The Western Maryland Railway was known for their well maintained fleet before Chessie System came along.

 

The Baltimore and Ohio Museum has the only remaining WM ALCO RS3 in their collection of rotting equipment.

 

It has sat untouched and unprotected for over 30 years.

 

The Wild Mary deserves better. The junk yard masquerading as a museum should have a little more pride in their collection or allow this motor to move to another venue that could actually maintain it.

12 Spitfires followed by 4 Hurricanes.

A big wing aircraft formation typically involves multiple aircraft flying closely together in a symmetrical pattern. This formation is often used during air shows or military demonstrations to showcase precision flying skills. It requires extensive coordination and communication between pilots to maintain safe spacing and prevent mid-air collisions.

According to Native American lore, Multnomah Falls was created to win the heart of a young princess who wanted a hidden place to bathe. The waterfall is located in the Columbia River Gorge, east of Troutdale, between Corbett and Dodson, Oregon, United States. The waterfall is accessible from the Historic Columbia River Highway and Interstate 84. Spanning two tiers on basalt cliffs, it is the tallest waterfall in the state of Oregon at 620 ft in height. The land surrounding the falls was developed by Simon Benson in the early-twentieth century, with a pathway, viewing bridge, and adjacent lodge being constructed in 1925. The Multnomah Falls Lodge and the surrounding footpaths at the falls were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1981. Contemporarily, the state of Oregon maintains a switchback trail that ascends to a talus slope 100 feet above the falls, and descends to an observation deck that overlooks the falls' edge. The falls attract over two million visitors each year, making it the most-visited natural recreation site in the U.S. Pacific Northwest.

Skeleton of DC-10-30 N810AX used for spares in maintaining and operating current Orbis Flying Eye Hospital DC-10 N220NU Stored @ Southern California Logistics Airport, Victorville, CA

Badly maintained council housing estate. Many flats have been sealed with steel panels and it appears that the remainder will be moved on in due course.

 

1960's social optimism gone wrong . . .

 

LR3781 © Joe O'Malley 2020

City maintained butterfly garden near the American Legion post in Fairhope Alabama.

AGR train 231 rolls northbound through the small town of Frisco City, Alabama, passing through the soybean fields. The town's water tower proudly proclaims the name and logo of the railroad that brought the prosperity here. Frisco City isn't a big town but it is a happy one. Surrounded by large swaths of Alabama agriculture and intersected by a few major roads it has all the rural culture you would expect. The only thing disturbing the silence is the weekday local blasting north towards a turn up in the hills at Fountain. Once a part of the Frisco system, the now Alabama and Gulf Coast Railroad maintains a healthy presence in town. Even to this day they still switch cottonseed mills and small one car lumberyards that many class ones would have abandoned many years ago. A great place to shoot trains that has seemingly stood still too...

Blocked-off ground-level units and weathered walls at Calle el Temple, Zaragoza.

 

am always a bit of a sucker for old buildings that show the effects of time, especially if they are on narrow, car-free European streets, and perhaps more so when they are a bit messy around the edges. This building puzzled me. The ground floor seemed abandoned, with doorways sealed of its bricks. But the second story and above seemed well-maintained.

 

We stayed in the old part of Zaragoza, Spain. This location is mere footsteps from our hotel, and we walked past it a number of times. ON this morning we were just starting a walk that would take us the Central Market, then to some historical buildings, followed by a walk along the river back to the center of this art of town.

 

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

01 April 2018

Its into the 9th year since I shot this and the situation in the DTES has only deteriorated. Governments have worsened the situation by piling more social housing in the area adding to the “customers with no cash” syndrome. The area is named “Canada’s poorest postal code” by activists and the poverty pimps love the situation making the area one of “Canada’s richest postal codes”, the only differenence being the pimp money goes home at night. Helpful groups support too many by offering them food daily with zero obligation. Its become an impossible sitiuation to address given the current state of political governance.

I wish this was just a sick April Fools Day joke but unfortuantely not.

 

Sleeping on a sidewalk in the Downtown East Side (DTES) of Vancouver BC takes on a different sense of survival than is observed in many west side sleepers. A combination of mental issues, drug sale and use, area resident poverty and the resulting community of "Customers With No Cash" combine for a perfect locale to take advantage of people on the edge where living is not comparable to what most of us bring to mind in our own comfortable world. Prostitution and drugs are a large part of this community. One can not help feel sorry and remorseful this exists in self important Vancouver.

 

The irony of this photo is it was shot about 10 feet from the entrance of BC Housing's recently opened Orange Hall office (open 10 am to 4 pm Monday to Friday) 297 Hastings Street at Gore Ave. This situation has steadily gone downhill since the Federal Governemt cut back funding for social housing.

  

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH:

From BC Housing website:

October 3rd, 2014

VICTORIA – The B.C. government is strengthening the non-profit housing sector by transferring provincially-owned properties to non-profit housing providers.

 

The Province owns approximately 350 parcels of land throughout British Columbia that are currently leased long-term to non-profit housing providers who own and operate social housing buildings on these properties.

 

The non-profit housing sector has been asking for this step for many years. Having ownership of the land will improve a non-profit’s ability to support better long-term planning and selfsufficiency. Owning the lands they operate on will also help non-profits secure the financing they need to be sustainable.

 

In order to transfer title, the Province will end these leases, and then transfer ownership of the land to the societies. The properties will be transferred at fair market value. The Province will assist the societies to secure mortgages on the properties. The current operating agreement that BC Housing has with each non-profit society will remain in place. Approximately 115 properties will be transferred by March 31, 2015, and the rest will be transferred over the next three years.

 

In addition, the Province is looking to transfer ownership of two properties currently managed by BC Housing to non-profit societies. The Province will begin the process by posting Expressions of Interest for Nicholson Tower and Stamps Place in Vancouver shortly.

 

Tenants will not be impacted by these transfers, and the amount of affordable housing stock will remain stable. Non-profit societies have been providing social housing in B.C. for more than 60 years. Today more than 90% of social housing is managed by non-profit societies.

 

THE GLOBE & MAIL:

FRANCES BULA

VANCOUVER — The Globe and Mail

Published Monday, Oct. 13 2014

 

Vancouver won’t solve street homelessness until both the city and province focus on targeting the limited supply of expensive social housing to those who need it most, say experts.

 

That means help can’t go to anyone who passes through a shelter or an outdoor camp or even to someone who sleeps outside temporarily. In the vast majority of cases, people who become homeless experience it briefly and are able to avoid losing housing again.

 

But people working on eliminating homelessness do not always understand that the thousands of people who experience homelessness in a year don’t all need expensive subsidized housing. That should be reserved for the chronically homeless, who are not sufficiently helped by temporary assistance with rent or other social supports.

 

“For nearly 90 per cent of people counted as homeless, they’ll get themselves out of homelessness on their own,” says Tim Richter, who led Calgary’s 10-year plan to end homelessness and is now the president of the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness. “It’s critical to set priorities. It shouldn’t be first-come, first-served.”

 

One of the region’s most experienced homelessness researchers, former Vancouver city-hall staffer Judy Graves, said the city is reaping the results of city and provincial staff not always setting the right priorities for the past six years. This past winter, Vancouver still had a count of 533 people sleeping outside (less than in 2008, but more than in 2011), even though the province and city have opened up thousands of new social-housing units rented at welfare-level rates.

 

It’s an issue that is returning to haunt Vision Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson, who promised in 2008 to end street homelessness by 2015, during this fall’s civic-election campaign.

 

His administration, which has pushed the issue non-stop since he was first elected, has recently exceeded previous efforts by jumping last month into paying for all the costs of converting a downtown Quality Inn to transitional housing, as well as all the costs of a new shelter nearby. Usually the province covers the majority of costs for both of those kinds of housing.

 

But Ms. Graves said even that unusual effort, accompanied by several hundred other new provincial units about to open, isn’t going to solve the problem by January, 2015.

 

That’s because the province is only committed to using half of the incoming housing units for the chronically homeless. And city staff also don’t always correctly identify who is the most in need.

 

“Both the city and province have bought into housing by wait lists,” said Ms. Graves. “It just can’t work. You have to work as though you’re in a disaster zone.”

 

She said she had doubts that the majority of people who camped in Oppenheimer Park over the summer were homeless, but they got priority for the scarce number of rooms available.

 

As well, in the early stages of the province’s big social-housing construction push, which will see 14 towers completed with around 1,400 units by the end, non-profit operators were simply moving people from residential hotel rooms into the new buildings.

 

That meant the housing didn’t go to the chronically homeless and the most in need, but worse, it then allowed landlords in the residential hotels to do renovations, raise rents, or refuse new low-income tenants once the former tenants were relocated to social housing.

 

That then reduced the overall number of private, low-cost housing units in the city. Ms. Graves said the whole region is experiencing an acute shortage of those kinds of private units now. It has become a game of musical chairs for housing-outreach workers to get a low-cost unit for someone trying to get out of shelters or off the street, she said.

 

All cities are grappling with constant pressures that create more homelessness at the front end: low working-class incomes that can’t keep up with gentrification and rising rents key among them, said Ms. Graves. That has left cities trying to solve the problem at the back end, trying to house all the people made homeless as a result of many larger forces.

 

24 HRS VANCOUVER - 16 OCT 14

16 Oct 2014 24 Hours VancouverJANE DEACON Comment at vancouver.24hrs.c

Laura Dilley, PACE Society Action Week, PACE plans to draft housing recommendations for city council before the coming election.

“Oftentimes we will create housing models not including the voices of those we would be housing,” said Dilley.

Rising rent prices that force people out of SROs is a significant factor, as well as landlords who refuse to rent to sex workers out of legal concerns, said Dilley. Low- income housing conditions that require tenants stay in at night or guests to sign in are also significant barriers. She estimates between 10 to 15% of sex workers fall under the category of “survival” or street- based prostitution. For that vulnerable population, simply switching professions is often not an option, said Dilley.

“They’re really forced and entrenched to continuously do that work because they have no options out of it, because we have such stigma in our society that they can’t seek help, they can’t find affordable housing, so they’re really stuck in that situation,” she said.

 

17 April 2019:

 

B.C. drug users demand clean supply, but fear they won’t live to see it happen

By David P. BallStar Vancouver

Tues., April 16, 2019

  

VANCOUVER—Several hundred Vancouverites marked three years since the province declared a public health emergency over the thousands of people killed by overdoses.

 

But as they marched Tuesday from the safe-injection clinic Insite through downtown Vancouver, advocates say “contaminated” drugs have taken a toll on their own leaders.

 

For B.C. Association of People on Methadone member Garth Mullins, the losses are mounting, and it’s been destabilizing and “disorganizing” for the drug-reform movement.

 

“We’ve lost rank and file members and leaders in such high numbers over the last five years,” he said, wearing a distinctive black case of the overdose-reversing drug naloxone on his belt. “It’s hard to organize or think strategically when you’re always doing triage, planning a memorial.”

 

Just last month the president of his organization, Chereece Keewatin, died from a fentanyl overdose. Mullins knew Keewatin for at least six years, and invited her to join the editorial board of the podcast Crackdown, of which he is executive producer.

 

“Chereece was really little, but she had this tremendous capacity to lift people’s spirits,” he said in an interview. “You’d have meetings where we talk about really, really bleak subjects, but she had these funny asides to cut through the bleakness.

 

“She made people laugh. In that way, she took responsibility for the whole collective emotional state of the group.”

 

It’s not just the B.C. Association of People on Methadone that’s seen the direct “casualties” of what Mullins called “a war.” The Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users and the national Canadian Association of People who Use Drugs have also lost high-ranking board members in recent years.

 

Since 2016, nearly 11,000 people have died across Canada from opioid overdoses, according to the most recent federal and provincial data. The majority of those deaths were from opioids such as fentanyl or its more deadly variants, but B.C. remains the epicentre for roughly a third of those deaths, 1,500 of them last year alone.

 

On average, four British Columbians died every day from overdoses last year, much higher than the national average and largely unchanged since the province’s April 2016 declaration of a public health emergency.

 

11 May 2020

.

A wall mural in the DTES poses a valid question, "how do we end the drug crisis"? A more basic question, how did we get here?

 

Vancouver, B.C. is consistently ranked at the top of the list for the world’s most liveable cities - but not for many in the DTES.

 

The city has a dirty little secret that it has been trying to suppress for decades. The historic four-block area near East Hastings and Main Street — the DTES — known as one of the “poorest postal codes” in Canada, has a combination of drug use, HIV, homelessness, prostitution, mental illness, and crime all making up this poor off neighbourhood.

 

To be successful as a drug lord you need a steady, reliable, cheap supply of product, a location where you can operate relatively free from prosecution and away you go. The prime location ingredients Vancouver offers is the DTES.

 

Over the decades continuing city administrations have built a community of “customers with no cash” by loading the DTES with blocks of not for profit social housing. Along with the myriad of Single Room Occupancy hotels (SRO's) the area is prime territory for the drug trade.

 

Social housing should be spread throughout the city to provide a society of different financial means for common support - IMO.

 

Administrations over the years have been loath to attempt social housing in the rich city enclaves due to onerous push back. It was and still is more expedient to keep adding more social housing in the DTES where there is minimal opposition.

 

***** Today there are at least 6 City of Vancouver development permit applications on file for more social housing in the DTES.

 

The process is welcomed by the myriad of DTES support service groups who like their clientele close at hand and the clientele are fine with it as services are nearby.

 

DTES government and service support groups along with poverty pimp lawyers who have a hissy fit if anyone tries to change the dial, while also making money off the situation, has resulted in the perfect condition for drug dealers to flourish.

 

Social housing residents, many older, Asian and often mentally challenged are living in a hell hole neighbourhood with little individual voice.

 

In recent years, the area is seeing an east creeping gentrification. This is causing the DTES street population to be squeezed into a smaller footprint resulting in more confrontation and the appearance of a worsening situation even though overall the numbers of street people remains fairly constant.

 

The amount of taxpayer dollars spent in the area is staggering with little to show for the investment.

 

Vancouver has always had a drug problem. The opioids of choice — and the increasingly staggering death toll — have changed over the years.

 

In 2017 Fentanyl killed so many Canadians it caused the average life expectancy in B.C. to drop for the first time in decades. But for crime kingpins, it became a source of such astonishing wealth it disrupted the Vancouver-area real estate market.

 

SOME BACKGROUND:

Excerpt from the Province Newspaper by reporter Randy Shore 18 March, 2017.

 

When members of the Royal Commission to Investigate Chinese and Japanese Immigration came to Vancouver in 1901, they got an eyeful.

“There were whole rooms of Chinese lying stretched out on beds with the opium apparatus laid out before them — all unmindful that their attitudes and surrounding conditions are being taken note of to assist in keeping the remainder of their countrymen entirely out of Canada,” reported the Vancouver World newspaper.

 

The fringes of Vancouver’s Chinatown have always been the centre of Canada’s opiate trade. Ever more potent and easily smuggled versions emerged through the decades, culminating in the scourge of synthetic opiates — fentanyl and carfentanil — thousands of times more powerful and many times more deadly than opium.

 

Opium was a source of revenue for governments of the day. A federal duty imposed on importers fetched hundreds of thousands of dollars between 1874 and 1899. In B.C. ports, and cities charged hundreds of dollars to purveyors in the form of business licences.

 

Between 1923 and 1932, more than 700 Chinese men were deported for drug-related violations.

 

Under constant pressure from the police, opium users began to inject their hit, as the technique created no smoke or aroma and used smaller equipment, which could be easily hidden. In the 1920s and 1930s, white users tended to be young criminals, “racetrack hands, and circus and show people” who smoked opium or sniffed heroin.

 

By the mid-1930s, heroin was one of the most common drugs in circulation and white users were increasingly taking the drug intravenously, especially as prices rose due to scarcity brought about by vigorous law enforcement.

 

The outbreak of the Second World War put opiate addicts into a state of crisis, as opiate drugs were required in great quantities for the war wounded. The street price of a hit — whether heroin, morphine or codeine — shot up and crime along with it.

 

In the post-war period, right through to the mid-’60s, Vancouver was ground zero for Canada’s intravenous drug scene, made up mainly of petty criminals, troubled youths fed by drug lords.

 

Before the ’40s were over, highly refined white heroin had appeared and it was coming from overseas to satisfy a hungry market in Vancouver, home to half of the country’s drug users.

 

Heroin use remained a constant undercurrent in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside during the ’70s and ’80s, even as alcohol was the neighbourhood’s real drug of choice.

 

But a flood of a new and even more potent “China White” heroin arriving into the city reignited public outrage in the early ’90s. A spate of 331 overdose deaths in 1993 spurred B.C. coroner Vince Cain to call for the decriminalization of heroin and addicts be prescribed the drug to legally maintain their habit.

 

It would be nearly 15 years before the Study to Assess Long-term Opioid Maintenance Effectiveness (SALOME) began in Vancouver, just about the time a new threat emerged.

 

Up to 80 times as powerful as heroin, fentanyl hit the streets and reduced the risk for traffickers as it was so concentrated, transportation was easier.

 

The carnage wrought by fentanyl has been without precedent.

 

Heroin seized in drug busts is routinely cut with fentanyl and in recent months the presence of carfentanil.

 

SUMMARY:

 

Where will this go next, who knows ?

 

The richest of societies should be especially judged by how they treat their least fortunate, and Vancouver has its challenge set out for the foreseeable future.

 

UPDATE 23 MAY 2020 - VANCOUVER SUN

John Mackie: The Downtown Eastside is a war zone disaster — stop ghettoizing it.

John Mackie, Vancouver Sun 23 May 2020

Twenty years ago local musician Kuba Oms was recording at the Miller Block, a now defunct Hastings Street recording studio near Save-On-Meats.

 

He jaywalked and was stopped by a cop, who handed him a ticket.

 

“I said ‘Are you kidding me?’” Oms recounts. “You know there’s a guy shooting up over there, and a crack dealer over there. And the cop said ‘That’s a health issue.’”

 

That story pretty much sums up the city’s attitude toward the Downtown Eastside over the past few decades.

 

In some ways the cop was right — it is a Vancouver health issue. But letting people openly do drugs in public and turn Hastings and the wider Downtown Eastside into a ghetto is political correctness gone mad.

 

Drive down Hastings Street between Abbott and Gore and you’ll see dozens, even hundreds of people hanging out on the street, in various states of sobriety. They are definitely not social distancing. It’s a miracle that COVID-19 hasn’t swept the entire area.

 

The height of this madness was the recent occupation of Oppenheimer Park. Vancouver has real issues of homelessness, but to some degree Oppenheimer was about a fringe group of politicos manipulating the homeless.

 

Many police resources were diverted to the park and there was a crime wave in nearby Chinatown — one business closed because they were being robbed a dozen times a day.

 

The province recently made hotel rooms available for the homeless people occupying Oppenheimer Park, so things have calmed down somewhat. But the big question is what happens in a few months? Is government going to find permanent homes for them?

 

Odds are if they do, it will be in highrises in the Downtown Eastside. For decades that’s where the city and province have been concentrating social housing, especially for the mentally ill and drug addicted.

 

Their argument is these residents feel comfortable there. But the reality is the more poverty is concentrated, the worse the area seems to become.

 

Maybe it’s time for the city of Vancouver to give its head a shake and realize that its much-ballyhooed Downtown Eastside Plan is actually part of the problem, not the solution.

 

Part of the plan decrees you can’t build condos on Hastings between Carrall Street in Gastown and Heatley Avenue in Strathcona, or in historic Japantown around Oppenheimer Park.

 

Development in those areas has to be rental only, with at least 60 per cent social housing. This pretty much ensures that no market housing is built in the poorest area of the city.

 

When the plan was unveiled in 2014, Vancouver’s former head planner Brian Jackson said the aim was to ensure that low-income people in the Downtown Eastside weren’t displaced.

 

“The plan is attempting to achieve balance,” he explained then.

 

In fact, the plan does the exact opposite. There is no balance in the Downtown Eastside: It’s been turned into a ghetto. A friend who’s worked there for two decades calls it a war zone.

 

The city desperately need some market housing, co-ops and development on Hastings and around Oppenheimer. The anti-poverty activists will scream blue murder that it’s gentrification, but it’s actually normalization. You don’t have to displace anybody, you just have add a different mix to make it safer.

 

I live in Strathcona, where about 6,500 people live in social housing and about 3,500 in market homes. It’s a close-knit neighbourhood that has the balance Brian Jackson was taking about — it’s diverse and features a variety of incomes.

 

Japantown and the Downtown Eastside could be a real neighbourhood again if the city retained its stock of handsome historic buildings but allowed some development of its many non-descript structures.

 

It could be like Strathcona, even the West End. But I fear it could get even worse, if the planners and politicians continue to concentrate all the Lower Mainland’s poverty and social ills in one small area.

 

jmackie@postmedia.com

 

John Mackie is a veteran Postmedia reporter who has written several stories about Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside Plan.

 

13 JULY, 2020

Vancouver can’t catch up to its housing crisis

 

ADRIENNE TANNER

SPECIAL TO THE GLOBE AND MAIL

PUBLISHED 13 JULY 2020

 

It is obvious now the cheers that erupted when Vancouver’s longest running tent city was dismantled were wildly premature. Fearing a COVID-19 outbreak would take hold in the overcrowded inner-city camp, the provincial government in April acquired emergency housing in hotels for homeless people living there and cleared the site.

 

Many camp residents embraced the offer of a clean room. Some refused and relocated outdoors. The camp shifted, first to some empty Port of Vancouver land, and when a court order quickly shut it down, finally landed in Strathcona Park. With each move, it grew.

 

Today there are about 150 tents Strathcona Park, roughly double the number there were in Oppenheimer Park. How many inhabitants are truly homeless is anyone’s guess. Some of the tents were erected by activists with homes. Others belong to people living in single room occupancy hotels, the worst of which are noisy, bug-infested and so hot that some residents prefer to spend summer outside.

  

There is already an air of permanence to the camp; the city has installed porta-potties, fresh drinking water and handwashing stations. Park rangers drop by a few times daily. The area is reasonably clean, but these are early days.

 

Strathcona residents are largely sympathetic to homeless people, but are understandably unhappy about losing a large chunk of park space. They fear the same violence and social disorder that cropped up at Oppenheimer is inevitable; there has already been a small fire and there appears to be a bike chop shop on site. There are cries for the city to sanction a permanent tent city location – elsewhere, of course.

 

So how exactly did the province’s efforts to shut down a tent city and house homeless people backfire so badly? The city and provincial officials have been out-manoeuvered and out-organized by anti-poverty activists who seized a COVID-19 opportunity when they saw it.

 

The pandemic raised fears the Oppenheimer tent city would turn into a reservoir of disease that could overwhelm the health system. The activists know that’s why the government cleared the camp and purchased hotels for social housing. They understand this is the moment to highlight society’s failure to solve homelessness, even if their end goals seem to differ. Some are calling for permanent housing – others prefer the idea of a permanent, free-wheeling tent city.

  

The sorry truth is, even with the addition of 600 units of temporary modular housing and, more recently, the purchase of three downtown hotels, there are still more homeless people than homes. Successions of governments at all levels have allowed this crisis to grow. They’ve failed to build enough social housing. Failed to provide adequate mental health services. Failed to fund enough drug rehabilitation programs for those who want to quit and provide a safe drug supply for those who can’t.

 

So, now here we are with the largest homeless camp the city has ever seen and another stressed-out neighbourhood. Legally, the new tent city may prove more difficult to dismantle – it’s a large park and the tents are well spaced so the pandemic may not wash as a valid reason. And unless housing is available for everyone who is homeless, it is unlikely the courts would grant an injunction.

 

Solving problems associated with homelessness is a huge challenge. We can start with housing, but that alone is not nearly enough. Many of the people living in the hotels and park are drug users. Many are mentally ill. Some are both. It takes money – and lots of it – to provide decent housing and supports for this segment of society.

  

But to cave to demands for a permanent tent city is an American-style admission of defeat. The park board seems resigned to tent cities in parks and is considering a bylaw seeking to control locations. City council has resisted sanctioning a permanent spot, instead offering up land for new social housing. The province has stepped up with money for temporary modular housing and purchases of hotels.

 

It will be tough to keep neighbourhoods onside if more parks are rendered unusable for recreation. There is only one palatable solution; the provincial government must stay the course and keep adding decent, affordable housing. It won’t be cheap or easy. Catchup never is.

 

01 APRIL 2022

More than 2,200 British Columbians lost to illicit drugs in 2021

 

The toxic illicit drug supply claimed the lives of at least 2,224 British Columbians in 2021, according to preliminary data released by the BC Coroners Service.

 

“Over the past seven years, our province has experienced a devastating loss of life due to a toxic illicit drug supply,” said Lisa Lapointe, chief coroner. “This public health emergency has impacted families and communities across the province and shows no sign of abating. In 2021 alone, more than 2,200 families experienced the devastating loss of a loved one. In the past seven years, the rate of death due to illicit drug toxicity in our province has risen more than 400%. Drug toxicity is now second only to cancers in B.C. for potential years of life lost. We cannot simply hope that things will improve. It is long past time to end the chaos and devastation in our communities resulting from the flourishing illicit drug market, and to ensure, on an urgent basis, access across the province to a safe, reliable regulated drug supply.”

 

The last two months of 2021 saw the largest number of suspected illicit drug deaths ever recorded in the province, with 210 deaths in November and an additional 215 in December. The 2,224 total number of deaths is 26% more than the 1,767 illicit drug-related deaths investigated by the BC Coroners Service in 2020, and equates to an average of 6.1 lives lost every day.

 

The provincewide death rate in 2021 was 42.8 per 100,000 residents. Every health authority in B.C. experienced a record loss of lives.

 

Since the public health emergency into substance-related harms was first declared in April 2016, more than 8,800 British Columbians have been lost to toxic drugs.

 

Toxicological testing once again underscores the reality that the illicit drug supply continues to be unstable and increasingly toxic. Fentanyl was detected in 83% of samples tested in 2021. Carfentanil was present in 187 results, almost triple the number recorded in 2020 (66).

 

Additionally, 50% of samples in December tested positive for etizolam, more than three times the rate of detection in July 2020 (15%). Benzodiazepines create significant challenges for life-saving efforts as naloxone does not reverse its effects. As with previous reporting, almost all test results included the presence of multiple substances.

 

“We need decision-makers at all levels to recognize and respond to this public health emergency with the level of urgency it demands,” Lapointe said. “The reality is this: every day we wait to act, six more people will die. COVID-19 has shown what is possible when goverments act decisively to save lives. And in order to save lives in this public-heath emergency, we need to provide people with access to the substances they need, where and when they need them. Time has run out for research and discussion. It is time to take action.”

 

Additional key preliminary findings are below. Data is subject to change as additional toxicology results are received:

 

In 2021, 71% of those who died as a result of suspected drug toxicity were between 30 to 59, and 78% were male.

The townships that experienced the highest number of illicit drug toxicity deaths in 2021 were Vancouver, Surrey and Victoria.

By health authority, in 2021, the highest numbers of illicit drug toxicity deaths were in the Fraser and Vancouver Coastal health authorities (765 and 615 deaths, respectively), making up 62% of all such deaths during this period.

By health authority, in 2021, the highest rates of death were in Vancouver Coastal Health (49 deaths per 100,000 individuals) and Northern Health (48 per 100,000).

By Health Service Delivery Area, in 2021, the highest rates of death were in Vancouver, Thompson Cariboo, Northwest, Northern Interior and Fraser East.

By Local Health Area, in 2021, the highest rates of death were in Upper Skeena, Merritt, Enderby, Lillooet and North Thompson.

Quotes:

 

Dr. Nel Wieman, deputy chief medical officer, First Nations Health Authority –

 

“The number of deaths due to toxic drug poisonings for 2021 translates to devastating losses of First Nations people: daughters and sons, aunties and uncles, mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, and grandfathers and grandmothers. These are people who loved and were loved. In every year since this public health emergency was declared, B.C. First Nations people have been over-represented in toxic drug-poisoning events and deaths. We must change our understanding of the root causes of substance use and addiction, and work together to address the stigmas surrounding toxic drug use and the people who use drugs. We must continue to invest in Indigenous-specific, culturally safe harm-reduction, treatment and recovery services that are accessible, timely and free from discrimination and racism.”

 

Guy Felicella, peer clinical adviser, Vancouver Coastal Health –

 

“I join the thousands of British Columbians who are heartbroken, frustrated and angry over this unfathomable loss. Every one of these deaths was preventable and represents a failure to act, a failure to learn from mistakes. Change nothing and nothing changes. That’s been the story now for years as the approach throughout this crisis has been to meet policies where they’re at, rather than meeting people who use drugs where they’re at. This approach is killing and continues to kill people. Who has the courage to step forward and make this stop?”

 

AUGUST 2023

Today’s release of the report on drug toxicity deaths for the month of July 2023 by the BC Coroners Service is a stark reminder that the ongoing toxic-drug crisis continues to have a devastating impact on communities across our province. We hold in our hearts the memories of the 198 people lost in July in British Columbia.

 

The coroners service said the 1,455 deaths from January to July are the most ever reported in the first seven months of the year since a public health emergency over drug poisoning deaths in the province was declared in 2016.

 

It puts the province on pace to potentially exceed the 2,383 deaths recorded in 2022. A total of 12,739 people in the province have died from drug overdoses in the seven years.

 

30 NOVEMBER, 2023

At least 2,039 British Columbians have died from toxic drugs so far this year, according to preliminary figures released by the B.C. Coroners Service on Thursday, 29 November, 2023.

 

Of those, 189 people died in October, which is about 6.1 deaths a day. Most of the dead were between 30 and 59 years of age, and more than three-quarters were men, according to the coroner.

 

While the largest number of deaths reported so far has been in urban centres, such as Vancouver, Surrey and Victoria, the health authority with the highest rate of death in 2023 is Northern Health, with 61 deaths per 100,000 residents, according to the coroner.

 

As in previous months, fentanyl was found in most — 85 per cent — of the illicit drugs tested, often combined with other opioids or stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine.

 

Earlier this month, Interior Health issued a drug advisory warning for people who use drugs that some substances being advertised as hydromorphone on the black market contain isotonitazine, a drug the coroner says is as potent as fentanyl.

 

Unregulated drug toxicity is the leading cause of death in B.C. for people aged 10 to 59, accounting for more deaths than homicides, suicides, accidents and natural disease combined, the coroner said.

 

Since a public health emergency was declared in 2016, more than 13,000 people have died.

 

JANUARY 2024:

Jennifer Whiteside, Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, has released the following statement regarding the BC Coroners Service year-end report on illicit drug toxicity deaths:

 

“Today, as we reflect on the year behind us, our hearts are heavy with the loss of 2,511 people in British Columbia to toxic drugs. Each of these lives was precious and important, each with their own story, their own dreams and people who love them. They were part of our community, and their loss is felt deeply by us all.

 

So what is the game plane to stop it?

 

C. seeks to keep cash seized from Downtown Eastside gang

 

Courtesy Kim Bolan and the Vancouver Sun.

  

Kim Bolan is an experienced and award-winning journalist who has covered gangs in British Columbia for the past 40 years. Bolan also investigated the Air India bombing for 25 years until the publication in 2005 of her book, Loss of Faith.

  

The B.C. government has filed a lawsuit against a group of alleged Downtown Eastside drug traffickers, seeking the forfeiture of more than $150,000 seized from them.

 

The lawsuit, filed this week by the director of civil forfeiture, names four defendants that it alleges are part of a criminal organization investigated by the Vancouver Police Department.

  

While the group is not named in the statement of claim, details of the VPD probe outlined in the court document match an investigation into Zone 43 — a gang that originated in Montreal but has taken over the Downtown Eastside in recent years. Zone 43 has connections to B.C.’s notorious Wolfpack gang alliance.

 

In June, the VPD announced arrests of several Zone 43 gangsters, though they were released pending approval of charges.

 

The VPD said it had seized firearms, 24 kilos of drugs and $150,000 in cash during searches on May 14 in Vancouver and Burnaby.

 

The civil forfeiture lawsuit refers to three VPD searches done on the same date in the same cities and alleges Shayne Cozier-Flanagan, Evantee Jevontee Eustace Stoney, Tristin Johnson and Raimon Geday were “participating in the activities of a criminal organization.”

 

When police searched Stoney’s apartment on the 30th floor at 2388 Madison Ave. in Burnaby, they found $143,910.75 in Canadian currency and $607 in U.S. currency, the lawsuit said.

  

Officers seized another $5,800 at Cozier-Flanagan’s suite, also on the 30th floor, at 5665 Boundary Rd. in Vancouver, it said.

 

About $3,417 was seized from Johnson, who also lives in the Madison apartment, when he was arrested in the 300-block of East Hastings. Another $1,920 was found in Geday’s room in a supportive housing building on Kaslo Street, the lawsuit said.

 

The VPD also seized a 2017 Acura RDX, of which Stoney is the registered owner and which was used “to facilitate the trafficking of controlled substances,” the civil forfeiture director alleged.

 

The statement of claim notes that both Stoney and Geday have previous trafficking convictions and are banned from possessing firearms.

 

All four men named in the lawsuit “trafficked in controlled substances in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver and the surrounding areas,” the lawsuit alleges.

 

In the Boundary apartment, police also found a money counter and business cards with the number to call to purchase drugs — known as a ‘dialer’ number.

 

In the Madison suite, the VPD also found dilaudid pills, oxycodone pills and “score sheets” documenting drug sales, collection and debts.

 

In Geday’s room, police found crack cocaine, powdered cocaine, crystal methamphetamine and another 275 dilaudid pills, as well as score sheets, bear spray and “miscellaneous drug packaging materials.”

 

The cash and car should be forfeited to the government because they are proceeds of or were used for unlawful activity, the lawsuit alleged.

 

The crimes committed include possession for the purpose of trafficking and trafficking, committing offences for the benefit of a criminal organization, conspiracy, money laundering and failure to declare taxable income, it alleged

 

No statements of defence have yet been filed on behalf of the four men.

 

Vancouver Police Insp. Phil Heard said at the June news conference that Zone 43 gangsters “pose a very significant risk to the public. They’re involved in a well-documented conflict ongoing in the province of Quebec with a rival group.”

 

Sources say the gang is still selling drugs in the Downtown Eastside.

 

AUGUST 2025:

The law protects the rights of the most vulnerable among us to live in filth and despair

Pete McMartin: I'm tired of how homelessness and addiction take up so much oxygen in the social discourse.

 

Published Aug 03, 2025

 

In 2014, Vancouver Sun reporter Lori Culbert and I wrote a weeklong series of stories identifying the government social welfare programs — and their cost to taxpayers — in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

 

Over 100 programs existed just for housing. Thirty provided health care, 30 offered family services and a miscellany of another 100 services — including a food bank for pets — brought the total to 260 social welfare agencies operating solely within the eight square blocks of the DTES.

 

Those 260 programs served just 6,500 clients.

 

Five years earlier, in 2009, Province reporter David Carrigg also did a survey of the programs available in the DTES, and he identified 174 social welfare agencies offering services to about 5,000 clients.

 

In other words, in the five years between Carrigg’s survey and Culbert’s and mine, not only had the number of people needing help grown but so had the number of agencies serving them.

 

And the cost to taxpayers?

 

Over $360 million annually.

 

That astounding figure — almost a million dollars a day — did little to satisfy the DTES’s voracious appetite for tax dollars. More to the point, it did nothing to eradicate the misery and living conditions of the people who lived there.

 

Rather than winning the war on poverty — and what a quaint phrase that seems now — governments engineered a truce, with the unstated understanding that if they couldn’t solve the problem or spend their way out of it, they could contain it. Those 260 social service bureaucracies weren’t solutions to an intractable problem; they were barricades. They ghettoized their impoverished clientele by concentrating the services on which they depended.

 

And let’s be honest: The public was complicit in this, and content for it to continue as long as the misery stayed confined within the borders of the DTES.

 

And yet here we are. The squalor spreads. It corrodes a once-vibrant downtown core. It infiltrates the suburbs. Daily acts of random violence and vandalism have become normalized, while a cornucopia of drugs — some decriminalized, some tolerated, many deadly — act as accelerants.

 

In 2016, a year after our survey, provincial health officer Dr. Perry Kendall declared a public health emergency under the Public Health Act due to the alarming rise in opioid-related overdose deaths. Since then, over 16,000 people have died from those opioids. That’s not progress. It’s a plague.

 

Nothing, absolutely nothing, has worked. Over the decades, the problem has been studied to death — admittedly, a poor choice of words — with consultants and academics and the legions of poverty industry advocates offering up solutions that ultimately fail. They fail because they’re predicated on two simple criteria:

 

1. Give us more money.

 

2. Give us more of everything — housing, hospital beds, food banks, drugs, injection sites, counselling or — and this is always implicit — empathy, with a side order of collective guilt.

 

I’ve seen this in my own newspaper.

 

In one recent opinion piece, the author laments that it has been the public’s and governments’ norm “to daily bypass our downtrodden, our homeless, our addicted or mentally ill on the street as though they are either invisible or merely equivalent to lampposts” — to which I have to reply: ‘Are you f—ng kidding me?’

 

The public and its governments have done exactly the opposite and, short of bathing their feet with Christ-like piety, have directed billions of tax dollars not only to ease the suffering of the homeless, the addicted and the mentally ill, but also to make them completely dependent upon those dollars.

 

Another Sun story — this one again by Culbert — examined the merits of involuntary care through the experiences of three addicts who underwent the process, and while two saw it as beneficial and helped them get clean, the third condemned it as “dehumanizing” and a cause of her PTSD. Though she no longer does drugs, she said that if she relapses she would prefer to take her chances with street drugs that could possibly kill her rather than be readmitted to hospital against her will.

 

Well, OK, I thought, ‘You’re an adult. Good for you for having the honesty to express that choice, however idiotic I may find it.’

 

But what I thought was missing in her testimonial was (a) any appreciation of the monumentally expensive efforts governments and the public had tried to make on her behalf, however ill-informed she may have believed those attempts to be, and (b) her failure to recognize the destructive effects that a relapse would have not just on her own health and family, but, more importantly, also on the collective health of the public, who would be asked to offer up yet more money, and deal yet again with her relapse — providing she survives it.

 

Finally, in The Sun, there was another column, this one by Sam Sullivan, who wrote that, after 52 years, it was time to end the DTES “experiment” and the restrictive housing policies that he believes led to the homelessness and violence bedevilling it.

 

Funny thing about that.

 

Between 1993 and 2005, Sullivan was a Vancouver city councillor, and for three years after that, he was mayor. Yet despite the fact that his 15-year tenure at city hall placed him in the midst of that DTES experiment, if not close to its helm, it is only now, 20 years later, that he publicly declares the experiment to be a failure, and — as far as I could tell from reading his opinion piece — without taking any responsibility for it.

 

I will refrain here, in my own column, from claiming to speak for the public or with any inkling of what popular sentiment might be.

 

But this is how I feel:

 

My patience is Exhausted.

 

I’m tired of the endless, self-regenerating calls for more studies and more funding when all I see is a colossal waste of money and effort leading to no improvement. I’m tired of how homelessness and addiction take up so much oxygen in the social discourse. I’m tired of civil rights that supersede my own, and treat the right to defecate in the streets with greater regard than my right to be offended by it.

 

Finally, I’m tired of a social welfare system that not only encourages dependency, but refuses, out of moral timidity, to also admit its complicity in it, and which shies away from asking hard questions about personal responsibility and the consideration of measures more draconian than safe injection sites — measures like a return to complete drug criminalization, a higher threshold of minimum sentences for trafficking, the establishment of rehabilitation centres or work camps exclusively in wilderness areas far from the temptations of cities, the discontinuation of any efforts that facilitate drug use, and yes, the robust expansion of an involuntary care system.

 

It’s also my opinion that none of these measures, given the current legal climate, will become reality, at least for the foreseeable future. Under our Constitution and the Criminal Code, the law, in its majestic equality, protects the rights of the most vulnerable among us to live in filth and despair, and, as so often happens, bring about their own deaths.

 

How enlightened we have become! What progress we have made! We’ve reached that point when now sleeping under bridges, begging in the streets and stealing one’s daily bread are no longer evidence of a system’s failure.

 

They are the system.

Taken from Oxfordshire at 4:05am on 22nd March with a Canon 1100D with 300mm zoom lens

Composite of 2 images, one exposed to capture Jupiter and the other exposed to maintain lunar detail. Images merged in Photoshop CS2 using a layer mask then tweaked in Faststone Image Viewer

This wood sculpture was for sale at Sissinghurst's plant and gift shop.

 

The garden at Sissinghurst Castle in the Weald of Kent, in England at Sissinghurst village, is owned and maintained by the National Trust. It is among the most famous gardens in England and is grade I listed.

 

Sissinghurst's garden was created in the 1930s by Vita Sackville-West, poet and gardening writer, and her husband Harold Nicolson, author and diplomat. Sackville-West was a writer on the fringes of the Bloomsbury Group who found her greatest popularity in the weekly columns she contributed as gardening correspondent of The Observer, which incidentally—for she never touted it—made her own garden famous. The garden itself is designed as a series of 'rooms', each with a different character of colour and/or theme, the walls being high clipped hedges and many pink brick walls. The rooms and 'doors' are so arranged that, as one enjoys the beauty in a given room, one suddenly discovers a new vista into another part of the garden, making a walk a series of discoveries that keeps leading one into yet another area of the garden. Nicolson spent his efforts coming up with interesting new interconnections, while Sackville-West focused on making the flowers in the interior of each room exciting.

 

For Sackville-West, Sissinghurst and its garden rooms came to be a poignant and romantic substitute for Knole, reputedly the largest house in Britain, which as the only child of Lionel, the 3rd Lord Sackville she would have inherited had she been a male, but which had passed to her cousin as the male heir.

 

The site is ancient; "hurst" is the Saxon term for an enclosed wood. A manor house with a three-armed moat was built here in the Middle Ages. In 1305, King Edward I spent a night here. It was long thought that in 1490 Thomas Baker, a man from Cranbrook, purchased Sissinghurst, although there is no evidence for it. What is certain is that the house was given a new brick gatehouse in the 1530s by Sir John Baker, one of Henry VIII's Privy Councillors, and greatly enlarged in the 1560s by his son Sir Richard Baker, when it became the centre of a 700-acre (2.8 km2) deer park. In August 1573 Queen Elizabeth I spent three nights at Sissinghurst.

 

After the collapse of the Baker family in the late 17th century, the building had many uses: as a prisoner-of-war camp during the Seven Years' War; as the workhouse for the Cranbrook Union; after which it became homes for farm labourers.

 

Sackville-West and Nicolson found Sissinghurst in 1930 after concern that their property Long Barn, near Sevenoaks, Kent, was close to development over which they had no control. Although Sissinghurst was derelict, they purchased the ruins and the farm around it and began constructing the garden we know today. The layout by Nicolson and planting by Sackville-West were both strongly influenced by the gardens of Gertrude Jekyll and Edwin Lutyens; by the earlier Cothay Manor in Somerset, laid out by Nicolson's friend Reginald Cooper, and described by one garden writer as the "Sissinghurst of the West Country"; and by Hidcote Manor Garden, designed and owned by Lawrence Johnston, which Sackville-West helped to preserve. Sissinghurst was first opened to the public in 1938.

 

The National Trust took over the whole of Sissinghurst, its garden, farm and buildings, in 1967. The garden epitomises the English garden of the mid-20th century. It is now very popular and can be crowded in peak holiday periods. In 2009, BBC Four broadcast an eight-part television documentary series called Sissinghurst, describing the house and garden and the attempts by Adam Nicolson and his wife Sarah Raven, who are 'Resident Donors', to restore a form of traditional Wealden agriculture to the Castle Farm. Their plan is to use the land to grow ingredients for lunches in the Sissinghurst restaurant. A fuller version of the story can be found in Nicolson's book, Sissinghurst: An Unfinished History (2008).

 

For further information please visit en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sissinghurst_Castle_Garden and www.nationaltrust.org.uk/sissinghurst-castle-garden

 

The maintenance facility at the Glasgow Subway's depot at Broomloan in Govan. A complete unit is undergoing maintenance on there far left road, while a driving trailer is positioned on the near, right hand road. Copyright Photograph John Whitehouse - all rights reserved (courtesy of Strathclyde Partnership for Transport)

This is a found photo. I was attracted to it because of the unusual last name. G. Luther Sadgwar died in the 1920s leaving a widow and 2 children. This could be his widow or sister. I don't have a date on the photo. I love and hate these threads of history...

 

Update:

Another antebellum builder was David Sadgwar, the founder of a Wilmington dynasty. He and his son Frederick Sadgwar built a family home in 1872 at 15 N. Eighth St. Frederick Sadgwar, who graduated from Lincoln University, founded a Freedmen's School at Whiteville, then returned to Wilmington, where he operated a number of businesses and worked as a contractor.

 

Frederick Sadgwar's daughter Caroline attended Fisk University in Nashville, where she was a member of the celebrated Fisk Jubilee Singers. She married Alexander Manly, the editor-publisher of the Wilmington Record. His newspaper office, on South Seventh Street between Nun and Church, was burned during the Wilmington riot of 1898.

 

The Manlys were forced to flee the city, however Caroline's sister Felice remained in the city as a longtime teacher at Williston School. She and her father later converted to the Baha'i faith, which teaches universal brotherhood and the essential truth of all world religions. The Sadgwar house now serves as Wilmington's Baha'i Center.

 

Taken from www.uga.edu/bahai/2003/030213.html

  

Manly, Alexander L [Manley]

Manly was born near Raleigh in 1866. Family tradition held that his father was Governor Charles Manly. There is some confusion about Manly’s father and he may have been Governor’s Manly’s grandson or nephew instead. Manly’s legal father, Trim, was a slave on the Governor’s plantation. Family tradition also held that Alex’s mother Corrine was an enslaved maid in the household. Manly and his brothers were well educated and attended Hampton Institute. Alexander was listed in the 1880 census living in his father’s household in Selma. Family tradition has held that Manly resented his heritage and that hatred may have driven him to react so strongly to Felton.

Manly was the target of the Democratic campaign in 1898 and his printing office was destroyed by the mob led by Alfred Moore Waddell in 1898. Soon after the publication of his contentious article in August, 1898, the owner of the building, M. J. Heyer evicted the business. At the same time, a group of black men surrounded the press to protect it from impending destruction by a white group of men. Manly then retaliated by proposing that blacks boycott white businesses. On the night prior to the riot, a Red Shirt mob searched for him but was unsuccessful in finding him. Manly would have been lynched or shot by the mob on the 10th had he been found but, because he was informed of the threat to his life, Manly and his brother Frank escaped the city. Some accounts record that he left prior to the violence but others indicate he left on the day of the riot. Tradition holds that he was given the passcode and money to leave town by Thomas Clawson and that he and Frank were light-skinned enough to pass as white through thecheckpoints armed by white men. Other, contradicting, evidence indicates that he may have left the city much earlier. Another report indicated that he was notified of the approach of the mob by his youngest brother, Thomas, age 11. Thomas was reportedly as light-skinned as Alex and, because of this fact, he was able to learn about the impending danger to his brother from Red Shirts while they were marching toward the press. Recently, it was published in a history of St. James Church that Robert Strange personally escorted Manly out of the city in his carriage.

Manly relocated to Washington, DC by 1900 and rented a home at 1607 11th Street. Family tradition holds that he was first given asylum by Congressman George White. According to the 1900 census, Manly lived in Washington, DC with his brother Frank (born 1869), brother Henry (born 1879), boarder John P. Meyers (born in South Carolina in 1877), and boarder John Goins (born in South Carolina in 1869). Manly listed his occupation as a journalist. His brother Henry listed his occupation as commercial printer along with the Meyers and Goins. Manly had another younger brother, Thomas, who was approximately 11 at the time of the violence and who apparently lived in Wilmington also. Thomas later married Mabel Sadgwar, daughter of Frederick Sadgwar and sister to Caroline, Alex Manly’s fiancé in 1898. Mabel said that Thomas passed as white most of his life. Mabel and Thomas moved to Pennsylvania after their marriage and he worked as an electrical engineer. Mabel and Caroline were the daughters of prominent community leader and Wilmington native Frederick Sadgwar, Sr. (See Sadgwar’s entry for more information on that family)

Manly was involved in Wilmington civic life as an active member of Chestnut Street Presbyterian Church and was engaged to Caroline Sadgwar at the time of the violence. Caroline was educated at Gregory Normal School and attended Fisk University in Tenneesse. A talented singer, Caroline toured the world with the Fisk Jubilee Singers. Caroline was performing in England at the time of the violence and, as soon as she returned to the United States, she married Alex Manly while he lived in Washington, D.C. soon after the violence in the home of Congressman George White. They later moved to Philadelphia where they had one son, Milo and Alex worked as a painter.

While in Wilmington, Manly lived at 514 McRae Street with his brother Frank. Manly and Caroline were able to return to the city for visits with her family many years after the violence although he may have traveled under disguise. He definitely returned to the city in 1925 for Frederick Sadgwar’s funeral.

Manly and his son Milo maintained that property he owned in Wilmington was seized for non-payment of taxes. No confirmation of this activity has been found.

Manly became active in many activities after leaving Wilmington. He was a leader in the Afro-American Newspaper Council and most likely knew Timothy T. Fortune, prominent African American editor in New York. Manly also knew Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. DuBois. He helped to establish the Armstrong Association, a forebear of the Urban League.

Slideshow : www.flickr.com/photos/reurinkjan/sets/72157635937209655/show

 

Dzochen Rudam Orgyen Samten Choling Gonpa རྫོགས་ཆེན་དགོན་པ་

Dzogchen Monastery (Tib. rdzogs chen dgon pa) is one of the six great monasteries of the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism.

 

Concealed valley of Rudam Kyitram, dominated to the southwest by the jagged snow peaks of Mount Dorje Ziltrom 5816 m.

The monastery was founded in 1684-1685 on the advice of the Fifth Dalai Lama, by the charismatic the First Dzogchen Pema Rigdzin (1625-1697), and it was subsequently maintained by his students, including Zhechen Rabjam Tenpei Gyeltsen, and by his successive incarnations. Among the latter, the Second Dzogchen Gyurme Tekchok Tenzin (1699-1758) is known to have inspired the king of Derge to construct the famous Derge Parkhang, the Third Dzogchen Ngedon Tenzin Zangpo (1759-1792) built 13 hermitages, colleges and mantra-wheels, the Fourth Dzogchen Migyur Namkei Dorje (b 1793) presided over the monastery when its greatest college was founded, and the Fifth Dzogchen Tubten Chokyi Dorje (1872-1935) increased its branches to over 200 throughout Kham, Amdo and Central Tibet. The mother monastery itself had a population of 1000 monks. The Sixth Dzogchen Jigdrel Jangchub Dorje (1935-1959) died tragically during the resistance to the Chinese occupation of East Tibet, and his reliquary is even now revered in the main temple. The Seventh Dzogchen Rinpoche lives in Karnataka in South India, where he has constructed a branch of the monastery. Meanwhile, at the mother monastery in Kham, an alternative Dzogchen Rinpoche has recently been recognized.

www.footprinttravelguides.com/c/2848/tibet/&Action=pr...

Powis Castle is a medieval fortress and grand country house located near Welshpool, Wales, and is renowned for its magnificent interiors and spectacular Baroque gardens. Unlike most border castles built by Normans, Powis was originally constructed by a Welsh prince in the 13th century. Today, the castle and gardens are maintained by the National Trust.

 

Transformed over centuries from a military fortress into an opulent residence, the castle showcases a wealth of architectural and decorative styles.

 

Medieval origins: The structure has its roots in the 13th century, with the earliest stone keep likely built by Welsh prince Gruffydd ap Gwenwynwyn. The impressive twin drum towers framing the main entrance were added in the 14th century.

 

Rich interiors: The castle is famous for its exceptionally lavish interiors, which reflect the tastes of the Herbert family and later the Clive family over many generations.

 

Key rooms include:

The State Bedroom: A rare, surviving example of a 17th-century state bedroom, it features a balustrade that once separated the royal bed from the rest of the room to mimic the etiquette of Versailles.

 

The Long Gallery: An Elizabethan-era addition containing family portraits and busts of Roman emperors.

The Great Staircase: Adorned with 17th-century frescoes and carvings.

 

The Clive Museum

Within the castle is one of the most important collections of South Asian artifacts in the UK, acquired by Robert Clive and his son during their time with the East India Company in the 18th century.

 

Controversial collection: The museum, located in the former ballroom, displays over 1,000 items, including textiles, weapons, and ceremonial objects. The origins of the collection are complex and controversial, as many were acquired as spoils of war. The National Trust is conducting ongoing research into the collection's history and provenance.

 

Exhibits: Notable items include the jewel-encrusted finials from Tipu Sultan's throne and a magnificent state tent.

 

Gardens

The world-famous Baroque gardens cascade down the hillside in dramatic Italianate terraces, a layout that largely survived the 18th-century shift toward more naturalistic landscapes.

 

Terraces and topiary: A key feature is the Top Terrace, with its huge, ancient yew trees that have been clipped into fantastical, amorphous shapes over centuries. Below this are the Aviary and Orangery terraces, featuring statues and formal flowerbeds.

 

Seasonal displays: The gardens are known for their vibrant and varied plant life, offering stunning displays throughout the year, from spring blossoms to brilliant autumn foliage.

 

Wildlife: Resident peacocks roam freely through the grounds, adding to the picturesque scenery.

Went for a surreal image this week. Flipped upside down meaning you have to think where the light hits the "baloons" and flipped the bow to maintain the illusion.

BX55XNL seen pulling into the Bus Stop at North Bay. The seafront is very deserted due to how early in the day it was and COVID 19.

In the year 2525

If man is still alive

If woman can survive

They may find

In the year 3535

Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lies

Everything you think, do, or say

Is in the pill you took today

~Zager & Evans videolink 1969

 

Makeup and styling by Kelayla.

 

DSC00658

8 Aug 18

a beautifully maintained barn on the edge of Port Williams, Nova Scotia. Pass it every time we go to the vineyard and today I stopped to take a picture. Glad I did.

Best if viewed large. This fellow was trying to take over the nest but the residing couple managed to maintain ownership. It was quite a spectacle for a few moments.

Blessed be the trail maintainers.

 

Keeping the trails clear of deadfalls and debris is a never-ending job. Monroe County has a lot of parks with many miles of trails. The trail-maintenance crews do a fine job of keeping up with it.

 

Walking along Durand Lake at Durand Eastman Park, about a mile and a half from home. The camera and mini-tripod are sitting on top of what was once the continuation of the downed tree on the left on the other side of the trail.

 

Ondu 6x6 Pinhole Camera

Kodak Tri-X developed in D76

Epson Perfection V500 Photo scanner

 

#kodaktrix, #kodakfilm, #ondu6x6 #ondu_pinhole, #pinholecamera, #pinhole, #woodencamera,

#blackandwhite, #shootfilmstaypoor, #ishootfilm,

#durandeastmanpark,

Maintain the regurator.

The Pont Saint-Bénézet, also known as the Pont d'Avignon, is a famous medieval bridge in the town of Avignon, in southern France.

 

A wooden bridge spanning the Rhone between Villeneuve-les-Avignon and Avignon was built between 1177 and 1185. This early bridge was destroyed forty years later in 1226 during the Albigensian Crusade when Louis VIII of France laid siege to Avignon. Beginning in 1234 the bridge was rebuilt with 22 stone arches. The stone bridge was about 900 m (980 yd) in length and only 4.9 m (16 ft) in width, including the parapets at the sides. The bridge was abandoned in the mid-17th century as the arches tended to collapse each time the Rhone flooded making it very expensive to maintain. Four arches and the gatehouse at the Avignon end of the bridge have survived. The Chapel of Saint Nicholas which sits on the second pier of the bridge, was constructed in the second half of 12th century but has since been substantially altered. The western terminus, the Tour Philippe-le-Bel, is also preserved.

 

The bridge was the inspiration for the song Sur le pont d'Avignon and is considered a landmark of the city. In 1995, the surviving arches of the bridge, together with the Palais des Papes and Cathedrale Notre-Dame des Doms were classified as a World Heritage Site.

Blue Ridge Southern Railroad long hood end of EMD SD40M-2 locomotive # 4202 is seen in the maintainence & service area of the yard at Canton, North Carolina, 9-16-2016. It appears that on this stub end siding there is pit area situated under the locomotive to perform required work.

Walking alongside the River Witham as the snow comes down, in Lincoln, Lincolnshire.

 

The River Witham is a river almost entirely in the county of Lincolnshire in the east of England. It rises south of Grantham close to South Witham, passes Lincoln and at Boston, flows into The Haven, a tidal arm of The Wash, near RSPB Frampton Marsh. The name "Witham" seems to be extremely old and of unknown origin. Archaeological and documentary evidence shows the importance of the Witham as a navigation from the Iron Age onwards.

 

From Roman times it was navigable to Lincoln, from where the Fossdyke was constructed to link it to the River Trent. The mouth of the river moved in 1014 following severe flooding, and Boston became important as a port. From 1142 onwards, sluices were constructed to prevent flooding by the sea, and this culminated in the Great Sluice, which was constructed in 1766.

 

It maintained river levels above Boston and helped to scour the channel below it. The land through which the lower river runs has been the subject of much land drainage, and many drains are connected to the Witham by flood doors, which block them off if river levels rise rapidly.

 

The river is navigable from Brayford Pool in Lincoln to Boston, with Locks only in Lincoln, at Bardney and at the Grand Sluice. Passage through the Grand Sluice lock is restricted to short periods when the tidal levels are suitable. The river provides access for boaters to the Witham Navigable Drains, to the north of Boston, and to the South Forty-Foot Drain to the south, which was reopened as part of the Fens Waterways Link, a project to link the river to the River Nene near Peterborough. From Brayford Pool, the Fossdyke Navigation still links to the Trent.

 

Promos for Being As An Ocean

Canon 5D Mark II | 24-105mm

Strobist info:

1) AB800 shot through large softbox

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I always love working with these guys, and this time was no exception. They were troopers as we took about a mile walk down the windy beach to get to our location on the other side of the cliff wall, and maintained their composure while getting splashed by incoming waves. I've wanted to shoot a band at this location for a while and I couldn't be happier with the results.

 

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This ex-BFI Heil was acquired by Groot when Allied/BFI had to sell off some of their assets. Today, Groot has this unit and 3 other units just like it that are normally used on residential yard waste routes.

 

Until recently, Groot would usually pull their E-Z Pack Hercules residential front loaders onto commercial when necessary, but as of late these units have been taken. While these trucks are old, they have been well maintained and still work well for their age.

Widow wearing white saree is a tradition.

They used to have their heads shaved, and were disallowed from wearing any form of jewellery or beautification. It was initially supposed to be voluntary, like dowry, or sati, indicating that the woman had voluntarily given up on worldly pleasures to mourn her husband's death, but later began to be imposed by the family and relatives, to maintain the 'family's honour'.

Snoqualmie, Washington

 

Olympus Pen-F

Olympus 12-100mm

Black Swan Trail is maintained by the Bear Yuba Land Trust. The pond was formed in the 1850's when hydraulic or placer mining was used to wash the hillside away. It was a fast way to find gold and ruin the environment. The trail goes up over the bluffs and around the pond. Black Swan, Nevada Co, California on 5 October 2017.

1202 Willow Street

Point Loma, San Diego

 

When I moved to San Diego in 1974, this is the very first place I went to visit upon arriving in town. It was magical. The people I knew were friends of my parents from World War II that maintained a long distance friendship with Dr. Lawrence Owens, his wonderful mate, Beverly and the four first daughters I would meet on that fateful day when Nancy Owens Sterba took me...let me repeat took me to San Diego State University to see Lonesome Dan Hicks at the Backdoor. We really connected immediately and all those years later I only wished that these damn circumstances prevented us from visiting.

 

The was a large house that made you physically fit with lots of climbing on that hill. Dr. Owens was a good and popular local Physician. He was Regis Philbin's personal physician when Reege broadcast a local San Diego show in the 1960s.

 

This home was unlike any other home I had been in before. Their living room view had two panoramic windows overlooking downtown San Diego, one can be mesmerized by the the airport landings and departures and on clear nights, the twinkling of lights from Tijuana. It is a corner unit of land on a steep hill overlooking the Pt. Loma neighborhood with architecture to boot. Simply beautiful homes. Very romantic area.

 

This week, I was able to revisit and create that magnificent view from 1202 Willow Street, at Byron in Point Loma off of Rosecrans. It has been something I have wanted to do for many years.

 

Dr. Owens owned a classic Lincoln Continental that the good doctor took me for a ride driving well over 100 mph on Interstate 8 coming out of Ocean Beach towards Hotel Circle. It was exhilarating. His was a 1946, I have only photographed a 1948.

 

San Diego was beautiful, but we drove through too many neighborhoods in the beach area in crowded outdoor bars and restaurants that looked like mobile petri dishes. People have got to take this more seriously.

The treacly small car Klv 53 is a vehicle for rail construction works and maintainance works. It was procured by the German Federal Railroad from 1964 in a total of 840 copies what makes him the most-built vehicle.

On the CPR track in Salmon Arm

Successful people maintain a positive focus in life no matter what is going on around them. They stay focused on their past successes rather than their past failures, and on the next action steps they need to take to get them closer to the fulfillment of their goals rather than all the other distractions that life presents to them.

- Jack Canfield

When I knocked thr doors of BirdMan Sekar Camerahouse I was greeted with the screaming of a caged Alexandrine parakeet kept in the veranda. The guy was emaphtic and energetically trying to widen the gaps between the tthin metal bars of the cage with its poweful beak.

After a glance on me staring at the action of the parakeet Birdman called me in and told the story behind.

According to Mr.Sekar this Female Alexandrine parakeet, in the picture, was left with him by some one as he was leaving for US. He initially requested Mr.Sekar to maintain it for six months. Birdman responded it with a condition that the bird would be allowed to join the flock of daily visiting wild parakeets once its cut wings fully grown. So many persons handed over their pet ones for various reasons and he claimed to have made them fly free after some care and practice.

He was happy to say that many Media including BBC recently visited and shot the story of it.

"The Alleged Farm is located in the Town of Easton, in the rolling hills of southern Washington County, New York. We farm on fields under continuous cultivation since 1788 and take our stewardship of the land seriously. For us, that means a commitment to sustainable practices such as crop rotation, controlled grazing, minimal tillage and the use of cover crops and compost in order to promote and maintain the health of the earth"

 

~Thomas Christenfeld, The Alleged Farmer

 

I had the privilege of photographing this beautiful farm today. I couldn't ask for a better way to spend some time on a sunny, early-spring day.

you know how it works. I first thought it might be ATT but after many go rounds with them they maintain they are not the source of the snooping. Then I read a little blurb from flicker about them hiring an ex-cop from one of the police forces locally from some where out in California. She is going to lead the flickr equivalent to online censors. ( monitor content of web sites belonging to members ) It might be the Flickr police who have their nose up my backside looking at what I post and what other people send to me. Even though Flickr has guide lines posted about what they will allow on sites with different safety ratings . ( and if I read it correctly a site that is considered safe can have some nudity on it as long as it is within the guidelines set down by Flickr. Which would mean no adult content on a safe site. ) Artsy stuff would pass and so would some partial nudity as long as it is kept tasteful. I have some folks who do send stuff of and adult nature and it does not bother me. I just won't let it out where the public can see it. ( It is not going to my faves page period ) I have been in 29 countries around the world. Different things fly in different countries. I received one heck of a dose of culture shock but learned to deal with it. ( if you have been to Copenhagen, and some other cities in Scandinavia you know what I mean ) Things are very open there ! Toplessness in Europe is so common place hardly anyone one pays attention to it there. However I live in the United States. One of the most prudish countries on the planet. ( we have some loopy people here ). Sometimes I think laws here way overreach what was intended ( different ways different people who are not of the judiciary interpret Them ) and it can cause some problems. Then you have groups who are on a crusade to abolish everything that displeases them. ( know a few like that and they are a pain in every ones back side ) Then you have political groups that have an agenda they push and depending on where you are at ( some states are a little more liberal than others ) can range from gun control to getting rid of government altogether because they think they have a better idea. After reading the flickr blurb about hiring an ex-cop red flags went off. Ex-cop, female, possibly gay ( most of the ones I have come in contact with were and they were assholes ) and probably with a firmly established cop mentality In charge of monitoring content on Flickr...… Going to be an interesting trip to say the least.

Once we turned around and went around the swamp we happened upon this lovely maintained trail complete with these arbors to support the growth over the path.

Don’t eat meat, eat bugs! Larva fat to replace butter…woohoo! Humans can’t digest Chitin…but hey, if you love cancer, chow down. Let’s put mRNA vaccines in lettuce—for the soft cull. Death rates rising! Cancer rates rising! The New York Times: “A Taste for Cannibalism?” “Soylent Green is people!” Eat green, eat healthy! But don’t drink the water, unless it’s recycled sewage! Don’t breath, unless you pay a carbon tax. Save the planet, get rid of oil and gas! Say no to cars, stay home. Net-zero emissions for you! Woohoo, let’s become a third world dump, let’s become utterly impoverished. Let’s embrace this dystopian nightmare. War, Famine, and plague—BABY! The Georgia Guidestones, the American Stonehenge of paganism: “Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.” That sounds like an excellent idea! Will you choose euthanasia to save the planet? It’s for the greater good! Sorry: I’m an individualist, not a collectivist. The devil’s gospel is depopulation. But God said, “Be fruitful and multiply.” Remember: you can’t save your soul, how much less the planet. They worship the earth as an idol! But I worship the creator, not the created.

 

The Hegelian Dialectic is a satanic apparatus. Order out of chaos is a satanic principle. Satanic theology: the Hegelian Dialectic—Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis. The New World Order Hegelian Dialectic: Problem, Reaction, Solution—order out of chaos. Climate change, climate change! WEATHER AND CLIMATE MODIFICATION—Report of the SPECIAL COMMISSION ON WEATHER MODIFICATION—NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION. A global technocratic superstate—let’s microchip the people…it’s what’s best for the planet! Take the devils bait, and you’ll become a devil worshipping transhuman. Then, just as Adam and Eve were thrown out of the Garden of Eden, you too will be thrown out of the paradise of Heaven. Indeed, the Hegelian Dialectic rolls on. It will roll on towards global authoritarianism, and an Antichrist—666 the globalist utopia realized. Will they obtain Godhood in their utopia? Nope! They will never be omnipotent, omniscient, or omnipresent—they will try to accomplish this with their technology, but they will fail miserably. L-O-S-E-R-S! Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis, and the false trinity: Dragon, Beast, and False Prophet—a satanic cult. Become a new socialist man, a new creation of the Beast—a transhuman who has taken another bite of the apple. When you do this, you’ll become more enlightened, and your eyes will be opened. Why are you trying to replicate man’s original sin? It’s because you too are rebelling against God! However, eating the apple means that you will surely die, how much more when you attempt to steal another bite. “The smoke of their torment will rise forever and ever, and they will have no relief day or night, for they have worshiped the Beast and his Image and have accepted the Mark of his name.” Indeed, with judgment comes heat!

 

A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up. And something like a great burning mountain and a great blazing star fell into the waters. A third of the sun, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars were darkened. A third of the day had no light, and likewise a third of the night. Then the shaft of the bottomless pit was opened, and billows of smoke arose. Out of the dense haze came demonic locusts. They had tails and stingers like scorpions. They covered the land, they swarmed the sky! Both land and sky were black with locusts. There was no place to escape. They were everywhere! They were in every house, in every room. They were in the food, they were in the water. They aggressively stung without mercy! The pain of their sting was like that of a scorpion. The land was burned by fire—now it’s your turn to burn with pain. You will be stung both day and night. You will seek death, but you will not find it. You will long to die, but death will elude you. If bugs are what you want, then bugs are what you’ll get. However, I’d advise you not to consume such bugs. Bon Appétit! And if climate change is what you want, then climate change is what you’ll get. Enjoy the heat! “The sun was allowed to scorch people with fire. They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God.” Enjoy your judgment of fire: “A third of mankind was killed by the three plagues of fire, smoke and sulfur that came out of their mouths.” And just think: this is only the tip of the iceberg! It sucks to be you! Enjoy your dystopian bliss!

 

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We no longer maintain a separate Friends and Family status or have pictures tagged as Friends, Family, or Friends and Family. All photos we are willing to post will be tagged as Public and available to everyone. Any photos that have been tagged previously as F&F will either be tagged as Public or moved to our Private page. Too many requests were coming in from individuals who did not read our profile and I simply do not want to maintain separate tags on our photos any longer.

 

We do not care how many favorites you select from our photo stream, but a couple of comments along the way would be nice.

 

We appreciate comments and playful banter among our fans, we thank you for that! However, be warned, we will not tolerate disrespectful, lewd, crude and/or excessively vulgar comments! Any comments made that fit into this category will be ignored and will result in you being banned. We do not have time for those who wish to converse in this manner.

 

If you do not like our content, poses, facial expressions, or the photo stream in general, simply move along and do not spread your negativity here! Constructive criticism is always welcome, but there is a line that can be crossed. We are simple amateurs, neither one a professional, and we are not getting paid to do this. Those who feel the need to spew negativity will simply be banned, removing any insolent comments you insist on sharing.

 

Please feel free to invite our stuff to your groups. If you do, please ensure we are invited to any "private" groups before we will add our photos.

 

Thanks to everyone who encourages and supports our photo stream.

  

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maintaining the tension on the lines - Gebersheim substation

I used a clear glass ball and placed in clear focus to capture the subject in the background, maintaining the Bokeh technique and silhouette

July 24th-25th

•

In 1848, the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein rebelled against the Danish government, starting a little known but incredibly important conflict in present-day northern Germany. The First Schleswig war saw Schleswig Holstein, alongside Prussia and numerous other German states, battle with Denmark for over four years. Each side would suffer almost 9,000 casualties each. The Danes emerged victorious and retained control of the duchy of Schleswig and the German state of Holstein, solidifying the territories as part of the Danish federation. Twelve years later, however, a second war would ignite over the same territories. This time around, Prussia and the German Confederation would gain control of the duchies in a lopsided victory over Denmark.

•

Isted, or Idstedt in German, is a town in Flensburg, Schleswig-Holstein. Denmark and Schleswig-Holstein wanted to end the ongoing war with one decisive battle. At Isted, the two armies clashed over a terrain littered with defensive works, hamlets, and streams. Though outnumbered by over 10,000 troops, Schleswig-Holstein maintained a line of defenses that protected much of the town. Denmark's forces, bolstered by an unknown number of Swedish-Norwegian volunteers, fought through rain, humidity, and difficult terrain to defeat their dug-in foe, killing, wounding, or capturing over 2,800 troops to their over 3,600 casualties. The decisive battle both sides had wanted came and went, though neither gained a particularly significant advantage over the other and the war continued for two more years. This scene depicts the Danish main army at the Helligbæk stream, a chokepoint where the fighting of the first day was at its hottest. The redoubts and artillery pits of the German forces take their toll on the advancing Danes, especially the royal guard at the forefront. Cavalry from both sides enter the fray, hoping to tip the scales.

•

This collaboration with 8 builders earned the Best Battle Scene award at BrickFair VA 2024 and is our largest collaborative project to date at 3x8 gray baseplates!

 

More on Instagram @carson_brix_1 and @natelego_

Today, 231s are valuable collectors' items, often being maintained using the same tools that came with the car when it first rolled out of the factory. Many ingenious construction techniques were employed by the designers to make the car durable, yet simple to repair. Replacement parts are easy to come by as the car is built from very standard parts, aside from a a handful of specialized suspension pieces for the rear axle fabricated by Kastner in limited amounts. Many of these parts have modern-day duplicates, making the 231 a very easy car to refurbish and maintain.

 

©2015 Christopher Elliott, All Rights Reserved

 

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Everyone knows about the iceberg lake of Iceland. But how many of you knew that there is an iceberg lake also in Switzerland. Yes even in summer you can see icebergs floating on that lake. It is not that secret anymore as it was 10 years back. It had became popular recently. However, due to the difficult ascent it is still not as crowded as many other hiking trails of Switzerland.

 

After planning for some time, I had an opportunity to explore it myself. And wow, what an experience. I always missed the thrill of Himalayan hikes of my childhood while hiking in Switzerland. Here things are always extremely carefully planned through and maintained. That is a great thing to have, but that reduces that adventure that I used have 30 years back in Himalaya when the infrastructure was poor and trails almost didn't exist.

 

But this time, I must admit; I had the same feeling and that was exciting.

 

Here is a little piece I have complied to share my experience of spending one night near the iceberg lake.

The fill version documenting the trail, story and all details is coming soon.

 

Till then, I hope I will be able to give you a little flavour of how it was.

 

You can find better 4K resolution of the same video on youtube.

youtu.be/6WWa8NSHueU

Photo Copyright 2012, dynamo.photography.

All rights reserved, no use without license

 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(Redirected from Hong kong)

 

Hong Kong, officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, is an autonomous territory south to Mainland China and east to Macao in East Asia. With around 7.2 million Hong Kongers of various nationalities[note 2] in a territory of 1,104 km2, Hong Kong is the world's fourth most densely populated country or territory.

 

Hong Kong used to be a British colony with the perpetual cession of Hong Kong Island from the Qing Empire after the First Opium War (1839–42). The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 and acquired a 99-year lease of the New Territories from 1898. Hong Kong was later occupied by Japan during the Second World War until British control resumed in 1945. The Sino-British Joint Declaration signed between the United Kingdom and China in 1984 paved way for the transfer of sovereignty of Hong Kong in 1997, when it became a special administrative region (SAR) of the People's Republic of China with a high degree of autonomy.[15]

 

Under the principle of "one country, two systems",[16][17] Hong Kong maintains a separate political and economic system from China. Except in military defence and foreign affairs, Hong Kong maintains its independent executive, legislative and judiciary powers.[18] In addition, Hong Kong develops relations directly with foreign states and international organisations in a broad range of "appropriate fields".[19] Hong Kong involves in international organizations, such as the WTO[20] and the APEC [21], actively and independently.

 

Hong Kong is one of the world's most significant financial centres, with the highest Financial Development Index score and consistently ranks as the world's most competitive and freest economic entity.[22][23] As the world's 8th largest trading entity,[24] its legal tender, the Hong Kong dollar, is the world's 13th most traded currency.[25] As the world's most visited city,[26][27] Hong Kong's tertiary sector dominated economy is characterised by competitive simple taxation and supported by its independent judiciary system.[28] Even with one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, it suffers from severe income inequality.[29]

 

Nicknamed "Pearl of the Orient", Hong Kong is renowned for its deep natural harbour, which boasts the world's fifth busiest port with ready access by cargo ships, and its impressive skyline, with the most skyscrapers in the world.[30][31] It has a very high Human Development Index ranking and the world's longest life expectancy.[32][33] Over 90% of the population makes use of well-developed public transportation.[34][35] Seasonal air pollution with origins from neighbouring industrial areas of Mainland China, which adopts loose emissions standards, has resulted in a high level of atmospheric particulates in winter.[36][37][38]

Contents

 

1 Etymology

2 History

2.1 Prehistory

2.2 Imperial China

2.3 British Crown Colony: 1842–1941

2.4 Japanese occupation: 1941–45

2.5 Resumption of British rule and industrialisation: 1945–97

2.6 Handover and Special Administrative Region status

3 Governance

3.1 Structure of government

3.2 Electoral and political reforms

3.3 Legal system and judiciary

3.4 Foreign relations

3.5 Human rights

3.6 Regions and districts

3.7 Military

4 Geography and climate

5 Economy

5.1 Financial centre

5.2 International trading

5.3 Tourism and expatriation

5.4 Policy

5.5 Infrastructure

6 Demographics

6.1 Languages

6.2 Religion

6.3 Personal income

6.4 Education

6.5 Health

7 Culture

7.1 Sports

7.2 Architecture

7.3 Cityscape

7.4 Symbols

8 See also

9 Notes

10 References

10.1 Citations

10.2 Sources

11 Further reading

12 External links

 

Etymology

 

Hong Kong was officially recorded in the 1842 Treaty of Nanking to encompass the entirety of the island.[39]

 

The source of the romanised name "Hong Kong" is not known, but it is generally believed to be an early imprecise phonetic rendering of the pronunciation in spoken Cantonese 香港 (Cantonese Yale: Hēung Góng), which means "Fragrant Harbour" or "Incense Harbour".[13][14][40] Before 1842, the name referred to a small inlet—now Aberdeen Harbour (Chinese: 香港仔; Cantonese Yale: Hēunggóng jái), literally means "Little Hong Kong"—between Aberdeen Island and the southern coast of Hong Kong Island. Aberdeen was an initial point of contact between British sailors and local fishermen.[41]

 

Another theory is that the name would have been taken from Hong Kong's early inhabitants, the Tankas (水上人); it is equally probable that romanisation was done with a faithful execution of their speeches, i.e. hōng, not hēung in Cantonese.[42] Detailed and accurate romanisation systems for Cantonese were available and in use at the time.[43]

 

Fragrance may refer to the sweet taste of the harbour's fresh water estuarine influx of the Pearl River or to the incense from factories lining the coast of northern Kowloon. The incense was stored near Aberdeen Harbour for export before Hong Kong developed Victoria Harbour.[40]

 

The name had often been written as the single word Hongkong until the government adopted the current form in 1926.[44] Nevertheless, a number of century-old institutions still retain the single-word form, such as the Hongkong Post, Hongkong Electric and the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.

 

As of 1997, its official name is the "Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China". This is the official title as mentioned in the Hong Kong Basic Law and the Hong Kong Government's website;[45] however, "Hong Kong Special Administrative Region" and "Hong Kong" are widely accepted.

 

Hong Kong has carried many nicknames. The most famous among those is the "Pearl of the Orient", which reflected the impressive nightscape of the city's light decorations on the skyscrapers along both sides of the Victoria Harbour. The territory is also known as "Asia's World City".

History

Main articles: History of Hong Kong and History of China

Prehistory

Main article: Prehistoric Hong Kong

 

Archaeological studies support human presence in the Chek Lap Kok area (now Hong Kong International Airport) from 35,000 to 39,000 years ago and on Sai Kung Peninsula from 6,000 years ago.[46][47][48]

 

Wong Tei Tung and Three Fathoms Cove are the earliest sites of human habitation in Hong Kong during the Paleolithic Period. It is believed that the Three Fathom Cove was a river-valley settlement and Wong Tei Tung was a lithic manufacturing site. Excavated Neolithic artefacts suggested cultural differences from the Longshan culture of northern China and settlement by the Che people, prior to the migration of the Baiyue to Hong Kong.[49][50] Eight petroglyphs, which dated to the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600 BC – 1066 BC) in China, were discovered on the surrounding islands.[51]

Imperial China

Main article: History of Hong Kong under Imperial China

 

In 214 BC, Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of a centralised China, conquered the Baiyue tribes in Jiaozhi (modern-day Liangguang region and Vietnam) and incorporated the area of Hong Kong into his imperial China for the first time. Hong Kong proper was assigned to the Nanhai commandery (modern-day Nanhai District), near the commandery's capital city Panyu.[52][53][54]

 

After a brief period of centralisation and collapse of the Qin dynasty, the area of Hong Kong was consolidated under the Kingdom of Nanyue, founded by general Zhao Tuo in 204 BC.[55] When Nanyue lost the Han-Nanyue War in 111 BC, Hong Kong came under the Jiaozhi commandery of the Han dynasty. Archaeological evidence indicates an increase of population and flourish of salt production. The Lei Cheng Uk Han Tomb on the Kowloon Peninsula is believed to have been built as a burial site during the Han dynasty.[56]

 

From the Han dynasty to the early Tang dynasty, Hong Kong was a part of Bao'an County. In the Tang dynasty, modern-day Guangzhou (Canton) flourished as an international trading centre. In 736, the Emperor Xuanzong of Tang established a military stronghold in Tuen Mun to strengthen defence of the coastal area.[57] The nearby Lantau Island was a salt production centre and salt smuggler riots occasionally broke out against the government. In c. 1075, The first village school, Li Ying College, was established around 1075 AD in modern-day New Territories by the Northern Song dynasty.[58] During their war against the Mongols, the imperial court of Southern Song was briefly stationed at modern-day Kowloon City (the Sung Wong Toi site) before their ultimate defeat by the Mongols at the Battle of Yamen in 1279.[59] The Mongols then established their dynastic court and governed Hong Kong for 97 years.

 

From the mid-Tang dynasty to the early Ming dynasty (1368–1644), Hong Kong was a part of Dongguan County. During the Ming dynasty, the area was transferred to Xin'an County. The indigenous inhabitants at that time consisted of several ethnicities such as Punti, Hakka, Tanka and Hoklo.

European discovery

 

The earliest European visitor on record was Jorge Álvares, a Portuguese explorer, who arrived in 1513.[60][61] Having established a trading post in a site they called "Tamão" in Hong Kong waters, Portuguese merchants commenced with regular trading in southern China. Subsequent military clashes between China and Portugal, however, led to the expulsion of all Portuguese merchants from southern China.

 

Since the 14th century, the Ming court had enforced the maritime prohibition laws that strictly forbade all private maritime activities in order to prevent contact with foreigners by sea.[62] When the Manchu Qing dynasty took over China, Hong Kong was directly affected by the Great Clearance decree of the Kangxi Emperor, who ordered the evacuation of coastal areas of Guangdong from 1661 to 1669. Over 16,000 inhabitants of Xin'an County including those in Hong Kong were forced to migrate inland; only 1,648 of those who had evacuated subsequently returned.[63][64]

British Crown Colony: 1842–1941

A painter at work. John Thomson. Hong Kong, 1871. The Wellcome Collection, London

Main articles: British Hong Kong and History of Hong Kong (1800s–1930s)

 

In 1839, threats by the imperial court of Qing to sanction opium imports caused diplomatic friction with the British Empire. Tensions escalated into the First Opium War. The Qing admitted defeat when British forces captured Hong Kong Island on 20 January 1841. The island was initially ceded under the Convention of Chuenpi as part of a ceasefire agreement between Captain Charles Elliot and Governor Qishan. A dispute between high-ranking officials of both countries, however, led to the failure of the treaty's ratification. On 29 August 1842, Hong Kong Island was formally ceded in perpetuity to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland under the Treaty of Nanking.[65] The British officially established a Crown colony and founded the City of Victoria in the following year.[66]

 

The population of Hong Kong Island was 7,450 when the Union Flag raised over Possession Point on 26 January 1841. It mostly consisted of Tanka fishermen and Hakka charcoal burners, whose settlements scattered along several coastal hamlets. In the 1850s, a large number of Chinese immigrants crossed the then-free border to escape from the Taiping Rebellion. Other natural disasters, such as flooding, typhoons and famine in mainland China would play a role in establishing Hong Kong as a place for safe shelter.[67][68]

 

Further conflicts over the opium trade between Britain and Qing quickly escalated into the Second Opium War. Following the Anglo-French victory, the Crown Colony was expanded to include Kowloon Peninsula (south of Boundary Street) and Stonecutter's Island, both of which were ceded to the British in perpetuity under the Convention of Beijing in 1860.

 

In 1898, Britain obtained a 99-year lease from Qing under the Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory, in which Hong Kong obtained a 99-year lease of Lantau Island, the area north of Boundary Street in Kowloon up to Shenzhen River and over 200 other outlying islands.[69][70][71]

 

Hong Kong soon became a major entrepôt thanks to its free port status, attracting new immigrants to settle from both China and Europe. The society, however, remained racially segregated and polarised under early British colonial policies. Despite the rise of a British-educated Chinese upper-class by the late-19th century, race laws such as the Peak Reservation Ordinance prevented ethnic Chinese in Hong Kong from acquiring houses in reserved areas such as Victoria Peak. At this time, the majority of the Chinese population in Hong Kong had no political representation in the British colonial government. The British governors did rely, however, on a small number of Chinese elites, including Sir Kai Ho and Robert Hotung, who served as ambassadors and mediators between the government and local population.

File:1937 Hong Kong VP8.webmPlay media

Hong Kong filmed in 1937

 

In 1904, the United Kingdom established the world's first border and immigration control; all residents of Hong Kong were given citizenship as Citizens of United Kingdom and Colonies (CUKC).

 

Hong Kong continued to experience modest growth during the first half of the 20th century. The University of Hong Kong was established in 1911 as the territory's first higher education institute. While there had been an exodus of 60,000 residents for fear of a German attack on the British colony during the First World War, Hong Kong remained unscathed. Its population increased from 530,000 in 1916 to 725,000 in 1925 and reached 1.6 million by 1941.[72]

 

In 1925, Cecil Clementi became the 17th Governor of Hong Kong. Fluent in Cantonese and without a need for translator, Clementi introduced the first ethnic Chinese, Shouson Chow, into the Executive Council as an unofficial member. Under Clementi's tenure, Kai Tak Airport entered operation as RAF Kai Tak and several aviation clubs. In 1937, the Second Sino-Japanese War broke out when the Japanese Empire expanded its territories from northeastern China into the mainland proper. To safeguard Hong Kong as a freeport, Governor Geoffry Northcote declared the Crown Colony as a neutral zone.

Japanese occupation: 1941–45

Main article: Japanese occupation of Hong Kong

The Cenotaph in Hong Kong commemorates those who died in service in the First World War and the Second World War.[73]

 

As part of its military campaign in Southeast Asia during Second World War, the Japanese army moved south from Guangzhou of mainland China and attacked Hong Kong in on 8 December 1941.[74] Crossing the border at Shenzhen River on 8 December, the Battle of Hong Kong lasted for 18 days when British and Canadian forces held onto Hong Kong Island. Unable to defend against intensifying Japanese air and land bombardments, they eventually surrendered control of Hong Kong on 25 December 1941. The Governor of Hong Kong was captured and taken as a prisoner of war. This day is regarded by the locals as "Black Christmas".[75]

 

During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, the Japanese army committed atrocities against civilians and POWs, such as the St. Stephen's College massacre. Local residents also suffered widespread food shortages, limited rationing and hyper-inflation arising from the forced exchange of currency from Hong Kong dollars to Japanese military banknotes. The initial ratio of 2:1 was gradually devalued to 4:1 and ownership of Hong Kong dollars was declared illegal and punishable by harsh torture. Due to starvation and forced deportation for slave labour to mainland China, the population of Hong Kong had dwindled from 1.6 million in 1941 to 600,000 in 1945, when the United Kingdom resumed control of the colony on 2 September 1945.[76]

Resumption of British rule and industrialisation: 1945–97

Main articles: British Hong Kong, 1950s in Hong Kong, 1960s in Hong Kong, 1970s in Hong Kong, 1980s in Hong Kong, and 1990s in Hong Kong

Flag of British Hong Kong from 1959 to 1997

 

Hong Kong's population recovered quickly after the war, as a wave of skilled migrants from the Republic of China moved in to seek refuge from the Chinese Civil War. When the Communist Party eventually took full control of mainland China in 1949, even more skilled migrants fled across the open border for fear of persecution.[69] Many newcomers, especially those who had been based in the major port cities of Shanghai and Guangzhou, established corporations and small- to medium-sized businesses and shifted their base operations to British Hong Kong.[69] The establishment of a socialist state in China (People's Republic of China) on 1 October 1949 caused the British colonial government to reconsider Hong Kong's open border to mainland China. In 1951, a boundary zone was demarked as a buffer zone against potential military attacks from communist China. Border posts along the north of Hong Kong began operation in 1953 to regulate the movement of people and goods into and out of the territory.

Stamp with portrait of Queen Elizabeth II, 1953

 

In the 1950s, Hong Kong became the first of the Four Asian Tiger economies under rapid industrialisation driven by textile exports, manufacturing industries and re-exports of goods to China. As the population grew, with labour costs remaining low, living standards began to rise steadily.[77] The construction of the Shek Kip Mei Estate in 1953 marked the beginning of the public housing estate programme to provide shelter for the less privileged and to cope with the influx of immigrants.

 

Under Sir Murray MacLehose, 25th Governor of Hong Kong (1971–82), a series of reforms improved the public services, environment, housing, welfare, education and infrastructure of Hong Kong. MacLehose was British Hong Kong's longest-serving governor and, by the end of his tenure, had become one of the most popular and well-known figures in the Crown Colony. MacLehose laid the foundation for Hong Kong to establish itself as a key global city in the 1980s and early 1990s.

A sky view of Hong Kong Island

An aerial view of the northern shore of Hong Kong Island in 1986

 

To resolve traffic congestion and to provide a more reliable means of crossing the Victoria Harbour, a rapid transit railway system (metro), the MTR, was planned from the 1970s onwards. The Island Line (Hong Kong Island), Kwun Tong Line (Kowloon Peninsula and East Kowloon) and Tsuen Wan Line (Kowloon and urban New Territories) opened in the early 1980s.[78]

 

In 1983, the Hong Kong dollar left its 16:1 peg with the Pound sterling and switched to the current US-HK Dollar peg. Hong Kong's competitiveness in manufacturing gradually declined due to rising labour and property costs, as well as new development in southern China under the Open Door Policy introduced in 1978 which opened up China to foreign business. Nevertheless, towards the early 1990s, Hong Kong had established itself as a global financial centre along with London and New York City, a regional hub for logistics and freight, one of the fastest-growing economies in Asia and the world's exemplar of Laissez-faire market policy.[79]

The Hong Kong question

 

In 1971, the Republic of China (Taiwan)'s permanent seat on the United Nations was transferred to the People's Republic of China (PRC), Hong Kong's status as a recognised colony became terminated in 1972 under the request of PRC. Facing the uncertain future of Hong Kong and expiry of land lease of New Territories beyond 1997, Governor MacLehose raised the question in the late 1970s.

 

The British Nationality Act 1981 reclassified Hong Kong into a British Dependent Territory amid the reorganisation of global territories of the British Empire. All residents of Hong Kong became British Dependent Territory Citizens (BDTC). Diplomatic negotiations began with China and eventually concluded with the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration. Both countries agreed to transfer Hong Kong's sovereignty to China on 1 July 1997, when Hong Kong would remain autonomous as a special administrative region and be able to retain its free-market economy, British common law through the Hong Kong Basic Law, independent representation in international organisations (e.g. WTO and WHO), treaty arrangements and policy-making except foreign diplomacy and military defence.

 

It stipulated that Hong Kong would retain its laws and be guaranteed a high degree of autonomy for at least 50 years after the transfer. The Hong Kong Basic Law, based on English law, would serve as the constitutional document after the transfer. It was ratified in 1990.[69] The expiry of the 1898 lease on the New Territories in 1997 created problems for business contracts, property leases and confidence among foreign investors.

Handover and Special Administrative Region status

Main articles: Transfer of sovereignty over Hong Kong and 2000s in Hong Kong

Transfer of sovereignty

Golden Bauhinia Square

 

On 1 July 1997, the transfer of sovereignty over Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to the People's Republic of China took place, officially marking the end of Hong Kong's 156 years under British colonial governance. As the largest remaining colony of the United Kingdom, the loss of Hong Kong effectively represented the end of the British Empire. This transfer of sovereignty made Hong Kong the first special administrative region of China. Tung Chee-Hwa, a pro-Beijing business tycoon, was elected Hong Kong's first Chief Executive by a selected electorate of 800 in a televised programme.

 

Structure of government

 

Hong Kong's current structure of governance inherits from the British model of colonial administration set up in the 1850s. The 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration states that "Hong Kong should enjoy a high degree of autonomy in all areas except defence and foreign affairs" with reference to the underlying principle of one country, two systems.[note 3] This Declaration stipulates that Hong Kong maintains her capitalist economic system and guarantees the rights and freedoms of her people for at least 50 years after the 1997 handover. [note 4] Such guarantees are enshrined in the Hong Kong's Basic Law, the territory's constitutional document, which outlines the system of governance after 1997, albeit subject to interpretation by China's Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPCSC).[95][96]

 

Hong Kong's most senior leader, Chief Executive, is elected by a committee of 1,200 selected members (600 in 1997) and nominally appointed by the Government of China. The primary pillars of government are the Executive Council, Legislative Council, civil service and Judiciary.

 

Policy-making is initially discussed in the Executive Council, presided by the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, before passing to the Legislative Council for bill adoption. The Executive Council consists of 30 official/unofficial members appointed by the Chief Executive and one member among them acts as the convenor.[97][98]

 

The Legislative Council, set up in 1843, debates policies and motions before voting to adopt or rejecting bills. It has 70 members (originally 60) and 40 (originally 30) among them are directly elected by universal suffrage; the other 30 members are "functional constituencies" (indirectly) elected by a smaller electorate of corporate bodies or representatives of stipulated economic sectors as defined by the government. The Legislative Council is chaired by a president who acts as the speaker.[99][100]

 

In 1997, seating of the Legislative Council (also public services and election franchises) of Hong Kong modelled on the British system: Urban Council (Hong Kong and Kowloon) and District Council (New Territories and Outlying Islands). In 1999, this system has been reformed into 18 directly elected District Offices across 5 Legislative Council constituencies: Hong Kong Island (East/West), Kowloon and New Territories (East/West); the remaining outlying islands are divided across the aforementioned regions.

 

Hong Kong's Civil Service, created by the British colonial government, is a politically neutral body that implements government policies and provides public services. Senior civil servants are appointed based on meritocracy. The territory's police, firefighting and customs forces, as well as clerical officers across various government departments, make up the civil service.[101][102]