The news was that Jools' cough was little better. She got a mail back from the surgery on Friday saying her (non-urgent) appointment with the doctor was on December 14th. But as we were going to Tesco, she would have a chat with the pharmasist and see about some of the behind the counter stuff.

 

Winter has arrived, though no snow as yet, but the wind is set in the east, its cloudy and feels raw outside.

 

I would spend part of the day churchcrawling.

 

After shopping.

 

We go to Tesco, Jools really only coming so she could get something for her cough.

 

With a few bottles of tripel and cider we managed to spend £140. A bag of rice, not white easy cook rice I'll admit, but that's £4.50 now.

 

Wow.

 

Back home with the shopping and a bottle of serious cough syrup, we put the shopping away and have breakfast.

 

No surprise then that Jools wasn't coming out with me, she wanted to get the cough under control, would only take the new syrup when needed as it can make you drowsy.

 

I had a list of churches, and first up was our local one, St Margaret.

 

They were having a craft day. I thought it might be a fayre, but was a kid's craft day. Anyway, the church would be open and I could take shots of the memorials and windows.

 

There were pagan heads at the top of each column, and as corbel stones. The more I looked, the more pagan heads, even at the top of two of the columns, but not all.

 

No real ancient glass, but good quality Victorian.

 

The church itself is the triumph, being an early Norman and well preserved.

 

Although, sadly, the tower is in poor repair and needs reroofing, which is why it is currently encased in scaffolding.

 

I am sure when we called in at Barham last week, a sign said there was a craft fayre on, so would be open. I would go back, and get some shots, I thought.

 

Its a half hour drive, if that out of Dover down the A2 and off at the Wingham turning, down the valley and parking outside the church, its spire pointing to heaven.

 

Inside the church there was no fayre again, just a warden showing a lady round. We all said "hello", and I went about getting shots.

 

I have been here at least three times, but now take the big lens to get details of the windows and memorials high up, so there are always new details to reveal.

 

Star item is the window of St George and the dragon, though is hidden in the north-west corner, and best viewed from the stairs to the belltower.

 

After 20 minutes, the visitor left and the warden turned off the lights, forgetting I was there, but I had my shots.

 

From Barham its a short drive to Bridge, then along the Nailbourne to Patrixbourne, where I see the door was open, but I had another target: Bekesbourne, the next village along, crossing the dry bed of the bourne, stopping on the lane outside the church. I look left to the Old Palace, but there were no cars parked there, so no point of even knocking, I drove on.

 

Instead of turning left back to Bridge, I turn right towards Littlebourne, no real idea where I was going.

 

Littlebourne could wait for another time, I only went back there in 2020, I went to Wingham, driving on towards Sandwich.

 

I thought, it's a long time since I was at Woodnesborough, I could cut through Ash and go there.

 

Which is what I did.

 

I could have stopped at Ash too, that's usually open, but there'll be other times. I have been there twice and got good shots last time for sure.

 

From Ash, the road climbs, leading to Woodnesborough, Woden's Hill, where there was a hill fort in antiquity. The church is on the highest point, overlooking the marshes of the old Wantsum Channel, and on to Sandwich which when the Channel was still flooded, was on a spit of land.

 

The church is a marker for miles around due to its cupola, something is shares with Ringwould near to home.

 

Inside it was so dark, I thought I would need to find the lights, but I could not find them. So, I hoped the camera would cope without.

 

It did.

 

But again, I was here really to record the windows, which were rich in detail. I took 215 shots here, 560 in a morning at three churches.

 

Not bad.

 

But I was done, what light there was, was fading, even though it was only just after one. I would go home.

 

Once home I got busy.

 

I have a taste for beans. Not baked beans, but Boston Beans. I had a recipe, and we got the ingredients that morning, so went about making a huge panful. Three tins of haricot beans, tomatoes, stock, spices, bacon, pork belly, mustard, and black treacle.

 

Cooked on the hob for an hour, then cooked long and low in the oven for four hours.

 

What came out looked and tasted like fine Boston Beans. We will be eating these for weeks.

 

At the same time I make fritters.

 

The plan was to be all cooked and eaten before the football began at three.

 

I did it with half an hour to spare, the leftover wine drunk too, meaning I would struggle to stay awake for Holland v USA game. Netherlands win pretty comfortably.

 

And in the evening, with a soundtrack of funk and soul thanks to Craig, I watch Argentine v Australia, which was a stunning game.

 

Even better, I sat on the sofa to watch, Cleo eyed me as if to say how dare you take my chosen sleeping place. But she came over, paced around, then lay between the arm of the sofa and my leg. Scully lay on the other side. I had 50% of the household cats.

 

Happier than I have been for ages.

 

Best of all was that the syrup worked, stopped the coughing, and Jools fell asleep right off.

 

------------------------------------------------

 

A morning out, revisiting some familiar fairly local churches.

 

Final visit was to Woodnesborough, aka Woden's Hill, near to Sandwich.

 

It was open, but no light switch that could be found meant that the church was dark, but the camera coped well.

 

Woodnesborough sits on the highest point near to the coast, its cupola marking the spot, and visible for miles in all directions.

 

-------------------------------------------

 

The tower makes this church one of the easiest in Kent to identify. It is capped by a little cupola and wooden balustrade of eighteenth-century date that replaced a medieval spire. During the Middle Ages the church was owned by Leeds Priory which invested heavily in the structure, and was no doubt responsible for the excellent sedilia built in about 1350. The canopy is supported by a quadripartite vault in turn supported by angry little heads. Above the sedilia is the cut-off end of a prickett beam. The east window, of Decorated style stonework, has a thirteenth-century hangover in the form of a shafted rere-arch. There are two excellent modern stained glass windows designed by F.W Cole, which show the Creation (1980) and St Francis (1992). The good altar rails are of Queen Anne's reign, as are the splendid Royal Arms.

 

www.kentchurches.info/church.asp?p=Woodnesborough

 

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WOODNESBOROUGH,

¶OR Winsborough, as it is usually called, lies the next parish northward from Eastry, being written in the survey of Domesday, Wanesberge. It took its name according to Verstegan, from the Saxon idol Woden, (and it is spelt by some Wodensborough) whose place of worship was in it; however that may be, the termination of the word berge, or borough, shews it to be of high antiquity.

 

art of this parish, over which the manor of Boxley claims, is within the jurisdiction of the justices of the town and port of Sandwich, and liberty of the cinque ports; and the residue is in the hundred of Eastry, and jurisdiction of the county of Kent.

 

There are three boroughs in this parish, viz. Cold Friday, Hamwold, and Marshborough; the borsholders of which are chosen at the petty sessions of the justices, acting at Wingham, for the east division of the lath of St. Augustine.

 

THIS PARISH is large, being two miles and an half one way, and upwards of a mile and an half the other. The church stands nearly in the centre of it, on high ground. At a small distance from the church is Woodnesborough hill, both of which are sea marks. This hill is a very high mount, seemingly thrown up by art, and consisting of a sandy earth, it has been thought by some to have been the place on which the idol Woden from whom this place is supposed to have taken its name) was worshipped in the time of the Saxons; by others to be the burial place of Vortimer, the Saxon king, who died in 457, whilst others suppose this mount was raised over those who fell in the battle fought between Ceoldred, king of Mercia, and Ina, king of the West Saxons, in the year 715, at Woodnesbeorb, according to the Saxon chronicle, which name Dr. Plot supposes to be Woodnesborough. Vortimer, as our historians tell us, at his death, desired to be buried near the place where the Saxons used to land, being persuaded that his bones would deter them from any attempt in future. Though authors differ much on the place of his burial, yet this mount at Woodnesborough is as probable, or more so, perhaps, than any other, for it was near to, and was cast up so high as to be plainly seen from the Portus Rutupinus, which at that time was the general landing place of the Saxon fleets. Some years ago there were found upon the top of it sundry sepulchral remains, viz. a glass vessel (engraved by the Rev. Mr. Douglas, in his Nænia;) a fibula, (engraved by Mr. Eoys, in his collections for Sandwich;) the head of a spear, and some fragments of Roman vessels. Much of the earth of sand has been lately removed round the sides of it, but nothing further has been found.

 

At a small distance northward from hence, at the bottom of a short steep hill, lies the village called Woodnesborough-street, and sometimes Cold Fridaystreet, containing thirty four houses. The vicaragehouse is situated in the middle of it, being a new handsome building; almost contiguous to it is a handsome sashed house, belonging to the Jull family, now made use of as a poor-house; through this street the road leads to Sandwich. West ward of the street stands the parsonage-house, late the seat of Oliver Stephens, esq. deceased, and now of his window, as will be further noticed hereafter. Besides the manors and estates in this parish, particularly described, in the western parts of it there are several hamlets, as Somerfield, Barnsole, Coombe, with New-street, Great and Little Flemings, Ringlemere, and the farm of Christians Court.

 

In the north east part of the parish, the road from Eastry, by the parsonage of Woodnesborough northwestward, divides; one road, which in antient deeds is called Lovekys-street, going towards Ash-street; the other through the hamlet of Marshborough, formerly called Marshborough, alias Stipins, to Each End and Sandwich, the two windmills close to the entrance of which are with in the bounds of this parish. Each, Upper Each, called antiently Upriche, and Each End, antiently called Netheriche, were both formerly accounted manors, and are mentioned as such in the marriage settlement of Henry Whyte, esq. in the beginning of queen Elizabeth's reign. After the Whytes, these manors passed in like manner as Grove, in this parish, to the James's. Upper Each, or Upriche, has for many years belonged to the family of Abbot, of Ramsgate, and is now the property of John Abbot, esq. of Canterbury. Each End, or Netheriche, belongs, one moiety to the heirs or devisees of the late earl of Strafford, and the other moiety to John Matson, esq. of Sandwich.

 

¶It cannot but occur to the reader how much this parish abounds with Saxon names, besides the name of Wodens borough, the street of Cold Friday, mentioned before, is certainly derived from the Saxon words, Cola, and Friga, which latter was the name of a goddess, worshipped by the Saxons, and her day Frige-deag, from whence our day of Friday is derived; other places in this parish, mentioned before likewise, claim, surely, their original from the same language.

 

This parish contains about 3000 acres, the whole rents of it being about 3373l. yearly value. It is very bare of coppice wood; the Old Wood, so called, in Ringleton, being the only one in it. The soil of this parish is very rich and fertile, equal to those the most so in this neighbourhood, particularly as to the plantations of hops, which have much increased within these few years past. The middle of the parish is high ground, and is in general a flat open country of arable common fields. West and south-westward the lands are more inclosed with hedges. North and north-westward of the parsonage, towards Sandwich, they are low and wet, consisting of a large level of marsh land, the nearness of which makes the other parts of this parish rather unhealthy, which is not otherwise very pleasant in any part of it. There was a fair held here yearly, on Holy Thursday, but it has been for some time disused.

 

In Ringleton field, in this parish, there was found about the year 1514, a fine gold coin, weighing about twelve shillings, with a loop of the same metal to hang it by; on one side was the figure of a young man in armour, a helmet on his head, and a spear over his right shoulder; on the reverse, the figure of Victory, with a sword in her hand, the point downwards.

 

The church, which is dedicated to St. Mary, consists of a nave, and two isles, having a square tower steeple at the west end, with a modern wooden turret and vane at the top of it, in which are five bells, made in 1676. It had a high spire on the tower, which was taken down some years ago. At the east end of the chancel is a marble tablet for John Cason, esq. of this place, justice of the peace, obt. 1718; John Cason, esq. his son, obt. 1755; arms,Argent, a chevron, sable, between three wolves heads, erased, gules, on an escutcheon of pretence, sable, a chevron, between three fleurs de lis, of the field; another for Thomas Blechenden, of the antient family of that name, of Aldington, in Kent, obt. 1661; arms, Azure, a fess nebulee, argent, between three lions heads erased, or, attired, gules, impalingBoys. On the south side, an antient altar monument with gothic pillars and arches, having had shields and arms, now obliterated. Against the wall, under the canopy, two brass plates, which have been removed to this place, from two grave-stones in the chancel; the first for Sir John Parcar, late vicar of this church, who died the v.day of May, a°o dni m° v° xiij° on the second are Latin verses to the memory of Nichs Spencer, esq. obt. 1593. In the middle of the chancel, a gravestone for William Docksey, esq. of Snellston, in Derbyshire, a justice of the peace, obt. 1760; Sarah his wife, youngest daughter of John Cason, esq. obt. 1774; arms,Or, a lion rampant, azure, surmounted of a bend, argent. On a gravestone on the north side of the chancel, on a brass plate, On a chevron, three quatersoils, between three annulets, quartering other coats, now obliterated, for Master Myghell Heyre, sumtyme vicar of this churche, who dyed the xxii day of July, m° v° xxviii. In the north isle are several memorials for the family of Gillow, arms, A lion rampant, in chief, three fleurs de lis. At the entrance into the chancel, on a grave-stone, on a brass plate, John Hill, gent. of the parish of Nassall, in Staffordshire, obt. 1605. A mural monument for William Gibbs, of this parish, obt. 1777; arms,Argent, three battle axes, in fess, sable. In the church-yard are altar tombs to the memory of the Julls, and for Sladden; one for John Verall, gent. sometime mayor of Sandwich, obt. 1610; and another for John Benchkin, of Pouton, obt. 1639.

 

There were formerly painted in the windows of this church,Or, a chief indented, azure, for John de Sandwich. Several coats of arms, among which were those of Valence and St. Leger,Argent, three leaves in sinster bend, their points downward, proper.— On a canton, azure, three crescents, or, for Grove.— Argent, three escallops in chief, or, in base a crescent, gules, for Helpestone, usually called Hilpurton, bailiff of Sandwich, in 1299. A shield, being Helpeston's badge, another On a fess engrailed, three cinquefoils, between three garbs, for John Hill, of Nasall, in Staffordshire, who lies buried in this church. —A fess engrailed, three lions rampant, in chief, on the fess, a crescent for difference, for Spencer, customer, of Sandwich. — Quarterly, four coats; first, On a chevron, three quaterfoils; second, Per pale, ermine and argent; third, A cross, between four pomegranates, slipped; sourth,Three bars, wavy, for Michael Heyre, vicar here in 1520.

 

The church of Woodnesborough was given, in the reign of king Henry I. by a religious woman, one Ascelina de Wodensberg, to the priory of Ledes, soon after the foundation of it; to which deed was witness Robert de Crevequer, founder of the priory, Elias his son, and others; which gift was confirmed by the said Robert, who by his charter, released to the priory all his right and title to it. It was likewise confirmed by archbishop Theobald, and several of his successors, and by king Henry III. by his charter of inspeximus in his 41st year.

 

Archbishop William Corboil, who came to the see of Canterbury, three years after the foundation of Ledes priory, at the instance and petition of Ascelina above mentioned, who resigned this church into his hands for this purpose, appropriated it to the prior and convent, for the finding of necessary cloaths, for the canons there; and a vicarage was accordingly endowed in it.

 

There was a controversy between the prior and convent, and Adam, vicar of this church, in 1627, anno 14 Henry II. concerning the great tithes arising from the crofts and curtilages within this parish, which was referred to the prior of Rochester, who was the pope's delegate for this purpose, who determined that the prior and convent of Ledes, as rectors of this church, should receive, without any exception, all the great tithes of wheat, barley, oats, beans, peas, and of every fort of corn arising, or to arise from all lands, crofts, curtilages, or other places whatever, situated within the bounds, of this parish; and that the prior and convent should yearly pay to the said vicar, and his successors, half a seam of barley, and half a seam of beans, at the nativity of our Lord. (fn. 10)

 

¶After which, this parsonage appropriate,(which appears to have been esteemed as a manor) together with the advowson of the vicarage, remained with the prior and convent of Ledes, till its dissolution in the 31st year of king Henry VIII. when it was, with all its lands and possessions, surrendered into the king's hands, who by his dotation charter, in his 33d year, settled both parsonage and advowson on his new-founded dean and chapter of Rochester, with whom they remain at this time. On the dissolution of deans and chapters, after the death of king Charles I. this parsonage was surveyed in 1649, when is appeared that the manor or parsonage of Woodnesborough, with the scite thereof, and all manner of tithes belonging to it, with a garden and orchard of one acre, was valued all together at 300l. that the lessee was to repair the premises, and the chancel of the church; that the vicarage was worth fifty pounds per annum. The then incumbent was under sequestration, and there was none to serve the cure; and that the church was then quite ruinated, and in great decay. (fn. 11)

 

www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-kent/vol10/pp121-144

Epcot is the second of four theme parks built at Walt Disney World in Bay Lake, Florida, near the city of Orlando. It opened as EPCOT Center on October 1, 1982, and spans 300 acres (120 ha), more than twice the size of the Magic Kingdom park. It is dedicated to the celebration of human achievement, namely technological innovation and international culture, and is often referred to as a "Permanent World's Fair." In 2013, the park hosted approximately 11.22 million guests, making it the fifth most visited theme park in the world. The park is represented by Spaceship Earth, a geodesic sphere that also serves as an attraction. Epcot was known as EPCOT Center until 1994, when it was later renamed Epcot '94, then Epcot '95 the following year.

EPCOT is an acronym for Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow; a Utopian city of the future planned by Walt Disney, often interchanging "city" and "community." In Walt Disney's words: "EPCOT will take its cue from the new ideas and new technologies that are now emerging from the creative centers of American industry. It will be a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing, and testing, and demonstrating new materials and new systems. And EPCOT will always be a showcase to the world of the ingenuity and imagination of American free enterprise." His original vision was for a model community which would have been home to twenty thousand residents and a test bed for city planning as well as organization. It was to have been built in the shape of a circle with businesses and commercial areas at its center with community buildings, schools, and recreational complexes around it while residential neighborhoods would line the perimeter. This radial plan concept is strongly influenced by British planner Ebenezer Howard and his Garden Cities of To-morrow. Transportation would have been provided by monorails and PeopleMovers (like that in Magic Kingdom's Tomorrowland.) Automobile traffic would be kept underground, leaving pedestrians safe above ground. The original model of EPCOT can still be seen by passengers riding the Tomorrowland Transit Authority attraction in the Magic Kingdom park; when the PeopleMover enters the showhouse for Stitch's Great Escape!, the remaining portion of the model is visible on the left (when facing forward) behind glass. Walt Disney was not able to obtain funding and permission to start work on his Florida property until he agreed to first build Magic Kingdom. He died nearly five years before Magic Kingdom opened.

 

After Disney's death, The Walt Disney Company decided that it did not want to be in the business of running a city without Walt's guidance. The model community of Celebration, Florida has been mentioned as a realization of Disney's original vision, but Celebration is based on concepts of new urbanism which is radically different from Disney's modernist and futurist visions. However, the idea of EPCOT was instrumental in prompting the state of Florida to create the Reedy Creek Improvement District (RCID) and the Cities of Bay Lake and Reedy Creek (now Lake Buena Vista), a legislative mechanism allowing the Walt Disney Company to exercise governmental powers over Walt Disney World. Control over the RCID is vested in the landowners of the district, and the promise of an actual city in the district would have meant that the powers of the RCID would have been distributed among the landowners in EPCOT. Because the idea of EPCOT was never implemented, the Disney Corporation remained almost the sole landowner in the district allowing it to maintain control of the RCID and the cities of Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista; Disney further cemented this control by deannexing Celebration from the RCID.

 

The original plans for the park showed indecision over the park's purpose. Some Imagineers wanted it to represent the cutting edge of technology, while others wanted it to showcase international cultures and customs. At one point, a model of the futuristic park was pushed together against a model of a World's Fair international theme, and the two were combined. The park was originally named EPCOT Center to reflect the ideals and values of the city. It was constructed for an estimated $800 million to $1.4 billion and took three years to build, at the time the largest construction project on Earth. The parking lot serving the park is 141 acres (57 ha) (including bus area) and can accommodate 11,211 vehicles (grass areas hold additional 500+ vehicles). Before it opened on October 1, 1982, Walt Disney World Ambassador Genie Field introduced E. Cardon Walker, Disney's chairman and CEO, who dedicated EPCOT Center. Walker also presented a family with lifetime passes for the two Walt Disney World theme parks. His remarks were followed by Florida Governor Bob Graham and William Ellinghouse, president of AT&T.

 

As part of the opening-day ceremony, dancers and band members performed We've Just Begun to Dream. The Sherman Brothers wrote a song especially for the occasion entitled "The World Showcase March". During the finale, doves and many sets of balloons were released. Performing groups representing countries from all over the world performed in World Showcase. Water was gathered from major rivers across the globe and emptied into the park's fountain of nations ceremonial containers to mark the opening. Located at the front of the park is a plaque bearing Walker's opening-day dedication, as seen above.

 

Future World consists of a variety of pavilions that explore innovative aspects and applications including technology and science. Future World also serves as the park's main entrance and features the park's iconic landmark, Spaceship Earth, a large geodesic sphere structure which houses a themed attraction inside. Originally, each pavilion of Future World featured a unique circular logo which was featured on park signage and the attractions themselves. The logos, including that of Epcot itself, have been phased out over recent years, but some remnants are still scattered throughout the park; the pavilions are now instead identified by name and recognized by the main attraction(s) housed inside. The various pavilions located in Future World include the following:

 

Spaceship Earth

Universe of Energy

Mission: Space

Test Track

Innoventions East

Innoventions West

The Seas with Nemo & Friends

The Land

Imagination!

Wonders of Life/Festival Center (Seasonal Operation)

 

Corporate sponsorships

 

Each pavilion was initially sponsored by a corporation which helped fund its construction and maintenance in return for the corporation's logos and some marketing elements appearing throughout the pavilion. For example, Universe of Energy was sponsored by Exxon from 1982 to 2004, and The Land was sponsored by Kraft from 1982 to 1993, then Nestlé from 1993 to 2009. Each pavilion contains a private "VIP area" for its sponsor with offices, lounges, and reception areas hidden away from regular park guests. While some pavilions still retain active sponsorships, in recent years several pavilions have lost sponsorships due to lack of interest from partner companies in renewing expiring agreements. After General Electric left Horizons in 1993, it closed for a couple of years, then reopened temporarily while neighboring attractions Universe of Energy and World of Motion were renovated. Horizons closed permanently on January 9, 1999 and was demolished in the summer of 2000 to make room for the opening of Mission: SPACE on October 9, 2003. Metlife sponsored Wonders of Life from 1989 to 2001, until that area was closed. However, the Wonders Of Life pavilion is still mostly intact and is used for both the Flower and Garden Festival and the Food and Wine Festival. Current active sponsorships include the following:

 

Test Track opened in the former World of Motion pavilion and is currently sponsored by Chevrolet

Mission: SPACE is currently sponsored by Hewlett-Packard

Spaceship Earth is currently sponsored by Siemens which also sponsors the park's nighttime show IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth.

Living with the Land is currently sponsored by Chiquita.

Individual small attractions and exhibits within or nearby the Innoventions pavilions are sponsored by various companies such as THINK presented by IBM, Where's the Fire? and Play It Safe presented by Liberty Mutual, Club Cool presented by Coca-Cola, The Great Piggy Bank Adventure presented by T. Rowe Price, Habit Heroes presented by Florida Blue Cross and The Sum Of All Thrills presented by Raytheon.

 

from Wikipedia

 

Is the largest country in South America and the only Portuguese-speaking country in the Americas. It is the fifth largest country by geographical area and the fifth most populous country in the world.

Bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the east, Brazil has a coastline of over 7,491 kilometers (4,655 mi).[ It is bordered on the north by Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname and the French overseas department of French Guiana; on the northwest by Colombia; on the west by Bolivia and Peru; on the southwest by Argentina and Paraguay and on the south by Uruguay. Numerous archipelagos are part of the Brazilian territory, such as Fernando de Noronha, Rocas Atoll, Saint Peter and Paul Rocks, and Trindade and Martim Vaz.

Brazil was a colony of Portugal from the landing of Pedro Álvares Cabral in 1500 until its independence in 1822. Initially independent as the Brazilian Empire, the country has been a republic since 1889, although the bicameral legislature, now called Congress, dates back to 1824, when the first constitution was ratified. Its current Constitution defines Brazil as a Federal Republic. The Federation is formed by the union of the Federal District, the 26 States, and the 5,564 Municipalities.

Brazil is the world's eighth largest economy by nominal GDP and the ninth largest by purchasing power parity. Economic reforms have given the country new international recognition. Brazil is a founding member of the United Nations, the G20, Mercosul and the Union of South American Nations, and is one of the BRIC Countries. Brazil is also home to a diversity of wildlife, natural environments, and extensive natural resources in a variety of protected habitats

 

History

Portuguese colonization and territorial expansion

The land now called Brazil (the origin of whose name is disputed), was claimed by Portugal in April 1500, on the arrival of the Portuguese fleet commanded by Pedro Álvares Cabral. The Portuguese encountered stone age natives divided into several tribes, most of whom shared the same Tupi-Guarani linguistic family, and fought among themselves.

Colonization was effectively begun in 1534, when Dom João III divided the territory into twelve hereditary captaincies, but this arrangement proved problematic and in 1549 the king assigned a Governor-General to administer the entire colony. The Portuguese assimilated some of the native tribes while others were enslaved or exterminated in long wars or by European diseases to which they had no immunity. By the mid 16th century, sugar had become Brazil's most important export and the Portuguese imported African slaves to cope with the increasing international demand.

Through wars against the French, the Portuguese slowly expanded their territory to the southeast, taking Rio de Janeiro in 1567, and to the northwest, taking São Luís in 1615. They sent military expeditions to the Amazon rainforest and conquered British and Dutch strongholds, founding villages and forts from 1669. In 1680 they reached the far south and founded Sacramento on the bank of the Rio de la Plata, in the Eastern Strip region (present-day Uruguay).

At the end of the 17th century sugar exports started to decline but the discovery of gold by explorers in the region that would later be called Minas Gerais (General Mines) around 1693, and in the following decades in current Mato Grosso and Goiás, saved the colony from imminent collapse. From all over Brazil, as well as from Portugal, thousands of immigrants came to the mines.

The Spanish tried to prevent Portuguese expansion into the territory that belonged to them according to the 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas, and succeeded in conquering the Eastern Strip in 1777. However, this was in vain as the Treaty of San Ildefonso, signed in the same year, confirmed Portuguese sovereignty over all lands proceeding from its territorial expansion, thus creating most of the current Brazilian borders.

In 1808, the Portuguese royal family, fleeing the troops of the French Emperor Napoleon I that were invading Portugal and most of Central Europe, established themselves in the city of Rio de Janeiro, which thus became the seat of the entire Portuguese Empire. In 1815 Dom João VI, then regent on behalf of his incapacitated mother, elevated Brazil from colony to sovereign Kingdom united with Portugal. In 1809 the Portuguese invaded French Guiana (which was returned to France in 1817) and in 1816 the Eastern Strip, subsequently renamed Cisplatina.

 

Independence and empire

 

King João VI returned to Europe on 26 April 1821, leaving his elder son Prince Pedro de Alcântara as regent to rule Brazil. The Portuguese government attempted to turn Brazil into a colony once again, thus depriving it of its achievements since 1808. The Brazilians refused to yield and Prince Pedro stood by them declaring the country's independence from Portugal on 7 September 1822. On 12 October 1822, Pedro was declared the first Emperor of Brazil and crowned Dom Pedro I on 1 December 1822.

At that time almost all Brazilians were in favor of a monarchy and republicanism had little support. The subsequent Brazilian War of Independence spread through almost the entire territory, with battles in the northern, northeastern, and southern regions. The last Portuguese soldiers surrendered on 8 March 1824 and independence was recognized by Portugal on 29 August 1825.

The first Brazilian constitution was promulgated on 25 March 1824, after its acceptance by the municipal councils across the country. Pedro I abdicated on 7 April 1831 and went to Europe to reclaim his daughter’s crown, leaving behind his five year old son and heir, who was to become Dom Pedro II. As the new emperor could not exert his constitutional prerogatives until he reached maturity, a regency was created.

Disputes between political factions led to rebellions and an unstable, almost anarchical, regency. The rebellious factions, however, were not in revolt against the monarchy, even though some declared the secession of the provinces as independent republics, but only so long as Pedro II was a minor. Because of this, Pedro II was prematurely declared of age and "Brazil was to enjoy nearly half a century of internal peace and rapid material progress."

Brazil won three international wars during the 58-year reign of Pedro II (the Platine War, the Uruguayan War and the War of the Triple Alliance) and witnessed the consolidation of representative democracy, mainly due to successive elections and unrestricted freedom of the press. Most importantly, slavery was extinguished after a slow but steady process that began with the end of the international traffic in slaves in 1850 and ended with the complete abolition of slavery in 1888.The slave population had been in decline since Brazil's independence: in 1823, 29% of the Brazilian population were slaves but by 1887 this had fallen to 5%.

When the monarchy was overthrown on 15 November 1889 there was little desire in Brazil to change the form of government and Pedro II was at the height of his popularity among his subjects. However, he "bore prime, perhaps sole, responsibility for his own overthrow." After the death of his two sons, Pedro believed that "the imperial regime was destined to end with him." He cared little for the regime's fate and so neither did anything, nor allowed anyone else to do anything, to prevent the military coup, backed by former slave owners who resented the abolition of slavery.

 

States and municipalities

 

Brazil is a federation composed of twenty-six States, one federal district (which contains the capital city, Brasília) and municipalities. States have autonomous administrations, collect their own taxes and receive a share of taxes collected by the Federal government. They have a governor and a unicameral legislative body elected directly by their voters. They also have independent Courts of Law for common justice. Despite this, states have much less autonomy to create their own laws than in the United States. For example, criminal and civil laws can only be voted by the federal bicameral Congress and are uniform throughout the country.

The states and the federal district may be grouped into regions: Northern, Northeast, Central-West, Southeast and Southern. The Brazilian regions are merely geographical, not political or administrative divisions, and they do not have any specific form of government. Although defined by law, Brazilian regions are useful mainly for statistical purposes, and also to define the application of federal funds in development projects.

Municipalities, as the states, have autonomous administrations, collect their own taxes and receive a share of taxes collected by the Union and state government. Each has a mayor and an elected legislative body, but no separate Court of Law. Indeed, a Court of Law organized by the state can encompass many municipalities in a single justice administrative division called comarca (county).

 

Geography

 

Brazil occupies a large area along the eastern coast of South America and includes much of the continent's interior, sharing land borders with Uruguay to the south; Argentina and Paraguay to the southwest; Bolivia and Peru to the west; Colombia to the northwest; and Venezuela, Suriname, Guyana and the French overseas department of French Guiana to the north. It shares a border with every country in South America except for Ecuador and Chile. It also encompasses a number of oceanic archipelagos, such as Fernando de Noronha, Rocas Atoll, Saint Peter and Paul Rocks, and Trindade and Martim Vaz. Its size, relief, climate, and natural resources make Brazil geographically diverse.

Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world, after Russia, Canada, China and the United States, and third largest in the Americas; with a total area of 8,514,876.599 square kilometers (3,287,612 sq mi), including 55,455 square kilometers (21,411 sq mi) of water. It spans three time zones; from UTC-4 in the western states, to UTC-3 in the eastern states (and the official time of Brazil), and UTC-2 in the Atlantic islands.

Brazilian topography is also diverse and includes hills, mountains, plains, highlands, and scrublands. Much of the terrain lies between 200 metres (660 ft) and 800 metres (2,600 ft) in elevation. The main upland area occupies most of the southern half of the country. The northwestern parts of the plateau consist of broad, rolling terrain broken by low, rounded hills.

The southeastern section is more rugged, with a complex mass of ridges and mountain ranges reaching elevations of up to 1,200 metres (3,900 ft). These ranges include the Mantiqueira and Espinhaço mountains and the Serra do Mar. In the north, the Guiana Highlands form a major drainage divide, separating rivers that flow south into the Amazon Basin from rivers that empty into the Orinoco River system, in Venezuela, to the north. The highest point in Brazil is the Pico da Neblina at 3,014 metres (9,890 ft), and the lowest is the Atlantic Ocean.

Brazil has a dense and complete system of rivers, one of the world's most extensive, with eight major drainage basins, all of which drain into the Atlantic. Major rivers include the Amazon (the world's second-longest river and the largest in terms of volume of water), the Paraná and its major tributary the Iguaçu (which includes the Iguazu Falls), the Negro, São Francisco, Xingu, Madeira and Tapajós rivers.

 

Other Infos

Oficial name:

Republica Federativa do Brasil

 

Independence:

Declared September 7, 1822

- Recognized August 29, 1825

- Republic November 15, 1889

 

Area:

8.514.816 km2

 

Inhabitants:

182.670.000

 

Dialects:

Agavotaguerra,Amahuaca ,Amanayé ,Amapá Creole ,Amikoana ,Amundava ,Anambé ,Apalaí,Apiacá ,Apinayé ,Apurinã ,Arapaso ,Arára,Araweté ,Parakanã ,Tapirapé,Arikapú ,Aruá ,Arutani ,Ashéninka ,Asuriní ,Asuriní,Atorada ,Atruahí ,Aurá ,Avá-Canoeiro ,Awetí ,Bakairí ,Banawá ,Baniwa ,Borôro ,Brazilian Sign Language ,Cafundo Creole ,Caló ,Canela ,Carib ,Carútana ,Cashinahua ,Chiripá ,Cinta Larga ,Cocama-Cocamilla ,Cubeo ,Culina ,Curripaco ,Dâw ,Dení ,Desano ,Enawené-Nawé ,Fulniô ,Gavião do Jiparaná ,Gavião, ,Guajá ,Guajajára ,Guanano Guaraní, Mbyá ,Guarequena ,Guató ,Hixkaryána,Hupdë ,Iapama ,Ikpeng ,Ingarikó ,Ipeka-Tapuia Irántxe ,Jabutí ,Jamamadí Jaruára ,Júma ,Jurúna ,Kabixí ,Kadiwéu ,Kaingáng ,Kaiwá ,Kamayurá ,Kanamarí ,Karahawyana ,Karajá ,Karapanã ,Karipuná ,Karipúna Creole French ,Karitiâna ,Karo ,Katawixi ,Katukína ,Katukína, Panoan ,Kaxararí ,Kaxuiâna Kayabí ,Kayapó ,Kohoroxitari ,Korubo ,Krahô ,Kreen-Akarore ,Krenak ,Kreye ,Krikati-Timbira Kuikúro-Kalapálo ,Kuruáya ,Machinere ,Macuna ,Macushi ,Makuráp ,Mandahuaca ,Mapidian Maquiritari ,Marúbo ,Matipuhy ,Matís ,Matsés ,Maxakalí ,Mehináku ,Miarrã ,Miraña ,Mondé ,Morerebi ,Mundurukú ,Nadëb ,Nambikuára, Northern ,Nambikuára, Nhengatu ,Ninam ,Ofayé ,Omagua .Oro Win ,Pakaásnovos ,Palikúr ,Papavô ,Parakanã ,Parecís ,Paumarí ,Pemon ,Pirahã ,Piratapuyo,

Plautdietsch ,Pokangá ,Portuguese, Poyanáwa ,Puruborá ,Rikbaktsa, Sabanês ,Sakirabiá ,Salumá ,Sanumá ,Sateré-Mawé , Sharanahua ,Sikiana ,Siriano ,Suruahá ,Suruí ,Suruí do Pará ,Suyá ,Tapirapé ,Tariano ,Tembé, ,Tenharim ,Terêna ,Ticuna ,Torá ,Tremembé, Trumaí ,Tubarão ,Tucano ,Tuparí ,Tuyuca ,Urubú-Kaapor ,Urubú-Kaapor ,Uru-Eu-Wau-Wau ,Uru-Pa-In ,Waimaha ,Waiwai ,Wapishana ,Waurá ,Wayampi ,Wayana ,Wayoró ,Xavánte ,Xerénte ,Xetá Xipaya ,Xiriâna ,Xokleng ,Yaminahua ,Yanomámi ,Yanomamö ,Yawanawa,Yuhup ,Yurutí ,Zo'é.

 

Capital city:

Brasilia

 

Meaning of the Country name:

Named after the brazilwood tree, so-named because its reddish wood resembled the color of red-hot embers (brasil in Portuguese). In Tupi it is called "ibirapitanga", which means literally 'red wood'. The wood of the tree was used to color clothes and fabrics.

Another theory stands that the name of the country is related to the Irish myth of Hy-Brazil, a phantom island similar to St. Brendan's Island, situated southwest of Ireland. The legend was so strong that during the 15th century many expeditions tried to find it, the most important being John Cabot. As the Brazilian lands were reached by Pedro Álvares Cabral in 1500 A.D., the Irish myth would have influenced the late name given to the country (after "Island of Real Cross" and "Land of Holy Cross"). The proof that the legend was popular among Iberic people may be verified by the name of the Azorean Terceira Island, registered in the 14th century in the Atlas Catalan and around 1436 on the Venetian map of Andrea Bianco.

 

Description Flag:

Brazil's current flag was inspired by the flag of the former Brazilian Empire. On the imperial flag, the green represented the Imperial House of Braganza of Pedro I, the first Emperor of Brazil, and the yellow represented the Habsburg Imperial Family of Empress Leopoldina, Pedro I's first wife. Thus, green and yellow are the colours of the Families of origin of the first imperial couple, founders of the Brazilian monarchy. The centre of the old imperial flag bore the Imperial Coat of Arms.

The Empire Flag, September 18, 1822–November 15, 1889On the modern republican flag, the coat of arms has been replaced by the blue circle, which depicts the sky over Rio de Janeiro on the morning of November 15, 1889 – the day the Republic of Brazil was declared. It is shown as seen from outside of the celestial sphere (i.e. the view is mirrored).

The stars, whose position in the flag reflect the sky above Rio de Janeiro on November 15, 1889, represent the union's member-states - each star representing a specific state (which is not the case of the stars in the flag of the United States). The number of stars changes with the creation of new states and, since the early days of the republic, has risen from an original 21 stars to the current 27, standing for the 26 states and the Federal District.

The star that represents the Federal District is Sigma Octantis, a star whose position near the south celestial pole makes it visible across almost the whole country, all year round. In addition, given its polar position, all the other stars depicted on the flag trace appear to rotate around Sigma Octantis. Choosing this star to represent Brazil's capital is therefore particularly apt (although it is a much fainter star than any of the others).

The motto Ordem e Progresso ("Order and Progress") is inspired by Auguste Comte's motto of positivism: L’amour pour principe et l’ordre pour base; le progrès pour but ("Love as a principle and order as the basis; progress as the goal"). It was inserted due to the fact that several of the people involved in the military coup d'état that deposed the monarchy and proclaimed Brazil a republic were followers of the ideas of Comte's thought.

 

Coat of arms:

The Coat of arms of Brazil was created in November 19, 1889, 4 days after Brazil became a republic.

The coat of arms consists of the central emblem surrounded by coffee (at the left) and tobacco (at the right) branches, which are important crops in Brazil.

In the blue circle in the center, the Southern Cross (also known as Crux) can be seen. The ring of 27 stars around it represents Brazil's 26 states and 1 federal district.

The blue ribbon contains the official name of Brazil (República Federativa do Brasil — Federative Republic of Brazil) in its first line. In the second line, the date of the federative republic's establishment (November 15, 1889) is written.

  

Motto:

"Order and Progress"

 

National Anthem: Brazilian national anthem

  

Tupi Language

 

Embeyba Ypiranga sui, pitúua,

Ocendu kirimbáua sacemossú

Cuaracy picirungára, cendyua,

Retama yuakaupé, berabussú.

 

Cepy quá iauessáua sui ramé,

Itayiuá irumo, iraporepy,

Mumutara sáua, ne pyá upé,

I manossáua oiko iané cepy.

 

Iassalssú ndê,

Oh moetéua

Auê, Auê !

 

Brasil ker pi upé, cuaracyáua,

Caissú í saarússáua sui ouié,

Marecê, ne yuakaupé, poranga.

Ocenipuca Curussa iepé !

 

Turussú reikô, ara rupí, teen,

Ndê poranga, i santáua, ticikyié

Ndê cury quá mbaé-ussú omeen.

 

Yby moetéua,

Ndê remundú,

Reikô Brasil,

Ndê, iyaissú !

 

Mira quá yuy sui sy catú,

Ndê, ixaissú, Brasil!

 

Ienotyua catú pupé reicô,

Memê, paráteapú, quá ara upé,

Ndê recendy, potyr America sui.

I Cuaracy omucendy iané !

 

Inti orecó purangáua pyré

Ndê nhu soryssára omeen potyra pyré,

ìCicué pyré orecó iané caaussúî.

Iané cicué, ìndê pyá upé, saissú pyréî.

 

Iassalsú ndê,

Oh moetéua

Auê, Auê !

 

Brasil, ndê pana iacy-tatá-uára

Toicô rangáua quá caissú retê,

I quá-pana iakyra-tauá tonhee

Cuire catuana, ieorobiára kuecê.

 

Supí tacape repuama remé

Ne mira apgáua omaramunhã,

Iamoetê ndê, inti iacekyé.

 

Yby moetéua,

Ndê remundú,

Reicô Brasil,

Ndê, iyaissú !

 

Mira quá yuy sui sy catú,

Ndê, ixaissú,

Brasil!

 

Portuguese

 

1

Ouviram do Ipiranga as margens plácidas

De um povo heróico o brado retumbante,

E o sol da Liberdade, em raios fúlgidos,

Brilhou no céu da Pátria nesse instante.

 

Se o penhor dessa igualdade

Conseguimos conquistar com braço forte,

Em teu seio, ó Liberdade,

Desafia o nosso peito a própria morte!

 

Ó Pátria amada,

Idolatrada,

Salve! Salve!

 

Brasil, um sonho intenso, um raio vívido,

De amor e de esperança à terra desce,

Se em teu formoso céu, risonho e límpido,

A imagem do Cruzeiro resplandece.

 

Gigante pela própria natureza,

És belo, és forte, impávido colosso,

E o teu futuro espelha essa grandeza.

 

Terra adorada

Entre outras mil

És tu, Brasil,

Ó Pátria amada!

 

Dos filhos deste solo

És mãe gentil,

Pátria amada,

Brasil!

 

2

Deitado eternamente em berço esplêndido,

Ao som do mar e à luz do céu profundo,

Fulguras, ó Brasil, florão da América,

Iluminado ao sol do Novo Mundo!

 

Do que a terra mais garrida

Teus risonhos, lindos campos têm mais flores,

"Nossos bosques têm mais vida",

"Nossa vida" no teu seio "mais amores".

 

Ó Pátria amada,

Idolatrada,

Salve! Salve!

 

Brasil, de amor eterno seja símbolo

O lábaro que ostentas estrelado,

E diga o verde-louro dessa flâmula

- Paz no futuro e glória no passado.

 

Mas se ergues da justiça a clava forte,

Verás que um filho teu não foge à luta,

Nem teme, quem te adora, a própria morte.

 

Terra adorada

Entre outras mil

És tu, Brasil,

Ó Pátria amada!

 

Dos filhos deste solo

És mãe gentil,

Pátria amada,

Brasil!

 

English

 

The placid banks of the Ipiranga heard

the resounding cry of heroic people

and brilliant beams from the sun of liberty

shone in our homeland's skies at that very moment.

 

If we have fulfilled the promise

of equality by our mighty arms,

in thy bosom, O freedom,

our brave breast shall defy death itself!

 

O beloved,

idolized homeland,

Hail, hail!

 

Brazil, an intense dream, a vivid ray

of love and hope descends to earth

if in thy lovely, smiling and clear skies

the image of the (Southern) Cross shines resplendently.

 

A giant by thine own nature,

thou art a beautiful, strong and intrepid colossus,

and thy future mirrors thy greatness.

 

Beloved Land

amongst a thousand others

art thou, Brazil,

O beloved homeland!

 

To the sons of this land

thou art a gentle mother,

beloved homeland,

Brazil!

 

2

 

Eternally lying in a splendid cradle,

by the sound of the sea and the light of the deep sky,

thou shinest, O Brazil, garland of America,

illuminated by the sun of the New World!

 

Thy smiling, lovely fields have more flowers

than the most elegant land abroad,

"Our woods have more life,

"our life" in thy bosom "more love."

 

O beloved,

idolized homeland,

Hail, hail!

 

Brazil, let the star-spangled banner thou showest forth

be the symbol of eternal love,

and let the laurel-green of thy pennant proclaim

'Peace in the future and glory in the past.'

 

But if thou raisest the strong gavel of Justice,

thou wilt see that a son of thine flees not from battle,

nor does he who loves thee fear death itself.

 

Beloved Land,

amongst a thousand others

art thou, Brazil,

O beloved homeland!

 

To the sons of this land

thou art a gentle mother,

beloved homeland,

Brazil!

 

Internet Page: www.turismo.gov.br

www.brazil.gov.br

 

Brazil in diferent languages

 

eng | bre | hau | hrv | ibo | lin | tpi: Brazil

arg | ast | cat | cor | cym | eus | glg | grn | ina | jav | lld | nor | oci | pap | por | que | sme | spa | tgl: Brasil

fao | fin | lat | roh: Brasilia

cos | ita | srd: Brasile

deu | ltz | nds: Brasilien / Braſilien

bos | crh: Brazil / Бразил

dan | swe: Brasilien

dsb | hsb: Brazilska

est | vor: Brasiilia

hun | slk: Brazília

jnf | nrm: Brési

kaa | uzb: Braziliya / Бразилия

kin | run: Brazile

lit | slv: Brazilija

ron | rup: Brazilia

sqi | swa: Brazili

tur | zza: Brezilya

afr: Brasilië

aze: Braziliya / Бразилија

bam: Berezili

ces: Brazílie

epo: Brazilo

fra: Brésil

frp: Brèsil

fry: Brazylje

fur: Brasîl

gla: Braisil; Brasil

gle: An Bhrasaíl / An Ḃrasaíl

glv: Yn Vrasseel

hat: Brezil

ind: Brasil / براسيل

isl: Brasilía

kmr: Brazîlî / Бразили / برازیلی; Brazîl / Бразил / برازیل

kur: Brazîl / برازیل

lav: Brazīlija

lim: Braziel; Brazilië

mlg: Brezila

mlt: Brażil

mol: Brazilia / Бразилия

msa: Brazil / برازيل

nld: Brazilië

pol: Brazylia

rmy: Brazil / ब्राज़िल

scn: Brasili

slo: Brazilia / Бразилиа

smg: Brazilėjė

smo: Parasili

som: Braasiil; Baraasiil

szl: Brazylijo

tet: Brazíl

ton: Palasili

tuk: Braziliýa / Бразилия

vie: Ba Tây; Bra-xin

vol: Brasilän

wln: Braezi

wol: Bereesil

alt | bul | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | rus | tyv | udm: Бразилия (Brazilija)

che | chv | oss: Бразили (Brazili)

mkd | mon: Бразил (Brazil)

abq: Бразилия (Braziłija)

bak: Бразилия / Braziliya

bel: Бразілія / Brazilija; Бразылія / Brazylija

chm: Бразилий (Brazilij)

kaz: Бразилия / Brazïlïya / برازيليا

kbd: Бразилие (Brazilie)

srp: Бразил / Brazil

tat: Бразилия / Braziliä

tgk: Бразилия / برزیلیه / Brazilija

ukr: Бразилія (Brazylija)

ara: البرازيل (al-Barāzīl)

fas: برزیل (Berzīl / Berezīl)

prs: برازیل (Brāzīl)

pus: برازيل (Brāzīl)

uig: برازىلىيە / Braziliye / Бразилия

urd: برازیل (Barāzīl)

div: ބްރެޒިލް (Breżil); ބުރެޒިލް (Bureżil)

heb: ברזיל (Brazîl); בראזיל (Brâzîl)

lad: בראסיל / Brasil

yid: בראַזיליע (Brazilye)

amh: ብራዚል (Brazil)

ell: Βραζιλία (Vrazilía)

hye: Բրազիլիա (Brazilia)

kat: ბრაზილია (Brazilia)

hin: ब्राज़ील (Brāzīl); ब्राजील (Brājīl); ब्राज़िल (Brāzil)

mar: ब्राजील (Brājīl)

ben: ব্রাজিল (Brājil)

guj: બ્રાજીલ (Brājīl)

pan: ਬਰਾਜ਼ੀਲ (Brāzīl)

kan: ಬ್ರಾಜಿಲ್ (Brājil)

mal: ബ്രസീല് (Brasīl)

tam: பிரேசில் (Pirēčil); பிரேஸில் (Pirēsil)

tel: బ్రెజిల్ (Brejil)

zho: 巴西 (Bāxī)

yue: 巴西 (Bāsāi)

jpn: ブラジル (Burajiru)

kor: 브라질 (Beurajil)

bod: པུ་རུ་ཟིལ་ (Pu.ru.zil.); པའ་ཤིས་ (Pa'a.šis.)

dzo: བཱརཱ་ཛིལ་ (Bārā.dzil.)

mya: ဘရာဇီး (Bʰáẏazì)

tha: บราซิล (Brāsin)

lao: ບາເລຊີນ (Bālēsīn)

khm: ប្រេស៊ីល (Bresīl); ប្រាហ៊សិល (Brāhsil)

 

Mädchen im ockergelben Kleid/Girl in Ocher-Colored Dress, 1911

Bleistift, schwarze Kreide und Aquarell/Pencil, black chalk and watercolor

Albertina

 

"For months on end, Schiele was occupied with drawing and painting working-class children. He was fascinated with the ravages of the dirty sufferings to which these innocents are exposed. In amazement he saw the light-shunning green eyes behind red inflamed lids, the scrofulous wirsts and the souls inside these bad vessels."

 

"Durch Monate war Schiele damit beschäftigt, Proletarierkinder zu zeichnen und zu malen. Ihn faszinierten die Verwüstungen der schmutzigen Leiden, denen diese an sich Unschuldigen ausgesetzt sind. Staunend sah er auch die lichtscheuen grünen Augen hinter rot entzündeten Lidern, die verskrofelten Handknochen und die Seele in diesen schlechten Gefäßen."

Arthur Roessler, 1911

 

The Albertina

The architectural history of the Palais

(Pictures you can see by clicking on the link at the end of page!)

Image: The oldest photographic view of the newly designed Palais Archduke Albrecht, 1869

"It is my will that ​​the expansion of the inner city of Vienna with regard to a suitable connection of the same with the suburbs as soon as possible is tackled and at this on Regulirung (regulation) and beautifying of my Residence and Imperial Capital is taken into account. To this end I grant the withdrawal of the ramparts and fortifications of the inner city and the trenches around the same".

This decree of Emperor Franz Joseph I, published on 25 December 1857 in the Wiener Zeitung, formed the basis for the largest the surface concerning and architecturally most significant transformation of the Viennese cityscape. Involving several renowned domestic and foreign architects a "master plan" took form, which included the construction of a boulevard instead of the ramparts between the inner city and its radially upstream suburbs. In the 50-years during implementation phase, an impressive architectural ensemble developed, consisting of imperial and private representational buildings, public administration and cultural buildings, churches and barracks, marking the era under the term "ring-street style". Already in the first year tithe decided a senior member of the Austrian imperial family to decorate the facades of his palace according to the new design principles, and thus certified the aristocratic claim that this also "historicism" said style on the part of the imperial house was attributed.

Image: The Old Albertina after 1920

It was the palace of Archduke Albrecht (1817-1895), the Senior of the Habsburg Family Council, who as Field Marshal held the overall command over the Austro-Hungarian army. The building was incorporated into the imperial residence of the Hofburg complex, forming the south-west corner and extending eleven meters above street level on the so-called Augustinerbastei.

The close proximity of the palace to the imperial residence corresponded not only with Emperor Franz Joseph I and Archduke Albert with a close familial relationship between the owner of the palace and the monarch. Even the former inhabitants were always in close relationship to the imperial family, whether by birth or marriage. An exception here again proves the rule: Don Emanuel Teles da Silva Conde Tarouca (1696-1771), for which Maria Theresa in 1744 the palace had built, was just a close friend and advisor of the monarch. Silva Tarouca underpins the rule with a second exception, because he belonged to the administrative services as Generalhofbaudirektor (general court architect) and President of the Austrian-Dutch administration, while all other him subsequent owners were highest ranking military.

In the annals of Austrian history, especially those of military history, they either went into as commander of the Imperial Army, or the Austrian, later kk Army. In chronological order, this applies to Duke Carl Alexander of Lorraine, the brother-of-law of Maria Theresa, as Imperial Marshal, her son-in-law Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, also field marshal, whos adopted son, Archduke Charles of Austria, the last imperial field marshal and only Generalissimo of Austria, his son Archduke Albrecht of Austria as Feldmarschalil and army Supreme commander, and most recently his nephew Archduke Friedrich of Austria, who held as field marshal from 1914 to 1916 the command of the Austro-Hungarian troops. Despite their military profession, all five generals conceived themselves as patrons of the arts and promoted large sums of money to build large collections, the construction of magnificent buildings and cultural life. Charles Alexander of Lorraine promoted as governor of the Austrian Netherlands from 1741 to 1780 the Academy of Fine Arts, the Théâtre de Ja Monnaie and the companies Bourgeois Concert and Concert Noble, he founded the Academie royale et imperial des Sciences et des Lettres, opened the Bibliotheque Royal for the population and supported artistic talents with high scholarships. World fame got his porcelain collection, which however had to be sold by Emperor Joseph II to pay off his debts. Duke Albert began in 1776 according to the concept of conte Durazzo to set up an encyclopedic collection of prints, which forms the core of the world-famous "Albertina" today.

Image : Duke Albert and Archduchess Marie Christine show in family cercle the from Italy brought along art, 1776. Frederick Henry Füger.

1816 declared to Fideikommiss and thus in future indivisible, inalienable and inseparable, the collection 1822 passed into the possession of Archduke Carl, who, like his descendants, it broadened. Under him, the collection was introduced together with the sumptuously equipped palace on the Augustinerbastei in the so-called "Carl Ludwig'schen fideicommissum in 1826, by which the building and the in it kept collection fused into an indissoluble unity. At this time had from the Palais Tarouca by structural expansion or acquisition a veritable Residenz palace evolved. Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen was first in 1800 the third floor of the adjacent Augustinian convent wing adapted to house his collection and he had after 1802 by his Belgian architect Louis de Montoyer at the suburban side built a magnificent extension, called the wing of staterooms, it was equipped in the style of Louis XVI. Only two decades later, Archduke Carl the entire palace newly set up. According to scetches of the architect Joseph Kornhäusel the 1822-1825 retreaded premises presented themselves in the Empire style. The interior of the palace testified from now in an impressive way the high rank and the prominent position of its owner. Under Archduke Albrecht the outer appearance also should meet the requirements. He had the facade of the palace in the style of historicism orchestrated and added to the Palais front against the suburbs an offshore covered access. Inside, he limited himself, apart from the redesign of the Rococo room in the manner of the second Blondel style, to the retention of the paternal stock. Archduke Friedrich's plans for an expansion of the palace were omitted, however, because of the outbreak of the First World War so that his contribution to the state rooms, especially, consists in the layout of the Spanish apartment, which he in 1895 for his sister, the Queen of Spain Maria Christina, had set up as a permanent residence.

Picture: The "audience room" after the restoration: Picture: The "balcony room" around 1990

The era of stately representation with handing down their cultural values ​​found its most obvious visualization inside the palace through the design and features of the staterooms. On one hand, by the use of the finest materials and the purchase of masterfully manufactured pieces of equipment, such as on the other hand by the permanent reuse of older equipment parts. This period lasted until 1919, when Archduke Friedrich was expropriated by the newly founded Republic of Austria. With the republicanization of the collection and the building first of all finished the tradition that the owner's name was synonymous with the building name:

After Palais Tarouca or tarokkisches house it was called Lorraine House, afterwards Duke Albert Palais and Palais Archduke Carl. Due to the new construction of an adjacently located administration building it received in 1865 the prefix "Upper" and was referred to as Upper Palais Archduke Albrecht and Upper Palais Archduke Frederick. For the state a special reference to the Habsburg past was certainly politically no longer opportune, which is why was decided to name the building according to the in it kept collection "Albertina".

Picture: The "Wedgwood Cabinet" after the restoration: Picture: the "Wedgwood Cabinet" in the Palais Archduke Friedrich, 1905

This name derives from the term "La Collection Albertina" which had been used by the gallery Inspector Maurice von Thausing in 1870 in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts for the former graphics collection of Duke Albert. For this reason, it was the first time since the foundation of the palace that the name of the collection had become synonymous with the room shell. Room shell, hence, because the Republic of Austria Archduke Friedrich had allowed to take along all the movable goods from the palace in his Hungarian exile: crystal chandeliers, curtains and carpets as well as sculptures, vases and clocks. Particularly stressed should be the exquisite furniture, which stems of three facilities phases: the Louis XVI furnitures of Duke Albert, which had been manufactured on the basis of fraternal relations between his wife Archduchess Marie Christine and the French Queen Marie Antoinette after 1780 in the French Hofmanufakturen, also the on behalf of Archduke Charles 1822-1825 in the Vienna Porcelain Manufactory by Joseph Danhauser produced Empire furnitures and thirdly additions of the same style of Archduke Friedrich, which this about 1900 at Portois & Ffix as well as at Friedrich Otto Schmidt had commissioned.

The "swept clean" building got due to the strained financial situation after the First World War initially only a makeshift facility. However, since until 1999 no revision of the emergency equipment took place, but differently designed, primarily the utilitarianism committed office furnitures complementarily had been added, the equipment of the former state rooms presented itself at the end of the 20th century as an inhomogeneous administrative mingle-mangle of insignificant parts, where, however, dwelt a certain quaint charm. From the magnificent state rooms had evolved depots, storage rooms, a library, a study hall and several officed.

Image: The Albertina Graphic Arts Collection and the Philipphof after the American bombing of 12 März 1945.

Image: The palace after the demolition of the entrance facade, 1948-52

Worse it hit the outer appearance of the palace, because in times of continued anti-Habsburg sentiment after the Second World War and inspired by an intolerant destruction will, it came by pickaxe to a ministerial erasure of history. In contrast to the graphic collection possessed the richly decorated facades with the conspicuous insignia of the former owner an object-immanent reference to the Habsburg past and thus exhibited the monarchial traditions and values ​​of the era of Francis Joseph significantly. As part of the remedial measures after a bomb damage, in 1948 the aristocratic, by Archduke Albert initiated, historicist facade structuring along with all decorations was cut off, many facade figures demolished and the Hapsburg crest emblems plunged to the ground. Since in addition the old ramp also had been cancelled and the main entrance of the bastion level had been moved down to the second basement storey at street level, ended the presence of the old Archduke's palace after more than 200 years. At the reopening of the "Albertina Graphic Collection" in 1952, the former Hapsburg Palais of splendour presented itself as one of his identity robbed, formally trivial, soulless room shell, whose successful republicanization an oversized and also unproportional eagle above the new main entrance to the Augustinian road symbolized. The emocratic throw of monuments had wiped out the Hapsburg palace from the urban appeareance, whereby in the perception only existed a nondescript, nameless and ahistorical building that henceforth served the lodging and presentation of world-famous graphic collection of the Albertina. The condition was not changed by the decision to the refurbishment because there were only planned collection specific extensions, but no restoration of the palace.

Image: The palace after the Second World War with simplified facades, the rudiment of the Danubiusbrunnens (well) and the new staircase up to the Augustinerbastei

This paradigm shift corresponded to a blatant reversal of the historical circumstances, as the travel guides and travel books for kk Residence and imperial capital of Vienna dedicated itself primarily with the magnificent, aristocratic palace on the Augustinerbastei with the sumptuously fitted out reception rooms and mentioned the collection kept there - if at all - only in passing. Only with the repositioning of the Albertina in 2000 under the direction of Klaus Albrecht Schröder, the palace was within the meaning and in fulfillment of the Fideikommiss of Archduke Charles in 1826 again met with the high regard, from which could result a further inseparable bond between the magnificent mansions and the world-famous collection. In view of the knowing about politically motivated errors and omissions of the past, the facades should get back their noble, historicist designing, the staterooms regain their glamorous, prestigious appearance and culturally unique equippment be repurchased. From this presumption, eventually grew the full commitment to revise the history of redemption and the return of the stately palace in the public consciousness.

Image: The restored suburb facade of the Palais Albertina suburb

The smoothed palace facades were returned to their original condition and present themselves today - with the exception of the not anymore reconstructed Attica figures - again with the historicist decoration and layout elements that Archduke Albrecht had given after the razing of the Augustinerbastei in 1865 in order. The neoclassical interiors, today called after the former inhabitants "Habsburg Staterooms", receiving a meticulous and detailed restoration taking place at the premises of originality and authenticity, got back their venerable and sumptuous appearance. From the world wide scattered historical pieces of equipment have been bought back 70 properties or could be returned through permanent loan to its original location, by which to the visitors is made experiencable again that atmosphere in 1919 the state rooms of the last Habsburg owner Archduke Frederick had owned. The for the first time in 80 years public accessible "Habsburg State Rooms" at the Palais Albertina enable now again as eloquent testimony to our Habsburg past and as a unique cultural heritage fundamental and essential insights into the Austrian cultural history. With the relocation of the main entrance to the level of the Augustinerbastei the recollection to this so valuable Austrian Cultural Heritage formally and functionally came to completion. The vision of the restoration and recovery of the grand palace was a pillar on which the new Albertina should arise again, the other embody the four large newly built exhibition halls, which allow for the first time in the history of the Albertina, to exhibit the collection throughout its encyclopedic breadh under optimal conservation conditions.

Image: The new entrance area of the Albertina

64 meter long shed roof. Hans Hollein.

The palace presents itself now in its appearance in the historicist style of the Ringstrassenära, almost as if nothing had happened in the meantime. But will the wheel of time should not, cannot and must not be turned back, so that the double standards of the "Albertina Palace" said museum - on the one hand Habsburg grandeur palaces and other modern museum for the arts of graphics - should be symbolized by a modern character: The in 2003 by Hans Hollein designed far into the Albertina square cantilevering, elegant floating flying roof. 64 meters long, it symbolizes in the form of a dynamic wedge the accelerated urban spatial connectivity and public access to the palace. It advertises the major changes in the interior as well as the huge underground extensions of the repositioned "Albertina".

 

Christian Benedictine

Art historian with research interests History of Architecture, building industry of the Hapsburgs, Hofburg and Zeremonialwissenschaft (ceremonial sciences). Since 1990 he works in the architecture collection of the Albertina. Since 2000 he supervises as director of the newly founded department "Staterooms" the restoration and furnishing of the state rooms and the restoration of the facades and explores the history of the palace and its inhabitants.

 

www.wien-vienna.at/albertinabaugeschichte.php

 

G-SGTS

Viking Air DHC-6-400 Twin Otter

Loganair

Glasgow Airport

30/05/2015

The Scottish Government through Transport Scotland ordered two new Twin Otters for it's Public Service Obligation routes. The planes are owned by Highland and Islands Airports Limited, which is owned by the Scottish Government, and are leased to Loganair as it currently operates the PSO routes. The planes will be leased to the operators of the routes in future. They are intended to replace the two Twin Otters currently used by Loganair on the routes.

Geeks on the web tend to gravitate to elaborate lists to break down competing gadgets. In the case of Apple, they usually break out a list that features a lot of what's missing from a Apple product, without mentioning what's missing from a competing product.

 

For instance, I've seen many lists that compare the Nexus One to the iPhone. While the lists always seem to mention the fact that the iPhone doesn't have multi-tasking (for third party apps) they seem to omit the fact that the Nexus One doesn't have a good native music app or support Multi-touch for native apps. And if you bring up the Multi-touch flaw, the Android Fanboys will argue that you can get Multi-touch for third party apps, which to them, makes the point irrelevant. Of course, I invariably counter with the fact that the iPhone does have multi-tasking for NATIVE APPS, the logic being that if you're going to omit one flaw for the Nexus One based on a technicality, then you got to do the same for multi-tasking on the iPhone. Fair is fair.

 

But I digress. I present the 10 Reasons to buy an iPad. To prove that I'm not a total Fanboy (even though I am), I've included 5 things missing from the current iPad.

  

10 Reasons to buy the iPad.

 

1) 3G. The 3G plan is great. $15 for a plan with a 250 MB cap or $30 for unlimited. The iPad comes with a built-in mic and headphone jack, which means you can connect the default headphones that feature the mic that people use to make Skype calls on the iPod Touch. That means the iPad can replace my cell phone and unlike the iPod Touch, I can use it anywhere, not just in places that have Wi-Fi.

 

2) The Mac-Like Apps. The default apps on the iPad are actually more like Mac apps, but optimized for Multi-touch. I've watched several videos of people using the iPad and the apps are more fully featured than the ones on the iPhone or iPod Touch. The apps in iWork would have never worked on an iPhone for instance. The iPad apps have new features like Popovers and Split Views, which again, take advantage of the larger screen real estate. The faster processor speed means more robust apps. Maybe the iPad won't be able to run the 2009 version of Photoshop, but it definitely will be able to run something equivalent to the 2001 version of Photoshop. This is huge and will create a variety of apps that are a vast improvement over the current apps available in the App Store, to say nothing of the fully featured games that will now come out for the iPad.

 

3) The App Store. There are 140,000 apps available from the start. You don't have to wait for apps, like say, the people who are waiting for stuff to come out on Android. And the SDK has already been released, which means many developers will have enhanced their apps specifically for the iPad before it even launches.

 

4) The Bigger Screen. Multi-touch is going to be much easier to manage on the iPad than on a little screen. The reading is going to be much easier than an iPhone screen. You don't have to pinch to enlarge as often on the iPad screen.

 

5) Video. Because of the bigger screen, the movies and video will be desktop resolution. Also, one of the less talked about features are the external speakers. Assuming you use the dock or a third party stand, the external speakers will allow you to watch video or movies like you would a regular TV.

 

6) The Battery Life. The battery is 10 hours for constant use, with 30 DAYS of standby time. That's good enough for me. I don't plan on reading e-books more than 10 hours. Maybe 5, tops. Steve Jobs made a similar comment the day of the iPad Keynote to Walt Mossberg, saying in effect that no one would be reading for more than 10 hours, which for some reason enraged a lot of people. My question, who are these people who have more than 10 hours of time to read? What kind of jobs do you people have? Please send me an e-mail and let me know where to sign up.

 

7) The Weight. The iPad's weight is much better than a Laptop. If I got to bolt from the house for a few minutes, maybe wait in line at the post office, I would much rather have an iPad with me. A laptop is just not feasible in situations where you're waiting in line somewhere with nothing to rest the laptop on and the availability of iWork on the iPad means that I'll actually be able to do some real work.

 

8) The iPhone OS. Because Apple decided to use the iPhone OS instead of the Mac OS, we actually have a large selection of games, which means the iPad is the largest portable gaming device on the market. The iPhone OS also happens to be so simple to use that babies have been given the device and were able to figure it out, but now we have that same easy to use OS on an oversized device. This will be huge for people who are scared of computers. Apple is ushering in a new era of computer as appliance. It doesn't surprise me in the least that geeks don't quite get it yet (or maybe they DO get it and are angry that their technical support won't be needed any longer).

 

9) The Price. The price is essentially the same as the iPhone three years ago, but the features are bigger and more robust than the iPhone.

 

10) No Flash. Unlike many geeks, the option for no flash is actually a selling point for me. If the iPad were to become an unqualified hit, it would signal the death knell for Flash, especially if the iPad became THE default device for the mobile web, much like the iPhone and iPod touch are becoming that now. It only takes a couple of major companies saying no to a standard to kill it in its tracks. This is a major reason why Microsoft never got a major foothold on standards governing the internet. Apple's banning of WMA and WMV file formats from iTunes caused their marginalization in the market. Sure, those formats are still around, but they don't dominate like MP3 and AAC.

 

twitpic.com/10fjic

  

5 Things I would like to see in future iPads.

 

1) A TV Tuner. For the life of me, I can't understand why Apple doesn't have TV Tuners in all their Macs. I've managed to solve this omission on my iMac by buying a TV Tuner from Elgato, the makers of the popular EyeTV software, but come on Apple, this would make the iPad an alternative TV! This would be the start of something very huge. I'm not advocating that the TV Tuner be integrated into the iPad itself, because TV Tuners need either bulky digital antennas or to be connected to coax cable to work properly and that obviously won't work for a mobile device, but if the tuner could be integrated into that dock that allows the iPad to be free standing, I could set this iPad on my entertainment center and stream TV signals. The iPad is just screaming for this!

 

2) A Camera. Although I consider myself a geek by a wide margin, I am fairly enlightened when it comes to the desires of the ordinary consumer (which is why I want a TV Tuner for this thing), but you just can't have modern gadgets without slapping on a camera somewhere. It's just not permitted. Of course, I would be remiss to forget all the tech analysts who said that the original iPhone wouldn't be good for Enterprise because it featured a camera, which are banned by plenty of corporations. I'm quite sure a lot of those same dicks are currently bashing the iPad for not having a camera. Of course, the iPad is being marketed as a consumer level device, so I might have to agree with them here. The iPad should have a camera, just to shut the dirty masses up.

 

3) Multi-tasking. Even though I don't think most regular consumers are even aware that the current iPhone and iPod Touches don't feature multi-tasking, except for native apps, I still think it would be nice if we just had the OPTION for multi-tasking for third party apps. Heck, Apple, turn off multi-tasking by default, code in a pop-up that warns me of the decreased battery life and the consequences for performance for enabling multi-tasking, but for the love of God, GIVE ME A CHOICE. I would be satisfied with the ability to run only three apps at a time. I'm not asking for much.

 

4) A full iTunes client. Apple provided a blazing fast processor for the iPad and ported versions of desktop apps like Pages, Keynote and Numbers to the iPad, but they can't port the desktop version of iTunes? What gives! With the iPad's big screen, I should be able to manage my music, I shouldn't have to tether it to a desktop. If Steve Jobs truly wants the iPad to kill netbooks, it's going to have to be in some ways as robust as a netbook. The upgrades of the native iPhone apps and the addition of iWork are steps in the right direction, but I believe iTunes is even more important.

 

5) One USB slot. I've got my geek hat on now, and the geek inside tells me that a USB slot would be good for stuff like file transfer, you know, adding a little external flash drive and moving stuff like pictures from digital cameras. Theoretically, Bluetooth will suffice for printing and other functions, but USB comes with the added bonus of shutting up all the other annoying geeks who HAVE to have a USB connector for some reason (If you think I'm just adding a USB slot to fill out my list with five items, because four would be awkward, you're probably right).

 

For those of you shaking with anger that your unicorn wishes for the iPad didn't pan out, maybe you need to relax and watch the wisdom of Louis C.K., you spoiled brats.

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN0MpBQG3-E

 

Photo I shot of Jan and Dean taken June 1987 at the Dardanella Bar at Wasaga Beach

After concert Jan signed autographs for concert goers. Jan Berry died March 26, 2004, after he suffered a seizure eight days before his 63rd birthday

died. Today Dean Torrence still tours.

 

For more information on Jan and Berry check websites below :

 

www.jananddean-janberry.com/main/

 

www.surfcityallstars.com/torrence.html

 

Jan & Dean "Sidewalk Surfin'"

American Bandstand. August 22, 1964

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_Qr6Ky1Lbg

  

American Bandstand. August 22, 1964

  

JAN AND DEAN

 

Jan Berry and Arnie Ginsburg decided they had what it took to be a music act. How hard could it be? Seems Arnie had come

 

up with a song based on a real person...a stripper named Jennie Lee, "The Bazoom Girl," charter member of the "League of

 

Exotic Dancers." Arnie, 18 years old and sowing a few wild oats, had caught her act at an L.A. burlesque club. It was

 

1958; Jan was still in high school and missed out on Arnie's "adult" excursion. The guys got together in the garage at

 

Jan's home in Westwood with an Ampex reel-to-reel recorder Jan's dad had gotten him and began harmonizing, doo wop

 

style, while another friend, Donald Altfeld, supplied makeshift percussion (banging on sticks). A primitive, echo-

 

drenched version of "Jennie Lee" was the result.

 

It didn't take much effort on the part of Jan and Arnie to get the song released on Arwin Records, owned by Doris Day's

 

husband Marty Melcher. Joe Lubin, A&R man for the Hollywood-based label, heard the tape and felt strongly enough about

 

its potential that he got together with the guys do a more polished version, but insisted on duplicating the sound he

 

heard on the tape. An all night session with Lubin in Jan's garage produced a second take as well as "Gotta Getta Date,"

 

written on the fly by the three and recorded in the early morning hours for use as the single's B side. Back in the

 

studio, Lubin hired the best session men in town (guitarist Rene Hall, saxophonist Plas Johnson, pianist Ernie Freeman

 

and drummer Earl Palmer) and overdubbed the band for the finished product. It was an unconventional way to make a

 

record...but not all that uncommon in the early rock and roll environment of the late '50s.

 

The song caught on, hit big (top ten in June '58), and Berry and Ginsburg found themselves appearing onstage doing rock

 

shows with some of the hottest names of the era in a blur of bright lights and adoring female fans that began to affect

 

Arnie in a stressful, emotional way. Not everyone, it seems, is cut out for instant stardom. Jan was fine with it. The

 

follow-up, "Gas Money" (Altfeld shared writer credit with Berry and Ginsburg on this one), hit the charts less

 

impressively while hinting at a car-and-hot-rod direction the act (or Jan at least) would explore more deeply in the

 

future. The third Arwin single didn't sell and the duo appeared to be done, which was okay by Arnie, mentally and

 

physically drained and ready to move into a less manic vocation. He quit to attend the University of Southern Cal,

 

leaving Jan, wound up and ready for more, with the task of finding another singing partner.

 

An old football buddy, Dean Torrence, had just returned from six months' initial training with the U.S. Army Reserve and

 

was game to take over where Ginsburg left off. The two had met at Emerson Junior High in Westwood several years earlier,

 

playing on the school football team there and at University High School right up through graduation. Locker room

 

harmonizing had become a regular routine with other school athletes joining in; roughhousing on the gridiron, singing in

 

the showers. A school club called The Barons, counting Jan, Dean, future actor James Brolin and pounding-drum devotee

 

Sandy Nelson among its members, did some impromptu singing as well. It was a no-brainer in 1959 for Jan and Dean to

 

attempt to continue what Jan and Arnie had begun.

 

Budding record industry everyman Kim Fowley, another classmate of Jan, Arnie and Dean at University High, recommended

 

the new duo to Lou Adler and Herb Alpert, producers at Los Angeles label Dore (upon meeting them, Adler said they had a

 

"very California look" in contrast to the Philadelphia breed of teen idols saturating the biz at the time). For "Baby

 

Talk" (penned by Melvin Schwartz), a recent release by Brooklyn doo wop group The Laurels, Jan and Dean put more

 

emphasis on the song's nonsense baby syllables; their version hit the national top ten in September 1959. Several

 

follow-up singles on Dore appeared on the charts in '59 and '60: Alpert and Adler's "There's a Girl," the oldtime

 

standard "Clementine" (eclipsed by Bobby Darin's rendition, released at about the same time) and two older R&B hits-

 

turned-teen-tunes, The Moonglows' "We Go Together" and The Crows' "Gee."

 

With a solid track record, Jan and Dean approached Liberty, one of L.A.'s top record companies, in the hopes of working

 

with the label's bigtime hitmaking team and securing longer-term success. A demo of Hoagy Carmichael and Frank Loesser's

 

1938 tune "Heart and Soul" done up J&D style was rejected by the label, though they were interested in signing the duo.

 

The two instead took the song to Gene Autry's Challenge Records, relying on their gut instinct that it would be a hit

 

(even though a version by The Cleftones was already scaling the charts). It was; number one in Los Angeles in June '61

 

and a top 30 hit nationally (the markedly different-sounding Cleftones record did reach the top 20 a few weeks earlier,

 

winning the overall competition). After one other Challenge 45, "Wanted, One Girl," Jan recorded a solo single,

 

"Tomorrow's Teardrops," released by Alpert and Adler on a "just for fun" label, Ripple Records. In late 1961, Jan and

 

Dean signed a long-term contract with Liberty.

 

Early Liberty efforts were a bit directionless as they stayed with the previously established formula. "A Sunday Kind of

 

Love" (a Louis Prima standard best known through Jo Stafford's 1947 hit and a 1953 R&B version by New York group The

 

Harptones) hit the charts briefly in early 1962. "Tennessee," with a doo wop hook not unlike the ones in "Jennie Lee"

 

and "Baby Talk," had a slightly better run a few months later. "Linda," written in the '40s by Jack Lawrence, showed

 

promise when adjusted to Jan and Dean mode in spring 1963, a top 40 hit but just the third overall among more than a

 

dozen releases since '59.

 

The Beach Boys had been together for two years and were really heating up at about this time, opening for Jan and Dean

 

in concert and serving as the duo's backing band onstage. Jan began writing songs with the group's leader Brian Wilson

 

and their composition of "Surf City" opened the world of surf music to J&D and hit number one on the charts in July '63.

 

Suddenly Jan and Dean and the Beach Boys were competing with one another...and the leader of the latter was consorting

 

with the enemy! Of course it was a friendly rivalry and Wilson continued to contribute songs, usually in collaboration

 

with Berry and Roger Christian, a songwriter and well-known Los Angeles disc jockey. "Honolulu Lulu," a Berry-

 

Christian-Spunky song ("Spunky" being another case of Lou Adler just "having fun"), was a fall '63 hit in the surf-and-

 

beach vein, then Jan and Dean took the next logical step into the drag race craze (as the Beach Boys had done on the B

 

sides of their last few surf hits) with the first of several hot rod and/or car songs. "Drag City," written by Berry,

 

Christian and Brian Wilson, went top ten in January 1964.

 

Jan Berry began writing and producing outside acts, among them The Matadors, who backed Jan and Dean on many of their

 

studio recordings. He and Art Kornfeld composed The Angels' 1963 hit "I Adore Him" and with Christian he contributed

 

"Three Window Coupe" to The Rip Chords' run of car song smashes in '64. Dean Torrence went in another direction during

 

what little free time he had, attending USC and studying a number of subjects, including architecture and science. At

 

the start of 1964, the guys came up with a song that crossed the car craze with the "teen death" movement going strong

 

since the start of the decade: "Dead Man's Curve" (the nickname of an actual stretch of Sunset Boulevard) was deemed a

 

bit dark by Liberty Records brass, so they made sure it was backed with a "happy" song, "The New Girl in School,"

 

promoting the record as a double A side. Both songs were hits, but "Dead Man's Curve" was bigger and landed them back in

 

the top ten. The song's impact didn't end there, though; in a couple of years it would become a permanent, and tragic,

 

part of the Jan and Dean story.

 

Donald Altfeld turned a possible hallucination into a major hit for his longtime pals. One night while driving down

 

Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena, he swore he saw a little old grandmother-type in a hot, souped-up rod speed past him.

 

The illusion became reality after that, when he and Roger Christian wrote "The Little Old Lady (From Pasadena)," another

 

top ten for Jan and Dean during the summer of '64. At the same time, the Dodge Dealers of Southern California came up

 

with a series of TV commercials with actress Kathryn Minner as a Granny in '...a brand new shiny red Super Stock Dodge,'

 

as the song described. The spots were popular and Minner became a star, causing a sensation at personal appearances and

 

even appearing with Jan and Dean on the cover of their album titled after the hit song.

 

Next up was the theme from the summer film "Ride the Wild Surf" starring Fabian and Shelley Fabares, backed with "The

 

Anaheim, Azusa and Cucamonga Sewing Circle, Book Review and Timing Association," the logical follow-up to "Little Old

 

Lady," featuring an entire group of Grannies hipper than yourself. "Sidewalk Surfin'" made sure skateboarders weren't

 

overlooked; it used the melody of Wilson's Beach Boys tune "Catch a Wave."

 

The T.A.M.I. Show was a big event for rock music fans, hosted by Jan and Dean during two nights of filming in October

 

1964 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. Shot on videotape and later transferred to film for a theatrical premiere in

 

December, the all-star concert featured James Brown, The Rolling Stones, Lesley Gore, The Supremes, J&D partners-in-

 

crime the Beach Boys and many others. The film's theme, "(Here They Come) From All Over the World," was written by P.F.

 

Sloan and Steve Barri (of The Fantastic Baggys, another sometimes-backup band for Jan and Dean) and a live performance

 

by the duo was released as a single, even though the version heard at the beginning of the film was a studio recording.

 

Following the high of hosting one of the all time great, star-studded music movies, Jan and Dean's singles began showing

 

sings of weakness. Like Brian Wilson, Berry and Torrence were huge fans of producer Phil Spector; "You Really Know How

 

to Hurt a Guy" was produced by Jan in a Spectoresque "Wall of Sound" style and hit the top 40 at the start of summer

 

1965. Sloan and Barri's "I Found a Girl" had more in common with their early recordings and was also a top 40 hit. Jan

 

released another solo single, his one attempt at a protest song, "The Universal Coward" (a takeoff on "The Universal

 

Soldier," a fall '65 hit for both Donovan and Glen Campbell), but like the earlier Berry single, it didn't catch on.

 

Meanwhile, Dean sang on the early 1966 Beach Boys hit "Barbara Ann." When the Batman TV series premiered on ABC-TV in

 

January and immediately dominated in the ratings, the duo released their own "Batman" single (with no similarities to

 

the show's theme by Neal Hefti), a cartoonish take on Gotham City's dependancy on the Caped Crusader.

 

If the best days were behind them, any chance of a resurgence was extinguished in April 1966 when Jan Berry ran into a

 

parked truck while driving his Corvette Stingray not far from the location detailed so morbidly in "Dead Man's Curve."

 

He suffered brain damage and paralysis resulting in limited use of his limbs, including his legs (doctors diagnosed that

 

he would never be able to walk again). The likelihood of his making records or performing in the future was slim, but

 

Dean Torrence continued solo, releasing several singles under the name of the duo. Their contract with Liberty had

 

expired and the label released a few older recordings as singles, including the act's last top 40 hit that summer,

 

"Popsicle" (a remix of a 1963 recording, "Popsicle Truck"). Dean formed the J&D label and licensed one track, "Yellow

 

Balloon," to Columbia Records (competing in the spring of '67 with a version by a band named The Yellow Balloon, which

 

became the hit). He also started his own company, Kittyhawk Graphics, geared specifically toward creating logos and

 

cover art for music acts and, with artist Gene Brownell, won a Grammy Award in the category of Best Album Cover for

 

designing the cover art for the 1971 release by the band Pollution.

 

There were no further chart appearances for the duo after 1967. Berry rehabbed successfully enough over the next few

 

years to return to studio recording and the two worked together off and on. Live appearances were trickier, as Jan's

 

struggles were all too obvious to concertgoers, but they kept at it and made regular appearances in the '70s and '80s as

 

headliners (with a new backup band, Papa Doo Run Run, named after a variation on the lyrical intro of "The New Girl in

 

School") and as an opening act for longtime colleagues The Beach Boys. Jan Berry passed away in 2004 at the age of 62.

 

Dean Torrence still performs occasionally under the name The Jan and Dean Show in memory of his close friend and musical

 

other half. Music fans will always keep that image of two guys with a "very California look" in their minds and hearts.

- Michael Jack Kirby

 

NOTABLE SINGLES:

 

Jennie Lee - 1958

by Jan and Arnie

Gas Money - 1958

by Jan and Arnie

Baby Talk - 1959

There's a Girl - 1959

Clementine - 1960

We Go Together - 1960

Gee - 1960

Heart and Soul - 1961

Wanted, One Girl - 1961

Tomorrow's Teardrops - 1961

by Jan Berry

A Sunday Kind of Love - 1962

Tennessee - 1962

Linda - 1963

Surf City - 1963

Honolulu Lulu - 1963

Drag City - 1963

Dead Man's Curve /

The New Girl in School - 1964

The Little Old Lady (From Pasadena) - 1964

Ride the Wild Surf /

The Anaheim, Azusa and Cucamonga Sewing Circle, Book Review

and Timing Association - 1964

Sidewalk Surfin' - 1964

(Here They Come) From All Over the World - 1965

You Really Know How to Hurt a Guy - 1965

I Found a Girl - 1965

The Universal Coward - 1965

by Jan Berry

A Beginning From an End - 1966

Batman - 1966

Popsicle - 1966

Fiddle Around - 1966

Yellow Balloon - 1967

 

The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968, KSC has been NASA's primary launch center of American spaceflight, research, and technology. Launch operations for the Apollo, Skylab and Space Shuttle programs were carried out from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 and managed by KSC. Located on the east coast of Florida, KSC is adjacent to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). The management of the two entities work very closely together, share resources and operate facilities on each other's property.

 

Though the first Apollo flights and all Project Mercury and Project Gemini flights took off from the then-Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, the launches were managed by KSC and its previous organization, the Launch Operations Directorate. Starting with the fourth Gemini mission, the NASA launch control center in Florida (Mercury Control Center, later the Launch Control Center) began handing off control of the vehicle to the Mission Control Center in Houston, shortly after liftoff; in prior missions it held control throughout the entire mission.

 

Additionally, the center manages launch of robotic and commercial crew missions and researches food production and in-situ resource utilization for off-Earth exploration. Since 2010, the center has worked to become a multi-user spaceport through industry partnerships, even adding a new launch pad (LC-39C) in 2015.

 

There are about 700 facilities and buildings grouped throughout the center's 144,000 acres (580 km2). Among the unique facilities at KSC are the 525-foot (160 m) tall Vehicle Assembly Building for stacking NASA's largest rockets, the Launch Control Center, which conducts space launches at KSC, the Operations and Checkout Building, which houses the astronauts dormitories and suit-up area, a Space Station factory, and a 3-mile (4.8 km) long Shuttle Landing Facility. There is also a Visitor Complex on site that is open to the public.

 

Since 1949, the military had been performing launch operations at what would become Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. In December 1959, the Department of Defense transferred 5,000 personnel and the Missile Firing Laboratory to NASA to become the Launch Operations Directorate under NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.

 

President John F. Kennedy's 1961 goal of a crewed lunar landing by 1970 required an expansion of launch operations. On July 1, 1962, the Launch Operations Directorate was separated from MSFC to become the Launch Operations Center (LOC). Also, Cape Canaveral was inadequate to host the new launch facility design required for the mammoth 363-foot (111 m) tall, 7,500,000-pound-force (33,000 kN) thrust Saturn V rocket, which would be assembled vertically in a large hangar and transported on a mobile platform to one of several launch pads. Therefore, the decision was made to build a new LOC site located adjacent to Cape Canaveral on Merritt Island.

 

NASA began land acquisition in 1962, buying title to 131 square miles (340 km2) and negotiating with the state of Florida for an additional 87 square miles (230 km2). The major buildings in KSC's Industrial Area were designed by architect Charles Luckman. Construction began in November 1962, and Kennedy visited the site twice in 1962, and again just a week before his assassination on November 22, 1963.

 

On November 29, 1963, the facility was named by President Lyndon B. Johnson under Executive Order 11129. Johnson's order joined both the civilian LOC and the military Cape Canaveral station ("the facilities of Station No. 1 of the Atlantic Missile Range") under the designation "John F. Kennedy Space Center", spawning some confusion joining the two in the public mind. NASA Administrator James E. Webb clarified this by issuing a directive stating the Kennedy Space Center name applied only to the LOC, while the Air Force issued a general order renaming the military launch site Cape Kennedy Air Force Station.

 

Located on Merritt Island, Florida, the center is north-northwest of Cape Canaveral on the Atlantic Ocean, midway between Miami and Jacksonville on Florida's Space Coast, due east of Orlando. It is 34 miles (55 km) long and roughly six miles (9.7 km) wide, covering 219 square miles (570 km2). KSC is a major central Florida tourist destination and is approximately one hour's drive from the Orlando area. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex offers public tours of the center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

 

From 1967 through 1973, there were 13 Saturn V launches, including the ten remaining Apollo missions after Apollo 7. The first of two uncrewed flights, Apollo 4 (Apollo-Saturn 501) on November 9, 1967, was also the first rocket launch from KSC. The Saturn V's first crewed launch on December 21, 1968, was Apollo 8's lunar orbiting mission. The next two missions tested the Lunar Module: Apollo 9 (Earth orbit) and Apollo 10 (lunar orbit). Apollo 11, launched from Pad A on July 16, 1969, made the first Moon landing on July 20. The Apollo 11 launch included crewmembers Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin, and attracted a record-breaking 650 million television viewers. Apollo 12 followed four months later. From 1970 to 1972, the Apollo program concluded at KSC with the launches of missions 13 through 17.

 

On May 14, 1973, the last Saturn V launch put the Skylab space station in orbit from Pad 39A. By this time, the Cape Kennedy pads 34 and 37 used for the Saturn IB were decommissioned, so Pad 39B was modified to accommodate the Saturn IB, and used to launch three crewed missions to Skylab that year, as well as the final Apollo spacecraft for the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project in 1975.

 

As the Space Shuttle was being designed, NASA received proposals for building alternative launch-and-landing sites at locations other than KSC, which demanded study. KSC had important advantages, including its existing facilities; location on the Intracoastal Waterway; and its southern latitude, which gives a velocity advantage to missions launched in easterly near-equatorial orbits. Disadvantages included: its inability to safely launch military missions into polar orbit, since spent boosters would be likely to fall on the Carolinas or Cuba; corrosion from the salt air; and frequent cloudy or stormy weather. Although building a new site at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico was seriously considered, NASA announced its decision in April 1972 to use KSC for the shuttle. Since the Shuttle could not be landed automatically or by remote control, the launch of Columbia on April 12, 1981 for its first orbital mission STS-1, was NASA's first crewed launch of a vehicle that had not been tested in prior uncrewed launches.

 

In 1976, the VAB's south parking area was the site of Third Century America, a science and technology display commemorating the U.S. Bicentennial. Concurrent with this event, the U.S. flag was painted on the south side of the VAB. During the late 1970s, LC-39 was reconfigured to support the Space Shuttle. Two Orbiter Processing Facilities were built near the VAB as hangars with a third added in the 1980s.

 

KSC's 2.9-mile (4.7 km) Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) was the orbiters' primary end-of-mission landing site, although the first KSC landing did not take place until the tenth flight, when Challenger completed STS-41-B on February 11, 1984; the primary landing site until then was Edwards Air Force Base in California, subsequently used as a backup landing site. The SLF also provided a return-to-launch-site (RTLS) abort option, which was not utilized. The SLF is among the longest runways in the world.

 

On October 28, 2009, the Ares I-X launch from Pad 39B was the first uncrewed launch from KSC since the Skylab workshop in 1973.

 

Beginning in 1958, NASA and military worked side by side on robotic mission launches (previously referred to as unmanned), cooperating as they broke ground in the field. In the early 1960s, NASA had as many as two robotic mission launches a month. The frequent number of flights allowed for quick evolution of the vehicles, as engineers gathered data, learned from anomalies and implemented upgrades. In 1963, with the intent of KSC ELV work focusing on the ground support equipment and facilities, a separate Atlas/Centaur organization was formed under NASA's Lewis Center (now Glenn Research Center (GRC)), taking that responsibility from the Launch Operations Center (aka KSC).

 

Though almost all robotics missions launched from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS), KSC "oversaw the final assembly and testing of rockets as they arrived at the Cape." In 1965, KSC's Unmanned Launch Operations directorate became responsible for all NASA uncrewed launch operations, including those at Vandenberg Space Force Base. From the 1950s to 1978, KSC chose the rocket and payload processing facilities for all robotic missions launching in the U.S., overseeing their near launch processing and checkout. In addition to government missions, KSC performed this service for commercial and foreign missions also, though non-U.S. government entities provided reimbursement. NASA also funded Cape Canaveral Space Force Station launch pad maintenance and launch vehicle improvements.

 

All this changed with the Commercial Space Launch Act of 1984, after which NASA only coordinated its own and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) ELV launches. Companies were able to "operate their own launch vehicles" and utilize NASA's launch facilities. Payload processing handled by private firms also started to occur outside of KSC. Reagan's 1988 space policy furthered the movement of this work from KSC to commercial companies. That same year, launch complexes on Cape Canaveral Air Force Force Station started transferring from NASA to Air Force Space Command management.

 

In the 1990s, though KSC was not performing the hands-on ELV work, engineers still maintained an understanding of ELVs and had contracts allowing them insight into the vehicles so they could provide knowledgeable oversight. KSC also worked on ELV research and analysis and the contractors were able to utilize KSC personnel as a resource for technical issues. KSC, with the payload and launch vehicle industries, developed advances in automation of the ELV launch and ground operations to enable competitiveness of U.S. rockets against the global market.

 

In 1998, the Launch Services Program (LSP) formed at KSC, pulling together programs (and personnel) that already existed at KSC, GRC, Goddard Space Flight Center, and more to manage the launch of NASA and NOAA robotic missions. Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and VAFB are the primary launch sites for LSP missions, though other sites are occasionally used. LSP payloads such as the Mars Science Laboratory have been processed at KSC before being transferred to a launch pad on Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

 

On 16 November 2022, at 06:47:44 UTC the Space Launch System (SLS) was launched from Complex 39B as part of the Artemis 1 mission.

 

As the International Space Station modules design began in the early 1990s, KSC began to work with other NASA centers and international partners to prepare for processing before launch onboard the Space Shuttles. KSC utilized its hands-on experience processing the 22 Spacelab missions in the Operations and Checkout Building to gather expectations of ISS processing. These experiences were incorporated into the design of the Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF), which began construction in 1991. The Space Station Directorate formed in 1996. KSC personnel were embedded at station module factories for insight into their processes.

 

From 1997 to 2007, KSC planned and performed on the ground integration tests and checkouts of station modules: three Multi-Element Integration Testing (MEIT) sessions and the Integration Systems Test (IST). Numerous issues were found and corrected that would have been difficult to nearly impossible to do on-orbit.

 

Today KSC continues to process ISS payloads from across the world before launch along with developing its experiments for on orbit. The proposed Lunar Gateway would be manufactured and processed at the Space Station Processing Facility.

 

The following are current programs and initiatives at Kennedy Space Center:

Commercial Crew Program

Exploration Ground Systems Program

NASA is currently designing the next heavy launch vehicle known as the Space Launch System (SLS) for continuation of human spaceflight.

On December 5, 2014, NASA launched the first uncrewed flight test of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV), currently under development to facilitate human exploration of the Moon and Mars.

Launch Services Program

Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNa)

Research and Technology

Artemis program

Lunar Gateway

International Space Station Payloads

Camp KSC: educational camps for schoolchildren in spring and summer, with a focus on space, aviation and robotics.

 

The KSC Industrial Area, where many of the center's support facilities are located, is 5 miles (8 km) south of LC-39. It includes the Headquarters Building, the Operations and Checkout Building and the Central Instrumentation Facility. The astronaut crew quarters are in the O&C; before it was completed, the astronaut crew quarters were located in Hangar S at the Cape Canaveral Missile Test Annex (now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station). Located at KSC was the Merritt Island Spaceflight Tracking and Data Network station (MILA), a key radio communications and spacecraft tracking complex.

 

Facilities at the Kennedy Space Center are directly related to its mission to launch and recover missions. Facilities are available to prepare and maintain spacecraft and payloads for flight. The Headquarters (HQ) Building houses offices for the Center Director, library, film and photo archives, a print shop and security. When the KSC Library first opened, it was part of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency. However, in 1965, the library moved into three separate sections in the newly opened NASA headquarters before eventually becoming a single unit in 1970. The library contains over four million items related to the history and the work at Kennedy. As one of ten NASA center libraries in the country, their collection focuses on engineering, science, and technology. The archives contain planning documents, film reels, and original photographs covering the history of KSC. The library is not open to the public but is available for KSC, Space Force, and Navy employees who work on site. Many of the media items from the collection are digitized and available through NASA's KSC Media Gallery Archived December 6, 2020, at the Wayback Machine or through their more up-to-date Flickr gallery.

 

A new Headquarters Building was completed in 2019 as part of the Central Campus consolidation. Groundbreaking began in 2014.

 

The center operated its own 17-mile (27 km) short-line railroad. This operation was discontinued in 2015, with the sale of its final two locomotives. A third had already been donated to a museum. The line was costing $1.3 million annually to maintain.

 

The Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building (O&C) (previously known as the Manned Spacecraft Operations Building) is a historic site on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places dating back to the 1960s and was used to receive, process, and integrate payloads for the Gemini and Apollo programs, the Skylab program in the 1970s, and for initial segments of the International Space Station through the 1990s. The Apollo and Space Shuttle astronauts would board the astronaut transfer van to launch complex 39 from the O&C building.

The three-story, 457,000-square-foot (42,500 m2) Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) consists of two enormous processing bays, an airlock, operational control rooms, laboratories, logistics areas and office space for support of non-hazardous Space Station and Shuttle payloads to ISO 14644-1 class 5 standards. Opened in 1994, it is the largest factory building in the KSC industrial area.

The Vertical Processing Facility (VPF) features a 71-by-38-foot (22 by 12 m) door where payloads that are processed in the vertical position are brought in and manipulated with two overhead cranes and a hoist capable of lifting up to 35 short tons (32 t).

The Hypergolic Maintenance and Checkout Area (HMCA) comprises three buildings that are isolated from the rest of the industrial area because of the hazardous materials handled there. Hypergolic-fueled modules that made up the Space Shuttle Orbiter's reaction control system, orbital maneuvering system and auxiliary power units were stored and serviced in the HMCF.

The Multi-Payload Processing Facility is a 19,647 square feet (1,825.3 m2) building used for Orion spacecraft and payload processing.

The Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility (PHSF) contains a 70-by-110-foot (21 by 34 m) service bay, with a 100,000-pound (45,000 kg), 85-foot (26 m) hook height. It also contains a 58-by-80-foot (18 by 24 m) payload airlock. Its temperature is maintained at 70 °F (21 °C).[55]

The Blue Origin rocket manufacturing facility is located immediately south of the KSC visitor complex. Completed in 2019, it serves as the company's factory for the manufacture of New Glenn orbital rockets.

 

Launch Complex 39 (LC-39) was originally built for the Saturn V, the largest and most powerful operational launch vehicle until the Space Launch System, for the Apollo crewed Moon landing program. Since the end of the Apollo program in 1972, LC-39 has been used to launch every NASA human space flight, including Skylab (1973), the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project (1975), and the Space Shuttle program (1981–2011).

 

Since December 1968, all launch operations have been conducted from launch pads A and B at LC-39. Both pads are on the ocean, 3 miles (4.8 km) east of the VAB. From 1969 to 1972, LC-39 was the "Moonport" for all six Apollo crewed Moon landing missions using the Saturn V, and was used from 1981 to 2011 for all Space Shuttle launches.

 

Human missions to the Moon required the large three-stage Saturn V rocket, which was 363 feet (111 meters) tall and 33 feet (10 meters) in diameter. At KSC, Launch Complex 39 was built on Merritt Island to accommodate the new rocket. Construction of the $800 million project began in November 1962. LC-39 pads A and B were completed by October 1965 (planned Pads C, D and E were canceled), the VAB was completed in June 1965, and the infrastructure by late 1966.

 

The complex includes: the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), a 130,000,000 cubic feet (3,700,000 m3) hangar capable of holding four Saturn Vs. The VAB was the largest structure in the world by volume when completed in 1965.

a transporter capable of carrying 5,440 tons along a crawlerway to either of two launch pads;

a 446-foot (136 m) mobile service structure, with three Mobile Launcher Platforms, each containing a fixed launch umbilical tower;

the Launch Control Center; and

a news media facility.

 

Launch Complex 48 (LC-48) is a multi-user launch site under construction for small launchers and spacecraft. It will be located between Launch Complex 39A and Space Launch Complex 41, with LC-39A to the north and SLC-41 to the south. LC-48 will be constructed as a "clean pad" to support multiple launch systems with differing propellant needs. While initially only planned to have a single pad, the complex is capable of being expanded to two at a later date.

 

As a part of promoting commercial space industry growth in the area and the overall center as a multi-user spaceport, KSC leases some of its properties. Here are some major examples:

 

Exploration Park to multiple users (partnership with Space Florida)

Shuttle Landing Facility to Space Florida (who contracts use to private companies)

Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF)-3 to Boeing (for CST-100 Starliner)

Launch Complex 39A, Launch Control Center Firing Room 4 and land for SpaceX's Roberts Road facility (Hanger X) to SpaceX

O&C High Bay to Lockheed Martin (for Orion processing)

Land for FPL's Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center to Florida Power and Light (FPL)

Hypergolic Maintenance Facility (HMF) to United Paradyne Corporation (UPC)

 

The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, operated by Delaware North since 1995, has a variety of exhibits, artifacts, displays and attractions on the history and future of human and robotic spaceflight. Bus tours of KSC originate from here. The complex also includes the separate Apollo/Saturn V Center, north of the VAB and the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, six miles west near Titusville. There were 1.5 million visitors in 2009. It had some 700 employees.

 

It was announced on May 29, 2015, that the Astronaut Hall of Fame exhibit would be moved from its current location to another location within the Visitor Complex to make room for an upcoming high-tech attraction entitled "Heroes and Legends". The attraction, designed by Orlando-based design firm Falcon's Treehouse, opened November 11, 2016.

 

In March 2016, the visitor center unveiled the new location of the iconic countdown clock at the complex's entrance; previously, the clock was located with a flagpole at the press site. The clock was originally built and installed in 1969 and listed with the flagpole in the National Register of Historic Places in January 2000. In 2019, NASA celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo program, and the launch of Apollo 10 on May 18. In summer of 2019, Lunar Module 9 (LM-9) was relocated to the Apollo/Saturn V Center as part of an initiative to rededicate the center and celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo Program.

 

Historic locations

NASA lists the following Historic Districts at KSC; each district has multiple associated facilities:

 

Launch Complex 39: Pad A Historic District

Launch Complex 39: Pad B Historic District

Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) Area Historic District

Orbiter Processing Historic District

Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) Disassembly and Refurbishment Complex Historic District

NASA KSC Railroad System Historic District

NASA-owned Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Industrial Area Historic District

There are 24 historic properties outside of these historic districts, including the Space Shuttle Atlantis, Vehicle Assembly Building, Crawlerway, and Operations and Checkout Building.[71] KSC has one National Historic Landmark, 78 National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) listed or eligible sites, and 100 Archaeological Sites.

 

Further information: John F. Kennedy Space Center MPS

Other facilities

The Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility (RPSF) is responsible for the preparation of solid rocket booster segments for transportation to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB). The RPSF was built in 1984 to perform SRB operations that had previously been conducted in high bays 2 and 4 of the VAB at the beginning of the Space Shuttle program. It was used until the Space Shuttle's retirement, and will be used in the future by the Space Launch System[75] (SLS) and OmegA rockets.

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Annapurna trekking region of Nepal enjoy with magnificent view close to highest and impressive mountain range in the world. Day exploration in Pokhara and morning morning flight to Jomsom or drive to Besishisahar from Kathmandu begin of trek. High destination, Muktinath 3800m and in generally highest point of whole Annapurna is 5416m. Thorangla la is situated in Buddhist Monastery, an eternal flame, and Hindus Vishnu Tempe of Juwala Mai making it a pilgrimage site for both Hindus and Buddhists and Muktinath is on the way down from popular trekking it call Thorang la pass which is incredible view in Annapurna region. Whenever possible we will arrive at lodging mid-afternoon, which should leave plenty time for explore the local villages, enjoy the hot springs at Tatopani, continue to Ghorepani where there is forever the possibility of sunrise hike to Poon Hill for spectacular views of Dhaulagiri, Fishtail, Nilgiri and the Annapurna Himalaya range. Continue on to Birethanti finally between with the Baglung road where we will catch cab to Pokhara, next day drive or fly to Kathmandu.

 

Everest trekking region, although fairly effortless compare to some of other trek, takes you high along trails to Tengboche monastery Everest Solu Khumbu is the district south and west of Mount Everest. It is inhabited by sherpa, cultural group that has achieve fame because of the develop of its men on climbing expeditions. Khumbu is the name of the northern half of this region above Namche, includes highest mountain (Mt. Everest 8848m.) in the world. Khumbu is in part of Sagarmatha National Park. This is a short trek but very scenic trek offers really superb view of the world's highest peaks, including Mt. Everest, Mt. Lhotse, Mt. Thamserku, Mt. Amadablam and other many snowy peaks. Fly from Kathmandu to Lukla it is in the Khumbu region and trek up to Namche Bazzar, Tyangboche and into the Khumjung village, a very nice settlement of Sherpas people. This trek introduction to Everest and Sherpa culture with great mountain views, a very popular destination for first time trekkers in Nepal. Justifiably well-known world uppermost mountain (8848m.) and also for its Sherpa villages and monasteries. Few days trek from Lukla on the highland, takes you to the entry to Sagarmatha National Park and town of Namche Bazaar is entrance of Everest Trek. Environment of the towering Himalayas is a very delicate eco-system that is effortlessly put out of balance.

 

Langtang trekking region mixture of three beautiful trek taking us straight into some of the wildest and most pretty areas of Nepal. Starting from the lovely hill town of Syabrubensi our trek winds during gorgeous rhododendron and conifer forests throughout the Langtang National Park on the way to the higher slopes. Leads up to the high alpine yak pastures, glaciers and moraines around Kyanging. Along this route you will have an chance to cross the Ganja La Pass if possible from Langtang Valley. Trail enters the rhododendron (National flower of Nepal) forest and climbs up to alpine yak pastures at Ngegang (4404m). From Ngegang we make a climb of Ganja La Pass (5122m). We start southwest, sliding past Gekye Gompa to reach Tarkeghyang otherwise we take a detour and another unique features of trekking past, the holy lakes of Gosainkund (4300 m.) cross into Helambu via Laurebina to Ghopte (3430 m) and further to Trakegyang. Northern parts of the area mostly fall within the boundaries of Langtang National park.

 

Peak Climbing in Nepal is great view of Himalayas and most various geological regions in asia. Climbing of peaks in Nepal is restricted under the rules of Nepal Mountaineering Association. Details information and application for climbing permits are available through Acute Trekking. First peak climbing in Nepal by Tenzing Norgey Sherpa and Sir Edmund Hilary on May 29, 1953 to Mt. Everest. Trekking Agency in Nepal necessary member from Nepal Mountaineering Association. Our agency will arrange equipment, guides, high altitude porters, food and all necessary gears for climbing in Nepal. Although for some peaks, you need to contribute additional time, exertion owing to improved elevation and complexity. Climbing peaks is next step beyond simply trekking and basic mountaineering course over snow line with ice axe, crampons, ropes etc under administration and coaching from climbing guide, who have substantial mountaineering knowledge and for your climbing in mountain.

 

Everest Base Camp Trek well noon its spectacular mountain peaks and the devotion and openness of its inhabitants, the Everest region is one of the most popular destination for tourists in Nepal. While numerous of the routes through the mountains are difficult, there are plenty places to rest and enjoy a meal along the way. Additionally, don't worry about receiving lost. Just ask a local the way to the next village on your route, and they will direct you. Most Sherpas under the age of fifty can at least understand basic English, and many speak it fluently.

 

Annapurna Base Camp Trek is the major peaks of the western portion of the great Annapurna Himalaya, Annapurna South, Fang, Annapurna, Ganagapurna, Annapurna 3 and Machhapuchhare and including Annapurna first 8091 meters are arranged almost exactly in a circle about 10 miles in diameter with a deep glacier enclosed field at the center. From this glacier basin, known as the Annapurna base camp trek (Annapurna sanctuary trek), the Modi Khola way south in a narrow ravine fully 12 thousand ft. deep. Further south, the ravine opens up into a wide and fruitful valley, the domain of the Gurungs. The center and upper portions of Modi Khola offer some of the best short routes for trekking in Nepal and the valley is situated so that these treks can be easily joint with treks into the Kali Gandaki (Kali Gandaki is name of the river in Nepal) region to the west.

 

Upper Mustang Trekking name Make an escapade beginning from world deepest gorge Kaligandaki valley into world's highest area of Lo-Mangthang valley that passes through an almost tree-less barren landscape, a steep stony trail up and down hill and panorama views of high Annapurna Himalaya including Nilgiri, Annapurna, Dhaulagiri and numerous other peaks. The trek passes through high peaks, passes, glaciers, and alpine valleys. The thousands years of seclusion has kept the society, lifestyle and heritage remain unaffected for centuries and to this date.

 

Helicopter Tour in Nepal having high mountains and wonderful landscape of countryside but is effortlessly reachable by land transport, is known as helicopter tours country. Helicopter services industry in Nepal is now well well-known with many types and categories of helicopters for the fly to different of Nepal. The pilots are very knowledgeable expert with 1000 of flying hours knowledge in Nepal. We have service for helicopter is outstanding reputations and established records for reliable emergency and rescue flight too. Here we would like to offer some of amazing helicopter tour in Himalaya country of Nepal. Further more details information about Nepal tour itinerary for helicopter tour in different part of Nepal contact us without hesitation.

 

Kathmandu Pokhra Tour is an exclusive tour package specially designed for all level travelers. Kathmandu Pokhara tour package is effortless tour alternative for Nepal visitors. This tour package vacation the historically significant and ethnically rich capital (Kathmandu ) of Nepal and the most stunning city of world by the nature, Pokhara. Mountain museum and world peace stupa are another charming of Pokhara tour. Pokhara is the center of escapade tourism in Nepal. Package tour to Kathmandu Pokhara is design to discover highlighted areas of Kathmandu and Pokhara valley. Nepal is the country which is socially and geographically different that’s why we powerfully recommend you discover Nepal to visit once in life time. It is hard to explore all Nepal in one Nepal tours trip in this way we design this trip to show you the highlights of Nepal especially in Kathmandu and Pokhara.

 

Adventure trekking in the southern part of the asia continent there lays a tiny rectangular kingdom squeezed between two hugely populated countries, China to the north and India to the south, this country is Nepal a world of its own. Adventure trekking is a type of tourism, involving exploration or travel to remote, exotic and possibly hostile areas. Adventure trekking in Nepal is rapidly growing in popularity, as tourists seek different kinds of vacations. The land of contrast is presumably the exact way to define the scenery of Nepal for you will find maximum world highest peaks high high up above the clouds determined for the gods above. Straight, active and attractive learning experience adventure trekking in Nepal that engross the whole person and have real adventure. Mt. Everest, Kanchenjunga, Daulagiri, and Annapurna and many more are there for the offering for mountain-lovers, adventurers and travelers.

 

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Trekking in Nepal - Nepal Trekking - Tea House Trekking - Lodge Trekking - Kathmandu Pokhara Tour - High Pass Trekking - Luxury Trekking in Nepal - Luxury Tour in Nepal - Helicopter Tour in Nepal - Nepal Helicopter Tour - Annapurna Trekking - Annapurna Base Camp Trek - Annapurna Sanctuary Trek - Annapurna Panirama Trekking - Ghorepani Trekking - Jomsom Muktinath Trekking - Annapurna Circuit Trekking - Annapurna Round Trekking - Tilicho Mesokanto Trekking - Tilicho Lake Mesokanto Pass Trekking - Upper Mustang Trekking - Everest Trekking - Everest Base Camp Trek - Everest Panorama Trekking - Gokyo Trekking - Gokyo Everest Trekking - Renjola Pass Trekking - Kongmala Pass Trekking - Three Pass Trekking - Jiri Everest Trekking - Langtang Trekking - Langtang Valley Trekking - Gosaikunda Trekking - Helambu Trekking - Tamang Heritage Trekking - Chisapani Nagarkot Trekking - Kathmandu Valley Cultural Trekking - Langtang Gosaikunda Helambu Trekking - Ganjala Pass Trekking - Peak Climbing in Nepal - Nepal Peak Climbing - High Pass Trekking - Nepal For All Season - Package Tour in Nepal - Island Peak Climbing - Mera Peak Climbing - Pisang Peak Climbing - Adventure Trekking - Adventures Trekking - Mustang Trekking - Upper Mustang Trek - Lower Mustang Trekking - Seasonal Package Trekking Tours in Nepal - Annapurna Trekking Region - Annapurna Base Camp Trek - Everest Trekking Region - Gokyo Trekking - Langtang Trekking Region - Tea House Trek or Lodge Trek - Three Pass Trekking or Everest High Pass Trekking

 

The book Poetics of Architecture has an apt statement, "... fantasy with imagination and association can improve reality; it can upgrade reality...".

 

My camera designs dedicated to Tadao Ando are simple machines.

 

They shed light upon and debunk our common views of the structure as well as the function of the camera. But more importantly, at least to myself on a personal level, these cameras attempt to bring their user closer to a spiritual awareness by functioning similarly to a poem. In this way they perform a social function which is one of my main design goals.

 

When one looks at Tadao Ando's buildings and museums, one can't help but feel his near religious devotion to materials and natural light as well as shadow. Perhaps like Louis Kahn, he brings you to an awareness of the beauty of everything around his structures: the sky, the sea, nature and also emptiness. He is not the first architect to do this but he is one of the first to focus on the minute gradations and infinite shades of this sort of reality.

 

Although I would prefer my cameras to be the size of a typical Ando wall (of monumental proportions), my task is to recreate this vast scale in miniature and to re-create the important experience of a poetic moment for the camera's user.

 

When I made my very first notes for the Ando cameras, I thought that the lion's share of my time would be spent measuring, laying out and drawing these simple forms. I saw it as but a chore and a done deal. But I could never finish these layouts. As it turned out I constantly gave up and had to move on to other camera designs rather than spend even more time on these deceptively simple machines. Conceptualizing these camera homages to Ando was much harder than all the other designs I had done. Even writing this tiny essay has caused me to rethink, reconsider, throw up my hands in puzzlement, and look to diversions.

 

The above photo is some of my beginning notes.

 

I'm so happy to present the beginning page of a design that attempts to go in the direction of Ando's world, by way of the camera world.

 

I seem to have too much that I want to say regarding the ramifications of these designs. I think that these few ideas discovered from my work on the Ando homages will show up in future design drawings of mine.

 

Design and photo contents copyright 2013 by David Lo

But in the cultural sense

I just speak in future tense

 

Non è stata una decisione facile.Sono consapevole della difficoltà di questa scelta,per questo ho cercato disperatamente di trovar qualcos'altro che potesse piacermi e che potesse darmi più possibilità lavorative,in futuro.

Era la scelta più ovvia,per me...eppure quella più difficile.

Bè,di certo non mi si potrà dire,un domani,che la mia è stata una decisione avventata.

Sono consapevole che sarà dura,e che in futuro avrò poche possibilità. Sono consapevole che un giorno potrei forse pentirmene.

Non importa.Va bene così.Ho la piena cognizione di ciò che stò facendo.

Oggi ho scelto filosofia.

Voglio studiare filosofia.

  

It wasn't an easy decision.I'm aware of the difficulty of this choice, so I tried desperately to find something else that would like me and whose could give me more job opportunities in the future.

It was the obvious choice for me...and yet the most difficult.

Well,certainly no one will say that my decision was hasty,one day.

I am aware that it will be tough, and that in future I won't have many chance. I am aware that one day I might regret it.

Don't mind.It's ok.I've got the full knowledge of what I'm doing.

Today I chose philosophy.

I want to study philosophy.

*from a selection of sketches, drawings and portraits of people known to artist, their dreams, anxieties and life styles as perceived by artist. Sketchbooks are the diaries artists carry in their heads until put on paper, they are not copies of other people's art and are not made to please anyone except artist who may or my not use them in future for the making of art. They are neither good or bad; I don't even know if they can be categorized as art, all i know they are revealing to what we feel within ourselves and what we think of those that have influenced our art. The portraits are not as they or the world sees them but as we perceive them to be. In short they are nothing but impressions of them at the moment which can often change within minutes or hours. There are some of course who never change for the better or worse. When viewing set, should anyone be interested in the character or image drawn, you are welcome to question them in my comment box and I will gladly answer your queries.

Thank you!

 

Me and my wife enjoying a glorious bortle 3 sky using a 300mm dobson and two pairs of eyes :) A profoundly beautifull experience to try again many times in future, this will be my future astrophotography election site, after all it's just a litle over an hour drive from home (90 kms). This is just a single 30 sec. exposure at ISO 3200 taken with the kit lens from the Canon M100.

Who are we? How do we identify ourselves? There is never a definite answer for that. Maybe the best answer

we could come up with might not do justice to what we actually are. But these questions have ever more relavance

during these testing time.

 

This is a photo series of people I met and photographed over the years. I do not remember most of their names

but the situations they were photographed have been embedded in my memory. They are people I met randomly and who

identified themselves through their expressions, not just facial but also the situations they were in while being

photographed.

 

With people wearing masks that cover up a good portion of their face due to the onset of COVID19, it is going to be

more difficult to capture a person's expression in future. Hence this series is even more special for me because I would

not be able to do this for very long time.

 

The way of life is changing, so are the expressions of identity.

London Transport RT 82 (FXT 257) was purchased by Alan Pommer for preservation and was parked in this rural setting when seen on 6 June 1978. It appeared to have suffered some roof damage and I believe the bus gradually deteriorated in future years. Photograph (c) Paul Bateson, please do not copy.

Selbstbildnis/Self-Portrait, 1906

Kohle/Charcoal

Albertina

 

Egon Schiele

Egon Schiele was born in Tulln, Lower Austria, on June 12 1890, to the town's stationmaster Adolf Schiele (1850 - 1904) and his wife Maria (1862 - 1935). He grew up with his sisters Melanie (1886 - 1974) and Gertrude ("Gerti", 1894 - 1981). While still a child, he began to draw.

He attended one year of secondary school in Krems before he changed to Klosterneuburg. Doing poorly at school, he had to repeat a grade. On December 31, 1904, his gravely ill father died in Klosterneuburg, to where the family had moved. Schiele would suffer from his father's loss throughout his life, honoring his memory in the allegorical double self-portrait The Hermits.

Schiele's well-off uncle Leopold Czihaczey (1842 - 1929) became his guardian. Thanks to his mother, yet against his guardian's will, Schiele applied to Vienna's Academy of Fine Arts, which accepted him als its youngest student. During his years in Christian Griepenkerl's (1839 - 1916) master class, Schiele got to know the sucessful and admired Gustav Klimt (1862 - 1918). In 1908, he presented his work in a public exhibition in Klosterneuburg Monastery for the first time, where he attracted the attention of Heinrich Benesch, who would become an important collector and his companion.

 

Egon Schiele

Am 12. Juni 1980 kommt Egon Schiele in Tulln als Kind des Bahnhofsvorstandes Adolf Schiele (1850 - 1904) und dessen Frau Maria (1862 - 1935) zur Welt. Er verbringt die Kindheit mit seinen Schwestern Melanie (1886 - 1974) und Gertrude ("Gerti", 1894 - 1981). Schon als Kind beginnt Schiele zu zeichnen.

Das Gymnasium besucht er für ein Jahr zunächst in Krems, dann in Klosterneuburg. Als schlechter Schüler muss er eine Klasse wiederholen. Am 31. Dezember 1904 stirbt sein schwerkranker Vater in Klosterneuburg, wohin die Familie übersiedelt ist. Zeitlebens leidet Schiele am Verlust seines Vaters, dem er 1912 im allegorischen Doppelselbstbildnis "Die Eremiten" ein Denkmal setzt.

Vormund wird Schieles wohlhabender Onkel Leopold Czihaczek (1842 - 1929). Gegen dessen Willen ermöglicht die Mutter eine Bewerbung an der Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Wien, in die er im Oktober 1906 als der jüngste Student aufgenommen wird. Noch während des Studiums in der Meisterklasse Christian Griepenkerls (1839 - 1916) lernt Schiele 1907 den erfolgreichen und bewunderten Gustav Klimt (1862 - 1918) kennen. 1908 beteiligt er sich erstmals an einer öffentlichen Ausstellung im Stift Klosterneuburg, wo Heinrich Benesch, später wichtiger Sammler und Wegbegleiter, auf ihn aufmerksam wird.

 

When Egon Schiele passed the entrance exam to the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna on October 3, 1906, he had already explored his mirror image more than ten times. Flaunting an elegantly knotted bow tie and a stiff stand-up collar, Schiele emphasizes his middle-class status in this self-portrait from 1906. With his long hair parted in the middle, the sixteen-year-old presents himself as a dandy, hinting at his artistic vocation with these role props. The subject's serious gaze intensely fixing the viewer antcipates the mise-en-scène of the eye contact motif that was to become so important to the artist later on.

 

Als Egon Schiele am 3. Oktober 1906 die Aufnahmeprüfung an der Wiener Akademie der Bildenden Künste besteht, hat er bereits mehr als zehnmal sein Spiegelbild studiert. In diesem Selbstbildnis von 1906 betont Schiele mit der elegant geknoteten Masche und dem steifen Stehkragen seinen bürgerlichen Status. Mit der längeren Haartracht und dem Mittelscheitel stellt der 16-jährige sich selbst als Dandy dar und spielt mit diesem Rollenrequisit auf seine künstlerische Bedeutung an. Der ernste und intensive den Betrachter fixierende Blick des Knaben nimmt bereits die später für den Künstler wichtige Inszenierung von Blickmotiven vorweg.

 

The Beginnings

In October 1906, at the age of sixteen, Egon Schiele was admitted to the master class of the history painter Christian Griepenkerl at Vienna's Academy of Fine Arts. In three years of study, Schiele mastered a number of techniques thanks to his natural talent for sketching and to the fact that most of the teachings focused on drawing.

After just a few years, Schiele was producing works in a wide variety of styles that speak to his interest in naturalism, symbolism, late impressionism and from very early on, the Viennese Jugendstil. Gustav Klimt became his primary point of reference.

Particularly Schiele's prodigious mastery of the flat style typical of the Wiener Werkstätte and the Secession reveal how the young artist quickly threw off his professor's academic conventions. Soft undulating lines evenlop his figures harmoniously, and his preference of the decorative ornamental line manifest itself in both his nudes and his portraits and full-lenght figures.

 

Der Beginn

Im Oktover 1906 wird Egon Schiele mit sechzehn Jahren in die Meisterklasse des Historienmalers Christian Griepenkerl der Akademie der bildenden Künste in Wien aufgenommen. In nur drei Jahren eignet sich Schiele eine Vielfalt an Techniken an. Dass der Schwerpunkt der Ausbildung auf dem Gebiet der Zeichnung und der Übung des Schnellzeichnens liegt, kommt ihm entgegen.

Innerhalb weniger Jahre entstehen Werk von einer große stilistischen Spannweite, die Schieles Auseinandersetzung mit dem Naturalismus und Symbolismus, aber auch mit dem Spätimpressionismus und schon sehr früh mit dem Wiener Jugendstil belegen. Schieles großes Vorbild wird Gustav Klimt.

Vor allem die virtuose Aneignung des Flächenstils der Wiener Werkstätte und der Secession zeigt, dass sich der junge Künstler früh von den akademischen Konventionen seines Lehrers abwendet. Sanft schwingende Linien umspielen melodiös die Figuren. Schieles Vorliebe für die dekorativ-ornamentale Linie artikuliert sich ebenos in den Akten wie in den Porträts und Ganzfigurendarstellungen.

 

The Albertina

The architectural history of the Palais

(Pictures you can see by clicking on the link at the end of page!)

Image: The oldest photographic view of the newly designed Palais Archduke Albrecht, 1869

"It is my will that ​​the expansion of the inner city of Vienna with regard to a suitable connection of the same with the suburbs as soon as possible is tackled and at this on Regulirung (regulation) and beautifying of my Residence and Imperial Capital is taken into account. To this end I grant the withdrawal of the ramparts and fortifications of the inner city and the trenches around the same".

This decree of Emperor Franz Joseph I, published on 25 December 1857 in the Wiener Zeitung, formed the basis for the largest the surface concerning and architecturally most significant transformation of the Viennese cityscape. Involving several renowned domestic and foreign architects a "master plan" took form, which included the construction of a boulevard instead of the ramparts between the inner city and its radially upstream suburbs. In the 50-years during implementation phase, an impressive architectural ensemble developed, consisting of imperial and private representational buildings, public administration and cultural buildings, churches and barracks, marking the era under the term "ring-street style". Already in the first year tithe decided a senior member of the Austrian imperial family to decorate the facades of his palace according to the new design principles, and thus certified the aristocratic claim that this also "historicism" said style on the part of the imperial house was attributed.

Image: The Old Albertina after 1920

It was the palace of Archduke Albrecht (1817-1895), the Senior of the Habsburg Family Council, who as Field Marshal held the overall command over the Austro-Hungarian army. The building was incorporated into the imperial residence of the Hofburg complex, forming the south-west corner and extending eleven meters above street level on the so-called Augustinerbastei.

The close proximity of the palace to the imperial residence corresponded not only with Emperor Franz Joseph I and Archduke Albert with a close familial relationship between the owner of the palace and the monarch. Even the former inhabitants were always in close relationship to the imperial family, whether by birth or marriage. An exception here again proves the rule: Don Emanuel Teles da Silva Conde Tarouca (1696-1771), for which Maria Theresa in 1744 the palace had built, was just a close friend and advisor of the monarch. Silva Tarouca underpins the rule with a second exception, because he belonged to the administrative services as Generalhofbaudirektor (general court architect) and President of the Austrian-Dutch administration, while all other him subsequent owners were highest ranking military.

In the annals of Austrian history, especially those of military history, they either went into as commander of the Imperial Army, or the Austrian, later kk Army. In chronological order, this applies to Duke Carl Alexander of Lorraine, the brother-of-law of Maria Theresa, as Imperial Marshal, her son-in-law Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, also field marshal, whos adopted son, Archduke Charles of Austria, the last imperial field marshal and only Generalissimo of Austria, his son Archduke Albrecht of Austria as Feldmarschalil and army Supreme commander, and most recently his nephew Archduke Friedrich of Austria, who held as field marshal from 1914 to 1916 the command of the Austro-Hungarian troops. Despite their military profession, all five generals conceived themselves as patrons of the arts and promoted large sums of money to build large collections, the construction of magnificent buildings and cultural life. Charles Alexander of Lorraine promoted as governor of the Austrian Netherlands from 1741 to 1780 the Academy of Fine Arts, the Théâtre de Ja Monnaie and the companies Bourgeois Concert and Concert Noble, he founded the Academie royale et imperial des Sciences et des Lettres, opened the Bibliotheque Royal for the population and supported artistic talents with high scholarships. World fame got his porcelain collection, which however had to be sold by Emperor Joseph II to pay off his debts. Duke Albert began in 1776 according to the concept of conte Durazzo to set up an encyclopedic collection of prints, which forms the core of the world-famous "Albertina" today.

Image : Duke Albert and Archduchess Marie Christine show in family cercle the from Italy brought along art, 1776. Frederick Henry Füger.

1816 declared to Fideikommiss and thus in future indivisible, inalienable and inseparable, the collection 1822 passed into the possession of Archduke Carl, who, like his descendants, it broadened. Under him, the collection was introduced together with the sumptuously equipped palace on the Augustinerbastei in the so-called "Carl Ludwig'schen fideicommissum in 1826, by which the building and the in it kept collection fused into an indissoluble unity. At this time had from the Palais Tarouca by structural expansion or acquisition a veritable Residenz palace evolved. Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen was first in 1800 the third floor of the adjacent Augustinian convent wing adapted to house his collection and he had after 1802 by his Belgian architect Louis de Montoyer at the suburban side built a magnificent extension, called the wing of staterooms, it was equipped in the style of Louis XVI. Only two decades later, Archduke Carl the entire palace newly set up. According to scetches of the architect Joseph Kornhäusel the 1822-1825 retreaded premises presented themselves in the Empire style. The interior of the palace testified from now in an impressive way the high rank and the prominent position of its owner. Under Archduke Albrecht the outer appearance also should meet the requirements. He had the facade of the palace in the style of historicism orchestrated and added to the Palais front against the suburbs an offshore covered access. Inside, he limited himself, apart from the redesign of the Rococo room in the manner of the second Blondel style, to the retention of the paternal stock. Archduke Friedrich's plans for an expansion of the palace were omitted, however, because of the outbreak of the First World War so that his contribution to the state rooms, especially, consists in the layout of the Spanish apartment, which he in 1895 for his sister, the Queen of Spain Maria Christina, had set up as a permanent residence.

Picture: The "audience room" after the restoration: Picture: The "balcony room" around 1990

The era of stately representation with handing down their cultural values ​​found its most obvious visualization inside the palace through the design and features of the staterooms. On one hand, by the use of the finest materials and the purchase of masterfully manufactured pieces of equipment, such as on the other hand by the permanent reuse of older equipment parts. This period lasted until 1919, when Archduke Friedrich was expropriated by the newly founded Republic of Austria. With the republicanization of the collection and the building first of all finished the tradition that the owner's name was synonymous with the building name:

After Palais Tarouca or tarokkisches house it was called Lorraine House, afterwards Duke Albert Palais and Palais Archduke Carl. Due to the new construction of an adjacently located administration building it received in 1865 the prefix "Upper" and was referred to as Upper Palais Archduke Albrecht and Upper Palais Archduke Frederick. For the state a special reference to the Habsburg past was certainly politically no longer opportune, which is why was decided to name the building according to the in it kept collection "Albertina".

Picture: The "Wedgwood Cabinet" after the restoration: Picture: the "Wedgwood Cabinet" in the Palais Archduke Friedrich, 1905

This name derives from the term "La Collection Albertina" which had been used by the gallery Inspector Maurice von Thausing in 1870 in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts for the former graphics collection of Duke Albert. For this reason, it was the first time since the foundation of the palace that the name of the collection had become synonymous with the room shell. Room shell, hence, because the Republic of Austria Archduke Friedrich had allowed to take along all the movable goods from the palace in his Hungarian exile: crystal chandeliers, curtains and carpets as well as sculptures, vases and clocks. Particularly stressed should be the exquisite furniture, which stems of three facilities phases: the Louis XVI furnitures of Duke Albert, which had been manufactured on the basis of fraternal relations between his wife Archduchess Marie Christine and the French Queen Marie Antoinette after 1780 in the French Hofmanufakturen, also the on behalf of Archduke Charles 1822-1825 in the Vienna Porcelain Manufactory by Joseph Danhauser produced Empire furnitures and thirdly additions of the same style of Archduke Friedrich, which this about 1900 at Portois & Ffix as well as at Friedrich Otto Schmidt had commissioned.

The "swept clean" building got due to the strained financial situation after the First World War initially only a makeshift facility. However, since until 1999 no revision of the emergency equipment took place, but differently designed, primarily the utilitarianism committed office furnitures complementarily had been added, the equipment of the former state rooms presented itself at the end of the 20th century as an inhomogeneous administrative mingle-mangle of insignificant parts, where, however, dwelt a certain quaint charm. From the magnificent state rooms had evolved depots, storage rooms, a library, a study hall and several officed.

Image: The Albertina Graphic Arts Collection and the Philipphof after the American bombing of 12 März 1945.

Image: The palace after the demolition of the entrance facade, 1948-52

Worse it hit the outer appearance of the palace, because in times of continued anti-Habsburg sentiment after the Second World War and inspired by an intolerant destruction will, it came by pickaxe to a ministerial erasure of history. In contrast to the graphic collection possessed the richly decorated facades with the conspicuous insignia of the former owner an object-immanent reference to the Habsburg past and thus exhibited the monarchial traditions and values ​​of the era of Francis Joseph significantly. As part of the remedial measures after a bomb damage, in 1948 the aristocratic, by Archduke Albert initiated, historicist facade structuring along with all decorations was cut off, many facade figures demolished and the Hapsburg crest emblems plunged to the ground. Since in addition the old ramp also had been cancelled and the main entrance of the bastion level had been moved down to the second basement storey at street level, ended the presence of the old Archduke's palace after more than 200 years. At the reopening of the "Albertina Graphic Collection" in 1952, the former Hapsburg Palais of splendour presented itself as one of his identity robbed, formally trivial, soulless room shell, whose successful republicanization an oversized and also unproportional eagle above the new main entrance to the Augustinian road symbolized. The emocratic throw of monuments had wiped out the Hapsburg palace from the urban appeareance, whereby in the perception only existed a nondescript, nameless and ahistorical building that henceforth served the lodging and presentation of world-famous graphic collection of the Albertina. The condition was not changed by the decision to the refurbishment because there were only planned collection specific extensions, but no restoration of the palace.

Image: The palace after the Second World War with simplified facades, the rudiment of the Danubiusbrunnens (well) and the new staircase up to the Augustinerbastei

This paradigm shift corresponded to a blatant reversal of the historical circumstances, as the travel guides and travel books for kk Residence and imperial capital of Vienna dedicated itself primarily with the magnificent, aristocratic palace on the Augustinerbastei with the sumptuously fitted out reception rooms and mentioned the collection kept there - if at all - only in passing. Only with the repositioning of the Albertina in 2000 under the direction of Klaus Albrecht Schröder, the palace was within the meaning and in fulfillment of the Fideikommiss of Archduke Charles in 1826 again met with the high regard, from which could result a further inseparable bond between the magnificent mansions and the world-famous collection. In view of the knowing about politically motivated errors and omissions of the past, the facades should get back their noble, historicist designing, the staterooms regain their glamorous, prestigious appearance and culturally unique equippment be repurchased. From this presumption, eventually grew the full commitment to revise the history of redemption and the return of the stately palace in the public consciousness.

Image: The restored suburb facade of the Palais Albertina suburb

The smoothed palace facades were returned to their original condition and present themselves today - with the exception of the not anymore reconstructed Attica figures - again with the historicist decoration and layout elements that Archduke Albrecht had given after the razing of the Augustinerbastei in 1865 in order. The neoclassical interiors, today called after the former inhabitants "Habsburg Staterooms", receiving a meticulous and detailed restoration taking place at the premises of originality and authenticity, got back their venerable and sumptuous appearance. From the world wide scattered historical pieces of equipment have been bought back 70 properties or could be returned through permanent loan to its original location, by which to the visitors is made experiencable again that atmosphere in 1919 the state rooms of the last Habsburg owner Archduke Frederick had owned. The for the first time in 80 years public accessible "Habsburg State Rooms" at the Palais Albertina enable now again as eloquent testimony to our Habsburg past and as a unique cultural heritage fundamental and essential insights into the Austrian cultural history. With the relocation of the main entrance to the level of the Augustinerbastei the recollection to this so valuable Austrian Cultural Heritage formally and functionally came to completion. The vision of the restoration and recovery of the grand palace was a pillar on which the new Albertina should arise again, the other embody the four large newly built exhibition halls, which allow for the first time in the history of the Albertina, to exhibit the collection throughout its encyclopedic breadh under optimal conservation conditions.

Image: The new entrance area of the Albertina

64 meter long shed roof. Hans Hollein.

The palace presents itself now in its appearance in the historicist style of the Ringstrassenära, almost as if nothing had happened in the meantime. But will the wheel of time should not, cannot and must not be turned back, so that the double standards of the "Albertina Palace" said museum - on the one hand Habsburg grandeur palaces and other modern museum for the arts of graphics - should be symbolized by a modern character: The in 2003 by Hans Hollein designed far into the Albertina square cantilevering, elegant floating flying roof. 64 meters long, it symbolizes in the form of a dynamic wedge the accelerated urban spatial connectivity and public access to the palace. It advertises the major changes in the interior as well as the huge underground extensions of the repositioned "Albertina".

 

Christian Benedictine

Art historian with research interests History of Architecture, building industry of the Hapsburgs, Hofburg and Zeremonialwissenschaft (ceremonial sciences). Since 1990 he works in the architecture collection of the Albertina. Since 2000 he supervises as director of the newly founded department "Staterooms" the restoration and furnishing of the state rooms and the restoration of the facades and explores the history of the palace and its inhabitants.

 

www.wien-vienna.at/albertinabaugeschichte.php

 

Our memorable London, England, UK July/August 2007 visit. Highly recommended again and again.

Cataloguing and culling of older photos to assess what they look like and what to do in future photography/videography.

BLOGGED: 07 Oct. 2008: www.counterspinyc.blogspot.com/\

 

New Yorkers Protest the US$850 BILLION Wall Street BAILOUT: Wall Street, NYC - September 25, 2008

 

Phototgrapher: a. golden, eyewash design - c. 2008.

 

This is actually a GOOD guy. See: billionairesforbush.com/index.php for more information.

 

Friends,

 

The richest 400 Americans -- that's right, just four-hundred people -- own MORE than the bottom 150 million Americans COMBINED! 400 of the wealthiest Americans have got more stashed away than half the entire country! Their combined net worth is $1.6 trillion. During the eight years of the Bush Administration, their wealth has increased by nearly $700 billion -- the same amount that they were demanding We give to them for the "bailout." Why don't they just spend the money they made under Bush to bail themselves out? They'd still have nearly a trillion dollars left over to spread amongst themselves!

 

Of course, they are not going to do that -- at least not voluntarily. George W. Bush was handed a $127 billion surplus when Bill Clinton left office. Because that money was OUR money and not HIS, he did what the rich prefer to do -- spend it and never look back. Now we have a $9.5 trillion debt that will take seven generations from which to recover. Why -- on --earth – did -- our -- "representatives" -- give -- these -- robber -- barons -- $US850 BILLION -- of – OUR -- money?

 

Last week, proposed my own bailout plan. My suggestions, listed below, were predicated on the singular and simple belief that the rich must pull themselves up by their own platinum bootstraps. Sorry, fellows, but you drilled it into our heads one too many times: THERE...IS...NO…FREE... LUNCH ~ PERIOD! And thank you for encouraging us to hate people on welfare! So, there should have been NO HANDOUTS FROM US TO YOU! Last Friday, after voting AGAINST this BAILOUT, in an unprecedented turn of events, the House FLIP-FLOPPED their "No" Vote & said "Yes", in a rush version of a "bailout" bill vote. IN SPITE OF THE PEOPLE'S OVERWHELMING DISAPPROVAL OF THIS BAILOUT BILL... IN SPITE OF MILLIONS OF CALLS FROM THE PEOPLE CRASHING WASHINGTON "representatives'" PHONE LINES...IN SPITE OF CRASHING OUR POLITICIAN'S WEBSITES...IN SPITE OF HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE PROTESTING AROUND THE COUNTRY... THEY VOTED FOR THIS BAILOUT! The People first succeeded on Monday with the House, but failed do it with the Senate and then THE HOUSE TURNED ON US TOO!

 

It is clear, though, we cannot simply continue protesting without proposing exactly what it is we think THESE IDIOTS should/'ve do/one. So, after consulting with a number of people smarter than Phil Gramm, here’s the proposal, now known as "Mike's Rescue Plan." (From Michael Moore's Bailout Plan) It has 10 simple, straightforward points. They are that you DIDN'T, BUT SHOULD'VE:

 

1. APPOINTED A SPECIAL PROSECUTOR TO CRIMINALLY INDICT ANYONE ON WALL STREET WHO KNOWINGLY CONTRIBUTED TO THIS COLLAPSE. Before any new money was expended, Congress should have committed, by resolution, to CRIMINALLY PROSECUTE ANYONE who had ANYTHING to do with the attempted SACKING OF OUR ECONOMY. This means that anyone who committed insider trading, securities fraud or any action that helped bring about this collapse should have and MUST GO TO JAIL! This Congress SHOULD HAVE called for a Special Prosecutor who would vigorously go after everyone who created the mess, and anyone else who attempts to scam the public in future. (I like Elliot Spitzer ~ so, he played a little hanky-panky...Wall Street hates him & this is a GOOD thing.)

 

2. THE RICH SHOULD HAVE PAID FOR THEIR OWN BAILOUT! They may have to live in 5 houses instead of 7. They may have to drive 9 cars instead of 13. The chef for their mini-terriers may have to be reassigned. But there is no way in hell, after forcing family incomes to go down more than $2,000 dollars during the Bush years, that working people and the middle class should have to fork over one dime to underwrite the next yacht purchase.

 

If they truly needed the $850 billion they say they needed, well, here is an easy way they could have raised it:

 

a) Every couple makeing over a million dollars a year and every single taxpayer who makes over $500,000 a year should pay a 10% surcharge tax for five years. (It's the Senator Sanders plan. He's like Colonel Sanders, only he's out to fry the right chickens.) That means the rich would have still been paying less income tax than when Carter was president. That would have raise a total of $300 billion.

 

b) Like nearly every other democracy, they should have charged a 0.25% tax on every stock transaction. This would have raised more than $200 billion in a year.

 

c) Because every stockholder is a patriotic American, stockholders should have forgone receiving a dividend check for ONE quarter and instead this money would have gone the treasury to help pay for the bullsh*t bailout.

 

d) 25% of major U.S. corporations currently pay NO federal income tax. Federal corporate tax revenues currently amount to 1.7% of the GDP compared to 5% in the 1950s. If we raised the corporate income tax BACK to the levels of the 1950s, this would give us an extra $500 billion.

 

All of this combined should have been enough to end the calamity. The rich would have gotten to keep their mansions and their servants and our United States government ("COUNTRY FIRST!") would've have a little leftover to repair some roads, bridges and schools...

 

3. YOU SHOULD HAVE BAIL OUT THE PEOPLE LOSING THEIR HOMES, NOT THE PEOPLE WHO WILL BUILD AN EIGHTH HOME! There are 1.3 million homes in foreclosure right now. That is what is at the heart of this problem. So, instead of giving the money to the banks as a gift, they should have paid down each of these mortgages by $100,000. They should have forced the banks to renegotiate the mortgage so the homeowner could pay on its current value. To insure that this help wouldn't go to speculators and those who tried to making money by flipping houses, the bailout should have only been for people's primary residences. And, in return for the $100K pay-down on the existing mortgage, the government would have gotten to share in the holding of the mortgage so it could get some of its money back. Thus, the total initial cost of fixing the mortgage crisis at its roots (instead of with the greedy lenders) is $150 billion, not $850 BILLION.

 

And let's set the record straight. People who have defaulted on their mortgages are not "bad risks." They are our fellow Americans, and all they wanted was what we all want: a home to call their own. But, during the Bush years, millions of the People lost the decent paying jobs they had. SIX MILLION fell into poverty! SEVEN MILLION lost their health insurance! And, every one of them saw their real wages go DOWN by $2,000! Those who DARE look down on these Americans who got hit with one bad break after another should be ASHAMED.! We are a better, stronger, safer and happier society when all of our citizens can afford to live in a home they own.

 

4. THERE SHOULD HAVE BEEN A STIPULATION THAT IF YOUR BANK OR COMPANY GOT ANY OF OUR MONEY IN A "BAILOUT," THEN WE OWN YOU. Sorry, that's how it's done. If the bank gives me money so I can buy a house, the bank "owns" that house until I pay it all back -- with interest. Same deal for Wall Street. Whatever money you need to stay afloat, if our government considers you a safe risk -- and necessary for the good of the country -- then you can get a loan, but WE SHOULD OWN YOU. If you default, we will sell you. This is how the Swedish government did it and it worked.

 

5. ALL REGULATIONS SHOULD HAVE BEEN BE RESTORED. THE REAGAN REVOLUTION IS DEAD! This catastrophe happened because we let the fox have the keys to the hen-house. In 1999, Phil Gramm authored a bill to remove all the regulations that governed Wall Street and our banking system. The bill passed and Clinton signed it. Here's what Sen.Phil Gramm, McCain's chief economic advisor, said at the bill signing:

 

"In the 1930s ... it was believed that government was the answer. It was believed that stability and growth came from government overriding the functioning of free markets.

 

"We are here today to repeal [that] because we have learned that government is not the answer. We have learned that freedom and competition are the answers. We have learned that we promote economic growth and we promote stability by having competition and freedom.

 

"I am proud to be here because this is an important bill; it is a deregulatory bill. I believe that that is the wave of the future, and I am awfully proud to have been a part of making it a reality."

 

FOR THIS NOT TO REOCCUR, This BILL SHOULD HAVE BEEN REPEALED! Bill Clinton could have helped by leading the effort for the repeal of the Gramm bill and the reinstating of even tougher regulations regarding our financial institutions. And when they were done with that, they should have restored the regulations for the airlines, the inspection of our food, the oil industry, OSHA, and every other entity that affects our daily lives. All oversight provisions for any "bailout" should have had enforcement monies attached to them and criminal penalties for all offenders.

 

6. IF IT'S TOO BIG TO FAIL, THEN THAT MEANS IT'S TOO BIG TO EXIST! Allowing the creation of these mega-mergers and not enforcing the monopoly and anti-trust laws has allowed a number of financial institutions and corporations to become so large, the very thought of their collapse means an even bigger collapse across the entire economy. No ONE or TWO companies should EVER have this kind of power! The so-called "economic Pearl Harbor" can't happen when you have hundreds -- thousands -- of institutions where people have their money. When we have a dozen auto companies, if one goes belly-up, we DON'T FACE A NATIONAL DISASTER! If we have three separately-owned daily newspapers in your town, then one media company can't call all the shots (I know... What am I thinking?! Who reads a paper anymore? Sure glad all those mergers and buyouts left us with a STRONG and "FREE" press!). Laws Should have been enacted to prevent companies from being so large and dominant that with one slingshot to the eye, the GIANT FALLS and DIES. And no institution should be allowed to set up money schemes that NO ONE understands. If you can't explain it in two sentences, you shouldn't be taking anyone's money!

 

7. NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD EVER BE PAID MORE THAN 40 TIMES THEIR AVERAGE EMPLOYEE, AND NO EXECUTIVE SHOULD RECEIVE ANY KIND OF "PARACHUTE" OTHER THAN THE VERY GENEROUS SALARY HE OR SHE MADE WHILE WORKING FOR THE COMPANY. In 1980, the average American CEO made 45 times what their employees made. By 2003, they were making 254 times what their workers made. After 8 years of Bush, they now make over 400 times what their average employee makes. How We have allowed this to happen at publicly held companies is beyond reason. In Britain, the average CEO makes 28 times what their average employee makes. In Japan, it's only 17 times! The last I heard, the CEO of Toyota was living the high life in Tokyo. How does he do it on so little money? Seriously, this is an OUTRAGE! We have created the mess we're in by letting the people at the top become bloated beyond belief with millions of dollars. THIS HAS TO STOP! Not only should no executive who receives help out of this mess profit from it, but any executive who was in charge of running his company into the ground should be FIRED before the company receives ANY help.

 

8. CONGRESS SHOULD HAVE STRENGTHENED THE FDIC AND MADE IT A MODEL FOR PROTECTING NOT ONLY PEOPLE'S SAVINGS, BUT ALSO THEIR PENSIONS AND THEIR HOMES. Obama was correct to propose expanding FDIC protection of people's savings in their banks to $250,000. But, this same sort of government insurance must be given to our NEVER have to worry about whether or not the money they've put away for their old age will be there. This should have meant strict government oversight of companies who manage their employees' funds -- or perhaps it means the companies should have been forced to turn over those funds and their management to the government? People's private retirement funds must also be protected, but perhaps it's time to consider not having one's retirement invested in the casino known as the stock market??? Our government should have a solemn duty to guarantee that no one who grows old in this country has to worry about becoming destitute.

 

9. EVERYBODY NEEDS TO TAKE A DEEP BREATH, CALM DOWN, AND NOT LET FEAR RULE THE DAY. Turn off your TVs! We are NOT in the Second Great Depression. The sky is NOT falling, Chicken Little! Pundits and politicians have lied to us so FAST and FURIOUS it's hard not to be affected by all the fear mongering. Even I wrote to and repeated what I heard on the news last week, that the Dow had the biggest one day drop in its history. Well, that was true in terms of points, but its 7% drop came nowhere close to Black Monday in 1987 when the stock market in one day lost 23% of its value. In the '80s, 3,000 banks closed, but America didn't go out of business. These institutions have always had their ups and downs and eventually it works out. It has to, because the rich do not like their wealth being disrupted! They have a vested interest in calming things down and getting back into their Jacuzzis before they slip into their million thread-count sheets to drift off to a peaceful, Vodka tonic and Ambien-induced slumber.

 

As crazy as things are right now, tens of thousands of people got a car loan last week. Thousands went to the bank and got a mortgage to buy a home. Students just back to college found banks more than happy to put them into hock for the next 15 years with a student loan. I was even pre-approved for a US$5K personal loan. Yes, life has gone on with little-or-no-change (other than the whopping 6.1% umeployment rate, but that happened last month). Not a single person lost any of his/her monies in bank, or a treasury note, or in a CD. And, the perhaps the most amazing thing is that the American public FINALLY didn't buy the scare campaign. The citizens didn't blink, instead telling Congress to take that bailout and shove it. THAT was impressive. Why didn't the population succumb to the fright-filled warnings from their president and his cronies? Well, you can only say 'Saddam has the bomb' so many times before the people realize you're a lying sack of shit. After eight long years, the nation is worn out and simply can't take it any longer. The WORLD is fed up & I don't blame them.

 

10. THEY SHOULD HAVE CREATED A NATIONAL BANK, A "PEOPLE'S BANK." Since they're really itching to print up a trillion dollars, instead of giving it to a few rich people, why don't We give it to ourselves? Now that We own Freddie and Fannie, why not set up a People's bank? One that can provide low-interest loans for all sorts of people who want to own a home, start a small business, go to school, come up with the cure for cancer or create the next great invention. And, now that we own AIG - the country's largest insurance company - let's take the next step and PROVIDE HEALTH INSURANCE FOR EVERYONE. MEDICARE FOR ALL! It will SAVE us SO MUCH MONEY in the LONG RUN (not to mention bring peace of mind to all). And, America won't be 12th on the life expectancy list! We'll be able to have a longer lifespan, enjoying our government-protected pension and will live to see the day when the corporate criminals who caused this much misery are let out of prison so that We can help re-acclimate them to plain old ordinary, civilian life -- a life with ONE nice home and ONE gas-free car invented with help from the People's Bank.

 

P.S. Call your Senators NOW !!! ---> www.visi.com/juan/congress/

 

Since they voted against passing the extension of unemployment benefits and skipped out to "campaign" to us to be re-elected...call them and tell them you will vote for the other "guy" if they don't get their act together!

  

Berlin boasts two zoological gardens, a consequence of decades of political and administrative division of the city. The older one, called Zoo Berlin, founded in 1844, is situated in what is now called the "City West". It is the most species-rich zoo worldwide. The other one, called Tierpark Berlin ("Animal Park"), was established on the long abandoned premises of Friedrichsfelde Manor Park in the eastern borough of Lichtenberg, in 1954. Covering 160 ha, it is the largest landcape zoo in Europe.

 

Rund 15 Prozent der Erdoberfläche werden von Savannen bedeckt. Damit gehören sie zu den größten und wichtigsten Lebensräumen des Planeten. Seit dem 26. Mai 2023 wird Besucher*innen im Tierpark Berlin ein Einblick in diese faszinierende Landschaft gewährt und sie können mehr über die unterschiedlichen Bewohner der ostafrikanischen Savanne und ihren natürlichen Lebensraum erfahren.

Ein wahrer Höhepunkt der neuen Tierpark-Savanne ist der 120 Meter lange Giraffenpfad: Hier werden die Gäste den bis zu fünf Meter hohen Grazien der Savanne zukünftig auf Augenhöhe begegnen können – wer sich traut, bahnt sich den Weg durch den Wald bis zu den Aussichtsplattformen über eine abenteuerliche Hängebrücke. Der Tierpark Berlin erreicht mit der Eröffnung der Afrikanischen Savannenlandschaft ein neues Etappenziel auf seinem Weg zu einem Zoo der Zukunft. Seit knapp neun Jahren wird der 1955 gegründete und 160 Hektar große Tierpark Berlin zu einem naturnahen Geozoo umgebaut. Um einen Einblick in den Lebensraum der einzelnen Tierarten und deren Interaktionen, Besonderheiten und Problematiken zu ermöglichen, werden die Tiere im Tierpark größtenteils nach geografischen Gesichtspunkten zu sehen sein.

 

de/de/aktuelles/alle-news/artikel/wil...

 

Around 15 per cent of the earth's surface is covered by savannahs. This makes them one of the largest and most important habitats on the planet. Since 26 May 2023, visitors to Tierpark Berlin have been given an insight into this fascinating landscape and can learn more about the different inhabitants of the East African savannah and their natural habitat.

A true highlight of the new zoo savannah is the 120-metre-long giraffe trail: here, guests will be able to meet the up to five-metre-high graces of the savannah at eye level in future - those who dare will make their way through the forest to the viewing platforms via an adventurous suspension bridge. With the opening of the African Savannah Landscape, Tierpark Berlin has reached a new milestone on its way to becoming a zoo of the future. For almost nine years, the 160-hectare Tierpark Berlin, which was founded in 1955, has been transformed into a near-natural geozoo. In order to provide an insight into the habitat of the individual animal species and their interactions, peculiarities and problems, the animals in the zoo will largely be seen according to geographical aspects.

 

de/de/aktuelles/alle-news/artikel/wil...

In the dull grey conditions, a lot of Pink-footed Geese were feeding on the freshmarsh @ Holkham this morning. A few were so close to the drive, I did not need a lot of zoom. Many thousands were also reported on Holme grazing marsh, normally they should be out on the fields @ this time of year, feeding on the discarded sugar beet tops. However farm contractors use massive machines these days that shred the tops as they go. The farmers then cultivate the fields quickly, leaving the Geese with less tops to feed on than they used to have. Perhaps the numbers here may reduce in future years.

The last official steam train on the tracks of Jindřichohradecké místní dráhy till now was operated on the 2nd of October 2022, by locomotive U46 101. It is quite a sad story, after more than a century operations have stopped completely. The line to Nová Bystřice was opened on 1 November 1897 and the line to Obrataň followed on 24 December 1906. Hopefully there will be operations in future again!

László Moholy-Nagy, 1895-1946

Ungarische Felder, 1919/Hungarian Fields

Albertina - Dauerleihgabe der Sammlung Forberg

 

In spring of 2007, the Albertina also received the previously based in Salzburg "Batliner Collection" as unrestricted permanent loan. The collection of Rita and Herbert Batliner includes important works by modern masters, from French impressionism to German expressionism of the "Blue Rider" and the "bridge" to works of the Fauvist or the Russian avant-garde from Chagall to Malevich.

de.wikipedia.org / wiki / Albertina_ (Vienna)

 

 

The Albertina

The architectural history of the Palais

(Pictures you can see by clicking on the link at the end of page!)

Image: The oldest photographic view of the newly designed Palais Archduke Albrecht, 1869

"It is my will that ​​the expansion of the inner city of Vienna with regard to a suitable connection of the same with the suburbs as soon as possible is tackled and at this on Regulirung (regulation) and beautifying of my Residence and Imperial Capital is taken into account. To this end I grant the withdrawal of the ramparts and fortifications of the inner city and the trenches around the same".

This decree of Emperor Franz Joseph I, published on 25 December 1857 in the Wiener Zeitung, formed the basis for the largest the surface concerning and architecturally most significant transformation of the Viennese cityscape. Involving several renowned domestic and foreign architects a "master plan" took form, which included the construction of a boulevard instead of the ramparts between the inner city and its radially upstream suburbs. In the 50-years during implementation phase, an impressive architectural ensemble developed, consisting of imperial and private representational buildings, public administration and cultural buildings, churches and barracks, marking the era under the term "ring-street style". Already in the first year tithe decided a senior member of the Austrian imperial family to decorate the facades of his palace according to the new design principles, and thus certified the aristocratic claim that this also "historicism" said style on the part of the imperial house was attributed.

Image: The Old Albertina after 1920

It was the palace of Archduke Albrecht (1817-1895), the Senior of the Habsburg Family Council, who as Field Marshal held the overall command over the Austro-Hungarian army. The building was incorporated into the imperial residence of the Hofburg complex, forming the south-west corner and extending eleven meters above street level on the so-called Augustinerbastei.

The close proximity of the palace to the imperial residence corresponded not only with Emperor Franz Joseph I and Archduke Albert with a close familial relationship between the owner of the palace and the monarch. Even the former inhabitants were always in close relationship to the imperial family, whether by birth or marriage. An exception here again proves the rule: Don Emanuel Teles da Silva Conde Tarouca (1696-1771), for which Maria Theresa in 1744 the palace had built, was just a close friend and advisor of the monarch. Silva Tarouca underpins the rule with a second exception, because he belonged to the administrative services as Generalhofbaudirektor (general court architect) and President of the Austrian-Dutch administration, while all other him subsequent owners were highest ranking military.

In the annals of Austrian history, especially those of military history, they either went into as commander of the Imperial Army, or the Austrian, later kk Army. In chronological order, this applies to Duke Carl Alexander of Lorraine, the brother-of-law of Maria Theresa, as Imperial Marshal, her son-in-law Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, also field marshal, whos adopted son, Archduke Charles of Austria, the last imperial field marshal and only Generalissimo of Austria, his son Archduke Albrecht of Austria as Feldmarschalil and army Supreme commander, and most recently his nephew Archduke Friedrich of Austria, who held as field marshal from 1914 to 1916 the command of the Austro-Hungarian troops. Despite their military profession, all five generals conceived themselves as patrons of the arts and promoted large sums of money to build large collections, the construction of magnificent buildings and cultural life. Charles Alexander of Lorraine promoted as governor of the Austrian Netherlands from 1741 to 1780 the Academy of Fine Arts, the Théâtre de Ja Monnaie and the companies Bourgeois Concert and Concert Noble, he founded the Academie royale et imperial des Sciences et des Lettres, opened the Bibliotheque Royal for the population and supported artistic talents with high scholarships. World fame got his porcelain collection, which however had to be sold by Emperor Joseph II to pay off his debts. Duke Albert began in 1776 according to the concept of conte Durazzo to set up an encyclopedic collection of prints, which forms the core of the world-famous "Albertina" today.

Image : Duke Albert and Archduchess Marie Christine show in family cercle the from Italy brought along art, 1776. Frederick Henry Füger.

1816 declared to Fideikommiss and thus in future indivisible, inalienable and inseparable, the collection 1822 passed into the possession of Archduke Carl, who, like his descendants, it broadened. Under him, the collection was introduced together with the sumptuously equipped palace on the Augustinerbastei in the so-called "Carl Ludwig'schen fideicommissum in 1826, by which the building and the in it kept collection fused into an indissoluble unity. At this time had from the Palais Tarouca by structural expansion or acquisition a veritable Residenz palace evolved. Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen was first in 1800 the third floor of the adjacent Augustinian convent wing adapted to house his collection and he had after 1802 by his Belgian architect Louis de Montoyer at the suburban side built a magnificent extension, called the wing of staterooms, it was equipped in the style of Louis XVI. Only two decades later, Archduke Carl the entire palace newly set up. According to scetches of the architect Joseph Kornhäusel the 1822-1825 retreaded premises presented themselves in the Empire style. The interior of the palace testified from now in an impressive way the high rank and the prominent position of its owner. Under Archduke Albrecht the outer appearance also should meet the requirements. He had the facade of the palace in the style of historicism orchestrated and added to the Palais front against the suburbs an offshore covered access. Inside, he limited himself, apart from the redesign of the Rococo room in the manner of the second Blondel style, to the retention of the paternal stock. Archduke Friedrich's plans for an expansion of the palace were omitted, however, because of the outbreak of the First World War so that his contribution to the state rooms, especially, consists in the layout of the Spanish apartment, which he in 1895 for his sister, the Queen of Spain Maria Christina, had set up as a permanent residence.

Picture: The "audience room" after the restoration: Picture: The "balcony room" around 1990

The era of stately representation with handing down their cultural values ​​found its most obvious visualization inside the palace through the design and features of the staterooms. On one hand, by the use of the finest materials and the purchase of masterfully manufactured pieces of equipment, such as on the other hand by the permanent reuse of older equipment parts. This period lasted until 1919, when Archduke Friedrich was expropriated by the newly founded Republic of Austria. With the republicanization of the collection and the building first of all finished the tradition that the owner's name was synonymous with the building name:

After Palais Tarouca or tarokkisches house it was called Lorraine House, afterwards Duke Albert Palais and Palais Archduke Carl. Due to the new construction of an adjacently located administration building it received in 1865 the prefix "Upper" and was referred to as Upper Palais Archduke Albrecht and Upper Palais Archduke Frederick. For the state a special reference to the Habsburg past was certainly politically no longer opportune, which is why was decided to name the building according to the in it kept collection "Albertina".

Picture: The "Wedgwood Cabinet" after the restoration: Picture: the "Wedgwood Cabinet" in the Palais Archduke Friedrich, 1905

This name derives from the term "La Collection Albertina" which had been used by the gallery Inspector Maurice von Thausing in 1870 in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts for the former graphics collection of Duke Albert. For this reason, it was the first time since the foundation of the palace that the name of the collection had become synonymous with the room shell. Room shell, hence, because the Republic of Austria Archduke Friedrich had allowed to take along all the movable goods from the palace in his Hungarian exile: crystal chandeliers, curtains and carpets as well as sculptures, vases and clocks. Particularly stressed should be the exquisite furniture, which stems of three facilities phases: the Louis XVI furnitures of Duke Albert, which had been manufactured on the basis of fraternal relations between his wife Archduchess Marie Christine and the French Queen Marie Antoinette after 1780 in the French Hofmanufakturen, also the on behalf of Archduke Charles 1822-1825 in the Vienna Porcelain Manufactory by Joseph Danhauser produced Empire furnitures and thirdly additions of the same style of Archduke Friedrich, which this about 1900 at Portois & Ffix as well as at Friedrich Otto Schmidt had commissioned.

The "swept clean" building got due to the strained financial situation after the First World War initially only a makeshift facility. However, since until 1999 no revision of the emergency equipment took place, but differently designed, primarily the utilitarianism committed office furnitures complementarily had been added, the equipment of the former state rooms presented itself at the end of the 20th century as an inhomogeneous administrative mingle-mangle of insignificant parts, where, however, dwelt a certain quaint charm. From the magnificent state rooms had evolved depots, storage rooms, a library, a study hall and several officed.

Image: The Albertina Graphic Arts Collection and the Philipphof after the American bombing of 12 März 1945.

Image: The palace after the demolition of the entrance facade, 1948-52

Worse it hit the outer appearance of the palace, because in times of continued anti-Habsburg sentiment after the Second World War and inspired by an intolerant destruction will, it came by pickaxe to a ministerial erasure of history. In contrast to the graphic collection possessed the richly decorated facades with the conspicuous insignia of the former owner an object-immanent reference to the Habsburg past and thus exhibited the monarchial traditions and values ​​of the era of Francis Joseph significantly. As part of the remedial measures after a bomb damage, in 1948 the aristocratic, by Archduke Albert initiated, historicist facade structuring along with all decorations was cut off, many facade figures demolished and the Hapsburg crest emblems plunged to the ground. Since in addition the old ramp also had been cancelled and the main entrance of the bastion level had been moved down to the second basement storey at street level, ended the presence of the old Archduke's palace after more than 200 years. At the reopening of the "Albertina Graphic Collection" in 1952, the former Hapsburg Palais of splendour presented itself as one of his identity robbed, formally trivial, soulless room shell, whose successful republicanization an oversized and also unproportional eagle above the new main entrance to the Augustinian road symbolized. The emocratic throw of monuments had wiped out the Hapsburg palace from the urban appeareance, whereby in the perception only existed a nondescript, nameless and ahistorical building that henceforth served the lodging and presentation of world-famous graphic collection of the Albertina. The condition was not changed by the decision to the refurbishment because there were only planned collection specific extensions, but no restoration of the palace.

Image: The palace after the Second World War with simplified facades, the rudiment of the Danubiusbrunnens (well) and the new staircase up to the Augustinerbastei

This paradigm shift corresponded to a blatant reversal of the historical circumstances, as the travel guides and travel books for kk Residence and imperial capital of Vienna dedicated itself primarily with the magnificent, aristocratic palace on the Augustinerbastei with the sumptuously fitted out reception rooms and mentioned the collection kept there - if at all - only in passing. Only with the repositioning of the Albertina in 2000 under the direction of Klaus Albrecht Schröder, the palace was within the meaning and in fulfillment of the Fideikommiss of Archduke Charles in 1826 again met with the high regard, from which could result a further inseparable bond between the magnificent mansions and the world-famous collection. In view of the knowing about politically motivated errors and omissions of the past, the facades should get back their noble, historicist designing, the staterooms regain their glamorous, prestigious appearance and culturally unique equippment be repurchased. From this presumption, eventually grew the full commitment to revise the history of redemption and the return of the stately palace in the public consciousness.

Image: The restored suburb facade of the Palais Albertina suburb

The smoothed palace facades were returned to their original condition and present themselves today - with the exception of the not anymore reconstructed Attica figures - again with the historicist decoration and layout elements that Archduke Albrecht had given after the razing of the Augustinerbastei in 1865 in order. The neoclassical interiors, today called after the former inhabitants "Habsburg Staterooms", receiving a meticulous and detailed restoration taking place at the premises of originality and authenticity, got back their venerable and sumptuous appearance. From the world wide scattered historical pieces of equipment have been bought back 70 properties or could be returned through permanent loan to its original location, by which to the visitors is made experiencable again that atmosphere in 1919 the state rooms of the last Habsburg owner Archduke Frederick had owned. The for the first time in 80 years public accessible "Habsburg State Rooms" at the Palais Albertina enable now again as eloquent testimony to our Habsburg past and as a unique cultural heritage fundamental and essential insights into the Austrian cultural history. With the relocation of the main entrance to the level of the Augustinerbastei the recollection to this so valuable Austrian Cultural Heritage formally and functionally came to completion. The vision of the restoration and recovery of the grand palace was a pillar on which the new Albertina should arise again, the other embody the four large newly built exhibition halls, which allow for the first time in the history of the Albertina, to exhibit the collection throughout its encyclopedic breadh under optimal conservation conditions.

Image: The new entrance area of the Albertina

64 meter long shed roof. Hans Hollein.

The palace presents itself now in its appearance in the historicist style of the Ringstrassenära, almost as if nothing had happened in the meantime. But will the wheel of time should not, cannot and must not be turned back, so that the double standards of the "Albertina Palace" said museum - on the one hand Habsburg grandeur palaces and other modern museum for the arts of graphics - should be symbolized by a modern character: The in 2003 by Hans Hollein designed far into the Albertina square cantilevering, elegant floating flying roof. 64 meters long, it symbolizes in the form of a dynamic wedge the accelerated urban spatial connectivity and public access to the palace. It advertises the major changes in the interior as well as the huge underground extensions of the repositioned "Albertina".

 

Christian Benedictine

Art historian with research interests History of Architecture, building industry of the Hapsburgs, Hofburg and Zeremonialwissenschaft (ceremonial sciences). Since 1990 he works in the architecture collection of the Albertina. Since 2000 he supervises as director of the newly founded department "Staterooms" the restoration and furnishing of the state rooms and the restoration of the facades and explores the history of the palace and its inhabitants.

 

www.wien-vienna.at/albertinabaugeschichte.php

(Word is a series of designs for books of the Bible. This is Word: 2 Peter. Find out more about Word.)

 

First off, thanks to the over 100 people who participated in last week's free Word print giveaway on my Facebook page. Yesterday morning I said I'd give away one print plus an extra one if I got up to 750 "likes" by 5:00pm (I was at around 705). My Facebook peeps took on the challenge and got me up to 761 "likes" so two folks ended up with free prints! If you want to take part in future giveaways, make sure you "like" my Facebook page and/or follow me on Twitter.

 

Peter is not feeling very rosey

 

Last week we saw Peter's peaceful and tender side. He encouraged Jesus followers to respond to evil with blessing. But just as you think Peter is walking around dishing out flowers, Sweet Tarts and hugs to everyone he meets, we get to Peter's thoughts on false teachers within the church. Let's just say they he won't be sending them a bouquet of roses.

 

Peter, why you gots to be such a hater?

 

If you read 2 Peter, you'll realize quickly that Peter is pretty upset with false teachers in the church. I first noticed it when he he said they would perish just like the dumb animals they are. Not too many ways to interpret that. At first I wondered what the big deal was. I mean, so a few people are telling the rest of the church folks that the square root of 1463897 is 1209.916112794603 when it's actually 1209.916112794602. C'mon, Peter. How 'bout you count to 10 and just let that one go, huh? But here's the thing... these false teachers were not teaching math. Apparently, there were some people in the church who were teaching not out of love, but out of greed and selfishness. The text doen't get into specific details, but I'm guessing these were the folks who pulled up to church in a brand new 100 A.D. Ferrari and wore Armani suits with imported camel hair.

 

This sections mentions homosexuality and politics!

 

Again, Peter has softened a bit towards his enemies and instead of getting bent out of shape when he's persecuted, he's now a blessing machine. But if someone within the church starts perverting the beauty of Jesus for your own personal gain, he turns into the Incredible Hulk.

 

As I thought about this, I feel like it says something about what kinds of things should turn us Jesus followers into the Incredible Hulk. What kinds of things should make us irate? There are a lot of things we do Hulk up about (politics, laws, homosexuality, etc.), but should we? And who sets the criteria? Who determines that homosexuality is something we Hulk up about but gluttony is not, even though it's mentioned way more often in the Bible?

 

Un-Hulk and let it go

 

What's interesting about Peter's transformation is that he used to Hulk up to everyone about everything. If his fish was overcooked, he probably went off on the person who cooked it on the fire and then yelled at the fish for allowing itself to be overcooked. But now he says to bless your enemies. What he does Hulk up about is when someone is distorting the beauty of Jesus. Actually, that's not even entirely true. He doesn't seem to hold folks outside the church accountable to that. He gets irate when it's someone within the church doing that – someone who claims to be a Jesus follower. He'll get in the face of people within his community. After all, they signed up for this Jesus thing and being corrected and called out is gonna be how you grow, right? But for everyone else who hasn't joined the Jesus camp? Seems like you do your best to show them the beauty of Jesus, but then you let it go. No need to get huffy and cover yourself with green body paint. Just let it go.

 

But what if someone hurts Jesus' feelings and makes him cry?

 

There are a lot of non-Christians who rail at God. (More than a few Christians too, but not my point here.) If I'm striving to be like Jesus, my response must always be loving and that means I have to give folks space to do that. I try to show the beauty of Jesus for sure, but all those times where I feel my fallen nature get all Hulked up, defensive and needing to be correct as though it's some kind of school test, I have to let it go. In fact, I think there's even a verse in the Bible that says the world will know that I'm a Jesus follower because the see me do that very thing.

 

Jesus doesn't need me to protect him from having his feelings hurt by things people say about him. He's got some pretty thick skin, knows his true identity and has a bottomless well of love and forgiveness.

 

So what is my job then? Bless 'em all and let God sort 'em out.

Information from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Cod

 

Cape Cod

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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This article is about the area of Massachusetts. For other uses, see Cape Cod (disambiguation).

For other uses, see Cod (disambiguation).

 

Coordinates: 41°41′20″N 70°17′49″W / 41.68889°N 70.29694°W / 41.68889; -70.29694

Map of Massachusetts, with Cape Cod (Barnstable County) indicated in red

Dunes on Sandy Neck are part of the Cape's barrier beach which helps to prevent erosion

 

Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is an island and a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States. It is coextensive with Barnstable County. Several small islands right off Cape Cod, including Monomoy Island, Monomoscoy Island, Popponesset Island, and Seconsett Island, are also in Barnstable County, being part of municipalities with land on the Cape. The Cape's small-town character and large beachfront attract heavy tourism during the summer months.

 

Cape Cod was formed as the terminal moraine of a glacier, resulting in a peninsula in the Atlantic Ocean. In 1914, the Cape Cod Canal was cut through the base or isthmus of the peninsula, forming an island. The Cape Cod Commission refers to the resultant landmass as an island; as does the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in regards to disaster preparedness.[1] It is still identified as a peninsula by geographers, who do not change landform designations based on man-made canal construction.[citation needed]

 

Unofficially, it is one of the biggest barrier islands in the world, shielding much of the Massachusetts coastline from North Atlantic storm waves. This protection helps to erode the Cape shoreline at the expense of cliffs, while protecting towns from Fairhaven to Marshfield.

 

Road vehicles from the mainland cross over the Cape Cod Canal via the Sagamore Bridge and the Bourne Bridge. The two bridges are parallel, with the Bourne Bridge located slightly farther southwest. In addition, the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge carries railway freight as well as tourist passenger services.

Contents

[hide]

 

* 1 Geography and political divisions

o 1.1 "Upper" and "Lower"

* 2 Geology

* 3 Climate

* 4 Native population

* 5 History

* 6 Lighthouses of Cape Cod

* 7 Transportation

o 7.1 Bus

o 7.2 Rail

o 7.3 Taxi

* 8 Tourism

* 9 Sport fishing

* 10 Sports

* 11 Education

* 12 Islands off Cape Cod

* 13 See also

* 14 References

o 14.1 Notes

o 14.2 Sources

o 14.3 Further reading

* 15 External links

 

[edit] Geography and political divisions

Towns of Barnstable County

historical map of 1890

 

The highest elevation on Cape Cod is 306 feet (93 m), at the top of Pine Hill, in the Bourne portion of the Massachusetts Military Reservation. The lowest point is sea level.

 

The body of water located between Cape Cod and the mainland, bordered to the north by Massachusetts Bay, is Cape Cod Bay; west of Cape Cod is Buzzards Bay. The Cape Cod Canal, completed in 1916, connects Buzzards Bay to Cape Cod Bay; it shortened the trade route between New York and Boston by 62 miles.[2] To the south of Cape Cod lie Nantucket Sound; Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, both large islands, and the mostly privately owned Elizabeth Islands.

 

Cape Cod incorporates all of Barnstable County, which comprises 15 towns: Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee, Barnstable, Yarmouth, Dennis, Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. Two of the county's fifteen towns (Bourne and Sandwich) include land on the mainland side of the Cape Cod Canal. The towns of Plymouth and Wareham, in adjacent Plymouth County, are sometimes considered to be part of Cape Cod but are not located on the island.

 

In the 17th century the designation Cape Cod applied only to the tip of the peninsula, essentially present-day Provincetown. Over the ensuing decades, the name came to mean all the land east of the Manomet and Scussett rivers - essentially the line of the 20th century Cape Cod Canal. Now, the complete towns of Bourne and Sandwich are widely considered to incorporate the full perimeter of Cape Cod, even though small parts of these towns are located on the west side of the canal. The canal divides the largest part of the peninsula from the mainland and the resultant landmass is sometimes referred to as an island.[3][4] Additionally some "Cape Codders" – residents of "The Cape" – refer to all land on the mainland side of the canal as "off-Cape."

 

For most of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, Cape Cod was considered to consist of three sections:

 

* The Upper Cape is the part of Cape Cod closest to the mainland, comprising the towns of Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee. Falmouth is the home of the famous Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and several other research organizations, and is also the most-used ferry connection to Martha's Vineyard. Falmouth is composed of several separate villages, including East Falmouth, Falmouth Village, Hatchville, North Falmouth, Teaticket, Waquoit, West Falmouth, and Woods Hole, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Davisville, Falmouth Heights, Quissett, Sippewissett, and others).[5]

 

* The Mid-Cape includes the towns of Barnstable, Yarmouth and Dennis. The Mid-Cape area features many beautiful beaches, including warm-water beaches along Nantucket Sound, e.g., Kalmus Beach in Hyannis, which gets its name from one of the inventors of Technicolor, Herbert Kalmus. This popular windsurfing destination was bequeathed to the town of Barnstable by Dr. Kalmus on condition that it not be developed, possibly one of the first instances of open-space preservation in the US. The Mid-Cape is also the commercial and industrial center of the region. There are seven villages in Barnstable, including Barnstable Village, Centerville, Cotuit, Hyannis, Marstons Mills, Osterville, and West Barnstable, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Craigville, Cummaquid, Hyannisport, Santuit, Wianno, and others).[6] There are three villages in Yarmouth: South Yarmouth, West Yarmouth and Yarmouthport. There are five villages in Dennis including, Dennis Village(North Dennis), East Dennis, West Dennis, South Dennis and Dennisport.[7]

 

* The Lower Cape traditionally included all of the rest of the Cape,or the towns of Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. This area includes the Cape Cod National Seashore, a national park comprising much of the outer Cape, including the entire east-facing coast, and is home to some of the most popular beaches in America, such as Coast Guard Beach and Nauset Light Beach in Eastham. Stephen Leatherman, aka "Dr. Beach", named Coast Guard Beach the 5th best beach in America for 2007.[8]

 

[edit] "Upper" and "Lower"

 

The terms "Upper" and "Lower" as applied to the Cape have nothing to do with north and south. Instead, they derive from maritime convention at the time when the principal means of transportation involved watercraft, and the prevailing westerly winds meant that a boat with sails traveling northeast in Cape Cod Bay would have the wind at its back and thus be going downwind, while a craft sailing southwest would be going against the wind, or upwind.[9] Similarly, on nearby Martha's Vineyard, "Up Island" still is the western section and "Down Island" is to the east, and in Maine, "Down East" is similarly defined by the winds and currents.

 

Over time, the reasons for the traditional nomenclature became unfamiliar and their meaning obscure. Late in the 1900s, new arrivals began calling towns from Eastham to Provincetown the "Outer Cape", yet another geographic descriptor which is still in use, as is the "Inner Cape."

[edit] Geology

Cape Cod and Cape Cod Bay from space.[10]

 

East of America, there stands in the open Atlantic the last fragment of an ancient and vanished land. Worn by the breakers and the rains, and disintegrated by the wind, it still stands bold.

“

”

Henry Beston, The Outermost House

 

Cape Cod forms a continuous archipelagic region with a thin line of islands stretching toward New York, historically known by naturalists as the Outer Lands. This continuity is due to the fact that the islands and Cape are all terminal glacial moraines laid down some 16,000 to 20,000 years ago.

 

Most of Cape Cod's geological history involves the advance and retreat of the Laurentide ice sheet in the late Pleistocene geological era and the subsequent changes in sea level. Using radiocarbon dating techniques, researchers have determined that around 23,000 years ago, the ice sheet reached its maximum southward advance over North America, and then started to retreat. Many "kettle ponds" — clear, cold lakes — were formed and remain on Cape Cod as a result of the receding glacier. By about 18,000 years ago, the ice sheet had retreated past Cape Cod. By roughly 15,000 years ago, it had retreated past southern New England. When so much of Earth's water was locked up in massive ice sheets, the sea level was lower. Truro's bayside beaches used to be a petrified forest, before it became a beach.

 

As the ice began to melt, the sea began to rise. Initially, sea level rose quickly, about 15 meters (50 ft) per 1,000 years, but then the rate declined. On Cape Cod, sea level rose roughly 3 meters (11 ft) per millennium between 6,000 and 2,000 years ago. After that, it continued to rise at about 1 meter (3 ft) per millennium. By 6,000 years ago, the sea level was high enough to start eroding the glacial deposits that the vanished continental ice sheet had left on Cape Cod. The water transported the eroded deposits north and south along the outer Cape's shoreline. Those reworked sediments that moved north went to the tip of Cape Cod.

 

Provincetown Spit, at the northern end of the Cape, consists largely of marine deposits, transported from farther up the shore. Sediments that moved south created the islands and shoals of Monomoy. So while other parts of the Cape have dwindled from the action of the waves, these parts of the Cape have grown.

Cape Cod National Seashore

 

This process continues today. Due to their position jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, the Cape and islands are subject to massive coastal erosion. Geologists say that, due to erosion, the Cape will be completely submerged by the sea in thousands of years.[11] This erosion causes the washout of beaches and the destruction of the barrier islands; for example, the ocean broke through the barrier island at Chatham during Hurricane Bob in 1991, allowing waves and storm surges to hit the coast with no obstruction. Consequently, the sediment and sand from the beaches is being washed away and deposited elsewhere. While this destroys land in some places, it creates land elsewhere, most noticeably in marshes where sediment is deposited by waters running through them.

[edit] Climate

 

Although Cape Cod's weather[12] is typically more moderate than inland locations, there have been occasions where Cape Cod has dealt with the brunt of extreme weather situations (such as the Blizzard of 1954 and Hurricane of 1938). Because of the influence of the Atlantic Ocean, temperatures are typically a few degrees cooler in the summer and a few degrees warmer in the winter. A common misconception is that the climate is influenced largely by the warm Gulf Stream current, however that current turns eastward off the coast of Virginia and the waters off the Cape are more influenced by the cold Canadian Labrador Current. As a result, the ocean temperature rarely gets above 65 °F (18 °C), except along the shallow west coast of the Upper Cape.

 

The Cape's climate is also notorious for a delayed spring season, being surrounded by an ocean which is still cold from the winter; however, it is also known for an exceptionally mild fall season (Indian summer), thanks to the ocean remaining warm from the summer. The highest temperature ever recorded on Cape Cod was 104 °F (40 °C) in Provincetown[13], and the lowest temperature ever was −12 °F (−24.4 °C) in Barnstable.[14]

 

The water surrounding Cape Cod moderates winter temperatures enough to extend the USDA hardiness zone 7a to its northernmost limit in eastern North America.[15] Even though zone 7a (annual low = 0–5 degrees Fahrenheit) signifies no sub-zero temperatures annually, there have been several instances of temperatures reaching a few degrees below zero across the Cape (although it is rare, usually 1–5 times a year, typically depending on locale, sometimes not at all). Consequently, many plant species typically found in more southerly latitudes grow there, including Camellias, Ilex opaca, Magnolia grandiflora and Albizia julibrissin.

 

Precipitation on Cape Cod and the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket is the lowest in the New England region, averaging slightly less than 40 inches (1,000 mm) a year (most parts of New England average 42–46 inches). This is due to storm systems which move across western areas, building up in mountainous regions, and dissipating before reaching the coast where the land has leveled out. The region does not experience a greater number of sunny days however, as the number of cloudy days is the same as inland locales, in addition to increased fog. Snowfall is annual, but a lot less common than the rest of Massachusetts. On average, 30 inches of snow, which is a foot less than Boston, falls in an average winter. Snow is usually light, and comes in squalls on cold days. Storms that bring blizzard conditions and snow emergencies to the mainland, bring devastating ice storms or just heavy rains more frequently than large snow storms.

[hide]Climate data for Cape Cod

Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year

Average high °C (°F) 2.06

(35.7) 2.5

(36.5) 6.22

(43.2) 11.72

(53.1) 16.94

(62.5) 23.5

(74.3) 26.39

(79.5) 26.67

(80.0) 25.06

(77.1) 18.39

(65.1) 12.56

(54.6) 5.44

(41.8) 26.67

(80.0)

Average low °C (°F) -5.33

(22.4) -5

(23.0) -1.33

(29.6) 2.72

(36.9) 8.72

(47.7) 14.61

(58.3) 19.22

(66.6) 20.28

(68.5) 15.56

(60.0) 9.94

(49.9) 3.94

(39.1) -2.22

(28.0) -5.33

(22.4)

Precipitation mm (inches) 98

(3.86) 75.4

(2.97) 95

(3.74) 92.5

(3.64) 83.6

(3.29) 76.7

(3.02) 62.2

(2.45) 65

(2.56) 74.7

(2.94) 84.8

(3.34) 90.7

(3.57) 92.7

(3.65) 990.9

(39.01)

Source: World Meteorological Organisation (United Nations) [16]

[edit] Native population

 

Cape Cod has been the home of the Wampanoag tribe of Native American people for many centuries. They survived off the sea and were accomplished farmers. They understood the principles of sustainable forest management, and were known to light controlled fires to keep the underbrush in check. They helped the Pilgrims, who arrived in the fall of 1620, survive at their new Plymouth Colony. At the time, the dominant group was the Kakopee, known for their abilities at fishing. They were the first Native Americans to use large casting nets. Early colonial settlers recorded that the Kakopee numbered nearly 7,000.

 

Shortly after the Pilgrims arrived, the chief of the Kakopee, Mogauhok, attempted to make a treaty limiting colonial settlements. The effort failed after he succumbed to smallpox in 1625. Infectious diseases such as smallpox, measles and influenza caused the deaths of many other Kakopee and Wampanoag. They had no natural immunity to Eurasian diseases by then endemic among the English and other Europeans. Today, the only reminder of the Kakopee is a small public recreation area in Barnstable named for them. A historic marker notes the burial site of Mogauhok near Truro, although the location is conjecture.

 

While contractors were digging test wells in the eastern Massachusetts Military Reservation area, they discovered an archeological find.[citation needed] Excavation revealed the remains of a Kakopee village in Forestdale, a location in Sandwich. Researchers found a totem with a painted image of Mogauhok, portrayed in his chief's cape and brooch. The totem was discovered on property on Grand Oak Road. It is the first evidence other than colonial accounts of his role as an important Kakopee leader.

 

The Indians lost their lands through continued purchase and expropriation by the English colonists. The documentary Natives of the Narrowland (1993), narrated by actress Julie Harris, shows the history of the Wampanoag people through Cape Cod archaeological sites.

 

In 1974, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council was formed to articulate the concerns of those with Native American ancestry. They petitioned the federal government in 1975 and again in 1990 for official recognition of the Mashpee Wampanoag as a tribe. In May 2007, the Wampanoag tribe was finally federally recognized as a tribe.[17]

[edit] History

Cranberry picking in 1906

 

Cape Cod was a landmark for early explorers. It may have been the "Promontory of Vinland" mentioned by the Norse voyagers (985-1025). Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524 approached it from the south. He named Martha's Vineyard Claudia, after the mother of the King of France.[18] The next year the explorer Esteban Gómez called it Cape St. James.

 

In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold named it Cape Cod, the surviving term and the ninth oldest English place-name in the U.S.[19] Samuel de Champlain charted its sand-silted harbors in 1606 and Henry Hudson landed there in 1609. Captain John Smith noted it on his map of 1614 and at last the Pilgrims entered the "Cape Harbor" and – contrary to the popular myth of Plymouth Rock – made their first landing near present-day Provincetown on November 11, 1620. Nearby, in what is now Eastham, they had their first encounter with Native Americans.

 

Cape Cod was among the first places settled by the English in North America. Aside from Barnstable (1639), Sandwich (1637) and Yarmouth (1639), the Cape's fifteen towns developed slowly. The final town to be established on the Cape was Bourne in 1884.[20] Provincetown was a group of huts until the 18th century. A channel from Massachusetts Bay to Buzzards Bay is shown on Southack's map of 1717. The present Cape Cod Canal was slowly developed from 1870 to 1914. The Federal government purchased it in 1928.

 

Thanks to early colonial settlement and intensive land use, by the time Henry Thoreau saw Cape Cod during his four visits over 1849 to 1857[21], its vegetation was depauperate and trees were scarce. As the settlers heated by fires, and it took 10 to 20 cords (40 to 80 m³) of wood to heat a home, they cleared most of Cape Cod of timber early on. They planted familiar crops, but these were unsuited to Cape Cod's thin, glacially derived soils. For instance, much of Eastham was planted to wheat. The settlers practiced burning of woodlands to release nutrients into the soil. Improper and intensive farming led to erosion and the loss of topsoil. Farmers grazed their cattle on the grassy dunes of coastal Massachusetts, only to watch "in horror as the denuded sands `walked' over richer lands, burying cultivated fields and fences." Dunes on the outer Cape became more common and many harbors filled in with eroded soils.[22]

 

By 1800, most of Cape Cod's firewood had to be transported by boat from Maine. The paucity of vegetation was worsened by the raising of merino sheep that reached its peak in New England around 1840. The early industrial revolution, which occurred through much of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, mostly bypassed Cape Cod due to a lack of significant water power in the area. As a result, and also because of its geographic position, the Cape developed as a large fishing and whaling center. After 1860 and the opening of the American West, farmers abandoned agriculture on the Cape. By 1950 forests had recovered to an extent not seen since the 18th century.

 

Cape Cod became a summer haven for city dwellers beginning at the end of the 19th century. Improved rail transportation made the towns of the Upper Cape, such as Bourne and Falmouth, accessible to Bostonians. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Northeastern mercantile elite built many large, shingled "cottages" along Buzzards Bay. The relaxed summer environment offered by Cape Cod was highlighted by writers including Joseph C. Lincoln, who published novels and countless short stories about Cape Cod folks in popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post and the Delineator.

 

Guglielmo Marconi made the first transatlantic wireless transmission originating in the United States from Cape Cod, at Wellfleet. The beach from which he transmitted has since been called Marconi Beach. In 1914 he opened the maritime wireless station WCC in Chatham. It supported the communications of Amelia Earhart, Howard Hughes, Admiral Byrd, and the Hindenburg. Marconi chose Chatham due to its vantage point on the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded on three sides by water. Walter Cronkite narrated a 17-minute documentary in 2005 about the history of the Chatham Station.

 

Much of the East-facing Atlantic seacoast of Cape Cod consists of wide, sandy beaches. In 1961, a significant portion of this coastline, already slated for housing subdivisions, was made a part of the Cape Cod National Seashore by President John F. Kennedy. It was protected from private development and preserved for public use. Large portions are open to the public, including the Marconi Site in Wellfleet. This is a park encompassing the site of the first two-way transoceanic radio transmission from the United States. (Theodore Roosevelt used Marconi's equipment for this transmission).

 

The Kennedy Compound in Hyannisport was President Kennedy's summer White House during his presidency. The Kennedy family continues to maintain residences on the compound. Other notable residents of Cape Cod have included actress Julie Harris, US Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis, figure skater Todd Eldredge, and novelists Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut. Influential natives included the patriot James Otis, historian and writer Mercy Otis Warren, jurist Lemuel Shaw, and naval officer John Percival.

[edit] Lighthouses of Cape Cod

Race Point Lighthouse in Provincetown (1876)

 

Lighthouses, from ancient times, have fascinated members of the human race. There is something about a lighted beacon that suggests hope and trust and appeals to the better instincts of mankind.

“

”

Edward Rowe Snow

 

Due to its dangerous constantly moving shoals, Cape Cod's shores have featured beacons which warn ships of the danger since very early in its history. There are numerous working lighthouses on Cape Cod and the Islands, including Highland Light, Nauset Light, Chatham Light, Race Point Light, and Nobska Light, mostly operated by the U.S. Coast Guard. The exception is Nauset Light, which was decommissioned in 1996 and is now maintained by the Nauset Light Preservation Society under the auspices of Cape Cod National Seashore. These lighthouses are frequently photographed symbols of Cape Cod.

 

Others include:

 

Upper Cape: Wings Neck

 

Mid Cape: Sandy Neck, South Hyannis, Lewis Bay, Bishop and Clerks, Bass River

 

Lower Cape: Wood End, Long Point, Monomoy, Stage Harbor, Pamet, Mayo Beach, Billingsgate, Three Sisters, Nauset, Highland

[edit] Transportation

 

Cape Cod is connected to the mainland by a pair of canal-spanning highway bridges from Bourne and Sagamore that were constructed in the 1930s, and a vertical-lift railroad bridge. The limited number of access points to the peninsula can result in large traffic backups during the tourist season.

 

The entire Cape is roughly bisected lengthwise by U.S. Route 6, locally known as the Mid-Cape Highway and officially as the Grand Army of the Republic Highway.

 

Commercial air service to Cape Cod operates out of Barnstable Municipal Airport and Provincetown Municipal Airport. Several bus lines service the Cape. There are ferry connections from Boston to Provincetown, as well as from Hyannis and Woods Hole to the islands.

 

Cape Cod has a public transportation network comprising buses operated by three different companies, a rail line, taxis and paratransit services.

The Bourne Bridge over the Cape Cod Canal, with the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge in the background

[edit] Bus

 

Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority operates a year-round public bus system comprising three long distance routes and a local bus in Hyannis and Barnstable Village. From mid June until October, additional local routes are added in Falmouth and Provincetown. CCRTA also operates Barnstable County's ADA required paratransit (dial-a-ride) service, under the name "B-Bus."

 

Long distance bus service is available through Plymouth and Brockton Street Railway, with regular service to Boston and Logan Airport, as well as less frequent service to Provincetown. Peter Pan Bus Lines also runs long distance service to Providence T.F. Green Airport and New York City.

[edit] Rail

 

Regular passenger rail service through Cape Cod ended in 1959, quite possibly on June 30 of that year. In 1978, the tracks east of South Dennis were abandoned and replaced with the very popular bicycle path, known as the Cape Cod Rail Trail. Another bike path, the Shining Sea Bikeway, was built over tracks between Woods Hole and Falmouth in 1975; construction to extend this path to North Falmouth over 6.3 miles (10.1 km) of inactive rail bed began in April 2008[23] and ended in early 2009. Active freight service remains in the Upper Cape area in Sandwich and in Bourne, largely due to a trash transfer station located at Massachusetts Military Reservation along the Bourne-Falmouth rail line. In 1986, Amtrak ran a seasonal service in the summer from New York City to Hyannis called the Cape Codder. From 1988, Amtrak and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation increased service to a daily frequency.[24] Since its demise in 1996, there have been periodic discussions about reinstating passenger rail service from Boston to reduce car traffic to and from the Cape, with officials in Bourne seeking to re-extend MBTA Commuter Rail service from Middleboro to Buzzards Bay[25], despite a reluctant Beacon Hill legislature.

 

Cape Cod Central Railroad operates passenger train service on Cape Cod. The service is primarily tourist oriented and includes a dinner train. The scenic route between Downtown Hyannis and the Cape Cod Canal is about 2½ hours round trip. Massachusetts Coastal Railroad is also planning to return passenger railroad services eventually to the Bourne-Falmouth rail line in the future. An August 5, 2009 article on the New England Cable News channel, entitled South Coast rail project a priority for Mass. lawmakers, mentions a $1.4-billion railroad reconstruction plan by Governor Deval Patrick, and could mean rebuilding of old rail lines on the Cape. On November 21, 2009, the town of Falmouth saw its first passenger train in 12 years, a set of dinner train cars from Cape Cod Central. And a trip from the Mass Bay Railroad Enthusiasts on May 15, 2010 revealed a second trip along the Falmouth line.

[edit] Taxi

 

Taxicabs are plentiful, with several different companies operating out of different parts of the Cape. Except at the airport and some bus terminals with taxi stands, cabs must be booked ahead of time, with most operators preferring two to three hours notice. Cabs cannot be "hailed" anywhere in Barnstable County, this was outlawed in the early nineties after several robbery attempts on drivers.

 

Most companies utilize a New York City-style taximeter and charge based on distance plus an initial fee of $2 to $3. In Provincetown, cabs charge a flat fare per person anywhere in the town.

[edit] Tourism

Hyannis Harbor on Nantucket Sound

 

Although Cape Cod has a year-round population of about 230,000, it experiences a tourist season each summer, the beginning and end of which can be roughly approximated as Memorial Day and Labor Day, respectively. Many businesses are specifically targeted to summer visitors, and close during the eight to nine months of the "off season" (although the "on season" has been expanding somewhat in recent years due to Indian Summer, reduced lodging rates, and the number of people visiting the Cape after Labor Day who either have no school-age children, and the elderly, reducing the true "off season" to six or seven months). In the late 20th century, tourists and owners of second homes began visiting the Cape more and more in the spring and fall, softening the definition of the high season and expanding it somewhat (see above). Some particularly well-known Cape products and industries include cranberries, shellfish (particularly oysters and clams) and lobstering.

 

Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod, also berths several whale watching fleets who patrol the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. Most fleets guarantee a whale sighting (mostly humpback whale, fin whale, minke whale, sei whale, and critically endangered, the North Atlantic Right Whale), and one is the only federally certified operation qualified to rescue whales. Provincetown has also long been known as an art colony, attracting writers and artists. The town is home to the Cape's most attended art museum, the Provincetown Art Association and Museum. Many hotels and resorts are friendly to or cater to gay and lesbian tourists and it is known as a gay mecca in the summer.[26]

 

Cape Cod is a popular destination for beachgoers from all over. With 559.6 miles (900.6 km) of coastline, beaches, both public and private, are easily accessible. The Cape has upwards of sixty public beaches, many of which offer parking for non-residents for a daily fee (in summer). The Cape Cod National Seashore has 40 miles (64 km) of sandy beach and many walking paths.

 

Cape Cod is also popular for its outdoor activities like beach walking, biking, boating, fishing, go-karts, golfing, kayaking, miniature golf, and unique shopping. There are 27 public, daily-fee golf courses and 15 private courses on Cape Cod.[27] Bed and breakfasts or vacation houses are often used for lodging.

 

Each summer the Naukabout Music Festival is held at the Barnstable County Fair Grounds located in East Falmouth,(typically) during the first weekend of August. This Music festival features local, regional and national talent along with food, arts and family friendly activities.

[edit] Sport fishing

 

Cape Cod is known around the world as a spring-to-fall destination for sport anglers. Among the species most widely pursued are striped bass, bluefish, bluefin tuna, false albacore (little tunny), bonito, tautog, flounder and fluke. The Cape Cod Bay side of the Cape, from Sandwich to Provincetown, has several harbors, saltwater creeks, and shoals that hold bait fish and attract the larger game fish, such as striped bass, bluefish and bluefin tuna.

 

The outer edge of the Cape, from Provincetown to Falmouth, faces the open Atlantic from Provincetown to Chatham, and then the more protected water of Nantucket and Vineyard Sounds, from Chatham to Falmouth. The bays, harbors and shoals along this coastline also provide a robust habitat for game species, and during the late summer months warm-water species such as mahi-mahi and marlin will also appear on the southern edge of Cape Cod's waters. Nearly every harbor on Cape Cod hosts sport fishing charter boats, which run from May through October.[28]

[edit] Sports

 

The Cape has nine amateur baseball franchises playing within Barnstable County in the Cape Cod Baseball League. The Wareham Gatemen also play in the Cape Cod Baseball League in nearby Wareham, Massachusetts in Plymouth County. The league originated 1923, although intertown competition traces to 1866. Teams in the league are the Bourne Braves, Brewster Whitecaps, Chatham Anglers (formerly the Chatham Athletics), Cotuit Kettleers, Falmouth Commodores, Harwich Mariners, Hyannis Harbor Hawks (formerly the Hyannis Mets), Orleans Firebirds (formerly the Orleans Cardinals), Wareham Gatemen and the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox. Pro ball scouts frequent the games in the summer, looking for stars of the future.

 

Cape Cod is also a national hot bed for baseball and hockey. Along with the Cape Cod Baseball League and the new Junior Hockey League team, the Cape Cod Cubs, many high school players are being seriously recruited as well. Barnstable and Harwich have each sent multiple players to Division 1 colleges for baseball, Harwich has also won three State titles in the past 12 years (1996, 2006, 2007). Bourne and Sandwich, known rivals in hockey have won state championships recently. Bourne in 2004, and Sandwich in 2007. Nauset, Barnstable, and Martha's Vineyard are also state hockey powerhouses. Barnstable and Falmouth also hold the title of having one of the longest Thanksgiving football rivalries in the country. The teams have played each other every year on the Thanksgiving since 1895. The Bourne and Barnstable girl's volleyball teams are two of the best teams in the state and Barnstable in the country. With Bourne winning the State title in 2003 and 2007. In the past 15 years, Barnstable has won 12 Division 1 State titles and has won the state title the past two years.

 

The Cape also is home to the Cape Cod Frenzy, a team in the American Basketball Association.

 

Soccer on Cape Cod is represented by the Cape Cod Crusaders, playing in the USL Premier Development League (PDL) soccer based in Hyannis. In addition, a summer Cape Cod Adult Soccer League (CCASL) is active in several towns on the Cape.

 

Cape Cod is also the home of the Cape Cod Cubs, a new junior league hockey team that is based out of Hyannis at the new communtiy center being built of Bearses Way.

 

The end of each summer is marked with the running of the world famous Falmouth Road Race which is held on the 3rd Saturday in August. It draws about 10,000 runners to the Cape and showcases the finest runners in the world (mainly for the large purse that the race is able to offer). The race is 7.2 miles (11.6 km) long, which is a non-standard distance. The reason for the unusual distance is that the man who thought the race up (Tommy Leonard) was a bartender who wanted a race along the coast from one bar (The Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole) to another (The Brothers Four in Falmouth Heights). While the bar in Falmouth Heights is no longer there, the race still starts at the front door of the Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole and now finishes at the beach in Falmouth Heights. Prior to the Falmouth race is an annual 5-mile (8.0 km) race through Brewster called the Brew Run, held early in August.

[edit] Education

 

Each town usually consists of a few elementary schools, one or two middle schools and one large public high school that services the entire town. Exceptions to this include Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High School located in Yarmouth which services both the town of Yarmouth as well as Dennis and Nauset Regional High School located in Eastham which services the town of Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown (optional). Bourne High School is the public school for students residing in the town of Bourne, which is gathered from villages in Bourne, including Sagamore, Sagamore Beach, and Buzzards Bay. Barnstable High School is the largest high school and is known for its girls' volleyball team which have been state champions a total of 12 times. Barnstable High School also boasts one of the country's best high school drama clubs which were awarded with a contract by Warner Brothers to created a documentary in webisode format based on their production of Wizard of Oz. Sturgis Charter Public School is a public school in Hyannis which was featured in Newsweek's Magazine's "Best High Schools" ranking. It ranked 28th in the country and 1st in the state of Massachusetts in the 2009 edition and ranked 43rd and 55th in the 2008 and 2007 edition, respectively. Sturgis offers the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme in their junior and senior year and is open to students as far as Plymouth. The Cape also contains two vocational high schools. One is the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School in Harwich and the other is Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical High School located in Bourne. Lastly, Mashpee High School is home to the Mashpee Chapter of (SMPTE,) the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers. This chapter is the first and only high school chapter in the world to be a part of this organization and has received much recognition within the Los Angeles broadcasting industry as a result. The officers of this group who have made history are listed below:

 

* President: Ryan D. Stanley '11

* Vice-President Kenneth J. Peters '13

* Treasurer Eric N. Bergquist '11

* Secretary Andrew L. Medlar '11

 

In addition to public schools, Cape Cod has a wide range of private schools. The town of Barnstable has Trinity Christian Academy, Cape Cod Academy, St. Francis Xavier Preparatory School, and Pope John Paul II High School. Bourne offers the Waldorf School of Cape Cod, Orleans offers the Lighthouse Charter School for elementary and middle school students, and Falmouth offers Falmouth Academy. Riverview School is located in East Sandwich and is a special co-ed boarding school which services students as old as 22 who have learning disabilities. Another specialized school is the Penikese Island School located on Penikese Island, part of the Elizabeth Islands off southwestern Cape Cod, which services struggling and troubled teenage boys.

 

Cape Cod also contains two institutions of higher education. One is the Cape Cod Community College located in West Barnstable, Barnstable. The other is Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay, Bourne. Massachusetts Maritime Academy is the oldest continuously operating maritime college in the United States.

[edit] Islands off Cape Cod

 

Like Cape Cod itself, the islands south of the Cape have evolved from whaling and trading areas to resort destinations, attracting wealthy families, celebrities, and other tourists. The islands include Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, as well as Forbes family-owned Naushon Island, which was purchased by John Murray Forbes with profits from opium dealing in the China trade during the Opium War. Naushon is one of the Elizabeth Islands, many of which are privately owned. One of the publicly accessible Elizabeths is the southernmost island in the chain, Cuttyhunk, with a year-round population of 52 people. Several prominent families have established compounds or estates on the larger islands, making these islands some of the wealthiest resorts in the Northeast, yet they retain much of the early merchant trading and whaling culture.

Vathylakas (Greek: Βαθύλακας, Turkish: Derince) is a village in the Famagusta District of Cyprus, located on the Karpas Peninsula. It is under the de facto control of Northern Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus, officially the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), is a de facto state that comprises the northeastern portion of the island of Cyprus. It is recognised only by Turkey, and its territory is considered by all other states to be part of the Republic of Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus extends from the tip of the Karpass Peninsula in the northeast to Morphou Bay, Cape Kormakitis and its westernmost point, the Kokkina exclave in the west. Its southernmost point is the village of Louroujina. A buffer zone under the control of the United Nations stretches between Northern Cyprus and the rest of the island and divides Nicosia, the island's largest city and capital of both sides.

 

A coup d'état in 1974, performed as part of an attempt to annex the island to Greece, prompted the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. This resulted in the eviction of much of the north's Greek Cypriot population, the flight of Turkish Cypriots from the south, and the partitioning of the island, leading to a unilateral declaration of independence by the north in 1983. Due to its lack of recognition, Northern Cyprus is heavily dependent on Turkey for economic, political and military support.

 

Attempts to reach a solution to the Cyprus dispute have been unsuccessful. The Turkish Army maintains a large force in Northern Cyprus with the support and approval of the TRNC government, while the Republic of Cyprus, the European Union as a whole, and the international community regard it as an occupation force. This military presence has been denounced in several United Nations Security Council resolutions.

 

Northern Cyprus is a semi-presidential, democratic republic with a cultural heritage incorporating various influences and an economy that is dominated by the services sector. The economy has seen growth through the 2000s and 2010s, with the GNP per capita more than tripling in the 2000s, but is held back by an international embargo due to the official closure of the ports in Northern Cyprus by the Republic of Cyprus. The official language is Turkish, with a distinct local dialect being spoken. The vast majority of the population consists of Sunni Muslims, while religious attitudes are mostly moderate and secular. Northern Cyprus is an observer state of ECO and OIC under the name "Turkish Cypriot State", PACE under the name "Turkish Cypriot Community", and Organization of Turkic States with its own name.

 

Several distinct periods of Cypriot intercommunal violence involving the two main ethnic communities, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, marked mid-20th century Cyprus. These included the Cyprus Emergency of 1955–59 during British rule, the post-independence Cyprus crisis of 1963–64, and the Cyprus crisis of 1967. Hostilities culminated in the 1974 de facto division of the island along the Green Line following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The region has been relatively peaceful since then, but the Cyprus dispute has continued, with various attempts to solve it diplomatically having been generally unsuccessful.

 

Cyprus, an island lying in the eastern Mediterranean, hosted a population of Greeks and Turks (four-fifths and one-fifth, respectively), who lived under British rule in the late nineteenth-century and the first half of the twentieth-century. Christian Orthodox Church of Cyprus played a prominent political role among the Greek Cypriot community, a privilege that it acquired during the Ottoman Empire with the employment of the millet system, which gave the archbishop an unofficial ethnarch status.

 

The repeated rejections by the British of Greek Cypriot demands for enosis, union with Greece, led to armed resistance, organised by the National Organization of Cypriot Struggle, or EOKA. EOKA, led by the Greek-Cypriot commander George Grivas, systematically targeted British colonial authorities. One of the effects of EOKA's campaign was to alter the Turkish position from demanding full reincorporation into Turkey to a demand for taksim (partition). EOKA's mission and activities caused a "Cretan syndrome" (see Turkish Resistance Organisation) within the Turkish Cypriot community, as its members feared that they would be forced to leave the island in such a case as had been the case with Cretan Turks. As such, they preferred the continuation of British colonial rule and then taksim, the division of the island. Due to the Turkish Cypriots' support for the British, EOKA's leader, Georgios Grivas, declared them to be enemies. The fact that the Turks were a minority was, according to Nihat Erim, to be addressed by the transfer of thousands of Turks from mainland Turkey so that Greek Cypriots would cease to be the majority. When Erim visited Cyprus as the Turkish representative, he was advised by Field Marshal Sir John Harding, the then Governor of Cyprus, that Turkey should send educated Turks to settle in Cyprus.

 

Turkey actively promoted the idea that on the island of Cyprus two distinctive communities existed, and sidestepped its former claim that "the people of Cyprus were all Turkish subjects". In doing so, Turkey's aim to have self-determination of two to-be equal communities in effect led to de jure partition of the island.[citation needed] This could be justified to the international community against the will of the majority Greek population of the island. Dr. Fazil Küçük in 1954 had already proposed Cyprus be divided in two at the 35° parallel.

 

Lindley Dan, from Notre Dame University, spotted the roots of intercommunal violence to different visions among the two communities of Cyprus (enosis for Greek Cypriots, taksim for Turkish Cypriots). Also, Lindlay wrote that "the merging of church, schools/education, and politics in divisive and nationalistic ways" had played a crucial role in creation of havoc in Cyprus' history. Attalides Michael also pointed to the opposing nationalisms as the cause of the Cyprus problem.

 

By the mid-1950's, the "Cyprus is Turkish" party, movement, and slogan gained force in both Cyprus and Turkey. In a 1954 editorial, Turkish Cypriot leader Dr. Fazil Kuchuk expressed the sentiment that the Turkish youth had grown up with the idea that "as soon as Great Britain leaves the island, it will be taken over by the Turks", and that "Turkey cannot tolerate otherwise". This perspective contributed to the willingness of Turkish Cypriots to align themselves with the British, who started recruiting Turkish Cypriots into the police force that patrolled Cyprus to fight EOKA, a Greek Cypriot nationalist organisation that sought to rid the island of British rule.

 

EOKA targeted colonial authorities, including police, but Georgios Grivas, the leader of EOKA, did not initially wish to open up a new front by fighting Turkish Cypriots and reassured them that EOKA would not harm their people. In 1956, some Turkish Cypriot policemen were killed by EOKA members and this provoked some intercommunal violence in the spring and summer, but these attacks on policemen were not motivated by the fact that they were Turkish Cypriots.

 

However, in January 1957, Grivas changed his policy as his forces in the mountains became increasingly pressured by the British Crown forces. In order to divert the attention of the Crown forces, EOKA members started to target Turkish Cypriot policemen intentionally in the towns, so that Turkish Cypriots would riot against the Greek Cypriots and the security forces would have to be diverted to the towns to restore order. The killing of a Turkish Cypriot policeman on 19 January, when a power station was bombed, and the injury of three others, provoked three days of intercommunal violence in Nicosia. The two communities targeted each other in reprisals, at least one Greek Cypriot was killed and the British Army was deployed in the streets. Greek Cypriot stores were burned and their neighbourhoods attacked. Following the events, the Greek Cypriot leadership spread the propaganda that the riots had merely been an act of Turkish Cypriot aggression. Such events created chaos and drove the communities apart both in Cyprus and in Turkey.

 

On 22 October 1957 Sir Hugh Mackintosh Foot replaced Sir John Harding as the British Governor of Cyprus. Foot suggested five to seven years of self-government before any final decision. His plan rejected both enosis and taksim. The Turkish Cypriot response to this plan was a series of anti-British demonstrations in Nicosia on 27 and 28 January 1958 rejecting the proposed plan because the plan did not include partition. The British then withdrew the plan.

 

In 1957, Black Gang, a Turkish Cypriot pro-taksim paramilitary organisation, was formed to patrol a Turkish Cypriot enclave, the Tahtakale district of Nicosia, against activities of EOKA. The organisation later attempted to grow into a national scale, but failed to gain public support.

 

By 1958, signs of dissatisfaction with the British increased on both sides, with a group of Turkish Cypriots forming Volkan (later renamed to the Turkish Resistance Organisation) paramilitary group to promote partition and the annexation of Cyprus to Turkey as dictated by the Menderes plan. Volkan initially consisted of roughly 100 members, with the stated aim of raising awareness in Turkey of the Cyprus issue and courting military training and support for Turkish Cypriot fighters from the Turkish government.

 

In June 1958, the British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, was expected to propose a plan to resolve the Cyprus issue. In light of the new development, the Turks rioted in Nicosia to promote the idea that Greek and Turkish Cypriots could not live together and therefore any plan that did not include partition would not be viable. This violence was soon followed by bombing, Greek Cypriot deaths and looting of Greek Cypriot-owned shops and houses. Greek and Turkish Cypriots started to flee mixed population villages where they were a minority in search of safety. This was effectively the beginning of the segregation of the two communities. On 7 June 1958, a bomb exploded at the entrance of the Turkish Embassy in Cyprus. Following the bombing, Turkish Cypriots looted Greek Cypriot properties. On 26 June 1984, the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktaş, admitted on British channel ITV that the bomb was placed by the Turks themselves in order to create tension. On 9 January 1995, Rauf Denktaş repeated his claim to the famous Turkish newspaper Milliyet in Turkey.

 

The crisis reached a climax on 12 June 1958, when eight Greeks, out of an armed group of thirty five arrested by soldiers of the Royal Horse Guards on suspicion of preparing an attack on the Turkish quarter of Skylloura, were killed in a suspected attack by Turkish Cypriot locals, near the village of Geunyeli, having been ordered to walk back to their village of Kondemenos.

 

After the EOKA campaign had begun, the British government successfully began to turn the Cyprus issue from a British colonial problem into a Greek-Turkish issue. British diplomacy exerted backstage influence on the Adnan Menderes government, with the aim of making Turkey active in Cyprus. For the British, the attempt had a twofold objective. The EOKA campaign would be silenced as quickly as possible, and Turkish Cypriots would not side with Greek Cypriots against the British colonial claims over the island, which would thus remain under the British. The Turkish Cypriot leadership visited Menderes to discuss the Cyprus issue. When asked how the Turkish Cypriots should respond to the Greek Cypriot claim of enosis, Menderes replied: "You should go to the British foreign minister and request the status quo be prolonged, Cyprus to remain as a British colony". When the Turkish Cypriots visited the British Foreign Secretary and requested for Cyprus to remain a colony, he replied: "You should not be asking for colonialism at this day and age, you should be asking for Cyprus be returned to Turkey, its former owner".

 

As Turkish Cypriots began to look to Turkey for protection, Greek Cypriots soon understood that enosis was extremely unlikely. The Greek Cypriot leader, Archbishop Makarios III, now set independence for the island as his objective.

 

Britain resolved to solve the dispute by creating an independent Cyprus. In 1959, all involved parties signed the Zurich Agreements: Britain, Turkey, Greece, and the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders, Makarios and Dr. Fazil Kucuk, respectively. The new constitution drew heavily on the ethnic composition of the island. The President would be a Greek Cypriot, and the Vice-President a Turkish Cypriot with an equal veto. The contribution to the public service would be set at a ratio of 70:30, and the Supreme Court would consist of an equal number of judges from both communities as well as an independent judge who was not Greek, Turkish or British. The Zurich Agreements were supplemented by a number of treaties. The Treaty of Guarantee stated that secession or union with any state was forbidden, and that Greece, Turkey and Britain would be given guarantor status to intervene if that was violated. The Treaty of Alliance allowed for two small Greek and Turkish military contingents to be stationed on the island, and the Treaty of Establishment gave Britain sovereignty over two bases in Akrotiri and Dhekelia.

 

On 15 August 1960, the Colony of Cyprus became fully independent as the Republic of Cyprus. The new republic remained within the Commonwealth of Nations.

 

The new constitution brought dissatisfaction to Greek Cypriots, who felt it to be highly unjust for them for historical, demographic and contributional reasons. Although 80% of the island's population were Greek Cypriots and these indigenous people had lived on the island for thousands of years and paid 94% of taxes, the new constitution was giving the 17% of the population that was Turkish Cypriots, who paid 6% of taxes, around 30% of government jobs and 40% of national security jobs.

 

Within three years tensions between the two communities in administrative affairs began to show. In particular disputes over separate municipalities and taxation created a deadlock in government. A constitutional court ruled in 1963 Makarios had failed to uphold article 173 of the constitution which called for the establishment of separate municipalities for Turkish Cypriots. Makarios subsequently declared his intention to ignore the judgement, resulting in the West German judge resigning from his position. Makarios proposed thirteen amendments to the constitution, which would have had the effect of resolving most of the issues in the Greek Cypriot favour. Under the proposals, the President and Vice-President would lose their veto, the separate municipalities as sought after by the Turkish Cypriots would be abandoned, the need for separate majorities by both communities in passing legislation would be discarded and the civil service contribution would be set at actual population ratios (82:18) instead of the slightly higher figure for Turkish Cypriots.

 

The intention behind the amendments has long been called into question. The Akritas plan, written in the height of the constitutional dispute by the Greek Cypriot interior minister Polycarpos Georkadjis, called for the removal of undesirable elements of the constitution so as to allow power-sharing to work. The plan envisaged a swift retaliatory attack on Turkish Cypriot strongholds should Turkish Cypriots resort to violence to resist the measures, stating "In the event of a planned or staged Turkish attack, it is imperative to overcome it by force in the shortest possible time, because if we succeed in gaining command of the situation (in one or two days), no outside, intervention would be either justified or possible." Whether Makarios's proposals were part of the Akritas plan is unclear, however it remains that sentiment towards enosis had not completely disappeared with independence. Makarios described independence as "a step on the road to enosis".[31] Preparations for conflict were not entirely absent from Turkish Cypriots either, with right wing elements still believing taksim (partition) the best safeguard against enosis.

 

Greek Cypriots however believe the amendments were a necessity stemming from a perceived attempt by Turkish Cypriots to frustrate the working of government. Turkish Cypriots saw it as a means to reduce their status within the state from one of co-founder to that of minority, seeing it as a first step towards enosis. The security situation deteriorated rapidly.

 

Main articles: Bloody Christmas (1963) and Battle of Tillyria

An armed conflict was triggered after December 21, 1963, a period remembered by Turkish Cypriots as Bloody Christmas, when a Greek Cypriot policemen that had been called to help deal with a taxi driver refusing officers already on the scene access to check the identification documents of his customers, took out his gun upon arrival and shot and killed the taxi driver and his partner. Eric Solsten summarised the events as follows: "a Greek Cypriot police patrol, ostensibly checking identification documents, stopped a Turkish Cypriot couple on the edge of the Turkish quarter. A hostile crowd gathered, shots were fired, and two Turkish Cypriots were killed."

 

In the morning after the shooting, crowds gathered in protest in Northern Nicosia, likely encouraged by the TMT, without incident. On the evening of the 22nd, gunfire broke out, communication lines to the Turkish neighbourhoods were cut, and the Greek Cypriot police occupied the nearby airport. On the 23rd, a ceasefire was negotiated, but did not hold. Fighting, including automatic weapons fire, between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and militias increased in Nicosia and Larnaca. A force of Greek Cypriot irregulars led by Nikos Sampson entered the Nicosia suburb of Omorphita and engaged in heavy firing on armed, as well as by some accounts unarmed, Turkish Cypriots. The Omorphita clash has been described by Turkish Cypriots as a massacre, while this view has generally not been acknowledged by Greek Cypriots.

 

Further ceasefires were arranged between the two sides, but also failed. By Christmas Eve, the 24th, Britain, Greece, and Turkey had joined talks, with all sides calling for a truce. On Christmas day, Turkish fighter jets overflew Nicosia in a show of support. Finally it was agreed to allow a force of 2,700 British soldiers to help enforce a ceasefire. In the next days, a "buffer zone" was created in Nicosia, and a British officer marked a line on a map with green ink, separating the two sides of the city, which was the beginning of the "Green Line". Fighting continued across the island for the next several weeks.

 

In total 364 Turkish Cypriots and 174 Greek Cypriots were killed during the violence. 25,000 Turkish Cypriots from 103-109 villages fled and were displaced into enclaves and thousands of Turkish Cypriot houses were ransacked or completely destroyed.

 

Contemporary newspapers also reported on the forceful exodus of the Turkish Cypriots from their homes. According to The Times in 1964, threats, shootings and attempts of arson were committed against the Turkish Cypriots to force them out of their homes. The Daily Express wrote that "25,000 Turks have already been forced to leave their homes". The Guardian reported a massacre of Turks at Limassol on 16 February 1964.

 

Turkey had by now readied its fleet and its fighter jets appeared over Nicosia. Turkey was dissuaded from direct involvement by the creation of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) in 1964. Despite the negotiated ceasefire in Nicosia, attacks on the Turkish Cypriot persisted, particularly in Limassol. Concerned about the possibility of a Turkish invasion, Makarios undertook the creation of a Greek Cypriot conscript-based army called the "National Guard". A general from Greece took charge of the army, whilst a further 20,000 well-equipped officers and men were smuggled from Greece into Cyprus. Turkey threatened to intervene once more, but was prevented by a strongly worded letter from the American President Lyndon B. Johnson, anxious to avoid a conflict between NATO allies Greece and Turkey at the height of the Cold War.

 

Turkish Cypriots had by now established an important bridgehead at Kokkina, provided with arms, volunteers and materials from Turkey and abroad. Seeing this incursion of foreign weapons and troops as a major threat, the Cypriot government invited George Grivas to return from Greece as commander of the Greek troops on the island and launch a major attack on the bridgehead. Turkey retaliated by dispatching its fighter jets to bomb Greek positions, causing Makarios to threaten an attack on every Turkish Cypriot village on the island if the bombings did not cease. The conflict had now drawn in Greece and Turkey, with both countries amassing troops on their Thracian borders. Efforts at mediation by Dean Acheson, a former U.S. Secretary of State, and UN-appointed mediator Galo Plaza had failed, all the while the division of the two communities becoming more apparent. Greek Cypriot forces were estimated at some 30,000, including the National Guard and the large contingent from Greece. Defending the Turkish Cypriot enclaves was a force of approximately 5,000 irregulars, led by a Turkish colonel, but lacking the equipment and organisation of the Greek forces.

 

The Secretary-General of the United Nations in 1964, U Thant, reported the damage during the conflicts:

 

UNFICYP carried out a detailed survey of all damage to properties throughout the island during the disturbances; it shows that in 109 villages, most of them Turkish-Cypriot or mixed villages, 527 houses have been destroyed while 2,000 others have suffered damage from looting.

 

The situation worsened in 1967, when a military junta overthrew the democratically elected government of Greece, and began applying pressure on Makarios to achieve enosis. Makarios, not wishing to become part of a military dictatorship or trigger a Turkish invasion, began to distance himself from the goal of enosis. This caused tensions with the junta in Greece as well as George Grivas in Cyprus. Grivas's control over the National Guard and Greek contingent was seen as a threat to Makarios's position, who now feared a possible coup.[citation needed] The National Guard and Cyprus Police began patrolling the Turkish Cypriot enclaves of Ayios Theodoros and Kophinou, and on November 15 engaged in heavy fighting with the Turkish Cypriots.

 

By the time of his withdrawal 26 Turkish Cypriots had been killed. Turkey replied with an ultimatum demanding that Grivas be removed from the island, that the troops smuggled from Greece in excess of the limits of the Treaty of Alliance be removed, and that the economic blockades on the Turkish Cypriot enclaves be lifted. Grivas was recalled by the Athens Junta and the 12,000 Greek troops were withdrawn. Makarios now attempted to consolidate his position by reducing the number of National Guard troops, and by creating a paramilitary force loyal to Cypriot independence. In 1968, acknowledging that enosis was now all but impossible, Makarios stated, "A solution by necessity must be sought within the limits of what is feasible which does not always coincide with the limits of what is desirable."

 

After 1967 tensions between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots subsided. Instead, the main source of tension on the island came from factions within the Greek Cypriot community. Although Makarios had effectively abandoned enosis in favour of an 'attainable solution', many others continued to believe that the only legitimate political aspiration for Greek Cypriots was union with Greece.

 

On his arrival, Grivas began by establishing a nationalist paramilitary group known as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston B or EOKA-B), drawing comparisons with the EOKA struggle for enosis under the British colonial administration of the 1950s.

 

The military junta in Athens saw Makarios as an obstacle. Makarios's failure to disband the National Guard, whose officer class was dominated by mainland Greeks, had meant the junta had practical control over the Cypriot military establishment, leaving Makarios isolated and a vulnerable target.

 

During the first Turkish invasion, Turkish troops invaded Cyprus territory on 20 July 1974, invoking its rights under the Treaty of Guarantee. This expansion of Turkish-occupied zone violated International Law as well as the Charter of the United Nations. Turkish troops managed to capture 3% of the island which was accompanied by the burning of the Turkish Cypriot quarter, as well as the raping and killing of women and children. A temporary cease-fire followed which was mitigated by the UN Security Council. Subsequently, the Greek military Junta collapsed on July 23, 1974, and peace talks commenced in which a democratic government was installed. The Resolution 353 was broken after Turkey attacked a second time and managed to get a hold of 37% of Cyprus territory. The Island of Cyprus was appointed a Buffer Zone by the United Nations, which divided the island into two zones through the 'Green Line' and put an end to the Turkish invasion. Although Turkey announced that the occupied areas of Cyprus to be called the Federated Turkish State in 1975, it is not legitimised on a worldwide political scale. The United Nations called for the international recognition of independence for the Republic of Cyprus in the Security Council Resolution 367.

 

In the years after the Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus one can observe a history of failed talks between the two parties. The 1983 declaration of the independent Turkish Republic of Cyprus resulted in a rise of inter-communal tensions and made it increasingly hard to find mutual understanding. With Cyprus' interest of a possible EU membership and a new UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 1997 new hopes arose for a fresh start. International involvement from sides of the US and UK, wanting a solution to the Cyprus dispute prior to the EU accession led to political pressures for new talks. The believe that an accession without a solution would threaten Greek-Turkish relations and acknowledge the partition of the island would direct the coming negotiations.

 

Over the course of two years a concrete plan, the Annan plan was formulated. In 2004 the fifth version agreed upon from both sides and with the endorsement of Turkey, US, UK and EU then was presented to the public and was given a referendum in both Cypriot communities to assure the legitimisation of the resolution. The Turkish Cypriots voted with 65% for the plan, however the Greek Cypriots voted with a 76% majority against. The Annan plan contained multiple important topics. Firstly it established a confederation of two separate states called the United Cyprus Republic. Both communities would have autonomous states combined under one unified government. The members of parliament would be chosen according to the percentage in population numbers to ensure a just involvement from both communities. The paper proposed a demilitarisation of the island over the next years. Furthermore it agreed upon a number of 45000 Turkish settlers that could remain on the island. These settlers became a very important issue concerning peace talks. Originally the Turkish government encouraged Turks to settle in Cyprus providing transfer and property, to establish a counterpart to the Greek Cypriot population due to their 1 to 5 minority. With the economic situation many Turkish-Cypriot decided to leave the island, however their departure is made up by incoming Turkish settlers leaving the population ratio between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots stable. However all these points where criticised and as seen in the vote rejected mainly by the Greek Cypriots. These name the dissolution of the „Republic of Cyprus", economic consequences of a reunion and the remaining Turkish settlers as reason. Many claim that the plan was indeed drawing more from Turkish-Cypriot demands then Greek-Cypriot interests. Taking in consideration that the US wanted to keep Turkey as a strategic partner in future Middle Eastern conflicts.

 

A week after the failed referendum the Republic of Cyprus joined the EU. In multiple instances the EU tried to promote trade with Northern Cyprus but without internationally recognised ports this spiked a grand debate. Both side endure their intention of negotiations, however without the prospect of any new compromises or agreements the UN is unwilling to start the process again. Since 2004 negotiations took place in numbers but without any results, both sides are strongly holding on to their position without an agreeable solution in sight that would suit both parties.

For the past year, I have posted shots of Kent churches on Twitter than on a churchcrawling group on FB, and in the course of that year, I have come to realise that some churches I recorded better than others, and some of the early one, were mostly dreadful wide angle shots.

 

So, one by one, I plan to go back and reshoot them.

 

St Mary was one. It was closed on All Hallow's Eve last year, but on Saturday last month, we dropped off some prints to be framed in the town, and a short walk along Strand Street is St Mary.

 

It was open for an art shot, but that was OK, as I wanted to snap the memorials and details.

 

Today, St Mary is used as a community resource. It has a stage, and the nave either used for the audience or an exhibition space.

 

Around the walls are many fine memorials and details to look at and ponder over.

 

Sandwich had three parish churches, two are now redundant, but both St Mary and St Peter have survived to be assets for the town.

 

As they should be.

 

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An extraordinary barn of a church - one of two in the town cared for by The Churches Conservation Trust. That it was a large Norman church is without question - see the responds at the west end of the nave. Like the other two churches in Sandwich, St Mary's probably also had a central tower, the collapse of which (like St Peter's) caused havoc to the building. Rebuilding here took a rather rare form with the building losing its south arcade; having a new north arcade built of wood; and a new roof to cover the whole! By the 20th century the church was surplus to requirements and was threatened with demolition. However local supporters, encouraged by the doyen of ecclesiologists, Ivor Bulmer-Thomas, saved it. Now used for concerts it is open to visitors and has much of interest. In the north aisle are 18th century pews saved from Gopsall Hall in Leicestershire. The chancel contains a rare banner stave locker for the poles used to carry banners in medieval street processions. Nearby is an example of two pieces of stone being joined together with a dowel made from animal bone. The glass in the east window is scratched with the names of the glaziers who have repaired it on numerous occasions!

 

www.kentchurches.info/church.asp?p=Sandwich+2

 

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THE town of Sandwich is situated on the north-east confines of this county, about two miles from the sea, and adjoining to the harbour of its own name, through which the river Stour flows northward into the sea at Pepperness. It is one of the principal cinque ports, the liberty of which extends over it, and it is within the jurisdiction of the justices of its own corporation.

 

Sandwich had in antient time several members appertaining to it, (fn. 1) called the antient members of the port of Sandwich; these were Fordwich, Reculver, Sarre, Stonar, and Deal; but in the later charters, the members mentioned are Fordwich incorporated, and the non-corporated members of Deal, Walmer, Ramsgate, Stonar, Sarre, all in this county, and Brightlingsea, in Sussex; but of late years, Deal, Walmer, and Stonar, have been taken from it; Deal, by having been in 1699 incorporated with the charter of a separate jurisdiction, in the bounds of which Walmer is included; and Stonar having been, by a late decision of the court of king's bench in 1773, adjudged to be within the jurisdiction of the county at large.

 

The first origin of this port was owing to the decay of that of Richborough, as will be further noticed hereafter. It was at first called Lundenwic, from its being the entrance to the port of London, for so it was, on the sea coast, and it retained this name until the supplanting of the Saxons by the Danes, when it acquired from its sandy situation a new name, being from thenceforward called Sandwic, in old Latin, Sabulovicum, that is, the sandy town, and in process of time, by the change of language, Sandwich.

 

Where this town now stands, is supposed, in the time of the Romans, and before the decay of the haven, or Portus Rutupinus, to have been covered with that water, which formed the bay of it, which was so large that it is said to have extended far beyond this place, on the one side almost to Ramsgate cliffs, and on the other near five miles in width, over the whole of that flat of land, on which Stonar and Sandwich too, were afterwards built, and extending from thence up to the æstuary, which then flowed up between the Isle of Thanet and the main land of this county.

 

During the time of the Saxons, the haven and port of Richborough, the most frequented of any in this part of Britain, began to decay, and swarve up, the sea by degrees entirely deserting it at this place, but still leaving sufficient to form a large and commodious one at Sandwich, which in process of time, became in like manner, the usual resort for shipping, and arose a Flourishing harbour in its stead; from which time the Saxon fleets, as well as those of the Danes, are said by the historians of those times, to sail for the port of Sandwich; and there to lie at different times, and no further mention is made of that of Richborough, which being thus destroyed, Sandwich became the port of general resort; which, as well as the building of this town, seems to have taken place, however, some while after the establishment of the Saxons in Britain, and the first time that is found of the name of Sandwich being mentioned and occurring as a port, is in the life of St. Wilfred, archbishop of York, written by Eddius Stephanus; in which it is said, he and his company, prosper in portum Sandwich, atque suaviter pervenerunt, happily and pleasantly arrived in the harbour of Sandwich, which happened about the year 665, or 666, some what more than 200 years after the arrival of the Saxons in Britain. During the time of the Danes insesting this kingdom, several of their principal transactions happened at this place, (fn. 2) and the port of it became so much frequented, that the author of queen Emma's life stiles it the most noted of all the English ports; Sandwich qui est omnium Anglorum portuum famosissimus.

 

FROM THE TIME of the origin of the town of Sandwich, the property of it was vested in the several kings who reigned over this country, and continued so till king Ethelred, in the year 979, gave it, as the lands of his inheritance, to Christ-church, in Canterbury, free from all secular service and fiscal tribute, except the repelling invasions, and the repairing of bridges and castles. (fn. 3) After which king Canute, having obtained the kingdom, finished the building of this town, and having all parts and places in the realm at his disposal, as coming to the possession of it by conquest, by his charter in the year 1023, gave, or rather restored the port of Sandwich, with the profits of the water of it, on both sides of the stream, for the support of that church, and the sustenance of the monks there.

 

Soon after this, the town of Sandwich increased greatly in size and inhabitants, and on account of the commodity and use of its haven, and the service done by the shipping belonging to it, was of such estimation, that it was made one of the principal cinque ports; and in king Edward the Confessor's days it contained three hundred and seven houses, and was an hundred within itself; and it continued increasing, as appears by the description of it, in the survey of Domesday, taken in the 15th year of the Conqueror's reign, anno 1080, in which it is thus entered, under the title of the lands of the archbishop:

 

Sandwice lies in its own proper hundred. This borough the archbishop holds, and it is of the clothing of the monks, and yields the like service to the king as Dover; and this the men of that borough testify, that before king Edward gave the same to the Holy Trinity, it paid to the king fisteen pounds. At the time of King Edward's death it was not put to ferme. When the archbishop received it, it paid forty pounds of ferme, and forty thousand herrings to the food of the monks. In the year in which this description was made, Sanuuic paid fifty pounds of ferme, & Herrings as above. In the time of king Edward the Confessor there were there three hundred and seven mansions tenanted, now there are seventy six more, that is together three hundred and eighty three.

 

And under the title of the bishop of Baieux's lands, as follows, under the description of the manor of Gollesberge:

 

In Estrei hundred, in Sandunic, the archbishop has thirty two houses, with plats of land belonging to this manor,(viz. Gollesberge) and they pay forty-two shil lings and eight pence, and Adeluuold has one yoke, which is worth ten shillings.

 

These houses, with all the liberties which the bishop of Baieux had in Sandwich, had been given by him to Christ-church, in Canterbury, and confirmed to it in the year 1075, by his brother the Conqueror. (fn. 4)

 

Afterwards king Henry II. granted to the monks the full enjoyment of all those liberties and customs in Sandwich, which they had in the time of king Henry his grandfather, that is, the port and toll, and all maritime customs in this port, on both sides of the water, that is, from Eadburgate unto Merksflete, and the small boat to ferry across it, and that no one should have any right there except them and their servants.

 

The town, by these continued privileges, and the advantages it derived from the great resort to the port, increased much in wealth and number of inhabitants; and notwithstanding, in the year 1217, anno 2 king Henry III. great part of the town was burnt by the French, yet the damage seems soon to have been recompenced by the savors bestowed on it by the several kings, in consideration of the services it had continually afforded, in the shipping of this port, to the nation. The first example of royal favor, being shewn by the last-mentioned king, was in his 11th year, who not only confirmed the customs before granted, but added the further grant of a market to this town and port, (fn. 5) and in his 13th year granted the custom of taking twopence for each cask of wine received into it.

 

After which, the prior and convent of Christ-church, in the 18th year of King Edward I. gave up in exchange for other lands elsewhere, to his queen Eleanor, all their rights, possessions, and privileges here, excepting their houses and keys, and a free passage in the

 

haven, in the small boat, called the vere boat, (fn. 6) and free liberty for themselves and their tenants to buy and sell toll free, which the king confirmed that year; and as a favor to the town, he placed the staple for wool in it for some time.

 

The exception above-mentioned, was afterwards found to be so very prejudicial, as well as inconvenient, that king Edward III. in his 38th year, gave them other lands in Essex, in exchange for all their rights, privileges, and possessions, in this town and port. After which king Richard II. in his first year, removed the staple for wool from Queenborough, where it had been for some time, hither.

 

During the whole of this period from the time of the conquest, this port continued the general rendezvous of the royal sleets, and was as constantly visted by the several monarchs, who frequently embarked and returned again hither from France; the consequence of which was, that the town became so flourishing, that it had increased to between eight and nine hundred houses inhabited, divided into three parishes; and there were of good and able mariners, belonging to the navy of it, above the number of 1500; so that when there was occasion at any time, the mayors of it, on the receipt of the king's letters, furnished, at the town's charges, to the seas, fifteen sail of armed ships of war, which were of such continued annoyance to the French, that they in return made it a constant object of their revenge. Accordingly, in the 16th year of king Henry VI. they landed here and plundered the greatest part of the inhabitants, as they did again in the 35th year of it; but but this not answering the whole of their purpose, Charles VIII. king of France, to destroy it entirely, sent hither four thousand men, who landing in the night, after a long and bloody conflict gained possession of the town, and having wasted it with fire and sword, slew the greatest part of the inhabitants; and to add to these misfortunes it was again ransacked by the earl of Warwick, in the same reign.

 

To preserve the town from such disasters in future, king Edward IV. new walled, ditched, and fortifield it with bulwarks, and gave besides, for the support of them, one hundred pounds yearly out of the customhouse here; which, together with the industry and efforts of the merchants, who frequented this haven, the goodness of which, in any storm or contrary wind, when they were in danger from the breakers, or the Goodwin Sands, afforded them a safe retreat; in a very short time restored it again to a flourishing state, infomuch, that before the end of that reign, the clear yearly receipt of the customs here to that king, amounted to above the sum of 16 or 17,000l. (fn. 7) and the town had ninety five ships belonging to it, and above fifteen hundred sailors.

 

But this sunshine of prosperity lasted no long time afterwards, for in king Henry VII.'s time, the river Stour, or as it was at this place antiently called, the Wantsume, continued to decay so fast, as to leave on each side at low water, a considerable quantity of salts, which induced cardinal archbishop Moreton, who had most part of the adjoining lands belonging to his bishopric, for his own private advantage, to inclose and wall them in, near and about Sarre; which example was followed from time to time, by several owners of the lands adjoining, by which means the water was deprived of its usual course, and the haven felt the loss of it by a hasty decay. Notwithstanding which, so late as the first year of king Richard III. ships failed up this haven as high as Richborough, for that year, as ap pears by the corporation books of Sandwich, the mayor ordered a Spanish ship, lying on the outside of Richborough, to be removed. (fn. 8)

 

"Leland, who wrote in the reign of Henry VIII. gives the following description of Sandwich, as it was in his time. "Sandwich, on the farther side of the ryver of Sture, is neatly welle walled, where the town stonddeth most in jeopardy of enemies. The residew of the town is diched and mudde waulled. There be yn the town iiii principal gates, iii paroche chyrches, of the which sum suppose that St. Maries was sumtyme a nunnery. Ther is a place of White Freres, and an hospistal withowt the town, fyrst ordened for maryners desesid and hurt. There is a place where monkes of Christ-church did resort, when they were lords of the towne. The caryke that was sonke in the haven, in pope Paulus tyme, did much hurt to the haven and gether a great bank. The grounde self from Sandwich to the heaven, and inward to the land, is caullid Sanded bay".

 

The sinking of this great ship of pope Paul IV. in the very mouth of the haven, by which the waters had not their free course as before, from the sand and mud gathering round about it, together with the innings of the lands on each side the stream, had such a fatal effect towards the decay of the haven, that in the time of king Edward VI. it was in a manner destroyed and lost, and the navy and mariners dwindled to almost nothing, and the houses then inhabited in this town did not exceed two hundred, the inhabitants of which were greatly impoverished; the yearly customs of the town, by reason of the insufficiency of the haven, were so desicient, that there was scarcely enough arising from it to satisfy the customer his fee. This occasioned two several commissions to be granted, one in the 2d year of that reign, and another in the 2d year of queen Eli zabeth, to examine the state of the haven, and make a return of it; in consequence of the first of which, a new cut was begun by one John Rogers, which, however, was soon left in an untinished state, though there are evident traces of what was done towards making this canal still remaining, on the grounds between the town and Sandowne castle; and in consequence of the second, other representations and reports were made, one of which was, that the intended cut would be useless, and of no good effect.

 

Whether these different reports where the occasion that no further progress was made towards this work, and the restoration of this haven, or the very great expence it was estimated at, and the great difficulty of raising so large a sum, being 10,000l which the queen at that time could no ways spare, but so it was, that nothing further was done in it.

 

¶The haven being thus abandoned by the queen, and becoming almost useless, excepting to vessels of the small burthen before mentioned, the town itself would before long have become impoverished and fallen wholly to decay, had it not been most singularly preserved, and raised again, in some measure, to great wealth and prosperity, occasioned by the persecution for religion in Brabant and Flanders, which communicated to all the Protestant parts of Europe, the paper, silk, woollen, and other valuable manufactures of Flanders and France, almost peculiar at that time to those countries, and till then, in vain attempted elsewhere; the manufacturers of them came in bodies up to London, and afterwards chose their situations, with great judgment, distributing themselves, with the queen's licence, through England, so as not to interfere too much with one another. The workers in sayes, baize, and flannel in particular, fixed themselves here, at Sandwich, at the mouth of a haven, by which they might have an easy communication with the metropolis, and other parts of this kingdom, and afforded them like wife an easy export to the continent. These manufacturers applied accordingly to the queen, for her protection and licence; for which purpose, in the third year of her reign, she caused letters patent to be passed, directed to the mayor, &c. to give liberty to such of them, as should be approved of by the archbishop, and bishop of London, to inhabit here for the purpose of exercising those manufactures, which had not been used before in England, or for shishing in the seas, not exceeding the number of twenty-five house holders, accounting to every household not above twelve persons, and there to exercise their trade, and have as many servants as were necessary for carrying them on, not exceeding the number above mentioned; these immediately repaired to Sandwich, to the number, men, women, and children, of four hundred and six persons; of which, eight only were masters in the trade. A body of gardeners likewife discovered the nature of the soil about Sandwich to be exceedingly favourable to the growth of all esculent plants, and fixed themselves here, to the great advantage of this town, by the increase of inhabitants, the employment of the poor, and the money which circulated; the landholders like wife had the great advantage of their rents being considerably increased, and the money paid by the town and neighbourhood for vegetables, instead of being sent from hence for the purchase of them, remained within the bounds of it. The vegetables grew here in great perfection, but much of them was conveyed at an easy expence, by water carriage, to London, and from thence dispersed over different parts of the kingdom.

 

These strangers, by their industry and prudent conduct, notwithstanding the obstructions they met with, from the jealousy of the native tradesmen, and the avarice of the corporation, very soon rose to a flourishing condition.

  

There were formerly THREE PAROCHIAL CHURCHES in this town, and a church or chapel likewise, supposed by some to have been parochial, dedicated to St. Jacob, which has been long since demolished; but the three former churches, being those of St. Mary, St. Peter, and St. Clement, Still remain; an account of all which will be given separately.

 

ST. MARY'S CHURCH stands in a low situation in Strand street, on the northern part of the town. The original church, built in the time of the Saxons, is said to have been demolished by the Danes, and to have been afterwards rebuilt by queen Emma, which building was burnt down by the French, and it was not long afterwards again rebuilt; notwithstanding which, it appears to have become dilapidated and in a most ruinous state in the time of king Henry VI. for in the 2d year of that reign, anno 1448, part of the steeple fell, in consequence of which it underwent a thorough repair, and then consisted of two isles and the nave; the latter was terminated by the high chancel, and the south isle by St. Laurence's chancel. It however, fell down again on April 25, 1667, and brought down with it most of the church; the western wall, portions of the south isle and its chancel only remaining; and though the church itself was soon afterwards rebuilt, as at present, yet it does not appear that any steeple was built till the year 1718, when the present low one was raised upon the south porch, and one bell put up in it. Before this, there were five small bells, which about the year 1639, had been formed out of three larger ones; the above five bells were sold, for the faculty had been obtained in 1669, to fell the useless timber and the bells, towards the rebuilding of the church, and they were sold, as it is said, to the parish of Eleham.

 

In an antient bead-roll of this church, there is mention made of John and William Condy, the first beginners of the foundation of the chantry of that name in this church; of Thomas Loueryk and his wife, who founded the chapel of our Lady, at the east head of it; and of the three windows of the north side of the church; of Thomas Elys and Margaret his wife, and Sir Thomas Rolling, vicar of this church, of whose goods was made the west window of it, and who made the vicarage of the parish more than it was before; and besides these, of several other benefactors to the windows and other parts of it. And there were divers other gifts made to this church, for its reparation, and for obits, and other religious services performed in it, as appears by the evidences belonging to it.

 

The inventory of the silver and jewels, belonging to the church before the reformation, sufficiently shew the costliness of the utensils belonging to it, and the riches of it. The silver, according to the inventory made of them, amounting to 724 ounces; and the habits of the ministers to officiate in it, the linen and books, were answerable to the rest belonging to it.

 

The present church of St. Mary consists of a north isle, and the nave, at the end of which is the chancel, which has an ascent of three steps on each side; between which entrances are the mayor's seat and other pews. The altar piece, table, and rails, are of wainscot and very ornamental. The sont is at the west end of the nave, it is a stone bason, having eight faces changed alternately with plain shields and roses, in quaterfoils; on the shaft are the letters cw. II. RS. DE. IC. POD. 1662.

 

In this church are numbers of monuments and inscriptions, all which are printed in Mr. Boys's Collections, P. 319, the whole too numerous to mention here, but among others at the west end of the nave, are memorials of the Smiths and Verriers. In the south space are memorials for the Petleys and for the Whites. In the middle space, on an old stone, are the remains of a cross story, resting on a dog or lion, and the remains of an inscription with this date, I. M. CCC. XXX. In the north isle are three grave-stones, on a rise above the pavement, with inscriptions shewing, that underneath is a vault, in which lie many of the family of Hayward, formerly mayors of this town; arms, Argent, on a pale, sable, three crescents of the field, In the chancel is a large stone, robbed of its brasses, which formerly commerated the deaths of Roger Manwood and his family; the place where it lies was formerly St. Laurence chancel. In the chancel is a monument of stone much defaced; on it are the figures of a manand woman kneeling, in a praying posture, for Abraham Rutton, formerly mayor, and Susan his wife, by whom he had seven sons and six daughters. He died in 1608; and for his descendant the Rev. John Rutton, obt. 1763, rector of this parish. Against the south wall, is a handsome monument of marble, with these arms, Argent, five chevronels, sable, and per pale, azure and gules, a lion rampant, argent; and an inscription for several of the family of Hougham. Against the same wall a tablet, for Mary, wife of Joseph Stewart, esq. obt. 1775; arms, Argent, a lion rampant, gules, over all, a bend raguled, or. Over the south door, a marble monument for Richard Solly, gent. thrice mayor, obt. 1731; and Anna his wife, daughter of John Crickett, gent, by whom he had ten sons and three daughters; arms, Azure, a chevron, party per pale, or, and gules, between three soles, naient, argent. At the west end of the nave is an altar tomb, with an inscription, shewing, that in a vault underneath, lie several of the Cricketts; another altar tomb, with an inscription, for several of the Nowells; arms, Three covered cups. By the gallery stairs, on an altar tomb, an inscription for Tho. Danson, preacher, of this town, who died 1764; on a raised monument of brick, an inscription, for several of the name of Jordan; this stands close before, and hides the altar part of a monument, under an arch in the north wall, to the memory of Sir William Loverick, of Ash, and dame Emma his wife, the daughter of Sir John Septvans, of that parish, who are said to have been the principal repairers, or builders of this church, after it had been burnt by the French, and were buried in king Henry IV.'s reign; on an adjoining tomb an inscription for the Maundys.

 

There are stones, pointing out the entrances into the vaults of Solly and Stewart, and there are inscriptions on a board, commemorating the benefactions of John Dekewer, esq. Solomon Hougham, gent. Sir Henry Furnese, bart. and Mr. Peter Jarvis.

 

Several names appear on the stones, on the outside of the east and north walls of the chancel. Sir Edward Ringely, of Knolton, was buried in Jesus chapel, in this church, on the left side of the altar. In the 35th of king Henry VIII. William, lord Clinton, is said to have been interred under a gilded arch in the south wall of this church, which arch was walled up in king Edward VI.'s reign, but it was visible some time afterwards in the church yard, perhaps it may be the same projectioin that now appears there, on the south side of the chancel. William Condie, who founded the chantry, afterwards called by his name, in this church, was likewife interred, together with his wife, in the south isle of the old church, near the lord Clinton's tomb; but there is nothing now to point out precisely the situation of their remains, nor those of Thomas Manwood, gent. who died in king Henry VIII.'s time and was buried under the belfry. Stephen Perot was buried likewise in this church in 1570.

 

There are several altar tombs in the church-yard, one of which is for the family of Dekewer; arms, Vert, on a cross, engrailed, or, five fleurs de lis, sable; in the first and fourth quarters, a caltrop, argent; in the second and third quarters, a lion rampant, of the last.

 

An anchoress had her cell at the east end of this church in the 20th year of king Henry VIII.

 

At a small distance south-west of St. Mary's church, was a church or chapel, dedicated to St. facob, supposed by many to have been a parochial church; there is nothing lest now to point out the situation of the building, the cemetery remains and is used occasionally as a burial place, for the use of St. Mary's parish. This church-yard seems to have got into lay hands at the suppression, for in 1578, it was enfeoffed by Edward Wood, to certain persons, for the necessary uses of the parish. The trust was renewed in 1604 and 1649. At the south-west corner was an hermitage, the residence of an hermit. The last hermit in it was John Steward, in king Henry VIII.'s reign, who was afterwards vicar of St. Mary's church, whose duty it was to minister to strangers and the poor, to bury the dead, and pray for the people in the chapel, which was destroyed, as well as others of the like sort, in the beginning of king Edward VI.'s reign. Great part of this building was standing at the latter end of Edward VI.'s reign; there was in it a brotherhood of St. Catherine, consisting of both brothers and sisters, which was benesitted by the will of John Wynchelse, of Sandwich. It appears that this church or chapel was under the management of the officers of St. Mary's parish, and that the building had been repaired in the years 1445 and 1478.

 

The church of St. Mary is a vicarage, the patronage of which has ever been part of the possessions of the archdeaconry of Canterbury, to whom the appropriation of the church likewise formerly belonged; it did so in the 8th year of king Richard II. anno 1384, when on the taxation of the spiritualities and temporalities ecclesiastic, in this diocese, the church of St. Mary's appropriated to the archdeacon, was valued at eight pounds, and the vicarage was valued at only four pounds, and on account of the smallness of it, was not taxed to the tenth. (fn. 47) The vicarage is valued in the king's books, in king Henry VIII.'s reign, at 8l. 1s. since which time, and it should seem during the reign of queen Elizabeth, the great tithes, or appropriate parsonage of this church, were given up by the archdeacon to the vicarage, so that the vicar has been since intitled to both great and small tithes within the bounds of this parish, which induced several of the incumbents to stile themselves rectors, but certainly wrong, for it is still a vicarage, the vicars of which are entitled to the receipt and possession of the great tithes, by grant from the appropriator.

 

¶In 1588 here were 385 communicants, and it was valued at forty pounds per annum. In 1640 here were the same number of communicants, and it was valued at sixty-eight pounds. It is now a discharged living, of the clear yearly value of forty pounds. It has been augmented by the governors of queen Anne's bounty, the greater part of the money from which has been laid out in the purchase of marsh land in Wood. nesborough. At present the vicar receives the tithes of about eighty-four acres of land. There were great disputes formerly, between the appropriators of Eastry and the vicars of St. Mary's, respecting the tithes of a small district of land called Puttock's downe; but the decisions were constantly against the vicars of St. Mary's, and the tithes now belong to Word, a chapel of ease to Eastry.

 

Besides the ordinary small tithes, the vicar of this parish, as well as the incumbents of the two other parishes in Sandwich, collect from every house a certain sum, under the denomination of dues; this payment is said to be a composition for all the house, gardens, barns, and stables, according to custom, since the 12th year of queen Elizabeth; and the vicar of St. Mary's receives besides, 6s. 8d. annually, under the denomination of tithe of the old Crane.

 

In 1776 there were one hundred and sixty-eight houses in this parish, and six hundred and fourteen inhabitants; and the rents of it were in 1787, according to the pound rate, at rack rents towards the poor, upwards of 3,500l. per annum.

 

www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-kent/vol10/pp152-216#h2-...

For the past year, I have posted shots of Kent churches on Twitter than on a churchcrawling group on FB, and in the course of that year, I have come to realise that some churches I recorded better than others, and some of the early one, were mostly dreadful wide angle shots.

 

So, one by one, I plan to go back and reshoot them.

 

St Mary was one. It was closed on All Hallow's Eve last year, but on Saturday last month, we dropped off some prints to be framed in the town, and a short walk along Strand Street is St Mary.

 

It was open for an art shot, but that was OK, as I wanted to snap the memorials and details.

 

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An extraordinary barn of a church - one of two in the town cared for by The Churches Conservation Trust. That it was a large Norman church is without question - see the responds at the west end of the nave. Like the other two churches in Sandwich, St Mary's probably also had a central tower, the collapse of which (like St Peter's) caused havoc to the building. Rebuilding here took a rather rare form with the building losing its south arcade; having a new north arcade built of wood; and a new roof to cover the whole! By the 20th century the church was surplus to requirements and was threatened with demolition. However local supporters, encouraged by the doyen of ecclesiologists, Ivor Bulmer-Thomas, saved it. Now used for concerts it is open to visitors and has much of interest. In the north aisle are 18th century pews saved from Gopsall Hall in Leicestershire. The chancel contains a rare banner stave locker for the poles used to carry banners in medieval street processions. Nearby is an example of two pieces of stone being joined together with a dowel made from animal bone. The glass in the east window is scratched with the names of the glaziers who have repaired it on numerous occasions!

 

www.kentchurches.info/church.asp?p=Sandwich+2

 

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THE town of Sandwich is situated on the north-east confines of this county, about two miles from the sea, and adjoining to the harbour of its own name, through which the river Stour flows northward into the sea at Pepperness. It is one of the principal cinque ports, the liberty of which extends over it, and it is within the jurisdiction of the justices of its own corporation.

 

Sandwich had in antient time several members appertaining to it, (fn. 1) called the antient members of the port of Sandwich; these were Fordwich, Reculver, Sarre, Stonar, and Deal; but in the later charters, the members mentioned are Fordwich incorporated, and the non-corporated members of Deal, Walmer, Ramsgate, Stonar, Sarre, all in this county, and Brightlingsea, in Sussex; but of late years, Deal, Walmer, and Stonar, have been taken from it; Deal, by having been in 1699 incorporated with the charter of a separate jurisdiction, in the bounds of which Walmer is included; and Stonar having been, by a late decision of the court of king's bench in 1773, adjudged to be within the jurisdiction of the county at large.

 

The first origin of this port was owing to the decay of that of Richborough, as will be further noticed hereafter. It was at first called Lundenwic, from its being the entrance to the port of London, for so it was, on the sea coast, and it retained this name until the supplanting of the Saxons by the Danes, when it acquired from its sandy situation a new name, being from thenceforward called Sandwic, in old Latin, Sabulovicum, that is, the sandy town, and in process of time, by the change of language, Sandwich.

 

Where this town now stands, is supposed, in the time of the Romans, and before the decay of the haven, or Portus Rutupinus, to have been covered with that water, which formed the bay of it, which was so large that it is said to have extended far beyond this place, on the one side almost to Ramsgate cliffs, and on the other near five miles in width, over the whole of that flat of land, on which Stonar and Sandwich too, were afterwards built, and extending from thence up to the æstuary, which then flowed up between the Isle of Thanet and the main land of this county.

 

During the time of the Saxons, the haven and port of Richborough, the most frequented of any in this part of Britain, began to decay, and swarve up, the sea by degrees entirely deserting it at this place, but still leaving sufficient to form a large and commodious one at Sandwich, which in process of time, became in like manner, the usual resort for shipping, and arose a Flourishing harbour in its stead; from which time the Saxon fleets, as well as those of the Danes, are said by the historians of those times, to sail for the port of Sandwich; and there to lie at different times, and no further mention is made of that of Richborough, which being thus destroyed, Sandwich became the port of general resort; which, as well as the building of this town, seems to have taken place, however, some while after the establishment of the Saxons in Britain, and the first time that is found of the name of Sandwich being mentioned and occurring as a port, is in the life of St. Wilfred, archbishop of York, written by Eddius Stephanus; in which it is said, he and his company, prosper in portum Sandwich, atque suaviter pervenerunt, happily and pleasantly arrived in the harbour of Sandwich, which happened about the year 665, or 666, some what more than 200 years after the arrival of the Saxons in Britain. During the time of the Danes insesting this kingdom, several of their principal transactions happened at this place, (fn. 2) and the port of it became so much frequented, that the author of queen Emma's life stiles it the most noted of all the English ports; Sandwich qui est omnium Anglorum portuum famosissimus.

 

FROM THE TIME of the origin of the town of Sandwich, the property of it was vested in the several kings who reigned over this country, and continued so till king Ethelred, in the year 979, gave it, as the lands of his inheritance, to Christ-church, in Canterbury, free from all secular service and fiscal tribute, except the repelling invasions, and the repairing of bridges and castles. (fn. 3) After which king Canute, having obtained the kingdom, finished the building of this town, and having all parts and places in the realm at his disposal, as coming to the possession of it by conquest, by his charter in the year 1023, gave, or rather restored the port of Sandwich, with the profits of the water of it, on both sides of the stream, for the support of that church, and the sustenance of the monks there.

 

Soon after this, the town of Sandwich increased greatly in size and inhabitants, and on account of the commodity and use of its haven, and the service done by the shipping belonging to it, was of such estimation, that it was made one of the principal cinque ports; and in king Edward the Confessor's days it contained three hundred and seven houses, and was an hundred within itself; and it continued increasing, as appears by the description of it, in the survey of Domesday, taken in the 15th year of the Conqueror's reign, anno 1080, in which it is thus entered, under the title of the lands of the archbishop:

 

Sandwice lies in its own proper hundred. This borough the archbishop holds, and it is of the clothing of the monks, and yields the like service to the king as Dover; and this the men of that borough testify, that before king Edward gave the same to the Holy Trinity, it paid to the king fisteen pounds. At the time of King Edward's death it was not put to ferme. When the archbishop received it, it paid forty pounds of ferme, and forty thousand herrings to the food of the monks. In the year in which this description was made, Sanuuic paid fifty pounds of ferme, & Herrings as above. In the time of king Edward the Confessor there were there three hundred and seven mansions tenanted, now there are seventy six more, that is together three hundred and eighty three.

 

And under the title of the bishop of Baieux's lands, as follows, under the description of the manor of Gollesberge:

 

In Estrei hundred, in Sandunic, the archbishop has thirty two houses, with plats of land belonging to this manor,(viz. Gollesberge) and they pay forty-two shil lings and eight pence, and Adeluuold has one yoke, which is worth ten shillings.

 

These houses, with all the liberties which the bishop of Baieux had in Sandwich, had been given by him to Christ-church, in Canterbury, and confirmed to it in the year 1075, by his brother the Conqueror. (fn. 4)

 

Afterwards king Henry II. granted to the monks the full enjoyment of all those liberties and customs in Sandwich, which they had in the time of king Henry his grandfather, that is, the port and toll, and all maritime customs in this port, on both sides of the water, that is, from Eadburgate unto Merksflete, and the small boat to ferry across it, and that no one should have any right there except them and their servants.

 

The town, by these continued privileges, and the advantages it derived from the great resort to the port, increased much in wealth and number of inhabitants; and notwithstanding, in the year 1217, anno 2 king Henry III. great part of the town was burnt by the French, yet the damage seems soon to have been recompenced by the savors bestowed on it by the several kings, in consideration of the services it had continually afforded, in the shipping of this port, to the nation. The first example of royal favor, being shewn by the last-mentioned king, was in his 11th year, who not only confirmed the customs before granted, but added the further grant of a market to this town and port, (fn. 5) and in his 13th year granted the custom of taking twopence for each cask of wine received into it.

 

After which, the prior and convent of Christ-church, in the 18th year of King Edward I. gave up in exchange for other lands elsewhere, to his queen Eleanor, all their rights, possessions, and privileges here, excepting their houses and keys, and a free passage in the

 

haven, in the small boat, called the vere boat, (fn. 6) and free liberty for themselves and their tenants to buy and sell toll free, which the king confirmed that year; and as a favor to the town, he placed the staple for wool in it for some time.

 

The exception above-mentioned, was afterwards found to be so very prejudicial, as well as inconvenient, that king Edward III. in his 38th year, gave them other lands in Essex, in exchange for all their rights, privileges, and possessions, in this town and port. After which king Richard II. in his first year, removed the staple for wool from Queenborough, where it had been for some time, hither.

 

During the whole of this period from the time of the conquest, this port continued the general rendezvous of the royal sleets, and was as constantly visted by the several monarchs, who frequently embarked and returned again hither from France; the consequence of which was, that the town became so flourishing, that it had increased to between eight and nine hundred houses inhabited, divided into three parishes; and there were of good and able mariners, belonging to the navy of it, above the number of 1500; so that when there was occasion at any time, the mayors of it, on the receipt of the king's letters, furnished, at the town's charges, to the seas, fifteen sail of armed ships of war, which were of such continued annoyance to the French, that they in return made it a constant object of their revenge. Accordingly, in the 16th year of king Henry VI. they landed here and plundered the greatest part of the inhabitants, as they did again in the 35th year of it; but but this not answering the whole of their purpose, Charles VIII. king of France, to destroy it entirely, sent hither four thousand men, who landing in the night, after a long and bloody conflict gained possession of the town, and having wasted it with fire and sword, slew the greatest part of the inhabitants; and to add to these misfortunes it was again ransacked by the earl of Warwick, in the same reign.

 

To preserve the town from such disasters in future, king Edward IV. new walled, ditched, and fortifield it with bulwarks, and gave besides, for the support of them, one hundred pounds yearly out of the customhouse here; which, together with the industry and efforts of the merchants, who frequented this haven, the goodness of which, in any storm or contrary wind, when they were in danger from the breakers, or the Goodwin Sands, afforded them a safe retreat; in a very short time restored it again to a flourishing state, infomuch, that before the end of that reign, the clear yearly receipt of the customs here to that king, amounted to above the sum of 16 or 17,000l. (fn. 7) and the town had ninety five ships belonging to it, and above fifteen hundred sailors.

 

But this sunshine of prosperity lasted no long time afterwards, for in king Henry VII.'s time, the river Stour, or as it was at this place antiently called, the Wantsume, continued to decay so fast, as to leave on each side at low water, a considerable quantity of salts, which induced cardinal archbishop Moreton, who had most part of the adjoining lands belonging to his bishopric, for his own private advantage, to inclose and wall them in, near and about Sarre; which example was followed from time to time, by several owners of the lands adjoining, by which means the water was deprived of its usual course, and the haven felt the loss of it by a hasty decay. Notwithstanding which, so late as the first year of king Richard III. ships failed up this haven as high as Richborough, for that year, as ap pears by the corporation books of Sandwich, the mayor ordered a Spanish ship, lying on the outside of Richborough, to be removed. (fn. 8)

 

"Leland, who wrote in the reign of Henry VIII. gives the following description of Sandwich, as it was in his time. "Sandwich, on the farther side of the ryver of Sture, is neatly welle walled, where the town stonddeth most in jeopardy of enemies. The residew of the town is diched and mudde waulled. There be yn the town iiii principal gates, iii paroche chyrches, of the which sum suppose that St. Maries was sumtyme a nunnery. Ther is a place of White Freres, and an hospistal withowt the town, fyrst ordened for maryners desesid and hurt. There is a place where monkes of Christ-church did resort, when they were lords of the towne. The caryke that was sonke in the haven, in pope Paulus tyme, did much hurt to the haven and gether a great bank. The grounde self from Sandwich to the heaven, and inward to the land, is caullid Sanded bay".

 

The sinking of this great ship of pope Paul IV. in the very mouth of the haven, by which the waters had not their free course as before, from the sand and mud gathering round about it, together with the innings of the lands on each side the stream, had such a fatal effect towards the decay of the haven, that in the time of king Edward VI. it was in a manner destroyed and lost, and the navy and mariners dwindled to almost nothing, and the houses then inhabited in this town did not exceed two hundred, the inhabitants of which were greatly impoverished; the yearly customs of the town, by reason of the insufficiency of the haven, were so desicient, that there was scarcely enough arising from it to satisfy the customer his fee. This occasioned two several commissions to be granted, one in the 2d year of that reign, and another in the 2d year of queen Eli zabeth, to examine the state of the haven, and make a return of it; in consequence of the first of which, a new cut was begun by one John Rogers, which, however, was soon left in an untinished state, though there are evident traces of what was done towards making this canal still remaining, on the grounds between the town and Sandowne castle; and in consequence of the second, other representations and reports were made, one of which was, that the intended cut would be useless, and of no good effect.

 

Whether these different reports where the occasion that no further progress was made towards this work, and the restoration of this haven, or the very great expence it was estimated at, and the great difficulty of raising so large a sum, being 10,000l which the queen at that time could no ways spare, but so it was, that nothing further was done in it.

 

¶The haven being thus abandoned by the queen, and becoming almost useless, excepting to vessels of the small burthen before mentioned, the town itself would before long have become impoverished and fallen wholly to decay, had it not been most singularly preserved, and raised again, in some measure, to great wealth and prosperity, occasioned by the persecution for religion in Brabant and Flanders, which communicated to all the Protestant parts of Europe, the paper, silk, woollen, and other valuable manufactures of Flanders and France, almost peculiar at that time to those countries, and till then, in vain attempted elsewhere; the manufacturers of them came in bodies up to London, and afterwards chose their situations, with great judgment, distributing themselves, with the queen's licence, through England, so as not to interfere too much with one another. The workers in sayes, baize, and flannel in particular, fixed themselves here, at Sandwich, at the mouth of a haven, by which they might have an easy communication with the metropolis, and other parts of this kingdom, and afforded them like wife an easy export to the continent. These manufacturers applied accordingly to the queen, for her protection and licence; for which purpose, in the third year of her reign, she caused letters patent to be passed, directed to the mayor, &c. to give liberty to such of them, as should be approved of by the archbishop, and bishop of London, to inhabit here for the purpose of exercising those manufactures, which had not been used before in England, or for shishing in the seas, not exceeding the number of twenty-five house holders, accounting to every household not above twelve persons, and there to exercise their trade, and have as many servants as were necessary for carrying them on, not exceeding the number above mentioned; these immediately repaired to Sandwich, to the number, men, women, and children, of four hundred and six persons; of which, eight only were masters in the trade. A body of gardeners likewife discovered the nature of the soil about Sandwich to be exceedingly favourable to the growth of all esculent plants, and fixed themselves here, to the great advantage of this town, by the increase of inhabitants, the employment of the poor, and the money which circulated; the landholders like wife had the great advantage of their rents being considerably increased, and the money paid by the town and neighbourhood for vegetables, instead of being sent from hence for the purchase of them, remained within the bounds of it. The vegetables grew here in great perfection, but much of them was conveyed at an easy expence, by water carriage, to London, and from thence dispersed over different parts of the kingdom.

 

These strangers, by their industry and prudent conduct, notwithstanding the obstructions they met with, from the jealousy of the native tradesmen, and the avarice of the corporation, very soon rose to a flourishing condition.

  

There were formerly THREE PAROCHIAL CHURCHES in this town, and a church or chapel likewise, supposed by some to have been parochial, dedicated to St. Jacob, which has been long since demolished; but the three former churches, being those of St. Mary, St. Peter, and St. Clement, Still remain; an account of all which will be given separately.

 

ST. MARY'S CHURCH stands in a low situation in Strand street, on the northern part of the town. The original church, built in the time of the Saxons, is said to have been demolished by the Danes, and to have been afterwards rebuilt by queen Emma, which building was burnt down by the French, and it was not long afterwards again rebuilt; notwithstanding which, it appears to have become dilapidated and in a most ruinous state in the time of king Henry VI. for in the 2d year of that reign, anno 1448, part of the steeple fell, in consequence of which it underwent a thorough repair, and then consisted of two isles and the nave; the latter was terminated by the high chancel, and the south isle by St. Laurence's chancel. It however, fell down again on April 25, 1667, and brought down with it most of the church; the western wall, portions of the south isle and its chancel only remaining; and though the church itself was soon afterwards rebuilt, as at present, yet it does not appear that any steeple was built till the year 1718, when the present low one was raised upon the south porch, and one bell put up in it. Before this, there were five small bells, which about the year 1639, had been formed out of three larger ones; the above five bells were sold, for the faculty had been obtained in 1669, to fell the useless timber and the bells, towards the rebuilding of the church, and they were sold, as it is said, to the parish of Eleham.

 

In an antient bead-roll of this church, there is mention made of John and William Condy, the first beginners of the foundation of the chantry of that name in this church; of Thomas Loueryk and his wife, who founded the chapel of our Lady, at the east head of it; and of the three windows of the north side of the church; of Thomas Elys and Margaret his wife, and Sir Thomas Rolling, vicar of this church, of whose goods was made the west window of it, and who made the vicarage of the parish more than it was before; and besides these, of several other benefactors to the windows and other parts of it. And there were divers other gifts made to this church, for its reparation, and for obits, and other religious services performed in it, as appears by the evidences belonging to it.

 

The inventory of the silver and jewels, belonging to the church before the reformation, sufficiently shew the costliness of the utensils belonging to it, and the riches of it. The silver, according to the inventory made of them, amounting to 724 ounces; and the habits of the ministers to officiate in it, the linen and books, were answerable to the rest belonging to it.

 

The present church of St. Mary consists of a north isle, and the nave, at the end of which is the chancel, which has an ascent of three steps on each side; between which entrances are the mayor's seat and other pews. The altar piece, table, and rails, are of wainscot and very ornamental. The sont is at the west end of the nave, it is a stone bason, having eight faces changed alternately with plain shields and roses, in quaterfoils; on the shaft are the letters cw. II. RS. DE. IC. POD. 1662.

 

In this church are numbers of monuments and inscriptions, all which are printed in Mr. Boys's Collections, P. 319, the whole too numerous to mention here, but among others at the west end of the nave, are memorials of the Smiths and Verriers. In the south space are memorials for the Petleys and for the Whites. In the middle space, on an old stone, are the remains of a cross story, resting on a dog or lion, and the remains of an inscription with this date, I. M. CCC. XXX. In the north isle are three grave-stones, on a rise above the pavement, with inscriptions shewing, that underneath is a vault, in which lie many of the family of Hayward, formerly mayors of this town; arms, Argent, on a pale, sable, three crescents of the field, In the chancel is a large stone, robbed of its brasses, which formerly commerated the deaths of Roger Manwood and his family; the place where it lies was formerly St. Laurence chancel. In the chancel is a monument of stone much defaced; on it are the figures of a manand woman kneeling, in a praying posture, for Abraham Rutton, formerly mayor, and Susan his wife, by whom he had seven sons and six daughters. He died in 1608; and for his descendant the Rev. John Rutton, obt. 1763, rector of this parish. Against the south wall, is a handsome monument of marble, with these arms, Argent, five chevronels, sable, and per pale, azure and gules, a lion rampant, argent; and an inscription for several of the family of Hougham. Against the same wall a tablet, for Mary, wife of Joseph Stewart, esq. obt. 1775; arms, Argent, a lion rampant, gules, over all, a bend raguled, or. Over the south door, a marble monument for Richard Solly, gent. thrice mayor, obt. 1731; and Anna his wife, daughter of John Crickett, gent, by whom he had ten sons and three daughters; arms, Azure, a chevron, party per pale, or, and gules, between three soles, naient, argent. At the west end of the nave is an altar tomb, with an inscription, shewing, that in a vault underneath, lie several of the Cricketts; another altar tomb, with an inscription, for several of the Nowells; arms, Three covered cups. By the gallery stairs, on an altar tomb, an inscription for Tho. Danson, preacher, of this town, who died 1764; on a raised monument of brick, an inscription, for several of the name of Jordan; this stands close before, and hides the altar part of a monument, under an arch in the north wall, to the memory of Sir William Loverick, of Ash, and dame Emma his wife, the daughter of Sir John Septvans, of that parish, who are said to have been the principal repairers, or builders of this church, after it had been burnt by the French, and were buried in king Henry IV.'s reign; on an adjoining tomb an inscription for the Maundys.

 

There are stones, pointing out the entrances into the vaults of Solly and Stewart, and there are inscriptions on a board, commemorating the benefactions of John Dekewer, esq. Solomon Hougham, gent. Sir Henry Furnese, bart. and Mr. Peter Jarvis.

 

Several names appear on the stones, on the outside of the east and north walls of the chancel. Sir Edward Ringely, of Knolton, was buried in Jesus chapel, in this church, on the left side of the altar. In the 35th of king Henry VIII. William, lord Clinton, is said to have been interred under a gilded arch in the south wall of this church, which arch was walled up in king Edward VI.'s reign, but it was visible some time afterwards in the church yard, perhaps it may be the same projectioin that now appears there, on the south side of the chancel. William Condie, who founded the chantry, afterwards called by his name, in this church, was likewife interred, together with his wife, in the south isle of the old church, near the lord Clinton's tomb; but there is nothing now to point out precisely the situation of their remains, nor those of Thomas Manwood, gent. who died in king Henry VIII.'s time and was buried under the belfry. Stephen Perot was buried likewise in this church in 1570.

 

There are several altar tombs in the church-yard, one of which is for the family of Dekewer; arms, Vert, on a cross, engrailed, or, five fleurs de lis, sable; in the first and fourth quarters, a caltrop, argent; in the second and third quarters, a lion rampant, of the last.

 

An anchoress had her cell at the east end of this church in the 20th year of king Henry VIII.

 

At a small distance south-west of St. Mary's church, was a church or chapel, dedicated to St. facob, supposed by many to have been a parochial church; there is nothing lest now to point out the situation of the building, the cemetery remains and is used occasionally as a burial place, for the use of St. Mary's parish. This church-yard seems to have got into lay hands at the suppression, for in 1578, it was enfeoffed by Edward Wood, to certain persons, for the necessary uses of the parish. The trust was renewed in 1604 and 1649. At the south-west corner was an hermitage, the residence of an hermit. The last hermit in it was John Steward, in king Henry VIII.'s reign, who was afterwards vicar of St. Mary's church, whose duty it was to minister to strangers and the poor, to bury the dead, and pray for the people in the chapel, which was destroyed, as well as others of the like sort, in the beginning of king Edward VI.'s reign. Great part of this building was standing at the latter end of Edward VI.'s reign; there was in it a brotherhood of St. Catherine, consisting of both brothers and sisters, which was benesitted by the will of John Wynchelse, of Sandwich. It appears that this church or chapel was under the management of the officers of St. Mary's parish, and that the building had been repaired in the years 1445 and 1478.

 

The church of St. Mary is a vicarage, the patronage of which has ever been part of the possessions of the archdeaconry of Canterbury, to whom the appropriation of the church likewise formerly belonged; it did so in the 8th year of king Richard II. anno 1384, when on the taxation of the spiritualities and temporalities ecclesiastic, in this diocese, the church of St. Mary's appropriated to the archdeacon, was valued at eight pounds, and the vicarage was valued at only four pounds, and on account of the smallness of it, was not taxed to the tenth. (fn. 47) The vicarage is valued in the king's books, in king Henry VIII.'s reign, at 8l. 1s. since which time, and it should seem during the reign of queen Elizabeth, the great tithes, or appropriate parsonage of this church, were given up by the archdeacon to the vicarage, so that the vicar has been since intitled to both great and small tithes within the bounds of this parish, which induced several of the incumbents to stile themselves rectors, but certainly wrong, for it is still a vicarage, the vicars of which are entitled to the receipt and possession of the great tithes, by grant from the appropriator.

 

¶In 1588 here were 385 communicants, and it was valued at forty pounds per annum. In 1640 here were the same number of communicants, and it was valued at sixty-eight pounds. It is now a discharged living, of the clear yearly value of forty pounds. It has been augmented by the governors of queen Anne's bounty, the greater part of the money from which has been laid out in the purchase of marsh land in Wood. nesborough. At present the vicar receives the tithes of about eighty-four acres of land. There were great disputes formerly, between the appropriators of Eastry and the vicars of St. Mary's, respecting the tithes of a small district of land called Puttock's downe; but the decisions were constantly against the vicars of St. Mary's, and the tithes now belong to Word, a chapel of ease to Eastry.

 

Besides the ordinary small tithes, the vicar of this parish, as well as the incumbents of the two other parishes in Sandwich, collect from every house a certain sum, under the denomination of dues; this payment is said to be a composition for all the house, gardens, barns, and stables, according to custom, since the 12th year of queen Elizabeth; and the vicar of St. Mary's receives besides, 6s. 8d. annually, under the denomination of tithe of the old Crane.

 

In 1776 there were one hundred and sixty-eight houses in this parish, and six hundred and fourteen inhabitants; and the rents of it were in 1787, according to the pound rate, at rack rents towards the poor, upwards of 3,500l. per annum.

 

www.british-history.ac.uk/survey-kent/vol10/pp152-216#h2-...

ATHENS ARCHEOLOGIA e RESTAURO ARCHITETTURA. Acropolis Reopens, Along With 200 Other Greek Archaeological Sites. The Greek Reporter (18/05/2020). While the Colosseum of Rome is Still Closed, Updated For Chinese Tourists. Parco Archeologico del Colosseo (05/2020). S.v., ATHENS - Athens hotel ordered to demolish top floors blocking Acropolis view. Campaigners ‘overjoyed’ at landmark ruling but say review of planning laws still needed. THE GUARDIAN U.K., (11/05/2020).

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911624892

 

1). ATHENS - Acropolis Reopens, Along With 200 Other Greek Archaeological Sites. The Greek Reporter (18/05/2020).

 

A lone tourist was among the first to enter the archaeological site on the Acropolis on Monday, as authorities opened up more than 200 archaeological sites in Greece which had remained closed for almost two months due to the coronavirus pandemic.

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49910810968

 

Greek President Katerina Sakellaropoulou, accompanied by Culture Minister Lina Mendoni, climbed up the hill several hours later. Her presence sent a powerful message that the country’s tourism sector is gradually returning to normalcy.

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911624937

 

Final preparations for the reopening were completed early on Monday. As required, the visitors were keeping appropriate social distance from one another.

 

Archaeological sites are the first category of cultural sites in Greece to return to normal operations, followed by open-air summer cinemas on June 1, museums on June 15 and art events on July 15, as Culture Minister Lina Mendoni has announced.

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49910811008

 

They will operate from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and follow all the necessary safety measures, according to the instructions of the National Public Health Organization (EODY).

 

These include keeping the distance of 1.5 meters between visitors, ensuring the maximum number of visitors per each archeological site, marking safe routes, separating entries and exits while putting in place plexiglas divider panels where needed.

 

There will also be special rules for all restroom facilities at these sites. The use of a protective mask is also recommended as well as alcohol-based antiseptic gels for disinfecting the hands.

 

Fonte / source:

--- The Greek Reporter (18/05/2020).

greece.greekreporter.com/2020/05/18/acropolis-reopens-alo...

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911328151

 

1.1). Athens Acropolis Reopens After Pandemic. The Greek Reporter / You-Tube (18/05/2020).

 

Greece - The Acropolis in Athens reopened today after a long lockdown and the few tourists who visited the Parthenon said they felt so lucky to be able to enjoy the monument all to themselves without its usual crowds.

 

Fonte / source:

--- The Greek Reporter / You-Tube (18/05/2020).

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YMFPmebyM8&feature=emb_title

 

2). ATHENS - Athens hotel ordered to demolish top floors blocking Acropolis view. Campaigners ‘overjoyed’ at landmark ruling but say review of planning laws still needed. THE GUARDIAN U.K., (11/05/2020) & (08/03/2019).

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911624902

 

2.1). ATHENS - Athens hotel ordered to demolish top floors blocking Acropolis view. Campaigners ‘overjoyed’ at landmark ruling but say review of planning laws still needed. THE GUARDIAN U.K., (11/05/2020).

 

A battle over the right to enjoy uninterrupted views of the Acropolis has resulted in a five-star hotel being ordered to demolish its top two floors, in a landmark ruling hailed by residents of Athens.

 

Owned by Coco-Mat, the Greece-based mattress maker, the hotel — whose “breathtaking terrace” had been its selling point — opened its doors barely a year ago. Citizens enraged about the ten-storey establishment blocking their own views of the citadel took the case to the highest court in the land.

 

“It was a very brave decision,” said Athens mayor Kostas Bakoyannis of the ruling by Greece’s central archaeological council (KAS), the country’s top advisory body on the preservation of ancient antiquities. “The Acropolis is our heart and our soul, an essential part of our cultural heritage. It’s very important that everyone can enjoy it.”

 

Campaigners are on a roll. The decision follows more than a year of protests against “mammoth” high rises being erected in neighbourhoods at the sharp end of tourism beneath the fifth century BC site.

 

In April residents in Makriyianni, the district due south of the Acropolis, stepped up the fight launching an online petition, with members of the Avaaz activist network demanding the centre-right Greek government safeguard the declared archaeological zone. Within days 23,000 people had signed the appeal.

 

“We know of permits being considered for at least seven huge hotels,” said Irini Frezadou, the Swiss-trained architect spearheading the grassroots drive. “We are overjoyed that under pressure the immovable Greek state has finally acted but it’s urgent we have new building and planning laws if the urban and cultural environment of the Acropolis is to be protected.”

 

Spurred by the protests Greece’s archaeological council unexpectedly convened. After six hours of debate conducted via teleconference, the expert committee came to the unanimous conclusion that the multimillion-euro edifice would have to be lowered, in the name of protecting the symbol of western democracy.

 

“When the Acropolis is harmed, in essence our civilisation is harmed too,” said Lina Mendoni, the Greek culture minister. “The Acropolis is a symbol. It is not simply a monument.” Compensation might, she suggested, be in the offing, but KAS had ruled, irrevocably, that the gargantuan building could be no more than 24 metres in height and would have to be partially torn down. At 31.5 metres, the hotel is by far the biggest construction in Makriyianni, outstripping the new Acropolis Museum in size.

 

Last week Greece’s highest court, the Council of State, also weighed in, adjudicating that in future, structures in the area must be 21 metres or less. The judgment came after the court revoked building permission for an even larger hotel due to go up in Makriyianni, with three underground parking lots and a pool garden on top.

 

“Both decisions are a huge victory, testimony to the strength of civil society and what people can do when they unite,” said Andreas Papapetropoulos, the lawyer representing the campaigners. “We are lucky that the tribunal convened under Katerina Sakellaropoulou,” he added, referring to the environmentally sensitive high court justice who has since become Greece’s first female head of state.

 

Construction of multistorey hotels at the base of the site will, critics argue, create the effect of “a wall of high rises” encircling the Acropolis.

 

“Makriyianni is a residential neighbourhood. It was never meant for buildings of such dimensions,” said Frezadou. “The mass tourism we have witnessed may have disappeared with coronavirus, but it will be back. And if it goes unchecked it will destroy the very monument visitors have come for, the Acropolis itself.”

 

But Greece’s culture minister also acknowledged the ruling had been a “very difficult decision”, saying the hotel’s proprietors “very likely” had justice on their side – even if KAS had not formally endorsed construction after the discovery of antiquities on the site.

 

In 2012, in the midst of Greece’s economic crisis, a new construction code was passed permitting bigger and taller buildings if they met “green” standards. Investors seized the opportunity, initiating a building spree in a capital that would subsequently attract record tourist arrivals.

 

“A lot of questions will be asked,” said Giannis Mihail, vice president of the conservation group Elliniki Etairia. An urban planner, Mihail drafted the land use laws credited with protecting Plaka, the ancient district of narrow lanes and neoclassical houses north of the Acropolis. “From the Acropolis hill Plaka looks much the same as it did in the time of Pericles. That cannot be said of Makriyianni, on the south side of the monument, because land use laws were never extended to the entire urban area surrounding the site.”

 

Bakoyannis, like the campaigners, believes no view should be the preserve of a privileged few. Athens, he says, stands out from other cities precisely because the Acropolis – undergoing a mini facelift ahead of reopening on 18 May – can be seen far and wide.

 

“In London there’s Big Ben but you can only see it from certain, richer areas. The same goes for Paris and the Eiffel Tower. But the Acropolis has a unifying character. You can see it from all around Athens, whether you live in a poor neighbourhood or a rich neighbourhood,” he told the Guardian.

 

But the mayor also cautioned against heaping blame on businessmen. Greece’s fragile economy is set to contract by as much as 10% as a result of the pandemic, with investment crucial to any recovery. He added: “It’s easy to say this bad hotel owner or that bad investor but we also need to be very clear about the rules we set, respect the decisions of our high court and create a predictable and safe business environment.”

 

How or when the owners of the hotel will be called to demolish the upper floors has yet to be revealed. So far they have not reacted publicly to the KAS decision, and when asked to comment, declined.

 

Locals have scrambled to find the money to cover legal costs. Many grumble they are doing what the state should have done long ago. But Frezadou and her fellow activists see it as a duty to keep on going: international investors are lining up, fuelling fears of runaway greed transforming the area forever.

 

“Our battle is not yet over,” she said. “This campaign is not against one, but every, ten-storey monster in the shadow of this glorious site.”

 

Fonte / source:

--- THE GUARDIAN U.K., (11/05/2020).

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/11/athens-hotel-ordere...

 

2.2). ATHENS - 'Not everything's for sale': Greeks mobilise as new hotels obscure Acropolis views -

Athens’ tourism boom capitalises on building regulations relaxed in the economic crisis. THE GUARDIAN U.K., (08/03/2019).

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49910810953

 

ATHENS - The 10-storey hotel at 5 Falirou street in Athens was always going to stand out. Built to impress, its handsomely modernist wood-panelled facade added a contemporary touch to the streetscape of the otherwise lacklustre popular Makriyanni area beneath the Acropolis.

 

But as local residents watched it go up over the winter, they became ever more concerned. By February, when it had reached 31.5 metres, the hotel was the tallest building in the neighbourhood and had started to impede what had once been uninterrupted views of the Parthenon and the 5000BC monument’s fortified walls.

 

“Suddenly, it was taller than the new Acropolis museum itself,” said Irini Frezadou, pointing to the building from her rooftop down the road. “This is meant to be an area of archaeological protection. Our zoning laws are partly to blame but a construction of such gigantic dimensions was never approved by the central archaeological council.”

 

Battle lines are being drawn in the skies above Athens’ historic city centre from the rooftops of locals galvanised into action by the prospect of multi-storey buildings being constructed within metres of the Periclean masterpiece, one of the world’s premier heritage sites.

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911624912

 

With word spreading of a “wall of high-rise hotels” being planned around the Acropolis in the coming years, Frezadou, a Swiss-trained architect and urban planner, is spearheading a campaign to stop the building spree, initiating a petition on the online activist network Avaaz that has already collected upwards of 25,000 signatures.

 

“Clearly, what we need urgently in the name of sustainability is new building and urban planning rules,” she said.

 

Frezadou does not have to look far to get angry. The grassy plot behind her own apartment block has been designated for an even bigger hotel with three underground parking floors and a pool garden on top.

 

Activists have gone to Greece’s highest administrative court, the Council of State, to ask for permits for approval to be revoked.

 

“We are not taking any chances,” said Andreas Papapetropoulos, the lawyer representing the campaigners, adding that hundreds have signed a class action suit brought before the court in recent weeks. “We’re not absurdist, we recognise Athens has a need for good hotels, but not at the expense of our greatest monument. We will campaign for the building on Falirou street not to be demolished but certainly reduced in height.”

 

Far from being a hub for violent anti-austerity protests synonymous with the country’s economic crisis, its reputation not that long ago, Athens is in the grip of an unprecedented tourist boom.

 

Makriyanni, like Koukaki, its adjacent neighbourhood south of the Acropolis, are go-to places for the ever-increasing Airbnb tourists flocking to a city that is expected to host more than 5 million visitors this year – nearly half of the country’s entire population.

 

But the influx has come at a cost. Increasingly, international investors are taking advantage of controversial construction regulations passed at the height of the crisis that permit bigger and taller buildings if they meet “green” standards.

 

None know this better than Elliniki Etairia, a conservation watchdog housed in a neo-classical building in Plaka, Athens’ oldest continuously inhabited district, directly below the ancient citadel. “When we heard that buildings were going up that were obscuring views of the Acropolis, the symbol of democracy, we immediately saw it as a national emergency and began bombarding every government office that we could,” said Lydia Carras, the organisation’s president.

 

“There are certain views, not many in the world, that are views of identity, and the Parthenon is one of them that at all costs has to be preserved.”

 

Unlike other major European metropolises, Athens escaped the phenomenon of the high-rise precisely because of the fear that multi-storey blocks would overshadow the capital’s greatest showpiece. As a result only one, a 28-storey bloc known as the Athens Tower, was constructed under the curatorship of Greece’s then-military dictatorship in the 1970s.

 

Under pressure, Athens’ leftist government announced this week that the new construction licences in the archaeological buffer zone around the Acropolis would be temporarily suspended. Pledging to create a committee to review zoning laws in the area, it said permits for buildings higher than 17.5 metres would be banned for the next year.

 

Insisting on everyone’s right to view the monument, Greece’s culture minister, Myrsini Zorba, acknowledged the protests had to be taken into account. “A view is a cultural good and in no circumstance can it be turned into a privilege for the few. We ought to be responsive to the protest of civil society so that rule of law and a sense of justice are upheld.”

 

However, privately culture ministry officials admit they are in a bind, hamstrung by laws that allow for taller buildings. “As archaeologists we are called to work in the ground, not up in the air,” said one. “This was legislation passed by the environment ministry.”

 

Across Europe, conservationists are watching closely and they insist they will hold the Greek government to account. “This is an extremely important battle that has to be won,” said Sneška Quaedvlieg-Mihailović, the secretary general of Europa Nostra, widely regarded as the voice of cultural heritage in Europe.

 

“We are not against new buildings of contemporary architecture but they have to respect the heritage settings of European cities. A view of the Acropolis is the most miraculous of any to be had,” she told the Guardian. “Fortunately, civil society has taken a very strong stance. What we expect now is a very clear signal from national authorities that not everything is for sale.”

 

www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/49911328246

 

3). ROME - While the Colosseum of Rome is Still Closed, Now Updated For Chinese Tourists. Parco Archeologico del Colosseo (05/2020). Parco Archeologico del Colosseo (05/2020).

Italian = parcocolosseo.it/

Chinese = parcocolosseo.it/zh-hans/

 

Fonte / fonte / source:

--- Vasilis Ververidas, “Aerial view of Parthenon and Acropolis in Athens, Greece.” Skypixel.com (2017) accessed 05/2020.

www.skypixel.com/photos/aerial-view-of-parthenon-and-acro...

Two hours later, all MOCs in the previous pic have been deconstructed and parted out.

 

While disassembling, was quite surprised about some of the constructs/techniques that were done which most likely be used again in future MOCs.

Information from: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Cod

 

Cape Cod

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This article is about the area of Massachusetts. For other uses, see Cape Cod (disambiguation).

For other uses, see Cod (disambiguation).

 

Coordinates: 41°41′20″N 70°17′49″W / 41.68889°N 70.29694°W / 41.68889; -70.29694

Map of Massachusetts, with Cape Cod (Barnstable County) indicated in red

Dunes on Sandy Neck are part of the Cape's barrier beach which helps to prevent erosion

 

Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is an island and a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States. It is coextensive with Barnstable County. Several small islands right off Cape Cod, including Monomoy Island, Monomoscoy Island, Popponesset Island, and Seconsett Island, are also in Barnstable County, being part of municipalities with land on the Cape. The Cape's small-town character and large beachfront attract heavy tourism during the summer months.

 

Cape Cod was formed as the terminal moraine of a glacier, resulting in a peninsula in the Atlantic Ocean. In 1914, the Cape Cod Canal was cut through the base or isthmus of the peninsula, forming an island. The Cape Cod Commission refers to the resultant landmass as an island; as does the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in regards to disaster preparedness.[1] It is still identified as a peninsula by geographers, who do not change landform designations based on man-made canal construction.[citation needed]

 

Unofficially, it is one of the biggest barrier islands in the world, shielding much of the Massachusetts coastline from North Atlantic storm waves. This protection helps to erode the Cape shoreline at the expense of cliffs, while protecting towns from Fairhaven to Marshfield.

 

Road vehicles from the mainland cross over the Cape Cod Canal via the Sagamore Bridge and the Bourne Bridge. The two bridges are parallel, with the Bourne Bridge located slightly farther southwest. In addition, the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge carries railway freight as well as tourist passenger services.

Contents

[hide]

 

* 1 Geography and political divisions

o 1.1 "Upper" and "Lower"

* 2 Geology

* 3 Climate

* 4 Native population

* 5 History

* 6 Lighthouses of Cape Cod

* 7 Transportation

o 7.1 Bus

o 7.2 Rail

o 7.3 Taxi

* 8 Tourism

* 9 Sport fishing

* 10 Sports

* 11 Education

* 12 Islands off Cape Cod

* 13 See also

* 14 References

o 14.1 Notes

o 14.2 Sources

o 14.3 Further reading

* 15 External links

 

[edit] Geography and political divisions

Towns of Barnstable County

historical map of 1890

 

The highest elevation on Cape Cod is 306 feet (93 m), at the top of Pine Hill, in the Bourne portion of the Massachusetts Military Reservation. The lowest point is sea level.

 

The body of water located between Cape Cod and the mainland, bordered to the north by Massachusetts Bay, is Cape Cod Bay; west of Cape Cod is Buzzards Bay. The Cape Cod Canal, completed in 1916, connects Buzzards Bay to Cape Cod Bay; it shortened the trade route between New York and Boston by 62 miles.[2] To the south of Cape Cod lie Nantucket Sound; Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, both large islands, and the mostly privately owned Elizabeth Islands.

 

Cape Cod incorporates all of Barnstable County, which comprises 15 towns: Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee, Barnstable, Yarmouth, Dennis, Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. Two of the county's fifteen towns (Bourne and Sandwich) include land on the mainland side of the Cape Cod Canal. The towns of Plymouth and Wareham, in adjacent Plymouth County, are sometimes considered to be part of Cape Cod but are not located on the island.

 

In the 17th century the designation Cape Cod applied only to the tip of the peninsula, essentially present-day Provincetown. Over the ensuing decades, the name came to mean all the land east of the Manomet and Scussett rivers - essentially the line of the 20th century Cape Cod Canal. Now, the complete towns of Bourne and Sandwich are widely considered to incorporate the full perimeter of Cape Cod, even though small parts of these towns are located on the west side of the canal. The canal divides the largest part of the peninsula from the mainland and the resultant landmass is sometimes referred to as an island.[3][4] Additionally some "Cape Codders" – residents of "The Cape" – refer to all land on the mainland side of the canal as "off-Cape."

 

For most of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries, Cape Cod was considered to consist of three sections:

 

* The Upper Cape is the part of Cape Cod closest to the mainland, comprising the towns of Bourne, Sandwich, Falmouth, and Mashpee. Falmouth is the home of the famous Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and several other research organizations, and is also the most-used ferry connection to Martha's Vineyard. Falmouth is composed of several separate villages, including East Falmouth, Falmouth Village, Hatchville, North Falmouth, Teaticket, Waquoit, West Falmouth, and Woods Hole, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Davisville, Falmouth Heights, Quissett, Sippewissett, and others).[5]

 

* The Mid-Cape includes the towns of Barnstable, Yarmouth and Dennis. The Mid-Cape area features many beautiful beaches, including warm-water beaches along Nantucket Sound, e.g., Kalmus Beach in Hyannis, which gets its name from one of the inventors of Technicolor, Herbert Kalmus. This popular windsurfing destination was bequeathed to the town of Barnstable by Dr. Kalmus on condition that it not be developed, possibly one of the first instances of open-space preservation in the US. The Mid-Cape is also the commercial and industrial center of the region. There are seven villages in Barnstable, including Barnstable Village, Centerville, Cotuit, Hyannis, Marstons Mills, Osterville, and West Barnstable, as well as several smaller hamlets that are incorporated into their larger neighbors (e.g., Craigville, Cummaquid, Hyannisport, Santuit, Wianno, and others).[6] There are three villages in Yarmouth: South Yarmouth, West Yarmouth and Yarmouthport. There are five villages in Dennis including, Dennis Village(North Dennis), East Dennis, West Dennis, South Dennis and Dennisport.[7]

 

* The Lower Cape traditionally included all of the rest of the Cape,or the towns of Harwich, Brewster, Chatham, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown. This area includes the Cape Cod National Seashore, a national park comprising much of the outer Cape, including the entire east-facing coast, and is home to some of the most popular beaches in America, such as Coast Guard Beach and Nauset Light Beach in Eastham. Stephen Leatherman, aka "Dr. Beach", named Coast Guard Beach the 5th best beach in America for 2007.[8]

 

[edit] "Upper" and "Lower"

 

The terms "Upper" and "Lower" as applied to the Cape have nothing to do with north and south. Instead, they derive from maritime convention at the time when the principal means of transportation involved watercraft, and the prevailing westerly winds meant that a boat with sails traveling northeast in Cape Cod Bay would have the wind at its back and thus be going downwind, while a craft sailing southwest would be going against the wind, or upwind.[9] Similarly, on nearby Martha's Vineyard, "Up Island" still is the western section and "Down Island" is to the east, and in Maine, "Down East" is similarly defined by the winds and currents.

 

Over time, the reasons for the traditional nomenclature became unfamiliar and their meaning obscure. Late in the 1900s, new arrivals began calling towns from Eastham to Provincetown the "Outer Cape", yet another geographic descriptor which is still in use, as is the "Inner Cape."

[edit] Geology

Cape Cod and Cape Cod Bay from space.[10]

 

East of America, there stands in the open Atlantic the last fragment of an ancient and vanished land. Worn by the breakers and the rains, and disintegrated by the wind, it still stands bold.

“

”

Henry Beston, The Outermost House

 

Cape Cod forms a continuous archipelagic region with a thin line of islands stretching toward New York, historically known by naturalists as the Outer Lands. This continuity is due to the fact that the islands and Cape are all terminal glacial moraines laid down some 16,000 to 20,000 years ago.

 

Most of Cape Cod's geological history involves the advance and retreat of the Laurentide ice sheet in the late Pleistocene geological era and the subsequent changes in sea level. Using radiocarbon dating techniques, researchers have determined that around 23,000 years ago, the ice sheet reached its maximum southward advance over North America, and then started to retreat. Many "kettle ponds" — clear, cold lakes — were formed and remain on Cape Cod as a result of the receding glacier. By about 18,000 years ago, the ice sheet had retreated past Cape Cod. By roughly 15,000 years ago, it had retreated past southern New England. When so much of Earth's water was locked up in massive ice sheets, the sea level was lower. Truro's bayside beaches used to be a petrified forest, before it became a beach.

 

As the ice began to melt, the sea began to rise. Initially, sea level rose quickly, about 15 meters (50 ft) per 1,000 years, but then the rate declined. On Cape Cod, sea level rose roughly 3 meters (11 ft) per millennium between 6,000 and 2,000 years ago. After that, it continued to rise at about 1 meter (3 ft) per millennium. By 6,000 years ago, the sea level was high enough to start eroding the glacial deposits that the vanished continental ice sheet had left on Cape Cod. The water transported the eroded deposits north and south along the outer Cape's shoreline. Those reworked sediments that moved north went to the tip of Cape Cod.

 

Provincetown Spit, at the northern end of the Cape, consists largely of marine deposits, transported from farther up the shore. Sediments that moved south created the islands and shoals of Monomoy. So while other parts of the Cape have dwindled from the action of the waves, these parts of the Cape have grown.

Cape Cod National Seashore

 

This process continues today. Due to their position jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean, the Cape and islands are subject to massive coastal erosion. Geologists say that, due to erosion, the Cape will be completely submerged by the sea in thousands of years.[11] This erosion causes the washout of beaches and the destruction of the barrier islands; for example, the ocean broke through the barrier island at Chatham during Hurricane Bob in 1991, allowing waves and storm surges to hit the coast with no obstruction. Consequently, the sediment and sand from the beaches is being washed away and deposited elsewhere. While this destroys land in some places, it creates land elsewhere, most noticeably in marshes where sediment is deposited by waters running through them.

[edit] Climate

 

Although Cape Cod's weather[12] is typically more moderate than inland locations, there have been occasions where Cape Cod has dealt with the brunt of extreme weather situations (such as the Blizzard of 1954 and Hurricane of 1938). Because of the influence of the Atlantic Ocean, temperatures are typically a few degrees cooler in the summer and a few degrees warmer in the winter. A common misconception is that the climate is influenced largely by the warm Gulf Stream current, however that current turns eastward off the coast of Virginia and the waters off the Cape are more influenced by the cold Canadian Labrador Current. As a result, the ocean temperature rarely gets above 65 °F (18 °C), except along the shallow west coast of the Upper Cape.

 

The Cape's climate is also notorious for a delayed spring season, being surrounded by an ocean which is still cold from the winter; however, it is also known for an exceptionally mild fall season (Indian summer), thanks to the ocean remaining warm from the summer. The highest temperature ever recorded on Cape Cod was 104 °F (40 °C) in Provincetown[13], and the lowest temperature ever was −12 °F (−24.4 °C) in Barnstable.[14]

 

The water surrounding Cape Cod moderates winter temperatures enough to extend the USDA hardiness zone 7a to its northernmost limit in eastern North America.[15] Even though zone 7a (annual low = 0–5 degrees Fahrenheit) signifies no sub-zero temperatures annually, there have been several instances of temperatures reaching a few degrees below zero across the Cape (although it is rare, usually 1–5 times a year, typically depending on locale, sometimes not at all). Consequently, many plant species typically found in more southerly latitudes grow there, including Camellias, Ilex opaca, Magnolia grandiflora and Albizia julibrissin.

 

Precipitation on Cape Cod and the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket is the lowest in the New England region, averaging slightly less than 40 inches (1,000 mm) a year (most parts of New England average 42–46 inches). This is due to storm systems which move across western areas, building up in mountainous regions, and dissipating before reaching the coast where the land has leveled out. The region does not experience a greater number of sunny days however, as the number of cloudy days is the same as inland locales, in addition to increased fog. Snowfall is annual, but a lot less common than the rest of Massachusetts. On average, 30 inches of snow, which is a foot less than Boston, falls in an average winter. Snow is usually light, and comes in squalls on cold days. Storms that bring blizzard conditions and snow emergencies to the mainland, bring devastating ice storms or just heavy rains more frequently than large snow storms.

[hide]Climate data for Cape Cod

Month Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Year

Average high °C (°F) 2.06

(35.7) 2.5

(36.5) 6.22

(43.2) 11.72

(53.1) 16.94

(62.5) 23.5

(74.3) 26.39

(79.5) 26.67

(80.0) 25.06

(77.1) 18.39

(65.1) 12.56

(54.6) 5.44

(41.8) 26.67

(80.0)

Average low °C (°F) -5.33

(22.4) -5

(23.0) -1.33

(29.6) 2.72

(36.9) 8.72

(47.7) 14.61

(58.3) 19.22

(66.6) 20.28

(68.5) 15.56

(60.0) 9.94

(49.9) 3.94

(39.1) -2.22

(28.0) -5.33

(22.4)

Precipitation mm (inches) 98

(3.86) 75.4

(2.97) 95

(3.74) 92.5

(3.64) 83.6

(3.29) 76.7

(3.02) 62.2

(2.45) 65

(2.56) 74.7

(2.94) 84.8

(3.34) 90.7

(3.57) 92.7

(3.65) 990.9

(39.01)

Source: World Meteorological Organisation (United Nations) [16]

[edit] Native population

 

Cape Cod has been the home of the Wampanoag tribe of Native American people for many centuries. They survived off the sea and were accomplished farmers. They understood the principles of sustainable forest management, and were known to light controlled fires to keep the underbrush in check. They helped the Pilgrims, who arrived in the fall of 1620, survive at their new Plymouth Colony. At the time, the dominant group was the Kakopee, known for their abilities at fishing. They were the first Native Americans to use large casting nets. Early colonial settlers recorded that the Kakopee numbered nearly 7,000.

 

Shortly after the Pilgrims arrived, the chief of the Kakopee, Mogauhok, attempted to make a treaty limiting colonial settlements. The effort failed after he succumbed to smallpox in 1625. Infectious diseases such as smallpox, measles and influenza caused the deaths of many other Kakopee and Wampanoag. They had no natural immunity to Eurasian diseases by then endemic among the English and other Europeans. Today, the only reminder of the Kakopee is a small public recreation area in Barnstable named for them. A historic marker notes the burial site of Mogauhok near Truro, although the location is conjecture.

 

While contractors were digging test wells in the eastern Massachusetts Military Reservation area, they discovered an archeological find.[citation needed] Excavation revealed the remains of a Kakopee village in Forestdale, a location in Sandwich. Researchers found a totem with a painted image of Mogauhok, portrayed in his chief's cape and brooch. The totem was discovered on property on Grand Oak Road. It is the first evidence other than colonial accounts of his role as an important Kakopee leader.

 

The Indians lost their lands through continued purchase and expropriation by the English colonists. The documentary Natives of the Narrowland (1993), narrated by actress Julie Harris, shows the history of the Wampanoag people through Cape Cod archaeological sites.

 

In 1974, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Council was formed to articulate the concerns of those with Native American ancestry. They petitioned the federal government in 1975 and again in 1990 for official recognition of the Mashpee Wampanoag as a tribe. In May 2007, the Wampanoag tribe was finally federally recognized as a tribe.[17]

[edit] History

Cranberry picking in 1906

 

Cape Cod was a landmark for early explorers. It may have been the "Promontory of Vinland" mentioned by the Norse voyagers (985-1025). Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524 approached it from the south. He named Martha's Vineyard Claudia, after the mother of the King of France.[18] The next year the explorer Esteban Gómez called it Cape St. James.

 

In 1602 Bartholomew Gosnold named it Cape Cod, the surviving term and the ninth oldest English place-name in the U.S.[19] Samuel de Champlain charted its sand-silted harbors in 1606 and Henry Hudson landed there in 1609. Captain John Smith noted it on his map of 1614 and at last the Pilgrims entered the "Cape Harbor" and – contrary to the popular myth of Plymouth Rock – made their first landing near present-day Provincetown on November 11, 1620. Nearby, in what is now Eastham, they had their first encounter with Native Americans.

 

Cape Cod was among the first places settled by the English in North America. Aside from Barnstable (1639), Sandwich (1637) and Yarmouth (1639), the Cape's fifteen towns developed slowly. The final town to be established on the Cape was Bourne in 1884.[20] Provincetown was a group of huts until the 18th century. A channel from Massachusetts Bay to Buzzards Bay is shown on Southack's map of 1717. The present Cape Cod Canal was slowly developed from 1870 to 1914. The Federal government purchased it in 1928.

 

Thanks to early colonial settlement and intensive land use, by the time Henry Thoreau saw Cape Cod during his four visits over 1849 to 1857[21], its vegetation was depauperate and trees were scarce. As the settlers heated by fires, and it took 10 to 20 cords (40 to 80 m³) of wood to heat a home, they cleared most of Cape Cod of timber early on. They planted familiar crops, but these were unsuited to Cape Cod's thin, glacially derived soils. For instance, much of Eastham was planted to wheat. The settlers practiced burning of woodlands to release nutrients into the soil. Improper and intensive farming led to erosion and the loss of topsoil. Farmers grazed their cattle on the grassy dunes of coastal Massachusetts, only to watch "in horror as the denuded sands `walked' over richer lands, burying cultivated fields and fences." Dunes on the outer Cape became more common and many harbors filled in with eroded soils.[22]

 

By 1800, most of Cape Cod's firewood had to be transported by boat from Maine. The paucity of vegetation was worsened by the raising of merino sheep that reached its peak in New England around 1840. The early industrial revolution, which occurred through much of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, mostly bypassed Cape Cod due to a lack of significant water power in the area. As a result, and also because of its geographic position, the Cape developed as a large fishing and whaling center. After 1860 and the opening of the American West, farmers abandoned agriculture on the Cape. By 1950 forests had recovered to an extent not seen since the 18th century.

 

Cape Cod became a summer haven for city dwellers beginning at the end of the 19th century. Improved rail transportation made the towns of the Upper Cape, such as Bourne and Falmouth, accessible to Bostonians. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Northeastern mercantile elite built many large, shingled "cottages" along Buzzards Bay. The relaxed summer environment offered by Cape Cod was highlighted by writers including Joseph C. Lincoln, who published novels and countless short stories about Cape Cod folks in popular magazines such as the Saturday Evening Post and the Delineator.

 

Guglielmo Marconi made the first transatlantic wireless transmission originating in the United States from Cape Cod, at Wellfleet. The beach from which he transmitted has since been called Marconi Beach. In 1914 he opened the maritime wireless station WCC in Chatham. It supported the communications of Amelia Earhart, Howard Hughes, Admiral Byrd, and the Hindenburg. Marconi chose Chatham due to its vantage point on the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded on three sides by water. Walter Cronkite narrated a 17-minute documentary in 2005 about the history of the Chatham Station.

 

Much of the East-facing Atlantic seacoast of Cape Cod consists of wide, sandy beaches. In 1961, a significant portion of this coastline, already slated for housing subdivisions, was made a part of the Cape Cod National Seashore by President John F. Kennedy. It was protected from private development and preserved for public use. Large portions are open to the public, including the Marconi Site in Wellfleet. This is a park encompassing the site of the first two-way transoceanic radio transmission from the United States. (Theodore Roosevelt used Marconi's equipment for this transmission).

 

The Kennedy Compound in Hyannisport was President Kennedy's summer White House during his presidency. The Kennedy family continues to maintain residences on the compound. Other notable residents of Cape Cod have included actress Julie Harris, US Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis, figure skater Todd Eldredge, and novelists Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut. Influential natives included the patriot James Otis, historian and writer Mercy Otis Warren, jurist Lemuel Shaw, and naval officer John Percival.

[edit] Lighthouses of Cape Cod

Race Point Lighthouse in Provincetown (1876)

 

Lighthouses, from ancient times, have fascinated members of the human race. There is something about a lighted beacon that suggests hope and trust and appeals to the better instincts of mankind.

“

”

Edward Rowe Snow

 

Due to its dangerous constantly moving shoals, Cape Cod's shores have featured beacons which warn ships of the danger since very early in its history. There are numerous working lighthouses on Cape Cod and the Islands, including Highland Light, Nauset Light, Chatham Light, Race Point Light, and Nobska Light, mostly operated by the U.S. Coast Guard. The exception is Nauset Light, which was decommissioned in 1996 and is now maintained by the Nauset Light Preservation Society under the auspices of Cape Cod National Seashore. These lighthouses are frequently photographed symbols of Cape Cod.

 

Others include:

 

Upper Cape: Wings Neck

 

Mid Cape: Sandy Neck, South Hyannis, Lewis Bay, Bishop and Clerks, Bass River

 

Lower Cape: Wood End, Long Point, Monomoy, Stage Harbor, Pamet, Mayo Beach, Billingsgate, Three Sisters, Nauset, Highland

[edit] Transportation

 

Cape Cod is connected to the mainland by a pair of canal-spanning highway bridges from Bourne and Sagamore that were constructed in the 1930s, and a vertical-lift railroad bridge. The limited number of access points to the peninsula can result in large traffic backups during the tourist season.

 

The entire Cape is roughly bisected lengthwise by U.S. Route 6, locally known as the Mid-Cape Highway and officially as the Grand Army of the Republic Highway.

 

Commercial air service to Cape Cod operates out of Barnstable Municipal Airport and Provincetown Municipal Airport. Several bus lines service the Cape. There are ferry connections from Boston to Provincetown, as well as from Hyannis and Woods Hole to the islands.

 

Cape Cod has a public transportation network comprising buses operated by three different companies, a rail line, taxis and paratransit services.

The Bourne Bridge over the Cape Cod Canal, with the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge in the background

[edit] Bus

 

Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority operates a year-round public bus system comprising three long distance routes and a local bus in Hyannis and Barnstable Village. From mid June until October, additional local routes are added in Falmouth and Provincetown. CCRTA also operates Barnstable County's ADA required paratransit (dial-a-ride) service, under the name "B-Bus."

 

Long distance bus service is available through Plymouth and Brockton Street Railway, with regular service to Boston and Logan Airport, as well as less frequent service to Provincetown. Peter Pan Bus Lines also runs long distance service to Providence T.F. Green Airport and New York City.

[edit] Rail

 

Regular passenger rail service through Cape Cod ended in 1959, quite possibly on June 30 of that year. In 1978, the tracks east of South Dennis were abandoned and replaced with the very popular bicycle path, known as the Cape Cod Rail Trail. Another bike path, the Shining Sea Bikeway, was built over tracks between Woods Hole and Falmouth in 1975; construction to extend this path to North Falmouth over 6.3 miles (10.1 km) of inactive rail bed began in April 2008[23] and ended in early 2009. Active freight service remains in the Upper Cape area in Sandwich and in Bourne, largely due to a trash transfer station located at Massachusetts Military Reservation along the Bourne-Falmouth rail line. In 1986, Amtrak ran a seasonal service in the summer from New York City to Hyannis called the Cape Codder. From 1988, Amtrak and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation increased service to a daily frequency.[24] Since its demise in 1996, there have been periodic discussions about reinstating passenger rail service from Boston to reduce car traffic to and from the Cape, with officials in Bourne seeking to re-extend MBTA Commuter Rail service from Middleboro to Buzzards Bay[25], despite a reluctant Beacon Hill legislature.

 

Cape Cod Central Railroad operates passenger train service on Cape Cod. The service is primarily tourist oriented and includes a dinner train. The scenic route between Downtown Hyannis and the Cape Cod Canal is about 2½ hours round trip. Massachusetts Coastal Railroad is also planning to return passenger railroad services eventually to the Bourne-Falmouth rail line in the future. An August 5, 2009 article on the New England Cable News channel, entitled South Coast rail project a priority for Mass. lawmakers, mentions a $1.4-billion railroad reconstruction plan by Governor Deval Patrick, and could mean rebuilding of old rail lines on the Cape. On November 21, 2009, the town of Falmouth saw its first passenger train in 12 years, a set of dinner train cars from Cape Cod Central. And a trip from the Mass Bay Railroad Enthusiasts on May 15, 2010 revealed a second trip along the Falmouth line.

[edit] Taxi

 

Taxicabs are plentiful, with several different companies operating out of different parts of the Cape. Except at the airport and some bus terminals with taxi stands, cabs must be booked ahead of time, with most operators preferring two to three hours notice. Cabs cannot be "hailed" anywhere in Barnstable County, this was outlawed in the early nineties after several robbery attempts on drivers.

 

Most companies utilize a New York City-style taximeter and charge based on distance plus an initial fee of $2 to $3. In Provincetown, cabs charge a flat fare per person anywhere in the town.

[edit] Tourism

Hyannis Harbor on Nantucket Sound

 

Although Cape Cod has a year-round population of about 230,000, it experiences a tourist season each summer, the beginning and end of which can be roughly approximated as Memorial Day and Labor Day, respectively. Many businesses are specifically targeted to summer visitors, and close during the eight to nine months of the "off season" (although the "on season" has been expanding somewhat in recent years due to Indian Summer, reduced lodging rates, and the number of people visiting the Cape after Labor Day who either have no school-age children, and the elderly, reducing the true "off season" to six or seven months). In the late 20th century, tourists and owners of second homes began visiting the Cape more and more in the spring and fall, softening the definition of the high season and expanding it somewhat (see above). Some particularly well-known Cape products and industries include cranberries, shellfish (particularly oysters and clams) and lobstering.

 

Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod, also berths several whale watching fleets who patrol the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary. Most fleets guarantee a whale sighting (mostly humpback whale, fin whale, minke whale, sei whale, and critically endangered, the North Atlantic Right Whale), and one is the only federally certified operation qualified to rescue whales. Provincetown has also long been known as an art colony, attracting writers and artists. The town is home to the Cape's most attended art museum, the Provincetown Art Association and Museum. Many hotels and resorts are friendly to or cater to gay and lesbian tourists and it is known as a gay mecca in the summer.[26]

 

Cape Cod is a popular destination for beachgoers from all over. With 559.6 miles (900.6 km) of coastline, beaches, both public and private, are easily accessible. The Cape has upwards of sixty public beaches, many of which offer parking for non-residents for a daily fee (in summer). The Cape Cod National Seashore has 40 miles (64 km) of sandy beach and many walking paths.

 

Cape Cod is also popular for its outdoor activities like beach walking, biking, boating, fishing, go-karts, golfing, kayaking, miniature golf, and unique shopping. There are 27 public, daily-fee golf courses and 15 private courses on Cape Cod.[27] Bed and breakfasts or vacation houses are often used for lodging.

 

Each summer the Naukabout Music Festival is held at the Barnstable County Fair Grounds located in East Falmouth,(typically) during the first weekend of August. This Music festival features local, regional and national talent along with food, arts and family friendly activities.

[edit] Sport fishing

 

Cape Cod is known around the world as a spring-to-fall destination for sport anglers. Among the species most widely pursued are striped bass, bluefish, bluefin tuna, false albacore (little tunny), bonito, tautog, flounder and fluke. The Cape Cod Bay side of the Cape, from Sandwich to Provincetown, has several harbors, saltwater creeks, and shoals that hold bait fish and attract the larger game fish, such as striped bass, bluefish and bluefin tuna.

 

The outer edge of the Cape, from Provincetown to Falmouth, faces the open Atlantic from Provincetown to Chatham, and then the more protected water of Nantucket and Vineyard Sounds, from Chatham to Falmouth. The bays, harbors and shoals along this coastline also provide a robust habitat for game species, and during the late summer months warm-water species such as mahi-mahi and marlin will also appear on the southern edge of Cape Cod's waters. Nearly every harbor on Cape Cod hosts sport fishing charter boats, which run from May through October.[28]

[edit] Sports

 

The Cape has nine amateur baseball franchises playing within Barnstable County in the Cape Cod Baseball League. The Wareham Gatemen also play in the Cape Cod Baseball League in nearby Wareham, Massachusetts in Plymouth County. The league originated 1923, although intertown competition traces to 1866. Teams in the league are the Bourne Braves, Brewster Whitecaps, Chatham Anglers (formerly the Chatham Athletics), Cotuit Kettleers, Falmouth Commodores, Harwich Mariners, Hyannis Harbor Hawks (formerly the Hyannis Mets), Orleans Firebirds (formerly the Orleans Cardinals), Wareham Gatemen and the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox. Pro ball scouts frequent the games in the summer, looking for stars of the future.

 

Cape Cod is also a national hot bed for baseball and hockey. Along with the Cape Cod Baseball League and the new Junior Hockey League team, the Cape Cod Cubs, many high school players are being seriously recruited as well. Barnstable and Harwich have each sent multiple players to Division 1 colleges for baseball, Harwich has also won three State titles in the past 12 years (1996, 2006, 2007). Bourne and Sandwich, known rivals in hockey have won state championships recently. Bourne in 2004, and Sandwich in 2007. Nauset, Barnstable, and Martha's Vineyard are also state hockey powerhouses. Barnstable and Falmouth also hold the title of having one of the longest Thanksgiving football rivalries in the country. The teams have played each other every year on the Thanksgiving since 1895. The Bourne and Barnstable girl's volleyball teams are two of the best teams in the state and Barnstable in the country. With Bourne winning the State title in 2003 and 2007. In the past 15 years, Barnstable has won 12 Division 1 State titles and has won the state title the past two years.

 

The Cape also is home to the Cape Cod Frenzy, a team in the American Basketball Association.

 

Soccer on Cape Cod is represented by the Cape Cod Crusaders, playing in the USL Premier Development League (PDL) soccer based in Hyannis. In addition, a summer Cape Cod Adult Soccer League (CCASL) is active in several towns on the Cape.

 

Cape Cod is also the home of the Cape Cod Cubs, a new junior league hockey team that is based out of Hyannis at the new communtiy center being built of Bearses Way.

 

The end of each summer is marked with the running of the world famous Falmouth Road Race which is held on the 3rd Saturday in August. It draws about 10,000 runners to the Cape and showcases the finest runners in the world (mainly for the large purse that the race is able to offer). The race is 7.2 miles (11.6 km) long, which is a non-standard distance. The reason for the unusual distance is that the man who thought the race up (Tommy Leonard) was a bartender who wanted a race along the coast from one bar (The Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole) to another (The Brothers Four in Falmouth Heights). While the bar in Falmouth Heights is no longer there, the race still starts at the front door of the Cap'n Kidd in Woods Hole and now finishes at the beach in Falmouth Heights. Prior to the Falmouth race is an annual 5-mile (8.0 km) race through Brewster called the Brew Run, held early in August.

[edit] Education

 

Each town usually consists of a few elementary schools, one or two middle schools and one large public high school that services the entire town. Exceptions to this include Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High School located in Yarmouth which services both the town of Yarmouth as well as Dennis and Nauset Regional High School located in Eastham which services the town of Brewster, Orleans, Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, and Provincetown (optional). Bourne High School is the public school for students residing in the town of Bourne, which is gathered from villages in Bourne, including Sagamore, Sagamore Beach, and Buzzards Bay. Barnstable High School is the largest high school and is known for its girls' volleyball team which have been state champions a total of 12 times. Barnstable High School also boasts one of the country's best high school drama clubs which were awarded with a contract by Warner Brothers to created a documentary in webisode format based on their production of Wizard of Oz. Sturgis Charter Public School is a public school in Hyannis which was featured in Newsweek's Magazine's "Best High Schools" ranking. It ranked 28th in the country and 1st in the state of Massachusetts in the 2009 edition and ranked 43rd and 55th in the 2008 and 2007 edition, respectively. Sturgis offers the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme in their junior and senior year and is open to students as far as Plymouth. The Cape also contains two vocational high schools. One is the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School in Harwich and the other is Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical High School located in Bourne. Lastly, Mashpee High School is home to the Mashpee Chapter of (SMPTE,) the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers. This chapter is the first and only high school chapter in the world to be a part of this organization and has received much recognition within the Los Angeles broadcasting industry as a result. The officers of this group who have made history are listed below:

 

* President: Ryan D. Stanley '11

* Vice-President Kenneth J. Peters '13

* Treasurer Eric N. Bergquist '11

* Secretary Andrew L. Medlar '11

 

In addition to public schools, Cape Cod has a wide range of private schools. The town of Barnstable has Trinity Christian Academy, Cape Cod Academy, St. Francis Xavier Preparatory School, and Pope John Paul II High School. Bourne offers the Waldorf School of Cape Cod, Orleans offers the Lighthouse Charter School for elementary and middle school students, and Falmouth offers Falmouth Academy. Riverview School is located in East Sandwich and is a special co-ed boarding school which services students as old as 22 who have learning disabilities. Another specialized school is the Penikese Island School located on Penikese Island, part of the Elizabeth Islands off southwestern Cape Cod, which services struggling and troubled teenage boys.

 

Cape Cod also contains two institutions of higher education. One is the Cape Cod Community College located in West Barnstable, Barnstable. The other is Massachusetts Maritime Academy in Buzzards Bay, Bourne. Massachusetts Maritime Academy is the oldest continuously operating maritime college in the United States.

[edit] Islands off Cape Cod

 

Like Cape Cod itself, the islands south of the Cape have evolved from whaling and trading areas to resort destinations, attracting wealthy families, celebrities, and other tourists. The islands include Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard, as well as Forbes family-owned Naushon Island, which was purchased by John Murray Forbes with profits from opium dealing in the China trade during the Opium War. Naushon is one of the Elizabeth Islands, many of which are privately owned. One of the publicly accessible Elizabeths is the southernmost island in the chain, Cuttyhunk, with a year-round population of 52 people. Several prominent families have established compounds or estates on the larger islands, making these islands some of the wealthiest resorts in the Northeast, yet they retain much of the early merchant trading and whaling culture.

MODEL: Steph

HAIR/MAKE-UP/COSTUMING/SET/POST PRODUCTION: me

   

Overview

Steph, hands photo shoot.

 

The set, the hands…

This set is very important for the meaning of the photograph and a lot of thought has gone into how it would be created. The cube symbolizes being surrounded and being stuck in a certain situation. I have constructed the set very carefully and the end photograph gives the illusion of a 3D, showing how feelings are realistic, and emphasizing of the idea, feeling and illusion of being surrounded.

 

I originally wanted to stick white latex gloves all over the walls inside the box, but for many reasons it would have been ineffective, such as; the cost for purchasing many gloves, would have been very expensive- due to the fact I would have to of had enough to cover 5 square meters of area, adhesives such as: blue tack and tapes would have been ineffective and weak in holding such a surface to the vertical walls and ceiling, there wouldn’t have been much texture to the walls because all the white would have blended together and form one cohesive mass and I wouldn’t know if the walls would have held it for an entire photo shoot and the time to construct the set would have been unimaginable…

I knew I wanted to do something with hands and I later came up with the idea of using a photocopier and photocopying my hands as the design for inside the cube. It also seemed to be more environmentally friendly than using latex gloves because paper can be easily recycled. Also there was little cost involved, I could use blue tack to stick the paper to the walls securely, there isn’t much mess involved and it only took me about 3-4 hours to photocopy my hands and complete the set.

 

I have been fascinated with the idea of using hands for a photo shoot because I like how they can be posed in many ways to give different meanings, messages and symbols.

This also seemed ideal for my theme and ideas for my photo shoot in showing the inner feelings of teenagers.

 

With reading and understanding my message for the need to create such a set, so when photocopying my hands, the poses I did were crucial- they all had to be different and show the idea of trying to harm and to get to whatever what in the box, the poses had to be aggressive and angry looking.

 

I also really liked the contrast of the white hands to the black background- this also showed the important detail of the positive space what you can see: the hands and how they were trying to get into the box, to the person in it and made the negative space: the black area looks dark as though to think ‘what else is out there?’, and to reveal that there is the unknown

 

When sticking the hands to the wall, I had the choice of sticking them anywhere and everywhere or neatly in a pattern or an order. I chose to do them in a pattern, not only to save paper but to add to the meaning of the set. To just stick them all over the place would still have meaning to it- how people can attack from any direction any where, but I feel that the meaning of the contrast between the black and white was like ‘good vs evil’ and normally when two sides confront in a battle there is an order of event and who goes first- like in a game of chest which also incorporates the these shades. The pattern of the paper is of a brick laying pattern which demonstrates the foundation of the ‘attacking’ on the victim in levels, that it keeps building up and up, until it consumes you- thus being in a box and the wall are covered in this pattern.

 

The message…

I wanted to show symbolic and surreal pictures showing inside an emotionally unstable, victimized and bullied persons head and telling how some people can’t even find comfort inside them self to escape from the world, how it feels like that some ‘things’ and people just never go away; like your in a small dark enclosed room thinking your safe and suddenly you realize that your not alone, and you cant see the objects of words and abuse attacking you again, no matter how much you try to adapt, change yourself, ignore them they are still there, trying to get to you and destroy you.

I must admit this idea seems very negative in how I have wrote about it, but I want people to understand my messages as clear as possible, I want people to understand how some people can feel, and to open eyes to these predators who are looked upon with fear and the act of conformity, to avoid being the victim.

I feel that there is hope to be found in certain understandings, not from my picture as such, but from the viewer; to see it, and to then think about it and realize what not to be and what not to let happen to cause a reform in society where there is no need to for suicide, self harm, bad thoughts for ones self or others or anything of this nature which is primarily caused by that persons environment- ‘others’, these others who aim to torture drive one insane, insane to a breaking point, where you think ‘maybe there right, I don’t belong’ and then you become what you fear most, you become your own enemy.

 

I also have more meanings into this set/photoshoot which are more subtle but are there. It also displays how people having expectations of you, wanting to control you and your life, you not being able to make your own decisions freely and peacefully and the feeling that everyone is watching you wanting and waiting for you to fail and screw up. A lot of my inspiration for this photo shoot comes from myself and my understanding of the lyrics of the Linkin Park song ‘;Paper cut’, the lyrics and my feeling about them can be found in my inspiration near to start of my folio.

 

The model…

I used a family friend, Steph for this photoshoot. She is nine years old, a very shy girl and a very nice person. I used her not only because she was photogenic but because she is young and she worked with me very well to get a range of expressions and poses. When you’re young you have a silliness and immaturity where you can get into a range of moods, but with her shyness it took her a while to let loose but having fun and really mucking around and making faces really helped her adapt into a range of characters which was necessary for my aim.

This was the second photoshoot I had done with her. The first one she was very shy, it was hard for her to feel comfortable, she seemed scared that I was mocking her by having her pose, but she then learned to trust me and I tried to make her have as much fun and be as comfortable as possible. The first photoshoot she had never done anything like that before and when I asked to do another photoshoot with me she was more comfortable, excited, and understood what to do and enjoyed herself through the photoshoot.

 

The hair…

I instantly wanted to do her hair big and teased, to give her a crazy unstable look, and to associate her with looking like she is going insane, that she isn’t normal like every one else, that she is unstable and out of control-like her hair. And I also wanted to cover as much space negative space in the cube as possible, so by having the hair big, it took up more area.

 

The make-up…

For the make-up I wanted something dramatic and dark to contrast with her white clothes, so put heavy black eyes make-up around her eyes and then smudged it with water so it looked like she had been crying. I really liked the make-up especially how it makes her look like she had been crying.

 

The clothes and costume…

I had done the set the day before Steph was to come over for the photoshoot and she wanted to know what clothes to bring. I thought that white would have been the most appropriate due to the large amount of black in the box. Also I think the white outfit works best because white is seen to be a shade which symbolizes innocent and good and black is the opposite, the contrast of white and black displays the fight between those good and those bad, Steph as a good person trying to be corrupted by bad people- the black darkness around the hands- demonstrates the unknown possibilities of what the future brings and what she is install for, for no one can see the future.

Also for the costume the white gloves on her hands are an important aspect which helps link her to the set and give an important meaning.

The gloves question the person/victim(Steph), about their intention, and reveal what she is escaping from: people. The white gloves contrast to the white hands in the direction they are going. I made sure that when I was photo coping my hands that it was only my palms facing down wards on the scanner, and not showing the back of my hands- it contrast because Steph is unable, and its impossible for her to be on the same side of the wall on the side of the hands who are trying to attack her, the only direction she can put her hands is against the ones on the walls- which shows hope and courage, that she can over come this and strive for better turns in the future- that good can over come evil.

Also the hands on the wall can be seen as ‘fake’, copies, followers and symbolize conformity in their repletion and 2D form, where as Steph white gloves are realistic, are a real objects, individual, 3D and you can see who they belong to.

 

Lighting

For lighting I used natural light and flash light. Klieg light was an idea to trial but I didn’t have access to it at the time of the photo shoot.

With using natural light that meant that I had to turn off the flash off on the digital camera which seemed to affect the quality of the images in that it made them blurry and distorted, I haven’t incorporated many of these photos in my folio due to this, but if I had, it was because I really liked the composition of the photo and that I will try to see if I can fix them with photoshop later down the track.

Flash light seemed to be the best because natural light couldn’t get all the way into the cube because of it’s depth and angle of lighting during the time of day of the photoshoot, but the flash seemed to be able to help this and get into the box to lighten it up as well as the model when I took a picture.

Palaikythro (Greek: Παλαίκυθρο, Turkish: Balıkesir) is a village in the Nicosia District of Cyprus, located 6 km south of Kythrea, on the main Nicosia-Famagusta highway. The village is under de facto control of Northern Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus, officially the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), is a de facto state that comprises the northeastern portion of the island of Cyprus. It is recognised only by Turkey, and its territory is considered by all other states to be part of the Republic of Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus extends from the tip of the Karpass Peninsula in the northeast to Morphou Bay, Cape Kormakitis and its westernmost point, the Kokkina exclave in the west. Its southernmost point is the village of Louroujina. A buffer zone under the control of the United Nations stretches between Northern Cyprus and the rest of the island and divides Nicosia, the island's largest city and capital of both sides.

 

A coup d'état in 1974, performed as part of an attempt to annex the island to Greece, prompted the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. This resulted in the eviction of much of the north's Greek Cypriot population, the flight of Turkish Cypriots from the south, and the partitioning of the island, leading to a unilateral declaration of independence by the north in 1983. Due to its lack of recognition, Northern Cyprus is heavily dependent on Turkey for economic, political and military support.

 

Attempts to reach a solution to the Cyprus dispute have been unsuccessful. The Turkish Army maintains a large force in Northern Cyprus with the support and approval of the TRNC government, while the Republic of Cyprus, the European Union as a whole, and the international community regard it as an occupation force. This military presence has been denounced in several United Nations Security Council resolutions.

 

Northern Cyprus is a semi-presidential, democratic republic with a cultural heritage incorporating various influences and an economy that is dominated by the services sector. The economy has seen growth through the 2000s and 2010s, with the GNP per capita more than tripling in the 2000s, but is held back by an international embargo due to the official closure of the ports in Northern Cyprus by the Republic of Cyprus. The official language is Turkish, with a distinct local dialect being spoken. The vast majority of the population consists of Sunni Muslims, while religious attitudes are mostly moderate and secular. Northern Cyprus is an observer state of ECO and OIC under the name "Turkish Cypriot State", PACE under the name "Turkish Cypriot Community", and Organization of Turkic States with its own name.

 

Several distinct periods of Cypriot intercommunal violence involving the two main ethnic communities, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, marked mid-20th century Cyprus. These included the Cyprus Emergency of 1955–59 during British rule, the post-independence Cyprus crisis of 1963–64, and the Cyprus crisis of 1967. Hostilities culminated in the 1974 de facto division of the island along the Green Line following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The region has been relatively peaceful since then, but the Cyprus dispute has continued, with various attempts to solve it diplomatically having been generally unsuccessful.

 

Cyprus, an island lying in the eastern Mediterranean, hosted a population of Greeks and Turks (four-fifths and one-fifth, respectively), who lived under British rule in the late nineteenth-century and the first half of the twentieth-century. Christian Orthodox Church of Cyprus played a prominent political role among the Greek Cypriot community, a privilege that it acquired during the Ottoman Empire with the employment of the millet system, which gave the archbishop an unofficial ethnarch status.

 

The repeated rejections by the British of Greek Cypriot demands for enosis, union with Greece, led to armed resistance, organised by the National Organization of Cypriot Struggle, or EOKA. EOKA, led by the Greek-Cypriot commander George Grivas, systematically targeted British colonial authorities. One of the effects of EOKA's campaign was to alter the Turkish position from demanding full reincorporation into Turkey to a demand for taksim (partition). EOKA's mission and activities caused a "Cretan syndrome" (see Turkish Resistance Organisation) within the Turkish Cypriot community, as its members feared that they would be forced to leave the island in such a case as had been the case with Cretan Turks. As such, they preferred the continuation of British colonial rule and then taksim, the division of the island. Due to the Turkish Cypriots' support for the British, EOKA's leader, Georgios Grivas, declared them to be enemies. The fact that the Turks were a minority was, according to Nihat Erim, to be addressed by the transfer of thousands of Turks from mainland Turkey so that Greek Cypriots would cease to be the majority. When Erim visited Cyprus as the Turkish representative, he was advised by Field Marshal Sir John Harding, the then Governor of Cyprus, that Turkey should send educated Turks to settle in Cyprus.

 

Turkey actively promoted the idea that on the island of Cyprus two distinctive communities existed, and sidestepped its former claim that "the people of Cyprus were all Turkish subjects". In doing so, Turkey's aim to have self-determination of two to-be equal communities in effect led to de jure partition of the island.[citation needed] This could be justified to the international community against the will of the majority Greek population of the island. Dr. Fazil Küçük in 1954 had already proposed Cyprus be divided in two at the 35° parallel.

 

Lindley Dan, from Notre Dame University, spotted the roots of intercommunal violence to different visions among the two communities of Cyprus (enosis for Greek Cypriots, taksim for Turkish Cypriots). Also, Lindlay wrote that "the merging of church, schools/education, and politics in divisive and nationalistic ways" had played a crucial role in creation of havoc in Cyprus' history. Attalides Michael also pointed to the opposing nationalisms as the cause of the Cyprus problem.

 

By the mid-1950's, the "Cyprus is Turkish" party, movement, and slogan gained force in both Cyprus and Turkey. In a 1954 editorial, Turkish Cypriot leader Dr. Fazil Kuchuk expressed the sentiment that the Turkish youth had grown up with the idea that "as soon as Great Britain leaves the island, it will be taken over by the Turks", and that "Turkey cannot tolerate otherwise". This perspective contributed to the willingness of Turkish Cypriots to align themselves with the British, who started recruiting Turkish Cypriots into the police force that patrolled Cyprus to fight EOKA, a Greek Cypriot nationalist organisation that sought to rid the island of British rule.

 

EOKA targeted colonial authorities, including police, but Georgios Grivas, the leader of EOKA, did not initially wish to open up a new front by fighting Turkish Cypriots and reassured them that EOKA would not harm their people. In 1956, some Turkish Cypriot policemen were killed by EOKA members and this provoked some intercommunal violence in the spring and summer, but these attacks on policemen were not motivated by the fact that they were Turkish Cypriots.

 

However, in January 1957, Grivas changed his policy as his forces in the mountains became increasingly pressured by the British Crown forces. In order to divert the attention of the Crown forces, EOKA members started to target Turkish Cypriot policemen intentionally in the towns, so that Turkish Cypriots would riot against the Greek Cypriots and the security forces would have to be diverted to the towns to restore order. The killing of a Turkish Cypriot policeman on 19 January, when a power station was bombed, and the injury of three others, provoked three days of intercommunal violence in Nicosia. The two communities targeted each other in reprisals, at least one Greek Cypriot was killed and the British Army was deployed in the streets. Greek Cypriot stores were burned and their neighbourhoods attacked. Following the events, the Greek Cypriot leadership spread the propaganda that the riots had merely been an act of Turkish Cypriot aggression. Such events created chaos and drove the communities apart both in Cyprus and in Turkey.

 

On 22 October 1957 Sir Hugh Mackintosh Foot replaced Sir John Harding as the British Governor of Cyprus. Foot suggested five to seven years of self-government before any final decision. His plan rejected both enosis and taksim. The Turkish Cypriot response to this plan was a series of anti-British demonstrations in Nicosia on 27 and 28 January 1958 rejecting the proposed plan because the plan did not include partition. The British then withdrew the plan.

 

In 1957, Black Gang, a Turkish Cypriot pro-taksim paramilitary organisation, was formed to patrol a Turkish Cypriot enclave, the Tahtakale district of Nicosia, against activities of EOKA. The organisation later attempted to grow into a national scale, but failed to gain public support.

 

By 1958, signs of dissatisfaction with the British increased on both sides, with a group of Turkish Cypriots forming Volkan (later renamed to the Turkish Resistance Organisation) paramilitary group to promote partition and the annexation of Cyprus to Turkey as dictated by the Menderes plan. Volkan initially consisted of roughly 100 members, with the stated aim of raising awareness in Turkey of the Cyprus issue and courting military training and support for Turkish Cypriot fighters from the Turkish government.

 

In June 1958, the British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, was expected to propose a plan to resolve the Cyprus issue. In light of the new development, the Turks rioted in Nicosia to promote the idea that Greek and Turkish Cypriots could not live together and therefore any plan that did not include partition would not be viable. This violence was soon followed by bombing, Greek Cypriot deaths and looting of Greek Cypriot-owned shops and houses. Greek and Turkish Cypriots started to flee mixed population villages where they were a minority in search of safety. This was effectively the beginning of the segregation of the two communities. On 7 June 1958, a bomb exploded at the entrance of the Turkish Embassy in Cyprus. Following the bombing, Turkish Cypriots looted Greek Cypriot properties. On 26 June 1984, the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktaş, admitted on British channel ITV that the bomb was placed by the Turks themselves in order to create tension. On 9 January 1995, Rauf Denktaş repeated his claim to the famous Turkish newspaper Milliyet in Turkey.

 

The crisis reached a climax on 12 June 1958, when eight Greeks, out of an armed group of thirty five arrested by soldiers of the Royal Horse Guards on suspicion of preparing an attack on the Turkish quarter of Skylloura, were killed in a suspected attack by Turkish Cypriot locals, near the village of Geunyeli, having been ordered to walk back to their village of Kondemenos.

 

After the EOKA campaign had begun, the British government successfully began to turn the Cyprus issue from a British colonial problem into a Greek-Turkish issue. British diplomacy exerted backstage influence on the Adnan Menderes government, with the aim of making Turkey active in Cyprus. For the British, the attempt had a twofold objective. The EOKA campaign would be silenced as quickly as possible, and Turkish Cypriots would not side with Greek Cypriots against the British colonial claims over the island, which would thus remain under the British. The Turkish Cypriot leadership visited Menderes to discuss the Cyprus issue. When asked how the Turkish Cypriots should respond to the Greek Cypriot claim of enosis, Menderes replied: "You should go to the British foreign minister and request the status quo be prolonged, Cyprus to remain as a British colony". When the Turkish Cypriots visited the British Foreign Secretary and requested for Cyprus to remain a colony, he replied: "You should not be asking for colonialism at this day and age, you should be asking for Cyprus be returned to Turkey, its former owner".

 

As Turkish Cypriots began to look to Turkey for protection, Greek Cypriots soon understood that enosis was extremely unlikely. The Greek Cypriot leader, Archbishop Makarios III, now set independence for the island as his objective.

 

Britain resolved to solve the dispute by creating an independent Cyprus. In 1959, all involved parties signed the Zurich Agreements: Britain, Turkey, Greece, and the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders, Makarios and Dr. Fazil Kucuk, respectively. The new constitution drew heavily on the ethnic composition of the island. The President would be a Greek Cypriot, and the Vice-President a Turkish Cypriot with an equal veto. The contribution to the public service would be set at a ratio of 70:30, and the Supreme Court would consist of an equal number of judges from both communities as well as an independent judge who was not Greek, Turkish or British. The Zurich Agreements were supplemented by a number of treaties. The Treaty of Guarantee stated that secession or union with any state was forbidden, and that Greece, Turkey and Britain would be given guarantor status to intervene if that was violated. The Treaty of Alliance allowed for two small Greek and Turkish military contingents to be stationed on the island, and the Treaty of Establishment gave Britain sovereignty over two bases in Akrotiri and Dhekelia.

 

On 15 August 1960, the Colony of Cyprus became fully independent as the Republic of Cyprus. The new republic remained within the Commonwealth of Nations.

 

The new constitution brought dissatisfaction to Greek Cypriots, who felt it to be highly unjust for them for historical, demographic and contributional reasons. Although 80% of the island's population were Greek Cypriots and these indigenous people had lived on the island for thousands of years and paid 94% of taxes, the new constitution was giving the 17% of the population that was Turkish Cypriots, who paid 6% of taxes, around 30% of government jobs and 40% of national security jobs.

 

Within three years tensions between the two communities in administrative affairs began to show. In particular disputes over separate municipalities and taxation created a deadlock in government. A constitutional court ruled in 1963 Makarios had failed to uphold article 173 of the constitution which called for the establishment of separate municipalities for Turkish Cypriots. Makarios subsequently declared his intention to ignore the judgement, resulting in the West German judge resigning from his position. Makarios proposed thirteen amendments to the constitution, which would have had the effect of resolving most of the issues in the Greek Cypriot favour. Under the proposals, the President and Vice-President would lose their veto, the separate municipalities as sought after by the Turkish Cypriots would be abandoned, the need for separate majorities by both communities in passing legislation would be discarded and the civil service contribution would be set at actual population ratios (82:18) instead of the slightly higher figure for Turkish Cypriots.

 

The intention behind the amendments has long been called into question. The Akritas plan, written in the height of the constitutional dispute by the Greek Cypriot interior minister Polycarpos Georkadjis, called for the removal of undesirable elements of the constitution so as to allow power-sharing to work. The plan envisaged a swift retaliatory attack on Turkish Cypriot strongholds should Turkish Cypriots resort to violence to resist the measures, stating "In the event of a planned or staged Turkish attack, it is imperative to overcome it by force in the shortest possible time, because if we succeed in gaining command of the situation (in one or two days), no outside, intervention would be either justified or possible." Whether Makarios's proposals were part of the Akritas plan is unclear, however it remains that sentiment towards enosis had not completely disappeared with independence. Makarios described independence as "a step on the road to enosis".[31] Preparations for conflict were not entirely absent from Turkish Cypriots either, with right wing elements still believing taksim (partition) the best safeguard against enosis.

 

Greek Cypriots however believe the amendments were a necessity stemming from a perceived attempt by Turkish Cypriots to frustrate the working of government. Turkish Cypriots saw it as a means to reduce their status within the state from one of co-founder to that of minority, seeing it as a first step towards enosis. The security situation deteriorated rapidly.

 

Main articles: Bloody Christmas (1963) and Battle of Tillyria

An armed conflict was triggered after December 21, 1963, a period remembered by Turkish Cypriots as Bloody Christmas, when a Greek Cypriot policemen that had been called to help deal with a taxi driver refusing officers already on the scene access to check the identification documents of his customers, took out his gun upon arrival and shot and killed the taxi driver and his partner. Eric Solsten summarised the events as follows: "a Greek Cypriot police patrol, ostensibly checking identification documents, stopped a Turkish Cypriot couple on the edge of the Turkish quarter. A hostile crowd gathered, shots were fired, and two Turkish Cypriots were killed."

 

In the morning after the shooting, crowds gathered in protest in Northern Nicosia, likely encouraged by the TMT, without incident. On the evening of the 22nd, gunfire broke out, communication lines to the Turkish neighbourhoods were cut, and the Greek Cypriot police occupied the nearby airport. On the 23rd, a ceasefire was negotiated, but did not hold. Fighting, including automatic weapons fire, between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and militias increased in Nicosia and Larnaca. A force of Greek Cypriot irregulars led by Nikos Sampson entered the Nicosia suburb of Omorphita and engaged in heavy firing on armed, as well as by some accounts unarmed, Turkish Cypriots. The Omorphita clash has been described by Turkish Cypriots as a massacre, while this view has generally not been acknowledged by Greek Cypriots.

 

Further ceasefires were arranged between the two sides, but also failed. By Christmas Eve, the 24th, Britain, Greece, and Turkey had joined talks, with all sides calling for a truce. On Christmas day, Turkish fighter jets overflew Nicosia in a show of support. Finally it was agreed to allow a force of 2,700 British soldiers to help enforce a ceasefire. In the next days, a "buffer zone" was created in Nicosia, and a British officer marked a line on a map with green ink, separating the two sides of the city, which was the beginning of the "Green Line". Fighting continued across the island for the next several weeks.

 

In total 364 Turkish Cypriots and 174 Greek Cypriots were killed during the violence. 25,000 Turkish Cypriots from 103-109 villages fled and were displaced into enclaves and thousands of Turkish Cypriot houses were ransacked or completely destroyed.

 

Contemporary newspapers also reported on the forceful exodus of the Turkish Cypriots from their homes. According to The Times in 1964, threats, shootings and attempts of arson were committed against the Turkish Cypriots to force them out of their homes. The Daily Express wrote that "25,000 Turks have already been forced to leave their homes". The Guardian reported a massacre of Turks at Limassol on 16 February 1964.

 

Turkey had by now readied its fleet and its fighter jets appeared over Nicosia. Turkey was dissuaded from direct involvement by the creation of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) in 1964. Despite the negotiated ceasefire in Nicosia, attacks on the Turkish Cypriot persisted, particularly in Limassol. Concerned about the possibility of a Turkish invasion, Makarios undertook the creation of a Greek Cypriot conscript-based army called the "National Guard". A general from Greece took charge of the army, whilst a further 20,000 well-equipped officers and men were smuggled from Greece into Cyprus. Turkey threatened to intervene once more, but was prevented by a strongly worded letter from the American President Lyndon B. Johnson, anxious to avoid a conflict between NATO allies Greece and Turkey at the height of the Cold War.

 

Turkish Cypriots had by now established an important bridgehead at Kokkina, provided with arms, volunteers and materials from Turkey and abroad. Seeing this incursion of foreign weapons and troops as a major threat, the Cypriot government invited George Grivas to return from Greece as commander of the Greek troops on the island and launch a major attack on the bridgehead. Turkey retaliated by dispatching its fighter jets to bomb Greek positions, causing Makarios to threaten an attack on every Turkish Cypriot village on the island if the bombings did not cease. The conflict had now drawn in Greece and Turkey, with both countries amassing troops on their Thracian borders. Efforts at mediation by Dean Acheson, a former U.S. Secretary of State, and UN-appointed mediator Galo Plaza had failed, all the while the division of the two communities becoming more apparent. Greek Cypriot forces were estimated at some 30,000, including the National Guard and the large contingent from Greece. Defending the Turkish Cypriot enclaves was a force of approximately 5,000 irregulars, led by a Turkish colonel, but lacking the equipment and organisation of the Greek forces.

 

The Secretary-General of the United Nations in 1964, U Thant, reported the damage during the conflicts:

 

UNFICYP carried out a detailed survey of all damage to properties throughout the island during the disturbances; it shows that in 109 villages, most of them Turkish-Cypriot or mixed villages, 527 houses have been destroyed while 2,000 others have suffered damage from looting.

 

The situation worsened in 1967, when a military junta overthrew the democratically elected government of Greece, and began applying pressure on Makarios to achieve enosis. Makarios, not wishing to become part of a military dictatorship or trigger a Turkish invasion, began to distance himself from the goal of enosis. This caused tensions with the junta in Greece as well as George Grivas in Cyprus. Grivas's control over the National Guard and Greek contingent was seen as a threat to Makarios's position, who now feared a possible coup.[citation needed] The National Guard and Cyprus Police began patrolling the Turkish Cypriot enclaves of Ayios Theodoros and Kophinou, and on November 15 engaged in heavy fighting with the Turkish Cypriots.

 

By the time of his withdrawal 26 Turkish Cypriots had been killed. Turkey replied with an ultimatum demanding that Grivas be removed from the island, that the troops smuggled from Greece in excess of the limits of the Treaty of Alliance be removed, and that the economic blockades on the Turkish Cypriot enclaves be lifted. Grivas was recalled by the Athens Junta and the 12,000 Greek troops were withdrawn. Makarios now attempted to consolidate his position by reducing the number of National Guard troops, and by creating a paramilitary force loyal to Cypriot independence. In 1968, acknowledging that enosis was now all but impossible, Makarios stated, "A solution by necessity must be sought within the limits of what is feasible which does not always coincide with the limits of what is desirable."

 

After 1967 tensions between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots subsided. Instead, the main source of tension on the island came from factions within the Greek Cypriot community. Although Makarios had effectively abandoned enosis in favour of an 'attainable solution', many others continued to believe that the only legitimate political aspiration for Greek Cypriots was union with Greece.

 

On his arrival, Grivas began by establishing a nationalist paramilitary group known as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston B or EOKA-B), drawing comparisons with the EOKA struggle for enosis under the British colonial administration of the 1950s.

 

The military junta in Athens saw Makarios as an obstacle. Makarios's failure to disband the National Guard, whose officer class was dominated by mainland Greeks, had meant the junta had practical control over the Cypriot military establishment, leaving Makarios isolated and a vulnerable target.

 

During the first Turkish invasion, Turkish troops invaded Cyprus territory on 20 July 1974, invoking its rights under the Treaty of Guarantee. This expansion of Turkish-occupied zone violated International Law as well as the Charter of the United Nations. Turkish troops managed to capture 3% of the island which was accompanied by the burning of the Turkish Cypriot quarter, as well as the raping and killing of women and children. A temporary cease-fire followed which was mitigated by the UN Security Council. Subsequently, the Greek military Junta collapsed on July 23, 1974, and peace talks commenced in which a democratic government was installed. The Resolution 353 was broken after Turkey attacked a second time and managed to get a hold of 37% of Cyprus territory. The Island of Cyprus was appointed a Buffer Zone by the United Nations, which divided the island into two zones through the 'Green Line' and put an end to the Turkish invasion. Although Turkey announced that the occupied areas of Cyprus to be called the Federated Turkish State in 1975, it is not legitimised on a worldwide political scale. The United Nations called for the international recognition of independence for the Republic of Cyprus in the Security Council Resolution 367.

 

In the years after the Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus one can observe a history of failed talks between the two parties. The 1983 declaration of the independent Turkish Republic of Cyprus resulted in a rise of inter-communal tensions and made it increasingly hard to find mutual understanding. With Cyprus' interest of a possible EU membership and a new UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 1997 new hopes arose for a fresh start. International involvement from sides of the US and UK, wanting a solution to the Cyprus dispute prior to the EU accession led to political pressures for new talks. The believe that an accession without a solution would threaten Greek-Turkish relations and acknowledge the partition of the island would direct the coming negotiations.

 

Over the course of two years a concrete plan, the Annan plan was formulated. In 2004 the fifth version agreed upon from both sides and with the endorsement of Turkey, US, UK and EU then was presented to the public and was given a referendum in both Cypriot communities to assure the legitimisation of the resolution. The Turkish Cypriots voted with 65% for the plan, however the Greek Cypriots voted with a 76% majority against. The Annan plan contained multiple important topics. Firstly it established a confederation of two separate states called the United Cyprus Republic. Both communities would have autonomous states combined under one unified government. The members of parliament would be chosen according to the percentage in population numbers to ensure a just involvement from both communities. The paper proposed a demilitarisation of the island over the next years. Furthermore it agreed upon a number of 45000 Turkish settlers that could remain on the island. These settlers became a very important issue concerning peace talks. Originally the Turkish government encouraged Turks to settle in Cyprus providing transfer and property, to establish a counterpart to the Greek Cypriot population due to their 1 to 5 minority. With the economic situation many Turkish-Cypriot decided to leave the island, however their departure is made up by incoming Turkish settlers leaving the population ratio between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots stable. However all these points where criticised and as seen in the vote rejected mainly by the Greek Cypriots. These name the dissolution of the „Republic of Cyprus", economic consequences of a reunion and the remaining Turkish settlers as reason. Many claim that the plan was indeed drawing more from Turkish-Cypriot demands then Greek-Cypriot interests. Taking in consideration that the US wanted to keep Turkey as a strategic partner in future Middle Eastern conflicts.

 

A week after the failed referendum the Republic of Cyprus joined the EU. In multiple instances the EU tried to promote trade with Northern Cyprus but without internationally recognised ports this spiked a grand debate. Both side endure their intention of negotiations, however without the prospect of any new compromises or agreements the UN is unwilling to start the process again. Since 2004 negotiations took place in numbers but without any results, both sides are strongly holding on to their position without an agreeable solution in sight that would suit both parties.

The Hall of the Muses

The Hall of the Muses, the spatial and ceremonial center of the state apartments, served as a dining room and offered the prestigious setting for glamorous soirees and splendid balls.

Five gorgeous crystal chandeliers enlighted the room in light brightness, 258 additional candles that were additionally anchored in the running rosette frieze, plunged it in a sea of ​​lights.

Hall of the Muses © Albertina, Vienna (Photo: Alexander Ch Wulz)

Musensaal

To the splendid appearance of the hall also contribute the precious stucco marble panelings of the wall panels and pilasters as well as the gilded doors and decorative elements.

The name of the hall is derived from the cycle of figures "Apollo and the Nine Muses". The life-size, with a marble imitating polishing white surface provided sandstone figures come from Joseph Klieber (1773-1859), who drew inspiration for this work from the oeuvres of the sculptor Antonio Canova.

www.albertina.at/das_palais/prunkraeume/musensaal

 

The Albertina

The architectural history of the Palais

 

"It is my will that ​​the expansion of the inner city of Vienna with regard to a suitable connection of the same with the suburbs as soon as possible is tackled and at this on Regulirung (regulation) and beautifying of my Residence and Imperial Capital is taken into account. To this end I grant the withdrawal of the ramparts and fortifications of the inner city and the trenches around the same".

This decree of Emperor Franz Joseph I, published on 25 December 1857 in the Wiener Zeitung, formed the basis for the largest the surface concerning and architecturally most significant transformation of the Viennese cityscape. Involving several renowned domestic and foreign architects a "master plan" took form, which included the construction of a boulevard instead of the ramparts between the inner city and its radially upstream suburbs. In the 50-years during implementation phase, an impressive architectural ensemble developed, consisting of imperial and private representational buildings, public administration and cultural buildings, churches and barracks, marking the era under the term "ring-street style". Already in the first year tithe decided a senior member of the Austrian imperial family to decorate the facades of his palace according to the new design principles, and thus certified the aristocratic claim that this also "historicism" said style on the part of the imperial house was attributed.

It was the palace of Archduke Albrecht (1817-1895), the Senior of the Habsburg Family Council, who as Field Marshal held the overall command over the Austro-Hungarian army. The building was incorporated into the imperial residence of the Hofburg complex, forming the south-west corner and extending eleven meters above street level on the so-called Augustinerbastei.

The close proximity of the palace to the imperial residence corresponded not only with Emperor Franz Joseph I and Archduke Albert with a close familial relationship between the owner of the palace and the monarch. Even the former inhabitants were always in close relationship to the imperial family, whether by birth or marriage. An exception here again proves the rule: Don Emanuel Teles da Silva Conde Tarouca (1696-1771), for which Maria Theresa in 1744 the palace had built, was just a close friend and advisor of the monarch. Silva Tarouca underpins the rule with a second exception, because he belonged to the administrative services as Generalhofbaudirektor (general court architect) and President of the Austrian-Dutch administration, while all other him subsequent owners were highest ranking military.

In the annals of Austrian history, especially those of military history, they either went into as commander of the Imperial Army, or the Austrian, later kk Army. In chronological order, this applies to Duke Carl Alexander of Lorraine, the brother-of-law of Maria Theresa, as Imperial Marshal, her son-in-law Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen, also field marshal, whos adopted son, Archduke Charles of Austria, the last imperial field marshal and only Generalissimo of Austria, his son Archduke Albrecht of Austria as Feldmarschalil and army Supreme commander, and most recently his nephew Archduke Friedrich of Austria, who held as field marshal from 1914 to 1916 the command of the Austro-Hungarian troops. Despite their military profession, all five generals conceived themselves as patrons of the arts and promoted large sums of money to build large collections, the construction of magnificent buildings and cultural life. Charles Alexander of Lorraine promoted as governor of the Austrian Netherlands from 1741 to 1780 the Academy of Fine Arts, the Théâtre de Ja Monnaie and the companies Bourgeois Concert and Concert Noble, he founded the Academie royale et imperial des Sciences et des Lettres, opened the Bibliotheque Royal for the population and supported artistic talents with high scholarships. World fame got his porcelain collection, which however had to be sold by Emperor Joseph II to pay off his debts. Duke Albert began in 1776 according to the concept of conte Durazzo to set up an encyclopedic collection of prints, which forms the core of the world-famous "Albertina" today.

1816 declared to Fideikommiss and thus in future indivisible, inalienable and inseparable, the collection 1822 passed into the possession of Archduke Carl, who, like his descendants, it broadened. Under him, the collection was introduced together with the sumptuously equipped palace on the Augustinerbastei in the so-called "Carl Ludwig'schen fideicommissum in 1826, by which the building and the in it kept collection fused into an indissoluble unity. At this time had from the Palais Tarouca by structural expansion or acquisition a veritable Residenz palace evolved. Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen was first in 1800 the third floor of the adjacent Augustinian convent wing adapted to house his collection and he had after 1802 by his Belgian architect Louis de Montoyer at the suburban side built a magnificent extension, called the wing of staterooms, it was equipped in the style of Louis XVI. Only two decades later, Archduke Carl the entire palace newly set up. According to scetches of the architect Joseph Kornhäusel the 1822-1825 retreaded premises presented themselves in the Empire style. The interior of the palace testified from now in an impressive way the high rank and the prominent position of its owner. Under Archduke Albrecht the outer appearance also should meet the requirements. He had the facade of the palace in the style of historicism orchestrated and added to the Palais front against the suburbs an offshore covered access. Inside, he limited himself, apart from the redesign of the Rococo room in the manner of the second Blondel style, to the retention of the paternal stock. Archduke Friedrich's plans for an expansion of the palace were omitted, however, because of the outbreak of the First World War so that his contribution to the state rooms, especially, consists in the layout of the Spanish apartment, which he in 1895 for his sister, the Queen of Spain Maria Christina, had set up as a permanent residence.

The era of stately representation with handing down their cultural values ​​found its most obvious visualization inside the palace through the design and features of the staterooms. On one hand, by the use of the finest materials and the purchase of masterfully manufactured pieces of equipment, such as on the other hand by the permanent reuse of older equipment parts. This period lasted until 1919, when Archduke Friedrich was expropriated by the newly founded Republic of Austria. With the republicanization of the collection and the building first of all finished the tradition that the owner's name was synonymous with the building name:

After Palais Tarouca or tarokkisches house it was called Lorraine House, afterwards Duke Albert Palais and Palais Archduke Carl. Due to the new construction of an adjacently located administration building it received in 1865 the prefix "Upper" and was referred to as Upper Palais Archduke Albrecht and Upper Palais Archduke Frederick. For the state a special reference to the Habsburg past was certainly politically no longer opportune, which is why was decided to name the building according to the in it kept collection "Albertina".

This name derives from the term "La Collection Albertina" which had been used by the gallery Inspector Maurice von Thausing in 1870 in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts for the former graphics collection of Duke Albert. For this reason, it was the first time since the foundation of the palace that the name of the collection had become synonymous with the room shell. Room shell, hence, because the Republic of Austria Archduke Friedrich had allowed to take along all the movable goods from the palace in his Hungarian exile: crystal chandeliers, curtains and carpets as well as sculptures, vases and clocks. Particularly stressed should be the exquisite furniture, which stems of three facilities phases: the Louis XVI furnitures of Duke Albert, which had been manufactured on the basis of fraternal relations between his wife Archduchess Marie Christine and the French Queen Marie Antoinette after 1780 in the French Hofmanufakturen, also the on behalf of Archduke Charles 1822-1825 in the Vienna Porcelain Manufactory by Joseph Danhauser produced Empire furnitures and thirdly additions of the same style of Archduke Friedrich, which this about 1900 at Portois & Ffix as well as at Friedrich Otto Schmidt had commissioned.

The "swept clean" building got due to the strained financial situation after the First World War initially only a makeshift facility. However, since until 1999 no revision of the emergency equipment took place, but differently designed, primarily the utilitarianism committed office furnitures complementarily had been added, the equipment of the former state rooms presented itself at the end of the 20th century as an inhomogeneous administrative mingle-mangle of insignificant parts, where, however, dwelt a certain quaint charm. From the magnificent state rooms had evolved depots, storage rooms, a library, a study hall and several officed.

Worse it hit the outer appearance of the palace, because in times of continued anti-Habsburg sentiment after the Second World War and inspired by an intolerant destruction will, it came by pickaxe to a ministerial erasure of history. In contrast to the graphic collection possessed the richly decorated facades with the conspicuous insignia of the former owner an object-immanent reference to the Habsburg past and thus exhibited the monarchial traditions and values ​​of the era of Francis Joseph significantly. As part of the remedial measures after a bomb damage, in 1948 the aristocratic, by Archduke Albert initiated, historicist facade structuring along with all decorations was cut off, many facade figures demolished and the Hapsburg crest emblems plunged to the ground. Since in addition the old ramp also had been cancelled and the main entrance of the bastion level had been moved down to the second basement storey at street level, ended the presence of the old Archduke's palace after more than 200 years. At the reopening of the "Albertina Graphic Collection" in 1952, the former Hapsburg Palais of splendour presented itself as one of his identity robbed, formally trivial, soulless room shell, whose successful republicanization an oversized and also unproportional eagle above the new main entrance to the Augustinian road symbolized. The emocratic throw of monuments had wiped out the Hapsburg palace from the urban appeareance, whereby in the perception only existed a nondescript, nameless and ahistorical building that henceforth served the lodging and presentation of world-famous graphic collection of the Albertina. The condition was not changed by the decision to the refurbishment because there were only planned collection specific extensions, but no restoration of the palace.

This paradigm shift corresponded to a blatant reversal of the historical circumstances, as the travel guides and travel books for kk Residence and imperial capital of Vienna dedicated itself primarily with the magnificent, aristocratic palace on the Augustinerbastei with the sumptuously fitted out reception rooms and mentioned the collection kept there - if at all - only in passing. Only with the repositioning of the Albertina in 2000 under the direction of Klaus Albrecht Schröder, the palace was within the meaning and in fulfillment of the Fideikommiss of Archduke Charles in 1826 again met with the high regard, from which could result a further inseparable bond between the magnificent mansions and the world-famous collection. In view of the knowing about politically motivated errors and omissions of the past, the facades should get back their noble, historicist designing, the staterooms regain their glamorous, prestigious appearance and culturally unique equippment be repurchased. From this presumption, eventually grew the full commitment to revise the history of redemption and the return of the stately palace in the public consciousness.

The smoothed palace facades were returned to their original condition and present themselves today - with the exception of the not anymore reconstructed Attica figures - again with the historicist decoration and layout elements that Archduke Albrecht had given after the razing of the Augustinerbastei in 1865 in order. The neoclassical interiors, today called after the former inhabitants "Habsburg Staterooms", receiving a meticulous and detailed restoration taking place at the premises of originality and authenticity, got back their venerable and sumptuous appearance. From the world wide scattered historical pieces of equipment have been bought back 70 properties or could be returned through permanent loan to its original location, by which to the visitors is made experiencable again that atmosphere in 1919 the state rooms of the last Habsburg owner Archduke Frederick had owned. The for the first time in 80 years public accessible "Habsburg State Rooms" at the Palais Albertina enable now again as eloquent testimony to our Habsburg past and as a unique cultural heritage fundamental and essential insights into the Austrian cultural history. With the relocation of the main entrance to the level of the Augustinerbastei the recollection to this so valuable Austrian Cultural Heritage formally and functionally came to completion. The vision of the restoration and recovery of the grand palace was a pillar on which the new Albertina should arise again, the other embody the four large newly built exhibition halls, which allow for the first time in the history of the Albertina, to exhibit the collection throughout its encyclopedic breadh under optimal conservation conditions.

The palace presents itself now in its appearance in the historicist style of the Ringstrassenära, almost as if nothing had happened in the meantime. But will the wheel of time should not, cannot and must not be turned back, so that the double standards of the "Albertina Palace" said museum - on the one hand Habsburg grandeur palaces and other modern museum for the arts of graphics - should be symbolized by a modern character: The in 2003 by Hans Hollein designed far into the Albertina square cantilevering, elegant floating flying roof. 64 meters long, it symbolizes in the form of a dynamic wedge the accelerated urban spatial connectivity and public access to the palace. It advertises the major changes in the interior as well as the huge underground extensions of the repositioned "Albertina".

Christian Benedictine

 

Art historian with research interests History of Architecture, building industry of the Hapsburgs, Hofburg and Zeremonialwissenschaft (ceremonial sciences). Since 1990 he works in the architecture collection of the Albertina. Since 2000 he supervises as director of the newly founded department "Staterooms" the restoration and furnishing of the state rooms and the restoration of the facades and explores the history of the palace and its inhabitants.

 

www.wien-vienna.at/albertinabaugeschichte.php

This build is part of a larger display I’m developing for exhibition next year, where I’ll be revisiting and expanding on the concept of Neo Fabuland—a reinterpretation of the classic Fabuland aesthetic, much like how Neo-Classic Space draws inspiration from the original Classic Space theme. If you’re curious, you can read more about the goals of the project here.

 

I currently have several builds in progress for this display, and this is the first one to be completed.

 

While not directly based on any specific Fabuland set, this watermill draws loose inspiration from 3679 Flour Mill and Shop. It features a weathered stone-and-timber structure beside a millpond, complete with a working waterwheel, lily pads, reeds, and rounded rocks. The water cascades over the rocks to form a small waterfall. I’m especially pleased with the textures throughout—the flowing water, the stonework, and the building itself—as well as a custom spreading tree technique I developed for this scene (and will likely reuse in future Neo Fabuland builds).

 

This build also showcases my approach to Neo Fabuland windows, using brick-built frames with vinyl-cut sticker panes to echo the distinctive charm of original Fabuland designs.

(for further information and pictures please go to the end of page and by clicking on the link you will get them!)

 

The newly constructed Theater an der Wien, 1801

On 13 June, 7 o'clock in the evening, Emanuel Schikaneder could open the Theater an der Wien as "Kaiserliches Königliches privileged Schauspielhaus" with the self-written allegorical feast prologue Thespis dream and the heroic opera by Franz Alexander Teyber. The stage house was outside ocher yellow with empire windows and inside blue and silver decorated (since the colors red and gold were the Court reserved) and "so spacious like no other in Vienna" - it took almost 2000 visitors. "Schikaneder is playing his artistical life in the suburbs of Vienna, where he has built himself a really stately home, whose equipment some drama director could visit with benefits and should..." (Johann Gottfried Seume on his "walk to Syracuse", October 1801)

1803

View Papagenotor (now Millöckergasse ) , 1801

After only two years, the funder and his theater director were divided and bankrupt. Schikaneder had the house to sell to his worst enemy, Peter Freiherr von Braun. But he kept - in the possession of the imperial privilege (as is still shown by the eagle above the Papageno Gate) - the artistic direction and he engaged Ludwig van Beethoven as musical director and composer-in-residence. On 3 April 1803 are in an "academy" the oratorio Christ on the Mount of Olives, the second Symphony, and the C minor piano concerto premiered .

1805

Beethoven's Fidelio, the Eroica and many of his orchestral works are at the Theater an der Wien, partly under Beethoven's direction or his involvement as pianist, premiered.

1810

Under the direction of the "Society of the Cavaliere" (Gesellschaft der Cavaliere) the frequently changing program, varied by musical theater, comedy, "academy" (concert) and tragedy, gets a new emphasis by the fashion of the knight pieces: So it comes on 17 March 1810 to the premiere of Heinrich von Kleist's Cathy of Heilbronn.

1812

Schikaneder dies totally impoverished and abandoned. His spirit lives on in his theater: There dominate performances with very spectacular effects, such as fairy tales and knights tournaments with sword fights and burning castles. To it belongs also Friedrich von Schiller's tragedy The Maid of Orleans with more than 400 people and 80 horses on stage. 1815-1821 the "children ballets of Count Palffy" are considered the biggest attraction, from which, among others, the later world-famous Fanny Elssler emerged.

1817

Gioacchino Rossini's operas trigger a genuine hysteria in Vienna. With the premiere of Franz Grillparzer's "the Ancestress" leaves something of Austrian classical music what has survived two centuries even at the Theater an der Wien its marks.

1818

Ferdinand Raimund acts the first time here. 1827 his magic game Moisasurs magic curse is premiered before Johann Nestroy dominats the next 20 years. Both were set on the Iron Curtain besides the Magic Flute a permanent monument.

1820

In August the Theater an der Wien for the first time is played in the lottery because the revenue is not sufficient to ensure the operation. Later on also lotteries bring the tenants money while the winners prefer get paid in cash as to take over the theater! The premiere of the opera The Magic Harp by Franz Schubert and his music to the romantic tragedy Rosamunde show that even musical theater and drama constantly mitmachten (took part) of the latest developments.

1825

Karl Carl, coming from Munich, takes over the totally indebted theater and conquers as "Staberl (de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staberl_(Theater)" fastly the heart of the Wiener. Spectacle comedies and knight pieces attract the audience while the new director treats his actors as supernumeraries (and pays them accordingly). The theater in the Josefstadt, too, 1827 comes under his leadership, and thereby Carl gains a new main character: Wenzel Scholz, the fat comedian who is not in vain immortalized alongside Nestroy and Raimund on the Iron Curtain.

1830.

The actress Therese Krones and Johann Nestroy enter into the ensemble of the Theater an der Wien. The following years bring some successful premieres of Nestroy, where he always plays a starring role and holds his contemporaries a mirror up to their face: 1833 The Vagabond (Lumpazivagabundus), 1835 On the ground floor and first floor, 1837 The House of temperaments, 1840 The Talisman, 1841 The Mädl from the suburbs, in 1842 a joke he wants to make, 1843 Love stories and Marriage Business, 1844 (the) Torn Apart.

Imperial. Royal. Theatre an der Wien (Kaiserliches Königliches Schauspielhaus an der Wien)

Through a "hostile takeover" (a benefactor paid the burdensome debt on the house) acquires Franz Pokorny the Theater an der Wien and director Karl Carl has to clear out along with his troupe. Pokorny in future wants to play mainly operas, but he goes very soon bankrupt, despite a sensational guest performance of the " Swedish Nightingale" Jenny Lind. After the turmoil of the 1848 revolution and the death of his father Alois Pokorny also leads rather luckless the directorate. Composer-in-residence Franz von Suppe (www.wienersymphoniker.at/concert/pid/000000e9h58500016f75) composed in 1860 with The boarding school the first Viennese operetta.

1862

With the acquisition of the house by Friedrich Stampfer the triumph of the operetta begins. The diva-in-residence Josefine Gallmeyer, attractive, cheeky and frivolous, introduces in Vienna the cancan. Marie Geistinger, her strongest competitor, ensures that Offenbach's greatest Parisian successes La Belle Hélène and The Grand Duchess of Gerolstein at the Theater an der Wien continue.

In this year not only acts Alexander Girardi for the first time at the Theater an der Wien, on 5 April begins with the world premiere of Johann Strauss' Die Fledermaus the "Golden Age of the Viennese operetta". For years to come, by the operettas of Johann Strauss (The Gypsy Baron, 1885), Carl Zeller (The Bird Seller, 1891) and Carl Millöcker (The Beggar Student, 1883) the need for entertainment of the Wiener and soon the whole world with great charm and the highest musical quality (quallität) is satisfied.

1900

Interior view of cabaret 'Hell', Photo 1910

The Biedermeier Vorhaus (outer house) ("at the Laimgruben 26") is replaced by a residential building in the style of the turn of the century. In the basement the building later houses the cabaret Hell, as today's break room is still called in the house jargon. In addition to cabaret programs, chanson evenings and comedies here are also small operettas premiered so inter alia (Leo) Fall's Brüderlein fein or Lehár's spring.

1905

Playbill 'The Merry Widow' by Franz Lehár, 1906

With The Merry Widow by Franz Lehár begins a successful second, the "Silver Age of Viennese operetta". Besides Lehar are mainly Emmerich Kálmán, Edmund Eysler, Leo Fall, Bruno Granichstaedten, as remnants of an almost bygone epoch Ralph Benatzky and Paul Abraham, the protagonists of this era. The special style of the Theater an der Wien, best entertainment with artistic commitment, is practiced by the Directors Wilhelm Karczag and his son Hubert Marischka almost forty years.

1923

Franz Lehar's The Yellow Jacket is premiered here and comes in 1930 with Richard Tauber as The Land of Smiles again .

1932

A final highlight: Sissy, to the music of violinist Fritz Kreisler, and Paula Wessely in the title role, is a series of successes. Hubert Marischka's brother Ernst will still twenty years later create from the same stuff with Romy Schneider in the title role the film legend Sissi.

1936

With Zarah Leander in Ralph Benatzky's Axel at heaven's door a long era comes to an end. The film for a long time will take over many tasks of the entertainment theater. Yet before the Anschluss of Austria to the German Reich in 1938 closed and not used except by some "Strength through Joy" events, the Theater an der Wien survives the war undamaged.

1945

On 6 October, the house with Fidelio is reopened by the ensemble of the Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Philharmonic under Josef Krips. In five productions (1945 The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and 1946 The Abduction from the Seraglio, 1947 Così fan tutte, and finally in 1948 The Magic Flute) arises under very specific conditions the legendary "Vienna Mozart style".

1951

For the 150-year celebration, the Theater an der Wien with an extensive repertoire and with the greatest conductors of the time (Karl Böhm, Hans Knappertsbusch or Clemens Kraus) has got the rank of one of the most important opera houses in Europe.

The Merry Widow is (initially with Johannes Heesters) was added as a summer operetta in the programme and shown the next 13 years. The Italian star tenor Giuseppe di Stefano with great success made a guest appearance in Lehár's The Land of Smiles.

1972

With heroes, heroes (music : Udo Jürgens), the first self-created musical production is premiered. This is followed 1977 by The glass of water and 1978 The Countess of Naschmarkt.

1983

Cats openes the directorate of Peter Weck and is the first long-running series of successes on the continent. This is followed by The Phantom of the Opera and Freudiana.

1992

In September the renowned opera director Harry Kupfer stages the world premiere of the musical Elisabeth.

1999

After the renovation and technical revision starts the musical Mozart! by Michael Kunze and Sylvester Levay, again directed by Harry Kupfer.

2005

With the last performance of Elisabeth on 4 December, the musical era ends at the Theater an der Wien. Under the directorship of Roland Geyer the house from January 2006 becomes the new opera house of the city of Vienna.

Logo

The ceremonial opening of the new opera house followed on 8 January 2006 with a gala concert under the baton of Plácido Domingo. Besides compositions by Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin, the programme with music for a celebration (Musik für ein Fest) of the Austrian composer Thomas Daniel Schlee also included a world premiere. With solemn speeches by Federal President Dr. Heinz Fischer, Mayor Michael Häupl and City Councillor Dr. Andreas Mailath-Pokorny, the Theater an der Wien was opened as a new opera house of the city of Vienna.

www.theater-wien.at/index.php/de/geschichte

   

 

During this Chinese New Year , family will get together , starting from the reunion dinner during the eve. Then staying up throughout the night aka guarding the night so that your loved one and parents will have longvetity....

Throughout the chinese new year , family will do home visiting to relatives and friends , with a pair of mandrain orange in their hand.

Kids during this period as they will received ang bao from the married adults. Ang bao aka red packet is a chinese new year tradition whereby the married will put $$$ inside it as a blessing.

 

One of the event during this festive period is River Hongbao.

 

.:Taken from From River HongBao 2012

 

Introduction

River Hongbao 2012

As the year of the Rabbit draws to a close, River Hongbao prepares to welcome the Year of the Dragon with the biggest New Year Carnival in Singapore at The Float @ Marina Bay! From 21st to 29th January 2012, The Float will be turned into a wonderland of culture, food, lights and entertainment daily from 12 noon to 11.30pm (On Chinese New Year’s Eve 22 January 2012, from 12 noon till 1am).

 

With 25 years of success, next year’s River Hongbao aims for even greater heights, focusing on Fun, Culture and Heritage. Visitors will get to learn more about Chinese culture and heritage while engaging in fun-filled activities throughout the River Hongbao site.

  

Highlights

The Wonders of Guangxi

River Hongbao will be collaborating with the Culture Department of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region for the very first time, bringing the region’s specialties in food, dance, song and handicraft to River HonIntroduction

River Hongbao 2012

As the year of the Rabbit draws to a close, River Hongbao prepares to welcome the Year of the Dragon with the biggest New Year Carnival in Singapore at The Float @ Marina Bay! From 21st to 29th January 2012, The Float will be turned into a wonderland of culture, food, lights and entertainment daily from 12 noon to 11.30pm (On Chinese New Year’s Eve 22 January 2012, from 12 noon till 1am).

 

With 25 years of success, next year’s River Hongbao aims for even greater heights, focusing on Fun, Culture and Heritage. Visitors will get to learn more about Chinese culture and heritage while engaging in fun-filled activities throughout the River Hongbao site.

  

Highlights

The Wonders of Guangxi

River Hongbao will be collaborating with the Culture Department of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region for the very first time, bringing the region’s specialties in food, dance, song and handicraft to River Hongbao visitors. Performers from the region’s ethnic minorities will entertain the audience with many song and dance items native to their individual tribes as well as excerpts adapted from the highly acclaimed movie Liu San Jie (刘三姐). Visitors will also have the opportunity to view traditional handicraft exhibits and get first hand experiences with live cultural demonstrations like caramel painting, paper cutting, rice carving and many more!

 

Lighting up the Bay

Possibly the largest lantern display in Southeast Asia, River Hongbao 2012 will see more than 60 exquisitely designed lanterns on display, adding to the spectacular view of the Marina Bay. Handcrafted by Chengdu craftsmen, this year will see a myriad of materials used and the marriage of traditional design with technical effects, creating livelier and more vibrant designs to bring the Float to life with lights, movement and sound.

 

Martial God of Wealth （武财神）

Chinese New Year is all about auspicious tidings and good luck, which makes the God of Wealth, deemed as the patron of wealth and prosperity, an integral part of River Hongbao. This year, River Hongbao welcomes the Martial God of Wealth as the main highlight of the lantern display. According to traditional belief, the Martial God of Wealth is a symbol used in boosting economy and bringing wealth and prosperity to businessmen. An expert in geomancy has also advised that placing the Martial God of Wealth at the Bay area this year will help in stabilize Singapore’s position in the recently tumultuous global economy.

 

Biggest ever River Hongbao Food Street

With more than 40 stalls, this year’s River Hongbao Food Street will be the biggest ever set up and aims to tantalize visitors’ taste buds with 70 varieties of New Year goodies and local hawker favourites like Hainanese Chicken Rice, Nasi Lemak, Roti Prata and many more. Other than local fare, visitors will also have the rare opportunity to sample Guangxi local specialties specially prepared by Guangxi chefs like Guilin Rice Noodles （桂林米粉）, Bamboo Rice （竹筒饭）and Yu Lin Meatballs （玉林肉蛋）.

River Hongbao will also be collaborating with At-Sunrice Globalchef Academy for the very first time, inviting their students to create and market a special Nian Gao （Chinese New Year Sticky Rice Cake年糕）, only available for sale at River Hongbao. More details of this culinary showcase will be unveiled in future press conferences.

 

Greater Youth Participation

Expect a more ‘youthful’ River Hongbao as the committee plans for more youth involvement. Students will be invited to train as tour guides of River Hongbao’s ‘History of Chinese Education in Singapore’ Exhibition as well as to visit the Exhibition as part of their Chinese cultural curriculum, organize Lantern Riddles Contest and also get the chance to perform nightly on the River Hongbao stage. Online quizzes, of which answers can only be found at River Hongbao site, will also be hosted via River Hongbao’s website (www.riverhongbao.sg) and Facebook Page to pique their interest.

 

Night after Night of exciting performances!

Nine nights of festivities, nine nights of exciting performances to wow the audience! With Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong gracing the event as the Guest-of-Honour, River Hongbao will open on 21st January with a wonderful fireworks display as well as performances by Guangxi Performing Group and Taiwanese Singer Zhang Xiu Qing（张秀卿）.

On 22nd January, President Tony Tan will be ushering in the Year of the Dragon with another spectacular fireworks display followed by exciting performances by Guangxi, Zhang Xiu Qing as well as our very own local performing groups, artistes and students!

From 26th to 29th January, our local talents like Liu Ling Ling, Huang Qing Yuan, Li Pei Fen, Wang Lei, Chen Jian Bin will be hosting Local Talent night (26th January), performers from the Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Philippines will entertain the masses on SCCCI Night (27th January), student groups will take center stage with

their dynamic performances on Youth Night (28th January) and performers from all different ethnic groups will come together in a grand finale to wrap up River Hong Bao on Harmony Night (29th January).

gbao visitors. Performers from the region’s ethnic minorities will entertain the audience with many song and dance items native to their individual tribes as well as excerpts adapted from the highly acclaimed movie Liu San Jie (刘三姐). Visitors will also have the opportunity to view traditional handicraft exhibits and get first hand experiences with live cultural demonstrations like caramel painting, paper cutting, rice carving and many more!

 

Lighting up the Bay

Possibly the largest lantern display in Southeast Asia, River Hongbao 2012 will see more than 60 exquisitely designed lanterns on display, adding to the spectacular view of the Marina Bay. Handcrafted by Chengdu craftsmen, this year will see a myriad of materials used and the marriage of traditional design with technical effects, creating livelier and more vibrant designs to bring the Float to life with lights, movement and sound.

 

Martial God of Wealth （武财神）

Chinese New Year is all about auspicious tidings and good luck, which makes the God of Wealth, deemed as the patron of wealth and prosperity, an integral part of River Hongbao. This year, River Hongbao welcomes the Martial God of Wealth as the main highlight of the lantern display. According to traditional belief, the Martial God of Wealth is a symbol used in boosting economy and bringing wealth and prosperity to businessmen. An expert in geomancy has also advised that placing the Martial God of Wealth at the Bay area this year will help in stabilize Singapore’s position in the recently tumultuous global economy.

 

Biggest ever River Hongbao Food Street

With more than 40 stalls, this year’s River Hongbao Food Street will be the biggest ever set up and aims to tantalize visitors’ taste buds with 70 varieties of New Year goodies and local hawker favourites like Hainanese Chicken Rice, Nasi Lemak, Roti Prata and many more. Other than local fare, visitors will also have the rare opportunity to sample Guangxi local specialties specially prepared by Guangxi chefs like Guilin Rice Noodles （桂林米粉）, Bamboo Rice （竹筒饭）and Yu Lin Meatballs （玉林肉蛋）.

River Hongbao will also be collaborating with At-Sunrice Globalchef Academy for the very first time, inviting their students to create and market a special Nian Gao （Chinese New Year Sticky Rice Cake年糕）, only available for sale at River Hongbao. More details of this culinary showcase will be unveiled in future press conferences.

 

Greater Youth Participation

Expect a more ‘youthful’ River Hongbao as the committee plans for more youth involvement. Students will be invited to train as tour guides of River Hongbao’s ‘History of Chinese Education in Singapore’ Exhibition as well as to visit the Exhibition as part of their Chinese cultural curriculum, organize Lantern Riddles Contest and also get the chance to perform nightly on the River Hongbao stage. Online quizzes, of which answers can only be found at River Hongbao site, will also be hosted via River Hongbao’s website (www.riverhongbao.sg) and Facebook Page to pique their interest.

 

Night after Night of exciting performances!

Nine nights of festivities, nine nights of exciting performances to wow the audience! With Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong gracing the event as the Guest-of-Honour, River Hongbao will open on 21st January with a wonderful fireworks display as well as performances by Guangxi Performing Group and Taiwanese Singer Zhang Xiu Qing（张秀卿）.

On 22nd January, President Tony Tan will be ushering in the Year of the Dragon with another spectacular fireworks display followed by exciting performances by Guangxi, Zhang Xiu Qing as well as our very own local performing groups, artistes and students!

From 26th to 29th January, our local talents like Liu Ling Ling, Huang Qing Yuan, Li Pei Fen, Wang Lei, Chen Jian Bin will be hosting Local Talent night (26th January), performers from the Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Philippines will entertain the masses on SCCCI Night (27th January), student groups will take center stage with

their dynamic performances on Youth Night (28th January) and performers from all different ethnic groups will come together in a grand finale to wrap up River Hong Bao on Harmony Night (29th January).

    

.:Taken from From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:.

  

Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays. In China, it is known as "Spring Festival," the literal translation of the Chinese name 春節 (Pinyin: Chūn Jié), since the spring season in Chinese calendar starts with lichun, the first solar term in a Chinese calendar year. It marks the end of the winter season, analogous to the Western carnival. The festival begins on the first day of the first month (Chinese: 正月; pinyin: Zhēng Yuè) in the traditional Chinese calendar and ends with Lantern Festival which is on the 15th day. Chinese New Year's Eve, a day where Chinese families gather for their annual reunion dinner, is known as Chú Xī (除夕) or "Eve of the Passing Year." Because the Chinese calendar is lunisolar, the Chinese New Year is often referred to as the "Lunar New Year".

 

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On March 14, Michael O’Hanlon—senior fellow and director of research for the Foreign Policy program at Brookings—engaged Undersecretary of the United States Army Ryan McCarthy in a discussion on the Army’s most recent budget request, its operational outlook, and the role it will play in future defense strategy.

 

Photo Credit: Paul Morigi

I know a RS5 isn't that rare but I like this picture very much. This was taken in my hometown , Mainz. I think I will be often there in future ! Hope you like it! feel free to comment and fav :)

 

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Tashilhunpo Monastery (Tibetan: བཀྲ་ཤིས་ལྷུན་པོ་), founded in 1447 by Gendun Drup, the First Dalai Lama, is a historic and culturally important monastery next to Shigatse, the second-largest city in Tibet.

 

It was sacked when the Gurkhas invaded Tibet and captured Shigatse in 1791 before a combined Tibetan and Chinese army drove them back as far as the outskirts of Kathmandu, when they were forced to agree to keep the peace in future, pay tribute every five years, and return what they had looted from Tashilhunpo.

 

The monastery is the traditional seat of successive Panchen Lamas, the second highest ranking tulku lineage in the Gelukpa tradition. The "Tashi" or Panchen Lama had temporal power over three small districts, though not over the town of Shigatse itself, which was administered by a dzongpön (prefect) appointed from Lhasa.

 

Located on a hill in the center of the city, the full name in Tibetan of the monastery means: "all fortune and happiness gathered here" or "heap of glory".

 

Fortunately, although two-thirds of the buildings were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, they were mainly the residences for the 4,000 monks and the monastery itself was not as extensively damaged as most other monasteries in Tibet, for it was the seat of the Panchen Lama who remained in Chinese-controlled territory.

   

I took this shot at a local gallery/fashion show which was held at Center City Galleries in my hometown of Paterson, NJ. Its one of my favorite shots of the night, the girl in the picture loved it and now many other photogs and models have viewed it on Facebook.

I was invited to display 5 of my images at the gallery on Saturday night where the fashion show was being held. Out of the five pieces I displayed on the wall, I actually sold two! It was a great night meeting and networking with other artist, photographers, and models. I printed out a bunch of my best shots on 5x7's which included my name & contact info to pass out to those who I mingled with during the night. I also had a chance to shoot a few models using studio lighting. The whole gallery experience along with the networking was the best thing I could have done for myself, walking away with new contacts was worth more than I can imagine. I now have a studio I can visit, and a handful of new model contacts to use in future shoots. I cant wait for the next oppurtunity, I look foward to making a habit out of going to galleries in the future even if its just for the purpose of networking.

 

Here is a series of shots I took on Saturday

 

www.louisfornaro.wordpress.com

   

IF.

I'm still not 100% sure about new bratz and especially in these.

 

First: This is an US exclusive so I didn't have idea how to order it. Second: blond doll (lavander eyes) with normal skin or black hair doll (lavender eyes) with lighter skin?

 

I've seen real pictures of these and they are way too different from these pictures on the site. This is for me a shame, since the faces of prototypes are way better. Really.

 

Plus, the lipsticks are different for each hair-skin color girl.

I would prefer the dark haired combo (lighter skin tone and better lipstick color) , but I just love lighter hair.

 

For now, my "idea" is to probably get a dark haired one (with more cold pink lips and lavender eyes) and in future commission a reroot with a strawberry blond saran hair.. What a stress.

 

And probably an endless thing.

 

Love the outfits.. Really love them and the fact I pick them is more special.. Indecision..

Designer SQ Elsa and Hans boxed, with slipcover.

 

I have finally deboxed the Designer Fairytale Snow Queen Elsa and Hans Doll Set (2015). My set is #4597 of 6000. It was the only set that I didn't get at the Disney Store raffle, so I had to order her online. I show the set boxed, during deboxing and fully deboxed. After deboxing them, I place them back on their display stand, in a different pose.

 

I was a little surprised that Elsa has the body construction of the 2012 DS Classic Princess dolls, so has external hinged knee joints and ankle joints. It makes her legs a bit unsightly when they are exposed by opening the slit of the skirt. She has shiny pearlescent skin that is similar to the Harrods Elsa doll, but doesn't have the heavy blush. Her Snow Queen outfit also has embellishments that are more similar to that of the Harrods Elsa rather than that of the LE 2500 Snow Queen Elsa. But rather than the jeweled snowflakes of the 17'' LE Elsa she has single clear rhinestones throughout her braid, and a few on her head. The snowflake and icicle design in her cape are printed rather than embroidered (as in the 17'' LE Elsas) or glittered (as in the Classic Elsa). They are flat and smooth, and I don't think are as effective in depicting ice.

 

The major embellishments of Designer Hans over Classic Hans are the addition of white gloves, and a sword. However, It's disappointing that there is no scabbard for the sword - it is loosely sewn to his pants legs, which looks rather cheap.

 

I will show the dolls in side by side comparisons to other Elsa and Hans dolls in future postings.

 

Elsa and Hans Doll Set - Disney Fairytale Designer Collection

US Disney Store

$129.95

Item No. 6003040901259P

 

Released in store 2015-10-27

Released online 2015-10-28

Sold out online in less than 25 minutes

Purchased online 2015-10-28

#4597 of 6000

 

Parvati (Devanagari: पार्वती, IAST: Pārvatī) is known as the motherly form of Mother Goddess Gauri Jagadamba, Parvati is another form of Shakti, the wife of Shiva and the gentle aspect of Maha Devi or Durga, the Great Goddess. Parvati is considered to be a complete incarnation of Adi Parashakti or Goddess Durga, with all other Goddesses being her incarnations or manifestations. Parvati is nominally the second consort of Shiva, the Hindu God of destruction and rejuvenation. However, she is not different from Sati, being the reincarnation of Shiva's first wife. Parvati is the mother of the Gods Ganesha, Kartikeya, Ashoka Sundari. Some communities also believe her to be the sister of Vishnu. She is also regarded as the daughter of King Himavan. Parvati, when depicted alongside Shiva, generally appears with two arms, but when alone, she is depicted having four, eight or ten arms, and is astride on a tiger or lion. Generally considered a benevolent Goddess, Parvati also has wrathful incarnations, such as Durga, Kali, Tara, Chandi, and the Dasha Mahavidyas (ten great wisdoms), Tripur Sundari (Shodashi), Bhuvaneshwari, Bhairavi, Chinnamasta, Dhumavati, Bagla Mukhi, Matangi and Kamala, as well as benevolent forms like Katyayani, Maha Gauri, Kamalatmika, Bhuvaneshwari and Lalita.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Parvata is one of the Sanskrit words for "mountain"; "Parvati" translates to "She of the mountains" and refers to Parvati being born the daughter of Himavan, lord of the mountains and the personification of the Himalayas. Other which associate her with mountains are Shailaja (Daughter of the mountains), Adrija or Nagajaa or Shailaputri (Daughter of Mountains), 'Haimavathi' (Daughter of Himavan) and 'Girija' or 'Girirajaputri' (Daughter of king of the mountains). Parvati's name is also sometimes considered a form of 'pavitra', meaning 'sinless' or 'holy' in Sanskrit. Her consort is Shiva and she is the sagun swaroop of the Supreme Being Adi Parashakti that is the material form of the supreme power.

 

She is also known by 108 names from the Durga Saptashati. These include Durga (invincible), Shakti (power), Ambika ('dear mother'), Gauri ('fair complexioned'), Bhairavi ('ferocious'), Kali ('dark'), Umā, Lalita, Mataji ('revered mother'), Sahana ('pure'), Maheshwari ('great goddess'). Bhavani, Shivaradni ('Queen of Shiva'), and many hundreds of others. The Lalita sahasranama contains an authoritative listing of 1,000 names of Parvati.

 

Two of Parvati's most famous epithets are Uma and Aparna. The name Uma is used for Sati in earlier texts, but in the Ramayana, it is used as synonym for Parvati. In the Harivamsa, Parvati is referred to as Aparna ('One who took no sustenance') and then addressed as Uma, who was dissuaded by her mother from severe austerity by saying u mā ('oh, don't').

 

The apparent contradiction that Parvati is addressed as the fair one, Gauri, as well as the dark one, Kali or Shyama is a philosophical matter. It suggests that the one calm and placid wife, Uma, in times of danger, can transfer back to her primal fierce and angry or (sometimes) Maternal nature as Kali, who stands uncloaked, with a foot on her husband's chest. The twin opposite colors, white and black represent the two opposing nature of the Goddess. Parvati is also the goddess of love and devotion, or Kamakshi.

 

GODDESS OF POWER

Parvati is the source of all the powers and weapons. She is the base of all kinds of powers that are used for doing any work. It is also believed that without her, Shiva remains as Shava or Corpse, for she is the ultimate source of power for all beings, gods and Devas. That is why she is considered as goddess of power. According to the Devi Bhagavatam, she is the most powerful of all. When her anger reaches its peak, she can destroy the whole universe in just seconds. Even Trinity i.e. Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, never try to make her angry at any cost.

 

Sarvarupe Sarveshe Sarvashakti Samanvite Bhayebhyastrahi no devi durge devi namostute

 

It translates to: We bow down to Devi Durga, who is source of all forms (sarvarupe), who is the goddess of all beings (sarveshe), in whom all power exists (Sarvashakti samanvite) and who destroys all fear (bhaye bhyastrai no devi).

 

RISE TO PROMINENCE

Parvati herself does not explicitly appear in Vedic literature, though the Kena Upanishad (3.12) contains a goddess called Uma-Haimavati. She appears as the shakti, or essential power, of the Supreme Brahman. Her primary role is as a mediator who reveals the knowledge of Brahman to the Vedic trinity of Agni, Vayu, and Indra, who were boasting about their recent defeat of a group of demons. But Kinsley notes: "it is little more than conjecture to identify her with the later goddess Satī-Pārvatī, although [..] later texts that extol Śiva and Pārvatī retell the episode in such a way to leave no doubt that it was Śiva's spouse.." Both textual and archaeological evidence suggests Sati-Parvati appears in the epic period (400 BC–400 AD), as both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata present Parvati as Shiva's wife. However, it is not until the plays of Kalidasa (5th-6th centuries) and the Puranas (4th through the 13th centuries) that the myths of Sati-Parvati and Shiva acquire more comprehensive details. Kinsley adds that Parvati may have emerged from legends of non-aryan goddesses that lived in mountains.

 

Prof. Weber suggests that like Shiva is combination of various Vedic gods Rudra and Agni, the Puranic Parvati is a combination of Uma, Haimavati, Ambika and earlier Parvati, identified as wives of Rudra; of others like Kali, who could be a wife of Agni and of Gauri and others inspired by Nirriti. Tate suggests Parvati is a mixture of the Vedic goddess Aditi and Nirriti, and being a mountain goddess herself, was associated with other mountain goddesses like Durga and Kali in later traditions.

 

BIRTH AND MARRIAGE

The Puranas repeatedly tell the tale of Sati's marriage to Shiva against her father Daksha's wishes and her subsequent self-immolation at Daksha's sacrifice, leaving Shiva grief-stricken and having lost interest in worldly affairs. In the Brahma Vaivarta Purana, Sati appears before Shiva, in her divine form, and reassures him that she will return as the daughter of Himavan. Sati is reborn as Parvati, the daughter of Himavat and Minavati, and is named Parvati, 'daughter of Himavant '. Sati, as well as Parvati, are considered manifestations of Mahadevi, the great Goddess. In the Ramayana, the river goddess Ganga is depicted as the elder sister of Parvati. In the Harivamsa, Parvati has two younger sisters called Ekaparna and Ekapatala. According to Devi Bhagawata Purana and Shiva Purana mount Himalaya and his wife Mena perform extreme austerities to appease the goddess Adi Shakti. Pleased with their penance the Adi Shakti agrees to be born as their daughter. When born goddess Parvati has four arms and manifests a divine light which pervades the entire Himalaya region on the auspicious tritiya day. Mena implores to the child to withdraw its four armed form and make herself visible as a two armed normal child to which the goddess agrees and becomes a normal girl child.

 

Parvati is depicted as interested in Shiva's tales and appearance from her very birth and eventually remembering her previous life as Sati. As Parvati grows into a young woman, she begins tapas (austerities) to please Shiva to grant her wish to reunite with him. She is portrayed as surpassing all other ascetics in austerity, undergoing severe mortifications and fasting. Finally, Shiva tests her devotion by appearing himself in disguise to criticize Shiva. Untouched by the act, Parvati retains her desire for Shiva, compelling him to marry her. After the marriage, Parvati moves to Mount Kailash, the residence of Shiva.

 

Kalidasa's epic Kumarasambhavam ("Birth of Kumara") details with matchlessly lyrical beauty the story of the maiden Parvati: her devotions aimed at gaining the favor of Shiva, the subsequent annihilation of Kamadeva, the consequent fall of the universe into barren lifelessness, the subsequent marriage of Parvati and Shiva, the birth of Kumara, and the eventual resurrection of Kamadeva after Parvati intercedes for him to Shiva.

 

MAIN FORMS OF PARVATI

As per devi bhagwata Purana, Goddess Parvati is lineal progenitor of all other goddesses. She is one who is source of all forms of goddesses. She is worshiped as one with many forms and name. Her different mood brings different forms or incarnation.

 

- Durga is demon fighting form of this Goddess, and some texts suggest Parvati took the form of Goddess Durga to kill Demon Durgam.

- Kali is another aspect that was assisted by Goddess Chandi while fighting with rakta bija. She was born from the forehead of the goddess. But many interpretations of scriptures suggests that it was Goddess Chamunda who has gotten same iconography as goddess Kali who is nobody but an aspect of Kali, even Parvati is considered to be Goddess Kali herself in her ferocious form.

- Goddess Chandi is the epithet of Maa Durga, who is created by the collection of all demigods and trimurti power, and then considered to be power of sagun parashakti (Parvati), She is black in color and rides on lion, she is known as the original slayer of Demon Mahishasura, considered to be a form taken by Durga herself.

- Ten Mahavidyas are the ten aspects of Shakti, in tantra all have great importance in majority, they all took birth from Goddess Sati, previous Incarnation of Shakti before Goddess Parvati. There is no difference between Sati and Parvati.

- 52 Shakti Peethas of Sati, proves that all Goddesses are expansions of the Goddess Parvati.

- Nava Durga nine forms of goddess Parvati.

 

SEVERAL INCARNATIONS OF THE GODDESS

- Goddess Meenakshi

- Goddess Kamakshi

- Goddess Lalita, the Original Goddess of Universe, Parvati is referred as her complete incarnation.

- Goddess Akhilandeshwari.

- Goddess Annapurna the representation of all that is complete and of food is Parvati Herself.

- and many others . . .

 

ASSOCIATION WITH SHIVA

Parvati's legends are intrinsically related to Shiva. In the goddess-oriented Shakta texts, that she is said to transcend even Shiva, and is identified as the Supreme Being. Just as Shiva is at once the presiding deity of destruction and regeneration, the couple jointly symbolise at once both the power of renunciation and asceticism and the blessings of marital felicity.

 

Parvati thus symbolises many different virtues esteemed by Hindu tradition: fertility, marital felicity, devotion to the spouse, asceticism, and power. Parvati represents the householder ideal in the perennial tension in Hinduism in the household ideal and the ascetic ideal, represented by Shiva. In classical Hindu mythology, the "raison d’être" of Parvati, and before that of Sati, is to lure Shiva into marriage and thus into a wider circle of worldly affairs.

 

Parvati tames Shiva, the "great unpredictable madman" with her presence. When Shiva does his violent, destructive Tandava dance, Parvati is described as calming him or complementing his violence by slow, creative steps of her own Lasya dance. In many myths, Parvati is not as much his complement as his rival, tricking, seducing, or luring him away from his ascetic practices.

 

Three images are central to the mythology, iconography and philosophy of Parvati:

 

- The theme of Shiva-Shakti

- The image of Shiva as Ardhanarishvara (the Lord who is half-woman)

- The image of the linga and the yoni

 

These images that combine the two deities, Shiva and Parvati, yield a vision of reconciliation, interdependence and harmony between the way of the ascetic and that of a householder.

 

The couple are often depicted in the Puranas as engaged in "dalliance" or seated on Mount Kailash or discussing abstract concepts in Hindu theology. Occasionally, they are depicted as quarrelling. In stories of the birth of Kartikeya, the couple are described as love-making generating the seed of Shiva. Parvati's union with Shiva symbolises the union of a male and female in "ecstasy and sexual bliss". In art, Parvati is depicted seated on Shiva's knee or standing beside him (together the couple is referred to as Uma-Maheshvara or Hara-Gauri) or as Annapurna (the goddess of grain) giving alms to Shiva.

 

Shaiva approaches tend to look upon Parvati primarily as the Shiva's submissive and obedient wife and helpmate. However, Shaktas focus on Parvati's equality or even superiority to her consort. The story of the birth of the ten Mahavidyas (Wisdom Goddesses) of Shakta Tantrism. This event occurs while Shiva is living with Parvati in her father's house. Following an argument, he attempts to walk out on her. Her rage manifests in the form of ten terrifying goddesses who block Shiva's every exit.

 

As the scholar David Kinsley explains:

 

- The fact that [Parvati] is able to physically restrain Shiva dramatically makes the point that she is superior in power. The theme of the superiority of the goddess over male deities is common in Shakta texts, [and] so the story is stressing a central Shakta theological principle. ... The fact that Shiva and Parvati are living in her father's house in itself makes this point, as it is traditional in many parts of India for the wife to leave her father's home upon marriage and become a part of her husband's lineage and live in his home among his relatives. That Shiva dwells in Parvati's house thus implies Her priority in their relationship. Her priority is also demonstrated in her ability, through the Mahavidyas, to thwart Shiva's will and assert her own.

 

Aum Girijayai cha vidmahe Shivapriyayai cha dhimahi tanno durgah prachodayat

 

May the goddess Durga, who is the daughter of the mountains and the beloved of lord Shiva illumine me with spiritual wisdom

 

Sarvamangala mangalye shive sarvardha sadhike sharanye tryambake gouri narayani namostute

 

I bow down to and take the refuge of the three eyed Mother Gouri(Parvati) of fair countenance,who is the embodiment of supreme auspiciousness, the giver of all the benedictions,the beloved of Lord Shiva and the power of lord Narayana.

 

RELATIONSHIP TO VISHNU

During the initial stages when Parvathi was performing intense puja to Shiva to obtain Shiva as her husband, Shiva kept testing her by destroying the Shiva lingam she constructed to perform puja. Vishnu then helped in constructing a Shiva lingam for Parvati which was not destroyed by Shiva because of the respect Shiva had towards Vishnu. Thus Vishnu helped Paravthi in continuing her puja for Shiva. This is when Parvathi tied a knot to Vishnu's hand and claimed him as her brother. This is the reason during the marriage of Shiva and Parvathi, Vishnu got involved in all the ceremonies that are supposed to be done by the bride’s brother. This is how Parvati is related to Vishnu as a sister.

 

The interesting story about the relationship between Vishnu and Parvati is more clearly depicted in Markandeya Purana where it is said that Mahalakshmi or Durga was the only one. Then she transforms into Mahakali and Mahasarasvati. After which she ask them to evolve pair. Here Mahalakshmi gives rise to brahma and lakshmi, Mahakali evolved Shiv and Saraswati while Mahasarsvati gave rise to Vishnu and parvati. Then Mahalakshmi ordered rest to interchange pairs for marriage and Shiv was provided with parvati, vishnu with lakshmi and brahma with saraswati. Its quite interesting that Mahasarsvati who is goddess of education gives birth to parvati and vishnu and both of them in future tells Geeta to Himalaya and Arjun respectively.

 

MOTHER OF GANESHA

Though Ganesha considered to be son of Shiva and Parvati, the Matsya Purana, Shiva Purana, and Skanda Purana ascribe the birth of Ganesha to Parvati only, without any form of participation of Shiva in Ganesha's birth.

 

Once, while Parvati wanted to take a bath, there were no attendants around to guard her and stop anyone from accidentally entering the house. Hence she created an image of a boy out of turmeric paste which she prepared to cleanse her body, and infused life into it, and thus Ganesha was born. Parvati ordered Ganesha not to allow anyone to enter the house, and Ganesha obediently followed his mother's orders. After a while Shiva returned and tried to enter the house, Ganesha stopped him. Shiva was infuriated and it started a chain of events leading to war of the entire heavenly kingdom and the lone child. Midst the war, Shiva lost his temper and severed the boy's head with his trident. When Parvati came out and saw her son's lifeless body, she was very angry. She immediately revealed her true self as Adi Shakti, the primodial power. She called upon the nine forms within her, the nine forms surrounded her. She ordered them to destroy the whole world and if her son does not get back to life, then everyone and everything will be destroyed and demanded that Shiva restore Ganesha's life at once. The Gods prostrated at her feet and an elephant's head was attached to Ganesha's body, bringing him back to life. To appease Parvati further, Shiva declared that the child be made head of the ghost-followers (Gana's)of Shiva and worshipped by everyone before beginning any activity, and gods accepted this condition.

 

Ganesha is identified as a god named after his mother. He is called Umaputra, Parvatisuta, Gaurisuta meaning son of Parvati and Heramba, "mother's beloved (son)".

 

ICONOGRAPHY

Naturally, Parvati’s unique characteristics have become more and more obscured, as she absorbed more and more goddesses into her iconography. Therefore, her depictions have become rather generic today. When shown with Shiva, she carries a blue lotus in full bloom, shows the abhaya mudra (hand gesture of fearlessness) and usually has one of her children on her knee. The only hint of her former occult status is the somewhat languid appearance of her eyes, as one who has recently emerged from deep meditation. Other goddesses are usually shown with large staring eyes as this is considered a mark of beauty. The consorts of the other two Gods of the trinity, Saraswati and Lakshmi, may be depicted alone, but Parvati hasn’t been depicted this way for many centuries.

 

The goddess is usually represented as a fair and beautiful. The colour of her vestments is milk-white, the colour of enlightenment and knowledge. Since white is a combination of all hues it shows that She has all the qualities or Gunas. Since white also depicts huelesness, it indicates that She is devoid of all Gunas. Hence, She is referred to as Trigunatmika (having the three gunas - Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas) - and at the same time being Nirguna (without any gunas). She has three eyes. Her accoutrements tend to be those of a Rishi (seer). She is also usually depicted with jatamukuta or a crown of matted hair, as Shiva is usually depicted. She is also shown as having a crescent moon bound in her locks, like Shiva.

 

Images of Parvati, wearing a sacred thread something not many women are associated with and as this marks the second-birth or dwija it is seems an advanced concept far beyond early pashupatas, and with her hair styled in a top knot like a Rishi (seer) survive into the Chola period (approximately ninth century A.D.). In fact, these two particularities were the only means of distinguishing her statuary from the images of the Goddess Shri of the time.

 

Her Mudras (symbolic hand gestures) are Kataka-fascination and enchantment, Hirana - the antelope, the powers of nature and the elusive, Tarjani - gesture of menace, and Chandrakal - the moon, a symbol of intelligence. Kataka must be affected by one of the foremost hands as it is a means of drawing the worshiper closer. Tarjani must be described with the left hand, which symbolises contempt, and usually in the back set of hands. If Parvati is depicted with two hands, then Tarjani and Chandrakal may be dropped but Hirana and Kataka are signature except in very modern representations, where Abhaya (fearlessness), and Varada, (beneficence), are used.

 

ASSOCIATION WITH OTHER GODDESSES

In several myths, the presence of a dark, violent side of this otherwise benign Parvati is suggested. When approached by the gods to defeat demons, Parvati morphs back to her true self, shakti, which is pure energy, untamed, unchecked and chaotic. Her wrath crystallizes into a dark, blood thirsty, tangled-hair Goddess with an open mouth and a drooping tongue. This goddess is usually identified as the terrible mahakali or Kali. In Linga Purana, Parvati summons Kali on the request of Shiva, to destroy a female asura (demoness) Daruka. Even after destroying the demoness, Kali's wrath could not be controlled. She ran around the three worlds in her mad, blind fury and creation was endangered. To lower Kali's rage, Shiva appeared as a crying baby in the middle of a battlefield. The cries of the baby raised the maternal instinct of Kali who started breast-feeding Shiva and resorted back to her benign form as Parvati. Kali is associated and identified with Parvati as Shiva's consort.

 

In Skanda Purana, Parvati is said to have assumed a form of a warrior-goddess and defeated a demon called Durg who assumes the form of a buffalo. Thereafter, she is by the name Durga. In myths relating to her defeat of demons Sumbha and Nisumbha, Durga emerges from Parvati when Parvati sheds her outer sheath, which takes an identity of its own as a warrior goddess.

 

Although Parvati is considered to be synonymous with Kali, Durga, Kamakshi, Meenakshi, Gauri and many others in modern day Hinduism, many of these “forms” or incarnations originated from different sects, or traditions, and the distinctions from Parvati are pertinent.

 

The Shastras (sanctioned works of religious doctrine) attribute the golden colour of goddess Gauri’s skin and ornaments to the story of Parvati casting off her unwanted dark complexion after Shiva teased her, but the cult of Gauri tells a different story. Gauri is in essence a fertility Goddess, and is venerated as a corn mother which would seem to suggest that she owes her colouring to the hues of ripening grain, for which she is propitiated.

 

So whatever be said, Goddess Parvati has two main forms, what actually shaktas says out of which one is Lalita who is Supreme in Srikula family of shaktism and second one is Durga or kali who is supreme in kalikula family.

 

WORSHIP AND FESTIVALS

The Gowri Habba, or Gauri Festival, is celebrated on the seventh, eighth, ninth of Bhadrapada Shukla paksha. She is worshipped as the goddess of harvest and protectress of women. Her festival, chiefly observed by women, is closely associated with the festival of her son Ganesha (Ganesh Chaturthi). The festival is popular in Maharashtra and Karnataka.

 

In Rajasthan the worship of Gauri happens during the Gangaur festival. The festival starts on the first day of Chaitra the day after Holi and continues for 18 days. Images of Issar and Gauri are made from Clay for the festival.

 

Another very popular festival in regard to the Mother Parvati is Navratri, in which all her manfestations are worshiped for nine days. Actually the festival is associated with Her warrior appearance is Mother Durga, with her nine forms i.e. Shailputri, Brahmacharini, Chandraghanta, Kashmunda, Skandmata, Katyani, Kalratri, Mahagauri, Siddhidaatri.

 

Another festival Gauri tritiya is celebrated from Chaitra shukla third to Vaishakha shukla third. It is believed that Parvati spends a month at her parent's home now. This festival is popular in Maharashtra and Karnataka, less observed in North India and unknown in Bengal. The unwidowed women of the household erect a series of platforms in a pyramidal shape with the image of the goddess at the top and collection of ornaments, images of other Hindu deities, pictures, shells etc. below. Neighbours are invited and presented with turmeric, fruits, flowers etc. as gifts. At night, prayers are held by singing and dancing. Down south in Tamil Nadu and Andhra The Kethara Gauri Vritham festival is celebrated on the new moon day of Diwali and the unwidowed women of the family fast for the whole day and prepare sweets and worship the goddess for the well-being of the family.

 

FAMOUS TEMPLES

Annapurneshwari Temple, Cherukunnu, Kannur, Kerala is dedicated to an aspect of Parvati.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Parvati (Devanagari: पार्वती, IAST: Pārvatī) is known as the motherly form of Mother Goddess Gauri Jagadamba, Parvati is another form of Shakti, the wife of Shiva and the gentle aspect of Maha Devi or Durga, the Great Goddess. Parvati is considered to be a complete incarnation of Adi Parashakti or Goddess Durga, with all other Goddesses being her incarnations or manifestations. Parvati is nominally the second consort of Shiva, the Hindu God of destruction and rejuvenation. However, she is not different from Sati, being the reincarnation of Shiva's first wife. Parvati is the mother of the Gods Ganesha, Kartikeya, Ashoka Sundari. Some communities also believe her to be the sister of Vishnu. She is also regarded as the daughter of King Himavan. Parvati, when depicted alongside Shiva, generally appears with two arms, but when alone, she is depicted having four, eight or ten arms, and is astride on a tiger or lion. Generally considered a benevolent Goddess, Parvati also has wrathful incarnations, such as Durga, Kali, Tara, Chandi, and the Dasha Mahavidyas (ten great wisdoms), Tripur Sundari (Shodashi), Bhuvaneshwari, Bhairavi, Chinnamasta, Dhumavati, Bagla Mukhi, Matangi and Kamala, as well as benevolent forms like Katyayani, Maha Gauri, Kamalatmika, Bhuvaneshwari and Lalita.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Parvata is one of the Sanskrit words for "mountain"; "Parvati" translates to "She of the mountains" and refers to Parvati being born the daughter of Himavan, lord of the mountains and the personification of the Himalayas. Other which associate her with mountains are Shailaja (Daughter of the mountains), Adrija or Nagajaa or Shailaputri (Daughter of Mountains), 'Haimavathi' (Daughter of Himavan) and 'Girija' or 'Girirajaputri' (Daughter of king of the mountains). Parvati's name is also sometimes considered a form of 'pavitra', meaning 'sinless' or 'holy' in Sanskrit. Her consort is Shiva and she is the sagun swaroop of the Supreme Being Adi Parashakti that is the material form of the supreme power.

 

She is also known by 108 names from the Durga Saptashati. These include Durga (invincible), Shakti (power), Ambika ('dear mother'), Gauri ('fair complexioned'), Bhairavi ('ferocious'), Kali ('dark'), Umā, Lalita, Mataji ('revered mother'), Sahana ('pure'), Maheshwari ('great goddess'). Bhavani, Shivaradni ('Queen of Shiva'), and many hundreds of others. The Lalita sahasranama contains an authoritative listing of 1,000 names of Parvati.

 

Two of Parvati's most famous epithets are Uma and Aparna. The name Uma is used for Sati in earlier texts, but in the Ramayana, it is used as synonym for Parvati. In the Harivamsa, Parvati is referred to as Aparna ('One who took no sustenance') and then addressed as Uma, who was dissuaded by her mother from severe austerity by saying u mā ('oh, don't').

 

The apparent contradiction that Parvati is addressed as the fair one, Gauri, as well as the dark one, Kali or Shyama is a philosophical matter. It suggests that the one calm and placid wife, Uma, in times of danger, can transfer back to her primal fierce and angry or (sometimes) Maternal nature as Kali, who stands uncloaked, with a foot on her husband's chest. The twin opposite colors, white and black represent the two opposing nature of the Goddess. Parvati is also the goddess of love and devotion, or Kamakshi.

 

GODDESS OF POWER

Parvati is the source of all the powers and weapons. She is the base of all kinds of powers that are used for doing any work. It is also believed that without her, Shiva remains as Shava or Corpse, for she is the ultimate source of power for all beings, gods and Devas. That is why she is considered as goddess of power. According to the Devi Bhagavatam, she is the most powerful of all. When her anger reaches its peak, she can destroy the whole universe in just seconds. Even Trinity i.e. Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, never try to make her angry at any cost.

 

Sarvarupe Sarveshe Sarvashakti Samanvite Bhayebhyastrahi no devi durge devi namostute

 

It translates to: We bow down to Devi Durga, who is source of all forms (sarvarupe), who is the goddess of all beings (sarveshe), in whom all power exists (Sarvashakti samanvite) and who destroys all fear (bhaye bhyastrai no devi).

 

RISE TO PROMINENCE

Parvati herself does not explicitly appear in Vedic literature, though the Kena Upanishad (3.12) contains a goddess called Uma-Haimavati. She appears as the shakti, or essential power, of the Supreme Brahman. Her primary role is as a mediator who reveals the knowledge of Brahman to the Vedic trinity of Agni, Vayu, and Indra, who were boasting about their recent defeat of a group of demons. But Kinsley notes: "it is little more than conjecture to identify her with the later goddess Satī-Pārvatī, although [..] later texts that extol Śiva and Pārvatī retell the episode in such a way to leave no doubt that it was Śiva's spouse.." Both textual and archaeological evidence suggests Sati-Parvati appears in the epic period (400 BC–400 AD), as both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata present Parvati as Shiva's wife. However, it is not until the plays of Kalidasa (5th-6th centuries) and the Puranas (4th through the 13th centuries) that the myths of Sati-Parvati and Shiva acquire more comprehensive details. Kinsley adds that Parvati may have emerged from legends of non-aryan goddesses that lived in mountains.

 

Prof. Weber suggests that like Shiva is combination of various Vedic gods Rudra and Agni, the Puranic Parvati is a combination of Uma, Haimavati, Ambika and earlier Parvati, identified as wives of Rudra; of others like Kali, who could be a wife of Agni and of Gauri and others inspired by Nirriti. Tate suggests Parvati is a mixture of the Vedic goddess Aditi and Nirriti,and being a mountain goddess herself, was associated with other mountain goddesses like Durga and Kali in later traditions.

 

BIRTH AND MARRIAGE

The Puranas repeatedly tell the tale of Sati's marriage to Shiva against her father Daksha's wishes and her subsequent self-immolation at Daksha's sacrifice, leaving Shiva grief-stricken and having lost interest in worldly affairs. In the Brahma Vaivarta Purana, Sati appears before Shiva, in her divine form, and reassures him that she will return as the daughter of Himavan. Sati is reborn as Parvati, the daughter of Himavat and Minavati, and is named Parvati, 'daughter of Himavant ' . Sati, as well as Parvati, are considered manifestations of Mahadevi, the great Goddess. In the Ramayana, the river goddess Ganga is depicted as the elder sister of Parvati. In the Harivamsa, Parvati has two younger sisters called Ekaparna and Ekapatala. According to Devi Bhagawata Purana and Shiva Purana mount Himalaya and his wife Mena perform extreme austerities to appease the goddess Adi Shakti. Pleased with their penance the Adi Shakti agrees to be born as their daughter. When born goddess Parvati has four arms and manifests a divine light which pervades the entire Himalaya region on the auspicious tritiya day. Mena implores to the child to withdraw its four armed form and make herself visible as a two armed normal child to which the goddess agrees and becomes a normal girl child.

 

Parvati is depicted as interested in Shiva's tales and appearance from her very birth and eventually remembering her previous life as Sati. As Parvati grows into a young woman, she begins tapas (austerities) to please Shiva to grant her wish to reunite with him. She is portrayed as surpassing all other ascetics in austerity, undergoing severe mortifications and fasting. Finally, Shiva tests her devotion by appearing himself in disguise to criticize Shiva. Untouched by the act, Parvati retains her desire for Shiva, compelling him to marry her. After the marriage, Parvati moves to Mount Kailash, the residence of Shiva.

 

Kalidasa's epic Kumarasambhavam ("Birth of Kumara") details with matchlessly lyrical beauty the story of the maiden Parvati: her devotions aimed at gaining the favor of Shiva, the subsequent annihilation of Kamadeva, the consequent fall of the universe into barren lifelessness, the subsequent marriage of Parvati and Shiva, the birth of Kumara, and the eventual resurrection of Kamadeva after Parvati intercedes for him to Shiva.

 

MAIN FORMS OF PARVATI

As per devi bhagwata Purana, Goddess Parvati is lineal progenitor of all other goddesses. She is one who is source of all forms of goddesses. She is worshiped as one with many forms and name. Her different mood brings different forms or incarnation.

 

- Durga is demon fighting form of this Goddess, and some texts suggest Parvati took the form of Goddess Durga to kill Demon Durgam.

- Kali is another aspect that was assisted by Goddess Chandi while fighting with rakta bija. She was born from the forehead of the goddess. But many interpretations of scriptures suggests that it was Goddess Chamunda who has gotten same iconography as goddess Kali who is nobody but an aspect of Kali, even Parvati is considered to be Goddess Kali herself in her ferocious form.

- Goddess Chandi is the epithet of Maa Durga, who is created by the collection of all demigods and trimurti power, and then considered to be power of sagun parashakti (Parvati), She is black in color and rides on lion, she is known as the original slayer of Demon Mahishasura, considered to be a form taken by Durga herself.

- Ten Mahavidyas are the ten aspects of Shakti, in tantra all have great importance in majority, they all took birth from Goddess Sati, previous Incarnation of Shakti before Goddess Parvati. There is no difference between Sati and Parvati.

- 52 Shakti Peethas of Sati, proves that all Goddesses are expansions of the Goddess Parvati.

- Nava Durga nine forms of goddess Parvati.

 

SEVERAL INCARNATIONS OF THE GODDESS

- Goddess Meenakshi

- Goddess Kamakshi

- Goddess Lalita, the Original Goddess of Universe, Parvati is referred as her complete incarnation.

- Goddess Akhilandeshwari.

- Goddess Annapurna the representation of all that is complete and of food is Parvati Herself.

 

And many others.

 

ASSOCIATION WITH SHIVA

Parvati's legends are intrinsically related to Shiva. In the goddess-oriented Shakta texts, that she is said to transcend even Shiva, and is identified as the Supreme Being. Just as Shiva is at once the presiding deity of destruction and regeneration, the couple jointly symbolise at once both the power of renunciation and asceticism and the blessings of marital felicity.

 

Parvati thus symbolises many different virtues esteemed by Hindu tradition: fertility, marital felicity, devotion to the spouse, asceticism, and power. Parvati represents the householder ideal in the perennial tension in Hinduism in the household ideal and the ascetic ideal, represented by Shiva. In classical Hindu mythology, the "raison d’être" of Parvati, and before that of Sati, is to lure Shiva into marriage and thus into a wider circle of worldly affairs.

 

Parvati tames Shiva, the "great unpredictable madman" with her presence. When Shiva does his violent, destructive Tandava dance, Parvati is described as calming him or complementing his violence by slow, creative steps of her own Lasya dance. In many myths, Parvati is not as much his complement as his rival, tricking, seducing, or luring him away from his ascetic practices.

 

Three images are central to the mythology, iconography and philosophy of Parvati:

 

- The theme of Shiva-Shakti

- The image of Shiva as Ardhanarishvara (the Lord who is half-woman)

- The image of the linga and the yoni

 

These images that combine the two deities, Shiva and Parvati, yield a vision of reconciliation, interdependence and harmony between the way of the ascetic and that of a householder.

 

The couple are often depicted in the Puranas as engaged in "dalliance" or seated on Mount Kailash or discussing abstract concepts in Hindu theology. Occasionally, they are depicted as quarrelling. In stories of the birth of Kartikeya, the couple are described as love-making generating the seed of Shiva. Parvati's union with Shiva symbolises the union of a male and female in "ecstasy and sexual bliss". In art, Parvati is depicted seated on Shiva's knee or standing beside him (together the couple is referred to as Uma-Maheshvara or Hara-Gauri) or as Annapurna (the goddess of grain) giving alms to Shiva.

 

Shaiva approaches tend to look upon Parvati primarily as the Shiva's submissive and obedient wife and helpmate. However, Shaktas focus on Parvati's equality or even superiority to her consort. The story of the birth of the ten Mahavidyas (Wisdom Goddesses) of Shakta Tantrism. This event occurs while Shiva is living with Parvati in her father's house. Following an argument, he attempts to walk out on her. Her rage manifests in the form of ten terrifying goddesses who block Shiva's every exit.

 

As the scholar David Kinsley explains:

 

- The fact that [Parvati] is able to physically restrain Shiva dramatically makes the point that she is superior in power. The theme of the superiority of the goddess over male deities is common in Shakta texts, [and] so the story is stressing a central Shakta theological principle. ... The fact that Shiva and Parvati are living in her father's house in itself makes this point, as it is traditional in many parts of India for the wife to leave her father's home upon marriage and become a part of her husband's lineage and live in his home among his relatives. That Shiva dwells in Parvati's house thus implies Her priority in their relationship. Her priority is also demonstrated in her ability, through the Mahavidyas, to thwart Shiva's will and assert her own.

 

Aum Girijayai cha vidmahe Shivapriyayai cha dhimahi tanno durgah prachodayat

 

May the goddess Durga, who is the daughter of the mountains and the beloved of lord Shiva illumine me with spiritual wisdom

 

Sarvamangala mangalye shive sarvardha sadhike sharanye tryambake gouri narayani namostute

 

I bow down to and take the refuge of the three eyed Mother Gouri(Parvati) of fair countenance,who is the embodiment of supreme auspiciousness, the giver of all the benedictions,the beloved of Lord Shiva and the power of lord Narayana.

 

RELATIONSHIP TO VISHNU

During the initial stages when Parvathi was performing intense puja to Shiva to obtain Shiva as her husband, Shiva kept testing her by destroying the Shiva lingam she constructed to perform puja. Vishnu then helped in constructing a Shiva lingam for Parvati which was not destroyed by Shiva because of the respect Shiva had towards Vishnu. Thus Vishnu helped Paravthi in continuing her puja for Shiva. This is when Parvathi tied a knot to Vishnu's hand and claimed him as her brother. This is the reason during the marriage of Shiva and Parvathi, Vishnu got involved in all the ceremonies that are supposed to be done by the bride’s brother. This is how Parvati is related to Vishnu as a sister.

 

The interesting story about the relationship between Vishnu and Parvati is more clearly depicted in Markandeya Purana where it is said that Mahalakshmi or Durga was the only one. Then she transforms into Mahakali and Mahasarasvati. After which she ask them to evolve pair. Here Mahalakshmi gives rise to brahma and lakshmi, Mahakali evolved Shiv and Saraswati while Mahasarsvati gave rise to Vishnu and parvati. Then Mahalakshmi ordered rest to interchange pairs for marriage and Shiv was provided with parvati, vishnu with lakshmi and brahma with saraswati. Its quite interesting that Mahasarsvati who is goddess of education gives birth to parvati and vishnu and both of them in future tells Geeta to Himalaya and Arjun respectively.

 

MOTHER OF GANESHA

Though Ganesha considered to be son of Shiva and Parvati, the Matsya Purana, Shiva Purana, and Skanda Purana ascribe the birth of Ganesha to Parvati only, without any form of participation of Shiva in Ganesha's birth.

 

Once, while Parvati wanted to take a bath, there were no attendants around to guard her and stop anyone from accidentally entering the house. Hence she created an image of a boy out of turmeric paste which she prepared to cleanse her body, and infused life into it, and thus Ganesha was born. Parvati ordered Ganesha not to allow anyone to enter the house, and Ganesha obediently followed his mother's orders. After a while Shiva returned and tried to enter the house, Ganesha stopped him. Shiva was infuriated and it started a chain of events leading to war of the entire heavenly kingdom and the lone child. Midst the war, Shiva lost his temper and severed the boy's head with his trident. When Parvati came out and saw her son's lifeless body, she was very angry. She immediately revealed her true self as Adi Shakti, the primodial power. She called upon the nine forms within her, the nine forms surrounded her. She ordered them to destroy the whole world and if her son does not get back to life, then everyone and everything will be destroyed and demanded that Shiva restore Ganesha's life at once. The Gods prostrated at her feet and an elephant's head was attached to Ganesha's body, bringing him back to life. To appease Parvati further, Shiva declared that the child be made head of the ghost-followers (Gana's)of Shiva and worshipped by everyone before beginning any activity, and gods accepted this condition.

 

Ganesha is identified as a god named after his mother. He is called Umaputra, Parvatisuta, Gaurisuta meaning son of Parvati and Heramba, "mother's beloved (son)".

 

ICONOGRAPHY

Naturally, Parvati’s unique characteristics have become more and more obscured, as she absorbed more and more goddesses into her iconography. Therefore, her depictions have become rather generic today. When shown with Shiva, she carries a blue lotus in full bloom, shows the abhaya mudra (hand gesture of fearlessness) and usually has one of her children on her knee. The only hint of her former occult status is the somewhat languid appearance of her eyes, as one who has recently emerged from deep meditation. Other goddesses are usually shown with large staring eyes as this is considered a mark of beauty. The consorts of the other two Gods of the trinity, Saraswati and Lakshmi, may be depicted alone, but Parvati hasn’t been depicted this way for many centuries.

 

The goddess is usually represented as a fair and beautiful. The colour of her vestments is milk-white, the colour of enlightenment and knowledge. Since white is a combination of all hues it shows that She has all the qualities or Gunas. Since white also depicts huelesness, it indicates that She is devoid of all Gunas. Hence, She is referred to as Trigunatmika (having the three gunas—Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas) - and at the same time being Nirguna (without any gunas). She has three eyes. Her accoutrements tend to be those of a Rishi (seer). She is also usually depicted with jatamukuta or a crown of matted hair, as Shiva is usually depicted. She is also shown as having a crescent moon bound in her locks, like Shiva.

 

Images of Parvati, wearing a sacred thread something not many women are associated with and as this marks the second-birth or dwija it is seems an advanced concept far beyond early pashupatas, and with her hair styled in a top knot like a Rishi (seer) survive into the Chola period (approximately ninth century A.D.). In fact, these two particularities were the only means of distinguishing her statuary from the images of the Goddess Shri of the time.

 

Her Mudras (symbolic hand gestures) are Kataka—fascination and enchantment, Hirana - the antelope, the powers of nature and the elusive, Tarjani - gesture of menace, and Chandrakal - the moon, a symbol of intelligence. Kataka must be affected by one of the foremost hands as it is a means of drawing the worshiper closer. Tarjani must be described with the left hand, which symbolises contempt, and usually in the back set of hands. If Parvati is depicted with two hands, then Tarjani and Chandrakal may be dropped but Hirana and Kataka are signature except in very modern representations, where Abhaya (fearlessness), and Varada, (beneficence), are used.

 

ASSOCIATION WITH OTHER GODDESSES

In several myths, the presence of a dark, violent side of this otherwise benign Parvati is suggested. When approached by the gods to defeat demons, Parvati morphs back to her true self, shakti, which is pure energy, untamed, unchecked and chaotic. Her wrath crystallizes into a dark, blood thirsty, tangled-hair Goddess with an open mouth and a drooping tongue. This goddess is usually identified as the terrible mahakali or Kali. In Linga Purana, Parvati summons Kali on the request of Shiva, to destroy a female asura (demoness) Daruka. Even after destroying the demoness, Kali's wrath could not be controlled. She ran around the three worlds in her mad, blind fury and creation was endangered. To lower Kali's rage, Shiva appeared as a crying baby in the middle of a battlefield. The cries of the baby raised the maternal instinct of Kali who started breast-feeding Shiva and resorted back to her benign form as Parvati. Kali is associated and identified with Parvati as Shiva's consort.

 

In Skanda Purana, Parvati is said to have assumed a form of a warrior-goddess and defeated a demon called Durg who assumes the form of a buffalo. Thereafter, she is by the name Durga. In myths relating to her defeat of demons Sumbha and Nisumbha, Durga emerges from Parvati when Parvati sheds her outer sheath, which takes an identity of its own as a warrior goddess.

 

Although Parvati is considered to be synonymous with Kali, Durga, Kamakshi, Meenakshi, Gauri and many others in modern day Hinduism, many of these “forms” or incarnations originated from different sects, or traditions, and the distinctions from Parvati are pertinent.

 

The Shastras (sanctioned works of religious doctrine) attribute the golden colour of goddess Gauri’s skin and ornaments to the story of Parvati casting off her unwanted dark complexion after Shiva teased her, but the cult of Gauri tells a different story. Gauri is in essence a fertility Goddess, and is venerated as a corn mother which would seem to suggest that she owes her colouring to the hues of ripening grain, for which she is propitiated.

 

So whatever be said, Goddess Parvati has two main forms, what actually shaktas says out of which one is Lalita who is Supreme in Srikula family of shaktism and second one is Durga or kali who is supreme in kalikula family.

 

WORSHIP AND FESTIVALS

The Gowri Habba, or Gauri Festival, is celebrated on the seventh, eighth, ninth of Bhadrapada Shukla paksha. She is worshipped as the goddess of harvest and protectress of women. Her festival, chiefly observed by women, is closely associated with the festival of her son Ganesha (Ganesh Chaturthi). The festival is popular in Maharashtra and Karnataka.

 

In Rajasthan the worship of Gauri happens during the Gangaur festival. The festival starts on the first day of Chaitra the day after Holi and continues for 18 days. Images of Issar and Gauri are made from Clay for the festival.

 

Another very popular festival in regard to the Mother Parvati is Navratri, in which all her manfestations are worshiped for nine days. Actually the festival is associated with Her warrior appearance is Mother Durga, with her nine forms i.e. Shailputri, Brahmacharini, Chandraghanta, Kashmunda, Skandmata, Katyani, Kalratri, Mahagauri, Siddhidaatri.

 

Another festival Gauri tritiya is celebrated from Chaitra shukla third to Vaishakha shukla third. It is believed that Parvati spends a month at her parent's home now. This festival is popular in Maharashtra and Karnataka, less observed in North India and unknown in Bengal. The unwidowed women of the household erect a series of platforms in a pyramidal shape with the image of the goddess at the top and collection of ornaments, images of other Hindu deities, pictures, shells etc. below. Neighbours are invited and presented with turmeric, fruits, flowers etc. as gifts. At night, prayers are held by singing and dancing.Down south in Tamil Nadu and Andhra The Kethara Gauri Vritham festival is celebrated on the new moon day of Diwali and the unwidowed women of the family fast for the whole day and prepare sweets and worship the goddess for the well-being of the family.

 

FAMOUS TEMPLES

Annapurneshwari Temple, Cherukunnu, Kannur, Kerala is dedicated to an aspect of Parvati.

 

WIKIPEDIA

 

The church of St Thomas Becket, Fairfield, is a rare example of a small medieval church which has managed to survive without an immediate village to sustain it. Remote on a man-made hillock above the Wallend Marsh, part of Romney Marsh, the church guidebook suggests there was never a village of Fairfield as such but rather a scattered rural community which was served by a small church initially built only of timber, lath and plaster.

 

www.flickr.com/photos/barryslemmings/sets/72157594384281432/ to view the whole set.

 

Probably built in the late 12th century, a 1293 AD visitation roll records that the church was lightly constructed and it appears to have remained as such for much of its life - implying the church authorities themselves may have regarded the Fairfield community as 'marginal' and the building's fabric as almost expendable. It is described in 1293 as being of wood and plaster, very damp and full of holes.

 

The same roll records many shortcomings - namely that the current chaplain had pastured sheep in the churchyard and had allowed a woman to serve at the altar. He agreed not to do this in future, except in harvest time. Simon, the former chaplain, was having an affair with Natakina, the daughter of Hugh at Walle. He was 'corrected' by church authorities. The font was found to have no lock meaning that laymen could help themselves to the Holy Water for illicit purposes.

 

The timber structural frame was eventually replaced in the 15th century [and is what we see today] and the lath and plaster walls were replaced in the 18th century with more durable brick. But the standard of the 18th century workmanship was poor and in 1912 the church was found to be in danger of collapse. Around 1913 the entire chancel, the north wall of the nave, the porch, the turret and the entire roof were carefully taken down and rebuilt but re-using all old materials and timbers under the direction of architect W. D. Caroe.

 

The interior is very 18th century with oval text boards on the inside of the sloping roof, white painted box pews and a three-decker pulpit. The communion table retains a three-sided 'Laudian' communion rail to prevent dogs from fouling the altar.

 

The church today is small and quite charming, being surrounded on all sides by water courses and only reached via a concrete footbridge. Until 1913, when an earth causeway was built, a boat was often needed to reach it. An 18th century mounting block at the west end implies horse riders could also reach the church, at least at some times of the year. As late as 1960 the fields around the church flooded and a photograph appeared in national newspapers of Fairfield church and its little hill rising just a couple feet out of a vast expanse of water.

 

The church is still in regular use and cared-for by the Romney Marsh Historic Churches Trust. The huge [18th century?] key hangs on a special board behind a nearby house and visitors have to walk around to the back door to borrow it.

 

The Romney Marsh Historic Churches Trust was formed under the patronage of the then Archbishop of Canterbury Robert Runcie and the former Private Eye editor Richard Ingrams. Details about the trust are obtainable from Mrs Elizabeth Marshall, Lansdell House, Rolvenden, Kent, TN17 4LW.

The Walker Dam – Its Past, Present and Future

 

28 years I have lived in Aberdeen, never knowing this beautiful piece of land was less than a 15 minute drive through the city centre from my home.

 

I visited today 3rd May 2018, and walked the whole area taking photos of everything that lured me, on my walk I saw herrons, mandarin ducks , mallards etc, it was a joy.

 

The weather was overcast though warm and bright, I will revisit in the summer on a golden day to get the best of this beautiful area of Aberdeen.

 

The Walker Dam, with which many Aberdeen citizens are so familiar, is only a fraction of the size it was when - in the 1830s - it was constructed in accordance with the plans drawn by

Aberdeen’s first City Architect, John Smith.

 

From the second quarter of the 19th century to the early 20th century the dam was a deep and massive body of water which extended from its present location, eastward, to Springfield Road – then called Walker Dam Road – where its sluice gate would have been opened at the beginning of the working day to allow water to rush through a culvert under the road, then south-east through a deep man-made channel (which is still evident today) to feed the steam condensing ponds of the Rubislaw Bleachfield, the property Richards and Company, textile manufacturers.

 

Today this treasured green space is one of Aberdeen City Council's 'Local Nature Conservation Sites', the 'Walker Dam and Rubislaw Link', which is a 3.9 kilometre walk along

a series of connected paths and streets. Popular with dog walkers, joggers and ramblers, the future of this valuable charming landscaped area with its semi-natural habitats, has been secured by the initiatives and work of 'Friends of Walker Dam' who are registered with 'Keep Scotland Beautiful' - a Scottish environment charity – which, independent of governmental finance and influence, is committed to the improvement of people’s lives and the places they care for.

 

The Friends of Walker Dam work in partnership with Aberdeen City Council to deliver the standards of maintenance and the plans for future improvements to this amenity site.

Mr Allan Davidson, Treasurer of Craigiebuckler and Seafield Community Council who is also a member of Friends of Walker Dam, has frequent meetings with the City Council's Environment Manager.

 

Those meetings have been very productive and improvements to the site have already been achieved.

 

For example, there has been a clean-up of the Dam and the

burn which flows into it; improvements have also been made to the path on the South bank of the dam, which is part of Aberdeen's core path system. The Walker Dam sign has also

been repainted.

 

In the near future, a bridge will be constructed at the East bank of the dam to connect its North and South banks - thus making both banks accessible for the enjoyment of visitors to

the dam. This significant infrastructural improvement has been made possible by a final act of generosity by Aberdeen Greenspace Trust. Local Councillor Martin Greig is a member of Greenspace and worked to ensure a donation of £8000 from the Trust towards the upgrade of the Walker Dam which includes the construction of the bridge, new benches, bins and various paths and tree works. A further enhancement in the area is a community notice

board.

Thanks to the Friends of Walker Dam, Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeen Greenspace Trust and the work of many volunteers, we have much to look forward to.

 

Walker Dam is located within the former Royal Forest of Stocket, part of the Freedom Lands gifted by Robert I to the burgh (recorded in a charter of 1319). Now it is in the modern

Burnieboozle estate, part of the larger Craigiebuckler estate, which was sparsely populated countryside until the 1950s, when major housing development began in that area.

 

Walker Dam is bounded by Springfield Road (which replaced a roadway called Walker Dam Road) to the east and Woodburn Gardens to the north.

 

The dam is fed by the Holburn (‘Burn of the Howe’), which has two head waters, the northern and greater one coming from Hazlehead and through Walker Dam.

 

The section entering Walker Dam is the West Burn of Rubislaw. The two head streams of the Holburn joined together between Rubislaw Quarry and Springbank Cemetery, and this united stream fed the steamcondensing

ponds at Rubislaw Bleachfield before flowing eastward together as far as Hartington Road, where they separate.

 

The south branch, the original burn, crossed Union Grove and passed under the old Holburn Bridge, while the north branch, an artificial mill-lead, went to the Upper and Lower Justice Mills.

 

As a consequence, Walker Dam was at one time closely associated with the city’s milling operations and, especially, with textile manufacturing. In the nineteenth century it was a resource integral to the firm once called Maberly’s (established between 1808 and 1811) and later Richards, which had the Broadford Works on Maberly Street and which was

the principal user of the bleachfields. An 1866-67 Ordnance Survey description of Walker Dam gives it as ‘a very large dam built by the proprietors of the Rubislaw Bleach Field for their own use.’

 

Bleachfields were a development of the eighteenth century Scottish textile and thread industries. The first bleachfield in Scotland was established in the late 1720s as an alternative to

either small, burnside bleaching operations which were of variable quality, or sending the unbleached cloth to England, Ireland or Holland for treatment.

 

In March 1801, the lands of Springfield were offered for sale. They were described as comprising about 63 acres, ‘inclosed and subdivided’, and held feu of ‘the Community of Aberdeen’ at the annual feu-duty of £2 14s 2d sterling. A large house was included in the sale, and it was noted that ‘the dam for the Justice-mills is situated within this property, and the millburn

passes thro’ it, by which considerable benefit may be derived by a purchaser.’

 

In 1833 Aberdeen Town Council agreed to have Walker Dam cleaned out and deepened, in partnership with Messrs Richards and Company, manufacturers in Aberdeen.

 

Richards was the instigator of the plan, to which the Council agreed because the work was expected to be ‘highly

beneficial to the Upper and Nether Justice Mills by affording them an additional supply of water,’ and authorised it providing that the Town’s share of the costs would not exceed £20; the work would be executed under the sole charge of John Smith, Town Superintendant; and Richards, which must not spend less than the Council on the project, should not use this as a means of claiming any right over Walker Dam in future.

 

In 1837, Richards proposed to the Council that Walker Dam should be excavated and extended, citing an 1829 agreement to this effect between the Town and Messrs Maberly and Company, the previous owners of the manufacturing works now operated by Richards (Maberley’s folded in 1832).

 

Richards sought a lease of the dam water at a fixed rent once the work had been completed.

 

The Council remitted consideration of this to a committee previously established to look at a proposal to move Justice Mill Dam westwards to Rubislaw. Early in 1839, the Council

approved the recommendation of this committee that Walker Dam should be excavated and enlarged so that it would hold an additional 700,000 cubic feet of water, again on the grounds that it would provide a more reliable source of water for the town’s mills, especially in the dry

season.

 

The new capacity of the dam was expected to be more than adequate for the needs of the mills. The estimated cost of the works at this stage was £360: should the eventual cost exceed £400, Richards was to pay the excess.

 

The company was also to pay the Council £75 a year for its

lease of the water, and would be responsible for repair and maintenance of the extended dam, to the satisfaction of the Town, during the life of its lease. (Richards continued to own rights over the water for several decades.)

 

After further negotiations, a Council meeting of 15 April 1839 approved implementation of the project and authorised the Town Treasurer to enter into a contract with Richards and Co.

 

Work included the construction of a spillwater tunnel and breast mound for the dam extension,with additional dykes and the installation of a new cast-iron tunnel pipe and sluice.

 

The plans,drawings and a detailed specification produced by the Council formed the basis of the contract, signed on 17 April 1839.

 

The revised estimate of costs based on the plans drawn up by the Town considerably exceeded the original £400 anticipated; the Council minutes do not record the new estimate but note that Richards offered to pay the full amount, on the basis that Richards would receive the original £400 from the Town once the work was completed.

 

The Council had earlier noted that implementation of the project would require the purchase of an adjacent piece

of land owned by Alexander Bannerman and instructed that he should be approached to sell part

of his property near Springfield

 

The necessary land was obtained from Bannerman at a feu-duty of £20, recorded in a feu charter of 19 April 1839.

 

On 1 August 1860, the lands and estates of Craigiebuckler and Burnieboozle, including Walker Dam, were offered for sale by public roup, as part of the sequestrated estate of John Blaikie,

advocate. (John Blaikie went to Spain in 1860, following the collapse of his business and financial ruin. He was a son of James Blaikie of Craigiebuckler, Provost of Aberdeen from 1833 to 1835.) Walker Dam is described in the sale notice as ‘an Ornamental Sheet of Water, from which there is an yearly Revenue of £20 sterling from the Town of Aberdeen’.

 

The estates evidently failed to sell at the advertised ‘upset price’ (the lowest price consistent with the valuation of a property) of at £5,771 2s 6d, since the estate of Burnieboozle, within which Walker Dam is situated, was again offered for sale on 3 September 1860, now at £5,500, with neighbouring lands at Springfield for sale separately.18 Again it failed to realise this amount and was offered for sale on 5 October 1860 at the further reduced upset price of £5,200.19.

 

At some point after this date it was purchased by John Stewart, Esq.

 

The lands of Burnieboozle and Walkerhill were once again offered for sale in August 1865, with Walker Dam included - the sale notice mentions the annual feu-duty of £20 paid by the Town Council on it.20 In early September, the Aberdeen Journal reported that ‘The estates of Craigiebuckler, Burnieboozle, Walkerhill, and others, lately belonging to John Stewart, Esq., were on Friday purchased for the sum of £31,500 by Lauchlan McKinnon, junior, advocate, on behalf

of John Cardno Couper, Esq., lately of Whampoa, China.’ (Whampoa is now usually known as Classifed advertisement inviting tenders for the work, The Aberdeen Journal, 30 Jan 1839.

  

urgh, had served as an apprentice in the Aberdeen shipbuilding

firm of Alexander Hall and Co. before going to Hong Kong and working with his father in their

own highly successful ship-building and repairing company. By the time he returned to Aberdeen

in the 1860s, he had amassed a fortune. He was involved in a number of Aberdeen business

enterprises and in the Church of Scotland. Couper gave a portion of land close to Walker Dam to

be the site of Craigiebuckler Church, built in 1883, of which he was an elder. He died in January

1902 at the age of 82. His son, Lieutenant-Colonel John Cardno Ogston Couper (1st Highland

Brigade), succeeded to the property but died at the age of 48 in 1913. His widow and two young

children remained at Craigiebuckler; his daughter, Florence, went on to marry the ministe

Dr S. Marshall, 2014

The Council’s Finance Committee visited the dam in the aftermath of the tragic incident and

agreed to recommend the repair of the surrounding walls. They also instructed that information

boards should be erected at the site warning of the dangers. During this site visit, one of the

councillors slipped by the side of the stream entering the dam, and fell into the mud. It is not

clear if the children had similarly slipped and landed in the water, or if they had intended to enter

it.

The future of Walker Dam was the subject of two proposals of 1933. Council minutes of 4 December that year record that Aberdeen Land Association intended to donate to the Council the wooded den lying between Johnston House on Springfield Road and Viewfield Road, on condition the den should be maintained by the local authority as an open space and that the Council pay half the cost of a proposed road to be built along the west boundary of the property.

 

The Council formally accepted this proposal in January of 1934.26.

 

Also in December 1933, the City Engineer, Thomas F. Henderson, wrote to the Council’s Streets and Works Committee, which was then looking at the widening of Springfield Road and the layout and construction of a new road between it and Queen’s Road. Henderson asked the

committee to consider the future use of the Council-owned Walker Dam at the same time.

 

According to Henderson: ‘This dam is formed on a burn which rises in the grounds of Hazlehead and flows through the dam and joins the West Burn of Rubislaw at a point south-east of

Kepplestone Nursing Home and later forms what is known as the Ferryhill Burn.’

 

On 12 July that year, very heavy rainfall had flooded the electricity works and caused damage to property in

Crown Street and Ferryhill Terrace. To prevent further flooding, the water was run out of the dam on 1 September and although here had been no heavy rain since then, ‘we know that, by controlling the flow at the outlet of the dam we can reduce the risk of flooding in the lower parts

very considerably.

 

‘In conjunction with the Superintendant of Parks, I have prepared a plan showing how the Walker Dam could be laid out as a pleasure ground where the public could leave Springfield Road and walk through the gardens on to the grounds of Hazlehead.

 

The superintendant of parks is of the opinion that during storm periods the gardens could be flooded without doing much damage to the grass or plants. As the Dam is the property of the Common Good, I would suggest that the sub-committee confer with the Finance Committee and Town Planning Committee and submit a report.’

 

The next meeting of full Council on 3 January 1934 agreed that the committee should investigate further, though it also wanted the remarks of the Superintendant of Parks about flooding not doing damage to the proposed gardens to be deleted. Also presented to the Council at the same

meeting was a letter to the Town Clerk from Professor James Ritchie of the University of Aberdeen, suggesting the Council should consider making Walker Dam a bird sanctuary. This

was remitted to Streets and Works Committee for consideration. (The two schemes were possibly

not wholly compatible - some residents opposed turning the site into a pleasure park on the grounds that it would interfere with the natural beauty and the birdlife of the site.)

 

It seems that these two proposals had been prompted by the threat of the dam being filled in or otherwise scrapped: two days after the Council meeting, a reader’s letter to the

 

Aberdeen Journal urged that the dam should be improved and made safe for children rather than ‘done away with’.

 

The writer suggested that a low wall could be built around it, ‘made from the old dykes that have been pulled down in the vicinity’. Whatever enclosure was erected in 1911 after the drowning incident had evidently not endured.

  

The same edition of the paper published an old photograph of the dam ‘before it was drained’.

 

This remark referred to the decision to run off the water in the dam the previous year, to obviate flood damage to the surroundings. However, doing so had created other problems – correspondents to the Aberdeen Journal in 1934 complained about the condition of the dam as ‘an evil-smelling mudhole’ and ‘horrible looking and stinking’, especially during hot weather, and recommended that the Medical Officer of Health should investigate.

 

Whatever schemes were mooted for the dam, they took a considerable time to be implemented.

 

The better part of two years later, a short Bon-Accord article of October 1935 reports work being undertaken to transform Walker Dam, ‘from its present wild state’.

 

From the mid-1940s and during the 1950s, Stewart Construction (Aberdeen) Ltd., which was by then the heritable proprietor of the Craigiebuckler estate, built several housing developments on the land around Walker Dam.29

 

The minute of a meeting of the Links and Parks Committee of Aberdeen Town Council, held on 24 August 1964, notes that the committee considered a report by the Director of Parks and agreed the recommendation that the Council lay out an amenity area on ground lying to the south of the woodlands at Walker Dam extending to c. 0.75 of an acre. This was one of three proposed (and agreed) amenity areas to be created in the vicinity and included in the report, the others being a

strip of ground on the south side of Hazledene Road (c. 0.4 acre), and two strips of ground adjoining Craigiebuckler Avenue (c. 3,150 square yards).

 

The total estimated cost is given as £1,470.30

 

By this time Walker Dam had become home to a community of swans. The Press & Journal reported that the Links and Parks Committee of 30 September 1964 considered a letter from the

Aberdeen Association for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, requesting the committee ban fishing in Walker Dam, so as to protect the swans living on it. The committee recommended no action.

 

This was the second attempt by the association to have fishing banned: it had submitted a similar request at the previous meeting. The renewal of the request was prompted by the discovery of a cygnet badly injured by a fishing hook and line.

 

Walker Dam is no longer a swan habitat, but they were a popular feature of Walker Dam for many years. When Walker Dam Infant School opened in 1966, it adopted the emblem of swans on water as its school badge. (The swans have also inspired the song, ‘Walker Dam’, by Aberdeen singer-songwriter Bob Knight.)

 

A Springfield resident, Mrs Nanette Grieve, had left the Council a bequest on her death in 1955 to

fund the services of a warden to protect them.

 

At times, much effort was put into ensuring this protection: the Evening Express in 1972 reported that the Council had mounted a vigil of ‘almost Loch Garten proportions’ to see that swan eggs made it to hatching. In previous years eggs had

been stolen or lost due to flooding.

 

As this suggests, the problem of flooding at Walker Dam, highlighted by the City Engineer in 1933, was still an issue over thirty years later.

 

In 1965, the Evening Express published ‘before and after’ photographs of the flooded area: the latter image shows Council parks and recreation staff laying out grounds and planting shrubs and other flora capable of surviving immersion for a Craigiebuckler Chartulery (Charter Register of Craigiebuckler, 1958-1959), CA/4/21 in Records of the Royal Burgh and City of Aberdeen, Aberdeen City Archives.

 

The newspaper also reported that the works were to include provision for the dam water to be diverted at times into a burn, so relieving the pressure and reducing the silting that had caused flooding problems in the past.

 

A 1969 article in the Aberdeen Press & Journal refers

to Walker Dam being a body of water ‘shaped and even bottomed by the combined operations of the Aberdeen Corporation Cleansing and Links & Parks Departments,’ and to a plan by Links & Parks to provide an amenity walk or nature trail along the course from Johnston Gardens to Hazlehead, via Walker Dam.

 

Today (2014) Walker Dam (with Rubislaw Link) is a 3.38 hectare Local Nature Conservation Site, run by Aberdeen City Council’s Countryside Ranger Service.33 Comprising a mix of open water, landscaped areas and semi-natural habitats, with a footpath running through it, Walker Dam is animportant recreational and educational resource, being one of the few larger bodies of water in the city.

 

[ CPP example with Denim 4.06 ]

 

This is a new example from the CPP double exposure project shot in collaboration with Denim.

 

This is a part of an ongoing & experimental double exposure photo project entitled Corpse Photo-Poetics (CPP).” In 1994, I had the idea, which was a sort of abstraction of the Surrealist game, "Exquisite Corpse" -- at the time, I had not seen anything else like it.

 

It was conceived, you could say, as a way to keep myself awake along the lonely stretches of the 95 (through the old American south -- Georgia, specifically, in this case) in the absence of readily available diner-grade coffee. I've carried this project with me for years now. Although I've enjoyed gallery and pub showings with different collaborators (the first was on my birthday in 1996), it has been here on Flickr that the project has taken on new life.

 

I posted my first examples on Flickr, as I recall, in January, 2005. I didn't have any idea how you would respond (I still hadn't seen another project like it). But your response was overwhelming and generous (particularly [ CK ]'s, for instance =), and in recent months I've seen what feels like an explosion of similar projects around Flickr.

 

But I've also recruited some wonderful and amazing Flickrites to participate in CPP (including Denim, [ CK ], Kristal, Sneaky G, Divisible Eye, among others), and look forward to getting better at organizing all things CPP (also look forward to having an expanded gallery online -- here & elsewhere -- along with more non-electronic showings at different spots around the world in the future. There is some discussion of this already).

 

OK. What's all this crap about CPP, anyway??? Here’s an a-t-t-e-m-p-t to succinctly state the simplicity of the project:

 

With E.C., partipants divide a piece of a paper into thirds or quaters, choosing, for instance, the human form. Each participant chooses a section of the form to complete, covering their work, leaving only lines to give the next player a starting point for the next section of the piece. The result can be something quite surprising and, sometimes, even good! ;)

 

I chose to use double exposure photographs. The CPP images have mostly been produced directly in the camera (35mm). With no fixed form in mind, participants grab an image to be integrated with the photograph of another in the camera, and hopefully the result is just as surprising and, sometimes, even good!

 

Well, thank you for taking a look, reading about this crazy project, & please LMK (again) if you are interested.

 

CPP is a bit of an eccentric project, and it takes a kind and creative soul to play along. Many thanks to Denim for participating, and I indeed look forward to seeing what other buried treasure we might find in future CPP rolls!

 

"Enough! Or too much"

 

You can read more about the CPP project here.

I love this new look! I used a Cherry Wood skin from Aki Asahi, and lightly sealed it with matte Mod Podge. In retrospect, I probably should have used a more proper wood sealant, maybe next time. :-) I went back and forth whether to stain it or not, but the Cherry wood shade was beautiful and I hear it darkns beautifully with exposure to the light, so I left the color as it is.

 

The Sony grip is NOT attached to the skin, it is directly attached to the camera; that way I can change the skin in future without removing the grip (and I think it attaches more securely to the camera body directly).