View allAll Photos Tagged different
So I requested from an online friend that they do something a little different with me....
The end result after far too many images to choose from was this gorgeous artwork 😍
Bless you my darling, you made an old woman cry with happiness and love.
Must be my hormones. 💕
Coleraine. Major Thomas Mitchell passed through here exploring in 1836 and it was because of his favourable reports the Edward Henty took up a squatting run just west of Coleraine in 1837. This was later converted to leasehold which Henty called Merino Downs. The main early homestead named Muntham was on a different run. Henty’s brother-in-law James Bryan squatted here too but his land was soon taken by an official lease by the Whyte brothers in 1846 for their run called Koroite. In time some of their lease was subdivided into smaller properties and in 1870 the rest of the run was resumed for closer settlement. Around 1850 a small settlement emerged called Bryans Creek Crossing, after James Bryan. This was later changed to Coleraine in 1853 when a government town was surveyed. The town grew slowly as the runs around it were so big until the 1880s and beyond. When selection acts were introduced in Victoria the wealthy pastoralists bought up their runs freehold. The Anglican Church opened in 1865, the Catholic Church 1888 and the Presbyterian 1892. Many of the large estates were not broken up until the 1910 closer settlement act and in 1923 when blocks were offered to soldier settlers.
Waterfall ICM (Intentional Camera Movement)
A great idea to experiment with as you can do it hand held. Trying different exposure lengths combined with moving the camera in various ways during the exposure.
Lots and lots of them don't work but the odd shot can work out rather well.
La Défense Offices, Almere, Netherlands, architect UNStudio, Ben van Berkel -- 1999–2004
The office complex is well integrated with the larger urban plan. Both its height and the entrances into the inner courtyards tie in with the larger site. The exterior façade reflects the larger urban condition, while the interior façades of the courtyards have been designed with the office tenants in mind. These façades are clad with glass panels in which a multi- colored foil is integrated and, depending on the time of day and the angle of incidence, a variety of different colours are reflected, animating the courtyards. Building area: 23.000 m² offices, 15.000 m² parking.
+++ 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:
Although Japan had designed and manufactured a number of military aircraft before and during World War II, it was forbidden according to the Potsdam Declaration from engaging in the production of airplanes and other products that could be used to rearm a military. These restrictions, however, were lightened by the United States during the Korean War, opening up the possibility for a Japanese company to produce a civilian aircraft.
Actually a consortium of several different manufacturing companies and university professors, NAMC was founded in April 1957 by executives from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Fuji Heavy Industries, Shin Meiwa Manufacturing, Sumitomo, Japan Aircraft, Showa Aircraft, and Kawasaki Heavy Industries with the goal of designing and manufacturing a Japanese civilian turboprop airliner to replace the successful but aging Douglas DC-3. The resulting aircraft, the YS-11, a low-winged twin-turboprop-engine monoplane, capable of seating up to 60 passengers, became a successful civilian airliner.
On 30 August 1962, the first YS-11 prototype performed its maiden flight. Deliveries commenced on 30 March 1965 and commercial operations began the following month. The majority of orders for the type were issued from various Japanese airliners. While sales to such customers were swift in the YS-11's initial years of availability, this limited market soon became saturated, leading to a slump in demand. By the late 1970s, after producing several variations of the YS-11, NAMC hoped to introduce a jet airliner in order to replace and upgrade the primarily domestic operators and compete with those short-haul airliners being produced in the U.S. by companies such as Boeing and McDonnell Douglas.
This project was called YS-21 and work started in 1968. During the design phase, a high level of attention was paid to market research and operator concerns – even though this was almost exclusively limited to the domestic, Japanese market. Amongst other changes made, the prospective jetliner was increased in size, changing its maximum seating capacity from the YS-11’s 60 to at least 85 passengers in a five-abreast configuration, with a maximum of 100 seats in a tight single-class arrangement.
The aircraft’s general layout resembled the contemporary Boeing 737: a low-wing twin-jet airliner with a conventional tail and podded engines slung under the only slightly swept (just 25°at quarter chord) wings. However, the engines were not directly mounted under the wings, but rather in pods on pylons that set them apart from the wings’ undersurfaces. Fuel was stored within both the outer wings and within the lower fuselage. As a special feature, additional pylon-mounted tanks could be installed under the outer wings for extended range operations if so required.
Special care was taken to allow the aircraft to operate from the same smaller airfields as the YS-11, and various elements of the YS-21 were designed to maximize passenger comfort and operator convenience during operations on 2nd class airfields. One such measure was the rear entry door with built-in stairs that, while adding structural complexity, meant that mobile airport stairs were unnecessary for boarding. In order to ensure operations on smaller airfields and reduce ground pressure, the aircraft received, despite its compact size, four-wheel bogies on its main landing gear. The machine furthermore feature an autonomous power unit (APU) for operations independent from most airfield equipment.
However, a central problem of the YS-21’s development became the powerplant: there was no indigenous engine available to power the aircraft, and developing one at a timely schedule for the YS-21 program turned out to be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming. At one stage of development, NAMC had reportedly intended the YS-21 to be powered by a pair of Bristol Siddeley BS.75 turbofans. However, this selection was hotly contested by rival British engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce, who proposed their Rolls-Royce Spey Junior, a simplified version of the Rolls-Royce Spey.
The engine procurement from foreign sources caused a lot of debate, not only among the NAMC engineers, but also on a political level, since the YS-21 was intended to be a 100% domestic product. Eventually, pragmatism prevailed and the Pratt & Whitney JT8D-9 with thrust reversers and an output of 14,500 lbf (64.50 kN) was chosen, because it was, at the time of the YS-21’s development, to be built under license by Mitsubishi for the Kawasaki C-1 JASDF military jet transport aircraft. A compromise that more or less saved face of the project leaders and the political powers that promoted the aircraft.
A distinctive design trademark of the YS-21 became its engine pods: in order to gain as much ground clearance as possible and keep the landing gear short, the JT8s’ auxiliary installations were mounted to the engines’ sides, resulting in a noticeable bulge on the pods’ outer flanks and a noticeable oval air intake orifice.
Initial domestic market response was quite positive, mostly boosted by national pride, though, and NAMC tried to attract the interest of major national airlines (primarily JAL and ANA, but also smaller companies) and several foreign regional airlines, touting the YS-21 as the better alternative to the foreign Douglas DC-9 or Boeing 737. A few airlines, also from other countries, showed some initial interest but only ANA and JAL placed concrete orders. These were (mis)interpreted as a very positive sign, though, and production was prematurely greenlighted with only 15 firm orders and 10 options in the books.
This lack of interest could be, despite the YS-21’s qualities, contributed to several factors. The main influence was the oil crisis of the 1970s, but another factor was the YS-21’s limited capacity and range – suitable for domestic service in Japan with many short routes, but unattractive for many other potential users. At maximum payload, the aircraft's range was only a mere 1,700 km (a comparable early Boeing 737 had a range of 2.800km), and the optional underwing tanks did not help much since drag and extra weight almost entirely compensated for the potential increase in range. This inherent flaw resulted in a high refueling frequency that grounded the aircraft more often than other types and, as a further effect, relatively high operating costs.
Consequently, the YS-21 achieved no foreign sales, and beyond JAL and ANA as launch customers and main operators of the type, only Japan Transocean Air ordered four machines. With a total of only thirty-three sales and with one of the three prototypes refurbished and sold as the 11th YS-21 to ANA, the airliner represented a severe failure for NAMC and the Japanese commercial airliner industry. Plans for an enlarged version with a stretched fuselage for up to 120 passengers never left the drawing board, since both the domestic and the international markets for short and medium range passenger aircraft were already dominated by other types like the Boeing 727 and 737.
In service, the YS-21 was quickly nicknamed “Karigane” (かりがね; Wild Goose), due to its slender fuselage, the streamlined cockpit section that resembled a goose’s head on a long neck, and the engine nacelles under the rather straight wings, which reminded of the bird’s stretched feet upon landing. This nickname was never officially adopted, though, but frequently used by the crews and in public.
The YS-21 turned out to be a reliable and sturdy aircraft, popular among its crews for its good low speed handling. On 29 April 1995, the last YS-21s in service flew their last commercial flights. Throughout their combined cumulative operational lifetimes, the YS-21s accumulated a total of 1.18 mio. flight hours, during which 80.4 million passengers were carried across 1.3 mio. individual flights, without any accidents and an impressive 98% in-service reliability.
General characteristics:
Crew: 3
Capacity: 85 with 8,400 kg (18,519 lb) payload
Length: 32.40 m (106 ft 1 1/2 in)
Wingspan: 34.3 m (112 ft 6 in)
Height: 10.80 m (35 ft 4 1/2 in)
Wing area: 146.7 m2 (1,579 sq ft)
Empty weight: 22,200 kg (48,943 lb)
Max takeoff weight: 46,000 kg (101,413 lb)
Powerplant:
2× Mitsubishi-built Pratt & Whitney JT8D-9 low bypass turbofans, 64 kN (14,500 lbf) thrust each
Performance:
Maximum speed: 590 mph (950 km/h, 510 kn) at 6,100 m (20,000 ft)
Cruise speed: 470–530 mph (750–850 km/h, 400–460 kn) at 6,100 m (20,000 ft)
Range: 1,700 km (1,100 mi, 920 nmi)
Service ceiling: 12,000 m (39,000 ft)
Rate of climb: 16.7 m/s (3,300 ft/min) at 2,135 m (7,005 ft)
Takeoff roll: 1,859 m (6,099 ft)
Landing roll: 1,755 m (5,670 ft)
The kit and its assembly:
Even though I am not a fan of small-scale airliners, I have recently (and successfully) built two what-if conversions, and I still had the idea of this short-haul airliner in the back of my mind since my Il-60 airliner build. The latter was based on a Caravelle airliner and featured two turboprops on the wings in new nacelles as well as a low tail. However, when I built it, I already considered a similar conversion, just with podded jet engines under the wings like the Dassault Mercure or the Boeing 737.
I had based the Il-60 on the rather crappy Caravelle kit from Mastercraft, so that I switched this time to the new (but much more expensive) Amodel kit – in this case the Caravelle 10R model, which comes with proper JT8 engine pods.
Despite a completely new layout of the aircraft, I wanted to change as little as possible and use only few donor parts. In fact, the only additional/new parts are the radome (actually a propeller spinner from a Matchbox He 115, simply glued onto the Caravelle’s nose and blended into the fuselage with PSR) and longer landing gear struts, because the re-located engines under the wings called for a bigger ground clearance. The front leg was completely replaced (taken from a 1:200 Space Shuttle, but still with OOB wheels), while on the main struts only the legs were replaced with longer parts from a 1:72 F4U. A weird detail: the kit comes with separate struts and bogies, but this makes this surgery relatively easy. In order to change the profile of the aircraft I replaced the round fin tip with a square one, scratched with styrene sheet and PSR.
Lots of PSR went into the build, in part because of peculiar solutions the mold designers chose. For instance, the window section consists of three clear panels per side, to be glued into recesses on the flanks, which have back walls. The benefit of this construction is beyond me, because it just causes surface mess and calls for sanding and filling. Naturally, the three panels per side do not lie perfectly flat or even in their recesses, and they are in total 2mm too long for their intended openings…? WHY!? If Amodel had wanted a clean solution, they could (and should) have molded the complete fuselage halves as clear parts? Another weak point I came across was the windshield, which comes (Minicraft style) as a clear cockpit area section and seemed to belong to an altogether different aircraft – it did not fit into the respective fuselage opening at all and called for massive trimming and more PSR…
These problems with the clear parts almost ruined everything, and that’s a shame because the Amodel Caravelle is a nice kit of this airliner, with fine, recessed surface details and delicate details. Nevertheless, even though it is a modern mold the kit does not get together easily, a typical short-run affair without locator pins.
As a typical feature of my airliner builds, I added a vertical styrene tube in the fuselage’s center of gravity as a display holder adapter for the in-flight scenes.
Painting and markings:
I had a hard time figuring out a potential manufacturer and operator for this aircraft – placed into the Seventies time frame, there were many similar designs on the market, so why add another short-/medium range airliner with a rather limited capacity which would rather be a Sixties design? After long considerations I settled upon a Japanese aircraft – national pride and stubborn processes might certainly lead to such an aircraft, and the YS-11 shows that the idea is not far-fetched.
I also considered a fictional airline as operator, but when I checked options for an aftermarket decal sheet, I realized that the early ANA livery, the so-called “Mohican” scheme due to the blue dorsal stripe, featured a da Vinci helicopter as a logo. I never noticed this before or wasn’t able to identify it, and I found this badge so charming and weird that I eventually settled for ANA as the aircraft’s operator. After some more search I even found a decal sheet from 26decals for an ANA Boeing 767 from 2009 in a retro scheme, and I was also able to organize a Mohican livery sheet from a Hasegawa 1:200 Boeing 737, because the 767 fin emblems were simply oversized for the Caravelle’s fin.
Creating and adapting the early ANA scheme to the model was complicated, though. In an initial step I gave the model’s underside and the upper wing surfaces a coat of White Aluminum from the rattle can – I opted for this simple quasi-NMF finish because of its retro look. The upper fuselage became white, with the help of decal sheet material and enamel paint (Humbrol 22). The blue spine and the fin were also painted with a brush in French Blue (Modelmaster), which came close to the cheat lines’ blue tone from the retro 767 sheet – even though these are IMHO a bit dark. Some fine-tuning and decal trimming had to be done in order to make the livery work, though, but I think the result looks quite good – better than expected after this material mish-mash.
Once the basic livery had been applied, the windows were added with decals. The cockpit windows had to be improvised, since Amodel’s Caravelle sheet does not offer a decal option for the windscreen. But I am not sure if it would have matched the modified nose section at all? So I trimmed down the Boeing 767 windscreen from the 26decal sheet and improvised. The cabin windows were taken from the 767, too. I wanted a very different look from the Caravelle’s original triangular window rows, and with the 767 windows' rather oval shape and higher density, this worked well. It also makes the YS-21 look bigger than it actually is.
After that, the airline markings and some more details like walkways on the wings (created with generic decal strips from TL Modellbau) were added.
In a final step, the landing gear was finished and some more detail painting (position lights, exhausts and thrust reversers) was done, before the kit was sealed with an overall coat of gloss acrylic varnish for a clean and shiny look.
I am torn about the outcome of this build, esp. the Amodel base. After long waiting, I hoped for a decent Caravelle kit in 1:144 scale. It is basically there, but the weird window panel construction really ruins what could have been a crisp up-to-date offering. This does not ruin the model as such, but the panel solution is IMHO far from perfect and user-friendly. :(
The layout conversion into the 737-style YS-21 whif worked well, despite some problems, and I think there’s only little left of what reminds of the model’s Caravelle heritage. The ANA Mohican livery also looks stylish, it adds a nice retro touch to the aircraft, very Seventies (if not Sixties?). With the glossy and bright finish, the model even looks, from certain angles, like a vintage Chinese tin toy?
Eden, New South Wales - Australia
HWW!
~~~ Thank you all for viewing, kind comments, favs and awards - much appreciated! ~~~
Sunday walk in Ierapetra, Crete, November 3, 2019
(bidrag till flickr-gruppen Fotosöndag med tema "lika men ändå olika")
(contribution to the Flickr group Fotosöndag with this week's theme "similar yet different")
Have you ever noticed what a different world it is UNDER the bridge?
When you take the time to look that is
Same printing for the eyes but it looks different depending on the colour of the dog fur... Interesting! I forgot to bring out the white version... he's happily barking somewhere... :D
Going away shot of 43047 seen at Harrowden junction on the 1C91 1436 Leeds - London St Pancras International 24/6/18. (Taken using a pole)
Three different Airbus models are stored at the Western end of runway 07L/25R in Frankfurt during the COVID-19 lockdown.
From left to right:
Lufthansa Airbus A330-343E D-AIKM:
MSN 913 has had its first flight on 25.02.08 with the test registration F-WWYJ and was delivered to LH on 19.03.08.
The jet is powered by 2x Rolls-Royce Trent 772B-60 turbofans and has a cabin layout with 42 Business. 28 Premium Economy and 185 Economy Class seats.
Lufthansa Airbus A340-642 (HGW) D-AIHZ Leipzig:
MSN 1005 has had its first flight on 14.04.09 with the test registration F-WWCR and was delivered to LH on 06.05.09.
The jet is powered by 4x Rolls-Royce Trent 556-61 turbofans and has a cabin layout with 8 First, 44 Business, 32 Premium Economy and 213 Economy Class seats.
Lufthansa Airbus A340-313E D-AIGW Gladbeck:
MSN 327 has had its first flight on 11.02.00 with the test registration F-WWJO and was delivered to LH on 10.03.00. It was painted in Star Alliance colours in June 2015. Since 18.11.15 it is operated by Lufthansa CityLine.
The jet is powered by 4x CFMI CFM56-5C4 turbofans and has a cabin layout with 18 Business, 19 Premium Economy and 261 Economy Class seats.
I thought I'd mix it up with a bit of black and white. I'm always wary of it because it seems to make me look more like a guy when I convert the pictures. But sometimes it pays off.
The first Ilam Hall was built by the Port family in the 16th century but this was demolished by Jesse Watts Russell to make way for his much grander hall of the 1820s. Most of the hall was demolished in the 1920s before Sir Robert McDougall bought the estate and donated it to the National Trust in 1934. Since then, the main remaining part of the hall has been used as a Youth Hostel and the grounds have been open to the public.
mémoire2cité - Sols absorbants, formes arrondies et couleurs vives, les aires de jeux standardisées font désormais partie du paysage urbain. Toujours les mêmes toboggans sécurisés, châteaux forts en bois et animaux à ressort. Ces non-lieux qu’on finit par ne plus voir ont une histoire, parallèle à celle des différentes visions portées sur l’enfant et l’éducation. En retournant jouer au xixe siècle, sur les premiers playgrounds des États-Unis, on assiste à la construction d’une nation – et à des jeux de société qui changent notre vision sur les balançoires du capitalisme. Ce texte est paru dans le numéro 4 de la revue Jef Klak « Ch’val de Course », printemps-été 2017. La version ici publiée en ligne est une version légèrement remaniée à l’occasion de sa republication dans le magazine Palais no 27 1, paru en juin 2018. la video içi www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uwj1wh5k5PY The concept for adventure playgrounds originated in postwar Europe, after a playground designer found that children had more fun with the trash and rubble left behind by bombings -inventing their own toys and playing with them- than on the conventional equipment of swings and slides. Narrator John Snagge was a well-known voice talent in the UK, working as a newsreader for BBC Radio - jefklak.org/le-gouvernement-des-playgrounds/ - www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/chasing-the-vanishing-p... or children, playgrounds are where magic happens. And if you count yourself among Baby Boomers or Gen Xers, you probably have fond memories of high steel jungle gyms and even higher metal slides that squeaked and groaned as you slid down them. The cheerful variety of animals and vehicles on springs gave you plenty of rides to choose from, while a spiral slide, often made of striped panels, was a repeated thrill. When you dismounted from a teeter-totter, you had to be careful not to send your partner crashing to the ground or get hit in the head by your own seat. The tougher, faster kids always pushed the brightly colored merry-go-round, trying to make riders as dizzy as possible. In the same way, you’d dare your sibling or best friend to push you even higher on the swing so your toes could touch the sky. The most exciting playgrounds would take the form of a pirate ship, a giant robot, or a space rocket.
“My husband would look at these big metal things and go, ‘Oh my God, those are the Slides of Death!'” - insh.world/history/playground-equipment-of-yesterday-that...
Today, these objects of happy summers past have nearly disappeared, replaced by newer equipment that’s lower to the ground and made of plastic, painted metal, and sometimes rot-resistant woods like cedar or redwood. The transformation began in 1973, when the U.S. Congress established the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which began tracking playground injuries at hospital emergency rooms. The study led to the publication of the first Handbook for Public Playground Safety in 1981, which signaled the beginning of the end for much of the playground equipment in use. (See the latest PPS handbook here.) Then, the American Society for Testing and Materials created a subcommittee of designers and playground-equipment manufacturers to set safety standards for the whole industry. When they published their guidelines in 1993, they suggested most existing playground surfaces, which were usually asphalt, dirt, or grass, needed to be replaced with pits of wood or rubber mulch or sand, prompting many schools and parks to rip their old playgrounds out entirely.
Top: A Space Age rocket-themed playground set by Miracle Playground Equipment, introduced circa 1968, photographed in Burlington, Colorado, in 2009. Above: Two seesaws and a snail-shaped climber, circa 1970s, photographed in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, in 2007. (Photos by Brenda Biondo)
Top: A Space Age rocket-themed playground set by Miracle Playground Equipment, introduced circa 1968, photographed in Burlington, Colorado, in 2009. Above: Two seesaws and a snail-shaped climber, circa 1970s, photographed in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania, in 2007. (Photos by Brenda Biondo)
That said, removing and replacing playground equipment takes money, so a certain amount of vintage playground equipment survived into the next millennium—but it’s vanishing fast. Fortunately, Brenda Biondo, a freelance journalist turned photographer, felt inspired to document these playscapes before they’ve all been melted down. Her photographs capture the sculptural beauty and creativity of the vintage apparatuses, as well as that feeling of nostalgia you get when you see a piece of your childhood. After a decade of hunting down old playgrounds, Biondo published a coffee-table book, 2014’s Once Upon a Playground: A Celebration of Classic American Playgrounds, 1920-1975, which includes both her photographs of vintage equipment and pages of old playground catalogs that sold it.
Starting this November, Biondo’s playground photos will hit the road as part of a four-year ExhibitsUSA traveling show, which will also include vintage playground postcards and catalog pages from Biondo’s collection. The show will make stops in smaller museums and history centers around the United States, passing through Temple, Texas; Lincoln, Nebraska; Kansas City, Missouri; and Greenville, South Carolina. Biondo talked to us on the phone from her home in small-town Colorado, where she lives with her husband and children.
This 1975 Miracle catalog page reads, "This famous Lifetime Whirl has delighted three generations of children and still is a safe, playground favorite. Although it has gone through many improvements many of the original models are still spinning on playgrounds from coast to coast." (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)This 1975 Miracle catalog page reads, “This famous Lifetime Whirl has delighted three generations of children and still is a safe, playground favorite. Although it has gone through many improvements many of the original models are still spinning on playgrounds from coast to coast.” (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)Collectors Weekly: What inspired you to photograph playgrounds?Biondo: In 2004, I happened to be at my local park with my 1-year-old daughter, who was playing in the sandbox. I had just switched careers, from freelance journalism to photography, and I was looking for a starter project. I looked around the playground and thought, “Where is all the equipment that I remember growing up on?” They had new plastic contraptions, but nothing like the big metal slides I grew up with. After that, I started driving around to other playgrounds to see if any of this old equipment still existed. I found very little of it and realized it was disappearing quickly. That got to me.I felt like somebody should be documenting this equipment, because it was such a big part—and a very good part—of so many people’s childhoods. I couldn’t find anybody else who was documenting it, and I didn’t see any evidence that the Smithsonian was collecting it. As far as I could tell, it was just getting ripped up and sent to the scrap heap. At first, I started traveling around Colorado where I live, visiting playgrounds. Eventually, I took longer trips around the Southwest, and then I started looking for playgrounds whenever I was in any other parts of the country, like around California and the East Coast. It was a long-term project—shot over the course of a decade. And every year that I was shooting, it got harder and harder to find those pieces of old equipment.
This merry-go-round, photographed in Cañon City, Colorado, in 2006, is very similar to the Lifetime Whirl above. In the background are a rideable jalopy and animals, including four attached to a teeter-totter. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
This merry-go-round, photographed in Cañon City, Colorado, in 2006, is very similar to the Lifetime Whirl above. In the background are a rideable jalopy and animals, including four attached to a teeter-totter. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: How did you find them?
Biondo: I would just drive around. I started hunting down local elementary schools and main-street playgrounds as well as neighborhood playgrounds. If I had a weekend, I would say, “OK, I’m going to drive from my home three hours east to the Kansas border, stay overnight and drive back.” Along the way, I would stop at every little town that I’d pass. They usually had one tiny main-street playground and one elementary school. I never knew what I was going to find. In a poorer area, a town often doesn’t have much money to replace playground equipment, whereas more affluent areas usually have updated their playgrounds by now. It was a bit of a crap shoot. Sometimes, I’d drive for hours and not really find anything—or I’d find one old playground after the other, because I happened to be in an area where equipment hadn’t been replaced.
I couldn’t get to every state, so I had to shoot where I was. I think there certainly are still old playgrounds out there, especially in small towns. But there’s fewer and fewer of them every year. My book has something like 170 photographs. I would guess that half the equipment pictured is already gone. Sometimes, I’d go back to a playground with a nice piece of equipment a year later to reshoot it, maybe in different lighting or a different season, and so often it had been removed. That pressured me to get out as often as I could because if I waited a few weeks, that piece might not be there anymore.
A 1911 postcard shows girls playing on an outdoor gymnasium at Mayo Park in Rochester, Minnesota.
a 1911 postcard shows girls playing on an outdoor gymnasium at Mayo Park in Rochester, Minnesota.
Collectors Weekly: What did you learn about playground history?
Biondo: I didn’t know American playgrounds started as part of the social reform or progressive movement of the early 1900s. Reformers hoped to keep poor inner-city immigrant kids safe and out of trouble. Back then, city children were playing in the streets with nothing to do, and when cars became more popular, kids started to get hit by motorists. Child activists started building playgrounds in big cities like Boston, Chicago, and New York as a way to help and protect these kids. These reformers felt they could build model citizens by teaching cooperation and manners through playgrounds. These early main-street parks would also have playground leaders who orchestrated activities such as games and songs.
“I started driving to playgrounds to see if any old equipment still existed. I found very little of it and realized it was disappearing quickly.”
In the late 1800s, Germans developed what they called “sand gardens,” which are just piles of sand where kids can come dig and build things. There were few of those in the United States as well. But by the early 1900s, the emphasis of playgrounds was on the apparatuses, things kids could climb on or swing on.
Soon after I started researching playground history, I happened to stumble on an eBay auction for a 1926 catalog that the playground manufacturers used to send to schools. At that point, I wasn’t thinking of doing a book, but I thought I could do something with it. I won the catalog; I paid, like, $12 for it. And it was so interesting because I could see this vintage equipment when it was brand new and considered modern and advanced. The manufacturers boasted about how safe it was and how it was good for building both muscles and imaginations.
After that, I would always search on eBay for playground catalogs, and I ended up with about three dozen catalogs from different manufacturers. My oldest is 1916, and my newest is from 1975. So I would take a photograph of some type of merry-go-round, and then I might find that same merry-go-round in a 1930 catalog. Often in the book, I pair my picture with the page from the catalog showing when it was first manufactured. I discovered a couple dozen manufacturers, which tended to be located in the bigger industrial areas with steel manufacturing, like Trenton, New Jersey, and Kokomo and Litchfield, Indiana. Pueblo, Colorado, even had a playground manufacturer. Burke and GameTime were big 20th century companies, and actually are among few still in existence.
The cover of a 1926 catalog for EverWear Manufacturing Company. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
The cover of a 1926 catalog for EverWear Manufacturing Company. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: I recently came across an old metal slide whose steps had the name of the manufacturer, American, forged in openwork letters.
Biondo: I love those. One of the last pages in the book shows treads from six different slides, and they each had the name of their manufacturer in them, including Porter, American, and Burke. One time when I was traveling, I did a quick side trip to a small town with an elementary school. In the parking lot was this old metal slide with the American step treads, lying on its side. You could tell it had just been ripped off out of the concrete, which was still attached to the bottom, and was waiting for the steel recyclers to come and take it away.
I thought, “Oh my gosh, just put it on eBay! Somebody is going to want that. Don’t melt it down.” But nobody thinks about this stuff getting thrown away when it should be preserved. If you go on eBay, you can find a lot of those small animals on springs that little kids ride, because they’re small enough to be shipped. Once I saw someone selling one of those huge rocket ships, which had been dismantled, on eBay, but I don’t know if anybody ever bid on it. It’s rare to see the big stuff, because it is so expensive to ship. It’s like, “What kind of truck do you need to haul this thing away?” I don’t know of anyone who’s collecting those pieces, but I hope somebody is.
A metal slide in Victor, Colorado, had step treads with the name "American" in them. Photographed in 2008. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
A metal slide in Victor, Colorado, had step treads with the name “American” in them. Photographed in 2008. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: It seems like an opportunity for both starting a collection or repurposing the material.
Biondo: I photographed many of the apparatuses as if they were sculptures because they have really cool designs and colors. Even when they’re worn down, the exposed layers of paint can be beautiful. Hardly anybody stops to look at it that way. People drive by and think, “Oh, there’s an old, rusty, rundown playground.” But if you take the time to look closely at this stuff, it’s really interesting. Just by looking at these pieces, you can picture all the kids who played on them.
Collectors Weekly: Aren’t people nostalgic for their childhood playgrounds?
Biondo: While I was taking the pictures, I visited Boulder, Colorado, which is a very affluent community. I was sure there would be no old playground equipment there. When I was driving around, all of a sudden, I looked over and saw this huge rocket ship. It turns out that one of the original NASA astronauts, Scott Carpenter, grew up in Boulder, and this playground was built in the ’60s to honor their hometown boy. Because of that, the citizens of Boulder never wanted to take down the rocket ship. One of the first exhibitions of this photography project happened in Boulder, and at the opening, I sold four prints of that rocket ship. People would come up to me at the exhibition, and they’d go, “Oh my gosh, I grew up playing on this when I was a little kid! Now, my kids are playing on it, and I’m so excited that I can get a picture of it and hang it in their bedroom.” So people have a strong nostalgic attachment to this equipment. It’s sad that most of it’s not going to be around for much longer.
A 1968 Miracle Playground Equipment catalog features the huge rocket-ship play set seen at the top of this story. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
A 1968 Miracle Playground Equipment catalog features the huge rocket-ship playset seen at the top of this story. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: Besides slides and animals on springs, what were some other pieces that were common in older playgrounds?
Biondo: I didn’t come across as many old swings as I expected. I thought they would be all over the place, but I guess they’re gone now because they were so easy to replace. I tended to find merry-go-rounds more frequently—you know, the one where you’d run around pushing them and then jump on. When my kids were younger, they’d go out playground hunting with me, and the merry-go-rounds were their favorite things. They’re just so fun. The other thing you don’t find often is the seesaw or teeter-totter, and that was my favorite.The Karymor Stationary Jingle Ring Outfit appeared in the 1931 playground catalog put out by Pueblo, Colorado's R.F. Lamar and Co. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
The Karymor Stationary Jingle Ring Outfit appeared in the 1931 playground catalog put out by Pueblo, Colorado’s R.F. Lamar and Co. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Before I started this project, I didn’t know there was such a variety of equipment. I figured I’d see seesaws, swings, slides, and merry-go-rounds. But I had no idea there were such things as revolving swings, which would be attached to a spinning pole via outstretched metal arms. Many mid-century pieces had themes from pop culture like “The Wizard of Oz,” “Cinderella,” “Denis the Menace,” cowboys and Indians, and Saturday-morning cartoons. During the Space Age, you started to see pieces of equipment shaped like rocket ships and satellites, because in the ’60s, Americans were so excited about space exploration. What was going on in the broader culture often got reflected in playground equipment.
Pursuing the catalogs was eye-opening. I live about an hour and a half south of Denver, so I often looked for playgrounds around the city. There, I’d find these contraptions where were shaped like umbrella skeletons, but then they had these rings hanging off the spindles. I’ve never seen them outside of Colorado. Then I bought a 1930s catalog from the manufacturer in Pueblo, Colorado, which is only 45 minutes from me, and it featured this apparatus. Later, I met people in Denver who’d say, “Oh, yeah, I remember that thing as a kid. It’s kind of like monkey bars where you had to try and get from ring to ring swinging and hanging by your arms.” There was so much variety, and even so many variations on the basics.I have a cool catalog from 1926 from the manufacturer Mitchell, which doesn’t exist anymore. I looked at one of the contraptions they advertised and I was like, “Oh my God, this looks like a torture device!” It was their own proprietary apparatus and maybe it didn’t prove to be very popular. I had never seen something like that on a playground. There probably weren’t very many of them installed.
This strange Climbing Swing from the 1926 Mitchell Manufacturing Company catalog looks a bit like a torture device. Brenda Biondo says she's never found one in the wild. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
This Climbing Swing from the 1926 Mitchell Manufacturing Company catalog looks a bit like a torture device. Biondo’s never found one in the wild. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: After a while, were you able to date pieces just by looking at them?
Biondo: From looking at the catalogs, I certainly got a better idea of when things were built. But there were a handful things I couldn’t find in the catalogs. You can guess the age by knowing the design, as well as by looking at the amount of wear and the height of the piece. Usually, the taller it was, the older it was. One of the oldest slides I photographed was probably from the ’30s. I climbed to the top to shoot it as if the viewer were going to go down the slide. Up there, the place where you’d sit before sliding had been used for so many years by so many kids that I could see an outline of all the butts worn into the metal. You can imagine all the children who must have gone down that slide to wear the metal down like that.
This 1930s-era slide, found in Sargents, Colorado, in 2007, developed a butt-shaped imprint. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
This 1930s-era slide, found in Sargents, Colorado, in 2007, developed a butt-shaped imprint. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: How did Modernism influence playground design?
Biondo: In 1953, the Museum of Modern Art in New York held a competition for playground design. Modern Art was just getting popular, and the idea of incorporating the theories of Modernist design into utilitarian objects was in the air, and was translated into playgrounds for several years. I have a 1967 catalog that features very abstract playground equipment made from sinuous blobs of poured concrete. And you’ve probably seen some of it, but there’s not too much of that around. That’s another example of how broader cultural trends were reflected in playgrounds.
When most people think of playgrounds, they say, “Oh, that’s a kiddie subject. There’s not much to it.” But when you start looking into them, you realize playgrounds are a fascinating piece of American culture—they go back a hundred years and played a part in most Americans’ lives. These playground pieces are icons of our childhood.
Collectors Weekly:What was the impact of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which launched in 1973?
Biondo: Things started to change after that, which is why I limited to book to apparatuses made before 1975. New playgrounds were starting to be build out of plastic and fiberglass. I looked up the statistics, and according to the little research I’ve done—contrary to what you’d expect—there’s not much difference in the number of injuries on older equipment versus injuries on equipment today. A “New York Times” article from 2011 called “Can a Playground Be Too Safe?” explains that studies show when playground equipment was really high and just had asphalt underneath it and not seven layers of mulch, thekids knew they had to be careful because they didn’t want to fall. Nowadays, when everything is lower and there’s so much mulch, kids are just used to jumping down and falling and catching themselves. So kids learned to assess risk by playing on the older equipment. They also learned to challenge themselves because it is a little scary to go up to the top of the thing.
This old postcard of Shawnee Park in Kansas City, Kansas, circa 1912, shows how tall slides could get.
This old postcard of Shawnee Park in Kansas City, Kansas, circa 1912, shows how tall slides could get.
At my local park where you have new equipment, the monkey bars aren’t that high and there’s mulch below it, but a child fell and broke their arm last year. When I was talking to the principal at the school where they had just torn out that old American slide, I asked her, “Why did you replace the equipment?” She said, “We felt the parents in the community were expecting to have a little bit newer and nicer equipment. And this stuff had been here for so long.” And I said, “Have you seen a difference in injury rates since you put up your newer equipment?” She replied, “I’ve been a principal here several years, and we never had a serious broken-bone injury on the playground until four months ago on the new equipment.”
There were some nasty accidents in the ‘60s and ’70s, where kids got their arms or their heads caught in the contraptions. Those issues definitely needed to be assessed. What’s interesting is the Consumer Product Safety Commission never issued requirements, just suggested guidelines. But manufacturers felt that if their equipment didn’t meet those guidelines, they’d be vulnerable to liability. Everybody went to the extreme, making everything super safe so they wouldn’t risk getting sued.A 1970s-era climbing-bar apparatus, photographed in Rocky Ford, Colorado, in 2006. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
A 1970s-era climbing-bar apparatus, photographed in Rocky Ford, Colorado, in 2006. (Photo by Brenda Biondo)
In the last decade, people have been looking at playground-equipment design and trying to make it more challenging and more encouraging of imaginative play, but without making it more likely someone’s going to get injured. And adults, I think, are realizing kids are spending more time indoors on devices so they want to do everything they can to encourage kids to still get outside, run around, and climb on things.
Collectors Weekly: You don’t need a playground to hurt yourself. When I was a kid, I fell off a farm post and broke my arm.Biondo: Oh, yeah, kids have been falling out trees forever—they always want to climb stuff. Playground politics are always evolving. Even in the 1920s, the catalogs talked about how safe their equipment was, and they were selling these 30-foot slides. Sometimes, I’d be out with my family on a vacation, and we’d make a little side tour to look for an old playground to shoot. My husband would look at these big metal things and go, “Oh my God, those are the Slides of Death!” because they were so huge and rickety. But back then, these were very safe pieces of equipment compared to what kids had been playing on before.
A page from the 1971 GameTime catalog offering rideable Saddle Mates. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
A page from the 1971 GameTime catalog offering rideable Saddle Mates. (Courtesy of Brenda Biondo)
Collectors Weekly: Growing up in the 1980s, I always hated the new fiberglass slides because I’d end up with all these tiny glass shards in my butt.
Biondo: Yeah, I remember that, too. It’s always something. It is fun to talk to people about playgrounds because it reminds them of all the fun stuff they did as kids. When people see pictures of these metal slides, they tell me, “Oh my gosh, I remember getting such a bad burn from a metal slide one summer!” The metal would get so hot in the sun, and kids would take pieces of wax paper with them to sit on so they’d go flying down the slide. I have some old postcards that show playgrounds from the early ’20s. The wood seesaws not only were huge, but they had no handles so you had hold on to the sides of the board where you sat. I’m looking at that like, “Oh my God!” It’s all relative.
playground_postcard_milwaukee
Kids ride the rocking-boat seesaw at a Milwaukee, Wisconsin, park in this postcard postmarked 1910.
(To see more of Brenda Biondo’s playground photos and vintage catalog pages, pick up a copy of her book, “Once Upon a Playground: A Celebration of Classic American Playground, 1920-1975.” To find an exhibition of Biondo’s playground project, or to bring it to your town, visit the ExhibitsUSA page. To learn more about creative mid-century playgrounds around the globe, also pick up, “The Playground Project” by Xavier Salle and Vincent Romagny.) insh.world/history/playground-equipment-of-yesterday-that...
I did not take this picture. Just did some edting for the Process My Photo (Not Better, Just Different) Group.
Photo owned and copyright: Tja'Sha.
I hope this isn't too late for submission. Tja'Sha is gorgeous to begin with, so I didn't do much editing. =)
It's interesting, this process.
Model & Styling: Monika
Photo & Processing: Me
I think this is totally different from everything else I have done before.
This was taken with my Canon 350d and processed with Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop.
My friend Ulrike - who also wants to start her own photography business - just called to tell me she is now on Flickr too.
So please lovely Flickr friends. Visit her stream (she is working on uploading) and show her some love :) Thank you
A little different from the usual. Spring has definitely sprung when the local woods start filling with Bluebells. For locals these are not the usual part of Slindon Woods entered from Dukes Road but further east and due south of Slindon Village in the woodland surrounding Park Lane Car Park, known as Butchers Copse. Many Bluebell pictures are either eye level views of the woods or close ups. Seeing this path I decided to go for a woodland view at Bluebell level. This shot was taken at 6.40pm about 90 minutes before sunset for better light.
The picture was taken on a mini tripod with a Sony A550 with a Sigma 28-80 zoom at 28mm I used the A550 for its folding screen to make it easier to get a low down image.
A single image was taken and first processed in RAW. I then used Topaz DeNoise followed by Topaz Clarity to recover detail.
For my Photography books Understand Your Camera and Compose Better Pictures see My Author Page USA or My Author Page UK
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For Galleries, Prints and Licences see Edwin Jones Photography
A different perspective of the 4 masted steel barque STS Sedov (Седов), moored at Funchal Harbour.
She remains the largest training ship in operation, with room for 102 cadets and 46 trainees, along with 54 main crew.
She has an incredible sail area of 4.192 m², mast height of 58m, an overall length of 117,5 m and a beam of 14.9 m.
She was the first windjammer to be built with an with auxiliary engine, launched in Kiel in 1921.
Acquired in 1945 by the Soviet Union as a war reparation her current home port is Murmansk.
Ju-287
Please watch this and many other fantastic creations here: www.flickr.com/photos/einon/
I have already built some Luft46 projects, like the Blohm + Voss P.188.03, but I wanted to build a different project this time. The Ju-287 was a German test-bed bomber built in the end of the war, but the Germans were developing new and more advanced versions like the EF-140.
The real story:
This Ju-287 version is the EF-140, a prototype only built after the war by the Soviets. The first flight was in 1948, using two Klimov VK-1 jet engines. If the WW2 had continued, it might have been built by the germans and used as a tactical bomber against England and the URSS.
Alternate Story (what if? 1945-47)
The prototype was powered by two BMW 109-018 jet engines, featured a revolutionary forward-swept wing and, like other bombers built by Junkers, it carried a pressure cabin housing the three man crew. The defensive guns were all remotely controlled.
Operationally, the plane was called Ju-287 A-5. A small squadron of 5 Ju-287s A-5 operating from Norway, each plane armed with two Hs 296, tried to sink the soviet battleship Sovetsky Soyuz in 1946. The battleship eventually was hit two times but managed to survive and return to Murmansk. Two Ju-287 A-5 bombers were shot down during the attack. The fast bomber was also used with great success against the Soviet army, being too fast for the soviet fighters to catch up. This led the soviets to develop mixed rocket-and-propeller fighters to defend it´s troops.
In May 1947, a few weeks before the “end of the war”, a total of 350 Ju-287 A-5 were used in the Second Battle of Britain. Half of them were lost in less than a week, most to the new British jet fighters like the De Havilland Vampire and the Gloster Meteor.
Henschel Hs 296 Flying bomb (invented by me)
The Henschel Hs 296 was a radio-controlled flying bomb carrying a 750kg armour-piercing charge. The bomb was developed from the Fieseler Fi 103 Flying bomb (also know as V-1) and was guided to the target using a “Tonne-Seedorf” TV guidance system built for the Hs 293D. It had a range of 30km and was propelled by 2 Schmidding SG 34 solid fuel rocket boosters (1,200 kg for 10 seconds each).
General characteristics
Crew: 3
Length: 19.25 m
Wingspan: 21.87 m
Height: 5.65 m
Wing area: 61 m2
Empty weight: 14,676 kg
Gross weight: 25,543 kg
Powerplant: 2 × BMW 109-018 jet engines
Performance
Maximum speed: 900 km/h (estimated)
Range: 4000 km
Service ceiling: 14,100 m
Armament:
2 x 30mm Mk-103 cannon fixed forward firing;
2 × 20mm MG-151/20 cannon in a dorsal turret;
2 × 20mm MG-151/20 cannon in a rear turret;
2 × 20mm MG-151/20 in a DT-N1 ventral barbette (some models);
2 x 1000kg bombs in the bomb bay or;
4 x 500kg bombs in the bomb bay or;
2 x Hs 296 Glide-bomb under the wings or;
2 x FX 1400 Fritz X under the wings or;
2 x Blohm & Voss L 11 Schneewittchen Torpedo Gliders under the wings.
Max. Bombload: 4000kg.
Hope you like it
Please watch this and many other fantastic creations here: www.flickr.com/photos/einon/
Please comment or rate ^^
Eínon