View allAll Photos Tagged Realizations
Men can starve from a lack of self-realization as much as they can from a lack of bread. (Richard Wright)
#ChaChaPhoto #Lahore #DelhiGate #BreadMaker #OldFellow #Street #Portrait #StreetPortrait #EnvironmentalPortrait #Travel #OnTheJob
© Zahid Farooq Photography
Alpha Auer's installation "Listen …" at "Topophonia: 4 Realizations in sound" strongly overwhelmed by SaveMe Oh's particelshows.
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From the description:
TOPOPHONIA: 4 Realizations in Sound
HUMlab at Umea University in Sweden has generously provided this Yoshikaze "Up in the Air" Residency. I'm very grateful to Goodwind Seiling and HUMlab for the opportunity to participate in this program.
My idea for this residency was to ask 3 fellow artists each to create an artwork all using the same concept. I would also create my own version. (Although, my version shouldn't be thought of as 'definitive'.)
The concept is simple: use **sounds only** to guide an avatar around a build. I asked them to avoid providing visual cues for avatars to use in reaching whatever kind of goals the artists envisioned.
You will find four completely different pieces, four totally different visions of what that initial concept suggested. To me, the fact that our four versions are so different is tremendously exciting. It is further proof that the artist's mind is unlimited in its ability to make sense of the world, and to convey that sense to others.
Please be sure to visit all four installations. You will find TP kiosks on each level, and on the ground if you should somehow end up there. Have fun!
Oberon Onmura
January, 2013
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The "Somewhere in sl" picture series (or "The Adventures of WuWai in Second Life") is my guide and bookmark folder to wonderful, artful, curious or in other way remarkably sims of second life with travel guide WuWai Chun.
When was the last time you observed your reflection on water...or sat on the beach by yourself for an hour without worrying about monday blues & missed calls??
All I want to say is ...
Thank you God for Loving me...
and thank you for all the Beautiful people around me...
Presents don't really mean much to me. I don't want to sound mawkish, but - it was the realization that I have a great many people in my life who really love me, and who I really love. Gabriel Byrne..
Have a Wonderful weekend to all ...Hugs Arlene Kato...
I shared this a bit earlier on FB and just because I am sharing it here too.
I have come to a serious realization of how much I love being a woman. We are beautiful, magical and powerful. And yet in my feeling right now, only a portion of what we can be until paired with an equally powerful but loving man. Yes we don't NEED a man, we are strong and very wise. But being a woman and somewhat submitting to the strength of the right man, existing under his warmth, strength, his arm. Being the vessel of creation, the infinite love of the universe merging with the creator of life and the protector of the universe, nothing else can replace that. I know all wont agree with this but it is how I feel at this moment and I feel good. I have felt some of this on a smaller level before but last night and today I am just full of it. With a passion right now, I fully own being a woman. How many years of my life I have spouted the words, “it sucks being a girl/woman”. I will never again. I may have been through a lot and felt a lot of pain, maybe due to being a woman, maybe due to choices I made, maybe because of my attitude. Doesn't matter. I am so thankful and grateful for all that my body is, all that it creates, all that it is capable of and being able to share it with a man I love is just the icing on the cake.
Women everywhere YOU are AMAZING! KNOW it! FEEL it! SHARE it!
i've realized a lot being away at college
a lot.
and most of it seems so unreal to be true.
im glad i can spot the truth
also
Towards the end of the Korean War, the USAF came to the realization that their transport fleet was becoming obsolete. The C-46 Commandos and C-47 Skytrains in service were no longer adequate, while the C-119 Flying Boxcar was having difficulties. In 1951, the USAF issued a requirement for a new tactical transport, an aircraft that would need to carry at least 72 passengers, be capable of dropping paratroopers, and have a ramp for loading vehicles directly into the cargo compartment. Moreover, it must be a “clean sheet” design, not a conversion from an existing airliner, and the USAF preferred it be a turboprop design. Five companies submitted designs, and six months later the USAF chose Lockheed’s L-402 design—over the misgivings of Lockheed’s chief designer, Clarence “Kelly” Johnson, who warned that the L-402 would destroy the company. Little was Johnson to know that, fifty years later, the L-402—designated C-130 Hercules by the USAF—would still be in production, and one out of only five aircraft to have over 50 years of service with the original purchaser.
The C-130 was designed to give mostly unfettered access to a large cargo compartment—the ramp forms an integral part of the rear fuselage, the wing is mounted above the fuselage, and the landing gear is carried in sponsons attached to the fuselage itself, while the fuselage has a circular design to maximize loading potential. The high wing also gives the C-130 good lift, especially in “high and hot” situations. The Allison T56 turboprop was designed specifically for the Hercules, and has gone on to become one of the most successful turboprop designs in history.
After two YC-130 prototypes, the Hercules went into production as the C-130A in 1956, to be superseded by the improved C-130B in 1959. The latter became the baseline Hercules variant: C-130As had three-blade propellers and a rounded “Roman” nose, while the B introduced the more familiar, longer radar nose and four-blade propellers. (Virtually all A models were later retrofitted to the long nose, though they kept the three-blade propellers.) In the 50 years hence, the basic C-130 design has not changed much: the C-130E introduced underwing external fuel tanks, while the C-130H has a slightly different wing. Even the new C-130J variant only introduced new engines with more fuel efficient six-bladed propellers: the basic design remains the same. Lockheed also offers stretched versions of the Hercules, initially as a civilian-only option (the L-100-30); the British Royal Air Force bought this version as the C-130K and it was later adopted by other nations, including the United States.
The basic C-130 is strictly a transport aircraft, but the versatility of the aircraft has meant it has been modified into a dizzying number of variants. These include the AC-130 Spectre gunship, the HC-130 rescue aircraft and WC-130 weather reconnaissance version. Other versions include several dozen EC-130 electronic warfare/Elint variants, KC-130 tankers, and DC-130 drone aircraft controllers. The USAF, the US Navy, and the US Marine Corps are all C-130 operators as well. Besides the United States, there are 67 other operators of C-130s, making it one of the world’s most prolific aircraft, with its only rivals the Bell UH-1 Iroquois family and the Antonov An-2 Colt biplane transport. C-130s are also used extensively by civilian operators as well as the L-100 series.
The “Herky Bird,” as it is often nicknamed, has participated in every military campaign fought by the United States since 1960 in one variation or the other. During Vietnam, it was used in almost every role imaginable, from standard transport to emergency bomber: as the latter, it dropped M121 10,000 pound mass-focus bombs to clear jungle away for helicopter landing zones, and it was even attempted to use C-130s with these bombs against the infamous Thanh Hoa Bridge in North Vietnam. (Later this capability was added as standard to MC-130 Combat Talon special forces support aircraft; the MC-130 is the only aircraft cleared to carry the GBU-43 MOAB.) It was also instrumental in resupplying the Khe Sanh garrison during its three-month siege. Hercules crews paid the price as well: nearly 70 C-130s were lost during the Vietnam War. In foreign service, C-130s have also been used heavily, the most famous instance of which was likely the Israeli Entebbe Raid of 1976, one of the longest-ranged C-130 missions in history. C-130s are often in the forefront of humanitarian missions to trouble spots around the world.
As of this writing, over 2300 C-130s have been built, and most are still in service. It remains the backbone of the USAF’s tactical transport service; attempts to replace it with the Advanced Tactical Transport Program (ATTP) in the 1980s and to supplement it with the C-27J Spartan in the 2000s both failed, as the USAF realized that the only real replacement for a C-130 is another C-130.
An early "Roman Nose" C-130A--without the C-130's distinctive radar nose profile--54-1633 was intitially assigned to the 314th Troop Carrier Wing at Stewart AFB, Georgia in 1957, and remained with the unit after it was moved to Little Rock AFB, Arkansas. It would then be relegated in 1972 to the 913th Tactical Airlift Group (Reserve), also at Little Rock. In 1977, 54-1633 finally left Arkansas, serving with the 139th TAG (Missouri ANG) at St. Joseph. It was retired in 1984, but refurbished and sold to the Chadian Air Force. Sadly, as TT-PAB, 54-1633 would crash on takeoff in 1986.
Many of the USAF's "Roman Nose" C-130As were later refitted with standard noses, but 54-1633 kept its profile until it was retired, though it was likely refitted before going to Chad. This picture's location is unknown, but it was while the aircraft was still with the 314th--given that it carries Southeast Asia camouflage, it's likely the picture was taken in the early 1970s.
(Disclaimer: I found this picture among other photos in my dad’s slides. I’m not sure who took them; some of them may be his. If any of these pictures are yours or you know who took them, let me know and I will remove them from Flickr, unless I have permission to let them remain. These photos are historical artifacts, in many cases of aircraft long since gone to the scrapyard, so I feel they deserve to be shared to the public at large—to honor the men and women who flew and maintained them.)
I just discovered all the image editing tools... the 'photoshop' if you will (though I did this in aperture).
I haven't done this kind of stuff since film/darkroom days, mostly because I hadn't found a need. but I discovered that a lot of the stuff I've been doing with hdr is actually available just because of the high bit rate of the raw files. I never bothered to bother with them before.
anyway: this is an example. just by using the 'development' process on the raw file I got almost all of the range I needed. (btw: the previous image of the backhoe is the same process only via adobe dng development).
I also realized, looking at the pic, that even though I'm miserable most of the time, and probably totally crazy too, I don't think I'm in a bad place, once I step back and look at it.
I got this cute car, and I was spending a winter thursday out tootling around. I've got a set of window sashes that I'm going to turn into art and 40lbs of birdseed. and I'm in a state/place where I can stop and take pictures of a construction site for no reason other than that I wanted to.
what makes me particularly happy regarding this pic is that I was able to get the bright orange of the near side of the car out of the shadows and bring the sky down to blue. I really like those colors against each other. doing it via HDR would have sacrificed detail and it takes a while and it's a pain to take the frames correctly. much nicer this way.
The Victorian skirt...
The realization of this skirt cost me hours of work... (｡◕‿-｡)
I had to make two studies before finding the system to obtain conical tubular folds that I wanted. So I finally sewed several triangular pieces, each with a double fold. The bottom of the skirt is decorated with a veritable old Mechlin lace, very delicate and fragile, suspended by small bows of pink silk chiffon. This skirt is longer at the back than the front, and the small bows follow the curvature of the profile.
I get lost in the crashing and beating of the waves.
I cry at how the tide never stops kissing the shore, no matter how many times it's sent away.
The wind steals my thoughts and she sends them out to sea.
I scream to get them back, but she's just protecting me.
Banished forever now into the depths of the ocean.
Swallowed by the whale of good emotion.
I will lift my head high and make my footprints in the sand.
With rising tides and realizations.
I now stand on solid foundations.
No longer will I be defeated.
Note about this photograph: (rant inserted in July, 2015)
As you can see this photo has been up for nearly 8 years and, as of late, I had come to the realization that there are sleezy operators on the internet who will stop at nothing to make money on their sites by swiping other's work and displaying ads and giving NO attribution or credit to the original creator. I had originally posted this photo on Flickr and realized that it was getting more views than all of my other photos combined. So I set out to document what it was that made this particular building famous in my patently verbose way. I noticed that the more I typed and especially after adding links, the more views it got.
Originally on Google image search, it wended its way up to the first place if one searched for "Scranton Prep". That was not really my intention as the School itself should have top billing. I would settle for row 5 or 6 on page 1! Anyway, one day a couple of years ago, it fell totally off the Google radar and was only available if one was to add "Flickr" in the query. I don't really care as I am not really interested in the number of views though I found it interesting that this particular photo got so many views.
So then, in the interest of appeasing the Google gods and obtaining their algorithmic absolution, I put the same photo on Panaramio, another google property. This also allowed it to be viewed in Google Earth which I thought would get me the indulgence I was seeking on Google image search. Wrong!
So along comes this sleeze bag operator from the Czech republic by the moniker mapio.com which was using my photo (along with others that they swiped including the Scranton Fire Department) as background for their commercial pages, which, from what I can tell is a source of revenue as they display text ads for mostly educational sites.
Instead of my Flickr photo working its way back up, they chose my image which was expropriated by mapio (interestingly, they swiped it from Panaramio! - I don't know or care if Google is aware of it) Interestingly, even though I deleted my photo from Panaramio, it is still displayed on the top row of pictures (not in full resolution though) of Google image search though no longer on the mapio site as a background. Further, if one goes to mapio.com there is no way to leave feedback as in "I don't appreciate that you stole my photo without attribution".
If you go to their plain vanilla web address, mapio.com, you would not realize that they do more than rent out apartments in London without further digging. It is ironic that Google image search continues to display the mapio photo as if it belongs there even though they swiped it from Panaramio and it is no longer there! That obviously means that mapio has the photo cached.
That is the real reason for this rant. At the very minimum, any site wanting to use anyone else's photo or other media, should request permission to do so. I have had a few requests for that type of thing and I was glad to do so. Also, my photo not need to be the #1 photo (it is and has been on Yahoo image search which uses Bing as their search engine). I do not need to be embarrasingly successful...
Update 5-15-15
Though you can see an an approximation of the above image at google images, it is now a low resolution version hosted by flip.life (whoever they are) and, if one was to click on the "View Page" for further information, there is no information, in fact there is no photo!
Update: 5-16-15
Of all things, my actual Flickr photo is the one displayed on google images once again. It shows that, with persistence, one can take control of one's internet presence even if it is via a circuitous and devious route.
-- END of RANT --
Just sit back and eat the popcorn and enjoy our main feature...
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--------------------- The Scranton Preparatory School ------------------------
---------------------------------- aka Scranton Prep ----------------------------------
----- 1000 Wyoming Avenue in Scranton, Pennsylvania, USA -----
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The vantage point of this photo is through the fence abutting the railroad tracks behind the school's athletic field; the school itself is seen beyond the field and Wyoming Avenue. One of two relatively recent (2005+) additions can be seen to the left of the main building. It is actually the second iteration of wings built on the site of the former outdoor basketball courts and, like the smaller former wing, houses a gymnasium. The complementary addition on the right contains science laboratories and a lecture hall. That addition is not as large because it does not have the depth (from front to back) as it abuts a car dealership.
The Scranton Preparatory School, "Prep", was founded in 1944 by the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) and was originally located in the 300 block of Wyoming Avenue. Its first home was a building next to the Cathedral rectory which had been vacated by the University of Scranton (formerly Saint Thomas College) when the university relocated to larger quarters at the Scranton estate in the area of Madison Avenue and Linden Street. That building is gone; its replacement is a prayer garden.
Prep later moved to a building at the east corner of the same block at the intersection of Wyoming Avenue and Mulberry Street. That building formerly housed the Thompson Private Hospital.
.The school remained there until 1961 when the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania decided to widen Mulberry Street resulting in the demolition of the building. There was a two-year temporary relocation to a building at the University of Scranton while a new site was located. An ideal candidate was located in the 1000 block of Wyoming Avenue at the site of the former Women's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences* (see footnote below) , a branch of the International Correspondence Schools. The school relocated to that building, pictured here, in 1963.
. Prep's enrollment grew substantially in 1971 as a result of the additional students from the all-girls' Marywood Seminary whose building had been destroyed by fire. Prior to the combination, Prep had been an all-boys' school. The current enrollment for the school (2016-17) is 775 students.
. If this building looks somewhat familiar, you may have seen its image in the old Popular Mechanics among others. Page three of the magazine was many times a full page advertisement for the International Correspondence Schools (ICS), which advertised heavily in popular technical magazines and had their headquarters in Scranton. The building was featured in the upper left corner of their study manuals and and there was nearly always a likeness of one of their manuals in the advertisement. Too, there was usually a bright yellow, double tear-off postage-paid return card for those interested in furthering their education in "The World's Schoolhouse". (Who or what was the second one for??!).
. The athletic field in the foreground of the above photo was previously occupied by a factory known as Haddon Craftsmen, the printing subsidiary of ICS. It occupied the entire block across the street from the Women's Institute. In perhaps the ultimate example of addressing simplicity and a study of worker/management dichotomy , the Women's Institute's address was 1000 Wyoming Avenue and Haddon's address was 1001 Wyoming Avenue. It pretty much boiled down to the boys being on one side of the street and the girls on the other. Amazing things can happen when there is one building per block on each side.
Haddon printed the course books for the correspondence courses as well as other textbooks for Intext (The International Textbook Company), the parent company of ICS that supplied textbooks used in college courses. In its latter days before it closed, Haddon Craftsmen was spun off from Intext and printed, among other things, paperback book selections for the Book of the Month Club.
.One mysteriously vanished detail of the demolition of the Haddon Craftsmen printing plant is an historical marker honoring Thomas J. Foster, the founder of ICS, which adorned the plant on the Wyoming Avenue side. In a rather grandiose proclamation, it stated that ICS was the "World's Schoolhouse". You can see an image of the plaque along with a comprehensive narrative of ICS's raison d'etre here. A rendering of the Haddon Craftsmen printing plant can be seen here. The vantage point for this image is catty-cornered to Haddon, in other words, if you were in the north corner of Coyer Motors, a tiny Pontiac dealership with room for a single automobile in its showroom. That property is now home to that paragon of fast food haute cuisine, Wendy's.
There is a street off to the left called Institute Way. The volume of mail was such that ICS had its own zone code (15, as in Scranton 15 Penna.) which later became zip code 18515 and is used to this very day by its successor institution Penn Foster . The value of having its own zip code has been largely attenuated, given that the terms "distance learning" and "online learning" have replaced "mail correspondence course" in the parlance of this type of education. Stamps are now optional!
When ICS moved to "new and improved" quarters on Oak Street in North Scranton in 1963, this building became the home of Prep. Along with classrooms and a chapel, it had residential quarters for the Jesuits on the 4th floor and a TV/radio station (not related to the school) in the basement.
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* NOTICE NOTICE NOTICE NOTICE NOTICE NOTICE NOTICE *
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If you read on, you will see that there is a quiz at the end of this passage. It is recommended that, if one chooses to take the quiz, that it be self-scored.
As you may have NOTICEd, this segment is conveniently perforated so that you can cut and paste it and take it home if desired. If you are already at home, then you are already at home.
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********************* DO NOT attempt to mail it in! **********************
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The following is related only tangentially to the current building and is included for historical and amusement purposes only. It is not required reading for present day Cavaliers.
If you are, or have ever been a Cavalier after 1976 the following is arcane and superfluous information and will not appear on the graduation test. You need not read it!
Those who graduated in or before 1976 will be quizzed on call letters, frequencies, and TV and radio personalities.
One final preface to the next section is that, as usual, the people behind the scenes, the engineers, camera persons, secretaries, and others really deserve a lot of credit for any broadcast organization's success. They are, perhaps by omission and invisibility, the unsung heroes of broadcasting. This is largely because we never hear their names or see fast-scrolling credits which may or may not include them. What we see and hear on a daily basis is the "talent" or on-air personalities who are also essential and, because of their notoriety, appear to be 100% of tele-organizations. So, in a some way, we owe a good deal of gratitude to these invisible people for their contributions.
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--------------------------- TALES OF THE BASEMENT -----------------------------
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.First there was radio...
. In the olden days (the '60s and '70s), the basement of Prep was home to WGBI-TV (later changed to WDAU - channel 22) and WGBI-AM (910 kHz) and later WGBI-FM (101.3 mHz) radio. All were affiliates of the Columbia Broadcasting Sytem (CBS). The stations were owned by the Megargee family whose mainstay was the paper business.
Market penetration by the Megargee Paper Company, paper-wise, was such that its ubiquity ensured that no matter in which area restroom one chose to relieve oneself, it was assured that the label on the toilet paper and paper towel dispensers bore their brand.
.In the real olden days and after several frequency changes, WQAN (a Scranton Times/Lynett media company) and WGBI-AM (a Megargee of paper fame station) both broadcasted on 880kHz, the former from dawn until noon and the latter from noon until signoff. The stations operated at 1000 watts during the daytime and 500 watts at night.
.WQAN and WGBI shared the 880kHz frequency from the early 1930s until 1941 when the shared frequency was changed to 910kHz. This continued until 1948 when WQAN was allotted the 630kHz slot.
Urban legend has it that WQAN stood for "We Quit At Noon". That may be the actual derivation of the station's call letters. WQAN's call letters were changed to WEJL in January of 1954, the letters EJL being the initials of the newspaper's publisher Edward J. Lynett. According to the same urban legend types, the letters GBI in WGBI stood for "God Bless the Irish".
WGBI AM kept the 910kHz frequency and continued to use it for many years. Its mainstay was (both!) country and western music with the usual news and weather reports.
When Entercom lost its lease on WBZU's transmitter site on Davis Street in South Scranton in 2006, (WBZU is the current call letters of WGBI's 910kHz frequency) it set the stage for an ironic twist of fate. It turns out that WBZU and WEJL (formerly WGBI and WQAN) are once again located, equipment-wise, in the same location. This time, it is in the Scranton TImes building that the twain meet and their their transmitters are in the same room. Both broadcast from the tower atop the Scranton Times building at Penn Avenue and Spruce Street. These stations, which had parted company in 1948 are, once again, broadcasting side by side after a nearly 60 year hiatus!
...then came along that new-fangled invention, the television...
WGBI radio predated the televison station by nearly three decades. WGBI-AM began broadcasting in 1925 and WGBI-TV began in 1953.
In 1958 the McGargee family, the owners of WGBI TV, entered into a limited partnership with the Philadelphia Bulletin newspaper which operated WCAU TV in Philadelphia. The call letters of the TV station were then changed to WDAU. The Bulletin opted to sell WCAU, which then became a network O&O (owned and operated) and keep the smaller WDAU when forced by the Federal Communications Commission to divest itself of one of the television stations. The FCC deemed that there was too much signal overlap in the Lehigh Valley (Allentown) area where both signals were available. The partnership was dissolved a year later in 1959, the Bulletin selling its share back to the McGargees.
.In this era, Channel 22 was, hands down, the TV station as, along with the best local news gathering organization, the station was part of the CBS network which was the radio and television network. The local TV competition was WBRE, the NBC affiliate, and WNEP, the ABC affiliate. Too, there was a fair amount of synergy between TV and radio whereby some of the talent, including Tom Reilly and Bill White, among others, appeared on both media. Just imagine, one could watch the 6 o'clock news and on the way to the store in their '57 Chevy hear the same people talking at them!
.The entire TV menu at this time consisted of WDAU-22 (CBS), WBRE-28 (NBC), and WNEP-16 (ABC). Yes children, until WVIA, the PBS affiliate appeared on the scene in 1966, the entire TV world consisted of 3 TV stations! Nearly all broadcast stations, and TV sets for that matter, were black and white prior to 1965.
These were the days before the remote control; the term "couch potato" was not yet vernacular. One, upon hearing the phrase, might have thought that there was a misplaced spud on your davenport. TV viewers did not have the option of swiftly rotating though 500 channels of nothingness; three were plenty. One effect of the actual effort required to change channels is that people, many times, left their set tuned to a single station for an entire night. Too, it was a contest among the networks to see if they could lure you into leaving the dial set to their station.
.To add to the complexity of owning a set, there were many older TVs which received VHF only and in order to receive the UHF stations (those from 14 to 83), one needed a "converter box" as all TV stations in the Great Northeast (PA) were UHF. The converter box was a little box which sat atop the TV through which the antenna wire was routed, some electronic mumble jumble took place and then the resultant signal was routed to the TV via channel 3. These boxes (why are there always boxes involved with TV?) also had a separate electrical plug as they contained tubes. The TV was tuned to channel 3 (sound familiar?!!) and then one tuned the set through the converter box.
.As a bonus, semi-off topic, aside, I present the following:
Did you know that the TVs of old, the ones with the cathode ray tubes, (the analog ones) could be used to detect tornadoes or other storms in your area? It seems that storms broadcast on channel 2, much as channel 2 did. The method involved tuning the set to channel 13 and turning the brightness down just to where the screen was darkened and then tuning the set to channel 2. If there was a storm in the area, with each lightning strike, you would see the corresponding spikes on your CRT (here we are using the TV in monitor mode and hopefully you do not live in a city where there is an actual channel 2 broadcasting to spoil the fun). If there was an approaching tornado, the entire screen would glow so you knew to unplug your set and proceed directly to your tornado shelter. Maybe it would be best to place the TV in your tornado shelter and watch it until the power went out. By the way, there is nothing preventing you from trying this out if you have an old set lying aroud the house which has not been sacrificed due to our penchant for more pixels and the latest and greatest 3D 16384p 60" 7.1 theatre surround sound flat screen HD TV screens. Compare this product description with "da tube" which pretty much described a TV set in days gone by.
.For those of you who might be inclined to think that the previous passage was fabricated so that I might up my tube cred and continue my propensity for verbosity, which, given the lack of brevity in this mere photo description (!) seems not out of the realm of possibility, see the following link: Storms on TV
.End of bonus segment, now back to our regularly scheduled program
.Though their signals were easy to pick up in Scranton and Wilkes-Barre "metro areas", it was nearly impossible to get a signal outside of these urban areas. It seems that the undulating topography of heynaville (for clarification and further information on everything heyna, see Tutorial on Heynabonics ), otherwise known as Northeastern Pennsylvania, wreaks havoc on the electromagnetic emissions known as television signals. Simply stated, the folks out in the boonies could not get the TV signals.
.At this juncture in the annals of TV, a person in a metro area could easily get TV signals using a bow tie or rabbit-ear indoor antenna. The main problem with the "stronger" signal in these areas is that sometimes the signal could "ghost", a phenomenon whereby the viewer would not only see the intended transmission but, at times, a slightly off-registration "ghost" of the picture. These ghosts were caused by TV signals reflecting off large buildings or other objects. Many of these aberrations could be resolved by having someone else move the antenna about while you observed the screen. The best picture, it seems, always managed to leave the antenna holder/adjuster in a Twister-like body position and there were the predictable gripes as he/she put the antenna in a position "about" where it was optimum.
.Those in the intermediate area, say 8 to 10 miles away, depending on topography, could get a reasonable facsimile of a picture with an outdoor, roof-mounted antenna. It was found that wrapping a bit of aluminum foil around the antenna lead-in wire aided in minor adjustments to the picture. So if you needed to get rid of a minor ghost or snowy picture, the picture could be adjusted by sliding the foil up or down the wire as needed. People outside this range were able to get signals mostly through sheer will power and the expenditure of a goodly amount of funds for outdoor, roof-mounted antennae.
At this point, the only things keeping one from a clear TV picture were electromagnetic pulses, coronal mass ejections leading to minor EMPs), snow, fog, the cold war, high winds, communists, and rain. Reception, along with the dreaded horizontal and vertical hold adjustments on the TV required perseverance and experimentation if one was to be an avid TV watcher.
...it was then decreed that all TVs must have a coaxial cable attached and thus ended "free" TV as we knew it...
To solve the problem of lack of, or, at best, lousy, signal, the stations employed "translators" (no these were not people who translated heynabonics to English for the broadcasts!). These were additional broadcast towers distributed around NEPA (northeast Pennsylvania) to allow folks in say, Palmerton, Slatedale, and Slatington to get a reasonable semblance of a signal. These were not received on the regular station number, 22 in the case of WDAU, but rather, say for example, channel 18 in Clarks Summit or 52 in Hop Bottom.
Coincident with the rise of the translator, there was another industry, in its nascent stage, supplying TV signals to those who still had no reception. It was something called cable TV (or, in broadcast parlance, Community Antenna Television, or CATV) whose mission was to carry the local stations out to the valleys to the south and west where reception was otherwise impossible. This amounted to a guy locating an antenna on top of a mountain where he could receive the signal, amplify it by electronic means, and sell the signal to customers who were along the route of the wire. The charge was $2.00 per month for the service. They too had all of 3 stations on their schedule, though some subscribers in the southern reaches could get additional stations from the Philadelphia or New York areas.
Yes folks, cable TV was invented here in hard coal country in the little 'burgh of Mahanoy City so that an appliance store owner could sell more TVs. Though you may curse your Comcast or Time Warner cable bill, without cable it was impossible for a goodly segment of the population to receive any moving pictures on the television and for others to receive a clear signal.
Service Electric, which started operations in 1948 and still in business today, was a pioneer in the field. That may be why the first official broadcast of HBO was made from New York to Wilkes Barre in 1972 on Service Electric, a fact attested to on a bronze plaque on Public Square in Wilkes Barre.
--Yet another bonus, semi-off topic aside:
Certain areas in the Pocono mountains such as Tobyhanna and Mount Pocono were TV heaven. You could, with a moderate investment in an external VHF/UHF outdoor antenna, receive all the New York and Philadelphia stations plus the local UHF stations. Nearly the entire VHF dial from 2 to 13 had available stations. The quality of the signal depended on the weather and the amount spent on the antenna. Those with the best reception had the full dresser Channel Master fish bone antenna with the 360 degree rotating motor for VHF. You would turn on the desired station and turn the direction dial to the direction of the source station. Most times these directions were either known or actually marked on the rotation control knob. Some of the stations available were WCBS, KYW, WNBC, WNEW, WPVI, WABC, WOR, WCAU, WPIX, and WNET. It was like having cable before cable!
-- End of bonus segment. We now rejoin our regularly scheduled blurb which is already in progress.
.An odd situation was caused by the expensive AT&T/Bell System leased line to New York City for WDAU to recieve network programming. Rather than pay what they considered the exorbitant fee, a microwave relay system was set up to receive broadcast signal from WCBS in New York. This system was not unlike the system set up for cable TV where a receiver was placed on a mountain top and the signal was amplified. In this case, instead of being fed into a cable system, the signal was passed along to the next microwave tower in the chain. In the case of WDAU, the primary receiver was in Effort, PA in the Poconos and the signal was then beamed to the transmitter building atop the West Mountain in Scranton.
A problem occurred when WDAU had to sync with the CBS network for national programming. The engineers in the studio weren't able to see the WCBS signal and therefore an engineer had to be stationed at the transmitter to effect the changes as needed. This all had to be done with precise timing rather than cues from the station. Presumably there also had to be a switch at the commercials so those in Scranton would see commercials for da Acme and the Scranton Dry and not Crazy Eddie's commercials which were, as self-proclaimed, totally insane.
WDAU was not alone in having a cobbled-together system as similar methods were employed by WBRE in getting NBC's signal from New York to Wilkes-Barre and WNEP in getting ABC's signal from New York to Avoca. A side effect of all this cobbled-togetherness was that the TV signals' quality was, from time to time, not quite up to broadcast standards and there were the predictable complaints.
...they somehow all managed to operate in the cramped quarters....
When the local news made its debut on WDAU and other local TV stations, it was uncharted territory; they were flying by the seat of their pants, so to speak. The segments were 15 minutes long and consisted largely of the newsman reading reporter-generated news or copy from the newspaper. These documents were either held in his hand or laid on the desk, either of which required the anchor to be looking down a good deal of the time. There would be an occasional quick look up at the camera, hoping that his newspeak buffer did not run dry or his reading and speaking would get out of sync.
At this point in TV history, TV studios (also known as "sets") were rather primitive. Instead of having green screens , which enabled "chroma key", a method of cutting and pasting the talent's image superimposed over other graphics, the backdrop consisted of a textured, glittered wall. The field reporters were not giving live updates with the attendant graphics for their names and story lines; these were all shot on site on film and processed back at the station. In the weather segment, there were no dynamically updated, full color doppler radar weather updates. The highs, lows, and weather fronts were magnets arranged on a display board map.
These were the days before the teleprompter, chryron, chroma key, superimposed picture-in-picture and all the other equipment which give today's news broadcasts a very polished appearance.
What was remarkable was that, in this limited space, along with TV and radio studios and the requisite control rooms, there was a film processing area and a film library (Who can forget those "Movie for a Sunday Afternoon" etc. where cowboys and indians, Lawrence of Arabia type, and infinite World War 2, movies were played until the film reels wore out??!).
This was an era before ENG (Electronic News Gathering) where the live remote via microwave and later satellite was still a dream. The news was captured entirely on film shot by the photographers at the scene and rushed to the station and processed, hopefully in time for the next news broadcast. Submarine designers or NASA could surely have taken a clue on space utilization from this organization, where every cubic inch had to matter!
...and, as with all empires, it too must fall...
.Alas all of the former McGargee broadcasting empire has morphed into other entities. WDAU-TV was sold to Keystone Broadcasters in 1984 and redesignated WYOU. They initially moved broadcasting operations to the former Kresge's store which abutted the Scranton Dry Goods store on Lackawanna Avenue.
.That change also marked the end of the common ownership of the TV and radio stations. WYOU - the former WDAU (Channel 22 (13) - CBS affiliate), is currently owned by Mission Broadcasting and operated by the same company, Nexstar, that owns WBRE (Channel 28 (11) - NBC affiliate) in Wilkes-Barre. Both TV stations are currently located in the same building on Franklin Street near Public Square.
One downside to the WYOU/WBRE merger is that, upon the consolidation of the studios to Franklin Street in Wilkes Barre and the relocation of all their transmitters to Penobscot Mountain near Mountaintop, they decided to do away with all of their translators. Contrast that with WNEP which still maintains several translators reaching all the way to State College in the middle of the state and one can easily see why WYOU/WBRE are a distant 2nd and 3rd place finishers when it comes to audience size in the NEPA market. The Nexstar philosophy is that 90% of the people watching their station(s) are receiving it on cable therefore they don't need the expense of multiple translators.
.The radio stations were sold to Entercom in the early 1990s. WGBI-FM (101.3mHz) which had a soft rock format is now WGGY in Pittston doing a country thing. WGBI-AM (910khz) which was unabashedly country is now part of the greater WILK AM/FM conglomerate. It has a talk format that simulcasts in Wilkes Barre, Scranton, and Hazleton, and has a nearly 50 mile monopoly on talk radio in the region.
WGBI AM now bears the undignified moniker of WBZU AM and is merely, to use TV jargon, a translator. Though running on the classic 910kHz frequency, it is a tool with no personality of its own. Johnny Cash, Hank Snow, Ferlin Husky, and Merle Haggard surely are not tuned to BZU in their respective places of rest.
When WDAU moved out of Prep in 1984, its new home was the former Kresge's 5 and 10 Cent Store (note the F. W. Woolworth store further up the block, about the 4th iteration of Woolworth's opened by C. S. Woolworth mentioned at the outset of this description) downtown on Lackawanna Avenue. It remained there until Southern Union, a gas and oil conglomerate whose operations were largely located in Texas, through the beneficence of a hometown boy, bought the property and demolished Kresge's to build their expensive and fleeting headquarters. WYOU/WBRE then moved their Scranton operations next door to a corner of the Scranton Dry Goods building at Wyoming and Lackawanna Avenues. These days, WYOU, the formerly fabulously fantastic WDAU plays second fiddle to its ugly big sister WBRE.
...and that, folks, is the brief, concise history of a diminished broadcasting empire whose greatness will live on only in our memories and imaginations (and of course on Flickr!).
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------------------------------------ UPDATES ----------------------------------------------
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This will be updated periodically as the various internets and time allow.
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Update April 3, 2009
WYOU announced that they will no longer be doing local news. They will offer Judge Judy or some similar tripe in its place. Sadly, they probably will have higher ratings.
Further Update sometime later 2012
WYOU once again has local news. It is a simulcast with its sister station WBRE. The only difference in the newscasts is the superimposed logo at the bottom right corner of the screen identifying the station one happens to be viewing.
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---------------------- New and Improved: Quizzes -----------------------------
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This section will be updated periodically and I will post an email address where you can send your test for grading.
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WDAU quiz:
1. The main news anchor for much of the 60s was:
a. Mark Hiller
b. John Glough
c. Derry Bird
d. Perry Como
e. David DeCosmo
f. Franklin D. Coslett
g. John Perry
h. Hoyt Keiser
i. Tom Powell
j. Tom Bigler
k. Joey Shaver
l. Jerry Griffin
j. Bill O'reilly
2. A typical news/weather/sports lineup in the 60s would include (pick 3):
a. Vince Sweeny
b. Bill White
c. Harry West
d. Jack Doneger
e. Bill Flanagan
f. Nolan Johannes
g. Debbie Dunlavey
h. Jim Mustard
i. John Perry
j. Joe Zone
k. Tom Reilly
l. Lorri Lewis
m. J. Kristopher
n. Phil Cummins
o. Joe Dobbs
p. John Glawe
q. Bob Carroll
3. The signoff (Remember when TV stations actually signed off?) for WDAU started with:
a. The national anthem
b. "Hey all you coal miners out there..."
c. "From the basement of Scranton Prep..."
d. "Serving the industrial valleys of Pennsylvania..."
e. "That's all for today..."
4. The nearest donut/coffee shop to (and possibly half of the customer base of) WDAU was:
a. Mr. Donut
b. Curry Donut
c. Krispy Kreme
d. Dunkin Donuts
5. The official licensees of WDAU/WGBI was/were:
a. Roy Stauffer's Chevrolet
b. Megargee Paper Co.
c. Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Broadcasting Inc.
d. International Correspondence TV Inc.
e. Coyer Motors
f. Scranton Broadcasters Inc.
g. Burne Oldsmobile
6. During Station Identification (yet another "remember those"? questions), along with the call letters, channel number, and location, the following was shown:
a. A commercial
b. Public Service Announcements
c. Time and Temperature
d. Current Mine Subsidence information
e. School Closings
7. As part of WDAU's signoff each night, a video of an Air Force plane flying at high speed and altitude and accompanied by a (rather dramatic) poem by John Gillespie Magee was shown. The poem, whose last stanza is excerpted here:
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
was shown just prior to the national anthem. That poem was called:
a. Flying High
b. Hang 'em High
c. Twelve O'clock High
d. High Flight Poem
8. This is a quasi off-topic question: (quasi because it surely was reported on by WDAU) : The out-of-contol truck, the one popularized in Harry Chapin's immortal ballad "30,000 Pounds of Bananas", after overturning and disgorging its contents, came to a screeching halt at:
a. Chick's Diner
b. The beer distributor across from Chick's diner
c. The intersection of Harrison Avenue and Moosic Street
d. The intersection of Irving Avenue and Moosic Street
e. 1001 Wyoming Avenue
9. The very last image broadcast each day before the transmitter was turned off and the picture went to snow was:
a. A picture of the building
b. A picture of Madge Megargee Holcomb, the station owner
c. A test pattern
d. A random picture of paper products from the Megargee Paper Company
e. Live TV shot of Scranton Prep and WDAU staff schmoozing over coffee and doughnuts at Krispy Kreme
f. A live shot of the Krispy Kreme donut shop showing late night WDAU employees drinking coffee
10. The weather segment at WDAU was often sponsored by firms such as Bell Telephone or gasoline distributors. At one point, an oil company sponsored the segment which required the weatherman to use a car antenna as his pointer. Atop the antenna was a red ball. That sponsor was:
a. Shell
b. Texaco
c. Hess
d. Atlantic
e. Mobil
f. Sinclair
g. Esso
11. WDAU and WGBI had their transmitter on:
a. Penebscot Mountain
b. Bald Mountain, west of Scranton
c. Mountain Top
d. Colocated with WEJL atop the Scranton Times tower
e. Mount Pocono
12. WGBI radio's format was:
a. Hard Rock
b. Talk
c. Heavy Metal
d. Country and Western
e. Classical
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I will post the answers out there in internetville once I figure out what they are.
Update 4-12-13
Since this seems like just as good an internet as any, the answers are:
1. g 2. ibk 3. d 4. c 5. f 6. c 7. d 8. d 9. c 10. d 11. b 12. d
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Finally, if the Tales of the Basement has whetted your appetite for all things WDAU, a most excellent (former) TV station, a most excellent site is maintained by a former WDAUer:
Go there and you can Catch 22.
When we descended upon the US 127 overpass at Dawn, we knew there was a 4000-series leader on Q296 and assumed it was a UP unit. Soon it became apprarent that it was an SD40-3. Dave Oroszi who was shooting it just out of frame below was pleased. He said it was the best shot he's gotten to date of a "Spongebob."
Towards the end of the Korean War, the USAF came to the realization that their transport fleet was becoming obsolete. The C-46 Commandos and C-47 Skytrains in service were no longer adequate, while the C-119 Flying Boxcar was having difficulties. In 1951, the USAF issued a requirement for a new tactical transport, an aircraft that would need to carry at least 72 passengers, be capable of dropping paratroopers, and have a ramp for loading vehicles directly into the cargo compartment. Moreover, it must be a “clean sheet” design, not a conversion from an existing airliner, and the USAF preferred it be a turboprop design. Five companies submitted designs, and six months later the USAF chose Lockheed’s L-402 design—over the misgivings of Lockheed’s chief designer, Clarence “Kelly” Johnson, who warned that the L-402 would destroy the company. Little was Johnson to know that, fifty years later, the L-402—designated C-130 Hercules by the USAF—would still be in production, and one out of only five aircraft to have over 50 years of service with the original purchaser.
The C-130 was designed to give mostly unfettered access to a large cargo compartment—the ramp forms an integral part of the rear fuselage, the wing is mounted above the fuselage, and the landing gear is carried in sponsons attached to the fuselage itself, while the fuselage has a circular design to maximize loading potential. The high wing also gives the C-130 good lift, especially in “high and hot” situations. The Allison T56 turboprop was designed specifically for the Hercules, and has gone on to become one of the most successful turboprop designs in history.
After two YC-130 prototypes, the Hercules went into production as the C-130A in 1956, to be superseded by the improved C-130B in 1959. The latter became the baseline Hercules variant: C-130As had three-blade propellers and a rounded “Roman” nose, while the B introduced the more familiar, longer radar nose and four-blade propellers. (Virtually all A models were later retrofitted to the long nose, though they kept the three-blade propellers.) In the 50 years hence, the basic C-130 design has not changed much: the C-130E introduced underwing external fuel tanks, while the C-130H has a slightly different wing. Even the new C-130J variant only introduced new engines with more fuel efficient six-bladed propellers: the basic design remains the same. Lockheed also offers stretched versions of the Hercules, initially as a civilian-only option (the L-100-30); the British Royal Air Force bought this version as the C-130K and it was later adopted by other nations, including the United States.
The basic C-130 is strictly a transport aircraft, but the versatility of the aircraft has meant it has been modified into a dizzying number of variants. These include the AC-130 Spectre gunship, the HC-130 rescue aircraft and WC-130 weather reconnaissance version. Other versions include several dozen EC-130 electronic warfare/Elint variants, KC-130 tankers, and DC-130 drone aircraft controllers. The USAF, the US Navy, and the US Marine Corps are all C-130 operators as well. Besides the United States, there are 67 other operators of C-130s, making it one of the world’s most prolific aircraft, with its only rivals the Bell UH-1 Iroquois family and the Antonov An-2 Colt biplane transport. C-130s are also used extensively by civilian operators as well as the L-100 series.
The “Herky Bird,” as it is often nicknamed, has participated in every military campaign fought by the United States since 1960 in one variation or the other. During Vietnam, it was used in almost every role imaginable, from standard transport to emergency bomber: as the latter, it dropped M121 10,000 pound mass-focus bombs to clear jungle away for helicopter landing zones, and it was even attempted to use C-130s with these bombs against the infamous Thanh Hoa Bridge in North Vietnam. (Later this capability was added as standard to MC-130 Combat Talon special forces support aircraft; the MC-130 is the only aircraft cleared to carry the GBU-43 MOAB.) It was also instrumental in resupplying the Khe Sanh garrison during its three-month siege. Hercules crews paid the price as well: nearly 70 C-130s were lost during the Vietnam War. In foreign service, C-130s have also been used heavily, the most famous instance of which was likely the Israeli Entebbe Raid of 1976, one of the longest-ranged C-130 missions in history. C-130s are often in the forefront of humanitarian missions to trouble spots around the world.
As of this writing, over 2300 C-130s have been built, and most are still in service. It remains the backbone of the USAF’s tactical transport service; attempts to replace it with the Advanced Tactical Transport Program (ATTP) in the 1980s and to supplement it with the C-27J Spartan in the 2000s both failed, as the USAF realized that the only real replacement for a C-130 is another C-130.
96-5432 was probably one of the last H-model C-130s built, and began its career with the 302nd Operations Group (Reserve) at Peterson AFB, Colorado in 1997--making it, by C-130 standards, relatively young. It next served with the 130th Airlift Wing (West Virginia ANG) at Charleston, where it was named the "General Mac" for James McLaughlin, who was the first commander of the West Virginia ANG after World War II.
In March 2022, it was reassigned to the 120th Airlift Wing (Montana ANG), and was renamed the "City of Great Falls," becoming the 120th's "boss bird." As the CO's aircraft, the "City of Great Falls" also carries the 120th's heritage scheme--the checkerboard on the engine nacelles and the invasion stripes on the fuselage and wings are a throwback to the 371st Fighter Group of World War II, which flew P-47 Thunderbolts. One of the 371st's squadrons, the 40th, after the war was redesignated the 186th FS, and became the only squadron of the then-120th Fighter Group. Unlike the rest of the 120th's C-130s, which carry the CM Russell skull and mountain tail emblem, 96-5432 carries a "Big Sky Country" tail stripe--also a throwback, to the time when the 120th flew the F-106 Delta Dart. (It's blanked out by the wing here.)
I had been meaning to get a picture of the new "City of Great Falls" for quite awhile--I've seen it flying over my house a few times. Though I will always love the 120th's fighter days, this scheme looks good on a "Herky Bird" too.
What follows is nothing more than some ramblings from a less than articulate mind. Don't feel that you have to read it. It was inspired by a couple of recent posts from two of my favorite contacts and was meant for yesterday, but yesterday was far too turbulent.
Twelve years ago, the light that I had found comfort and strength in and that had nurtured me for 26 years; was quietly and peacefully extinguished….or so I thought. There was an enormous amount of weight associated with that realization. Tangible weight, like a physical presence, making it difficult to reason and seemingly, even breathe. Of course those feelings are associated with the grieving process, but were so intensified then. I couldn’t imagine life without the light; I mean what would be the point of trying to?
I found that very early in this experience that I had assumed the role of consoler. Everyone meant well, but as we find at times like this, they didn’t know what to do or say. Comforting others has the effect of providing a level of functionality and helps start the healing process. Still, I banged around in the dark for quite a few weeks. Work and volunteer commitments kept me occupied.
Then something amazing happened; when I least expected it, I saw a glimmer of light. I was overwhelmed and surprised. Here was a bit of the spark that I had so wanted to regain. I began to look for it everywhere, but it remained elusive. It teased and taunted me, tapped me on the shoulder, pinched my ear and even flirted with me. I know, it really didn’t do all of that, but it made itself known in other ways. I saw it in the face of the checkers when I bought my meager groceries; no longer was I receiving “that” look. I saw it in the face of a young Leukemia patient at the finish line of a 100 mile ride that friends and I did in her honor. I told a very close friend that I’d never marry again; I saw it in her smile when she responded “that’s ridiculous, of course you will. You love being married.” I felt it in my former mother-in-laws hug when I told her that I had started to date. My sister (an amazing source of strength and support) even mentioned that my eyes were beginning to shine again.
I found that I had been given the gift of a new start. Two years later a new light was lit as Jeanne (remember the very close friend from above?) and I exchanged vows. Now with two beautiful little girls (and one annoying yet adorable dog) it sustains me through the trials of life.
The old light; it’s still there. It keeps the memory of the person that I was from fading away. After all, that was part of the journey that brought me here. I still see it from time to time. It will make itself visible in the light on a child’s face from her birthday candles. I’ll see it in the subdued splendor of a Christmas tree. And on occasion, it will come out to simply dance on the water….
I wish you all peace and light.
D
"I serve the universe no more. I serve another force that has crept into my being and shown me the unfathomable power within the frigid vacuum of space." The Scarred Guardian
History
War of Light
One of the Guardians of the Universe revived by Kyle Rayner when he recharged the Central Power Battery, this Guardian participated in their attack on the Anti-Monitor during the Sinestro Corps War.
She was grabbed by the Anti-Monitor, who seriously burned her. Although she could theoretically heal her body with the help of the other Guardians, she has refused to do so, stating that it serves as a reminder of the Guardians' past arrogance and inaction.
She also became increasingly militant with regards to the rise of the Lantern Corps and the possibility of the Blackest Night. She was part of the diplomatic mission to Zamaron, where she was particularly aggressive with the Zamarons. Following the mission's failure, the Scarred Guardian proposed that the Guardians illegalize romantic relationships between members of the Green Lantern Corps, an act which lead to the resignation of dozens of Lantern couples.
Blackest Night
However, the Scarred Guardian's real goal was not the prevention of the Blackest Night, but its realization. While she was burned by the Anti-Monitor, she was exposed to the power behind the Black, and sought to ally with it.
She assigned Ash, the Green Lantern of Sector 650, on a secret mission to locate the Anti-Monitor's corpse. Additionally, she also assigned Saarek to try and communicate with the spirit of the Anti-Monitor to facilitate in recovering the corpse.
She has done these things without the knowledge of the Guardians of the Universe, even communicating with the Lanterns while in the other Guardians presence. The Scarred Guardian also appeared to leak information on Sinestro's transfer to Korugar to the Sinestro Corps, allowing them to launch a rescue mission.
Soon, she began withdrawing into the bowels of Oa to look at the Book of the Black, a book which contained prophecies on the people of Earth, who would be a major threat to the Black.
When Larfleeze declared his treaty with the Guardians void over the Controllers' actions, Scar saw a new opportunity to further the War of Light. She presented a motion to repeal the ban on the Vega system and the plan for the Guardians themselves to become more personally involved with the conflict.
When the Guardians left for Vega, Vice of the Red Lantern Corps was captured and placed in the sciencells. Planning to use him to split Oa in half, Scar freed Vice of the muzzle preventing him from spewing the acidic blood in his veins, then freed the Qwardian Power Rings that the Green Lanterns had been capturing, sending them to the Sinestro Corps members held in the sciencells.
During the breakout, the Sinestro soldier Lyssa Drak felt her way into the Bowels of Oa and located the Book of the Black. Unaware of Scar's presence, Scar took Lyssa by the head and slammed it literally into the book. Turning a page, Scar says only "I hope you enjoy the view from in there", as Lyssa looks out from a page in horror. Following this, Scar used the power of the Black to shatter the protective barrier around Oa.
Following the sciencell riot, the Guardians were observing the state of the Universe as the War of Light raged on.
The Guardians realized that Ganthet was correct in his interpretation of the prophecy, and that the Blackest Night would occur. They then noticed a shadow spreading from Sector 666, and decided to recall the Green Lanterns to Oa to prepare for an attack.
Scar, however, attacked the Guardians, killing one by tearing his heart out. Imprisoning the Guardians in her black blood, Scar explained that the Anti-Monitor's attack had not just burned her, it had poisoned her, killing her slowly and allowing her to come under the influence of the Black. Scar said that the Black Lantern Corps would succeed where the Green Lantern Corps and the Manhunters failed and bring order to the universe by destroying all life in it.
Powers and Abilities
Powers
Green Energy Manipulation: Scar, like all other Guardians, is capable of wielding the green light of the Emotional Electromagnetic Spectrum.
Black Energy Manipulation: Scar is also able to manipulate the power of the Black, usually taking the form of vomit from her mouth or her own blood.
Immortality: Like the other Guardians, Scar was naturally immortal and could not die of old age or disease. However, after the poisons of the Anti-Monitor killed her, she lived on in undeath.
Flight
Paraphernalia & Equipment
Book of the Black
Transportation
Flight, Teleportation
Notes
As one of the Guardians of the Universe resurrected as a female child by Kyle Rayner, Scar's technical first appearance is Green Lantern (Volume 3) #150. However, she was not differentiated as a unique character until Green Lantern (Volume 4) #25.
Guardians of the Universe
The Guardians of the Universe are a race of extraterrestrial superhero characters appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics, commonly in association with Green Lantern. They first appeared in Green Lantern (vol. 2) #1 (July 1960), and were created by John Broome and Gil Kane. The Guardians of the Universe have been adapted to a number of films, television programs, and video games.
The Guardians of the Universe are the founders and leaders of the interstellar law enforcement agency known as the Green Lantern Corps, which they administer from their homeworld Oa at the center of the Universe. The Guardians resemble short humans with blue skin and white hair. They are depicted as being immortal and are the oldest living beings created in the Universe.
Background
The Guardians evolved on the planet Maltus, being among the first intelligent life forms in the universe. At this time, they were tall, grayish-blue humanoids with black hair, who roughly resembled humans except for their skin color.
They became scientists and thinkers, experimenting on the worlds around them. One experiment led to the creation of a new species, the Psions. In a pivotal moment, billions of years ago, a Maltusian named Krona used time-bending technology to observe the beginning of the Universe. However, this experiment, and later attempts to stop it, unleashed disaster upon all existence.
Originally, the experiment splintered the Universe into the Multiverse and created the evil Anti-Matter Universe of Qward. Following the retroactive destruction of the Multiverse, it was revealed that Krona flooded the beginning of the Universe with entropy causing it "to be born old".
Feeling responsible for this, the evolved Maltusians relocated to the planet Oa (at "the center of the Universe") and became the Guardians. Their goal was simple: combat evil and create an orderly universe. They acted quickly on that goal.
During this period, they slowly evolved into their current appearance, losing about half of their height and having their skulls grow larger. They now act as the leaders of the Green Lantern Corps, an interstellar police force which patrols the universe.
Consequences
Desiring to bring order, peace and harmony to all the universe, they created a mechanized police force composed of powerful, self-aware androids known as Manhunters. These Manhunters, resembling uniformed, blue-skinned humanoids, operated as cosmic police officers, much like the later Green Lanterns. They protected civilization and maintained peace in the Universe for millions of years, patrolling 3600 sectors into which the cosmos had been divided.
One day, the Manhunters collectively changed their directives and set out on a campaign to eradicate all organic life. Starting with Sector 666, they killed the people they had been created to protect, eradicating almost all life in the entire sector before the Guardians stopped them.
Most Manhunters were decommissioned after the massacre of Sector 666, but the ones that escaped became the sworn enemies of their former masters and remained so until modern times.
The Manhunter rebellion caused the Guardians to split into groups with different goals. The Controllers believe the only way to protect the Universe is to control it.
The Zamarons, consisting entirely of female Oans, felt no need to involve themselves in the Universe's problems at all. Over the years, both groups evolved to look dissimilar to the Guardians. Other groups also left the Guardians; one such group settled on Earth, becoming the source of leprechaun legends.
The Apokolips campaign ended in a truce, with the Guardians forced to abandon a soldier (Raker Qarrigat) to Darkseid. Fearing dissension, they ordered all records of the Campaign expunged.
Survivors of the massacre of Sector 666 – beings labelled demons – banded together to form a nation called the Empire of Tears, which opposed the Guardians’ efforts and philosophy.
They used dark magic to create a galaxy-spanning realm of chaos and evil. The Guardians eventually defeated the Empire and imprisoned its leaders, the Five Inversions, on the bleak world of Ysmault.
The Guardians decided that magic was chaotic and posed a threat to the balance they desired to achieve. They labored to destroy sources of magic and suppress or imprison its users throughout the Universe. They succeeded in compacting much of the chaotic magic energy of the Cosmos and imprisoning it inside a star; part of it eventually escaped to become the Starheart.
Modern history
Oa's defensive systems
The Guardians were almost wiped out in the events of Emerald Twilight, the only survivor being Ganthet.
They sacrificed themselves to create one final power ring, a power ring perhaps more powerful than all others before it. Oa was itself destroyed in a battle between Parallax and Kyle Rayner, but rebuilt in the events of "Legacy" as the final wish of Hal Jordan's former power ring.
The Guardians have since been restored when Kyle Rayner, as Ion, recharged the Central Power Battery. Rayner lost his power and role as Ion but this sacrifice released all the Guardian's life forces from the dormancy in his ring.
The Immortals first appeared as children but aged quickly and many seem to have returned to the identities they had before they created Kyle Rayner's power ring. Unlike before, however, the Guardians are male and female, rather than just male.
While Kyle had made them children in order for them to grow up and become less cold than their predecessors, this had not worked. Instead, the Guardians were as cold and manipulative as they were before the Emerald Twilight, with the exception of Ganthet and Sayd. Also, one of them, Lianna, seemed to have reverted to the original Maltusian appearance in the process.
Many of the Guardians revived by Kyle Rayner seemed to have disappeared, as only a handful now appear in the current Green Lantern issues, while dozens were revived by Kyle Rayner.
Female Guardians appear in flashbacks to Hal Jordan's rookie days as a Green Lantern. Whether this is an oversight or a result of the events of Infinite Crisis has not been explained.
With their revival, they began to rebuild the Green Lantern Corps using veterans to train the new ring-bearers. Alongside this experiment, the Guardians refortified Oa by creating a planet-wide armor and defensive system to prevent successful attacks against them. The Sinestro Corps War forces them to rewrite the Book of Oa and to add ten new laws.
To date, four of the ten have been revealed. They also expelled Ganthet and Sayd from their rank, because of the discovery that they were in a romantic relationship with each other. Another reason for their expulsion was their quotation from the forbidden chapter of the Book of Oa, which has Abin Sur's discovery of the prophecy The Blackest Night.
In the aftermath of the War, both Ganthet and Sayd have evolved into two new beings on a paradise-like planet Odym, where they are harnessing the blue energy spectrum of hope and creating blue power rings and batteries, planning to create another intergalactic police force in order to be able to aid the Guardians and the Green Lantern Corps against The Blackest Night.
The rank of the Guardians has weakened, as well; while there were originally twelve of them as Head Guardians, there are now six of them, after Ganthet and Sayd left Oa, and one Guardian died after a battle with Superman-Prime—this Guardian willfully "detonated" himself in an unsuccessful, last-ditch effort to destroy the insane Kryptonian (who wished to destroy the Universe in his own right).
A female Guardian has been left scarred by the Anti-Monitor, and the exposure to his antimatter energy reveals to have had dire consequences. Her fellow Guardians were unaware of the changes within her, either physical or behavioral (she is far more militant than is normal for the Guardians).
In the Origins and Omens backup stories running through several DC releases in February 2009, she is given the official name of Scar.
Scar killed one of her fellow guardians in the beginning of the Blackest Night, and is later revealed that she has since died after the Anti-Monitor's attack, and functions as an undead instead of an immortal. Another guardian was killed by Nekron, as a sacrifice to summon the Entity on Earth.
The Guardians seemed extremely displeased with the appearance of the other corps. While they "tolerated" the existence of the Star Sapphires, they made it clear that they were going to exterminate the Red Lantern Corps.
They also made a deal with Larfleeze of the Orange Lantern Corps some time ago, which resulted in the Vega System being out of Green Lantern jurisdiction. However, they seem to show particular displeasure with the Blue Lantern Corps, going so far as to attempt to forcibly remove the blue ring acquired by Hal Jordan, and when that didn't work, attempting to hold him on Oa until such time as it could be removed. With the ultimatum delivered by Larfleeze, the current wielder of the orange power of avarice, Scar proposed lifting the ban on the Vega System as well as having the Guardians leave Oa to get involved in the conflict personally.
The Guardians accepted Scar's proposal and left Oa with Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps to confront Larfleeze in the Vega System. The Guardians also decided to see how Jordan's blue ring would function with his green one during battles. After the Agent Orange's defeat, the Guardians negotiated with Larfleeze once more in order to continue to keep the orange light of avarice contained. The Agent Orange later launched an attack on Odym, seeking to possess the powers of the Blue Lantern Corps, presumably being swayed by Scar.
During the Blackest Night, the Guardians finally realized that Ganthet and Sayd were correct in their interpretation of the prophecy discovered by Abin Sur. However, Scar killed a Guardian and bound the rest to prevent them from interfering.
She later sent a number of black power rings to the Green Lantern Corps' memorial, reviving the deceased members of the Corps as undead Black Lanterns. She also weakened Oa's planetary defenses for an attack from the Black Lantern Corps.
When a group of Green Lanterns found their way into the Guardians' chamber, they found it empty, with no sign of Scar or her captives. Scar had taken her captives to the dead planet of Ryut, home of the Black Lantern's Central Power Battery.
Scar teleported herself, the Guardians, and the Black Lantern Central Power Battery to Earth, directly on top of Black Hand's home, and Black Hand summoned Nekron to Coast City. In the midst of the battle, Nekron killed a Guardian and Black Hand used his blood and organs to raise "The Trespasser" from the ground, holding a white figure.
Ganthet revealed the entity to be the living embodiment of life in the universe. It seemed Earth was where life first began, a fact the Guardians did their best to hide, to keep the entity safe from harm and exploitation, redirecting that danger towards themselves by informing the majority of the universe that life began on their planet of Oa (despite the fact that the Oans were in fact born on the planet Maltus).
During the War of the Green Lanterns storyline, the Guardians had been discussing the various events occurring, ranging from Hal Jordan's allegiance with the New Guardians to the revolt of the Alpha Lanterns and so on.
The group is then later confronted by Krona, who reveals his plan to control emotions. As a result, he had the Ion, the Predator, Butcher, Ophidian, Ion, Adara, and Proselyte inhabit the six Guardians as hosts and placed Parallax back within the Green Central Power Battery to subjugate the Green Lantern Corps under his control.
The Guardians are freed from Krona's emotional control by Hal Jordan, who kills Krona using his ultimate power. The rings from the other corps return to their former wielders. However, the Guardians expel them from Oa. The Guardians believe Hal to be the most dangerous of the Green Lantern Corps; therefore, the Guardians wrongfully discharge him from the Corps, much to the Green Lantern Corps' chagrin.
Afterward, the Guardians of the Universe allow Sinestro to become a Green Lantern once more. However, the Green Lantern Corps learn from empathy Lantern Meadlux that the Guardians are afraid of Hal Jordan, fearing that what happened to Krona would eventually happen to them if Jordan was allowed to continue as a Green Lantern.
Later, when the Green Lantern Corps are in disagreement and attempt to kill Sinestro, the Corps break into the sciencells, but the Corps discover that the Guardians have in captivity Sinestro and are trying to remove Sinestro's green ring, but the ring will not be removed.
Later, the Green Lantern Corps were in a meeting by the Guardians, where they chose to continue the fight and that any intrusion would incite a mutiny. The other Green Lantern Corps are in agreement.
⚡ Happy 🎯 Heroclix 💫 Friday! 👽
_____________________________
A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.
Secret Identity: N/A
Publisher: DC
First appearance: Green Lantern Vol 4 #25 (January, 2008)
Created by: Geoff Johns (writer)
Ivan Reis (artist)
"Not beautiful beasts, but murderers"
A conversation with Professor Sigrid Jacobeit, director of the Ravensbrück Memorial from 1992 to 2005, about the exhibition opened in October 2004: "In the wake of the (female) SS guards in the concentration camp Ravensbrück."
Ravensbrück was the only concentration camp on German territory to be built as a "protective custody camp" for women. In the spring of 1939, the SS transferred the first female inmates to Ravensbrück. The Red Army liberated the camp on April 30, 1945. Between 1939 and 1945, numerous women performed their duties as wardens in the concentration camps of the National Socialist dictatorship.
Commemoration Service: In October 2004 you were able to open the exhibition "In the wake of the SS" about the concentration camp guards in Ravensbrück after over ten years of preparation. Which hurdles made the realization of the project more difficult or extended such the development process?
Jacobeit: Of course, that has to do with several reasons. On the one hand, it was conceptually clear from the beginning that there would be an overseer exhibition. That was already in the years 1993/1994 concept of the memorial Ravensbrück. But the time of realization was more in the second part of the realization of exhibition projects. The topic of the supervisors and the SS staff was not researched in any way at that time, so there was no thorough scientific research on it, and it was not the concern of the survivors that we already thematize in the first exhibition: "SS guards in Ravensbrück ". Initially, we wanted to try to live up to the place and its victims.
Which sources did you generally refer to?
We conducted interviews with survivors, and these were the first attempts to collect information about the guards, and also to gather resources to fill this guard house. We referred to the interviews. There were relatively few administrative files of the SS at that early stage. But of course, another important source is the process documentation. These are the main sources. And then, of course, the things that appeared spectacular in the press in 1945.
The director of the memorial, Insa Eschbach, calls Ravensbrück a paradigm of women's imprisonment, but also a paradigm of female perpetration. What kind of pattern was followed in recruitment, selection and training of concentration camp guards?
This is an important focus and a recurring question. You have to know, it was a time of eliminating unemployment. Among other things, men built the highways - the unemployed were sent to all sorts of projects, as part of the labor service, etc. And there were also unemployed women in such small towns as Fürstenberg is - that little town next to the village of Ravensbrück. In the vicinity of Fürstenberg and the surrounding villages there were women who had no work and they suddenly heard that a camp had been built where there were asocials, work-shy, Jews, and where there was a chance to supervise them. It suddenly became attractive information and you got an apartment in newly built houses, today we would say an apartment and you would be alone and away from home. Because many young women lived partly with their parents. So many made the decision to apply there in the concentration camp.
What motives motivated the most young women to serve in the SS? Did you predominantly have ideal or material interests? Only a few of them were members of the NSDAP.
I would associate these women, specifically from the region, with the following categories: material reasons, purely material reasons. Of course, over the course of these six years, this system has also helped to move people in one direction, to see inmates as inferiors that we do not need in our society. But that was probably not the main reason, and I would like to put this as a thesis in the room: the main reason was the material incentive. But a second reason was this ideologically infiltrated, which increased with the beginning of activity. There were very few who said, "I can not do that. I can not stand that. "That was the case, but most of them arranged very quickly, kicked the prisoners and hounded the dogs on them.
Many felt themselves to be elites of society, and these overseers quickly became involved in this elitist thinking, even though they were at the lowest level within the SS hierarchy.
Does this hierarchy within the SS, which you have already described, reflect the gender image of the Third Reich, considering that in Ravensbrück, too, the command staff and guard troops were reserved exclusively for male SS members? What impact did this ranking have on the behavior of women?
On the one hand, one could say that this hierarchy corresponds to the image of women in Nazi times. Because women could not make a career. The highest function was the Scholtz-Klink (Gertrud Scholtz-Klink later known as Maria Stuckebrock (9 February 1902 – 24 March 1999) was a Nazi Party (NSDAP) member and leader of the National Socialist Women's League (NS-Frauenschaft) in Nazi Germany) held. That was just like that. There was not a single woman in this big government field who really had anything important to say. This corresponded to the concept of this regime. And this is exactly how this has been reflected in the concentration camp system and thus in the hierarchy of the SS. And yet you needed women. It has been used in the tradition of guarding women. Thus, these gender stereotypes in the women's concentration camp Ravensbrück can be observed by way of example. As a result of the fact that the women actually had power at all, they felt in the majority in this power role "woman with power" very well. They felt very well in this power role and, of course, felt the need to prove themselves in this possibility of hierarchy, in the truest sense of the word. And it has also happened that women have been appointed from the normal supervisor - there was such a hierarchical structure - to be the guardien-in-chief, who for a period of time was considered equal to the protective custody camp leader. That was then abolished again.
Holocaust researcher Raul Hilberg writes that precisely the "succession of everyday tasks culminated in the massive extermination process." Confirms your research this adherence to a supposedly concrete everyday canon as a prerequisite and necessity for the Holocaust. "
Absolutely. Because this everyday life became routine and yet it has sometimes overwhelmed the supervisors. This is related to the increase in occupancy. In fact, they were no longer able to cope with this chaos in their everyday life. And this fact became an opportunity for the prisoners. We'll get that told again and again. They were glad when the guards were almost afraid of dirt, noise, noise, overcrowding. And yet, some have asserted themselves accordingly in their stature, which allowed no room for maneuver. You have practiced this supposed normality. It is important to look at the events in different time stages. One should not compare the beginning with the end. As a result, some of them behaved equally, routinely, and the others were no longer able to cope with this routine because there was no real routine anymore, because it also got a bit out of hand. So there was really more scope for the survivors, which on the other hand triggered increasing brutality.
To what extent is the distinction between male and female perpetrators necessary under National Socialism, to what extent does it serve myth building and thus has a distorting effect?
I believe, and consider that ethnologically at this point, this myth formation is a product of the post-1945 era. And it is very dangerous. Because you simply dismiss the role of the guards with the words, "She was a beautiful beast." That's the simplest form of judgment, nicely trimmed yet, shrouded - just wrong. On the contrary, I think that one has to study such biographies thoroughly, to search very precisely for sources, if possible to collect the last piece of mosaic in order to contradict precisely this image, this myth formation. They were all pretty and blonde and beasts. "Not more?", One asks then actually right away. It's just awful. In part they were cruel criminals, not beasts, but murderers.
How did the former guards integrate into the post-war society? Have the biographies of women been worked up or rather displaced within the family? How did she remember her service in the National Socialist dictatorship in the concentration camp system?
There are some who have been sentenced, even to death. Some have returned to society as normal, have gone underground, said in preparation of the exhibition, "Yes, I am the ... but I am not available."
To mention at this point is also the topic of the rehabilitation process from 1992. It has also existed. I also had a master's student who did some work on these famous events that took place immediately after the fall of the Wall. That then guards wanted to suddenly have compensation, because they were imprisoned after 1945, for example, in Sachsenhausen. Such have then tried to sign up with this compensation concept and get any funds. That was also successful. But the survivors protested, and a former guard then repaid.
What reactions did the exhibition evoke, especially in the immediate vicinity of the former camp?
It was very interesting to watch. At the beginning, many Fürstenbergers suddenly came to the memorial, which never came before. This has been watched by our ladies accompanying the exhibition. The Fürstenbergers know each other pretty well. And that was very exciting in the first weeks. They were curious, wondering what we show and how we show it. We hardly heard a reaction. And visitor numbers dropped back very quickly. The curiosity was quickly satisfied, because you do not love this place anyway. And you actually only came to visit this exhibition.
How do you like the exhibition in the end?
I think the exhibition did not succeed in design. I say that quite honestly. Something happened that should not have happened. The house is destroyed by this installation that was made. This massive installation of the walls may correspond to a design concept, but I would have imagined a very careful exhibition in the sense of the careful handling of the house and the rooms. It was called the design office, the walls like the rooms break. The "homely house" must be broken. But that does not break anything. The statements are strong enough.
That's an unnecessary exaggeration I think.
It is exactly like that. The place does not need these walls. The design overburdens the house. But no one notices, because the visitors in the visitors' book only articulate that it is good that there is such an exhibition. It is a pity. Some of the survivors said they will not say they do not like it, they will not say anything.
Thank you for the interview.
Interview: Maria Neumann
2006/7 EVS Volunteers at Memorial Service
„Keine schönen Biester, sondern Mörderinnen“
Ein Gespräch mit Professor Sigrid Jacobeit, Leiterin der Gedenkstätte Ravensbrück von 1992 bis 2005, über die im Oktober 2004 eröffnete Ausstellung: „Im Gefolge der SS-Aufseherinnen im KZ-Ravensbrück.“
Als einziges Konzentrationslager auf deutschem Gebiet wurde Ravensbrück als „Schutzhaftlager“ für Frauen errichtet. Die SS verlegte im Frühjahr 1939 die ersten weiblichen Häftlinge nach Ravensbrück. Die Rote Armee befreite das Lager am 30. April 1945. Zwischen 1939 und 1945 verrichteten zahlreiche Frauen ihren Dienst als Aufseherinnen in den Konzentrationslagern der nationalsozialistischen Diktatur.
Gedenkdienst: Im Oktober 2004 konnten Sie die Ausstellung „Im Gefolge der SS“ über die KZ-Aufseherinnen in Ravensbrück nach über zehnjähriger Vorbereitung eröffnen. Welche Hürden erschwerten die Realisierung des Projektes beziehungsweise dehnten den Entstehungsprozess derartig aus?
Jacobeit: Das hat natürlich mit mehrerlei Gründen zu tun. Zum einen war es konzeptionell von Anfang an klar, dass es eine Aufseherinnen-Ausstellung geben wird. Das war schon in den Jahren 1993/1994 Konzept der Gedenkstätte Ravensbrück. Aber der Zeitpunkt der Realisierung war eher im zweiten Teil der Realisierung von Ausstellungsprojekten angesiedelt. Das Thema der Aufseherinnen und des SS-Personals war zu dem Zeitpunkt noch in keiner Weise erforscht, es gab also keinerlei gründliche wissenschaftliche Forschungen dazu, und es war auch nicht das Anliegen der Überlebenden, dass wir bereits auch in der ersten Ausstellung thematisieren: „SS-Aufseherinnen in Ravensbrück“. Wir wollten eigentlich zunächst versuchen, dem Ort und seinen Opfern gerecht zu werden.
Auf welche Quellen konnten Sie sich generell beziehen?
Wir haben Interviews mit Überlebenden geführt und das waren so die ersten Versuche, Informationen über die Aufseherinnen zu sammeln, und auch Quellen zusammenzutragen, die dieses Aufseherinnenhaus dann füllen sollten. Wir haben uns auf die Interviews bezogen. Es gab zu jenem frühen Zeitpunkt relativ wenige Verwaltungsunterlagen der SS. Aber eine weitere wichtige Quelle sind natürlich auch die Prozessunterlagen. Das sind die Hauptquellen. Und dann natürlich die Dinge, die 1945 in der Presse spektakulär erschienen.
Die Direktorin der Gedenkstätte, Insa Eschbach, nennt Ravensbrück ein Paradigma der KZ- Haft von Frauen, aber auch Paradigma weiblicher Täterschaft. Nach welchem Muster erfolgte die Rekrutierung, Auswahl und Ausbildung der KZ-Aufseherinnen?
Das ist ein wichtiger Schwerpunkt und eine immer wieder gestellte Frage. Man muss dazu wissen, es war eine Zeit der Beseitigung von Arbeitslosigkeit. Männer bauten unter anderem die Autobahnen – die Arbeitslosen wurden ja zu allen möglichen Projekten geschickt, im Rahmen des Arbeitsdienstes usw. Und es gab eben auch arbeitslose Frauen in solchen kleinen Städten, wie es Fürstenberg ist – jene kleine Stadt neben dem Dorf Ravensbrück. Im Umfeld Fürstenbergs und der umliegenden Dörfer gab es Frauen, die keine Arbeit hatten und die hörten plötzlich, dass da ein Lager errichtet worden war, wo es Asoziale, Arbeitsscheue, Juden gibt, und wo es eine Chance gäbe, diese zu beaufsichtigen. Das wurde plötzlich zu einer attraktiven Information, und man bekam eine Wohnung in neu gebauten Häusern, heute würden wir sagen, ein Apartment, und man wäre allein und einmal von Zuhause weg. Denn viele junge Frauen wohnten zum Teil noch bei ihren Eltern. So fassten viele den Entschluss, sich dort im KZ zu bewerben.
Welche Motive bewegten die meist sehr jungen Frauen, ihren Dienst in der SS zu tun? Umgaben Sie vorwiegend ideelle oder materielle Interessen? Nur wenige von ihnen waren Mitglieder der NSDAP.
Ich würde diese Frauen, also speziell aus der Region, die würde ich eher folgender Kategorie zuordnen: materielle Gründe, ausschließlich materielle Gründe. Natürlich hat dieses System auch im Laufe dieser sechs Jahre dazu beigetragen, die Menschen in eine Richtung zu bringen, dass die Häftlinge als Untermenschen zu betrachten sind, die wir in unserer Gesellschaft nicht brauchen. Aber das war wahrscheinlich nicht der Hauptgrund, und ich möchte das als These auch in den Raum stellen: Der Hauptgrund war der materielle Anreiz. Aber ein zweiter Grund war dieser ideologisch infiltrierte, der mit der beginnenden Tätigkeit noch zunahm. Es gab ganz wenige, die gesagt haben: „Ich kann das nicht. Das halte ich nicht aus.“ Das hat es gegeben, aber die meisten haben sich doch sehr schnell arrangiert, haben die Häftlinge mit Füßen getreten und die Hunde drauf gehetzt.
Viele fühlten sich als Eliten der Gesellschaft und diese Aufseherinnen haben sich sehr schnell in dieses elitäre Denken versetzt, obgleich sie doch auf der niedrigsten Stufe innerhalb der SS-Hierarchie waren.
Spiegelt diese Hierarchie innerhalb der SS, die Sie eben bereits beschrieben haben, das Geschlechterbild des Dritten Reiches, bedenkt man, dass auch in Ravensbrück Kommandostab und Wachtruppen ausschließlich männlichen SS-Mitgliedern vorbehalten blieben? Welche Auswirkungen hatte diese Rangordnung auf das Verhalten der Frauen?
Zum einen könnte man sagen, entspricht diese Hierarchie spiegelgerecht dem Frauenbild in der Nazi-Zeit. Denn Frauen konnten keine Karriere machen. Die höchste Funktion hatte die ScholtzKlink inne. Das war einfach so. Es gab in diesem ganzen großen Regierungsfeld keine einzige Frau, die wirklich etwas Wichtiges zu sagen hatte. Das entsprach dem Konzept dieses Regimes. Und genau so hat sich das im KZ- System und damit in der Hierarchie der SS abgebildet. Und dennoch hat man Frauen gebraucht. Man hat sie gebraucht in der Tradition der Bewachung von Frauen. So sind diese Geschlechterstereotype im Frauen-KZ Ravensbrück exemplarisch zu beobachten. Dadurch, dass die Frauen eigentlich überhaupt Macht hatten, haben sie sich mehrheitlich in dieser Machtrolle „Frau mit Macht“ sehr wohl gefühlt. Sie haben sich in dieser Machtrolle sehr wohl gefühlt und hatten damit natürlich auch das Bedürfnis, sich in dieser Möglichkeit der Hierarchie zu bewähren, im wahrsten Sinne des Wortes. Und es ist auch passiert, dass Frauen von der normalen Aufseherin – es gab eine solche hierarchische Struktur – zur Oberaufseherin ernannt worden sind, die für einen gewissen Zeitraum dem Schutzhaftlagerführer gleichgestellt war. Das ist dann wieder abgeschafft worden.
Holocaust-Forscher Raul Hilberg schreibt, dass gerade die „Abfolge alltäglicher Erledigungen in den gewaltigen Vernichtungsprozess mündete.“ Bestätigt Ihre Forschung dieses Festhalten an einem vermeintlich konkreten Alltagskanon als Voraussetzung und Notwendigkeit für den Holocaust“
Unbedingt. Denn dieser Alltag wurde zur Routine und dennoch hat er die Aufseherinnen bisweilen überfordert. Das hängt mit der Zunahme der Belegung zusammen. Diesem Chaos waren sie in ihrer Alltäglichkeit eigentlich auch nicht mehr richtig gewachsen. Und diese Tatsache wurde zur Chance für die Häftlinge. Das kriegen wir immer wieder erzählt. Sie waren froh, wenn die Aufseherinnen fast Angst hat ten vor Schmutz, vor Krach, vor Lärm, vor Überfüllung. Und trotzdem haben sich einige in ihrer Statur dann doch entsprechend behauptet, die keine Handlungsspielräume zugelassen aben. Sie haben diese vermeintliche Normalität praktiziert. Es ist wichtig, das Geschehen in verschiedenen Zeitetappen zu betrachten. Man darf den Anfang nicht mit dem Ende vergleichen. Dementsprechend haben die einen sich gleichmäßig verhalten, routiniert, und die anderen waren eben dieser Routine nicht mehr gewachsen, weil es gar keine wirklich Routine mehr gab, weil sie auch ein wenig außer Kontrolle geriet. Es gab also wirklich zunehmende Spielräume für die Überlebenden, die andererseits eine zunehmende Brutalität auslösten.
Inwiefern ist die Unterscheidung zwischen männlichen und weiblichen TäterInnen im Nationalsozialismus notwendig, inwieweit dient sie der Mythenbildung und wirkt somit verfälschend?
Ich glaube, und betrachte dass an dieser Stelle ethnologisch, diese Mythenbildung ist ein Produkt der Zeit nach 1945. Und sie ist sehr gefährlich. Weil man die Rolle der Aufseherinnen einfach abtut mit den Worten: „Sie war ein schönes Biest.“ Das ist die einfachste Form eines Urteils, schön verbrämt noch, ummantelt - einfach falsch. Ich denke ganz im Gegenteil, man muss gerade solchen Biografien gründlich nachgehen, sehr präzise nach Quellen suchen, möglichst noch das letzte Mosaiksteinchen zusammenfinden, um genau diesem Bild, dieser Mythenbildung zu widersprechen. Die waren alle schön und blond und Biester. „Mehr nicht?“, fragt man dann eigentlich gleich. Es ist einfach ganz furchtbar. Zum Teil waren das grausame Verbrecherinnen, keine Biester, sondern Mörderinnen.
Wie gelang den ehemaligen Aufseherinnen die Integration in die Nachkriegsgesellschaft? Wurden die Biografien der Frauen innerfamiliär aufgearbeitet oder vielmehr verdrängt? Wie erinner(te)n sie sich an ihren Dienst in der nationalsozialistischen Diktatur im KZ-System?
Es gibt einige, die verurteilt worden sind, auch zum Tode. Einige sind ganz normal in die Gesellschaft zurückgekehrt, sind untergetaucht, haben in Vorbereitung der Ausstellung gesagt: „Ja ,ich bin die..., aber ich stehe nicht zur Verfügung.“
Zu nennen ist an dieser Stelle auch das Thema der Rehabilitierungsverfahren ab 1992. Die hat es ja auch gegeben. Da hatte ich auch eine Magisterstudentin, die eine Arbeit dazu gemacht hat, über diese berühmten Vorgänge, die sich da unmittelbar nach der Wende abspielten. Dass dann Aufseherinnen plötzlich Entschädigungen haben wollten, weil sie nach 1945 beispielsweise in Sachsenhausen eingesperrt waren. Solche haben dann auch versucht, sich bei diesem Entschädigungskonzept zu melden und irgendwelche Gelder zu bekommen. Das ist auch gelungen. Doch die Überlebenden haben protestiert, und eine ehemalige Aufseherin hat dann auch zurückgezahlt.
Welche Reaktionen rief die Ausstellung denn insbesondere in der nahen Umgebung des ehemaligen Lagers hervor?
Es war sehr interessant zu beobachten. Es kamen am Anfang relativ viele Fürstenberger plötzlich in die Gedenkstätte, die vorher nie kamen. Das haben unsere Damen, die die Ausstellung begleiten, beobachtet. Die Fürstenberger kennen sich ja ziemlich gut untereinander. Und das war in den ersten Wochen ganz spannend. Sie waren neugierig, fragten sich, was wir zeigen und wie wir es zeigen. Wir haben kaum eine Reaktion gehört. Und die Besucherzahlen gingen sehr schnell wieder zurück. Die Neugierde war sehr schnell befriedigt, denn man liebt diesen Ort ohnehin nicht. Und man ist eigentlich nur gekommen, um in diese Ausstellung zu gehen.
Wie gefällt Ihnen selbst denn letztendlich die Ausstellung?
Ich finde die Ausstellung gestalterisch nicht gelungen. Das sage ich auch ganz ehrlich. Es ist etwas passiert, was nicht hätte passieren sollen. Das Haus ist durch diesen Einbau, der gemacht wurde, zerstört. Dieser massive Einbau der Wände mag einem gestalterischen Konzept entsprechen, aber ich hätte mir im Sinne des behutsamen Umgangs mit dem Haus und den Räumen eine sehr behutsame Ausstellung vorgestellt. Es hieß vom Gestaltungsbüro, die Wände mögen die Räume brechen. Das “anheimelnde Haus“ müsse gebrochen werden. Doch dadurch breche ich gar nichts. Die Aussagen sind stark genug.
Das ist eine unnötige Übertreibung finde ich.
Genau so ist es. Der Ort braucht diese Wände nicht. Die Gestaltung überfrachtet das Haus. Es merkt aber keiner, weil die Besucher im Besucherbuch ja nur artikulieren, dass es gut ist, dass es eine solche Ausstellung gibt. Es ist richtig schade. Einige der Überlebenden haben gesagt, sie werden nicht sagen, dass es ihnen nicht gefällt, sie werden einfach nichts sagen.
Vielen Dank für das Gespräch.
Interview: Maria Neumann
2006/7 EVS-Freiwillige bei Gedenkdienst
The circle is the most primordial of geometric shapes. Among the wide range of organic patterns in nature, only rarely do we see triangles or rectangles. They are the hallmark of human-made things. Circles, however, have dominated our experience of nature for millennia. We see its shape in the sun that provides light and warmth, in the mysteriously peaceful glow of the moon, and in the journey of all heavenly bodies across the sky. The circle gave us the wheel, which empowered us to travel longer and further, ultimately culminating in the realization that the entire world, and perhaps the universe itself, are circular. Even our visual experience of the environment bears the kinship shape of the ellipse, as determined by the contours of our eye’s field of view. We would not see the world at all, nor have that proverbial opportunity to glimpse into the human soul, if not for the perfectly round iris and pupil of the human eye.
For all these reasons, circles are embedded in our minds as a fundamental experience and archetypic symbol. It represents unity, wholeness, completion, fullness, connectedness, and perfection, which is why we often associate it with the cosmos, spiritual energy, and a God with no beginning or end. It is the infinite and the eternal, as well as the sign of movement, mobility, repetition, cycles, and revolution. Because the circle encloses what is inside, it conveys the feeling of boundary, focus, centering, embodiment, and containment. In various religions throughout history, the circle symbolized the nurturing womb, sacred space, and the human psyche, as evident in the circular mandalas of Buddhism and Hinduism.
As you can see, it’s easy to wax the poetic about the circle. So let’s not forget some of its possible negative connotations. Despite its suggestion of unity, a circle can create inclusivity versus exclusivity. Some things belong inside; some are left out. Especially with small circles, the enclosure might feel insular, claustrophobic, even like a trap. The endless repetition of its shape might also suggest a lack of direction and aimlessness. No one wants to be accused of circular reasoning or walking in circles. Finally, a circle is zero, emptiness, nothing at all.
Given the variety of meanings we associate with the circle, it becomes a powerful device in photographic composition. In fact, circular compositions have been popular throughout the history of art and photography. They take at least four different forms: (1) a circular object serves as the primary subject of the image, (2) objects or people appear in a circular formation, (3) the placement of elements in a photo encourages the eye to move in a circular pattern around the image, and, (4) the corners of the frame are softened or rounded off in order to create a circular feeling to the photo. Complex pictures might combine two or more of these compositional approaches. Elliptical shapes can serve the same purposes as circular ones because the eye often perceives them as circles viewed from an angle.
A Circular Object as the Primary Subject
Our environment generously offers us a wide range of circular things to shoot. Besides eyes, wheels, and the heavenly bodies already mentioned, there are balls, clocks, fruit, globes, plates, cups, gears, disks, gauges, table tops, and signs, to name a few. Their circularity has an intrinsic appeal, both symbolically and on a purely visual level. Circular things are microcosms, worlds unto themselves. If there are several of them in a photo, they might suggest worlds joining, separating, cooperating, competing, or colliding. If they are embedded within each other, they reveal the mystical puzzle of worlds within worlds.
The circularity of objects can be pleasantly emphasized by their juxtaposition with the rectangular frame of the photo. The abruptness of the frame’s right angles provides a contrast to the smoothness of the curves. Circular objects within square frames can be particularly appealing, as both shapes are perfectly symmetrical, yet very different.
Because they possess that feeling of an enclosing movement, circular objects also lend themselves readily to the Gestalt law of perception known as “closure.” Circularity is so powerfully suggestive that the eye will complete the shape of a circular object even if only a part of it, even as little as a third, appears in the photo. We only need to see a small segment of a wheel in order to imagine the rest of it arching out of the frame and then curving back into it. In its power to unify, the partially visible circularity joins together the space inside and outside the frame.
Circular Formations
Objects arranged in a circular pattern within a photo tend to create a sense of organization and unity. Even in cases where the image might otherwise look confusing, a circular formation can help simplify it by creating the impression of order. In fact, painters attempting to cope with a work that is starting to become chaotic sometimes resolve the problem by rearranging an element to create the suggestion of a circular pattern. Such control over the picture isn’t always possible in photography when shooting a scene, although photo-editing programs do give us the power to rearrange the elements of the image, similar to painting.
The circular formation draws the eye inward into the image, thereby preventing it from wandering outside the bounds of the frame. The viewer’s attention becomes absorbed into the circuit, moving along the circumference of the circular pattern from one element to another, beginning at the point most prominent and later returning to it. Usually the effect is most appealing when the circular formation is subtle, perhaps barely noticed consciously by the viewer. An obviously circular design might feel contrived. As in the use of circular objects, circular compositions can be appealing in their contrast to the rectangular shape of the frame.
The effect of focusing attention on and within the circular formation can be so strong that elements outside it might not be noticed. For this reason, advocates of traditional composition say that the primary subject should lie either along or inside the circuit. If it appears outside, the eye will be thrown off the circular track. Of course, in an untraditional composition this might be exactly the effect you intend. If you want to create the idea of something being different, unconventional, not belonging, excluded, or disrupting order and continuity, place it outside the circular formation. An exit for the eye, like a door or window in the background, is another example of how placing something outside the circular pattern can enhance the quality of the image. Once the eye feels satisfied, it can leave the circuit as well as the image through the visual exit. Interesting elements outside the circular formation also can provide an intriguing balance of attention that alternates between focusing and opening up.
Radiating patterns often function similarly to circular ones. They might suggest movement bursting outward or converging inward, but they do beckon the eye towards a central point, while also creating rhythms that please the eye.
Circular Observations
In a composition that encourages circular observations, the eye first focuses on the dominant element of the composition, then moves outwards, curving around the image to notice other elements, and finally returns to the dominant element. The cycle might repeat itself, taking a slightly different path each time, but with the overall effect being a circular movement.
Although this type of composition bears similarities to circular formations, it differs in that the elements creating the circuit are not necessarily separate objects arranged in a circular pattern. Instead, interesting features of just one or two objects encourage a circular movement of the eye. The circular feeling is more a function of how the eye moves rather than a tangible visual arrangement of different objects. Imagine, for example, a subject staring intently into the camera, with one hand gently touching the shoulder and the other gripping the waist. The eye is tempted to move from the face, to one hand, then to the other hand, then return to the face.
Especially interesting images that stimulate circular observations take us on a gradual process of discovery. We begin by looking at the dominant component, but learn increasingly more about its meaning as we widen our attention to consider the other elements in the circuit. When we finally return to the dominant component, we see it with a deeper understanding than when we started.
Circular Internal Framing
In traditional theories of composition, artists take care to mute the viewer’s awareness of the edges and right angles of the frame. They don’t want anyone’s eyes getting locked into the corners or wandering out the boundaries of the image. They want to encourage the viewer’s attention to stay inside the picture. Some artists believe that it’s actually much easier to create good compositions within a rounded rather than rectangular frame - but perhaps due to the greater difficulty of producing oval and circular formats, they never caught on in painting and photography. One could also argue, as I have previously, that the contrast of a circular composition within a rectangular frame can be aesthetically pleasing.
Nevertheless, it is possible to smooth out the rectangularity by softening the corners with internal framing. For example, use leaves or clouds to round off the corners, or darken or lighten them with vignetting. Some people regard such tactics as clumsy substitutes for truly good circular composition that keeps the eye moving within the image. But if used subtly, in a way that captures a meaningful sensation or emotion (like being trapped), or in combination with other techniques for circular composition, internal framing can work quite well.
** This image and essay are part of a book on Photographic Psychology that I’m creating within Flickr. If anyone has photos that illustrate the ideas in this essay, please feel free to post and discuss them.
Here's an easier to read and navigate version of
Photographic Psychology
6:45 A.M., February 21, 2015, I looked out my window in Troy, New York, USA, to check the weather. Snow is expected, by mid-afternoon, & I wanted to see if it would come early & disrupt my plans, yet again. What I hadn't realized is that, for the sake of preserving my privacy (closed shades until I'm up & dressed), I've been depriving myself of sunrises, ever since I moved into my apartment! What a lovely surprise, this morning!
Thaumatophyllum sp. and T. giganteum - Self-Realization Fellowship Meditation Gardens, Encinitas, California
So... I had a realization earlier today about how much life can change in just one year. At this point last year I was still going to school for web design and I was extremely unhappy with the thought of coding and designing my life away.
In 2013 I made an epic and slightly sudden switch to photography and it has been such an amazing journey! There have been so many ups and downs, but all the changes have taught me so much and I have grown in art and also just as a person.
Anyways.. I know I don't post on flickr much anymore, but I just wanted to post this little update =) xoxo
Our Daily Challenge: Inconvenient
One of my most favorite local haunts is the Self Realization Fellowship in Encinitas, California. This image is of the spot where the original temple stood. Sadly it crumbled into sea in 1942 after only five years after being built. The original building is gone, but the fellowship is thriving. it is inconvenient that the original building is gone, but joyous that the gardens and the fellowship thrive today.
Thank you so much for your views, comments and favs. I really do appreciate every one!
My images are posted here for your enjoyment only. All rights are reserved. Please contact me through flickr if you are interested in using one.
The 11th. Batizado of the Grupo de Capoeira Beija-Flor on July 30th. celebrated the graduation of another 80 children and young people attended in our programme.
Lightly built and a capoeirist of promising talent, Diego proudly shows off the certificate for his third belt after three years of practicing the sport with our group. At this rate he will reach his apprenticeship at an early age.
The efficiency of Capoeira in social programmes is due to its wide-ranging scope to involve the lives of children and young people participating. It is a complete discipline including the use of rules, philosophy, positive group ethics, physical condition, creativity and values of self-esteem.
SIC Movie Realization Batman & Batpod. Finally i took it out!!!
Need to make the mini softbox back. Wasnt very keen on doing it after moving. Couldnt set it up nicely. Dont have a mini table.
Day 4 of 30.
Realization!
" But they will never seek for death, on account of the (sins) which their hands have sent on before them. and Allah is well-acquainted with the wrongdoers."
Surah Al-Baqra, Verse 95.
GA71 Side Event - Leaving No One Behind: Agents of Change for Achieving Goal 5 and the 2030 Agenda during the 71st Session of the United Nations General Assembly. 24 September 2016.
While there are many diverse actors working to implement the 2030 Agenda, the voices and perspectives of those working at the grassroots and local level are central to ensuring that real and inclusive change is made. Women’s civil society and human rights organizations, girls’ activist groups, and men and boys engaged in advancing gender equality at the local level, have a unique role to play in our collective realization of SDG5 and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development more broadly.
Through this high-level event Canada, UN Women and other partners are providing a space to promote the important role of these civil society actors and partners as agents of change, in the context of achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls by the year 2030.
Speakers, Panelists, Participants Include:
Elizabeth Plank, Moderator; Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, Minister of International Development and La Francophonie, Canada; Shahriar Alam, Minister of State, Foreign Affairs, Bangladesh; UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka; Martin Bille Hermann, State Secretary for Development Policy, Denmark; Baroness Patricia Scotland, Secretary General, The Commonwealt; Gary Cohen, Together for Girls Founder; Laure Zonga-Hien, Ministre de la Femme, de la Solidarité nationale et de la Famille, Burkina Faso; Patricia Herdt, OIF; Sister Winifred Doherty, Director, Working Group on Girls; Mervis, Plan International Girl Advocate; Eneless, Plan International Girl Advocate; Aasha, Girl Activist, Working Group on Girls; Dr. Alaa Murabit, Voice of Libyan Women; Ishita Chaudhry, Member, High Level Task Force, International Conference on Population and Development;
Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
Due to the restrictions of the Versailles treaties, the Reichswehr was already dealing with the increasing mobilization and motorization of the army after the end of the First World War. The realization that the speed of the troop units required appropriate equipment was available early on. However, the Reichswehr suffered from financial constraints and during the Weimar Republic the industry only had limited capacity for series production of larger, armored vehicles.
Nevertheless, at that time the Sd.Kfz. 3 (unarmored half-track transport vehicle/1927), the ARW (eight-wheel car/1928) and the ZRW (ten-wheel car/1928) provided fundamental experience. The findings of these tests and the troop testing with the Sd.Kfz. 3 enabled a more precise specification of the new vehicles to be developed. The "heavy" armored cars were primarily intended for the reconnaissance units of the new armored forces.
The incipient rearmament could only start with a "cheap" solution, though. A three-part armored structure for the chassis of commercially available off-road trucks was developed by the Army Weapons Office, Dept. WaTest 6, in cooperation with the company Deutsche Eisenwerke AG. The typical truck chassis featured front-wheel steering and a driven bogie at the rear (4x6 layout). In June 1929, the companies Magirus, Daimler-Benz and Büssing-NAG were commissioned to develop the desired armored car from it. If you consider that this truck class was developed for a payload of 1.5t, you can already conclude from this that the vehicles, which are now equipped with a significantly heavy armored structure, had little off-road mobility. Even if the appearance of the vehicles supplied by the different manufacturers was similar, there were external distinguishing features by which the manufacturer could be identified. The vehicles were tested in the Reichswehr from 1932 and introduced later.
One of the four crew members (driver, commander, gunner, radio-operator) was used as a reverse driver: with the narrow streets of the time and a turning circle of between 13 and 16m, this function was essential for a truck-sized heavy reconnaissance vehicle. The chassis had the excellent ladder-type configuration, able to withstand the stress of rough rides at high speed. The scout car was 5570 mm long, 1820 mm wide, 2250 mm high and weighed 5.35, 5.7 or 6 tons, depending on the manufacturer. The hull was made of welded steel armor, 5 to 14.5 mm (0.2-0.57 in) thick depending on the angle (bottom to front) with well-sloped plates. The armament consisted of a 2 cm KwK 30 with 200 rounds and a MG 13 with 1300 rounds in a manually operated turret. The fuel supply was 90, 105 or 110 liters, but with a consumption of about 35 or 40 liters per 100 km, this resulted in a completely inadequate range for a scout car.
Having no true alternatives at hand, the armored 4x6 car was accepted and became known as the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-wheel), and it was subsequently developed into two more vehicles. Up until 1937, 123 vehicles were built as Sd.Kfz. 231 reconnaissance cars and Sd.Kfz. 232 radio trucks. A further 28 were manufactured as Sd.Kfz. 263 (Panzerfunkwagen) command vehicles.
As early as 1932, after testing the pilot series, it was clear that the interim solution of "cheap" 6-wheel vehicles would not meet the future requirements of the armored divisions now planned. It was planned that from 1935/36 at least 18 vehicles of a new type that would meet the requirements for off-road mobility and high road speeds should be produced annually. Büssing-NAG had obviously made a good impression with the ARW and was now commissioned to make the revised vehicle ready for series production, which would become the SdKfz. 231 (8-Rad). The overall concept was completed between 1934 and 1935 and already showed all the features of the future type: all 8 wheels driven and steered, the same speed forwards and backwards, ability to change direction in less than 10 seconds, and a turning circle of "only" 10.5m. The vehicle layout was changed, too: the engine bay was relocated to the rear, the crew compartment was placed at the front end. This improved weight distribution, handling, and the field of view for the main forward driver.
The purpose of the new vehicles was identical to that of the earlier heavy 6-wheel vehicles, they were used on the same sites and so the same ordnance inventory designation was adopted, despite the vehicle’s many modifications. The so-called Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) was armed, corresponding to its 6-Rad counterpart, with a 2cm KwK 30 and the MG 13 (later MG 34) in a rotating turret. Likewise, the Sd.Kfz. 232 (8-Rad) carried a large, curved bow antenna, and there was a Sd.Kfz. 263 (8-Rad) command vehicle, too.
Nevertheless, the Army Weapons Office demanded a short-term solution for a vehicle based on the 4x6 chassis that offered better off-road performance and armament, namely a 37 mm anti-tank gun, with at least comparable range and armor protection. This interim vehicle was supposed to be ready for service in early 1934. Magirus accepted the challenge and proposed the Sd.Kfz. 241, a 4x8 vehicle. It retained the old overall 6-Rad layout with the front engine under a long bonnet, but it had a fourth steered axle added to lower ground pressure and improve the vehicle’s trench bridging capabilities. The powered two rear axles retained the 6-Rad’s twin wheels, so that the vehicle stood on a total of twelve tires with a relatively large footprint. The armored hull was very similar to the Sd.Kfz. 231 6-Rad, but carried a new, bigger turret with a 3.7 cm KwK 30 L/45 gun and an axis-parallel 7.92 mm MG 34 light machine gun.
The box-shaped turret exploited the hull’s width to the maximum and had a maximum armor of 15 mm, no base and the seat of the commander was attached to the tower wall. The commander sat elevated under a raised cupola in the rear section of the turret, just behind the main gun. He had five viewing slits protected by glass blocks and steel slides for all-round visibility. The gunner/loader, standing to the left of the main gun, had to constantly follow the movement of the turret, which was done by hand. In order to support the gunner when slewing the turret, the commander had an additional handle on the right side. The two crew members also had a turret position indicator.
The cannon was fired electrically via a trigger, the machine gun was operated mechanically with a pedal. To aim and view the outside, the gunner had a gun sight to the left of the gun with an opening in the gun mantlet. Standard access to the vehicle was through low double-doors in the vehicle’ flank, but side exit openings in the turret with two flaps each were also frequently used to board it. Another entry was through the commander cupola’s lid.
With all this extra hardware, the Sd.Kfz. 241’s overall weight rose considerably from the late Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) nearly 6 tons to 7.5 tons. As a consequence, the chassis had to be reinforced and a more powerful engine was used, a 6-cylinder Maybach HL 42 TRKM w carburetor gasoline engine with 4170 cc capacity and 100 hp (74 kW) output at 3000 rpm.
As expected, the Sd.Kfz. 241 was not a success. Even though the first vehicles were delivered in time in mid-1934, its operational value was rather limited. Off-road capability was, due to the extra weight, the raised center of gravity and the lack of all-wheel drive, just as bad as the 6-Rad vehicles, and the more powerful engine’s higher fuel consumption allowed neither higher range, despite bigger fuel tanks, nor a better street performance. The only real progress was the new 3.7 cm KwK 30’s firepower, which was appreciated by the crews, even though the weapon was only effective against armored targets at close range. At 100 m, 64 mm of vertical armor could be penetrated, but at 500 m this already dropped to 31 mm, any angle in the armor weakened its hitting power even further. The weapon’s maximum range was 5.000m, though, and with HE rounds the Sd.Kfz. 241 could provide indirect fire support. Another factor that limited the vehicle’s effectiveness was that the gun had to be operated by a single crew member who had to load and aim at the same time – there was simply not enough space for a separate loader who would also have increased the gun’s rate of fire from six to maybe twelve rounds per minute. The vehicle’s armor was also inadequate and only gave protection against light firearms, but not against machine guns or heavier weapons. On the other side, the cupola on top of the turret offered the commander in his elevated position a very good all-round field of view, even when under full protection – but this progressive detail was not adopted for the following armored reconnaissance vehicles and remained exclusive to German battle tanks.
Only a total of fifty-five Sd.Kfz. 241s were completed by Magirus in Cologne until 1936, when production of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) vehicle family started and soon replaced the Sd.Kfz. 241, which was primarily operated at the Eastern Front in Poland and Czechoslovakia. By 1940, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left in any frontline army unit, but a few survivors were grouped together and handed over to police units. Their main gun was either completely deleted or sometimes replaced with a second machine gun, and they were used for urban patrols and riot control duties. However, by 1942, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left over.
Specifications:
Crew: Four (commander, gunner, driver, radio operator/rear driver)
Weight: 7.5 tons (11.450 lb)
Length: 5,85 metres (19 ft 2 in)
Width: 2,20 metres (7 ft 2 ½ in)
Height: 2,78 metres (9 ft 1 in)
Ground clearance: 28.5 cm (10 in)
Suspension: Torsion bar and leaf springs
Fuel capacity: 150 litres (33 imp gal; 40 US gal)
Armor:
8–15 mm (0.31 – 0.6 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 70 km/h (43.5 mph)
52 km/h (32.3 mph) backwards
Operational range: 250 km (155 miles)
Power/weight: 13 PS/ton
Engine:
Maybach HL42 TRKM water-cooled straight 6-cylinder petrol engine with 100 hp (74 kW),
driving the rear pair of axles
Transmission:
Maybach gearbox with 5-speed forward and 4-speed reverse
Armament:
1× 37 mm KwK 30 L/45 cannon with 70 rounds
1× 7.92 mm MG 34 machine gun mounted co-axially with 1.300 rounds
The kit and its assembly:
This fictional armored car was inspired by a leftover rear axles from an Italeri Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) model that I converted into a fictional half-track variant some time ago. I wondered if the set could be transplanted under an 8-Rad chassis, to create a kind of missing link to the 8x8 successors of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) with a total of twelve tires on four axles.
The basis became a First to Fight 1:72 Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) kit – a rather simple and robust affair, apparently primarily intended for tabletop purposes. But the overall impression is good, and it would be modified, anyway, even though the plastic turned out to be rather soft/waxy and the parts’ sprue attachment points a bit wacky.
The hull was “turned around” to drive backwards, so that its rear engine ended up in the front. I eventually only used the rear twin wheels from the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad), but not its single axles and laminated springs. Instead, I first cut the OOB mudguards in two halves, removed their side skirts and glued them onto the lower hull in reversed order, so that the exhausts and their muffler boxes would end up at the rear of the front fenders. With these in place I checked the axles’ position from the OOB ladder chassis, which is a single, integral part, and found that the rear axles’ position had to be moved by 2mm backwards. Cutting the original piece and re-arranging it was easier to scratch a new rear suspension, and the rocker bars had to be shortened to accept the wider twin wheels.
The original small turret with the 20 mm autocannon was deleted and replaced with core elements from a Panzer III turret, left over from previous conversion projects. Wider than any original turret of the Sd.Kfz. 231/232 family, it had to be narrowed by roughly 5mm – I had to cut a respective plug from the turret’s and the mantlet’s middle section, the deformed hatch was covered under a Panzer III commander cupola. To mate the re-arranged turret with the OOB adapter plate to mount it onto the hull, and to add overall stability to the construction, I filled the interior with 2C putty.
The typical storage bin at the turret’s rear was omitted, though, it would have made it too large for the compact truck chassis. The shape was a perfect stylistic match, even though, with the longer gun barrel, the vehicle reminds a lot of the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car?
Most small details like the bumpers and the headlights were taken OOB, I added a whip antenna base at the rear and mounted two spare wheels at the back, one of them covered with a tarpaulin (made from paper tissue drenched with white glue, this was also used to create the gun mantlet seals).
Painting and markings:
Typical for German vehicles from the early WWII stages the Sd.Kfz. 241 was painted Panzergrau (RAL 7021; I used Humbrol 67, which is authentic, but mixed it with some 125 to create a slightly lighter shade of grey) overall - quite dull, but realistic. To make the vehicle look more interesting, though, I added authentic contemporary camouflage in the form of low-contrast blotches with RAL 8017, a very dark reddish brown, mixed from Humbrol 160 and some 98. Better, but IMHO still not enough.
After the model received a washing with highly thinned red-brown acrylic artist paint I applied the few decals and gave the parts an overall dry-brushing treatment with grey and dark earth. Everything was sealed with matt acrylic varnish. For even more “excitement”, I decided to add a coat of snow.
For the simulated “frosting” I used white tile grout – which has the benefits of being water-soluble, quite sturdy to touch and the material does not yellow over time like gypsum.
First, the wheels, the chassis and the inside of the wheel arches received a separate treatment with relatively dryly mixed tile grout, simulating snow and dirt clusters. Once thoroughly dried, the wheels were mounted. Then the model was sprayed with low surface tension water and loose tile grout was drizzled over hull and turret, creating a flaky coat of fake snow. Once dry again, everything received another coat of matt acrylic varnish to protect and fixate everything further.
A relatively quick build, done in a few days. The First to Fight kit is very simple and went together well, but I’d use something else the next time due to the odd material it was molded with. The outcome of an 4x8 scout car looks quite plausible, though, like the missing link between the Sd.Kfz. 231 and 232 – the unintended similarity with the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car was a bit surprising, though. And the snow on the model eventually makes it look a bit more interesting, the stunt was worth the effort.
For the full review of this action figure please check it out here → bitly.com/1Bp4VMZ
Facebook page → www.facebook.com/locustblogsite
In 1960, the US Army came to the realization that it had no real scout helicopter: the OH-13 Sioux could operate effectively in the role, but it was aging and its slow speed made it vulnerable to ground fire. The O-1/L-19 Birddog was a good scout aircraft, but it did not have the mobility of a helicopter. With this in mind, the Army issued a requirement for a Light Observation Helicopter (LOH). The new helicopter needed reasonably high speed, good visibility from the cockpit, and be not too expensive. Bell, Hiller and Hughes all developed prototypes; in 1965, the Army chose Hughes' Model 369 as the OH-6A Cayuse, and placed an order for 1300 helicopters.
The Army was then presented with a problem. Hughes did not have a large factory, and was run by the mercurial and unpredictable Howard Hughes: there was a real concern that Hughes could not deliver the order. Moreover, the Army learned that Hughes had deliberately undercut Bell's and Hiller's bids to win the contract, and as such was taking massive losses on the OH-6. The Army then reopened the competition, and Bell's OH-58A Kiowa won this time: the Army would use both helicopters. As for Hughes, the company would later make up the losses by marketing the OH-6 as the Model 369 and later the Model 500.
The OH-6A entered service in 1966, and was sent to Vietnam soon thereafter. Though given the name Cayuse (as part of the US Army's tradition of naming helicopters after native tribes), this name never stuck: instead, the helicopter was nicknamed Loach, after the LOH project name and its buglike appearance. Loaches were quickly armed with field modification kits to carry machine guns, and were usually paired with the also newly-arrived AH-1 Cobra as a "Pink Team." The job of the Pink Team was to scout ahead of the UH-1 "slicks" carrying troops: the OH-6 would come over at low level to see if it drew ground fire. If it did, it would then call in the AH-1s to attack the enemy position and clear the landing zone. This hunter-killer team proved very effective, if dangerous to the OH-6 crews: of 1420 OH-6s built, 842 were shot down over Vietnam.
Because of the heavy losses over Vietnam, the scout role after the war was gradually taken over by the OH-58A, which was cheaper to buy and easier to maintain. OH-6s began to be passed on to Reserve and National Guard units, but got a new lease on life after 1980: the Army still needed a small helicopter that could land in places the OH-58 or UH-1 could not. The OH-6 was the only aircraft that fit the bill, and several dozen were seconded to Task Force 158 in preparation for an operation to free the American hostages in Tehran, Iran. The hostages were freed by the Iranians themselves in 1980, but the Army recognized the need for an elite force trained in night operations, and renamed the unit Task Force 160--known to its crews as the "Nightstalkers."
TF 160 proved its worth during Operation Prime Chance, the United States' undeclared naval and air war against Iran in 1988, and the OH-6s were redesignated MH-6 (for transport OH-6s) and AH-6 (for armed versions). Nicknamed "Little Birds" by their crews, TF 160 worked closely with the elite and secretive Delta Force, most notably in the Battle of Mogadishu in 1993, where they were the only gunships available to the beleaguered Army forces in the Somalian city. The standard OH-6 has been retired from Army units, but the MH-6 and AH-6 remain in service. The Cayuse also remains operational with Spain and Japan, though in both cases it is being replaced.
Very little can be found on OH-6A 67-16132, though there is a very good chance that it served in Vietnam. Following its return to the United States, 67-16132 was likely passed to the Utah National Guard's 211th Aviation Regiment, and was retired in the late 1980s. It was donated to the Hill Aerospace Museum in Ogden, Utah, where it remained until 2006, but as 67-16132 is an Army helicopter, the USAF donated it to the Fort Douglas Museum in nearby Salt Lake City--which was felt to be more appropriate.
Of Fort Douglas' three helicopters, 67-16132 is the best preserved (though all three are in good condition). It carries standard Army olive drab camouflage, with an air cavalry emblem on the rear fuselage.
Towards the end of the Korean War, the USAF came to the realization that their transport fleet was becoming obsolete. The C-46 Commandos and C-47 Skytrains in service were no longer adequate, while the C-119 Flying Boxcar was having difficulties. In 1951, the USAF issued a requirement for a new tactical transport, an aircraft that would need to carry at least 72 passengers, be capable of dropping paratroopers, and have a ramp for loading vehicles directly into the cargo compartment. Moreover, it must be a “clean sheet” design, not a conversion from an existing airliner, and the USAF preferred it be a turboprop design. Five companies submitted designs, and six months later the USAF chose Lockheed’s L-402 design—over the misgivings of Lockheed’s chief designer, Clarence “Kelly” Johnson, who warned that the L-402 would destroy the company. Little was Johnson to know that, fifty years later, the L-402—designated C-130 Hercules by the USAF—would still be in production, and one out of only five aircraft to have over 50 years of service with the original purchaser.
The C-130 was designed to give mostly unfettered access to a large cargo compartment—the ramp forms an integral part of the rear fuselage, the wing is mounted above the fuselage, and the landing gear is carried in sponsons attached to the fuselage itself, while the fuselage has a circular design to maximize loading potential. The high wing also gives the C-130 good lift, especially in “high and hot” situations. The Allison T56 turboprop was designed specifically for the Hercules, and has gone on to become one of the most successful turboprop designs in history.
After two YC-130 prototypes, the Hercules went into production as the C-130A in 1956, to be superseded by the improved C-130B in 1959. The latter became the baseline Hercules variant: C-130As had three-blade propellers and a rounded “Roman” nose, while the B introduced the more familiar, longer radar nose and four-blade propellers. In the 50 years hence, the basic C-130 design has not changed much: the C-130E introduced underwing external fuel tanks, while the C-130H has a slightly different wing. Even the new C-130J variant only introduced new engines with more fuel efficient six-bladed propellers: the basic design remains the same. Lockheed also offers stretched versions of the Hercules, initially as a civilian-only option (the L-100-30); the British Royal Air Force bought this version as the C-130K and it was later adopted by other nations, including the United States.
The basic C-130 is strictly a transport aircraft, but the versatility of the aircraft has meant it has been modified into a dizzying number of variants. These include the AC-130 Spectre gunship, the HC-130 rescue aircraft and WC-130 weather reconnaissance version. Other versions include several dozen EC-130 electronic warfare/Elint variants, KC-130 tankers, and DC-130 drone aircraft controllers. The USAF, the US Navy, and the US Marine Corps are all C-130 operators as well. Besides the United States, there are 67 other operators of C-130s, making it one of the world’s most prolific aircraft. C-130s are also used extensively by civilian operators as well as the L-100 series.
The “Herky Bird,” as it is often nicknamed, has participated in every military campaign fought by the United States since 1960 in one variation or the other. During Vietnam, it was used in almost every role imaginable, from standard transport to emergency bomber. It was also instrumental in resupplying the Khe Sanh garrison during its three-month siege. Hercules crews paid the price as well: nearly 70 C-130s were lost during the Vietnam War. In foreign service, C-130s have also been used heavily, the most famous instance of which was likely the Israeli Entebbe Raid of 1976, one of the longest-ranged C-130 missions in history. C-130s are often in the forefront of humanitarian missions to trouble spots around the world.
As of this writing, over 2300 C-130s have been built, and most are still in service. It remains the backbone of the USAF’s tactical transport service; attempts to replace it with the Advanced Tactical Transport Program (ATTP) in the 1980s and to supplement it with the C-27J Spartan in the 2000s both failed, as the USAF realized that the only real replacement for a C-130 is another C-130.
This version of the C-130 is a HC-130P version, codenamed Combat King. These were designed to support air rescue operations, with dedicated crew and electronics to coordinate rescue missions between the downed aircrew, rescue helicopters, and any escorts or aircraft on station. The squared off nose housed a more advanced radar than the standard C-130. The tanks under the wing were hose/drogue refueling pods for helicopters such as the HH-53 Super Jolly Green Giant. In Vietnam, these aircraft used the callsign "Crown."
This aircraft, 65-0993, belonged to the 41st Air Rescue and Recovery Squadron, at the time operating from McClellan AFB, California. Dad got this picture on the Malmstrom AFB flightline after it made a fuel stop. It carries the standard Southeast Asia camouflage scheme of C-130s at the time. This aircraft was later modified to a MC-130P Combat Shadow aircraft (with the same role), and was retired from USAF service in 2014. It is currently in storage at AMARC at Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona.
Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky.
Rainer Maria Rilke
Special thanks to franak malaie
I think you should press L :)
You can see more of this shooting in my website LDmag.ir
In the early 1950s, air forces around the world came to the realization that it made little sense to train pilots on older piston-engined trainers, then expect them to go from those aircraft to high-performance jets without a high accident rate. Most nations with an aviation industry then embarked on designing jet trainers and a training syllabus entirely with jets.
For the Soviet Union, it would not only need a jet trainer, it would need thousands of them, to equip not only its own air force, but those of the Warsaw Pact and client states. The Khrushchev regime learned that two of the Pact nations were working on their own trainers--Aero of Czechoslovakia was designing the L-29 Delfin (Dolphin), while PZL of Poland was working on the TS-11 Iskra (Spark). Surprisingly for the Soviet Union, it issued a requirement for the jet trainer and opened it up to a competition between the two aircraft.
Aero's L-29 was designed to be everything a trainer should be: easy to fly, easy to maintain, forgiving of mistakes, and capable of simple aerobatics. As Soviet doctrine called for aircraft capable of operating from austere airstrips, the L-29 was given a strengthened landing gear, and for either weapons training or in emergencies, could be equipped with four underwing hardpoints for bombs, rockets or gunpods. It was not particularly fast and considered underpowered, but that was less important in a trainer.
The L-29 would first fly in 1959, and went up against the TS-11 in 1961. To the surprise of many, considering the TS-11 was faster, the L-29 was declared the winner. Suspecting politics and wishing to keep some independence, the Polish Air Force would never use the Delfin, and would make the Iskra its primary jet trainer. For the rest of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union, the L-29 would go into production. NATO would give it the reporting name of Maya.
Some 27 nations would eventually fly L-29s, as trainers, but occasionally in combat as well: Egyptian L-29s were pressed into service during the 1973 Yom Kippur (October) War as ground attack aircraft, and they were also used in the Biafran War of 1967-1970 and the First Nagorno-Karabakh War of 1988-1994 between Azerbaijan and Armenia. In these cases, the Delfin did not do well, but it was never intended to fight against modern air defenses. Saddam Hussein reportedly converted a number of his L-29s to drones, intended to carry poison gas towards Coalition forces in 2003, though they never flew.
While the L-29 was adequate, as aircraft got faster and more manueverable, the Delfin was becoming obsolete. In response, Aero designed the L-39 Albatros, a more advanced trainer, and L-29 production ended in 1974 after 3665 had been produced. Though most L-29 users replaced it with the L-39, some continued with the Delfin, and Angola and Georgia would use it as late as 2016. After the end of the Cold War, many Delfins became available on the open market, and while not as common as its Western equivalent--the T-33 Shooting Star--or its successor the L-39, L-29s are found in small numbers in the warbird community, and a few have raced in the Reno Air Races.
This is one of those L-29s. N37KF, also known as "Raju Grace," was originally built for the Czech Air Force in 1969. During its long career, it was Bort 3233. Retired in the early 1990s, Bort 3233 was stored until around 2008, when it was acquired by the Kendall Flight Corporation in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania. 3233 became N37KF, and received a striking all-red scheme, with a nude female figure and a snake on both sides of the fuselage. Since it was intended to be a racer, the original Motorlet engine was replaced by a much more powerful Rolls-Royce Viper, turning this L-29 into a true hot rod.
N37KF participated twice in the Reno Air Races, in 2010 and 2011, though it suffered some damage just before the 2011 race, when the engine accidentally melted the rudder. Luckily the pilot was able to get "Raju Grace" back down before it suffered catastrophic damage. In 2018, the aircraft seems to have been sold, and it was at Forgotten Warbirds in Brigham City, Utah when I saw it in July 2023.
Right now, "Raju Grace" isn't at her best, but it's being restored back to flying again, so far as I know. L-29s aren't the most sleek of aircraft, especially compared to the L-39, but this one is by far the most impressive Delfin I've seen.
Towards the end of the Korean War, the USAF came to the realization that their transport fleet was becoming obsolete. The C-46 Commandos and C-47 Skytrains in service were no longer adequate, while the C-119 Flying Boxcar was having difficulties. In 1951, the USAF issued a requirement for a new tactical transport, an aircraft that would need to carry at least 72 passengers, be capable of dropping paratroopers, and have a ramp for loading vehicles directly into the cargo compartment. Moreover, it must be a “clean sheet” design, not a conversion from an existing airliner, and the USAF preferred it be a turboprop design. Five companies submitted designs, and six months later the USAF chose Lockheed’s L-402 design—over the misgivings of Lockheed’s chief designer, Clarence “Kelly” Johnson, who warned that the L-402 would destroy the company. Little was Johnson to know that, fifty years later, the L-402—designated C-130 Hercules by the USAF—would still be in production, and one out of only five aircraft to have over 50 years of service with the original purchaser.
The C-130 was designed to give mostly unfettered access to a large cargo compartment—the ramp forms an integral part of the rear fuselage, the wing is mounted above the fuselage, and the landing gear is carried in sponsons attached to the fuselage itself, while the fuselage has a circular design to maximize loading potential. The high wing also gives the C-130 good lift, especially in “high and hot” situations. The Allison T56 turboprop was designed specifically for the Hercules, and has gone on to become one of the most successful turboprop designs in history.
After two YC-130 prototypes, the Hercules went into production as the C-130A in 1956, to be superseded by the improved C-130B in 1959. The latter became the baseline Hercules variant: C-130As had three-blade propellers and a rounded “Roman” nose, while the B introduced the more familiar, longer radar nose and four-blade propellers. (Virtually all A models were later retrofitted to the long nose, though they kept the three-blade propellers.) In the 50 years hence, the basic C-130 design has not changed much: the C-130E introduced underwing external fuel tanks, while the C-130H has a slightly different wing. Even the new C-130J variant only introduced new engines with more fuel efficient six-bladed propellers: the basic design remains the same. Lockheed also offers stretched versions of the Hercules, initially as a civilian-only option (the L-100-30); the British Royal Air Force bought this version as the C-130K and it was later adopted by other nations, including the United States.
The basic C-130 is strictly a transport aircraft, but the versatility of the aircraft has meant it has been modified into a dizzying number of variants. These include the AC-130 Spectre gunship, the HC-130 rescue aircraft and WC-130 weather reconnaissance version. Other versions include several dozen EC-130 electronic warfare/Elint variants, KC-130 tankers, and DC-130 drone aircraft controllers. The USAF, the US Navy, and the US Marine Corps are all C-130 operators as well. Besides the United States, there are 67 other operators of C-130s, making it one of the world’s most prolific aircraft, with its only rivals the Bell UH-1 Iroquois family and the Antonov An-2 Colt biplane transport. C-130s are also used extensively by civilian operators as well as the L-100 series.
The “Herky Bird,” as it is often nicknamed, has participated in every military campaign fought by the United States since 1960 in one variation or the other. During Vietnam, it was used in almost every role imaginable, from standard transport to emergency bomber: as the latter, it dropped M121 10,000 pound mass-focus bombs to clear jungle away for helicopter landing zones, and it was even attempted to use C-130s with these bombs against the infamous Thanh Hoa Bridge in North Vietnam. (Later this capability was added as standard to MC-130 Combat Talon special forces support aircraft; the MC-130 is the only aircraft cleared to carry the GBU-43 MOAB.) It was also instrumental in resupplying the Khe Sanh garrison during its three-month siege. Hercules crews paid the price as well: nearly 70 C-130s were lost during the Vietnam War. In foreign service, C-130s have also been used heavily, the most famous instance of which was likely the Israeli Entebbe Raid of 1976, one of the longest-ranged C-130 missions in history. C-130s are often in the forefront of humanitarian missions to trouble spots around the world.
As of this writing, over 2300 C-130s have been built, and most are still in service. It remains the backbone of the USAF’s tactical transport service; attempts to replace it with the Advanced Tactical Transport Program (ATTP) in the 1980s and to supplement it with the C-27J Spartan in the 2000s both failed, as the USAF realized that the only real replacement for a C-130 is another C-130.
This C-130E, 63-7861, was delivered to the USAF's 464th Tactical Airlift Wing at Pope AFB, North Carolina in 1964. It may have remained with the 464th until the wing's deactivation in 1971, after which it was transferred to the 435th TAW at Ramstein, West Germany and later the 314th TAW at Little Rock AFB, Arkansas. It was relegated to the 129th Rescue Group (California ANG) at Moffett Field, and was retired in 2006. It was donated to the 153rd Airlift Wing (Wyoming ANG) at Cheyenne afterwards, although 63-7861 never flew with the unit, and the 153rd never flew C-130Es.
That's a bit of nitpicking, though, as the 153rd has done a good job in keeping 63-7861 up. It carries the modern AMC Gray scheme, with the 153rd's present markings on the tail.
EDIT: I got a better picture of 63-7861 in May 2021, so I replaced it. Weirdly enough, we got caught in a thunderstorm this time, too.
Dear flickr friends,
I've come to the realization that I am SO BUSY! School-work is piling up, my internship is keeping me busy, and holiday season is coming up fast , and as a result of all of these combined, you may (or may not) have noticed a conspicuous lack of self-portraits for the 365 group from me. If you have, you're right. I haven't had time to take any SP's lately, much less any pictures! I decided that I'm going to stop the 365 challenge. I'm actually surprised that I've gotten as far as I have! I was thinking about it the other day and I have 168 pictures left to do. Woah. That number completely overwhelmed me! Hence my decision.
One thing I noticed in a lot of my SP's is that I don't genuinely smile. Here's the deal. I have yellow and stained teeth. They don't look so bad in this picture because the sun was so blaringly bright (yest that's a word), but the reason my teeth are yellow and stained is because a lot of it is genetic. Thanks dad. :) I actually take really good care of my teeth, have tried bleaching, etc. but nothing really seems to work. I've given up at this point on ever having the star-white teeth and I don't even notice anymore. People tell me I have a nice smile, but then I become self-conscious because I know it's then that they've seen my teeth. This is why i don't fully smile in a lot of my SP's and why make such silly faces, so I can distract you! :)
All that said, I'm done with 365, for now. When things start to calm down (like after I graduate!) I might start over. I want to have that feeling of accomplishment of doing this for a year, I don't think I've ever done anything consecutively for a year (well, besides brush my teeth, but we've already talked about that).
I'll still take some SP's every once in a while, but just not every day now. I'm done being stressed out, and it feels kind of nice not have to check another thing off of my list everyday. And I'll definitely take pictures of life that happens around me!
Thanks for all of you, I feel like I have become ten-times better at my pictures because of your comments and suggestions. 365 truly has helped me become a better photographer and I look forward to doing this project again in the future.
*cheers!*
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
Due to the restrictions of the Versailles treaties, the Reichswehr was already dealing with the increasing mobilization and motorization of the army after the end of the First World War. The realization that the speed of the troop units required appropriate equipment was available early on. However, the Reichswehr suffered from financial constraints and during the Weimar Republic the industry only had limited capacity for series production of larger, armored vehicles.
Nevertheless, at that time the Sd.Kfz. 3 (unarmored half-track transport vehicle/1927), the ARW (eight-wheel car/1928) and the ZRW (ten-wheel car/1928) provided fundamental experience. The findings of these tests and the troop testing with the Sd.Kfz. 3 enabled a more precise specification of the new vehicles to be developed. The "heavy" armored cars were primarily intended for the reconnaissance units of the new armored forces.
The incipient rearmament could only start with a "cheap" solution, though. A three-part armored structure for the chassis of commercially available off-road trucks was developed by the Army Weapons Office, Dept. WaTest 6, in cooperation with the company Deutsche Eisenwerke AG. The typical truck chassis featured front-wheel steering and a driven bogie at the rear (4x6 layout). In June 1929, the companies Magirus, Daimler-Benz and Büssing-NAG were commissioned to develop the desired armored car from it. If you consider that this truck class was developed for a payload of 1.5t, you can already conclude from this that the vehicles, which are now equipped with a significantly heavy armored structure, had little off-road mobility. Even if the appearance of the vehicles supplied by the different manufacturers was similar, there were external distinguishing features by which the manufacturer could be identified. The vehicles were tested in the Reichswehr from 1932 and introduced later.
One of the four crew members (driver, commander, gunner, radio-operator) was used as a reverse driver: with the narrow streets of the time and a turning circle of between 13 and 16m, this function was essential for a truck-sized heavy reconnaissance vehicle. The chassis had the excellent ladder-type configuration, able to withstand the stress of rough rides at high speed. The scout car was 5570 mm long, 1820 mm wide, 2250 mm high and weighed 5.35, 5.7 or 6 tons, depending on the manufacturer. The hull was made of welded steel armor, 5 to 14.5 mm (0.2-0.57 in) thick depending on the angle (bottom to front) with well-sloped plates. The armament consisted of a 2 cm KwK 30 with 200 rounds and a MG 13 with 1300 rounds in a manually operated turret. The fuel supply was 90, 105 or 110 liters, but with a consumption of about 35 or 40 liters per 100 km, this resulted in a completely inadequate range for a scout car.
Having no true alternatives at hand, the armored 4x6 car was accepted and became known as the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-wheel), and it was subsequently developed into two more vehicles. Up until 1937, 123 vehicles were built as Sd.Kfz. 231 reconnaissance cars and Sd.Kfz. 232 radio trucks. A further 28 were manufactured as Sd.Kfz. 263 (Panzerfunkwagen) command vehicles.
As early as 1932, after testing the pilot series, it was clear that the interim solution of "cheap" 6-wheel vehicles would not meet the future requirements of the armored divisions now planned. It was planned that from 1935/36 at least 18 vehicles of a new type that would meet the requirements for off-road mobility and high road speeds should be produced annually. Büssing-NAG had obviously made a good impression with the ARW and was now commissioned to make the revised vehicle ready for series production, which would become the SdKfz. 231 (8-Rad). The overall concept was completed between 1934 and 1935 and already showed all the features of the future type: all 8 wheels driven and steered, the same speed forwards and backwards, ability to change direction in less than 10 seconds, and a turning circle of "only" 10.5m. The vehicle layout was changed, too: the engine bay was relocated to the rear, the crew compartment was placed at the front end. This improved weight distribution, handling, and the field of view for the main forward driver.
The purpose of the new vehicles was identical to that of the earlier heavy 6-wheel vehicles, they were used on the same sites and so the same ordnance inventory designation was adopted, despite the vehicle’s many modifications. The so-called Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) was armed, corresponding to its 6-Rad counterpart, with a 2cm KwK 30 and the MG 13 (later MG 34) in a rotating turret. Likewise, the Sd.Kfz. 232 (8-Rad) carried a large, curved bow antenna, and there was a Sd.Kfz. 263 (8-Rad) command vehicle, too.
Nevertheless, the Army Weapons Office demanded a short-term solution for a vehicle based on the 4x6 chassis that offered better off-road performance and armament, namely a 37 mm anti-tank gun, with at least comparable range and armor protection. This interim vehicle was supposed to be ready for service in early 1934. Magirus accepted the challenge and proposed the Sd.Kfz. 241, a 4x8 vehicle. It retained the old overall 6-Rad layout with the front engine under a long bonnet, but it had a fourth steered axle added to lower ground pressure and improve the vehicle’s trench bridging capabilities. The powered two rear axles retained the 6-Rad’s twin wheels, so that the vehicle stood on a total of twelve tires with a relatively large footprint. The armored hull was very similar to the Sd.Kfz. 231 6-Rad, but carried a new, bigger turret with a 3.7 cm KwK 30 L/45 gun and an axis-parallel 7.92 mm MG 34 light machine gun.
The box-shaped turret exploited the hull’s width to the maximum and had a maximum armor of 15 mm, no base and the seat of the commander was attached to the tower wall. The commander sat elevated under a raised cupola in the rear section of the turret, just behind the main gun. He had five viewing slits protected by glass blocks and steel slides for all-round visibility. The gunner/loader, standing to the left of the main gun, had to constantly follow the movement of the turret, which was done by hand. In order to support the gunner when slewing the turret, the commander had an additional handle on the right side. The two crew members also had a turret position indicator.
The cannon was fired electrically via a trigger, the machine gun was operated mechanically with a pedal. To aim and view the outside, the gunner had a gun sight to the left of the gun with an opening in the gun mantlet. Standard access to the vehicle was through low double-doors in the vehicle’ flank, but side exit openings in the turret with two flaps each were also frequently used to board it. Another entry was through the commander cupola’s lid.
With all this extra hardware, the Sd.Kfz. 241’s overall weight rose considerably from the late Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) nearly 6 tons to 7.5 tons. As a consequence, the chassis had to be reinforced and a more powerful engine was used, a 6-cylinder Maybach HL 42 TRKM w carburetor gasoline engine with 4170 cc capacity and 100 hp (74 kW) output at 3000 rpm.
As expected, the Sd.Kfz. 241 was not a success. Even though the first vehicles were delivered in time in mid-1934, its operational value was rather limited. Off-road capability was, due to the extra weight, the raised center of gravity and the lack of all-wheel drive, just as bad as the 6-Rad vehicles, and the more powerful engine’s higher fuel consumption allowed neither higher range, despite bigger fuel tanks, nor a better street performance. The only real progress was the new 3.7 cm KwK 30’s firepower, which was appreciated by the crews, even though the weapon was only effective against armored targets at close range. At 100 m, 64 mm of vertical armor could be penetrated, but at 500 m this already dropped to 31 mm, any angle in the armor weakened its hitting power even further. The weapon’s maximum range was 5.000m, though, and with HE rounds the Sd.Kfz. 241 could provide indirect fire support. Another factor that limited the vehicle’s effectiveness was that the gun had to be operated by a single crew member who had to load and aim at the same time – there was simply not enough space for a separate loader who would also have increased the gun’s rate of fire from six to maybe twelve rounds per minute. The vehicle’s armor was also inadequate and only gave protection against light firearms, but not against machine guns or heavier weapons. On the other side, the cupola on top of the turret offered the commander in his elevated position a very good all-round field of view, even when under full protection – but this progressive detail was not adopted for the following armored reconnaissance vehicles and remained exclusive to German battle tanks.
Only a total of fifty-five Sd.Kfz. 241s were completed by Magirus in Cologne until 1936, when production of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) vehicle family started and soon replaced the Sd.Kfz. 241, which was primarily operated at the Eastern Front in Poland and Czechoslovakia. By 1940, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left in any frontline army unit, but a few survivors were grouped together and handed over to police units. Their main gun was either completely deleted or sometimes replaced with a second machine gun, and they were used for urban patrols and riot control duties. However, by 1942, no Sd.Kfz. 241 was left over.
Specifications:
Crew: Four (commander, gunner, driver, radio operator/rear driver)
Weight: 7.5 tons (11.450 lb)
Length: 5,85 metres (19 ft 2 in)
Width: 2,20 metres (7 ft 2 ½ in)
Height: 2,78 metres (9 ft 1 in)
Ground clearance: 28.5 cm (10 in)
Suspension: Torsion bar and leaf springs
Fuel capacity: 150 litres (33 imp gal; 40 US gal)
Armor:
8–15 mm (0.31 – 0.6 in)
Performance:
Maximum road speed: 70 km/h (43.5 mph)
52 km/h (32.3 mph) backwards
Operational range: 250 km (155 miles)
Power/weight: 13 PS/ton
Engine:
Maybach HL42 TRKM water-cooled straight 6-cylinder petrol engine with 100 hp (74 kW),
driving the rear pair of axles
Transmission:
Maybach gearbox with 5-speed forward and 4-speed reverse
Armament:
1× 37 mm KwK 30 L/45 cannon with 70 rounds
1× 7.92 mm MG 34 machine gun mounted co-axially with 1.300 rounds
The kit and its assembly:
This fictional armored car was inspired by a leftover rear axles from an Italeri Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) model that I converted into a fictional half-track variant some time ago. I wondered if the set could be transplanted under an 8-Rad chassis, to create a kind of missing link to the 8x8 successors of the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad) with a total of twelve tires on four axles.
The basis became a First to Fight 1:72 Sd.Kfz. 231 (8-Rad) kit – a rather simple and robust affair, apparently primarily intended for tabletop purposes. But the overall impression is good, and it would be modified, anyway, even though the plastic turned out to be rather soft/waxy and the parts’ sprue attachment points a bit wacky.
The hull was “turned around” to drive backwards, so that its rear engine ended up in the front. I eventually only used the rear twin wheels from the Sd.Kfz. 231 (6-Rad), but not its single axles and laminated springs. Instead, I first cut the OOB mudguards in two halves, removed their side skirts and glued them onto the lower hull in reversed order, so that the exhausts and their muffler boxes would end up at the rear of the front fenders. With these in place I checked the axles’ position from the OOB ladder chassis, which is a single, integral part, and found that the rear axles’ position had to be moved by 2mm backwards. Cutting the original piece and re-arranging it was easier to scratch a new rear suspension, and the rocker bars had to be shortened to accept the wider twin wheels.
The original small turret with the 20 mm autocannon was deleted and replaced with core elements from a Panzer III turret, left over from previous conversion projects. Wider than any original turret of the Sd.Kfz. 231/232 family, it had to be narrowed by roughly 5mm – I had to cut a respective plug from the turret’s and the mantlet’s middle section, the deformed hatch was covered under a Panzer III commander cupola. To mate the re-arranged turret with the OOB adapter plate to mount it onto the hull, and to add overall stability to the construction, I filled the interior with 2C putty.
The typical storage bin at the turret’s rear was omitted, though, it would have made it too large for the compact truck chassis. The shape was a perfect stylistic match, even though, with the longer gun barrel, the vehicle reminds a lot of the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car?
Most small details like the bumpers and the headlights were taken OOB, I added a whip antenna base at the rear and mounted two spare wheels at the back, one of them covered with a tarpaulin (made from paper tissue drenched with white glue, this was also used to create the gun mantlet seals).
Painting and markings:
Typical for German vehicles from the early WWII stages the Sd.Kfz. 241 was painted Panzergrau (RAL 7021; I used Humbrol 67, which is authentic, but mixed it with some 125 to create a slightly lighter shade of grey) overall - quite dull, but realistic. To make the vehicle look more interesting, though, I added authentic contemporary camouflage in the form of low-contrast blotches with RAL 8017, a very dark reddish brown, mixed from Humbrol 160 and some 98. Better, but IMHO still not enough.
After the model received a washing with highly thinned red-brown acrylic artist paint I applied the few decals and gave the parts an overall dry-brushing treatment with grey and dark earth. Everything was sealed with matt acrylic varnish. For even more “excitement”, I decided to add a coat of snow.
For the simulated “frosting” I used white tile grout – which has the benefits of being water-soluble, quite sturdy to touch and the material does not yellow over time like gypsum.
First, the wheels, the chassis and the inside of the wheel arches received a separate treatment with relatively dryly mixed tile grout, simulating snow and dirt clusters. Once thoroughly dried, the wheels were mounted. Then the model was sprayed with low surface tension water and loose tile grout was drizzled over hull and turret, creating a flaky coat of fake snow. Once dry again, everything received another coat of matt acrylic varnish to protect and fixate everything further.
A relatively quick build, done in a few days. The First to Fight kit is very simple and went together well, but I’d use something else the next time due to the odd material it was molded with. The outcome of an 4x8 scout car looks quite plausible, though, like the missing link between the Sd.Kfz. 231 and 232 – the unintended similarity with the Soviet BA-10 heavy armored car was a bit surprising, though. And the snow on the model eventually makes it look a bit more interesting, the stunt was worth the effort.