The Shemanovsky Museum-Exhibition Complex

 

The history of the museum started in 1906, when Father Irinarkh (I.S. Shemanovsky), a senior priest of the Obdorsk Orthodox mission, founded the Ethnographic Collection of Indigenous Peoples in Tobolsk North at the library of Saint Guria brotherhood in the village of Obdorsk (now Salekhard). The collection grew into the regional natural history museum, which received the name from its founder in 1996. In 2002 the museum was succeeded by the newly established Shemanovsky Museum-Exhibition Complex and celebrated its 110th birthday in 2016.

 

Today it is a large museum with numerous employees involved in research, methodical work, fund accounting, restoration, exhibition and publishing. The museum has its own research library and is actively developing education activities.

 

The museum is aimed mainly at children and teenagers by engaging them into activities of the Children’s Center, the Military History Club, and the Einstein Museum of Entertaining Sciences. Families are invited to join various city and museum tours via the project called New Tour. Adult visitors are welcome to attend the MUZART Creative Studio.

 

The museum’s total area is about 10 000 m2, with the exhibition area of 3 890 m2. The complex includes a museum with storage facilities and exhibition areas, an exhibition center with an exhibition hall of 700 m2, and an administrative center with a conference hall accommodating 195 people. Another part of the museum is the Laptsuy Memorial Flatdevoted to the life and works of the well-known Nenets writer L.V. Laptsuy and local literary life.

 

The Shemanovsky Museum-Exhibition Complex

 

Address: 38 Chubynina st., Salekhard

Tel./Fax: 7 3492230519;

mvk.yanao.ru

e-mail: mvk@dk.yanao.ru

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37,000 Year Old Baby Mammoth

by mtnspirit

 

Secrets of 37,000 year old baby mammoth revealed

By Paul Rincon – BBC

 

Perfectly preserved, the baby mammoth looks like she has been asleep only for a moment – not for the 37,000 years she has spent locked in the rock hard permafrost of the Arctic tundra. Clumps of brown hair still cling to the three foot tall body, hinting at the coarse coat that would have once covered the infant. Even her eylasahes are intact. These extraordinary images show why scientists are so excited by the discovery of Lyuba – the most complete body of a woolly mammoth ever found

 

Discovered at the side of a river by reindeer herders on the Yamal Peninsula in northwest Siberia, the bone month old female is helping scientists to unravel how the extinct ice age giants once lived. The contents of her stomach have provided scientists with valuable clues about what she and her fellow mammoths ate. The baby’s layers of fat and minerals in her teeth have provided an unprecedented insight into her health and the health of her herd. Palaeontologists now believe the information they have gleaned from the remains can help them understand what led to the woolly mammoths’ ultimate extinction around 10,000 years ago.

 

It is thought that mammoths died out as they were unable to adapt to the changing world around them as temperatures soared at the end of the last ice age, although some experts believe they may have been hunted to extinction by humans.

The findings have shown that the baby mammoth was in good health and well fed before its death, suggesting that its herd was able to find plenty of food at the time it was alive.

“Mammoths were the largest and most widespread of the many animals that went extinct near the end of the last ice age,” said Dr Dan Fisher, a palaeontologist at the University of Michigan’s Museum of Palaeontology who helped to study the baby mammoth.

“This is the first time we have been able to do a detailed comparison of a mammoth’s tusk and tooth data with soft tissues from the rest of its body.

“Though she is not large, no other specimen preserves this much of the original anatomy. That makes her a remarkable scientific resource.”

After spending 30 years studying mammoths, being able to see and touch one that so closely resembled how it would have looked when it was alive was an overwhelming experience for Dr Fisher. He said: “When I saw her, my first thought was ‘Oh my goodness, she’s perfect. It looked like she’d just drifted off to sleep. Suddenly what I’d been struggling to visualise for so long was lying right there for me to touch.”

 

The frozen remains of the baby mammoth were discovered on a sandbar beside the Yuribey River in May 2007 by a Nenets reindeer herder Yuri Khudi and three of his sons as they tended their herd. When they told the director of a local museum about their discovery it caused a worldwide sensation and officials named the calf Lyuba after Khudi’s wife.

Over the past two years palaeontologists from the US, Russia and Japan have been painstakingly examining the baby mammoth’s body. Their work will be revealed tonight in a National Geographic Channel documentary. While around a dozen other frozen woolly mammoth carcases have been found in Siberia since the first in 1806, none of them have been as complete or as well preserved as this one.

Using the latest medical scanning technology, scientists at Jikei University School of Medicine in Tokyo, Japan, were able to produce the first ever three dimensional scan of a woolly mammoth. It provided new insights into mammoth’s anatomy and also gave clues about the baby’s death. Sediment was found packed inside the baby mammoth’s trunk, blocking the nasal passages, and also in the mouth and windpipe. The experts believe that it may have suffocated to death after becoming trapped in the thick mud that eventually encased the body, where it had gradually pickled and was preserved.

They found the baby mammoth had recently fed, drinking its mothers milk. They also discovered dung inside the baby’s stomach, suggesting an origin of behaviour that is seen in modern elephants today. Baby elephants eat the dung from adults in their herd to provide them with bacteria they will need in their stomachs to digest the grass they will eat in later life. Comparisons with other mammoth specimens have also revealed how the mammoth calves changed as they matured.

The soles of the baby’s feet would have cracked as she aged to provide traction in the snow while fleshy pads behind her toes would have cushioned her steps, essential as fully grown mammoths weighed more than six tons.

Analysis on the milk tusks – the mammoth equivalent milk teeth which provide an almost daily record of the animal’s life history, like rings of a tree – will also help scientists find out what the climate was like at the time and if the mammoths underwent long migrations.

 

Palaeontologists also hope that by comparing the baby mammoth’s DNA with genetic information taken from other mammoth remains, it may be possible to understand what led to the mammoths’ ultimate extinction around 10,000 years ago. The discovery of such a well preserved carcase has also raised hopes that scientists may one day be able to use DNA from the remains to clone a woolly mammoth by inserting genetic information from the frozen body into the egg of a modern elephant.

 

Alexei Tikhonov, from the Russian Academy of Science who also helped to study the baby mammoth, added: “Lyuba is a creature straight out of a fairy tale. When you look at her, it’s hard to understand how she could have stayed in such good condition for nearly 40,000 years.” A baby mammoth unearthed in the permafrost of north-west Siberia could be the best preserved specimen of its type, scientists have said.

The frozen carcass is to be sent to Japan for detailed study.

The six-month-old female calf was discovered on the Yamal peninsula of Russia and is thought to have died 10,000 years ago.

 

The animal’s trunk and eyes are still intact and some of its fur remains on the body. In terms of its state of preservation, this is the world’s most valuable discovery

Alexei Tikhonov, Russian Academy of Sciences

Mammoths are an extinct member of the elephant family. Adults often possessed long, curved tusks and a coat of long hair.

 

The 130cm (4ft 3ins) tall, 50kg Siberian specimen dates to the end of the last Ice Age, when the great beasts were vanishing from the planet.

  

Missing tail

 

Last week, an international delegation of experts convened in the town of Salekhard, near the discovery site, to carry out a preliminary examination of the animal.

 

“The mammoth has no defects except that its tail was bit off,” said Alexei Tikhonov, deputy director of the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences and a member of the delegation.

 

Map, BBC

“In terms of its state of preservation, this is the world’s most valuable discovery,” he said.

 

Larry Agenbroad, director of the Mammoth Site of Hot Springs research centre in South Dakota, US, said: “To find a juvenile mammoth in any condition is extremely rare.” Dr Agenbroad added that he knew of only three other examples.

Some scientists hold out hope that well preserved sperm or other cells containing viable DNA could be used to resurrect the mammoth lineage. Despite the inherent difficulties, Dr Agenbroad remains optimistic about the potential for cloning.

 

“When we got the Jarkov mammoth [found frozen in Taimyr, Siberia, in 1997], the geneticists told me: ‘if you can get us good DNA, we’ll have a baby mammoth for you in 22 months’,” he told BBC News.

 

Lucrative trade

 

That specimen failed to yield DNA of sufficient quality, but some researchers believe it may only be a matter of time until the right find emerges from Siberia.

 

Bringing mammoths back from the dead could take the form of injecting sperm into the egg of a relative, such as the Asian elephant, to try to create a hybrid.

 

Alternatively, scientists could attempt to clone a pure mammoth by fusing the nucleus of a mammoth cell with an elephant egg cell stripped of its DNA. But Dr Agenbroad warned that scientifically valuable Siberian mammoth specimens were being lost to a lucrative trade in ivory, skin, hair and other body parts. The city of Yakutsk in Russia’s far east forms the hub for this trade. Local people are scouring the Siberian permafrost for remains to sell on, and, according to Dr Agenbroad, more carcasses could be falling into the hands of dealers than are finding their way to scientists.

 

Japan transfer

 

“These products are primarily for collectors and it is usually illicit,” he explained.

 

“Originally it was for ivory, now it is everything. You can now go on almost any fossil marketing website and find mammoth hair for $50 an inch. It has grown beyond anyone’s imagination.”

 

Dr Agenbroad added: “Russia says that any mammoth remains are the property of the Russian government, but nobody really pays attention to that.” The Yamal mammoth is expected to be transferred to Jikei University in Tokyo, Japan, later this year.

A team led by Professor Naoki Suzuki will carry out an extensive study of the carcass, including CT scans of its internal organs.

 

Mammoths first appeared in the Pliocene Epoch, 4.8 million years ago.

 

What caused their widespread disappearance at the end of the last Ice Age remains unclear; but climate change, overkill by human hunters, or a combination of both could have been to blame.

 

One population of mammoths lived on in isolation on Russia’s remote Wrangel Island until about 5,000 years ago.

 

Paul.Rincon-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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www.offtheunbeatentrack.com/country-guides/russia/yamal/

 

The lack of roads

 

North of Salekhard there is only tundra, a vast swampy wilderness, and a small number of tiny settlements. The only things capable of year-round travel north up the Yamal Peninsula to these settlements are all-terrain vehicles and helicopters. In summer boats also go up the coast, stopping at Yar-Sale and Novy Port. In winter all-terrain vehicles drive on frozen river surfaces and in summer they go straight through the tundra. They generally do not go further north than Yar-Sale, unless you want to pay a driver to take you somewhere specially. The ones going to Yar-Sale offer seats to passengers but do not run according to a timetable and leave from different places in Salekhard or Yar-Sale. Check the airports in Salekhard or Yar-Sale for notices with all-terrain vehicle drivers’ phone numbers. Public transport helicopters also link Salekhard and the Yamal Peninsula villages a few times a week. To Yar-Sale as of 2012 they run on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. They leave Salekhard at 10:50 and the return journey leaves Yar Sale at 12:45.

 

There is also a freight train running daily up the west coast of the Yamal Peninsula to the Bovanenkovo gas field in the north. It takes 24 hours to get there. They accept passengers too, but there are no villages along this route and reindeer herders obviously stay as far from the gas field as possible. If you knew the exact location of a reindeer-herding encampment it might be possible to get off the train somewhere along its route to meet up with them, but to be honest trekking through the tundra on your own to them is not recommended as in winter it’s cold and in summer it’s full of bears and swamps! Another problem with the freight railway is that to be accepted as a passenger you musr submit copies of your documents to them a month in advance. You need to submit them your passport and border zone permit (see below). To obtain your border zone permit you will have had to submit your visa a minimum of two months in advance. That means you will have had to have your visa ready more than 3 months before your actual trip, which unfortunately some Russian embassies don’t allow.

 

The need for a border zone permit

 

To come to Labytnangi, Salekhard or the Yamal Peninsula you need a special permit completely separate from your Russian visa and invitation letter. You can click this link to use my services to obtain a Yamal permit or, if you speak good Russian, go through the laborious process described below and obtain the permit yourself. If you opt to obtain it yourself be prepared to phone up to check up on them every few weeks and then hassle them to find it when they say they’ve lost your application.

 

To get the Yamal permit yourself you need to phone the Salekhard Border Division on +7 349 224 1553 and get them to send you an application form by fax. They will only send it to a Russian number. Then you need to fill it out in Russian and send it back by fax along with a scanned copy of your passport..

 

When filling out the form you must mention every settlement and region you plan to visit. Saying just Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug is not enough – you have to mention the individual regions and settlements within the okrug.

 

Sometimes the person receiving your application wants certain parts to be completed in English, such as your address, but other times different people want you to translate every word and name into Russian for some reason, so phone them up to make sure everything is to their liking after you send in your application form.

A construction site - slowly, methodically the building comes down.

 

Oku, Tokyo

Panasonic GX8

Leica Summilux 15mm F1.7

I started assembling the frame of the tool cart today. The right side will have five drawers in the front and five drawers in the back, and the left side will have a drawer at the top on both sides and a cabinet in the front and the back. The front cabinet will be deep for the air compressor while the back will be shallow for accessories for the compressor.

 

It's a slow-moving project, but I prefer the slow, methodical, and careful approach. My father taught me to measure twice and cut once, but equally as important I learned to build One board at a time. I know the dimensions of the remaining parts, but I wanted the cabinet to be assembled before cutting and finishing anything else.

 

Now, onto the next part!

 

Theme: Re-Creation

Year Nine Of My 365 Project

 

He had just caught a mouse or a rat...at first it gave me a couple of dirty looks, but after making sure i was not going to take his food away, he proceeded very methodically ... not even the fur was left...

Strobist info: full power shoot-through umbrella from the left and bare flash from the right at half power

 

created with DEEP DREAM TEXT2DREAM - DDG Model DaVinci2

 

Seed Image came from Nightcafe used on Deep Dream, same prompt, different pile.

  

PROMPT:

"wild west surrealism. medium shot. wild bill hickup holding a banana to the head of a little chibi monster. macro. in the styles of otto rapp, emek, and paul cunha. vivid colors, magic realism textures, intricate details. methodical, mixed media collage. elaborate cryptid taxidermy in the background, set in a fantastical, mystical landscape. sunset"

I remembered hearing a talk a few years ago from Indiana bee expert Robert Jean, and was fortunate to find his business card that I picked up at that meeting. I sent him photos and asked if he knew this bee. He says it is "a fairly recent addition to the Indiana bee fauna." It is native to Japan and China. I did not ask if he knew anything about how it got to the U.S.

 

This bee is quite large, being every bit as large as an average bumblebee. However, compared to a bumblebee, its shape is less compactly stout, and more elongate. The head appears large compared to the thorax and abdomen when compared to most typical hymenoptera.

 

In my prairie/meadow planting right now, the available flowering plants are mostly Culver’s root (Veronicastrum virginicum), yellow coneflower (Ratibida pinnata) and rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium). This bee was working over only the Culver’s root. Although I don’t remember seeing this bee in previous years, there were quite a few of them. Their behavior was quite interesting in that they very slowly and methodically worked their way around the entire flowering head of the Culver’s root, seeming to be in no hurry at all related to the duty at hand. I noticed that many other species of bees and bumblebees visiting the flowers had noticeably full pollen baskets, but this bee was carrying no visible pollen.

 

What can I say I was arrested by the F.B.I (Flickr Bureau of Investigation) and thrown in prison for a week.

I was charged with

● Impersonating a proper photographer

● Posting pictures of myself on flickr, which caused distress to others

● Being an obstruction to low flying aircraft due to my height

The FBI have been watching me for a while apparently and using 600mm lenses to stay hidden.

They grew suspicious after looking at my pictures 199,000 times but wondered how I reached over 200,000 views.

Anyway I was interrogated at Flickr headquarters in San Francisco, they wanted to know how I got into Explore without using pictures of nails and nail varnishes, teddies, dolls with button eyes, dolls with large breasts, pictures with bokeh and oof shots.

I didn't crack even after 20 hours of lamps in my face down in the basement so they transferred me to flickr Penitentiary.

They chloroformed me for the 10 minute journey across the road, I woke up a few hours later in my cell but damn that chloroform stuff really makes your bottom hurt.

Flickr Penitentiary was one hell of a scary experience especially as I shared a cell with Mr Big.

Mr Big was great for getting stuff, and I mean the hard stuff, I'm talking about class 10 cards none of this class 4 crap, the read and write times of the class 10 stuff sent me dizzy and on a high helping me to get through this horrible experience.

The Penitentiary was separated into groups I was in the Nikon group called the Nikon Bad boys then there was the Canon group called the 'L' class maulers and it was these two groups who ruled the place.

Another group was formed of smaller groups to make them stronger, they contained Sony, Pentax and Fuji and thanks to their combined numbers they where 10 strong.

Then you had the bridge camera and compact camera group, everyone just felt sorry for them, at night when it was really quiet you could hear them crying themselves to sleep, only if they spent a bit more on a proper camera.

The last group was the film users who were lifers, they had been in there forever.

The film users walked around like mindless zombies talking to pigeons and the walls telling them how digital is the work of the Devil and how you can't beat breathing in the fumes of film chemicals. They also ran the library bringing photography books to our cells on a trolley.

You are probably wondering how I got the scar on my face well I was mopping the corridor along the cells when three Canon users came round the corner and grabbed me.

Two held me down whilst the other one threatened me, he must have been a 5D MKIII owner as he looked like the boss and was very confident, the two apes looked like 550d owners to me, just following orders as they lacked the proper equipment.

Boss man told me to stay out of Explore if I knew what was good for me then slashed my face with what looked like a sharpened class 10 sdhc card attached to a toothbrush.

I was in the infirmary for the rest of the day with a nasty scar for my troubles.

Not long after I was released on bail thanks to my lawer a very famous landscape photographer who really knows what he's talking about, very knowledgeable and methodical.

Thanks to my lawer I also got the the set up used by the FBI for my police mugshot.

 

Taken With

►Nikon D300s

►Nikon 16-85 @45mm

►Tripod + Cable Release

►Elemental Ultra Pro 600 studio lamp with 42 inch Beauty Dish + Honeycomb cover

►2x Jessops 360 AFD flashguns

►Yongnuo RF-602 trigger + receivers

 

I was really impressed with their equipment and how they used it.

The elemental lamp was to the side of the camera and pointing down at my face and set at 1/2 power, the honeycomb cover helped to channel the light at my face.

1x flashgun was placed behind me pointing at the wall and set at 1/4 power.

1X flashgun was placed in the same position as the main lamp but lower down and set at 1/8 power to add light to the mugshot board.

All fired off camera using Yongnuo RF-602 trigger + receivers.

 

Thanks for reading about my experience and press 'L' on your keyboard to view this prisoner on black.

Now I'm out I will try and pop past your streams soon.

 

P.s anyone who reads this, leaves a comment, adds this as a fav, is a contact or just visits out of curiosity is now an accessory to the charges and will be subject to investigation by the FBI.

Perhaps I should have told you that at the begining Doh !

Sinar P

210mm

kodak portra 160 (expired)

 

I've lost count how many films I have processed using the BelliniFoto Monopart C41 kit (actually that's mistake #27/b) It has most certainly gone sour. I noticed a magenta cast to the rolls of film I did last and that should of been a warning sign (#27/c). This and a few other sheets were so thin I could barely see anything.

#28 - don't pull the holder out of the box by the slide as it slips out and exposes the edge to light.

I'm slowly and methodically working my way through these, please bare with me :)

(Photo taken with Lolly Lace & Cielo Capalini, check out their links through here!!)

 

-- As I lean against the TV that told us we had to murder each other I think about what I've done today. The lives I've taken, the blood I've spilled all in the name of entertainment and selfishness of wanting to go home. My "friends" rest for now, giggling to each other as I flick my knife back and forth just waiting. I wait because I know I am next on their list already a ghost in their eyes because I am not one of the crowd. This moment seems like forever as they methodically take their time laughing as their coldly plan. Heartless girls which I know I will perish at the hands of in this Battle Royale; it's comical though...that they call this a game. --

 

______________

Body: Maitreya Mesh Body w/ Bento Hands

 

Head: Catwa Mesh Bento HEAD - Sofia

 

Ears: Swallow Skin and Accessory Second Life Shiny Ears

 

Skin: .Atomic. Gacha // Catwa _Blossom - Sugar 5

 

Eyes: {S0NG} :: Toki~ Hazel Eyes

 

Lashes: Nightmare :: Milka Lashes - Plain

_______________

Hair: [monso] My Hair - Ann (M) - Red Pack

 

Tattoo Appliers: #Izzie's - Cheek Scar & Neck Scar

_______________

Outfit: #dami battle rayale gacha B1 maitreya

 

VALE KOER TECHNICAL BACKPACK - Jungle

 

#vaak Butterfly Knife (Scripted, moving)

 

Shoes: Glitzz Melanie Stockings - Solid White - Maitreya

_______________

Props: 3. :BAMSE: Sharpshooter - Military Case (all BAMSE Sharshooter items) @The Arcade Gacha Events

 

14. #BAMSE Sharpshooter - Ammo Box

 

4. :BAMSE: Sharpshooter - Sidearm

 

:BAMSE: Underground HQ - Radio (MP Purchase)

 

DUTY DUFFEL BAG - OLIVE (MP Purchase)

With so few flowers in bloom at this time, I had to really be on the lookout for Hummers. The foraging Hummers also have to be on the lookout for any blooming plant.This lady was methodically sampling all of these red blooms on an ornamental shrub in my daughter's back yard. I saw only a few flying Hummers species (mostly female Anna's and Costa's). These ladies are segregated from each other for IDs mainly on their bill shapes. This bill is said to be more curved... but there is overlap.

 

IMG_9875; Costa's Hummingbird

Gandhara is the name given to an ancient region or province invaded in 326 B.C. by Alexander the Great, who took Charsadda (ancient Puskalavati) near present-day Peshawar (ancient Purusapura) and then marched eastward across the Indus into the Punjab as far as the Beas river (ancient Vipasa). Gandhara constituted the undulating plains, irrigated by the Kabul River from the Khyber Pass area, the contemporary boundary between Pakistan and Afganistan, down to the Indus River and southward towards the Murree hills and Taxila (ancient Taksasila), near Pakistan"s present capital, Islamabad. Its art, however, during the first centuries of the Christian era, had adopted a substantially larger area, together with the upper stretches of the Kabul River, the valley of Kabul itself, and ancient Kapisa, as well as Swat and Buner towards the north.

   

A great deal of Gandhara sculptures has survived dating from the first to probably as late as the sixth or even the seventh century but in a remarkably homogeneous style. Most of the arts were almost always in a blue-gray mica schist, though sometimes in a green phyllite or in stucco, or very rarely in terracotta. Because of the appeal of its Western classical aesthetic for the British rulers of India, schooled to admire all things Greek and Roman, a great deal found its way into private hands or the shelter of museums.

  

Gandhara sculpture primarily comprised Buddhist monastic establishments. These monasteries provided a never-ending gallery for sculptured reliefs of the Buddha and Bodhisattvas. The Gandhara stupas were comparatively magnified and more intricate, but the most remarkable feature, which distinguished the Gandhara stupas from the pervious styles were hugely tiered umbrellas at its peak, almost soaring over the total structure. The abundance of Gandharan sculpture was an art, which originated with foreign artisans.

  

In the excavation among the varied miscellany of small bronze figures, though not often like Alexandrian imports, four or five Buddhist bronzes are very late in date. These further illustrate the aura of the Gandhara art. Relics of mural paintings though have been discovered, yet the only substantial body of painting, in Bamiyan, is moderately late, and much of it belongs to an Iranian or central Asian rather than an Indian context. Non-narrative themes and architectural ornament were omnipresent at that time. Mythical figures and animals such as atlantes, tritons, dragons, and sea serpents derive from the same source, although there is the occasional high-backed, stylized creature associated with the Central Asian animal style. Moldings and cornices are decorated mostly with acanthus, laurel, and vine, though sometimes with motifs of Indian, and occasionally ultimately western Asian, origin: stepped merlons, lion heads, vedikas, and lotus petals. It is worth noting that architectural elements such as pillars, gable ends, and domes as represented in the reliefs tend to follow the Indian forms

.

 

Gandhara became roughly a Holy Land of Buddhism and excluding a handful of Hindu images, sculpture took the form either of Buddhist sect objects, Buddha and Bodhisattvas, or of architectural embellishment for Buddhist monasteries. The more metaphorical kinds are demonstrated by small votive stupas, and bases teeming with stucco images and figurines that have lasted at Jaulian and Mora Moradu, outpost monasteries in the hills around Taxila. Hadda, near the present town of Jalalabad, has created some groups in stucco of an almost rococo while more latest works of art in baked clay, with strong Hellenistic influence, have been revealed there, in what sums up as tiny chapels. It is not known exactly why stucco, an imported Alexandrian modus operandi, was used. It is true that grey schist is not found near Taxila, however other stones are available, and in opposition to the ease of operating with stucco, predominantly the artistic effects which can be achieved, must be set with its impermanence- fresh deposits frequently had to be applied. Excluding possibly at Taxila, its use emerges to have been a late expansion.

  

Architectural fundamentals of the Gandhara art, like pillars, gable ends and domes as showcased in the reliefs, were inclined to follow Indian outlines, but the pilaster with capital of Corinthian type, abounds and in one-palace scene Persepolitan columns go along with Roman coffered ceilings. The so-called Shrine of the Double-Headed Eagle at Sirkap, in actuality a stupa pedestal, well demonstrates this enlightening eclecticism- the double-headed bird on top of the chaitya arch is an insignia of Scythian origin, which appears as a Byzantine motif and materialises much later in South India as the ga1J.qa-bheru1J.qa in addition to atop European armorial bearings.

 

In Gandhara art the descriptive friezes were all but invariably Buddhist, and hence Indian in substance- one depicted a horse on wheels nearing a doorway, which might have represented the Trojan horse affair, but this is under scan. The Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, familiar from the previous Greek-based coinage of the region, appeared once or twice as standing figurines, presumably because as a pair, they tallied an Indian mithuna couple. There were also female statuettes, corresponding to city goddesses. Though figures from Butkara, near Saidan Sharif in Swat, were noticeably more Indian in physical type, and Indian motifs were in abundance there. Sculpture was, in the main, Hellenistic or Roman, and the art of Gandhara was indeed "the easternmost appearance of the art of the Roman Empire, especially in its late and provincial manifestations". Furthermore, naturalistic portrait heads, one of the high-points of Roman sculpture, were all but missing in Gandhara, in spite of the episodic separated head, probably that of a donor, with a discernible feeling of uniqueness. Some constitutions and poses matched those from western Asia and the Roman world; like the manner in which a figure in a recurrently instanced scene from the Dipankara jataka had prostrated himself before the future Buddha, is reverberated in the pose of the defeated before the defeater on a Trojanic frieze on the Arch of Constantine and in later illustrations of the admiration of the divinised emperor. One singular recurrently occurring muscular male figure, hand on sword, witnessed in three-quarters view from the backside, has been adopted from western classical sculpture. On occasions standing figures, even the Buddha, deceived the elusive stylistic actions of the Roman sculptor, seeking to express majestas. The drapery was fundamentally Western- the folds and volume of dangling garments were carved with realness and gusto- but it was mainly the persistent endeavours at illusionism, though frequently obscured by unrefined carving, which earmarked the Gandhara sculpture as based on a western classical visual impact.

  

The distinguishing Gandhara sculpture, of which hundreds if not thousands of instances have outlived, is the standing or seated Buddha. This flawlessly reproduces the necessary nature of Gandhara art, in which a religious and an artistic constituent, drawn from widely varied cultures have been bonded. The iconography is purely Indian. The seated Buddha is mostly cross-legged in the established Indian manner. However, forthcoming generations, habituated to think of the Buddha as a monk, and unable to picture him ever possessing long hair or donning a turban, came to deduce the chigon as a "cranial protuberance", singular to Buddha. But Buddha is never depicted with a shaved head, as are the Sangha, the monks; his short hair is clothed either in waves or in taut curls over his whole head. The extended ears are merely due to the downward thrust of the heavy ear-rings worn by a prince or magnate; the distortion of the ear-lobes is especially visible in Buddha, who, in Gandhara, never wore ear-rings or ornaments of any kind. As Foucher puts it, the Gandhara Buddha is at a time a monk without shaving and a prince stripped off jewellery.

  

The western classical factor rests in the style, in the handling of the robe, and in the physiognomy of Buddha. The cloak, which covers all but the appendages (though the right shoulder is often bared), is dealt like in Greek and Roman sculptures; the heavy folds are given a plastic flair of their own, and only in poorer or later works do they deteriorate into indented lines, fairly a return to standard Indian practice. The "western" treatment has caused Buddha"s garment to be misidentified for a toga; but a toga is semicircular, while, Buddha wore a basic, rectangular piece of cloth, i.e., the samghiifi, a monk"s upper garment. The head gradually swerves towards a hieratic stylisation, but at its best, it is naturalistic and almost positively based on the Greek Apollo, undoubtedly in Hellenistic or Roman copies.

 

Gandhara art also had developed at least two species of image, i.e. not part of the frieze, in which Buddha is the fundamental figure of an event in his life, distinguished by accompanying figures and a detailed mise-en-scene. Perhaps the most remarkable amongst these is the Visit to the Indrasala Cave, of which the supreme example is dated in the year 89, almost unquestionably of the Kanishka period. Indra and his harpist are depicted on their visit in it. The small statuettes of the visitors emerge below, an elephant describing Indra. The more general among these detailed images, of which approximately 30 instances are known, is presumably related with the Great Miracle of Sravasti. In one such example, one of the adjoining Bodhisattvas is distinguished as Avalokiteshwara by the tiny seated Buddha in his headgear. Other features of these images include the unreal species of tree above Buddha, the spiky lotus upon which he sits, and the effortlessly identifiable figurines of Indra and Brahma on both sides.

  

Another important aspect of the Gandhara art was the coins of the Graeco-Bactrians. The coins of the Graeco-Bactrians - on the Greek metrological standard, equals the finest Attic examples and of the Indo-Greek kings, which have until lately served as the only instances of Greek art found in the subcontinent. The legendary silver double decadrachmas of Amyntas, possibly a remembrance issue, are the biggest "Greek" coins ever minted, the largest cast in gold, is the exceptional decadrachma of the same king in the Bibliotheque Nationale, with the Dioscuri on the inverse. Otherwise, there was scanty evidence until recently of Greek or Hellenistic influences in Gandhara. A manifestation of Greek metropolitan planning is furnished by the rectilinear layouts of two cities of the 1st centuries B.C./A.D.--Sirkap at Taxila and Shaikhan Pheri at Charsadda. Remains of the temple at Jandial, also at Taxila and presumably dating back to 1st century B.C., also includes Greek characteristics- remarkably the huge base mouldings and the Ionic capitals of the colossal portico and antechamber columns. In contrast, the columns or pilasters on the immeasurable Gandhara friezes (when they are not in a Indian style), are consistently coronated by Indo-Corinthian capitals, the local version of the Corinthian capital- a certain sign of a comparatively later date.

 

The notable Begram hoard confirms articulately to the number and multiplicity of origin of the foreign artefacts imported into Gandhara. This further illustrates the foreign influence in the Gandhara art. Parallel hoards have been found in peninsular India, especially in Kolhapur in Maharashtra, but the imported wares are sternly from the Roman world. At Begram the ancient Kapisa, near Kabul, there are bronzes, possibly of Alexandrian manufacture, in close proximity with emblemata (plaster discs, certainly meant as moulds for local silversmiths), bearing reliefs in the purest classical vein, Chinese lacquers and Roman glass. The hoard was possibly sealed in mid-3rd century, when some of the subjects may have been approximately 200 years old "antiques", frequently themselves replicates of classical Greek objects. The plentiful ivories, consisting in the central of chest and throne facings, engraved in a number of varied relief techniques, were credibly developed somewhere between Mathura and coastal Andhra. Some are of unrivalled beauty. Even though a few secluded instances of early Indian ivory carving have outlived, including the legendary mirror handle from Pompeii, the Begram ivories are the only substantial collection known until moderately in present times of what must always have been a widespread craft. Other sites, particularly Taxila, have generated great many instances of such imports, some from India, some, like the appealing tiny bronze figure of Harpocrates, undoubtedly from Alexandria. Further cultural influences are authenticated by the Scytho Sarmatian jewellery, with its characteristic high-backed carnivores, and by a statue of St. Peter. But all this should not cloud the all-important truth that the immediately identifiable Gandhara style was the prevailing form of artistic manifestation throughout the expanse for several centuries, and the magnitude of its influence on the art of central Asia and China and as far as Japan, allows no doubt about its integrity and vitality.

 

In the Gandhara art early Buddhist iconography drew heavily on traditional sources, incorporating Hindu gods and goddesses into a Buddhist pantheon and adapting old folk tales to Buddhist religious purposes. Kubera and Harm are probably the best-known examples of this process.

  

Five dated idols from Gandhara art though exist, however the hitch remains that the era is never distinguished. The dates are in figures under 100 or else in 300s. Moreover one of the higher numbers are debatable, besides, the image upon which it is engraved is not in the conventional Andhra style. The two low-number-dated idols are the most sophisticated and the least injured. Their pattern is classical Gandhara. The most undemanding rendition of their dates relates them to Kanishka and 78 A.D. is assumed as the commencement of his era. They both fall in the second half of the 2nd century A.D. and equally later, if a later date is necessitated for the beginning of Kanishka`s time. This calculation nearly parallels numismatics and archaeological evidences. The application of other eras, like the Vikrama (base date- 58 B.C.) and the Saka (base date- 78 A.D.), would place them much later. The badly battered figurines portray standing Buddhas, without a head of its own, but both on original figured plinths. They come to view as depicting the classical Gandhara style; decision regarding where to place these two dated Buddhas, both standing, must remain knotty till more evidence comes out as to how late the classical Gandhara panache had continued.

   

Methodical study of the Gandhara art, and specifically about its origins and expansion, is befuddled with numerous problems, not at least of which is the inordinately complex history and culture of the province. It is one of the great ethnical crossroads of the world simultaneously being in the path of all the intrusions of India for over three millennia. Bussagli has rightly remarked, `More than any other Indian region, Gandhara was a participant in the political and cultural events that concerned the rest of the Asian continent`.

   

However, Systematic study of the art of Gandhara, and particularly of its origins and development, is bedeviled by many problems, not the least of which is the extraordinarily complex history and culture of the region.

   

In spite of the labours of many scholars over the past hundred and fifty years, the answers to some of the most important questions, such as the number of centuries spanned by the art of Gandhara, still await, fresh archaeological, inscriptional, or numismatic evidence.

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandhara

 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gautama_Buddha

 

When I first started getting more serious about my photography I used to be in awe of those photographers that could go out and reel off a few hundred shots in a day. In fact I used to be so in awe that I would try and emulate them.

 

Truth is though it was a struggle. Even when I tried I still couldn't match their shot counts and in trying to do so I usually came away unsatisfied with the results. In the end I was focusing on getting x amount of shots instead of focusing on getting shots I was happy with.

 

And so it was that I went back to just doing what I do. I still envied those that could reel off a whole bunch of shots quickly but I came to realise that my process, the one that got me results, was to be slow and methodical about what, where and how I shoot.

 

Whether a professional or amateur I'm convinced you've got to find a process that works for you and the type of person you are. Going against your nature and instincts will only degrade the quality of your work.

 

Cheers, Chris

09/08/09

 

This is markfieldingpic's older brother and his fiancée, they're getting married in a a couple of weeks and Mark and I have been asked to take the photos at the wedding.

They wanted to do a little session before the wedding but and as Mark resides in Japan (and isn't back yet), it was more convenient for me to pop round than him.

 

This is one of the shots from that session. It was very interesting doing my first "real" photo session where there are given objectives to be achieved within a reasonable time-scale. I tend to fiddle about with my self portraits and other shots, flitting from one idea to another without any structure. Within a couple of minutes it became apparent that this "couple portrait malarkey" is a whole different ball game... and my disorganised eccentricity needs to be replaced with a confident methodical calm.

 

I'm fairly happy with the output and I hope they will be too! I chose this picture for my 365 as more of a reminder to make sure take more care in future. This picture could have been one of the better shots. their expressions are relaxed and natural, and basically they, as subjects, have done their part perfectly. On the other hand I'm still shooting at 200mm@f2.8, at this distance (2.5m/ 8feet) this gives me a depth of field of about 1.5cm (circa 1/2") Which means that as her head is slightly in front of his, her face is slightly out of focus. Not a problem on the web at these resolutions, but printed at A3 size (the size one of these shots will be printed out at) its going to fairly obvious that I've not got it right!

 

The main objective of my 365 was "to become a better photographer" and whilst I realise what's wrong with this shot, I need to apply that knowledge before I press the shutter, not in post processing. I'm probably being very harsh, but I find that I need to be my biggest critic. Plus most people on Flickr are genuinely nice people and tend to refrain from pointing out mistakes like this for fear of offending. So if anyone else feels like diving in with some more critique please feel free ;)

 

Fortunately a good chunk of the other shots came out "ok" so it wasn't a disaster of epic proportions! The moral here is whilst I might have spent a chunk of hard earned cash on a fast lens I sometimes need to stop it down a bit more!

 

Lightroom: start with direct positive preset then lots of tweaking, use the brush tool to give their eyes a little more sparkle, crop to square (probably not the best crop for this pic but I have a square thing going on at the moment and I didn't want to break the trend!) sharpen (aggressively to try and cover up the focus...doh!) save to JPG

 

atelier ying, nyc

 

Wodehouse like Ozu was a methodical, hard working reviser and editor of his own work. Like Ian Fleming he also started out working at a bank. Both were also avid golfers. Like Furtwangler and Edward the Duke of Winsor, politics was not his thing and in fact, his downfall. And like Ozu and Fleming, Wodehouse has created his own world to inhabit.

 

An unfortunate bitterness occurred between Wodehouse and A. A. Milne over Wodehouse's imprisonment during WWII. This design is meant to symbolically reconcile the feud between Wodehouse and Milne and the great conflict of his life.

 

Wodehouse the avid golfer has humorously referred to his mailing address as the 6th bunker at the Addington Golf course. The golf bunker is an apt metaphor not only as a trap for any golfer who has overdone his game but also a metaphor for the depths of life's sorrows as well as the dark depths of a camera's interior (Particularly on Scottish golf courses) This 6th bunker with a bridge is detailed in the camera viewfinder as a 3-D internal view.

 

The architecture of heights is the polar opposite. It is an architecture of pleasure. For this we site the camera-as-architectural-structure (a leaning obelisk) high up in the air, a metaphor of surmounting life's problems, by locating it high up in Milne's legendary Hundred-Acre Woods.

 

A large gnarly olive tree (a symbol of forgiveness) offers the enclosure for the camera which is itself made from Jerusalem wood. Wodehouse's Jeeves brings along accoutrements to serve the animals in Pooh's world. The club-conscious Bertie Wooster fits well with the animal community.

Surrounded by the tranquility of the woods, Jeeves and Bertie help maintain it as forest rangers or gardeners via the lookout of this camera treehouse which is oriented to focus on some of the Hundred-Acte Wood's more prominent "Kodak Moments" such as Owl's tree, Kanga's house, the Bee tree, Piglet's house with its famous wooden sign, Eeyore's gloomy place and of course, Pooh bear's treehouse. In reciprocation, the pair are allowed to use the woods as a 9-hole executive golf course, this extending the golf theme to this end of the camera.

 

Technically speaking, three vintage cameras are hidden the tree sculpture which itself is installed in the ant hill-like structure (the obelisk, or just a rocky eagle's nest).

 

The sheathed antique cameras peer onto their subjects (by virtue of their three different focal lengths) within relative anonymity (a muted metaphor for the humble nature of A.A. Milne's animal characters) while the photographer is given a full unhidden birds-eye view of the forest by climbing a stairs which begin in the dark ground level and gradually opens as one reaches the top where the contrast (of hiddenness and openness) is experienced the most. My design notes are still partial but this is the basic thematic layout.

 

In the wonderful book, "Origins of Architectural Pleasure" the author uses the term 'prospect' to gauge the quality of siting that brings the scene to the viewer. He further employs the term refuge to fall back to seclusion. Much of my viewfinder designs certainly agree with this author's concepts. Finally, my Wodehouse design is a sunny idyllic one. Wodehouse himself mentioned that there are two kinds of novels to write: Ones that are very real to life and those in which you throw all caution to the winds, heeding no one's advice and following no one else's trends, and creating a world that is only idyllic. Fortunately, camera designs can veer in either direction, but for this design we stay idyllic.

 

Design, text and drawing are copyright 2013 by David Lo.

 

Hildr.

Christina DC.

NikonD60.

Catacombs, Montparnasse, Paris

 

I decided that today was a day for going underground, and I set off to Montparnasse to visit the catacombs. These are a vast maze of tunnels under Paris originally used for quarrying the stone out of which the city's main buildings are constructed. In the late 18th Century, the state of the city's churchyards had become so disgusting that the city removed the bones from all of them. They were brought here at night, the carts coming from the centre of the city accompanied by torch-bearing acolytes and priests chanting the requiem Mass. A skull count showed that almost six million corpses were removed in this way. They were buried deep underground, but these people being Parisians the skulls and bones were arranged in a neat and methodical way, a meaningful chaos. Layers of tibia and femurs are crowned by a layer of pelvises and skulls, and so on. Each churchyard was grouped together, and a plaque shows which parish provided the skeletons.

 

The work was interrupted by the French Revolution,which provided plenty more corpses for when the work was resumed. Altogether about a kilometre and a half of tunnels were filled with the remains of dead Parisians, and you can walk through them on a winding route under the streets around Montparnasse station. In fact, this is just a tiny fraction of the tunnels. The catacombs extend for hundreds of kilometres under the city, many of them rarely explored and difficult of access. Because of this, they are regularly broken into by intrepid adventurers, and many legends have grown up about parts of the network. However, my favourite story is one which is true.

 

In 2004, a group of police cadets on a training exercise were given the task of tracking an imaginary criminal in a part of the network which was little known. They got into the system through a manhole, and when they were about a hundred feet underground something rather odd happened. They triggered a motion sensor which set off the sound of barking dogs. Thinking that it was part of the exercise, they headed onwards only to come out into a vast cavern which had been fully equipped as a cinema. An anteroom had been equipped and fully stocked as a bar, and there was also a film storage room. When the cadets reported what they had seen, the electricity board were sent in to work out where the invaders were getting their electricity from. Instead, they found the wires all cut, the equipment removed, and a sign saying 'Don't try to follow us. You'll never find us.'

 

Perhaps the cineastes had got fed up with waiting to get into the system officially, because this was the only place all week that I encountered a serious queue. Worse, I was just in front of a small group of people who talked constantly in very loud voices. She was an American who obviously lived in Paris, and they appeared to be young relatives who'd come to stay. She was taking them down the catacombs, and the price to be paid for this by the poor kids was to suffer her pretentious nonsense. She went on about spirituality, and homeopathy, and psychoanalysis, and the inner energy, and so on. Fair play to the kids, they responded enthusiastically enough.

 

And then she got out some of her stream of consciousness poetry, and started reading it in a loud voice. Well, goodness me. I was put in mind of something the graphic artist Alan Moore said when he was in Hollywood helping turn his 'V for Vendetta' into a film, and he was asked at a director's lunch why he lived in Northampton, England. "Because it keeps me grounded", he replied, and I thought that this was exactly right. It was like the opposite of this pompous woman, although to be fair to her I expect that if I went to live in Paris I would also disappear up my own backside.

 

The catacombs are brilliant, worth every minute of the queuing time, worth every insufferable stream of consciousness adjective. And then I went and did some shopping.

 

You can read my account of my travels at pariswander.blogspot.co.uk.

Primer testimonio de Teotihuacán cuando ya estaba abandonado:

 

Cuando aún era de noche,

cuando aún no había día,

cuando aún no había luz,

se reunieron,

se convocaron los dioses

allá en Teotihuacán.

Dijeron,

hablaron entre sí:

― «¡Venid acá, oh, dioses!

«¿Quién tomará sobre sí,

«quién se hará cargo

«de que haya día,

«de que haya luz?»

 

HISTORY AS A MANIFESTO

While Olmec civilization was headed for extinction, in central Mexico Teotihuacan was growing. It's power was trade. It had access to obsidian, a dark green volcanic glass found on mountains – a material that could be cut and pierced. And Teotihuacan produced and traded highly polished ceramic figures. With no horses or wheeled transport, it took traders months of walking to cross Teotihuacan's area of influence. It tied together its trading region with relay points and regional distributors, and these settlements became cities. Teotihuacan's culture spread with its goods, north into what is now the United States and south into what today is Guatemala.

 

In becoming a state power, Teotihuacan formalized its religion. It had numerous temples, and two pyramids faced with stone dedicated to the sun and moon. Its main god was Quetzalcoatl, a feathered snake god of fertility. Amid its religious monuments it had stone carvings depicting people in song and at play amid gardens, streams and fountains.

(Source: www.fsmitha.com/h1/ch29am.htm)

 

It is clear then that Teotihuacan was great culture and though it has been said that it disappeared because an invasion “it is now known that the destruction was centered on major civic structures along the Avenue of the Dead. Some statues seem to have been destroyed in a methodical way, with their fragments dispersed.” (Source: Wikipedia)

 

Therefore the duty of historians is to know what was the real cause because this is the only way to understand human nature and if we are to work for a better world this implies to reach a full and deep knowledge of how mankind adapts to every new human phase. Today we do not grasp what is coming in any facet, say, technology, religion, water nd so on, so to make a better world for all is a must.

 

Give peace a chance

 

The Great Egret also known as Common Egret, Large Egret or Great White Heron, is a large, widely distributed egret. Distributed across most of the tropical and warmer temperate regions of the world, in southern Europe it is rather localized. In North America it is more widely distributed, and it is ubiquitous across the Sun Belt of the United States and in the Neotropics. The Old World population is often referred to as the Great White Egret. This species is sometimes confused with the Great White Heron of the Caribbean which is a white morph of the closely related Great Blue Heron.

 

The Great Egret is a large heron with all-white plumage. Standing up to 3.3 ft tall it is only slightly smaller than the Great Blue or Grey Heron. Apart from size, the Great Egret can be distinguished from other white egrets by its yellow bill and black legs and feet, though the bill may become darker and the lower legs lighter in the breeding season. In breeding plumage, delicate ornamental feathers are borne on the back. Males and females are identical in appearance; juveniles look like non-breeding adults. It has a slow flight, with its neck retracted. This is characteristic of herons and bitterns and distinguishes them from storks, cranes, ibises and spoonbills, which extend their necks in flight.

 

The Great Egret is generally a very successful species with a large and expanding range. In North America large numbers of Great Egrets were killed around the end of the 19th century so that their plumes could be used to decorate hats. Numbers have since recovered as a result of conservation measures. Its range has expanded as far north as southern Canada. However, in some parts of the southern United States its numbers have declined due to habitat loss. Nevertheless, it adapts well to human habitation and can be readily seen near wetlands and bodies of water in urban and suburban areas. In 1953, the Great Egret in flight was chosen as the symbol of the National Audubon Society which was formed in part to prevent the killing of birds for their feathers ~ Delray Beach, Florida ~ Florida Wetlands

  

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Egret

 

John Lennon - "Free as a Bird!": www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZClS79egCM

 

Schweiz / Berner Oberland - Höhenwanderung Schynige Platte - First

 

View back. In the background you can see the Jungfrau.

 

Rückblick. Im Hintergrund sieht man die Jungfrau.

 

High altitude hike Schynige Platte - First

 

Six pearls in six hours: The mountain hike from Schynige Platte to First (or vice versa) must be done once in a lifetime. The first two pearls stand out at the end of the Schynige Platte railway: The flora on the Matten is nearly as diverse as the flowers in the Alpine Garden. After the Loucherhorn, you will encounter pearl number three, the wild karstic landscape in the Güw area. Pearl four, the Sägistalsee, sparkles far below. The largest pearl, however, awaits on the Faulhorn. The view from up there offers everything: Lake Brienz on one side, the overwhelming backdrop of the Jungfrau massif on the other. And further down is pearl six, the Bachalpsee, the "blue jewel" of the Bernese Alps.

 

Approximate hike duration: 6 hours

 

(jungfraujoch.ch)

 

The Jungfrau (YOONG-frow[c], German pronunciation: [ˈjʊŋˌfʁaʊ̯], transl. "maiden, virgin"), at 4,158 meters (13,642 ft) is one of the main summits of the Bernese Alps, located between the northern canton of Bern and the southern canton of Valais, halfway between Interlaken and Fiesch. Together with the Eiger and Mönch, the Jungfrau forms a massive wall of mountains overlooking the Bernese Oberland and the Swiss Plateau, one of the most distinctive sights of the Swiss Alps.

 

The summit was first reached on August 3, 1811, by the Meyer brothers of Aarau and two chamois hunters from Valais. The ascent followed a long expedition over the glaciers and high passes of the Bernese Alps. It was not until 1865 that a more direct route on the northern side was opened.

 

The construction of the Jungfrau Railway in the early 20th century, which connects Kleine Scheidegg to the Jungfraujoch, the saddle between the Mönch and the Jungfrau, made the area one of the most-visited places in the Alps. Along with the Aletsch Glacier to the south, the Jungfrau is part of the Jungfrau-Aletsch area, which was declared a World Heritage Site in 2001.

 

Etymology

 

The name Jungfrau ("maiden, virgin"), which refers to the highest of the three prominent mountains overlooking the Interlaken region, along with the Mönch ("monk") and the Eiger ("ogre"), is most likely derived from the name Jungfrauenberg given to Wengernalp, the alpine meadow directly facing the huge northern side of the Jungfrau, across the Trummelbach gorge. Wengernalp was so named for the nuns of Interlaken Monastery, its historical owner. Contrary to popular belief, the name did not originate from the appearance of the snow-covered mountain, the latter looking like a veiled woman.

 

The "virgin" peak was heavily romanticized as "goddess" or "priestess" in late 18th to 19th century Romanticism. Its summit, considered inaccessible, remained untouched until the 19th century. After the first ascent in 1811 by Swiss alpinist Johann Rudolf Meyer, the peak was jokingly referred to as "Mme Meyer" (Mrs. Meyer).

 

Geographic setting

 

Politically, the Jungfrau (and its massif) is split between the municipalities of Lauterbrunnen (Bern) and Fieschertal (Valais). It is the third-highest mountain of the Bernese Alps after the nearby Finsteraarhorn and Aletschhorn, respectively 12 and 8 km (7.5 and 5 mi) away. But from Lake Thun, and the greater part of the canton of Bern, it is the most conspicuous and the nearest of the Bernese Oberland peaks; with a height difference of 3,600 m (11,800 ft) between the summit and the town of Interlaken. This, and the extreme steepness of the north face, secured for it an early reputation for inaccessibility.

 

The Jungfrau is the westernmost and highest point of a gigantic 10 km (6.2 mi) wall dominating the valleys of Lauterbrunnen and Grindelwald. The wall is formed by the alignment of some of the biggest north faces in the Alps, with the Mönch (4,107 m or 13,474 ft) and Eiger (3,967 m or 13,015 ft) to the east of the Jungfrau, and overlooks the valleys to its north by a height of up to 3 km (1.9 mi). The Jungfrau is approximately 6 km (3.7 mi) from the Eiger; with the summit of the Mönch between the two mountains, 3.5 km (2.2 mi) from the Jungfrau. The Jungfraujoch is the saddle between the Jungfrau and the Mönch and the Eigerjoch is the saddle between the Mönch and the Eiger. The wall is extended to the east by the Fiescherwand and to the west by the Lauterbrunnen Wall, although it follows different directions from the Jungfrau and the Eiger.

 

The difference of altitude between the deep valley of Lauterbrunnen (800 m or 2,600 ft) and the summit is particularly visible from the area of Mürren. From the valley floor, west of the massif, the altitude gain is more than 3 km (1.9 mi) for a horizontal distance of 4 km (2.5 mi).

 

The landscapes around the Jungfrau are extremely contrasted. In contrast to the vertiginous precipices of its northwest, the mountain's southeastern side emerges from the upper snows of the Jungfraufirn, one of the main feeders of the Aletsch Glacier, at around 3,500 meters (11,500 ft). The 20-kilometer-long (12 mi) valley of Aletsch on the southeast is completely uninhabited, and is surrounded by neighboring valleys with similar landscapes. The area as a whole constitutes the largest glaciated area not just in the Alps, but in Europe as well.

 

Climbing history

 

In 1811, the brothers Johann Rudolf (1768–1825) and Hieronymus Meyer, sons of Johann Rudolf Meyer (1739–1813), the head of a rich merchant family of Aarau, along with several servants and a porter picked up at Guttannen, first reached the Valais by way of the Grimsel, and crossed the Beich Pass, a glacier pass over the Oberaletsch Glacier, to the head of the Lötschen valley. There, they added two local chamois hunters, Alois Volken and Joseph Bortis, to their party and traversed the Lötschenlücke before reaching the Aletschfirn (the west branch of the Aletsch Glacier), where they established the base camp, north of the Aletschhorn. After the Guttannen porter was sent back alone over the Lötschenlücke, the party finally reached the summit of the Jungfrau by the Rottalsattel on August 3. They then recrossed the two passes named to their point of departure in Valais, and went home again over the Grimsel.

 

The journey was a most extraordinary one for the time, and some persons threw doubts at its complete success. To settle these, another expedition was undertaken in 1812. In this the two sons, Rudolf (1791–1833) and Gottlieb (1793–1829), of Johann Rudolf Meyer, played the chief parts. After an unsuccessful attempt, defeated by bad weather, in the course of which the Oberaarjoch was crossed twice (this route being much more direct than the long detour through the Lötschental), Rudolf, with the two Valais hunters (Alois Volker and Joseph Bortis), a Guttannen porter named Arnold Abbühl, and a Hasle man, bivouacked on a depression on the southeast ridge of the Finsteraarhorn. Next day (August 16) the whole party attempted the ascent of the Finsteraarhorn from the Studer névé on the east by way of the southeast ridge, but Meyer, exhausted, remained behind. The following day the party crossed the Grünhornlücke to the Aletsch Glacier, but bad weather then put an end to further projects. At a bivouac, probably just opposite the present Konkordia Hut, the rest of the party, having come over the Oberaarjoch and the Grünhornlücke, joined the Finsteraarhorn party. Gottlieb, Rudolf's younger brother, had more patience than the rest and remained longer at the huts near the Märjelensee, where the adventurers had taken refuge. He could make the second ascent (September 3) of the Jungfrau, the Rottalsattel being reached from the east side as is now usual, and his companions being the two Valais hunters.

 

The third ascent dates from 1828, when several men from Grindelwald, headed by Peter Baumann, planted their flag upon the summit. Next came the ascent by Louis Agassiz, James David Forbes, Heath, Desor, and Duchatelier in 1841, recounted by Desor in his Excursions et Séjours dans les Glaciers. Gottlieb Samuel Studer published an account of the next ascent made by himself and Bürki in 1842.

 

In 1863, a party consisting of three young Oxford University graduates and three Swiss guides successfully reached the summit and returned to the base camp of the Faulberg (located near the present position of the Konkordia Hut) in less than 11 hours (see the section below, The 1863 Ascent). In the same year Mrs Stephen Winkworth became the first woman to climb the Jungfrau. She also slept overnight in the Faulberg cave prior to the ascent as there was no hut at that time.

 

Before the construction of the Jungfraujoch railway tunnel, the approach from the glaciers on the south side was very long. The first direct route from the valley of Lauterbrunnen was opened in 1865 by Geoffrey Winthrop Young, H. Brooke George with the guide Christian Almer. They had to carry ladders with them in order to cross the many crevasses on the north flank. Having spent the night on the rocks of the Schneehorn (3,402 m or 11,161 ft) they gained next morning the Silberlücke, the depression between the Jungfrau and Silberhorn, and thence in little more than three hours reached the summit. Descending to the Aletsch Glacier they crossed the Mönchsjoch, and passed a second night on the rocks, reaching Grindelwald next day. This route became a usual until the opening of the Jungfraujoch.

 

The first winter ascent was made on 23 January 1874, by Meta Brevoort and W. A. B. Coolidge with guides Christian and Ulrich Almer. They used a sled to reach the upper Aletsch Glacier, and were accompanied by Miss Brevoort's favorite dog, Tschingel.

 

The Jungfrau was climbed via the west side for the first time in 1885 by Fritz and Heinrich von Allmen, Ulrich Brunner, Fritz Graf, Karl Schlunegger and Johann Stäger—all from Wengen. They ascended the Rottal ridge (Innere Rottalgrat) and reached the summit on 21 September. The more difficult and dangerous northeast ridge that connects the summit from the Jungfraujoch was first climbed on 30 July 1911 by Albert Weber and Hans Schlunegger.

 

In July 2007, six Swiss Army recruits, part of the Mountain Specialists Division 1, died in an accident on the normal route. Although the causes of the deaths was not immediately clear, a report by the Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research concluded that the avalanche risk was unusually high due to recent snowfall, and that there was "no other reasonable explanation" other than an avalanche for the incident.

 

The 1863 Ascent

 

The Führerbuch of the Alpine guide Peter Baumann records an ascent of the Jungfrau made by himself with three men from England in July 1863. The foreign climbers were long thought to have been John Tyndall, J.J. Hornby and T.H. Philpott, until in 1958 the records were checked by the Alpine Club and the following conclusion was reached:

 

On July 23, 1963, Phillpotts, with James Robertson and H.J. Chaytor, climbed the Jungfrau (the entry shown in A.J. 32. 227 was wrongly transcribed by Montagnier, who says ‘T.H. Philpott’ for J.S. Phillpotts). The entry in Peter Baumann’s Führerbuch (facsimile in A.C. archives) says that the trio crossed the Strahlegg Pass and the Oberaarjoch, and then climbed the Jungfrau from the Eggishorn.

 

Tyndall, Hornby and Philpott were well-known Alpinists, but there is no record of their having attempted the Jungfrau in 1863. Robertson, Chaytor and Phillpotts were novices; they had recently graduated from Oxford University where they had all been keen members of the Oxford University Boat Club.

 

William Robertson (1839–1892), the leader of the expedition (wrongly called ‘James’ in the Note quoted above), was an Australian by birth, and the first non-British national to take part in the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race. He later became a barrister and member of parliament in Australia. He and H.J. Chaytor (possibly the father of the medievalist Henry John Chaytor) were both members of the victorious Oxford team in the 1861 Boat Race. James Surtees Phillpotts (1839–1930) was the third member of the team; he would later become headmaster of Bedford School. The trio had three Swiss guides, Peter Baumann, Peter Kaufmann ("Grabipeter", father of Peter Kaufmann the younger) and Rubi.

 

A description of the ascent of the Jungfrau is contained in a letter dated Sunday 26 July which Phillpotts wrote to his friend Alexander Potts (later to become the first headmaster of Fettes College). The letter is now in the possession of the Alpine Club. The following extracts are from that letter.

 

The Virgin certainly did not smile on the poor "fools who rushed in" on her sacred heights, i.e. in plain British, we had the treadmill slog, the biting wind, the half frost-bitten feet and the flayed faces that generally attend an Alpine ascent.

 

We got to the Faulberg hole about dark, and enjoyed the coffee the longman (Kauffmann) made, as one would in a hole in a rock in a cold evening. The "Faulberg Nachtlager" consists of two holes and a vestibule to the upper hole. The Upper Hole in which we lodged just contained Chay[tor], the Guv [Robertson] and myself, stretched at full length on a little hay over a hard rock mattress, convex instead of concave at the point where one likes to rest one's weight. Chaytor was in the middle, and as we were very close was warm and slept. The Guv and I courted Nature's soft nurse in vain. At two we got up and methodically put our feet into the stocks, i.e. our boots, breakfasted and shivered, then started (unwashed of course, as the cold gave us malignant hydrophobia) a little after 3:30.

 

The hole was about 150 feet [46 m] up one of the loose stone cliffs one now knows so well. So we groped our way down it and over the moraine – the stars still lingering, as day was just dawning. We could not start at 1:30, the proper time, as there was no moon and we wanted light as we had to tramp the glacier at once. Rubi led, and off we went, roped and in Indian file, in the old treadmill way over the slippery plowed-field-like snow that lay on the upper glacier, for a pull without a check of one or two hours.

 

At last we came to the region of bergschrunds and crevasses. They seemed to form at first an impassable labyrinth, but gradually the guides wound in and out between the large rifts, which were exquisitely lovely with their overhanging banks of snow and glittering icicles, and then trod as on pins and needles over a snowbridge here and there, or had to take a jump over the more feasible ones – and we found ourselves at the foot of the mountain; trudged up on the snow which ought to have been crisp but was even then more or less fresh fallen and sloppy; had to creep over about three crevasses, and after a tiresome pull, dragging one leg after another out of ankle or knee deep snow, we got on a crest of snow at right angles to the slope we had just come up. That slope with its crevasses on one side, and on the other a shorter and much steeper one which led in a few steps to a precipice.

 

All along this crest went a snakelike long crevasse, for which we had continually to sound, and go first one side and then the other; then we got to the foot of the saddle. Some twenty or thirty steps, some cut, some uncut, soon took us up a kind of hollow, and we got on a little sloping plateau of some six feet [1.8 m] large, where we left the grub and the knapsack, keeping my small flask of cognac only. Then up a steep ice slope, very steep I should say, down which the bits of ice cut out of the steps hopped and jumped at full gallop and then bounded over to some bottomless place which we could not see down. Their pace gave one an unpleasant idea of the possible consequence of a slip.

 

Here we encountered a biting bitter wind. Peter Baumann cut magnificent steps, at least he and Rubi did between them, the one improving on the other's first rough blows. After Rubi came Chaytor with Kauffmann behind him, then the Guv, and then myself, the tail of the string. Each step was a long lift from the last one, and as the snow was shallow they had to be cut in the ice which was like rock on this last slope.

 

Suddenly there burst upon us, on lifting our heads over the ridge, the green and cheerful valleys of Lauterbrunnen and Interlaken, of Grindelwald and a distant view of others equally beautiful stretching on for ever in one vast panorama. On the other side in grim contrast there was a wild and even awful scene. One gazed about one and tried in vain to see to the bottom of dark yawning abysses and sheer cliffs of ice or rock.

 

Tourism

 

Named after the Jungfrau, the Jungfrau Region of the Bernese Oberland is a major tourist destination in the Alps and includes a large number of railways and other facilities. While the mountain peak was once difficult to access, the Jungfrau Railway, a rack railway, now goes to the Jungfraujoch railway station at 3,454 m (11,332 ft), therefore providing an easy access to the upper Aletsch Glacier and a relatively short access to the Jungfrau itself, the height difference between the station and the summit being only 704 metres and the horizontal distance being slightly less than 2 kilometres. As a result, in the popular mind, the Jungfrau has become a mountain associated with the Bernese Oberland and Interlaken, rather than with Upper Valais and Fiesch.

 

In 1893, Adolf Guyer-Zeller conceived of the idea of a railway tunnel to the Jungfraujoch to make the glaciated areas on its south side more accessible. The building of the tunnel took 16 years and the summit station was not opened before 1912. The goal was in fact to reach the summit of the Jungfrau with an elevator from the highest railway station, located inside the mountain. The complete project was not realized because of the outbreak of the World War I. Nevertheless, it was at the time one of the highest railways in the world and remains today the highest in Europe and the only (non-cable) railway on Earth going well past the perennial snow-line.

 

The Jungfrau Railway leaves from Kleine Scheidegg, which can be reached from both sides by trains from Grindelwald, and Lauterbrunnen via Wengen. The train enters the Jungfrau Tunnel running eastward through the Eiger just above Eigergletscher, which is, since 2020, also accessible by aerial tramway from Grindelwald. Before arriving at the Jungfraujoch, it stops for a few minutes at two other stations, Eigerwand (on the north face of the Eiger) and Eismeer (on the south side), where passengers can see through the holes excavated from the mountain. The journey from Kleine Scheidegg to Jungfraujoch takes approximately 50 minutes including the stops; the downhill return journey taking only 35 minutes.

 

A large complex of tunnels and buildings has been constructed at the Jungfraujoch, referred to as the "Top of Europe". There are several restaurants and bars, shops, multimedia exhibitions, a post office, and a research station with dedicated accommodation facilities. An elevator enables access to the top of the Sphinx and its observatory, at 3,571 m (11,716 ft), the highest viewing platform of the area. Outside, at the level of the Jungfraujoch, there is a ski school, and the "Ice Palace", a collection of elaborate ice sculptures displayed inside the Aletsch Glacier. Another tunnel leads to the east side of the Sphinx, where one can walk on the glacier up to the Mönchsjoch Hut, the only hotel infrastructure in the area.

 

Apart from the Jungfraujoch, many facilities have been built in the Jungfrau Region, including numerous mountain railways. In 1908, the first public cable car in the world, the Wetterhorn Elevator, opened at the foot of the Wetterhorn, but was closed seven years later. The Schilthorn above Mürren, the Männlichen above Wengen, and the Schynige Platte above Wilderswil, offer good views of the Jungfrau and the Lauterbrunnen valley. On the south side, the Eggishorn above Fiesch also offers views of the Jungfrau, across the Aletsch Glacier.

 

Climbing routes

 

The normal route follows the traces of the first climbers, but the long approach on the Aletsch Glacier is no longer necessary. From the area of the Jungfraujoch the route to the summit takes only a few hours. Most climbers start from the Mönchsjoch Hut. After a traverse of the Jungfraufirn the route heads to the Rottalsattel (3,885 m or 12,746 ft), from where the southern ridge leads to the Jungfrau. It is not considered a very difficult climb but it can be dangerous on the upper section above the Rottalsattel, where most accidents happen. The use of the Jungfrau Railway instead of the much more gradual approach from Fiesch (or Fieschertal), via the Konkordia Hut, can cause some acclimatization troubles as the difference of altitude between the railway stations of Interlaken and Jungfraujoch is almost 3 km (1.9 mi).

 

(Wikipedia)

 

Höhenwanderung Schynige Platte – First

 

Sechs Perlen in sechs Stunden: Die Höhenwanderung von der Schynige Platte nach First (oder umgekehrt) muss man einmal im Leben gemacht haben. Die ersten zwei Perlen glänzen gleich bei der Endstation der Schynige Platte Bahn: Die Flora auf den Matten ist beinahe so vielfältig wie die Blumen im Alpengarten. Nach dem Loucherhorn trifft man auf Perle drei, die wilde Karstlandschaft im Gebiet Güw. Perle vier, der Sägistalsee, funkelt tief unten. Die grösste Perle wartet jedoch auf dem Faulhorn. Die Sicht von dort oben schlägt alles: der Brienzersee auf der einen Seite, die überwältigende Kulisse des Jungfraumassivs auf der anderen. Und weiter unten kündigt sich bereits Perle sechs an, der Bachalpsee, der als «blaues Juwel» der Berner Alpen jeden begeistert.

 

Ungefähre Wanderzeit: 6 Stunden

 

(jungfraujoch.ch)

 

Die Jungfrau ist ein Berg in der Schweiz. Sie ist mit 4158 m ü. M. der dritthöchste Berg der Berner Alpen und bildet zusammen mit Eiger und Mönch eine markante Dreiergruppe, ein sogenanntes «Dreigestirn».

 

Am 13. Dezember 2001 wurde die Jungfrau zusammen mit südlich angrenzenden Gebieten als Schweizer Alpen Jungfrau-Aletsch in die Liste als UNESCO-Weltnaturerbe aufgenommen.

 

Lage und Umgebung

 

Über den Jungfrau-Gipfel verläuft die Grenze zwischen den Kantonen Bern und Wallis. Der Berg ist ausserordentlich vielgestaltig. Im Norden und Nordwesten, auf ihrer „weiblichen“ Schauseite (vgl. Foto) sind ihr Wengen-Jungfrau, Schneehorn, das Silberhorn, das Chly Silberhoren und der „Schwarzmönch“ vorgelagert sowie die zerrissenen Kühlauenen- und Giessengletscher. Im Westen erhebt sie sich fast eisfrei volle 3250 Meter über dem hinteren Lauterbrunnental. Es ist dies (nach dem Mont Blanc) der zweithöchste direkte Abhang in den Alpen. Ihre Südwand erhebt sich über dem versteckten Rottalgletscher und ihre Ostwand über den Firnen am Jungfraujoch.

 

Die Pläne, auf die Jungfrau eine Bergbahn zu bauen, wurden aufgrund finanzieller Schwierigkeiten nicht realisiert. Die ursprünglich bis unter den Gipfel geplante Jungfraubahn wurde bis 1912 mit Endstation Jungfraujoch fertiggestellt.

 

Auf dem untersten Absatz des Nordostgrats haben die PTT einen Funk-Umsetzer auf 3777 m ü. M. installiert.

 

Geologie

 

Die Jungfrau liegt im nördlichen Randbereich des Aarmassivs, eines der sogenannten Zentralmassive der Schweizer Alpen. Ihre höheren Lagen (Silberhorn, Wengen-Jungfrau und Hauptgipfel) sowie ihre Westflanke bis hinunter zum oberen Ende des Lauterbrunnentals sind weit überwiegend aus kristallinem Grundgebirge (prä-triassische Gneise, Glimmerschiefer u. ä.) der Helvetischen Zone aufgebaut. Die Nordwestflanke hingegen, der ganze «Vorbau» (Schwarzmönch, Rotbrett und Schneehorn) besteht aus sedimentärem, überwiegend jurassischem und kretazischem Deckgebirge des Helvetikums. Eine Besonderheit der Jungfrau ist, dass dort zwischen dem prinzipiell autochthonen Gipfel-Kristallin und dessen Deckschichten ein Überschiebungs-kontakt besteht; somit ist das Grundgebirge geringfügig auf sein Deckgebirge überschoben worden.

 

Name

 

Der Name Jungfrau dürfte sich von der Wengernalp am Fusse des Berges ableiten, die – nach den Besitzerinnen, den Nonnen vom Kloster Interlaken – früher Jungfrauenberg genannt wurde. Einer anderen Quelle zufolge leitet sich der Name vom Aussehen des Nordhanges des Berges ab, der aus der Ferne dem Schleier eines Mädchens ähneln soll.

 

Nach dem Berg ist die Jungfrau-Region benannt, die Tourismusorganisation der Orte Grindelwald, Wengen, Mürren und Lauterbrunnen, ausserdem die Jungfraubahn Holding AG, die neben der Jungfraubahn selbst auch die anderen Bergbahnen in der Region betreibt.

 

Besteigungsgeschichte

 

Bergsteiger auf dem Gipfel im Jahr 1878

Erstbesteiger waren Johann Rudolf Meyer und sein Bruder Hieronymus mit den Führern Joseph Bortis und Alois Volken, die am 3. August 1811 vom Lötschental her den Berg von Süden erklommen hatten. Sie folgten ungefähr der heutigen Normalroute. Der Volksmund taufte daraufhin die bis dahin unberührte Jungfrau «Madame Meyer».

 

1874 erfolgte die Winter-Erstbesteigung durch die Alpinistin Margaret Claudia Brevoort.

 

Die Jungfrau gilt, obwohl leicht erreichbar, als unfallträchtiger Berg. Bei einem der schwersten Unglücke stürzten am 12. Juli 2007 sechs Rekruten der Gebirgsspezialisten-Rekrutenschule Andermatt vom Rottalsattel 1000 Meter auf den darunterliegenden Rottalgletscher in den Tod, nachdem sie eine Lawine ausgelöst hatten. Das urteilende Militärgericht ging von einem falsch eingeschätzten, heimtückischen Lawinenrisiko aus und sprach in der Folge die verantwortlichen Bergführer frei.

 

Routen

 

Rottalsattel und Südostgrat (Normalroute)

 

Schwierigkeit: ZS-

Zeitaufwand: 4–5 Std. von der Mönchsjochhütte, 3½–4½ Std. vom Jungfraujoch

Ausgangspunkt: Mönchsjochhütte (3657 m)

Talort: Grindelwald (1034 m)

 

Innere Rottalgrat

 

Schwierigkeit: ZS

Zeitaufwand: 6–7 Stunden

Ausgangspunkt: Rottalhütte (2755 m)

Talort: Stechelberg (919 m)

 

Nordwestgrat oder „Rotbrettgrat“

 

Schwierigkeit: S

Zeitaufwand: 8–12 Stunden

Ausgangspunkt: Silberhornhütte (2663 m)

Talort: Stechelberg (919 m)

 

Nordostgrat

 

Schwierigkeit: S+, mit IV. UIAA-Grad Felskletterei

Zeitaufwand: 8–10 Stunden

Ausgangspunkt: Jungfraujoch (3454 m)

Talort: Grindelwald (1034 m)

 

Kunst

 

Erwähnt ist die Jungfrau unter anderem bei Friedrich Schiller, Wilhelm Tell, Vers 628 (1804). Lord Byrons Drama Manfred (1817) spielt am Fuss und auf dem Gipfel des Massivs. Ferdinand Hodler hat die Jungfrau mehrfach gemalt, darunter die perspektivisch verfremdete «Jungfrau über dem Nebelmeer». Alex Diggelmann gab 1958 eine Lithographienmappe unter dem Titel Die Jungfrau, mein Berg heraus. Stephan Bundi gestaltete 2005 eine Schweizer Gedenkmünze mit dem Bergmotiv.

 

Im Januar 2012 wurde zum 100-jährigen bestehen der Jungfraubahn eine übergrosse Schweizer Flagge vom Lichtkünstler Gerry Hofstetter an den Gipfel projiziert. Zeitweise waren neben dem Schweizer Kreuz auch ein Porträt des Zürcher Unternehmers Adolf Guyer-Zeller sowie ein Bild von einem der Züge zu sehen.

 

(Wikipedia)

The Eurasian Spoonbill or Common Spoonbill (Platalea leucorodia) is unmistakable due to its long and flattened bill which expands into a flat spoon at the tip.

The Eurasian Spoonbill, a wading bird of the ibis and spoonbill family Threskiornithidae, is the only spoonbill to be found regularly in Europe. They are breeding in western Europe and central Europe to in India, China, Japan and in north Africa.

In Europe, only The Netherlands, Spain, Austria, Hungary and Greece have sizeable populations. About half of the European population, around 2300 pairs, were breeding in the Netherlands, with the majority found on the Wadden Islands. Most birds migrate south in the winter, but numerous individuals remain and winter in western Europe. The Eurasian Spoonbill frequents extensive wet areas such as flooded lands, rivers, marshes and large water bodies.

With its spoon-shaped black bill with yellowish tip, brilliant white plumage and long black legs, the spoonbill is an elegant bird to spot. The sexes are similar in overall appearance but the male is somewhat larger than the female, with a longer bill and longer legs.

The length is 70-95 cm, the wingspan is 115-135 cm and weight is 1150-2000 gr.

The Eurasian spoonbill forages alone or in small groups, wading methodically through shallow water whilst sweeping its distinctive bill from side to side in search of prey. Small fish, aquatic insects, shrimp and other invertebrates comprise the bulk of its diet, but it will also take algae and fragments of aquatic plants, although these may just be accidentally ingested. Foraging activity generally peaks around morning and evening, except in coastal areas, where it is governed by the timing of low tide.

This picture was taken in Burgers Zoo in Arnhem, the Netherlands.

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De lepelaar (Platalea leucorodia), de nationale vogel van Nederland, is een witte vogel ter grootte van een reiger of ooievaar. Door de lepelachtige snavel is de lepelaar van dichtbij met geen enkele andere vogel te verwarren. Op grote afstand en in de vlucht lijkt de vogel wat op een zilverreiger.

De Nederlandse populatie is behoorlijk uniek in Europa. De soort broedt behalve in Nederland namelijk vooral in Spanje, Hongarije, Oekraïne en Griekenland. In andere West Europese landen broeden slechts kleine aantallen lepelaars. In Nederland alleen al circa 2300 paartjes, ongeveer de helft van de totale Europese populatie, op enkele Waddeneilanden, in Zeeland en in moerasachtige natuurgebieden in het westen van het land. Door het verdwijnen van veel geschikte leefgebieden en door het droogmalen van moerassen en andere vochtige gebieden was de Nederlandse populatie lepelaars rond 1970 bijna uitgestorven. Door verschillende beschermingsmaatregelen en door vergroting van geschikte broedgebieden, zijn ze weer terug in Nederland.

In België is dit een zeldzame vogel. Het totale verspreidingsgebied is overigens enorm groot, van West Europa via Midden Europa, Noordelijk Afrika en de Oekraïne tot in China, Japan en India.

Het merendeel van de hier broedende lepelaars overwintert in West-Afrika. Een klein aantal blijft hier ook tijdens de wintermaanden.

De lepalaar is een grote witte vogel met lange zwarte poten. De volwassen vogels hebben in de zomer een okergele vlek op hun borst en kin. Kenmerkend is de lange zwarte lepelvormige snavel met een gele punt, waaraan de vogel zijn naam te danken heeft.

De langte is 70 à 95 cm, de vleugelspanwijdte 115 à 135 cm en het gewicht 1150 à 2000 gram.

De lepelaar filtert met zijn lepelvormige snavel het voedsel uit het water door zijn snavel heen en weer te bewegen. Het dieet bestaat uit insecten en de larven ervan, amfibieën, waterslakken en kleine visjes, waaronder stekelbaarzen.

Deze opname is gemaakt in Burgers Zoo in Arnhem.

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All rights reserved. Copyright © Martien Uiterweerd (Foto Martien).

All my images are protected under international authors copyright laws and may not be downloaded, reproduced, copied, transmitted or manipulated without my written explicit permission.

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"The rich song of the Warbling Vireo is a common sound in many parts of central and northern North America during summer. It’s a great bird to learn by ear, because its fast, rollicking song is its most distinctive feature. Otherwise, Warbling Vireos are fairly plain birds with gray-olive upperparts and white underparts washed with faint yellow. They have a mild face pattern with a whitish stripe over the eye. They stay high in deciduous treetops, where they move methodically among the leaves hunting for caterpillars." Cornell

Repost por tagged da nj-metamorfoses (E que saudades do México :x)

 

Recebi o desafio da Jo, Pedaços de Cor, Akira_sp e jrsloboda.

Obrigada! É sempre um desafio escrever sobre mim :D Cá vai para quem conseguir chegar ao fim :x

I've been tagged! It's always hard to write about me, but here it goes, if you can make it to the end :)

 

#1- Rute, 27 anos e muitos sonhos

Rute, 27, lots of dreams

 

#2 - Eterna gulosa, adoro chocolates e doces de um modo geral. Com fome impreterivelmente de 3 em 3h (ou menos), a menos que esteja a dormir (obviamente acordo sempre esfomeada).

I'm a bit of a glutton, just love chocolates and sweet in general. I'm hungry every three hours (or less), unless I'm sleeping (obviously waking up starving)

 

#3 - Definitivamente não sou uma pessoa matinal... Não funciono de manhã, não falo até 1h depois de acordar, e por favor não falem comigo nesse período, estou de péssimo humor. A boa notícia é que ele melhora ao longo do dia, e de noite está no pico :) Muito facilmente os meus horários avançam para me deitar tarde, por isso passo muitas semanas em privação de sono...

Definitely not a morning person... Just won't work in the morning, I won't talk until about 1h after waking up and pleeeeease... don't talk to me during that time, I'm in such a bad mood! Good news is, it gets better as the day goes by :D So I'm a night person, doesn't take much to be up late, so I'm usually on sleep deprivation during the week...

 

#4 - Sou naturalmente uma pessoa com tendência a ser ordenada e metódica. No entanto, quando mais stressada, frustrada ou irritada estou, mais o espaço à minha volta fica desarrumado, em proporção.

I tend to be a methodical person. Nonetheless, the more I get anxious, frutrated or irritated, the more the space around me gets messep up (in proportion)

 

#5 - Perfeccionista, até onde acaba a paciência (essa tem dias...).

A perfectionist as long as my patience will allow me (depends on the days...)

 

#6 - Exigente comigo e com os outros.

Pretty demanding, both with myself and the others.

 

#7 - Adoro animais (especialmente mamíferos), e os meus são literalmente parte da família.

I love animals (mammals especially), and mine are literally part of the familly.

 

#8 - Odeio oportunismo, mentiras, crueldade e injustiças.

I hate opportunism, lies, cruelty and injustices.

 

#9 - Extremamente protectora dos que me são caros, até mais do que de mim mesma, por vezes.

Over protective of the ones I hold dear, even more than of myself, sometimes.

 

#10 - Não gosto de conduzir na cidade, com excepção do período nocturno, mas gosto muito de estrada aberta. Não sei como nunca tive um acidente ou me matei no meu velhinho AX enquanto o tive.

I don't like driving in the city, expect for night time, but love open road. Somehow, I managed never to have an accident or kill myself on my old car.

 

#11 - Tenho sérios problemas em deitar coisas fora, especialmente cartas, bilhetes, fotos, ou objectos com valor sentimental.

I have serious issues getting rid of letters, notes, or any kind of object that has some sort of sentimental value.

 

#12 - Adoro cadernos, blocos, canetas... Tenho sempre mais do que consigo usar.

I love notebooks, pens, papers... Always have more than I can use.

 

#13 - Não passo sem livros. Adoro ler, praticamente todo o tipo de livros, de preferência em versão original se estiver dentro dos idiomas que domino. Idealmente, um ou dois por mês. Compro normalmente mais que isto por mês, pelo que posso vê-los acumularem-se enquanto aguardam vez... Nunca sei o que vou ler a seguir.

Books are part of my life. I love to read, almost any kind of book, preferably original version, if I can read it. Ideally, one or two each month, although I usually buy more than that. So I get to see the pile grow until i read them. Never know what I'll read next.

 

#14 - Tenho o privilégio de adorar a minha profissão.

I'm privileged to love my career.

 

#15 - Gosto muito de imagem, tudo o que seja bonito ou expressivo ou emotivo ou de alguma forma equilibrado. Bastante abrangente, portanto :) Só não ando com a câmera para todo o lado porque pesa :D

I love image, all that is beautiful or expressive or emotive or somehow balanced. I won't carry my camera around everyday because it's too heavy :D

 

#16 - Adoro viajar, e espero ter muitos anos para poder conhecer muitos e muitos sítios diferentes.

Love traveling, and hope to have lots of years to go to so many different places!

 

Foto . Photo by Tak

FINDING ALPHA FRANCES JARVIS...

For the most recent information about Alpha Frances Jarvis go to www.flickr.com/photos/man_is_like_unto_a_tree/sets/721576...

 

This image is not of Alpha Frances Jarvis. This image is one of two images that were in my grandmothers large family photographic collection whose identity still eludes me. I use this image to start this Family Tree story as a reminder of how little information I started out with on this quest in 2005.

 

To commence walking down the path and collecting each shattered branch of my Family Tree which eventually led me to discover the identity and the life travels of my great Aunt Alpha Frances Jarvis but still do not know who this family member is.

 

The names Alpha and Omega where spoken of many times throughout my childhood. Only their names where spoken, that their father was Spanish and he was a prominent School teacher in South Australia, Australia, nothing else.

 

This mystery around who these souls were, where did they live, what happened to them, did they have families I might just meet one day? My parents would often say they were all very beautiful women which used to invoke so many images in my child's mind. The photographs of my mother and my grandmother, when they were young women are testimonials to that being a true fact at least.

 

Add to those imaginary constructs in my child's mind of a family I had never met other than my mother, her mother and stepfather, one or two short visits with a couple of my grandmothers brothers family homes and my own father and three brothers left me with a very large empty space to be filled with made up imagined people that were my extended family that I would like to meet one day.

 

When I heard the names Alpha and Omega spoken about it became a history lesson that left me always amazed, inspired and very intrigued about the wide world that existed somewhere out there, way beyond my wonderful isolated environment of growing up in the foot hills of Rolystone Western Australia in the late 50's to 70's.

 

"Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet and Omega is the last letter" is what I was told through out my life when mums extended family came into a conversation. "The Aleph and the Thaw are the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet as the Alpha and Omegain Scripture, are of the Greek." www.newadvent.org/cathen/01332b.htm Such a rich deep history connected to these names that echo down the annuals of time for eternity. I often wondered about the magic of calling children such creative names with such depth of meaning. This would account for one of the main reasons why my two daughters got their Latin names, Regina and Aves.

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NO IMAGES OF ALPHA FRANCES JARVIS...

I have chosen to write about Alpha under this image because I have no images at all that show Alpha. Thanks to my cousin Kay and her wealth of genealogy experiences over the 30 years she has been tracking the Allen family tree I was at least able to date this image to a year it was taken.

 

(Note...I did finally figure out I had a whole lot of images of Alpha that I had assumed were of her sister. Only as I unravelled her story from shattered truths did I finally recognise there was three people in these images and not just two.)

 

Who this image above is is still unknown to me and for that matter everyone else in the family I have been able to share it with so far. After cousin Kay told me I could identify the year this image had been taken from a book in the State Library by its business details stamped on the base. I discovered at least it was taken in 1897 at Rembrant Studio, Boulder City, W.A. This would make this young lady in the image at least 15 to 20 years of age (in my estimation from looking at other images of the female family photographs of this time.) This means that any female family member who would have been born from 1877 through to around 1882 with dark hair and still alive in the Gold fields of Western Australia could be a candidate.

 

Now the fact that there are no images of Alpha in my grandmothers or my mothers extensive photographic collection is an indicator to some important aspect of this ladies story that I have not yet cracked or for that matter may never crack but am driven to see if I can at least understand why.

 

My grandmother had kept all of her photographs so that after her passing in 2005 at the age of 91, my mother then squirrelled them all away like the family treasures but not one of Alpha has serviced. This is in complete contrast to the very large number of images of Alpha’s younger sisters Lulu and Clytie in this photographic collection.

 

My mother grew up with very little family contact. She was an only child and the photographs reflected the major happy events that marked family time together. Snapshots where all that remained of their entire lives other than the physical truth that we did exist. Because my mother and father are real and my brothers are real then we did have to have family ancestors before them. This physical truth that we did exist is all I could hang onto as a bright flashing arrow pointing to where more truth could one day be mined, dug up and brought out into the light of day that would finally form into "my" extended family.

 

The rare times these family images did get brought out into the light of day caused deep longings in me to know these people, to get to know their stories. I so wanted to hold onto these images of my ancestors until they had burned themselves onto my minds surface before they would be stored away for another year or two before I could get to see them again.

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ALPHA FRANCES JARVIS FIRST BORN...

Alpha Frances Jarvis was the first born child to Henry Martin Jarvis (Widower) son of James

married 18 Aug 1877 St Lukes Church Adelaide, South Australia to his second wife Frances Elizabeth White (Single) daughter of George Tyler William and Roseanna Lock.

 

If Henry was born in 1827 he would have been 50 years of age and already retired from the army when he married Frances White in South Australia. Frances White would have been 26 years of age and most likely looking after Henry's youngest children from his first family after his first wife, Clara had died. More about Henry's first family in another chapter.

 

Alpha Frances Jarvis was born 10 months after Henry's second marriage on the 9/7/1878 Southwark South Australia, District Hindmarsh (Book 205 Page 287) to Frances Elizabeth White.

 

Frances Elizabeth White, Alhpa's mother died some time during or just after giving birth to her 6th child, Omega, in 1887 at the age of 33. Alpha would have only been 9 years of age at that time. Here younger brothers and sisters were Lulu Dagma 1880, Frank 1882 -1882, Clytie Grace Darling 1884,

(Gideon Jarvis Jarvis) Gibson Clarence 1885, Omega 1887-1887.

 

The next time Alpha Frances can be tracked in the records is when she is 18 years of age on the goldfields, Western Australia getting married in 1896 to a William George Ashton /Reg 107 COOLGARDIE.

 

Then in 1903 Alpha Frances is in Cottesloe, Western Australia giving birth to her only child,

Elgar Ashton. His father's name that is recorded on the record book was William George Ashton (no. 485). Note how long this is after Alpha was married before giving birth to Elgar and she has no other children that are recorded in Western Australia. This is very unusual for this time in Australian history. Without birth control for these women, back then in the isolation of the Australian European communities, the normal pattern of married women was once they got married they got pregnant every 18 months or so until either they died, usually due to complications during or just after giving birth or their husbands die.

 

The tracks left in the sand of the records world of Alpha's movements that I sieved through the screen of the computer in the State Library of Melbourne, Victoria Australia revealed many new gems. In searching through Electoral roles, Post Office records, Shipping lists and Microfiche and old Newspapers slowly started to build a picture of this great Aunt over the proceeding years from the birth of her first child back in 1903 Western Australia to her arriving here in Melbourne Australia many years later.

 

James Street, Perth Western Australia in 1903 and 1906 Alpha is recorded as living there in the States Electoral Roles. Searching through the same records I could not place her husband living with her or any body else with the last name of Ashton living at this address. But I do find under the name of Alfa Frances Ashton in the 1903 and 1906 (under the title of "Voters at James St), Electoral Roles living at 153 Lake Street, occupation as home duties, again no one else with the name Ashton living there. (note the spelling change to the name Alpha in this record)

 

Departing Brisbane, Queensland Australia 1912 Alpha Ashton, born ABT 1883 (29).

Arriving London England 25th May 1912. Ports on Voyage Sydney, Ship Name; Osterley Shipping Line Orient Steam Navigation company Ltd official No 128287. Further scratching through the records found another entry stating that Elgar Ashton (9) was her son accompanied by his mother and Alpha the wife were leaving Fremantle and arriving in Plymouth, England. It was also recorded that she was not accompanied by a husband. I would like to point out here that in 1912 Alpha would have actually been 34 years of age not 29.

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COUSIN LESLEY'S EMAIL CLUES...

All of the facts I have collected so far about my family have come from research on the internet, library visits in my home town of Western Australia, oral history from my mother, grandmother and very recently my dear cousins I have made contact with only over the past two years. Most of the history that I have collected over the past two years is the reason I went into the State Library of Melbourne to seek out Alpha's whereabouts’ was because of this story shared to me by my cousin Lesley, now living in Germany. This story was told to her from her 92-year-old mother, Shirley, who was on a holiday with her at the end of last year (2010).

 

This is the story emailed to me from cousin Lesley...

 

"Shirley today was somewhat off with the pixies. It does occur on some days and other days she is perfect with her memory so this is what I gleaned from this afternoon’s conversation when she was not concentrating on how she was going to paint a painting of the area here. She was greatly worried over not being able to get the trees right.!!! A typical way-would artist.!!!!!! She said to try again in the morning hours as she can remember better then.

 

So here we go about Aunt Alpha so far from what I know as of this arvo.

Alpha lived for many years in London. I asked Shirley about how long. She told me well over 20 years or much longer. Sorry cousin this is only what she told me this afternoon so I cant be more explicit.

She was very tall with beautiful skin and could sing, whistle, and yodel and was a great cook.

In London they all called her Lilly Langtry as she resembled her so very much. Who was Lilly Langtry??? Will Google her when I finish this note.

 

Alpha was married to someone who worked for the East Indian Tea Company.!!!

Mum can’t remember his name and doesn't know whether he was English or Australian.

They had one son and then her husband died so she returned to Oz and moved to Melbourne for a while. She had a falling out with her son and they broke off contact. She then lived with Vera and Shirley for a while in Sydney until she remarried a man called Caplan or Caplen who lived in Cabramatta also in the Sydney area.

 

He became ill and died and shortly after Alpha died of cancer from which she had been suffering with for some time. I asked Shirley how old she was then at the time and she figured that she was about 12 or 13 at the time so guess the year was about 1931 or thereabouts. Have no idea whether any of this info is correct so please be patient with us now. Shirley tends to switch over from one subject to another and went into her remembrances of her beloved Uncle Gorden who was for her a wonderful brother figure for her. They spent so much time together in Sydney.

Thats about all I can tell you at this stage.

Will certainly get on to Mum when she is not so off.!!!

 

Love and Light to you and all your loved ones,

Your cousin,

Lesley."

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FINDING ALPHA FRANCES CAPLIN...

I had found Alpha Caplin’s death details on line before I went to Melbourne February 2011 because of this wonderful story from cousin Lesley. The on line website for finding births, deaths and marriages for Sydney gave me those details without any real effort. That is what it is like doing genealogy. Once you have enough meat to add to a bone you can find so much out about what it is you are seeking but if you only have a bone it makes your searching very hard indeed.

Death...1941 CAPLIN ALPHA FRANCES, father HENRY MARTIN

mother, FRANCES ELIZABETH place, LIVERPOOL SYDNEY NSW (12470)

 

Well you would think at this stage I should be able to find a marriage certificate for Alpha and Mr Caplin would you not? All my search had revealed so far was that Alpha Frances had been born Jarvis and had got married in Perth Western Australia and became Alpha Frances Ashton. Then had a son Elgar Ashton. These two unattended by the father head off to London, England and as the email from cousin Lesley states they had both returned to Australia through Melbourne, Victoria and Alpha then had gone to Sydney and married a Mr Caplin and herself had died there.

 

So why could I not find a marriage certificate for a Alpha Frances Ashton? When I typed in just Caplin in the marriage section the clue was staring me right in the face at that time but I had missed it completely and it would not be until I had spent quite a few hours in the Melbourne State Library looking for Alhpa Frances Ashton that it became clear why there was no marriage certificate for her to a Mr Caplin. More on that later.

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FINDING ELGAR ASHTON MELBOURNE VICTORIA...

When I was in Melbourne, Victoria this past February, 2011, I met up with my very dear cousin Kay in the Victorian State Library. Kay was down in the city visiting family when she had let me know we could spend a short time together so what better place for us two to hangout in but in the State Library.

 

As I had just come from Sydney after meeting another cousins 91 year old wife, Viva Rodwell who was related to us both through my great grandfathers sisters son. Kay had unearthed this wonderful women and her husband’s family branch on my last trip to Melbourne only that previous November. I had a lot to share with Kay about the stories of Viva’s life and showed her the images on my camera I had taken of the Rodwell families’ photos and newspaper articles. This wonderfully gracious lady, Viva and the Rowell side of the family tree will be shared in another chapter of this book.

 

Kay shared all these amazing stories of her latest family discoveries and how she had found them. Kay has so much capacity in finding truth out of the smallest particles of detail. It is very clear to me that all those Allen ancestors skills and great capacity learned in the gold fields of Australia to hunt out gold over generations have been inherited in this lady for her to be able to find anything if she puts her mind to it.

 

After Kay had showed me around the genealogy section in the Library and showed me how to find people through the electoral roles microfiche we said our good byes until our paths would meet next. Now with all this newfound confidence to tackle the genealogy section I headed back by myself a few days later to hunt out, dig up, reveal the whereabouts of my cousin Elgar Ashton, son of Alpha Frances Ashton (nee Jarvis).

 

This should have been easy to find Elgar's movements there in Melbourne. I had his name, his mothers and fathers names and I was in the Melbourne State Library where all the local details should be right there at my fingertips so why was I finding it all so very hard to track him and for that matter Alpha.

.

All I could find was the death details of Elgar Ashton and a possible whereabouts of his fathers grave also. I had no idea what had happened to Elgar's father, William George Ashton. After finding the details of Alpha's marriage to him in Western Australia he disappears out of the records there so I find it very strange that he turns up now here in Victoria, if this is even his father?

 

Writing down all that I had found so far regardless if it was correct or not was all I could show for hours of work. Details I had at that point were...Died Elgar Ashton, father William George mother Alpha Frances Jarvis, place Fairfield Victoria, age 37, year 1940, Reg. No. 6135.

 

His fathers details, if this is even him were; Death Ashton William George, father Robert, mother Cathrine O'Brian, place Richmond, age 55, year 1931 Reg. No. 3001. I had even found where this person was buried; Ashton William George, cemetery St Kilda General Cemetery, Roman Catholic Monumental Compartment B. grave 335 Buried 14/03/1931. I knew at that point this was either useless or a very important piece to my puzzle and I had better write it down because there was no guarantee I could find it again.

 

The idea of going out to see this grave site at that point in time was not going to be feasible even if I could be sure it was Elgar's father. Time that I had left in Melbourne was short and I needed to find Elgar's grave site at least to see if there had been other names recorded on it. Had Elgar married, did he have children that might still be alive here in Melbourne?

 

With the clock ticking away I returned to the State Library of Victoria the following day and commenced cross referencing, playing around with what I did have and do strange things like type different combinations of names. It was while I was doing this last ditched attempt of finding where Elgar's grave was that I stumbled across this entry on Ancestry.com website (I had only just discovered Ancestry.com was free at our Library's)... Alpha Frances Ashton mother Elgar Jno Evans born 1903 death 1940 Fairfield, Victoria.

 

Evans, they had changed their name to Evans. Elgars name was Elgar Jno Evans, no wonder I could not find records in the microfiche and telephone records and all the other places I had been looking. I had the wrong name.

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NOW FINDING ELGAR JON EVANS...

The name Alpha, that strange and very mysterious name was all I had had to hang onto all throughout my life that had kept calling me to hunt her out. Alpha's name was all I had of my great Aunt and it was that name that I had used to track her and her sons details down. I had finally cracked this. After I found this piece of the jigsaw many other details started to pour out of the web sites and microfiche. I dived back into all those records that I had spent days searching through with the name Ashton and now I was back with the name Evans.

 

What I found...

Australian Electoral Roles for Elgar Evans

1931 South Yarra, Fawkner, Victoria

1936 South Yarra, Fawkner, Victoria

1937 South Yarra, Fawkner, Victoria

 

Australian Electoral Roles for Alpha Frances Evans

1931 at 286 Toorak Rd, home duties. Elgar Evans was at this same address and his occupation was motor mechanic (M.

 

Married, Alpha Frances Evans 1934 New South Wales, reg. place; Liverpool, NSW Husband, Caplin John (Reg.No.2210)

 

When I had looked for Caplin and Ashton getting married back in Perth after cousin Lesley’s email with Shirley’s oral history I had seen this entry but did not think twice. It had not for one second dawned on my very blond brain that Alpha could have remarried.

Marriage...2210/1934 CAPLIN JOHN EVANS ALPHA F LIVERPOOL. I had not even suspected that Alpha had changed her name while overseas. I should have realised the name Alpha was her and at least written it down.

 

Now it all made so much sense, Elgar and Alpha had come back to Australia by the name Evans and where living together until something happens and Alpha goes off to Sydney where her nieces, and sister are living and marries there only 3 years later, 1934. The Electoral Roles for NSW Australia have recorded for the C'wealth: -Werriwa state:-Bankstown for both 1936 and 1937

Caplin AF. Cabramatta Rd, Cabramatta homeduties (F.

Caplin John Cabramatta Rd Cabramatta no occupation (M.

 

Final resting place of my dear dear great Aunt is in New South Wales, Australia and this chapter closes on this part of the mystery for now. There is no time to loose, all energy must go now into tracking down Elgar's movements to see if I can find his grave site before I head back to Western Australia in a few days time. I need to see if he has got married and if I can find anything else out about him.

 

Looking further into the Australian Electoral Roles for Elgar Evans in Victoria, Australia I found the area he was living in was the same electoral boundaries but not the same house addresses. Commonwealth :-Fawkner and State:- Prahran were the same for all three years listed on the Ancestry.com website. His address in 1931 we have already mentioned as being 286 Toorak Rd, and both he and Alpha were listed as living there. Where as for 1936 the address was 3 Portland Place, motor Mechanic (M and in 1937 his address was Fitsgerald Street. motor mechanic (M.

 

At both the Portland and Fitsgerald address there was another person now living with Elgar and that was a Mrs Mary Doreen Evens. Married Ashton Elgar, spouse Family name Davies, spouse mother name?????? Mary Doreen, Reg. Year 1932 Reg. No 5803

 

Elgar had died only a few years after his marriage to Mary in 1940 and there is no other election until 1943 where I find a Mary Doreen Evans C'Wealth:-Maribyrnong. Subdivision of Ascot Vale.

State Flemington. address 18 Bank Street, home duties (F

 

In 1943 I also find a Mary Doreen Evans now living in New South Wales. C'Wealth: New England Sub: Raymond Terrace. State Gloucester at The Snug, Nelson's Bay, home duties (F

Also the same electoral role, state sub. in NSW but another address was recorded for the 1949 elections the address for that year was Victoria Parade, Nelson Bay NSW.

This exact same information is repeated for 1954. But there was a second entry for 1954 and that was for Mary Doreen Evans at 285 Bromide Street, C'Wealth: Darling Sub. Broken Hill West, State: Stuart. As Ancestry.com only goes up to 1954 in there Electoral roles I headed off to explore Melbourne cemetery's seeking where I could find the grave site details for Elgar.

 

After some real hard sifting through microfiche for this information after being guided by a very helpful Librarian showing where to at least start this search I found Elgar's grave at Springfield Victoria. Just to keep me on my toes Elgar’s name on the records was spelt differently.

Elga Evens 6/7/1940 Type B location. Exp.030-23000B0017-0043HKL000/00/0000 7

6 Fitzgerald St. South Yarra, Mrs MD Evans, Church England Monumental Compart. B section 17 grave 43.

 

I was so very, very happy and as I still wanted to come back to that Library I could not yell at the top of my lungs or do my magpie call. I was just over the moon. After a very good friend had agreed to very kindly drive me out to where this cemetery was on the other side of Melbourne and a far way out of town. After getting great maps and directions at the Administrative office my friend and I sent out to finally accomplish what had up until that point just been a wish and hope for me to achieve.

 

My friend and I set out in the mapped area with great energy until we realised none of the graves had numbers and although the map showed very clear and defined grave sites when you actually get there, on the ground, there are no head stones for over half of the graves. To add to the difficulty we faced in finding this exact grave was that none of the pathways between each set of graves was clearly defined either. We headed back to the corner and counted very methodically until I found Elgar’s grave hidden under a very low growing paper bark tree. This tree was sheltering his grave just like a large umbrella. It was so peaceful and a very beautiful place.

 

The grave was in perfect condition and the words on it were very simple and read;

"In loving memory of

Elgar (John) Evans

1903-1940"

And it did not matter how hard I stared at the large space below these words there was nothing else written there. I had accomplished this quest and was happy to return back to Western Australia to continue the next stage of this amazing journey of reconstructing my shattered family Tree.

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ELGAR ASHTON'S FATHER; WILLIAM GEORGE...

As I found pieces of genealogy that may be of interest to my dear cousin Kay I would send them to her when I was still in Melbourne February 2011. On the day before I was heading back to Western Australia she sent me a small email with an image attached that at first I could not open.

 

When I did open this image it was a South Australian newspaper article informing the reader of Alpha's marriage to Ashton back in Nov 1896, the article was published Jan 1987; that super sleuth Kay had done it again. Who would have thought to go look in a South Australian Newspaper for a Wedding in Western Australia two months after? Well it makes sense in hindsight, yes I have learned yet another great Family tree research skill, thank you Kay.

 

I did not really see anything that needed my attention, at that time, so I simply printed the email she had sent me and put it into my folder with my paperwork I took with me to the Library thinking nothing more of it.

 

My last day at the Victorian State Library revealed no new leads and I found nothing extra to add to my quest and as I was about to meet up with my eldest daughter to spend sometime together before we were to meet up with my other daughter and head off to the airport I farewelled the Victorian State Library until my next visit to this beautiful city.

 

As I was sitting in my daughters car waiting for her to finish work I went through my file of notes that I had collected over the days I had been visiting the Library there in Victoria and was very carefully reading them and cross referencing data when I re read the newspaper article that cousin Kay had emailed me the day before. What makes this story even more remarkable was that I had finished reading all the notes and the notes I had scribbled on this email with the article from Kay and only re read it again because I had re read everything else and there was nothing left to read; lol.

 

It was the name of Ashton's father in this newspaper article that kept screaming at me so I went back and re read all my data again from this trips visits to the State Library. It dawned on me that the details I did copy down of the person I thought could at least be Elgar's father turned out to also have recorded in his death details that his father's name was Robert. This was too much of a coincidence not to be the same Ashton married to Alpha all those years before in the goldfield's of Western Australia.

 

Then to add to that the newspaper article said that Ashton had come from Victoria and St Kilda all the same details on this Ashton's death details. On further reading of my notes I found even more notes about this same person. I had actually found several sources of data about this same man that had all converged to being the same person described in this tiny newspaper article sent the night before by my dear cousin Kay.

 

But until I make those final record searches he could still “not” be our Ashton's father.

 

Article from cousin Kay emailed to me the day before I was to return to WA;

MARRIAGE

ASHTON-JARVIS-On the 6th November, 1896,at St. Andrew's Church, Coolgardie, by the Rev.A. Craven, George, eldest son of Robert Ashton, of St. Kilda, Victoria, to Frances (Alpha), third daughter of Henry Martin Jarvis, of Fremantle, W.A. (late of Southwark, SA.)

source;

The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA:1889-1931) Wednesday 27 January 1897 page 4 of 8

 

I did not have time to go to that grave, as I needed to be on a plain heading back to Western Australia in one hour. My dear daughters did agreed to go and find this grave and find out if there is a head stone and see what data is recorded on it.

 

Information I did collected on William George Ashton in the Victorian State Library 2011;

 

Born William George Ashton, 1876, St. Kilda, Victoria, father Robert Ashton,

mother Catherine O'Brian Reg. No.12472

 

WA Electoral Role 1903 Ashton George William, Kanowna Firewood line, Kalgoolie.

Vic Electoral Role 1909 Ashton George William, Balaclava, 18 Nightingale St, St Kilda, Labourer

(M at the same address Annie Ashton home duties (F

Vic Electoral Role 1914 Ashton George William, Fitzroy North, 572 Rae St. North Fitzroy driver (M

at the same address Lilian Rebecca Ashton home duties (F

Vic Electoral Role 1919 Ashton George William, St Kilda 18 Wilgah St driver (M

Vic Electoral Role 1919 Ashton George William, Balaclava, 44 Nightingale St, St Kilda, ???? (M

Vic Electoral Role 1924 Ashton George William, Balaclava, Beach St, East Camberwell, rly. emp.

(M

These went on and I was not sure at that time if this was Elgar's father so I stopped recording them correctly and did not go on to other dates. Something I might get back to when I know for sure this is the right person.

 

Died Ashton William George, father Robert, mother Cathrine O'Brian, place Richmond, age 55, year 1931 Reg. No. 3001.

Buried; Ashton William George, cemetery St Kilda General Cemetery, Roman Catholic Monumental Compartment B. grave 335 Buried 14/03/1931.

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ALPHAS IN BETWEEN MISSING YEARS...

What happened to Alpha after her marriage and being in Cottesloe giving birth to Elgar and then off to England for over 29 years and returning back to Melbourne with another name? I have found a lot out about this great Aunt but now have even more questions. The random information that I have dug up so far that has not been recorded in the rest of this story is;

 

Australian Electoral Role 1903-1954,

1903 and 1906 Alpha Frances Ashton, James St. Perth Western Australia

 

Electoral Role 1903 and 1906 Voters at James Street.

Alfa Frances Ashton, 153 Lake St, home duties (note the spelling change in her first name)

 

mum never did meet Alpha???????

need to check out WA electorial roles to see if an evans name is living in james street Perth WA during the 1903 and 1906 time frame.????

 

what is coming to me on this subject is rather interesting mate and would love your view on it...

 

what I found studying both the records of William Ashton described on the prison records that you found first and the William Ashton described in the army records you found a bit later are NOT THE SAME MAN...

 

the markings and height and the character described in the two sets of documents are absolutely different people...

 

we know the man described in the army records was Alpha’s ex husband... we know the newspaper records of the divorce are real...BUT and A very big BUT is the information in them about which William Ashton they are referring to...

 

I think and this is where I could be wrong BUT as the police officer giving evidence in the divorce case spoke about the William Ashton in the prison records thinking it was Alphas husband when in fact it was one of the aliases used by the criminal one...getting my drift...then when you read the newspaper article a little closer it states that our William Ashton was not in court when all this info was being used to convict him...so even if the police officer did no very well the criminal William Ashton he did not know Alpha’s William Ashton as he is not in court to be seen as a different man...and worse Alpha’s husband William Ashton was not there to plea his innocence...

  

now I do not believe for one minute Alpha’s William was not a bit of a lad and even may have got himself into a lot of hot water and may even have had a jail term but the man who got bravery medals and re enlisted to go back to war after being discharged due to mustered Gas poisoning...no this is not the same character at all...so I think you

and I have a very interesting chapter of injustice of character here...

 

and I would then place a lot of money on that it was this miss representation of character of Elgar’s father that cased the huge rift between Alpha and Elgar...when they returned to Victoria and Elgar either saw his father before he died or met Williams family after his death in 1931 the real story, the truth would have come out and I very strongly believe would have been far tooo much for our dear Alpha to except that the man she thought was a monster was far from it...

 

what do you think mate...?????

 

where did you find the prison info...is it pos to go back to that site and keep looking what else might be there about these two William Ashton’s...????

 

If this William Ashton was such a nasty bit of work he must have then had a lot more prison records...which would prove that this is not Alphas husband...and the policeman was talking about the wrong man...

 

((((((FROM KAY....

Then show them the dates and names for the divorce and ask for help to find the index film and divorce film in the filing drawer, the machine is a buggar to use and to copy from. These should be available as 100 years old. All the info should be there, I am winging these instructions, but to be sure, perhaps a phone call to ask them might help.

 

OK, going by these days poor old Alpha had to put up with an awful husband, I will go back later and find all those court proceedings, I saw one In Kalgoorlie about 1909 and one in Broken Hill and then in New Zealand, hmm, not sure all is he but the Kalgoorlie one will be.

 

I just found another newspaper bit for 1913. I think he committed adultery too, I don't think it was final until then. Wait on will get that one. Oh yes, the same story as the first two files was in Western Mail (Perth, WA : 1885-1954) Saturday 20 April 1912 p 25 Article

from FREE BMD'S thought I might have found them on the London Registers,but in Lambeth.

Marriage Jun 1916 Ashton Frances A Evans Lambeth 1d 767

Evans Graham B Ashton Lambeth 1d 767

 

s the first two files was in Western Mail (Perth, WA : 1885-1954) Saturday 20 April 1912 p 25 Article

from FREE BMD'S thought I might have found them on the London Registers,but in Lambeth.

  

So now we have to find out if Graham B Evans was in the British Military and died. )))))

Died 4th July 1940 Queen's Memorial Infections Diseases Hospital, Fairfield, City of Heidelberg County of Bourke.

 

Residence 6 Fitzgerald street, south Yarra. City Prahram

motor machanic

Elgar John Evans 37 years male

 

cause of death Septic broncho-pneumonia 3 days scarlet fever 10days

 

it stated age of marriage 28 at South Yarra, Victoria

married Mary Doreen Davies

two children...

Louanne, 6years

Lionel Elgar, 2 years

 

YES HE DID HAVE CHILDREN...NOW GUIDE ME ON HOW i FIND THEM OR AT LEAST THE BOY AS WE KNOW HIS COMPLETE NAME...

the boy was born 1938

the girl born 1934

 

and as my electoral roles stated she moved to NSW 1943 and the last one I found was

1954 285 Bromide st,

C"Wealth; Darling

State; Stuart

Sub. Broken Hill West

Australian magpie (Gymnorhina tibicen)

 

The Australian magpie (Gymnorhina tibicen) is a medium-sized black and white passerine bird native to Australia and southern New Guinea. Although once considered to be three separate species, it is now considered to be one, with nine recognised subspecies. A member of the Artamidae, the Australian magpie is placed in its own genus Gymnorhina and is most closely related to the black butcherbird (Melloria quoyi). It is not, however, closely related to the European magpie, which is a corvid.

 

The adult Australian magpie is a fairly robust bird ranging from 37 to 43 cm (14.5 to 17 in) in length, with distinctive black and white plumage, gold brown eyes and a solid wedge-shaped bluish-white and black bill. The male and female are similar in appearance, and can be distinguished by differences in back markings. The male has pure white feathers on the back of the head and the female has white blending to grey feathers on the back of the head. With its long legs, the Australian magpie walks rather than waddles or hops and spends much time on the ground.

 

Described as one of Australia's most accomplished songbirds, the Australian magpie has an array of complex vocalisations. It is omnivorous, with the bulk of its varied diet made up of invertebrates. It is generally sedentary and territorial throughout its range. Common and widespread, it has adapted well to human habitation and is a familiar bird of parks, gardens and farmland in Australia and New Guinea. This species is commonly fed by households around the country, but in spring a small minority of breeding magpies (almost always males) become aggressive and swoop and attack those who approach their nests.

Over 1000 Australian magpies were introduced into New Zealand from 1864 to 1874 but have subsequently been accused of displacing native birds and are now treated as a pest species. Introductions also occurred in the Solomon Islands and Fiji, where the birds are not considered an invasive species. The Australian magpie is the mascot of several Australian sporting teams, most notably the Collingwood Magpies, the Western Suburbs Magpies and Port Adelaide Magpies.

  

Taxonomy

 

The Australian magpie was first described by English ornithologist John Latham in 1801 as Coracias tibicen, the type collected in the Port Jackson region. Its specific epithet derived from the Latintibicen "flute-player" or "piper" in reference to the bird's melodious call. An early recorded vernacular name is piping poller, written on a painting by Thomas Watling, one of a group known collectively as the Port Jackson Painter, sometime between 1788 and 1792. Tarra-won-nang, or djarrawunang, wibung, and marriyang were names used by the local Eora and Darug inhabitants of the Sydney Basin. Booroogong and garoogong were Wiradjuri words, and carrak was a Jardwadjali term from Victoria. Among the Kamilaroi, it is burrugaabu, galalu, or guluu. It was known as Warndurla among the Yindjibarndi people of the central and western Pilbara. Other names used include piping crow-shrike, piper, maggie, flute-bird and organ-bird. The term bell-magpie was proposed to help distinguish it from the European magpie but failed to gain wide acceptance.

 

The bird was named for its similarity in colouration to the European magpie; it was a common practice for early settlers to name plants and animals after European counterparts. However, the European magpie is a member of the Corvidae, while its Australian counterpart is placed in the family Artamidae (although both are members of a broad corvid lineage). The Australian magpie's affinities with butcherbirds and currawongs were recognised early on and the three genera were placed in the family Cracticidae in 1914 by John Albert Leach after he had studied their musculature. American ornithologists Charles Sibley and Jon Ahlquist recognised the close relationship between woodswallows and the butcherbirds in 1985, and combined them into a Cracticini clade, in the Artamidae. The Australian magpie is placed in its own monotypic genus Gymnorhina which was introduced by the English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1840. The name of the genus is from the Ancient Greek gumnos for "naked" or "bare" and rhis, rhinos "nostrils". Some authorities such as Glen Storr in 1952 and Leslie Christidis and Walter Boles in their 2008 checklist, have placed the Australian magpie in the butcherbird genus Cracticus, arguing that its adaptation to ground-living is not enough to consider it a separate genus. A molecular genetic study published in a 2013 showed that the Australian magpie is a sister taxon to the black butcherbird (Melloria quoyi) and that the two species are in turn sister to a clade that includes the other butcherbirds in the genus Cracticus. The ancestor to the two species is thought to have split from the other butcherbirds between 8.3 and 4.2 million years ago, during the late Miocene to early Pliocene, while the two species themselves diverged sometime during the Pliocene (5.8–3.0 million years ago).

The Australian magpie was subdivided into three species in the literature for much of the twentieth century—the black-backed magpie (G. tibicen), the white-backed magpie (G. hypoleuca), and the western magpie (G. dorsalis). They were later noted to hybridise readily where their territories crossed, with hybrid grey or striped-backed magpies being quite common. This resulted in them being reclassified as one species by Julian Ford in 1969, with most recent authors following suit.

  

Subspecies

 

There are currently thought to be nine subspecies of the Australian magpie, although there are large zones of overlap with intermediate forms between the taxa. There is a tendency for birds to become larger with increasing latitude, the southern subspecies being larger than those further north, except the Tasmanian form which is small.[26] The original form, known as the black-backed magpie and classified as Gymnorhina tibicen, has been split into four black-backed races:

•G. tibicen tibicen, the nominate form, is a large subspecies found in southeastern Queensland, from the vicinity of Moreton Bay through eastern New South Wales to Moruya, New South Wales almost to the Victorian border. It is coastal or near-coastal and is restricted to east of the Great Dividing Range.

 

•G. tibicen terraereginae, found from Cape York and the Gulf Country southwards across Queenslandto the coast between Halifax Bay in the north and south to the Mary River, and central and western New South Wales and into northern South Australia, is a small to medium-sized subspecies. The plumage is the same as that of subspecies tibicen, although the female has a shorter black tip to the tail. The wings and tarsus are shorter and the bill proportionally longer. It was originally described by Gregory Mathews in 1912, its subspecies name a Latin translation, terra "land" reginae "queen's" of "Queensland". Hybridisation with the large white-backed subspecies tyrannica occurs in northern Victoria and southeastern New South Wales; intermediate forms have black bands of varying sizes in white-backed area. Three-way hybridisation occurs between Bega and Batemans Bay on the New South Wales south coast.

 

•G. tibicen eylandtensis, the Top End magpie, is found from the Kimberley in northern Western Australia, across the Northern Territory through Arnhem Land and Groote Eylandt and into the Gulf Country. It is a small subspecies with a long and thinner bill, with birds of Groote Eylandt possibly even smaller than mainland birds. It has a narrow black terminal tailband, and a narrow black band; the male has a large white nape, the female pale grey. This form was initially described by H. L. White in 1922. It intergrades with subspecies terraereginae southeast of the Gulf of Carpentaria.

 

•G. tibicen longirostris, the long-billed magpie, is found across northern Western Australia, from Shark Bay into the Pilbara. Named in 1903 by Alex Milligan, it is a medium-sized subspecies with a long thin bill. Milligan speculated the bill may have been adapted for the local conditions, slim fare meaning the birds had to pick at dangerous scorpions and spiders. There is a broad area of hybridisation with the western dorsalis in southern central Western Australia from Shark Bay south to the Murchison River and east to the Great Victoria Desert.

  

The white-backed magpie, originally described as Gymnorhina hypoleuca by John Gould in 1837, has also been split into races:

 

•G. tibicen tyrannica, a very large white-backed form found from Twofold Bay on the New South Wales far south coast, across southern Victoria south of the Great Dividing Range through to the Coorong in southeastern South Australia. It was first described by Schodde and Mason in 1999. It has a broad black tail band.

 

•G. tibicen telonocua, found from Cowell south into the Eyre and Yorke Peninsulas in southern South Australia, as well as the southwestern Gawler Ranges. Described by Schodde and Mason in 1999, its subspecific name is an anagram of leuconota "white-backed". It is very similar to tyrannica, differing in having a shorter wing and being lighter and smaller overall. The bill is relatively short compared with other magpie subspecies. Intermediate forms are found in the Mount Lofty Ranges and on Kangaroo Island.

  

•G. tibicen hypoleuca now refers to a small white-backed subspecies with a short compact bill and short wings, found on King and Flinders Islands, as well as Tasmania.

 

•The western magpie, G. tibicen dorsalis was originally described as a separate species by A. J. Campbell in 1895 and is found in the fertile south-west corner of Western Australia. The adult male has a white back and most closely resembles subspecies telonocua, though it is a little larger with a longer bill and the black tip of its tail plumage is narrower. The female is unusual in that it has a scalloped black or brownish-black mantle and back; the dark feathers there are edged with white. This area appears a more uniform black as the plumage ages and the edges are worn away. Both sexes have black thighs.

 

•The New Guinean magpie, G. tibicen papuana, is a little-known subspecies found in southern New Guinea. The adult male has a mostly white back with a narrow black stripe, and the female a blackish back; the black feathers here are tipped with white similar to subspecies dorsalis. It has a long deep bill resembling that of subspecies longirostris. Genetically it is closely related to a western lineage of Australian magpies comprising subspecies dorsalis, longirostris and eylandtensis, suggesting their ancestors occupied in savannah country that was a land bridge between New Guinea and Australia and was submerged around 16,500 years ago.

  

Description

 

The adult magpie is a fairly solid, sturdy bird ranging from 37 to 43 cm (14.5 to 17 in) in length with a 65–85 cm (25.5–33.5 in) wingspan, and weighing 220–350 g (7.8–12.3 oz). Its robust wedge-shaped bill is bluish-white bordered with black, with a small hook at the tip. The black legs are long and strong. The plumage is pure glossy black and white; both sexes of all subspecies have black heads, wings and underparts with white shoulders. The tail has a black terminal band. The nape is white in the male and light greyish-white in the female. Mature magpies have dull red eyes, in contrast to the yellow eyes of currawongs and white eyes of Australian ravens and crows. The main difference between the subspecies lies in the "saddle" markings on the back below the nape. Black-backed subspecies have a black saddle and white nape. White-backed subspecies have a wholly white nape and saddle. The male Western Australian subspecies dorsalis is also white-backed, but the equivalent area in the female is scalloped black.

Juveniles have lighter greys and browns amidst the starker blacks and whites of their plumage; two- or three-year-old birds of both sexes closely resemble and are difficult to distinguish from adult females. Immature birds have dark brownish eyes until around two years of age. Australian magpies generally live to around 25 years of age, though ages of up to 30 years have been recorded. The reported age of first breeding has varied according to area, but the average is between the ages of three and five years.

Well-known and easily recognisable, the Australian magpie is unlikely to be confused with any other species. The pied butcherbird has a similar build and plumage, but has white underparts unlike the former species' black underparts. The magpie-lark is a much smaller and more delicate bird with complex and very different banded black and white plumage. Currawong species have predominantly dark plumage and heavier bills.

 

Vocalisation

 

One of Australia's most highly regarded songbirds, the Australian magpie has a wide variety of calls, many of which are complex. Pitch may vary as much as four octaves, and the bird can mimic over 35 species of native and introduced bird species, as well as dogs and horses. Magpies have even been noted to mimic human speech when living in close proximity to humans. Its complex, musical, warbling call is one of the most familiar Australian bird sounds. In Denis Glover's poem "The Magpies", the mature magpie's call is described as quardle oodle ardle wardle doodle, one of the most famous lines in New Zealand poetry, and as waddle giggle gargle paddle poodle, in the children's book Waddle Giggle Gargle by Pamela Allen.

 

When alone, a magpie may make a quiet musical warbling; these complex melodious warbles or subsongs are pitched at 2–4 KHz and do not carry for long distances. These songs have been recorded up to 70 minutes in duration and are more frequent after the end of the breeding season. Pairs of magpies often take up a loud musical calling known as carolling to advertise or defend their territory; one bird initiates the call with the second (and sometimes more) joining in. Often preceded by warbling, carolling is pitched between 6 and 8 kHz and has 4–5 elements with slurring indistinct noise in between. Birds will adopt a specific posture by tilting their heads back, expanding their chests, and moving their wings backwards. A group of magpies will sing a short repetitive version of carolling just before dawn (dawn song), and at twilight after sundown (dusk song), in winter and spring.

 

Fledgling and juvenile magpies emit a repeated short and loud (80 dB), high-pitched (8 kHz) begging call. Magpies may indulge in beak-clapping to warn other species of birds.They employ several high pitched (8–10 kHz) alarm or rallying calls when intruders or threats are spotted. Distinct calls have been recorded for the approach of eagles and monitor lizards.

 

Distribution and habitat

 

The Australian magpie is found in the Trans-Fly region of southern New Guinea, between the Oriomo River and Muli Strait, and across most of Australia, bar the tip of Cape York, the Gibson and Great Sandy Deserts, and southwest of Tasmania. Birds taken mainly from Tasmania and Victoria were introduced into New Zealand by local Acclimatisation Societies of Otago and Canterbury in the 1860s, with the Wellington Acclimatisation Society releasing 260 birds in 1874. White-backed forms are spread on both the North and eastern South Island, while black-backed forms are found in the Hawke's Bay region. Magpies were introduced into New Zealand to control agricultural pests, and were therefore a protected species until 1951. They are thought to affect native New Zealand bird populations such as the tui and kereru, sometimes raiding nests for eggs and nestlings, although studies by Waikato University have cast doubt on this, and much blame on the magpie as a predator in the past has been anecdotal only. Introductions also occurred in the Solomon Islands and Sri Lanka, although the species has failed to become established. It has become established in western Taveuni in Fiji, however.

 

The Australian magpie prefers open areas such as grassland, fields and residential areas such as parks, gardens, golf courses, and streets, with scattered trees or forest nearby. Birds nest and shelter in trees but forage mainly on the ground in these open areas. It has also been recorded in mature pine plantations; birds only occupy rainforest and wet sclerophyll forest in the vicinity of cleared areas. In general, evidence suggests the range and population of the Australian magpie has increased with land-clearing, although local declines in Queensland due to a 1902 drought, and in Tasmania in the 1930s have been noted; the cause for the latter is unclear but rabbit baiting, pine tree removal, and spread of the masked lapwing (Vanellus miles) have been implicated.

 

Behaviour

 

The Australian magpie is almost exclusively diurnal, although it may call into the night, like some other members of the Artamidae. Natural predators of magpies include various species of monitor lizard and the barking owl. Birds are often killed on roads or electrocuted by powerlines, or poisoned after killing and eating house sparrows or mice, rats or rabbits targeted with baiting. The Australian raven may take nestlings left unattended.

 

On the ground, the Australian magpie moves around by walking, and is the only member of the Artamidae to do so; woodswallows, butcherbirds and currawongs all tend to hop with legs parallel. The magpie has a short femur (thigh bone), and long lower leg below the knee, suited to walking rather than running, although birds can run in short bursts when hunting prey.

 

The magpie is generally sedentary and territorial throughout its range, living in groups occupying a territory, or in flocks or fringe groups. A group may occupy and defend the same territory for many years. Much energy is spent defending a territory from intruders, particularly other magpies, and different behaviours are seen with different opponents. The sight of a raptor results in a rallying call by sentinel birds and subsequent coordinated mobbing of the intruder. Magpies place themselves either side of the bird of prey so that it will be attacked from behind should it strike a defender, and harass and drive the raptor to some distance beyond the territory. A group will use carolling as a signal to advertise ownership and warn off other magpies. In the negotiating display, the one or two dominant magpies parade along the border of the defended territory while the rest of the group stand back a little and look on. The leaders may fluff their feathers or caroll repeatedly. In a group strength display, employed if both the opposing and defending groups are of roughly equal numbers, all magpies will fly and form a row at the border of the territory. The defending group may also resort to an aerial display where the dominant magpies, or sometimes the whole group, swoop and dive while calling to warn an intruding magpie's group.

 

A wide variety of displays are seen, with aggressive behaviours outnumbering pro-social ones. Crouching low and uttering quiet begging calls are common signs of submission. The manus flutter is a submissive display where a magpie will flutter its primary feathers in its wings. A magpie, particularly a juvenile, may also fall, roll over on its back and expose its underparts. Birds may fluff up their flank feathers as an aggressive display or preceding an attack. Young birds display various forms of play behaviour, either by themselves or in groups, with older birds often initiating the proceedings with juveniles. These may involve picking up, manipulating or tugging at various objects such as sticks, rocks or bits of wire, and handing them to other birds. A bird may pick up a feather or leaf and flying off with it, with other birds pursuing and attempting to bring down the leader by latching onto its tail feathers. Birds may jump on each other and even engage in mock fighting. Play may even take place with other species such as blue-faced honeyeaters and Australasian pipits.

 

Breeding

 

Magpies have a long breeding season which varies in different parts of the country; in northern parts of Australia they will breed between June and September, but not commence until August or September in cooler regions, and may continue until January in some alpine areas. The nest is a bowl-shaped structure made of sticks and lined with softer material such as grass and bark. Near human habitation, synthetic material may be incorporated. Nests are built exclusively by females and generally placed high up in a tree fork, often in an exposed position. The trees used are most commonly eucalypts, although a variety of other native trees as well as introduced pine, Crataegus, and elm have been recorded. Other bird species, such as the yellow-rumped thornbill (Acanthiza chrysorrhoa), willie wagtail(Rhipidura leucophrys), southern whiteface (Aphelocephala leucopsis), and (less commonly) noisy miner (Manorina melanocephala), often nest in the same tree as the magpie. The first two species may even locate their nest directly beneath a magpie nest, while the diminutive striated pardalote (Pardalotus striatus) has been known to make a burrow for breeding into the base of the magpie nest itself. These incursions are all tolerated by the magpies. The channel-billed cuckoo (Scythrops novaehollandiae) is a notable brood parasite in eastern Australia; magpies will raise cuckoo young, which eventually outcompete the magpie nestlings.

 

The Australian magpie produces a clutch of two to five light blue or greenish eggs, which are oval in shape and about 30 by 40 mm (1.2 by 1.6 in). The chicks hatch synchronously around 20 days after incubation begins; like all passerines, the chicks are altricial—they are born pink, naked, and blind with large feet, a short broad beak and a bright red throat. Their eyes are fully open at around 10 days. Chicks develop fine downy feathers on their head, back and wings in the first week, and pinfeathers in the second week. The black and white colouration is noticeable from an early stage. Nestlings are fed exclusively by the female, though the male magpie will feed his partner. The Australian magpie is known to engage in cooperative breeding, and helper birds will assist in feeding and raising young. This does vary from region to region, and with the size of the group—the behaviour is rare or nonexistent in pairs or small groups.

 

Juvenile magpies begin foraging on their own three weeks after leaving the nest, and mostly feeding themselves by six months old. Some birds continue begging for food until eight or nine months of age, but are usually ignored. Birds reach adult size by their first year. The age at which young birds disperse varies across the country, and depends on the aggressiveness of the dominant adult of the corresponding sex; males are usually evicted at a younger age. Many leave at around a year old, but the age of departure may range from eight months to four years.

 

Feeding

 

The Australian magpie is omnivorous, eating various items located at or near ground level including invertebrates such as earthworms, millipedes, snails, spiders and scorpions as well as a wide variety of insects—cockroaches, ants, beetles, cicadas, moths and caterpillars and other larvae. Insects, including large adult grasshoppers, may be seized mid-flight. Skinks, frogs, mice and other small animals as well as grain, tubers, figs and walnuts have also been noted as components of their diet. It has even learnt to safely eat the poisonous cane toadby flipping it over and consuming the underparts. Predominantly a ground feeder, the Australian magpie paces open areas methodically searching for insects and their larvae. One study showed birds were able to find scarab beetle larvae by sound or vibration. Birds use their bills to probe into the earth or otherwise overturn debris in search of food. Smaller prey are swallowed whole, although magpies rub off the stingers of bees and wasps before swallowing.

 

Relationship with humans

 

Swooping

 

Magpies are ubiquitous in urban areas all over Australia, and have become accustomed to people. A small percentage of birds become highly aggressive during breeding season from late August to early - mid October, and will swoop and sometimes attack passersby. Attacks begin as the eggs hatch, increase in frequency and severity as the chicks grow, and tail off as the chicks leave the nest.

 

The percentage has been difficult to estimate but is significantly less than 9%. Almost all attacking birds (around 99%) are male, and they are generally known to attack pedestrians at around 50 m (160 ft) from their nest, and cyclists at around 100 m (330 ft). There appears to be some specificity in choice of attack targets, with the majority of individuals specializing on either pedestrians or cyclists.Smaller - especially younger - people, lone people, and people travelling quickly (i.e., runners and cyclists) appear to be targeted most often by swooping magpies. Anecdotal evidence suggests that if a magpie sees a human trying to rescue a chick that has fallen from its nest, the bird will view this help as predation, and will become more aggressive to humans from then on.

 

Magpies may engage in an escalating series of behaviours to drive off intruders. Least threatening are alarm calls and distant swoops, where birds fly within several metres from behind and perch nearby. Next in intensity are close swoops, where a magpie will swoop in from behind or the side and audibly "snap" their beaks or even peck or bite at the face, neck, ears or eyes. More rarely, a bird may dive-bomb and strike the intruder's (usually a cyclist's) head with its chest. A magpie may rarely attack by landing on the ground in front of a person and lurching up and landing on the victim's chest and pecking at the face and eyes.

 

Magpie attacks can cause injuries, typically wounds to the head, and being unexpectedly swooped while cycling can result in loss of control of the bicycle, which may cause injury.

 

If it is necessary to walk near the nest, wearing a broad-brimmed or legionnaire's hat or using an umbrella will deter attacking birds, but beanies and bicycle helmets are of little value as birds attack the sides of the head and neck.

 

Magpies prefer to swoop at the back of the head; therefore, keeping the magpie in sight at all times can discourage the bird. A basic disguise such as sunglasses worn on the back of the head may fool the magpie as to where a person is looking. Eyes painted on hats or helmets will deter attacks on pedestrians but not cyclists.

 

Cyclists can deter attack by attaching a long pole with a flag to a bike, and the use of cable ties on helmets has become common and appears to be effective.

 

Magpies are a protected native species in Australia, so it is illegal to kill or harm them. However, this protection is removed in some Australian states if a magpie attacks a human, allowing for the bird to be killed if it is considered particularly aggressive (such a provision is made, for example, in section 54 of the South Australian National Parks and Wildlife Act).[ More commonly, an aggressive bird will be caught and relocated to an unpopulated area. Magpies have to be moved some distance as almost all are able to find their way home from distances of less than 25 km (16 mi). Removing the nest is of no use as birds will breed again and possibly be more aggressive the second time around.

 

Some claim that swooping can be prevented by hand-feeding magpies. Magpies will become accustomed to being fed by humans, and although they are wild, will return to the same place looking for handouts. The idea is that humans thereby appear less of a threat to the nesting birds. Although this has not been studied systematically, there are reports of its success.

  

Cultural references

 

The Australian magpie featured in aboriginal folklore around Australia. The Yindjibarndi people of the Pilbara in the northwest of the country used the bird as a signal for sunrise, frightening them awake with its call. They were also familiar with its highly territorial nature, and it features in a song in their Burndud, or songs of customs. It was a totem bird of the people of the Illawarra region south of Sydney.

 

Under the name piping shrike, the white-backed magpie was declared the official emblem of the Government of South Australia in 1901 by Governor Tennyson, and has featured on the South Australian flag since 1904. The magpie is a commonly used emblem of sporting teams in Australia, and its brash, cocky attitude has been likened to the Australian psyche. Such teams tend to wear uniforms with black and white stripes. The Collingwood Football Club adopted the magpie from a visiting South Australian representative team in 1892. The Port Adelaide Magpies would similarly adopt the black and white colours and Magpie name in 1902. Other examples include Brisbane's Souths Logan Magpies, and Sydney's Western Suburbs Magpies. Disputes over who has been the first club to adopt the magpie emblem have been heated at times. Another club, Glenorchy Football Club of Tasmania, was forced to change uniform design when placed in the same league as another club (Claremont Magpies) with the same emblem.

 

In New Zealand, the Hawke's Bay Rugby Union team, from Napier, New Zealand, is also known as the magpies. One of the best-known New Zealand poems is "The Magpies" by Denis Glover, with its refrain "Quardle oodle ardle wardle doodle", imitating the sound of the bird – and the popular New Zealand comic Footrot Flats features a magpie character by the name of Pew.

 

An online poll conducted by Guardian Australia and BirdLife Australia was held in late 2017 to choose the "Australian Bird of the Year". The Australian magpie won the contest with 19,926 votes (13.3%), narrowly ahead of the Australian white ibis.

 

[Credit: en.wikipedia.org]

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

History

United States

Name: USS Yorktown (CV-5)

Namesake: The Battle of Yorktown

Ordered: 3 August 1933

Builder: Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co.

Laid down: 21 May 1934

Launched: 4 April 1936

Sponsored by: Eleanor Roosevelt

Commissioned: 30 September 1937

In service: 1937

Out of service: 1942

Struck: 2 October 1942

Honors and

awards:

 

3 battle stars American Defense Service Medal

("A" device)/American Campaign Medal / Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal (3 stars) / World War II Victory Medal

 

Fate: Sunk 7 June 1942 in the Battle of Midway, 141 men killed.

General characteristics

Class & type: Yorktown-class aircraft carrier

Type: Aircraft carrier

Displacement:

 

As built:

19,800 long tons (20,100 t) light

25,500 long tons (25,900 t) full load

 

Length:

 

As built: 770 ft (230 m) (waterline @ design draft)

824 ft 9 in (251.38 m) overall

 

Beam:

 

As built: 83 ft 3 in (25.37 m) (waterline)

109 ft 6 in (33.38 m) (overall)

 

Draft: 25 ft 11.5 in (7.912 m) (as built)

Propulsion:

 

9 × Babcock & Wilcox boilers,

4 × Parsons geared turbines,

120,000 shp (89 MW)

4 × screws

 

Speed: 32.5 knots (37.4 mph; 60.2 km/h)

Range: 12,500 nautical miles (23,200 km; 14,400 mi) at 15 knots (17 mph; 28 km/h)

Complement: 2,217 officers and men (1941)

Sensors and

processing systems: CXAM radar from 1940[1]

Armament:

 

As built:

8 × single 5 in/38 cal guns

4 × quad 1.1 in/75 cal guns

24 × .50 caliber machine guns

From February 1942:

8 × 5 in/38 cal

4 × Quad 1.1 in/75 cal

24 20mm Oerlikon guns

24 × .50 caliber machine guns

 

Armor:

 

As built:

2.5-4 inch belt

60 lb protective decks

4 inch bulkheads

4 inch side and 3 inch top round conning tower

4 inch side over steering gear

 

Aircraft carried:

 

As built:

90 aircraft

3 × elevators

2 × flight deck hydraulic catapults

1 × hangar deck hydraulic catapults

 

USS Yorktown (CV-5) was an aircraft carrier commissioned in the United States Navy from 1937 until she was sunk at the Battle of Midway in June 1942. She was named after the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 and the lead ship of the Yorktown class which was designed after lessons learned from operations with the large converted battlecruiser Lexington class and the smaller purpose-built USS Ranger (CV-4). She represented the epitome of U.S. pre-war carrier design.

  

Early career

Eleanor Roosevelt christens the Yorktown (April 4, 1936)

Yorktown ship's insignia

 

Yorktown was laid down on 21 May 1934 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co.; launched on 4 April 1936; sponsored by Eleanor Roosevelt; and commissioned at the Naval Operating Base (NOB), Norfolk, Virginia, on 30 September 1937, Captain Ernest D. McWhorter in command.

 

After fitting out, the aircraft carrier trained in Hampton Roads, Virginia and in the southern drill grounds off the Virginia capes into January 1938, conducting carrier qualifications for her newly embarked air group.

 

Yorktown sailed for the Caribbean on 8 January 1938 and arrived at Culebra, Puerto Rico, on 13 January. Over the ensuing month, the carrier conducted her shakedown, touching at Charlotte Amalie, St Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands; Gonaïves, Haiti; Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and Cristóbal, Panama Canal Zone. Departing Colon Bay, Cristobal, on 1 March, Yorktown sailed for Hampton Roads, arrived on 6 March, and shifted to the Norfolk Navy Yard the next day for post-shakedown availability.

 

After undergoing repairs through the early autumn of 1938, Yorktown shifted from the navy yard to NOB Norfolk on 17 October and soon headed for the Southern Drill Grounds for training.

 

Yorktown operated off the eastern seaboard, ranging from Chesapeake Bay to Guantanamo Bay, into 1939. As flagship for Carrier Division 2, she participated in her first war game—Fleet Problem XX—along with her sister-ship USS Enterprise (CV-6) in February 1939. The scenario for the exercise called for one fleet to control the sea lanes in the Caribbean against the incursion of a foreign European power while maintaining sufficient naval strength to protect vital American interests in the Pacific. The maneuvers were witnessed, in part, by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, embarked in the heavy cruiser USS Houston (CA-30).

 

The critique of the operation revealed that carrier operations—a part of the scenarios for the annual exercises since the entry of USS Langley (CV-1) into the war games in 1925—had achieved a new peak of efficiency. Despite the inexperience of Yorktown and Enterprise—comparative newcomers to the Fleet—both carriers made significant contributions to the success of the problem. The planners had studied the employment of carriers and their embarked air groups in connection with convoy escort, antisubmarine defense, and various attack measures against surface ships and shore installations. In short, they worked to develop the tactics that would be used when war actually came.[2]

Pacific Fleet

 

Following Fleet Problem XX, Yorktown returned briefly to Hampton Roads before sailing for the Pacific on 20 April 1939. Transiting the Panama Canal a week later, Yorktown soon commenced a regular routine of operations with the Pacific Fleet. The Second World War started on 1 September 1939, but the USA was not yet involved. Operating out of San Diego, California into 1940, the carrier participated in Fleet Problem XXI that April. Yorktown was one of six ships to receive the new RCA CXAM radar in 1940.[1]

 

Fleet Problem XXI—a two-part exercise—included some of the operations that would characterize future warfare in the Pacific. The first part of the exercise was devoted to training in making plans and estimates; in screening and scouting; in coordination of combatant units; and in employing fleet and standard dispositions. The second phase included training in convoy protection, the seizure of advanced bases, and, ultimately, the decisive engagement between the opposing fleets. The last pre-war exercise of its type, Fleet Problem XXI contained two exercises (comparatively minor at the time) where air operations played a major role. Fleet Joint Air Exercise 114A prophetically pointed out the need to coordinate Army and Navy defense plans for the Hawaiian Islands, and Fleet Exercise 114 proved that aircraft could be used for high altitude tracking of surface forces—a significant role for planes that would be fully realized in the war to come.

 

With the retention of the Fleet in Hawaiian waters after the conclusion of Fleet Problem XXI, Yorktown operated in the Pacific off the west coast of the United States and in Hawaiian waters until the following spring, when the success of German U-boats preying upon British shipping in the Atlantic required a shift of American naval strength. Thus, to reinforce the U.S. Atlantic Fleet, the Navy transferred a substantial force from the Pacific including Yorktown, Battleship Division Three (the New Mexico-class battleships), three light cruisers, and 12 accompanying destroyers.[2]

Neutrality patrol

Yorktown prepares to get under way (June 1940)

Yorktown is refueled by the USS Brazos (AO-4) mid-Pacific (July 1940)

 

Yorktown departed Pearl Harbor on 20 April 1941 in company with destroyers Warrington, Somers, and Jouett; headed southeast, transited the Panama Canal on the night of 6–7 May, and arrived at Bermuda on 12 May. From that time until the United States entered the war, Yorktown conducted four patrols in the Atlantic, ranging from Newfoundland to Bermuda and logging 17,642 miles (28,392 km) steamed while enforcing American neutrality.

 

Although Adolf Hitler had forbidden his submarines to attack American ships, the men who manned the American naval vessels were not aware of this policy and operated on a wartime footing in the Atlantic.

 

On 28 October, while Yorktown, the battleship USS New Mexico (BB-40), and other American warships were screening a convoy, a destroyer picked up a submarine contact and dropped depth charges while the convoy itself made an emergency starboard turn, the first of the convoy's three emergency changes of course. Late that afternoon, engine repairs to one of the ships in the convoy, Empire Pintail, reduced the convoy's speed to 11 knots (13 mph; 20 km/h).

 

During the night, the American ships intercepted strong German radio signals, indicating submarines probably in the vicinity reporting the group. Rear Admiral H. Kent Hewitt, commanding the escort force, sent a destroyer to sweep astern of the convoy to destroy the U-boat or at least to drive him under.

 

The next day, while cruiser scout planes patrolled overhead, Yorktown and USS Savannah (CL-42) fueled their escorting destroyers, finishing the task as dusk fell. On 30 October, Yorktown was preparing to fuel three destroyers when other escorts made sound contacts. The convoy subsequently made 10 emergency turns while the destroyers Morris and Anderson dropped depth charges, with Hughes assisted in developing the contact. Anderson later made two more depth charge attacks, noticing "considerable oil with slick spreading but no wreckage".

 

The short-of-war period was becoming more like the real thing as each day went on. Elsewhere on 30 October, U-552 torpedoed the destroyer Reuben James, sinking her with a heavy loss of life, the first loss of an American warship in World War II. After another Neutrality Patrol stint in November, Yorktown put into Norfolk on 2 December.[2]

World War II

 

Yorktown in February 1942.

 

On the early morning of December 7, 1941, Japanese warplanes attacked the U.S. base at Pearl Harbor without warning, killing 2,403 Americans, destroying or damaging 247 U.S. aircraft, and damaging or sinking 16 U.S. warships. With the battle line crippled, the undamaged American carriers assumed great importance. There were, on 7 December, only three in the Pacific: Enterprise, Lexington, and Saratoga. Ranger, Wasp, and the recently commissioned Hornet remained in the Atlantic. The surprise attack on Pearl Harbor resulted in massive outrage across the United States and led the country's formal entry into World War II the next day. Yorktown departed Norfolk on 16 December 1941 for the Pacific, her secondary gun galleries studded with new Oerlikon 20 mm guns. She reached San Diego 30 December 1941 and soon became flagship for Rear Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher's newly formed Task Force 17 (TF 17).

 

The carrier's first mission in her new theater was to escort a convoy carrying Marine reinforcements to American Samoa. Departing San Diego on 6 January 1942, Yorktown and her consorts covered the movement of marines to Pago Pago in Tutuila to augment the garrison already there.

 

Having safely covered that troop movement, Yorktown, in company with sister ship Enterprise, departed Samoan waters on 25 January. Six days later, Task Force 8 (built around Enterprise), and TF 17 (around Yorktown) parted company. The former headed for the Marshall Islands, the latter for the Gilberts, each to take part in some of the first American offensives of the war, the Marshalls-Gilberts raids.

 

Yorktown was being screened by two cruisers, Louisville and St. Louis and four destroyers, seemingly provided by Destroyer Squadron 2. At 05:17, Yorktown launched 11 Douglas TBD-1 Devastators and 17 Douglas SBD-3 Dauntlesses, under the command of CMDR Curtis W. Smiley. Those planes hit what Japanese shore installations and shipping they could find at Jaluit, but severe thunderstorms hampered the mission, and seven planes were lost. Other Yorktown planes attacked Japanese installations and ships at Makin and Mili Atolls.

 

The attack on the Gilberts by Task Force 17 had apparently been a complete surprise since the American force encountered no enemy surface ships. A single four-engined Kawanishi H6K "Mavis" patrol flying boat attempted to attack American destroyers sent astern in hope of recovering the crews of planes overdue from the Jaluit mission. Antiaircraft fire from the destroyers drove off the intruder before he could cause any damage.

 

Later, another "Mavis"—or possibly the same one—came out of low clouds 15,000 yards (14,000 m) distant from Yorktown. The carrier withheld her antiaircraft fire in order not to interfere with the combat air patrol (CAP) fighters. Presently, the "Mavis", pursued by two F4F Wildcats, disappeared behind a cloud. Within five minutes, the enemy patrol plane fell out of the clouds and crashed in the water.

 

Although TF 17 was slated to make a second attack on Jaluit, it was canceled because of heavy rainstorms and the approach of darkness. Therefore, the Yorktown force retired from the area.

 

Admiral Chester Nimitz later called the Marshalls-Gilberts raids "well conceived, well planned, and brilliantly executed". The results obtained by Task Forces 8 and 17 were noteworthy, Nimitz continued in his subsequent report, because the task forces had been obliged to make their attacks somewhat blindly, due to lack of hard intelligence data on the Japanese-mandated islands.

 

Yorktown subsequently put in at Pearl Harbor for replenishment before she put to sea on 14 February, bound for the Coral Sea. On 6 March, she rendezvoused with TF 11—formed around Lexington and under the command of Vice Admiral Wilson Brown—and headed towards Rabaul and Gasmata to attack Japanese shipping there in an effort to check the Japanese advance and to cover the landing of Allied troops at Nouméa, New Caledonia. However, as the two carriers—screened by a powerful force of eight heavy cruisers (including the Australian warships HMAS Australia and HMAS Canberra) and 14 destroyers—steamed toward New Guinea, the Japanese continued their advance toward Australia with a landing on 7 March at the Huon Gulf, in the Salamaua-Lae area on the eastern end of New Guinea.

 

Word of the Japanese operation prompted Admiral Brown to change the objective of TF 11's strike from Rabaul to the Salamaua-Lae sector. On the morning of 10 March 1942, American carriers launched aircraft from the Gulf of Papua. Lexington flew off her air group commencing at 07:49 and, 21 minutes later, Yorktown followed suit. While the choice of the gulf as the launch point for the strike meant the planes would have to fly some 125 miles (200 km) across the Owen Stanley mountains—a range not known for the best flying conditions—that approach provided security for the task force and ensured surprise.

 

In the attacks that followed, Lexington's SBDs from Scouting Squadron 2 (VS-2) commenced dive-bombing Japanese ships at Lae at 0922. The carrier's torpedo and bomber squadrons (VT-2 and VB-2) attacked shipping at Salamaua at 09:38. Her fighters (VF-2) split up into four-plane attack groups: one strafed Lae and the other, Salamaua. Yorktown's planes followed on the heels of those from "Lady Lex". VB-5 and VT-5 attacked Japanese ships in the Salamaua area at 0950, while VS-5 went after auxiliaries moored close in shore at Lae. The fighters of VF-42 flew CAP over Salamaua until they determined there was no air opposition, then strafed surface objectives and small boats in the harbor.

 

After carrying out their missions, the American planes returned to their carriers, and 103 planes of the 104 launched were back safely on board by noon. One SBD-2 had been downed by Japanese antiaircraft fire. The raid on Salamaua and Lae was the first attack by many pilots of both carriers; and, while the resultant torpedo and bombing accuracy was inferior to that achieved in later actions, the operation gave the fliers invaluable experience which enabled them to do so well in the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway.

 

Task Force 11 retired at 20 knots (23 mph; 37 km/h) on a southeasterly course until dark, when the ships steered eastward at 15 knots (17 mph; 28 km/h) and made rendezvous with Task Group 11.7 (TG11.7), three heavy cruisers (USS Chicago, HMAS Australia, and HMAS Canberra) and four destroyers under the Australian Rear Admiral John Crace, which provided cover for the carriers on their approach to New Guinea.

 

Yorktown resumed her patrols in the Coral Sea area, remaining at sea into April, out of reach of Japanese land-based aircraft and ready to carry out offensive operations whenever the opportunity presented itself. After the Lae-Salamaua raid, the situation in the South Pacific seemed temporarily stabilized, and Yorktown and her consorts in TF 17 put into the undeveloped harbor at Tongatabu, in the Tonga Islands, for needed upkeep, having been at sea continuously since departing from Pearl Harbor on 14 February.

 

However, the enemy was soon on the move. To Admiral Nimitz, there seemed to be "excellent indications that the Japanese intended to make a seaborne attack on Port Moresby the first week in May". Yorktown accordingly departed Tongatapu on 27 April 1942, bound once more for the Coral Sea. TF 11—now commanded by Rear Admiral Aubrey W. Fitch, who had relieved Brown in Lexington—departed Pearl Harbor to join Fletcher's TF 17 and arrived in the vicinity of Yorktown's group, southwest of the New Hebrides Islands, on 1 May.[2]

 

Battle of the Coral Sea

 

At 15:17 the next afternoon, two Dauntlesses from VS-5 sighted a Japanese submarine, running on the surface. Three Devastators took off from Yorktown, sped to the scene, and carried out an attack that succeeded only in driving the submarine under.

 

On the morning of 3 May, TF 11 and TF 17 were some 100 miles (161 km) apart, engaged in fueling operations. Shortly before midnight, Fletcher received word from Australian-based aircraft that Japanese transports were disembarking troops and equipment at Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. Arriving soon after the Australians had evacuated the place, the Japanese landed to commence construction of a seaplane base there to support their southward thrust.

 

Yorktown accordingly set course northward at 27 knots (31 mph; 50 km/h). By daybreak on 4 May, she was within striking distance of the newly established Japanese beachhead and launched her first strike at 0701-18 F4F-3's of VF-42, 12 TBD's of VT-5, and 28 SBD's from VS and BY-5. Yorktown's air group made three consecutive attacks on enemy ships and shore installations at Tulagi and Gavutu on the south coast of Florida Island in the Solomons. Expending 22 torpedoes and 76 1,000 pounds (450 kg) bombs in the three attacks, Yorktown's planes sank the destroyer Kikuzuki, three minesweepers and four barges. In addition, Air Group 5 destroyed five enemy seaplanes, all at the cost of two F4Fs lost (the pilots were recovered) and one TBD (whose crew was lost).

 

Meanwhile, that same day, TF 44, a cruiser-destroyer force under Rear Admiral Crace (RN), joined Lexington's TF 11, thus completing the composition of the Allied force on the eve of the crucial Battle of the Coral Sea.

 

Elsewhere, to the northward, eleven troop-laden transports—escorted by destroyers and covered by the light carrier Shōhō, four heavy cruisers, and a destroyer—steamed toward Port Moresby. In addition, another Japanese task force—formed around the two Pearl Harbor veterans, carriers Shōkaku and Zuikaku, and screened by two heavy cruisers and six destroyers—provided additional air cover.

 

On the morning of 6 May, Fletcher gathered all Allied forces under his tactical command as TF 17. At daybreak on 7 May, he dispatched Crace, with the cruisers and destroyers under his command, toward the Louisiade archipelago to intercept any enemy attempt to move toward Port Moresby.

 

While Fletcher moved north with his two flattops and their screens in search of the enemy, Japanese search planes located the oiler Neosho and her escort, Sims and misidentified the former as a carrier. Two waves of Japanese planes—first high level bombers and then dive bombers—attacked the two ships. Sims, her antiaircraft battery crippled by gun failures, took three direct hits and sank quickly with a heavy loss of life. Neosho was more fortunate in that, even after seven direct hits and eight near-misses, she remained afloat until, on the 11th, her survivors were picked up by Henley and her hulk sunk by the rescuing destroyer.

 

Neosho and Sims had performed a valuable service, drawing off the planes that might otherwise have hit Fletcher's carriers. Meanwhile, Yorktown and Lexington's planes found Shōhō and sank her. One of Lexington's pilots reported this victory with the radio message, "Scratch one flattop".

 

That afternoon, Shōkaku and Zuikaku—still not located by Fletcher's forces—launched 27 bombers and torpedo planes to search for the American ships. Their flight proved uneventful until they ran into fighters from Yorktown and Lexington, who proceeded to down nine enemy planes in the ensuing dogfight.

 

Near twilight, three Japanese planes incredibly mistook Yorktown for their own carrier and attempted to land. The ship's gunfire, though, drove them off; and the enemy planes crossed Yorktown's bow and turned away out of range. Twenty minutes later, when three more enemy pilots made the mistake of trying to get into Yorktown's landing circle, the carrier's gunners splashed one of the trio.

 

However, the battle was far from over. The next morning, 8 May, a Lexington search plane spotted Admiral Takeo Takagi's carrier striking force—including Zuikaku and Shōkaku. Yorktown planes scored two bomb hits on Shōkaku, damaging her flight deck and preventing her from launching aircraft; in addition, the bombs set off explosions in gasoline storage tanks and destroyed an engine repair workshop. Lexington's Dauntlesses added another hit. Between the two American air groups, the hits killed 108 Japanese sailors and wounded 40 more.

 

While the American planes were occupying the Japanese flattops, however, Yorktown and Lexington—alerted by an intercepted message which indicated that the Japanese knew of their whereabouts—were preparing to fight off a retaliatory strike, which came shortly after 11:00.

 

American CAP Wildcats downed 17 planes, though some managed to slip through the defenses. "Kates" launched torpedoes from both sides of Lexington's bows. Two "fish" tore into "Lady Lex" on the port side; "Val" dive bombers added to the destruction with three bomb hits. Lexington developed a list, with three partially flooded engineering spaces. Several fires raged below decks, and the carrier's elevators were put out of commission.

 

Meanwhile, Yorktown was having problems of her own. Maneuvered by Captain Elliott Buckmaster, her commanding officer, the carrier dodged eight torpedoes. Attacked then by "Vals", the ship managed to evade all but one bomb. That one, however, penetrated the flight deck and exploded below decks, killing or seriously injuring 66 men.

 

Lexington's damage control parties brought the fires under control, and the ship was still able to continue flight operations despite the damage. The air battle itself ended shortly before noon on the 8th; within an hour, the carrier was on an even keel, although slightly down by the bow. However, an explosion caused by the ignition of gasoline vapors later caused a fire and tore apart the inside. Lexington was abandoned at 17:07, and later sunk by the destroyer Phelps.

 

The Japanese had won a tactical victory, inflicting comparatively heavier losses on the Allied force, but the Allies, in stemming the tide of Japan's conquests in the South and Southwest Pacific, had achieved a strategic victory. Yorktown had not achieved her part in the victory without cost, and had suffered enough damage to cause experts to estimate that at least three months in a yard would be required to put her back in fighting trim. However, there was little time for repairs, because Allied intelligence—most notably the cryptographic unit at Pearl Harbor—had gained enough information from decoded Japanese naval messages to estimate that the Japanese were on the threshold of a major operation aimed at the northwestern tip of the Hawaiian chain—two islets in a low coral atoll known as Midway.[2]

 

Battle of Midway

 

Yorktown on the morning of 4 June 1942.

 

Armed with this intelligence Admiral Nimitz began methodically planning Midway's defense, rushing all possible reinforcement in the way of men, planes and guns to Midway. In addition, he began gathering his comparatively meager naval forces to meet the enemy at sea. As part of those preparations, he recalled TF 16, Enterprise and Hornet, to Pearl Harbor for a quick replenishment.

 

Yorktown, too, received orders to return to Hawaii; she arrived at Pearl Harbor on 27 May, entering dry dock the following day. The damage the ship had sustained after Coral Sea was considerable, and led to the Navy Yard inspectors estimating that she would need at least two weeks of repairs. However, Admiral Nimitz ordered that she be made ready to sail alongside TF 16. Yard workers there, laboring around the clock, made enough repairs to enable the ship to put to sea again in 48 hours. The repairs were made in such a short time that the Japanese Naval Commanders thought they had mistaken Yorktown for another vessel as they thought she had been sunk after the previous battle, yet she had returned. Her air group was augmented by planes and crews from Saratoga which was then headed for Pearl Harbor after her refit on the West Coast. Yorktown sailed as the core of TF 17 on 30 May.

 

Northeast of Midway, Yorktown, flying Rear Admiral Fletcher's flag, rendezvoused with TF 16 under Rear Admiral Raymond A. Spruance and maintained a position 10 miles (16 km) to the northward of him.

 

Patrols, both from Midway and the carriers, were flown during early June. At dawn on 4 June Yorktown launched a 10-plane group of Dauntlesses from VB-5 which searched a northern semicircle for a distance of 100 miles (160 km) out but found nothing.

 

Meanwhile, PBYs flying from Midway had sighted the approaching Japanese and broadcast the alarm for the American forces defending the key atoll. Admiral Fletcher, in tactical command, ordered Admiral Spruance's TF 16 to locate and strike the enemy carrier force.

 

Yorktown's search group returned at 0830, landing soon after the last of the six-plane CAP had left the deck. When the last of the Dauntlesses were recovered, the deck was hastily respotted for the launch of the ship's attack group: 17 Dauntlesses from VB-3, 12 Devastators from VT-3, and six Wildcats from "Fighting Three". Enterprise and Hornet, meanwhile, launched their attack groups.

 

The torpedo planes from the three American carriers located the Japanese striking force, but met disaster. Of the 41 planes from VT-8, VT-6, and VT-3, only six returned to Enterprise and Yorktown; none made it back to Hornet.

 

As a reaction to the torpedo attack the Japanese CAP had broken off their high-altitude cover for their carriers and had concentrated on the Devastators, flying "on the deck", allowing Dauntlesses from Yorktown and Enterprise to arrive unopposed.[2]

 

Virtually unopposed, Yorktown's dive-bombers attacked Sōryū, making three lethal hits with 1,000 pounds (450 kg) bombs and setting her on fire.[3] Enterprise's planes, meanwhile, hit Akagi and Kaga, effectively destroying them. The bombs from the Dauntlesses caught all of the Japanese carriers in the midst of refueling and rearming operations, causing devastating fires and explosions.

 

Three of the four Japanese carriers had been destroyed. The fourth, Hiryū, separated from her sisters, launched a striking force of 18 "Vals" and soon located Yorktown.

Smoke pours from Yorktown after being hit in the boilers by Japanese dive bombers at Midway.

 

As soon as the attackers had been picked up on Yorktown's radar at about 1329, she discontinued fueling her CAP fighters on deck and swiftly cleared for action. Her returning dive bombers were moved from the landing circle to open the area for antiaircraft fire. The Dauntlesses were ordered aloft to form a CAP. An auxiliary 800 US gallons (3,000 l) gasoline tank was pushed over the carrier's fantail, eliminating one fire hazard. The crew drained fuel lines and closed and secured all compartments.[2]

 

All of Yorktown's fighters were vectored out to intercept the oncoming Japanese aircraft, and did so some 15 to 20 miles (24 to 32 km) out. The Wildcats attacked vigorously, breaking up what appeared to be an organized attack by some 18 "Vals" and 6 "Zeroes".[4] "Planes were flying in every direction", wrote Captain Buckmaster after the action, "and many were falling in flames."[2] The leader of the "Vals", Lieutenant Michio Kobayashi, was probably shot down by the VF-3's commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander John S. Thach. Lieutenant William W. Barnes also pressed home the first attack, possibly taking out the lead bomber and damaging at least two others.[citation needed]

 

Despite an intensive barrage and evasive maneuvering, three "Vals" scored hits. Two of them were shot down soon after releasing their bomb loads; the third went out of control just as his bomb left the rack. It tumbled in flight and hit just abaft the number two elevator on the starboard side, exploding on contact and blasting a hole about 10 feet (3 m) square in the flight deck. Splinters from the exploding bomb killed most of the crews of the two 1.1-inch (28 mm) gun mounts aft of the island and on the flight deck below. Fragments piercing the flight deck hit three planes on the hangar deck, starting fires. One of the aircraft, a Yorktown Dauntless, was fully fueled and carrying a 1,000 pounds (450 kg) bomb. Prompt action by LT A. C. Emerson, the hangar deck officer, prevented a serious fire by activating the sprinkler system and quickly extinguishing the fire.

 

The second bomb to hit the ship came from the port side, pierced the flight deck, and exploded in the lower part of the funnel. It ruptured the uptakes for three boilers, disabled two boilers, and extinguished the fires in five boilers. Smoke and gases began filling the firerooms of six boilers. The men at number one boiler remained at their post and kept it alight, maintaining enough steam pressure to allow the auxiliary steam systems to function.

 

A third bomb hit the carrier from the starboard side, pierced the side of number one elevator and exploded on the fourth deck, starting a persistent fire in the rag storage space, adjacent to the forward gasoline stowage and the magazines. The prior precaution of smothering the gasoline system with carbon dioxide undoubtedly prevented the gasoline from igniting.

 

While the ship recovered from the damage inflicted by the dive-bombing attack, her speed dropped to 6 knots (7 mph; 11 km/h); and then at 14:40, about 20 minutes after the bomb hit that had shut down most of the boilers, Yorktown slowed to a stop, dead in the water.

 

At about 15:40, Yorktown prepared to get steaming again; and, at 15:50, the engine room force reported that they were ready to make 20 knots (23 mph; 37 km/h) or better.

 

Simultaneously, with the fires controlled sufficiently to warrant the resumption of fueling, Yorktown began refueling the fighters then on deck; just then the ship's radar picked up an incoming air group at a distance of 33 miles (53 km). While the ship prepared for battle, again smothering gasoline systems and stopping the fueling of the planes on her flight deck, she vectored four of the six fighters of the CAP in the air to intercept the raiders. Of the 10 fighters on board, eight had as little as 23 US gallons (87 l) of fuel in their tanks. They were launched as the remaining pair of fighters of the CAP headed out to intercept the Japanese planes.

Yorktown is hit on the port side, amidships, by a Japanese Type 91 aerial torpedo during the mid-afternoon attack by planes from the carrier Hiryu.

 

At 16:00, maneuvering Yorktown churned forward, making 20 knots (23 mph; 37 km/h). The fighters she had launched and vectored out to intercept had meanwhile made contact with the enemy. Yorktown received reports that the planes were "Kates". The Wildcats shot down at least three, but the rest began their approach while the carrier and her escorts mounted a heavy antiaircraft barrage.

 

Yorktown maneuvered radically, avoiding at least two torpedoes before another two struck the port side within minutes of each other, the first at 16:20. The carrier had been mortally wounded; she lost power and went dead in the water with a jammed rudder and an increasing list to port.

 

As the ship's list progressed, Commander C. E. Aldrich, the damage control officer, reported from central station that, without power, controlling the flooding looked impossible. The engineering officer, LCDR. J. F. Delaney, soon reported that all boiler fires were out, that all power was lost and that it was impossible to correct the list. Buckmaster ordered Aldrich, Delaney, and their men to secure and lay up on deck to put on life jackets.

 

The list, meanwhile, continued to increase. When it reached 26 degrees, Buckmaster and Aldrich agreed that capsizing was imminent. "In order to save as many of the ship's company as possible", the captain wrote later, he "ordered the ship to be abandoned".

 

Over the next few minutes the crew lowered the wounded into life rafts and struck out for the nearby destroyers and cruisers to be picked up by their boats, abandoning ship in good order. After the evacuation of all wounded, the executive officer, Commander I. D. Wiltsie, left the ship down a line on the starboard side. Buckmaster, meanwhile, toured the ship one last time, to see if any men remained. After finding no "live personnel", Buckmaster lowered himself into the water by means of a line over the stern, by which time water was lapping the port side of the hangar deck.[2]

Salvage and sinking

 

After being picked up by the destroyer USS Hammann, Buckmaster transferred to the cruiser Astoria and reported to Rear Admiral Fletcher, who had shifted his flag to the heavy cruiser after the first dive-bombing attack. The two men agreed that a salvage party should attempt to save the ship, since she had stubbornly remained afloat despite the heavy list and imminent danger of capsizing.

 

While efforts to save Yorktown had been proceeding apace, her planes were still in action, joining those from Enterprise in striking the last Japanese carrier—Hiryū—late that afternoon. Taking four direct hits, the Japanese carrier was soon helpless. She was abandoned by her crew and left to drift out of control.

 

Yorktown, as it turned out, floated throughout the night. Two men were still alive on board her; one attracted attention by firing a machine gun, heard by the sole attending destroyer, Hughes. The escort picked up the men, one of whom later died.

 

Meanwhile, Buckmaster had selected 29 officers and 141 men to return to the ship in an attempt to save her. Five destroyers formed an antisubmarine screen while the salvage party boarded the listing carrier, the fire in the rag storage still smouldering on the morning of the 6th. The Fleet Tug USS Vireo, summoned from Pearl and Hermes Reef, soon commenced towing the ship, although progress was painfully slow.

 

Yorktown's repair party went on board with a carefully predetermined plan of action to be carried out by men from each department—damage control, gunnery air engineering, navigation, communication, supply and medical. To assist in the work, Lt. Cdr. Arnold E. True brought his ship, USS Hammann, alongside to starboard, aft, furnishing pumps and electric power.

 

By mid-afternoon, it looked as if the gamble to save the ship was paying off. The process of reducing topside weight was proceeding well—one 5-inch (127 mm) gun had been dropped over the side, and a second was ready to be cast loose; planes had been pushed over the side; the submersible pumps (powered by electricity provided by Hammann) had pumped a lot of water out of the engineering spaces. The efforts of the salvage crew had reduced the list about two degrees.

USS Hammann (DD-412) sinking with stern high, after being torpedoed by Japanese submarine I-168

 

Unknown to Yorktown and the six nearby destroyers, Japanese submarine I-168 had achieved a favorable firing position. Remarkably—but perhaps understandably due to the debris and wreckage in the water in the vicinity—none of the destroyers picked up the approaching I-boat. At 15:36 lookouts spotted a salvo of four torpedoes approaching the ship from the starboard beam.

 

Hammann went to general quarters, a 20 millimeter gun going into action in an attempt to explode the torpedoes in the water, her screws churning the water beneath her fantail as she tried to get underway. One torpedo hit Hammann directly amidships and broke her back. The destroyer jackknifed and went down rapidly.

 

Two torpedoes struck Yorktown just below the turn of the bilge at the after end of the island structure. The fourth torpedo passed just astern of the carrier.

 

About a minute after Hammann sank there was an underwater explosion, possibly caused by the destroyer's depth charges going off. The blast killed many of Hammann's and a few of Yorktown's men who had been thrown into the water. The concussion battered the already-damaged carrier's hull and caused tremendous shocks that carried away Yorktown's auxiliary generator, sent numerous fixtures from the hangar deck overhead crashing to the deck below, sheared rivets in the starboard leg of the foremast, and threw men in every direction, causing broken bones and several minor injuries.

Yorktown capsizing to port and sinking, 7 June 1942

 

All destroyers immediately commenced searches for the enemy submarine (which escaped) and commenced rescuing men from Hammann and Yorktown. Captain Buckmaster decided to postpone further attempts at salvage until the following day.

 

Vireo cut the tow and doubled back to Yorktown to pick up survivors, taking on board many men of the salvage crew while picking up men from the water. The little ship endured a terrific pounding from the larger ship but nevertheless stayed alongside to carry out her rescue mission. Later, while on board the tug, Buckmaster conducted a burial service, and two officers and an enlisted man from Hammann were buried at sea.

 

The second attempt at salvage was never made. Throughout the night of the 6th and into the morning of the 7th, Yorktown remained stubbornly afloat. By 05:30 on 7 June, however, the men in the ships nearby noted that the carrier's list was rapidly increasing to port. At 07:01, the ship turned over onto her port side, rolled upside-down, and sank, stern first, in 3,000 fathoms (5,500 m) of water.[2]

 

In all, Yorktown's sinking on 7 June 1942 claimed the lives of 141 of her officers and crewmen.[citation needed]

Honors and rediscovery

 

Yorktown (CV-5) earned three battle stars for her World War II service, two of them for the significant part she had played in stopping Japanese expansion and turning the tide of the war at Coral Sea and at Midway.[2]

 

On 19 May 1998, the wreck of Yorktown was found and photographed by renowned oceanographer Dr. Robert D. Ballard, discoverer of the wrecks of the RMS Titanic and the German battleship Bismarck. The wreck of the Yorktown, 3 miles (5 km) beneath the surface, was (and may still be) in excellent condition although she had spent 56 years on the deep-sea floor; much paint and equipment were still visible.[5] As of March 2015, there have not been any follow-up expeditions to the Yorktown '​s wreckage.

In culture

 

In the 2001 science fiction novel by Connie Willis entitled Passage, one character, a loquacious elderly man named Ed Wojakowski, claims to be a World War II veteran in the United States Navy who served on the Yorktown.

 

My background, huh? Well, I'll tell ya, I'm an old navy man. Served on the USS Yorktown... Aircraft carrier. Best damn one in the Pacific. Sank four carriers at the Battle of Midway before a Jap sub got her. Torpedo. Got a destroyer that was standing in the way, too. The Hammann. Went down just like that. Dead before she even knew it. Two minutes. All hands.[6]

 

In the Star Trek universe, there are at least two ships named USS Yorktown.

 

Yorktown plays a prominent role in the 2007 real-time tactics/action game Battlestations: Midway, in which the player gets to control her in three of the game's primary missions: The Strike on Tulagi, the Battle of the Coral Sea, and the opening of the Battle of Midway.

See also

Yup, I had to do the cheesy pose with your new camera shot! This is Veronica. My Toyo 45A view camera.

 

This camera is ridiculously cool. She's kinda huge, too. At 6lbs, this is not really a camera that you hold in your hands and take snapshots with.

 

There are 2 things I love about this camera: First, It is completely boiled down to the basics of camera technology. Everything is manual. There's no battery. There's no meter. There's no auto-focus. The film comes in sheets.

 

Second, the whole process of shooting with it has to be slow and methodical. Setting up the camera takes time. Composing and focusing takes time. Its good to slow down. That's been my motto over these past few months...

 

Me and Veronica are going to have a lovely time in Glacier National Park in a couple weeks. :-)

“your ticket, please.”

 

i look up from my glass of Hiram Walker whiskey

& see the conductor. i am sitting in the bar car

on the Hiram Bingham train that runs through

the Sacred Valley of the Incas. a tale of two hirams.

 

“i’m afraid i don’t have one,” i say. “there was no one

in the booth back at the station when I got on.”

 

“we’ll have to take this up

with the Railway Commissioner,” says the conductor.

 

“can’t i just pay you?” i ask.

 

“is that a bribe?”

 

“no, no, i was just saying, … well,

do i get some kind of a trial?”

 

“you are quite right … a trial. you may object

that the entire procedure is not a trial at all,” says

the conductor. “for it is only a trial if i recognize

it as such,” he continues. “but for the moment,

i do recognize it, on grounds of compassion, as it were,

if one is to regard it at all.”

 

“your procedures are contemptible,” i say.

 

“the right of understanding any procedure

and a misunderstanding of the same procedure

do not wholly exclude each other,” he replies.

 

“so when do i get see the Railway Commissioner?”

 

“i am the Railway Commissioner.”

 

“so you’re both prosecutor and executioner?” i ask.

 

“well, you know, what with the recession and all,

we’ve had to cut back on staff and double up on duties.”

 

“not guilty,” i say.

 

“we’ve met before, haven’t we?” asks the conductor,

ignoring my plea.

 

“i don’t think so … why … what’s your name?” i ask.

 

“call me K”

 

“okay,” i reply.

 

“not OK, just K.”

 

“okay.”

 

“it’s just K, got it?

 

“right … er … just K,” i say.

 

“okay,” says K.

 

“so it is OK?” i ask.

 

“no, i was just saying okay,” answers K.

 

“well, … K … , maybe i should just get off the train.”

 

“it’s possible. but not at the moment.”

 

“why?” i ask.

 

“because from a certain point onward there is no return.

that is the point that must be reached,” K tells me.

 

“look, i’m getting impatient here.

how far is it to the point of no return?”

 

“all human errors are impatience,

the premature breaking off of what is methodical,

an apparent fencing in of the apparent thing.

and besides, this is only Urubamba.”

   

In my story about my bad fall where I couldn't get up for two hours, this is where I scooted to in order to have some leverage that might help me get up off the ground. This is where Rose thought it was play time on the ground, and the chickens thought I was lunch. I'll mark some notes on some of the things in the picture. I'll be adding a copy of my true story here in a short while. It is with each photo in this set; so no matter which picture you click on you can read the story.

 

A longer true story than my usual ones is below the row of asterisks.

*************************************************************************

FALL OCCURRED IN THE SPRING

 

That’s right; fall occurred in the spring of 2012. Not the kind of fall like a beautiful autumn, but the kind of fall like Humpty Dumpty. The “splat” type of fall, which must have been painful for him. Mine was surely painful for me.

 

Let me digress a bit. I already have severe arthritis in both of my knees. I was very close to having the Orthopedic Physician’s Assistant refer me to the Orthopedist for knee replacements. The assistant had already seen me for seven to nine visits or so, and a series of Orthovisc® shots, which did not help me. I understand they are a great help to some people, but I wasn‘t one of them. He told me something I was completely unaware of. He said my teeth were bad, which is true. I have upper dentures and only one real tooth in my mouth. The bottom teeth except the one I just mentioned are all rotted away. They didn’t rot completely away; there are still parts of them in and below the gum line. He said they would all have to be surgically extracted before I could have knee replacements done. I asked him, “What do my teeth have to do with my knees?” He said infection can easily set in the rotten teeth and go to the knee or cause problems with my heart, major problems like death. Thus the reader can understand how I arrived at the title for my photo set about my hospital stay…The Knee Bone’s Connected to the Jaw Bone, Huh?

 

I have been walking around with very painful knees for quite awhile now, and I cannot afford the $1,600 to $2,000 to have my teeth surgically extracted. I already paid a dentist $180 for an appointment and a Panaray® X-Ray, over a year ago, just thinking it would be nice to finally get some lower dentures too. I never did get them. He split town, taking or disposing of his equipment and his files and x-rays. That $180 is long gone for me. I cannot even recover that old x-ray. Even if I did recover it, some new dentist would probably say it was out of date.

 

Medicare, which I am on, will pay for the two knee replacements, but here is the rub. They will not pay for dental. I have been in a surgical limbo with all the free pain I can stand.

 

That is the background information probably needed for this little story to be understood. There will be some OMG moments and some laughter. If it were a TV show, they would probably advertise, “You’ll Laugh; You’ll Cry; You’ll Sell Your Chickens; You’ll Call Your Congressman, and You’ll No Doubt Charge Your Cell Phone!”

 

That brings us to Thursday the 15th of March, 2012. (Beware the Ides of March). My daughter called to see if I could and would watch Rose all day Friday the 16th , as she had forgotten that she had signed up to be chaperone for her daughter, Anna Leigh’s, school field trip. It was going to be quite a bit out of town, the other direction from where I live. It was to be a special day. I wanted to be their hero; so I said sure. Some of you have seen Rose, the Hungarian Vizsla puppy among my photos. Rose is beautiful and young, and strong, and undisciplined and should probably be named Wild Rose. I love her, but she is a major handful. I had already watched her for 8 days while they went on a trip out of state, got one day off and then volunteered to do Friday the 16th.

 

Rose isn’t housebroken yet; so I took her out several times to encourage her to go outside. I was alone as far as other humans, and my daughter and granddaughter were about 60 miles away, on a school bus and then museum field trip. I live about 60 miles the other way from their home. It had been raining off and on and the ground and grass and driveway and mud were all pretty wet. My other trips outside with Rose that morning had been fine. I only had a thin shirt on, no extra shirt or jacket. I did not think I would be out in the yard very long.

 

Rose pulled on the leash too exuberantly, as she does often (she is five and a half months old, and has had puppy obedience training, but is in dire need of more of it). I slipped on a muddy and grassy slope. My right leg went out in front of me, and I fell on my rear end. My left leg folded underneath my thigh and toward my rear, and my weight, which is a lot, crunched it. It was bent backward way further than a knee is supposed to bend. I screamed bloody murder. I was afraid to even try to get up, as I thought I had probably torn a ligament or two.

 

Rose thought it was play time and was all over me. There was not a thing in sight that would give me any leverage to hold me up or to help me get up. I sat and I pondered what to do. My daughter and Anna Leigh would not be home for nearly 6 more hours. I thought, well I’ll just call 911 (the emergency number where we live). Wrong! No cell phone with me. It was inside their house, being charged up; ironically so it would be ready when I needed it.

 

I tried yelling for help. Nothing! A neighbor about a half an acre away, was mowing, and every time the mower cut off, I tried screaming for help. He must have had headphones on or something. Cars would drive by on the road way down the driveway, and I would yell, but no one had their windows down on that day. Did you know that when you have upper dentures and no lower ones, and you yell really hard, that it blows the upper dentures right out of your mouth? When I tried to hang onto them to keep them in my mouth, I was unable to cry out very loudly. I just thought I would throw that little trivia in. I didn’t know until that day.

 

I knew I couldn’t make it back in the house. There were too many upward slopes and an exposed aggregate patio and a few stairs. The front of the house was even worse, as it had more stairs. I looked down the driveway and saw a vehicle which had some metal protrusions, on the order of spare tire holder or something like that. I decided to try to scoot on my rear down to that metal thing. I thought perhaps it would give me leverage to get up. Rose thought that it was great fun to romp on and around me.

 

I thought the four chickens would be afraid to come around Rose. No, they are not very intelligent. They came right up to me and Rose and started pecking on me. I had never been pecked on by chickens before, and there I was on the ground with no help and Rose alternating between trying to attack the chickens and trying to play with me. Rose’s playfulness sort of resembles an attack, anyway. I scooted faster, much faster.

 

There was a light rain, but it was getting a little heavier. There was also a dusting of snow mixed with the rain. I was wondering how long it would take to get Exposure. I was wondering about Shock also. Can a person who has Exposure or Shock know that they have it? Ominous looking clouds were blowing quickly toward me. It was 1:30 P. M. when I fell. I didn’t have my phone, but I had my watch.

 

I scooted methodically toward the vehicle closest to me. I think it was about 100 feet. I got to it, and thought if worse came to worse with the weather, I could roll under the back of it. I did not relish thought of cold dark ground and spiders, but thought it might be better to risk them than the weather. I saw some wide strapping tape on the spare tire, which was loose. I didn’t want to risk hoisting myself up on the spare and its frame, as it was quite loose. But I took the tape and wrapped it around the metal thing that was separate from the spare tire things, and made it softer for my arm to lean on. I tried to prop myself up. No use; I fell back down. Not enough leverage. I put Rose’s leash handle on the trailer hitch. I didn’t want to just let her run free and maybe get hit by a car.

 

I tried again to get up and made it to both knees. It hurt so badly I went back down again. I noticed the license plate on the vehicle renewed on the ninth month of 2011. That said 911. I thought, “Oh yeah right, you inanimate license plate. Go ahead and taunt me! You know I can’t call 911.” I got a chuckle out of my own joke, and gave myself a figurative pat on the back for being resourceful about trying to get up.

 

I tried again. I got on both knees but the right one was in gravel that really hurt. Then I thought which knee should I put forward and which one should I try to rise on. I tried one, and it didn’t seem as if it would work so I tried the other way. That wasn’t the right way either. Finally I tried the first way again. I told myself on the count of three I would stand up, even if it hurt excruciatingly, I would scream but I would still get up. False start! Down again! I tried again and got up. I was standing!

 

Now was the problem of how to go anywhere, not knowing if my left knee would buckle at any time. I thought I had to try. I spotted my own truck further down the driveway, and decided to try to make it to it. I walked between two vehicles very carefully and slowly and got to my truck. I unlocked it with the remote key which I had in my pocket. After 11 years of driving it, the seat is pretty well conformed to me; so I didn’t have to bend my knees to sit down in it. I just leaned into the seat and put my relatively good right leg in. It was painful to bend my left knee to get it in the truck, but I did. Rose was still tied to a trailer hitch further back in the yard, but she was safe.

 

I looked at my watch. It was 3:30 P. M. It took me two hours to stand up and to get to some degree of safety and warmth. I could drive, as my truck is automatic. I drove down the road to a house that Anna had pointed out was where a schoolmate lived. I thought I could ask them to go in my daughter’s house and get my cell phone for me. There was a very large barking dog in the driveway, and no sign of humans, and the mother of the schoolmate has never even met me. I decided to go back to Jennifer’s home.

 

I found a cane in my truck that a charity, a different one than the one later in my story, had given me a few months ago. It is not a very sturdy one, but better than nothing. I did not use it on a regular basis. I used the hook end of it to fetch a large stick lying near the driveway (larger than a normal hiking stick). I pulled it to me, and stood back up out of the truck and used the big stick and the cane and balanced against two vehicles, and decided to try to get back in the house. I did. I got in the recliner and pulled a blanket up over me and slept until they got home.

 

After they got home, we all decided to go to the nearest Emergency room. It was a Friday night by then, and no normal doctor’s hours. We went to one closest to them, but it was still about 27 miles or so. They checked me out and did an x-ray. I told the Physician’s assistant nurse type lady about my knee history. She was fun and nice and caring and a little bit of a comedienne. She said that my left knee was really “ratty” looking on the x-ray. I laughed, because I’m sure it was. I have just never, in all my doctor visits ever had a nurse refer to one of my body parts as “ratty”. I suspect it is not a medical term. They said I sprained my knee, and gave me some medical records to take up to the emergency room (or my doctor) closer to where I live, seventeen miles from my home, the other direction from Jen & Anna. I wanted to be closer to the doctors and hospital that I know. I was given a prescription similar to Vicodin. Someone kindly pointed out that Walgreen’s was visible about a block away and their drive-thru was open. At that point I was still getting around by hobbling and by leaning on Jennifer. So I sat in a chair and she and Anna and Rose drove over to Walgreen’s . It seems as if it took a long time for them get the prescription filled.

 

While I was sitting there waiting, a employee came out to the lobby with clipboard in hand and asked if I were the lady with an injured knee. I replied that I was. She said, OK, come with me and we’ll have you see a triage. I thought it odd that I had already been seen and now they wanted to start all over again. I told her I had already been seen and x-rayed and all. It turned out there was another lady in the waiting room with an injured knee. It probably would have blown the Physician’s Assistant’s mind if I had played dumb and gone through everything again, and then told her when she looked shocked, “I’m coming through again; and this time don’t call my knee “ratty! Funny to imagine, but not a good idea.

 

Finally, my daughter and granddaughter returned to the hospital waiting room. Jennifer had forgotten her checkbook. So back they went and then it turned out, Jennifer couldn’t sign for my prescription, and she didn‘t have my insurance information. Thus, we all drove back over there. I was in line ahead of Jen‘s car. I told the pharmacist that my window did not go down well on the driver’s side, and I could not reach the pills in the drawer. So I would give him paperwork and cards he needed, but to please leave the pills themselves in the slide-out drawer. I said my daughter was right behind me and her window worked; and she would pick them up with my permission. Walgreen’s closed at 10 P. M. and it was about 9:57 P. M. Finally she got the pain pills in the drawer, but when we got out of Walgreen’s I flagged her down to stop and be sure to give me the pills to have with me before we forgot. Jennifer got them and handed them over to me. We laughed about how, at that time of night, it looked for the entire world like some sort of illegal drug deal.

 

We tried to go out for dinner, and the restaurant we chose put the closed sign in their front window as we were approaching. That always makes one feel so welcome, not!

 

Saturday, I rested, and then Sunday they took me to Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center. I had called my normal doctor, and he was out of the country (probably on some Doctors without Borders type thing). He participates in many good will efforts. The doctor filling in for him said to go to the Emergency Room. So I did, and they did an MRI, and I had torn the meniscus in my left knee. I ended up in the hospital for 8 days. No surgery was done to repair anything, because of the dental situation. But I got a walker, and some really nice nurses and physical therapy. I saw all kinds of doctors, and Home Health care people, and Senior and Disabled specialists. They must have taken my blood pressure 100 times, it seems. They always seem surprised that it is very good.

 

Anna Leigh, who is seven years old, threw a coin in the Hospital Fountain and made good wishes for me. She is such a sweetie. My daughter helped to clean up my place so when I went home the walker would fit through the rooms. I don’t know what I do without Jen and Anna. The first few days out of the hospital, I taught Anna how to play Monopoly, and she and Jennifer and I also did puzzles. There were some quality family moments. At one point I was eating a chip or cracker of some kind with my right hand, and trying to place a puzzle piece with my left hand. I got absentminded and stuck the puzzle piece in my mouth. I realized what I had done because the food tasted like cardboard. I took it out of my mouth. Anna about went into hysterics over it. I was laughing too. Anna’s Daddy called Jen about that time, and wanted to know what the laughter was all about. Anna wrote a note to show her Mom so her Mom could tell her Dad what happened. She spelled it phonetically, as she is only in first grade. I think she does really well, but Jen and I cracked up over how much Anna was laughing and over what she wrote. She wrote, “My grandmuther ate a pussel pees.” It looked substantially nastier than it was. Jen and I were cracking up about the note. Anna thought we were still laughing about the event itself, not the note. In any case, we all had some great belly laughs. Since the belly bone is no doubt connected to the brain bone and the knee bone, I think it was very healthy for us.

 

At first a physical therapist helped me in the hospital with a walker and with some small steps. After a few days, I could roam around the hallways on my own with the walker. At that point I took my camera. As I was practicing with my walker I took a number of pictures. I tried very hard to only shoot artsy type things and nothing about any patients or doctors that would invade their privacy. I had a bulletin board in my room just about me. I wrote “Exemplary Patient Award” on the comments. I wanted to see if it would make the nurses laugh. I thought it was funny to give myself an award. I enjoy making people laugh. I was curious if they would erase it, but it was still there when I was discharged.

 

I graduated from the walker to a cane yesterday. A home health physical therapist came to see how I was doing, and brought me a very colorful cane. I like it. It suits me, and it is brand new. There is a charity in my area called Love, Inc. I don’t know if it is just local or nationwide. Anyway, they gave him the cane to bring to me. Really super! Of course, I need to take a photo of it, and add it to this set. I’ll probably do that in the daylight.

 

I am still in surgical limbo, but a charity is going to come out and install grab bars on my shower, and still another charity will build up my recliner (which I sleep in) with a platform so it will be easier to get in and out of. It was suggested that I donate enough to cover the cost of the supplies but not the labor. I will probably make a donation, but I haven’t decided how much yet. I’m going to call my Congressman to see if something can be done about covering some dental procedures. I know him personally. He collects vintage cars, and has at least one Dodge and well over 10 Buicks. When I had a hubcap store, he would drop by and buy hubcaps for some of them. We would chat about politics, and automobiles, and high rent, etc. He probably won‘t be able to help, but I feel I have to try. Not just for me, but for a multitude of people.

 

I’ll close with a quote, although I don’t know who said it, “Be True to your Teeth and they will Never be False to You.” and “That is the Tooth, the whole Tooth, and Nothing but the Tooth.”

  

(3746toyotalandcruiser1969qwhereitriedtogetupresaminit)

iss070e022098 (Nov. 11, 2023) --- Thrusters on the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft fire automatically while adjusting the vehicle's slow, methodical approach toward the International Space Station for a docking to the Harmony module's forward port.