques, a excepción de la Tummelplatz. La estación central y las plantas industriales del sur y el oeste de la ciudad fueron los objetivos de los bombardeos.
En los años posteriores a la proclamación de la independencia del país en 1955, se produjeron muchos de los cambios que conformaron la imagen actual de la ciudad. En el plano cultural destaca la creación de varios festivales. En 1968 se celebró la primera edición del steirische herbst, el festival de arte contemporáneo más antiguo de Europa. En 1985 se inauguró el Styriarte, festival dedicado a la música clásica. Ambos festivales se celebran cada año y son de gran importancia para la capital de Estiria. La fisionomía de Graz va a experimentar sucesivas modificaciones y ampliaciones. Así pues, se construyeron nuevos puentes y en 1972 se abrió la primera zona peatonal. A finales de los años 80 tiene lugar un importante crecimiento de la zona sureste. En 1988, Puntigam fue considerado como distrito independiente de Straßgang, quedando establecidos los diecisiete distritos en los que se divide Graz hoy en día.
En 1993 la ciudad recibió un premio de la organización ecologista Greenpeace. Ese mismo año organizó el Mes de la cultura europeo por encargo de la Unión Europea.
El casco antiguo de Graz fue declarado Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la Unesco en 1999.
Graz cuenta con 4 universidades que reúnen a cerca de 40 000 estudiantes. Es la segunda ciudad universitaria más importante de Austria después de Viena. Uno de cada 7 habitantes de Graz estudia.
Graz (/ɡrɑːts/ GRAHTS, German: [ɡʁaːts]) is the capital of the Austrian province Styria and the second-largest city in Austria after Vienna. On 1 January 2019, it had a population of 328,276 (292,269 of whom had principal residence status). In 2015, the population of the Graz larger urban zone who had principal residence status stood at 633,168. Graz has a long tradition as seat of universities: its six universities have almost 60,000 students. Its historic centre is one of the best-preserved city centres in Central Europe.[5]
For centuries, Graz was more important to Slovenes and Croats, both politically and culturally, than the capitals of Ljubljana, Slovenia and Zagreb, Croatia; it remains influential to this day.[6] In 1999, Graz's historic centre was added to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites and in 2010, the site was extended with Eggenberg Palace (German: Schloss Eggenberg). Graz was the Cultural Capital of Europe in 2003 and became a City of Culinary Delights in 2008.
The name of the city, Graz, formerly spelled Gratz, most likely stems from the Slavic gradec, "small castle". Some archaeological finds point to the erection of a small castle by Alpine Slavic people, which over time became a heavily defended fortification. In literary Slovene and Croatian, gradec still means "small castle". The German name 'Graz' first appears in records in 1128.
Graz is situated on the Mur river in southeast Austria. It is about 200 km (120 mi) southwest of Vienna. The nearest larger urban centre is Maribor in Slovenia which is about 50 km (31 mi) away. Graz is the capital and largest city in Styria, a green and heavily forested area.
The oldest settlement on the ground of the modern city of Graz dates back to the Copper Age. However, no historical continuity exists of a settlement before the Middle Ages. During the 12th century, dukes under Babenberg rule made the town into an important commercial center. Later, Graz came under the rule of the Habsburgs and, in 1281, gained special privileges from King Rudolph I.
In the 14th century, Graz became the city of residence of the Inner Austrian line of the Habsburgs. The royalty lived in the Schlossberg castle and from there ruled Styria, Carinthia, most of today's Slovenia, and parts of Italy (Carniola, Gorizia and Gradisca, Trieste).
In the 16th century, the city's design and planning were primarily controlled by Italian Renaissance architects and artists. One of the most famous buildings built in this style is the Landhaus, designed by Domenico dell'Allio, and used by the local rulers as a governmental headquarters.
Karl-Franzens-Universität, also called the University of Graz, is the city's oldest university, founded in 1585 by Archduke Karl II. For most of its existence, it was controlled by the Catholic church, and was closed in 1782 by Joseph II in an attempt to gain state control over educational institutions. Joseph II transformed it into a lyceum where civil servants and medical personnel were trained. In 1827 it was re-instituted as a university by Emperor Franz I, thus gaining the name 'Karl-Franzens Universität,' meaning 'Charles-Francis University.' Over 30,000 students currently study at this university.
The astronomer Johannes Kepler lived in Graz for a short period. There, he worked as a math teacher and was a professor of mathematics at the University of Graz, but still found time to study astronomy. He left Graz to go to Prague when Lutherans were banned from the city.
Ludwig Boltzmann was Professor for Mathematical Physics from 1869 to 1890. During that time, Nikola Tesla studied electrical engineering at the Polytechnic in 1875. Nobel Laureate Otto Loewi taught at the University of Graz from 1909 until 1938. Ivo Andric, the 1961 Nobel Prize for Literature Laureate obtained his doctorate at the University of Graz. Erwin Schrödinger was briefly chancellor of the University of Graz in 1936.
Graz lies in Styria, or Steiermark in German. Mark is an old German word indicating a large area of land used as a defensive border, in which the peasantry is taught how to organize and fight in the case of an invasion. With a strategic location at the head of the open and fertile Mur valley, Graz was often assaulted (unsuccessfully), e.g. by the Hungarians under Matthias Corvinus in 1481, and by the Ottoman Turks in 1529 and 1532. Apart from the Riegersburg Castle, the Schlossberg was the only fortification in the region that never fell to the Ottoman Turks. Graz is home to the region's provincial armory, which is the world's largest historical collection of late medieval and Renaissance weaponry. It has been preserved since 1551, and displays over 30,000 items.
From the earlier part of the 15th century, Graz was the residence of the younger branch of the Habsburgs, which succeeded to the imperial throne in 1619 in the person of Emperor Ferdinand II, who moved the capital to Vienna. New fortifications were built on the Schlossberg at the end of the 16th century. Napoleon's army occupied Graz in 1797. In 1809, the city withstood another assault by the French army. During this attack, the commanding officer in the fortress was ordered to defend it with about 900 men against Napoleon's army of about 3,000. He successfully defended the Schlossberg against eight attacks, but they were forced to give up after the Grande Armée occupied Vienna and the Emperor ordered to surrender. Following the defeat of Austria by Napoleonic forces at the Battle of Wagram in 1809, the fortifications were demolished using explosives, as stipulated in the Peace of Schönbrunn of the same year. The belltower and the civic clock tower, often used as the symbol of Graz, were spared after the people of Graz paid a ransom for their preservation.
Archduke Karl II of Inner Austria had 20,000 Protestant books burned in the square of what is now a mental hospital, and succeeded in returning Styria to the authority of the Holy See. Archduke Franz Ferdinand was born in Graz, in what is now the Stadtmuseum (city museum).
The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students. At the end of 2016 there were 33,473 people with secondary residence status in Graz.
Oceanic climate is the type found in the city, but due to the 0 °C isotherm, the same occurs in a humid continental climate with based in Köppen system (Cfb/Dfb borderline). Wladimir Köppen himself was in town and conducted studies to see how the climate of the past influenced the Continental Drift theory. Due to its position southeast of the Alps, Graz is shielded from the prevailing westerly winds that bring weather fronts in from the North Atlantic to northwestern and central Europe. The weather in Graz is thus influenced by the Mediterranean, and it has more hours of sunshine per year than Vienna or Salzburg and also less wind or rain. Graz lies in a basin that is only open to the south, causing the climate to be warmer than would be expected at that latitude. Plants are found in Graz that normally grow much further south.
Politically, culturally, scientifically and religiously, Graz was an important centre for all Slovenes, especially from the establishment of the University of Graz in 1586 until the establishment of University of Ljubljana in 1919. In 1574, the first Slovene Catholic book [sl] was published in Graz, and in 1592, Hieronymus Megiser published in Graz the book Dictionarium quatuor linguarum, the first multilingual dictionary of Slovene.
The Styrian Slovenes did not consider Graz a German city, but their own, a place to study while living at their relatives' homes and to fulfill one's career ambitions. The student associations in Graz were a crucible of the Slovene identity, and the Slovene students in Graz were more nationally aware than some others. This led to fierce anti-Slovene efforts of German nationalists in Graz before and during World War II.
Many Slovenian Styrians study there. Slovenes are among the professors at the Institute for Jazz in Graz. Numerous Slovenes have found employment there, while being formerly unemployed in Slovenia. For the Slovene culture, Graz remains permanently important due to its university and the Universalmuseum Joanneum archives containing numerous documents from the Slovenian Styria.
A symposium on the relation of Graz and the Slovenes was held in Graz in 2010, at the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the establishment of the first and oldest chair of Slovene. It was established at the Lyzeum of Graz in July 1811 on the initiative of Janez Nepomuk Primic [sl]. A collection of lectures on the topic was published. The Slovenian Post commemorated the anniversary with a stamp.
For the year that Graz was Cultural Capital of Europe, new structures were erected. The Graz Museum of Contemporary Art (German: Kunsthaus) was designed by Peter Cook and Colin Fournier and is situated next to the Mur river. The Island in the Mur is a floating platform made of steel. It was designed by American architect Vito Acconci and contains a café, an open-air theatre and a playground.
The historic centre was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1999 due to the harmonious co-existence of typical buildings from different epochs and in different architectural styles. Situated in a cultural borderland between Central Europe, Italy and the Balkan States, Graz absorbed various influences from the neighbouring regions and thus received its exceptional townscape. Today the old town consists of over 1000 buildings, their age ranging from Gothic to contemporary.
The most important sights in the historic centre are:
Town Hall (Rathaus). The Schlossberg hill, a hill dominating the historic centre (475 m (1,558.40 ft) high), site of a demolished fortress, with views over Graz. The Clock Tower (Uhrturm) is a symbol of Graz, at the top of the Schlossberg hill. The New Gallery (Neue Galerie), a museum of art. The Schlossberg hill funicular (Schlossbergbahn), a funicular railway up the Schlossberg hill. The seat of Styria's provincial parliament (Landhaus), a palace in Lombardic style. It is one of the most important examples of Renaissance architecture in Austria and was built by Italian architect Domenico dell'Allio between 1557 and 1565.
The Armoury (Landeszeughaus) is the largest of its kind in the world.
The Graz Opera House (Opernhaus), the principal venue for opera, ballet, and operetta performances. It is the 2nd largest opera house in Austria.
The Graz Theatre (Schauspielhaus), Graz's principal theatre for productions of plays.
The Cathedral (Dom), a rare monument of Gothic architecture. Once, there were many frescos on the outer walls; today, only a few remain, like the Landplagenbild ("picture of plagues") painted in 1485, presumably by Thomas von Villach. The three plagues it depicts are locusts, pestilence and the invasion of the Turks, all of them striking the town in 1480. It features the oldest painted view of Graz.
The mausoleum of Emperor Ferdinand II next to the cathedral, the most important building of Mannerism in Graz. It includes both the grave where Ferdinand II and his wife are buried, and a church dedicated to St Catherine of Alexandria.
The Castle (Burg), with Gothic double staircase, built between 1438 and 1453 by Emperor Frederick III, because the old castle on the Schlossberg hill was too small and uncomfortable. The castle remained the residence of the Inner Austrian Court until 1619. Today, it serves as residence for the Styrian government.
The Painted House (Gemaltes Haus) in Herrengasse 3. It is completely covered with frescos (painted in 1742 by Johann Mayer).
The Museum of Contemporary Art Graz (Kunsthaus)
The Island in the Mur (Murinsel), an artificial island in the Mur river.
Buildings, inner courtyards (e. g. Early Renaissance courtyard of the Former House of Teutonic Knights in Sporgasse 22) and roofscape of the old town.
The Old Town and the adjacent districts are characterized by the historic residential buildings and churches found there. In the outer districts buildings are predominantly of the architectural styles from the second half of the 20th century.
In 1965 the Grazer Schule (School of Graz) was founded. Several buildings around the universities are of this style, for example the green houses by Volker Giencke and the RESOWI center by Günther Domenig.
Before Graz became the European Capital of Culture in 2003, several new projects were realized, such as the Stadthalle, the Kindermuseum (museum for children), the Helmut-List-Halle, the Kunsthaus and the Murinsel.
Murinsel es una plataforma construida sobre el río Mura y que conecta sus dos orillas con sendas pasarelas peatonales, a modo de puente, en la ciudad austriaca de Graz.
La Murinsel que en alemán significa literalmente isla en el Mura es una isla artificial flotante construida en medio del río Mura y que comunica las dos orillas del río. Este símbolo de la ciudad de Graz fue diseñado por el artista norteamericano Vito Acconci con motivo de la designación de Graz como Capital Europea de la Cultura en 2003.
La plataforma tiene 47 metros de largo y está construida en acero y cristal y con una forma que podría recordar a una concha abierta. Con el empleo de materiales transparentes crean la sensación de una burbuja de aire en el río. No se trata únicamente de un lugar de tránsito, pues en su interior se abre un pequeño auditorio con capacidad para 350 personas y una cafetería. Durante la noche es iluminada con unas llamativas luces azules que sirven también para que sea divisada por las embarcaciones.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murinsel
The Murinsel (German, literally Mur island) in Graz, Austria, is an artificial floating "island" in the middle of the Mur river and links the two banks on both sides. At night the blue navigation lights that surround the structure light up. This landmark of Graz was designed by New York City artist Vito Acconci on the occasion of Graz becoming the 2003 European Capital of Culture.
Described by the artist as "A bowl that morphs into a dome that morphs into a bowl…" Mur Island is in the form of a giant sea shell and measures 47 m (154 ft) in length. Two footbridges connect it with both banks of the Mur. The center of the platform forms an amphitheatre. Below a twisted round dome there is a café and a playground.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murinsel
El río Mura (en alemán, Mur; en prekmuro: Müra, a veces Möra) es un largo río de Europa Central, el principal afluente del río Drava, a su vez afluente del río Danubio. Tiene una longitud total de 465 km, de los que 295 km están en Austria, 98 km en Eslovenia y el resto forma la frontera natural entre Croacia y Hungría. La ciudad más grande a sus orillas es la ciudad austriaca de Graz.
El río Mura nace en Austria, en los Alpes Orientales, en el estado de Salzburgo. La fuente del río está a 1898 m, en el parque nacional de Hohe Tauern. El río discurre en su primer tramo en dirección este por el fondo de un estrecho valle de montaña, pasando por las pequeñas localidades de Muhr y Höf, a partir de donde el río estará siempre acompañado en su tramo montañoso por pequeñas carreteras locales. Llega después a las pequeñas localidades de Sankt Michael im Lungau, Unternberg, Tamsweg (5774 hab. 2008), Ramingstein y Kendlbruck.
Se adentra a continuación el Mura en el estado de Estiria manteniendo el mismo rumbo oriental, pasando por Predlitz, Einach, Stadl an der Mur, Murau, Sankt Egldlas, Triebendorf, Saurau, Frojach, Teufenbach, Scheifling, Unzmarkt, Wöll, Tralheim, Furth y Judenburg (9435 hab. en 2008). Aquí el valle se ensancha un poco y la carretera es más amplia. Sigue por Zeltweg y Kobenz y de nuevo se cierra el valle. Pasa por las pequeñas localidades de St. Stefan ob Leoben y St. Michael in der Obersteiermark y alcanza la ciudad de Leoben (25.227 hab. en 2006), la segunda más poblada de Estiria, y el centro económico e industrial del norte del estado.
Continua el río por Proleb, Oberaich y Bruck an der Mur (13 439 hab. en 2001), donde recibe a uno de sus primeros afluentes de importancia, el río Mürz, que llega del este (tiene una longitud de 98 km y le aporta 20 m³/s). El río vira hacia el sur, un tramo en el que vuelve a encajonarse y llega a las pequeñas localidades de Zlatten, Mautstatt, Röthelstein, Frohnleiten, Peggau y Gratwein, donde el río sale ya de la zona montañosa.
Sigue en dirección sur llegando al poco a Graz (252 867 hab. en 2008), la capital de Estiria y segunda ciudad de Austria y la ciudad más importante a lo largo de todo el curso del río. Graz fue nombrada en el año 2003 Capital Europea de la Cultura y una de las actividades para festejarlo fue la construcción, en medio del río Mura, de un pabellón flotante, Murinsel (en alemán, «isla sobre el Mura»).
Sigue luego el río por Gössendorf, Kalsdorf bei Graz y Wildon, donde recibe por la izquierda, llegando del noroeste al río Kainach (64 km). Continua por Lebring-Sankt Margarethen, Gabersdorf y Wagna, donde vuelve a recibir a otro afluente por la izquierda, al río Sulm (83 km) y la pequeña localidad de Spielfeld. A partir de aquí, el río forma durante un corto tramo la frontera natural entre Austria, al norte, y Eslovenia, al sur. El río toma dirección este, pasando cerca de las localidades austriacas de Murfeld, Mureck, Gosdorf y Bad Radkersburg (1940 hab.), frente a la ciudad eslovena de Gornja Radgona (8689 hab. en 2008).
El río entra en Eslovenia, discurriendo cada vez más hacia el sureste. Pasa por Radenci (5265 hab. en 2002), Izakovci y Razkrizje. Sigue otro tramo fronterizo, esta vez entre Eslovenia, al noreste, y Croacia, al suroeste.
El río da su nombre a la región eslovena de Prekmurje («tierra sobre el Mura») y a la región croata de Međimurje («tierra entre el Mura»). En este tramo aún es posible encontrar algún transbordador de cable como forma de cruzarlo.
En el área del Međimurje Superior (upper Međimurje), en la parte occidental de la región, se producen a menudo inundaciones y cambios de curso, desplazándose lentamente hacia el norte de su ribera izquierda. Aquí está el mayor bosque a lo largo del río, el Murščak, situado entre Domašinec (1871 hab. en 2001) y Donji Hrašćan («hrast »es roble en croata).
Sigue el río cerca de las localidades de Sveti Martin na Muri (2509 hab. en 2001), Mursko Središće (6548 hab.) y Podturen (4392 hab.). Después, y aún en el tramo fronterizo, recibe, llegando del norte, al río Lendva. A partir de aquí el río seguirá siendo frontera hasta su desembocadura, pero esta vez entre Hungría, al noroeste y Croacia, al suroeste. En este último tramo pasa cerca de la localidad eslovena de Kotoriba (3333 hab. y el río termina cerca de Legrad (2764 hab.), en el condado de Koprivnica-Križevci, donde desemboca en el río Drava.
Desde el siglo IV a. de C. hay noticias de molinos flotantes alimentados por las corrientes del río. La antigua tecnología fue adoptada más tarde por los llegados eslavos y luego por los húngaros. Hasta las décadas de los años 1920 y 1930 muchas de esas fábricas se seguían operando a lo largo del río. Al menos uno de los antiguos molinos —Babičev mlin, cerca Veržej, en Eslovenia— sigue funcionando hasta el día de hoy.
El Mura era conocido por llevar pequeñas cantidades de oro, no lo suficiente como para ser adecuadas para la explotación, pero hoy fue el centro de actividad para muchas personas desde tiempos antiguos. La búsqueda organizada y explotación de oro y otros recursos locales fue alentada por primera vez en 1772.
es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Río_Mura
The Mur (German pronunciation: [ˈmuːɐ̯]) or Mura (Slovene pronunciation: [ˈmúːɾa] or [ˈmùːɾa]; Croatian: [mǔːra]; Hungarian: [ˈmurɒ]; Prekmurje Slovene: Müra or Möra) is a river in Central Europe rising in the Hohe Tauern national park of the Central Eastern Alps in Austria with its source being 1,898 m (6,227 ft) above sea level. It is a tributary of the Drava and subsequently the Danube.
The Mur's total length is around 464 kilometres (288 mi). About 326 km are within the interior of Austria; 95 km flow in and around Slovenia (67 km along the borders with Austria and Croatia, 28 km inside Slovenia), and the rest forms the border between Croatia and Hungary. The largest city on the river is Graz, Austria. Its basin covers an area of 13,800 km2 (5,300 sq mi).
Tributaries of the Mur include the Mürz, the Sulm, the Ščavnica, the Ledava and the Trnava.
Its name probably comes from Proto-Indo-European word *morgj, meaning "mud".
The river rises in a remote valley within the Lungau region of Austrian state of Salzburg. The river flows eastwards through Tamsweg before crossing the border into the state of Styria.
Between Tamsweg and Unzmarkt-Frauenburg the river flows through a rural mountain valley and is closely paralleled by the 65 km (40 mi) long narrow gauge Murtalbahn railway. From Unzmarkt the river continues in an easterly direction through the industrial towns of Leoben and Bruck an der Mur. At Bruck an der Mur the Mürz joins the Mur, which turns sharply south to flow through the city of Graz.
The river flows through the centre of Graz, passing underneath the Schloßberg and by the historic Inner City. As a result of being the European Capital of Culture for 2003, an artificial island known as the Murinsel was constructed in the middle of the river. Once heavily polluted by several paper mills on the shore and by the ironworks around Leoben, the water quality has improved since the 1980s and the river is now seen as an asset to the city.
From Graz the river continues to flow south, past the town of Leibnitz to its nearby confluence with the Sulm, where it adopts a more easterly course. Near Spielfeld, the river forms the border between Austria and Slovenia, a role it retains until just after the twin towns of Bad Radkersburg and Gornja Radgona, where it passes fully into Slovenia.
In Slovenia it passes the towns of Radenci, and Veržej. The river gives its name to the Slovenian region of Prekmurje (literally 'across the Mur') and the Croatian region of Međimurje (literally 'between the Mur'). Cable ferries and ship mills are still found in this area.
In the upper Međimurje area, in the western part of the region, the Mur floods and changes its course rather often, moving slowly toward the north on its left. Here, the biggest forest along the river, the Murščak, is located between Domašinec and Donji Hrašćan (derived from Croatian hrast 'oak'). After receiving its last significant tributary Trnava, the river ends near Legrad in Koprivnica-Križevci county, Croatia, where it flows into the Drava River.
Since the 4th century BC, there have been reports of floating mills powered by the streams of the river. The ancient technology was adopted later by arriving Slavs and then by Magyars. Several decades ago, in the 1920s and 1930s, many of these mills were still operating along the river. At least one of the old mills, the Babič Mill (Slovene: Babičev mlin) near Veržej, Slovenia, continues to operate to this day.
The Mur is known to carry small quantities of gold, not enough to be suitable for exploitation today, but this was a focus of activity for many people since ancient times. Organized research and exploitation of gold and other local resources was encouraged for the first time in 1772.
In Austria, several hydroelectric dams have been constructed for the production of renewable energy. The word "renewable" may be misleading in the case of smaller hydroelectric plants whose output is small by comparison to the environmental cost of construction. Currently in 2017, a hydroelectric dam is under construction in Puntigam, a few km south of the Graz city centre. The plan includes a massive sewage pipe between the city centre and the new dam, necessitating the felling of thousands of trees. The project is controversial and environmental groups are resisting it. Both environmental impact and economic studies have found the project to be neither ecologically nor economically viable. Additional hydroelectric plants are planned for Slovenia.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mur_(river)
MADDENS BAR-EAST FINCHLEY-LONDRES-LONDON-PINTURA-ARTE-INTERIOR-HIGH ROAD-COMER-SERVIR MESAS-DISEÑO-PINTOR-ERNEST DESCALS-
Interior de establecimientos para comer en HIGH ROAD, EAST FINCHLEY, LONDRES, LONDON, el propietario albanés del MADDENS BAR sirve los platos en las mesas con clientes, un local con diseño especial en la calle de las tiendas, escenas de interiores con personajes que ofrecen movimiento y vida, cuadros pintandos en mis viajes a la ciudad y capital de Inglaterra, Reino Unido, momentos concretos que me gusta pintar como artista viajero que disfruta pintando en la profundidad humana de los lugares visitados y vividos con máxima atención y observación de los detalles y los ambientes, cada lugar es un observatorio en el que apreciar su atmósfera particular. Pintura con acuarelas sobre papel de 50 x 70 centímetros, obras del artista pintor Ernest Descals. Aquí han primado los personajes y los detalles como la perspectiva del sofá, las luces en las paredes, las macetas con plantas en en el fondo, las vitrinas frigoríficas y las baldosas del suelo.
•• From atop its solitary hill, fifty meters above sea level, the little cemetery of Querqueville has dominated the vast harbor of Cherbourg (département of Cotentin in Normandy) for time immemorial. It was already a burial site in early Christian times, and as archæological digs carried out during the 1970s have shown, this locale saw at least three successive places of worship built one after the other in the years 300–600. The etymology itself is eloquent, as Querqueville comes from the Norse word kirkja, church, which is not only the linguistic root of the word in English, but also in many other languages, such as the German Kirche or the Dutch kerk.
After it was destroyed, allegedly by a Viking raid, the church was rebuilt during Carolingian times, and has come to us through the centuries virtually untouched. The opus spicatum (fishbone apparel) walls are 0.70 meter thick. The nave is strictly oriented and designed on a basilica floor plan completed in the East by a rarest trefoil layout, of which only two other examples can be found in the whole of Normandy: the three leaves, of roughly the same dimensions, form the apse and the arms of the transept. There is no choir. The monument is regarded by some scholars as a direct descendant of the Gallo-Roman architectural tradition.
Many hypotheses have been formed to date this remarkable monument, surely the oldest in the département of Cotentin. Gerville, the Norman archæologist of the 19th century who coined the word “Romanesque” to describe the architectural style that predated Gothic, dated it “from Merovingian times”, i.e., roughly between 480 and 750 AD, and a similar date was also put forward in the 1920s. However, advanced archæological research undertaken in 1975–77 allowed to place construction of the walls around Year 900, even though such construction integrated older substructures, notably in the side walls.
The chapel is dedicated to Saint Germain, but no one knows if that is Saint Germain so-called «à la Rouelle», an Irishman born in Scotland (hence his other name of Saint Germain le Scot), who allegedly crossed the English Channel on a Roman chariot wheel miraculously supplied to him, then evangelized Normandy, or the better known Saint Germain of Auxerre who, besides, is supposed to have baptized the former and given him his Christian name, which implies he was named otherwise when born, but knowledge of that first given name never reached us.
Listed as a Historic Landmark as early as 1862, the chapel is dominated by a bell tower, the upper part of which is recent (1655). This modern part covers the 10th century bell tower which still exists, intact, inside that outer envelope, which was erected to house the bells of the parochial church built right next to the chapel, at a time when that church was in poor condition.
Inside, the chapel offers a crude and unrefined appearance, poorly lit by rare windows, of which several were opened or enlarged during Romanesque times, long after completion of the building. I had to use off-camera flash to properly lit the place. There is no capital; the four discharge arches that support the bell tower are made of shell limestone and rest on squarish piles via mere abacuses.
The whole monument emanates a great simplicity and humility; it expresses a naive and profound faith that cared not for decorum nor étiquette. Small (13 meters × 11) and built with shale rock found on-site, it is a rare witness of times forever gone, come to us in a state of purity and preservation that undoubtedly “deserves a détour”, or is even “worth a trip” for any connoisseur of Romanesque and pre-Romanesque architecture. It also features traces of alfresco wall paintings that, in my opinion, date from the 12th century. Those would probably be worth restoring, if they could be first uncovered, then recovered.
The southern elevation of the chapel. This is a four-exposure panorama shot that I had to stitch with PTGui software as Photoshop wasn’t doing a good job with this one, for some reason. Maybe it was a little extreme, as there is no room to step back any further because of the parochial church; the tripod is right up against its wall.
dal novembre 1981 all'estate del 1984 ho realizzato circa 400 ritratti in un locale di Torino, il "Metrò" un video bar, forse il primo a Torino. Un luogo di incontro per musicisti, studenti, artisti, attori, registi, grafici e creativi. Ci sono stati concerti dal vivo, spettacoli, performance, mostre. L'organizzazione di eventi, la preparazione di manifesti e fanzine era curata da Mariangela Gazzola, spesso in collaborazione con giovani artisti, in breve tempo divenne luogo di culto. Ho ritratto i visitatori ai quali si mescolavano musicisti e creativi, ritratti che sono la documentazione della movida torinese dei primi anni ottanta. Ritratti di giovani che volevano uscire dal clichè che vedeva una città dormitorio abitata sopratutto da operai e impiegati della FIAT, città votata alla produzione. I primi anni ottanta furono “Mitici” un cruogiolo di idee e di grande ricerca creativa e artistica, potete trovare una serie di immagine nel mio album “ritratti al Metrò”. Le foto che posto ora sono il ritratto del locale nel 1993 con le persone che ci lavoravano.
from November 1981 to the summer of 1984 I made about 400 portraits in a local in Turin, the "Metrò" a video bar, perhaps the first in Turin. A meeting place for musicians, students, artists, actors, directors, graphic designers and creatives. There have been live concerts, shows, performances, exhibitions. The organization of events,
the preparation of posters and fanzines was handled by Mariangela Gazzola, often in collaboration with young artists, soon a place of worship. I portrayed the visitors mixed with musicians and creatives, portraits that are the documentation of the Turin nightlife of the early eighties.
Portraits of young people who wanted to get out of the cliché that saw a dormitory city inhabited above all by workers and employees of FIAT, a city devoted to production. The early eighties were "Mythical" a cruogiolo of ideas and great creative and artistic research, you can find a series of images in my album "Portraits at the Metro".
The photos that I post now are the portrait of the place in 1993 with the people who worked there.
Strada locale tra S. Giovanni in Fiore e Campana (Provincia di Cosenza).
Calabria (South Italy) local road between S. Giovanni in Fiore and Campana (Province of Cosenza)
Le toit d'une hutte de la plage Del Cabo dans le Parc national naturel de Tayrona en Colombie.
D'après diapositive.
Surfboards are relatively light, but are strong enough to support an individual standing on them while riding an ocean surface wave breaking wave. Modern surfboards are made of polyurethane or polystyrene foam covered with layers of fiberglass cloth, and polyester or epoxy resin. The result is a light and strong surfboard that is buoyant and maneuverable.
Ruanda-Urundi 1930 - Deux jeunes filles assises sur une natte 'ikirago' - la première semble soigner le pied de l'autre.
Photo J. Dardenne
Carte postale 31 'site Delcampe'
One of the absolute highlights of our trip to Greenland was undoubtedly our arrival in Ilulissat and the legendary Disko Bay.
I had heard and read so much about this place that it was one of the stops I was most looking forward to. We boarded small local boats and headed into the beginning of the Icefjord, this majestic fjord where icebergs calved from the glacier accumulate, the glacier itself lying nearly 70 kilometres away.
The spectacle is simply breathtaking. The grey sky makes the electric blue of the ice stand out with even greater intensity, almost unreal in the cold Arctic light.
I am literally spellbound by so much beauty. There are moments when words, and even photographs, seem rather insignificant compared with what you actually have in front of you.
L’un des grands coups de cœur de notre voyage au Groenland est sans aucun doute notre arrivée à Ilulissat et la mythique baie de Disko.
J’en avais tellement entendu parler et lu à son sujet que c’était l’une des escales que j’attendais le plus. Nous embarquons dans de petites embarcations locales pour remonter le début de l’Icefjord, ce fjord majestueux où s’accumulent les icebergs détachés du glacier, situé à près de 70 kilomètres de là.
Le spectacle est tout simplement à couper le souffle. Le ciel gris fait ressortir avec encore plus d’intensité le bleu électrique de la glace, presque irréel dans cette lumière froide.
Je suis littéralement subjugué par tant de beauté. Il y a des moments où les mots, et même les photos, semblent bien dérisoires face à ce que l’on a sous les yeux…
Humber Br
Carries Motor vehicles (on the A15), pedestrians and cyclists
Crosses Humber
Locale East Riding of Yorkshire/North Lincolnshire
Maintained by The Humber Bridge Board
Design Suspension
Total length 2,220 m (7,283 ft)
Longest span 1,410 m (4,626 ft) (fifth-largest in the world)
AADT 120,000 vehicles per week
Opening date To traffic on 24 June 1981
Officially on 17 July 1981
Toll Car: £2.70
HGV: £18.30
Motorcycle: £1.20
Location within United Kingdom
Coordinates 53°42′41″N 0°26′55″W / 53.7114°N -0.4485°E / 53.7114; -0.4485Coordinates: 53°42′41″N 0°26′55″W / 53.7114°N -0.4485°E / 53.7114; -0.4485
The Humber Bridge is the fifth-largest single-span suspension bridge in the world, near Kingston upon Hull in England. It spans the Humber (the estuary formed by the rivers Trent and Ouse) between Barton-upon-Humber on the south bank and Hessle on the north bank, connecting the East Riding of Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire. The bridge carries an average of 120,000 vehicles per week,[1] which pay a toll of £2.70 each way for cars (higher for commercial vehicles).
Contents
[hide]
History
Plans for a bridge were originally drawn up in the 1930s, and were revised in 1955, but work did not begin until July 26, 1972. The Humber Bridge Act, promoted by Kingston Upon Hull Corporation, was passed in 1959. This established the Humber Bridge Board in order to manage and raise funds to build the bridge and buy the land required for the approach roads.
However raising the necessary funding proved impossible until the 1966 Hull North by-election. To save his government, Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson prevailed upon his Minister of Transport Barbara Castle to sanction the building of the bridge.
Dismay at the long wait for a crossing led to the writing by Christopher Rowe of a protest song entitled The Humber Bridge.[2]
The bridge was finally opened officially by HM The Queen on 17 July 1981. The consulting engineers for the project were Freeman Fox & Partners — now Hyder Consulting. The main contractor was Sir William Arrol & Co. at that time part of Northern Engineering Industries plc.[3]
With a centre span of 1,410 metres (4,626 ft) and a total length of 2,220 metres (7,283 ft), the Humber Bridge was the longest single-span suspension bridge in the world for 16 years.
[edit] Bridge statistics
The bridge's surface takes the form of a dual carriageway with a lower-level foot and cyclepath on both sides, although traffic is often restricted to one lane both ways. There is a permanent 50 mph (80 km/h) speed limit on the full length of the bridge.
Each tower consists of a pair of hollow vertical concrete columns, each 155.5 metres (510 ft) tall and tapering from 6 metres (20 ft) square at the base to 4.5 metres (14.8 ft) x 4.75 metres (15.6 ft) at the top. The bridge is designed to tolerate constant motion and bends more than 3 metres (10 ft) in winds of 80 miles per hour (129 km/h). The towers, although both vertical, are not parallel, being 36 millimetres (1.4 in) further apart at the top than the bottom as a result of the curvature of the earth.[4]
The north tower is on the bank, and has foundations down to 8 metres (26 ft). The south tower is in the water, and descends to 36 metres (118 ft) as a consequence of the shifting sandbanks that make up the estuary.
There is enough wire in the suspension cables to circle the Earth nearly twice.
The bridge held the record for the world's longest single-span suspension bridge for 16 years from its opening in June 1981 until the opening of the Great Belt Bridge in June 1997 and was relegated to third place with the opening of the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in April 1998. It is now the fifth longest single-span suspension bridge after two longer span bridges opened in China, the Xihoumen Bridge and the Runyang Bridge. It remains the longest bridge in the world that one can cross on foot. The bridge twice forms part of the route of the popular Humber Bridge Half Marathon.[5]
The road-distance between Hull and Grimsby was reduced by nearly 50 miles (80 km) as a consequence of the bridge. Prior to the bridge opening, commuters would go from one bank to the other either by using the ferry that ran between Hull and New Holland, Lincolnshire or driving via the M62, M18 and M180 motorways, crossing the River Ouse near Goole (connected to the Humber) in the process. There was also a short-lived hovercraft service; Minerva and Mercury linked Hull Pier and Grimsby Docks from 17 February 1968 to 21 October 1968, but suffered frequent mechanical failures.
Over 2,000 cars go over The Humber Bridge everyday.
[edit] Incidents and suicides
More than 200 incidents of people jumping or falling from the bridge have taken place since it was opened in 1981 with only five surviving.[6]
Between 1990 and February 2001 the Humber Rescue Team launched its boat 64 times to deal with people falling or jumping off the bridge.[7]
Notable incidents include the cases of a West Yorkshire woman and her two-year-old daughter who fell off the bridge in 2005,[8] a mother who killed herself and her 12-year old son with Rett's syndrome[dubious – discuss] in April 2006,[9] and that of a man jumping from the bridge to his death on the A63 road below in September 2006. As a result, plans have been considered to construct a suicide barrier or introduce higher fencing along the walkways of the bridge; trials have been held, with design constraints as well as cost cited as the reason for non-implementation so far.
Throughout the year many people commit or attempt to commit suicide on the Humber Bridge, so local NHS authorities have specialist counsellors and doctors on call.[citation needed].
[edit] Finances
The disappointing annual average daily traffic for the bridge and the resultant failure of the tolls to clear the debts causes them to remain in place.
The bridge has a toll charge of £2.70 (as of 10 April 2009) for cars. The Humber Bridge is the only major toll bridge in the United Kingdom to charge tolls to motorcycles (£1.20), others such as the Forth Road Bridge, Severn crossings and the Dartford Crossing are all free. In 2004 a large number of motorcyclists held a slow-pay protest, taking off gloves and helmets and paying the toll in large denomination bank notes.[10] Police reported a tailback of 4 miles (6 km) as a consequence of the protest. Despite receiving several letters in support of the removal of tolls, they remain in place for motorcycles.
In 1996, the British Parliament passed the Humber Bridge (Debts) Act 1996 to reorganise the Humber Bridge Board's debts in order to ensure the Bridge could be safely maintained. Although a significant proportion of the debt was suspended in that refinancing arrangement there was no "write off" of debt and the suspended portion is being gradually re-activated as the Bridge Board pays off the remainder of the active debt.
In 2006 a Private Member's Bill — sponsored by Cleethorpes Labour MP Shona McIsaac — relating to the Humber Bridge, was introduced into Parliament.[11] The Humber Bridge Bill would have made amendments to the Humber Bridge Act 1959 "requiring the secretary of state to give directions to members of the Humber Bridge Board regarding healthcare and to review the possibility of facilitating journeys across the Humber Bridge in relation to healthcare". The aim was to allow people who travel from the Southbank to the Northbank for medical treatment to cross the bridge without paying the toll, and to allow the Secretary of State for Transport to appoint two members of the Humber Bridge board to represent the interests of the NHS. Even though the Bill received cross-party support (it was co-sponsored by Shadow Home Secretary David Davis, and supported by all other MPs representing North Lincolnshire and East Yorkshire) it ran out of time later that year.[12]
A protest at the bridge on 1 September 2007 was supported by the local Cancer Patients Involvement Group, the Road Haulage Association, Yorkshire and Humberside MEP Diana Wallis and local business and council representatives.[13] The government responded to the petition on 14 January 2008, stating that "Concessions or exemptions from tolls on the Humber Bridge are a matter for the Humber Bridge Board."[14]
In October 2008, a joint campaign was launched by The Scunthorpe Telegraph, Hull Daily Mail and Grimsby Telegraph to abolish the fee for crossing the Humber. The papers' A Toll Too Far campaign garnered much support from councillors and MPs serving Lincolnshire and Humberside and was launched in response to a mooted increase in the cost of bridge crossings. The campaign's aim was not only to stave off any potential increase in crossing charges, but to ultimately see the costs abolished. A reduction to a £1 charge for bridge crossings was a sought-after alternative. Thousands of readers backed the campaign with an in-paper and online petition.
A public inquiry into the tolls was held in the first week of March 2009. The final evidence for and against the tolls was heard on March 5. Throughout the inquiry arguments were presented to independent inspector Neil Taylor. The evidence for and against the tolls is to be assessed by British Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon, with a decision expected in summer 2009.
Making it hard to identify with no target plates on both ends. I use my car number knowledge to best identify this Millennium
Sydney Train’s Millennium M Sets M13 & M14 take an average speed for its next stop on run 65-C City Circle via Town Hall service
9/7/25
The Flickr Lounge: No Signs of Life
Blessings for all, and prayers for peace 🙏.
Thank you so much for your views, comments and favs. I really do appreciate every one!
My images are posted here for your enjoyment only. All rights are reserved. Please contact me through flickr if you are interested in using one of my images for any reason.
The locale of the meeting, a mountaintop about twenty miles east of Manila, was in an area still occupied by the Japs, and it was necessary for our party to make a two hour march over rugged terrain to reach the meeting place which was marked by a rising sun flag tied to a bamboo pole.
38th Infantry Division.
Photographer: T/4 Reynolds.
Photo Source: U.S. National Archives. Digitized by Signal Corps Archive.
ИГНАСИО СУЛОАГА - Мадам Соути, полулежащая на софе
☆
Private collection.
Sotheby's London / European Paintings, November 22, 2011.
Source: www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2011/european-pai...
📌Painted in 1921, Zuloaga's gloriously brazen depiction of Marcelle Souty reclining in the artist's Paris studio is one of his most audacious portraits, and arguably his greatest painting of the nude.
The work is a remarkable culmination of a series of large scale oils of the sitter that Zuloaga painted over a seven year period. With but a red 'fascinator' clipped jauntily to the top of her head, and a lace mantilla draped languorously over her right shoulder and upper arm, Mme Souty poses decorously naked on a rich green drape as she gazes out to the viewer's right, her half-smile and unflinching stare expressing an enigmatic air of cool indifference. The studio props that surround the model evoke a culture and inheritance for Zuloaga that go back centuries: an eighteenth century tapestry acts as a backdrop; part pulled back, behind the tapestry are glimpsed photographs of works by El Greco and Velázquez. The candour of Souty's pose however, her implicit decadence mirrored in the louche sag of the green sofa covering, evokes a modernity utterly in keeping with the brave new world and social order that emerged in the immediate aftermath of the First World War.
Introduced to Souty by his friend the painter Jean-Gabriel Domergue and immediately attracted to her distinctive and sophisticated elegance, Zuloaga completed at least five large scale finished portraits of her clothed before embarking on the present study of her nude (Ferrari, nos. 386, 399, 400, 426 & 427). In the first of these compositions Souty modeled as a torero. With her left hand on her hip, and in her right the bullfighter's montera she sports the typical knee length suit (traje de luces), with the cape (capote) over her arm. The following year in 1915 he painted her again wearing a traditional Spanish dress, but this time emphasised her girlish good looks as she lounges on the studio sofa, engaging the viewer with her innocent eyes. The subsequent three major oils he painted of Souty are likewise all of her fully dressed, one of her standing with red flowers; one sitting holding a carnation, and one wearing black.
Up until Mme Souty sat for him, the model that Zuloaga painted most frequently was his cousin Cándida in Segovia who sat for Zuloaga repeatedly from the late 1890s onwards. But with the purchase of his studio in Montmartre in 1906 Zuloaga could be more detached, have the freedom to employ a professional model when in Paris, and reasonably request such models to pose for him déshabillée. In developing the style appropriate to the genre Zuloaga looked first to the French tradition. Thus the subject of one of his earliest Parisian nudes is Gitana desnuda con papagayo (Gypsy Nude, with Parrot) of 1906, a theme that he repeated in reclining form in 1913 in La dama del papagayo (Lady with a Parrot). The exotic flavour of both works owes a clear debt to earlier examples by Gustave Courbet and Edouard Manet, and it was surely Manet's notorious Olympia that Zuloaga must have had in mind when he painted the present work. Marcelle Souty's languid reclining position, however, also acknowledges Zuloaga's fascination with the work of Francisco Goya, and the Spanish master's Maja paintings in particular. Zuloaga kept a large copy of La maja vestida in his studio, and was instrumental in saving Goya's natal home at Fuendetodos for the nation, where he also oversaw the raising of a monument to his hero.
The influence of such painterly antecedents on Zuloaga's artistic development, both ancient and modern, mirrored the ever greater sophistication required of him to succeed as a portraitist, his talents for which were in huge demand. One of his most prestigious pre-War commissions was to paint the portrait of the leading Parisian society hostess and literary figure the Comtesse de Noailles, a work of consummate elegance, authority and simmering sexuality. As well as sharing a striking sensuality with that of Mme Souty, the pose of the Comtesse clothed bears a notable resemblance to that of Mme Souty naked. Both recline gracefully propped up on their left side, their right arms following the line of their bodies, their left leg straight while that of their right is bent. In the absence of Zuloaga being able to paint the Comtesse naked, it is tempting indeed to think that - consciously or not - Zuloaga may well have conceived the present work of Marcelle Souty as his 'Maja desnuda' to the Countess's 'Maja vestida'.
Zuloaga himself was keenly aware of the potential furore that his nudes elicited from the public, to the extent that he was notably coy about exhibiting them. Very few were shown in Europe, and when he did first exhibit two of them in the major travelling exhibtion of his work that toured America in 1916-17 they brought forth protesting letters from those who found it was impossible to see them without blushing. It is notable that the present work was never exhibited in public during Zuloaga's lifetime, remaining with his own collection, a fact that certainly reflects on Zuloaga's own assessment of the work, conscious of the controversy it could stir up.
The freedom Zuloaga felt to explore such new subject matter in Paris was inextricably tied to his long associations with France, the liberty he experienced in the French capital in particular, and the accolades for his work that he received there. As a school boy he had spent time at the lycée at Neuilly, before returning to Paris in 1890 to pursue his studies as an artist. He first took lessons from Henri Gervex and Eugène Carrière, and frequented the Académie de la palette in Clichy, where he met other Spanish painters, amongst them his future lifelong friends: Catalan Santiago Rusiñol and fellow Basque Pablo Uranga. Thereafter he divided his time between Paris and Spain, always keeping an eye on what was happening in the French capital.
In his early years he frequented the Café Voltaire where he met Paul Gauguin and showed his work at Le Barc de Bouteville on Rue Le Pelletier, exhibiting alongside Gauguin, Van Gogh and Emile Bernard. Between 1892-94 he shared rooms with Rusiñol and Uranga at the Quai Bourbon on the Île de la Cité, where amongst others they entertained Edgar Degas. In 1895 he exhibited six works at Le Barc de Bouteville, for which he received notably encouraging reviews in the Paris press; likewise at the Salon du Champ de Mars in 1897 he was lauded by a coterie of French critics, amongst them Arsène Alexandre and Gustave Geoffroy. The following year he was honoured by the French state, the government buying My Uncle and My Cousins that he showed at the 1898 Salon. Zuloaga's love affair with France continued when in 1899 he married Valentine Dethomas. Valentine was the sister of his friend Maxime Dethomas, a fellow student at the Académie de la Palette in Paris, and the daughter of a high ranking and well known French politician.
Married to his advantage, and with burgeoning critical acclaim for his work, the new century saw Zuloaga's reputation go from strength to strength both within France and internationally. In group exhibitions in Paris his work was exhibited alongside that of Degas, Van Gogh, Bonnard, Toulouse-Lautrec, Rodin and Vuillard; in 1902 he exhibited at the prestigious Galerie Georges Petit, and at the Paris Salon of 1903 the three works that he submitted were hailed by the critics as the 'clou' of the exhibition. One enthusiastic writer commented of the sensation that his work was causing: 'On parle que de lui [Zuloaga]'; and Le Figaro illustré devoted an entire issue to Zuloaga's work. By 1908 Zuloaga's reputation was such that he commanded a room to himself at the Salon d'automne.
As his star rose in Paris, so his international sphere of influence grew too. In 1900 he exhibited with La Libre Esthétique in Brussels, and his painting Víspera de la Corrida (The Eve of the Bullfight) was purchased by the Belgian government. He also exhibted that year in Berlin, Düsseldorf and Cologne. In 1901 he sent seven pictures to Dresden for exhibition. Awarded a gold medal for his contribution, his work was seen there by Rilke, an event that precipitated their life-long friendship. Zuloaga exhibited nine pictures at the Venice Biennale in 1903 and in Düsseldorf in 1904 Zuloaga, with Auguste Rodin and Adolf von Menzel were the only artists to be allotted dedicated galleries to show in, the space facilitating Zuloaga to show twenty of his pictures. In 1905 Zuloaga took Rodin on a sightseeing tour of Spain in his car, and during the year sent his work for exhibition in Prague, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Liège, Venice, Dresden and Vienna; he also designed sets for the Berlin opera's performance of Carmen. By the end of the decade Zuloaga's work had reached the Americas. In 1909 fifty of his works were exhibited at the Hispanic Society in New York, the exhibition then travelling to Buffalo and Boston. The following year his work was exhibited in Mexico, Chile and Argentina.
Zuloaga's purchase in 1906 of his first permanent studio at 54 rue Caulaincourt in Montmartre cemented his allegiance to his adopted country and his belief that his future lay in Paris. In contrast his association with Spain was more ambiguous, his ties not so much to the country as a whole but to his family and his Basque roots. The reception to his work in the 1890s in Spain was mixed, and for several years Zuloaga refused to show his work there. When he was not in Paris, Zuloaga preferred a more provincial life, sharing a studio in Segovia with his uncle Daniel and fraternising with his cousins, painting in Seville, or returning to see his family in Eibar over any attractions that might be found in Madrid. But as his reputation grew abroad, so he was increasingly fêted by his fellow countrymen, and attracted back to the capital.
In 1904 a banquet was hosted in his honour in Madrid, the event supported by many of the writers and intellectuals who comprised the 'Generation of 98', including Azorín, Marquina, Rusiñol and Maeztu. In 1907 Miquel Utrillo organised the exhibition of 31 of Zuloaga's pictures in Barcelona. The largest showing of his works thus far in Spain, the works received wide spread critical acclaim. Fulfilling his desire to re-establish himself and his family in the Basque country, in 1910 Zuloaga purchased the spit of land by the sea at Zumaya, along the coast from Bilbao. There he built his country house, studio, chapel and the museum to house his collection. Two years later in Bilbao a banquet was held in his honour at which there were 800 guests.
In the years that followed Zuloaga was in ever increasing demand as a portraitist, vying with the finest society painters of his generation, amongst them Kees Van Dongen, John Singer Sargent, Anders Zorn, and Giovanni Boldini, working on both sides of the Atlantic. But for all that he was taken up by Society, Zuloaga continued to pursue his particular interests in recording Spain - its landscape, people and types - and painting works for the pure pleasure of it, as in the present example.
The Mohatta Palace was built in the posh seaside locale of Clifton by Shivratan Chandraratan Mohatta, a Hindu Marwari businessman in 1927, as his summer home.[However, Mohatta could enjoy this building for only about two decades before independence, after which he left Karachi for India. He built the Palace in the tradition of stone palaces in Rajasthan, using pink Jodhpur stone in combination with the local yellow stone from Gizri.
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mark@macroscopicsolutions.com
Daniel Saftner B.S. Geoscientist and Returned Peace Corps Volunteer
daniel@macroscopicsolutions.com
Annette Evans Ph.D. Student at the University of Connecticut
annette@macroscopicsolutions.com
One day of relief.
A break from winter. This Friday it was over 5C. Next day, it was -15C. What kind of country do I live in!
Information from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Cod
Cape Cod
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This article is about the area of Massachusetts. For other uses, see Cape Cod (disambiguation).
For other uses, see Cod (disambiguation).
Coordinates: 41°41′20″N 70°17′49″W / 41.68889°N 70.29694°W / 41.68889; -70.29694
Map of Massachusetts, with Cape Cod (Barnstable County) indicated in red
Dunes on Sandy Neck are part of the Cape's barrier beach which helps to prevent erosion
Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is an island and a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States. It is coextensive with Barnstable County. Several small islands right off Cape Cod, including Monomoy Island, Monomoscoy Island, Popponesset Island, and Seconsett Island, are also in Barnstable County, being part of municipalities with land on the Cape. The Cape's small-town character and large beachfront attract heavy tourism during the summer months.
Cape Cod was formed as the terminal moraine of a glacier, resulting in a peninsula in the Atlantic Ocean. In 1914, the Cape Cod Canal was cut through the base or isthmus of the peninsula, forming an island. The Cape Cod Commission refers to the resultant landmass as an island; as does the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in regards to disaster preparedness.[1] It is still identified as a peninsula by geographers, who do not change landform designations based on man-made canal construction.[citation needed]
Unofficially, it is one of the biggest barrier islands in the world, shielding much of the Massachusetts coastline from North Atlantic storm waves. This protection helps to erode the Cape shoreline at the expense of cliffs, while protecting towns from Fairhaven to Marshfield.
Road vehicles from the mainland cross over the Cape Cod Canal via the Sagamore Bridge and the Bourne Bridge. The two bridges are parallel, with the Bourne Bridge located slightly farther southwest. In addition, the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge carries railway freight as well as tourist passenger services.
Contents
[hide]
* 1 Geography and political divisions
o 1.1 "Upper" and "Lower"
* 2 Geology
* 3 Climate
* 4 Native population
* 5 History
* 6 Lighthouses of Cape Cod
* 7 Transportation
o 7.1 Bus
o 7.2 Rail
o 7.3 Taxi
* 8 Tourism
* 9 Sport fishing
* 10 Sports
* 11 Education
* 12 Islands off Cape Cod
* 13 See also
* 14 References
o 14.1 Notes
o 14.2 Sources
o 14.3 Further reading
* 15 External links
[edit] Geography and political divisions
Towns of Barnstable County
historical map of 1890
The highest elevation on Cape Cod is 306 feet (93 m), at the top of Pine Hill, in the Bourne portion of the Massachusetts Military Reservation. The lowest point is sea level.
The body of water located between Cape Cod and the mainland, bordered to the north by Massachusetts Bay, is Cape Cod Bay; west of Cape Cod is Buzzards Bay. The Cape Cod Canal, completed in 1916, connects Buzzards Bay to Cape Cod Bay; it shortened the trade route between New York and Boston by 62 miles.[2] To the south of Cape Cod lie Nantucket Sound; Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, both large islands, and the mostly privately owned Elizabeth Islands.
Cape Cod incorporates all of Barnstable County, which comprises 15 towns: Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee, Barnstable, Yarmouth, Dennis, Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. Two of the county's fifteen towns (Bourne and Sandwich) include land on the mainland side of the Cape Cod Canal. The towns of Plymouth and Wareham, in adjacent Plymouth County, are sometimes considered to be part of Cape Cod but are not located on the island.
In the 17th century the designation Cape Cod applied only to the tip of the peninsula, essentially present-day Provincetown. Over the ensuing decades, the name came to mean all the land east of the Manomet and Scussett rivers - essentially the line of the 20th century Cape Cod Canal. Now, the complete towns of Bourne and Sandwich are widely considered to incorporate the full perimeter of Cape Cod, even though small parts of these towns are located on the west side of the canal. The canal divides the largest part of the peninsula from the mainland and the resultant landmass is sometimes referred to as an island.[3][4] Additionally some "Cape Codders" – residents of "The Cape" – refer to all land on the mainland side of the canal as "off-Cape."
For most of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, Cape Cod was considered to consist of three sections:
* The Upper Cape is the part of Cape Cod closest to the mainland, comprising the towns of Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee. Falmouth is the home of the famous Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and several other research organizations, and is also the most-used ferry connection to Martha's Vineyard. Falmouth is composed of several separate villages, including East Falmouth, Falmouth Village, Hatchville, North Falmouth, Teaticket, Waquoit, West Falmouth, and Woods Hole, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Davisville, Falmouth Heights, Quissett, Sippewissett, and others).[5]
* The Mid-Cape includes the towns of Barnstable, Yarmouth and Dennis. The Mid-Cape area features many beautiful beaches, including warm-water beaches along Nantucket Sound, e.g., Kalmus Beach in Hyannis, which gets its name from one of the inventors of Technicolor, Herbert Kalmus. This popular windsurfing destination was bequeathed to the town of Barnstable by Dr. Kalmus on condition that it not be developed, possibly one of the first instances of open-space preservation in the US. The Mid-Cape is also the commercial and industrial center of the region. There are seven villages in Barnstable, including Barnstable Village, Centerville, Cotuit, Hyannis, Marstons Mills, Osterville, and West Barnstable, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Craigville, Cummaquid, Hyannisport, Santuit, Wianno, and others).[6] There are three villages in Yarmouth: South Yarmouth, West Yarmouth and Yarmouthport. There are five villages in Dennis including, Dennis Village(North Dennis), East Dennis, West Dennis, South Dennis and Dennisport.[7]
* The Lower Cape traditionally included all of the rest of the Cape,or the towns of Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. This area includes the Cape Cod National Seashore, a national park comprising much of the outer Cape, including the entire east-facing coast, and is home to some of the most popular beaches in America, such as Coast Guard Beach and Nauset Light Beach in Eastham. Stephen Leatherman, aka "Dr. Beach", named Coast Guard Beach the 5th best beach in America for 2007.[8]
[edit] "Upper" and "Lower"
The terms "Upper" and "Lower" as applied to the Cape have nothing to do with north and south. Instead, they derive from maritime convention at the time when the principal means of transportation involved watercraft, and the prevailing westerly winds meant that a boat with sails traveling northeast in Cape Cod Bay would have the wind at its back and thus be going downwind, while a craft sailing southwest would be going against the wind, or upwind.[9] Similarly, on nearby Martha's Vineyard, "Up Island" still is the western section and "Down Island" is to the east, and in Maine, "Down East" is similarly defined by the winds and currents.
Over time, the reasons for the traditional nomenclature became unfamiliar and their meaning obscure. Late in the 1900s, new arrivals began calling towns from Eastham to Provincetown the "Outer Cape", yet another geographic descriptor which is still in use, as is the "Inner Cape."
[edit] Geology
Cape Cod and Cape Cod Bay from space.[10]
East of America, there stands in the open Atlantic the last fragment of an ancient and vanished land. Worn by the breakers and the rains, and disintegrated by the wind, it still stands bold.
“
”
Henry Beston, The Outermost House
Cape Cod forms a continuous archipelagic region with a thin line of islands stretching toward New York, historically known by naturalists as the Outer Lands. This continuity is due to the fact that the islands and Cape are all terminal glacial moraines laid down some 16,000 to 20,000 years ago.
Most of Cape Cod's geological history involves the advance and retreat of the Laurentide ice sheet in the late Pleistocene geological era and the subsequent changes in sea level. Using radiocarbon dating techniques, researchers have determined that around 23,000 years ago, the ice sheet reached its maximum southward advance over North America, and then started to retreat. Many "kettle ponds" — clear, cold lakes — were formed and remain on Cape Cod as a result of the receding glacier. By about 18,000 years ago, the ice sheet had retreated past Cape Cod. By roughly 15,000 years ago, it had retreated past southern New England. When so much of Earth's water was locked up in massive ice sheets, the sea level was lower. Truro's bayside beaches used to be a petrified forest, before it became a beach.
As the ice began to melt, the sea began to rise. Initially, sea level rose quickly, about 15 meters (50 ft) per 1,000 years, but then the rate declined. On Cape Cod, sea level rose roughly 3 meters (11 ft) per millennium between 6,000 and 2,000 years ago. After that, it continued to rise at about 1 meter (3 ft) per millennium. By 6,000 years ago, the sea level was high enough to start eroding the glacial deposits that the vanished continental ice sheet had left on Cape Cod. The water transported the eroded deposits north and south along the outer Cape's shoreline. Those reworked sediments that moved north went to the tip of Cape Cod.
Provincetown Spit, at the northern end of the Cape, consists largely of marine deposits, transported from farther up the shore. Sediments that moved south created the islands and shoals of Monomoy. So while other parts of the Cape have dwindled from the action of the waves, these parts of the Cape have grown.
Cape Cod National Seashore
This process continues today. Due to their position jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, the Cape and islands are subject to massive coastal erosion. Geologists say that, due to erosion, the Cape will be completely submerged by the sea in thousands of years.[11] This erosion causes the washout of beaches and the destruction of the barrier islands; for example, the ocean broke through the barrier island at Chatham during Hurricane Bob in 1991, allowing waves and storm surges to hit the coast with no obstruction. Consequently, the sediment and sand from the beaches is being washed away and deposited elsewhere. While this destroys land in some places, it creates land elsewhere, most noticeably in marshes where sediment is deposited by waters running through them.
[edit] Climate
Although Cape Cod's weather[12] is typically more moderate than inland locations, there have been occasions where Cape Cod has dealt with the brunt of extreme weather situations (such as the Blizzard of 1954 and Hurricane of 1938). Because of the influence of the Atlantic Ocean, temperatures are typically a few degrees cooler in the summer and a few degrees warmer in the winter. A common misconception is that the climate is influenced largely by the warm Gulf Stream current, however that current turns eastward off the coast of Virginia and the waters off the Cape are more influenced by the cold Canadian Labrador Current. As a result, the ocean temperature rarely gets above 65 °F (18 °C), except along the shallow west coast of the Upper Cape.
The Cape's climate is also notorious for a delayed spring season, being surrounded by an ocean which is still cold from the winter; however, it is also known for an exceptionally mild fall season (Indian summer), thanks to the ocean remaining warm from the summer. The highest temperature ever recorded on Cape Cod was 104 °F (40 °C) in Provincetown[13], and the lowest temperature ever was −12 °F (−24.4 °C) in Barnstable.[14]
The water surrounding Cape Cod moderates winter temperatures enough to extend the USDA hardiness zone 7a to its northernmost limit in eastern North America.[15] Even though zone 7a (annual low = 0–5 degrees Fahrenheit) signifies no sub-zero temperatures annually, there have been several instances of temperatures reaching a few degrees below zero across the Cape (although it is rare, usually 1–5 times a year, typically depending on locale, sometimes not at all). Consequently, many plant species typically found in more southerly latitudes grow there, including Camellias, Ilex opaca, Magnolia grandiflora and Albizia julibrissin.
Precipitation on Cape Cod and the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket is the lowest in the New England region, averaging slightly less than 40 inches (1,000 mm) a year (most parts of New England average 42–46 inches). This is due to storm systems which move across western areas, building up in mountainous regions, and dissipating before reaching the coast where the land has leveled out. The region does not experience a greater number of sunny days however, as the number of cloudy days is the same as inland locales, in addition to increased fog. Snowfall is annual, but a lot less common than the rest of Massachusetts. On average, 30 inches of snow, which is a foot less than Boston, falls in an average winter. Snow is usually light, and comes in squalls on cold days. Storms that bring blizzard conditions and snow emergencies to the mainland, bring devastating ice storms or just heavy rains more frequently than large snow storms.
[hide]Climate data for Cape Cod
Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year
Average high °C (°F) 2.06
(35.7) 2.5
(36.5) 6.22
(43.2) 11.72
(53.1) 16.94
(62.5) 23.5
(74.3) 26.39
(79.5) 26.67
(80.0) 25.06
(77.1) 18.39
(65.1) 12.56
(54.6) 5.44
(41.8) 26.67
(80.0)
Average low °C (°F) -5.33
(22.4) -5
(23.0) -1.33
(29.6) 2.72
(36.9) 8.72
(47.7) 14.61
(58.3) 19.22
(66.6) 20.28
(68.5) 15.56
(60.0) 9.94
(49.9) 3.94
(39.1) -2.22
(28.0) -5.33
(22.4)
Precipitation mm (inches) 98
(3.86) 75.4
(2.97) 95
(3.74) 92.5
(3.64) 83.6
(3.29) 76.7
(3.02) 62.2
(2.45) 65
(2.56) 74.7
(2.94) 84.8
(3.34) 90.7
(3.57) 92.7
(3.65) 990.9
(39.01)
Source: World Meteorological Organisation (United Nations) [16]
[edit] Native population
Cape Cod has been the home of the Wampanoag tribe of Native American people for many centuries. They survived off the sea and were accomplished farmers. They understood the principles of sustainable forest management, and were known to light controlled fires to keep the underbrush in check. They helped the Pilgrims, who arrived in the fall of 1620, survive at their new Plymouth Colony. At the time, the dominant group was the Kakopee, known for their abilities at fishing. They were the first Native Americans to use large casting nets. Early colonial settlers recorded that the Kakopee numbered nearly 7,000.
Shortly after the Pilgrims arrived, the chief of the Kakopee, Mogauhok, attempted to make a treaty limiting colonial settlements. The effort failed after he succumbed to smallpox in 1625. Infectious diseases such as smallpox, measles and influenza caused the deaths of many other Kakopee and Wampanoag. They had no natural immunity to Eurasian diseases by then endemic among the English and other Europeans. Today, the only reminder of the Kakopee is a small public recreation area in Barnstable named for them. A historic marker notes the burial site of Mogauhok near Truro, although the location is conjecture.
While contractors were digging test wells in the eastern Massachusetts Military Reservation area, they discovered an archeological find.[citation needed] Excavation revealed the remains of a Kakopee village in Forestdale, a location in Sandwich. Researchers found a totem with a painted image of Mogauhok, portrayed in his chief's cape and brooch. The totem was discovered on property on Grand Oak Road. It is the first evidence other than colonial accounts of his role as an important Kakopee leader.
The Indians lost their lands through continued purchase and expropriation by the English colonists. The documentary Natives of the Narrowland (1993), narrated by actress Julie Harris, shows the history of the Wampanoag people through Cape Cod archaeological sites.
In 1974, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council was formed to articulate the concerns of those with Native American ancestry. They petitioned the federal government in 1975 and again in 1990 for official recognition of the Mashpee Wampanoag as a tribe. In May 2007, the Wampanoag tribe was finally federally recognized as a tribe.[17]
[edit] History
Cranberry picking in 1906
Cape Cod was a landmark for early explorers. It may have been the "Promontory of Vinland" mentioned by the Norse voyagers (985-1025). Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524 approached it from the south. He named Martha's Vineyard Claudia, after the mother of the King of France.[18] The next year the explorer Esteban Gómez called it Cape St. James.
In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold named it Cape Cod, the surviving term and the ninth oldest English place-name in the U.S.[19] Samuel de Champlain charted its sand-silted harbors in 1606 and Henry Hudson landed there in 1609. Captain John Smith noted it on his map of 1614 and at last the Pilgrims entered the "Cape Harbor" and – contrary to the popular myth of Plymouth Rock – made their first landing near present-day Provincetown on November 11, 1620. Nearby, in what is now Eastham, they had their first encounter with Native Americans.
Cape Cod was among the first places settled by the English in North America. Aside from Barnstable (1639), Sandwich (1637) and Yarmouth (1639), the Cape's fifteen towns developed slowly. The final town to be established on the Cape was Bourne in 1884.[20] Provincetown was a group of huts until the 18th century. A channel from Massachusetts Bay to Buzzards Bay is shown on Southack's map of 1717. The present Cape Cod Canal was slowly developed from 1870 to 1914. The Federal government purchased it in 1928.
Thanks to early colonial settlement and intensive land use, by the time Henry Thoreau saw Cape Cod during his four visits over 1849 to 1857[21], its vegetation was depauperate and trees were scarce. As the settlers heated by fires, and it took 10 to 20 cords (40 to 80 m³) of wood to heat a home, they cleared most of Cape Cod of timber early on. They planted familiar crops, but these were unsuited to Cape Cod's thin, glacially derived soils. For instance, much of Eastham was planted to wheat. The settlers practiced burning of woodlands to release nutrients into the soil. Improper and intensive farming led to erosion and the loss of topsoil. Farmers grazed their cattle on the grassy dunes of coastal Massachusetts, only to watch "in horror as the denuded sands `walked' over richer lands, burying cultivated fields and fences." Dunes on the outer Cape became more common and many harbors filled in with eroded soils.[22]
By 1800, most of Cape Cod's firewood had to be transported by boat from Maine. The paucity of vegetation was worsened by the raising of merino sheep that reached its peak in New England around 1840. The early industrial revolution, which occurred through much of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, mostly bypassed Cape Cod due to a lack of significant water power in the area. As a result, and also because of its geographic position, the Cape developed as a large fishing and whaling center. After 1860 and the opening of the American West, farmers abandoned agriculture on the Cape. By 1950 forests had recovered to an extent not seen since the 18th century.
Cape Cod became a summer haven for city dwellers beginning at the end of the 19th century. Improved rail transportation made the towns of the Upper Cape, such as Bourne and Falmouth, accessible to Bostonians. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Northeastern mercantile elite built many large, shingled "cottages" along Buzzards Bay. The relaxed summer environment offered by Cape Cod was highlighted by writers including Joseph C. Lincoln, who published novels and countless short stories about Cape Cod folks in popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post and the Delineator.
Guglielmo Marconi made the first transatlantic wireless transmission originating in the United States from Cape Cod, at Wellfleet. The beach from which he transmitted has since been called Marconi Beach. In 1914 he opened the maritime wireless station WCC in Chatham. It supported the communications of Amelia Earhart, Howard Hughes, Admiral Byrd, and the Hindenburg. Marconi chose Chatham due to its vantage point on the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded on three sides by water. Walter Cronkite narrated a 17-minute documentary in 2005 about the history of the Chatham Station.
Much of the East-facing Atlantic seacoast of Cape Cod consists of wide, sandy beaches. In 1961, a significant portion of this coastline, already slated for housing subdivisions, was made a part of the Cape Cod National Seashore by President John F. Kennedy. It was protected from private development and preserved for public use. Large portions are open to the public, including the Marconi Site in Wellfleet. This is a park encompassing the site of the first two-way transoceanic radio transmission from the United States. (Theodore Roosevelt used Marconi's equipment for this transmission).
The Kennedy Compound in Hyannisport was President Kennedy's summer White House during his presidency. The Kennedy family continues to maintain residences on the compound. Other notable residents of Cape Cod have included actress Julie Harris, US Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis, figure skater Todd Eldredge, and novelists Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut. Influential natives included the patriot James Otis, historian and writer Mercy Otis Warren, jurist Lemuel Shaw, and naval officer John Percival.
[edit] Lighthouses of Cape Cod
Race Point Lighthouse in Provincetown (1876)
Lighthouses, from ancient times, have fascinated members of the human race. There is something about a lighted beacon that suggests hope and trust and appeals to the better instincts of mankind.
“
”
Edward Rowe Snow
Due to its dangerous constantly moving shoals, Cape Cod's shores have featured beacons which warn ships of the danger since very early in its history. There are numerous working lighthouses on Cape Cod and the Islands, including Highland Light, Nauset Light, Chatham Light, Race Point Light, and Nobska Light, mostly operated by the U.S. Coast Guard. The exception is Nauset Light, which was decommissioned in 1996 and is now maintained by the Nauset Light Preservation Society under the auspices of Cape Cod National Seashore. These lighthouses are frequently photographed symbols of Cape Cod.
Others include:
Upper Cape: Wings Neck
Mid Cape: Sandy Neck, South Hyannis, Lewis Bay, Bishop and Clerks, Bass River
Lower Cape: Wood End, Long Point, Monomoy, Stage Harbor, Pamet, Mayo Beach, Billingsgate, Three Sisters, Nauset, Highland
[edit] Transportation
Cape Cod is connected to the mainland by a pair of canal-spanning highway bridges from Bourne and Sagamore that were constructed in the 1930s, and a vertical-lift railroad bridge. The limited number of access points to the peninsula can result in large traffic backups during the tourist season.
The entire Cape is roughly bisected lengthwise by U.S. Route 6, locally known as the Mid-Cape Highway and officially as the Grand Army of the Republic Highway.
Commercial air service to Cape Cod operates out of Barnstable Municipal Airport and Provincetown Municipal Airport. Several bus lines service the Cape. There are ferry connections from Boston to Provincetown, as well as from Hyannis and Woods Hole to the islands.
Cape Cod has a public transportation network comprising buses operated by three different companies, a rail line, taxis and paratransit services.
The Bourne Bridge over the Cape Cod Canal, with the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge in the background
[edit] Bus
Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority operates a year-round public bus system comprising three long distance routes and a local bus in Hyannis and Barnstable Village. From mid June until October, additional local routes are added in Falmouth and Provincetown. CCRTA also operates Barnstable County's ADA required paratransit (dial-a-ride) service, under the name "B-Bus."
Long distance bus service is available through Plymouth and Brockton Street Railway, with regular service to Boston and Logan Airport, as well as less frequent service to Provincetown. Peter Pan Bus Lines also runs long distance service to Providence T.F. Green Airport and New York City.
[edit] Rail
Regular passenger rail service through Cape Cod ended in 1959, quite possibly on June 30 of that year. In 1978, the tracks east of South Dennis were abandoned and replaced with the very popular bicycle path, known as the Cape Cod Rail Trail. Another bike path, the Shining Sea Bikeway, was built over tracks between Woods Hole and Falmouth in 1975; construction to extend this path to North Falmouth over 6.3 miles (10.1 km) of inactive rail bed began in April 2008[23] and ended in early 2009. Active freight service remains in the Upper Cape area in Sandwich and in Bourne, largely due to a trash transfer station located at Massachusetts Military Reservation along the Bourne-Falmouth rail line. In 1986, Amtrak ran a seasonal service in the summer from New York City to Hyannis called the Cape Codder. From 1988, Amtrak and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation increased service to a daily frequency.[24] Since its demise in 1996, there have been periodic discussions about reinstating passenger rail service from Boston to reduce car traffic to and from the Cape, with officials in Bourne seeking to re-extend MBTA Commuter Rail service from Middleboro to Buzzards Bay[25], despite a reluctant Beacon Hill legislature.
Cape Cod Central Railroad operates passenger train service on Cape Cod. The service is primarily tourist oriented and includes a dinner train. The scenic route between Downtown Hyannis and the Cape Cod Canal is about 2½ hours round trip. Massachusetts Coastal Railroad is also planning to return passenger railroad services eventually to the Bourne-Falmouth rail line in the future. An August 5, 2009 article on the New England Cable News channel, entitled South Coast rail project a priority for Mass. lawmakers, mentions a $1.4-billion railroad reconstruction plan by Governor Deval Patrick, and could mean rebuilding of old rail lines on the Cape. On November 21, 2009, the town of Falmouth saw its first passenger train in 12 years, a set of dinner train cars from Cape Cod Central. And a trip from the Mass Bay Railroad Enthusiasts on May 15, 2010 revealed a second trip along the Falmouth line.
[edit] Taxi
Taxicabs are plentiful, with several different companies operating out of different parts of the Cape. Except at the airport and some bus terminals with taxi stands, cabs must be booked ahead of time, with most operators preferring two to three hours notice. Cabs cannot be "hailed" anywhere in Barnstable County, this was outlawed in the early nineties after several robbery attempts on drivers.
Most companies utilize a New York City-style taximeter and charge based on distance plus an initial fee of $2 to $3. In Provincetown, cabs charge a flat fare per person anywhere in the town.
[edit] Tourism
Hyannis Harbor on Nantucket Sound
Although Cape Cod has a year-round population of about 230,000, it experiences a tourist season each summer, the beginning and end of which can be roughly approximated as Memorial Day and Labor Day, respectively. Many businesses are specifically targeted to summer visitors, and close during the eight to nine months of the "off season" (although the "on season" has been expanding somewhat in recent years due to Indian Summer, reduced lodging rates, and the number of people visiting the Cape after Labor Day who either have no school-age children, and the elderly, reducing the true "off season" to six or seven months). In the late 20th century, tourists and owners of second homes began visiting the Cape more and more in the spring and fall, softening the definition of the high season and expanding it somewhat (see above). Some particularly well-known Cape products and industries include cranberries, shellfish (particularly oysters and clams) and lobstering.
Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod, also berths several whale watching fleets who patrol the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. Most fleets guarantee a whale sighting (mostly humpback whale, fin whale, minke whale, sei whale, and critically endangered, the North Atlantic Right Whale), and one is the only federally certified operation qualified to rescue whales. Provincetown has also long been known as an art colony, attracting writers and artists. The town is home to the Cape's most attended art museum, the Provincetown Art Association and Museum. Many hotels and resorts are friendly to or cater to gay and lesbian tourists and it is known as a gay mecca in the summer.[26]
Cape Cod is a popular destination for beachgoers from all over. With 559.6 miles (900.6 km) of coastline, beaches, both public and private, are easily accessible. The Cape has upwards of sixty public beaches, many of which offer parking for non-residents for a daily fee (in summer). The Cape Cod National Seashore has 40 miles (64 km) of sandy beach and many walking paths.
Cape Cod is also popular for its outdoor activities like beach walking, biking, boating, fishing, go-karts, golfing, kayaking, miniature golf, and unique shopping. There are 27 public, daily-fee golf courses and 15 private courses on Cape Cod.[27] Bed and breakfasts or vacation houses are often used for lodging.
Each summer the Naukabout Music Festival is held at the Barnstable County Fair Grounds located in East Falmouth,(typically) during the first weekend of August. This Music festival features local, regional and national talent along with food, arts and family friendly activities.
[edit] Sport fishing
Cape Cod is known around the world as a spring-to-fall destination for sport anglers. Among the species most widely pursued are striped bass, bluefish, bluefin tuna, false albacore (little tunny), bonito, tautog, flounder and fluke. The Cape Cod Bay side of the Cape, from Sandwich to Provincetown, has several harbors, saltwater creeks, and shoals that hold bait fish and attract the larger game fish, such as striped bass, bluefish and bluefin tuna.
The outer edge of the Cape, from Provincetown to Falmouth, faces the open Atlantic from Provincetown to Chatham, and then the more protected water of Nantucket and Vineyard Sounds, from Chatham to Falmouth. The bays, harbors and shoals along this coastline also provide a robust habitat for game species, and during the late summer months warm-water species such as mahi-mahi and marlin will also appear on the southern edge of Cape Cod's waters. Nearly every harbor on Cape Cod hosts sport fishing charter boats, which run from May through October.[28]
[edit] Sports
The Cape has nine amateur baseball franchises playing within Barnstable County in the Cape Cod Baseball League. The Wareham Gatemen also play in the Cape Cod Baseball League in nearby Wareham, Massachusetts in Plymouth County. The league originated 1923, although intertown competition traces to 1866. Teams in the league are the Bourne Braves, Brewster Whitecaps, Chatham Anglers (formerly the Chatham Athletics), Cotuit Kettleers, Falmouth Commodores, Harwich Mariners, Hyannis Harbor Hawks (formerly the Hyannis Mets), Orleans Firebirds (formerly the Orleans Cardinals), Wareham Gatemen and the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox. Pro ball scouts frequent the games in the summer, looking for stars of the future.
Cape Cod is also a national hot bed for baseball and hockey. Along with the Cape Cod Baseball League and the new Junior Hockey League team, the Cape Cod Cubs, many high school players are being seriously recruited as well. Barnstable and Harwich have each sent multiple players to Division 1 colleges for baseball, Harwich has also won three State titles in the past 12 years (1996, 2006, 2007). Bourne and Sandwich, known rivals in hockey have won state championships recently. Bourne in 2004, and Sandwich in 2007. Nauset, Barnstable, and Martha's Vineyard are also state hockey powerhouses. Barnstable and Falmouth also hold the title of having one of the longest Thanksgiving football rivalries in the country. The teams have played each other every year on the Thanksgiving since 1895. The Bourne and Barnstable girl's volleyball teams are two of the best teams in the state and Barnstable in the country. With Bourne winning the State title in 2003 and 2007. In the past 15 years, Barnstable has won 12 Division 1 State titles and has won the state title the past two years.
The Cape also is home to the Cape Cod Frenzy, a team in the American Basketball Association.
Soccer on Cape Cod is represented by the Cape Cod Crusaders, playing in the USL Premier Development League (PDL) soccer based in Hyannis. In addition, a summer Cape Cod Adult Soccer League (CCASL) is active in several towns on the Cape.
Cape Cod is also the home of the Cape Cod Cubs, a new junior league hockey team that is based out of Hyannis at the new communtiy center being built of Bearses Way.
The end of each summer is marked with the running of the world famous Falmouth Road Race which is held on the 3rd Saturday in August. It draws about 10,000 runners to the Cape and showcases the finest runners in the world (mainly for the large purse that the race is able to offer). The race is 7.2 miles (11.6 km) long, which is a non-standard distance. The reason for the unusual distance is that the man who thought the race up (Tommy Leonard) was a bartender who wanted a race along the coast from one bar (The Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole) to another (The Brothers Four in Falmouth Heights). While the bar in Falmouth Heights is no longer there, the race still starts at the front door of the Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole and now finishes at the beach in Falmouth Heights. Prior to the Falmouth race is an annual 5-mile (8.0 km) race through Brewster called the Brew Run, held early in August.
[edit] Education
Each town usually consists of a few elementary schools, one or two middle schools and one large public high school that services the entire town. Exceptions to this include Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High School located in Yarmouth which services both the town of Yarmouth as well as Dennis and Nauset Regional High School located in Eastham which services the town of Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown (optional). Bourne High School is the public school for students residing in the town of Bourne, which is gathered from villages in Bourne, including Sagamore, Sagamore Beach, and Buzzards Bay. Barnstable High School is the largest high school and is known for its girls' volleyball team which have been state champions a total of 12 times. Barnstable High School also boasts one of the country's best high school drama clubs which were awarded with a contract by Warner Brothers to created a documentary in webisode format based on their production of Wizard of Oz. Sturgis Charter Public School is a public school in Hyannis which was featured in Newsweek's Magazine's "Best High Schools" ranking. It ranked 28th in the country and 1st in the state of Massachusetts in the 2009 edition and ranked 43rd and 55th in the 2008 and 2007 edition, respectively. Sturgis offers the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme in their junior and senior year and is open to students as far as Plymouth. The Cape also contains two vocational high schools. One is the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School in Harwich and the other is Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical High School located in Bourne. Lastly, Mashpee High School is home to the Mashpee Chapter of (SMPTE,) the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers. This chapter is the first and only high school chapter in the world to be a part of this organization and has received much recognition within the Los Angeles broadcasting industry as a result. The officers of this group who have made history are listed below:
* President: Ryan D. Stanley '11
* Vice-President Kenneth J. Peters '13
* Treasurer Eric N. Bergquist '11
* Secretary Andrew L. Medlar '11
In addition to public schools, Cape Cod has a wide range of private schools. The town of Barnstable has Trinity Christian Academy, Cape Cod Academy, St. Francis Xavier Preparatory School, and Pope John Paul II High School. Bourne offers the Waldorf School of Cape Cod, Orleans offers the Lighthouse Charter School for elementary and middle school students, and Falmouth offers Falmouth Academy. Riverview School is located in East Sandwich and is a special co-ed boarding school which services students as old as 22 who have learning disabilities. Another specialized school is the Penikese Island School located on Penikese Island, part of the Elizabeth Islands off southwestern Cape Cod, which services struggling and troubled teenage boys.
Cape Cod also contains two institutions of higher education. One is the Cape Cod Community College located in West Barnstable, Barnstable. The other is Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay, Bourne. Massachusetts Maritime Academy is the oldest continuously operating maritime college in the United States.
[edit] Islands off Cape Cod
Like Cape Cod itself, the islands south of the Cape have evolved from whaling and trading areas to resort destinations, attracting wealthy families, celebrities, and other tourists. The islands include Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, as well as Forbes family-owned Naushon Island, which was purchased by John Murray Forbes with profits from opium dealing in the China trade during the Opium War. Naushon is one of the Elizabeth Islands, many of which are privately owned. One of the publicly accessible Elizabeths is the southernmost island in the chain, Cuttyhunk, with a year-round population of 52 people. Several prominent families have established compounds or estates on the larger islands, making these islands some of the wealthiest resorts in the Northeast, yet they retain much of the early merchant trading and whaling culture.