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The buildings depicted include the Robert Walker Log House (a reconstructed cabin used as an interpretive exhibit demonstrating the lifestyle of early Arlington settlers, and the Gulf Branch Forge (used by local guilds to practice the art of forging metal objects).

 

Photo by Kevin Borland.

 

If you enjoy my photographs, I invite you to listen to my music as well. Follow this link to visit SPEED LIMIT MUSIC on Pinterest.

Members: Ron Whiteside sent the Reunion notice of the Doolittle Raiders which took place. It’s too long to include in the Nov Newsletter, but I thought I’d send it as a separate mailing in case you were interested in reading it. I did put part of it in the Newsletter.

 

The Final Toast

 

It's the cup of brandy that no one wants to drink.

On April 17, 2013 in Fort Walton Beach , Florida , the surviving

Doolittle Raiders gathered publicly for the last time.

 

They once were among the most universally admired and revered men

in the United States . There were 80 of the Raiders in April 1942,

when they carried out one of the most courageous and

heart-stirring military operations in this nation's history. The

mere mention of their unit's name, in those years, would bring

tears to the eyes of grateful Americans.

 

Now only four survive.

After Japan 's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor , with the United

States reeling and wounded, something dramatic was needed to turn

the war effort around.

Even though there were no friendly airfields close enough to Japan

for the United States to launch a retaliation, a daring plan was

devised. Sixteen B-25s were modified so that they could take off

from the deck of an aircraft carrier. This had never before been

tried -- sending such big, heavy bombers from a carrier.

 

The 16 five-man crews, under the command of Lt. Col. James

Doolittle, who himself flew the lead plane off the USS Hornet,

knew that they would not be able to return to the carrier. They

would have to hit Japan and then hope to make it to China for a

safe landing.

 

But on the day of the raid, the Japanese military caught wind of

the plan. The Raiders were told that they would have to take off

from much farther out in the Pacific Ocean than they had counted

on. They were told that because of this they would not have

enough fuel to make it to safety.

And those men went anyway.

 

They bombed Tokyo , and then flew as far as they could. Four

planes crash-landed; 11 more crews bailed out, and three of the

Raiders died. Eight more were captured; three were executed.

Another died of starvation in a Japanese prison camp. One crew

made it to Russia .

 

The Doolittle Raid sent a message from the United States to its

enemies, and to the rest of the world: We will fight. And, no

matter what it takes, we will win.

Of the 80 Raiders, 62 survived the war. They were celebrated as

national heroes, models of bravery. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer produced

a motion picture based on the raid; "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo,"

starring Spencer Tracy and Van Johnson, was a patriotic and

emotional box-office hit, and the phrase became part of the

national lexicon. In the movie-theater previews for the film, MGM

proclaimed that it was presenting the story "with supreme pride."

 

Beginning in 1946, the surviving Raiders have held a reunion each

April, to commemorate the mission. The reunion is in a different

city each year. In 1959, the city of Tucson , Arizona , as a

gesture of respect and gratitude, presented the Doolittle Raiders

with a set of 80 silver goblets. Each goblet was engraved with

the name of a Raider.

 

Every year, a wooden display case bearing all 80 goblets is

transported to the reunion city. Each time a Raider passes away,

his goblet is turned upside down in the case at the next reunion,

as his old friends bear solemn witness.

 

Also in the wooden case is a bottle of 1896 Hennessy Very Special

cognac. The year is not happenstance: 1896 was when Jimmy

Doolittle was born.

There has always been a plan: When there are only two surviving

Raiders, they would open the bottle, at last drink from it, and

toast their comrades who preceded them in death.

As 2013 began, there were five living Raiders; then, in February,

Tom Griffin passed away at age 96.

 

What a man he was. After bailing out of his plane over a

mountainous Chinese forest after the Tokyo raid, he became ill

with malaria, and almost died. When he recovered, he was sent to

Europe to fly more combat missions. He was shot down, captured,

and spent 22 months in a German prisoner of war camp.

The selflessness of these men, the sheer guts ... there was a

passage in the Cincinnati Enquirer obituary for Mr. Griffin that,

on the surface, had nothing to do with the war, but that

emblematizes the depth of his sense of duty and devotion:

"When his wife became ill and needed to go into a nursing home,

he visited her every day. He walked from his house to the nursing

home, fed his wife and at the end of the day brought home her

clothes. At night, he washed and ironed her clothes. Then he

walked them up to her room the next morning. He did that for

three years until her death in 2005."

So now, out of the original 80, only four Raiders remain: Dick

Cole (Doolittle's co-pilot on the Tokyo raid), Robert Hite,

Edward Saylor and David Thatcher. All are in their 90s. They have

decided that there are too few of them for the public reunions to

continue.

The events in Fort Walton Beach marked the end. It

has come full circle; Florida 's nearby Eglin Field was where the

Raiders trained in secrecy for the Tokyo mission. The town

planned to do all it can to honor the men: a six-day celebration

of their valor, including luncheons, a dinner and a parade.

Do the men ever wonder if those of us for whom they helped save

the country have tended to it in a way that is worthy of their

sacrifice? They don't talk about that, at least not around other

people. But if you find yourself near Fort Walton Beach this

week, and if you should encounter any of the Raiders, you might

want to offer them a word of thanks. I can tell you from

firsthand observation that they appreciate hearing that they are

remembered.

The men have decided that after this final public reunion they

will wait until a later date -- some time this year -- to get

together once more, informally and in absolute privacy. That is

when they will open the bottle of brandy. The years are flowing

by too swiftly now; they are not going to wait until there are

only two of them.

They will fill the four remaining upturned goblets.

And raise them in a toast to those who are gone.

 

Their 70th Anniversary Photo

PLEASE SEND THIS ON TO EVERYONE IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK, ESPECIALLY

TO THOSE WHO WERE TOO YOUNG TO KNOW ABOUT THESE GUYS. THIS SHOULD

BE READ BY EVERY KID IN GRADE AND HIGH SCHOOL SO THEY KNOW WHAT

HAPPENED.

The Miao is an ethnic group recognized by the government of China as one of the 55 official minority groups. Miao is a Chinese term and does not reflect the self-designations of the component groups of people, which include (with some variant spellings) Hmong, Hmub, Xong (Qo-Xiong), and A-Hmao.

 

The Chinese government has grouped these people and other non-Miao peoples together as one group, whose members may not necessarily be either linguistically or culturally related, though the majority are members of Miao-Yao language family, which includes the Hmong, Hmub, Xong, and A-Hmao and the majority do share cultural similarities. Because of the previous given reasons, many Miao peoples cannot communicate with each other in their mother tongues, and have different histories and cultures. A few groups designated as Miao by the PRC do not even agree that they belong to the ethnic group, though most Miao groups, such as the Hmong and Hmub, do agree with the collective grouping as a single ethnic group – Miao.

 

The Miao live primarily in southern China's mountains, in the provinces of Guizhou, Hunan, Yunnan, Sichuan, Guangxi, Hainan, Guangdong, and Hubei. Some members of the Miao sub-groups, most notably the Hmong people, have migrated out of China into Southeast Asia (northern Vietnam, Laos, Burma (Myanmar) and Thailand). Following the communist takeover of Laos in 1975, a large group of Hmong refugees resettled in several Western nations, mainly in the United States, France, and Australia. There has been a recent tendency by Hmong Americans to group all Miao peoples together under the term Hmong because of their disdain for the Chinese term Miao. This however fails to recognize that the Hmong are only a subgroup within the broader linguistic and cultural family of Miao people and the vast majority of Miao people do not classify themselves as Hmong and have their own names for themselves.

 

NOMENCLATURE: MIAO AND HMONG

The term "Miao" gained official status in 1949 as a minzu (ethnic group) encompassing a group of linguistically-related ethnic minorities in Southwest China. This was part of a larger effort to identify and classify minority groups to clarify their role in the national government, including establishing autonomous administrative divisions and allocating the seats for representatives in provincial and national government.

 

Historically, the term "Miao" had been applied inconsistently to a variety of non-Han peoples. Early Western writers used Chinese-based names in various transcriptions: Miao, Miao-tse, Miao-tsze, Meau, Meo, mo, miao-tseu etc. In Southeast Asian contexts words derived from the Chinese "Miao" took on a sense which was perceived as derogatory by the Hmong subgroup living in that region. In China, however, the term has no such context and is used by the Miao people themselves, of every group.

 

The later prominence of Hmong people in the West has led to a situation where the entire Miao linguistic/cultural family is sometimes referred to as Hmong in English language sources. Following the recent increased interaction of Hmong in the West with Miao in China it is reported that some upwardly aspiring non-Hmong Miao have even begun to identify themselves as Hmong. However, most non-Hmong Miao in China are unfamiliar with the term as referring to their entire group and continue to use "Miao", or their own separate ethnic self-designations.

 

Though the Miao themselves use various self-designations, the Chinese traditionally classify them according to the most characteristic colour of the women's clothes. The list below contains some of these self-designations, the colour designations, and the main regions inhabited by the four major groups of Miao in China:

 

Ghao Xong/Qo Xiong; Xong; Red Miao; Qo Xiong Miao: west Hunan

Gha Ne/Ka Nao; Hmub; Black Miao; Mhub Miao: southeast Guizhou

A-Hmao; Big Flowery Miao: west Guizhou and northeast Yunnan

Gha-Mu; Hmong, Mong; White Miao, Green/Blue Miao, Small Flowery Miao; south and east Yunnan, south Sichuan and west Guizhou

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

According to the 2000 census, the number of Miao in China was estimated to be about 9.6 million. Outside of China, members of the Miao linguistic/cultural family sub-group or nations of the Hmong live in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Burma due to outward migrations starting in the 18th century. As a result of recent migrations in the aftermath of the Indochina and Vietnam Wars from 1949–75, many Hmong people now live in the United States, French Guiana, France and Australia. Altogether, there are approximately 8 million speakers in the Miao language family. This language family, which consists of 6 languages and around 35 dialects (some of which are mutually intelligible) belongs to the Hmong/Miao branch of the Hmong–Mien (Miao–Yao) language family.

 

The Hmong live primarily in the northern mountainous reaches of Southeast Asia including Thailand, Laos and Vietnam, and in far Southwest China mostly in the provinces of Yunnan, Guangxi, and to a very limited extent in Guizhou. There are about 1.5–2 million Hmong in China.

 

Note: The Miao areas of Sichuan province became part of the newly created Chongqing Municipality in 1997.

 

Most Miao currently live in China. Miao population growth in China:

 

1953: 2,510,000

1964: 2,780,000

1982: 5,030,000

1990: 7,390,000

 

3,600,000 Miao, about half of the entire Chinese Miao population, were in Guizhou in 1990. The Guizhou Miao and those in the following six provinces make up over 98% of all Chinese Miao:

 

Hunan: 1,550,000

Yunnan: 890,000

Sichuan: 530,000

Guangxi: 420,000

Hubei: 200,000

Hainan: 50,000 (known as Miao but ethnically Yao and Li)

 

In the above provinces, there are 6 Miao autonomous prefectures (shared officially with one other ethnic minority):

 

Qiandongnan Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture (黔东南 : Qiándōngnán), Guizhou

Qiannan Buyei and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (黔南 : Qiánnán), Guizhou

Qianxinan Buyei and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (黔西南 : Qiánxīnán), Guizhou

Xiangxi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (湘西 : Xiāngxī), Hunan

Wenshan Zhuang and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (Hmong) (文山 : Wénshān), Yunnan

Enshi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (恩施 : Ēnshī), Hubei

 

There are in addition 23 Miao autonomous counties:

 

Hunan:Mayang (麻阳 : Máyáng), Jingzhou (靖州 : Jīngzhōu), and Chengbu (城步 : Chéngbù)

Guizhou: Songtao (松桃 : Sōngtáo), Yingjiang (印江 : Yìnjiāng), Wuchuan (务川 : Wùchuān), Daozhen (道真 : Dǎozhēn), Zhenning (镇宁 : Zhènníng), Ziyun (紫云 : Zǐyún), Guanling (关岭 : Guānlíng), and Weining (威宁 : Wēiníng)

Yunnan: Pingbian (屏边 : Píngbiān), Jinping (金平 : Jīnpíng), and Luquan (禄劝 : Lùquàn)

Chongqing: Xiushan (秀山 : Xiùshān), Youyang (酉阳 : Yǒuyáng), Qianjiang (黔江 : Qiánjiāng), and Pengshui (彭水 : Péngshuǐ)

Guangxi: Rongshui (融水 : Róngshuǐ), Longsheng (龙胜 : Lóngshēng), and Longlin (隆林 : Lōnglín) (including Hmong)

Hainan Province: Qiong (琼中 : Qióngzhōng) and Baoting (保亭 : Bǎotíng)

 

Most Miao reside in hills or on mountains, such as

 

Wuling Mountain by the Qianxiang River (湘黔川边的武陵山 : Xiāngqián Chuān Biān Dí Wǔlíng Shān)

Miao Mountain (苗岭 : Miáo Líng), Qiandongnan

Yueliang Mountain (月亮山 : Yuèliàng Shān), Qiandongnan

Greater and Lesser Ma Mountain (大小麻山 : Dà Xiǎo Má Shān), Qiannan

Greater Miao Mountain (大苗山 : Dà Miáo Shān), Guangxi

Wumeng Mountain by the Tianqian River (滇黔川边的乌蒙山 : Tiánqián Chuān Biān Dí Wūmēng Shān)

 

Several thousands of Miao left their homeland to move to larger cities like Guangzhou and Beijing. There are 2,000,000 Hmong spread throughout northern Vietnam, Laos, Burma, and on other continents. 174,000 live in Thailand, where they are one of the six main hill tribes.

 

HISTORY

History according to Chinese legend and other considerations

According to Chinese legend, the Miao who descended from the Jiuli tribe led by Chiyou (Chinese: 蚩尤 pinyin: Chīyóu) were defeated at the Battle of Zhuolu (Chinese: 涿鹿 pinyin: Zhuōlù, a defunct prefecture on the border of present provinces of Hebei and Liaoning) by the military coalition of Huang Di (Chinese: 黃帝 pinyin: Huángdì) and Yan Di, leaders of the Huaxia (Chinese: 華夏 pinyin: Huáxià) tribe as the two tribes struggled for supremacy of the Yellow River valley.

 

ARCHEOLOGICAL DISCOVERIES

According to André-Georges Haudricourt and David Strecker's claims based on limited secondary data, the Miao were among the first people to settle in present-day China. They claim that the Han borrowed a lot of words from the Miao in regard to rice farming. This indicated that the Miao were among the first rice farmers in China. In addition, some have connected the Miao to the Daxi Culture (5,300 – 6,000 years ago) in the middle Yangtze River region. The Daxi Culture has been credited with being amongst the first cultivators of rice in the Far East by Western scholars. However, in 2006 rice cultivation was found to have existed in the Shandong province even earlier than the Daxi Culture.

 

A western study mention that the Miao (especially the Miao-Hunan) have some DNA from the Northeast people of China, but has origins in southern china. Recent DNA samples of Miao males contradict this theory. The White Hmong have 25% C, 8% D, & 6% N(Tat) yet they have the least contact with the Han population.

 

CHU

In 2002, the Chu language has been identified as perhaps having influence from Tai–Kam and Miao–Yao languages by researchers at University of Massachusetts Amherst.

 

QIN AND HAN DYNASTIES

The term Miao was first used by the Han Chinese in pre-Qin times (in other words, before 221 BC) for designating non-Han Chinese groups in the south. It was often used in combination: "nanmiao", "miaomin", "youmiao" and "sanmiao" (三苗; pinyin: Sānmiáo)

 

MING AND QING DYNASTIES

During the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368–1911) 'miao' and 'man' were both used, the second possibly to designate the Yao (傜 Yáo) people. The Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties could neither fully assimilate nor control the indigenous people.

 

During the Miao Rebellions, when Miao tribes rebelled, Ming troops, including Han Chinese, Hui people, and Uyghurs crushed the rebels, killing thousands of them. Mass castrations of Miao boys also took place.

 

During the Qing Dynasty the Miao fought three wars against the empire. In 1735 in the southeastern province of Guizhou, the Miao rose up against the government's forced assimilation. Eight counties involving 1,224 villages fought until 1738 when the revolt ended. According to Xiangtan University Professor Wu half the Miao population were affected by the war.

 

The second war (1795–1806) involved the provinces of Guizhou and Hunan. Shi Sanbao and Shi Liudeng led this second revolt. Again, it ended in failure, but it took 11 years to quell the uprising.

 

The greatest of the three wars occurred from 1854 to 1873. Zhang Xiu-mei led this revolt in Guizhou until his capture and death in Changsha, Hunan. This revolt affected over one million people and all the neighbouring provinces. By the time the war ended Professor Wu said only 30 percent of the Miao were left in their home regions. This defeat led to the Hmong people migrating out of China.

 

During Qing times, more military garrisons were established in southwest China. Han Chinese soldiers moved into the Taijiang region of Guizhou, married Miao women, and the children were brough up as Miao. In spite of rebellion against the Han, Hmong leaders made allies with Han merchants.

 

Politically and militarily, the Miao continued to be a stone in the shoe of the Chinese empire. The imperial government had to rely on political means to ensnare Hmong people, they created multiple competing positions of substantial prestige for Miao people to participate and assimilate into the Qing government system. During the Ming and Qing times, the official position of Kiatong was created in Indochina. The Miao would employ the use of the Kiatong government structure until the 1900s when they entered into French colonial politics in Indochina.

 

20th CENTURY

During the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC), the Miao played an important role in its birth when they helped Mao Zedong to escape the Kuomintang in the Long March with supplies and guides through their territory.

 

In Vietnam, a powerful Hmong named Vuong Chinh Duc, dubbed the king of the Hmong, aided Ho Chi Minh's nationalist move against the French, and thus secured the Hmong's position in Vietnam. During the Vietnam War, Miao fought on both sides, the Hmong in Laos primarily for the US, across the border in Vietnam for the North-Vietnam coalition, the Chinese-Miao for the Communists. However, after the war the Vietnamese were very aggressive towards the Hmong who suffered many years of reprisals and genocide. Most Hmong in Thailand also supported a brief Communist uprising during the war.

 

HAN CHINESE ORIGIN MIAO CLANS

A great number of Hmong lineage clans were founded by Chinese men who married Hmong women, these distinct Chinese descended clans practice Chinese burial customs instead of Hmong style burials.

 

The Hmong children of Hmong women who married Chinese men was the origin of numerous China and South East Asia based Hmong lineages and clans, these were called "Chinese Hmong" ("Hmong Sua") in Sichuan, the Hmong were instructed in military tactics by fugitive Chinese rebels.

 

Marriages between Hmong women and Han Chinese men is the origin of a lot of Hmong lineages and clans.

 

Hmong women married Han Chinese men to found new Hmong lineages which use Chinese names.

 

Chinese men who married into Hmong clans have established more Hmong clans than the ritual twelve, Chinese "surname groups" are comparable to the Hmong clans which are patrilineal, and practice exogamy.

 

Hmong women married Han Chinese men who pacified Ah rebels who were fighting against the Ming dynasty, and founded the Wang clan among the Hmong in Gongxian county, of Sichuan's Yibin district.

 

Hmong women who married Chinese men founded a new Xem clan in a Hmong village (among Northern Thailand's Hmong), fifty years later in Chiangmai two of their Hmong boy descendants were Catholics. A Hmong woman and a Chinese man married and founded the Lauj clan in Northern Thailand.

 

A marriage between a Hmong woman and a Chinese man resulted in northern Thailand's Lau2 clan being founded, another Han Chinese with the family name Deng founded another Hmong clan, Han Chinese men's marriages with Hmong women has led some ethnographers to conclude that Hmong clans in the modern era have possible all or partly have been founded in this matter.

 

Jiangxi Han Chinese are claimed by some as the forefathers of the southeast Guizhou Miao, and Miao children were born to the many Miao women married Han Chinese soldiers in Taijiang in Guizhou before the second half of the 19th century.

 

Imperially commissioned Han Chinese chieftancies "gon native", with the Miao and were the ancestors of a part of the Miao population in Guizhou.

 

The Hmong Tian clan in Sizhou began in the seventh century as a migrant Han Chinese clan.

 

Non-han women such as Miao women became wives of Han Chinese male soldiers who fought against the Miao rebellions during the Qing and Ming dynasties since Han women were not available.

 

The Ming dynasty Hongwu Emperor sent troops to Guizhou whose descendants became the Tunbao. The origin of the Tunbao people traces back to when the Ming dynasty sent 300,000 Han Chinese male soldiers in 1381 to conquer Yunnan and the men married Yao and Miao women.

 

The presence of women presiding over weddings was a feature noted in "Southeast Asian" marriages, such as in 1667 when a Miao woman in Yunnan married a Chinese official.

Some Sinicization occurred, in Yunnan a Miao chief's daughter married a scholar in the 1600s who wrote that she could read, write, and listen in Chinese and read Chinese classics.

 

The Sichuan Hmong village of Wangwu was visited by Nicholas Tapp who wrote that the "clan ancestral origin legend" of the Wang Hmong clan, had said that several times they were married into the Han Chinese and possibly one of these was their ancestor Wang Wu, there were two tpes of Hmong, "cooked" who sided with Chinese and "raw" who rebelled against the Chinese, the Chinese were supported by the Wang Hmong clan. A Hmong woman was married by the non-Hmong Wang Wu according to The Story of the Ha Kings in Wangwu village.

 

DISTRIBUTION

The 2000 Chinese census recorded 8,940,116 Miao in mainland China.

 

CUISINE

Miao Fish (苗鱼 miáo yǘ)

Miao fish is a special way of cooking a fish by Miao people. It has been recognized as a local featured cuisine with its tasty flavor: the mixture of fish, green peppers, ginger slices and garlic provided people with great eating experience.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bushwick, Brooklyn, New York, New York City, United States

 

Summary

 

The Romanesque Revival style office building at 31 Belvidere Street is the focal point of the William Ulmer Brewery complex, a reminder of one of Bushwick's, and Brooklyn's, most prominent 19th- and 20th -century industries. The entire complex remains a largely intact example of a late-19 -century brewery designed in the American round arch style, and includes, in addition to the office building, the main brew house (1872) and addition (c.1881), engine and machine houses (Theobald Engelhardt 1885), and stable and storage building (Frederick Wunder 1890).

 

A German emigrant, William Ulmer (1833-1907) began working in a New York City brewery owned by his uncles in the 1850s and later became a partner in the Vigelius & Ulmer Continental Lagerbier brewery, founded in 1871.

 

Within seven years, Ulmer became the sole proprietor of the brewery and under its new name - the William Ulmer Brewery - the business was expanded in the 1880s and 1890s with the construction of ice house, engine-, machine- and wash-room additions, a large storage and stable building, and a handsome Romanesque Revival style office building. Designed by prominent Brooklyn architect Theobald Engelhardt and constructed in 1885, the two-story red brick office building was the architectural highlight of the complex, featuring arched and dormered windows, a squat mansard roof clad in slate, as well as terra-cotta ornament.

 

Divided into three bays, the building's projecting center bay incorporates remarkably crisp red terra-cotta panels that identify the initial of the last name of the owner, the brewery's trademark, and the function of the building, as well as corbelled brickwork and a blind arcade. The office building was separated from the larger brewery by a passage with an elaborate iron gate. Though rusted, the richly embellished gate is historic and possibly original to the structure. The other buildings of the Ulmer brewery complex feature details commonly found on other 19th-century breweries, including round arch-headed and segmentally arch-headed window and door openings, projecting brick pilasters, pedimented parapets and corbelled, denticulated, zigzag-patterned, and channeled decorative brickwork, all characteristic of the American round arch style.

 

Prior to Prohibition, there were at least 24 breweries in Brooklyn, many of which were located in Williamsburgh and Bushwick. Ulmer's was one of the more successful and in 1896 the Brooklyn Eagle described him as a millionaire. Under Ulmer, beer production more than quadrupled, reaching over three million gallons annually. Upon his retirement in 1900, the brewery was run by Ulmer's sons-in-law, John W. Weber and John F. Becker. Like many other breweries, the enactment of Prohibition closed the Ulmer brewery.

 

The factory buildings were sold and converted for light manufacturing use, but the family retained ownership of the office building until 1952, using it as an office for their real estate business. The buildings remain largely intact and retain the detailing that defines their history and use.

 

DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

 

The History of Brewing in Brooklyn and New York

 

"To speak of the origins of brewing in America is to speak of the origins of the nation itself," stated historian Stanley Baron in his book, Brewed in America. While the first European settlers were dependent on beer shipments brought from England, there are also late-16th- and early-17th-century references to brewers operating in the Massachusetts Bay and Virginia colonies.

 

In many early colonial accounts, beer was considered safer to drink than water, and was consumed by all ages at all times of the day. Sickness, death and failure of some settlements were often attributed to a lack of supplies, including beer. In New Amsterdam, the Dutch, who were "even more partial to beer that the English," discovered that the ingredients for beer could be grown in the new world in 1626, the year Peter Minuit "purchased" Manhattan from Native Americans.

 

Brewing was an active industry in New York City during the 17th century, with small-scale commercial, home, and municipal breweries, including one operated by The Dutch East India Company. By the 1770s, New York City and Philadelphia were established as the colonies' brewing centers.

 

At least two documented commercial brewers operated in Brooklyn during the 18th century, and despite the advantage of abundant fresh water, that number grew very slowly after the turn of the 19th century. Most brews were produced for home consumption or by common brewers for sale in nearby "ordinaries" or taverns.

 

The few commercial brewers produced English style brews, such as ale, porter, stout, and common beer, using top-fermenting yeast. In 1840, a former brewer from Bavaria, John Wagner, who had brought lager beer yeast to this country, opened a small brewery in back of his house in Philadelphia to supply his nearby tavern. From these humble beginnings, the opening of small-scale breweries eventually led to a major switch in the American brewing industry, from English to German brewing techniques and brewery proprietors. While the industry did not change overnight, the introduction of lager beer to the American market coincided with a massive influx of German immigrants in the 1840s that revolutionized the brewing industry in New York City, Brooklyn and other cities where they settled in large numbers. The Germans provided an increased market for beer, and they favored lager:

 

"Lager beer - An effervescent malt beverage, brewed by using the bottom-fermentation process, in which a special yeast settles as residue at the bottom of the brewing vats. The distinctly German beer was popular in German countries in the early nineteenth century, and was introduced in the U.S. probably in the 1840s by John Wagner. Because the process for making this light, sparkling brew involved storage while fermentation occurred [which required cool temperatures], it was termed 'lager,' which is derived from the German verb lagern, meaning to stock or store."

 

While two New York City breweries (George Gillig and F & M Schaefer) began to brew lager in the 1840s, S. Liebmann and Sons Brewery (later renamed Rheingold), founded in 1854, was one of the first to use the bottom fermenting process in Brooklyn. As lager gained popularity beginning in the mid-1850s, the cities where most German immigrants settled became the largest brewing centers in the country, including Cincinnati, Milwaukee and St. Louis, as well as Philadelphia, Baltimore, New York City and Brooklyn. Several articles in the Brooklyn Eagle from the 1860s and 1870s focused on the growing popularity of lager beer, calling it our "National Beverage," appealing to people of all classes.

 

Using Long Island lake water supplied by a new gravity-fed water system, "by the 1870s Brooklyn had become a major force in American beer brewing, as numerous establishments, largely run by Germans, flourished in the borough's Eastern District (Williamsburg, Greenpoint and Bushwick)." Between the 1850s and the 1880s, 11 separate breweries operated there in a 14-square block area known as "Brewer's Row." "By the 1880s, 35 breweries had been established in Brooklyn," generating an estimated $8 million in revenue annually. The majority of these firms exclusively brewed lager beer, while the remainder brewed ale or weiss (wheat) beer.

 

Technology and increased demand, as well as taste, influenced the course of the brewing industry in the second half of the 19th century. Like many other industries, the use of steam power and mechanization were common by the second half of the 19th century, altering the earlier "hand-done" brewing process and allowing for greater and more consistent production with the use of less labor.

 

While both processes required boiling and cooling, the German brewing technique differed from the English in requiring cooler temperatures to store the beer. Like the ale breweries, lager breweries operated seasonally (from October to April) but also employed extensive cellars for storage, taking advantage of cooler underground temperatures, and used large blocks of ice to regulate temperature.

 

Changes in refrigeration technology, which was first employed in Brooklyn at S. Liebmann and Sons in 1870, hit most of the breweries in the 1880s, shortening the cooling stages of the brewing process and permitting a longer brewing season. Just as steam power had revolutionized the hand brewing process, in the last years of the 19th century electric power and machinery began to replace the large steam engines.

 

Finally, pasteurization, bottling and later canning, in combination with expanded shipping methods, allowed brewers to branch out beyond local markets. These factors all made it possible for brewers to run larger breweries with greater production and profits, and tended to eliminate the smaller competitors.

 

While the number of breweries increased slowly in the 1880s and 1890s, production continued to steadily increase, driven both by an increased demand and technological advances.

 

Prior to consolidation in 1898, Brooklyn was the fourth most populous city in the country and supported 45 breweries. The prosperity continued in the 20th century, and although the number of breweries declined, the quantity of beer produced continued to grow, reaching its peak, pre-Prohibition, output of 2.5 million barrels in 1907.

 

Bushwick, which was considered a major brewing center from about 1890 until the late 1940s, was supplying almost 10% of all beer consumed in the United States during the height of its production.

 

Eventually, the technological advances that allowed Brooklyn brewers to greatly increase their production ultimately worked against them, as "cheap rail transportation and mechanical refrigeration allowed entrepreneurs in Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Cincinnati to make inroads into the local markets. Successful breweries made larger investments in production and distribution facilities, and small firm disappeared."

 

Still, at the close of the 1910s, there were at least 24 breweries in Brooklyn, and 70 breweries in all the boroughs combined.

 

In 1920, the 18 th Amendment, the National Prohibition or Volstead Act closed many of the Brooklyn breweries,11 while others continued to manufacture near beer (less than .05% alcohol,) soft drinks or other food products. With the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, only 23 of the New York City's (including Brooklyn's) breweries resumed business, with most targeting the local market.

 

Over the next half of a century, brewing in the city declined. Brooklyn's last two breweries closed in 1976 (Rheingold and F & M Schaefer), marking the end of an era. However, about a decade later, during the micro-brewing revolution of 1980s, two Brooklyn entrepreneurs opened the Brooklyn Brewery in 1987. Although their first beers were contract brewed in Utica, New York, the opening of their new brewery in Williamsburg in 1996 revived an industry that once flourished in the borough. The Ulmer complex is a significant reminder of this once important and now reviving Brooklyn industry.

 

The History of the Neighborhood

 

The William Ulmer Brewery is located within the historic boundaries of the town of Bushwick, near the present boundary line between Brooklyn and Queens. Bushwick is one of the earliest colonial settlements in New York, first occupied in the 1630s. One of the original six towns in Brooklyn, it remained a rural farming area until the mid-19th century.

 

The site of the center of the township, the village of Bushwick, is the present intersection of Bushwick Avenue, Old Woodpoint Road, Metropolitan Avenue, Maspeth Avenue, and Humboldt Street. In 1852, Williamsburgh, the western and most populous section of the township, became an independent city, however, its municipal status ended three years later in 1855 when it and all of Bushwick were incorporated within the City of Brooklyn. Thereafter, until Brooklyn's consolidation into Greater New York in 1898, both areas and Greenpoint were known collectively as Brooklyn's Eastern District.

 

Located south of the center of Bushwick village, in the early 19th century, the land around the Ulmer Brewery site was owned by members of the Debevoise family.

 

Charles Debevoise purchased over 45 acres of property near the Bushwick-Newtown border from his brother Francis in 1823, and operated a farm.

 

Like many of his relatives and neighbors, Charles Debevoise was a slave owner. After his death in the 1850s, the Debevoise farm, which had been mapped and lotted in anticipation of sub-divison, was transferred to Charles' children, Jane Stockholm, Elizabeth Debevoise and Abraham Debevoise.

 

During the 1850s Bushwick began to lose its rural, agricultural landscape. Large numbers of Germans immigrated to New York following the political upheavals in central Europe in 1848. Many settled in Williamsburgh and Bushwick and began the development of the area's most famous local industry, brewing. The area boasted a number of features attractive to the brewing industry: an abundant water supply, soil suitable for the construction of underground storage chambers, and convenient water and rail transportation, as well as sufficient local demand. Henry R. Stiles, the notable Brooklyn historian, wrote in 1870:

 

"That quarter of Brooklyn, the Eastern District irreverently designated as Dutchtown, has been for some time the centre of the lager bier manufacturing interest in the Metropolitan District. Here are located some of the largest breweries in existence in the country. Surrounded by a population almost exclusively German, they all enjoy a local patronage to a considerable extent..."

 

A second wave of development in Bushwick began after the construction of the elevated railroad along Myrtle Avenue in 1888, making the area an attractive alternative to congested downtown Brooklyn and lower Manhattan.18 Development, consisting primarily of three-and four-story multiple dwellings, spread eastward toward the Brooklyn-Queens border during the following decade.

 

The population remained largely German until the 1930s and 40s, when Italian-Americans began moving in. Beginning with the brewery workers strike of 1949, the industry began a steady decline. The closing of factories, including the breweries, created an economic depression of the area. In the late 1950s and 1960s, African-Americans and Puerto Ricans immigrated to Bushwick, comprising more than half of its population by 1970.

 

Under the encouragement of real estate agents, many houses changed hands, purchased by low-income families with Federal Housing Authority insured mortgages, who were not necessarily able to maintain their buildings or payments during the economic downturn of the 1970s. New York City's fiscal crisis tightened the budget during this period, cutting essential services to certain communities.

 

Among them were cuts to fire department service in the area, at a time when buildings abandoned by foreclosure were subject to frequent fires, further devastating the neighborhood. Redevelopment efforts began in the 1980s and are still continuing today. According to a 2007 exhibit at the Brooklyn Historical Society, "today, Bushwick is one of Brooklyn's 'hottest' neighborhoods, abuzz with construction, renovation, and aspiration. With a burgeoning arts scene and convergence of Latin American people, Bushwick is truly one of Brooklyn's most dynamic communities."

 

German Immigration, Brooklyn's Eastern District and Lager Beer

 

From its founding in 1626 by Peter Minuit, a native of the German town of Wesel am Rhein, New York City has had a significant German population. During the 1820s, the first German neighborhood and commercial center developed in the area southeast of City Hall Park and by 1840 there were more than 24,000 Germans living in the city. During the next twenty years, their numbers increased dramatically as "mass transatlantic migration brought another hundred thousand Germans fleeing land shortages, unemployment, famine, and political and religious oppression," with over 1,350,000 immigrating to the United States.

 

To accommodate this growth, new German neighborhoods, developed on the Lower East Side of Manhattan and the Eastern District of Brooklyn. In the 1870s and 1880s, dislocations caused by the growth of the German Empire brought more new immigrants to the United States while thousands of American-born children of German immigrants established their own homes in these neighborhoods. By settling in areas with such a high concentration of fellow countrymen, it was easy for Germans to maintain their culture and customs, which included German-speaking churches and synagogues, German newspapers, singing societies, Turnvereine, and beer gardens.

 

In Williamsburgh and Bushwick, it was not uncommon for "Eastern District German-Americans to enrich their day with a brew or two. Lager tended to be the normal mealtime beverage, and it most certainly was served all around at picnics, Sunday outings, sporting events and all the other social gatherings that characterized German-American life everywhere these fun-loving people settled in the United States."

 

More than just a component of the German diet, lager beer was an integral part of the customs that new immigrants maintained in the United States. Lager was for socializing, recreating with family, and enjoyed at club meetings. While some of the clubs constructed their own buildings, such as the Eastern District Turnverein and the Arion Singing Society's Arion Hall, beer gardens were also popular meeting spots, providing entertainment and a family retreat, especially in the hot days of summer, unlike saloons, which were notorious for keeping workers away from their families after a day's labor.

 

The William Ulmer Brewery

 

Born in Wurttemberg in 1833, William Ulmer immigrated to New York in the 1850s to work with his two uncles, Henry Clausen Sr. and John F. Betz, in the brewing industry,25 eventually becoming the brewmaster for Clausen's very successful New York firm. In 1871, Ulmer partnered with Anton Vigelius to form the Vigelius & Ulmer Continental Lagerbier Brewery on Belvidere and Beaver Streets in Bushwick, Brooklyn.

 

Born in Bavaria, Anton Vigelius immigrated to Brooklyn in 1840 at the age of 18 and was involved in the produce business prior to opening the brewery. He purchased land at the corner of Beaver and Belvidere Streets from Abraham and Anna Debevoise in 1869, selling a half-interest in the parcel to Ulmer shortly before the construction of the brewery.

 

As evidenced by the marble date stone in the center of its facade, the first building of the Vigelius and Ulmer Brewery was constructed at the site in 1872. Typical of this period, all of the early brewing operations would have taken place in this building, from the storage of grains, to malting, brewing and lagering (or storage) of the beer. Vigelius also constructed a large residence behind the brewery facing Belvidere Street in 1872, following the common practice of 19th-century brewers who lived in or very near their breweries. The early success of the firm was noted in an 1875 article in the Brooklyn Eagle, which cited the Vigelius & Ulmer Brewery

 

among the largest and most noted of the Williamsburgh breweries, and of the 30 to 40 breweries that were then operating in Brooklyn.

 

In December of 1877, Anton Vigelius sold his share of the brewery to Ulmer and retired from brewing, leaving Ulmer the sole proprietor of what had "grown to be one of the largest breweries in Brooklyn."28 Vigelius remained a well-known and active member of the German community as Vice President of the German Savings Bank, a Director of the Broadway (Williamsburg) Bank, and a member of the Arion Singing Society until his death in 1891.

 

Like many other breweries in Brooklyn, New York and throughout the country, the Ulmer brewery complex expanded over time to increase capacity and accommodate technological advances in the industry.

 

Around 1880, shortly after Ulmer purchased the lot at the corner of Beaver and Locust Streets, a large, storage-house addition to the main building was constructed on Beaver Street. A testament to the brewery's success, in 1885 a major building campaign was begun that included the brick office building and boiler and machine houses (designed by architect Theobald Engelhardt) facing Belvidere Street, as well as a large addition at the rear of the main brewery that served as a wash house and racking (keg-filling) room. Several years later, brewery architect Frederick Wunder designed a large wagon room, stable, and storage building to replace an existing frame stable building.

 

This three-story brick building and its additions, constructed c.1890, was the last major building constructed at the brewery. By the late 1880s, the William Ulmer Brewery and John Becker (Ulmer's son-in-law who lived in Vigelius's former home adjacent to the brewery, demolished) owned more than half of the block bounded by Beaver Street, Belvidere Street, Broadway and Locust Street.

 

Through the 1890s and first decade of the 20th century, the brewery continued to construct minor additions and interior alterations as needed, including the installation of steel framing for a new 236-barrel cooking tank in the main brew house in 1906, a year before Brooklyn reached its peak beer production. Although specific production statistics have not been found, the regular alterations to the buildings indicates that the Ulmer Brewery continued to be successful and expand production.

 

Upon his retirement in 1900, the William Ulmer Brewery was incorporated with Catharine Ulmer (his wife), John F. Becker and John W. Weber (Ulmer's sons-in-law) as directors and stockholders and his daughters, Catharine Becker and Caroline Weber as additional stockholders. Weber, an attorney by trade, became president and Becker, who had been working for Ulmer for over 20 years as a brewer, was named treasurer.

 

The brewery's success continued, allowing Weber to construct a large home at 101 Eighth Avenue in 1909 (within the Park Slope Historic District), while Becker continued to occupy Vigelius's former home behind the brewery. An active philanthropist who belonged to many charitable organizations, Ulmer died in 1907 at his home at 680 Bushwick Avenue. His wife died the following March, leaving a "large estate."

 

Unlike other 19th- and early 20th -century lager breweries in Brooklyn, no evidence has been found that Ulmer operated an adjacent beer garden or that the brewery sold any bottled or canned beer. Instead, both for personal profit and beer distribution opportunities, Ulmer invested extensively in real estate. By purchasing or building taverns and installing a proprietor, brewers could guarantee that their beer was the only one sold.

 

Advertisements and articles in the Brooklyn Eagle and other publications indicate that Ulmer owned several taverns.

 

In 1893, in consultation with Weber, he opened Ulmer Park along the waterfront in Gravesend. This large resort and hotel featured music, dancing, boating, bathing, a shooting gallery, bowling alley and other attractions, and mostly importantly served as a place for the sale of Ulmer's lager.

 

In 1901 Ulmer purchased Dexter Park, a popular baseball and football stadium located in Woodhaven, Queens, where Sunday "blue laws" were less strictly enforced than in Brooklyn, a clear advantage for lager sales. Additionally, in 1914 the William Ulmer Brewery constructed a pavilion with a restaurant and bar at the corner of Metropolitan Avenue and Union Turnpike in Forest Hills, Queens, at the edge of Forest Park.

 

The William Ulmer Brewery closed with the passing of the Volstead Act, and its buildings were sold. The brewery retained ownership of the office and attached wagon house and storage additions, and maintained the buildings for use as a real estate office. Weber became president of the Ulmer Park Realty Company, owned by his wife and sister-in-law, while Becker, already in his 70s, likely retired. A few years prior to the repeal of Prohibition, in 1930, the company officially changed its name to William Ulmer Incorporated, signifying the company's permanent departure from brewing.

 

The Design of the Ulmer Brewery Buildings

 

The Ulmer Brewery complex consists of the main brew house and addition, office, engine and machine house, and stable and storage building. These buildings and other mid- to late-19th-century Brooklyn breweries show a similarity in form and design and feature details of American round arch design. This American industrial interpretation of the German Renaissance Revival or Rundbogenstil ("round-arch style"), which evolved in Germany in the 1820s, "synthesized classical and medieval architecture—particularly the round-arched elements of those style," according to Bradley.

 

These simply designed factory buildings use corbelled and other decorative brickwork, projecting brick piers, round arch window openings, and had parapets that sometimes varied in height and featured pediments, rather than applied ornament for interest and decoration. (Despite its name, buildings constructed in the American version of the style often used economical segmentally arch-headed window openings.) The

 

style was particularly well-suited to industrial and commercial buildings because of its reliance on brick and locally available stones, simplicity of detail, and structural expressiveness, as well as rapidity of construction, economy of materials and workmanship, durability, ample fenestration, and ease of adding extensions without grossly violating the original building fabric. Brick was the material of choice for most industrial buildings. It was inexpensive, durable, and easily supplied. More important, machine-pressed brick remained "the most fire-resistant building material available prior to the widespread use of concrete."

 

The American round-arch style was widely employed in the United States for factories, breweries, warehouses, and school buildings. Transmitted to this country through the immigration of German and Central European architects in the 1840s, as well as through architectural publications, the influence of the Rundbogenstil is clearly visible is the Ulmer Brewery buildings and other extant former brewery buildings in Brooklyn, many of which were located in the heavily German-populated Eastern District, owned by German immigrants and designed by German-immigrant architects or first generation German-Americans.

 

The first building at the brewery, the main brew house constructed in 1872, features many details characteristic of the American round arch style, including round arch-headed window and segmentally-arch-headed door openings with corbelled brick archivolts, projecting pilasters, and corbelled brickwork. Historic photos and illustrations of the complex indicate that the main brew house also featured pedimented parapets at the Beaver Street facade and a two-and-a-half-story, mansard-roofed tower, which are typical of 19th-century brewery architecture.

 

Between 1880 and 1885, shortly after Ulmer purchased the lot at the corner of Beaver and Locust Streets, a large, storage-house addition to the main building was constructed on Beaver Street. Similar in style to the original building, it featured a pedimented parapet, corbelled brickwork and round arch-headed window openings with corbelled brick archivolts. Like other 19th-century breweries, all of the operations likely took place in different sections of this four-story main building, which was divided into two buildings on the interior. As production expanded, the c.1881 addition along Beaver Street provided additional space for operations.

 

By 1887, maps indicate that the mashing of the malt and boiling took place on different floors of the building at the corner of Beaver and Belvidere streets, while in the remainder of the main brew house and its addition, ice was used to maintain cooler temperatures for fermenting, a much longer process. For the final step of the brewing process, the Ulmer Brewery took advantage of underground storage; Department of Buildings permits indicate that both sections of the main brew house have deep cellars, 20- and 34-feet deep.

 

The Ulmer brewery began a major building campaign in 1885; construction was begun on the two-story, brick office building and two- and three-story boiler and machine houses facing Belvidere Street, as well as a large addition at the rear of the main brewery. Dictated by expanding brewing capacity and changing brewery technology, the additions were designed by Eastern District architect Theobald Engelhardt.

 

Although not described specifically as brewery architect, Engelhardt worked on a number of brewery commissions and was also a prominent member of the German community. The new boiler and machine house building on Belvidere Street, which was connected to the southwest facade of the main brew house, was designed in the American round arch style, and features many details similar to its adjacent neighbor, including round arch-headed window openings with corbelled brick archivolts, projecting brick pilasters, and a decorative brick cornice.

 

Although it is only three stories in height, the machine house section of the building extends to the height of the four-story brew house, and the brick cornice, which features corbelled, denticulated and zigzag-patterned brickwork, extends across both buildings. This decorative brick cornice, characteristic of the inexpensive ornament applied to American round arch style factories, also extends across the lower, two-story, boiler-house section of the building and its side and rear facades. Designed with practical mechanical needs in mind, to house boilers and machinery, the tall first and second stories of the new building do not align with the adjacent brewery.

 

By 1887, maps indicate that an ice machine was located on the second story of the machine house, showing Ulmer's efforts to keep up to date with the latest brewing industry advances. Although it was not specifically cited in the permit, it is possible that this building was partially designed and constructed to accommodate this new technology. Also included in this building campaign was the construction of one-story addition at the rear of the main brew house that served as a wash house and racking room.

 

Constructed of brick, this addition was demolished in 1923 to allow for the construction of a parking lot in the former brewery courtyard.

 

Brewery architect Frederick Wunder designed the large wagon house, stable and storage building that faces Locust Street for the brewery in 1890. This three-story brick building and its additions, constructed in a similar round arch design as the other brewery buildings, was the last major building constructed at the brewery.

 

The one- and two-story wagon room and stable additions of the same building campaign were constructed as a rear addition to the office building, linking the Belvidere Street building with the new building fronting Locust Street. Both the northwest, Locust Street facade and the northeast, courtyard-facing facade, which was originally visible from Locust and Beaver streets, of the building are fully developed with features characteristic of the American round arch style, including segmentally arch-headed windows and doors with projecting brick lintels at the first floor; round arch-headed window openings with corbelled brick archivolts at the upper stories; bluestone window sills and string coursing; brick pilasters; and denticulated, channeled and corbelled decorative brickwork. Also characteristic of the style, a tall, pedimented parapet extends above the facade on the Locust Street side of the building and features the remnants of what appears to have been a round, terra-cotta ornament.

 

Original drawings (see illustrations) show that the courtyard-facing facade featured a two-story, central tower or monitor and a shorter tower at the building's northeast corner. (This shorter tower remains with an altered roof and attached fire escape.) The ground floor openings are raised at this facade, likely to accommodate horses, and the northeasternmost door opening (adjacent to the office) is large enough to permit the storage of wagons. By 1910, the Ulmer Brewery was using trucks for delivery, thereby diminishing the need for horses. The upper stories continued to be used for storage and later the third floor of the building was a cooperage.

 

While Ulmer's and other Brooklyn breweries display many Rundbogenstil characteristics, including Philadelphia brick facades with plain pilasters, decorative, patterned brickwork, and of course, round-arched openings accented with archivolts, the more elaborate office building complete with a terracotta company trademark, is the show piece of the brewing complex.

 

By the mid-1880s brewers and their architects were already attempting to show the wealth and success of their businesses through their brewery complexes, by creating a highly-visible corporate symbols, which could be used in company advertising. An article in the Brooklyn Eagle from 1886 described the counting houses of the S. Leibmann and Sons, Obermeyer and Liebmann, and Ulmer breweries as "not surpassed by anything of the kind in Broadway or Wall Street."

 

Designed in 1885 by Theobald Engelhardt, the office building features round arch-headed window openings, facade symmetry and a central projecting bay that are all characteristic of the Romanesque Revival style, which was also inspired by French medieval sources and the German Rundbogenstil.

 

Additional Romanesque Revival details include corbelled blind arches that decorate the pedimented parapet and corbelled archivolts. The terra cotta panels on the office building are of particular note. "OFFICE." above the front entry and the trademark "U" identify the original use and owner of the building, while a band of Queen Anne-inspired decorative panels separates the first and second floors. These floral- and foliate-motif panels were likely manufactured by the Perth Amboy Terra Cotta Company, as very similar tiles appear in an 1895 catalog issued by the company. Other decorative details include, at the second floor, a slate-clad, faux mansard roof and projecting dormers, which were historically more decorative, round arch-headed, copper dormers.

 

The finely detailed iron gate, located to the north of the office building, which historically obscured the entry to the brewery courtyard, also features Queen-Anne inspired motifs and is likely original to the building. As previously described, the office was later expanded as part of the construction of the stable building on Locust, with one- and two-story wagon room, storage and stable additions, which were later partially raised one story to allow for additional storage.

  

Later Building History and Alterations

 

The bulk of the brewery complex was sold in the early 1920s. The large stable and storage building on Locust Street was sold in 1921, and resold within two years to the Artcraft Metal Stamping Corp. A manufacturer of light fixtures, the company later changed its name to Artcraft Metal and Electrical Products and occupied the building as a factory until c.1940, at times sharing the space with other metal fabricators and lighting manufacturers. The full height addition to the building at its northeast corner is an elevator shaft that was probably constructed c. 1932.63 Alterations to the Locust Street fenestration, including the enlargement of several openings and the installation of square-headed windows, were completed by c.1940. Artcraft retained ownership of the building until 1944, after which it changed hands several times (likely between tenants) before it was sold to a realty company in 1949. Metal fabricators and clothing manufacturers are listed as occupants there until at least the 1980s.

 

In 2002, a permit was issued by the Department of Buildings approving a change from factory to residential use. The building is currently divided into a several apartments per floor.

 

The main brewery building, including its additions and engine and machine houses along Belvidere Street, was sold in 1922. Brooklyn Department of Buildings records indicate that the Otis Elevator Company filed to install an elevator in the main brewery building a year earlier, perhaps in anticipation of its sale and reuse for another function. Marcus Leavitt, owner of M. Leavitt Flooring Co. purchased the property in 1923 and made alterations to convert the buildings from a brewery to light manufacturing.

 

Among the changes were interior alterations, the replacement of the interior wooden stairs with fire proof equivalents, the installation of metal fire escapes on the Beaver Street and Locust Street-facing side facades, window replacement with steel sash and other fenestration changes. New fireproof stair cases were installed just behind the Beaver and Belvidere Street facades, as evidenced on the exterior by the offset window openings and stair bulkheads at the roof. The enlargement of several of the round arch-headed windows on the Beaver Street facade may have taken place at this time, as well as the bricking up of windows at the first floor of both facades and at the rear facade, and the lengthening of window openings along Belvidere Street for the installation of doors.

 

The additions to the main brew house and storage addition, located to the rear of the Beaver Street facade, were demolished during this period to allow for the construction of the one-story parking garage that occupies most of the former brewery courtyard and has frontage on Locust and Beaver Streets. (This garage remained part of the same tax lot as the brewery buildings until c.1965, but is not included in this designation.)

 

The brewery building's parapet was reconstructed in 1936, replacing the pedimented and decorative brickwork with four-feet of plain brick. A sprinkler system was added in 1952, and the fire escapes and doors to reach them were replaced in 1958. Subsequent alterations have mainly focused on interior and plumbing, heating or other mechanical work.

 

Leavitt sold the property in 1924 to a realty company in which he was a partner and continued to occupy a warehouse there into the 1940s. Other building tenants included mainly clothing, shoe and handbag manufacturers, which occupied the building into the 1980s. Belvedere Improvement Company Inc. sold the property in 1931, and it changed hands again under foreclosure in 1937. It was purchased by Beaver Management Corp. in 1945. Since the 1960s, several deeds have been recorded against the lot, mostly between realty companies. An application, filed to convert part of the building from light manufacturing into residential units in 2001, was disapproved by the Department of Buildings; however, the Department of Finance currently classifies the building as an elevator apartment building with artists-in-residence. Its recent uses include a warehouse for an electronics importing company and studio space for an artist.

 

William Ulmer Incorporated, with Ulmer's grandson William Ulmer Becker as president, sold the office building to William H. Ludwig Inc. in 1952. The Ludwig company, an electrical appliance manufacturer located at 656 Bushwick Avenue, made several alterations to the building, including interior alterations and the construction of a small concrete block addition at the northwest corner of the lot, as well as changing the use of the building from office and brewery to office, factory and storage. William H. Ludwig Inc. retained ownership of the building for ten years before selling it to Twenty Starr Street Corporation, based next door at 21 Belvidere Street. Twenty Starr Street Corp. held the building for over twenty years, part of which time it is said to have been used for lamp manufacturing and storage. The office building was sold to its current owner in 1985.

 

Description

 

All of the main buildings of the Ulmer Brewery complex are extant, and occupy the northern portion of the block bound by Locust, Beaver, and Belvidere streets and Broadway in Bushwick. The complex consists of the main brew house and addition (71-83 Beaver Street), office (31 Belvidere Street), engine and machine house (35-43 Belvidere Street), and stable and storage building (28 Locust Street), occupying three separate tax lots. The buildings were historically situated around a central courtyard, which is now occupied by a one-story parking garage that is not included in this designation.

 

- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

Aerial view of Mt. Toby Farm, in Sunderland, MA, has worked with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Natural Resources and Conservation Service (NRCS) to create their conservation plan that includes the use of Forage and biomass Planting (512) and Establish and reseed their cover crop during the cool season, on October 18, 2019. Working with Natural Resource Specialist / Business Tools Coordinator Lisa Gilbert who records the progress with the conservation plan. USDA Photo by Lance Cheung. Mt. Toby Farm is along the bank of the Connecticut River; across the river from the University of Massachusetts Crop Animal Research and Education Center, and Mt. Sugarloaf State Reservation.

 

Forage and Biomass Planting, Conservation Practice Code 512 - Forage and biomass planting is used to establish adapted and/or compatible species, varieties, or cultivars of herbaceous species suitable for pasture, hay, or biomass production. For more information, please see nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detail/national/enespanol/?cid=nrcs144p2_027163

 

Cover Crop, Conservation Practice Code 340 - Crops including grasses, legumes, and forbs for seasonal cover and other conservation purposes. For more information, please see nrcs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb1046845.pdf

 

NRCS has a proud history of supporting America’s farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners. For more than 80 years, we have helped people make investments in their operations and local communities to keep working lands working, boost rural economies, increase the competitiveness of American agriculture, and improve the quality of our air, water, soil, and habitat.

 

As the USDA’s primary private lands conservation agency, we generate, manage, and share the data, technology, and standards that enable partners and policymakers to make decisions informed by objective, reliable science.

 

And through one-on-one, personalized advice, we work voluntarily with producers and communities to find the best solutions to meet their unique conservation and business goals. By doing so, we help ensure the health of our natural resources and the long-term sustainability of American agriculture.

 

Farm Production and Conservation (FPAC) is the Department’s focal point for the nation’s farmers and ranchers and other stewards of private agricultural lands and non-industrial private forest lands. FPAC agencies implement programs designed to mitigate the significant risks of farming through crop insurance services, conservation programs and technical assistance, and commodity, lending, and disaster programs.

 

The agencies and service supporting FPAC are Farm Service Agency (FSA), Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), and Risk Management Agency (RMA).

 

NRCS – NRCS - nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/site/national/home/

 

FPAC - Farm Production and Conservation - usda.gov/our-agency/about-usda/mission-areas

 

USDA - USDA.gov

 

In the future, all Fast Food restaurants will limit their drive-thrus to two vehicles at a time and all fast food drive-thrus will include electric stop sign gates to warn drivers that the drive-thru is at its limited capacity and this will help to save the environment and reduce litter and keep the whole world nice and clean and fast food restaurants like McDonald's will have more dinning tables and will have arcade games in the playplaces in the future which is the 1997 My McDonald's rebrand to limit down the drive-thrus too stop from pollution and everybody who uses drive-thrus must wait until they get to their designated areas to eat their food instead of eating in the vehicles for safety and that will be the new law for the future. Pear-shaped wrecking balls MUST BE BANNED and NEVER EVER get restored and revived in the future and Pear-shaped Wrecking Balls also MUST GET BURNED INTO ASHES AND GET SHATTERED INTO TINY PIECES and get replaced by new modern spherical wrecking balls forever because pear-shaped wrecking balls are trash and very ineffective and makes people upset. This is why Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992) MUST BE BANNED and NEVER EVER get revived in the future I am glad the new Tom and Jerry movie that is coming out this year is replacing the old Tom and Jerry Movie from 1992 which is the movie this pear-shaped wrecking ball that destroyed a good house is from this movie which abused Blue's Clues Steve Fans. Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992) MUST BE BANNED never ever get revived in the future because Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992) does have an upsetting unrealistic house demolition with an old fashioned pear-shaped wrecking ball destroying a beautiful old fashioned living house because of it being decades old ruining nostalgia and ruining my golden toddlerhood and abused many Blue's Clues Steve fans making them think the wrecking ball destroyed the handy dandy notebooks which we all love because the destroyed house at the beginning of Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992) does look slightly identical to the Blue's Clues House and now even the destroyed Handy Dandy Notebooks are getting mended back together. So I hereby Tom and Jerry: The Movie (1992) to BE BANNED FOREVER due to abusing Blue's Clues Steve Fans like me. Tom and Jerry: The Movie MUST BE BANNED because it has an unrealistic house demolition with a very bad old fashioned wrecking ball that upsets people so bad and abused many Blue's Clues Steve Fans and some bratts were getting bad advice from this movie with convience taking over good old fashioned traditional stuff is the exaggerated house demolition in 1992's Tom and Jerry the movie with a pear-shaped wrecking ball destroying the beautiful old fashioned living house and replacing it with a garage full of ice cream trucks with the bad old outdated confusing misleading red trapezoid children slow crossing warning blades that word IF-SAFE STOP THEN-GO which is extremely mean-spirited and is a yield sign that says stop which is extremely wrong and confusing to people who are deaf, color blind, can't read, or don't speak English. Also old fashined traditional stuff are extremely important not just conviences and even polluting andhaving Eastern cottontail rabbits extinct. Good thing I am making safety collaborations by updating all ice cream trucks to all have the current updated yellow trapezoid children slow crossing warning blades that word children slow crossing and or school bus swing arm stop signs which are octagon shaped especially I know for a fact in all traffic signs the shape is the most important not just the word and color especially in all stop signs the octagon shape is the most important not just the word and color.

 

. Similar to modern Simpsons (seasons 19 and Later) 1992's Tom and Jerry the movie is another bad media showing convience taking over good important traditional stuff with a pear-shaped wrecking ball destroying a beautiful old fashioned living house and replace the house with convient high rise appartment building with a garage full of ice cream trucks with the bad old oudated confusing misleading red trapezoid children slow crossing warning blades that word IF-SAFE STOP THEN-GO which was mean-spirited and ruining my golden toddlerhood. In the 2000s, Warner Bros reviving 1992's Tom and Jerry the movie and and selling too many DVD copies of that movie surpassing Corduroy the Bear and his buttons was all McDonald's corporation and Bogen Communication's fault because the super size at McDonald's was brainwashing many people by reviving the bad old 1992 Tom and Jerry movie and popularizing Bogen Multicom 2000 and their mean spirited bell tones that are haunted chimes that don't sound like a bell at all scaring off kids especially kids with autism and making them not want to go to school and abandoning my golden toddler stuff like Corduroy the Bear with two buttons on his green corduroy overalls but good thing I am undoing all of the bad influence the super size gave us by restoring my golden toddlerhood, safety improvements, kindness improvements, reviving Nelvana's version of Corduroy the Bear with the premiere of Two Buttons again and Forever fixing Betty Quan's upsetting mistake for good by showing that they did get Corduroy's button out of the storm drain and put Corduroy's button back on Corduroy the Bear's green corduroy overalls and that corduroy the bear does have two buttons on his green corduroy overalls forever and bringing back all nostalgic inducing stuff like green chalkboards and electric mechanical wall bells etc and create a nostalgic inducing future. So this is why all broadcasts of The Simpsons MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be ONLY reruns of classic Simpsons (first 18 seasons of The Simpsons). This is why all schools MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be set up like Middleborough, Hilltop School from Timothy Goes to School, and or my DeVry building in North Brunswick, NJ and all with green chalkboards, electric mechanical wall bells, and Corbeil school buses and other school buses with electric stop arms, and only kind-spirited stuff like Disney Snow White and Pinocchio stuff and Corduroy the Bear with two buttons on his green corduroy overalls and Steve Notebooks etc, and no mean-spirited stuff like Bogen Multicom 2000 and that mean scary looking grumpy face with the freaky spikey eyelashes and triangular eyes and razor blade forehead wrinkles they used to have on Gordon in the old live action model version of Thomas and Friends and no processed foods in the school lunches. This is why McDonald's restaurants MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be McEyebrows with the yellow and orange striped awnings, arch wedge the new aluminum exterior I have created, or the original 1970s version of the iconic double sloped mansard roof and better and safe updated indoor PlayPlaces with low and safe steps and slides and green chalkboards and or just the dining room option (no playplace), This is why all ice cream trucks MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be all updated to the current updated yellow trapezoid children slow crossing warning blades that word CHILDREN SLOW CROSSING and or school bus stop signs and that all ice cream trucks MUST BE BY LAW MANDEDTED TO GET RID of the bad old outdated red trapezoid children slow crossing warning blades that word IF-SAFE STOP THEN-GO for good, This is why Crayola Crayon boxes MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be new modern 1997 boxes. This is why school PA systems MUST BE BY LAW MANDATED to be Rauland Telecenter or PA systems with no bell tones. And this is why Nelvana and Hanna-Barbera MUST TAKE OVER Warner Bros. Animation. The reality is that demolition are based on how bad the building is damaged not on how old the building is like in 1992's Tom and Jerry the movie.

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

Jon Magnuson, Executive Director of the nonprofit Cedar Tree Institute in Marquette, Michigan

906-2285494

magnusonx2@charter.net

www.earthkeepersup.org

www.cedartreeinstitute.org

 

EarthKeepers II (EK II) Project Coordinator Kyra Fillmore Ziomkowski explains creating 30 interfaith community gardens (2013-2014) across the Upper Peninsula of Michigan that include vegetables and native species plants that encourage and help pollinators like bees and butterflies.

 

The video was shot on April 5, 2013 at the Big Bay Point Lighthouse Bed and Breakfast in Big Bay, MI during a meeting of EK II representatives.

 

An Interfaith Energy Conservation and Community Garden Initiative Across the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to Restore Native Plants and Protect the Great Lakes from Toxins like Airborne Mercury in cooperation with the EPA Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, U.S. Forest Service, 10 faith traditions and Native American tribes such as Keweenaw Bay Indian Community

 

10 faiths: Roman Catholic" "Episcopal" "Jewish" "Lutheran" "Presbyterian" "United Methodist" "Bahá'í" "Unitarian Universalist" "American Friends" "Quaker" "Zen Buddhist" "

 

EK II website

EarthKeepersUP.org

 

Nonprofit Cedar Tree Institute

Marquette, MI

www.CedarTreeInstitute.org

 

Great Lakes Restoration Initiative

www.greatlakesrestoration.us

www.epa.gov

 

Deborah Lamberty

Program Analyst

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

Great Lakes National Program Office

Chicago, IL

 

Lamberty.Deborah@epa.gov

312-886-6681

 

Pastor Albert Valentine II

Manistique, MI

Manistique Presbyterian Church of the Redeemer

Gould City Community Presbyterian Church

Presbytery of Mackinac

www.presbymac.org

 

Rev. Christine Bergquist

Bark River United Methodist Church

First UMC of Hermansville

United Methodist Church Marquette District

www.mqtdistrict.com

 

Rev. Elisabeth Zant

Eden Evangelical Lutheran Church

Munising, MI

www.edenevangelical.org

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Northern Great Lakes Synod

www.nglsynod.org

 

Heidi Gould

Marquette, MI

Marquette Unitarian Universalist Congregation

www.mqtuu.org

twitter.com/Heidi_Gould

 

Rev. Pete Andersen

Marquette, MI

ELCA

 

Helen Grossman

Temple Beth Sholom

Jewish Synagogue

 

Rev. Stephen Gauger

Calvary Lutheran Church

Rapid River, MI

ELCA

 

Jan Schultz, Botanist

U.S. Forest Service (USFS)

Eastern Region 9

EK II Technical Advisor for Community Gardens

Milwaukee, WI

 

USFS

www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/nativegardening

www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers

www.wildlifeforever.org

 

Pollinator photos by Nancy Parker Hill

www.nancyhillphoto.com

 

Rev. David Van Kley, Senior Pastor

Rev. Amanda Kossow, Associate Pastor

www.marquettelutherans.org

 

Messiah Lutheran Church

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

Marquette, Michigan

 

Rev. David Van Kley, Senior Pastor

Rev. Amanda Kossow, Associate Pastor

www.marquettelutherans.org

  

NMU EK II Student Team

Katelin Bingner

Tom Merkel

Adam Magnuson

 

EK II social sites

www.youtube.com/EarthKeepersII

vimeo.com/EarthKeepersII

EarthKeepersII.blogspot.com

EarthKeepersII.wordpress.com

www.facebook.com/EarthKeepersII

www.twitter.com/EarthKeeperTeam

pinterest.com/EarthKeepersII

pinterest.com/EarthKeepersII/Great-Lakes-Restoration-Init...

pinterest.com/EarthKeepersII/EarthKeepers-II-and-the-EPA-...

Lake Superior Zendo

Zen Buddhist Temple

Marquette, Michigan

 

Rev. Tesshin Paul Lehmberg

906 226-6407

plehmber@nmu.edu

 

Dr. Michael Grossman, representing Jewish Temple Beth Sholom in Ishpeming, MI

Helen Grossman, representing Jewish Temple Beth Sholom in Ishpeming, MI

906-475-4009 (hm)

906-475-4127 (wk)

www.templebethsholom-ishpeming.org

www.templebethsholom-ishpeming.org/tikkun

www.templebethsholom-ishpeming.org/aboutus

 

Wild Rice: 8 videos

www.learningfromtheearth.org/video-interviews/wild-rice-m...

 

Birch – 2 videos

www.learningfromtheearth.org/video-interviews/paper-birch...

 

Photos (click on each name or topic to see the respective photo galleries):

www.learningfromtheearth.org/photo-gallery

 

www.picasaweb.google.com/Yoopernewsman/JonReport?authuser...

www.picasaweb.google.com/100329402090002004302/JonReport?...

 

“Albert Einstein speculated once that if bees disappeared off the surface of the earth, then humans would have only four years of life left.”

the late Todd Warner, KBIC Natural Resource Director

 

Links:

 

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project website:

www.wingsandseeds.org

 

Cedar Tree Institute: Zaagkii Project

www.cedartreeinstitute.org/2010/07/wings-seeds-zaagkii-pr...

www.cedartreeinstitute.org/2009/01/wings-seeds-the-zaagki...

 

Zaagkii Project Videos on youtube (also uploaded to dozens of internet sites):

www.youtube.com/ZaagkiiTV

 

KBIC Pollinator Preservation

www.indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/ictarchives/2008/0...

Zaagkii Project Indigenous Plants Help Give New Face to Sand Point on Keweenaw Bay www.indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/ictarchives/2008/0...

 

Zaagkii Project 2010: U.S. Forest Service & Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Native Plants Greenhouse

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hoq5xXHDF4E

United States Forest Service sponsored Zaagkii Project featured on Pollinator Live

www.youtube.com/watch?v=8P3DPfxx7Jw

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #9: Teens Painting Mason Bee Houses in Northern Michigan

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIIV6jrlT20

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #8: Marquette, Michigan Teens Build Mason Bee Houses

www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3MBfV7ION8

 

Zaagkii Project Butterfly Houses: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, U.S. Forest Service

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGQScEI9x7Q

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #6: "The Butterfly Lady" Susan Payant teaches teens about Monarchs

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlIgsuTFSuM

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #5: Terracotta half-life, Marquette, MI band supports environment projects

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqlFCHwW30o

 

2009 Zaagkii Video #4: Michigan teens meet 150,000 swarming honeybees with beekeeper Jim Hayward

www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2B4MEzM7w4

 

2009 Zaagkii Video #3: Michigan teens give away mason bee houses, honor supporters

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqfWeEgDxTY

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #2: Historic KBIC native plants greenhouse, USFS protects pollinators

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg8H5nhvzzc

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #1: Students make bee houses, plant native species plants

www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8jqJAQyXwE

 

Zaagkii Project Butterfly Houses: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, U.S. Forest Service:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGQScEI9x7Q

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project: Northern Michigan teens, KBIC tribal youth protect pollinators

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoPJOXHt7pI

 

Zaagkii Project – Northern Michigan University:

www.webb.nmu.edu/Centers/NativeAmericanStudies/SiteSectio...

 

Native Village stories: Beautiful Layout by Owner Gina Boltz:

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project: A Project by Ojibwe Students from the Keweenah Bay Indian Community

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

NMU Students Join Pollinator Protection Initiative

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

KBIC Tribal youth protect pollinators

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

Teens Help with Sweet Nature Project

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

USFS Success Stories:

Restoring Native Plants on the Enchanted Island

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=6274

 

Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Native Plant Greenhouse & Workshop

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5499

  

Intertribal Nursery Council Annual Meeting a Success

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=6276

 

New Greenhouse for KBIC Restoration

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5336

  

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds - An Update

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5076

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=4025

 

News Stories:

U.P. teens build butterfly houses, grow 26,000 indigenous plants

www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/519835.html?...

 

Effort to protect pollinators launched

www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/512810.html

 

Marquette Monthly (Sept. 2009):

www.mmnow.com/mm_archive_folder/09/0909/feature.html

 

As bees die, Keweena Bay Indian Community adults, teens actively protect pollinators

www.nativetimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&view...

 

Michigan Teens Build Butterfly Houses and Plant 26,000 Native Plants through the Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project

www.treehugger.com/culture/michigan-teens-build-butterfly...

 

Examples of numerous Gather.com articles with lots of photos/videos:

 

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project: Northern Michigan teens and KBIC tribal youth are protecting pollinators by building butterfly houses and planting native plants

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977550233

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project: Protecting Pollinators

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977428640

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #2: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community in 2010 to build first Native American native species plants greenhouse on tribal property in U.S.

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978040745

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #1: Northern Michigan Teens Protect Pollinators with U.S. Forest Service, Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, NMU Center for Native American Studies: Build mason bee houses, butterfly houses, distribute thousands of native species plants

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978040729

 

Zaagkii Project Internet sites – blogs, photos, videos etc.:

 

ZaagkiiProject on flickr

www.flickr.com/photos/zaagkiiproject

www.flickr.com/people/zaagkiiproject

 

Zaagkii on youtube:

www.youtube.com/ZaagkiiTV

 

Zaagkii on bliptv:

www.zaagkiitv.blip.tv

 

Zaagkii on word press:

www.zaagkiiproject.wordpress.com

 

Zaagkii on Blogger:

www.zaagkiiproject.blogspot.com

 

Zaagkii on Photobucket:

www.photobucket.com/ZaagkiiProjectWingsSeeds

www.photobucket.com/ZaagkiiProjectWingsSeeds/?start=all

 

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project website:

wingsandseeds.org

 

Cedar Tree Institute: Zaagkii Project

cedartreeinstitute.org/2010/07/wings-seeds-zaagkii-project

cedartreeinstitute.org/2009/01/wings-seeds-the-zaagkii-pr...

 

Zaagkii Project Videos on youtube (also uploaded to dozens of internet sites):

www.youtube.com/ZaagkiiTV

 

KBIC Pollinator Preservation

indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/ictarchives/2008/08/15...

Zaagkii Project Indigenous Plants Help Give New Face to Sand Point on Keweenaw Bay indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/ictarchives/2008/09/03...

 

Zaagkii Project 2010: U.S. Forest Service & Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Native Plants Greenhouse

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hoq5xXHDF4E

United States Forest Service sponsored Zaagkii Project featured on Pollinator Live

www.youtube.com/watch?v=8P3DPfxx7Jw

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #9: Teens Painting Mason Bee Houses in Northern Michigan

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIIV6jrlT20

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #8: Marquette, Michigan Teens Build Mason Bee Houses

www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3MBfV7ION8

 

Zaagkii Project Butterfly Houses: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, U.S. Forest Service

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGQScEI9x7Q

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #6: "The Butterfly Lady" Susan Payant teaches teens about Monarchs

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlIgsuTFSuM

 

2009 Zaagkii Project Vid #5: Terracotta half-life, Marquette, MI band supports environment projects

www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqlFCHwW30o

 

2009 Zaagkii Video #4: Michigan teens meet 150,000 swarming honeybees with beekeeper Jim Hayward

www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2B4MEzM7w4

 

2009 Zaagkii Video #3: Michigan teens give away mason bee houses, honor supporters

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqfWeEgDxTY

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #2: Historic KBIC native plants greenhouse, USFS protects pollinators

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg8H5nhvzzc

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #1: Students make bee houses, plant native species plants

www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8jqJAQyXwE

 

Zaagkii Project Butterfly Houses: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, U.S. Forest Service:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGQScEI9x7Q

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project: Northern Michigan teens, KBIC tribal youth protect pollinators

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoPJOXHt7pI

 

Zaagkii Project – Northern Michigan University:

webb.nmu.edu/Centers/NativeAmericanStudies/SiteSections/A...

 

Native Village stories: Beautiful Layout by Owner Gina Boltz:

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project: A Project by Ojibwe Students from the Keweenah Bay Indian Community

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

NMU Students Join Pollinator Protection Initiative

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

KBIC Tribal youth protect pollinators

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

Teens Help with Sweet Nature Project

www.nativevillage.org/Messages%20from%20the%20People/KBIC...

 

USFS Success Stories:

Restoring Native Plants on the Enchanted Island

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=6274

 

Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Native Plant Greenhouse & Workshop

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5499

 

Intertribal Nursery Council Annual Meeting a Success

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=6276

 

New Greenhouse for KBIC Restoration

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5336

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds - An Update

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=5076

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project

www.fs.fed.us/r9/ssrs/story?id=4025

 

News Stories:

U.P. teens build butterfly houses, grow 26,000 indigenous plants

www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/519835.html?...

 

Effort to protect pollinators launched

www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/512810.html

 

Marquette Monthly (Sept. 2009):

mmnow.com/mm_archive_folder/09/0909/feature.html

 

As bees die, Keweena Bay Indian Community adults, teens actively protect pollinators

nativetimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=art...

 

Michigan Teens Build Butterfly Houses and Plant 26,000 Native Plants through the Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project

www.treehugger.com/culture/michigan-teens-build-butterfly...

 

Examples of numerous Gather.com articles with lots of photos/videos:

 

Zaagkii Wings and Seeds Project: Northern Michigan teens and KBIC tribal youth are protecting pollinators by building butterfly houses and planting native plants

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977550233

 

Zaagkii Wings & Seeds Project: Protecting Pollinators

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977428640

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #2: Keweenaw Bay Indian Community in 2010 to build first Native American native species plants greenhouse on tribal property in U.S.

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978040745

 

2009 Zaagkii Project #1: Northern Michigan Teens Protect Pollinators with U.S. Forest Service, Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, NMU Center for Native American Studies: Build mason bee houses, butterfly houses, distribute thousands of native species plants

www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978040729

 

Zaagkii Project Internet sites – blogs, photos, videos etc.:

 

ZaagkiiProject on flickr

www.flickr.com/photos/zaagkiiproject

www.flickr.com/people/zaagkiiproject

 

Zaagkii on youtube:

www.youtube.com/ZaagkiiTV

 

Zaagkii on bliptv:

www.zaagkiitv.blip.tv

 

Zaagkii on word press:

zaagkiiproject.wordpress.com

 

Zaagkii on Blogger:

zaagkiiproject.blogspot.com

 

Zaagkii on Photobucket:

photobucket.com/ZaagkiiProjectWingsSeeds

photobucket.com/ZaagkiiProjectWingsSeeds/?start=all

Sunday Experiment Highlights NASA's MMS Mission: Join us from 1-3 PM on Sunday, March 16 at Goddard's Visitors Center : NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission via brief presentations from MMS scientists, hands-on activities that include spacecraft modeling (LEGO, paper), NASA Apps and iPad Teacher Tools, magnetism, mission career videos and more!

 

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Bill Hrybyk

 

NASA image use policy.

 

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.

 

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The hot and dry weather continues. They have got the sprinklers out at work, to keep the lawns looking green

This old Borax mine train engine was found in the desert and was later brought to Knott's Berry Farm's Ghost Town in Buena Park, where it can still be found today.

 

There are no known copyright restrictions on this image. All future uses of this photo should include the courtesy line, "Photo courtesy Orange County Archives."

 

Photo by Marion Speer from the Knott's Berry Farm Collection, Accession #2006/8.

A new interpretation of a timeless design

 

To mark the 50th anniversary of the iconic Berlinette, Design Yann Jarsalle and Concept and Show Car Director Axel Breun reinterpreted the original design cues to include the new Renault design language introduced by Laurens van den Acker with the DEZIR concept car, and which will soon be rolled out in the company’s future models. The new front-end look, with the upright, confident diamond, has been adapted for this very low and wide car. The Renault Alpine A 110-50 is a car of today; a bold embodiment of RENAULT’s passion for motorsport.

 

“For everybody on the team, it was a dream come true to work on an Alpine concept car. We wanted to put this car firmly in the modern day, while resonating with its heritage” Laurens van den Acker, Senior VP, Corporate Design.

 

The Renault Alpine A 110-50 concept car translates the most characteristic design features of the original A 110 in a modern and spectacular way with:

- the sculpted forms of its elegant, flowing bodywork, enhanced by lights over which air seems to flow effortlessly.

- the half-domed additional lamps, with a technical but nostalgic interpretation, thanks to full LED yellow lighting – as it should be!

- a characteristic 3D rear window, which reveals the mid-rear engine.

- air intakes on each side echo the ducts on the rear wheel arches of the Berlinette. The right-hand opening is for gearbox cooling, the left is for the engine bay.

Produced by Faster, the carbon-fibre bodywork features a new shade of blue which refreshes and reinterprets the famous original ‘Alpine Blue’. Every opening panel does so with dynamics worthy of the finest GTs, with the bonnet hinged at the front and the engine bay cover opening towards the rear. The doors feature a scissor motion.

 

“The car is very curvy, like the Berlinette, while expressing the three key words of our new design policy: simple, sensual and friendly” Axel Breun.

  

// Un dessin intemporel réinterprété

 

Pour fêter les 50 ans de cette icône qu’est la Berlinette, Yann Jarsalle, Designer et Axel Breun, Directeur Concept et Show Cars chez Renault Design, ont réinterprété les codes stylistiques d’origine tout en intégrant le nouveau langage formel de Renault initié par Laurens van den Acker sur le concept-car DEZIR et bientôt décliné sur les futures modèles de la marque. La nouvelle identité visuelle de face avant, avec le losange droit et fier, est adaptée sur cette voiture très basse et large. Renault Alpine A 110-50 se place dans notre temps et incarne avec force la passion de RENAULT pour le sport automobile.

 

« Ce fut un rêve pour tous les membres de l’équipe de travailler sur un concept-car Alpine. Nous avons souhaité inscrire la voiture dans la modernité avec des clins d’œil au passé. » Laurens van den Acker, Directeur du Design Industriel

 

Le concept-car Renault Alpine A 110-50 traduit les éléments stylistiques les plus emblématiques de l’A 110, de façon spectaculaire et actuelle avec :

- le traité sculpté d’une carrosserie élégante et fluide, mise en valeur par des jeux de lumière sur laquelle l’air semble glisser sans contrainte.

- les projecteurs additionnels « bombés » en demi-cercle, avec une interprétation à la fois technique et nostalgique, grâce à un éclairage full-LED de couleur jaune, comme il se doit !

- une lunette tridimensionnelle bien typée, qui laisse apparaître le moteur en position centrale arrière.

- une entrée d’air sur chaque flanc qui rappelle l’écope des ailes arrière de la Berlinette. Celle de droite assure le refroidissement de la boîte de vitesses, celle de gauche, celui du compartiment moteur.

 

Réalisée chez Faster, la carrosserie en carbone arbore une nouvelle couleur bleue qui réinterprète le « bleu Alpine » pour le réactualiser. Chaque ouvrant dispose d’une cinématique digne des plus belles G.T. Le capot avant s’ouvrant vers l’avant et le capot arrière vers l’arrière. Les portes s’ouvrent en élytre.

 

« La voiture est très sculptée comme l’était la Berlinette, tout en exprimant les trois mots clés de notre nouveau design : simple, sensuel, chaleureux. » Axel Breun.

 

For Sale Yamaha XJ900 1985 model

Excellent bike, smooth runner, very fast and ultra reliable. Of the more than100 bikes I have personally owned, which include a new zephyr 750, a new Vulcan 1500 classic, several kawasaki GT750, Z750, Z650, Z250, Zr750, XJ650, Suzuki GR650, GS850 Yamaha XS250, XS360, XS400, Honda CB250, CB900, CB400 CR125 Elsinore, Atomic Link 250, TDR200, Grand Prix Victa, and too many more to remember ……… THIS XJ900 is the best of them all. Last year when I was Blueing with my EX BITCH, I blew a gasket in my BRAIN and just took off to Brisbane for a couple of weeks. The Bike was Fantastic. Never missed a beat. I Made it to a friends in Gosford in a day, then I fell in a heap. Funny thing was, the speedo cable broke at Gundagai, so I assumed that 6000 RPM was oh,… about 110-120 kmh and so I did 6000 RPM all the way to Brisbane. DON’T LAUGH! I was being a bit optimistic. I got a new speedo cable in Brizzy and discovered to my amusement and AWE that I had been riding at 160kmh ALL THE BLOODY WAY! Hahahhaa! God was on my side,….. never copped a copper with a radar! I once rode at 160kmh from Adelaide to the border of Vic at 160kmh on a Kawasaki GT750. smoked like a prick after that. The XJ900 did Gundagai to Brizzy at 160 and is still running as beautifully today as the day I got it. Another reccomendation,… This bike has outlasted three motorcycle couriers, me and two mates and none of us Kamikaze Pilots could kill it. It is BULLETPROOF! The clutch slips a little if you wring its neck really hard, but it is fine under responsible law abiding riding conditions. The only other flaws are that it is cosmetically challenged. The tank has a less than perfect paint job done by another courier mate who owned the spares bike that accompanies this one. NOTE Both tanks do NOT LEAK. If I had the time I would have given the bike a full respray, but it looks reasonably presentable.

Registered until the end of November with 90% tyres and a complete XJ900 spares bike (not running)

Selling due to overseas travel. Must sell by 16th February!

Last year I put MYSELF on the market and I sold myself as a "mail order husband" on the internet to a GORGEOUS Eurasian woman. (No Sheet! Internet dating works! I never intended to hook up with anyone overseas, but I have found the perfect woman! Awesome!) At the end of February, I fly to Asia to get married and I won’t be back. Unfortunately, they don’t allow the importation of bikes over 5 years old over there, so the XJ900 has to go. SO… I am asking $1500 For it. I am insanely busy organising my departure, so I won’t have time to get a roadworthy. Get it yourself ya lazy bum! You want a great bike at a bargain price with 100% spares bike AND a Roadworthy! Anyway. Call me BEFORE BIDDING. This bike is offered for sale elsewhere and this auction may be cancelled at ANY TIME, with all bids being cancelled, so please call first to see if it is still available. My name is Peter and the number is 0432 695 269. Call me, Call me NOW! (between 10am and 10 PM)

This Bikes and parts must sell by the 16th of february and is located in North Dandenong Melbourne Victoria.

 

Sunday Experiment Highlights NASA's MMS Mission: Join us from 1-3 PM on Sunday, March 16 at Goddard's Visitors Center : NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission via brief presentations from MMS scientists, hands-on activities that include spacecraft modeling (LEGO, paper), NASA Apps and iPad Teacher Tools, magnetism, mission career videos and more!

 

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Bill Hrybyk

 

NASA image use policy.

 

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.

 

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Dharamshala (also Dharamsala) is a city and a municipal council in Kangra district in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. It is the district headquarters. It was formerly known as Bhagsu. The Dalai Lama's residence in McLeodGanj and the headquarters of Central Tibetan Administration (the Tibetan government in exile) are in Dharamshala. Dharamshala is 18 kilometres from Kangra.

 

DESCRIPTION

Dharamshala is a city in the upper reaches of the Kangra Valley and is surrounded by dense coniferous forest consisting mainly of stately Deodar cedar trees. The suburbs include McLeodGanj, Bhagsunath, Dharamkot, Naddi, ForsythGanj, Kotwali Bazaar (the main market), Kaccheri Adda (government offices such as the court, police, post, etc.), Dari, Ramnagar, Sidhpur, and Sidhbari (where the Karmapa is based).

 

The village of McLeodGanj, lying in the upper reaches, is known worldwide for the presence of the Dalai Lama. On 29 April 1959, the 14th Dalai Lama (Tenzin Gyatso) established the Tibetan exile administration in the north Indian hill station of Mussoorie. In May 1960, the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) was moved to Dharamshala.

 

Dharamshala is the centre of the Tibetan exile world in India. Following the 1959 Tibetan uprising there was an influx of Tibetan refugees who followed the 14th Dalai Lama. His presence and the Tibetan population has made Dharamshala a popular destination for Indian and foreign tourists, including students studying Tibet.

 

One of the main attractions of Dharamshala is Triund hill. Jewel of Dharamshala, Triund is one day trek at the upper reaches of McLeodGanj, about 9 km from McLeodGanj.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Dharamshala (Devanagari: धर्मशाला; ITRANS: Dharmashaalaa; IAST: Dharmaśālā) is a Hindi word (derived from Sanskrit) that is a compound of dharma (धर्म) and shālā (शाला). A loose translation into English would be 'spiritual dwelling' or, more loosely, 'sanctuary'. Rendering a precise literal translation into English is problematic due to the vast and conceptually rich semantic field of the word dharma[1] and the cultural aspect of India.

 

In common Hindi usage, the word dharamshala refers to a shelter or rest house for spiritual pilgrims. Traditionally, such dharamshalas (pilgrims' rest houses) were commonly constructed near pilgrimage destinations (often in remote areas) to give visitors a place to sleep for the night. When the first permanent settlement was created in the place now called Dharamshala, there was one such pilgrims' rest house on the site, and the settlement took its name from that dharamshala.

 

HISTORY

BEFORE THE RAJ

From the earliest times until the British Raj, Dharamshala and its surrounding area was ruled by the Katoch Dynasty of Kangra. The Katoch Dynasty is said to be the oldest serving Royal Family in the world. The Royal Family still keeps a residence in Dharamshala, known as 'Clouds End Villa'.

 

The indigenous people of the Dharamshala area (and the surrounding region) are the Gaddis, a predominantly Hindu group who traditionally lived a nomadic or semi-nomadic (transhumant) lifestyle. Due to the lack of permanent settlements in the area, some Gaddis lost their seasonal pastures and farmland when the British and the Gurkhas arrived to settle.

 

In 1848, the area now known as Dharamshala was annexed by the British.

 

"Dharamsāla lies on a spur of the Dhaola Dhār, 16 miles north-east of Kāngra, in the midst of wild and picturesque scenery. It originally formed a subsidiary cantonment for the troops stationed at Kāngra, and was first occupied as a station in 1849, when a site was required for a cantonment to accommodate a Native regiment which was being raised in the District. A site was found upon the slopes of the Dhaola Dhār, in a plot of waste land, upon which stood an old Hindu resthouse, or dharmsāla, whence the name adopted for the new cantonment. The civil authorities, following the example of the regimental officers, and attracted by the advantages of climate and scenery, built themselves houses in the neighbourhood of the cantonment; and in 1855 the new station was formally recognised as the head-quarters of the [Kāngra] District."

 

In 1860, the 66th Gurkha Light Infantry was moved from Kangra, Himachal Pradesh to Dharamshala, which was at first made a subsidiary cantonment. An ideal position for the new base was found on the slopes of the Dhauladhar Hills, near the site of a Hindu sanctuary, or Dharamshala, hence the name of the town. The Battalion was later renamed the historic 1st Gurkha Rifles, this was the beginning of the legend of the Gurkhas, also known as the 'Bravest of the Brave'. Consequently, fourteen Gurkha platoon villages grew from this settlement, and exist to this day, namely Dari, Ramnagar, Shyamnagar, Dal, Totarani, Khanyara, Sadher, Chaandmaari, Sallagarhi, Sidhbari, Yol, and so on. The Gurkhas worshipped at the ancient Shiva temple of Bhagsunag. The Gurkhas referred to Dharamshala as 'Bhagsu' and referred to themselves as Bhagsuwalas.

 

The 21st Gurkha Regiment from Dharamshala performed heroic feats during World War I and the North West Frontier Province campaigns. The Gurkha cantonment then reached its zenith during World War II, when battalions from Dharamshala made history. Many place names in the town still retain their former cantonment terminologies: Depot Bazaar, Pensioners' Lines, Tirah Lines (named after the 19th century Tirah Campaign), Bharatpore Lines (named after the 1826 Battle of Bharatpore).

 

The second Lord Elgin, Viceroy of India died here (at the 1st Gurkha Rifles Officers' Mess) in 1863 and is buried in the cemetery of St. John in the Wilderness, a small Anglican church distinguished by its stained-glass windows. Dharamshala became a popular hill station for the British working in or near Delhi, offering a cool respite during the hot summer months.

 

"Before the earthquake of 1905, the upper part of the station, which rises to a height of 2,168 metres, contained the European houses, the station church, and the officers' mess and lines of the 1st Gurkhas, together with the public gardens, post office, and two bazars, the Forsythganj and McLeodganj. The public offices, a bazar, and a few European houses made up the lower station, as low as 1,372 metres. The 1st battalion of the 1st Gurkhas used to be stationed here, but was moved to the upper station in 1894-5.... The public gardens, which were, before the earthquake, laid out with much taste in lawns and terraces, contained a valuable collection of indigenous and imported trees and shrubs, and were overlooked by the Assembly Rooms, a handsome building comprising a public hall, a library and reading-room and a billiard-room. The church was beautifully situated in a recess of the mountain."

 

In 1905, the Kangra valley suffered a major earthquake. On April 4 of that year, the earth shook, demolishing much of the cantonment and the neighbouring city of Kangra, Himachal Pradesh as well as the Bhagsunag temple. Altogether, the 1905 Kangra earthquake killed 20,000 people. "1,625 persons perished at Dharamsāla alone, including 15 Europeans and 112 of the Gurkha garrison."."

 

The Gurkhas rebuilt the town along with the temple, which today is acknowledged as the 1st Gurkha Rifles' heritage. The British had planned to make Dharamshala the summer capital of India, but moved to Shimla after the disaster.

 

Not only did the Gurkhas of Dharmshala make a major contribution to India's defence, many were freedom fighters for the Indian National Army, which had been founded by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. The Indian National Army Captain Ram Singh Thakur, a Gurkha from the village of Khanyara, composed some of India's most popular and stirring patriotic songs, including "Kadam Kadam Badaye Ja". He is acknowledged so by the Netaji Research Bureau, Kolkata. The important contribution of the noted Gurkha social commentator, the late Master Mitrasen Thapa, from the village of Totarani, has been acknowledged by the Himachal Pradesh government. Recently, a park dedicated to the memory of the late Brigadier Sher Jung Thapa, MVC, the 'Hero of Skardu', has been opened alongside the road between Lower and Upper Dharamshala.

 

ESTABLISHMENT OF TIBETAN EXILE COMMUNITY

The Tibetan settlement of Dharamshala began in 1959, when His Holiness the Dalai Lama had to flee Tibet and the Prime Minister of India allowed him and his followers to settle in McLeodGanj (in Upper Dharmshala), a former colonial British summer picnic spot. There they established the "government-in-exile" in 1960. Dharamshala had been connected with Hinduism and Buddhism for a long time, many monasteries having been established there in the past, by Tibetan immigrants in the 19th century.In 1970, The Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, opened the Library of Tibetan Works and Archives which houses over 80,000 manuscripts and other important resources related to Tibetan history, politics and culture. It is considered one of the most important institutions for Tibetology in the world, the new director is Geshe Lahkdor, the old translator of H.H. the Dalai Lama.

 

Several thousand Tibetan exiles have now settled in the area, and most live in and around McLeodGanj in Upper Dharamshala, where they have built monasteries, temples and schools. McLeodGanj is sometimes known as 'Little Lhasa", after the Tibetan capital city, or 'Dhasa' (a compound of 'Dharamshala' and 'Lhasa'). It has become an important tourist destination with many hotels and restaurants, leading to growth in tourism and commerce.

 

Dharamshala is the winter capital of Himachal Pradesh. The Legislative Assembly is at Sidhbari, near the Chinmaya Tapovan Ashram, and the winter sessions of the Government are held there.

 

GEOGRAPHY

Dharamshala has an average elevation of 1457 metres, covering an area of almost 8.51 km².

 

Dharamsala is located in the Kangra Valley, in the shadow of the Dhauladhar mountains.

 

The city is divided into two distinct sections. Kotwali Bazaar and the surrounding markets are referred to as "Lower Dharamshala" or just "Dharamshala." Further up the mountain is McLeodGanj separated in between by the village of Ganchen Kyishong, the home of the Tibetan government-in-exile. A steep, narrow road connects McLeodGanj from Dharamshala and is only accessible to taxis and small cars, while a longer road winds around the valley for use by buses and trucks. McLeodGanj is surrounded by pine, Himalayan oak, and rhododendron.

 

The main crops grown in the valleys below are rice, wheat and tea.

 

CONNECTIONS

Dharamshala town is reached by Gaggal Airport, (IATA: DHM, ICAO: VIGG), about 15 km to the town's south and about 10 km north of Kangra, Himachal Pradesh town. To reach Dharamshala by train, one has to reach Kangra, Himachal Pradesh town by Kangra Valley Railway line from Pathankot 94 km away and then take a bus or a taxi.

 

Pathankot is a broad gauge railway head. There is another railway line from Pathankot to Jogindernagar, a part of the Mandi District of Himachal Pradesh, which is a narrow-gauge line. The nearest station to Dharamshala on this line is Chamunda Marg, half an hour away, where a Shaktipitha is; the town is well connected by road to other parts of the country.

 

Buses of all classes (deluxe, air-conditioned, and regular) drive daily between Dharamshala and major cities such as Chandigarh, Delhi, and Shimla. Several buses each night connect McLeodGanj with Majnu Ka Tila, the Tibetan settlement in Delhi.

 

CLIMATE

Dharamshala has a monsoon-influenced humid subtropical climate (Cwa). Summer starts in early April, peaks in early June (when temperatures can reach 36 °C) and last till mid-June. From July to mid-September is the monsoon season when up to 3000 mm of rainfall can be experienced, making Dharamshala one of the wettest places in the state. Autumn is mild and lasts from October to the end of November.

 

Autumn temperatures average around 16–17 °C. Winter starts in December and continues until late February. Snow and sleet are common during the winter in upper Dharamshala (including McLeodganj, Bhagsu Nag and Naddi). Lower Dharamshala receives little solid precipitation except hail. The snowfall of January 7, 2012 was an exception. It was caused by deep low pressure entering the Kangra district. Winter is followed by a short, pleasant spring until April. Historically, the Dhauladhar mountains used to remain snow-covered all year long, however, in recent years they have been losing their snow blanket during dry spells.

 

The best times to visit are the autumn and spring months.

 

TREKKING

Dharamshala is a starting point to a number of trekking trails that especially lead trekkers across Dhauladhar into the upper Ravi Valley and Chamba district. En route, you cross through forests of deodar, pine, oak and rhododendron, and pass streams and rivers and wind along vertiginous cliff tracks, and the occasional lake waterfall and glacier.

 

A 2-km amble takes one to Bhagsu, and then a further 3-km walk will lead the trekkers to Dharamkot. If one wishes to go on a longer walk then he/she can trek 8-km to Triund. The snow line of Ilaqa Got is just a 5-km walk.

 

Other trekking trails that lead you to Chamba from Dharamshala are:

 

Toral Pass (4575m) which begins from Tang Narwana (1150m) that is nearly 10 km from Dharamshala

Across Bhimghasutri Pass (4580m) via near-vertical rocky ascents, steep cliffs and dangerous gorges. This is a highly difficult level trek and takes around six days to complete.

Dharamshala - Bleni Pass (3710m) – Dunali. Compared to other trekking trails, this one is much easier and takes around four or five-days to complete. The trek leads you through alpine pastures, woods, and streams, before ending at Dunali, on the Chamba road.

 

Dharamshala is an ideal destination for rock climbing enthusiasts. One can go rock climbing over the ridges of the Dhauladhar range.

 

Kareri Lake (near Kareri Village) is also a famous trekking destination for travellers.

 

PLACES OF ATTRACTION

Naam Art Gallery The exhibition in ‘NAAM ART GALLERY’ exhibits paintings by Elsbeth Buschmann - watercolours and acrylics - and oil paintings by Alfred W. Hallett. Elsbeth Buschmann, is a professional painter from Germany, having studied painting in London and Paris . She lived in many countries where she held exhibitions, especially in the USA where she received various awards. Her paintings are in private collections in Germany, USA, Scotland, India and Switzerland. In India she held solo exhibitions at AIFAX, New Delhi and TAG, the Art Gallery of the Taj Mahal Hotel, Mumbai. She also took part in ‘The Himalayan National Exhibition of Art’ and was awarded. Open 10am to 7.00pm (Monday Closed)

 

Masrur (or Masroor): The major attraction of this place is the fifteen exquisitely carved monolithic rock temples dating back to the 8th century. The carvings of these temples are similar to Kailash temple at Ellora. In the sanctum of the main temple, one can find images of Lord Ram, and the Goddesses Sita and Lakshmi. Masrur is 40 km south of Kangra, Himachal Pradesh at 32°4′22″N 76°8′14″E. Template:Jama Masjid, Kotwali Bazar, Dharamshala.

 

Bhagsu Waterfall: This waterfall is in Bhagsu, 2 km from McLeodGanj. It lies behind the Bhagsunag Temple. During Monsoon, the fall turns into a 30 feet cascade.

 

Bhagsunag Temple: Temple of god Shiva situated around 2 km from McLeodGanj Bazaar. Constructed by 1 GR by around 1800 century and then worshipped majorly by 14 Gukha platoon villages in Dharamshala. Very next to Bhagsunag temple is a water fall, one of the major tourist attraction spot in Dharamshala.

 

Kangra Museum: Situated close to the bus stand, Kangra Art Museum is a unique museum displaying the artifacts of Tibetan and Buddhist cultures. This is a treasure of Kangra valley’s cultural past, crafts, arts and other ancient artifacts. Some of the displayed items in the museum are dating back to the 5th century.

 

Kangra Museum encloses a gallery consisting of miniature paintings of Kangra’s rich past, pottery, rare coin memorabilia, sculptures and anthropological materials. It has a varied collection of tribal jewelry, embroidered costumes and wood carvings. A section dedicated to contemporary artworks adds the attraction to the museum.

 

Tourists can easily reach by bus or taxi and it will take 30 mins to one hour to see the museum. While visiting the museum, never miss to explore the Kotwali bazar.

 

Kunal Pathri Temple: This temple is dedicated to Goddess Kalpeshwari and is 3 km from the Kotwali Bazaar. It's believed that a part of Goddess Sati's skull fell here when Lord Shiva was carrying the charred body of the Goddess; hence the name of the temple.

 

Chamunda Temple: This temple is around 15 km from Dharamshala on the right bank of river Baner on the Mandi-Pathankot highway. According to mythology, Goddess Kali killed the demons Chand and Mund at this place.

 

Dal Lake: The Lake is spread in an area of 1 km and is bounded by rhododendrons, deodars, and junipers forest. Annually, a fair is held at the Kali Temple near the Lake. There is another temple close to the lake that is dedicated to sage Durvasa. Dal Lake is 2 km walk westwards from McLeodGanj bazaar.

 

Triund: Triund is nestled in the foothills of Dhauladhar and is around 17 km from Dharamshala. It's a trekking destination from McLeodGanj, and offers magnificent vistas of the mountains and valleys. The nightstays are in the hoods, small time caves, that local gaddis with their goat herds use as shelters from rains during the daytime.

 

Naddi: This scenic picnic spot is located 5 km northwest of McLeodGanj. Naddi offers a spectacular view of the Kangra valley. You can trek to Kareri Lake, Triund, and Guna Devi from here. It's becoming a popular destination for nature lovers.

 

Thaneek Pura or Thanik Pura is a hill station village (hamlet) in Chintpurni in the Una district of the state of Himachal Pradesh in India. It is near the Chintpurni Temple, which is a place of pilgrimage for both Hindus and Sikhs. The area is surrounded by the western Himalayas in the north and east in the smaller Shiwalik (or Shivalik) range bordering the state of Punjab.

 

McLeodGanj is around 9 km from Dharamshala. This place is famous for its markets, where one can shop for handicraft items, eat Tibetan food and visit statue of Lord Buddha.

 

Sidhbari : A village located 6 km from Dharamshala near Yol Cantonment and a place of historical spiritual significance. Attractions around Sidhbari include the Kapila Muni Cave, Chinmaya Ashram, Gyuto monastery, Aganjar Mahadev Temple and the newly constructed State legislature. The agricultural hamlet of Rakkar nearby is an ideal base to explore the rest of the Kangra district and experience the traditional lifestyle and mud architecture of the Gaddi community.

 

Adi Shakti Temple, Naddi

Aghanjar Mahadev

Bhagsu waterfall

Bhagsunath

Sheela Chowk

Bir - Popular destination for ecotourism, meditation studies, volunteering, and paragliding at Billing.

Brajeshwari Devi Temple

Chamunda Devi Mandir

Chinmaya Tapovan

Chime Gyatsarling Monastery, just behind of Norbulingka Institute, upper Sidhpur. 6 km from Dharmshala and 14 km from Gagal airport.

Dal Lake

Dari

Gopalpur Zoo and tea gardens

Dehra Gopipur

Dharamkot (2100 m)

Guna Devi Mandir amidst dense forest

Historical fort in Old Kangra, Himachal Pradesh. Adjoining the Fort is the Maharaja Sansar Chandra Museum, run by the Kangra Royal Family. The Museum provides audio guides for the fort and the museum.

Haripur Village (near Guler)

Pong Dam Lake

Indru Nag Temple

Kareri Lake

Khaniyara

Kunal Pathri

Lam Dal Lake

Library of Tibetan Works and Archives

Masrur (rock temple)

Namgyal Monastery

Narghota

Norbulingka Institute

Nurpur

Sidhbari

Church of St. John in the Wilderness

Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts

Triund (2975 m), a popular day hike or overnight trek. There is a forest rest house for overnight stay.

Tatwani and Machhrial

Trilokpur

Chime Gyatseling Monastery (Guru Padmasambhava)

Near Norbulingka Tibetan Institute

Jama Masjid kotwalibazar Dharamshala

 

WIKIPEDIA

The Theosophical Society, founded in New York in 1875, includes a Rosicrucian current that sees the Rosy Cross as ‘the divine light of self-knowledge’ (Franz Hartmann, 1838-1912). Yet there are no commentaries specifically dedicated to the Chymical Wedding in the theosophical literature. Like Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891), the co-founder of the Theosophical Society, the Austrian theosopher Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) was convinced that the mysteries of the Rosy Cross were ‘solely passed on through oral tradition’ (1906). Steiner became the Secretary General of the German branch of the Theosophical Society in 1902. He expected to discover authentic Rosicrucian rituals when he joined the Freemasons as his mentor Goethe had. But like the theosophers, he observed that the true spirit of the Rosy Cross was no longer to be found in the secret societies of his day. In 1906, the ‘Rosy Cross of the Theosophical Society’ began presenting the ‘Mystery of Golgotha’ as an entirely unique event in the history of mankind, at odds with the Theosophical Society’s custom of granting equal importance to all religions. In 1917, ten years after leaving Annie Besant’s Esoteric School and five years after founding the Anthroposophical Society, Steiner published a study on the Chymical Wedding in Berlin. The present article shows that this written commentary was a means for him to situate himself in the continuity of the Rosicrucian tradition of esoteric Christianity while introducing his own theosophy, which he called ‘anthroposophy’ or ‘spiritual science’, as the heir of the authentic Rosicrucians. The reference to the authoritative text allowed him to illustrate and justify his former assertions on 1) the actual existence of Christian Rosenkreuz and the Rosicrucian order, 2) the seven stages of Rosicrucian initiation, 3) Rosicrucianism as the best way of initiation for modern European man, 4) the “etheric vision” of Christ based on the action of Christian Rosencreuz’s “etheric body”. These ideas influenced a number of Western esotericists, including Neville Meakin (†1912), Max Heindel (1865-1919) and Jan van Rijckenborgh (1896-1968).

 

1 Chymical Wedding by Christian Rosencreutz has been the subject of an important reception1 within certain modern Western esoteric currents2, in particular since the end of the 19th century. In a context of criticism of positivism and enthusiasm for spiritualism from the United States, occultism was on the rise in Europe around 1900, and the Rosicrucians were a fashionable subject. In France, for example, the Martinist writer Joseph Péladan (1858-1918) organized between 1892 and 1897, in Parisian art galleries, several Salons de la Rose-Croix in which symbolist artists known as the Belgian painter Fernand Khnopff took part. . In this contribution, I will focus mainly on the period from 1875 – the date of the founding of the Theosophical Society in New York by the Russian occultist Helena Blavatsky, Colonel Henry Steel Olcott and a few others – to 1917, the year of the publication in Berlin of the Commentary on the Chemical Wedding of Christian Rose-Croix by the Austrian occultist Rudolf Steiner. The aim will be to understand Steiner's commentary from the inside, to reconstitute its internal logic from an emic perspective3, and to perceive in doing so the construction of the Rosicrucian myth specific to this esoteric4 vision of the world that is anthroposophy. . It will also be a question of resituating this commentary in the theosophical literature which preceded it and of bringing to light its influence on later esoteric literature.

 

Theosophical literature and the Chemical Weddings (1877-1902)

5 Franz Hartmann: Unter den Adepten und Rosenkreuzern (Leipzig n.d.). Berlin 1963, p. 96.

2The Theosophical Society is an international association teaching a religious syncretism of occultist and esoteric inspiration with a strong oriental flavor, particularly Buddhist and Hindu. Theosophical literature does not include a commentary dedicated specifically to the Chemical Wedding, but rather scattered reflections emphasizing the importance of Rosicrucianism as a Western path of self-knowledge leading to the knowledge of God. The German theosophist Franz Hartmann (1838-1912) states for example: “Es wird uns klar sein, daß es den Rosenkreuzern nicht so sehr um intellektuelle Forschung und Vielwisserei, als vielmehr um die göttliche Selbsterkenntnis zu tun war und um die Kraft des wahren Glaubens , der zu dieser Gotteserkenntnis führt. 5 The Theosophical Society does not regard any religion as superior to others; all express, according to her, an aspect of a universal truth. According to the famous motto of the Society, “there is no religion superior to truth”. According to Helena P. Blavatsky, the true spirit of the Rose-Croix no longer animates the Rosicrucians of her time:

 

6 Helena Petrovna Blavatsky: Isis unveiled. Key to the Mysteries of Ancient Science and Theology (...)

The Rose-Croix Brothers, mysterious practitioners of the Middle Ages, still exist, but only in name. They may 'shed tears over the grave of their revered Master Hiram Abiff', but they will search in vain for the true place 'where the acacia branch was placed'. The dead letter remains alone, the spirit has fled.6

 

3 This spirit is, according to her, much more preserved in literature – and Blavatsky explicitly quotes the famous initiatory novel by the British novelist Edward Bulwer-Lytton Zanoni7 – than in the various lodges and groups claiming Rosicrucianism in his time in Europe and in the USA. None seem to find favor in his eyes. We can think of the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia, a Rosicrucian order founded in London in 1865 by master masons William J. Hughan and Robert W. Little, or L'Aube Dorée, The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, a secret society (whose rituals are inspired by the Golden Rose-Cross, at least for the distribution of degrees) founded in London in 1888 by Samuel Liddell Mathers and William Wynn Westcott, both members of the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia. Note that Westcott later became theosophist. These groups multiplied at the end of the 19th century. In France, the Kabbalistic Order of the Rose-Croix founded in 1888 by Stanislas de Guaita (1861-1897) and Joséphin Péladan (1858-1918) had the role of perfecting the training of Martinists and included the French doctor and occultist Gérard Anaclet Vincent Encausse (1865-1916), known as Papus, among its members. In Germany, the Ordo Templi Orientis (O.T.O.), a para-Masonic organization oriented towards magic, was animated by a member of the Societas Rosicruciana in Germania, the German-English occultist Theodor Reuß, who in 1902 obtained the right, with the German theosophist Franz Hartmann, to practice the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite and the Rite of Memphis-Misraïm.

 

Rudolf Steiner, the “Rose-Croix” of the Theosophical Society (1902-1906)

8 Gary Lachmann: Rudolf Steiner, a biography. Paris 2009.

9 Rudolf Steiner: Mein Lebensgang. Eine nicht vollendete Autobiography [1925], Rudolf Steiner Gesam (...)

10 Hartmann: Unter den Adepten, quoted by Friedrich Lienhard: Unter dem Rosenkreuz: ein Hausbuch aus (...)

4It was also in 1902 that Rudolf Steiner, an Austrian born in 1861 in a small village in Croatia (which was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire), became Secretary General of the German section of the Theosophical Society, multiplying the conferences across Germany and beyond8. Steiner states in his autobiography that he became close to the Theosophists because, like them, he was convinced of the existence of a “spiritual world”9. At the beginning of the 20th century, Steiner gave less importance to the Rosicrucian manifestos than to an oral Rosicrucian tradition which would have remained intact within secret societies. He asserted in December 1906 that nothing of authentic Rosicrucianism would be found in the Rosicrucian writings of the early seventeenth century. Steiner endorses the argument of theosophists like Franz Hartmann who describe the essence of the authentic Rose-Croix as "the divine light of self-knowledge"10 and who are convinced that the mysteries of the Rose-Croix are only transmitted orally:

 

But you can see how difficult it has always been to get to know Rosicrucianism from the fact that Helmont, Leibniz and others were unable to find out anything about the Rosicrucians. The Rosicrucian initiation is historically traced back to a book from the beginning of the 17th century, which states, among other things, that the Rosicrucians dealt with alchemical things, as well as with other things, for example with higher education and so on. So it is written in the Fama Fraternitatis. / Nothing can be found there either about what really is Rosicrucianism, because the mysteries of the Rosicrucians have only been handed down through oral tradition. What has externally attached itself to the name Rosicrucian is very little suitable for fathoming the nature of the Rosicrucians.11

 

5 Steiner is also nourished by another tradition, in this case German thought and its “great geniuses”, which, according to him, must fertilize theosophy. Steiner thinks in particular of Goethe, whose thought cannot be grasped, according to him, without a deep understanding of its occult foundation. After having studied philosophy in Vienna and read in particular Kant, Fichte, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, after having defended in 1891 a doctoral thesis in philosophy at the University of Rostock, Steiner worked in Weimar on the edition of the scientific work of Goethe, and gave numerous lectures on Goethe to members of the Theosophical Society. Thus, in the lecture “Die okkulte Grundlage in Goethes Schaffen” (1905), he refers to Goethe’s poem Die Geheimnisse (1785), which according to him expresses the mysteries of the Rose-Croix12. Steiner takes Goethe for a Rose-Croix initiate. In 1780, the German poet was initiated into Freemasonry in the Amalia lodge in Weimar, and received in 1783 into the Order of the Illuminated under the name of Abaris. Speeches and many poems bear witness to this interest in Freemasons, but also several passages from Wilhelm Meister, from Dichtung und Wahrheit (Poetry and Truth) as well as Das Märchen (The Fairy Tale of the Beautiful Lily)

 

6 Steiner attempts to revitalize the Rosicrucian tradition not only by relating himself to the Rosicrucian inspiration of Goethe, but also by concretely seeking authentic Rosicrucians and rituals; he thinks he can do this by joining Freemasonry, like his mentor Goethe. It was in 1904-1905 that Steiner began to participate in Masonic activities, hoping to introduce the occult teachings of Theosophy into them. In 1905, he was initiated by Theodor Reuß into the Rite of Misraïm, with his wife – which cost him dearly, as noted by the German historian Helmut Zander14 –, and in 1906 became President of the “Chapter and Mystical Temple” Mystica Aeterna, in Berlin. In January 1906, he obtained permission from Theodor Reuß to bring into this Freemason Chapter as many members of the Theosophical Society (and other people) as he wished15. But he is somewhat wary of Reuß: “Reuß ist kein Mensch, auf den irgendwie zu bauen wäre. […] Wir haben es mit einem ‘Rahmen’, nicht mit mehr in der Wirklichkeit zu tun. Augenblicklich steckt gar nichts hinter der Sache. Die okkulten Mächte haben sich ganz davon zurückgezogen. 16 According to Helmut Zander, there is no historical proof that Steiner belonged to another Masonic society. In 1907, Steiner was appointed Grand Master of the Rite of Misraïm and led initiation ceremonies in this capacity. The First World War, however, marked the end of Steiner's Masonic activities. Between 1902 and 1906, Steiner developed his Christology independently within the Theosophical Society without this posing any particular problem. His relationship with Annie Besant is excellent: he is part of her Esoteric School and comments glowingly on the German translation of his work Esoteric Christianity published in 1903.

 

The gradual break with the Theosophists and the founding of the Anthroposophical Society (1906-1912)

18 Steiner, “Die drei Einweihungspfade”, lecture given in Basel on September 19, 1906 before (...)

19 Ibid., p. 92: “der größte der Religionslehrer”.

20 On the action of the Buddha, carried out at the request of the servant of Christ, Christian Rose-Croix, see (...)

7 It was in 1906 that Steiner distinguished for the first time three forms of initiation: the Eastern path, which presupposes the absolute obedience of the student to a guru, the Christian path, which would no longer be adapted to modern man due to the evolution of science and culture, and the Rosicrucian path, which would be free from any enslaving master-disciple relationship18. Alongside this hierarchy of initiatic schools, the "mystery of Golgotha" was mentioned for the first time, at the end of 1906, a concept which would become central to Steiner's Christology: Christ, considered as "the greatest religious teacher"19, embodies in an earthly physical body the solar macrocosmic Christ principle. He gives "the greatest impulse that the soul is able to assimilate" by coming from other worlds to unite with the earth. The Christ impulse, what Steiner calls the "mystery of Golgotha", is for him a completely unique and exceptional fact in the history of humanity. It is no coincidence that in several of his lectures, Steiner emphasizes that the life of Christ goes further than that of the Buddha, since it reaches the resurrection while that of the Buddha ends in the transfiguration20. By focusing his thought on the figure of Christ, Steiner approaches European theological traditions which consider Christ as a personal figure; but he distances himself from the theosophists of Adyar who give equal importance to all religions and consider Jesus as a “great initiate” among others. It was in this context that Annie Besant was elected President of the Theosophical Society in 1907. The same year, Steiner left the Esoteric School of Besant to found an independent esoteric school, teaching a Rosicrucian path rooted in a specifically European esoteric tradition. .

 

8 According to Helmut Zander, it was above all in opposition to Annie Besant that Steiner increasingly sought, from 1906-1907, to situate himself in a Rosicrucian tradition and to “Christologize” his thought21. The fact that in 1903 Steiner did not mention Christian Rose-Croix in his list of great initiates shows, according to Zander, that the Rosicrucian tradition was built gradually. It is also with the aim of building this European tradition that Steiner would have integrated Christian Rose-Croix in a series of reincarnations: Lazare, Hiram Abiff, the Count of Saint-Germain, etc. When Steiner and Besant agreed at the Munich Congress in May 1907, it was decided that Steiner would teach the Western, "Rosicrucian" path, and Besant the Eastern path. According to Zander, this agreement is superficial and hides a settlement of power. The day after the Congress, Steiner begins the cycle of lectures entitled Die Theosophie des Rosenkreuzers in which he emphasizes the superiority of the Rosicrucian path, and therefore, according to the German historian, his personal superiority over Besant. Zander is of the opinion that in these lectures, in particular in the last lecture of the cycle entitled "Theosophy according to the Rosicrucian method", the Rosicrucian reference would be applied like a thin superstructure on specifically Theosophical themes and, given its vague in the occultist circles of his time, would serve as an empty frame that Steiner could fill as he pleased with content from Christian and European esotericism22. This theory only seems partly relevant because the reference to the Rosicrucians is present long before the break with Besant and anchored in the German tradition, in Goethe in particular. From 1903-1904, Steiner presented Christian Rose-Croix and Jesus as the "two great Masters of the West", thus minimizing the influence of the Eastern Masters. In 1906 Steiner described the seven stages of the Rosicrucian path23, also present or explained in other texts, as in the Science of the Occult (1910) for example.

 

9 The fundamental disagreement concerns the theory of the return of Christ developed by Besant after the Munich Congress and explains that Steinerian Christology developed with increased speed after 1907. In 1908, Steiner clearly asserts the superiority of Christianity: “[… ] das Christentum ist größer als alle Religion! Das ist die Rosenkreuzerweisheit. 24 In 1911 he held conferences on Christian Rosicrucians at the newly created Rosicrucian branch of the Theosophical Society, where the disagreements appeared more and more evident. Unlike the Theosophists, Steiner considers Christian Rose-Croix as a personality who really lived in the 13th century, and the Rosicrucian order as an organization that really existed. The influence of the spiritual entity that is Christian Rose-Croix would be exerted mainly from his “etheric body”25, incarnated or not26. The action of Christ can take place according to Steiner only from the "etheric"27, that is to say from a subtle field of life forces made up of four ethers and located between the material and the astral plane. For Steiner, there can be no return of Christ to the physical plane, as the Theosophists assert. When leaders of the Theosophical Society believe they have found a new Messiah in the person of the young Hindu Jiddu Krishnamurti, Steiner separates definitively from the Theosophical Society to found, at the end of 1912, the Anthroposophical Society.

 

Rudolf Steiner anthroposophist: the role of the Chemical Weddings in the construction of a Rosicrucian tradition (1912-1917)

28 Rudolf Steiner: The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rose-Croix 1459, recorded by J. V. Andreae, Stud (...)

29 Rudolf Steiner: Die Theosophie des Rosenkreuzers, Vierzehn Vorträge, München 22. May bis 6. June 1 (...)

 

11 Steiner no doubt chose to comment on the Wedding because it was the Rosicrucian text he knew best31, but that is not the only reason. The importance he attached to this commentary is evident in the fact that, unlike many other things he has said about Christian Rose-Croix at conferences, it is a written study that he wrote himself. This is indicative of a change in initiatory method in modern times:

 

32 Bettina Gruber: “Überlegungen zu einer Begriffsdiskussion”. In: Moritz Baßler / Hildegard Châtel (...)

33 Aurélie Choné: Rudolf Steiner, Carl Gustav Jung, Hermann Hesse, Passeurs between East and West. (...)

As the written expression of the traditional teaching transmitted from master to disciple, the book increasingly replaces the oral transmission of knowledge within secret societies, and becomes what connects the instructor and the reader, or more precisely, the Real. and the reader. Reading thus becomes the occasion for a practice, that of a conscious relationship. This ‘self-initiation through reading’32 is a characteristic trend of modernity, perceptible as early as the 19th century. It is based on respect for the subject and his autonomy of thought, but in return requires significant self-discipline and a very firm will.33

 

30 Rudolf Steiner: Das rosenkreutzerische Christentum. Stuttgart 1950.

10 In 1917, five years after the foundation of the Anthroposophical Society, Steiner published in Berlin a study devoted to the Chemical Weddings28. A series of questions does not fail to arise: how to explain that Steiner felt the need to give a commentary on the Weddings when he did not comment on either the Fama or the Confessio? How to explain that he found it necessary to write a study insisting on the importance of this text eleven years after having affirmed that the oral tradition was more important than the Manifestos? Why did you publish this commentary precisely in 1917, more than a century ago, when he had already given several lectures in previous years on the Rosicrucian path, in particular ten years earlier, in 1907, Die Philosophie des Rosenkreuzers29 and in 1911-1912, on Rosicrucian Christianity30? And finally, for what purpose does he write this comment?

 

12 As secret societies no longer conveyed the authentic message according to Steiner, it no doubt seemed necessary to him, sensing the end of his life approaching, to write down what he knew of this original message. We will show that this written commentary was a means for him, at a time when he needed to affirm the identity of his movement in the face of the theosophists, to situate himself in the continuity of the Western tradition of Christian esotericism and to present anthroposophy as the heiress of the authentic Rosicrucians. If he appeals to an authoritative text, Les Noces Chymiques, it is to illustrate and justify his previous remarks:

 

on the real existence of Christian Rose-Croix and the Rosicrucian Order,

 

on the content of the Rosicrucian initiatory path,

 

on the superiority of the Rosicrucian path at the present time,

 

on the etheric vision of Christ thanks to the action of Christian Rose-Croix from the "etheric world".

 

The real existence of Christian Rose-Croix and the Order of the Rose-Croix

 

34 On this subject, see the article by Stefania Salvadori in this volume.

13 For Steiner, Johann Valentin Andreae (1586-1654) is the author of Les Noces Chymiques and he wrote the work in 1603, thirteen years before its publication in Strasbourg in 1616. It should be noted that these dates are roughly in line with the assertions of the most current researchers. Steiner does not seek to challenge by means of historical arguments the assertions of historians who hold the work to be “a kind of literary deception” (NC, 264). But he considers it impossible that a young man of seventeen had “the maturity required to ridicule the evaporated minds of his time, by presenting them with a phantasmagoria under the name of the Rosicrucian current”. Moreover, the spiritually very high content of Les Noces is not for him contradictory with the young age of the author. In his eyes, Andreae wrote under the dictation of “great intuitive forces” (NC, 269). Later, having become a pietistic theologian, Andreae would have lost this intuition, which explains why he was able to deny his story afterwards. Steiner points out that in transcribing the experiences of Christian Rose-Croix, the young Andreae encountered strong resistance, in this case “events similar to those which led to the Thirty Years’ War” (NC, 8). By comparing this situation to the one he knew himself, at a time when the development of anthroposophy was hampered by opposing forces, he clearly places himself in the continuity of the Rosicrucian current.

 

14 In his commentary, Steiner begins by explaining how the work should be approached, devoting several pages to the “method”, or rather to the attitude to adopt when faced with the text. Because it is precisely not an intellectual, scientific method in the usual sense of the word. Humility, self-knowledge and purification of the soul are the necessary conditions for the spiritual world to be able, through the text, to speak to the soul in the form of images, symbols, "secret figures" such as those of the Geheime Figuren der Rosenkreuzer35. A rather similar attitude of attentive listening with regard to images (and the products of the unconscious) characterizes the psychology of the depths of C. G. Jung (in particular the active imagination): it is not a question of seeking to understand intellectually the image that presents itself, but rather to let it act, to mature in the soul, to brood over it in oneself, until its meaning becomes clear; this requires great patience and the awareness that, as in any deep esoteric text, the message is never completely unveiled, deeper layers always remaining hidden.

 

15 The key to Steiner's argument therefore rests on a precise method, which he claims to deduce from the attitude and mode of perception of Christian Rose-Croix himself, as described in the novel. The historical method seems to him inappropriate for clarifying overly complicated controversies. “Spiritual Science” is presented as the most adequate way to deduce from the text itself the authenticity of the experiences described, and therefore the reality of the existence of Christian Rose-Croix as well as of the Rosicrucian current. It is not for him an allegory, but a true story, which confirms what he affirmed in his lectures of 1911 on the historical, and not mythical, figure of Christian Rose-Croix.

 

The content of the Rosicrucian initiatory school

 

16 In his commentary of 1917, Steiner explains, through the lived experience of Christian Rose-Croix, the seven stages of the Rosicrucian path which he had already exposed ten years earlier, in Die Theosophie des Rosenkreuzers: the study, the imagination, inspiration, the preparation of the Philosopher's Stone, the correspondences between macrocosm and microcosm, diving into the macrocosm and bliss. The seven days correspond to the stages of the initiatory path of Christian Rose-Croix towards the suprasensible worlds and reflect a process of alchemical transformation which leads him towards his spiritual rebirth.

 

17 From the first day, it is a question of an “imaginative vision” that Christian Rose-Croix had seven years earlier, which announced to him that he would be invited to the “Chymic Wedding”. Another imagination has him “see” a young woman in a blue dress studded with stars – the “manifestation of an entity from the spirit world” (NC, 195) according to Steiner. Another imagination reveals to him a portal, the threshold of the suprasensible world according to Steiner, and a castle, place of spiritual experience. Then comes the fourth day, with the presentation to the Kings and their decapitation: these symbols are for Steiner “authentic imaginations, in conformity with the laws which govern the evolution of the soul” (NC, 243). The ordeals that kings undergo foreshadow what must happen to Christian Rose-Croix himself. He feels the tragedy of the royal hall “as if his own soul lived it: Decapitation is a stage in his own evolution. (NC, 244) According to Steiner, the whole alchemical process described highlights "the mystery of psychic metamorphosis" (NC, 263), namely "the way in which the forces of knowledge, developed by the organism in the ordinary course of life, are transformed into forces of supersensible investigation. (NC, 253) The term "power of knowledge" is imbued with the philosophy of life (Lebensphilosophie) present at the time of Steiner, but it is a question of directing this vitalism towards a spiritualism by transforming sensitive knowledge in supersensible knowledge, which is possible only on condition "of being penetrated by the forces of death." (NC, 247) Thus Christian Rose-Croix contemplates the death of the "kings" in his soul, namely the death of "his means of knowledge, such as they result from the metamorphosis of the material processes of his organism, without himself intervenes. (NC, 248-249) By passing from natural alchemy to the art of alchemy, he will be able to confer on his ordinary faculties of knowledge a particular character which the processes of organic evolution have removed from them. The purpose of the fifth day is precisely, according to Steiner, to complete the natural alchemy. Christian Rose-Croix directs his gaze towards the “laboratory” of nature, where it “gives birth to the vital element of growth” (NC, 249). In the Tower of Olympus, during the preparation of the Stone of the Sages, the inanimate forces of knowledge are brought to life.

 

18 The seventh day describes the accomplishment of the alchemical work and the promotion of Christian Rose-Croix to the rank of “Knight of the Stone of Gold”. The man whose forces of the soul – thought, feeling, will – are transformed, is as if born again: he becomes the “father” of his own faculties of knowledge. It is a true gnosis in the sense of knowledge, the birth of new forces of supersensible knowledge. This also explains the Steinerian interpretation of the end of the story: Christian Rose-Croix expects to expiate the "fault" of having succumbed to the temptation by looking at Venus naked on the fifth day, and to be condemned to the charge of guardian; but this is not the case, because this guardian turns out in fact to be only a part of himself that he is able to distinguish from himself; and here we are almost approaching a Jungian interpretation of The Wedding , except that the existence of a spiritual world is clearly posed in Steiner: “He becomes the guardian of his own psychic life; but this office in no way prevents him from maintaining free relations with the world of the spirit. (NC, 260-261)

 

The Rosicrucian path, the initiatory school most suited to modern Europeans

 

19 Steiner also explains in his commentary on the Marriage why the Rosicrucian way is the most suitable for modern Western man.

 

20 First, it does not involve blindly following a guru as in the Eastern path as Steiner imagines it, or having absolute faith in the personality of Jesus Christ as in the Christian path. The Rosicrucian path gives less importance to feelings than to facts that can be observed and studied. The first stage of the journey, study, demonstrates the importance of a scientific approach. Steiner emphasizes that Christian Rose-Croix was versed in the knowledge provided by the study of the “Liberal Sciences and Arts” of his time and that he sought to unite knowledge and faith. This is also, according to Steiner, the objective of anthroposophy and as he can situate it in the continuity of the Rosicrucian current: neither religion nor philosophy, the Science of the mind (Geisteswissenschaft) aims to know the worlds suprasensibles with the same rigor as science studies the phenomena of the physical, sensible world.

 

36 Steiner: “The mission of Christian Rose-Croix, his character and his task. The mission of Gautama Bu (...)

21 This is only possible through the knowledge of nature, the very object of natural alchemy. In his commentary on the Wedding, Steiner clearly opposes the paths of mysticism and alchemy: “The alchemist seeks a knowledge of nature which opens the way to a true knowledge of man. (NC, 214) as the mystic turns inward. According to Steiner, it is quite revealing that the Rosicrucian current was born in the 15th century – a very dark period marked, according to him, by the appearance of the materialist current, which played a major role in scientific theories, especially in matters astronomy; with the beginnings of modern science – Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo (1564-1642), Kepler (1571-1630), etc. – developed, according to him, “a vision of the world which saw in the macrocosm only an immense machinery composed of material globes”36. A new science must bring the necessary corrective to this materialistic tendency; and Steiner sees it represented in the Weddings through the figure of the Virgin whose name is Alchemy: "this suprasensible science comes from the spiritual worlds whereas the knowledge of the Seven 'Liberal Arts' is acquired on the sensible plane" (NC, 236).

 

22 In the same spirit, Agrippa von Nettesheim (1487-1535) and Paracelsus (1493-1541) sought, according to Steiner, to explore the laws of nature and access the superior worlds from the natural sciences, through the study of the five elements . The alchemist learns to know his soul as well as nature and discovers that the same forces act there. This is the fifth stage of the Rosicrucian path, the correspondences between macro- and microcosm. The contemplation of natural processes like dissolution and putrefaction becomes meditation, fervent prayer, and arouses a sense of devotion. According to Steiner, the sanctity of nature is at the center of Les Noces, the mission of Christian Rose-Croix being to discover the spirit in nature. As a Knight of the Stone of Gold, he will have to live in accordance with the two mottos inscribed on the medal he receives, as well as the other Knights, on the seventh day: "Art is the servant of nature" and “Nature is the daughter of time. (NC, 259)

 

37 Antoine Faivre: Access to Western esotericism. Paris vol. I 1986, vol. II, 1996.

23 Steiner presents the Science of the Spirit as the heir to the Rosicrucian current in that it seeks to rediscover the religious character that the study of nature had in the Middle Ages, to reveal the spiritual reality behind the veil of nature. At the same time, he seeks to show the evolution of the Rosicrucian teaching. Mainly based on the natural sciences in the Middle Ages, in connection with alchemy, it became in its time "Science of the mind" in connection with the natural sciences in the Goethean sense of the term. The great Rosicrucian meditation on the symbol of the cross surrounded by seven roses, described for example in 1910 in Die Geheimwissenschaft (Science of the Occult), is deeply linked to living Nature, one of the criteria of esotericism according to Antoine Faivre37, since it is first of all a question of representing a plant which opens out, its roots which plunge into the darkness, its stem which rises towards the light. It involves the transformation of the forces of life into spiritual forces by a process of transmutation of the "etheric" into supersensible energy: this inner alchemy constitutes the very essence of the new Rosicrucian mysteries according to Steiner.

 

38 Johann Valentin Andreae: The Chemical Wedding of Christian Rose-Croix. In: Bernard Gorceix: The bi (...)

24 Finally, Steiner wishes to show through the experiences of Christian Rose-Croix and his companions that the Rosicrucian initiation is a personal path at the service of society: “The presence of such men in the social order will be a leaven for those who it and will help clean it up. (NC, 261) On reading Les Noces, it clearly appears that Christian Rose-Croix will play a special role because he is led to see more marvels38 than his companions who "only perceive what is shown to them, without the intervention of their personal will. (NC, 230) By continuing to serve as a guardian after receiving the supreme reward, he does not return to his solitary life, out of the world; he sees himself obliged to link spiritual life and social life in the service of others (karma-yoga, one would say in the Indian tradition), which is characteristic of a modern initiation. Steiner situates anthroposophy in the continuity of this tradition by insisting on education for freedom and by showing the importance of the concrete societal applications of its ideas in fields as diverse as pedagogy, agriculture, medicine and science. 'architecture.

 

25 In his commentary on Les Noces, Steiner particularly insists on the visions and imaginations of Christian Rose-Croix, which would be produced by the action of his “etheric body”. On Easter Friday, Christian's supersensible perception allows him to have the vision of the woman in the blue dress: "This activity of the etheric body can be compared to the bringing into action of a radiant light. (NC, 195-196) It is this activity that every human being is called upon to develop thanks to a daily meditative practice allowing the metamorphosis of his soul and the development of faculties of supersensible perception. Through this central practice in the Rosicrucian initiation as Steiner understands it, the student feels the influence of the etheric body of Christian Rose-Croix and can perceive the appearance of Christ in his own etheric body, that is, say realize the Christ in himself, the inner Christ, without going through a guru or other spiritual master. According to Steiner, all of humanity would be called to live this experience of the road to Damascus, and not only the circle of Rosicrucian initiates. The mission of the "Science of the Spirit" would be to divulge the Rosicrucian mystery to as many people as possible today.

 

39 On this subject, see Véronique Liard's contribution: “Carl Gustav Jung and the Chymic Weddings. Alc (...)

40 I refer here to chapter 10 of C. G. Jung's Psychological Types: Psychologische Typen. Zurich (...)

41 However, this interpretation should be qualified. Indeed, experience plays a very important role (...)

26We can see a certain affinity between the Steinerian commentary and the Jungian reading39 of the Wedding: in both cases, the initiatory journey of Christian Rose-Croix expresses the “mystery of psychic metamorphosis” (NC, 263). The big difference comes from the way of thinking of Jung and Steiner, and their opposite attitude towards reality. From a Jungian perspective,40 one could perhaps qualify Steiner’s philosophical temperament as “extroverted” and that of Jung as “introverted” (this is moreover how he saw himself); indeed, the anthroposophist links his thought closely to real objects while the founder of depth psychology is above all concerned with his inner world. Steiner is an idealist in that the spiritual world has for him a character of truth and absolute in the same way as the objects which are in front of him, without possible contestation, while for Jung, nourished by Kant, thought partially derives from subjectivity, which places all metaphysics beyond the reach of human understanding and establishes an empirical approach to reality. Jung needs to look within himself for landmarks to evolve in his inner world, without resorting to metaphysics to name things outside of him; he tends to see in him realities which, for the extrovert, are external.

 

42 We can think in particular of biodynamic agriculture – the processes of decomposition, putr (...)

43 See the third stage of the conjunction described at the end of Carl Gustav Jung: Mysterium conjunct (...)

44 On the comparison of these paths, see Aurélie Choné: Rudolf Steiner, Carl Gustav Jung, Herman (...)

27 Steiner considers the mystical path (introverted attitude according to the Jungian typology) unsuited to the materialistic modern age, and considers the alchemical path (extroverted attitude according to the Jungian typology) which passes through the knowledge of nature, as the most appropriate today. today. Could this be the reaction of an extrovert who does not understand the other attitude? Jung also uses alchemy, but more in the psychological sense of an inner psychic transformation; he emphasizes the writings that translate external experiences into symbolic processes revealing the archetypes of the collective unconscious, which he wants to find in order to shed light on his journey and that of his patients. But if Jung seems to be more interested in the interior side (oratory) and Steiner in the operative side of alchemy42 (laboratory), the fact remains that the psychiatrist also integrates a much broader dimension through the notion of unus mundus43, and that the anthroposophist pays great attention to inner processes, emphasizing the passage from natural alchemy to the Science of the mind. Anthroposophy, which seeks to develop our perception of the supersensible world, and depth psychology, which aims to approach the Self in order to reach the totality of our being, have important similarities in the journey they offer towards greater freedom. and autonomy.

 

28 If Les Noces has caught the attention of such different thinkers, it is undoubtedly because this writing offers a fine example of a balanced appreciation between the two points of view. The oratory is as important there as the laboratory. There is both the experimental side (Tower of Olympus) and the importance of moral purification (weighing test, vault of Venus). Extroverts tend to make it a laboratory affair by denying the other side, while introverts stress the projection of psychic contents onto matter and make it a process of individuation, neglecting the experimental side which is very vague in the definitions of the materials, which vary from one to another. But the secret undoubtedly lies in the right balance between extroversion and introversion, science and faith, laboratory and oratory.

 

Assessment and posterity of the anthroposophical reception of Les Noces until today

29 All the arguments deployed in Steiner’s extremely dense Commentary combine to demonstrate that the Weddings are “an objective relationship of an authentic quest” (NC, 263). Steiner felt the need to give a commentary on the Wedding - rather than on the Fama or the Confessio - because this story contains a wealth of images and symbols which make visible, in the form of evocative imaginations, the passage from sensitive to supersensitive. This commentary aims to anchor Steiner's theosophy, which he calls anthroposophy, in the Rosicrucian tradition of esoteric Christianity. Steiner thus stands out from the Theosophical Society and Eastern initiation by proposing a “Rosicrucian initiation” adapted to modern man in that it brings together faith and science, knowledge and contemplation of nature. Starting from the Manifesto, he seeks to prove what he has asserted in previous conferences and to give greater authority to his words through the exegesis of the source text itself. In doing so, he presents himself as the successor to the Rosicrucian current, which is supposed to express the quintessence of the great previous religions, and therefore the cutting edge of all spiritual teachings.

 

30 His reception of Les Noces will find an important echo in the anthroposophical milieu, among students and close friends like Michael Bauer46 (1871-1929), who was a member of his esoteric School. Today, the Rosicrucian reference is still very present among anthroposophists. According to the Dutch writer Jelle van der Meulen, for example, Steiner was initiated by Christian Rose-Croix47. The links between Anthroposophy and Rosicrucianism have been studied by engineer Viktor Stracke (1903-1991) and physician Peter Selg (1963- )48. Les Noces gave rise to a new commentary by Bastiaan Baan, director of the seminary of the Fellowship of Christians in North America, and former Waldorf school teacher. Overall, the interpretation of Les Noces is the object of a deepening in two main directions: meditation50 and cosmology51.

 

52 The outer order of the Stella Matutina was known as the Mystic Rose or Order of the M.R. i (...)

53 Crispian Villeneuve: Rudolf Steiner in Britain: A Documentation of His Ten Visits, 1902‑25, vol. 1 (...)

54 The Table Round (Ordo Tabulae Rotundae) is a neo-Arthurian mystical order that Felkin also exported (...)

55 Zander: Anthroposophy in Deutschland. t. I, p. 844.

56 See the contribution of Sébastien Gregov in this volume.

31 We also mention the influence of Steiner on the English doctor Robert Felkin, who in 1903 created the magical order Stella Matutina (Morning Star)52 in England, a splinter group from the Golden Dawn, and on Neville Meakin53, a member of the Stella Matutina. They saw in him an authentic representative of the Rosicrucian tradition, the missing link in the chain of the Rose-Croix dating back to the 17th century. Known by the initials EOL (Ex oriente Lux), Grand Master of the neo-Arthurian Order Ordo Tabulae Rotundae54, Meakin met Steiner in 1910 and 1912, received the initiation of adeptus minor in the Chapter Mystica aeterna and embarked in 1911 for Constantinople, traveling in the footsteps of the pilgrimage described in the Fama Fraternitatis. Steiner's ideas on the real existence of Christian Rose-Croix and his Order, as well as on the different incarnations of Christian Rose-Croix, will influence Max Heindel (1865-1919), who was vice-president of theosophy of Adyar in California in 1904-1905 and student of the Esoteric School of Steiner in 1907-1908. In 1909 Heindel created the Rosicrucian Fellowship in California. Steiner would accuse him in 1913 of having plagiarized several of his lectures55. Finally, let us mention the obvious influence of the Steinerian reading of the Wedding on the Dutch Rosicrucian Jan van Rijckenborgh, a former disciple of Heindel who founded the Lectorium Rosicrucianum in the 1920s.

 

journals.openedition.org/rg/679

willowgrovedaycamp.com/willows/

 

At this time in the camp season each child has found his/her favorite activities, which include Basketball, Soccer, Nature, Boating/Fishing, Tennis, Mini-Golf, Dance, etc.. Another favorite activity is when the Willows ride the Big Wheels. Everyone really loves racing their cars around the track. Of course, all The Willows love swimming and riding “Magic,” the pony.

 

Last week ended on a tasty note with our campers making Tie Dye bread in Cooking. After the bread was dyed, it was turned into grilled cheese or toast. Everyone found it yummy!

On Tuesday the Tadpoles and Minnows went to Woodcraft where they painted bird houses. They really enjoyed choosing their favorite colors. The Willows really love participating in big kid activities.

 

Our theme this week was “Up, Up and Away.” In Camper Creations, the children had fun making and decorating refrigerator kite magnets. They can’t wait to display them at home! In Ceramics, the children enjoyed adorning their ceramic bathing suits. These projects will be painted and sent home before the end of camp. We hope you enjoyed your child’s

ceramic hands/foot prints and ceramic faces.

 

While Carnival was postponed on Thursday the day was full of terrific rainy day activities. Our theme was “Harry the Dirty Dog” and we made a special snack, read the book, watched the movie and made our furry friends.

 

This fun filled week ended as the campers were thrilled to participate in the annual Carnival on Friday. It was a huge success and everyone had a terrific time. The campers played games, went on rides, ate lots of goodies and won prizes at various booths. Also on Friday was “Puttin’ on the Hits” where The Willows danced to the “Banana” song from “Despicable Me.”

 

About Willow Grove Day Camp

Willow Grove Day Camp provides summer fun for kids who live in Willow Grove, Abington, Blue Bell, Hatboro, Horsham, Huntingdon Valley, Lafayette Hill, Philadelphia, Plymouth Meeting, Southampton and the surrounding areas. For more information on the Willows at Willow Grove Day Camp please visit: willowgrovedaycamp.com/willows/

This unit includes some personal items from the Board of Trustees member who pays for it. We are gradually forcing him out of his own storage unit. It includes all the museum's display cases, TVs used at PAX, conservation supplies, archived magazines, and artifacts, including the Amiga Systems, game boxes, etc. Parts of the collection are in other Board member's homes while they are being worked on for conservation or record keeping.

The Kurfürstendamm (colloquially Ku'damm, About this sound German pronunciation (help·info)) is one of the most famous avenues in Berlin. The street takes its name from the former Kurfürsten (prince-electors) of Brandenburg. This very broad, long boulevard can be considered the Champs-Élysées of Berlin - lined with shops, houses, hotels and restaurants. In particular, many fashion designers have their shops there, as well as several car manufacturers' show rooms.

 

DESCRIPTION

The avenue includes four lines of plane trees and runs for 3.5 km through the city. It branches off from the Breitscheidplatz, where the ruins of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church stand, and leads southwestward up to the district of Grunewald.

 

At the junction with Joachimstaler Straße it passes the Café Kranzler, successor of the Café des Westens, a famous venue for artists and bohémiens of the pre-World War I era. The Kurfürstendamm U-Bahn station and the Swissôtel Berlin can be found at the same junction. One block farther, near Uhlandstraße U-Bahn station, is the Kempinski hotel as well as the Theater am Kurfürstendamm, at the site of a former exhibition hall of the Berlin Secession art association.

 

At Adenauerplatz the boulevard reaches the district of Wilmersdorf, where it passes the Schaubühne theatre on Lehniner Platz. The more sober western or "upper" end of the Kurfürstendamm is marked by the Berlin-Halensee railway station on the Ringbahn line and the junction with the Bundesautobahn 100 (Stadtring) at the Rathenauplatz roundabout, featuring the long-disputed 1987 "Beton Cadillacs" sculpture by Wolf Vostell.

 

Luxury boutiques located on the Kurfürstendamm include Aigner, Bally, Bogner, Bottega Veneta, Brunello Cucinelli, Bucherer, Bvlgari, Burberry, Cartier, Chanel, Chopard, Dior, Dolce & Gabbana, Ermenegildo Zegna, Escada, Giorgio Armani, Gucci, Hermès, Hublot, Hugo Boss, Jil Sander, Longchamp, Louis Vuitton, Maybach, MCM, Michael Kors, Moncler, Philipp Plein, Porsche Design, Prada, Roberto Cavalli, Rolex, Saint Laurent Paris, Salvatore Ferragamo, Steiff, Tumi, Valentino, Versace, Wolford, Wunderkind, and Zilli.

 

HISTORY

Unlike the adjacent streets, the Kurfürstendamm developed out of a historic corduroy road (German: Damm) laid out by the Brandenburg margraves to reach the Grunewald hunting lodge, which was erected about 1542 at the behest of the Hohenzollern elector Joachim II Hector. Although the exact date of the building is unknown, an unnamed causeway leading from the Stadtschloss through the swampy area between the settlements of Charlottenburg (then called Lietzow) and Wilmersdorf to Grunewald is already depicted in a 1685 map. The name Churfürsten Damm was first mentioned between 1767 and 1787.From 1875 the former bridlepath was embellished as a boulevard with a breadth of 53 m on the personal initiative of chancellor Otto von Bismarck, who also proposed the building of the Grunewald mansions colony at its western end. In 1882, Ernst Werner von Siemens presented his Elektromote trolley bus concept at an experimental track near Halensee station. The nearby Lunapark opened in 1909, then Europe's largest amusement park, modelled on Coney Island, where boxer Max Schmeling won his first title of a German Lightheavyweight Champion in 1926. After a long period of decline the park was finally closed in 1933. Large parts are today covered by the Stadtautobahn.

 

Especially during the "Golden Twenties" the Kurfürstendamm area of the "New West" was a centre of leisure and nightlife in Berlin, an era that ended with the Great Depression and the Nazi Machtergreifung in 1933. The shops and businesses owned by Jewish tradespeople became the target of several pogroms, culminating in the "Reichskristallnacht" of 9 November 1938. In World War II the boulevard suffered severe damage from air raids and the Battle of Berlin.

 

Nevertheless, after the war rebuilding started quickly, and when Berlin was separated into East and West Berlin, the Kurfürstendamm became the leading commercial street of West Berlin in its Wirtschaftswunder days. It was therefore the site of protests and major demonstrations by the German student movement, while on 11 April 1968 spokesman Rudi Dutschke was shot in the head while leaving the office of the Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund on Kurfürstendamm No. 140.

 

After German reunification the Kurfürstendamm had to compete with central places like Potsdamer Platz, Friedrichstraße, and Alexanderplatz, which led to the closing of numerous cafés and cinemas. It retained the character of a flâneur and upscale shopping street as the western continuation of the Tauentzienstraße with its large department stores.

 

The globally unique international art project United Buddy Bears was presented in Berlin on the Kurfürstendamm during the summer of 2011.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bourton-on-the-Water is a village and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England, that lies on a wide flat vale within the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The village had a population of 3,296 at the 2011 census. Much of the village centre is a designated Conservation Area.

 

Bourton-on-the-Water's high street is flanked by long wide greens and the River Windrush that runs through them. The river is crossed by five low, arched stone bridges. They were built between 1654 and 1953, leading to the nickname of "Venice of the Cotswolds"

 

The village often has more visitors than residents during the peak tourist season. Some 300,000 visitors arrive each year as compared to under 3,500 permanent residents.

 

There are three churches, Our Lady and St Kenelm Roman Catholic Church, Bourton-on-the-Water Baptist Church and St Lawrence, Church of England. The latter is usually open to visitors during the week. It is a Grade II listed building. A part of it was built in the 14th century but major modifications were made in the 1780s and in the late 1800s.

 

Educational institutions include Bourton-on-the-Water Primary School and the Cotswold School, a co-educational comprehensive school.

 

An electoral ward of the same name exists and includes Cold Aston in addition to Bourton. The total population of the ward at the 2011 census was 3,676. The village itself had 3,296 people; the estimated population in mid-2016 was 3,482.

 

Bourton-on-the-Water parish is bounded by the Fosse Way along the northwest, while the eastern boundary is defined by a series of brooks, namely Slaughter Brook, the River Dikler and the River Windrush. The southern boundary is associated with a watercourse that runs between Bourton Hill and Broadwater Bottom.

 

The earliest evidence of human activity within the Bourton-on-the-Water area was found in the Slaughter Bridge gravel-spread, where Neolithic pottery (dated c. 4000 B.C.) was discovered. Moreover, excavations of the Salmonsbury Camp give evidence of almost continuous habitation through the Neolithic period, the Bronze Age and throughout England's Roman period (c. 43 to 410 A.D.). A Roman road, Icknield Street (also known as Ryknild Street), ran from the Fosse Way at Bourton-on-the-Water to Templeborough in South Yorkshire. Ancient Roman pottery and coins discovered in the village itself give clear evidence of extended Roman occupation. By the 11th century a Christian church, Norman, was established and the village had developed along the River Windrush much as it is today. Centuries earlier, a Saxon timber church was located on that site in about AD 708, built on the site of an old Roman temple. Some of the St Lawrence church on that site today was built in the 14th century but most of it is from the 17th and 18th centuries.

 

The village was served by a passenger railway between 1862 and 1962. Tourism did not become a significant factor in the village until the 1920s and 1930s. The Model Village opened in 1937. There was a significant increase in the population between 1931 and 1951.

 

Following the formation of the Territorial Force in 1908, the town, for recruiting, was granted to the Royal Gloucestershire Hussars. Following this formation the regiment maintained a troop from B Squadron. Today the regiment, now a squadron of The Royal Wessex Yeomanry, continues to recruit from this area.

 

The houses and shops in the village are constructed of the ashlar yellow limestone characteristic of the Cotswolds and they have the embellishments that make Cotswold architecture so picturesque: projecting gables, string-courses, windows with stone mullions, dripmoulds and stone hoodmoulds over the doors.

 

Parts of the James Bond movie Die Another Day (2002) were filmed in the car park at Bourton-on-the-Water and on the nearby ex-RAF aircraft runway at RAF Little Rissington.

 

The small historic core of Bourton-on-the-Water along with associated areas along the River Windrush have been designated a UK Conservation Area.

 

Salmonsbury Camp, a nearby Iron Age habitation, is designated a UK National scheduled monument (SAM 32392).

 

English Heritage designates 114 buildings within Bourton-on-the-Water; all have Grade II or Grade II* listed status. (Grade II* indicates particularly important buildings of more than special interest.)

 

During the summer, a game of medieval football is played with goalposts set up in the River Windrush itself. Two teams play with a standard football and a referee attempts to keep order. Crowds line the banks of the river and the aim is to score as many goals as possible (while getting everyone else as wet as possible).

 

The model village is a 1:9 replica of the village and includes a model of the model village itself (a model within a model). It was built by local craftsmen in the 1930s, and opened in 1937. The model village was awarded Grade II listed status in 2013 in recognition of its uniquely precise details and the genuine building materials and methods used, which replicate those used in the construction of the life-size village.

 

The model railway

 

The Cotswold Motoring Museum (home of Brum)

 

Birdland Park and Gardens, which has a collection of birds, including penguins, parrots and passerine (perching) birds and a large pond full of salmon which can be fed by the public. There are bird-of-prey displays and a penguin feeding demonstration.

 

The Dragonfly Maze, designed by Kit Williams

On the fourth Sunday of each month, there is a farmers' market

 

Oasis' music video "I'm Outta Time" was recorded in the town, and shows Liam Gallagher walking in the countryside of the area, and in the model village and the town.

 

Long-distance footpaths and local walks start, finish or pass through Bourton-on-the-Water. One such route that begins its 100-mile route north is the Heart of England Way.

 

The village has its own non-league football club, Bourton Rovers, who play in the Hellenic Football League at the Rissington Road ground.

 

Local news and television programmes are provided BBC South and ITV Meridian. Television signals are received from the Oxford TV transmitter and the local relay transmitter situated in Icomb. Local radio stations are BBC Radio Gloucestershire, Heart West, Greatest Hits Radio South West, WRFM (Witney Radio) and Cotswolds Radio, community based radio station The town is served by the local newspaper, Cotswold Journal.

 

Bourton-on-the-Water was first served by rail with the opening of the Bourton-on-the-Water railway in 1862. This was a branch line from Kingham on the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway (OWWR). The station was situated just to the north of the village. The OWWR (and its branch) later amalgamated with the Great Western Railway (GWR) and, in 1881, the branch was extended westwards and formed part of the GWR's Banbury and Cheltenham Direct Railway. The station closed to passengers in 1962 and to goods in 1964.

 

The closest operating railway station now is in Moreton-in-Marsh. The heritage Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway uses part of the route of the former Great Western Railway's main line in the Cotswolds; it does not pass through the village.

 

Notable people

Actor Wilfrid Hyde-White was born in Bourton-on-the-Water in 1903

Major-general Dudley Johnson, British Army officer and Victoria Cross recipient, was born here in 1884 and fought in the First World War (1914–18).

Racing cyclist Sharon Laws, who competed in the 2008 Summer Olympics, grew up in the village.

Composer Edwin Ransford.

 

The River Windrush is a tributary of the River Thames in central England. It rises near Snowshill in Gloucestershire and flows south east for 65 km (40 mi) via Burford and Witney to meet the Thames at Newbridge in Oxfordshire.

 

The river gives its name to the village of Windrush in Gloucestershire.

 

The Windrush starts in the Cotswold Hills in Gloucestershire northeast of Taddington, which is north of Guiting Power, Temple Guiting, Ford and Cutsdean. It flows for about 35 miles (56 km): through Bourton-on-the-Water, by the village of Windrush, Gloucestershire, into Oxfordshire and through Burford, Witney, Ducklington and Standlake. It meets the Thames at Newbridge upstream of Northmoor Lock.

 

The river-name Windrush is first attested in an Anglo-Saxon charter of 779, where it appears as Uuenrisc. It appears as Wenris and Wænric in charters of 949, and Wenríc in one of 969. The name means 'white fen', from the Welsh gwyn and the Old Celtic reisko.

 

The river may still host trout, grayling, perch, chub, roach and dace. It held good populations of native crayfish until at least the 1980s. Its waters were used in cloth and woollen blanket making in Witney from mid 17th century. In 2007, it was among many of the district's rivers to flood. It flooded generally but perhaps most acutely in Witney, whose only bridge across the river was submerged. Some decline has been noted, especially in years of release of untreated sewage from plants of Thames Water. The river after drier spells sees algae formations.

 

The ship HMT Empire Windrush, synonymous with postwar immigration of West Indian people to the UK, was named after the river.

 

An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is one of 46 areas of countryside in England, Wales, or Northern Ireland that has been designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value. On 22 November 2023 the AONBs in England and Wales adopted a new name, National Landscapes, and are in the process of rebranding.

 

Areas are designated in recognition of their national importance by the relevant public body: Natural England, Natural Resources Wales, and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency respectively. In place of AONB, Scotland uses the similar national scenic area (NSA) designation. Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty enjoy levels of protection from development similar to those of UK national parks, but unlike national parks the responsible bodies do not have their own planning powers. They also differ from national parks in their more limited opportunities for extensive outdoor recreation.

 

The idea for what would eventually become the AONB designation was first put forward by John Dower in his 1945 Report to the Government on National Parks in England and Wales. Dower suggested there was need for protection of certain naturally beautiful landscapes that were unsuitable as national parks owing to their small size and lack of wildness. Dower's recommendation for the designation of these "other amenity areas" was eventually embodied in the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 as the AONB designation.

 

The purpose of an AONB designation is to conserve and enhance the natural beauty of the designated landscape.

 

There are two secondary aims: meeting the need for quiet enjoyment of the countryside and having regard for the interests of those who live and work there. To achieve these aims, AONBs rely on planning controls and practical countryside management. As they have the same landscape quality, AONBs may be compared to the national parks of England and Wales. National parks are well known in the UK; by contrast, there is evidence to indicate many residents in AONBs may be unaware of the status. However, the National Association of AONBs is working to increase awareness of AONBs in local communities, and, in 2014, successfully negotiated to have the boundaries of AONBs in England shown on Google Maps.

 

There are 46 Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the United Kingdom: 33 in England, four in Wales, one on the England–Wales border, and eight in Northern Ireland. The first AONB was established in 1956 on the Gower Peninsula in South Wales, and the most recent to be designated is the Tamar Valley AONB, established in 1995. More recent changes include the Clwydian Range AONB being extended in 2012 to form the Clwydian Range and Dee Valley AONB, and the Strangford Lough and Lecale Coast AONBs being merged to form a single AONB in 2010.

 

AONBs vary greatly in terms of size, type and use of land, and whether they are partly or wholly open to the public. The smallest AONB is the Isles of Scilly, 16 km2 (6.2 sq mi), and the largest is the Cotswolds, 2,038 km2 (787 sq mi). AONBs cover around 15% of England and 4% of Wales.

 

AONBs in England and Wales were originally created under the same legislation as the national parks, the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949. Unlike AONBs, national parks have special legal powers to prevent unsympathetic development. AONBs in general remain the responsibility of their local authorities by means of special committees that include members appointed by a minister and by parishes, and only very limited statutory duties were imposed on local authorities within an AONB by the original 1949 Act. However, further regulation and protection of AONBs in England and Wales was added by the Countryside and Rights of Way (CRoW) Act 2000, under which new designations are now made,

 

In the National Planning Policy Framework (March 2012), the government stated that AONBs and national parks have equal status when it comes to planning decisions on landscape issues. Two of the AONBs (the Cotswolds and the Chilterns), which extend into a large number of local authority areas, have their own statutory bodies, known as conservation boards. In 2019 the Glover Report made various recommendations regarding the future of AONBs – the report's 'central proposal' being to bring National Parks and AONBs together as part of one 'family of national landscapes' – but as at 1 November 2020 the government has yet to respond to those recommendations. However, the Cotswolds Conservation Board announced in September 2020 that they were re-styling the area name and it is now known as the Cotswolds National Landscape.

 

All English and Welsh AONBs have a dedicated AONB officer and other staff. As required by the CRoW Act, each AONB has a management plan that sets out the characteristics and special qualities of the landscape and how they will be conserved and enhanced. The AONBs are collectively represented by the National Association for Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (NAAONB), an independent registered charity acting on behalf of AONBs and their partners, which uses the slogan "Landscapes for Life".

 

AONBs in Northern Ireland was designated originally under the Amenity Lands (NI) Act 1965; subsequently under the Nature Conservation and Amenity Lands (NI) Order 1985.

 

There are growing concerns among environmental and countryside groups that AONB status is increasingly under threat from development. The Campaign to Protect Rural England said in July 2006 that many AONBs were under greater threat than ever before. Three particular AONBs were cited: the Dorset AONB threatened by a road plan, the threat of a football stadium in the Sussex Downs AONB, and, larger than any other, a £1 billion plan by Imperial College London to build thousands of houses and offices on hundreds of acres of AONB land on the Kent Downs at Wye. In September 2007 government approval was finally given for the development of a new football ground for Brighton and Hove Albion within the boundaries of the Sussex Downs AONB, after a fierce fight by conservationists. The subsequent development, known as Falmer Stadium, was officially opened in July 2011. The Weymouth Relief Road in Dorset was constructed between 2008 and 2011, after environmental groups lost a High Court challenge to prevent its construction.

 

Writing in 2006, Professor Adrian Phillips listed threats facing AONBs, which he says include uncertainty over future support for land management, increasing development pressures, the impacts of globalization, and climate change. More subtle threats include creeping suburbanization and horsiculture.

 

Poet Laureate Simon Armitage wrote a poem "Fugitives", commissioned by the National Association of AONBs, which he read on Arnside Knott on 21 September 2019 to launch the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act.

 

Gloucestershire is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire to the east, Wiltshire to the south, Bristol and Somerset to the south-west, and the Welsh county of Monmouthshire to the west. The city of Gloucester is the largest settlement and the county town.

 

The county is predominantly rural, with an area of 3,150 square kilometres (1,220 sq mi) and a population of 916,212. After Gloucester (118,555) the largest distinct settlements are Cheltenham (115,940), Stroud (26,080), and Yate (28,350). In the south of the county, the areas around Filton and Kingswood are densely populated and part of Bristol built-up area. For local government purposes Gloucestershire comprises a non-metropolitan county, with six districts, and the unitary authority area of South Gloucestershire.

 

Gloucestershire is bisected by the river River Severn, which enters the county near Tewkesbury and forms a wide valley down its centre before broadening into a large tidal estuary. The hills to the east form the majority of the Cotswolds AONB, and the uplands to the west are part of the Forest of Dean and the Wye Valley AONB, which stretches into Wales.

 

Gloucestershire was likely established in the tenth century, and expanded to approximately its current borders in the eleventh. The county was relatively settled during the late Middle Ages, and contained several wealthy monasteries such as Tewkesbury, Gloucester, Hailes, and Cirencester; the Forest of Dean was also a major iron-producing region in this period. The city of Bristol became an independent county in 1373, by which point it was the third-largest city in England. Gloucestershire was not heavily industrialised during the Industrial Revolution, but the Port of Gloucester was expanded with new docks and the small Forest of Dean coalfield was exploited.

 

The region now known as Gloucestershire was originally inhabited by Brythonic peoples (ancestors of the Welsh and English and other Romano-British peoples) in the Iron Age and Roman periods. After the Romans left Britain in the early 5th century, the Brythons re-established control but the territorial divisions for the post-Roman period are uncertain. The city of Caerloyw (Gloucester today, still known as Caerloyw in modern Welsh) was one centre and Cirencester may have continued as a tribal centre as well. The only reliably attested kingdom is the minor south-east Wales kingdom of Ergyng, which may have included a portion of the area (roughly the Forest of Dean). In the final quarter of the 6th century, the Saxons of Wessex began to establish control over the area.

 

The English conquest of the Severn valley began in 577 with the victory of Ceawlin at Deorham, followed by the capture of Cirencester, Gloucester and Bath. The Hwiccas who occupied the district were a West Saxon tribe, but their territory had become a dependency of Mercia in the 7th century, and was not brought under West Saxon dominion until the 9th century. No important settlements were made by the Danes in the district. Gloucestershire probably originated as a shire in the 10th century, and is mentioned by name in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 1016. Towards the close of the 11th century, the boundaries were readjusted to include Winchcombeshire, previously a county by itself, and at the same time the forest district between the Wye and the Severn was added to Gloucestershire. The divisions of the county for a long time remained very unsettled, and the thirty-nine hundreds mentioned in the Domesday Survey and the thirty-one hundreds of the Hundred Rolls of 1274 differ very widely in name and extent both from each other and from the twenty-eight hundreds of the present day.

 

Gloucestershire formed part of Harold's earldom at the time of the Norman Conquest of England, but it offered slight resistance to William the Conqueror.

 

During The Anarchy, Empress Matilda was supported by her half brother, Robert of Gloucester, who had rebuilt Bristol Castle. The castles at Gloucester and Cirencester were garrisoned on her behalf. Beverston Castle was also a site of the conflict.

 

During 13th century Eleanor, Fair Maid of Brittany was imprisoned for quite some time in Gloucester Castle and Bristol Castle, both were considered strongest among England castles.

 

In the barons' war of the reign of Henry III, Gloucester was garrisoned for Simon de Montfort, but was captured by Prince Edward in 1265, in which year de Montfort was slain at the Battle of Evesham.

 

Bristol and Gloucester actively supported the Yorkist cause during the Wars of the Roses.

 

In the religious struggles of the 16th century Gloucester showed strong Protestant sympathy, and in the reign of Mary, Bishop Hooper was sent to Gloucester to be burnt as a warning to the county.

 

The same Puritan leanings induced the county to support the Parliamentary cause in the civil war of the 17th century. In 1643 Bristol and Cirencester were captured by the Royalists, but the latter was recovered in the same year and Bristol in 1645. Two Civil War battles were fought at Beverston Castle, and Parliament ordered its battlements destroyed to deprive the Royalists use of the fortress. Gloucester was garrisoned for the Parliament throughout the struggle.

 

On the subdivision of the Mercian diocese in 680 the greater part of modern Gloucestershire was included in the diocese of Worcester, and shortly after the Conquest constituted the archdeaconry of Gloucester, which in 1290 comprised the deaneries of Campden, Stow, Cirencester, Fairford, Winchcombe, Stonehouse, Hawkesbury, Bitton, Bristol, Dursley and Gloucester. The district west of the Severn, with the exception of a few parishes in the deaneries of Ross and Staunton, constituted the deanery of the forest within the archdeaconry and diocese of Hereford. In 1535 the deanery of Bitton had been absorbed in that of Hawkesbury. In 1541 the diocese of Gloucester was created, its boundaries being identical with those of the county. On the erection of Bristol to a see in 1542 the deanery of Bristol was transferred from Gloucester to that diocese. In 1836 the sees of Gloucester and Bristol were united; the archdeaconry of Bristol was created out of the deaneries of Bristol, Cirencester, Fairford and Hawkesbury; and the deanery of the forest was transferred to the archdeaconry of Gloucester. In 1882 the archdeaconry of Cirencester was constituted to include the deaneries of Campden, Stow, Northleach north and south, Fairford and Cirencester. In 1897 the diocese of Bristol was recreated, and included the deaneries of Bristol, Stapleton and Bitton.

 

After the Conquest very extensive lands and privileges in the county were acquired by the church, the Cirencester Abbey alone holding seven hundreds at fee-farm, and the estates of the principal lay-tenants were for the most part outlying parcels of baronies having their caput in other counties. The large estates held by William Fitz Osbern, Earl of Hereford, escheated to the crown on the rebellion of his son Earl Roger in 1074. The Berkeleys have held lands in Gloucestershire from the time of the Domesday Survey, and the families of Basset, Tracy, Clifton, Dennis and Poyntz have figured prominently in the annals of the county. Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, and Richard of Cornwall claimed extensive lands and privileges in the shire in the 13th century, and Simon de Montfort owned Minsterworth and Rodley.

 

Bristol was made a county in 1373, and in 1483 Richard III created Gloucester as an independent county, adding to it the hundreds of Dudston and Kings Barton. The latter were reunited to Gloucestershire in 1673, but the cities of Bristol and Gloucester continued to rank as independent counties, with separate jurisdiction, county rate and assizes. The chief officer of the Forest of Dean was the warden, who was generally also constable of St Briavel Castle. The first justice-seat for the forest was held at Gloucester Castle in 1282, the last in 1635.

 

Gloucestershire was first represented in parliament in 1290, when it returned two members. Bristol and Gloucester acquired representation in 1295, Cirencester in 1572 and Tewkesbury in 1620. Under the Reform Act of 1832 the county returned four members in two divisions; Bristol, Gloucester, Cirencester, Stroud and Tewkesbury returned two members each, and Cheltenham returned one member. The act of 1868 reduced the representation of Cirencester and Tewkesbury to one member each.

 

The physical characteristics of the three natural divisions of Gloucestershire have given rise in each to a special industry. The forest district, until the development of the Sussex mines in the 16th century, was the chief iron producing area of the kingdom, the mines having been worked in Roman times, while the abundance of timber gave rise to numerous tanneries and to an important shipbuilding trade. The hill district, besides fostering agricultural pursuits, gradually absorbed the woollen trade from the big towns, which now devoted themselves almost entirely to foreign commerce. Silkweaving was introduced in the 17th century, and was especially prosperous in the Stroud valley. The abundance of clay and building-stone in the county gave rise to considerable manufactures of brick, tiles and pottery. Numerous minor industries sprang up in the 17th and 18th centuries, such as flax-growing and the manufacture of pins, buttons, lace, stockings, rope and sailcloth.

 

Gloucester Cathedral and Bristol Cathedral, Tewkesbury Abbey, and the Church of St. John the Baptist in Cirencester with its great Perpendicular porch, are historic buildings of Gloucestershire. Of the abbey of Hailes near Winchcomb, founded by Richard, Earl of Cornwall, in 1246, little more than the foundations are left, but these have been excavated with great care, and interesting fragments have been brought to light.

 

Most of the old market towns have line parish churches. At Deerhurst near Tewkesbury, and Cleeve near Cheltenham, there are churches of special interest on account of the pre-Norman work they retain. The Perpendicular church at Lechlade is unusually perfect; and that at Fairford was built (c. 1500), according to tradition, to contain the remarkable series of stained glass windows which are said to have been brought from the Netherlands. These are, however, adjudged to be of English workmanship, and are one of the finest series in the country. The castle at Berkeley is a splendid example of a feudal stronghold. Thornbury Castle, in the same district, is a fine Tudor ruin, the pretensions of which evoked the jealousy of Cardinal Wolsey against its builder, Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham, who was beheaded in 1521. Near Cheltenham is the fine 15th-century mansion of Southam de la Bere, of timber and stone.

 

Memorials of the de la Bere family appear in the church at Cleeve. The mansion contains a tiled floor from Hailes Abbey. Near Winchcomb is Sudeley Castle, dating from the 15th century, but the inhabited portion is chiefly Elizabethan. The chapel is the burial place of Queen Catherine Parr. At Great Badminton is the mansion and vast domain of the Beauforts (formerly of the Botelers and others), on the south-eastern boundary of the county.

Sunday Experiment Highlights NASA's MMS Mission: Join us from 1-3 PM on Sunday, March 16 at Goddard's Visitors Center : NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission via brief presentations from MMS scientists, hands-on activities that include spacecraft modeling (LEGO, paper), NASA Apps and iPad Teacher Tools, magnetism, mission career videos and more!

 

Credit: NASA/Goddard/Bill Hrybyk

 

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NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.

 

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An Oystercatcher with a tasty Mussel

The Kerala backwaters are a chain of brackish lagoons and lakes lying parallel to the Arabian Sea coast (known as the Malabar Coast) of Kerala state in southern India. The network includes five large lakes linked by canals, both manmade and natural, fed by 38 rivers, and extending virtually half the length of Kerala state. The backwaters were formed by the action of waves and shore currents creating low barrier islands across the mouths of the many rivers flowing down from the Western Ghats range.

 

The Kerala Backwaters are a network of interconnected canals, rivers, lakes and inlets, a labyrinthine system formed by more than 900 km of waterways, and sometimes compared to the American Bayou. In the midst of this landscape there are a number of towns and cities, which serve as the starting and end points of backwater cruises. National Waterway No. 3 from Kollam to Kottapuram, covers a distance of 205 km and runs almost parallel to the coast line of southern Kerala facilitating both cargo movement and backwater tourism.

 

The backwaters have a unique ecosystem - freshwater from the rivers meets the seawater from the Arabian Sea. In certain areas, such as the Vembanad Kayal, where a barrage has been built near Kumarakom, salt water from the sea is prevented from entering the deep inside, keeping the fresh water intact. Such fresh water is extensively used for irrigation purposes.

 

Many unique species of aquatic life including crabs, frogs and mudskippers, water birds such as terns, kingfishers, darters and cormorants, and animals such as otters and turtles live in and alongside the backwaters. Palm trees, pandanus shrubs, various leafy plants and bushes grow alongside the backwaters, providing a green hue to the surrounding landscape.

 

Vembanad Kayal is the largest of the lakes, covering an area of 200 km², and bordered by Alappuzha (Alleppey), Kottayam, and Ernakulam districts. The port of Kochi (Cochin) is located at the lake's outlet to the Arabian Sea. Alleppey, "Venice of the East", has a large network of canals that meander through the town. Vembanad is India’s longest lake.

 

HOUSE BOATS

The kettuvallams (Kerala houseboats) in the backwaters are one of the prominent tourist attractions in Kerala. More than 2000 kettuvallams ply the backwaters, 120 of them in Alappuzha. Kerala government has classified the tourist houseboats as Platinum, Gold and silver.

 

The kettuvallams were traditionally used as grain barges, to transport the rice harvested in the fertile fields alongside the backwaters. Thatched roof covers over wooden hulls, 30 m in length, provided protection from the elements. At some point in time the boats were used as living quarters by the royalty. Converted to accommodate tourists, the houseboats have become floating cottages having a sleeping area, with western-style toilets, a dining area and a sit out on the deck. Most tourists spend the night on a house boat. Food is cooked on board by the accompanying staff – mostly having a flavour of Kerala. The houseboats are of various patterns and can be hired as per the size of the family or visiting group. The living-dining room is usually open on at least three sides providing a grand view of the surroundings, including other boats, throughout the day when it is on the move. It is brought to a standstill at times of taking food and at night. After sunset, the boat crew provide burning coils to drive away mosquitoes. Ketuvallams are motorised but generally proceed at a slow speed for smooth travel. All ketuvallams have a generator and most bedrooms are air-conditioned. At times, as per demand of customers, electricity is switched off and lanterns are provided to create a rural setting.

 

While many ketuvalloms take tourists from a particular point and bring them back to around the same point next morning there are some specific cruises mostly in the Alappuzha area, such as the one night cruise from Alappuzha to Thotapally via Punnamada Lake two nights cruise from Alappuzha to Alumkavadi,[8] one night cruise from Alappuzha to Kidangara, and one night cruise from Alappuzha to Mankotta. There are numerous such cruises.

 

Beypore, located 10 km south of Kozhikode at the mouth of the Chaliyar River, is a famous fishing harbour, port and boat building centre. Beypore has a 1,500 year-tradition of boatbuilding. The skill of the local shipwrights and boat builders are widely sought after. There is a houseboat-building yard at Alumkadavu, in Ashtamudi Kayal near Kollam.

 

FERRY SERVICES

Regular ferry services connect most locations on both banks of the backwaters. The Kerala State Water Transport Department operates ferries for passengers as well as tourists. It is the cheapest mode of transport through the backwaters.

 

ECONOMIC SIGNIFICANCE

Connected by artificial canals, the backwaters form an economical means of transport, and a large local trade is carried on by inland navigation. Fishing, along with fish curing is an important industry.

 

Kerala backwaters have been used for centuries by the local people for transportation, fishing and agriculture. It has supported the efforts of the local people to earn a livelihood. In more recent times, agricultural efforts have been strengthened with reclamation of some backwater lands for rice growing, particularly in the Kuttanad area. Boat making has been a traditional craft, so has been the coir industry.

 

Kuttanad is crisscrossed with waterways that run alongside extensive paddy fields, as well as fields of cassava, banana and yam. A unique feature of Kuttanad is that many of these fields are below sea level and are surrounded by earthen embankments. The crops are grown on the low-lying ground and irrigated with fresh water from canal and waterways connected to Vembanad lake. The area is similar to the dikes of the Netherlands where land has been reclaimed from the sea and crops are grown.

 

WIKIPEDIA

  

City Palace, Jaipur, which includes the Chandra Mahal and Mubarak Mahal palaces and other buildings, is a palace complex in Jaipur, the capital of the Rajasthan state, India. It was the seat of the Maharaja of Jaipur, the head of the Kachwaha Rajput clan. The Chandra Mahal palace now houses a museum but the greatest part of it is still a royal residence. The palace complex, located northeast of the centre of the grid-patterned Jaipur city, incorporates an impressive and vast array of courtyards, gardens and buildings. The palace was built between 1729 and 1732, initially by Sawai Jai Singh II, the ruler of Amber. He planned and built the outer walls, and later additions were made by successive rulers continuing up to the 20th century. The credit for the urban layout of the city and its structures is attributed to two architects namely, Vidyadhar Bhattacharya, the chief architect in the royal court and Sir Samuel Swinton Jacob, apart from the Sawai himself who was a keen architectural enthusiast. The architects achieved a fusion of the Shilpa Shastra of Indian architecture with Rajput, Mughal and European styles of architecture.

 

HISTORY

The palace complex lies in the heart of Jaipur city, to the northeast of the very centre, located at 26.9255°N 75.8236°E. The site for the palace was located on the site of a royal hunting lodge on a plain land encircled by a rocky hill range, five miles south of Amber (city). The history of the city palace is closely linked with the history of Jaipur city and its rulers, starting with Maharaja Sawai Jai Singh II who ruled from 1699-1744. He is credited with initiating construction of the city complex by building the outer wall of the complex spreading over many acres. Initially, he ruled from his capital at Amber, which lies at a distance of 11 kilometres from Jaipur. He shifted his capital from Amber to Jaipur in 1727 because of an increase in population and increasing water shortage. He planned Jaipur city in six blocks separated by broad avenues, on the classical basis of principals of Vastushastra and other similar classical treatise under the architectural guidance of Vidyadar Bhattacharya, a Bengali architect from Naihati of present day West Bengal who was initially an accounts-clerk in the Amber treasury and later promoted to the office of Chief Architect by the King.

 

Following Jaisingh's death in 1744, there were internecine wars among the Rajput kings of the region but cordial relations were maintained with the British Raj. Maharaja Ram Singh sided with the British in the Sepoy Mutiny or Uprising of 1857 and established himself with the Imperial rulers. It is to his credit that the city of Jaipur including all of its monuments (including the City Palace) are stucco painted 'Pink' and since then the city has been called the "Pink City". The change in colour scheme was as an honour of hospitality extended to the Prince of Wales (who later became King Edward VII) on his visit. This colour scheme has since then become a trademark of the Jaipur city.

 

Man Singh II, the adopted son of Maharaja Madho Singh II, was the last Maharaja of Jaipur to rule from the Chandra Mahal palace, in Jaipur. This palace, however, continued to be a residence of the royal family even after the Jaipur kingdom merged with the Indian Union in 1949 (after Indian independence in August 1947) along with other Rajput states of Jodhpur, Jaisalmer and Bikaner. Jaipur became the capital of the Indian state of Rajasthan and Man Singh II had the distinction of becoming the Rajapramukh (present day Governor of the state) for a time and later was the Ambassador of India to Spain.

 

STRUCTURES

The City Palace is in the central-northeast part of the Jaipur city, which is laid in a grid pattern with wide avenues. It is a unique and arresting complex of several palaces, pavilions, gardens and temples. The most prominent and most visited structures in the complex are the Chandra Mahal, Mubarak Mahal, Mukut Mahal, Maharani's Palace, Shri Govind Dev Temple and the City Palace Museum.

 

ENTRANCE GATES

Virendra Pol, Udai Pol near Jaleb chowk and the Tripolia Gate (triple gate) are the entry gates to the City Palace. The Tripolia gate is reserved for entry into the palace by the royal family. Common people and visitors can enter the place complex only through the Virendra Pol and the Udai Pol or the Atish Pol (Stable Gate). The entry from Virendra Pol leads to the Mubarak Mahal. The gateways are richly decorated.

 

MUBARAK MAHAL

Mubarak Mahal, meaning the 'Auspicious Palace', was built with a fusion of the Islamic, Rajput and European architectural styles in the late 19th century by Maharaja Madho Singh II as reception centre. It is a museum; a fine repository of variety of textiles such as the royal formal costumes, sanganeri block prints, embroidered shawls, Kashmiri pashminas and silk saris as part of the Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II Museum. A noteworthy display here is of the set of voluminous clothes worn by Sawai Madhosingh I, who was 1.2 metres wide and weighed 250 kilograms but interestingly had 108 wives.

 

CHANDRA MAHAL

Chandra Mahal or Chandra Niwas is the most commanding building in the City Palace complex, on its west end. It is a seven-storeyed building and each floor has been given a specific name such as the Sukh-Niwas, Ranga-Mandir, Pitam-Niwas, Chabi-Niwas, Shri-Niwas and Mukut-Mandir or Mukut Mahal. It contains many unique paintings, mirror work on walls and floral decorations. At present, most of this palace is the residence of the descendents of the former rulers of Jaipur. Only the ground floor is allowed for visitors where a museum is located that displays carpets, manuscripts and other items that belonged to the royal family. There is beautiful peacock gate at the entry to the Mahal. It has screened balconies and a pavilion at the roof from where a panoramic view of the city can been seen. It is set amidst well laid out gardens and a decorative lake in the foreground. "Sukh Nivas" or the "Hall of Rest" - Sukh Niwas is painted in Wedgewood blue fully decorated with white lining. Sukh Niwas has the drawing and dining room of the Maharaja which is fully ornamented with mughal miniatures, silver and glass dining tables. Chandra Mahal 3rd floor is called "Rang Mandir". In this there are small and large mirrors in wall, pillars and ceilings. "Shobha Nivas" – It is on the 4th floor of the Chandra Mahal. It is also known as "Hall of Beauty". The walls of the Shobha Nivas are fully decorated with mirror walls with blue tiles ornamented with mica and gold leaf. It is still under the control of the present Maharaja. "Chhavi Nivas" or Hall of Images – It is on the 5th floor. In the rainy season this place was the retreat of the Maharaja. It has an elegant floor of blue. Chandra mahal 6th floor is called "shri Niwas". And the 7th floor is called "Mukut mandir" crown temple.

 

Also seen at the top of the Chandra Mahal is the flag of the royal family, which is seen unfurled when the Maharaja is in the palace. It is a one and quarter sized flag. However, when the king is away, the queen's flag is hoisted on the building.

 

There is an interesting anecdote narrated about the 'one and quarter flag', which is the insignia flag of the Maharajas of Jaipur. Emperor Aurangzeb who attended the wedding of Jai Singh, shook hands with the young groom and wished him well on his marriage. On this occasion, Jai Singh made an irreverent remark to the Emperor stating that the way he had shaken hands with him made it incumbent on the Emperor to protect him (Jai Singh) and his kingdom. Aurangzeb, instead of responding in indignation at the quip, felt pleased and conferred on the young Jai Singh the title of 'Sawai', which means "one and a quarter". Since then the Maharajas have pre-fixed their names with this title. During residence there, they also fly a one and a quarter size flag atop their buildings and palaces.

 

There is also a tragic story linked to this palace. Ishawri Singh, son of Jai Singh who was unwilling to face the advancing army of Marathas, ended his life humiliatingly by getting bitten by a snake. Following this, his 21 wives and paramours also committed the then accepted ritual of sati or jauhar (self immolation on the funeral pyre of their husband).

 

PRITAM NIWAS CHOWK

It is the inner courtyard, which provides access to the Chandra Mahal. Here, there are four small gates (known as Ridhi Sidhi Pol) that are adorned with themes representing the four seasons and Hindu gods. The gates are the Northeast Peacock Gate (with motifs of peacocks on the doorway) representing autumn and dedicated Lord Vishnu; the Southwest Lotus Gate (with continual flower and petal pattern) suggestive of summer season and dedicated to Lord Shiva-Parvati; the Northwest Green Gate, also called the Leheriya (meaning: "waves") gate, in green colour suggestive of spring and dedicated to Lord Ganesha, and lastly, the Rose Gate with repeated flower pattern representing winter season and dedicated to Goddess Devi.

 

DIWAN-I-KHAS

Diwan-I-Khas was a private audience hall of the Maharajas, a marble floored chamber. It is located between the armoury and the art gallery. There are two huge sterling silver vessels of 1.6 metres height and each with capacity of 4000 litres and weighing 340 kilograms, on display here. They were made from 14000 melted silver coins without soldering. They are officially recorded by the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's largest sterling silver vessels.[16] These vessels were specially made by Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh II, who was a highly pious Hindu, to carry the water of the Ganges to drink on his trip to England in 1901 (for Edward VII's coronation) as he was finicky about committing religious sin by consuming the English water. Hence, the vessels are named as Gangajelies (Ganges-water urns). There are a number of crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling (normally covered with plastic sheets to prevent dust collection), which are uncovered on special occasions.[

 

DIWAN-I-AAM

The 'Diwan-E-Aam' (Sabha Niwas) or the 'Hall of Public Audience' is an enchanting chamber, with the ceiling painted in rich red and gold colours, which still looks vibrant. It is a major attraction in the Mubarak Mahal courtyard. This chamber, functioning now as an art gallery, has exhibits of exquisite miniature paintings (of Rajastahni, Mughal and Persian art), ancient texts, embroidered rugs, Kashmir shawls and carpets. The ceiling is richly decorated. At present, it is an art gallery showcasing enthralling painted ceilings and rare ancient handwritten original manuscripts of Hindu scriptures (the Hindu holy scripture of the Bhagavad Gita handwritten in tiny script). Also seen in the art gallery is the Golden throne (called as Takth-e-Rawal) that was the seat of the Maharaja during public audience. It was mounted on an elephant or carried by palanquin bearers during the Maharajas visit outside the palace. At the entry gateway to the hall, two large elephants, each made out of single marble rock are on display.

 

MAHARANI PALACE

Maharani's Palace was originally the residence of the royal queens. It has been converted into a museum, where weapons used by the royalty during war campaigns are displayed, including those belonging to the 15th century. The ceiling of this chamber has unique frescoes, which are preserved using jewel dust of semiprecious stones. A particular weaponry on display is the scissor-action dagger, which when thrust into an enemy's body is said to disembowel the victim, on its withdrawal. The other artefacts on display include swords with pistols attached to it, the sword presented by Queen Victoria to Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh (1835–80) which is inlaid with rubies and emeralds, guns serving as walking sticks and a small canon.

 

BHAGGI KHANA

Bhaggi Khana is a museum in the palace complex where a collection of old carriages, palanquins and European cabs adopted as baggis to Indian situations are on display here. The baggi which attracts attention is the one gifted by Prince of Wales to the Maharaja in 1876, called the Victoria baggi. Also on display here are the mahadol, a palanquin with a single bamboo bar that was used to carry the priests and a ratha (chariot) that was used for carrying the idols of Hindu gods in procession on festive occasions.

 

GOVIND DEV JI TEMPLE

Govind Dev Ji temple, dedicated to the Hindu god Lord Krishna, is part of the City Palace complex. It was built in early 18th century outside the walls set in a garden environment. It has European chandeliers and paintings of Indian art. The ceiling in the temple is ornamented in gold. Its location provided a direct view to the Maharaja from his Chandar Mahal palace. The arathi (prayer offering) for the deity can be seen by devotees only for seven times during the day.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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The genus Lasioglossum includes species that exhibit the full range of bee social behaviors, including solitary, communal, and social habits. Most species nest in the ground. In social colonies, daughters remain in the nest and help care for the young. Some of the social species have small nests with a single queen and a few workers whereas others build long-lived nests with multiple queens and hundreds of workers. All Lasioglossum spp. line their nests with glandular secretions that are not easily detachable from the surrounding soil

 

Some Lasioglossum line their nest entrance, burrow and cells with glandular secretions of a mixture of chemicals called lactones. Each individual bee has its own unique combination of lactones and contributes this combination to the odor of the nest entrance. This helps workers recognize their own nest when they return from foraging

 

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THE BEATLES: LOST AND FOUND ARCHIVES 1964-1968 DVD

Can you belive even more unearthed footage??!?! It's true and it is here and almost all with original audio!

Great clips and interview and concert footage! Sweden, England, arrival in America, Wahington DC, Miami,

New Zealand color film, Sweden 1964,NY press conference, Belfast, 1965 arrival and press conf in NY!

1966 footage includes color Boston, Wash Dc footage and Shea 1966 B/w clip on stage and newly found 8mm

color Shea 1965 and 1966 films!! Plus Ringo in 1967 and George in 1968! 42 Chapters 93 Minutes.

VIDEO SAMPLE: youtu.be/QDwQINrCX-w

 

1963

01 Oct 20: Arrival - Alpha Television Studios, Aston, Birmingham - BBC News

02 Oct 23, 1963: Arrival - Arlanda Airport, Stockholm, Sweden - Color 8mm Film

Oct 23, 1963: Arrival - Arlanda Airport, Stockholm, Sweden - SVT News

03 Oct 26: Concert Clips - Kungliga Tennishallen, Stockholm, Sweden - B/W Movie

04 Oct 27: Concert Clips - Cirkus Lorensbergsparken, Gothenburg, Sweden - Color 8mm Film

05 Nov 7: Concert Clips - Adelphi Cinema, Dublin, Ireland - News Footage UPGRADE and DIFF

06 Nov 8: Beatles interview Belfast, Ireland - Ulster News LONGER

07 Ritz Cinema - Belfast Ireland - ITN News 2 Clips

08 Nov 20: She Loves You - Twist and Shout - ABC Cinema, Manchester Multi Angle

 

1964

09 Feb 7: Airport Arrival at JFK Airport, NYC, NY - CBS News

10 Arrival at Press Conf JFK Airport - CBS News

11 Airport Arrival at JFK Airport, NYC, NY - NBC News Original Report

12 Arrival at Plaza Hotel, NYC, NY - ABC News

13 Feb 7- 9: Arrival, Fans and More - NYC, NY - CBS News Footage 2014

14 Feb 9: Arrival at CBS Studio, New York, NY - Assoc Press

15 Feb 11: Arrival at Union Station - Wash DC - CBS News

16 Press Conference Washington Coliseum - Wash DC - CBS News LONGER

17 Interview at British Embassy - Wash DC - CBS News LONGER

18 Feb 13: Beatles arrive in Miami Intl Airport - CBS News

19 Beatles arrive in Miami Intl Airport - WQAM 8mm Color Film

20 Feb 21: Departure - Ed Sullivan Interview - Maimi Int'l Airport - CBS News

21 Feb 22: Return from USA - Heathrow Airport, London - UFA Deutsche Wochenschau Newsreel

22 June 21: International Airport - Wellington, New Zealand - 8mm Color Film

23 July 27: Fans in Sweden - SVT News

24 July 28: Interview at Hotel Foresta, Lidingo, Sweden - SVT News

25 Aug 28: Airport Arrival at JFK Airport, NYC, NY - ABC News

26 Press Conference - Delmonico Hotel NYC, NY - CBS News

27 Sept 14: Arrival Greater Pittsburgh Airport, Pittsburgh, PA - KDKA News

28 Sept 18: Arrival and Bert Shipp Interview - Airport and Hotel - Dallas, TX - WFAA News

29 Sept 20: Paramount Theatre NYC, NY - Newsreel

30 Nov 2: Arrival and Ride - Belfast Airport, Ireland - ITN News LONGER

31 Dec: Beatles records in Liverpool record shop - UK Newsreel

 

1965

32 Aug 13: Arrival at JFK Airport and Press Conference Warwick Hotel, NYC, NY - CBS News LONGER

33 Aug 15: Shea Stadium, NYC, NY - 8mm Color Film NEW

 

1966

34 Aug 11: Heathrow Airport, London - BBC News

35 Aug 11: Logan Airport - Boston MA - CBS News Color

36 Aug 15: Arrival and Fan Interviews - National Airport Wash DC - CBS News Color

37 Press Conference - Stadium, Wash DC - CBS News Color

38 Aug 19: Memphis Coliseum and Church - Memphis, TN - CBS News

39 Aug 23: Shea Stadium Concert NYC, NY - CBS News

40 Shea Stadium Concert NYC, NY - 8mm Color Film

 

1967-1968

41 Dec 1967: Ringo filming Candy - Rome, Italy - BBC News

42 Autumn 1968: George travels in England - Nov in LA - Color Home Movie

 

Northwest Airlines began life in September 1926 as Northwest Airways, headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and flying air mail. A year later, it expanded its service to include passenger routes, flying Hamilton H-47 biplanes. Due to the fallout from the Air Mail Scandal of the early 1930s, Northwest Airways changed its name to Northwest Airlines in 1934 to distance itself from its air mail beginnings. By that time, it had already moved its main base of operations to Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, and was operating a comparatively large route network through the upper Midwest. Due to this experience, Northwest got the coveted route from New York to Seattle, making the airline one of the few transcontinental American airlines. Because a good deal of this route was flown over the rugged Rocky Mountains in often winter weather, Northwest pioneered long-distance mountain flying in poor conditions.

 

During World War II, Northwest’s experience in flying these routes served it well: many of its pilots were tapped to map out the Alaska-Siberia (ALSIB) air ferrying route from Great Falls, Montana to destinations in the Soviet Union. With the risk of crashing into sparsely populated areas a real threat, Northwest’s aircraft were painted with bright red tails to better find them if there was a crash-landing. When the war ended, Northwest kept their red tails, which brought recognition from potential passengers. It also gained the airline’s pilots a great deal of experience in long-distance flight.

 

Before the war, Northwest was already considering a transpacific route through Alaska and Japan to China; after the war, with new long-range aircraft such as the Douglas DC-4 and Boeing 377 Stratocruiser becoming available, this idea became a reality. Northwest flew its first transpacific route from Minneapolis to Tokyo in 1947—the first to use the “Great Northern Circle” route. Asia became Northwest’s stock in trade after 1947. To reflect this, the airline began calling itself Northwest Orient, though it did not begin applying this title to its aircraft immediately. For awhile, Northwest was not only one of the more well-known American air carriers, it was also Japan’s largest and the American airline with the most destinations in Canada.

 

By 1960, when Northwest received its first jets (Douglas DC-8s, though these were soon replaced by Boeing 707s), it had the most Asian destinations of any US airline, and was also the largest airline in the Pacific Northwest as well, with a dense network serving small airports between Seattle and Minneapolis, as well a few Midwest locations as well. It had also acquired turboprops as one of the launch customers for the Lockheed L-188 Electra, but after a series of catastrophic accidents, these were quietly replaced by Boeing 727s, making Northwest one of the first all-jet airlines. A new livery was adopted in the early 1970s that kept the red tail but dropped the words “Northwest”; new titling with “Northwest Orient” was carried on the forward fuselage, and more bare metal was used. About the same time, Northwest entered the wide-body field in a big way, ordering both Boeing 747s and McDonnell Douglas DC-10s. In 1977, it received its first European routes, making it a worldwide airline.

 

Because of its extensive international network and near-stranglehold on the Pacific Northwest (its only rival was Western Airlines), Northwest weathered the post-deregulation American market and even profited from it: seeking to expand into the American East and South, it bought Republic Airlines in 1986. Not long afterwards, the title “Orient” was dropped from Northwest’s advertising and aircraft, as it was no longer a primarily transpacific airline.

 

This was not without price, however: the sudden acquisition of Republic left Northwest glutted with aircraft it could not afford to operate and routes it did not want, while continued issues with labor nearly led to strikes. The airline nearly went bankrupt in 1993 before restructuring; a modernization program began, with many regional routes farmed out to Northwest Airlink, its commuter service, and older aircraft leased out. Its European routes, however, were strengthened by a close relationship and codesharing agreement with KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.

 

Northwest returned to profitability after a brief period of low sales in the late 1990s, but then was deluged with a number of problems. This included its previous uncontested dominance in Asia being challenged by United and Delta; the latter, after buying out Western, was also becoming increasingly present in the Pacific Northwest as well, where low-cost carriers like Alaska and Southwest were beginning to take a toll. Labor issues continued to be an issue as well. After the 9/11 attacks grounded American air traffic—which for Northwest, came on the heels of a strike that grounded the airline for two weeks—Northwest filed for bankruptcy in 2005.

 

This led to a massive sell-off of older aircraft, the end of a great deal of complimentary items for passengers, slashing its Airlink fleet, and other cost-saving measures. Northwest emerged from bankruptcy in 2007, but never truly recovered. It curtailed some of its European routes in exchange for new routes to China, but though Northwest was posting a profit, it was not the airline giant it had been in the 1980s and 1990s.

 

In 2008, Northwest announced a merger with Delta, which would allieviate the problems with both airlines, though Northwest was clearly the junior partner. Though Delta adopted a shade of red in its famous widget identical to that of Northwest’s tail colors, the Northwest brand disappeared by 2010 as Delta became the largest airline in the world by fleet size.

 

N261US is another example of Northwest's classic "Northwest Orient" livery. Northwest used its 727s on its domestic routes; I grew up in Great Falls, Montana and remember these classic airliners quite well! N261US served its entire career with Northwest, from delivery in 1969 to its retirement in 1993; it was later scrapped.

When couples dream of their perfect wedding destination abroad, their vision often includes escaping to a far-away place that offers all of the charms one could possibly desire for their Religious or Civil Ceremony.

 

So, if you're looking at celebrating your wedding in Sicily, Taormina is a good choice.Taormina's beauty is uncontested.Some cities are known for their art treasures, others for their natural beauties; only a few, like Taormina, own both.Visitors to this magical yet relatively undiscovered island, leave with its images of sheer beauty, its cultural simplicity, the passion and warmth of the people and historical delights etched permanently in their memories.Within its ancient stone gates, the old town has fascinating archeological monuments and medieval homes like Palazzo Santo Stefano (where civil weddings are held). Magnificent views of the sea complete the picture.The most famous is the view overlooking the Greco-Roman amphitheatre; with Mount Etna and the sea in the background.

 

The city is located on a cliff top overlooking the deep blue of the never ending horizon reflected in a clear turquoise sea which surrounds the bays and beaches.In fact it is Sicily's number one tourist resort, boasting magnificent scenery, architecture and great local cuisine.It's no wonder tourists flock to Taormina every year. Its rich culture and crystal clear sea and views of Mount Etna create a magical atmosphere.Taormina has endlessly winding medieval streets and tiny passages, each with its own secrets. Some of these intriguing places are secluded gardens hidden by stone walls; others are set on terraces overlooking the coast or in more public but equally pleasant squares.Taormina is beautiful by day but in the evenings its atmosphere is simply enchanting, whether you stroll the illuminated streets or indulge in the view of the coast over an authentic Sicilian dinner.Taormina's ancient Greek splendor, medieval charm and unique views will leave you with a lasting impression of Sicily.The climate is mild even in the winter, where it feels like eternal spring time. Its air is filled with the scent of orange and lemon blossoms.Steal away on an island retreat in beautiful Sicily, as it offers a taste of the traditional with a delicate touch of the exotic.There are several charming churches here in which to have a Catholic wedding, as well as Taormina's city hall for civil weddings, which takes an exquisitely charming medieval mood.Taormina's regal Norman Byzantine, Romanesque and Baroque churches offer a beautiful venue for a religious wedding.Couples may choose to exchange their wedding vows in any of these spectacular locations!The whole Taormina experience leaves visitors breathless and enthusiastic to plan their dream wedding here.

 

Make the dream come true for you...

 

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Taormina is a comune and small town on the east coast of the island of Sicily, Italy, in the Province of Messina, about midway between Messina and Catania. Taormina has been a very popular tourist destination since the 19th century. It has popular beaches (accessible via an aerial tramway) on the Ionian sea, which is remarkably warm and has a high salt content. Taormina can be reached via highways from Messina from the north and Catania .Just south of Taormina is the Isola Bella, a nature reserve. Tours of the Capo Sant' Andrea grottos are also available. Taormina is built on an extremely hilly coast, and is approximately a forty-five minute drive away from Europe's largest active volcano, Mount Etna.A stay at Taormina is not just a seaside vacation. This area, rich in charm and history, must be experienced in a spirit that is outside the ordinary, and for one simple reason: here, everything is extraordinary. Every stone is a thousand-year-old piece of history, the glorious sea reflects Taormina's beauty, as it shapes and marks the passage of time, and the places that enchanted the Greeks create to this day a vibrant and exciting ambiance. But trying to describe in words what makes Taormina unique is truly difficult.

 

Taormina ist eine Stadt mit 11.076 Einwohnern (Stand 31. Dezember 2010) an der Ostküste Siziliens. Die Gründung der Stadt geht auf die Sikuler zurück, die schon vor der griechischen Kolonisation auf den Terrassen des Monte Tauro siedelten. Im 4. Jahrhundert vor Christus wurde die Stadt griechisch. Die heutige Stadt ist eine Neugründung aus dem Mittelalter, nachdem die Araber die antike Stadt zerstört hatten.Auf Grund der malerischen Landschaft, des milden Klimas und zahlreicher historischer Sehenswürdigkeiten entwickelte sich die Stadt im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert zu einem der wichtigsten Touristenzentren Siziliens. Besonders bekannt und sehenswert sind das antike Theater mit Blick auf den Ätna und den Golf von Giardini-Naxos und die kleine Insel Isola Bella vor der Küste Taorminas.

 

Taormina (griego antiguo Ταυρομένιον, Tauromenion, latín Tauromenium) es una ciudad situada en la costa este de la isla de Sicilia (Italia), en la provincia de Mesina, a medio camino entre Mesina y Catania. Cuenta con 10.991 habitantes.Está casi en el límite de la provincia de Catania, se extiende por el monte Tauro, a 200 m de altitud, y se halla en un balcón sobre el mar, enfrente del volcán Etna. Es un centro turístico muy importante desde el siglo XIX.Posee magníficas playas (accesibles mediante teleférico) y un patrimonio histórico muy rico, cuyo máximo exponente es el célebre teatro greco-romano. Además, se conserva un castillo árabe, que ocupa el lugar de la antigua ciudadela o Arx.Taormina y el volcán Etna al fondo, desde el teatro griego.La ciudad fue fundada por los griegos en el 736 a. C., con el nombre de Naxos.La leyenda cuenta que los marinos griegos que pasaban por la costa oriental de Sicilia olvidaron realizar sacrificios en honor a Poseidón, y él, encolerizado, les hizo naufragar. El único superviviente, Teocles, llegó al Capo Schico, próximo a Naxos, y volvió a Grecia para contar las maravillas de Sicilia, convenciendo a sus compatriotas para instalarse en la isla.

 

Taormine, en italien Taormina, est une commune de la province de Messine en Sicile (Italie).Taormine est située sur la côte est de la Sicile, à peu près à mi-chemin entre Messine et Catane (50 km), presque à la limite de la province de Catane.Elle s’étend sur le Mont Tauro à 200 m d’altitude. La ville est en balcon sur la mer face à l’Etna. La Calabre, distante d'environ 30 km, est visible par temps clair ainsi que la nuit.La légende dit que des marins grecs, passant sur la côte orientale de la Sicile, avaient oublié de sacrifier à Neptune. Celui-ci, en colère, fit chavirer leur embarcation. Le seul survivant, Théocle, parvint au Cap Schiso, non loin du site de Naxos (aujourd'hui Giardini-Naxos). Il retourna ensuite en Grèce pour narrer à ses compatriotes les merveilles de la Sicile. Certains, convaincus, décidèrent de venir s’y installer.

 

Taormina è un comune di 10.991 abitanti della provincia di Messina. E' uno dei centri balneari di maggiore rilievo di tutta la regione. Il suo aspetto, il suo paesaggio, i suoi luoghi, le sue bellezze riescono ad attirare turisti provenienti da tutto il mondo.Situata su una collina a 206 m di altezza sul livello del mare , sospesa tra rocce e mare su un terrazzo del monte Tauro, in uno scenario di bellezze naturali unico per varietà e contrasti di motivi , splendore di colori e lussureggiante vegetazione.Il clima è dolcemente mite.Molto belle le mezze stagioni , Primavera e Autunno infatti vantano un clima idealmente mite.La storia di Taormina è sicuramente costellata da molteplici dominazioni, e questo è possibile vederlo passeggiando per le strade del centro storico che mostrano i segni lasciati dai vari popoli passati per Taomina. Essendo situata al centro del mediterraneo la Sicilia fu sempre una preda ambita per la sua posizione strategica di passaggio,situata sulla parte est e in posizione fortificata su una collina permetteva già da allora di controllare buona parte della costa ionica e ha sempre rappresentato un ottimo punto di fortificazione e controllo nelle stradegie di guerra. Dopo aver attestato l'esistenza di una sede di siculi ( antichi abitanti dell'isola, detti anche sicani) presso Taormina, per certo vi passarono e vi lasciarono le loro tracce I Greci, i Romani, i Saraceni, dunque gli Arabi, i Bizantini ,I Normanni , Gli Aragonesi , e per ultimi i Borboni.Un soggiorno a Taormina non è semplicemente una vacanza al mare. Questi luoghi, pregni di storia e di fascino, chiedono infatti di essere vissuti con uno spirito diverso da quello comune e la ragione è semplice: qui tutto è fuori dall'ordinario.Ogni pietra reca in sé una storia millenaria, il mare meraviglioso su cui Taormina riflette tutta la sua bellezza, condiziona e scandisce lo scorrere del tempo ed i luoghi che furono l'incanto dei greci trasmettono tutt'oggi un'atmosfera vibrante di emozioni. Ma tentare di descrivere con le parole ciò che rende unica Taormina è davvero difficile.

 

Font : Wikipedia

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgokPbsuXrw

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2na3n59torA

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMiplnTr6FU

 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDDZzYD2vxY

ATSCC Arizona CBP Operations, to include aerials of CBP locations, canine inspections, ports of entry and exit, border patrols, OFO operations and inspections, apprehensions, drug seizures, and check points.

The Ajanta Caves (Ajiṇṭhā leni; Marathi: अजिंठा लेणी) in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, India are about 30 rock-cut Buddhist cave monuments which date from the 2nd century BCE to about 480 or 650 CE. The caves include paintings and sculptures described by the government Archaeological Survey of India as "the finest surviving examples of Indian art, particularly painting", which are masterpieces of Buddhist religious art, with figures of the Buddha and depictions of the Jataka tales. The caves were built in two phases starting around the 2nd century BCE, with the second group of caves built around 400–650 CE according to older accounts, or all in a brief period of 460 to 480 according to the recent proposals of Walter M. Spink. The site is a protected monument in the care of the Archaeological Survey of India, and since 1983, the Ajanta Caves have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

 

The caves are located in the Indian state of Maharashtra, near Jalgaon and just outside the village of Ajinṭhā 20°31′56″N 75°44′44″E), about 59 kilometres from Jalgaon railway station on the Delhi – Mumbai line and Howrah-Nagpur-Mumbai line of the Central Railway zone, and 104 kilometres from the city of Aurangabad. They are 100 kilometres from the Ellora Caves, which contain Hindu and Jain temples as well as Buddhist caves, the last dating from a period similar to Ajanta. The Ajanta caves are cut into the side of a cliff that is on the south side of a U-shaped gorge on the small river Waghur, and although they are now along and above a modern pathway running across the cliff they were originally reached by individual stairs or ladders from the side of the river 35 to 110 feet below.

 

The area was previously heavily forested, and after the site ceased to be used the caves were covered by jungle until accidentally rediscovered in 1819 by a British officer on a hunting party. They are Buddhist monastic buildings, apparently representing a number of distinct "monasteries" or colleges. The caves are numbered 1 to 28 according to their place along the path, beginning at the entrance. Several are unfinished and some barely begun and others are small shrines, included in the traditional numbering as e.g. "9A"; "Cave 15A" was still hidden under rubble when the numbering was done. Further round the gorge are a number of waterfalls, which when the river is high are audible from outside the caves.

 

The caves form the largest corpus of early Indian wall-painting; other survivals from the area of modern India are very few, though they are related to 5th-century paintings at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka. The elaborate architectural carving in many caves is also very rare, and the style of the many figure sculptures is highly local, found only at a few nearby contemporary sites, although the Ajanta tradition can be related to the later Hindu Ellora Caves and other sites.

 

HISTORY

Like the other ancient Buddhist monasteries, Ajanta had a large emphasis on teaching, and was divided into several different caves for living, education and worship, under a central direction. Monks were probably assigned to specific caves for living. The layout reflects this organizational structure, with most of the caves only connected through the exterior. The 7th-century travelling Chinese scholar Xuanzang informs us that Dignaga, a celebrated Buddhist philosopher and controversialist, author of well-known books on logic, lived at Ajanta in the 5th century. In its prime the settlement would have accommodated several hundred teachers and pupils. Many monks who had finished their first training may have returned to Ajanta during the monsoon season from an itinerant lifestyle.

 

The caves are generally agreed to have been made in two distinct periods, separated by several centuries.

 

CAVES OF THE FIRST (SATAVAHANA) PERIOD

The earliest group of caves consists of caves 9, 10, 12, 13 and 15A. According to Walter Spink, they were made during the period 100 BCE to 100 CE, probably under the patronage of the Satavahana dynasty (230 BCE – c. 220 CE) who ruled the region. Other datings prefer the period 300 BCE to 100 BCE, though the grouping of the earlier caves is generally agreed. More early caves may have vanished through later excavations. Of these, caves 9 and 10 are stupa halls of chaitya-griha form, and caves 12, 13, and 15A are vihāras (see the architecture section below for descriptions of these types). The first phase is still often called the Hinayāna phase, as it originated when, using traditional terminology, the Hinayāna or Lesser Vehicle tradition of Buddhism was dominant, when the Buddha was revered symbolically. However the use of the term Hinayana for this period of Buddhism is now deprecated by historians; equally the caves of the second period are now mostly dated too early to be properly called Mahayana, and do not yet show the full expanded cast of supernatural beings characteristic of that phase of Buddhist art. The first Satavahana period caves lacked figurative sculpture, emphasizing the stupa instead, and in the caves of the second period the overwhelming majority of images represent the Buddha alone, or narrative scenes of his lives.

 

Spink believes that some time after the Satavahana period caves were made the site was abandoned for a considerable period until the mid-5th century, probably because the region had turned mainly Hindu

 

CAVES OF THE LATER OR VAKATAKA PERIOD

The second phase began in the 5th century. For a long time it was thought that the later caves were made over a long period from the 4th to the 7th centuries CE, but in recent decades a series of studies by the leading expert on the caves, Walter M. Spink, have argued that most of the work took place over the very brief period from 460 to 480 CE, during the reign of Emperor Harishena of the Vakataka dynasty. This view has been criticized by some scholars, but is now broadly accepted by most authors of general books on Indian art, for example Huntington and Harle.

 

The second phase is still often called the Mahāyāna or Greater Vehicle phase, but scholars now tend to avoid this nomenclature because of the problems that have surfaced regarding our understanding of Mahāyāna.

 

Some 20 cave temples were simultaneously created, for the most part viharas with a sanctuary at the back. The most elaborate caves were produced in this period, which included some "modernization" of earlier caves. Spink claims that it is possible to establish dating for this period with a very high level of precision; a fuller account of his chronology is given below. Although debate continues, Spink's ideas are increasingly widely accepted, at least in their broad conclusions. The Archaeological Survey of India website still presents the traditional dating: "The second phase of paintings started around 5th – 6th centuries A.D. and continued for the next two centuries". Caves of the second period are 1–8, 11, 14–29, some possibly extensions of earlier caves. Caves 19, 26, and 29 are chaitya-grihas, the rest viharas.

 

According to Spink, the Ajanta Caves appear to have been abandoned by wealthy patrons shortly after the fall of Harishena, in about 480 CE. They were then gradually abandoned and forgotten. During the intervening centuries, the jungle grew back and the caves were hidden, unvisited and undisturbed, although the local population were aware of at least some of them.

 

REDISCOVERY

On 28 April 1819, a British officer for the Madras Presidency, John Smith, of the 28th Cavalry, while hunting tiger, accidentally discovered the entrance to Cave No. 10 deep within the tangled undergrowth. There were local people already using the caves for prayers with a small fire, when he arrived. Exploring that first cave, long since a home to nothing more than birds and bats and a lair for other larger animals, Captain Smith vandalized the wall by scratching his name and the date, April 1819. Since he stood on a five-foot high pile of rubble collected over the years, the inscription is well above the eye-level gaze of an adult today. A paper on the caves by William Erskine was read to the Bombay Literary Society in 1822. Within a few decades, the caves became famous for their exotic setting, impressive architecture, and above all their exceptional, all but unique paintings. A number of large projects to copy the paintings were made in the century after rediscovery, covered below. In 1848 the Royal Asiatic Society established the "Bombay Cave Temple Commission" to clear, tidy and record the most important rock-cut sites in the Bombay Presidency, with John Wilson, as president. In 1861 this became the nucleus of the new Archaeological Survey of India. Until the Nizam of Hyderabad built the modern path between the caves, among other efforts to make the site easy to visit, a trip to Ajanta was a considerable adventure, and contemporary accounts dwell with relish on the dangers from falls off narrow ledges, animals and the Bhil people, who were armed with bows and arrows and had a fearsome reputation.

 

Today, fairly easily combined with Ellora in a single trip, the caves are the most popular tourist destination in Mahrashtra, and are often crowded at holiday times, increasing the threat to the caves, especially the paintings. In 2012, the Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation announced plans to add to the ASI visitor centre at the entrance complete replicas of caves 1, 2, 16 & 17 to reduce crowding in the originals, and enable visitors to receive a better visual idea of the paintings, which are dimly-lit and hard to read in the caves. Figures for the year to March 2010 showed a total of 390,000 visitors to the site, divided into 362,000 domestic and 27,000 foreign. The trends over the previous few years show a considerable growth in domestic visitors, but a decline in foreign ones; the year to 2010 was the first in which foreign visitors to Ellora exceeded those to Ajanta.

 

PAINTINGS

Mural paintings survive from both the earlier and later groups of caves. Several fragments of murals preserved from the earlier caves (Caves 9 and 11) are effectively unique survivals of court-led painting in India from this period, and "show that by Sātavāhana times, if not earlier, the Indian painter had mastered an easy and fluent naturalistic style, dealing with large groups of people in a manner comparable to the reliefs of the Sāñcī toraņa crossbars".

 

Four of the later caves have large and relatively well-preserved mural paintings which "have come to represent Indian mural painting to the non-specialist", and fall into two stylistic groups, with the most famous in Caves 16 and 17, and apparently later paintings in Caves 1 and 2. The latter group were thought to be a century or more later than the others, but the revised chronology proposed by Spink would place them much closer to the earlier group, perhaps contemporary with it in a more progressive style, or one reflecting a team from a different region. The paintings are in "dry fresco", painted on top of a dry plaster surface rather than into wet plaster.

 

All the paintings appear to be the work of painters at least as used to decorating palaces as temples, and show a familiarity with and interest in details of the life of a wealthy court. We know from literary sources that painting was widely practised and appreciated in the courts of the Gupta period. Unlike much Indian painting, compositions are not laid out in horizontal compartments like a frieze, but show large scenes spreading in all directions from a single figure or group at the centre. The ceilings are also painted with sophisticated and elaborate decorative motifs, many derived from sculpture. The paintings in cave 1, which according to Spink was commissioned by Harisena himself, concentrate on those Jataka tales which show previous lives of the Buddha as a king, rather than as an animal or human commoner, and so show settings from contemporary palace life.

 

In general the later caves seem to have been painted on finished areas as excavating work continued elsewhere in the cave, as shown in caves 2 and 16 in particular. According to Spink's account of the chronology of the caves, the abandonment of work in 478 after a brief busy period accounts for the absence of painting in caves such as 4 and 17, the later being plastered in preparation for paintings that were never done.

 

COPIES

The paintings have deteriorated significantly since they were rediscovered, and a number of 19th-century copies and drawings are important for a complete understanding of the works. However, the earliest projects to copy the paintings were plagued by bad fortune. In 1846, Major Robert Gill, an Army officer from Madras presidency and a painter, was appointed by the Royal Asiatic Society to replicate the frescoes on the cave walls to exhibit these paintings in England. Gill worked on his painting at the site from 1844 to 1863 (though he continued to be based there until his death in 1875, writing books and photographing) and made 27 copies of large sections of murals, but all but four were destroyed in a fire at the Crystal Palace in London in 1866, where they were on display.

 

Another attempt was made in 1872 when the Bombay Presidency commissioned John Griffiths, then principal of the Bombay School of Art, to work with his students to make new copies, again for shipping to England. They worked on this for thirteen years and some 300 canvases were produced, many of which were displayed at the Imperial Institute on Exhibition Road in London, one of the forerunners of the Victoria and Albert Museum. But in 1885 another fire destroyed over a hundred paintings that were in storage. The V&A still has 166 paintings surviving from both sets, though none have been on permanent display since 1955. The largest are some 3 × 6 metres. A conservation project was undertaken on about half of them in 2006, also involving the University of Northumbria. Griffith and his students had unfortunately painted many of the paintings with "cheap varnish" in order to make them easier to see, which has added to the deterioration of the originals, as has, according to Spink and others, recent cleaning by the ASI.

 

A further set of copies were made between 1909 and 1911 by Christiana Herringham (Lady Herringham) and a group of students from the Calcutta School of Art that included the future Indian Modernist painter Nandalal Bose. The copies were published in full colour as the first publication of London's fledgling India Society. More than the earlier copies, these aimed to fill in holes and damage to recreate the original condition rather than record the state of the paintings as she was seeing them. According to one writer, unlike the paintings created by her predecessors Griffiths and Gill, whose copies were influenced by British Victorian styles of painting, those of the Herringham expedition preferred an 'Indian Renascence' aesthetic of the type pioneered by Abanindranath Tagore.

 

Early photographic surveys were made by Robert Gill, who learnt to use a camera from about 1856, and whose photos, including some using stereoscopy, were used in books by him and Fergusson (many are available online from the British Library), then Victor Goloubew in 1911 and E.L. Vassey, who took the photos in the four volume study of the caves by Ghulam Yazdani (published 1930–1955).

 

ARCHITECTURE

The monasteries mostly consist of vihara halls for prayer and living, which are typically rectangular with small square dormitory cells cut into the walls, and by the second period a shrine or sanctuary at the rear centred on a large statue of the Buddha, also carved from the living rock. This change reflects the movement from Hinayana to Mahāyāna Buddhism. The other type of main hall is the narrower and higher chaitya hall with a stupa as the focus at the far end, and a narrow aisle around the walls, behind a range of pillars placed close together. Other plainer rooms were for sleeping and other activities. Some of the caves have elaborate carved entrances, some with large windows over the door to admit light. There is often a colonnaded porch or verandah, with another space inside the doors running the width of the cave.

 

The central square space of the interior of the viharas is defined by square columns forming a more or less square open area. Outside this are long rectangular aisles on each side, forming a kind of cloister. Along the side and rear walls are a number of small cells entered by a narrow doorway; these are roughly square, and have small niches on their back walls. Originally they had wooden doors. The centre of the rear wall has a larger shrine-room behind, containing a large Buddha statue. The viharas of the earlier period are much simpler, and lack shrines. Spink in fact places the change to a design with a shrine to the middle of the second period, with many caves being adapted to add a shrine in mid-excavation, or after the original phase.

 

The plan of Cave 1 shows one of the largest viharas, but is fairly typical of the later group. Many others, such as Cave 16, lack the vestibule to the shrine, which leads straight off the main hall. Cave 6 is two viharas, one above the other, connected by internal stairs, with sanctuaries on both levels.

 

The four completed chaitya halls are caves 9 and 10 from the early period, and caves 19 and 26 from the later period of construction. All follow the typical form found elsewhere, with high ceilings and a central "nave" leading to the stupa, which is near the back, but allows walking behind it, as walking around stupas was (and remains) a common element of Buddhist worship (pradakshina). The later two have high ribbed roofs, which reflect timber forms, and the earlier two are thought to have used actual timber ribs, which have now perished. The two later halls have a rather unusual arrangement (also found in Cave 10 at Ellora) where the stupa is fronted by a large relief sculpture of the Buddha, standing in Cave 19 and seated in Cave 26. Cave 29 is a late and very incomplete chaitya hall.

 

The form of columns in the work of the first period is very plain and un-embellished, with both chaitya halls using simple octagonal columns, which were painted with figures. In the second period columns were far more varied and inventive, often changing profile over their height, and with elaborate carved capitals, often spreading wide. Many columns are carved over all their surface, some fluted and others carved with decoration all over, as in cave 1.

 

The flood basalt rock of the cliff, part of the Deccan Traps formed by successive volcanic eruptions at the end of the Cretaceous, is layered horizontally, and somewhat variable in quality, so the excavators had to amend their plans in places, and in places there have been collapses in the intervening centuries, as with the lost portico to cave 1. Excavation began by cutting a narrow tunnel at roof level, which was expanded downwards and outwards; the half-built vihara cave 24 shows the method. Spink believes that for the first caves of the second period the excavators had to relearn skills and techniques that had been lost in the centuries since the first period, which were then transmitted to be used at later rock-cut sites in the region, such as Ellora, and the Elephanta, Bagh, Badami and Aurangabad Caves.

 

The caves from the first period seem to have been paid for by a number of different patrons, with several inscriptions recording the donation of particular portions of a single cave, but according to Spink the later caves were each commissioned as a complete unit by a single patron from the local rulers or their court elites. After the death of Harisena smaller donors got their chance to add small "shrinelets" between the caves or add statues to existing caves, and some two hundred of these "intrusive" additions were made in sculpture, with a further number of intrusive paintings, up to three hundred in cave 10 alone.

 

A grand gateway to the site, at the apex of the gorge's horsehoe between caves 15 and 16, was approached from the river, and is decorated with elephants on either side and a nāga, or protective snake deity.

 

ICONOGRAPHY OF THE CAVES

In the pre-Christian era, the Buddha was represented symbolically, in the form of the stupa. Thus, halls were made with stupas to venerate the Buddha. In later periods the images of the Buddha started to be made in coins, relic caskets, relief or loose sculptural forms, etc. However, it took a while for the human representation of the Buddha to appear in Buddhist art. One of the earliest evidences of the Buddha's human representations are found at Buddhist archaeological sites, such as Goli, Nagarjunakonda, and Amaravati. The monasteries of those sites were built in less durable media, such as wood, brick, and stone. As far as the genre of rock-cut architecture is concerned it took many centuries for the Buddha image to be depicted. Nobody knows for sure at which rock-cut cave site the first image of the Buddha was depicted. Current research indicates that Buddha images in a portable form, made of wood or stone, were introduced, for the first time, at Kanheri, to be followed soon at Ajanta Cave 8 (Dhavalikar, Jadhav, Spink, Singh). While the Kanheri example dates to 4th or 5th century CE, the Ajanta example has been dated to c. 462–478 CE (Spink). None of the rock-cut monasteries prior to these dates, and other than these examples, show any Buddha image although hundreds of rock-cut caves were made throughout India during the first few centuries CE. And, in those caves, it is the stupa that is the object of veneration, not the image. Images of the Buddha are not found in Buddhist sailagrhas (rock-cut complexes) until the times of the Kanheri (4th–5th century CE) and Ajanta examples (c. 462–478 CE).

 

The caves of the second period, now all dated to the 5th century, were typically described as "Mahayana", but do not show the features associated with later Mahayana Buddhism. Although the beginnings of Mahāyāna teachings go back to the 1st century there is little art and archaeological evidence to suggest that it became a mainstream cult for several centuries. In Mahayana it is not Gautama Buddha but the Bodhisattva who is important, including "deity" Bodhisattva like Manjushri and Tara, as well as aspects of the Buddha such as Aksobhya, and Amitabha. Except for a few Bodhisattva, these are not depicted at Ajanta, where the Buddha remains the dominant figure. Even the Bodhisattva images of Ajanta are never central objects of worship, but are always shown as attendants of the Buddha in the shrine. If a Bodhisattva is shown in isolation, as in the Astabhaya scenes, these were done in the very last years of activities at Ajanta, and are mostly 'intrusive' in nature, meaning that they were not planned by the original patrons, and were added by new donors after the original patrons had suddenly abandoned the region in the wake of Emperor Harisena's death.

 

The contrast between iconic and aniconic representations, that is, the stupa on one hand and the image of the Buddha on the other, is now being seen as a construct of the modern scholar rather than a reality of the past. The second phase of Ajanta shows that the stupa and image coincided together. If the entire corpus of the art of Ajanta including sculpture, iconography, architecture, epigraphy, and painting are analysed afresh it will become clear that there was no duality between the symbolic and human forms of the Buddha, as far as the 5th-century phase of Ajanta is concerned. That is why most current scholars tend to avoid the terms 'Hinayana' and 'Mahayana' in the context of Ajanta. They now prefer to call the second phase by the ruling dynasty, as the Vākāţaka phase.

 

CAVES

CAVE 1

Cave 1 was built on the eastern end of the horse-shoe shaped scarp, and is now the first cave the visitor encounters. This would when first made have been a less prominent position, right at the end of the row. According to Spink, it is one of the latest caves to have been excavated, when the best sites had been taken, and was never fully inaugurated for worship by the dedication of the Buddha image in the central shrine. This is shown by the absence of sooty deposits from butter lamps on the base of the shrine image, and the lack of damage to the paintings that would have been happened if the garland-hooks around the shrine had been in use for any period of time. Although there is no epigraphic evidence, Spink believes that the Vākāţaka Emperor Harishena was the benefactor of the work, and this is reflected in the emphasis on imagery of royalty in the cave, with those Jakata tales being selected that tell of those previous lives of the Buddha in which he was royal.

 

The cliff has a more steep slope here than at other caves, so to achieve a tall grand facade it was necessary to cut far back into the slope, giving a large courtyard in front of the facade. There was originally a columned portico in front of the present facade, which can be seen "half-intact in the 1880s" in pictures of the site, but this fell down completely and the remains, despite containing fine carving, were carelessly thrown down the slope into the river, from where they have been lost, presumably carried away in monsoon torrents.

 

This cave has one of the most elaborate carved façades, with relief sculptures on entablature and ridges, and most surfaces embellished with decorative carving. There are scenes carved from the life of the Buddha as well as a number of decorative motifs. A two pillared portico, visible in the 19th-century photographs, has since perished. The cave has a front-court with cells fronted by pillared vestibules on either side. These have a high plinth level. The cave has a porch with simple cells on both ends. The absence of pillared vestibules on the ends suggest that the porch was not excavated in the latest phase of Ajanta when pillared vestibules had become a necessity and norm. Most areas of the porch were once covered with murals, of which many fragments remain, especially on the ceiling. There are three doorways: a central doorway and two side doorways. Two square windows were carved between the doorways to brighten the interiors.

 

Each wall of the hall inside is nearly 12 m long and 6.1 m high. Twelve pillars make a square colonnade inside supporting the ceiling, and creating spacious aisles along the walls. There is a shrine carved on the rear wall to house an impressive seated image of the Buddha, his hands being in the dharmachakrapravartana mudra. There are four cells on each of the left, rear, and the right walls, though due to rock fault there are none at the ends of the rear aisle. The walls are covered with paintings in a fair state of preservation, though the full scheme was never completed. The scenes depicted are mostly didactic, devotional, and ornamental, with scenes from the Jataka stories of the Buddha's former existences as a bodhisattva), the life of the Gautama Buddha, and those of his veneration. The two most famous individual painted images at Ajanta are the two over-life size figures of the protective bodhisattvas Padmapani and Vajrapani on either side of the entrance to the Buddha shrine on the wall of the rear aisle (see illustrations above). According to Spink, the original dating of the paintings to about 625 arose largely or entirely because James Fegusson, a 19th-century architectural historian, had decided that a scene showing an ambassador being received, with figures in Persian dress, represented a recorded embassy to Persia (from a Hindu monarch at that) around that date.

 

CAVE 2

Cave 2, adjacent to Cave 1, is known for the paintings that have been preserved on its walls, ceilings, and pillars. It looks similar to Cave 1 and is in a better state of preservation.

 

Cave 2 has a porch quite different from Cave one. Even the façade carvings seem to be different. The cave is supported by robust pillars, ornamented with designs. The front porch consists of cells supported by pillared vestibules on both ends. The cells on the previously "wasted areas" were needed to meet the greater housing requirements in later years. Porch-end cells became a trend in all later Vakataka excavations. The simple single cells on porch-ends were converted into CPVs or were planned to provide more room, symmetry, and beauty.

 

The paintings on the ceilings and walls of this porch have been widely published. They depict the Jataka tales that are stories of the Buddha's life in former existences as Bodhisattva. Just as the stories illustrated in cave 1 emphasize kingship, those in cave 2 show many "noble and powerful" women in prominent roles, leading to suggestions that the patron was an unknown woman. The porch's rear wall has a doorway in the center, which allows entrance to the hall. On either side of the door is a square-shaped window to brighten the interior.

 

The hall has four colonnades which are supporting the ceiling and surrounding a square in the center of the hall. Each arm or colonnade of the square is parallel to the respective walls of the hall, making an aisle in between. The colonnades have rock-beams above and below them. The capitals are carved and painted with various decorative themes that include ornamental, human, animal, vegetative, and semi-divine forms.

 

Paintings appear on almost every surface of the cave except for the floor. At various places the art work has become eroded due to decay and human interference. Therefore, many areas of the painted walls, ceilings, and pillars are fragmentary. The painted narratives of the Jataka tales are depicted only on the walls, which demanded the special attention of the devotee. They are didactic in nature, meant to inform the community about the Buddha's teachings and life through successive rebirths. Their placement on the walls required the devotee to walk through the aisles and 'read' the narratives depicted in various episodes. The narrative episodes are depicted one after another although not in a linear order. Their identification has been a core area of research since the site's rediscovery in 1819. Dieter Schlingloff's identifications have updated our knowledge on the subject.

 

CAVE 4

The Archeological Survey of India board outside the caves gives the following detail about cave 4: "This is the largest monastery planned on a grandiose scale but was never finished. An inscription on the pedestal of the buddha's image mentions that it was a gift from a person named Mathura and paleographically belongs to 6th century A.D. It consists of a verandah, a hypostylar hall, sanctum with an antechamber and a series of unfinished cells. The rear wall of the verandah contains the panel of Litany of Avalokiteśvara".

 

The sanctuary houses a colossal image of the Buddha in preaching pose flanked by bodhisattvas and celestial nymphs hovering above.

 

CAVES 9-10

Caves 9 and 10 are the two chaitya halls from the first period of construction, though both were also undergoing an uncompleted reworking at the end of the second period. Cave 10 was perhaps originally of the 1st century BCE, and cave 9 about a hundred years later. The small "shrinelets" called caves 9A to 9D and 10A also date from the second period, and were commissioned by individuals.

 

The paintings in cave 10 include some surviving from the early period, many from an incomplete programme of modernization in the second period, and a very large number of smaller late intrusive images, nearly all Buddhas and many with donor inscriptions from individuals. These mostly avoided over-painting the "official" programme and after the best positions were used up are tucked away in less prominent positions not yet painted; the total of these (including those now lost) was probably over 300, and the hands of many different artists are visible.

 

OTHER CAVES

Cave 3 is merely a start of an excavation; according to Spink it was begun right at the end of the final period of work and soon abandoned. Caves 5 and 6 are viharas, the latter on two floors, that were late works of which only the lower floor of cave 6 was ever finished. The upper floor of cave 6 has many private votive sculptures, and a shrine Buddha, but is otherwise unfinished. Cave 7 has a grand facade with two porticos but, perhaps because of faults in the rock, which posed problems in many caves, was never taken very deep into the cliff, and consists only of the two porticos and a shrine room with antechamber, with no central hall. Some cells were fitted in.

 

Cave 8 was long thought to date to the first period of construction, but Spink sees it as perhaps the earliest cave from the second period, its shrine an "afterthought". The statue may have been loose rather than carved from the living rock, as it has now vanished. The cave was painted, but only traces remain.

 

SPINK´S DETAILED CHRONOLOGY

Walter M. Spink has over recent decades developed a very precise and circumstantial chronology for the second period of work on the site, which unlike earlier scholars, he places entirely in the 5th century. This is based on evidence such as the inscriptions and artistic style, combined with the many uncompleted elements of the caves. He believes the earlier group of caves, which like other scholars he dates only approximately, to the period "between 100 BCE – 100 CE", were at some later point completely abandoned and remained so "for over three centuries", as the local population had turned mainly Hindu. This changed with the accession of the Emperor Harishena of the Vakataka Dynasty, who reigned from 460 to his death in 477. Harisena extended the Central Indian Vakataka Empire to include a stretch of the east coast of India; the Gupta Empire ruled northern India at the same period, and the Pallava dynasty much of the south.

 

According to Spink, Harisena encouraged a group of associates, including his prime minister Varahadeva and Upendragupta, the sub-king in whose territory Ajanta was, to dig out new caves, which were individually commissioned, some containing inscriptions recording the donation. This activity began in 462 but was mostly suspended in 468 because of threats from the neighbouring Asmaka kings. Work continued on only caves 1, Harisena's own commission, and 17–20, commissioned by Upendragupta. In 472 the situation was such that work was suspended completely, in a period that Spink calls "the Hiatus", which lasted until about 475, by which time the Asmakas had replaced Upendragupta as the local rulers.

 

Work was then resumed, but again disrupted by Harisena's death in 477, soon after which major excavation ceased, except at cave 26, which the Asmakas were sponsoring themselves. The Asmakas launched a revolt against Harisena's son, which brought about the end of the Vakataka Dynasty. In the years 478–480 major excavation by important patrons was replaced by a rash of "intrusions" – statues added to existing caves, and small shrines dotted about where there was space between them. These were commissioned by less powerful individuals, some monks, who had not previously been able to make additions to the large excavations of the rulers and courtiers. They were added to the facades, the return sides of the entrances, and to walls inside the caves. According to Spink, "After 480, not a single image was ever made again at the site", and as Hinduism again dominated the region, the site was again abandoned, this time for over a millennium.

 

Spink does not use "circa" in his dates, but says that "one should allow a margin of error of one year or perhaps even two in all cases".

 

IMPACT ON MODERN INDIAN PAINTINGS

The Ajanta paintings, or more likely the general style they come from, influenced painting in Tibet and Sri Lanka.

 

The rediscovery of ancient Indian paintings at Ajanta provided Indian artists examples from ancient India to follow. Nandlal Bose experimented with techniques to follow the ancient style which allowed him to develop his unique style. Abanindranath Tagore also used the Ajanta paintings for inspiration.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Companies deciding where to locate their manufacturing activities, or whether to source their products in the United States or from overseas, should carefully consider the total costs of shipping. Shipping costs include both the direct and indirect costs of transporting products from their point of origin to their destination market. Expected gains from offshoring can often be erased by long shipping times, rising or fluctuating shipping costs, regulatory fees, and unexpected delays.

 

Shipping costs occur in both directions. They are a cost to U.S. firms that import, and they also are a cost to firms that purchase exported U.S. products. As this website emphasizes, firms worldwide must take into account numerous costs, including and in addition to shipping, when assessing where to produce or make their purchases. The resurgence in U.S. exports over the past several years provides strong evidence that many foreign customers recognize the value of products with the "Made in the U.S.A." label.

 

Freight Costs and Shipping Time

Most goods imported into the United States travel by land or sea – less than one percent of the total imports by weight arrive by air. This is due in large part to the substantial cost of air freight, which the World Bank estimates is 12 to 16 times more expensive than ocean freight. Whatever the mode of transportation shipping involves multiple costs, including container fees, packaging, terminal handling, and broker fees. In order to get a complete picture of shipping costs, each of these factors should be taken into account.

 

In addition to financial costs, shipping goods internationally takes time. For example, goods shipped from China, on average, take around 14 days to reach the West Coast or 30 days to reach the East Coast. If there are any problems with the final goods delivered to the United States, or if a fast resupply becomes necessary, it can be difficult or impossible to receive a new shipment in time.

 

In order to save on fuel costs, many ocean shipping lines use slow steaming on many of their routes. Pioneered by Maersk Line, slow steaming involves ships sailing at low speeds to reduce the amount of fuel consumed. This reduces costs for the shipping companies, but it increases the amount of time it takes to move goods from one place to another.

 

Slow steaming has quickly become the preferred method used by ocean shipping lines, both for economic and environmental reasons. A recent study published in the Journal of Maritime Economics and Logistics estimates that “extra slow steaming” is the most beneficial vessel speed, reducing costs for the transport company by 20 percent (which can pass those savings on to the manufacturers whose goods they carry) and reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 43 percent. However, extra slow steaming reduces speed by 25 to 40 percent from normal speeds. Slow steaming adds as many as ten extra days in shipping from China to the United States. While reduced shipping costs might be attractive, they come with a price—even longer shipping times.

 

Long shipping times also play a role in product returns. Any items that must be returned to the factory or point of origin must again travel the two to four weeks required to get there or be shipped by air, which is considerably more expensive than shipping by sea. If a customer requires a new or replacement item right away, this will almost always require costly air freight.

 

Infrastructure

Before being loaded on a freighter or airplane, goods must be secured in shipping boxes and traveled from the factory to the port. The overall quality of the foreign transportation infrastructure, which includes roads, railroads, ports, and air transportation networks, varies across countries and has a direct bearing on the total time and cost of shipping. To help gauge the relative differences in individual countries' infrastructure it is worthwhile to consult the World Economic Forum's latest Global Competitiveness Report. The report provides data on 144 countries.

Fort Totten Historic District, Fort Totten, Bayside, Queens

 

Building 207 is a two-and-one-half story rectangular residence, faced in red brick laid in stretcher bond above a rusticated foundation of schist. The building has a gabled roof covered with asphalt shingles. The horizontal and raking cornices at the edge of the roof are enriched with corbels and dentils.

 

On the front roof slope two wide gabled dormers are faced with slate shingles, have Palladianesque window surrounds, and are framed with wood pilasters carrying raking denticulated cornices. A two-story wood porch extends across the entire front facade. Two sets of wooden stairs approach the porch. At both levels, Tuscan columns are linked by wood balustrades. The second-story columns support a shallow hipped roof. The porch base is supported on concrete piers with wooden screens between them.

 

The two entrances to the residence have paired paneled wood doors below transoms. Similar entrances are located at the second story. All of the first and second-story window openings have splayed brick lintels with keystones. The windows have stone sills and contain two-over-two wood sash. Paired arched windows with keystones and stone sills are placed at attic level in the gable ends.

 

Building 207 was constructed in 1905 as Enlisted Personnel (lower-ranking non-commissioned officers) Quarters, part of a campaign to meet the housing needs of the rapidly growing fort and the newly installed Coast Artillery. Erected for the Office of the Quartermaster General, the building displays the forms and details of the popular Colonial Revival style. Under construction at the same time as the adjacent Post Headquarters, Building 207 replaced a frame building, the assistant engineer's office, constructed between 1866 and 1871 during the first development phase of the Fort at Willets Point. It remained in use as housing for enlisted officers until the late 1960s.

 

Historic District description

 

Fort Totten occupies a 136-acre site in northeast Queens, north of Bayside, on a peninsula jutting into the Long Island Sound. The Fort Totten Historic District, incorporating much of the peninsula, includes over 100 buildings and smaller secondary structures built between the 1830s and the 1960s.1 The fort, originally called the Fort at Willets Point, was established in 1857 as a major component in the defense system of New York Harbor. Its surviving, although uncompleted, fortification displays the features of the last phase of the Third System of coastal fortification, an important period of American military construction. The fort's surviving structures from various phases of construction vividly depict the changing role of military technology and defense strategy between the Civil War and World War II. The major period of improvement and expansion for the fort occurred in 1885-1914, resulting in much of the historic character that exists today.

 

In addition to upgrading the fortifications and batteries, installing torpedo buildings, and reconfiguring the parade grounds, the Army built about 80 structures, many of them to house the soldiers and officers who were stationed there. In 1898, the Fort at Willets Point was renamed in honor of Maj. Gen. Joseph G. Totten (1788-1864), who had been a major force in developing the Third System, and it was characterized as one of the most essential posts on the East Coast. The buildings and grounds, represent Fort Totten as a major military post and as one of the most intact, self-contained army posts in New York City.

 

Fort Totten is a tangible reminder of New York City's once-powerful harbor defense system which ranged from the inner harbor adjacent to Manhattan Island to the Narrows and Long Island Sound. Since the sixteenth century, New York Harbor has been recognized for its strategic importance, and as the city grew to prominence, its defense became increasingly important to New York and the nation. Fort Totten (the Fort at Willets Point) was planned as the counterpoint to Fort Schuyler on Throgs Neck (The Bronx), begun 1833, to guard the Long Island Sound entrance to New York Harbor. Although the Third System fort, begun in 1862 during the Civil War, was never completed because of advances in weaponry during that conflict, the army post retained its importance as the site of advanced training for Army Engineers and of research in military technology and military medicine.

 

It also housed several major military commands, including the Eastern Artillery District, New York, and the Coast Defense of Eastern New York and the North Atlantic District, through much of the twentieth century.

 

In 1968, Fort Totten became the home of the 77th United States Regional Support Command for the Army Reserve, and the United States Coast Guard took over a portion of the facility in 1969. The United States Department of Labor established a Job Corps Training Center on a portion of the site in 1971.2 Both the Army and the Coast Guard retain some facilities at Fort Totten; however, much of the fort is to be turned over the the City of New York and will be operated under the jurisdiction of the Fire Department, the Parks Department, and the Historic House Trust.

 

Notable structures have survived from four major periods of construction on Willets Point. These periods correspond to changing roles of military technology and defense strategy at Fort Totten, and the surviving physical structures of each period give tangible evidence of those roles and exert a strong historical presence.

 

These periods of construction are described briefly below and in greater detail in the History section following. The fort's open space, which reflects the topography of the peninsula, evolved as part of these campaigns. A description of the open space and landscape features concludes this section on Physical and Architectural Development.

 

Period of Local Settlement. 1639-1857

 

Although the Dutch had taken over the peninsula from the Matinecock Indians in 1639, no pre-nineteenth-century structures survive at Fort Totten. The Willets family constructed a Greek Revival double house,3 now known as Building 211, after Charles Willets purchased the peninsula, then known as Wilkins Point, in 1829 and changed the name to Willets Point. This house, the earliest surviving structure on the fort and the only one that predates the fort's establishment, was described in 1868 as "a large double house, which had been built on that portion of the point facing the river and commanding a view of Long Island Sound, for occupation as a summer residence."4 At that time, the house had been moved to its present location on Murray Avenue and remodeled as a Gothic Revival villa to serve as the living quarters for the commanding officer of the fort, Major Henry L. Abbot.

 

The Fort at Willets Point: Third System. Civil War, and Reconstruction Periods (1857-1885)

 

Construction of the original Third System battery (now called the Stone Fort or Building 518) began in 1862 at the north end of the peninsula under the direction of Col. William Petit Trowbridge. It was planned as a V-shaped structure with a polygonal bastion at the vertex of the ramparts with four tiers of casemates, but construction halted in 1864 when advances in Civil War weaponry made the plan obsolete. The two tiers of vaulted casemates that were built are of brick, faced with heavy granite blocks, and they command an impressive view of Long Island Sound and Fort Schuyler on Throgs Neck. The Quartermaster's Wharf (Building 605) was built in 1864, extending 460 feet into Little Bay with all necessary facilities for unloading vessels. Portions of this pier structure survive.5

 

Although the battery was obsolete as planned, the Army Engineers enhanced the defensive capability of the Fort at Willets Point in several phases ~ 1868, 1872, and 1883; the main magazine was constructed of concrete and masonry with walls from 17 to 36 inches thick for the storage of gun powder in the hillside behind the battery in several phases — 1868, 1872, and 1883. A barrel-vaulted vehicular access tunnel of concrete was built through the hillside in 1870, linking the batteiy with the rest of the post. Adjacent to the magazine and tunnel are vaulted masonry and concrete casemates, built into the south slope of the hill, for storing torpedo mines. Building 129, constructed sometime between 1871 and 1879 as a fireproof torpedo storehouse, is the oldest brick building at the post and the only surviving structure from the Army Engineers' initial period of research into torpedo technology and development of torpedo defense.

 

The Queen Anne style and domestic appearance of Building 317, constructed in 1882-83, belies its initial use as a photographic laboratory; it is one of the oldest surviving frame buildings at Fort Totten and is the earliest surviving frame building constructed specifically for the purposes of this Army post, namely one of the technical and research functions carried out by the Army Engineers.

 

Endicott Board and Taft Board Period. 1885-1914

 

The major period of improvement and expansion at the fort occurred in 1885-1914, resulting in much of the historic character that survives today. This work was in part the outcome of recommendations for improved harbor defense for the New York area (in addition to other strategic locations in the United States) from two Congressionally-authorized boards of experts, the Endicott Board, issued in 1886, and the Taft Board, issued in 1906, as well as a locations of these two structures has not been determined; they were demolished prior to 1890. See Trieschmann and Gettings, vol. 1, 37.

 

While the fortifications were upgraded by the Army Corps of Engineers, other improvements to the fort were undertaken by the Office of the Quartermaster General. Some 80 structures were built during this period, including housing for the soldiers and officers who were stationed there.6 Many of these replaced earlier wood-frame structures. The first major building from this period is Building 208, a castellated Gothic Revival style wood frame structure built as the Officers Mess and Officers Club in 1887, facing the parade ground at the west. Now a designated New York City Landmark, it is leased to the Bayside Historical Society. Brick barracks with Colonial Revival details, Buildings 322, 323, and 325, were built at the south end of the parade ground between 1892 and 1894. (These three barracks were enlarged in 1904.)

 

Building 405, a slightly later barracks dating from 1900 but similar in design to the earlier ones, was built north of the parade ground. Building 331, a brick and frame fire engine house, was erected in 1892 near the new barracks. A new bungalow style guardhouse, Building 103, was constructed in 1892, just inside the grand Romanesque Revival style entrance gates that had been installed in 1889. Building 637, the brick Engineers' Museum, was built in 1890-98 with Romanesque Revival detail, facing what is now Totten Avenue. Building 333 was constructed in 1897-98 near the barracks as the post mess hall for non-commissioned officers and enlisted personnel. Building 222, built sometime between 1890 and 1898 as offices and a storehouse for the commissary, is located southwest of the intersection of Murray Avenue and Sgt. Beers Avenue.

 

The Quartermaster's storehouse (Building 107), built in 1897, is located near the guardhouse, while another commissary storehouse, Building 601, dating from 1896-97, is on the shore of Little Bay. The bakery, Building 309, was built that same year, and is close to the barracks. Building 502, built in 1900 as an ordnance shop strategically situated near the batteries (and later an artillery repair shop), is now the Fort Totten Historical Center. All of these non-domestic structures have a sturdy utilitarian character enhanced by Romanesque Revival detail.

 

A major building campaign beginning in 1905 brought many significant structures to the area adjacent to the parade ground as part of the campaign to improve and enhance the facilities at Fort Totten. This coincided with a change in the fort's mission after the Army Engineers were withdrawn and the Coast Artillery installed. All of the buildings constructed during this campaign are brick structures, designed in variants of the Colonial Revival style but with a common vocabulary of details that echo the details used on the somewhat earlier barracks structures and reinforce the architectural cohesion of the fort. Virtually all were constructed according to standardized plans from the Office of the Quartermaster General. Building 206, the Post Headquarters, displays the characteristics of high style Colonial Revival architecture with neo-Georgian details.

 

The use of such elaborate detail can be seen to convey the importance of the headquarters as the command post of the Fort Totten military installation, by then the home of the Coast Artillery. Housing for commissioned officers was built in single-family and twin-dwelling units in the area north and west of the parade ground, forming an enclave known as Officers' Row. This group includes Buildings 203, 400, 401, 402, 409, 411, 413, 415, 418, and 420. Field officers (with the rank of major or colonel) occupied the single-family dwellings, while lieutenants and captains occupied with twin dwellings.7 Twin-dwelling units for noncommissioned officers were built off Shore Road, south of the parade ground (Buildings 306, 308, 309, 310, 312, and 314 (the last remodelled in the 1930s)). Building 207, a multi-unit dwelling to house enlisted officers, was constructed west of the parade ground between the post headquarters and the officers' mess.

 

The last major barracks structure, Building 330, which is similar in architectural character and detail to the earlier barracks, was built in 1907-08 southeast of the parade ground. A new imposing neo-Georgian Commanding Officer's Quarters, Building 422, was constructed among the other houses of Officers Row in 1909.

 

The Colonial Revival style Hospital, Building 304, built in 1906 and enlarged in 1911-12, is located east of the parade ground along Shore Road facing Little Neck Bay. While the hospital is much larger in size, its details are similar to those of the contemporary houses as well as the earlier brick barracks. The somewhat more architecturally elaborate annex, Building 326, dates from 1914. During this period the mission of the fort was expanded to include research into and development of medical equipment and care for military personnel. Building 305, a modest Colonial Revival style dwelling, was built in 1907 to house the hospital steward. Building 319, the gymnasium, was built in 1905 south of the parade ground. Colonial Revival in form and detail, it complements the nearby residential structures.

 

The more utilitarian buildings constructed prior to 1914 are situated on the periphery of the fort. Building 128, built in 1907-08 as a stable, is located southwest of the noncommissioned officers' housing; Building 604, Building 607, and Building 614 are storage facilities situated close to Little Bay. Building 105 was constructed in 1910 as the permanent electric sub-station for Fort Totten, which connected the army base with the municipal power supply at Bayside, Queens.

 

The Period between World War I and World War II. 1920-1940

 

While the 1920s saw little new construction at Fort Totten, a number of nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century utilitarian structures were converted for other uses.8 The YMCA, Building 318, a neo-Georgian style brick building, situated next to the gymnasium, was built in 1926-27. The YMCA had a presence at Fort Totten prior to the construction of this building.9

 

Another building campaign to improve housing facilities at Fort Totten (as well as many other Army posts) took place beginning in 1933. This resulted in the construction of several Colonial Revival twin dwellings; Buildings 316 and 634 are within the boundaries of the historic district. Building 314, a frame twin dwelling, was remodeled in the Colonial Revival style to be more compatible with other nearby houses. Two other major structures date from 1938-39. Building 332, the theater, was constructed south of the barracks area, east of the gymnasium and the YMCA. The chapel, Building 638, is situated north of the parade ground, between Officers' Row and the Post Headquarters. Both were built according to standardized plans that display characteristics of the Colonial Revival style.

 

Among the secondary structures constructed at Fort Totten in 1937-38 are the many one-story garages set behind the officers' housing and the small brick transformer structures throughout the grounds. Both are evidence of continuing technological change at the fort.

 

Open Space and Landscape Features

 

Fort Totten is located on a small ridge that forms a peninsula jutting into Long Island South that is protected by a stone sea wall. Historically the peninsula was known as Thome's Point, subsequently Wilkins Point, and then Willets Point, after the major owners prior to acquisition by the U.S. government. The portions of Long Island Sound surrounding the peninsula on three sides are more specifically identified as Little Bay, Little Neck Bay, and the Hast River Channel, while the land side was historically wetlands, much of which has been filled in. The ridge rises to the northeast to a high point of 68 feet above sea level, but it drops abruptly at the north end at the site of the granite fortifications and on the west facing Little Bay. The road system of Fort Totten generally follows the topographical terrain of the ridge, creating a series of circular drives that focus attention on the parade ground and allow for vistas overlooking Long Island Sound.

 

The rising slope at the intersection of Bay side Street and Totten Avenue, in front of Building 635, contains the simple granite grave marker of Charles A. Willets, the property owner who gave the point its name. The steep slope rising to the south of Totten Avenue remains open.

 

The major open space at Fort Totten is the parade ground, which had been established after the Civil War.10 It was originally oriented in a north-south direction and fronted by buildings with the post gardens behind at the north and south. As part of the major building campaign in the early twentieth century, the parade ground was reoriented from a north-south to an east-west direction. It is likely that the trees surrounding the periphery date from that period. The parade ground is bisected by a pedestrian path, and the eastern section is sometimes called the park. Many of the major buildings of the fort continue to front the parade ground on the north, south, and west. Current plans to expand the parade ground into parklands include the demolition of several of the 1959 houses northeast of the parade ground (Buildings 406-408, 423-431, 504-514).

 

Two sections of the parade ground have been identified as containing archeological deposits and recommended as eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. Section A at the southwest corner is bordered by Story Avenue and Murray Avenue and may contain intact structural remnants from the 1866-1885 period. Section B is at the northwest corner of the eastern section (the park) bordered by Weaver Avenue and the pedestrian path; it contains intact foundation remnants and the possible remains of a storehouse from the period of the 1860S-1910.11

 

Historic cast-iron lamp posts edge the roads throughout the fort. These presumably were installed after 1910 when the first permanent electric sub-station was constructed. The posts have fluted shafts set on molded bases with stylized acanthus caps surmounted by octagonal lanterns.

 

Additional open space is located near the north end of the fort on top of Battery King (Building 500), now a baseball field bounded by Abbott Road and North Loop Road.

 

HISTORY OF FORT TOTTEN

 

Local Settlement to Government Acquisition. 1639-1857

 

The peninsula occupied by Fort Totten was taken from the Matinecock Indians by the Dutch in 1639. William Kieft, Governor General of New Netherlands, transferred the land by patent to the Englishman William Thome, who had been forced to Long Island from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for assisting religious dissenters. The land became known as Thome's Point, and his farmstead was called "one of the most valuable and handsome" in the area.13 The property, some 152 acres, was held by the Thome family until 1788, when Ann Thome married William Wilkins and the peninsula became known as Wilkins Point. In 1829, Charles A. Willets (1781-1832), an area nurseryman, purchased the Wilkins farmland and changed the name of the peninsula to Willets Point. Possibly Willets hoped to sell the property to the Army, as the Army Board of Engineers had recommended fortifying various points in the New York Harbor, including Willets Point and Throgs Neck, in a report issued in 1821.

 

A property transfer did not take place, so Willets established a nursery and built a Greek Revival style house near the north end of the peninsula. This house, now known as Building 211, was subsequently moved and remodeled in the fashionable Gothic Revival style in 1867. Presumably other service buildings were constructed by either Wilkins or Willets, but none survive. Charles Willets died in 1832 and was buried on the property down the slope from the original site of the house. His simple granite grave marker survives near the intersection of Bayside Street and Totten Avenue. Willets's heirs sold the property in 1857 to George Irving, a New York broker and land speculator.

 

The Fort at Willets Point: Third System. Civil War, and Reconstruction Periods (1857-1885)

 

The defense of New York Harbor had been a matter of continuing interest to the United States government from the time of the Revolutionary War on. Initial efforts had focused on the inner harbor utilizing the First and Second Systems of fortifications; the result was the construction of Fort Jay (later Fort Columbus), Castle Williams and the South Battery on Governors Island, Castle Clinton at the southern tip of Manhattan, Fort Wood on Bedloe's (now Liberty Island), and Fort Gibson on what is now Ellis Island.16 Following the War of 1812, the Federal government established a board to create a permanent system of defenses and fortification, which came to be known as the Third System. Organized in 1816, the board was headed by Simon Bernard, a French military engineer, Capt. J.D. Elliott of the Navy, and Maj. William McKee and Lt. Col. Joseph G. Totten of the Army Engineers.

 

Totten proved to be the most influential figure in the advancement of the Third System, serving for 26 years as Chief Engineer of the Army Engineers. In this capacity he was responsible for the design of most of the forts built in the United States between the 1820s and the 1860s; the Third System is often called the Totten system, in recognition of his achievement. Third System forts are generally polygonal in plan with one or more arched tiers of casemates on the seaward fronts and roof tiers of barbette emplacements (platforms from which guns were fired over parapets) surmounting the exterior walls, which were built of brick or stone or both materials. Casemate emplacement and the size and shapes of the embrasures (gun openings) were a major focus of Totten's innovations.18 In addition to the Fort at Willets Point, two other forts were named after him, one in North Dakota and the other in North Carolina.

 

The Bernard Board was initially charged with dealing with seacoast defense "as an activity involving the efforts of several interrelated elements—a navy, fortifications, avenues of communication in the interior, and a regular army and well-organized militia."19 The Board's first report was submitted in February 1821 and listed 18 defensive works as a top priority, followed by 32 for future construction as lesser priorities. However, by 1850, the Board envisoned a major scheme of harbor defense for the United States, with nearly 200 separate works, from the East Coast, to the Gulf of Mexico, to the Pacific Coast. In fact, because of the limitations of cost and manpower, far fewer fortifications were actually constructed.

 

In New York, the system of harbor fortification gradually moved to the outer harbor. While the Narrows had been guarded initially by Fort Richmond and Fort Tompkins on the Staten Island side and Fort Lafayette on the Brooklyn side, these 1812 fortifications were replaced in 1847 and 1825 respectively by the present Fort Richmond and Fort Hamilton. Throgs Neck in the Bronx acquired Fort Schuyler, beginning in 1833, to guard the entrance from Long Island Sound. Finally, the last piece of New York harbor defense under the Third System was put into place with the acquisition of 110 acres of Willets Point from George Irving in 1857.

 

The price, $200,000, brought forth accusations of profiteering and an abortive congressional investigation. Even though Congress appropriated some $155,000 to have plans drawn for a fortification, reputedly by Robert E. Lee, the work was not carried out despite continued calls for improving New York Harbor defenses.

 

With the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, a temporary camp known as Camp Morgan was set up at Willets Point to train military recruits and to accommodate volunteer units, among them the 15th New York Volunteers (Engineer), the 2nd Marine Volunteers (Infantry), and the 9th Indiana Volunteers (Infantry). With fears that Confederate troops might attack New York Harbor from Long Island Sound, Congress appropriated $200,000 in 1862 for fortifications work at Willets Point. The land area of the fort was increased in 1863 with the purchase of an additional 26 acres. Work on the pentagonal casemated fortification had begun in 1862 at the north end of the peninsula. The Quartermaster's Wharf, jutting into Little Bay, was constructed at the same time to accommodate materials and supplies needed during construction.

 

The fortification called for four tiers of casemates on the water side and two tiers on the land side with foundations extending twelve feet below sea level and walls eight feet thick. Guns and cannon were to be mounted in the casemates. Even as construction was underway, the fortification was made obsolete by advances in military technology.22 The Rodman cannon could smash fort walls with heavy iron balls, while rifled guns and cannons could be fired with great accuracy over long ranges. Rifled projectiles could penetrate the masonry walls of fortifications and then explode inside. Only two tiers of casemates were completed at Fort Totten, and the work was subsequently abandoned.

 

The other major construction at the fort during the Civil War was the General Grant Hospital, completed in 1865 in the southern section of the site. Containing 1,410 beds in 37 wards, the hospital treated 5,283 soldiers in its one year of existence.23

 

Following the Civil War, three of the Army's four companies of Engineers were sent to the Fort at Willets Point because of existing storage facilities for the engineering materials remaining from the war. This was the first permanent garrison at the Fort where they were initially commanded by Gen. J.C. Duane and then, beginning in 1868, for some twenty years by Maj. Henry L. Abbot (1831-1927). The relocation and remodelling of the original Willets house occurred in 1867-68 in conjunction with the establishment of this permanent garrison.

 

Prior to 1866, the Army Engineers had headed the program at West Point. When this connection ended, a group of officers founded the Essayons Club at Willets Point to perpetuate the study of engineering in the Army.24 This became the Engineer School for Application. The Engineer Depot for the eastern United States was established at Willets Point in 1870, and a torpedo school was set up in 1873.

 

Under Abbot's leadership, the Engineer School of Application carried out experiments and training in engineer reconnaissance, military bridges, weaponry, astronomy, photography, submarine mines, torpedoes, submarine rockets, and searchlights, beginning in 1872. Abbot's report on a system of coastal defense by submarine mines was published in 1881 as No. 23 of the Professional Papers of the Army Corps of Engineers.25

 

Few of the structures that were built between 1865 and 1885 survive. Those that do include the batteries behind the Civil War battery, the seacoast mortar battery, the torpedo research and storage facilities, as well as the photo laboratory (Building 317).

 

While frame barracks and other housing were constructed for enlisted men and officers, none of these survive. The frame officers quarters were of the type still seen on Governors Island around Nolan Park (located within the Governor's Island Historic District). Other structures built during this period included the observatory, library and theater, the first officers mess (designed in the Gothic Revival style and later replaced by the barracks on the south side of the Parade Ground), and the first chapel, also built in the Gothic Revival style 26

 

Endicott Board and Taft Board Period. 1885-1914

 

By the 1880s, coastal and harbor defense had again become a national issue. In 1885, Congress authorized a board of experts to examine what defenses were needed at what ports. This became known as the Endicott Board after its president, Secretary of War William C. Endicott. As a result, New York was identified as one of five harbors most in need of new fortifications, and as part of the New York Harbor defense, the Fort at Willets Point was classified as one of the most essential on the East Coast .29

 

As the result of Congressional appropriations in the 1890, more facilities were constructed in the 1890s, especially a first phase of more permanent barracks and related service structures. The fort had been supplied with water from the Town of Flushing in 1886. The Engineers' Museum was also constructed in the 1890s.

 

The Fort at Willets Point was renamed in honor of Maj. Gen. Joseph G. Totten in 1898 by direction of President William McKinley.30 However, the Engineer School of Application relocated to Washington in 1901, and the Engineering Depot closed in 1902.

 

The mission of the fort changed as five companies of the Coast Artillery Corps were moved there. There was a major influx of personnel between 1902 and 1913 with the establishment of the Eastern Artillery District, New York, in 1906, and the Coast Defense of Eastern New York and the North Atlantic District in 1913. The building campaign that began in 1905 coincided with this change as there were many more officers on site who needed housing.

 

President Theodore Roosevelt appointed the Taft Board, named after Secretary of War William Howard Taft, in 1905 to review and update the harbor defense programs. By this time, emphasis had shifted from fortifications to ever increasing attention to weapons and firepower. Fort Totten was the site of innovations and experimentation with searchlights, electrification, and precision methods of fire control for greater accuracy of artillery, all under the jurisdiction of the Coast Artillery stationed there.31

 

World War I period

 

No structures built at Fort Totten during this period survive. During the war, Fort Totten served as a training and administrative post. Units of the Coast Artillery, Infantry, Engineering, Field Artillery, Army Medical Corps, Signal Corps, Anti-aircraft, and members of the First Reserve Engineers were trained at Fort Totten before going to Europe. Company A of the First Reserve Engineers, sailed for France on July 14, 1917, becoming the first unit to leave the United States for the front.

 

The Period between World War I and World War II. 1920-1945

 

A new Torpedo Depot was established in 1921 which focused on improved torpedoes, naval mines, and anti-aircraft technology. The 62nd Coast Artillery (Anti-Aircraft) was stationed there in 1922. The batteries were abandoned completely in 1938. Many temporary structures were erected in 1940s for barracks, storage, etc. Few survive, and most are not within the boundaries of the historic district.

 

The first radar installation used in Anti-Aircraft Command on the east coast was constructed at Fort Totten in 1941. Fort Totten became the Headquarters of the Anti-Aircraft Command of the Eastern Defense Command. In 1944 the Eastern Defense Command Headquarters and the 1378 AAF unit of the North Atlantic Wing, Air Transport Command moved to Fort Totten. Fort Totten also served as the processing point for troops departing through La Guardia Field Terminal until 1947.

 

Post World War II to Present. 1945 on

 

Following World War II, Fort Totten remained in active service as the home of the 1362nd Service Unit in 1947 and the New York-New Jersey Sub-Area Headquarters for Civilian Component Activities in 1949. It housed the Fort Totten Medical Center for army personnel in 1947-49. The Development Branch of the Army Service Medical Program Agency moved to Fort Totten in 1948, being reorganized in 1957 as the U.S. Army Medical Equipment Research and Development Laboratory under direction of Army Surgeon General. The laboratory had the sole responsibility for conducting engineering research and development leading to new items of military equipment for the Army, including surgical, veterinary, dental, and optical equipment, hospital utensils, medical sets and kits, x-ray equipment, devices for insect and rodent control, and equipment for a combat casualty evacuation system.

 

The First Regional Army Air Defense Command was organized in 1954 to provide overall anti-aircraft defense for New England, New York, New Jersey, and Greenland. Its mission was expanded in 1961 to the defense of Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Washington. First Anti-Aircraft Regional Command remained at Fort Totten until 1967 and included the 23 rd Anti-Aircraft Artillery Group; the 41st Anti-Aircraft Artillery Battalion (with 90-millimeter guns); the 66th Anti-Aircraft Artillery Missile Battalion (which monitored the Nike/Ajax and Nike/Hercules missile systems). The construction of additional housing, beginning in 1959, to the north and south of the earlier officers' housing, coincided with this command. These houses, most of which are outside the boundaries of the historic district, are of the so-called Capehart type, built in double and quadruple units.36

 

In 1967, Fort Totten was placed on inactive status as a sub-installation for Fort Hamilton, after the First Regional Army Air Defense Command was relocated. It continued to provide housing for military personnel in the New York City area and to serve as the headquarters of the 77th Regional Support Command (RSC), stationed at Fort Totten in 1969. The United States Coast Guard took over 9.6 acres with its related buildings near the shore of Little Bay in 1969. The parade ground and Buildings 322 and 323 were transferred to the United States Department of Labor in 1971 for use as a Job Corps Training Center. The Army Reserve remained an active presence, and the Ernie Pyle U.S. Army Reserve Center was dedicated in 1983. This building is outside the boundaries of the historic district. Other buildings at Fort Totten have been leased to various units of New York City government and non-profit entities.

 

- From the 1999 NYCLPC Historic District Designation Report

Choose to Include Peace Walk. Photo by Thomas Graning/Ole Miss Digital Imaging Services

The Pilot of Loot, a prop created by desginer Claude Pare, represents Hollywood's vision of some of the Smithsonian's treasured collections. In the movie, Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, the villainous King Kah Mun Rah steals Smithsonian artifacts and hoards them in his throne room, which he sets up in the Commons, located on the first floor of the Smithsonian Castle. The pile includes reproductions of such famous artifacts as Archie Bunker's armchair, Fonzie's jacket, and Dorothy's ruby slippers.

 

The Smithsonian Institution Building, popularly known as the "Castle," at 1000 Jefferson Drive, SW, houses the Smithsonian Institution's administrative offices and information center. Constructed of red sandstone from Seneca Creek, Maryland, the building was designed in the Norman style by architect James Renwick, Jr., and completed in phases between 1849 and 1855. The building served as a home for the first Secretary of the Smithsonian Joseph Henry and his family. Until 1881, it also housed all aspects of Smithsonian operations, including research and administrative offices, lectures halls, exhibit halls, a library and reading room, and chemical laboratories. Today, the Castle houses the Institution's administrative offices and the Smithsonian Information Center.

 

The building comprises a central section, two extensions or ranges, and two wings. Four towers contain occupiable space, while five smaller towers are primarily decorative. As constructed, the central section contained the main entry and museum space (now the Great Hall), with a basement beneath and a large lecture room above. Two galleries on the second floor were used to display artifacts and art. The East Range contained laboratory space on the first floor and research space on the second. The East Wing, completed in 1849, contained storage space on the first floor and a suite of rooms on the second as an apartment for the Secretary of the Smithsonian. The West Range was one story and used as a reading room. The West Wing, also completed in 1849, known as the chapel, was used as a library. On the exterior, the principal tower on the south side is 91-feet high and 37-feet square. On the north side there are two towers--the taller rising 145-feet, the shorter 117-feet.

 

A disastrous fire on January 24, 1865 destroyed the upper story of the main segment and the north and south towers. Lost to the fire were the correspondence of James Smithson, Henry's files, two hundred oil paintings of American Indians by J.M. Stanley, and the contents of the public libraries of Alexandria, Virginia and Beaufort, South Carolina, confiscated by Union forces during the American Civil War. An ensuing renovation was undertaken by local Washington architect Adolph Cluss in 1865-67. In 1833, Cuss fireproofed the east wing, added a second and third floor to the east wing, and a third floor to the west wing. Around 1900 the wooden floor of the Great Hall was replaced with terrazzo and a Children's Museum was installed near the south entrance. A tunnel connected to the Arts and Industries Building. A general renovation took place in 1968-70, restoring the building to its original Victorian atmosphere and installing modern electrical systems, elevators and heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.

 

Located inside the north entrance is the crypt of James Smithson, benefactor of the Institution, while outside on the Mall a bronze statue of Joseph Henry, executed by William Wetmore Story, honors the eminent scientist who was the Institution's first Secretary.

 

The Smithsonian Institution, an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its shops and its magazines, was established in 1846. Although concentrated in Washington DC, its collection of over 136 million items is spread through 19 museums, a zoo, and nine research centers from New York to Panama.

 

National Register #66000867 (1966)

The Lidl Run Kildare Events 2013 were held at the Curragh Racecourse, Newbridge, Co. Kildare, Ireland on Sunday 12th May 2013. There were three events: a 10KM, a half marathon, and a full marathon. This is a selection of photographs which includes all events. The photographs are taken from the start and finish of the marathon, the finish of the 10KM, and the finish of the half marathon. Due to the large numbers participating we did not manage to photograph everyone - which was not helped by the weather. Congratulations to Jo Cawley and her RunKildare crew for another great event. The weather didn't dampen the spirits of the many happy participants.

 

Electronic timing was provided by Red Tag Timing [www.redtagtiming.com/]

 

Overall Race Summary

Participants: There were approximately 3,000 participants over the 3 race events - there were runners, joggers, and walkers participating.

Weather: A cold breezy morning with heavy rain at the start. The weather dried up for the 10KM and the Half Marathon races

Course: This is an undulating course with some good flat stretches on the Curragh.

  

Viewing this on a smartphone device?

If you are viewing this Flickr set on a smartphone and you want to see the larger version(s) of this photograph then: scroll down to the bottom of this description under the photograph and click the "View info about this photo..." link. You will be brought to a new page and you should click the link "View All Sizes".

 

Some Useful Links

GPS Garmin Trace of the Kildare Marathon Route: connect.garmin.com/activity/175709313

Homepage of the Lidl Run Kildare Event: www.kildaremarathon.ie/index.html

Facebook Group page of the Lidl Run Kildare Event: www.facebook.com/RunKildare

Boards.ie Athletics Discussion Board pages about the race series: www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056815306

Our photographs from Run Kildare 2012: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157629707887620/

Our photographs from Run Kildare 2011: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157626725200956/

A small selection of photographs from Run Kildare 2010: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157623899845567/ (first event)

 

Can I use the photograph with the watermark?

Yes! Absolutely - you can post this photograph to your social networks, blogs, micro-blogging, etc.

 

How can I get a full resolution, no watermark, copy of these photographs?

 

All of the photographs here on this Flickr set have a visible watermark embedded in them. All of the photographs posted here on this Flickr set are available, free, at no cost, at full resolution WITHOUT watermark. We take these photographs as a hobby and as a contribution to the running community in Ireland. We do not know of any other photographers who operate such a policy. Our only "cost" is our request that if you are using these images: (1) on social media sites such as Facebook, Tumblr, Pinterest, Twitter,LinkedIn, Google+, etc or (2) other websites, web multimedia, commercial/promotional material that you provide a link back to our Flickr page to attribute us. This also extends the use of these images for Facebook profile pictures. In these cases please make a separate wall or blog post with a link to our Flickr page. If you do not know how this should be done for Facebook or other social media please email us and we will be happy to help suggest how to link to us.

 

Please email petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com with the links to the photographs you would like to obtain a full resolution copy of. We also ask race organisers, media, etc to ask for permission before use of our images for flyers, posters, etc. We reserve the right to refuse a request.

 

In summary please remember - all we ask is for you to link back to our Flickr set or Flickr pages. Taking the photographs and preparing them for online posting does take a significant effort. We are not posting photographs to Flickr for commercial reasons. If you really like what we do please spread the link around, send us an email, leave a comment beside the photographs, send us a Flickr email, etc.

 

If you would like to contribute something for your photograph(s)?

Some people offer payment for our photographs. We do not charge for these photographs. We take these photographs as our contribution to the running community in Ireland. If you feel that the photograph(s) you request are good enough that you would pay for their purchase from other photographic providers we would suggest that you can provide a donation to any of the great charities in Ireland who do work for Cancer Care or Cancer Research in Ireland.

 

I ran in the race - but my photograph doesn't appear here in your Flickr set! What gives?

 

As mentioned above we take these photographs as a hobby and as a voluntary contribution to the running community in Ireland. Very often we have actually ran in the same race and then switched to photographer mode after we finished the race. Consequently, we feel that we have no obligations to capture a photograph of every participant in the race. However, we do try our very best to capture as many participants as possible. But this is sometimes not possible for a variety of reasons:

 

     ►You were hidden behind another participant as you passed our camera

     ►Weather or lighting conditions meant that we had some photographs with blurry content which we did not upload to our Flickr set

     ►There were too many people - some races attract thousands of participants and as amateur photographs we cannot hope to capture photographs of everyone

     ►We simply missed you - sorry about that - we did our best!

  

You can email us petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com to enquire if we have a photograph of you which didn't make the final Flickr selection for the race. But we cannot promise that there will be photograph there. As alternatives we advise you to contact the race organisers to enquire if there were (1) other photographs taking photographs at the race event or if (2) there were professional commercial sports photographers taking photographs which might have some photographs of you available for purchase. You might find some links for further information above.

 

Don't like your photograph here?

That's OK! We understand!

 

If, for any reason, you are not happy or comfortable with your picture appearing here in this photoset on Flickr then please email us at petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com and we will remove it as soon as possible. We give careful consideration to each photograph before uploading.

 

I want to tell people about these great photographs!

Great! Thank you! The best link to spread the word around is probably www.flickr.com/peterm7/sets

  

Generally, we only include photos taken on the National Elk Refuge in our photo gallery. This one, however, was too precious not to include. A refuge volunteer shot this picture in Grand Teton National Park, which borders the National Elk Refuge. When the bison later migrated to the refuge in winter, it may have been disappointed in the lack of facilities we offer the wildlife!

"Anybody in here?"

 

Credit: USFWS / Gaylia Hudgins, National Elk Refuge volunteer

 

Sunday 5th February 2012 Doors open at 3.00pm - 9.00pm

Our acts are unsuitable for under 18's. £5 on the door but all confirmed performers are free.

 

We have an amazing sixth line up for you at The New inn Gloucester which includes the usual eclectic mix of acts bands singers and spoken word performers but for February we will have a predominantly large and diverse range of hilarious stand up comedy...lucky lucky Gloucester!!

  

As usual ARTournament will be giving away £100 in cash for the best audience voted performance of the day. Each member of the audience will be given one vote on the door when they arrive. The performer/s with the most votes at 8.45pm will be presented with £100 in cash-good luck everyone.

 

IMPORTANT.....PLEASE CAN ALL ACTS SIGN IN AN HOUR BEFORE THEY ARE DUE TO PERFORM AS DUE TO ILLNESS TRAINS PLANES AND AUTOMOBILES WE MAY HAVE TO CHANGE THE TIME SLOTS TO EARLIER OR LATER DEPENDING ON HOW THINGS ARE RUNNING and THERE WILL BE A FILM CREW ON SITE, IF ANYONE OBJECTS TO BEING FILMED CAN YOU PLEASE LET US KNOW ASAP.

 

On the Elephant Stage we have a good PA, 2 sm58 mics and can use CDs for backing tracks. The Moroccan Stage has a small PA and MIc and is acoustic/spoken word. if you need any help our engineer is James Candler (in friends list) Thanks

 

Compered by the talented Guy Williams who will also be performing his poetry for us on during the day.

 

3-3.30pm James Evans-Musician

3.30-3.45pm Lyn Cinderry

3.30-4pm Jim Evans and his tantalising Banjo

4-4.15pm Jeremy Toombs Poet

4.15-4.30pm James Bunting

4.30- 5pm Benita Johnson-Acoustic Set

5pm-5.15pm Alison Hustwitt

5.15-5.30pm Helen Gregory-Poet

5.30-5.40pm Citizen Smith-A poem

5.40-6pm Sophia Marie Bovall

6-6.15pm Debra hannis

6.15-6.30pm Andrew Owens

6.30-7pm Jade Richards Poetess.

7-7.15pm Guy Williams-a poet and also our compere for April.

7.15-7.30 Sarah Snell Pym TBC

7.30-8pm Angus McDressence Clements-very talented local musician who will be treating us to some new music.

8-8.30pm Damon Thomas and his beautiful blues.

 

Compere for the Elephant Stage is the multi talented hilarious comedy guru Josh Richards. He and Guy Williams are consistently a couple of the audience's favorite performers and we are looking forward to having them on our stages for the whole day.

 

3-3.30pm Hartley playing some sweet music

3.30-4pm Ratface Russ and his musical box of tricks.

4-4.30pm Shadowlight Sounds

4.30-5pm Rebecca Cant-Novembers favourite singer and £100 cash winner

5-5.15pm Claire Nelson-Our special funny lady and winner of last months audience vote.

5.15-5.30 Jamie Doughty-a special brand of funny

5.30-6pm Our funny Birmingham friends Louise+Nadeem and Lou

6-6.15pm Julie ‘Psycho’Jones-hilarious and winner of dec £100 prize.

6.15-6.30pm Demitris Deech-brilliant, witty, fast stand up

6.30-6.45pm Bambos- special kind of greek Musician-looking forward to this one..

6.45-7pm Matt Leigh-Clever Comedy and brand new material especially for you lot...

7.15-7.30pm Darren Hoskins and his box of comedy tricks

7.30-7.45pm John Bassett-very very funny

7.45-8pm Mark Chatterley-A laugh a minute

8.00-8.45pm Gregory Davies and the Simplistic Scientists-and its Greg's Birthday!

    

MARCH 2012

 

Elephant Stage-Bands and Comedy March 2012

Compered by the hilarious Josh Richards and his alter ego the Koala....

3.00-3.30pm Lisa Wilkinson-Acoustic

3.30-3.45pm Alison Hustwitt and her hilarious little songs

3.45-4.10pm Way Out West-a band you have to see to believe!

4.15-4.30pm Darren Hoskins and his box of comedy tricks

4.30-4.50pm Martin Thorne-An amazing blues singer and guitarist

5.00-5.10pm James Rushbrook and his new 2012 comedy set-lucky lucky us

5.15-5.25pm Mark Chatterley-A laugh a minute

5.30-5.45pm Julie ‘Psycho’Jones - Januarys winner and hilarious is an understatement!

5.45-6.00pm Demitris Deech-brilliant, witty, fast stand up and Febs Winner

6.00-6.15pm Josh Richards brings in the Koala-be scared, very scared!

6.15-6.45pm Stephen Grimes will be treating us all to a bit of hip hop

6.45-6.55pm Paul Cook With Some New Stand Up Comedy

7.00-7.30pm Martin Maidment and his infamous band Gagarin

7.30-8.00pm Club 41 James Alexander Dart and his rocking band

8.00-8.20pm Damon Thomas and his beautiful blues-came in second last month!

8.30-9.00pm Liam Dunn and his band www.stereoinfluence.com

   

Moroccan Stage-Spoken Word and Acoustic

Compered by the brains behind Worcester Literary Festival and a poet in her own right...the multi talented Lisa Ventura.

3.00-3.30pm Rebecca Cant-Decembers winner and an unbeleivable voice. TBC

3.30-3.45pm Lisa Ventura

3.45-4.00pm Andrew Owens

4.00-4.15pm Keith Hyatt-bringing some acoustic flamenco guitar and poetry

4.15-4.30pm Sarah Snell Pym

4.30-4.45pm Mark Chatterley

4.45-5.00pm Julie Jones and her comedy from the freezer

5.00-5.15pm Tony Judge-satirical short stories.

5.15-5.30pm Jeremy Toombs TBC

5.30-5.45pm Lyn Cinderry TBC

5.45-6.00pm James Bunting-Amazing Bristol Poet

6.00-6.15pm Chloe Lees-Grown up stories

6.15-6.30pm John Bassetts Dark Tales TBC

6.30-6.45pm Guy Williams and his broken foot!

6.45-7.00pm Suz Winspear

7.00-7.15pm Dan Holloway-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXXdIqA8LsI

7.15-7.30pm Joel Denno

7.30-7.45pm Closing from Lisa Ventura

7.45-8.00pm TBC

           

Joel Denno

  

Tony Judge-satirical short stories and a regular reader at Parole Parlate (Worcester) and on Radio Wildfire.

Keith Hyatt-bringing some acoustic flamenco feel guitar and poetry all the way from Swindon. TBC

 

April 2012 Bookings

Paul Johnson and his guitar will be treating us all again.

Emmet Brown-Whitey Shakespliff Oldham rapping and highly recommended

The Bonfire of the insanities Sunday Chill was reviewed by the Citizen so don't listen to us blowing our own trumpet - see what they have to think...http://www.thisisgloucestershire.co.uk/nailed-arts-festival/story-13787726-detail/story.html

Down among the Bluebells at Patching Woods this afternoon

Paimpont forest, also known as Brocéliande, is in the French commune of Paimpont, near the city of Rennes in Brittany. As Brocéliande it had a reputation in the Medieval imagination as a place of magic and mystery. It is the setting of a number of adventures in Arthurian legend, notably Chrétien de Troyes's Yvain, the Knight of the Lion, and locals claim the tree in which the Lady of the Lake supposedly imprisoned Merlin can still be seen today. Other legendary places said to lie within the forest include the Val sans Retour, the tomb of Merlin, the Fountain of Youth, and Hotié de Vivianne (castle of the Lady of the Lake). The medieval chronicler Wace visited the forest but left disappointed:

 

"...I went there in search of marvels; I saw the forest and the land and looked for marvels, but found none. I came back as a fool and went as a fool. I went as a fool and came back as a fool. I sought foolishness and considered myself a fool."

 

For those living close to Paimpont, the Arthurian legend is very strong. Many names in the legend can be translated into Breton or French, for example the name Lancelot translates as "wanderer" or "vagabond" in Breton. There is also a strong influence from the Druids, and all around Brittany are standing stones or alignments, the most famous of which are nearby at Carnac; a group of the alignments at Kerlescan are nicknamed "the soldiers of Arthur."

 

Paimpont is a forest of broadleaf trees, oaks and beeches mainly, with areas of conifers either inside after clear-felling or on the periphery as transition with the moor, for example towards the west in the sector of Tréhorenteuc and the Val-sans-Retour (= Valley of no Return) which was devastated by several fires in particular in 1976, a year of great drought. It occupies mainly the territory of the commune of Paimpont, but extends to bordering communes, mainly Guer and Beignon in the south, Saint-Péran in the northeast, and Concoret in north. The forest of Paimpont is the largest remnant of an ancient forest occupying Argoat, the interior region of Brittany. It was more often called the forest of Brécélien, but its ancient character and other qualities underlined by many authors decided on its name of "forest of Brocéliande," tallying of the adventures of the legend of the Round Table. This flattering designation was reinforced by the birth of the Pays de Brocéliande at the end of the 20th century, an institution intended to facilitate the development of the communes of the west of the département.

 

The relative altitude of the forested massif contributes to give it a climate close to the oceanic climate of the coasts of Finistere. This mode, where west and south-west winds carry of clouds and regular rain supports the vegetation, dominates. The surplus of water feeds the many brooks occupying the bottoms of small valleys before flowing into the river Aff, then the Vilaine, to the area around Redon in the south of the department. The highest point is at 256 m in the western part called Haute forêt. Altitude decreases regularly while offering viewpoints towards the department of Morbihan; viewpoints which one finds the equivalents in the north on the commune of Mauron, port of the Côtes-d'Armor. It is not far from there that the Paimpont Biological Station of the University of Rennes 1, built in 1966 and 1967, dominates the lake of Chatenay. The varied forest and its surroundings constitute a framework favorable to many training courses in which the Rennes 1 biology students as well as foreign researchers take part. These buildings can accommodate approximately 70 people, and researchers work all the year on subjects generally very far away from the local biotope such as behavior of primates, represented by Cercopithecus, whose cries are familiar for the area but surprising to the walker little accustomed to this exotic fauna. The first researchers lengthily studied the ecology of the Armorican moors, the grounds, and the hydrology.

 

The forest belongs mainly to owners who maintain it and exploit it for timber and hunting; only in the north-eastern part, a small part (10%) is "domanial" and is managed by the National Forestry Commission. This situation prevents freedom of movement in the forest even with the access to the borough and its pond. The owners, however, signed a convention authorizing, from April 1 to the end of September, the use of some hiking trails in the forest. Among the responsibilities of the forest guards are watching for behaviors that threaten the forest, its flora, and its fauna. For example, behaviors that pose the risk of fire, and those that endanger the game, like dogs running loose. The gathering of mushrooms is not absolutely prohibited, but it is only tolerated near the approved trails. Because of its importance before the French Revolution, the forest was the responsibility of a royal jurisdiction called the National Forestry Commission, as the traditional jurisdictions of the seigneurs did not occupying itself with forest management. The wood was excessively exploited for the power supply of the charcoal blast furnaces for the nearby industry, at least in the 17th and 18th centuries; the assignment of the trees of first choice to the navy was a marginal role.

 

An extract of the files of the correctional court of Montfort:

 

"Having left the forging mills of Paimpont on Monday morning, he passed by the workshop of the carpenter who was far away from the forging mills but in the middle of the forest, he drank there with Julien Auffray his cousin and foreman of the carpenters." (Foreman of the carpenters and sawyers on contract to the naval yards elsewhere). Auffray interrogation, 1826.

 

The Matter of Britain is a name given collectively to the legends that concern the Celtic and legendary history of Great Britain, especially those focused on King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. The 12th century French poet Jean Bodel created the name in the following lines of his epic Chanson de Saisnes:

 

Ne sont que III matières à nul homme atandant,

De France et de Bretaigne, et de Rome la grant.

 

The name distinguishes and relates the Matter of Britain from the mythological themes taken from classical antiquity, the "matter of Rome", and the tales of the paladins of Charlemagne and their wars with the Moors and Saracens, which constituted the "matter of France". While Arthur is the chief subject of the Matter of Britain, other lesser-known legendary history of Great Britain, including the stories of Brutus of Britain, Old King Cole, King Lear, and Gogmagog, is also included in the Matter of Britain: see Legendary Kings of the Britons.

 

Legendary history of Britain

 

It could be said that the legendary history of Britain was created in part to form a body of patriotic myth for the island. Several agendas thus can be seen in this body of literature.

 

The Historia Britonum, the earliest known source of the story of Brutus of Britain, may have been devised to create a distinguished genealogy for a number of Welsh princes in the 9th century. Traditionally attributed to Nennius, its actual compiler is unknown; it exists in several recensions. This tale went on to achieve greater currency because its inventor linked Brutus to the diaspora of heroes that followed the Trojan War, and thus provided raw material which later mythographers such as Geoffrey of Monmouth, Michael Drayton, and John Milton could draw upon, linking the settlement of Britain to the heroic age of Greek literature, for their several and diverse literary purposes. As such, this material could be used for patriotic mythmaking just as Virgil linked the mythical founding of Rome to the Trojan War in The Æneid. Geoffrey of Monmouth also introduced the fanciful claim that the Trinovantes, reported by Tacitus as dwelling in the area of London, had a name he interpreted as Troi-novant, "New Troy".

 

More speculative claims link Celtic mythology with several of the rulers and incidents compiled by Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniæ. It has been suggested, for instance, that Leir of Britain, who later became Shakespeare's King Lear, was originally the Welsh sea-god Llŷr (see also the Irish sea-god Lir). Various Celtic deities have been identified with characters from Arthurian literature as well: Morgan le Fay was often thought to have originally been the Welsh goddess Modron (cf. the Irish goddess Mórrígan). Many of these identifications come from the speculative comparative religion of the late 19th century, and have been questioned in more recent years.

 

William Shakespeare seems to have been deeply interested in the legendary history of Britain, and to have been familiar with some of its more obscure byways. Shakespeare's plays contain several tales relating to these legendary kings, such as King Lear and Cymbeline. It has been suggested that Shakespeare's Welsh schoolmaster Thomas Jenkins introduced him to this material, and perhaps directed him to read Geoffrey of Monmouth[citation needed]. These tales also figure in Raphael Holinshed's The Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, which also appears in Shakespeare's sources for Macbeth. A Welsh schoolmaster appears as the character Sir Hugh Evans in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

 

Other early authors also drew from the early Arthurian and pseudo-historical sources of the Matter of Britain. The Scots, for instance, formulated a mythical history in the Picts and the Dál Riata royal lines. While they do eventually become factual lines, unlike those of Geoffrey, their origins are vague and often incorporate both aspects of mythical British history and mythical Irish history. The story of Gabhran especially incorporates elements of both those histories.

 

The Arthurian cycle

"Parsifal before the Castle of the Grail" - inspired by Richard Wagner's Opera Parsifal - painted in Weimar Germany 1928 by Hans Werner Schmidt (1859-1950)

 

The Arthurian literary cycle is the best known part of the Matter of Britain. It has succeeded largely because it tells two interlocking stories that have intrigued many later authors. One concerns Camelot, usually envisioned as a doomed utopia of chivalric virtue, undone by the fatal flaws of Arthur and Sir Lancelot. The other concerns the quests of the various knights to achieve the Holy Grail; some succeed (Galahad, Percival), and others fail (Lancelot).

 

The medieval tale of Arthur and his knights is full of Christian themes; those themes involve the destruction of human plans for virtue by the moral failures of their characters, and the quest for an important Christian relic. Finally, the relationships between the characters invited treatment in the tradition of courtly love, such as Lancelot and Guinevere, or Tristan and Iseult. In more recent years, the trend has been to attempt to link the tales of King Arthur and his knights with Celtic mythology, usually in highly romanticized, early twentieth century reconstructed versions.

 

Additionally, it is possible to read the Arthurian literature in general, and that concerned with the Grail tradition in particular, as an allegory of human development and spiritual growth (a theme explored by mythologist Joseph Campbell amongst others).

 

Sources wikipedia

The Canyon Diablo meteorites include the many fragments of the asteroid that created the Barringer Crater (Meteor Crater), Arizona, USA. Meteorites have been found around the crater rim, and are named for nearby Canyon Diablo, which lies about three to four miles west of the crater.

 

The asteroid fell about 50,000 years ago. The meteorites have been known and collected since the mid-19th century and were known and used by pre-historic Native Americans. The Barringer Crater, from the late 19th to the mid-20th century, was the center of a long dispute over the origin of craters that showed little evidence of volcanism. That debate was settled in the 1950s thanks to Eugene Shoemaker's study of the crater.

 

In 1953, Clair Cameron Patterson measured ratios of the lead isotopes in samples of the meteorite. The result permitted a refinement of the estimate of the age of the Earth to 4.550 billion years (± 70 million years).

Complete and assembled - no damage

 

Includes an extra set of lower legs and extra hands with two-toned manicure, plus her complete fashion and accessories:

faux leather pants

graphic print camisole with train

yellow heels

silver/black flats,

jewelry

sunglasses

clutch purse

beret

elbow-length leather gloves with molded hands. As a special "build a doll," she did not come with her own box or COA

  

Includes, Bear topper with bottle, 2 bibs, 4 onesies 3-6 months and a hooded blanket, with 34 size 1 diapers. 14 " tall & 13" wide

The Lidl Run Kildare Events 2013 were held at the Curragh Racecourse, Newbridge, Co. Kildare, Ireland on Sunday 12th May 2013. There were three events: a 10KM, a half marathon, and a full marathon. This is a selection of photographs which includes all events. The photographs are taken from the start and finish of the marathon, the finish of the 10KM, and the finish of the half marathon. Due to the large numbers participating we did not manage to photograph everyone - which was not helped by the weather. Congratulations to Jo Cawley and her RunKildare crew for another great event. The weather didn't dampen the spirits of the many happy participants.

 

Electronic timing was provided by Red Tag Timing [www.redtagtiming.com/]

 

Overall Race Summary

Participants: There were approximately 3,000 participants over the 3 race events - there were runners, joggers, and walkers participating.

Weather: A cold breezy morning with heavy rain at the start. The weather dried up for the 10KM and the Half Marathon races

Course: This is an undulating course with some good flat stretches on the Curragh.

  

Viewing this on a smartphone device?

If you are viewing this Flickr set on a smartphone and you want to see the larger version(s) of this photograph then: scroll down to the bottom of this description under the photograph and click the "View info about this photo..." link. You will be brought to a new page and you should click the link "View All Sizes".

 

Some Useful Links

GPS Garmin Trace of the Kildare Marathon Route: connect.garmin.com/activity/175709313

Homepage of the Lidl Run Kildare Event: www.kildaremarathon.ie/index.html

Facebook Group page of the Lidl Run Kildare Event: www.facebook.com/RunKildare

Boards.ie Athletics Discussion Board pages about the race series: www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056815306

Our photographs from Run Kildare 2012: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157629707887620/

Our photographs from Run Kildare 2011: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157626725200956/

A small selection of photographs from Run Kildare 2010: www.flickr.com/photos/peterm7/sets/72157623899845567/ (first event)

 

Can I use the photograph with the watermark?

Yes! Absolutely - you can post this photograph to your social networks, blogs, micro-blogging, etc.

 

How can I get a full resolution, no watermark, copy of these photographs?

 

All of the photographs here on this Flickr set have a visible watermark embedded in them. All of the photographs posted here on this Flickr set are available, free, at no cost, at full resolution WITHOUT watermark. We take these photographs as a hobby and as a contribution to the running community in Ireland. We do not know of any other photographers who operate such a policy. Our only "cost" is our request that if you are using these images: (1) on social media sites such as Facebook, Tumblr, Pinterest, Twitter,LinkedIn, Google+, etc or (2) other websites, web multimedia, commercial/promotional material that you provide a link back to our Flickr page to attribute us. This also extends the use of these images for Facebook profile pictures. In these cases please make a separate wall or blog post with a link to our Flickr page. If you do not know how this should be done for Facebook or other social media please email us and we will be happy to help suggest how to link to us.

 

Please email petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com with the links to the photographs you would like to obtain a full resolution copy of. We also ask race organisers, media, etc to ask for permission before use of our images for flyers, posters, etc. We reserve the right to refuse a request.

 

In summary please remember - all we ask is for you to link back to our Flickr set or Flickr pages. Taking the photographs and preparing them for online posting does take a significant effort. We are not posting photographs to Flickr for commercial reasons. If you really like what we do please spread the link around, send us an email, leave a comment beside the photographs, send us a Flickr email, etc.

 

If you would like to contribute something for your photograph(s)?

Some people offer payment for our photographs. We do not charge for these photographs. We take these photographs as our contribution to the running community in Ireland. If you feel that the photograph(s) you request are good enough that you would pay for their purchase from other photographic providers we would suggest that you can provide a donation to any of the great charities in Ireland who do work for Cancer Care or Cancer Research in Ireland.

 

I ran in the race - but my photograph doesn't appear here in your Flickr set! What gives?

 

As mentioned above we take these photographs as a hobby and as a voluntary contribution to the running community in Ireland. Very often we have actually ran in the same race and then switched to photographer mode after we finished the race. Consequently, we feel that we have no obligations to capture a photograph of every participant in the race. However, we do try our very best to capture as many participants as possible. But this is sometimes not possible for a variety of reasons:

 

     ►You were hidden behind another participant as you passed our camera

     ►Weather or lighting conditions meant that we had some photographs with blurry content which we did not upload to our Flickr set

     ►There were too many people - some races attract thousands of participants and as amateur photographs we cannot hope to capture photographs of everyone

     ►We simply missed you - sorry about that - we did our best!

  

You can email us petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com to enquire if we have a photograph of you which didn't make the final Flickr selection for the race. But we cannot promise that there will be photograph there. As alternatives we advise you to contact the race organisers to enquire if there were (1) other photographs taking photographs at the race event or if (2) there were professional commercial sports photographers taking photographs which might have some photographs of you available for purchase. You might find some links for further information above.

 

Don't like your photograph here?

That's OK! We understand!

 

If, for any reason, you are not happy or comfortable with your picture appearing here in this photoset on Flickr then please email us at petermooney78 AT gmail DOT com and we will remove it as soon as possible. We give careful consideration to each photograph before uploading.

 

I want to tell people about these great photographs!

Great! Thank you! The best link to spread the word around is probably www.flickr.com/peterm7/sets

  

An Alfa 6C-3000 in the paddock at the 77th Members' Meeting, Goodwood.

1. Best Package Enterprise Co., Ltd offers full product range, includes:

Plastic Containers, Plastic Bottles, Plastic Jars, Plastic Pails, Plastic Tubes/ Vials, Plastic Caps

Glass Containers, Glass Bottles, Glass Jars, Glass Vials,

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Our products include (but not limited to): cosmetics, personal care, essential oils, herbal, food storage, industrial, medical & pharmaceuticals, laboratory, and chemical industry. Bottles and containers are available in all kinds of shapes, sizes, colors, & decoration. We offer a variety of amenity bottles available in varies shapes and sizes including rounds, squat bottles, rectangles and more. We also have a wide selection of cap options for our lines of amenity bottles such as ribbed top caps, flip-top dispensing closures, disc-top caps, and ball caps. These bottles are suitable for facial moisturizer, body lotion, bath product, cream, soap and more. They are great for sample size products; using in spas, salons, hotels, motels, and much more!

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2. We carry many types of caps and closures including pumps, sprays, misters, atomizers, brush caps, sifter caps, and much more. We also offer special custom decorating services such as: multi-color silk screening, hot stamping, pad printing, gliding, labeling, and more. For our special service there is a minimum limited order of 200pcs.

 

3. We offer various types of plastic containers. We are also expert on inventing and producing 3D designed products by using plastic raw materials ranging from PP, HDPE, LDPE, PET, ABS, EVA, SAN, PVC, TPA, PS, AS, PMMA, etc. We do mold design, manufacturing, injection molding, producing, hot stamping, silk-screening, pad printing, labeling and assembly- with many years of manufacturing expertise.

 

4. We have over 90% of products in stock. “Order today, ship out tomorrow” is our promise to you even if you only order one single piece. We welcome orders for bottle printing and design as well as gliding your own logo.

 

To best serve you:

Our company email: 2008@taiwanbottle.com.tw

 

As always NEoN celebrates its festival with a late night party. Acts include Plastique Fantastique, Verity Brit & Musician U, Fallope & The Tubes and Resident DJ RHL. With a pop up bar and performances amongst our large group exhibition the vast factory space West Ward Works, this night promises to be a visual audible delight.

 

Plastique Fantastique (UK)

 

A performance fiction envisaged as a group of human and non-human avatars delivering communiqués from the past and the future. The communiqués are channelled through installations, writing, comics and sound and moving image work and performances, addressing technology, popular and mass media and sacred cultures and also human-machine animals and non-human entities and agents. Over several years, numerous people have produced Plastique Fantastique but there is also a core group producing the performance fiction. Plastique Fantastique was first presented by David Burrows and Simon O’Sullivan and developed with long-term collaborators Alex Marzeta and Vanessa Page, and more recently with Mark Jackson. For NE0N 2017, this group will call forth and trap a bit-coin-fairy-spirit to ask it seems questions. The performance – Plastique Fantastique Protocols for the Society for Cutting Up Mun-knee-snakers (S.C.U.M.): I-Valerie-Solaris-AKA-@32ACP-Amazon.co.uk-recommends-‘Pacific-Rim’ may/may-not shoot b1t-c0in-f@iry-sp1r1t) – uses drone-folk-songs, moving image projection, reliquaries and ritual to manifest the block-chain-spirit.

 

David Burrows, Alex Marzeta, Vanessa Page and Mark Jackson will be performing.

  

Rites of the Zeitgeber, Verity Brit & Musician ‘U’ (UK)

 

9 channel video installation, live score performed by musician ‘U’

 

The Zeitgeber (‘time giver’ or ‘synchroniser’) is honoured by a triadic henge of stacked CRT monitors in which past durations collide with future vacuums. Strange extra-terrestrial topographies are traversed across geological time and the internet. Curious substances are unearthed and lost languages resurrected. Fragments from Mina Loy, J. G. Ballard and Henri Bergson emerge amongst an archaeology of media from Super 8, VHS, to HD. Time bends from matter, history is up-set and the clock is obsolete.

 

Verity Birt an artist based in London. She studied an MA in Moving Image at the Royal College of Art (2013–2015) and BA in Art Practice at Goldsmiths University of London (2008–2011). She is involved with collaborative research groups; The Future is a Collective Project, Reconfiguring Ruins and a founding member of women artists collective Altai. This summer, Verity was artist in residence at BALTIC and The Newbridge Project in Newcastle. Previous exhibitions include: Our House of Common Weeds; Res. Gallery, London (2017); Relics from the De-crypt | Gossamer Fog Gallery London (2017), Altai in Residence, Experiments in Collective Practice, Dyson Gallery, London (2017); Chemhex Extract, Peacock Visual Arts, Aberdeen (2016); Feeling Safer, IMT Gallery, London and Gallery North, New York (2016); Come to Dust, Generator Projects, Dundee (2016)

 

Fallopé & The Tubes (UK)

 

A weirdo-punk performance band. Each live show features live humans! film and visuals! costumes! sculpture! visual props! and music/a sequence of sounds!

 

Fallopé and The Tubes is a fluctuating live musical and performative event with contributions from Sarah Messenger, Ruby Pester, Nadia Rossi, Rachel Walker, Catherine Weir, Emma McIntyre and Skye Renee Foley. The group are made up of Scottish based artists and musicians that are also filmmakers, festival organisers, librarians, boatbuilders and more who work collaboratively to devise live performances. Drawing influence from a wide range of fringe and mainstream musical genres, exploring sexuality, elements of social satire, self promotion and leftist political ideologies.

 

The group was established in January 2014 at Insriach Bothy, Aviemore and have developed their practice during numerous residency experiences across Scotland. By living and working together ‘off grid’ the group have developed experimental techniques to create a collective energy. Fallopé & The Tubes draw influence from a wide range of fringe and mainstream musical genres, as well as sexuality, elements of social satire and self promotion and leftist political ideologies. Soakin Records

 

DJ RHL (UK)

 

Resident NEoN DJ has been entertaining us since 2010. Djing for about 25 years, he predominately plays Techno but you often find him playing anything dance music related. Spinning old school vinyl sets containing an eclectic mix of old and new stuff. RHL just likes making people dance. Check here for past performances.

 

Accompanying DJ RHL is ‘The Wanderer‘ aka Naomi Lamb. Naomi works layers of diverse video loops into an ever evolving collage colours textures and shape and intuitively mixies visuals live. She improvises, freestyles and channels the room, customising the ephemeral moving collage in response to the tone of the happening.

 

For the past 20 years Naomi has been a prolific live video art performer utilising techniques and process that is often associated with the ever growing subculture of VJing and presents under the name of ‘The Wander’. Naomi has an intimate knowledge of not only the process of live video performance but also an wide reaching connections within the VJ community and has performed at many of the leading outdoor music and art festivals in New Zealand with a debut at two English Festivals this summer and she is super please for her first time mixing it up in Scotland to be at NEoN. “

 

AGK Booth

 

Yuck ’n Yum hereby invites you to attend the Annual General Karaoke booth at this year’s NEoN at Night. The AGK is a fiercely contested karaoke video competition, getting creative types to make videos that will shock, delight and confound its audience. First staged back in 2010, over the years the AGK has built up a sizeable back catalogue of singalong anthems encompassing everything from pop classics to the most extreme avant garde out there. Now Yuck ’n Yum will bring the AGK archive to NEoN revellers in an audiovisual extravaganza that will overturn everything you ever thought you knew about karaoke convention. This November, Yuck ’n Yum together with NEoN are making a song and dance about it.

 

About the Artists Yuck ‘n Yum is a curatorial collective formed in Dundee 2008. Until 2013 its main raison d’etre was to make zines and distribute art. The AGK booth is the first of three projects that will kick start a period of activity after a couple of years of hibernation.

 

Yuck ‘n Yum are Andrew Maclean, Gayle Meikle, Ben Robinson, Alexandra Ross, Alex Tobin, Becca Clark and Morgan Cahn.

 

WEST WARD WORKS

Guthrie Street

DD1 5BR

 

Images: Kathryn Rattray Photography

Oxon Cove Park and Oxon Cove Farm is a national historic district that includes a living farm museum operated by the National Park Service, and located at Oxon Hill, Prince George's County, Maryland. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

 

The park provides an excellent resource for environmental studies, wildlife observing, fishing, and other recreational activities made possible by easy access to the Potomac River. Fourteen buildings and two structures are located in the historic district and associated with the property's sequential development as a plantation, an institutional agricultural complex, and a farm museum.

 

The Oxon Hill Farm includes the Mount Welby home, Farm Museum, barns, a stable, feed building, livestock buildings and a visitor activity barn. Farm animals include cows, horses and chickens. Visitors can view the animals up close daily and learn about the workings of a farm. The Farm Museum building displays historical farm equipment dating from the late 19th century.

 

The district also includes a hexagonal frame outbuilding; ca. 1830 brick root cellar; ca. 1973 frame hog house; ca. 1890 frame horse and pony barn; ca. 1991 frame chicken house; ca. 1970 steel-frame implement shed; ca. 1980 frame visitor barn; ca. 1970 steel-frame windmill; ca. 1940 frame hay barn; ca. 1890 frame feed building; ca. 1830 brick stable; ca. 1970 frame tool shed; ca. 1980 frame "sorghum sirip" shed; and a ca. 1980 frame dairy barn, and ca. 1940 tile silo. From the 1890s to 1950s, under the ownership of St. Elizabeth's Hospital, the site was used as a therapeutic treatment center for the mentally ill known as Godding Croft. The Oxon Cove Farm historic district is located on the crest of a ridge overlooking the Potomac River, north of I-95.

 

The principal dwelling, known as "Mount Welby," is a ca. 1807-1811 two-story three-bay brick structure laid in Flemish bond with Italianate detailing and sheltered by a shed roof, and visible to motorists crossing the interstate Woodrow Wilson Bridge. The house was built by Irish immigrant Dr. Samuel DeButts. It was entrusted to the National Park Service in 1959 in order to protect its resources from increased development. From 1891 to 1950, the property was used as a therapeutic farm by St. Elizabeths Hospital, and was known as Godding Croft.

 

The house is operated as a historic house museum, with exhibits about period life in the early 19th century for the owners and slaves on the plantation. Other exhibits focus on the home's role at Godding Croft.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxon_Cove_Park_and_Oxon_Hill_Farm

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_Creative_Commons_...