A white, wood picket fence is an American icon. These fences have been around since the founding of our nation and were originally used as a way to mark property boundaries. Later the picket fence became associated with prosperity and it is still in use across the country. Some people call it a “friendly fence” because it has an open weave and a low enough height to let your neighbor say hello. Dating to pre-Revolutionary days, the first picket fences developed as sturdy, simple, and utilitarian boundaries to keep chickens in or out of gardens. Usually made of local wood, in some areas picket fences were required to mark property borders. The name comes from the individual wood slats, which are called pickets. The typical fence of this type is fairly short and built out of wood that is later whitewashed. The flat pickets have a point at the top and they are evenly spaced along the length of the fence. Nails are used to attach the pickets to rails along the bottom and top. The rails are in turn nailed to vertical posts that are spaced evenly and buried in the ground. If a gate is needed, it is constructed using the same method. A century later, during the Victorian era the style became more decorative to match the architecture. By the late 1800's, mass production techniques made pickets more affordable and people all over the country were able to order them from catalogs. The idea of a house with a picket fence is iconically American. Sturdy, attractive, and ingeniously thrifty with evenly spaced vertical boards that allow daylight to peak through, picket fences originated as an inexpensive way for colonists to mark property boundaries. This kind of fence is believed to be adapted from a type of fencing used in medieval times. Paling, as it was called, featured flat stakes driven into the ground. Over time, Hollywood helped the picket fence become a symbol of peace and security: “In my wildest dreams and juvenile yearnings, I wanted the house with the picket fence from June Allyson movies,” the poet Maya Angelou said. Another reason the style has endured is practicality; the pickets keep animals in and out of yards while creating a sense of open space. Decorative pointed tops also divert rainwater away from the end grain of the wood, extending the fences’ lifespans. There is nothing that symbolizes the American dream better than the single family home with a yard and the iconic white picket fence. Just say the words and they immediately conjure up a cute little house, gingerbread trim and a lovely rose garden out front. Ozzie and Harriet brought the concept to our TV screens back in the day and the tradition is alive and well even to this day. Put a picket fence around your yard and your home is a Norman Rockwell painting come to life. Like baseball and apple pie, it is a part of Americana.

Heading : 18th Century Nizet-Liege Wine glass

Date : c1710-50

Origin : Liege, Belgium

Colour : Clear

Bowl : A round funnel bowl with a band of strawberry moulding above rib moulding

Stem : Plain with shoulder blade knop and small basal knop

Foot : Conical

Pontil : Snapped

Glass Type : Low lead

Size : 13.7cm tall with a 5.7cm bowl and a 5.7cm foot

Condition : Excellent : no chips or cracks, rocks slightly on its foot

Weight : 96 grams

This was one of my ebay 'weak' moments, bought from an antique glass dealer. A rare old glass ( Around 300 years old) with an air tear in the stem which is typical of these glasses, it rocks on it's base hence the relatively low purchase price I paid. These can be rather expensive.

Some time around 1710, Nizet, formerly a wine dealer, established a glasshouse in Liege which rapidly overtook the fine glass business from the Bonhomme glasshouse. His invention was to introduce a thicker (more durable) and more limpid glass than that used by the Bonhommes, who still produced glass in the Façon d'Altare. Nizet was inspired by the English lead glass and his glasses (except those produced when production first began) contain a low level lead oxide.

 

During the second half of the 17th century, the Bonhommes generated most of their revenue from the production of simple, small glasses. The production of luxury Façon de Venise glasses was already on the wane. This may in part be attributed to poor economic conditions due to a series of French invasions of Southern Netherlands, the last wave of which took place in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714). Style and practicality may also have played a role consumers desired practical smaller glasses in which to enjoy their wine and in economical portions. With the coming of Nizet, the production of the most luxurious "verres d'apparat" was ceased altogether in the Low Countries and was left mostly to Bohemia, Germany and later England.

 

These glasses are successors of thinner verres de fougère produced in France, the Southern Netherlands and probably even in England. In the Low Countries they were made to enjoy Burgundy wine. This was imported from Burgundy by the river Meuse. It is believed that the ships returned to France loaded with Nizet glasses from Liège. It seems that they were very popular within the region and goes some way to explain why many reside in French collections.

These are indeed called "verres fraisés". When filled with Burgundy wine, which was probably of a lighter red than now, the bowls do indeed have a resemblance to strawberries!

 

Coimbra University, Portugal.

 

"One of the most visible and distinctive traditions is the use of the academic costume of the University of Coimbra, a black suit and cape worn on special occasions by the students (and more often by many), which was adopted by other Portuguese universities and is actually used by students of almost all higher education institutions in the city and across the country."

 

Influence on Harry Potter:

 

"Consider the cloak: that heavy, full-length piece of outerwear most often associated with epic fantasy franchises, and specifically, Harry Potter. It’s not something you’d wear to class, not if you value practicality—and yet somehow it remains the most iconic part of the wizarding school uniform.

 

But in the non-magical world, Portuguese university students have been wearing cloaks to class day in, day out, more or less since higher education was invented. They are the indisputable pioneers of the trend—so much so that many would swear, under Veritaserum if needed be, that J.K. Rowling was inspired by the Portuguese when picking out the outfits for her young wizards. Although Rowling has never been explicit about her inspiration for the cloaks, she wrote part of what would become Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone while living in Porto, Portugal, in the 1990s. Tour guides often point out the cloaked university students, whom Rowling must have seen walking to and from class, as the likely inspirations behind the Hogwarts dress code.

 

The look stems from the history of post-secondary education in Portugal, which has some of the oldest universities in the world. When the country's first university—the University of Coimbra—was created in 1290 in Lisbon, teaching was a religious vocation (as was learning), and so the medieval campus was teeming with clergymen. There wasn’t a student uniform, exactly, but the mish-mash of men from different religious orders did result in a student look: a dark, severe ensemble that civilian students began to approximate in the centuries that followed. As late as 1850, the all-male student body at the University of Coimbra was still wearing knee-length cassocks over shorts and knee socks. A long cloak topped off the whole outfit, lending a decidedly clerical look to the decidedly civilian students.

 

Things changed, dramatically, in the latter half of the 19th century. The progressive spirit of the era replaced the old-fashioned shorts with a practical three-piece suit, composed of black frock coat, waistcoat, and tailored pants—and so the standard male university uniform, or traje, was born. The cumbersome old cloak very nearly went out of commission then, but the boys had reportedly grown so attached to its drama that they kept wearing it over the new suits. School authorities allowed the cloak to remain, proudly anachronistic, to sweep the cobblestones of Coimbra another day. When the country’s second and third universities were founded in 1911, in the cities of Lisbon and Porto, students rushed to adopt the same weirdly popular suit-and-cloak combo.

 

Girls didn’t get a standard uniform until 1945, when the Orfeão Universitário do Porto, a student association at the then-young University of Porto, accepted the first female members into its roster. (Before then, women didn't have any particular school attire, although they were sometimes told to wear all black so as not to stand out.) Members of the Orfeão were expected to perform traditional Portuguese singing and dancing in full uniform, and the girls rose to the occasion by suiting up in their very own, alternate version of the traje. They found their inspiration in the stripped-down practicality of military women’s uniforms and settled on a knee-length trapeze skirt and boxy three-button jacket. The cloak, of course, was the final touch, which quickly caught on at other schools.

 

Today, there are over 300,000 university students in Portugal, a respectable number of whom routinely wear the traje to class. It is no longer mandatory, as it once was, but it doesn’t need to be. To wear this historic uniform is to embrace and broadcast one’s identity as a student—although it’s also to be frequently confused with a Harry Potter cosplayer. Foreign visitors to Portugal sometimes make that mistake, but they should know the opposite is likelier to be true: Local students have been wearing cloaks to class since long before Harry Potter was cool."

  

Coachwork by Vanden Plas

Chassis n° 14812

 

Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais

Bonhams

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

 

Estimated : € 425.000 - 475.000

Sold

  

"In the scheme of things there are cars, good cars, and super cars. When a machine can be put into the last of these three categories, yet is by no means in the highest-priced class, considerable praise is due to the makers. This model is the latest 4.3-litre Alvis Sports Tourer."

 

One of a dozen cars produced, this fascinating, beautiful and important sports car brings together two companies at their zenith, Vanden Plas and Alvis.

 

On one hand is the 4.3 Litre Alvis, the result of two decades of refinement in their field, the 4.3 was the largest engine they offered, a silky solid six cylinder which was capable of supplying approximately 140bhp to the road, one of its most ground breaking characteristics was transmission between those two aspects, an all synchromesh 4 speed, which was light years ahead of its time and made these cars easier to drive than an E Type! "A Remarkable British Car" and displaying impressive performance figures of 0-50mph in 7.6 seconds and 105mph top speed in standard road trim, the fastest British un-supercharged pre-war sports car.

 

On the other, the famed house of Vanden Plas. Throughout the pre-war era they consistently produced great looking sporting coachwork, predominantly for great British marques, but also the occasional Alfa Romeo, Mercedes or even Austro Daimler. In the 1920s they had blended simplicity with looks for the numerous bodies that they had provided to WO Bentley for his own Cricklewood built cars and when times looked more austere and the 'boy racer' touring cars looked like they might have had their day, Vanden Plas simply modernized that similar look for the 1930s. Their most successful renditions in the mid to late Thirties were these 'cut down' door sports tourers.

 

It is said that their influence for this particular design feature came directly from serial racer and Bentley owner, Malcolm Campbell. In the now low-slung post Vintage chassis' where one sat 'in', rather than 'on' a car, one's elbow could never be comfortable if level with one's shoulder, the solution? Make a notch in the side of the coachwork. Between the ever-stylish Campbell and Vanden Plas' draftsman, this example of practicality was turned into part of the design. A genius move, which was frequently then accented with a side sweep moulding along the body, at once it created one of the design classics of its generation.

 

Those rakish 30s Vanden Plas 'Malcolm Campbell' design cars were somewhat limited in their production, a dozen are known to have been fitted to Derby Bentleys and are among the most coveted of their breed, a single Bugatti Type 57S (sold by Bonhams in 2016) wears the same, but it arguably on the 4.3 Litre Alvis that the coachwork works best. For that reason, the dozen Alvis's so equipped have long been the stand out pinnacle of the marque's production, cherished by the few lucky enough to own one and they rarely appear for sale.

 

Here we proudly present one that can rightfully claim to be the best even among that 'rara avis', with a remarkable history of racing and ownership as well as striking and fresh presentation. As new, 14812 was built new by Alvis with its own definitive specifications being on the short chassis and including a special high compression engine which it retains to this day. Registered for the British roads as 'DHP233' it was used by Alvis as their Demonstrator, it would also be campaigned competitively from its earliest days.

 

At Brooklands on 16th July 1938 the '4.3' made its debut in a rather ignominious fashion, where piloted by G. Hartwell and R.S. Newton in the Light Car Club's 3-Hour Race for Standard Sports Cars, its 'box lost two of gears, not surprisingly the shock of which caused the drivers to put the car into a spin on a couple of occasions and setting it back down the pack. 2 months later after the Summer had passed it was back for an altogether more successful outing, at the Dunlop Jubilee International Car Races, on 24th September. Here, the car was driven by well-known racer, broadcaster and motoring personality Tommy Wisdom in two Outer Circuit handicap races. In Alvis: The Story of the Red Triangle author Ken Day quotes Tommy Wisdom:

"The car I had for test differed from standard models in that the compression ratio of the engine had been increased to 8.5 to 1, which meant that use of 50:50 benzole mixture was necessary. Top-gear ratio was higher than standard and wings, lamps and screen were removed."

 

Aside from these alterations 'DHP 233' remained in remarkably standard form, especially when one considers it was to share the circuit with the likes of the Pacey-Hassan 4½ Litre Bentley single seater special, Duller's monster Duesenberg and a whole host of supercharged European exotica. The drivers too were no slouches either, with the likes of greats such as Jean-Pierre Wimille and Rene Dreyfus also competing in the same events. Although the Alvis was never going to be the quickest car on the circuit the performance figures it achieved were quite exceptional for a largely standard un-supercharged road going sportscar. To quote Tommy Wisdom again: "In the 20 Miles Outer Circuit Handicap race the car averaged better than 110 mph. The standing lap was covered at 92.23 mph, three laps at 111 mph, two at 116 mph and the fastest at 115.29 mph while the maximum on the Railway Straight, according to the revolution counter, was 119 mph." If one considers that the race was won at a speed of 119.86 mph, these figures make for impressive reading.

 

Within the month, 'DHP 233' had completed its service for the Works and was returned to production road trim and showroom condition. It was shipped to agents Hugh Anderson Ltd. Of London and quickly snapped up by its first public owner, Mr. Edgar H. Whale of Watford, Hertfordshire, amazingly its next recorded owner, Mr. J.A. Penman of Penrith, Cumbria, would keep the Alvis until the early 1980s! After two brief sojourns in the UK trade, it emigrated to the U.S. and into one of the greatest collections of sportscars of its day, that of Henry Petronis. If one need further proof of its importance and stature, in this well-honed collection it would share a stable with a Blower Bentley, Supercharged Alfa Romeo, Mercedes S-Type and many more pre-war gems. After this collection was dispersed privately in 2011, the current owner was fortunate enough to become its fourth private owner in 70 years.

 

In the current ownership 'DHP 233' has been treated to a total re-paint and re-trim back to original factory specifications by Red Triangle. Tim Walker Restorations have carried out a total engine rebuild and numerous mechanical works, a detailed in the history files. A firm believer that cars are made to be driven the current owner has used 'DHP 233' on a number of well-known endurance events including: The Flying Scotsman, Cape Horn Rally, The Alpine Trial and 1000 Mile Trial. No expense has been spared to ensure the reliability and usability of the car whilst retaining the originality and historical integrity of this important pre-war sports car. With full-synchromesh gearbox as standard, independent front suspension and a standard pedal layout 'DHP 233' is not only one of the fastest standard pre-war sports cars, but also one of the easiest to drive and this extremely rare and original sports car is ready to be enjoyed by the next owner on numerous international events.

 

Having enjoyed the car for 8 years, the Alvis emerges for public sale for the first time, a great if not the best of all of these legendary cars, it's a wonderful usable all-rounder and deserving of close inspection of the car and its fascinating history file.

The Prophet is a concept ship designed more as a showpiece rather than for practicality. The ship is powered by a rotary anti-gravity engine with the ships-rims functioning as stylized radiators for the ships components, with heat pipes connecting it to the main frame.

 

The ship can carry 2 passengers and 2 pilots with a large viewing angle from the cockpit.

 

The ship also features a set of landing gear and an easy access lower-able ramp directly into the cockpit.

 

The SHIP is 138 studs (1.1m) metres long.

 

Justin Hills always loved the beautiful lines and flow of the XK 120 but felt some minor improvements could be made to the overall appearance of this beautiful car. He now feels that his Jaguar XK 120 is a true representation of what he thinks the original designer would have first sketched, before practicality and cost had to be included into the design. Justin's design is now receiving a written endorsement form Jaguar designer, Ian Cullim himself ! The car is currently on display at Jaguar Design Studio headquarters, as visual inspiration for the Jaguar design team. One-off custom coachwork + V12 engine.

 

Class XV : Special Display

 

Zoute Concours d'Elegance

The Royal Zoute Golf Club

 

Zoute Grand Prix 2019

Knokke - Zoute

België - Belgium

October 2019

Yes, believe it or not, the origin of the mighty Range Rover goes back to the communistic clumsiness of British Leyland, where, in one of their rare moments of genius, they realised the dream that a contemporary 4x4 could be married with the luxuries and styling of a regular saloon car!

 

The original concept of the Range Rover can be traced back to the groundbreaking original Land Rover of the 1940's, where upon its introduction in 1948 as an extended development of the American Willy's Jeep, the Land Rover had taken the world by storm and become the most desired 4x4 in the world. Light, practical, endlessly tunable and easy to maintain, the Land Rover was a hit across the globe, primarily in the colonies of the British Empire, taking people to remote regions that had once been only within the reach of a Horse or a Camel. Initially, a plan was made to create a saloon style version of the Land Rover in 1949 with the help of coachbuilder Tickford, dubbed the 'Land Rover Station-Wagon', but this was not exactly a success and sold only 700 examples before the car was withdrawn from production in 1951. The main features of the Station-Wagon were a wooden-framed body, seven seats, floor carpets, a heater, a one-piece windscreen and other car-like features, its hand-built nature kept prices high.

In 1954 Land Rover took another stab at the Station Wagon concept, only this time it was built in-house rather than outsourced to a different company. This version's primary market was for those who required an off-road vehicle with greater capacity, such as ambulances or even small buses in remote regions such as the Scottish Highlands. But even though this second incarnation of the Station Wagon was available with features such as an interior light, heater, door and floor trims and upgraded seats, the basic Land Rover roots of this car meant it was still tough and capable, but the firm suspension made its road performance somewhat mediocre.

 

In 1958, Land Rover took yet another stab with the Road Rover, a development of combining the Land Rover chassis and running gear with the internal furnishings and body of a regular saloon car. The intended audience of the Road Rover was again in the remote British Colonies of Africa and the Australian Outback, where the firm suspension would be useful on the long, uneven roads. By the 1960's however, developments across the pond in the United States were starting to rock Rover's boat, as the newly coined Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV) began to make progress. International Harvester released the Scout, and Ford the Bronco, offering a different blend of off and on-road ability from existing utility 4x4s such as the Land Rover and the Jeep, proving capable of good on-road comfort and speed while retaining more than adequate off-road ability for most private users. The Jeep Wagoneer proved the concept further, being both spacious and practical, but still with the raunchy off-road abilities to conquer the harsh American terrain.

 

Being frontline observers to this, Rover dealers in the United States looked on in horror as the American motor industry cornered the market for the SUV, and through frustration the president of Rover's USA division sent head office a Land Rover Series II 88 fitted with a Buick V8, designed for contemporary American pickup trucks, which offered far greater on-road performance and refinement than any Land Rover then in production.

 

Things came full circle though thanks to a man named Charles Spencer King, a former apprentice at Rolls Royce and one of the most prominent figures in the ownership of Rover and its transition to British Leyland. Taking over the development, he began the development program with the 100-inch Station Wagon project, taking the original concepts of the previous Road Rover and fitting it with coil springs after coming to the conclusion that only long-travel coil springs could provide the required blend of luxury car comfort and Land Rover's established off-road ability. His realisation of this apparently came when he drove a Rover P6 across rough scrubland adjacent to Land Rover's Solihull Factory, but was also helped by the fact that Land Rover purchased the coil springs from a Ford Bronco and began developing from those. Permanent 4WD was also necessary so as to provide both adequate handling and to reliably absorb the power that would be required by the vehicle if it was to be competitive, which came through in the form of a new transmission known as the Land Rover 101 Forward Control. The final piece to the puzzle though was the use of the Buick derived Rover V8, a strong, reliable, lightweight and endlessly tunable engine. In addition to the regular V8, the car was fitted with both a starting handle for emergencies, and carburettors to help continue to supply fuel at extreme angles.

 

The final design, launched in 1970 with bodywork styled largely by the engineering team rather than David Bache's styling division, was marketed as 'A Car For All Reasons'. In its original guise, the Range Rover was more capable off-road than the Land Rover but was much more comfortable, offering a top speed in excess of 100mph, a towing capacity of 3.5 tons, spacious accommodation for five people and groundbreaking features such as a four-speed, dual-range, permanent four-wheel-drive gearbox and hydraulic disc brakes on all wheels. The body was constructed, in keeping with other Rover products, of lightweight aluminium, and in its first incarnation was only available as a two-door utilitarian runabout, rather than the five-door luxury car we know today. This was rectified in 1981 when a 4-door version was made available, but this doesn't mean that the Range Rover wasn't a success before this change.

 

Upon its launch in June 1970, the Range Rover was lauded with critical acclaim, and Rover was praised for succeeding in marrying the practicalities of a modern 4x4 with the luxury capabilities of a standard road car. With a top speed of 95mph and a 0-60 acceleration of less than 15 seconds, performance was stated as being better than many family saloon cars of its era, and off-road performance was good, owing to its long suspension travel and high ground clearance. The bulky but practical design was also praised, with many considering it a piece of artwork, with one example being put on display in the Louvre in Paris! Early celebrity ownership also helped the sales quota, but not in the same way you'd expect today. Instead of Musicians and Movie Stars buying up stashes of Range Rovers like they do nowadays, people of established wealth such as Princess Diana and Government bodies became proud custodians of these mighty machines.

 

Problems however were quick to occur, as let's not forget, this was a British Leyland product. Reliability was a major issue, with strike cars being especially poor as many would leave the factory with vital components missing or not installed properly. To save costs, many pieces of the cars were carried over from other Leyland products, with switches and dials being donated from Austin Allegros, and the door handles coming direct from Morris Marinas. Name any of the faults endemic to British Leyland products of the time, and the Range Rover suffered from the same curse, be they mechanical, electric, cosmetic, or, worst of all, the demon rust!

 

But the Range Rover survived to see the 1980's despite its faults, and after the introduction of an extra set of doors it started to gain a true identity as the luxury motor of choice for the new money. With the additional 5-door layout, new variants such as the long wheelbase Vogue and the SE (Special Equipment) versions took many of the luxury items of the Jaguar XJ series such as leather seats and hazelnut wooden trim and placed them into the Range Rover. In the 1980s as well, special utility versions began to be developed, including a 6x6 Fire Tender for airfields and small airports, Ambulances for military bases and remote regions, and one special variant for his holiness the Pope, affectionately dubbed the Popemobile!

 

However, towards the late 1980's the Range Rover in its original incarnation was starting to look very much its age. The angular design was looking tired, and internally its utilitarian roots were in evidence. The dashboard was not much like that of a regular saloon car, but more a bus or a truck, with a huge steering wheel like that from a tractor, and was not particularly well equipped. Land Rover however intended to narrow the Range Rover's portfolio to the truly luxury market rather than having the low end versions which didn't sell as well due to their expense. In 1989 Land Rover launched the Discovery, which was similar in size to the Range Rover but cheaper and given a more family layout with seats and furnishings being carried over from the Austin Montego. To bring the Range Rover back into the front line of luxury motors for the 1990's, Rover Group (the descendant of British Leyland) put together a plan to design a new car under the chassis codenumber P38A (or just P38 for short). Four years of development and £300 million later, the car was launched to a whirlwind of critical acclaim. With a beautifully equipped interior, a more car-like design of dashboard and with a wider variety of luxury trim levels, including the personalised Autobiography editions, the P38 was the first of the mighty Range Rovers to appeal to the bling-bling generation.

 

This, however, left the original Range Rover out in the cold, and even though it was still a much loved part of the British motoring scene, the time had come for the original, dubbed the Range Rover Classic after launch of the P38. The last of the original Range Rovers slunk silently of the production line at Solihull in 1996, with production now fully based on the new P38, as well as to future developments such as the Freelander of 1997 and ongoing Discovery and Defender. Today original Range Rovers are somewhat easy to come by depending on where you look. In London you'll find a fair few (after all, these were the original Chelsea Tractors), but even in the country you'll bump into these things, especially around my home of Devon where the Range Rover/Land Rover products were perfect for the rugged Moorland terrain. Early British Leyland ones you'd be hard pressed to find, most rusting away in the 1980's, but the Rover Group ones of the 80's and 90's are by no means rare.

 

But even so, 45 years after the first Range Rover left the factory in Solihull, Range Rovers continue to be produced today, now in it's 4th Generation and available in more variations than ever before! Although British Leyland has long since died together with their many woeful products such as the Morris Marina and the Austin Allegro, the Range Rover is very much their legacy, the last of their original products to survive the strikes and bankruptcy, fighting off the fuel crisis and privatisation by the Thatcher Government, and then being split in 2000 by BMW and juggled between owners Ford and TATA Steel, and still being the luxury motorised toy of the modern day rich! :)

A treasured sight of many pilgrimages, both for practicality and superstition’s sake, the Aquam de Petra lies deep within the rocky crags of the North Hills, and is one of the main tributaries of the Great River. This seemingly bizarre phenomenon – a life-giving spring in the midst of a stony wasteland – has caused hundreds through the ages to revere this spot as a source of Life. Some even believe that a cup filled at this spring will give the drinker eternal life.

_______________________________________________

 

Wow, it feels so good to be posting! This is a project I’ve been working on for the last months in between school and stuff, after scrapping some summer WIPs. Not really sure how much I like it…it really good from some angles irl, and not so good from others. It was pretty intense fun to build though! ;)

 

Now to begin work on some CCC entries! :D

 

Soli Deo Gloria!

 

Will the rain continue? Get worse? Let up?

 

More important, should I sacrifice fashion for practicality?

It struck me yesterday, as I explored the historical sites of once thriving shipyards, the priceless nature of the term ‘living memory’.

A term made all the more poignant as we enter Remembrance Day and collectively recall those no longer with us.

What struck me was just how many questions I’ve wanted to ask since my parents and grandparents left and the gap they leave now they’re no longer around to answer them.

Mum & Dad for example, they were holders of their parents oral traditions, their stories, their experiences and those of their extended friends and family.

Now, leafing through old photo albums or written records I’m suddenly aware of their being nobody left with the answers to the arising questions of who and when or where.

In a way we’re all custodians of living memories, the retainers of records of how things were during our time here.

I’m also wondering now whether my ramblings are in fact a way of reaching through time to generations yet to arrive.

They may well be and equally they may also disappear like all the tape cassettes I made in my youth or the countless notebooks I filled when the business was at full tilt.

Still survive or not, the ramblings serve their own purpose in that they remind me as I’m writing them about what’s happened and how it fits into the wider scheme of things.

Witnessing Mum’s gradual and severe memory loss through vascular dementia seems to have heightened my own interest in the subject of memory.

The close proximity to her experience provided an even greater sense of appreciation for the precious nature of the time any of us have.

And so, yesterday’s visit to the sites of the former shipyards focused in upon the preservation of living memories and a place for these to be held for the wider community.

We met with the heritage architects Donald Insall Associates and they’ve now agreed to design a vital part of the project to return the OAKDALE to the Mersey.

Richard who was with us has award winning experience in the sector and had worked on similar preservation projects before, so we took another great step forward yesterday.

The end result will be a combination of commercial practicality blended with working demonstrations of how things were done on the site over hundreds of years.

Another part of the jigsaw fell into place yesterday in a call from the logistics expert regarding the transportation of the boat from Cumbria back to Merseyside.

As the project manager I’d sought a second opinion and it proved to be the right call as the logistics expert and the shipwright are now firmly on the same page.

Next step is finding a suitable dry-dock for the restoration. The poignant thing being, all this will one day be a distant memory.

Luckily though, there’s plenty of young minds already gathering in the wings, waiting to carry the metaphorical baton ever onwards!

Wheeled radar dish thing. Who cares about practicality!

This was my final full-day in Britain. Dan has relatives in Wales and he was staying with them for a few more days, whereas I was to take the train from Cardiff Central back to London Victoria, before returning to Toronto the following day.

 

Cloevelly was the last planned stop enroute from St. Ives, Cornwall to Cardiff, Wales.

 

Partial and edited quote from Wikipedia:

 

Clovelly (/kləˈvɛli/) is a small village in the Torridge district of Devon, England. It has a harbour and is a tourist attraction notable for its steep pedestrianised cobbled main street, donkeys and views over the Bristol Channel. At the 2011 census, the parish population was 443, which was 50 fewer than ten years previously. The ward of Clovelly Bay includes the island of Lundy.

 

There is a road leading to the harbour but the village main street is not accessible by motor vehicle. The lack of vehicular access to the main street has led to deliveries being made by sledge. This is not done as a tourist attraction, but as a matter of practicality. Goods are delivered by being pulled down on a sledge from the upper car park (see next photo).

One of the most important factors of the success of Stockholm’s bicycle network is that it is conceived and perceived as a system. This means that one can find different categories of bicycle lanes, starting from those that cross the city and connect it to nearby towns, to the neighborhood lanes which take you to the local store, school or the nearby metro station.

 

www.slowtravelstockholm.com/resources-practicalities/biki...

The World Solar Challenge (WSC), or the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge since 2013, tied to the sponsorship of Bridgestone Corporation is the world's most well-known solar-powered car race event. A biennial road race covering 3,022 km (1,878 mi) through the Australian Outback, from Darwin, Northern Territory, to Adelaide, South Australia, created to foster the development of experimental, solar-powered vehicles.

The race attracts teams from around the world, most of which are fielded by universities or corporations, although some are fielded by high schools. The race has a 32-year history spanning fourteen races, with the inaugural event taking place in 1987. Initially held once every three years, the event became biennial from the turn of the century.

Since 2001 the World Solar Challenge was won seven times out of nine efforts by the Nuna team and cars of the Delft University of Technology from the Netherlands, with only the Tokai Challenger, built by the Tokai University of Japan able to take the crown in 2009 and 2011.

Starting in 2007, the WSC has been raced in multiple classes. After the German team of Bochum University of Applied Sciences competed with a four-wheeled, multi-seat car, the BoCruiser (in 2009), in 2013 a radically new "Cruiser Class" was introduced, racing and stimulating the technological development of practically usable, and ideally road-legal, multi-seater solar vehicles. Since its inception, Solar Team Eindhoven's four- and five-seat Stella solar cars from Eindhoven University of Technology (Netherlands) won the Cruiser Class in all three races so far.

Remarkable technological progress has been achieved since the GM led, highly experimental, single-seat Sunraycer prototype first won the WSC with an average speed of 66.9 km/h (41.6 mph). Once competing cars became steadily more capable to match or exceed legal maximum speeds on the Australian highway, the race rules were consistently made more demanding and challenging — for instance after Honda's Dream car first won the race with an average speed exceeding 55 mph (88.5 km/h) in 1996. In 2005 the Dutch Nuna team were the first to beat an average speed of 100 km/h (62 mph).

The 2017 Cruiser class winner, the five-seat Stella Vie vehicle, was able to carry an average of 3.4 occupants at an average speed of 69 km/h (43 mph). Like its two predecessors, the 2017 Stella Vie vehicle was successfully road registered by the Dutch team, further emphasizing the great progress in real world compliance and practicality that has been achieved.

The World Solar Challenge held its 30th anniversary event on October 8–15, 2017.

The 2019 World Solar Challenge will take place from 13 to 20 October. 53 teams from 24 countries have entered the competition. The same 3 classes, Challenger (30 teams), Cruiser (23 teams) and Adventure will be featured.

 

Saturday 7th July 2018, a revisit to my favourite place, Stonehaven a 25 minute drive from my home, I can never visit without taking in Dunnottar Castle views, today she looked magnificent.

 

The rock the Castle sits upon was forced to the surface 440 million years ago during the Silurian period. A red rock conglomerate with boulders up to 1m across known as Pudding Stone is incredibly durable.

 

The ancient Highland rock pebbles and cementing matter is so tough that faults or cracks pass through the pebbles themselves.

 

I first visited Dunnottar Castle summer 2017, this magnificent castle sits high on a hill, last time I visited I captured my shots from the cliffs overlooking the site, though today I made the journey up the hill and entered the castle walls , wow what a magnificent experience, just perfect with loads of great photo opportunities to capture real Scottish history,after two hours wandering around and capturing as many shots that caught my eye , I made my way home, a magnificent experience indeed.

 

Dunnottar Castle (Scottish Gaelic: Dùn Fhoithear, "fort on the shelving slope" is a ruined medieval fortress located upon a rocky headland on the north-east coast of Scotland, about 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) south of Stonehaven.

 

The surviving buildings are largely of the 15th and 16th centuries, but the site is believed to have been fortified in the Early Middle Ages. Dunnottar has played a prominent role in the history of Scotland through to the 18th-century Jacobite risings because of its strategic location and defensive strength. Dunnottar is best known as the place where the Honours of Scotland, the Scottish crown jewels, were hidden from Oliver Cromwell's invading army in the 17th century. The property of the Keiths from the 14th century, and the seat of the Earl Marischal, Dunnottar declined after the last Earl forfeited his titles by taking part in the Jacobite rebellion of 1715.

 

The castle was restored in the 20th century and is now open to the public.

 

The ruins of the castle are spread over 1.4 hectares (3.5 acres), surrounded by steep cliffs that drop to the North Sea, 50 metres (160 ft) below. A narrow strip of land joins the headland to the mainland, along which a steep path leads up to the gatehouse.

 

The various buildings within the castle include the 14th-century tower house as well as the 16th-century palace. Dunnottar Castle is a scheduled monument, and twelve structures on the site are listed buildings.

 

History

Early Middle Ages

A chapel at Dunnottar is said to have been founded by St Ninian in the 5th century, although it is not clear when the site was first fortified, but in any case the legend is late and highly implausible. Possibly the earliest written reference to the site is found in the Annals of Ulster which record two sieges of "Dún Foither" in 681 and 694.

 

The earlier event has been interpreted as an attack by Brude, the Pictish king of Fortriu, to extend his power over the north-east coast of Scotland. The Scottish Chronicle records that King Domnall II, the first ruler to be called rí Alban (King of Alba), was killed at Dunnottar during an attack by Vikings in 900. King Aethelstan of Wessex led a force into Scotland in 934, and raided as far north as Dunnottar according to the account of Symeon of Durham. W. D. Simpson speculated that a motte might lie under the present caste, but excavations in the 1980s failed to uncover substantive evidence of early medieval fortification.

 

The discovery of a group of Pictish stones at Dunnicaer, a nearby sea stack, has prompted speculation that "Dún Foither" was actually located on the adjacent headland of Bowduns, 0.5 kilometres (0.31 mi) to the north.

 

Later Middle Ages

During the reign of King William the Lion (ruled 1165–1214) Dunnottar was a center of local administration for The Mearns. The castle is named in the Roman de Fergus, an early 13th-century Arthurian romance, in which the hero Fergus must travel to Dunnottar to retrieve a magic shield.

 

In May 1276 a church on the site was consecrated by William Wishart, Bishop of St Andrews. The poet Blind Harry relates that William Wallace captured Dunnottar from the English in 1297, during the Wars of Scottish Independence. He is said to have imprisoned 4,000 defeated English soldiers in the church and burned them alive.

 

In 1336 Edward III of England ordered William Sinclair, 8th Baron of Roslin, to sail eight ships to the partially ruined Dunnottar for the purpose of rebuilding and fortifying the site as a forward resupply base for his northern campaign. Sinclair took with him 160 soldiers, horses, and a corps of masons and carpenters.

 

Edward himself visited in July, but the English efforts were undone before the end of the year when the Scottish Regent Sir Andrew Murray led a force that captured and again destroyed the defences of Dunnottar.

 

In the 14th century Dunnottar was granted to William de Moravia, 5th Earl of Sutherland (d.1370), and in 1346 a licence to crenellate was issued by David II. Around 1359 William Keith, Marischal of Scotland, married Margaret Fraser, niece of Robert the Bruce, and was granted the barony of Dunnottar at this time. Keith then gave the lands of Dunnottar to his daughter Christian and son-in-law William Lindsay of Byres, but in 1392 an excambion (exchange) was agreed whereby Keith regained Dunnottar and Lindsay took lands in Fife.

 

William Keith completed construction of the tower house at Dunnottar, but was excommunicated for building on the consecrated ground associated with the parish church. Keith had provided a new parish church closer to Stonehaven, but was forced to write to the Pope, Benedict XIII, who issued a bull in 1395 lifting the excommunication.William Keith's descendents were created Earls Marischal in the mid 15th century, and they held Dunottar until the 18th century.

 

16th century rebuilding

Through the 16th century the Keiths improved and expanded their principal seats: at Dunnottar and also at Keith Marischal in East Lothian. James IV visited Dunnottar in 1504, and in 1531 James V exempted the Earl's men from military service on the grounds that Dunnottar was one of the "principall strenthis of our realme".

 

Mary, Queen of Scots, visited in 1562 after the Battle of Corrichie, and returned in 1564.

 

James VI stayed for 10 days in 1580, as part of a progress through Fife and Angus, during which a meeting of the Privy Council was convened at Dunnottar.

 

During a rebellion of Catholic nobles in 1592, Dunnottar was captured by a Captain Carr on behalf of the Earl of Huntly, but was restored to Lord Marischal just a few weeks later.

 

In 1581 George Keith succeeded as 5th Earl Marischal, and began a large scale reconstruction that saw the medieval fortress converted into a more comfortable home. The founder of Marischal College in Aberdeen, the 5th Earl valued Dunnottar as much for its dramatic situation as for its security.

 

A "palace" comprising a series of ranges around a quadrangle was built on the north-eastern cliffs, creating luxurious living quarters with sea views. The 13th-century chapel was restored and incorporated into the quadrangle.

 

An impressive stone gatehouse was constructed, now known as Benholm's Lodging, featuring numerous gun ports facing the approach. Although impressive, these are likely to have been fashionable embellishments rather than genuine defensive features.

 

Civil wars

Further information: Scotland in the Wars of the Three Kingdoms

In 1639 William Keith, 7th Earl Marischal, came out in support of the Covenanters, a Presbyterian movement who opposed the established Episcopal Church and the changes which Charles I was attempting to impose. With James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose, he marched against the Catholic James Gordon, 2nd Viscount Aboyne, Earl of Huntly, and defeated an attempt by the Royalists to seize Stonehaven. However, when Montrose changed sides to the Royalists and marched north, Marischal remained in Dunnottar, even when given command of the area by Parliament, and even when Montrose burned Stonehaven.

 

Marischal then joined with the Engager faction, who had made a deal with the king, and led a troop of horse to the Battle of Preston (1648) in support of the royalists.

 

Following the execution of Charles I in 1649, the Engagers gave their allegiance to his son and heir: Charles II was proclaimed king, arriving in Scotland in June 1650. He visited Dunnottar in July 1650, but his presence in Scotland prompted Oliver Cromwell to lead a force into Scotland, defeating the Scots at Dunbar in September 1650.

 

The Honours of Scotland

Charles II was crowned at Scone Palace on 1 January 1651, at which the Honours of Scotland (the regalia of crown, sword and sceptre) were used. However, with Cromwell's troops in Lothian, the honours could not be returned to Edinburgh. The Earl Marischal, as Marischal of Scotland, had formal responsibility for the honours, and in June the Privy Council duly decided to place them at Dunnottar.

 

They were brought to the castle by Katherine Drummond, hidden in sacks of wool. Sir George Ogilvie (or Ogilvy) of Barras was appointed lieutenant-governor of the castle, and given responsibility for its defence.

 

In November 1651 Cromwell's troops called on Ogilvie to surrender, but he refused. During the subsequent blockade of the castle, the removal of the Honours of Scotland was planned by Elizabeth Douglas, wife of Sir George Ogilvie, and Christian Fletcher, wife of James Granger, minister of Kinneff Parish Church. The king's papers were first removed from the castle by Anne Lindsay, a kinswoman of Elizabeth Douglas, who walked through the besieging force with the papers sewn into her clothes.

 

Two stories exist regarding the removal of the honours themselves. Fletcher stated in 1664 that over the course of three visits to the castle in February and March 1652, she carried away the crown, sceptre, sword and sword-case hidden amongst sacks of goods. Another account, given in the 18th century by a tutor to the Earl Marischal, records that the honours were lowered from the castle onto the beach, where they were collected by Fletcher's servant and carried off in a creel (basket) of seaweed. Having smuggled the honours from the castle, Fletcher and her husband buried them under the floor of the Old Kirk at Kinneff.

 

Meanwhile, by May 1652 the commander of the blockade, Colonel Thomas Morgan, had taken delivery of the artillery necessary for the reduction of Dunnottar. Ogilvie surrendered on 24 May, on condition that the garrison could go free. Finding the honours gone, the Cromwellians imprisoned Ogilvie and his wife in the castle until the following year, when a false story was put about suggesting that the honours had been taken overseas.

 

Much of the castle property was removed, including twenty-one brass cannons,[28] and Marischal was required to sell further lands and possessions to pay fines imposed by Cromwell's government.

 

At the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, the honours were removed from Kinneff Church and returned to the king. Ogilvie quarrelled with Marischal's mother over who would take credit for saving the honours, though he was eventually rewarded with a baronetcy. Fletcher was awarded 2,000 merks by Parliament but the sum was never paid.

  

Whigs and Jacobites

Religious and political conflicts continued to be played out at Dunnottar through the 17th and early 18th centuries. In 1685, during the rebellion of the Earl of Argyll against the new king James VII, 167 Covenanters were seized and held in a cellar at Dunnottar. The prisoners included 122 men and 45 women associated with the Whigs, an anti-Royalist group within the Covenanter movement, and had refused to take an oath of allegiance to the new king.

 

The Whigs were imprisoned from 24 May until late July. A group of 25 escaped, although two of these were killed in a fall from the cliffs, and another 15 were recaptured. Five prisoners died in the vault, and 37 of the Whigs were released after taking the oath of allegiance.

 

The remaining prisoners were transported to Perth Amboy, New Jersey, as part of a colonisation scheme devised by George Scot of Pitlochie. Many, like Scot himself, died on the voyage.

 

The cellar, located beneath the "King's Bedroom" in the 16th-century castle buildings, has since become known as the "Whigs' Vault".

 

Both the Jacobites (supporters of the exiled Stuarts) and the Hanoverians (supporters of George I and his descendents) used Dunnottar Castle. In 1689 during Viscount Dundee's campaign in support of the deposed James VII, the castle was garrisoned for William and Mary with Lord Marischal appointed captain.

 

Seventeen suspected Jacobites from Aberdeen were seized and held in the fortress for around three weeks, including George Liddell, professor of mathematics at Marischal College.

 

In the Jacobite Rising of 1715 George Keith, 10th Earl Marischal, took an active role with the rebels, leading cavalry at the Battle of Sheriffmuir. After the subsequent abandonment of the rising Lord Marischal fled to the Continent, eventually becoming French ambassador for Frederick the Great of Prussia. Meanwhile, in 1716, his titles and estates including Dunnottar were declared forfeit to the crown.

 

Later history

The seized estates of the Earl Marischal were purchased in 1720 for £41,172, by the York Buildings Company who dismantled much of the castle.

 

In 1761 the Earl briefly returned to Scotland and bought back Dunnottar only to sell it five years later to Alexander Keith, an Edinburgh lawyer who served as Knight Marischal of Scotland.

 

Dunnottar was inherited in 1852 by Sir Patrick Keith-Murray of Ochtertyre, who in turn sold it in July 1873 to Major Alexander Innes of Cowie and Raemoir for about £80,000.

 

It was purchased by Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray, in 1925 after which his wife embarked on a programme of repairs.

 

Since that time the castle has remained in the family, and has been open to the public, attracting 52,500 visitors in 2009.

 

Dunnottar Castle, and the headland on which is stands, was designated as a scheduled monument in 1970.In 1972 twelve of the structures at Dunnottar were listed.

 

Three buildings are listed at category A as being of "national importance": the keep; the entrance gateway; and Benholm's Lodging.

 

The remaining listings are at category B as being of "regional importance".[39] The Hon. Charles Anthony Pearson, the younger son of the 3rd Viscount Cowdray, currently owns and runs Dunnottar Castle which is part of the 210-square-kilometre (52,000-acre) Dunecht Estates.

 

Portions of the 1990 film Hamlet, starring Mel Gibson and Glenn Close, were shot there.

  

Description

Dunnottar's strategic location allowed its owners to control the coastal terrace between the North Sea cliffs and the hills of the Mounth, 3.5 kilometres (2.2 mi) inland, which enabled access to and from the north-east of Scotland.

 

The site is accessed via a steep, 800-metre (2,600 ft) footpath (with modern staircases) from a car park on the coastal road, or via a 3-kilometre (1.9 mi) cliff-top path from Stonehaven. Dunnottar's several buildings, put up between the 13th and 17th centuries, are arranged across a headland covering around 1.4 hectares (3.5 acres).

 

The dominant building, viewed from the land approach, is the 14th-century keep or tower house. The other principal buildings are the gatehouse; the chapel; and the 16th-century "palace" which incorporates the "Whigs' Vault".

 

Defences

The approach to the castle is overlooked by outworks on the "Fiddle Head", a promontory on the western side of the headland. The entrance is through the well-defended main gate, set in a curtain wall which entirely blocks a cleft in the rocky cliffs.

 

The gate has a portcullis and has been partly blocked up. Alongside the main gate is the 16th-century Benholm's Lodging, a five-storey building cut into the rock, which incorporated a prison with apartments above.

 

Three tiers of gun ports face outwards from the lower floors of Benholm's Lodging, while inside the main gate, a group of four gun ports face the entrance. The entrance passage then turns sharply to the left, running underground through two tunnels to emerge near the tower house.

 

Simpson contends that these defences are "without exception the strongest in Scotland", although later writers have doubted the effectiveness of the gun ports. Cruden notes that the alignment of the gun ports in Benholm's Lodging, facing across the approach rather than along, means that they are of limited efficiency.

 

The practicality of the gun ports facing the entrance has also been questioned, though an inventory of 1612 records that four brass cannons were placed here.

 

A second access to the castle leads up from a rocky cove, the aperture to a marine cave on the northern side of the Dunnottar cliffs into which a small boat could be brought. From here a steep path leads to the well-fortified postern gate on the cliff top, which in turn offers access to the castle via the Water Gate in the palace.

 

Artillery defences, taking the form of earthworks, surround the north-west corner of the castle, facing inland, and the south-east, facing seaward. A small sentry box or guard house stands by the eastern battery, overlooking the coast.

 

Tower house and surrounding buildings

The tower house of Dunnottar, viewed from the west

The late 14th-century tower house has a stone-vaulted basement, and originally had three further storeys and a garret above.

 

Measuring 12 by 11 metres (39 by 36 ft), the tower house stood 15 metres (49 ft) high to its gable. The principal rooms included a great hall and a private chamber for the lord, with bedrooms upstairs.

 

Beside the tower house is a storehouse, and a blacksmith's forge with a large chimney. A stable block is ranged along the southern edge of the headland. Nearby is Waterton's Lodging, also known as the Priest's House, built around 1574, possibly for the use of William Keith (died 1580), son of the 4th Earl Marischal.

 

This small self-contained house includes a hall and kitchen at ground level, with private chambers above, and has a projecting spiral stair on the north side. It is named for Thomas Forbes of Waterton, an attendant of the 7th Earl.

 

The palace

The palace, to the north-east of the headland, was built in the late 16th century and early to mid-17th century. It comprises three main wings set out around a quadrangle, and for the most part is probably the work of the 5th Earl Marischal who succeeded in 1581.

 

It provided extensive and comfortable accommodation to replace the rooms in the tower house. In its long, low design it has been compared to contemporary English buildings, in contrast to the Scottish tradition of taller towers still prevalent in the 16th century.

 

Seven identical lodgings are arranged along the west range, each opening onto the quadrangle and including windows and fireplace. Above the lodgings the west range comprised a 35-metre (115 ft) gallery. Now roofless, the gallery originally had an elaborate oak ceiling, and on display was a Roman tablet taken from the Antonine Wall.

 

At the north end of the gallery was a drawing room linked to the north range. The gallery could also be accessed from the Silver House to the south, which incorporated a broad stairway with a treasury above.

 

The basement of the north range incorporates kitchens and stores, with a dining room and great chamber above. At ground floor level is the Water Gate, between the north and west ranges, which gives access to the postern on the northern cliffs.

 

The east and north ranges are linked via a rectangular stair. The east range has a larder, brewhouse and bakery at ground level, with a suite of apartments for the Countess above. A north-east wing contains the Earl's apartments, and includes the "King's Bedroom" in which Charles II stayed. In this room is a carved stone inscribed with the arms of the 7th Earl and his wife, and the date 1654. Below these rooms is the Whigs' Vault, a cellar measuring 16 by 4.5 metres (52 by 15 ft). This cellar, in which the Covenanters were held in 1685, has a large eastern window, as well as a lower vault accessed via a trap-door in the floor.

 

Of the chambers in the palace, only the dining room and the Silver House remain roofed, having been restored in the 1920s. The central area contains a circular cistern or fish pond, 16 metres (52 ft) across and 7.6 metres (25 ft) deep, and a bowling green is located to the west.

 

At the south-east corner of the quadrangle is the chapel, consecrated in 1276 and largely rebuilt in the 16th century. Medieval walling and two 13th-century windows remain, and there is a graveyard to the south.

HINDU GODDESS KALI

Kālī, also known as Kālikā (Sanskrit: कालिका), is the Hindu goddess associated with empowerment, shakti. She is the fierce aspect of the goddess Durga (Parvati). The name Kali comes from kāla, which means black, time, death, lord of death: Shiva. Since Shiva is called Kāla— the eternal time — the name of Kālī, his consort, also means "Time" or "Death" (as in "time has come"). Hence, Kāli is the Goddess of Time and Change. Although sometimes presented as dark and violent, her earliest incarnation as a figure of annihilation of evil forces still has some influence. Various Shakta Hindu cosmologies, as well as Shākta Tantric beliefs, worship her as the ultimate reality or Brahman. Comparatively recent devotional movements largely conceive Kāli as a benevolent mother goddess. Kālī is represented as the consort of Lord Shiva, on whose body she is often seen standing. Shiva lies in the path of Kali, whose foot on Shiva subdues her anger.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Kālī is the feminine form of kālam ("black, dark coloured"). Kāla primarily means "time" but also means "black" in honor of being the first creation before light itself. Kālī means "the black one" and refers to her being the entity of "time" or "beyond time." Kāli is strongly associated with Shiva, and Shaivas derive the masculine Kāla (an epithet of Shiva) to come from her feminine name. A nineteenth-century Sanskrit dictionary, the Shabdakalpadrum, states: कालः शिवः। तस्य पत्नीति - काली। kālaḥ śivaḥ। tasya patnīti kālī - "Shiva is Kāla, thus, his consort is Kāli" referring to Devi Parvathi being a manifestation of Devi MahaKali.

 

Other names include Kālarātri ("black night"), as described above, and Kālikā ("relating to time"). Coburn notes that the name Kālī can be used as a proper name, or as a description of color.

 

Kāli's association with darkness stands in contrast to her consort, Shiva, who manifested after her in creation, and who symbolises the rest of creation after Time is created. In his supreme awareness of Maya, his body is covered by the white ashes of the cremation ground (Sanskrit: śmaśāna) where he meditates, and with which Kāli is also associated, as śmaśāna-kālī.

 

ORIGINS

Hugh Urban notes that although the word Kālī appears as early as the Atharva Veda, the first use of it as a proper name is in the Kathaka Grhya Sutra (19.7). Kali is the name of one of the seven tongues of Agni, the [Rigvedic] God of Fire, in the Mundaka Upanishad (2:4), but it is unlikely that this refers to the goddess. The first appearance of Kāli in her present form is in the Sauptika Parvan of the Mahabharata (10.8.64). She is called Kālarātri (literally, "black night") and appears to the Pandava soldiers in dreams, until finally she appears amidst the fighting during an attack by Drona's son Ashwatthama. She most famously appears in the sixth century Devi Mahatmyam as one of the shaktis of Mahadevi, and defeats the demon Raktabija ("Bloodseed"). The tenth-century Kalika Purana venerates Kāli as the ultimate reality.

 

According to David Kinsley, Kāli is first mentioned in Hinduism as a distinct goddess around 600 CE, and these texts "usually place her on the periphery of Hindu society or on the battlefield." She is often regarded as the Shakti of Shiva, and is closely associated with him in various Puranas. The Kalika Purana depicts her as the "Adi Shakti" (Fundamental Power) and "Para Prakriti" or beyond nature.

 

WORSHIP & MANTRA

Kali could be considered a general concept, like Durga, and is mostly worshiped in the Kali Kula sect of worship. The closest way of direct worship is Maha Kali or Bhadra Kali (Bhadra in Sanskrit means 'gentle'). Kali is worshiped as one of the 10 Mahavidya forms of Adi Parashakti (Goddess Durga) or Bhagavathy according to the region. The mantra for worship is called Devi Argala Stotram.

Sanskrit: सर्वमङ्गलमाङ्गल्ये शिवे सर्वार्थसाधिके । शरण्ये त्र्यम्बके गौरि नारायणि नमोऽस्तु ते ॥

 

ॐ जयंती मंगल काली भद्रकाली कपालिनी । दुर्गा क्षमा शिवा धात्री स्वाहा स्वधा नमोऽस्तु‍ते ॥

(Sarvamaṅgalamāṅgalyē śivē sarvārthasādhikē . śaraṇyē tryambakē gauri nārāyaṇi namō'stu tē.

Oṃ jayantī mangala kālī bhadrakālī kapālinī . durgā kṣamā śivā dhātrī svāhā svadhā namō'stu‍tē.)

 

TANTRA

Goddesses play an important role in the study and practice of Tantra Yoga, and are affirmed to be as central to discerning the nature of reality as are the male deities. Although Parvati is often said to be the recipient and student of Shiva's wisdom in the form of Tantras, it is Kāli who seems to dominate much of the Tantric iconography, texts, and rituals. In many sources Kāli is praised as the highest reality or greatest of all deities. The Nirvana-tantra says the gods Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva all arise from her like bubbles in the sea, ceaselessly arising and passing away, leaving their original source unchanged. The Niruttara-tantra and the Picchila-tantra declare all of Kāli's mantras to be the greatest and the Yogini-tantra, Kamakhya-tantra and the Niruttara-tantra all proclaim Kāli vidyas (manifestations of Mahadevi, or "divinity itself"). They declare her to be an essence of her own form (svarupa) of the Mahadevi.

 

In the Mahanirvana-tantra, Kāli is one of the epithets for the primordial sakti, and in one passage Shiva praises her:

 

At the dissolution of things, it is Kāla [Time] Who will devour all, and by reason of this He is called Mahākāla [an epithet of Lord Shiva], and since Thou devourest Mahākāla Himself, it is Thou who art the Supreme Primordial Kālika. Because Thou devourest Kāla, Thou art Kāli, the original form of all things, and because Thou art the Origin of and devourest all things Thou art called the Adya [the Primordial One]. Re-assuming after Dissolution Thine own form, dark and formless, Thou alone remainest as One ineffable and inconceivable. Though having a form, yet art Thou formless; though Thyself without beginning, multiform by the power of Maya, Thou art the Beginning of all, Creatrix, Protectress, and Destructress that Thou art.

 

The figure of Kāli conveys death, destruction, and the consuming aspects of reality. As such, she is also a "forbidden thing", or even death itself. In the Pancatattva ritual, the sadhaka boldly seeks to confront Kali, and thereby assimilates and transforms her into a vehicle of salvation. This is clear in the work of the Karpuradi-stotra, a short praise of Kāli describing the Pancatattva ritual unto her, performed on cremation grounds. (Samahana-sadhana)

 

He, O Mahākāli who in the cremation-ground, naked, and with dishevelled hair, intently meditates upon Thee and recites Thy mantra, and with each recitation makes offering to Thee of a thousand Akanda flowers with seed, becomes without any effort a Lord of the earth. Oh Kāli, whoever on Tuesday at midnight, having uttered Thy mantra, makes offering even but once with devotion to Thee of a hair of his Shakti [his energy/female companion] in the cremation-ground, becomes a great poet, a Lord of the earth, and ever goes mounted upon an elephant.

 

The Karpuradi-stotra clearly indicates that Kāli is more than a terrible, vicious, slayer of demons who serves Durga or Shiva. Here, she is identified as the supreme mistress of the universe, associated with the five elements. In union with Lord Shiva, she creates and destroys worlds. Her appearance also takes a different turn, befitting her role as ruler of the world and object of meditation. In contrast to her terrible aspects, she takes on hints of a more benign dimension. She is described as young and beautiful, has a gentle smile, and makes gestures with her two right hands to dispel any fear and offer boons. The more positive features exposed offer the distillation of divine wrath into a goddess of salvation, who rids the sadhaka of fear. Here, Kali appears as a symbol of triumph over death.

 

BENGALI TRADITION

Kali is also a central figure in late medieval Bengali devotional literature, with such devotees as Ramprasad Sen (1718–75). With the exception of being associated with Parvati as Shiva's consort, Kāli is rarely pictured in Hindu legends and iconography as a motherly figure until Bengali devotions beginning in the early eighteenth century. Even in Bengāli tradition her appearance and habits change little, if at all.

 

The Tantric approach to Kāli is to display courage by confronting her on cremation grounds in the dead of night, despite her terrible appearance. In contrast, the Bengali devotee appropriates Kāli's teachings adopting the attitude of a child, coming to love her unreservedly. In both cases, the goal of the devotee is to become reconciled with death and to learn acceptance of the way that things are. These themes are well addressed in Rāmprasād's work. Rāmprasād comments in many of his other songs that Kāli is indifferent to his wellbeing, causes him to suffer, brings his worldly desires to nothing and his worldly goods to ruin.

 

To be a child of Kāli, Rāmprasād asserts, is to be denied of earthly delights and pleasures. Kāli is said to refrain from giving that which is expected. To the devotee, it is perhaps her very refusal to do so that enables her devotees to reflect on dimensions of themselves and of reality that go beyond the material world.

 

A significant portion of Bengali devotional music features Kāli as its central theme and is known as Shyama Sangeet ("Music of the Night"). Mostly sung by male vocalists, today even women have taken to this form of music. One of the finest singers of Shyāma Sāngeet is Pannalal Bhattacharya.

 

In Bengal, Kāli is venerated in the festival Kali Puja, the new moon day of Ashwin month which coincides with Diwali festival.

 

In a unique form of Kāli worship, Shantipur worships Kāli in the form of a hand painted image of the deity known as Poteshwari (meaning the deity drawn on a piece of cloth).

 

LEGENDS

SLAYER OF RAKTABIJA

In Kāli's most famous legend, Devi Durga (Adi Parashakti) and her assistants, the Matrikas, wound the demon Raktabija, in various ways and with a variety of weapons in an attempt to destroy him. They soon find that they have worsened the situation for with every drop of blood that is dripped from Raktabija he reproduces a clone of himself. The battlefield becomes increasingly filled with his duplicates. Durga, in need of help, summons Kāli to combat the demons. It is said, in some versions, that Goddess Durga actually assumes the form of Goddess Kāli at this time. The Devi Mahatmyam describes:

 

Out of the surface of her (Durga's) forehead, fierce with frown, issued suddenly Kali of terrible countenance, armed with a sword and noose. Bearing the strange khatvanga (skull-topped staff ), decorated with a garland of skulls, clad in a tiger's skin, very appalling owing to her emaciated flesh, with gaping mouth, fearful with her tongue lolling out, having deep reddish eyes, filling the regions of the sky with her roars, falling upon impetuously and slaughtering the great asuras in that army, she devoured those hordes of the foes of the devas.

 

Kali destroys Raktabija by sucking the blood from his body and putting the many Raktabija duplicates in her gaping mouth. Pleased with her victory, Kali then dances on the field of battle, stepping on the corpses of the slain. In the Devi Mahatmya version of this story, Kali is also described as a Matrika and as a Shakti or power of Devi. She is given the epithet Cāṃuṇḍā (Chamunda), i.e. the slayer of the demons Chanda and Munda. Chamunda is very often identified with Kali and is very much like her in appearance and habit.

 

DAKSHINA KALI

In her most famous pose as Daksinakali, popular legends say that Kali, becoming drunk on the blood of her victims on the battlefield, dances with destructive frenzy. She is about to destroy the whole universe when, urged by all the gods, Shiva lies in her way to stop her. In her fury, she fails to see the body of Shiva lying amongst the corpses on the battlefield and steps upon his chest. Realizing Shiva lies beneath her feet, her anger is pacified and she calms her fury. Though not included in any of the puranas, popular legends state that Kali was ashamed at the prospect of keeping her husband beneath her feet and thus stuck her tongue out in shame. The Devi-Bhagavata Purana, which goes into great depths about the goddess Kali, reveals the tongue's actual symbolism.

 

The characteristic icons that depict Kali are the following; unbridled matted hair, open blood shot eyes, open mouth and a drooping tongue; in her hands, she holds a Khadga (bent sword or scimitar) and a human head; she has a girdle of human hands across her waist and an enchanted Shiva lies beneath her feet. Each of these icons represent a deep philosophical epithet. The drooping out-stuck tongue represents her blood-thirst. Lord Shiva beneath her feet represents matter, as Kali is undoubtedly the primeval energy. The depiction of Kali on Shiva shows that without energy, matter lies "dead". This concept has been simplified to a folk-tale depicting a wife placing her foot on her husband and sticking her tongue out in shame. In tantric contexts, the tongue is seen to denote the element (guna) of rajas (energy and action) controlled by sattva.

 

If Kali steps on Shiva with her right foot and holds the sword in her left hand, she is considered to be Dakshina Kali. The Dakshina Kali Temple has important religious associations with the Jagannath Temple and it is believed that Daksinakali is the guardian of the kitchen of the Lord Jagannath Temple. Puranic tradition says that in Puri, Lord Jagannath is regarded as Daksinakalika. Goddess Dakshinakali plays an important role in the 'Niti' of Saptapuri Amavasya.

 

One South Indian tradition tells of a dance contest between Shiva and Kali. After defeating the two demons Sumbha and Nisumbha, Kali takes up residence in the forest of Thiruvalankadu or Thiruvalangadu. She terrorizes the surrounding area with her fierce, disruptive nature. One of Shiva's devotees becomes distracted while performing austerities, and asks Shiva to rid the forest of the destructive goddess. When Shiva arrives, Kali threatens him, claiming the territory as her own. Shiva challenges Kali to a dance contest; both of them dance and Kali matches Shiva in every step that he takes until Shiva takes the "Urdhvatandava" step, by vertically raising his right leg. Kali refuses to perform this step, which would not befit her as a woman, and became pacified.

 

SMASHAN KALI

If the Kali steps out with the left foot and holds the sword in her right hand, she is the terrible form of Mother, the Smashan Kali of the cremation ground. She is worshiped by tantrics, the followers of Tantra, who believe that one's spiritual discipline practiced in a smashan (cremation ground) brings success quickly. Sarda Devi, the consort of Ramakrishna Paramhansa, worshipped Smashan Kali at Dakshineshwar.

 

MATERNAL KALI

Another legend depicts the infant Shiva calming Kali. In this similar story, Kali has defeated her enemies on the battlefield and begun to dance out of control, drunk on the blood of the slain. To calm her down and to protect the stability of the world, Shiva is sent to the battlefield, as an infant, crying aloud. Seeing the child's distress, Kali ceases dancing to care for the helpless infant. She picks him up, kisses his head, and proceeds to breast feed the infant Shiva. This legend is notable because it shows Kali in her benevolent, maternal aspect, with which she is not usually identified.

 

MAHAKALI

Mahakali (Sanskrit: Mahākālī, Devanagari: महाकाली), literally translated as Great Kali, is sometimes considered as a greater form of Kali, identified with the Ultimate reality of Brahman. It can also be used as an honorific of the Goddess Kali, signifying her greatness by the prefix "Mahā-". Mahakali, in Sanskrit, is etymologically the feminized variant of Mahakala or Great Time (which is interpreted also as Death), an epithet of the God Shiva in Hinduism. Mahakali is the presiding Goddess of the first episode of the Devi Mahatmya. Here she is depicted as Devi in her universal form as Shakti. Here Devi serves as the agent who allows the cosmic order to be restored.

 

Kali is depicted in the Mahakali form as having ten heads, ten arms, and ten legs. Each of her ten hands is carrying a various implement which vary in different accounts, but each of these represent the power of one of the Devas or Hindu Gods and are often the identifying weapon or ritual item of a given Deva. The implication is that Mahakali subsumes and is responsible for the powers that these deities possess and this is in line with the interpretation that Mahakali is identical with Brahman. While not displaying ten heads, an "ekamukhi" or one headed image may be displayed with ten arms, signifying the same concept: the powers of the various Gods come only through Her grace.

 

ICONOGRAPHY

Kali is portrayed mostly in two forms: the popular four-armed form and the ten-armed Mahakali form. In both of her forms, she is described as being black in color but is most often depicted as blue in popular Indian art. Her eyes are described as red with intoxication, and in absolute rage, her hair is shown disheveled, small fangs sometimes protrude out of her mouth, and her tongue is lolling. She is often shown naked or just wearing a skirt made of human arms and a garland of human heads. She is also accompanied by serpents and a jackal while standing on a seemingly dead Shiva, usually right foot forward to symbolize the more popular Dakshinamarga or right-handed path, as opposed to the more infamous and transgressive Vamamarga or left-handed path.

 

In the ten-armed form of Mahakali she is depicted as shining like a blue stone. She has ten faces and ten feet and three eyes. She has ornaments decked on all her limbs. There is no association with Shiva.

 

The Kalika Purana describes Kali as possessing a soothing dark complexion, as perfectly beautiful, riding a lion, four-armed, holding a sword and blue lotuses, her hair unrestrained, body firm and youthful.

 

In spite of her seemingly terrible form, Kali Ma is often considered the kindest and most loving of all the Hindu goddesses, as she is regarded by her devotees as the Mother of the whole Universe. And because of her terrible form, she is also often seen as a great protector. When the Bengali saint Ramakrishna once asked a devotee why one would prefer to worship Mother over him, this devotee rhetorically replied, "Maharaj, when they are in trouble your devotees come running to you. But, where do you run when you are in trouble?"

 

According to Ramakrishna, darkness is the Ultimate Mother, or Kali:

 

My Mother is the principle of consciousness. She is Akhanda Satchidananda; indivisible Reality, Awareness, and Bliss. The night sky between the stars is perfectly black. The waters of the ocean depths are the same; The infinite is always mysteriously dark. This inebriating darkness is my beloved Kali.

 

SRI RAMAKRISHNA

This is clear in the works of such contemporary artists as Charles Wish, and Tyeb Mehta, who sometimes take great liberties with the traditional, accepted symbolism, but still demonstrate a true reverence for the Shakta sect.

 

POPULAR FORM

Classic depictions of Kali share several features, as follows:

 

Kali's most common four armed iconographic image shows each hand carrying variously a sword, a trishul (trident), a severed head and a bowl or skull-cup (kapala) catching the blood of the severed head.

 

Two of these hands (usually the left) are holding a sword and a severed head. The Sword signifies Divine Knowledge and the Human Head signifies human Ego which must be slain by Divine Knowledge in order to attain Moksha. The other two hands (usually the right) are in the abhaya (fearlessness) and varada (blessing) mudras, which means her initiated devotees (or anyone worshipping her with a true heart) will be saved as she will guide them here and in the hereafter.

 

She has a garland consisting of human heads, variously enumerated at 108 (an auspicious number in Hinduism and the number of countable beads on a Japa Mala or rosary for repetition of Mantras) or 51, which represents Varnamala or the Garland of letters of the Sanskrit alphabet, Devanagari. Hindus believe Sanskrit is a language of dynamism, and each of these letters represents a form of energy, or a form of Kali. Therefore she is generally seen as the mother of language, and all mantras.

 

She is often depicted naked which symbolizes her being beyond the covering of Maya since she is pure (nirguna) being-consciousness-bliss and far above prakriti. She is shown as very dark as she is brahman in its supreme unmanifest state. She has no permanent qualities - she will continue to exist even when the universe ends. It is therefore believed that the concepts of color, light, good, bad do not apply to her - she is the pure, un-manifested energy, the Adi-shakti.

 

SHIVA IN KALI ICONOGRAPHY

In both these images she is shown standing on the prone, inert or dead body of Shiva. There is a legend for the reason behind her standing on what appears to be Shiva's corpse, which translates as follows:

 

Once Kali had destroyed all the demons in battle, she began a terrific dance out of the sheer joy of victory. All the worlds or lokas began to tremble and sway under the impact of her dance. So, at the request of all the Gods, Shiva himself asked her to desist from this behavior. However, she was too intoxicated to listen. Hence, Shiva lay like a corpse among the slain demons in order to absorb the shock of the dance into himself. When Kali eventually stepped upon Shiva, she realized she was trampling and hurting her husband and bit her tongue in shame.

 

The story described here is a popular folk tale and not described or hinted in any of the puranas. The puranic interpretation is as follows:

 

Once, Parvati asks Shiva to chose the one form among her 10 forms which he likes most. To her surprise, Shiva reveals that he is most comfortable with her Kali form, in which she is bereft of her jewellery, her human-form, her clothes, her emotions and where she is only raw, chaotic energy, where she is as terrible as time itself and even greater than time. As Parvati takes the form of Kali, Shiva lies at her feet and requests her to place her foot on his chest, upon his heart. Once in this form, Shiva requests her to have this place, below her feet in her iconic image which would be worshiped throughout.

 

This idea has been explored in the Devi-Bhagavata Purana and is most popular in the Shyama Sangeet, devotional songs to Kali from the 12th to 15th centuries.

 

The Tantric interpretation of Kali standing on top of her husband is as follows:

 

The Shiv tattava (Divine Consciousness as Shiva) is inactive, while the Shakti tattava (Divine Energy as Kali) is active. Shiva and Kali represent Brahman, the Absolute pure consciousness which is beyond all names, forms and activities. Kali, on the other hand, represents the potential (and manifested) energy responsible for all names, forms and activities. She is his Shakti, or creative power, and is seen as the substance behind the entire content of all consciousness. She can never exist apart from Shiva or act independently of him, just as Shiva remains a mere corpse without Kali i.e., Shakti, all the matter/energy of the universe, is not distinct from Shiva, or Brahman, but is rather the dynamic power of Brahman. Hence, Kali is Para Brahman in the feminine and dynamic aspect while Shiva is the male aspect and static. She stands as the absolute basis for all life, energy and beneath her feet lies, Shiva, a metaphor for mass, which cannot retain its form without energy.

 

While this is an advanced concept in monistic Shaktism, it also agrees with the Nondual Trika philosophy of Kashmir, popularly known as Kashmir Shaivism and associated most famously with Abhinavagupta. There is a colloquial saying that "Shiva without Shakti is Shava" which means that without the power of action (Shakti) that is Mahakali (represented as the short "i" in Devanagari) Shiva (or consciousness itself) is inactive; Shava means corpse in Sanskrit and the play on words is that all Sanskrit consonants are assumed to be followed by a short letter "a" unless otherwise noted. The short letter "i" represents the female power or Shakti that activates Creation. This is often the explanation for why She is standing on Shiva, who is either Her husband and complement in Shaktism or the Supreme Godhead in Shaivism.

 

To properly understand this complex Tantric symbolism it is important to remember that the meaning behind Shiva and Kali does not stray from the non-dualistic parlance of Shankara or the Upanisads. According to both the Mahanirvana and Kularnava Tantras, there are two distinct ways of perceiving the same absolute reality. The first is a transcendental plane which is often described as static, yet infinite. It is here that there is no matter, there is no universe and only consciousness exists. This form of reality is known as Shiva, the absolute Sat-Chit-Ananda - existence, knowledge and bliss. The second is an active plane, an immanent plane, the plane of matter, of Maya, i.e., where the illusion of space-time and the appearance of an actual universe does exist. This form of reality is known as Kali or Shakti, and (in its entirety) is still specified as the same Absolute Sat-Chit-Ananda. It is here in this second plane that the universe (as we commonly know it) is experienced and is described by the Tantric seer as the play of Shakti, or God as Mother Kali.

 

From a Tantric perspective, when one meditates on reality at rest, as absolute pure consciousness (without the activities of creation, preservation or dissolution) one refers to this as Shiva or Brahman. When one meditates on reality as dynamic and creative, as the Absolute content of pure consciousness (with all the activities of creation, preservation or dissolution) one refers to it as Kali or Shakti. However, in either case the yogini or yogi is interested in one and the same reality - the only difference being in name and fluctuating aspects of appearance. It is this which is generally accepted as the meaning of Kali standing on the chest of Shiva.

 

Although there is often controversy surrounding the images of divine copulation, the general consensus is benign and free from any carnal impurities in its substance. In Tantra the human body is a symbol for the microcosm of the universe; therefore sexual process is responsible for the creation of the world. Although theoretically Shiva and Kali (or Shakti) are inseparable, like fire and its power to burn, in the case of creation they are often seen as having separate roles. With Shiva as male and Kali as female it is only by their union that creation may transpire. This reminds us of the prakrti and purusa doctrine of Samkhya wherein prakāśa- vimarśa has no practical value, just as without prakrti, purusa is quite inactive. This (once again) stresses the interdependencies of Shiva and Shakti and the vitality of their union.

 

Gopi Krishna proposed that Kali standing on the dead Shiva or Shava (Sanskrit for dead body) symbolised the helplessness of a person undergoing the changing process (psychologically and physiologically) in the body conducted by the Kundalini Shakti.

 

DEVELOPMENT

In the later traditions, Kali has become inextricably linked with Shiva. The unleashed form of Kali often becomes wild and uncontrollable, and only Shiva is able to tame her just as only Kali can tame Shiva. This is both because she is often a transformed version of one of his consorts and because he is able to match her wildness.

 

The ancient text of Kali Kautuvam describes her competition with Shiva in dance, from which the sacred 108 Karanas appeared. Shiva won the competition by acting the urdva tandava, one of the Karanas, by raising his feet to his head. Other texts describe Shiva appearing as a crying infant and appealing to her maternal instincts. While Shiva is said to be able to tame her, the iconography often presents her dancing on his fallen body, and there are accounts of the two of them dancing together, and driving each other to such wildness that the world comes close to unravelling.

 

Shiva's involvement with Tantra and Kali's dark nature have led to her becoming an important Tantric figure. To the Tantric worshippers, it was essential to face her Curse, the terror of death, as willingly as they accepted Blessings from her beautiful, nurturing, maternal aspect. For them, wisdom meant learning that no coin has only one side: as death cannot exist without life, so life cannot exist without death. Kali's role sometimes grew beyond that of a chaos - which could be confronted - to that of one who could bring wisdom, and she is given great metaphysical significance by some Tantric texts. The Nirvāna-tantra clearly presents her uncontrolled nature as the Ultimate Reality, claiming that the trimurti of Brahma, Vishnu and Rudra arise and disappear from her like bubbles from the sea. Although this is an extreme case, the Yogini-tantra, Kamakhya-tantra and the Niruttara-tantra declare her the svarupa (own-being) of the Mahadevi (the great Goddess, who is in this case seen as the combination of all devis).

 

The final stage of development is the worshipping of Kali as the Great Mother, devoid of her usual violence. This practice is a break from the more traditional depictions. The pioneers of this tradition are the 18th century Shakta poets such as Ramprasad Sen, who show an awareness of Kali's ambivalent nature. Ramakrishna, the 19th century Bengali saint, was also a great devotee of Kali; the western popularity of whom may have contributed to the more modern, equivocal interpretations of this Goddess. Rachel McDermott's work, however, suggests that for the common, modern worshipper, Kali is not seen as fearful, and only those educated in old traditions see her as having a wrathful component. Some credit to the development of Devi must also be given to Samkhya. Commonly referred to as the Devi of delusion, Mahamaya or Durga, acting in the confines of (but not being bound by) the nature of the three gunas, takes three forms: Maha-Kali, Maha-Lakshmi and Maha-Saraswati, being her tamas-ika, rajas-ika and sattva-ika forms. In this sense, Kali is simply part of a larger whole.

 

Like Sir John Woodroffe and Georg Feuerstein, many Tantric scholars (as well as sincere practitioners) agree that, no matter how propitious or appalling you describe them, Shiva and Devi are simply recognizable symbols for everyday, abstract (yet tangible) concepts such as perception, knowledge, space-time, causation and the process of liberating oneself from the confines of such things. Shiva, symbolizing pure, absolute consciousness, and Devi, symbolizing the entire content of that consciousness, are ultimately one and the same - totality incarnate, a micro-macro-cosmic amalgamation of all subjects, all objects and all phenomenal relations between the "two." Like man and woman who both share many common, human traits yet at the same time they are still different and, therefore, may also be seen as complementary.

 

Worshippers prescribe various benign and horrific qualities to Devi simply out of practicality. They do this so they may have a variety of symbols to choose from, symbols which they can identify and relate with from the perspective of their own, ever-changing time, place and personal level of unfolding. Just like modern chemists or physicists use a variety of molecular and atomic models to describe what is unperceivable through rudimentary, sensory input, the scientists of ontology and epistemology must do the same. One of the underlying distinctions of Tantra, in comparison to other religions, is that it allows the devotee the liberty to choose from a vast array of complementary symbols and rhetoric which suit one's evolving needs and tastes. From an aesthetic standpoint, nothing is interdict and nothing is orthodox. In this sense, the projection of some of Devi's more gentle qualities onto Kali is not sacrilege and the development of Kali really lies in the practitioner, not the murthi.

______________________

 

HINDU GODDESS DURGA

Durga, meaning "the inaccessible" or "the invincible", is the most popular incarnation of Devi and one of the main forms of the Goddess Shakti in the Hindu pantheon. Durga is the original manifested form of Mother Parvati or Adi-Parashakti. Durga is Adi-Parashakti herself. The Devi Gita, declares her to be the greatest Goddess. Thus, she is considered the supreme goddess and primary deity in Shaktism, occupying a place similar to Lord Krishna in Vaishnavism. According to Skanda Purana, the goddess Parvati accounted the name "Durga" after she killed the demon Durgamaasura. Goddess Parvati is considered to be the complete incarnation of Adi Parashakti or Goddess Durga, with all other goddesses being her incarnations or manifestations. Adi Parashakti or Mahadevi, the supreme power, is called Durga Shakti as per Devi-Mahatmya. Adi Parashakti or Devi Durga is a Hindu concept of the Ultimate Shakti or Mahashakti, the ultimate power inherent in all Creation. This is especially prevalent in the Shakta denomination within Hinduism, which worships the Goddess Devi in all her manifestations. She is Goddess Lakshmi and Goddess Saraswati in her mild form; Goddess Kali and Goddess Chandi in her wrathful form. Durga is also called Padmanabha-Sahodari and Narayani, the sister of Lord Vishnu. According to Shaivism and Shaktism She is supreme, but to bring back lord Shiva in Sansar, she was reborn in human form (Sati and Parvati) to marry Shiva. Durga gave birth to his first child Kartikeya.

 

ORIGINS & DEVELOPMENT

Ramprasad Chanda writes the following about the development of Durga from primitive goddess to her current form:

 

"...it is possible to distinguish two different strata – one primitive and the other advanced. The primitive form of Durga is the result of syncretism of a mountain-goddess worshiped by the dwellers of the Himalaya and the Vindhyas, a goddess worshiped by the nomadic Abhira shepherd, the vegetation spirit conceived as a female, and a war-goddess. As her votaries advanced in civilization the primitive war-goddess was transformed into the personification of the all-destroying time (Kali), the vegetation spirit into the primordial energy (Adya Sakti) and the saviouress from “samsara” (cycle of rebirths) , and gradually brought into line with the Brahmanic mythology and philosophy."

 

It is not possible to date her The delusion of the supreme soul is otherwise called Shakti (power). From this power, generates all forms of knowledge of the world and it is accepted as vital cause of creation, existence and destruction. According to 'Shree Durga Shaptshati- Rahasyam', the original power is Mahalaxmi that created three pairs of Supreme Powers. They are Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva as male and Saraswati, Laxmi and Parvati as female, and they married respectively. Maha Saraswati is well known as Brahmani, Mahalaxmi as Vaishnavi and Mahakali as Maheswari. Durga Shakti is the original cause of all the present or past worldly occurrences. Durga Shakti is called as Adhyashakti, Paramatma Shakti or Ati Prakrutika Shakti. She is creating and controlling other two powers: Natural and General. Natural Power is called as Atma Shakti, Prakrutika Shakti, Pancha Mahabhuta Shakti etc. This Shakti creates and controls the General Energy. General Energies are called Jada Shakti or Tamashakti. By the blessings of Durga Shakti, the mother of the Universe, man is able to get his emancipation or salvation and indulge in enjoyments in performance of his daily activities. So Vyasadev, the eminent poet of "Devi Bhagwat", has aptly described "Rudrahinam Vishnuhinam na vadanti janastatha Shaktihinam Yathasarbe probodhanti Naradhamam". The powerless persons are despised as mean persons. So, by being devoted to the Supreme, we should be strong and powerful by her grace.

 

STORIES

Shiva Purana gives an account of the origin of Durga. At the beginning of time, Lord Shiva invoked Durga, the primordial energy from his left half to create. Together they created their eternal abode, Shivaloka, also known as Kashi. Thereafter, they created Vishnu and Brahma.

 

As per Shiva Purana and Devi Mahatmyah, Mahishasura, the son of demon Rambha, unleashed reign of terror on earth. When gods intervened, Mahishasura defeated gods and banished them from heaven. Vanquished gods went to Trideva- Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. As they narrated their woeful tale, immense mass of light manifested from Lord Vishnu's mouth, which was joined by similar rays that emerged from the enraged faces of gods. This mass of light transformed into a woman. Then all the Gods gave their devine weapon to that supreme power. Adishakti re-manifested as Durga to slay Mahishasura. Armed with celestial weapons of all deities and decked with divine ornaments, Durga rode into the battle field and challenged demons for battle. Mahishasura's entire army, led by demons like Chikshur, Chamar, Asiloma, Vidalaksha, Durdhara, Durmukha, Mahahanu and many more attacked Durga at once. But Durga slew all of them with unparalleled cruelty. An enraged Mahishasura attacked Durga in guise of a buffalo. But Durga bound it with ropes. The buffalo morphed into a lion and lept on Durga, but she beheaded it with her sword. At this, Mahishasura began to fight in form of a swordsman. Durga pinned him down with a torrent of arrows. Mahishasura now assumed form of a giant elephant and tugged at Durga's lion. Durga lopped off its trunk with her sword and freed her lion. The elephent turned into a buffalo and charged at Durga. Sipping from her wine cup, Durga flung her trident and beheaded Mahishasura, finally killing him.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Everyone knows I’m all about sensibility, safety, and practicality. That is why when they posted this month’s LUGNuts challenge having to do with cars with place names, pretty much my only choice was the Chevy Monte Carlo SS. This is your average, every day mid-80’s family sedan with some very minor customizations you probably wouldn’t notice. They’re not even worth mentioning, really.

“MOON BASE -- As a solar system satellite vehicle proceeds en route to another planet (top), a lunar transfer vehicle with wheeled base and reversible-thrust power plants prepares to land at a moon base. Personnel are housed in spherical chamber capped by parabolic antenna. Hydroponic farms are shown on moon base beneath transparent circular domes.”

 

Dated by Mr. Stanilla as having been completed August 1959. Interestingly, it’s missing the “STOIKO-CROSS” reference that commonly accompanied his signature. So, possibly, this was prior to/after(?) his affiliation with them?

And…although of course commensurate with the time period - so I guess, to be expected - I just love the look of his works. They’re so aesthetically appealing…and the detail…feasibility & practicality be damned. Enjoy.

 

The fold/crease line in the upper left white border is tenuously keeping the corner attached. Prior to me, it was probably folded for 65+ years, likely under some weight for extended periods of time.

 

I’ve never previously seen this work by him. Note the solar glare/radiance extending up from beyond the lunar horizon…nice dramatic touch. And “solar system satellite vehicle”…I love it.

 

x.com/marco_nerli/status/684992825113579520

Credit: Nerli Ballati Marco/X

Done in Ai, Finalized in Photoshop

 

Beneath a violet-tinged sky where the light of a colossal planet bleeds across the horizon, a lone astronaut stands poised on alien ground. The terrain is cracked and glowing with veins of molten pink lava, painting the landscape in a surreal glow that pulses like the beat of a sleeping world. Jagged mountains loom in the distance, shrouded in mist, their silhouettes breaking the dreamlike haze.

 

The astronaut’s suit is a seamless fusion of vintage NASA-era design and sleek cyberpunk augmentation — matte black armored plating with glowing violet conduits running through its joints and seams. Neon accents pulse along the limbs and chest in rhythmic intervals, as if synced with a distant signal. The helmet is smooth and fully reflective, tinted with a dark chrome finish, casting back distorted reflections of the strange, breathtaking world before them.

 

Wires, tubes, and compact tech modules wrap the figure's silhouette, balanced between practicality and aesthetic — a traveler engineered for survival, style, and mystery. The atmosphere flickers with static and glowing embers, and the astronaut stands not as a visitor, but as if answering a call — drawn to something ancient, buried, or awakening beneath the surface of Echo-7.

British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. W223. Photo: R.K.O. Radio. Collection: Marlene Pilaete.

 

American actress Dorothy McGuire (1916-2001) was nominated for the Oscar for Best Actress for Gentleman's Agreement (1947) and won the National Board of Review Award for Best Actress for Friendly Persuasion (1956).

 

Dorothy Hackett McGuire was born in Omaha, Nebraska. She was the only child of Thomas Johnson McGuire and Isabelle Flaherty McGuire. Dorothy made her stage debut at the age of 13 at the local community playhouse in Barrie's 'A Kiss for Cinderella'. Her co-star was Henry Fonda, who was also born in Nebraska and was making a return visit to his home town after becoming a success on Broadway. After her father's death, McGuire attended a convent school in Indianapolis, Indiana. She later attended Pine Manor Junior College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, serving as president of that school's drama club. She graduated from Pine Manor when she was 19. She appeared in summer stock at Deertrees, Maine, in 1937 before going to New York. She acted on radio, playing Sue in the serial 'Big Sister' (1937) and took part in an experimental television broadcast, The Mysterious Mummy Case (1938). She was hired by producer Jed Harris to understudy the ingenue in a Broadway play, 'Stop Over' (1938), which ran only 23 performances. Then, she was an understudy to Martha Scott in 'Our Town' in 1938. She eventually took over Scott's role. She toured in 'My Dear Children' opposite John Barrymore, and in 1939, was in a revue with Benny Goodman, 'Swingin' the Dream'. She had a role in the short-lived 'Medicine Show' (1940), and a part in the longer-running revival of 'Kind Lady' (1940). McGuire achieved Broadway fame when cast in the title role of the domestic comedy 'Claudia'. It ran for 722 performances from 1941 to 1943. Brooks Atkinson wrote, "She gives a splendid performance of a part that would be irritating if it were played by a dull actress. She is personally genuine; the charm she radiates across the play is not merely theatrical mannerism. "

 

Dorothy McGuire was brought to Hollywood by producer David O. Selznick who called her "a born actress". On the strength of her stage performance, McGuire starred in her first film Claudia (Edmund Goulding, 1943), a film adaptation of her Broadway success. She portrayed a child bride who almost destroys her marriage through her selfishness. Selznick developed the project, then sold it to 20th Century Fox; under this deal, Selznick would share McGuire's services with Fox. McGuire's co-star in Claudia was Robert Young, and RKO reunited them in The Enchanted Cottage (John Cromwell, 1945), which was a box-office success. At age 28, she played the mother of an impoverished but aspirational, second-generation Irish-American family living in Brooklyn in A Tree Grows In Brooklyn (Elia Kazan, 1946), replacing Gene Tierney, who had gotten pregnant. The film was a big success. So, too, was the psychological horror film The Spiral Staircase (Robert Siodmak, 1946) in which McGuire played the lead role, a mute servant who is terrorized by a serial killer. McGuire and Young made a third film together, Claudia and David (Walter Lang, 1946), a sequel to Claudia, which was less well-received but also quite a success at the box-office. Then followed Till the End of Time (Edward Dmytryk, 1946), a popular hit. She was offered the lead in Anna and the King of Siam (1946), but turned it down to go travelling with her family. McGuire was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actress for Gentleman's Agreement (Elia Kazan, 1947) with Gregory Peck. The film was a surprise hit. Following this film, she, Peck, and Mel Ferrer helped form the La Jolla Playhouse. She appeared in productions of 'The Importance of Being Earnest',' I Am a Camera', 'The Winslow Boy', and 'Tonight at 8:30'. Then she went to live in Italy for a year.

 

Dorothy McGuire spent some time away from screens before returning in the comedy Mother Didn't Tell Me (Claude Binyon, 1950) and Mister 880 (Edmund Goulding, 1950) with Burt Lancaster. Neither was particularly popular. She made her TV debut in Robert Montgomery Presents, an adaptation of Dark Victory, with McGuire playing the Bette Davis role. Schary had become head of production at MGM, where McGuire appeared in Callaway Went Thataway (Melvin Frank, Norman Panama, 1951), which lost money. She did I Want You (Mark Robson, 1951), then returned to Broadway for 'Legend of Lovers' (1951–1952), but it only had a short run. McGuire made Invitation (Gottfried Reinhardt, 1952), which flopped, and the Film Noir Make Haste to Live (William A. Seiter, 1954) at Republic. She had a huge hit with the comedy Three Coins in the Fountain (Jean Negulesco, 1954) and appeared in episodes of The United States Steel Hour, Lux Video Theatre, The Best of Broadway (an adaptation of The Philadelphia Story, as Tracey Lord), and Climax!. She played Glenn Ford's love interest in Trial (Mark Robson, 1955), which was a hit. McGuire was cast as Quaker Gary Cooper's wife in Friendly Persuasion (William Wyler, 1956). The success of this performance led her to being cast in a series of "mother" roles, continuing with Disney's Old Yeller (Robert Stevenson, 1957) about a boy (Tommy Kirk) and a stray dog in post-Civil War Texas. McGuire returned to Broadway in 'Winesburg, Ohio' (1958), which had a short run, then she played a wife and mother in The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker (Henry Levin, 1959) with Clifton Webb. She was the matriarchs in some melodramas: This Earth Is Mine (Henry King, 1959) with Jean Simmons; A Summer Place (Delmer Daves, 1959) with Sandra Dee and Troy Donahue, which was a big success; and The Dark at the Top of the Stairs (Delbert Mann, 1960).

 

Dorothy McGuire returned to Disney with Swiss Family Robinson (John McKimson, Ken Annakin, 1960), one of the most popular films of the year. She made a second film with Daves and Donahue, Susan Slade (Delmer Daves, 1961), playing a mother who passed off her daughter's illegitimate child as her own. She was a mother in Disney's Summer Magic (James Neilson, 1963) with Hayley Mills. McGuire played the Virgin Mary in the biblical epic The Greatest Story Ever Told (George Stevens, 1965). She was off-screen for a number of years before returning as an Irish granny in a British family film, Flight of the Doves (Ralph Nelson, 1971). McGuire appeared in some TV movies, She Waits (1972) and Another Part of the Forest (1972). She provided voice work for Jonathan Livingston Seagull (Hall Bartlett, 1973), and made one final appearance on Broadway in a revival of 'The Night of the Iguana' (1976–1977) alongside Richard Chamberlain. Most of McGuire's later career work was for the small screen: The Runaways (Harry Harris, 1975), Rich Man, Poor Man (David Greene, Boris Sagal, 1976), the pilot for Little Women (David Lowell Rich, 1976), The Incredible Journey of Doctor Meg Laurel (Guy Green, 1979), Ghost Dancing (1983), Amos (Michael Tuchner, 1985), Between the Darkness and the Dawn (1985), American Geisha (1986), and Caroline? (1990). She was also in episodes of Fantasy Island, Hotel, The Love Boat, Glitter, St Elsewhere, and Highway to Heaven. She provided the narration for Summer Heat (Michie Gleason, 1987), and toured in 1987 in 'I Never Sang for My Father'. Her final screen appearance was in the TV film The Last Best Year (John Erman, 1990) with Mary Tyler Moore. Dorothy McGuire was married to Life magazine photographer John Swope for more than 35 years, till his death in 1979. They had a son, photographer Mark Swope (1953), and a daughter, actress Topo Swope (1948). Dorothy's health declined severely after she fell and broke her leg in 2001. McGuire died of cardiac arrest not long after in a Santa Monica hospital, at the age of 85. For her contribution to the motion-picture industry, Dorothy McGuire has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6933 Hollywood Boulevard. Gaty Brumburgh at IMDb: "A genuine model of sincerity, practicality and dignity in most of the roles she inhabited, actress Dorothy McGuire offered Tinseltown more talent than it probably knew what to do with. A quiet, passive beauty, she had a soothing quality to her open-faced looks and voice."

 

Sources: Gary Brumburgh (IMDb), Wikipedia, and IMDb.

 

And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.

Opened in May 2008 by HRH The Princess Royal this Grade II listed building had been carefully renovated and transformed into a public venue for all to enjoy.

 

Designed by Alfred Waterhouse it has been a central part of University life for over a century. The history behind the building is just as interesting as the treasures it contains. Ordinary bricks and terracotta dressings were selected for the Gothic exterior, which led to the coining of the phrase ‘red brick university’ by Bruce Truscot.

 

The interior was finished to a similarly high standard. The entrance hall was elaborately decorated with faience of terracotta, turquoise and buff glazed tiles, while corridors were lined with glazed ivory and brown bricks, divided into bays by arches. Additions such as electric lighting were ahead of their time for buildings of that period.

 

Completed in 1892, costing £53,000 – slightly more than estimated – the building combined architectural drama with practicality.

 

Delays in construction resulted in the cancellation of an opening by the Prince of Wales in June 1892, but it was finally officially opened on 13 December 1892 by the Chancellor of the federal Victoria University, Lord Spencer.

 

SAAB (of Sweden) had always made some oddball cars. This was not always a good way of returning profits to development. By the mid-1980s, it was clear that the luxury market, to which SAAB aspired, had consolidated to the 3-box sedan.

 

The 9000 was part of the Type Four program, a pooled platform which yielded large cars for Alfa Romeo (164), FIAT (Croma), Lancia (Thema), and the SAAB 9000. By the time all the cars had been launched, all but SAAB were now part of the wider FIAT combine. An approach was made in the 1990s for SAAB to also be purchased, but this was rejected.

 

The SAAB 9000, which had originally been launched as a large 5-door in 1984, was updated to include a second body design - a conventional saloon, in late 1988. The car was called the 9000 CD, and the chief market was the US.

 

On endearing feature of SAABs was their practicality and utility, and though the 9000 CD was more useful than most sedans, SAAB buyers actually preferred their cars as 5-doors. The 9000 CD continued until 1998, when the car was replaced by the SAAB 9.5, a second attempt at a GM-derived platform project. GM's ownership of SAAB came to a conclusion with the remnants of SAAB sold first to Dutch boutique manufacturer Spyker, after GM's bankruptcy in 2009. SAAB was declared insolvent in 2012, and the remaining assets purchased by Chinese owned NEVS.

Chassis n° LP400 112 0016

 

Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais

Bonhams

Estimated : € 600.000 - 800.000

Sold for € 638.250

 

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

February 2018

 

'But for sheer outlandish eye appeal, and track-car capability that's translatable for the road, there is simply no better car. It's hard, also, to imagine a better one coming along.' – Car magazine on the Lamborghini Countach.

The legendary Miura was always going to be a hard act to follow, so the extent to which its successor eclipsed the greatest of 1960s supercars came as something of a shock to all. The sensation of the 1971 Geneva Salon, the Countach was styled, like its predecessor, by Carrozzeria Bertone's Marcello Gandini. Looking aggressive from every angle, the Countach was nothing less than spectacular, suggesting it had been conceived on another planet. As Motor magazine observed: 'few people gazing at the original Bertone Countach at Geneva in 1971 could have regarded it as anything but a "show" car. There were those fold-up doors for a start and the space-age cockpit with its abysmal rear visibility not to mention the strange engine/transmission configuration.' Happily, Lamborghini disregarded criticism of the car's supposed lack of practicality, and the Countach entered production changed in detail only. As it happened, the production version would not be seen for another two years, with deliveries commencing in 1974.

 

The running gear was largely carried over from the Miura, although it had been recognised that the latter's shortcomings in terms of handling and stability would not be tolerable in the Countach. At the same time, cabin heat and noise had to be reduced, and a more user-friendly gear change devised. The Miura's four-cam V12 was retained for the Countach, though this time installed longitudinally and equipped with side-draught Weber carburettors. To achieve optimum weight distribution, designer Paolo Stanzani placed the five-speed gearbox ahead of the engine between the seats, and the differential - driven by a shaft passing through the sump - at the rear. The result was a delightful gearchange and a better-balanced car than the Miura.

 

When production began in 1974, the Countach sported an improved spaceframe chassis, replacing the prototype's rather untidy semi-monocoque, while the bodywork was made of aluminium. One of the Countach's most striking features was the doors, which opened vertically and were supported by hydraulic struts, pivoting at their most forward point.

 

The production Countach came with the standard 4.0-litre - instead of the prototype's 5.0-litre - engine. Even with the smaller engine producing 'only' 375bhp, the aerodynamically efficient Countach could attain 170mph (274km/h) and, naturally, came with racetrack roadholding to match. Designated 'LP400' by the factory (LP = Longitudinale Posteriore, describing the engine placement), the first Countach is commonly known as the 'periscopio', after its central periscope, faired into the roof, which provided rearward vision.

 

This stunning example of the revolutionary Countach in its original LP400 'periscopio' form is one of approximately 157 built between 1974 and 1977, which explains why examples are only rarely seen for sale. Fitted with body number '8', chassis number '0016' was delivered new to Germany finished in Nero (black) with Senape (mustard) leather interior. Currently red with beige interior, it has been fitted with the later LP400 S wheels.

 

A ground-breaking design that set new standards for aspiring supercar manufacturers, the Lamborghini Countach is one of the most iconic sports cars of the 20th Century, and none more so than in its earliest and purest LP400 'Periscopio' form.

 

Coachwork by Carrozzeria Pinin Farina

Chassis n° B521004

n° 1 of 7

 

Bonhams

Les Grandes Marques du Monde à Paris

The Grand Palais Éphémère

Place Joffre

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

February 2023

 

Estimated : € 800.000 - 1.000.000

Sold for € 718.750

 

"The car body is characterised by its streamlined silhouette, tapered toward the tail, the smooth sides, the raised circular front air intake, which generates the central part of the hood, also circular in cross section. Evidently there is the influence of the aeronautics of the era." - Antoine Prunet, Pininfarina.

 

Offered here is the very first of Pinin Farina's PF200 show cars, built for promotional purposes to generate publicity and never intended for series production, although Pinin Farina (as it was then) went on to build a further six examples, some open, some closed. The seven PF200s were slightly different from one another, although all featured the signature circular front air intake reminiscent of the North American F-86 Sabre jet fighter. The concept made its debut in 1952 when this very car, chassis number '1004', was displayed on the Pinin Farina stand at the Turin Motor Show. Italian film star and lover of fine cars, Renato Rascel (real name Renato Ranucci) met Sergio 'Pinin' Farina at the 1952 Turin Show and purchased '1004'. The side air intakes and six exhaust pipes are delightful details, while instead of stowing the soft-top behind the seats, like many open cars of the period, Pinin Farina arranged for the PF200's hood to fold down out of sight within the body, thus preserving its streamlined appearance.

 

The PF200 used the chassis and running gear of the Lancia Aurelia B52, one of the most advanced sporting cars of the era. At this time Pinin Farina had yet to supplant Carrozzeria Vignale as Ferrari's coachbuilder of choice, and much of its best work from this period was on Lancia chassis. One of the most influential designs to emerge from Italy post-WW2, Lancia's classic Aurelia was the first car ever to employ a V6 engine. Designed in wartime by Francesco de Virgilio and launched at the 1950 Turin Motor Show, the Aurelia B10 was powered by a 1,754cc 60-degree V6 of all-aluminium construction that used overhead valves operated via short pushrods instead of Lancia's traditional overhead camshafts.

 

An advanced unitary-construction design, the Aurelia retained Lancia's 'sliding pillar' independent front suspension, first seen on the Lambda, but used a novel semi-trailing-arm layout at the rear, another world first. The transmission too, was unusual, comprising a two-piece prop-shaft and combined gearbox/rear transaxle on which were mounted the inboard brakes, though for once this was not an entirely new departure. The original B10 saloon was joined the following year by the landmark, Pininfarina-styled B20 Coupé, a fastback '2+2' on a shortened wheelbase which, with its combination of sports car performance and saloon car practicality, can be said to have introduced the Gran Turismo concept to the world. Models with longer wheelbases and larger engines in various states of tune followed. To cater for independent coachbuilders, Lancia offered the longer-wheelbase (291cm) B50 chassis, based on B10 mechanicals, and later the B52, which came with the 2.0-litre engine of the B20/B21. In total Lancia built only 98 B52 chassis, the last of which was delivered in 1953.

 

Bought new by famous Italian film star, Renato Ranucci, in 1952 at the Turin Motor Show, '1004' changed ownership in 1958 and a couple of times more between then and 1961. It then seems to have remained in the same family for some 13 years before being bought by the current owner in 1974.

A passionate collector of classic cars, with a passion for flying, the current owner is himself a pilot of light aircraft, and during military service also of jets. He found the Lancia in a very poor condition; the car was in pieces but what caught his eye was the circular front air-intake: it looked more like a jet than a car so you can imagine how his passion for cars and aircraft coalesced in the same object - it was love at first sight.

 

The car was restored in the 1980s by the current owner, who commissioned what were then the best specialists for the job. The painstaking professional restoration took almost 10 years, a period in which the owner and the restorer, Mr. Giancarlo Cappa, became very close friends after doing a lot of research about this Pf200 together. During the restoration and despite the time-consuming research, some details had to be altered as replacements for some of the unique parts were unobtainable. The restoration notes/receipts for 35,000,000 liras are on file, an astronomical amount for a restoration if you know that a monthly salary for a worker at that time was around 300.000/350.000 liras. The car is finished in the lovely colour scheme of dark grey with a tan interior.

 

Once the Lancia came finally 'home', the owner put the car in one of the living rooms of the main house, which had ramp access. It was here that the family spent most evenings, especially at weekends. The car stood in the middle of the room as the centrepiece. The owner's rationale was very clear: the PF200 is a masterpiece and a work of art, which fully justified having it in your main living room. If you are not driving the car, indoors is the best place to enjoy it the most!

 

In the 1990s the engine failed and was removed, and it was then decided to replace it with one of an identical type (no. B21*2700*). Unfortunately, the original block was not retained, the importance of 'matching numbers' not being appreciated at that time. Carefully looked after by its long-term custodian, the car is presented today in mainly preserved condition following its 1980s restoration, which is now showing signs of age, especially in the paint. Residing for almost 50 years with the same owner, the car has its own dedicated space in the garage with magnificent 'Lancia PF200' badging on the wall.

 

On old Italian plates, the car has featured on posters and in magazines, etc and comes with an Italian libretto and a quite exceptional history file. The latter contains important correspondence with Pininfarina dating from 1981, which confirms that the car belonged to Renato Rascel; that it is the example exhibited at the 1952 Turin Motor Show; and that it was the first of a 'series' of seven PF200s of the same type built by hand, each of them different from the others even if only by some small functional or ornamental details, very often requested by the customer. Unfortunately, a fire at the Pininfarina factory destroyed all records of the PF200s and there are no photographs of this car's interior. The fascinating history file also contains lots of other correspondence; various articles; period photographs (1970s onwards); restoration photos (1980s); and the all-important Automobile Club D'Italia document confirming build details and ownership history. With the recent announcement of the re-birth of the Lancia Aurelia model, this unique car will become all-the-more collectible and is a unique opportunity for any major collector.

I-Pace, the first Jaguar all-electric car, was introduced in 2018. Manufactured in Graz, Austria, the Jaguar I-Pace is best known for an engaging driving experience, stylish design, and premium features. It offers a compelling blend of performance, range, and practicality, making it a strong contender in the electric vehicle market.

 

It has won over 90 global awards, including European Car of the Year 2019 and has sold 66,750 units.

 

In 2025, the UK electric vehicle (EV) market is experiencing significant growth, with sales making up 22% of all new cars sold so far this year.

Anoraks abound at the Kings Cross platform end, plus half-mast trousers. In a modern context, the title is oxymoronic, but I am not going to repeat cheap jokes in the well-mined sphere of rail enthusiasts’ alleged lack of sartorial flair. Had I taken an equivalent view some 10-15 years earlier, the boys would have been dressed in their school uniforms.

 

The notion of smart casual clothing for younger people was slow to evolve, and family budgets remained tight at the time of this view. Forget designer labels…Growing up back then, you wore what your parents got you, like it or not. Practicality ruled over style.

 

I wonder if any Flickrite recognises himself from this scene? Perhaps he has a record of the Class 47 in the view? I never did note its identity. I am guessing that the loco’s 1N10 headcode depicts a KX-Newcastle service.

 

March 1974

Zorki 4 camera

Agfa CT18 film.

AWD - All-wheel drive

4x4

(Four Wheel Drive).

4WD - Allrad Variante 2019

Quattro (four-wheel-drive system)

"4motion"

°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°

A plug-in hybrid variant, a first for any Citroën, is due in late 2019. It will be the only 4x4 model in the range;

 

Citroen C5 Aircross SUV launched in Europe + prototype drive

 

Focus on comfort is just what Citroen needs to stand out

compact five-seat SUV Segment

 

Citroen C5 Aircross – front-wheel mid-size SUV (by European standards), which combines a bright style, practicality, functionality and modern Technology.

 

. Das 4,50 Meter lange Mittelklasse-SUV basiert auf der konzerneigenen Plattform EMP2-Plattform und ist somit technisch eng mit dem Peugeot 5008, Opel Grandland X und dem DS 7 verwandt.

  

2018

Citroën has now repackaged the C5 Aircross to appeal to European customers

 

It is the second model to receive Citroën’s new rally-derived Progressive Hydraulic Cushion suspension system, following the C4 Cactus, which aims to deliver “peerless comfort” while retaining the relaxed characteristics of the company’s long-standing hydropneumatic system.

-

At launch, buyers will have a choice of a Puretech 130 engine with a six-speed manual gearbox and a Puretech 180 unit with an eight-speed automatic 'box. BlueHDi 130 (manual or auto) and

BlueHDI 180 (automatic) diesel models will also be available.

-

Mit dem C5 Aircross bietet Citroën ab Ende 2018 ein eigenständiges SUV.

Edler Kompakt-SUV mit Komfort-Fahrwerk:

Stoßdämpfer mit hydraulischen Anschlägen sollen harte Ein- und Ausfederbewegungen vermeiden, der Schaumstoff im Sitz Vibrationen schlucken. Liest sich banal, ist clever konstruiert und funktioniert verblüffend gut.

 

Mit dem neuen Federungssystem mit hydraulischem Anschlag will Citroën mehr Komfort als die Konkurrenz bieten und sich von den Konzernmarken unterscheiden. Advanced Comfort ersetzt außerdem das hydropneumatische System früherer Citroën-Modelle.

 

Unter der Haube gibt es laut Citroën zunächst zwei Benzinmotoren mit 96 kW/130 PS und 132 kW/180 PS sowie zwei Diesel mit den gleichen Leistungsdaten.

 

Als Option gibt es eine neue Achtstufen-Automatik.

  

C5 Aircros SUV

In China hat Citroën den C5 schon im April 2017 auf der Automesse in Shanghai gezeigt.

 

40.000 wurden schon in China produziert und verkauft.

-

  

-

Zur Sicherheitsausstattung des Citroën C5 Aircross zählen unter anderem ein Notbremsassistent, ein Toter-Winkel-Assistent und ein adaptiver Tempomat.

 

Allradantrieb gibt es für den C5 Aircross nicht, dafür aber das regelbare Grip Control-System, das die Traktion an den angetriebenen Vorderrädern optimieren soll, sowie einen Bergabfahrassistenten.

-

Die Abmessungen – 4,50 Meter Länge, 1,84 Meter Breite und 1,67 Meter Höhe – entsprechen fast exakt jenen des VW Tiguan.

 

Dem Kompakt-SUV aus Wolfsburg setzt Citroën ein eigenständiges SUV entgegen, das mit variabler Rückbank, komfortablem Fahrwerk und selbstbewusstem Design

Anhänger der Marke genauso überzeugen soll wie Neukunden.

Piper waits to perform on Royal Mile, Edinburgh

Coachwork by Graber (n° 350)

Chassis n° 57443

One-off

 

3.257 cc

8 in-line

130 ch @ 5.000 rpm

 

Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais

Bonhams

Estimated : € 280.000 - 340.000

Sold for € 293.250

 

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

February 2018

 

The extremely handsome, one off coachbuilt Bugatti presented here is accredited by Bugatti experts to be a collaboration of its original owner with the Swiss coachbuilder Graber who were one of the leading Swiss coachbuilders of their day.

 

Most of Graber's 50 workers were skilled specialists, and the firm regularly displayed their latest creations on their stand at the Geneva Salon. It could be said that they were less flashy than some of the French coachbuilders, less advanced than certain Italian efforts but they were definitely of higher quality than most and displaying the well-balanced design preferred by their wealthy clientele. The success of Hermann Graber's company may be judged by the fact that it perpetuated comfortably into the 1970s, long after many of its pre-war contemporaries had ceased.

 

According to information supplied by Bugattiste Kees Jansen, 57443 was completed by the Bugatti Works in September 1936 and was sold in chassis form to the Bucar Bugatti agency, who had operations in both Berlin and Zurich. This particular order was for the Grob Agency in the Zurich Canton of Horgen. 57443 is one of a handful of Type 57s that were supplied at this time all with chassis numbers in close proximity of each other, notably, 57444, 57446 and 57447. 57443, 57444 and 57447 were all to be equipped with coachwork by Graber. Jansen's records state that the rolling chassis was driven over 150km to Hermann Graber's coachbuilding works on September 21, 1936.

 

The car's original owner is said to have been an architect and was therefore responsible for the design, while the coachbuilder was for its construction. A number of its features including the hood louver treatment are common with other Graber bodies.

 

The result was a dramatically different automobile to the factory offered Pillarless sedan, which was arguably a victim of practicality over style. The car here is a clever, set-back, close-coupled design retaining the popular scalloped side panels synonymous with Bugattis, and dispensing with running boards to accentuate separate 'teardrop' or pontoon fenders. It is unquestionably a success, and it is perhaps only at second glance that one notices the presence of the secondary door. With the spare tire set at the back of the car, the full design of its side from its quarter-batched hood louvers backward is uncompromised, always a sporting styling touch. Another particular feature which is rather interesting are the long 'eared' wheel hub spinners, which it is said were to make wheel removal easier for a lady owner early in its career.

 

By 1960, the Type 57 was the property of Dieter Marx of Basel, and it was there that it was spotted by well known Dutch Bugatti dealer Bart Loyens, using one of the many connections he had forged as a student in Switzerland. The car had apparently been laid up following an engine failure, allowing Loyens to acquire it for a relatively favorable SWF500. He would bring it to the Netherlands and it would remain in Dutch ownership for the next 48 years.

 

Arriving in Holland 57443 was stored in warehouse space he used of the America-Holland Shipping Line, but it was not long before it passed onto the Dutch Bugatti Agent Albatros, owned by the van Ramhorst brothers. At this point, the 'broken' engine was replaced by another correct contemporary Type 57 unit, being over-stamped with the car's chassis number. (Today its original engine is in America having been fitted to Jim Hull's remarkable recreation of the 'Torpedo Competition' completed and debuted in the last few years.)

 

After brief sojourn out of the country, while in the custody of Dutchman Gies Pluim came to an end when his wife decided that they didn't need more than one Bugatti (already owning #43198) the car then passed to Hans Sauerbrier in November 1962 where it would remain until 2008. In Sauerbrier's custody the Bugatti was well maintained, and received an engine rebuild with new block in the 1980s, with the work being carried out by Fa Keizer of Doetinchem. Perhaps also at this time it was upgraded to have the hydraulic brake system as on the later models. With that addition and while retaining correct rubber engine dampers of its series, it is today to the definitive specification of the Type 57.

 

After more than 4 decades of ownership in this family the Bugatti migrated to the U.K. being sold publicly. Its buyer subsequently refurbished the car mechanically before passing it to the current owner.

 

In its present custody, the decision was made to repaint the car in a style more in keeping with others of its brethren accenting the body moldings in a two tone scheme. At the same time, the interior was sympathetically attended to, repairing the original leather. The details of the cabin are particularly attractive and extend to aspects such as the rarely seen accessory of the original leather cover for the steering column.

 

On close inspection, this is a rewarding Bugatti to look at today, its distinct body styling is particularly appealing and the preservation of its interior has ensured that the soul and charm of the car can still be experienced. Bonhams has a great tradition of offering special Bugattis, the latest, this unique example follows firmly in those footsteps and will no doubt be appreciated for its usability in events such as those of the American Bugatti Club or indeed to be shown.

Visit to the North American International Auto Show at the Cobo Center in Detroit, Michigan on January 25, 2019. Hyundai Kona

 

View my collections on flickr here: Collections

 

Press L for a larger image on black.

Coachwork by Graber (n° 350)

Chassis n° 57443

One-off

 

3.257 cc

8 in-line

130 ch @ 5.000 rpm

 

Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais

Bonhams

Estimated : € 280.000 - 340.000

Sold for € 293.250

 

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

February 2018

 

The extremely handsome, one off coachbuilt Bugatti presented here is accredited by Bugatti experts to be a collaboration of its original owner with the Swiss coachbuilder Graber who were one of the leading Swiss coachbuilders of their day.

 

Most of Graber's 50 workers were skilled specialists, and the firm regularly displayed their latest creations on their stand at the Geneva Salon. It could be said that they were less flashy than some of the French coachbuilders, less advanced than certain Italian efforts but they were definitely of higher quality than most and displaying the well-balanced design preferred by their wealthy clientele. The success of Hermann Graber's company may be judged by the fact that it perpetuated comfortably into the 1970s, long after many of its pre-war contemporaries had ceased.

 

According to information supplied by Bugattiste Kees Jansen, 57443 was completed by the Bugatti Works in September 1936 and was sold in chassis form to the Bucar Bugatti agency, who had operations in both Berlin and Zurich. This particular order was for the Grob Agency in the Zurich Canton of Horgen. 57443 is one of a handful of Type 57s that were supplied at this time all with chassis numbers in close proximity of each other, notably, 57444, 57446 and 57447. 57443, 57444 and 57447 were all to be equipped with coachwork by Graber. Jansen's records state that the rolling chassis was driven over 150km to Hermann Graber's coachbuilding works on September 21, 1936.

 

The car's original owner is said to have been an architect and was therefore responsible for the design, while the coachbuilder was for its construction. A number of its features including the hood louver treatment are common with other Graber bodies.

 

The result was a dramatically different automobile to the factory offered Pillarless sedan, which was arguably a victim of practicality over style. The car here is a clever, set-back, close-coupled design retaining the popular scalloped side panels synonymous with Bugattis, and dispensing with running boards to accentuate separate 'teardrop' or pontoon fenders. It is unquestionably a success, and it is perhaps only at second glance that one notices the presence of the secondary door. With the spare tire set at the back of the car, the full design of its side from its quarter-batched hood louvers backward is uncompromised, always a sporting styling touch. Another particular feature which is rather interesting are the long 'eared' wheel hub spinners, which it is said were to make wheel removal easier for a lady owner early in its career.

 

By 1960, the Type 57 was the property of Dieter Marx of Basel, and it was there that it was spotted by well known Dutch Bugatti dealer Bart Loyens, using one of the many connections he had forged as a student in Switzerland. The car had apparently been laid up following an engine failure, allowing Loyens to acquire it for a relatively favorable SWF500. He would bring it to the Netherlands and it would remain in Dutch ownership for the next 48 years.

 

Arriving in Holland 57443 was stored in warehouse space he used of the America-Holland Shipping Line, but it was not long before it passed onto the Dutch Bugatti Agent Albatros, owned by the van Ramhorst brothers. At this point, the 'broken' engine was replaced by another correct contemporary Type 57 unit, being over-stamped with the car's chassis number. (Today its original engine is in America having been fitted to Jim Hull's remarkable recreation of the 'Torpedo Competition' completed and debuted in the last few years.)

 

After brief sojourn out of the country, while in the custody of Dutchman Gies Pluim came to an end when his wife decided that they didn't need more than one Bugatti (already owning #43198) the car then passed to Hans Sauerbrier in November 1962 where it would remain until 2008. In Sauerbrier's custody the Bugatti was well maintained, and received an engine rebuild with new block in the 1980s, with the work being carried out by Fa Keizer of Doetinchem. Perhaps also at this time it was upgraded to have the hydraulic brake system as on the later models. With that addition and while retaining correct rubber engine dampers of its series, it is today to the definitive specification of the Type 57.

 

After more than 4 decades of ownership in this family the Bugatti migrated to the U.K. being sold publicly. Its buyer subsequently refurbished the car mechanically before passing it to the current owner.

 

In its present custody, the decision was made to repaint the car in a style more in keeping with others of its brethren accenting the body moldings in a two tone scheme. At the same time, the interior was sympathetically attended to, repairing the original leather. The details of the cabin are particularly attractive and extend to aspects such as the rarely seen accessory of the original leather cover for the steering column.

 

On close inspection, this is a rewarding Bugatti to look at today, its distinct body styling is particularly appealing and the preservation of its interior has ensured that the soul and charm of the car can still be experienced. Bonhams has a great tradition of offering special Bugattis, the latest, this unique example follows firmly in those footsteps and will no doubt be appreciated for its usability in events such as those of the American Bugatti Club or indeed to be shown.

From Wikipedia:

Roseland Cottage, also known as Henry C. Bowen House or as Bowen Cottage, is a historic house located on Route 169 in Woodstock, Connecticut. The house was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977, and was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1992. It is described as one of the best-preserved and best-documented Gothic summer houses in the nation, with virtually intact interior decorations.

 

It is now owned by Historic New England, a non-profit organization that preserves the historical value of the house and operates it as a museum.

 

Roseland Cottage was built in 1846 in the Gothic Revival style as the summer home of Henry Chandler Bowen and family. The entire complex, with a boxwood parterre garden, an icehouse, garden house, carriage barn, and the nation's oldest surviving indoor bowling alley, reflects the principles of writer and designer Andrew Jackson Downing. In his widely popular books, Downing stressed practicality along with the picturesque, and offered detailed instructions on room function, sanitation, and landscaping.

 

Beginning in 1870, the largest Fourth of July celebrations in the United States were held at Roseland Cottage. Four United States Presidents visited Bowen's summer home as his guests and speakers for these celebrations: Ulysses S. Grant, Benjamin Harrison, Rutherford B. Hayes, and William McKinley. Other prominent visitors included Henry Ward Beecher, Julia Ward Howe, Oliver Wendell Holmes and John C. Fremont

© Angela M. Lobefaro

All Rights Reserved

RIPRODUZIONE RISERVATA

My Popular-Interesting Photos on Flickriver

   

taken in Otranto. Italy

 

The Zen of Python

 

Beautiful is better than ugly.

Explicit is better than implicit.

Simple is better than complex.

Complex is better than complicated.

Flat is better than nested.

Sparse is better than dense.

Readability counts.

Special cases aren't special enough to break the rules.

Although practicality beats purity.

Errors should never pass silently.

Unless explicitly silenced.

In the face of ambiguity, refuse the temptation to guess.

There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it.

Although that way may not be obvious at first unless you're Dutch.

Now is better than never.

Although never is often better than *right* now.

If the implementation is hard to explain, it's a bad idea.

If the implementation is easy to explain, it may be a good idea.

Namespaces are one honking great idea -- let's do more of those!

   

In September 1977 Mercedes-Benz introduced their first factory-built wagon model as part of the W123 range.

 

The T-Series was available with the same engine range as the saloon, but featured the extra practicality of the wagon body form, frequently supplemented by the fitment of a 3rd row of rearward facing seats.

 

The model shown here the 300 TD Wagon, was fitted with a 3.0 L 5-cylinder Diesel engine, and is based on the car owned by the parent of one of my friends in the 1980s. They had a large family, and the 7-seat wagon was a very sensible proposition for carrying some of the family in one go (eight kids, so there was a second car as well).

 

Power output of the diesel engine was limited, based on numbers alone the car seems woefully under-powered by today's standards. But having driven a similar W123 sedan 300 D, the car moved along well enough.

 

The W123 reange was replaced by the W124 in 1985, and the new model range also included a high-capable wagon model.

"Many different architectural styles can be found among the plantation homes along Louisiana’s Great River Road and throughout the south. Wherever wealth, social status, and heartfelt hospitality converged, these antebellum structures — some more grand than others — rose to reflect these and other characteristics of the landowners.

 

Some of the main houses were simple home places designed as raised Creole cottages made largely from native Cypress and built for comfort and practicality.

 

Others took the form of grand mansions; some expressed in styles of Greek Revival, Italianate, Federal or other architectural styles. To a great extent, the point of these elegant and dramatic southern mansions was to emulate the grand homes and villas of wealthy Europeans who set the standard of the day for exhibiting wealth and expressing style.

 

Upon its completion in 1840, Houmas House was the Crown Jewel of Louisiana’s River Road with its heroically-columned Greek Revival exterior topped by a belvedere that surveyed the Oak alley leading south to the sweeping bend in the Mississippi and the miles and miles of cane fields to the north and east.

 

But that 1840 mansion with its broad galleries and thick masonry walls had humble beginnings in the mid-1700’s when the original house was built on the site by Maurice Conway and Alexandre Latil, New Orleans businessmen who purchased the property from the Houmas Indians. Latil designed a more modest home that reflected both the French and Spanish architectural influences that still define Louisiana’s heritage. The smaller residence that also houses the kitchen and is now connected at the back of the Mansion by a carriageway was, indeed, the original Latil House.

 

architecture1After Gen. Wade Hampton of South Carolina bought the property in 1810, his son-in-law Col. John Preston and daughter Caroline began construction on the present Mansion. As was often the practice in those days, the great house grew in stages and reached its final full dimension in 1840.

 

The Mansion is an excellent example of the peripteral type of Greek Revival architecture in which the main structure is surrounded by grand columns, each with an uninterrupted span from ground level to the roofline.

 

Among Houmas House Plantation and Gardens’ unique features are twin Garconierre, very rare among plantation homes. Federal arched dormers stand above the large Doric galleries.

 

Inside, a free-standing, three-story helix staircase follows the corresponding curvature of the adjacent wall.

 

Nearly 100 years after the Mansion was completed, Dr. George Crozat purchased Houmas House as his country escape from his city place in New Orleans. Determined to “Federalize” the look of the home, Dr. Crozat removed ornate features such as cornices, crown moldings, and ceiling medallions and painted the structure white, both inside and out. During this time, modern plumbing was added and several changes were made to the service quarters, including the addition of an upstairs hallway to connect the two structures and the installation of a striking Palladian window that provides a view of the fountain courtyard.

 

When New Orleans businessman and preservationist Kevin Kelly fulfilled a lifelong dream by purchasing the home in early summer, 2003, he set about recreating the experience of encountering Houmas House circa 1840.

 

Houmas House staircaseToday, visitors to Houmas house encounter Kelly’s loving salute to the grand property’s antebellum heritage his respectful homage to his antebellum predecessors.

 

The mansion’s faux marble exterior is painted in rich ochre which reflects the influence of Mediterranean villas owned by the wealthy Europeans that the southern planters emulated. The belvedere that crowns the house has been restored, and interior features and finishes have been reinstalled in their original form. The twin Garconierre that distinguish the property have been renovated. And the central hallway of the grand house bears a room-size mural with a sugar cane motif that characterizes the original entryway artwork common in many plantation homes along the Mississippi."

Taken from as it appeared on 28MAR2018.

I believe this is the Mission Chapel of San Juan Bautista.( I may be wrong. Please correct me if I am.)

 

Two years ago, we visited 3 of the 21 Spanish Missions that were established in Alta California during the expansion and colonization of California back in 1700s... for my daughter's school project.

 

A vast majority of these chapels have seen too many earthquakes, fires, floods and have been restored at least 3 times. Some were relocated while others were rebuilt. In fact, the better the condition of the structure, the more likely the chances are that the original structure has not survived the earthquake or the fire that hit it. The missions( most of them) although do not hold regular services, allow visitors and some are also available for hire for weddings and other occasions. Some are privately run and so are off limit to the general public.

 

While most of religious places are built for opulence and grandeur, these Mission chapels stood out to me for their simplicity and practicality. I suppose the they did not have much choice. Most of these were built with stone and wood and still have that 18th century charm. In almost all of them, even the ones with structure barely holding up, I found the main chapel warm and welcoming.

 

I for one would love to visit the other 18 of the Mission Chapels if possible. :)

MG ZT-T Estate (2001-05) Engine 1798cc S4

 

Registration Number BX 02 RGV

 

MG SET

 

www.flickr.com/photos/45676495@N05/sets/72157623797586658...

The Rover 75 was unveiled to the public at the 1998 Birmingham Motor Show, with deliveries commencing in February 1999 2001 saw the introduction of the Rover 75 Tourer (developed alongside the saloon but never authorised for production by BMW), swiftly followed by the MG ZT and MG ZT-T, more sporting interpretations of the model, differentiated by modified, sporting chassis settings and colour and trim derivatives

The ZT-T was the MG Estate car version, launched alongside its sibling Rover 75 Tourer. They were was designed to offer Rover customers a greater degree of practicality while retaining the 75's sleek looks and high-class image. The tailgate is fitted with a separate opening rear screen, allowing owners to drop items into the boot, without having to lift up the whole door. Once the door is opened, however, the load space is up to 1,480 mm wide and 2,060 mm long. With the seats up there is a competitive 400 to 680 litres of cargo space, and with the seats folded down (in a 60:40 ratio complete with centre load-through hatch) there is 1,222 litres available, making it more of a 'lifestyle' estate than all-out load lugger.

 

Shot 13:04:2013 at The Pride of Longbridge Rally, Cofton Park, Birmingham REF 90b-511

 

Chassis n° LP400 112 0016

 

Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais

Bonhams

Estimated : € 600.000 - 800.000

Sold for € 638.250

 

Parijs - Paris

Frankrijk - France

February 2018

 

'But for sheer outlandish eye appeal, and track-car capability that's translatable for the road, there is simply no better car. It's hard, also, to imagine a better one coming along.' – Car magazine on the Lamborghini Countach.

The legendary Miura was always going to be a hard act to follow, so the extent to which its successor eclipsed the greatest of 1960s supercars came as something of a shock to all. The sensation of the 1971 Geneva Salon, the Countach was styled, like its predecessor, by Carrozzeria Bertone's Marcello Gandini. Looking aggressive from every angle, the Countach was nothing less than spectacular, suggesting it had been conceived on another planet. As Motor magazine observed: 'few people gazing at the original Bertone Countach at Geneva in 1971 could have regarded it as anything but a "show" car. There were those fold-up doors for a start and the space-age cockpit with its abysmal rear visibility not to mention the strange engine/transmission configuration.' Happily, Lamborghini disregarded criticism of the car's supposed lack of practicality, and the Countach entered production changed in detail only. As it happened, the production version would not be seen for another two years, with deliveries commencing in 1974.

 

The running gear was largely carried over from the Miura, although it had been recognised that the latter's shortcomings in terms of handling and stability would not be tolerable in the Countach. At the same time, cabin heat and noise had to be reduced, and a more user-friendly gear change devised. The Miura's four-cam V12 was retained for the Countach, though this time installed longitudinally and equipped with side-draught Weber carburettors. To achieve optimum weight distribution, designer Paolo Stanzani placed the five-speed gearbox ahead of the engine between the seats, and the differential - driven by a shaft passing through the sump - at the rear. The result was a delightful gearchange and a better-balanced car than the Miura.

 

When production began in 1974, the Countach sported an improved spaceframe chassis, replacing the prototype's rather untidy semi-monocoque, while the bodywork was made of aluminium. One of the Countach's most striking features was the doors, which opened vertically and were supported by hydraulic struts, pivoting at their most forward point.

 

The production Countach came with the standard 4.0-litre - instead of the prototype's 5.0-litre - engine. Even with the smaller engine producing 'only' 375bhp, the aerodynamically efficient Countach could attain 170mph (274km/h) and, naturally, came with racetrack roadholding to match. Designated 'LP400' by the factory (LP = Longitudinale Posteriore, describing the engine placement), the first Countach is commonly known as the 'periscopio', after its central periscope, faired into the roof, which provided rearward vision.

 

This stunning example of the revolutionary Countach in its original LP400 'periscopio' form is one of approximately 157 built between 1974 and 1977, which explains why examples are only rarely seen for sale. Fitted with body number '8', chassis number '0016' was delivered new to Germany finished in Nero (black) with Senape (mustard) leather interior. Currently red with beige interior, it has been fitted with the later LP400 S wheels.

 

A ground-breaking design that set new standards for aspiring supercar manufacturers, the Lamborghini Countach is one of the most iconic sports cars of the 20th Century, and none more so than in its earliest and purest LP400 'Periscopio' form.

 

When you think of poor cars and the worst era of British Industry, most will cite the Austin Allegro, a car that truly is a staple of its time, and those times were pretty grim to say the least! It has become a symbol of failure, a monument to catastrophic engineering, a beacon of impracticality and a terrible tribute to an age we Brits would sooner forget.

 

Bit is the Austin Allegro really deserving of such maligned opinions? Should we really hate it as much as we do?

 

The story of the Allegro goes back to the previous model of its range, the Austin 1100, a car that had become symbolic of the British family motor industry, with crisp smooth lines, round peeking headlights and a good blend of space and practicality, it sold by the millions and could have almost been described as a family equivalent of the Mini, novelty that you can use everyday. Trouble was that the 1100 was starting to look very much its age in 1971, and thus British Leyland, the new owners of Austin, took it upon themselves to design a new car that would be sheek and European, something that could win both the British and the International markets.

 

For this they enlisted the help of Chief BL Designer Harris Mann, famous for many great BL products such as the Marina, the Ital, the Princess and the Triumph TR7. Today many people blame him for the poor designs that the company spewed out onto the roads of Britain, but I personally feel sorry for him, especially with cars such as the Allegro. His original design for the car was an angular and very streamlined looking piece of kit, a hatchback and with two fins on the rear to compliment the long smooth waistband, making it look almost reminiscent of an Aston Martin DB5 crossed with a 1969 DBS. However, his promising designs were sadly watered down by British Leyland, tinkered, altered, and, quite frankly, ruined his idea to become what it is, with its bathtub curves, long sloping back and piggy headlights. I will say, it's not the ugliest car in the world, far from it, I've seen much worse like the Pontiac Aztek which looks like a cross between a Bug and a mutant Rhino, but when you compare it to Harris Mann's original sketches, then, and only then, do you understand how far down the Allegro design came.

 

But styling wasn't what BL expected to win the market with, but instead with the car's practicality, starting with the new Hydragas suspension to replace the previous Hydrolastic suspension of the 1100. With this suspension, The Allegro intended to lock horns with the likes of the outgoing Citroën DS and its replacement the CX. Hydragas uses displaced spheres of Nitrogen gas to replace the conventional steel springs of a regular suspension design. The means for pressurising the gas in the displacers is done by pre-pressurising a hydraulic fluid, and then connecting the displacer to its neighbour on the other axle. This is unlike the Citroën system, which uses hydraulic fluid continuously pressurised by an engine-driven pump and regulated by a central pressure vessel. However, the attempt at being an outstanding motor ended at Hydragas because there was nothing else particularly endearing about the Allegro. The interior was cheap, nasty and very cramped, especially in the back where you couldn't even fit a bag of shopping let alone your children! Rather than taking the sensible approach of the competition by fitting the car with a hatchback for more boot space, the car was just fitted with a tiny little trunk that you couldn't fit a bag of shopping into either! The engine, the BMC A-Series, was carried over from the 1100, which was a fine little engine, perky and fairly reliable if maintained properly, as well as the heater being carried over from the Morris Marina, but I'm no judge of heaters so I won't say if that was for good or for ill. Most jarring however was when the car was fitted with a square steering wheel! Probably the most memorable part of the Allegro is the fact that it was given a quartic steering wheel, which BL claimed was for ease of access to the front seat and so that the instruments could be seen, which leaves one asking whether you couldn't see them with a round steering wheel! In the end even Harris Mann disowned the car with disappointment, claiming it was nothing like his original idea, which is pretty bad when even the Chief Designer disowns it!

 

Either way, in spite of Mr. Mann's space-age design being watered down to something unrecognisable and with only Hydragas suspension to make it any different from anything else on the market, the Allegro was launched in 1973 with a promotional trip to Marbella in the south of Spain, and early reviews, despite there being a unanimous dislike to the car's shape and styling, were quite warm, many praising the comfort of the Hydragas suspension. However, reviews of the drive quality, such as the car's heavy steering and cheap, plastic interior, were less favourable.

 

Nevertheless, initial sales of the Allegro were promising and it was in 1973 one of the best selling cars of the year, but things truly went for the plunge soon afterwards, and the car never fully recovered. The flaws of the design became prominent, followed by British Leyland's infamous low quality builds. Roofs, panels and boots leaked, rear wheels flew off, and rumour has it that these cars were banned from the Mersey Tunnel in Liverpool because they couldn't be towed after a breakdown without the chassis bending in the middle! Engines failed to start, wiring was abysmal, rear windows popped out, the paint colours were dreary and dismal, the car would rust before you got it home and many commented that the car had a better drag co-efficiency going backwards!

 

The Allegro did come in a selection of variants, including an estate, a sporty coupé known as the Equipe, and a very strange luxury variant known as the Vanden Plas 1500, a peculiar which was fitted with luxury items carried over from the Jaguar XJ range and had a big chrome nose yoked onto the front to try and make it look reminiscent of a Rolls Royce or a Bentley. Only problem is that Rolls Royce's and Bentley's have their front ends designed around the chrome nose, and thus the result was that it looked something like a pig! Also, another thing about Rollers and Bentleys is that they're much, much bigger than a tiny Allegro, which had absolutely no legroom in the back which made the concept entirely pointless! The car was also sold in Italy as the Innocenti Regent, nothing particularly different apart from different badges.

 

In 1975 the Allegro II was launched to try and redress some of the issues with the original car, including a slightly altered front-end and some minor changes internally, but overall it was very much the same. These changes however weren't enough to save the car's dwindling reputation, and even though the BL advertisers continued to lay on the imaginative promotion, the car was still losing heavily to the likes of the Ford Cortina.

 

The final variant, the Allegro III, had the most changes upon its launch in 1979, including a new version of the A-Series engine and quad round headlights to make it look a bit more modern. Apart from that the car was still very much the same as it was in 1973, and it was truly showing its age. British Leyland, recovering from the bankruptcy of 1977, attempted to rationalise the company by pulling out of the sports car range as well as some of their older products. The MG sportsters were killed off in 1980 and their factory closed whilst production of the Allegro and the Mini were slowed down as they prepared to discontinue to both of them in favour of the Austin Metro. The Morris Marina and Princess were replaced by the mostly identical Morris Ital and the Austin Ambassador, and Triumph was now being used to pioneer a tie up with Japan to create good and reliable cars in the form of the Triumph Acclaim.

 

The hammer eventually fell on the Allegro after 9 years of production in 1982 when the Austin Maestro was launched after 5 years of development. In all, 642,000 Allegros left the factory during its lifetime, but today less than 250 are known to exist, with many rusting away or being part exchanged for a plant pot by the time 1990 hit. The reputation of these cars is still very much maligned by both critics and motoring enthusiasts alike, with it topping many people's worst car in history lists, and becoming Britain's worst car of all time followed closely by the Morris Marina. Top Gear were always quick to bash the Allegro, with two of the ambiguous Vaden Plas 1500's meeting their maker, one being smashed with a suspended Morris Marina in a giant game of Bar Skittles, whilst another was driven in reverse off a ramp and smashed into a pile of scrapyard cars.

 

Me personally? I feel that the Allegro was a car with promise and premise, but the abilities of British Leyland fell far short of their ambitions, not helped by their incompetence and desire to commit corporate suicide. If the car had been built as Harris Mann had designed, been given a hatchback, and had been created with the slightest semblance of sense, then it could have truly been a winner. As it is, the car is now a sorry marker in the world of broken dreams, one that we simply choose to forget and never forgive.

A brief note in early summer of 1904 began the life of St. Dominic Catholic Church. Bishop Schwebach’s short letter to Messrs Terra, Matushalk and Langford gave the Catholic church a home in Frederic, Wisconsin.

 

With permission granted by the Bishop in LaCrosse and the donation of a site by William Starr, a Frederic pioneer, the construction was begun. The church community was to pay one hundred dollars down and the balance on the completion of the church. Area residents such as John Matushalk, George Hagberg, Maggie Murphy, C. A. Carlson, M. Beaulieu, John Anderson, Martin Fox, and Thomas Smith, gave contributions, or donations of money in the amount of seventy-five cents to fifty dollars.

 

The contractor, W. E. Weaver, made an agreement with the church community that called for him to erect a building at a cost of twenty-five cents per block, when he provided them, and twelve cents when they were provided by the congregation.

 

Father Louis Archambault, a Dominican from Farmington, helped in the construction of the church.

 

Among the church workers were Melbert Beaulieu and his sons Francis and Fred. Melbert and Francis cleared all the trees from the wooded lot. They helped make and lay cement blocks along with Father Archambault, who dressed in overalls and helped pour cement into molds right along with the parishioners.

 

Prior to the establishment of a Catholic Church, in Frederic, as a parish unit, Franciscan and Dominican missionaries visited the area twice a year. The best known of these missionaries were: Father Cassimer Voght O.F.M., Chrysostom Werwyst O.F.M., and finally Father Odoric Derenthal, the priest, who said the first mass in Frederic, at the home of John Matushak, in 1902.

 

A Franciscan from Ashland, Father Odoric, was most highly remembered because of his work with the Chippewas. Given the name “Kosslnsian” which meant “Little Father”, he traveled to their homes and ministered to their spiritual needs.

 

Gordon Holmes, a zealous Native American Catholic, from Trade Lake, was a special friend of Father Odoric. Mr. Holmes taught his children and other Native Americans their catechism.

 

On a missionary trip to Stone Lake, Father Odoric was approached by Mrs. Pat McHale, a convert, who wanted him to build a church in Clam Falls. “I was dumbfounded,” writes Father Odoric in his diary, “at hearing such a foolish idea.

 

He continued, “After a few weeks I received a letter from Mrs. McHale at Ashland and she said, Dear Father, We had a supper dance when the River Boys (the men delivering logs down river) passed here and we made eighty dollars.” Again she wrote, “Father we had another social and made thirty dollars. I would like the church. What name do you purpose?” Father Odoric concluded, “I sent her a pretty plan made by our brother Leonard and selected St. Michael the archangel, thinking we needed a valiant defender against the power of darkness, who was very busy in this part of the country.”

 

The foundation of St. Michael Church in Clam Falls was laid in 1902 and served the needs of the Catholics in the area. Some families attending St. Michael were; Greeners, Malinovskys, McHales, Fahlands, Martins, Mrs. Warren Smith, Knights, Tyminskis, and Weinzierls. Many of these families became members of the St. Dominic congregation in 1944 when St. Michael closed.

 

Dorothy Fahland, whose home contains the dresser used as an altar by the early missionaries, remembers that church was held every Sunday in Frederic but not at St. Michael. Some other things that she could recollect were that St. Michael church was smaller, that everyone dressed in his or her best to attend church, and that most people traveled by horse-drawn sleds or wagons to attend mass.

 

Thomas Malinovsky, also a member of St. Michael, recalls a cold, stormy winter when Father Bernard Fries came to Clam Falls to say mass. Because the snow was so deep and drifted, his car got stuck, and he had to walk a quarter of a mile to the church. He said mass for the parishioners. A collection was taken up, and the total contribution was twenty-five cents.

 

In 1907 the women of the parish formed the Women’s under the patronage of St. Rose of Lima. The guild was responsible for sponsoring bazaars and parties to help support the church.

 

The young parish soon grew old enough to need a cemetery. In 1908 land was deeded to St. Dominic Church by the Maple Grove Cemetery Association for the sum of one dollar. This plot, adjacent to the municipal cemetery still serves the church community.

 

Handwritten entries in baptismal records testify to the number of priests who have served the people of St. Dominic.

 

One of the earliest was Father Joseph Fagan, a missionary from Superior, who came to say mass for the few Catholic families in Frederic. Despite the poor roads and other handicaps, the congregation moved forward.

 

Father Fagan would sometimes pass the home of Henry VanLoo, where he would pick up Henry and his sister Alice. Henry remembers that Father Fagan drove a Chevrolet coupe, with mohair upholstery, and that Father “Drove like crazy!”

 

According to Henry, most people came to church in wagons. To keep warm, in winter, the wagons were filled with straw and warm rocks. The rocks had been heated in kitchen ovens, prior to the ride to church. Henry remembers that many parishioners attended mass with pieces of straw stuck to their clothing.

 

Father Fagan recalled the first venture of the Sisters of St. Joseph, who came to work, as nurses, for the Frederic hospital for 1918-1919. But, because of the lack of a daily mass in the community, they reluctantly had to leave after the short stay.

 

At this time Frederic was one mission church, among ten or twelve, being served by the Cathedral of Superior. Missionaries sent from the cathedral were: Father Borucki, in 1918, Father Ignatius Kinney, from 1918-1920, Father M. A. Proch, from 1920-1921 and Father Henry Shaney, from 1920-1927,.

 

Father Joseph Annabring, who later became Bishop of the Superior Diocese, came in 1927. He inaugurated vacation religious instructions; perhaps the first of its kind in the Superior Diocese.

 

Father Ludwig Bohl came to serve as a missionary in 1929. Dorothy Fahland and other parishioners remember that he had a great singing voice.

 

Alice VanLoo, who once shared toe-curling rides with her brother in Father Fagan’s car, entered the Convent of the Sisters of Perpetual Adoration, in Lacrosse in 1929. Her community gaver the name Sister Mary Pascaleen. She was stationed in Iowa for many years, and is now retired.

 

Until 1934 priests would say mass at St. Dominic twice a month. For the most part, they were stationed in either Superior or Webster and on their visits, they were offered the hospitality of the parishioners.

 

The last missionary priest assigned to Frederic was Father Constant Trimbos, who served here from 1931-1938.

 

The parish owes a special remembrance to Father Bernard Fries who during his pastorate in Webster took a deep interest in the welfare of St. Dominic. He baptized many people during his visits from 1927-1938.

 

Being the first resident priest at St. Dominic was quite difficult for Father Henry Keil, when he was appointed here in 1934. In a letter he wrote, “I almost froze to death,” while living in the church basement for two months. A parishioner, Miss Sawyer, gave him a small stove and he “borrowed” a little wood from the church so that he had a little heat.

 

When Marge Ryan was a young girl, she stayed with her grandma Haumant in Frederic. She recalls that it was the job of her two uncles, Don and Elmer, to build the fire in the wood furnace at church. These uncles were “real, classy, dressers.” One Sunday, Elmer went to start the fire, so the church would be warm for mass. He was straightening up and he had a bunch of scraps, to burn, in his hand. So, before he went home, he was going to throw them into the fire. He opened the furnace door and threw in his new felt hat instead of the scraps. Marge relates that he was “madder than heck.” He still had the scraps in his hand when he came home.

 

While Father Wilfred Fries was assigned to St. Dominic in 1938, the first rectory was purchased.

 

In these early years, money was scarce. Dinners were held, Kit Oeffler remembers, and everyone brought something. Each family donated fifty cents for the meat. All the church work was done by the parishioners, and not one person asked for pay.

 

Louis D’Jock remembers having “Sister School,” during the summer, in Frederic. Someone from Siren would bring the kids to Frederic, and these kids would take the train back to Siren. The train left between three-thirty and four o’clock, so the Siren kids got to leave early.

 

The original church was remodeled while Father Henry Schnitz was pastor at St. Dominic, from 1946-1950. Father Schnitz presided over the organization of the Men’s Club in 1948, under the leadership of Louis St. Angelo. It was dedicated to serve the needs of the church community.

 

Father Alex Anton, pastor from 1950-1962, traveled between churches in all kinds of weather. Jim Ryan remembers it being so cold, during the winter that Father Anton said he kept the holy water in his pocket so that it wouldn’t freeze.

 

Cecelia Meyer went to confirmation classes at Father Anton’s house. They were often given popcorn as a special treat. One specific event, she recalls, was a trip to St. Angelo’s cabin on Silver Lake.

 

Father Anton received an unusual present for one Christmas according to Delores Duncan. In 1953, the children had a program in the old church basement. A stage was set up near the furnace, and the rest of the area was filled with chairs. People donated silver dollars that had been attached to a bell. The children came in singing, “Silver Bells”, while carrying bells. It was a presented to Father Anton as a gift. The ladies served a lunch to a packed audience.

 

Before Father Anton was reassigned, plans for the new church were well underway. In 1963, while Father Philip Stack was pastor at St. Dominic, the new church construction was completed.

 

John Donlin recalled a time, in 1963, when Father Stack called a meeting. He showed the church checkbook with a balance of between two and three hundred dollars; not enough to make it through the winter. He was concerned that the church would have to close its doors. Rose D’Jock, took over the meeting, and plans were made for the first parish festival. It was a pig roast at the home of Verne Engels.

 

After the first festival, it was decided to serve grilled chicken, so plans were made to get the necessary equipment. Jim Ryan and Gordan Rogers borrowed a pick-up to go to Dresser stone quarry and get some old scrap metal screens. They dug through to find what they wanted and took them to the Murphy brothers, in Luck, who made them into the grilling screens still used at p arish festivals today.

 

Father Stack brought some buddies, from Rice Lake, to teach the cooks how to do the chicken. Evidentially, the visitors spent too much time getting ready to be of any help to those men trying to learn.

 

Danuta (“Doody”) Williamson began playing the organ at St. Dominic in 1964, and continued to provide this ministry until her death in 1998. During more than 34 years she brought music to our parish as a solo performer, with leaders of song, and with the choir. Her faithfulness and talent added immensely to the worship of our parish.. Only weather or health would prevent her on occasion from sharing her gifts. Doody’s love for music, dedication and commitment provided many joyous and inspirational liturgies.

 

Father Aloysius Gostomski, pastor from 1965-1969, made many home visits. He often celebrated mass in parishioners’ homes, and blessed homes in both parishes.

 

A new bell tower was constructed while Father Marion Scheutz was pastor in 1972. Louis St. Angelo raised the money for the purchase, and the installation of the bell. In the same year Roman Weinzierl recalls the privilege was given by the bishop for a lay person to touch the host and distribute communion.

 

1972 also saw the chartering of the Knights of Columbus. The membership included the parishes of Frederic, Grantsburg, Balsam Lake, and Centuria. It is known as Council Number 6370, and is called the Philip Gordon Council. Roman Weinzierl was installed as the First Grand Knight. The members have spent hours helping the mentally disabled, in their Tootsie Roll Campaign. Recently, the Knights have branched out to help a local dentist raise money for orphans in Russia. The goal of the dentist was to give dental help for the children by training adults to use the equipment that he was taking over there.

 

Father Hugh Roches was assigned to Frederic, from 1972-74, followed by Father Andrew Berthold , who was a chaplain in Viet Nam before coming to St. Dominic in 1973. While here, Father Berthold helped increase the church membership by one-third. He had prayer services for the sick, instituted release time from the school for religious education, and he also held home masses.

 

For a brief time, in 1976, no priest was assigned to St. Dominic Church. During this time Father James Horath and Father Thomas Keilin were acting administrators while Sister Jean Benzchawel was parish coordinator.

 

In July of 1976, Father Jim Kraker became thew pastor of St. Dominic, in Frederic, and Immaculate Conception, in Grantsburg. Under the guidance of Father Jim, the church experienced the Spirit of Renewal rooted in Vatican 2. Sister Mary Clare Wartner, former Mother of Superior of the Order of the Sorrowful Mother, joined Father Jim as pastoral assistant. Her ministry lasted until 1978, when she was forced to retire due to a health condition.

 

Sister Lucy Ann Wasinzer became pastoral assistant to the Frederic and Grantsburg parishes, in 1979. Before coming to Frederic,she lived at St. Agnes Convent. While here, she helped develop our faith community by involving members of the church. She was reassigned in 1981.

 

While Father Kraker was pastor, a new rectory and religious center was planned and built. This building, which was constructed in the spring and summer of 1979, had six education rooms, a two-car garage, and pastoral offices. It was built at a cost of $114,000. Bishop Hammes blessed the rectory on October 21st, 1979; the same day St. Dominic celebrated its seventy-fifth anniversary.

 

Bill Heffner, a member of St. Dominic, was accepted as an applicant for permanent deconcate, in 1981, by the Diocese of Superior. He was later ordained by the Bishop Fliss and held this position until he later moved to Webster and Webb Lake.

 

On July 4, 1982 Father Kraker, to most parishioners unhappiness, was reassigned. Father James Dluge, former pastor of St. Louis Church in Superior, succeeded Father Kraker on July 26th, 1982.

 

One of the first things that Father Dluge accomplished was the re-activation of the Women’s Guild. Another top priority was to get the parish out of debt, and on June 15th, 1986, the debt was paid in full.

 

Many other improvements have been made in the years following. In the summer of 1988, stained glass windows adorned the church. Completed in October of 1988, the windows depict the seven Sacraments, and the five Christian Virtues. Other improvements included air-conditioning in 1991, along with new pew cushions the same year.

 

A new pavilion was built on the church grounds in 1992. This building is used for summer festival and houses the hamburger stand and the country store.

 

Because the old organ began to fall apart, and parts were no longer available, the parish decided to purchase an Allen Digital Computer organ from the Schmit Music Company in Minneapolis. It was blessed and dedicated by Father Dluge on Sunday, February 16th, 1992, with Garret William Lamain giving a concert on the new organ.

 

Father Dluge remained in Frederic and Grantsburg until 1997, when he was forced to resign due to ill health.

 

Father David Lusson was appointed to the two parishes on February 11th, 1997, and on Ash Wednesday, he said his first mass.

 

Before coming, Father Lusson served in the United States Navy from 1965-1972.

 

He was ordained on June 14th, 1980 after attending St. John’s School of Theology in Collegeville, Minnesota.

 

Before coming to Frederic, he was pastor of Saint Anne Church, Somerset and Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Parish at East Farmington.

 

In addition to St. Dominic Father Dave serves the parish of Immaculate Conception in Grantsburg. A popular innovation has been “neighborhood masses.” The combination of informal liturgy and pot luck dinner is held each week during the summer months at a parishioner’s residence.

 

Father Dave has something in common with Father Fagan, one of missionary priests. He does not like to spend a lot of time traveling slowly on the roads.

 

Faith in God, the parishioners, and himself even led to the printing of a parish Christmas card. One year it was decided that a Christmas tree, given by Irene Anderson, and as tall as the ceiling, was to be used for decoration. Few though it could be done, but Father said that all we needed was a little faith. With a lot of help, and a lot of faith it was accomplished. The Liturgy Committee was so impressed they had a photograph taken and made into a Christmas card.

 

Father Dave’s energy and enthusiasm has generated a new spirit for this church community.

 

Joel Cycenas, son of Joe and Nancy Cycenas of St. Dominic church was ordained to the priesthood on May 27th, 2000. He received his degree from Magdalen College in New Hampshire, and then joined the Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul. He was sent to Rome and began the theology program. His first assignment will be at St. Peters in Mendota Heights, Minnesota.

 

Al Schommer reminisces about the changes in the church. He remembers that everyone dressed up for church and went to confession at least once a month. Kids didn’t miss CCD unless they were really sick. He wonders if these many changes that have taken place are, “For the better or the worse.”

 

Fifty years ago, Father Anton said, “Cement blocks do not make a church. Our church is neat and compact, and inspires a prayerful spirit. Our rectory is comfortable, and our parish membership is increasing from year to year. But this is not the real wealth of our parish. The real wealth is the deep faith of its people.”

 

That same faith carries St. Dominic Parish to new goals and achievements today as we celebrate the Jubilee year 2000 and prepare to celebrate our first century as a parish family.

 

Frederic is a village in Polk County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 1,137 at the 2010 census. It was established as a village in 1901.

 

Frederic is located at 45°39′32″N 92°28′1″W (45.658797, -92.466921).

 

According to the United States Census Bureau, the village has a total area of 1.79 square miles (4.64 km2), of which, 1.72 square miles (4.45 km2) of it is land and 0.07 square miles (0.18 km2) is water.

 

Frederic is along Wisconsin Highways 35 and 48, and Polk County Road W.

 

The Frederic School District consists of Frederic Elementary School and Frederic 6-12 School, which contains Frederic Middle School and Frederic High School.

 

Notable people

Robert M. Dueholm, Wisconsin politician, was born in Frederic.

Rodney Erickson, former president of Pennsylvania State University

Nathan Heffernan, member of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, was born in Frederic.

Erick H. Johnson, Wisconsin politician, lived in Frederic.

Rita Lee, Playboy's Playmate for the Month of November 1977, was born in Frederic.

Carol Merrill, a model for the original television game show Let's Make A Deal, was born in Frederic.

Erin Gloria Ryan, writer and podcaster, was born in Frederic.

Harvey Stower, Wisconsin politician, was born in Frederic.

 

Polk County is a county in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. As of the 2020 census, the population was 44,977. Its county seat is Balsam Lake. The county was created in 1853 and named for United States President James K. Polk.

 

Wisconsin is a state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by land area and the 20th-most populous.

 

The bulk of Wisconsin's population live in areas situated along the shores of Lake Michigan. The largest city, Milwaukee, anchors its largest metropolitan area, followed by Green Bay and Kenosha, the third- and fourth-most-populated Wisconsin cities, respectively. The state capital, Madison, is currently the second-most-populated and fastest-growing city in the state. Wisconsin is divided into 72 counties and as of the 2020 census had a population of nearly 5.9 million.

 

Wisconsin's geography is diverse, having been greatly impacted by glaciers during the Ice Age with the exception of the Driftless Area. The Northern Highland and Western Upland along with a part of the Central Plain occupy the western part of the state, with lowlands stretching to the shore of Lake Michigan. Wisconsin is third to Ontario and Michigan in the length of its Great Lakes coastline. The northern portion of the state is home to the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. At the time of European contact, the area was inhabited by Algonquian and Siouan nations, and today it is home to eleven federally recognized tribes. During the 19th and early 20th centuries, many European settlers entered the state, most of whom emigrated from Germany and Scandinavia. Wisconsin remains a center of German American and Scandinavian American culture, particularly in respect to its cuisine, with foods such as bratwurst and kringle. Wisconsin is home to one UNESCO World Heritage Site, comprising two of the most significant buildings designed by Wisconsin-born architect Frank Lloyd Wright: his studio at Taliesin near Spring Green and his Jacobs I House in Madison.

 

The Republican Party was founded in Wisconsin in 1854. In more recent years, Wisconsin has been a battleground state in presidential elections, notably in 2016 and 2020.

 

Wisconsin is one of the nation's leading dairy producers and is known as "America's Dairyland"; it is particularly famous for its cheese. The state is also famous for its beer, particularly and historically in Milwaukee, most notably as the headquarters of the Miller Brewing Company. Wisconsin has some of the most permissive alcohol laws in the country and is well known for its drinking culture. Its economy is dominated by manufacturing, healthcare, information technology, and agriculture—specifically dairy, cranberries, and ginseng. Tourism is also a major contributor to the state's economy. The gross domestic product in 2020 was $348 billion.

 

The history of Wisconsin encompasses the story not only of the people who have lived in Wisconsin since it became a state of the U.S., but also that of the Native American tribes who made their homeland in Wisconsin, the French and British colonists who were the first Europeans to live there, and the American settlers who lived in Wisconsin when it was a territory.

 

Since its admission to the Union on May 29, 1848, as the 30th state, Wisconsin has been ethnically heterogeneous, with Yankees being among the first to arrive from New York and New England. They dominated the state's heavy industry, finance, politics and education. Large numbers of European immigrants followed them, including German Americans, mostly between 1850 and 1900, Scandinavians (the largest group being Norwegian Americans) and smaller groups of Belgian Americans, Dutch Americans, Swiss Americans, Finnish Americans, Irish Americans and others; in the 20th century, large numbers of Polish Americans and African Americans came, settling mainly in Milwaukee.

 

Politically the state was predominantly Republican until recent years, when it became more evenly balanced. The state took a national leadership role in the Progressive Movement, under the aegis of Robert M. "Fighting Bob" La Follette and his family, who fought the old guard bitterly at the state and national levels. The "Wisconsin Idea" called for the use of the higher learning in modernizing government, and the state is notable for its strong network of state universities.

 

The first known inhabitants of what is now Wisconsin were Paleo-Indians, who first arrived in the region in about 10,000 BC at the end of the Ice Age. The retreating glaciers left behind a tundra in Wisconsin inhabited by large animals, such as mammoths, mastodons, bison, giant beaver, and muskox. The Boaz mastodon and the Clovis artifacts discovered in Boaz, Wisconsin show that the Paleo-Indians hunted these large animals. They also gathered plants as conifer forests grew in the glaciers' wake. With the decline and extinction of many large mammals in the Americas, the Paleo-Indian diet shifted toward smaller mammals like deer and bison.

 

During the Archaic Period, from 6000 to 1000 BC, mixed conifer-hardwood forests as well as mixed prairie-forests replaced Wisconsin's conifer forests. People continued to depend on hunting and gathering. Around 4000 BC they developed spear-throwers and copper tools such as axes, adzes, projectile points, knives, perforators, fishhooks and harpoons. Copper ornaments like beaded necklaces also appeared around 1500 BC. These people gathered copper ore at quarries on the Keweenaw Peninsula in Michigan and on Isle Royale in Lake Superior. They may have crafted copper artifacts by hammering and folding the metal and also by heating it to increase its malleability. However it is not certain if these people reached the level of copper smelting. Regardless, the Copper Culture of the Great Lakes region reached a level of sophistication unprecedented in North America. The Late Archaic Period also saw the emergence of cemeteries and ritual burials, such as the one in Oconto.

 

The Early Woodland Period began in 1000 BC as plants became an increasingly important part of the people's diet. Small scale agriculture and pottery arrived in southern Wisconsin at this time. The primary crops were maize, beans and squash. Agriculture, however, could not sufficiently support these people, who also had to hunt and gather. Agriculture at this time was more akin to gardening than to farming. Villages emerged along rivers, streams and lakes, and the earliest earthen burial mounds were constructed. The Havana Hopewell culture arrived in Wisconsin in the Middle Woodland Period, settling along the Mississippi River. The Hopewell people connected Wisconsin to their trade practices, which stretched from Ohio to Yellowstone and from Wisconsin to the Gulf of Mexico. They constructed elaborate mounds, made elaborately decorated pottery and brought a wide range of traded minerals to the area. The Hopewell people may have influenced the other inhabitants of Wisconsin, rather than displacing them. The Late Woodland Period began in about 400 AD, following the disappearance of the Hopewell culture from the area. The people of Wisconsin first used the bow and arrow in the final centuries of the Woodland Period, and agriculture continued to be practiced in the southern part of the state. The effigy mound culture dominated Southern Wisconsin during this time, building earthen burial mounds in the shapes of animals. Examples of effigy mounds still exist at High Cliff State Park and at Lizard Mound County Park. In northern Wisconsin people continued to survive on hunting and gathering, and constructed conical mounds.

 

People of the Mississippian culture expanded into Wisconsin around 1050 AD and established a settlement at Aztalan along the Crawfish River. While begun by the Caddoan people, other cultures began to borrow & adapt the Mississippian cultural structure. This elaborately planned site may have been the northernmost outpost of Cahokia, although it is also now known that some Siouan peoples along the Mississippi River may have taken part in the culture as well. Regardless, the Mississippian site traded with and was clearly influenced in its civic and defensive planning, as well as culturally, by its much larger southern neighbor. A rectangular wood-and-clay stockade surrounded the twenty acre site, which contained two large earthen mounds and a central plaza. One mound may have been used for food storage, as a residence for high-ranking officials, or as a temple, and the other may have been used as a mortuary. The Mississippian culture cultivated maize intensively, and their fields probably stretched far beyond the stockade at Aztalan, although modern agriculture has erased any traces of Mississippian practices in the area. Some rumors also speculate that the people of Aztalan may have experimented slightly with stone architecture in the making of a man-made, stone-line pond, at the very least. While the first settler on the land of what is now the city supposedly reported this, he filled it in and it has yet to be rediscovered.

 

Both Woodland and Mississippian peoples inhabited Aztalan, which was connected to the extensive Mississippian trade network. Shells from the Gulf of Mexico, copper from Lake Superior and Mill Creek chert have been found at the site. Aztalan was abandoned around 1200 AD. The Oneota people later built agriculturally based villages, similar to those of the Mississippians but without the extensive trade networks, in the state.

 

By the time the first Europeans arrived in Wisconsin, the Oneota had disappeared. The historically documented inhabitants, as of the first European incursions, were the Siouan speaking Dakota Oyate to the northwest, the Chiwere speaking Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) and the Algonquian Menominee to the northeast, with their lands beginning approximately north of Green Bay. The Chiwere lands were south of Green Bay and followed rivers to the southwest. Over time, other tribes moved to Wisconsin, including the Ojibwe, the Illinois, the Fauk, the Sauk and the Mahican. The Mahican were one of the last groups to arrived, coming from New York after the U.S. congress passed the Indian Removal Act of 1830.

 

The first European known to have landed in Wisconsin was Jean Nicolet. In 1634, Samuel de Champlain, governor of New France, sent Nicolet to contact the Ho-Chunk people, make peace between them and the Huron and expand the fur trade, and possibly to also find a water route to Asia. Accompanied by seven Huron guides, Nicolet left New France and canoed through Lake Huron and Lake Superior, and then became the first European known to have entered Lake Michigan. Nicolet proceeded into Green Bay, which he named La Baie des Puants (literally "The Stinking Bay"), and probably came ashore near the Red Banks. He made contact with the Ho-Chunk and Menominee living in the area and established peaceful relations. Nicolet remained with the Ho-Chunk the winter before he returned to Quebec.

 

The Beaver Wars fought between the Iroquois and the French prevented French explorers from returning to Wisconsin until 1652–1654, when Pierre Radisson and Médard des Groseilliers arrived at La Baie des Puants to trade furs. They returned to Wisconsin in 1659–1660, this time at Chequamegon Bay on Lake Superior. On their second voyage they found that the Ojibwe had expanded into northern Wisconsin, as they continued to prosper in the fur trade. They also were the first Europeans to contact the Santee Dakota. They built a trading post and wintered near Ashland, before returning to Montreal.

 

In 1665 Claude-Jean Allouez, a Jesuit missionary, built a mission on Lake Superior. Five years later he abandoned the mission, and journeyed to La Baie des Puants. Two years later he built St. Francis Xavier Mission near present-day De Pere. In his journeys through Wisconsin, he encountered groups of Native Americans who had been displaced by Iroquois in the Beaver Wars. He evangelized the Algonquin-speaking Potawatomi, who had settled on the Door Peninsula after fleeing Iroquois attacks in Michigan. He also encountered the Algonquin-speaking Sauk, who had been forced into Michigan by the Iroquois, and then had been forced into central Wisconsin by the Ojibwe and the Huron.

 

The next major expedition into Wisconsin was that of Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet in 1673. After hearing rumors from Indians telling of the existence of the Mississippi River, Marquette and Joliet set out from St. Ignace, in what is now Michigan, and entered the Fox River at Green Bay. They canoed up the Fox until they reached the river's westernmost point, and then portaged, or carried their boats, to the nearby Wisconsin River, where they resumed canoeing downstream to the Mississippi River. Marquette and Joliet reached the Mississippi near what is now Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin in June, 1673.

 

Nicolas Perrot, French commander of the west, established Fort St. Nicholas at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin in May, 1685, near the southwest end of the Fox-Wisconsin Waterway. Perrot also built a fort on the shores of Lake Pepin called Fort St. Antoine in 1686, and a second fort, called Fort Perrot, on an island on Lake Peppin shortly after. In 1727, Fort Beauharnois was constructed on what is now the Minnesota side of Lake Pepin to replace the two previous forts. A fort and a Jesuit mission were also built on the shores of Lake Superior at La Pointe, in present-day Wisconsin, in 1693 and operated until 1698. A second fort was built on the same site in 1718 and operated until 1759. These were not military posts, but rather small storehouses for furs.

 

During the French colonial period, the first black people came to Wisconsin. The first record of a black person comes from 1725, when a black slave was killed along with four Frenchmen in a Native American raid on Green Bay. Other French fur traders and military personnel brought slaves with them to Wisconsin later in 1700s.

 

None of the French posts had permanent settlers; fur traders and missionaries simply visited them from time to time to conduct business.

 

In the 1720s, the anti-French Fox tribe, led by war chief Kiala, raided French settlements on the Mississippi River and disrupted French trade on Lake Michigan. From 1728 to 1733, the Fox fought against the French-supported Potawatomi, Ojibwa, Huron and Ottawa tribes. In 1733, Kiala was captured and sold into slavery in the West Indies along with other captured Fox.

 

Before the war, the Fox tribe numbered 1500, but by 1733, only 500 Fox were left. As a result, the Fox joined the Sauk people.

 

The details are unclear, but this war appears to have been part of the conflict that expelled the Dakota & Illinois peoples out onto the Great Plains, causing further displacement of other Chiwere, Caddoan & Algonquian peoples there—including the ancestors of the Ioway, Osage, Pawnee, Arikara, A'ani, Arapaho, Hidatsa, Cheyenne & Blackfoot.

 

The British gradually took over Wisconsin during the French and Indian War, taking control of Green Bay in 1761, gaining control of all of Wisconsin in 1763, and annexing the area to the Province of Quebec in 1774. Like the French, the British were interested in little but the fur trade. One notable event in the fur trading industry in Wisconsin occurred in 1791, when two free African Americans set up a fur trading post among the Menominee at present day Marinette. The first permanent settlers, mostly French Canadians, some Anglo-New Englanders and a few African American freedmen, arrived in Wisconsin while it was under British control. Charles Michel de Langlade is generally recognized as the first settler, establishing a trading post at Green Bay in 1745, and moving there permanently in 1764. In 1766 the Royal Governor of the new territory, Robert Rogers, engaged Jonathan Carver to explore and map the newly acquired territories for the Crown, and to search for a possible Northwest Passage. Carver left Fort Michilimackinac that spring and spent the next three years exploring and mapping what is now Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota.

 

Settlement began at Prairie du Chien around 1781. The French residents at the trading post in what is now Green Bay, referred to the town as "La Bey", however British fur traders referred to it as "Green Bay", because the water and the shore assumed green tints in early spring. The old French title was gradually dropped, and the British name of "Green Bay" eventually stuck. The region coming under British rule had virtually no adverse effect on the French residents as the British needed the cooperation of the French fur traders and the French fur traders needed the goodwill of the British. During the French occupation of the region licenses for fur trading had been issued scarcely and only to select groups of traders, whereas the British, in an effort to make as much money as possible from the region, issued licenses for fur trading freely, both to British and French residents. The fur trade in what is now Wisconsin reached its height under British rule, and the first self-sustaining farms in the state were established at this time as well. From 1763 to 1780, Green Bay was a prosperous community which produced its own foodstuff, built graceful cottages and held dances and festivities.

 

The United States acquired Wisconsin in the Treaty of Paris (1783). Massachusetts claimed the territory east of the Mississippi River between the present-day Wisconsin-Illinois border and present-day La Crosse, Wisconsin. Virginia claimed the territory north of La Crosse to Lake Superior and all of present-day Minnesota east of the Mississippi River. Shortly afterward, in 1787, the Americans made Wisconsin part of the new Northwest Territory. Later, in 1800, Wisconsin became part of Indiana Territory. Despite the fact that Wisconsin belonged to the United States at this time, the British continued to control the local fur trade and maintain military alliances with Wisconsin Indians in an effort to stall American expansion westward by creating a pro-British Indian barrier state.

 

The United States did not firmly exercise control over Wisconsin until the War of 1812. In 1814, the Americans built Fort Shelby at Prairie du Chien. During the war, the Americans and British fought one battle in Wisconsin, the July, 1814 Siege of Prairie du Chien, which ended as a British victory. The British captured Fort Shelby and renamed it Fort McKay, after Major William McKay, the British commander who led the forces that won the Battle of Prairie du Chien. However, the 1815 Treaty of Ghent reaffirmed American jurisdiction over Wisconsin, which was by then a part of Illinois Territory. Following the treaty, British troops burned Fort McKay, rather than giving it back to the Americans, and departed Wisconsin. To protect Prairie du Chien from future attacks, the United States Army constructed Fort Crawford in 1816, on the same site as Fort Shelby. Fort Howard was also built in 1816 in Green Bay.

 

Significant American settlement in Wisconsin, a part of Michigan Territory beginning in 1818, was delayed by two Indian wars, the minor Winnebago War of 1827 and the larger Black Hawk War of 1832.

 

The Winnebago War started when, in 1826, two Winnebago men were detained at Fort Crawford on charges of murder and then transferred to Fort Snelling in present-day Minnesota. The Winnebago in the area believed that both men had been executed. On June 27, 1827, a Winnebago war band led by Chief Red Bird and the prophet White Cloud (Wabokieshiek) attacked a family of settlers outside of Prairie du Chien, killing two. They then went on to attack two keel-boats on the Mississippi River that were heading toward Fort Snelling, killing two settlers and injuring four more. Seven Winnebago warriors were killed in those attacks. The war band also attacked settlers on the lower Wisconsin River and the lead mines at Galena, Illinois. The war band surrendered at Portage, Wisconsin, rather than fighting the United States Army that was pursuing them.

 

In the Black Hawk War, Sac, Fox, and Kickapoo Native Americans, otherwise known as the British Band, led by Chief Black Hawk, who had been relocated from Illinois to Iowa, attempted to resettle in their Illinois homeland on April 5, 1832, in violation of Treaty. On May 10 Chief Black Hawk decided to go back to Iowa. On May 14, Black Hawk's forces met with a group of militiamen led by Isaiah Stillman. All three members of Black Hawk's parley were shot and one was killed. The Battle of Stillman's Run ensued, leaving twelve militiamen and three to five Sac and Fox warriors dead. Of the fifteen battles of the war, six took place in Wisconsin. The other nine as well as several smaller skirmishes took place in Illinois. The first confrontation to take place in Wisconsin was the first attack on Fort Blue Mounds on June 6, in which one member of the local militia was killed outside of the fort. There was also the Spafford Farm Massacre on June 14, the Battle of Horseshoe Bend on June 16, which was a United States victory, the second attack on Fort Blue Mounds on June 20, and the Sinsinawa Mound raid on June 29. The Native Americans were defeated at the Battle of Wisconsin Heights on July 21, with forty to seventy killed and only one killed on the United States side. The Ho Chunk Nation fought on the side of the United States. The Black Hawk War ended with the Battle of Bad Axe on August 1–2, with over 150 of the British Band dead and 75 captured and only five killed in the United States forces. Those crossing the Mississippi were killed by Lakota, American and Ho Chunk Forces. Many of the British Band survivors were handed over to the United States on August 20 by the Lakota Tribe, with the exception of Black Hawk, who had retreated into Vernon County, Wisconsin and White Cloud, who surrendered on August 27, 1832. Black Hawk was captured by Decorah south of Bangor, Wisconsin, south of the headwaters of the La Crosse River. He was then sold to the U.S. military at Prairie du Chien, accepted by future Confederate president, Stephen Davis, who was a soldier at the time. Black Hawk's tribe had killed his daughter. Black Hawk moved back to Iowa in 1833, after being held prisoner by the United States government.

 

The Francois Vertefeuille House in Prairie du Chien was built in the 1810s by fur traders. A rare example of the pièce-sur-pièce à coulisse technique once common in French-Canadian architecture, it is one of the oldest buildings in the state and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

 

The Cornish immigrants who worked in Wisconsin's lead mines build simple stone cabins from limestone. Six cabins are preserved at the Pendarvis Historic Site in Mineral Point.

The resolution of these Indian conflicts opened the way for Wisconsin's settlement. Many of the region's first settlers were drawn by the prospect of lead mining in southwest Wisconsin. This area had traditionally been mined by Native Americans. However, after a series of treaties removed the Indians, the lead mining region was opened to white miners. Thousands rushed in from across the country to dig for the "gray gold". By 1829, 4,253 miners and 52 licensed smelting works were in the region. Expert miners from Cornwall in Britain informed a large part of the wave of immigrants. Boom towns like Mineral Point, Platteville, Shullsburg, Belmont, and New Diggings sprang up around mines. The first two federal land offices in Wisconsin were opened in 1834 at Green Bay and at Mineral Point. By the 1840s, southwest Wisconsin mines were producing more than half of the nation's lead, which was no small amount, as the United States was producing annually some 31 million pounds of lead. Wisconsin was dubbed the "Badger State" because of the lead miners who first settled there in the 1820s and 1830s. Without shelter in the winter, they had to "live like badgers" in tunnels burrowed into hillsides.

 

Although the lead mining area drew the first major wave of settlers, its population would soon be eclipsed by growth in Milwaukee. Milwaukee, along with Sheboygan, Manitowoc, and Kewaunee, can be traced back to a series of trading posts established by the French trader Jacques Vieau in 1795. Vieau's post at the mouth of the Milwaukee River was purchased in 1820 by Solomon Juneau, who had visited the area as early as 1818. Juneau moved to what is now Milwaukee and took over the trading post's operation in 1825.

 

When the fur trade began to decline, Juneau focused on developing the land around his trading post. In the 1830s, he formed a partnership with Green Bay lawyer Morgan Martin, and the two men bought 160 acres (0.6 km2) of land between Lake Michigan and the Milwaukee River. There they founded the settlement of Juneautown. Meanwhile, an Ohio businessman named Byron Kilbourn began to invest in the land west of the Milwaukee River, forming the settlement of Kilbourntown. South of these two settlements, George H. Walker founded the town of Walker's Point in 1835. Each of these three settlements engaged in a fierce competition to attract the most residents and become the largest of the three towns. In 1840, the Wisconsin State Legislature ordered the construction of a bridge over the Milwaukee River to replace the inadequate ferry system. In 1845, Byron Kilbourn, who had been trying to isolate Juneautown to make it more dependent on Kilbourntown, destroyed a portion of the bridge, which started the Milwaukee Bridge War. For several weeks, skirmishes broke out between the residents of both towns. No one was killed but several people were injured, some seriously. On January 31, 1846, the settlements of Juneautown, Kilbourntown, and Walker's Point merged into the incorporated city of Milwaukee. Solomon Juneau was elected mayor. The new city had a population of about 10,000 people, making it the largest city in the territory. Milwaukee remains the largest city in Wisconsin to this day.

 

Wisconsin Territory was created by an act of the United States Congress on April 20, 1836. By fall of that year, the best prairie groves of the counties surrounding Milwaukee were occupied by New England farmers. The new territory initially included all of the present day states of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa, as well as parts of North and South Dakota. At the time the Congress called it the "Wiskonsin Territory".

 

The first territorial governor of Wisconsin was Henry Dodge. He and other territorial lawmakers were initially busied by organizing the territory's government and selecting a capital city. The selection of a location to build a capitol caused a heated debate among the territorial politicians. At first, Governor Dodge selected Belmont, located in the heavily populated lead mining district, to be capital. Shortly after the new legislature convened there, however, it became obvious that Wisconsin's first capitol was inadequate. Numerous other suggestions for the location of the capital were given representing nearly every city that existed in the territory at the time, and Governor Dodge left the decision up to the other lawmakers. The legislature accepted a proposal by James Duane Doty to build a new city named Madison on an isthmus between lakes Mendota and Monona and put the territory's permanent capital there. In 1837, while Madison was being built, the capitol was temporarily moved to Burlington. This city was transferred to Iowa Territory in 1838, along with all the lands of Wisconsin Territory west of the Mississippi River.

 

Wyman calls Wisconsin a "palimpsest" of layer upon layer of peoples and forces, each imprinting permanent influences. He identified these layers as multiple "frontiers" over three centuries: Native American frontier, French frontier, English frontier, fur-trade frontier, mining frontier, and the logging frontier. Finally the coming of the railroad brought the end of the frontier.

 

The historian of the frontier, Frederick Jackson Turner, grew up in Wisconsin during its last frontier stage, and in his travels around the state he could see the layers of social and political development. One of Turner's last students, Merle Curti used in-depth analysis of local history in Trempealeau County to test Turner's thesis about democracy. Turner's view was that American democracy, "involved widespread participation in the making of decisions affecting the common life, the development of initiative and self-reliance, and equality of economic and cultural opportunity. It thus also involved Americanization of immigrant." Curti found that from 1840 to 1860 in Wisconsin the poorest groups gained rapidly in land ownership, and often rose to political leadership at the local level. He found that even landless young farm workers were soon able to obtain their own farms. Free land on the frontier therefore created opportunity and democracy, for both European immigrants as well as old stock Yankees.

 

By the mid-1840s, the population of Wisconsin Territory had exceeded 150,000, more than twice the number of people required for Wisconsin to become a state. In 1846, the territorial legislature voted to apply for statehood. That fall, 124 delegates debated the state constitution. The document produced by this convention was considered extremely progressive for its time. It banned commercial banking, granted married women the right to own property, and left the question of African-American suffrage to a popular vote. Most Wisconsinites considered the first constitution to be too radical, however, and voted it down in an April 1847 referendum.

 

In December 1847, a second constitutional convention was called. This convention resulted in a new, more moderate state constitution that Wisconsinites approved in a March 1848 referendum, enabling Wisconsin to become the 30th state on May 29, 1848. Wisconsin was the last state entirely east of the Mississippi River (and by extension the last state formed entirely from territory assigned to the U.S. in the 1783 Treaty of Paris) to be admitted to the Union.

 

With statehood, came the creation of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, which is the state's oldest public university. The creation of this university was set aside in the state charter.

 

In 1847, the Mineral Point Tribune reported that the town's furnaces were producing 43,800 pounds (19,900 kg) of lead each day. Lead mining in southwest Wisconsin began to decline after 1848 and 1849 when the combination of less easily accessible lead ore and the California Gold Rush made miners leave the area. The lead mining industry in mining communities such as Mineral Point managed to survive into the 1860s, but the industry was never as prosperous as it was before the decline.

 

By 1850 Wisconsin's population was 305,000. Roughly a third (103,000) were Yankees from New England and western New York state. The second largest group were the Germans, numbering roughly 38,000, followed by 28,000 British immigrants from England, Scotland and Wales. There were roughly 63,000 Wisconsin-born residents of the state. The Yankee migrants would be the dominant political class in Wisconsin for many years.

 

A railroad frenzy swept Wisconsin shortly after it achieved statehood. The first railroad line in the state was opened between Milwaukee and Waukesha in 1851 by the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad. The railroad pushed on, reaching Milton, Wisconsin in 1852, Stoughton, Wisconsin in 1853, and the capital city of Madison in 1854. The company reached its goal of completing a rail line across the state from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River when the line to Prairie du Chien was completed in 1857. Shortly after this, other railroad companies completed their own tracks, reaching La Crosse in the west and Superior in the north, spurring development in those cities. By the end of the 1850s, railroads crisscrossed the state, enabling the growth of other industries that could now easily ship products to markets across the country.

 

Nelson Dewey, the first governor of Wisconsin, was a Democrat. Born in Lebanon, Connecticut, Dewey's father's family had lived in New England since 1633, when their ancestor, Thomas Due, had come to America from Kent County, England. Dewey oversaw the transition from the territorial to the new state government. He encouraged the development of the state's infrastructure, particularly the construction of new roads, railroads, canals, and harbors, as well as the improvement of the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers. During his administration, the State Board of Public Works was organized. Dewey was an abolitionist and the first of many Wisconsin governors to advocate against the spread of slavery into new states and territories. The home Dewey built near Cassville is now a state park.

 

Between 1848 and 1862, Wisconsin had three Democratic governors, all of whom were in office prior to 1856, four Republican governors, all of whom were in office after 1856, and one Whig governor, Leonard J. Farwell, who served from 1852 to 1854. Under Farwell's governorship, Wisconsin became the second state to abolish capital punishment.

 

In the presidential elections of 1848 and 1852, the Democratic Party won Wisconsin. In the elections of 1856, 1860, and 1864, the Republican Party won the state.

 

Between the 1840s and 1860s, settlers from New England, New York and Germany arrived in Wisconsin. Some of them brought radical political ideas to the state. In the 1850s, stop-overs on the underground railroad were set up in the state and abolitionist groups were formed. Some abolitionist and free-soil activists left the Whig and Democratic parties, running and in some cases being elected as candidates of the Liberty Party and Free Soil Party. The most successful such group was the Republican Party. On March 20, 1854, the first county meeting of the Republican Party of the United States, consisting of about thirty people, was held in the Little White Schoolhouse in Ripon, Wisconsin. Ripon claims to be the birthplace of the Republican Party, as does Jackson, Michigan, where the first statewide convention was held. The new party absorbed most of the former Free Soil and Liberty Party members.

 

A notable instance of abolitionism in Wisconsin was the rescue of Joshua Glover, an escaped slave from St. Louis who sought refuge in Racine, Wisconsin in 1852. He was caught in 1854 by federal marshals and put in a jail at Cathedral Square in Milwaukee, where he waited to be returned to his owner. A mob of 5,000 people led by Milwaukee abolitionist Sherman Booth, himself a "Yankee" transplant from rural New York, sprung Glover from jail and helped him escape to Canada via the underground railroad.

 

In the 1850s, two-thirds of immigrants to Wisconsin came from the eastern United States, the other one-third being foreign-born. The majority of the foreign born were German immigrants. Many Irish and Norwegian immigrants also came to Wisconsin in the 1850s. Northern Europeans, many of whom were persecuted in their home countries because of their support for the failed bourgeois Revolutions of 1848, often chose Wisconsin because of the liberal constitution of human rights such as the state's unusual recognition of immigrants' right to vote and rights to citizenship.

 

Yankee settlers from New England started arriving in Wisconsin in the 1830s spread throughout the southern half of the territory. They dominated early politics. Most of them started as farmers, but the larger proportion moved to towns and cities as entrepreneurs, businessmen and professionals.

 

Historian John Bunker has examined the worldview of the Yankee settlers in the Wisconsin:

 

Because they arrived first and had a strong sense of community and mission, Yankees were able to transplant New England institutions, values, and mores, altered only by the conditions of frontier life. They established a public culture that emphasized the work ethic, the sanctity of private property, individual responsibility, faith in residential and social mobility, practicality, piety, public order and decorum, reverence for public education, activists, honest, and frugal government, town meeting democracy, and he believed that there was a public interest that transcends particular and stick ambitions. Regarding themselves as the elect and just in a world rife with sin, air, and corruption, they felt a strong moral obligation to define and enforce standards of community and personal behavior....This pietistic worldview was substantially shared by British, Scandinavian, Swiss, English-Canadian and Dutch Reformed immigrants, as well as by German Protestants and many of the "Forty-Niners."

 

The color guard of the Wisconsin 8th Infantry with Old Abe

Wisconsin enrolled 91,379 soldiers in the Union Army during the American Civil War. 272 of enlisted Wisconsin troops were African American, with the rest being white. Of these, 3,794 were killed in action or mortally wounded, 8,022 died of disease, and 400 were killed in accidents. The total mortality was 12,216 men, about 13.4 percent of total enlistments. Many soldiers trained at Camp Randall currently the site of the University of Wisconsin's athletic stadium.

 

The draft implemented by President Lincoln in 1862 was unpopular in some Wisconsin communities, particularly among German and Luxembourgish immigrants. In November 1862, draft riots broke out in Milwaukee, Port Washington, and West Bend, which were quelled by deploying U.S. troops in the cities.

 

Most Wisconsin troops served in the western theater, although several Wisconsin regiments fought in the east, such as the 2nd Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 6th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment, and 7th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment, which formed part of the Iron Brigade. These three regiments fought in the Northern Virginia Campaign, the Maryland Campaign, the Battle of Fredericksburg, the Battle of Chancellorsville, the Gettysburg Campaign, the Battle of Mine Run, the Overland Campaign, the Siege of Petersburg, and the Appomattox Campaign.

 

The 8th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment, which fought in the western theater of war, is also worthy of mention, having fought at the Battle of Iuka, the Siege of Vicksburg, the Red River Campaign, and the Battle of Nashville. The 8th Wisconsin is also known for its mascot, Old Abe.

 

Agriculture was a major component of the Wisconsin economy during the 19th century. Wheat was a primary crop on early Wisconsin farms. In fact, during the mid 19th century, Wisconsin produced about one sixth of the wheat grown in the United States. However, wheat rapidly depleted nutrients in the soil, especially nitrogen, and was vulnerable to insects, bad weather, and wheat leaf rust. In the 1860s, chinch bugs arrived in Wisconsin and damaged wheat across the state. As the soil lost its quality and prices dropped, the practice of wheat farming moved west into Iowa and Minnesota. Some Wisconsin farmers responded by experimenting with crop rotation and other methods to restore the soil's fertility, but a larger number turned to alternatives to wheat.

 

In parts of northern Wisconsin, farmers cultivated cranberries and in a few counties in south central Wisconsin, farmers had success growing tobacco, but the most popular replacement for wheat was dairy farming. As wheat fell out of favor, many Wisconsin farmers started raising dairy cattle and growing feed crops, which were better suited to Wisconsin's climate and soil. One reason for the popularity of dairy farming was that many of Wisconsin's farmers had come to the state from New York, the leading producer of dairy products at the time. In addition, many immigrants from Europe brought an extensive knowledge of cheese making. Dairying was also promoted by the University of Wisconsin–Madison's school of agriculture, which offered education to dairy farmers and researched ways to produce better dairy products. The first test of butterfat content in milk was developed at the university, which allowed for consistency in the quality of butter and cheese. By 1899, over ninety percent of Wisconsin farms raised dairy cows and by 1915, Wisconsin had become the leading producer of dairy products in the United States, a position it held until the 1990s. The term America's Dairyland appeared in newspapers as early as 1913 when the state's butterfat production became first in the nation. In 1939 the state legislature enacted a bill to add the slogan to the state's automobile license plates. It continues to be the nation's largest producer of cheese, no longer focusing on the raw material (milk) but rather the value-added products. Because of this, Wisconsin continues to promote itself as "America's Dairyland", Wisconsinites are referred to as cheeseheads in some parts of the country, including Wisconsin, and foam cheesehead hats are associated with Wisconsin and its NFL team, the Green Bay Packers.

 

The first brewery in Wisconsin was opened in 1835 in Mineral Point by brewer John Phillips. A year later, he opened a second brewery in Elk Grove. In 1840, the first brewery in Milwaukee was opened by Richard G. Owens, William Pawlett, and John Davis, all Welsh immigrants. By 1860, nearly 200 breweries operated in Wisconsin, more than 40 of them in Milwaukee. The huge growth in the brewing industry can be accredited, in part, to the influx of German immigrants to Wisconsin in the 1840s and 1850s. Milwaukee breweries also grew in volume due to the destruction of Chicago's breweries during the great Chicago fire. In the second half of the 19th century, four of the largest breweries in the United States opened in Milwaukee: Miller Brewing Company, Pabst Brewing Company, Valentin Blatz Brewing Company, and Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company. In the 20th century Pabst absorbed Blatz and Schlitz, and moved its brewery and corporate headquarters to California. Miller continues to operate in Milwaukee. The Jacob Leinenkugel Brewing Company opened in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin in 1867 and continues to operate there to this day.

 

Agriculture was not viable in the densely forested northern and central parts of Wisconsin. Settlers came to this region for logging. The timber industry first set up along the Wisconsin River. Rivers were used to transport lumber from where the wood was being cut, to the sawmills. Sawmills in cities like Wausau and Stevens Point sawed the lumber into boards that were used for construction. The Wolf River also saw considerable logging by industrious Menominee. The Black and Chippewa Rivers formed a third major logging region. That area was dominated by one company owned by Frederick Weyerhaeuser. The construction of railroads allowed loggers to log year round, after rivers froze, and go deeper into the forests to cut down previously unshippable wood supplies. Wood products from Wisconsin's forests such as doors, furniture, beams, shipping boxes, and ships were made in industrial cities with connects to the Wisconsin lumber industry such as Chicago, Milwaukee, Sheboygan, and Manitowoc. Milwaukee and Manitowoc were centers for commercial ship building in Wisconsin. Many cargo ships built in these communities were used to transport lumber from logging ports to major industrial cities. Later a growing paper industry in the Fox River Valley made use of wood pulp from the state's lumber industry.

 

Logging was a dangerous trade, with high accident rates. On October 8, 1871, the Peshtigo Fire burned 1,875 square miles (4,850 km2) of forest land around the timber industry town of Peshtigo, Wisconsin, killing between 1,200 and 2,500 people. It was the deadliest fire in United States history.

 

From the 1870s to the 1890s, much of the logging in Wisconsin was done by immigrants from Scandinavia.

 

By the beginning of the twentieth century, logging in Wisconsin had gone into decline. Many forests had been cleared and never replanted and large corporations in the Pacific Northwest took business away from the Wisconsin industry. The logging companies sold their land to immigrants and out of work lumberjacks who hoped to turn the acres of pine stumps into farms, but few met with success.

 

Wisconsin is known in the 18th century to have discovered gold deposits in western Wisconsin. Such discoveries occurred around the town of St. Croix Falls where a settler stumbled across a gold nugget valued to be worth lots at the time. It's no surprise Wisconsin's western region was once the site of volcanic eruptions so it makes sense that minerals that weren't commonly found in other parts of the state would be present here.

 

Wisconsin was a regional and national model for innovation and organization in the Progressive Era in the early 20th century. The direct primary law of 1904 made it possible to mobilize voters against the previously dominant political machines. The first factors involved the La Follette family going back and forth between trying control of the Republican Party and third-party activity. Secondly the Wisconsin idea, of intellectuals and planners based

The photo appears to have been staged with them all having a cigarette hanging out of their mouths. Have they swapped hats too, for a joke? Despite the names on the back it's difficult to actually identify the actual soldiers, except for Reg Jephcott.

 

Named on the back left to right:

English Tommy - An English soldier?.....but is he?

 

Hookey Walker - possibly David Henry Walker #2022 - Imperial Camel Corps.

 

Fatty Wright - this man has Sergeant stripes

(I found a Trooper Alexander Robertson Wright KIA 6 Nov 1917, 3rd Australian Battn Imperial Camel Corps)

 

(I also found a Lieutenant Charles Robert Victor Wright - 1st Anzac Battalion - Imperial Camel Corps - he earned a Military Cross and Serbian Order of the White Eagle, Third Class and became a Major - and was later given an O.B.E.)

 

Vic Reynolds

I found Victor Arthur Reynolds #2347 - 1st Anzac Battalion - Signalman - serving in Egypt - in the 1st Imperial Camel Corps. He is listed with Alexander Robertson Wright in the 9th Light Horse Regiment, 16th reinforcements, so quite possible these two men are the ones in the photo.)

 

Reg Jephcott - this man has Sergeant stripes

(I found 2nd/Lieutenant Reginald Francis Jephcott #13 - 1st Anzac Battalion Headquarters and 1st Imperial Camel Corps in Egypt - he earned the Military Cross.)

 

The Imperial Camel Corps (ICC) was formed in January 1916 in order to deal with the revolt of pro-Turkish Senussi tribesmen in Egypt's Western Desert. The first four companies were recruited from Australian infantry battalions recuperating after Gallipoli. Four battalions were eventually formed. The 1st and 3rd were entirely Australian, the 2nd was British, and the 4th was a mix of Australians and New Zealanders. The ICC also had its own machine gun unit, and a battery of light artillery recruited in Hong Kong and Singapore.

 

The operations of the ICC in the Western Desert in 1916 were characterised by long patrols and brief skirmishes with the Senussi. British commanders in Egypt appreciated the fighting qualities of the ICC and in late 1916 the ICC was transferred to the Sinai desert to take part in operations against the Turkish army. Here the battalions of the ICC fought alongside Australian light horse units at Romani, Magdhaba and Rafa.

 

The ICC remained an integral part of the British and dominion force that advanced north through Palestine in 1917 and 1918. It suffered particularly heavily during the Second Battle of Gaza on 19 April 1917, and in the operations conducted in November to destroy the Turkish defensive line between Gaza and Beersheba. As the ICC moved into the more fertile country of northern Palestine, its practicality declined. The camels needed more fodder and water than equivalent numbers of horses, and, unimpeded by the desert, horses could move much faster. The bulk of the ICC was disbanded in June 1918 and the Australians were used to form the 14th and 15th Light Horse Regiments.

 

The men of the ICC had a rough reputation, largely because when the Corps was originally formed Australian battalion commanders had seized upon it as an opportunity to offload some of their more difficult characters. In 1917 a British supply dump at Rafa was warned to double their guards as the ICC was going to be camped nearby. The men of the ICC were, however, resourceful and effective. While defending a hill called Musallabeh in April 1918, some Australians of the ICC ran out of hand grenades. They resorted to heaving boulders down upon the attacking Turks and eventually fought them off. The hill became known as the "Camel's Hump".

(Australian War Memorial)

The original Iron Man costume worn on set of the movie by Robert Downey Jr..

 

This picture got me almost thrown out of the Met by a security guard, because there were no pictures allowed (special exhibition).

  

---

The challenge in designing a costume such as Ironman is that it has to serve two masters. First and foremost, in order for the film to work, the audience's disbelief must be suspended. The suit must be a convincing technological artifact: a wearable airplane, a powered suit of armor. Every detail must seem carefully thought out and evoke our experience of functional technology. You must believe this could be built and fly.

 

At the same time, once Tony Stark dons the costume he cannot simply be a man in a metal suit. He must become another character entirely, with his own identity, his own personality. Ironman must look every part the hero. The design must be a simple iconic gesture, human enough to become superhuman. The forms must convey mechanical athleticism, denoting muscularity and potency while seeming to serve aerodynamics and articulation. Shoulder blades become ailerons, serratus muscles become venting louvers. It should feel as if the shape mimics the human body and a sports car in equal parts—not as a means to manipulate perception, but as the inevitable product of some artificial evolution.

 

—Phil Saunders

 

Iron Man is a unique challenge in the superhero world because he is, depending on how you choose to look at it, both a superhero in the traditional sense, and a technological device based on science rather than superpowers. That is more true today than ever before because a lot of today’s technology is catching up to the science-fiction Iron Man is based on; while he was once a far-fetched fantastical idea, today he is a believable possibility. In designing the character, as well as his villains, I chose to look at it from a technological perspective and let a level of practicality dictate the aesthetics. The difficult part is that he still has to be a superheroic icon in the true Marvel fashion, so the challenge was to keep the larger-than-life, elegant silhouette and color scheme, which makes him instantly recognizable and which dates to the 1960s, and makes him as iconic as Spider-Man or Captain America, but update it for the current times. The biggest inspirations for my vision of Iron Man were the modern jet-fighters and sports cars with their active aerodynamics, various flaps, winglets, etc., which add a level of believability and practicality, but allow the design to maintain an elegance, much like those machines—an outer skin hiding a whole array of devices.

 

Iron Man Mark 2 and 3 were a collaboration between the designer Phil Saunders and myself, and our various strengths combined to create what I believe to be a very successful manifestation of that practical superhero idea. The suit in the movie is, for all intents and purposes, as much of a wearable aircraft as a superhero outfit. It maintains all of the key features Iron Man possesses in comics, but adds a huge level of detail and technology which makes him be as believable in motion on the cinema screens as he is.

 

—Adi Granov

 

www.metmuseum.org/special/superheroes/

 

BOX DATE: 1993

MANUFACTURER: Mattel

IMPORTANT NOTES: My set is missing the shelf backing.

 

PERSONAL FUN FACT written by my sister: It was love at first sight! When Shelly approached a container of doll furniture on what began as an unlucky day at the flea market, the first thing I saw was the cardboard part of this grocery store! The second thing I took in was, of course, the 1995 Barbie Mini Van. The combination of my nostalgic longing for this 90s Barbie grocery store and fierce desire to possess that unusual but captivating vehicle made me want the container instantly, even though we typically gravitate toward dolls and clothes, not larger playsets. I figured, in that moment, that I needed the bin to be really cheap--like five bucks--to be worth our while. Otherwise, it wasn't something we'd normally go for. However, the seller told us it was thirty dollars! My hopes sank. They rose again when he told us there was a container of dolls and another mystery box beneath that that went along with it. Before we had a long time to assess the dolls (less than three minutes), he dropped the price down to twenty and Shelly said she was going to the ATM. Sold! We were both curious and nostalgic for these 90s items and, while we'd normally be more excited about the dolls, the playsets were this bins claim to fame. If not for the mold, the "Oldie Moldies" bin (July 2019) would have likely had another name, related to the abundance of playsets. I'm glad that what was left of this child's stash was kept together. A lot of things that went together were scattered in both bins. As we went through it, two things became clear: 1) it was biohazardous 2) It was one of the largest hauls we'd gotten in a while . Normally, I rank a bin's "size" on the number of dolls. However, this bin had an abundance of stuff--playsets and accessories. As we went through and found more plastic accessories in car trunks and the storage space on this store, we couldn't believe how much we'd actually gotten for our money! All laid out, it was insane. Of course, it also stank of mold. Therefore, we had to prioritize. On day one, our focus was getting the smelly mold off the dolls and soaking the clothing and small accessories. It wasn't until day two that Shelly wiped down the plastic furniture pieces while I was at work and started piecing it all together. However, while things were soaking and she was trying to figure out who the dolls were, pulling them out of the bleach soak occasionally to look at a face, I tried to salvage all the cardboard items I could by wiping them down with rubbing alcohol. The cardboard item here, the very one that drew me in, was the most challenging to wipe down. But it was worth it! I originally wanted this set because it looked so similar in style to the 1993 Mini Mart that Steve, a family friend, gave us many years ago and our first ever Barbie grocery store, the So Much to Do! Supermarket. The register is really cool. I like that there is a way to slide it down. The styling of the Barbie logo and cardboard piece are so adorable and remind me of my childhood. I love the convenience, realism, and practicality of the magazine rack and the plastic piece on the end where you can bag. It is so similar to So Much to Do! I'm glad we got the carriage. A lot of our Barbie carriages have broken over the years. The shelf may be my favorite component. It's size is practical and, while it's missing the cardboard, it'll be fine with our grocery store themed backdrop! I love the purple accents on the top and how it has a place for storage. It reminds me of how we would use my ancient Barbie caboodle as a grocery store display AND storage unit for our dolly food. I like this set for so many reasons.

If the weather is good he likes to have his driver bring out some of his car collection and park them in the front garden. Pride of place today is his Bugatti Type 55, a sports car produced by Bugatti from 1932-1935. 2.3 L (2262 cc. 2-valve DOHC straight-8 engine with a Roots-type supercharger. It produces 130 hp (96 kW) at 5000 rpm, often criticized for its lack of practicality and for being deafening to ride in, due to a combination of noisy mechanicals and straight cut gears.

( thanks to RBH as enactor )

Strength and power come directly from intention and then action in that order, sure. But to break it down to more than that, it takes a deep harnessing of spiritual intention and activated genuine desire to do something to get anything genuinely done, good or bad. Desire is desire, like a river is a river, it flows no matter what to where it needs to go. Activated desire is like an uncontrollably flowing river that goes where it needs to go and wants to go. Desire is the power behind it all as a spiritual concept, especially when it is activated through purity of action, whatever it may be.

 

The way to harness life energy productively is to use it, no matter how it is used. Like a river uses the ground to move its water. Or a plant grows through being nourished by the river on the riverside. To increase, harness and control life energy this is all that is necessary in every genuine way.

 

Now sure, it begins with thinking and it ends with persistence and achievement. That simple. I am coming from a place of deep honesty, reality and practicality about the situation as it all really is.

 

So, when it is said, "by all means persist." That saying has been fully decoded for you here in this picture: The isolation of life energy in fully practical terms.

 

Taken: Hussaini Village, Hike back to KKH from Borit Lake, Upper Hunza, Near Passu, Northern Areas of Pakistan.

 

Rate my photo: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Kālī, also known as Kālikā (Sanskrit: कालिका), is the Hindu goddess associated with empowerment, shakti. She is the fierce aspect of the goddess Durga (Parvati). The name Kali comes from kāla, which means black, time, death, lord of death: Shiva. Since Shiva is called Kāla— the eternal time — the name of Kālī, his consort, also means "Time" or "Death" (as in "time has come"). Hence, Kāli is the Goddess of Time and Change. Although sometimes presented as dark and violent, her earliest incarnation as a figure of annihilation of evil forces still has some influence. Various Shakta Hindu cosmologies, as well as Shākta Tantric beliefs, worship her as the ultimate reality or Brahman. Comparatively recent devotional movements largely conceive Kāli as a benevolent mother goddess. Kālī is represented as the consort of Lord Shiva, on whose body she is often seen standing. Shiva lies in the path of Kali, whose foot on Shiva subdues her anger.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Kālī is the feminine form of kālam ("black, dark coloured"). Kāla primarily means "time" but also means "black" in honor of being the first creation before light itself. Kālī means "the black one" and refers to her being the entity of "time" or "beyond time." Kāli is strongly associated with Shiva, and Shaivas derive the masculine Kāla (an epithet of Shiva) to come from her feminine name. A nineteenth-century Sanskrit dictionary, the Shabdakalpadrum, states: कालः शिवः। तस्य पत्नीति - काली। kālaḥ śivaḥ। tasya patnīti kālī - "Shiva is Kāla, thus, his consort is Kāli" referring to Devi Parvathi being a manifestation of Devi MahaKali.

 

Other names include Kālarātri ("black night"), as described above, and Kālikā ("relating to time"). Coburn notes that the name Kālī can be used as a proper name, or as a description of color.

 

Kāli's association with darkness stands in contrast to her consort, Shiva, who manifested after her in creation, and who symbolises the rest of creation after Time is created. In his supreme awareness of Maya, his body is covered by the white ashes of the cremation ground (Sanskrit: śmaśāna) where he meditates, and with which Kāli is also associated, as śmaśāna-kālī.

 

ORIGINS

Hugh Urban notes that although the word Kālī appears as early as the Atharva Veda, the first use of it as a proper name is in the Kathaka Grhya Sutra (19.7). Kali is the name of one of the seven tongues of Agni, the [Rigvedic] God of Fire, in the Mundaka Upanishad (2:4), but it is unlikely that this refers to the goddess. The first appearance of Kāli in her present form is in the Sauptika Parvan of the Mahabharata (10.8.64). She is called Kālarātri (literally, "black night") and appears to the Pandava soldiers in dreams, until finally she appears amidst the fighting during an attack by Drona's son Ashwatthama. She most famously appears in the sixth century Devi Mahatmyam as one of the shaktis of Mahadevi, and defeats the demon Raktabija ("Bloodseed"). The tenth-century Kalika Purana venerates Kāli as the ultimate reality.

 

According to David Kinsley, Kāli is first mentioned in Hinduism as a distinct goddess around 600 CE, and these texts "usually place her on the periphery of Hindu society or on the battlefield." She is often regarded as the Shakti of Shiva, and is closely associated with him in various Puranas. The Kalika Purana depicts her as the "Adi Shakti" (Fundamental Power) and "Para Prakriti" or beyond nature.

 

WORSHIP & MANTRA

Kali could be considered a general concept, like Durga, and is mostly worshiped in the Kali Kula sect of worship. The closest way of direct worship is Maha Kali or Bhadra Kali (Bhadra in Sanskrit means 'gentle'). Kali is worshiped as one of the 10 Mahavidya forms of Adi Parashakti (Goddess Durga) or Bhagavathy according to the region. The mantra for worship is called Devi Argala Stotram.

Sanskrit: सर्वमङ्गलमाङ्गल्ये शिवे सर्वार्थसाधिके । शरण्ये त्र्यम्बके गौरि नारायणि नमोऽस्तु ते ॥

 

ॐ जयंती मंगल काली भद्रकाली कपालिनी । दुर्गा क्षमा शिवा धात्री स्वाहा स्वधा नमोऽस्तु‍ते ॥

(Sarvamaṅgalamāṅgalyē śivē sarvārthasādhikē . śaraṇyē tryambakē gauri nārāyaṇi namō'stu tē.

Oṃ jayantī mangala kālī bhadrakālī kapālinī . durgā kṣamā śivā dhātrī svāhā svadhā namō'stu‍tē.)

 

TANTRA

Goddesses play an important role in the study and practice of Tantra Yoga, and are affirmed to be as central to discerning the nature of reality as are the male deities. Although Parvati is often said to be the recipient and student of Shiva's wisdom in the form of Tantras, it is Kāli who seems to dominate much of the Tantric iconography, texts, and rituals. In many sources Kāli is praised as the highest reality or greatest of all deities. The Nirvana-tantra says the gods Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva all arise from her like bubbles in the sea, ceaselessly arising and passing away, leaving their original source unchanged. The Niruttara-tantra and the Picchila-tantra declare all of Kāli's mantras to be the greatest and the Yogini-tantra, Kamakhya-tantra and the Niruttara-tantra all proclaim Kāli vidyas (manifestations of Mahadevi, or "divinity itself"). They declare her to be an essence of her own form (svarupa) of the Mahadevi.

 

In the Mahanirvana-tantra, Kāli is one of the epithets for the primordial sakti, and in one passage Shiva praises her:

 

At the dissolution of things, it is Kāla [Time] Who will devour all, and by reason of this He is called Mahākāla [an epithet of Lord Shiva], and since Thou devourest Mahākāla Himself, it is Thou who art the Supreme Primordial Kālika. Because Thou devourest Kāla, Thou art Kāli, the original form of all things, and because Thou art the Origin of and devourest all things Thou art called the Adya [the Primordial One]. Re-assuming after Dissolution Thine own form, dark and formless, Thou alone remainest as One ineffable and inconceivable. Though having a form, yet art Thou formless; though Thyself without beginning, multiform by the power of Maya, Thou art the Beginning of all, Creatrix, Protectress, and Destructress that Thou art.

 

The figure of Kāli conveys death, destruction, and the consuming aspects of reality. As such, she is also a "forbidden thing", or even death itself. In the Pancatattva ritual, the sadhaka boldly seeks to confront Kali, and thereby assimilates and transforms her into a vehicle of salvation. This is clear in the work of the Karpuradi-stotra, a short praise of Kāli describing the Pancatattva ritual unto her, performed on cremation grounds. (Samahana-sadhana)

 

He, O Mahākāli who in the cremation-ground, naked, and with dishevelled hair, intently meditates upon Thee and recites Thy mantra, and with each recitation makes offering to Thee of a thousand Akanda flowers with seed, becomes without any effort a Lord of the earth. Oh Kāli, whoever on Tuesday at midnight, having uttered Thy mantra, makes offering even but once with devotion to Thee of a hair of his Shakti [his energy/female companion] in the cremation-ground, becomes a great poet, a Lord of the earth, and ever goes mounted upon an elephant.

 

The Karpuradi-stotra clearly indicates that Kāli is more than a terrible, vicious, slayer of demons who serves Durga or Shiva. Here, she is identified as the supreme mistress of the universe, associated with the five elements. In union with Lord Shiva, she creates and destroys worlds. Her appearance also takes a different turn, befitting her role as ruler of the world and object of meditation. In contrast to her terrible aspects, she takes on hints of a more benign dimension. She is described as young and beautiful, has a gentle smile, and makes gestures with her two right hands to dispel any fear and offer boons. The more positive features exposed offer the distillation of divine wrath into a goddess of salvation, who rids the sadhaka of fear. Here, Kali appears as a symbol of triumph over death.

 

BENGALI TRADITION

Kali is also a central figure in late medieval Bengali devotional literature, with such devotees as Ramprasad Sen (1718–75). With the exception of being associated with Parvati as Shiva's consort, Kāli is rarely pictured in Hindu legends and iconography as a motherly figure until Bengali devotions beginning in the early eighteenth century. Even in Bengāli tradition her appearance and habits change little, if at all.

 

The Tantric approach to Kāli is to display courage by confronting her on cremation grounds in the dead of night, despite her terrible appearance. In contrast, the Bengali devotee appropriates Kāli's teachings adopting the attitude of a child, coming to love her unreservedly. In both cases, the goal of the devotee is to become reconciled with death and to learn acceptance of the way that things are. These themes are well addressed in Rāmprasād's work. Rāmprasād comments in many of his other songs that Kāli is indifferent to his wellbeing, causes him to suffer, brings his worldly desires to nothing and his worldly goods to ruin. He also states that she does not behave like a mother should and that she ignores his pleas:

 

Can mercy be found in the heart of her who was born of the stone? [a reference to Kali as the daughter of Himalaya]

Were she not merciless, would she kick the breast of her lord?

Men call you merciful, but there is no trace of mercy in you, Mother.

You have cut off the heads of the children of others, and these you wear as a garland around your neck.

It matters not how much I call you "Mother, Mother." You hear me, but you will not listen.

 

To be a child of Kāli, Rāmprasād asserts, is to be denied of earthly delights and pleasures. Kāli is said to refrain from giving that which is expected. To the devotee, it is perhaps her very refusal to do so that enables her devotees to reflect on dimensions of themselves and of reality that go beyond the material world.

 

A significant portion of Bengali devotional music features Kāli as its central theme and is known as Shyama Sangeet ("Music of the Night"). Mostly sung by male vocalists, today even women have taken to this form of music. One of the finest singers of Shyāma Sāngeet is Pannalal Bhattacharya.

 

In Bengal, Kāli is venerated in the festival Kali Puja, the new moon day of Ashwin month which coincides with Diwali festival.

 

In a unique form of Kāli worship, Shantipur worships Kāli in the form of a hand painted image of the deity known as Poteshwari (meaning the deity drawn on a piece of cloth).

 

LEGENDS

SLAYER OF RAKTABIJA

In Kāli's most famous legend, Devi Durga (Adi Parashakti) and her assistants, the Matrikas, wound the demon Raktabija, in various ways and with a variety of weapons in an attempt to destroy him. They soon find that they have worsened the situation for with every drop of blood that is dripped from Raktabija he reproduces a clone of himself. The battlefield becomes increasingly filled with his duplicates. Durga, in need of help, summons Kāli to combat the demons. It is said, in some versions, that Goddess Durga actually assumes the form of Goddess Kāli at this time. The Devi Mahatmyam describes:

 

Out of the surface of her (Durga's) forehead, fierce with frown, issued suddenly Kali of terrible countenance, armed with a sword and noose. Bearing the strange khatvanga (skull-topped staff ), decorated with a garland of skulls, clad in a tiger's skin, very appalling owing to her emaciated flesh, with gaping mouth, fearful with her tongue lolling out, having deep reddish eyes, filling the regions of the sky with her roars, falling upon impetuously and slaughtering the great asuras in that army, she devoured those hordes of the foes of the devas.

 

Kali destroys Raktabija by sucking the blood from his body and putting the many Raktabija duplicates in her gaping mouth. Pleased with her victory, Kali then dances on the field of battle, stepping on the corpses of the slain. In the Devi Mahatmya version of this story, Kali is also described as a Matrika and as a Shakti or power of Devi. She is given the epithet Cāṃuṇḍā (Chamunda), i.e. the slayer of the demons Chanda and Munda. Chamunda is very often identified with Kali and is very much like her in appearance and habit.

 

DAKSHINA KALI

In her most famous pose as Daksinakali, popular legends say that Kali, becoming drunk on the blood of her victims on the battlefield, dances with destructive frenzy. She is about to destroy the whole universe when, urged by all the gods, Shiva lies in her way to stop her. In her fury, she fails to see the body of Shiva lying amongst the corpses on the battlefield and steps upon his chest. Realizing Shiva lies beneath her feet, her anger is pacified and she calms her fury. Though not included in any of the puranas, popular legends state that Kali was ashamed at the prospect of keeping her husband beneath her feet and thus stuck her tongue out in shame. The Devi-Bhagavata Purana, which goes into great depths about the goddess Kali, reveals the tongue's actual symbolism.

 

The characteristic icons that depict Kali are the following; unbridled matted hair, open blood shot eyes, open mouth and a drooping tongue; in her hands, she holds a Khadga (bent sword or scimitar) and a human head; she has a girdle of human hands across her waist and an enchanted Shiva lies beneath her feet. Each of these icons represent a deep philosophical epithet. The drooping out-stuck tongue represents her blood-thirst. Lord Shiva beneath her feet represents matter, as Kali is undoubtedly the primeval energy. The depiction of Kali on Shiva shows that without energy, matter lies "dead". This concept has been simplified to a folk-tale depicting a wife placing her foot on her husband and sticking her tongue out in shame. In tantric contexts, the tongue is seen to denote the element (guna) of rajas (energy and action) controlled by sattva.

 

If Kali steps on Shiva with her right foot and holds the sword in her left hand, she is considered to be Dakshina Kali. The Dakshina Kali Temple has important religious associations with the Jagannath Temple and it is believed that Daksinakali is the guardian of the kitchen of the Lord Jagannath Temple. Puranic tradition says that in Puri, Lord Jagannath is regarded as Daksinakalika. Goddess Dakshinakali plays an important role in the 'Niti' of Saptapuri Amavasya.

 

One South Indian tradition tells of a dance contest between Shiva and Kali. After defeating the two demons Sumbha and Nisumbha, Kali takes up residence in the forest of Thiruvalankadu or Thiruvalangadu. She terrorizes the surrounding area with her fierce, disruptive nature. One of Shiva's devotees becomes distracted while performing austerities, and asks Shiva to rid the forest of the destructive goddess. When Shiva arrives, Kali threatens him, claiming the territory as her own. Shiva challenges Kali to a dance contest; both of them dance and Kali matches Shiva in every step that he takes until Shiva takes the "Urdhvatandava" step, by vertically raising his right leg. Kali refuses to perform this step, which would not befit her as a woman, and became pacified.

 

SMASHAN KALI

If the Kali steps out with the left foot and holds the sword in her right hand, she is the terrible form of Mother, the Smashan Kali of the cremation ground. She is worshiped by tantrics, the followers of Tantra, who believe that one's spiritual discipline practiced in a smashan (cremation ground) brings success quickly. Sarda Devi, the consort of Ramakrishna Paramhansa, worshipped Smashan Kali at Dakshineshwar.

 

MATERNAL KALI

Another legend depicts the infant Shiva calming Kali. In this similar story, Kali has defeated her enemies on the battlefield and begun to dance out of control, drunk on the blood of the slain. To calm her down and to protect the stability of the world, Shiva is sent to the battlefield, as an infant, crying aloud. Seeing the child's distress, Kali ceases dancing to care for the helpless infant. She picks him up, kisses his head, and proceeds to breast feed the infant Shiva. This legend is notable because it shows Kali in her benevolent, maternal aspect, with which she is not usually identified.

 

MAHAKALI

Mahakali (Sanskrit: Mahākālī, Devanagari: महाकाली), literally translated as Great Kali, is sometimes considered as a greater form of Kali, identified with the Ultimate reality of Brahman. It can also be used as an honorific of the Goddess Kali, signifying her greatness by the prefix "Mahā-". Mahakali, in Sanskrit, is etymologically the feminized variant of Mahakala or Great Time (which is interpreted also as Death), an epithet of the God Shiva in Hinduism. Mahakali is the presiding Goddess of the first episode of the Devi Mahatmya. Here she is depicted as Devi in her universal form as Shakti. Here Devi serves as the agent who allows the cosmic order to be restored.

 

Kali is depicted in the Mahakali form as having ten heads, ten arms, and ten legs. Each of her ten hands is carrying a various implement which vary in different accounts, but each of these represent the power of one of the Devas or Hindu Gods and are often the identifying weapon or ritual item of a given Deva. The implication is that Mahakali subsumes and is responsible for the powers that these deities possess and this is in line with the interpretation that Mahakali is identical with Brahman. While not displaying ten heads, an "ekamukhi" or one headed image may be displayed with ten arms, signifying the same concept: the powers of the various Gods come only through Her grace.

 

ICONOGRAPHY

Kali is portrayed mostly in two forms: the popular four-armed form and the ten-armed Mahakali form. In both of her forms, she is described as being black in color but is most often depicted as blue in popular Indian art. Her eyes are described as red with intoxication, and in absolute rage, her hair is shown disheveled, small fangs sometimes protrude out of her mouth, and her tongue is lolling. She is often shown naked or just wearing a skirt made of human arms and a garland of human heads. She is also accompanied by serpents and a jackal while standing on a seemingly dead Shiva, usually right foot forward to symbolize the more popular Dakshinamarga or right-handed path, as opposed to the more infamous and transgressive Vamamarga or left-handed path.

 

In the ten-armed form of Mahakali she is depicted as shining like a blue stone. She has ten faces and ten feet and three eyes. She has ornaments decked on all her limbs. There is no association with Shiva.

 

The Kalika Purana describes Kali as possessing a soothing dark complexion, as perfectly beautiful, riding a lion, four-armed, holding a sword and blue lotuses, her hair unrestrained, body firm and youthful.

 

In spite of her seemingly terrible form, Kali Ma is often considered the kindest and most loving of all the Hindu goddesses, as she is regarded by her devotees as the Mother of the whole Universe. And because of her terrible form, she is also often seen as a great protector. When the Bengali saint Ramakrishna once asked a devotee why one would prefer to worship Mother over him, this devotee rhetorically replied, "Maharaj, when they are in trouble your devotees come running to you. But, where do you run when you are in trouble?"

 

According to Ramakrishna, darkness is the Ultimate Mother, or Kali:

 

My Mother is the principle of consciousness. She is Akhanda Satchidananda; indivisible Reality, Awareness, and Bliss. The night sky between the stars is perfectly black. The waters of the ocean depths are the same; The infinite is always mysteriously dark. This inebriating darkness is my beloved Kali.

 

SRI RAMAKRISHNA

This is clear in the works of such contemporary artists as Charles Wish, and Tyeb Mehta, who sometimes take great liberties with the traditional, accepted symbolism, but still demonstrate a true reverence for the Shakta sect.

 

POPULAR FORM

Classic depictions of Kali share several features, as follows:

 

Kali's most common four armed iconographic image shows each hand carrying variously a sword, a trishul (trident), a severed head and a bowl or skull-cup (kapala) catching the blood of the severed head.

 

Two of these hands (usually the left) are holding a sword and a severed head. The Sword signifies Divine Knowledge and the Human Head signifies human Ego which must be slain by Divine Knowledge in order to attain Moksha. The other two hands (usually the right) are in the abhaya (fearlessness) and varada (blessing) mudras, which means her initiated devotees (or anyone worshipping her with a true heart) will be saved as she will guide them here and in the hereafter.

 

She has a garland consisting of human heads, variously enumerated at 108 (an auspicious number in Hinduism and the number of countable beads on a Japa Mala or rosary for repetition of Mantras) or 51, which represents Varnamala or the Garland of letters of the Sanskrit alphabet, Devanagari. Hindus believe Sanskrit is a language of dynamism, and each of these letters represents a form of energy, or a form of Kali. Therefore she is generally seen as the mother of language, and all mantras.

 

She is often depicted naked which symbolizes her being beyond the covering of Maya since she is pure (nirguna) being-consciousness-bliss and far above prakriti. She is shown as very dark as she is brahman in its supreme unmanifest state. She has no permanent qualities - she will continue to exist even when the universe ends. It is therefore believed that the concepts of color, light, good, bad do not apply to her - she is the pure, un-manifested energy, the Adi-shakti.

 

SHIVA IN KALI ICONOGRAPHY

In both these images she is shown standing on the prone, inert or dead body of Shiva. There is a legend for the reason behind her standing on what appears to be Shiva's corpse, which translates as follows:

 

Once Kali had destroyed all the demons in battle, she began a terrific dance out of the sheer joy of victory. All the worlds or lokas began to tremble and sway under the impact of her dance. So, at the request of all the Gods, Shiva himself asked her to desist from this behavior. However, she was too intoxicated to listen. Hence, Shiva lay like a corpse among the slain demons in order to absorb the shock of the dance into himself. When Kali eventually stepped upon Shiva, she realized she was trampling and hurting her husband and bit her tongue in shame.

 

The story described here is a popular folk tale and not described or hinted in any of the puranas. The puranic interpretation is as follows:

 

Once, Parvati asks Shiva to chose the one form among her 10 forms which he likes most. To her surprise, Shiva reveals that he is most comfortable with her Kali form, in which she is bereft of her jewellery, her human-form, her clothes, her emotions and where she is only raw, chaotic energy, where she is as terrible as time itself and even greater than time. As Parvati takes the form of Kali, Shiva lies at her feet and requests her to place her foot on his chest, upon his heart. Once in this form, Shiva requests her to have this place, below her feet in her iconic image which would be worshiped throughout.

 

This idea has been explored in the Devi-Bhagavata Purana and is most popular in the Shyama Sangeet, devotional songs to Kali from the 12th to 15th centuries.

 

The Tantric interpretation of Kali standing on top of her husband is as follows:

 

The Shiv tattava (Divine Consciousness as Shiva) is inactive, while the Shakti tattava (Divine Energy as Kali) is active. Shiva and Kali represent Brahman, the Absolute pure consciousness which is beyond all names, forms and activities. Kali, on the other hand, represents the potential (and manifested) energy responsible for all names, forms and activities. She is his Shakti, or creative power, and is seen as the substance behind the entire content of all consciousness. She can never exist apart from Shiva or act independently of him, just as Shiva remains a mere corpse without Kali i.e., Shakti, all the matter/energy of the universe, is not distinct from Shiva, or Brahman, but is rather the dynamic power of Brahman. Hence, Kali is Para Brahman in the feminine and dynamic aspect while Shiva is the male aspect and static. She stands as the absolute basis for all life, energy and beneath her feet lies, Shiva, a metaphor for mass, which cannot retain its form without energy.

 

While this is an advanced concept in monistic Shaktism, it also agrees with the Nondual Trika philosophy of Kashmir, popularly known as Kashmir Shaivism and associated most famously with Abhinavagupta. There is a colloquial saying that "Shiva without Shakti is Shava" which means that without the power of action (Shakti) that is Mahakali (represented as the short "i" in Devanagari) Shiva (or consciousness itself) is inactive; Shava means corpse in Sanskrit and the play on words is that all Sanskrit consonants are assumed to be followed by a short letter "a" unless otherwise noted. The short letter "i" represents the female power or Shakti that activates Creation. This is often the explanation for why She is standing on Shiva, who is either Her husband and complement in Shaktism or the Supreme Godhead in Shaivism.

 

To properly understand this complex Tantric symbolism it is important to remember that the meaning behind Shiva and Kali does not stray from the non-dualistic parlance of Shankara or the Upanisads. According to both the Mahanirvana and Kularnava Tantras, there are two distinct ways of perceiving the same absolute reality. The first is a transcendental plane which is often described as static, yet infinite. It is here that there is no matter, there is no universe and only consciousness exists. This form of reality is known as Shiva, the absolute Sat-Chit-Ananda - existence, knowledge and bliss. The second is an active plane, an immanent plane, the plane of matter, of Maya, i.e., where the illusion of space-time and the appearance of an actual universe does exist. This form of reality is known as Kali or Shakti, and (in its entirety) is still specified as the same Absolute Sat-Chit-Ananda. It is here in this second plane that the universe (as we commonly know it) is experienced and is described by the Tantric seer as the play of Shakti, or God as Mother Kali.

 

From a Tantric perspective, when one meditates on reality at rest, as absolute pure consciousness (without the activities of creation, preservation or dissolution) one refers to this as Shiva or Brahman. When one meditates on reality as dynamic and creative, as the Absolute content of pure consciousness (with all the activities of creation, preservation or dissolution) one refers to it as Kali or Shakti. However, in either case the yogini or yogi is interested in one and the same reality - the only difference being in name and fluctuating aspects of appearance. It is this which is generally accepted as the meaning of Kali standing on the chest of Shiva.

 

Although there is often controversy surrounding the images of divine copulation, the general consensus is benign and free from any carnal impurities in its substance. In Tantra the human body is a symbol for the microcosm of the universe; therefore sexual process is responsible for the creation of the world. Although theoretically Shiva and Kali (or Shakti) are inseparable, like fire and its power to burn, in the case of creation they are often seen as having separate roles. With Shiva as male and Kali as female it is only by their union that creation may transpire. This reminds us of the prakrti and purusa doctrine of Samkhya wherein prakāśa- vimarśa has no practical value, just as without prakrti, purusa is quite inactive. This (once again) stresses the interdependencies of Shiva and Shakti and the vitality of their union.

 

Gopi Krishna proposed that Kali standing on the dead Shiva or Shava (Sanskrit for dead body) symbolised the helplessness of a person undergoing the changing process (psychologically and physiologically) in the body conducted by the Kundalini Shakti.

 

DEVELOPMENT

In the later traditions, Kali has become inextricably linked with Shiva. The unleashed form of Kali often becomes wild and uncontrollable, and only Shiva is able to tame her just as only Kali can tame Shiva. This is both because she is often a transformed version of one of his consorts and because he is able to match her wildness.

 

The ancient text of Kali Kautuvam describes her competition with Shiva in dance, from which the sacred 108 Karanas appeared. Shiva won the competition by acting the urdva tandava, one of the Karanas, by raising his feet to his head. Other texts describe Shiva appearing as a crying infant and appealing to her maternal instincts. While Shiva is said to be able to tame her, the iconography often presents her dancing on his fallen body, and there are accounts of the two of them dancing together, and driving each other to such wildness that the world comes close to unravelling.

 

Shiva's involvement with Tantra and Kali's dark nature have led to her becoming an important Tantric figure. To the Tantric worshippers, it was essential to face her Curse, the terror of death, as willingly as they accepted Blessings from her beautiful, nurturing, maternal aspect. For them, wisdom meant learning that no coin has only one side: as death cannot exist without life, so life cannot exist without death. Kali's role sometimes grew beyond that of a chaos - which could be confronted - to that of one who could bring wisdom, and she is given great metaphysical significance by some Tantric texts. The Nirvāna-tantra clearly presents her uncontrolled nature as the Ultimate Reality, claiming that the trimurti of Brahma, Vishnu and Rudra arise and disappear from her like bubbles from the sea. Although this is an extreme case, the Yogini-tantra, Kamakhya-tantra and the Niruttara-tantra declare her the svarupa (own-being) of the Mahadevi (the great Goddess, who is in this case seen as the combination of all devis).

 

The final stage of development is the worshipping of Kali as the Great Mother, devoid of her usual violence. This practice is a break from the more traditional depictions. The pioneers of this tradition are the 18th century Shakta poets such as Ramprasad Sen, who show an awareness of Kali's ambivalent nature. Ramakrishna, the 19th century Bengali saint, was also a great devotee of Kali; the western popularity of whom may have contributed to the more modern, equivocal interpretations of this Goddess. Rachel McDermott's work, however, suggests that for the common, modern worshipper, Kali is not seen as fearful, and only those educated in old traditions see her as having a wrathful component. Some credit to the development of Devi must also be given to Samkhya. Commonly referred to as the Devi of delusion, Mahamaya or Durga, acting in the confines of (but not being bound by) the nature of the three gunas, takes three forms: Maha-Kali, Maha-Lakshmi and Maha-Saraswati, being her tamas-ika, rajas-ika and sattva-ika forms. In this sense, Kali is simply part of a larger whole.

 

Like Sir John Woodroffe and Georg Feuerstein, many Tantric scholars (as well as sincere practitioners) agree that, no matter how propitious or appalling you describe them, Shiva and Devi are simply recognizable symbols for everyday, abstract (yet tangible) concepts such as perception, knowledge, space-time, causation and the process of liberating oneself from the confines of such things. Shiva, symbolizing pure, absolute consciousness, and Devi, symbolizing the entire content of that consciousness, are ultimately one and the same - totality incarnate, a micro-macro-cosmic amalgamation of all subjects, all objects and all phenomenal relations between the "two." Like man and woman who both share many common, human traits yet at the same time they are still different and, therefore, may also be seen as complementary.

 

Worshippers prescribe various benign and horrific qualities to Devi simply out of practicality. They do this so they may have a variety of symbols to choose from, symbols which they can identify and relate with from the perspective of their own, ever-changing time, place and personal level of unfolding. Just like modern chemists or physicists use a variety of molecular and atomic models to describe what is unperceivable through rudimentary, sensory input, the scientists of ontology and epistemology must do the same. One of the underlying distinctions of Tantra, in comparison to other religions, is that it allows the devotee the liberty to choose from a vast array of complementary symbols and rhetoric which suit one's evolving needs and tastes. From an aesthetic standpoint, nothing is interdict and nothing is orthodox. In this sense, the projection of some of Devi's more gentle qualities onto Kali is not sacrilege and the development of Kali really lies in the practitioner, not the murthi.

 

A TIME magazine article of October 27, 1947, used Kali as a symbol and metaphor for the human suffering in British India during its partition that year.

 

Swami Vivekananda wrote his favorite poem Kali the Mother in 1898.

 

IN NEW AGE & NEOPAGANISM

An academic study of Western Kali enthusiasts noted that, "as shown in the histories of all cross-cultural religious transplants, Kali devotionalism in the West must take on its own indigenous forms if it is to adapt to its new environment." The adoption of Kali by the West has raised accusations of cultural appropriation:

 

A variety of writers and thinkers have found Kali an exciting figure for reflection and exploration, notably feminists and participants in New Age spirituality who are attracted to goddess worship. Kali is a symbol of wholeness and healing, associated especially with repressed female power and sexuality. [However, such interpretations often exhibit] confusion and misrepresentation, stemming from a lack of knowledge of Hindu history among these authors, draw upon materials written by scholars of the Hindu religious tradition. The majority instead rely chiefly on other popular feminist sources, almost none of which base their interpretations on a close reading of Kali's Indian background. The most important issue arising from this discussion - even more important than the question of 'correct' interpretation - concerns the adoption of other people's religious symbols. It is hard to import the worship of a goddess from another culture: religious associations and connotations have to be learned, imagined or intuited when the deep symbolic meanings embedded in the native culture are not available.

 

WIKIPEDIA

THERE’S A SPECIAL place in the custom motorcycle scene for motorcycles that eschew practicality, in order to push boundaries. This BMW R nineT from Zillers Garage in Russia is hardly the ideal grocery getter or tourer, but the level of craftsmanship at play here is on another level. And that’s why we love it.

 

Zillers Garage is run by Dmitry Golubchikov—an AMD Championship winner who wowed us with his custom Vincent a few months ago. He mostly works alone, but occasionally calls in reinforcements on bigger projects. The commission for this R nineT came from BMW Motorrad Russia, but the inspiration came from the world of aviation.

 

Dmitry started out with a 2016-model R nineT, but all that’s really left now is the motor, final drive arm and part of the frame. Just about everything else was created in-house, with the bike taking a full ten months to complete.

 

The R nineT’s most striking feature is undoubtedly its retro-futuristic bodywork. With the exception of the boxer cylinder heads still poking out, the entire bike is wrapped in hand-formed aluminum sections. And the lines are inspired—from the robotic visage up front, right through to the classically styled tail section.

I am soooooo pleased with how this dress came out. I used the Oliver and S Playdate Dress pattern and this was my first crack at it, and It went very well, no problems. I have to thank Nicole for her great tutorial on making this dress that I used the entire time and also for her great idea of adding a tab instead of the ruffles and buttons on the front yoke. So I used Berry kona cotton with Heather Ross Far Far Away I double gauze flowers as the yoke (with a kona white lining) and Bubble Gum kona cotton as the piping and accent color. I added a tab on the front left yoke with an embroidered flower to match the HR print. I love the beauty of this little dress, the practicality of the pockets and the pleats in the sleeves and on the dress that create beautiful dimension in the solid berry. Maybe next I can snap a picture of Lucy wearing it :)