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No Vale da Ferradura, a convivência harmônica com a natureza é um espetáculo à parte. Curta o vento, o sol, as belas vistas, um banho de cachoeira, os animais!
Aqui você encontra animais como quati, macaco-prego, bugio-ruivo, serelepe, cutia, gambá, mão-pelada, veado-mateiro, graxaim e muitos roedores. E também grande variedade de aves de extrema beleza e raridade.
Muitos deles possuem um contato próximo com os seres humanos, como é o caso, principalmente, dos quatis, e em geral você pode observá-los de perto na área principal do Vale da Ferradura, mesmo sem fazer as trilhas.
Os quatis, em grande quantidade no Vale da Ferradura, são mamíferos que se alimentam de minhocas, insetos e frutas, apreciando também ovos, legumes e especialmente lagartos. Dormem no alto das árvores, enrolados como uma bola, e não descem antes do amanhecer. Seu órgão mais sensível com certeza é seu nariz, que é móvel e muito alongado. Possui dentes e garras fortes.
O parque Vale da Ferradura está localizado ao norte do município de Canela RS, na região correspondente às coordenadas 29°16' S - 50°50' W, compreendendo um total de aproximadamente 200 ha, com altitudes que variam de 400 m a 750 m.
Fica no Planalto das Araucárias, popularmente designado como "Serra Gaúcha". Os elementos que compõem a sua flora são típicos da Floresta Ombrófila Mista Montana e da Floresta Estacional Semidecidual Montana, com áreas de transição entre as mesmas e com diversos estágios de sucessão.
A área do parque faz parte da bacia hidrográfica do rio Caí. Nesta bacia, existem 11 Unidades de Conservação municipais e/ou particulares, duas estaduais - Parque Estadual do Delta do Jacuí e Parque Estadual do Caracol - e uma Federal - Floresta Nacional de Canela.
O clima da região é superúmido, com as curvas ombrométricas das estações meteorológicas sempre positivas. Há ocorrência de três ou mais meses com temperaturas médias compensadas mensais abaixo de 15°C, que ocasionam a chamada seca fisiológica das plantas tropicais, criadora da estacionalidade.
O Vale da Ferradura possui variados micro-habitats, com áreas mais expostas a incidência solar, aos ventos e sujeitas a interferência humana, bem como áreas totalmente protegidas, sombreadas, úmidas e sujeitas a inundações periódicas. A preservação destes remanescentes aliada à atividade de educação ambiental ao mesmo tempo que ao ócio, como forma de lazer recreativo, é extremamente importante.O parque é cortado por quatro trilhas, que apresentam características peculiares: trilha do Rio Caí, trilha do Pórtico, trilha das Cutias e trilha das Pinguelas.
http://www.canelaturismo.com.br/roteiros-e-atrativos/parque-da-ferradura/
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Outras Informações:
O parque Vale da Ferradura, localizado a 13 km do centro de Canela, proporciona ao turista integração com a natureza, com mirantes para o deslumbrante Vale da Ferradura, para a Cascata do Arroio do Caçador e Rio Santa Cruz. Uma área especial para toda família com trilhas e estrutura de churrasqueira, playground e lanchonete.
No alto do canyon de 420 metros de extensão está localizado o Vale da Ferradura - onde o Rio Santa Cruz forma a ferradura que dá nome ao lugar. A vista privilegiada da cascata do Arroio Caçador, o verde e o ar puro são complementos perfeitos para as 4 trilhas, os 3 mirantes e a estrutura de 8 churrasqueiras, playground e lanchonete, numa área total de aproximadamente 200 hectares.
A área do parque faz parte da bacia hidrográfica do rio Caí. Nesta bacia, existem 11 Unidades de Conservação municipais e/ou particulares, duas estaduais - Parque Estadual do Delta do Jacuí e Parque Estadual do Caracol - e uma federal - Floresta Nacional de Canela.
O Vale da Ferradura possui variados micro-habitats, com áreas mais expostas a incidência solar, aos ventos e sujeitas a interferência humana, bem como áreas totalmente protegidas, sombreadas, úmidas e sujeitas a inundações periódicas. A preservação destes remanescentes aliada à atividade de educação ambiental ao mesmo tempo que ao ócio, como forma de lazer recreativo, é extremamente importante.
As árvores de –Araucária, que produzem os delicioso pinhão são a maioria no parque e atraem animais silvestres como o Quati, a Cutia, o Macaco-prego e a Gralha-azul, importante para a multiplicação das árvores.
MIRANTES
• Mirante Vale da Ferradura
É o principal mirante do Vale da Ferradura. Dele você aprecia a vista da Cascata do Arroio Caçador e tem uma visão geral.
• Mirante do Vale do Arroio Caçador
Proporciona uma vista impressionante do vale do Arroio Caçador. O acesso é por uma trilha leve - cerca de 2 minutos.
• Mirante da Cascata do Arroio Caçador
Proporciona uma vista impressionante da cascata do Arroio Caçador. Aqui você desce 50 metros e a trilha é um pouco mais íngreme.
TRILHAS
• Trilha do Rio Caí
São 350 metros de trilha, iniciando a 750 metros altura e terminando a 400 metros altura, no ponto em que o arroio Caçador deságua no Rio Caí. É a principal trilha do parque, com maior nível de dificuldade, pelo declive do terreno. Você vai levar 60 minutos para descer, e 2 horas para subir.
Como a trilha do Rio Caí pode ser dividida em quatro trechos, você não precisa fazê-la inteira. Confira os trechos:
- O primeiro leva a dois mirantes, localizados a 700 metros de altura e de onde se tem uma belíssima vista da cascata do arroio Caçador.
- O segundo trecho vai de 700 até 550 metros de altura e é o de maior extensão e menor dificuldade.
- O terceiro trecho inicia a 550 metros de altura, ponto onde as trilhas do Rio Caí e do Pórtico se encontram, e termina a 450 metros de altura, no leito do arroio Caçador, acima da queda d’água.
- O quarto e último trecho vai de 450 a 400 metros altura e é o de maior dificuldade, pois o declive é acentuado e as condições de umidade são elevadas. Interessante é que parte deste trecho está sujeita a borrifos d’água, porque acompanha a queda da cascata. Ele termina no pé da cascata do arroio Caçador e às margens do Rio Caí, em uma área plana, local para um descanso merecido.
• Trilha do Pórtico
A trilha do Pórtico tem 200 metros, iniciando a 750 metros de altura e terminando a 550 metros de altura, onde se encontra com a trilha do Rio Caí. Nela existe um recanto conhecido como Cascata do Graxaim, e podem ser admiradas araucárias e xaxins.
• Trilha das Cotias
É uma bela trilha, com muita sombra, sem esforço físico, para todas as idades e condicionamentos físicos. Dá para dizer que, mais que uma trilha, é um passeio em meio à natureza. Encontra-se na faixa entre 700 e 750 metros de altura, no platô do parque, acima da trilha do Pórtico. Aprecie a bela paisagem de cactus e bromélias na área mais rochosa.
• Trilha das Pinguelas
Também está entre 700 e 750 metros de altura, porém voltada para a bela vista do Vale da Ferradura. A trilha das Pinguelas acompanha um pequeno arroio e você aproveita a sombra da copa das árvores.
Localização e informações gerais
O parque Vale da Ferradura fica na Serra Gaúcha, em Canela RS, a 13 km do centro, no Km 6 da RS 466, mais conhecida como Estrada do Caracol. Funciona das 8h30 às 17h30. No verão, quando o sol se põe bastante tarde na Região Sul, este horário pode ser estendido.
Para chegar, pegue a Estrada do Caracol, que está localizada logo ao chegar a Canela, vindo de Gramado, e vá sempre por essa via, seguindo as placas. Após o Parque do Caracol, a estrada é de terra, por alguns quilômetros.
http://www.lajedepedra.com.br/o-hotel/vale-da-ferradura.htm
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For our Camera Club September project: Changing Seasons.
Latin Name: Hydrangea Petiolaris - Climbing Hydrangea
This is a species of Hydrangea native to the woodlands of Japan, the Korean peninsula, and on Sakhalin island of easternmost Siberia in the Russian Far East.
Hydrangea petiolaris is a vigorous woody climbing vine plant, growing to 30 to 50 ft (9 to 15 m) height and 5 to 6 ft (2 to 2 m) wide. It grows up trees and rock faces in its native Asian habitats, climbing by means of small aerial roots on the stems. The leaves are deciduous, ovate, 4–11 cm long and 3–8 cm broad, with a heart-shaped base, coarsely serrated margin and acute apex.
The flowers are produced in flat corymbs 15–25 cm diameter in mid-summer; each corymb includes a small number of peripheral sterile white flowers 2.5-4.5 cm across, and numerous small, off-white fertile flowers 1–2 mm diameter. The fruit is a dry urn-shaped capsule 3–5 mm diameter containing several small winged seeds.
It is cultivated as an ornamental plant in Europe and North America. Climbing hydrangea is grown either on masonry walls or on sturdy trellises or fences. It is at its best where it gets morning sun and afternoon shade, however it can tolerate dense shade, and is therefore often selected for shady, north-facing areas with little or no sun. Its clinging rootlets are not as strong as some other wall-climbing vines, and so is often anchored with supplemental gardening ties. Its outward-reaching side shoots can be pruned back to a pair of buds to espalier it flatter against its support. When pruned during flowering, the blooms are useful in bouquets.
This is part of an autumn series, showing some of the colours and plants in our garden in October.
Taken with my Canon EOS 7D Mark II and Canon Telephoto Zoom 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM EF Lens and framed in Photoshop.
Better viewed in light box - click on the image or press 'L' on your keyboard.
Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits.
~Thomas Jefferson
All my images are protected by copyright, Please do not use in any blogs, websites or reproduced in any way without my specific written permission. Any unauthorized use is strictly prohibited.
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If you are interested in my photos, they are available for sale. Please contact me by email: aragaofrancisco@gmail.com. Do not use without permission.
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Portuguese
Inaugurado em março de 2006, pelo governador Ronaldo Lessa, o Palácio República dos Palmares representou uma contribuição do governo de Alagoas para revitalizar e modernizar o centro comercial de Maceió, que na época passava por reestruturação que englobou praças, prédios e ruas da região.
A inauguração marcou a primeira etapa do Centro Administrativo, parte de um conjunto de obras estruturantes viabilizadas pelo governo de Alagoas no centro da cidade e entorno do Palácio Marechal Floriano Peixoto. Foram também inclusos no projeto a reforma do prédio da Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa de Alagoas (Fapeal) e o antigo prédio do Produban.
A nova estrutura física governamental abriga desde então o Gabinete do Governador, o Gabinete Civil e o Gabinete Militar. O novo prédio otimizou as decisões e proporcionou maior comodidade, criando entrosamento maior entre os órgãos.
O edifício conta com uma estrutura moderna, com vãos livres e sem alvenaria, pele de vidro e salas com divisórias, sala de reunião dos conselhos, salão de despachos, auditório, sala de imprensa com terminais de computador para oferecer toda estrutura necessária aos profissionais de imprensa, e heliponto.
A escolha do nome Palácio República dos Palmares foi feita para homenagear a luta e a história do Quilombo dos Palmares e o bravo povo alagoano. A iniciativa teve o aval das entidades representativas dos comerciantes, dos movimentos e da sociedade civil organizada.
Cada setor do Palácio recebeu denominações referentes a personalidades e mocambos da República dos Palmares, a exemplo do auditório-sala Aquatune; a sala Cerca Real dos Macacos; salas Dandara e dos reis Ganga Zumba e Zumbi, herói e símbolo da luta pela liberdade dos negros. A sala de imprensa, por sua vez, recebeu o nome de Ary Cipolla, renomado profissional do jornalismo brasileiro, que adotou Alagoas como sua terra natal.
http://www.gabinetecivil.al.gov.br/alagoas/palacios
+1 In comments, without the airplane trails removed. Very hectic!
50x 30 sec exposures at 30secs, f4. ISO800. To make sure the church was corectlt exposed I took a shot at the end and painted it with light which was around a min. I then blended the star trails with the correctly painted church.
Beautifully clear and cold night, but very very cold!
Does flickr sharpen photos? It looks different than before i uploaded it.
Hit L
Please don't use this image on websites, blogs or other media without my explicit permission. If you wish to use this image, please, contact me through flickrmail or at vicenc.feliu@gmail.com. © All rights reserved...
Orchids: A Cultural Odyssey. Exhibition at the United States Botanic Garden from February 6– April 11, 2010.
The United States Botanic Garden is rooted in the nation’s heritage. During the late 18th century, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison shared the dream of a national botanic garden and were instrumental in establishing one on the National Mall in 1820.
The institution actually traces its beginning to 1816, when the constitution of the Columbian Institute for the Promotion of Arts and Sciences in Washington, D.C., proposed the creation of a botanic garden to collect, grow, and distribute plants of this and other countries that might contribute to the welfare of the American people. The Institute's garden was established by Congress in 1820 to the west of the Capitol Grounds, from First Street to Third Street between Pennsylvania and Maryland Avenues. This facility functioned until shortly after the organization stopped holding meetings in 1837.
In 1842, the idea of a national botanic garden was reestablished when the United States Exploring Expedition to the South Seas (the Wilkes Expedition) brought to Washington a collection of living plants from around the globe. Initially placed in a specially constructed greenhouse behind the Old Patent Office Building, the plants were moved in late 1850 into a new structure on the site previously occupied by the Columbian Institute's garden.
In continuous operation and open to the public since 1850, the Botanic Garden moved to its present location in 1933, a complex located along the north and south sides of Independence Avenue bordered by First Street and Third Streets, S.W. The Garden includes the Conservatory; the National Garden, which opened in 2006; and Bartholdi Park, which was created in 1932. A plant production and support facility opened in Anacostia in 1993 includes greenhouse bays and maintenance shops.
The U.S. Botanic Garden was formally placed under the jurisdiction of the Joint Committee on the Library of Congress in 1856 and has been administered through the Office of the Architect of the Capitol since 1934. The Architect of the Capitol has served as Acting Director of the United States Botanic Garden and is responsible for the maintenance and operation of the Garden and for any construction, changes, or improvements made.
This was the best I could do without trespassing and was taken through a fence with permision.
And be sure to check by my other acount: www.flickr.com/photos_user.gne?path=&nsid=77145939%40..., to see what else I saw Today here at Dunkirk!!
Yes I'm back again.
However due to my main computer on which I edit my work being struck down with a big bad virus, this picture and all the others I am uploading, were Unedited but have now been replaced with Edited versions. So enjoy and Thanks for your patience and understanding.
I do still hate everything about this shit that is new Flickr and always will, but an inability to find another outlet for my work that is as easy for me to use as the Old BETTER Flickr was, has forced me back to Flickr, even though it goes against everything I believe in.
I don't generally have an opinion on my own work, I prefer to leave that to other people and so based on the positive responses to my work from the various friends I had made on Flickr prior to the changes I have decided to upload some more of my work as an experiment and to see what happens.
So make the most of me before they delete my acount: www.flickr.com/photos/69558134@N05/?details=1, to stop me complaining!!
©All photographs on this site are copyright: ©DESPITE STRAIGHT LINES (Paul Williams) 2011 – 2021 & GETTY IMAGES ®
No license is given nor granted in respect of the use of any copyrighted material on this site other than with the express written agreement of ©DESPITE STRAIGHT LINES (Paul Williams). No image may be used as source material for paintings, drawings, sculptures, or any other art form without permission and/or compensation to ©DESPITE STRAIGHT LINES (Paul Williams)
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I would like to say a huge and heartfelt 'THANK YOU' to GETTY IMAGES, and the 43.733+ Million visitors to my FLICKR site.
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This photograph became my 5,699th frame to be selected for sale in the Getty Images collection and I am very grateful to them for this wonderful opportunity.
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Photograph taken at an altitude of Fifty eight metres at 07:18am just as the light broke through the dawn on an Autumn morning, Saturday Octyober 22nd 2022 off Hythe Avenue and Chessington Avenue in Bexleyheath, Kent.
Here we see an adult male Carrion crow (Corvus corone), one of a pair who I have fed for three years now. Nicknamed Russell, he sits on an aerial opposite my front door, calling to Sheryl his wife, and Baboo, thier young'en from this year.
AN IN DEPTH LOOK AT CORVUS CORONE
LEGEND AND MYTHOLOGY
By Paul Williams
Crows appear in the Bible where Noah uses one to search for dry land and to check on the recession of the flood. Crows supposedly saved the prophet, Elijah, from famine and are an Inuit deity. Legend has it that England and its monarchy will end when there are no more crows in the Tower of London. And some believe that the crows went to the Tower attracted by the regular corpses following executions with written accounts of their presence at the executions of Anne Boleyn and Jane Gray.
In Welsh mythology, unfortunately Crows are seen as symbolic of evilness and black magic thanks to many references to witches transforming into crows or ravens and escaping. Indian legend tells of Kakabhusandi, a crow who sits on the branches of a wish-fulfilling tree called Kalpataru and a crow in Ramayana where Lord Rama blessed the crow with the power to foresee future events and communicate with the souls.
In Native American first nation legend the crow is sometimes considered to be something of a trickster, though they are also viewed positively by some tribes as messengers between this world and the next where they carry messages from the living to those deceased, and even carry healing medicines between both worlds. There is a belief that crows can foresee the future. The Klamath tribe in Oregon believe that when we die, we fly up to heaven as a crow. The Crow can also signify wisdom to some tribes who believe crows had the power to talk and were therefore considered to be one of the wisest of birds. Tribes with Crow Clans include the Chippewa (whose Crow Clan and its totem are called Aandeg), the Hopi (whose Crow Clan is called Angwusngyam or Ungwish-wungwa), the Menominee, the Caddo, the Tlingit, and the Pueblo tribes of New Mexico.
The crow features in the Nanissáanah (Ghost dance), popularized by Jerome Crow Dog, a Brulé Lakota sub-chief and warrior born at Horse Stealing Creek in Montana Territory in 1833, the crow symbolizing wisdom and the past, when the crow had became a guide and acted as a pathfinder during hunting. The Ghost dance movement was originally created in 1870 by Wodziwob, or Gray Hair, a prophet and medicine man of the Paiute tribe in an area that became known as Nevada. Ghost dancers wore crow and eagle feathers in their clothes and hair, and the fact that the Crow could talk placed it as one of the sages of the animal kingdom. The five day dances seeking trance,prophecy and exhortations would eventually play a major part in the pathway towards the white man's broken treaties, the infamous battle at Wounded knee and the surrender of Matȟó Wanáȟtaka (Kicking Bear), after officials began to fear the ghost dancers and rituals which seemed to occur prior to battle.
Historically the Vikings are the group who made so many references to the crow, and Ragnarr Loðbrók and his sons used this species in his banner as well as appearances in many flags and coats of arms. Also, it had some kind of association with Odin, one of their main deities. Norse legend tells us that Odin is accompanied by two crows. Hugin, who symbolizes thought, and Munin, who represents a memory. These two crows were sent out each dawn to fly the entire world, returning at breakfast where they informed the Lord of the Nordic gods of everything that went on in their kingdoms. Odin was also referred to as Rafnagud (raven-god). The raven appears in almost every skaldic poem describing warfare.Coins dating back to 940's minted by Olaf Cuaran depict the Viking war standard, the Raven and Viking war banners (Gonfalon) depicted the bird also.
In Scandinavian legends, crows are a representative of the Goddess of Death, known as Valkyrie (from old Norse 'Valkyrja'), one of the group of maidens who served the Norse deity Odin, visiting battlefields and sending him the souls of the slain worthy of a place in Valhalla. Odin ( also called Wodan, Woden, or Wotan), preferred that heroes be killed in battle and that the most valiant of souls be taken to Valhöll, the hall of slain warriors. It is the crow that provides the Valkyries with important information on who should go. In Hindu ceremonies that are associated to ancestors, the crow has an important place in Vedic rituals. They are seen as messengers of death in Indian culture too.
In Germanic legend, Crows are seen as psychonomes, meaning the act of guiding spirits to their final destination, and that the feathers of a crow could cure a victim who had been cursed. And yet, a lone black crow could symbolize impending death, whilst a group symbolizes a lucky omen! Vikings also saw good omens in the crow and would leave offerings of meat as a token.
The crow also has sacred and prophetic meaning within the Celtic civilization, where it stood for flesh ripped off due to combat and Morrighan, the warrior goddess, often appears in Celtic mythology as a raven or crow, or else is found to be in the company of the birds. Crow is sacred to Lugdnum, the Celtic god of creation who gave his name to the city of Lug
In Greek mythology according to Appolodorus, Apollo is supposedly responsible for the black feathers of the crow, turning them forever black from their pristine white original plumage as a punishment after they brought news that Κορωνις (Coronis) a princess of the Thessalian kingdom of Phlegyantis, Apollo's pregnant lover had left him to marry a mortal, Ischys. In one legend, Apollo burned the crows feathers and then burned Coronis to death, in another Coronis herself was turned into a black crow, and another that she was slain by the arrows of Αρτεμις (Artemis - twin to Apollo). Koronis was later set amongst the stars as the constellation Corvus ("the Crow"). Her name means "Curved One" from the Greek word korônis or "Crow" from the word korônê.A similar Muslim legend allegedly tells of Muhammad, founder of Islam and the last prophet sent by God to Earth, who's secret location was given away by a white crow to his seekers, as he hid in caves. The crow shouted 'Ghar Ghar' (Cave, cave) and thus as punishment, Muhammad turned the crow black and cursed it for eternity to utter only one phrase, 'Ghar, ghar). Native Indian legend where the once rainbow coloured crows became forever black after shedding their colourful plumage over the other animals of the world.
In China the Crow is represented in art as a three legged bird on a solar disk, being a creature that helps the sun in its journey. In Japan there are myths of Crow Tengu who were priests who became vain, and turned into this spirit to serve as messengers until they learn the lesson of humility as well as a great Crow who takes part in Shinto creation stories.
In animal spirit guides there are general perceptions of what sightings of numbers of crows actually mean:
1 Crow Meaning: To carry a message from your near one who died recently.
2 Crows Meaning: Two crows sitting near your home signifies some good news is on your way.
3 Crows Meaning: An upcoming wedding in your family.
4 Crows Meaning: Symbolizes wealth and prosperity.
5 Crows Meaning: Diseases or pain.
6 Crows Meaning: A theft in your house!
7 Crows Meaning: Denotes travel or moving from your house.
8 Crows Meaning: Sorrowful events
Crows are generally seen as the symbolism when alive for doom bringing, misfortune and bad omens, and yet a dead crow symbolises potentially bringing good news and positive change to those who see it. This wonderful bird certainly gets a mixed bag of contradictory mythology and legend over the centuries and in modern days is often seen as a bit of a nuisance, attacking and killing the babies of other birds such as Starlings, Pigeons and House Sparrows as well as plucking the eyes out of lambs in the field, being loud and noisy and violently attacking poor victims in a 'crow court'....
There is even a classic horror film called 'THE CROW' released in 1994 by Miramax Films, directed by Alex Proyas and starring Brandon Lee in his final film appearance as Eric Draven, who is revived by a Crow tapping on his gravestone a year after he and his fiancée are murdered in Detroit by a street gang. The crow becomes his guide as he sets out to avenge the murders. The only son of martial arts expert Bruce Lee, Brandon lee suffered fatal injuries on the set of the film when the crew failed to remove the primer from a cartridge that hit Lee in the abdomen with the same force as a normal bullet. Lee died that day, March 31st 1993 aged 28.
The symbolism of the Crow resurrecting the dead star and accompanying him on his quest for revenge was powerful, and in some part based on the history of the carrion crow itself and the original film grossed more than $94 Million dollars with three subsequent sequels following.
TAKING A CLOSER LOOK
So let's move away from legend, mythology and stories passed down from our parents and grandparents and look at these amazing birds in isolation.
Carrion crow are passerines in the family Corvidae a group of Oscine passerine birds including Crows, Ravens, Rooks, Jackdaws, Jays, Magpies, Treepies, Choughs and Nutcrackers. Technically they are classed as Corvids, and the largest of passerine birds. Carrion crows are medium to large in size with rictal bristles and a single moult per year (most passerines moult twice). Carrion crow was one of the many species originally described by Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus (Carl Von Linne after his ennoblement) in his 1758 and 1759 editions of 'SYSTEMA NATURAE', and it still bears its original name of Corvus corone, derived from the Latin of Corvus, meaning Raven and the Greek κορώνη (korōnē), meaning crow.
Carrion crow are of the Animalia kingdom Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves Order: Passeriformes Family: Corvidae Genus: Corvus and Species: Corvus corone
Corvus corone can reach 45-47cm in length with a 93-104cm wingspan and weigh between 370-650g. They are protected under The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 in the United Kingdom with a Green UK conservation status which means they are of least concern with more than 1,000,000 territories. Breeding occurs in April with fledging of the chicks taking around twenty nine days following an incubation period of around twenty days with 3 to 4 eggs being the average norm. They are abundant in the UK apart from Northwest Scotland and Ireland where the Hooded crow (Corvus cornix) was considered the same species until 2002. They have a lifespan of around four years, whilst Crow species can live to the age of Twenty years old, and the oldest known American crow in the wild was almost Thirty years old. The oldest documented captive crow died at age Fifty nine. They are smaller and have a shorter lifespan than the Raven, which again is used as a symbol in history to live life to the full and not waste a moment!
They are often mistaken for the Rook (Corvus frugilegus), a similar bird, though in the UK, the Rook is actually technically smaller than the Carrion crow averaging 44-46cm in length, 81-99cm wingspan and weighing up to 340g. Rooks have white beaks compared to the black beaks of Carrion crow, a more steeply raked ratio from head to beak, and longer straighter beaks as well as a different plumage pattern. There are documented cases in the UK of singular and grouped Rooks attacking and killing Carrion crows in their territory. Rooks nest in colonies unlike Carrion crows. Carrion crows have only a few natural enemies including powerful raptors such as the northern goshawk, the peregrine falcon, the Eurasian eagle-owl and the golden eagle which will all readily hunt them.
Regarded as one of the most intelligent birds, indeed creatures on the planet, studies suggest that Corvids cognitive abilities can rival that of primates such as chimpanzees and gorillas and even provide clues to understanding human intelligence. Crows have relatively large brains for their body size, compared to other animals. Their encephalization quotient (EQ) a ratio of brain to body size, adjusted for size because there isn’t a linear relationship is 4.1. That is remarkably close to chimps at 4.2 whilst humans are 8.1. Corvids also have a very high neuronal density, the number of neurons per gram of brain, factoring in the number of cortical neurons, neuron packing density, interneuronal distance and axonal conduction velocity shows that Corvids score high on this measure as well, with humans scoring the highest.
A corvid's pallium is packed with more neurons than a great ape's. Corvids have demonstrated the ability to use a combination of mental tools such as imagination, and anticipation of future events. They can craft tools from twigs and branches to hook grubs from deep recesses, they can solve puzzles and intricate methods of gaining access to food set by humans., and have even bent pieces of wire into hooks to obtain food. They have been proven to have a higher cognitive ability level than seven year old humans. Communications wise, their repertoire of wraw-wraw's is not fully understood, but the intensity, rhythm, and duration of caws seems to form the basis of a possible language. They also remember the faces of humans who have hindered or hurt them and pass that information on to their offspring.
Aesop's fable of 'The Crow and the Pitcher, tells of a thirsty crow which drops stones into a water pitcher to raise the water level and enable it to take a drink. Scientists have conducted tests to see whether crows really are this intelligent. They placed floating treats in a deep tube and observed the crows indeed dropping dense objects carefully selected into the water until the treat floated within reach. They had the intelligence to pick up, weigh and discount objects that would float in the water, they also did not select ones that were too large for the container.
Pet crows develop a unique call for their owners, in effect actually naming them. They also know to sunbathe for a dose of vitamin D, regularly settling on wooden garden fences, opening their mouths and wings and raising their heads to the sun. In groups they warn of danger and communicate vocally. They store a cache of food for later if in abundance and are clever enough to move it if they feel it has been discovered. They leave markers for their cache. They have even learned to place walnuts and similar hard food items under car tyres at traffic lights as a means of cracking them!
Crows regularly gather around a dead fellow corvid, almost like a funeral, and it is thought they somehow learn from each death. They can even remember human faces for decades.Crows group together to attack larger predators and even steal their food, and they have different dialects in different areas, with the ability to mimic the dialect of the alpha males when they enter their territory!
They have a twenty year life span, the oldest on record reaching the age of Fifty nine. Crows can leave gifts for those who feed them such as buttons or bright shiny objects as a thank you, and they even kiss and make up after an argument, having mated for life.
In mythology they are associated with good and bad luck, being the bringers of omens and even witchcraft and are generally reviled for their attacks on baby birds and small mammals. They have an attack method of to stunning smaller birds before consuming them, tearing violently at smaller, less aggressive birds, which is simply down to the fact that they are so highly intelligent, and also the top of the food chain. Their diet includes over a thousand different items: Dead animals (as their name suggests), invertebrates, grain, as well as stealing eggs and chicks from other birds' nests, worms, insects, fruit, seeds, kitchen scraps. They are highly adaptable when food sources grow scarce. I absolutely love them, they are magnificent, bold, beautiful and incredibly interesting to watch and though at times it is hard to witness attacks made by them, I cannot help but adore them for so many other and more important reasons.
OBSERVATIONS ON THE PAIR IN MY GARDEN
Crows have been in the area for a while, but rarely had strayed into my garden, leaving the Magpies to own the territory. Things changed towards the end of May when a beautiful female Carrion crow appeared and began to take some of the food that I put down for the other birds. Within a few days she began to appear regularly, on occasions stocking up on food, whilst other times placing pieces in the birdbath to soften them. She would stand on the birdbath and eat and drink and come back over the course of the day to eat the softened food.
Shortly afterwards she brought along her mate, a tall and handsome fella, much larger than her who was also very vocal if he felt she was getting a little too close to me. By now I had moved from a seated position from the patio as an observer, to laying on a mat just five feet from the birdbath with my Nikon so that I could photograph the pair as they landed, scavenged and fed. She was now confident enough to let me be very close, and she even tolerated and recognized the clicking of the camera. At first I used silent mode to reduce the noise but this only allowed two shooting frame rates of single frame or continuous low frame which meant I was missing shots. I reverted back to normal continuous high frames and she soon got used to the whirring of the mechanisms as the mirror slapped back and forth.
The big fella would bark orders at her from the safety of the fence or the rear of the garden, whilst she rarely made a sound. That was until one day when in the sweltering heat she kept opening her beak and sunning on the grass, panting slightly in the heat. I placed the circular water sprayer nearby and had it rotating so that the birdbath and grass was bathed in gentle water droplets and she soon came back, landed and seemed to really like the cooling effect on offer. She then climbed onto the birdbath and opened her wings slightly and made some gentle purring, cooing noises....
I swear she was expressing happiness, joy....
On another blisteringly hot day when the sprayer was on, she came down, walked towards it and opened her wings up running into the water spray. Not once, but many times.
A further revelation into the unseen sides to these beautiful birds came with the male and female on the rear garden fence. They sat together, locked beaks like a kiss and then the male took his time gently preening her head feathers and the back of her neck as she made tiny happy sounds. They stayed together like that for several minutes, showing a gentle, softer side to their nature and demonstrating the deep bond between them. Into July and the pair started to bring their three youngsters to my garden, the nippers learning to use the birdbath for bathing and dipping food, the parents attentive as ever. Two of the youngsters headed off once large enough and strong enough.
I was privileged to be in close attendance as the last juvenile was brought down by the pair, taught to take food and then on a night in July, to soar and fly with it's mother in the evening sky as the light faded. She would swoop and twirl, and at regular intervals just touch the juvenile in flight with her wing tip feathers, as if to reassure it that she was close in attendance. What an amazing experience to view. A few days later, the juvenile, though now gaining independence and more than capable of tackling food scraps in the garden, was still on occasions demand feeding from it's mother who was now teaching him to take chicken breast, hotdogs or digestive biscuits and bury them in the garden beds for later delectation. The juvenile also liked to gather up peanuts and bury them in the grass. On one occasion I witnessed a pair of rumbunctious Pica Pica (Magpies), chasing the young crow on rooftops, leaping at him no matter how hard he tried to get away. He defended himself well and survived the attacks, much to my relief.
Into August and the last youngster remained with the adults, though now was very independent even though he still spent time with his parents on rooftops, and shared food gathering duties with his mum.Hotdog sausages were their favourite choice, followed by fish fingers and digestive biscuits which the adult male would gather up three at a time. In October, the three Crows were still kings of the area, but my time observing them was pretty much over as I will only put food out now for the birds in the winter months. The two adults are still here in December and now taking the food that I put out to help all birds survive in the winter months. They also have a pair of Magpies to compete with now.
Late February 2022 and Cheryl and Russell and their youngster are still with me, still dominant in the area and still taking raw chicken, hotdogs, biscuits and fatballs that I put out for them. Today I saw them mating for the first time this year in the tree and the cycle continues.
By October 2022 the pair had successfully reared a new baby who we nicknamed Baboo, and the other youngster flew the coup. The three no recognised our car returning from weekends away, and were enjoying sausages, hotdogs, raw chicken, fish and especially cheese, but life was hard as they aged with daily morning and evening tustles in the air with invaders and intruders hoping to take their land.
Corvus Corone.... magnificently misunderstood by some!
Paul Williams June 4th 2021 (Updated in October 2022)
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Nikon D850 Focal length 550mm Shutter speed: 1/40s Aperture f/11.0 iso640 Hand held with Tamron VC Vibration control set to ON in position 1 14 Bit uncompressed RAW NEF file size L (8256 x 5504 pixels) FX (36 x 24) Focus mode: AF-C AF-Area mode: 3D-tracking AF-C Priority Selection: Release. Nikon Back button focusing enabled 3D Tracking watch area: Normal 55 Tracking points Exposure mode: Manual exposure mode Metering mode: Matrix metering ISO Sensitivity: Auto 360 White balance on: Auto1 (5390k) Colour space: RGB Picture control: Standard (Sharpening +3)
Tamron SP 150-600mm F/5-6.3 Di VC USD G2. Nikon GP-1 GPS module. Lee SW150 MKII filter holder. Lee SW150 95mm screw in adapter ring. Lee SW150 circular polariser glass filter.Lee SW150 Filters field pouch. Hoodman HEYENRG round eyepiece oversized eyecup.Mcoplus professional MB-D850 multi function battery grip 6960.Two Nikon EN-EL15a batteries (Priority to battery in Battery grip). Black Rapid Curve Breathe strap. My Memory 128GB Class 10 SDXC 80MB/s card. Lowepro Flipside 400 AW camera bag.
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Nikon D850 Firmware versions C 1.10 (9/05/2019) LD Distortion Data 2.018 (18/02/20) LF 1.00
HP 110-352na Desktop PC with AMD Quad-Core A6-5200 APU 64Bit processor. Radeon HD8400 graphics. 8 GB DDR3 Memory with 1TB Data storage. 64-bit Windows 10. Verbatim USB 2.0 1TB desktop hard drive. WD My Passport Ultra 1tb USB3 Portable hard drive. Nikon ViewNX-1 64bit Version 1.4.1 (18/02/2020). Nikon Capture NX-D 64bit Version 1.6.2 (18/02/2020). Nikon Picture Control Utility 2 (Version 2.4.5 (18/02/2020). Nikon Transfer 2 Version 2.13.5. Adobe photoshop Elements 8 Version 8.0 64bit.
A Mucabal girl without the giant headwear!
Mucubal (also called Mucubai, Mucabale, Mugubale) people are a subgroup of the Herero ethnic group, which means they are bantu speaking, and are supposed to have come from Kenya and to be related with Massais.
They are semi nomadic pastoralists living of cattle raising and agriculture. They live in a large area between the slopes of Chela Mounts in the north, and River Cunene to the south, where they are believed to have stopped during the Herero migration, about 300 years ago.
Mucubal have some very specific customs and traditions. They only are interested in cattle and do not care of the rest of the world outside of the bush. Mucubals are not allowed to mention people’s name in public, except their parent’s one, and children’s name in general. A married couple is not allowed to talk to each other in public, as long as the wife hasn’t had children. They only can speak to each other in private. Girls have their upper teeth sharpened and lower ones removed. In order to convince young girls to have their lower teeth removed, old men make them believe, that their teeth leave their mouth during the night, to go in a hole dug to relieve themselves and return in their mouth covered with excrement. The family structure and organization is also very specific. The father has the authority and is the head of the family, although the matrilineal descent is considered more important, as they inherit throught the mother's family. For example the son of the Soba -chieftain of the village-’s sister is the heir of the Soba. It is possible to be disowned by their father's family but not by their mother's because for them this link is sacred. The maternal uncle has to provide his nephew with an ox, called Remussungo. However a father provides his son with an ox, called Hupa. Mucubal can only get married with an outsider of the clan, although it cannot be with a member of another tribe like a Himba for example. Marriages of convenience are the rule most of the time. The fiancée is presented to her future husband during the Fico ceremony, when she is fourteen or less. This ceremony consists in a party with the two families during which presents are offered. The couple has to wait a few more years before consummating the marriage in the centre of the village. Mucubal men can have several wives and are also allowed to sell their wife, if they don’t get along with her or even if they want to earn money, as a woman can be worth 2 cows, which is about 2000 euros and represents a lot of money. For a first marriage a woman can even be worth 3 or 4 cows.
Their nomadic lifestyle based on cycles, between nomadism and stays in the same places (where they settle their villages), accounts for their religious customs and the funerary rites they follow. Mucubal people believe in a God called Huku, Klaunga, Ndyambi. They also worship their ancestors' spirits called Oyo Handi and Ovi huku, which are considered inferior to their supreme divinity. Divination is very important in their culture. They use talismans and amulets to protect their herds or prevent adultery. Nevertheless Mucubal are not afraid of death. Funerals can last several days or weeks. They decorate their graves with cattle horns. The number of cows sacrificed are in relation with the importance of the deceased. This shows the importance of cattle in their culture. Cattle is only killed on special occasions, as Mucubal usually don’t eat meat but rather corn (when they manage to grow some), eggs, milk and chicken.
They don’t eat any fish because according to the legend, one of their chieftains was brought to the sea by the portuguese and never came back. So they think that fish kills men.
Women use mupeque oil, a yellow dried fruit crushed and boiled from which they just drink juice but do no eat pulp. They also eat small red berries with a pepper taste that they boil. In order to show they are hungry Mucubal mimic the gesture we do when we brush our teeth. Mucubal especially women, are famous for the way they dress. The latter wear an original and unique headdress called the Ompota. It is made of a wicker framework, traditionally filled with a bunch of tied cow tails, decorated with buttons, shells, zippers and beads. But tradition is disappearing as some women use modern stuff to fill their ompota headdress. One was using a Barbie doll box! Women whether they are married or not can wear jewels. Ornaments like iron anklets, called Othivela, and armlets, called Othingo, are worn by girls as well as adult women. Mucubal women are also famous for the string they have around their breast, called oyonduthi, which is used as a bra. Women use to smoke tobacco (that they keep in a snuffbox called boceta) in pipes called opessi. There are several ways of saying hello. "Okamene" means good morning", "Tchou"is what a woman answers to a greeting and "Mba" is the word a man answers back to a woman saying him hello.
© Eric Lafforgue
The self portrait without the flowers overlaid on it. I was thinking what to write for this photo so I'm going to ramble a bunch of and pardon my language bullshit. I've felt so restless the last few days. A part of me wishes I could travel right now. I mean technically I can but then I'm thinking about covid in the back of my mind and I'm not so much afraid of covid but people around me not wearing masks to being responsible. Then on top of that my tummy has had some issues lately and traveling to a different part of the country with tummy issues sounds like an awful idea. Then to add on top of all of this my mental health has felt not great recently with the random crying at work. I think because my birthday is coming up and I'm still doing retail thinking I have some talent to photograph and blah blah wasting my life. Basically I'm having a pity party. Anyways I know I'll be okay or at least I want to be okay. I know I have the function of seeing what I want. I need to move towards goals and not be full of fear.
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Portuguese
O rio Douro (Río Duero em espanhol) é um rio que nasce em Espanha na província de Sória, nos picos da Serra de Urbião (Sierra de Urbión), a 2.080 metros de altitude e atravessa o norte de Portugal. A foz do Douro é junto às cidades do Porto e Vila Nova de Gaia. Tem 927 km de comprimento e é o terceiro rio mais extenso da Península Ibérica.
A UNESCO incluiu, em 14 de Dezembro de 2001, a Região Vinhateira do Alto Douro (45°68' N, 5°93' W) na lista dos locais que são Património da Humanidade, na categoria de paisagem cultural.
English
The Douro (Portuguese: Douro [ˈdowɾu, ˈdoɾu]; Spanish: Duero [ˈdweɾo]; Latin: Durius) is one of the major rivers of the Iberian Peninsula, flowing from its source near Duruelo de la Sierra in Soria Province across northern-central Spain and Portugal to its outlet at Porto.
A 1908 image of the boats along the Douro River
The name, Latinized Durius, may have come from the Celtic tribes that inhabited the area before Roman times: the Celtic root is *dubro- and in modern Welsh dŵr is "water" with cognate dobhar in Irish. In Roman times, the river was personified as a god, Durius.
The Douro vinhateiro (=winegrowing), an area of the Douro Valley in Portugal, has been classified by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. Traditionally, the wine was taken down river in flat-bottom boats called rabelos to be stored in barrels in cellars in Vila Nova de Gaia, just across the river from Porto. In the 1950s and 1960s, dams were built along the river ending this river traffic on Spanish and border sections. Now Port wine is transported in tanker trucks.
Spanish
El Duero (en portugués: Douro [ˈdouɾu]) es el río más importante del noroeste de la península ibérica. Nace en Fuentes del Duero, en la falda sur del Pico Urbión (Duruelo de la Sierra, Soria), a unos 2.160 metros sobre el nivel del mar, y desemboca en el océano Atlántico en el estuario de Oporto (Portugal). Tiene 897 km de largo, con 572 de recorrido en territorio español, 213 navegables por tierras portuguesas y 112 km de carácter internacional, al estar situada sobre él la frontera entre ambos países. Este último tramo es de singular belleza natural, en el que el cauce se estrecha y profundiza, formando los denominados arribes, cuyas márgenes han sido protegidas con la creación de los parques naturales del Duero Internacional en Portugal y de Arribes del Duero en España.
Posee la mayor cuenca hidrográfica de la península ibérica, al ocupar 98.073 km², de los que 78.859 km² corresponden al territorio español y 19.214 km² al portugués. La parte española incluye territorios de las comunidades autónomas de Castilla y León, Galicia, Cantabria, La Rioja, Castilla-La Mancha, Extremadura y Madrid, aunque algo más del 98% de la superficie de la cuenca corresponde a Castilla y León. Su cuenca destaca por los cultivos de vid y cereales, así como por la producción de vinos de gran calidad. Administrativamente, el Duero discurre por las provincias españolas de Soria, Burgos, Valladolid, Zamora y Salamanca, y los distritos portugueses de Braganza, Guarda, Vila Real, Viseu, Porto y Aveiro.
Es el río de mayor caudal absoluto de la geografía peninsular y el segundo de España tras el Ebro. Tiene una tupida red de afluentes que recogen aguas de la cordillera Cantábrica, el sistema Ibérico y el sistema Central, todos ellos responsables de su elevado caudal. De todos ellos, los más importantes son el Pisuerga y el Esla, por el norte, y el Adaja y el Tormes, por el sur. Además, y con sus 897 km, es el tercer río más largo de la península, tras el Tajo y el Ebro.
Wikipedia
[ E x p l o r e d ] [ Best Position #292 ] on 27 Sep, 2010.
Place : Dhaka Cantonment.
Camera : D90.
Date : 09 Jun, 2010.
Please don't use this image anywhere without my permission.
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Portuguese version:
A capela do Hôtel des Invalides, concebida para acolher os pensionistas dos Invalides, foi elevada à categoria de cathédrale. É a sede do Bispo Católico dos Exércitos.
Órgão de Saint-Louis-des-Invalides.
A planta geral do edifício, criada por Jules Hardouin-Mansart, é simples: uma cruz grega inscrita num plano quadrado. Cada uma das fachadas é composta por duas ordens sobrepostas, sublinhadas por um pórtico encimado por um frontão triangular. A cúpula está colocada sobre um alto tambor, cujo segundo andar está ornado por altas janelas. É a este nível que o grande rigor clássico da arquitectura evolui sensivelmente: a parte baixa do tambor está rodeada por colunas geminadas cercadas por altas janelas com lintéis curvos. Estas colunas não estão dispostas regularmente nos pontos cardiais do edifício, uma vez que foram reagrupadas em grupos de dois por dois para assegurar a estabilidade da cúpula. Pela mesma razão, pequenas volutas, à imagem da Salute de Veneza, foram dispostas sobre esta coroa de colunas, na base da segunda parte do tambor.
A cúpula em forma oval, rodeada por potes de fogo, está recoberta de ricos motivos dourados de troféus e perfurada com óculos. Por fim, é encimado por um lanternim que não renegaria Boromini. Trata-se de um pequeno pavilhão quadrado, com corte enviesado em relação à fachada, com ângulos decorados por colunas sobre as quais foram dispostas estátuas. O conjunto é por fim coroado por um obelisco afilado terminado por uma cruz. Com uma base de estrutura quadrada encimada por frontões triangulares, passa insensivelmente às formas complexas onde as curvas dominam: tambor, cúpula, óculus, volutas…
Podem ver-se, suspensas na abóbada segundo uma tradição antiga, as bandeiras e estandartes tomadas ao inimigo.
English version:
Louis XIV initiated the project by an order dated November 24, 1670, as a home and hospital for aged and unwell soldiers: the name is a shortened form of hôpital des invalides. The architect of Les Invalides was Libéral Bruant. The selected site was suburban in the seventeenth century. By the time the enlarged project was completed in 1676, the river front measured 196 metres and the complex had fifteen courtyards, the largest being the cour d'honneur ("court of honour") for military parades. It was then felt that the veterans required a chapel. Jules Hardouin Mansart assisted the aged Bruant, and the chapel was finished in 1679 to Bruant's designs after the elder architect's death. The chapel is known as Eglise Saint-Louis des Invalides. Daily attendance was required.
Shortly after the veterans' chapel was completed, Louis XIV had Mansart construct a separate private royal chapel, often referred to as the Église du Dôme from its most striking feature (ill. right). Inspired by St. Peter's Basilica in Rome the original for all Baroque domes, it is one of the triumphs of French Baroque architecture. Mansart raises his drum with an attic storey over its main cornice, and employs the paired columns motif in his more complicated rhythmic theme. The general programme is sculptural but tightly integrated, rich but balanced, consistently carried through, capping its vertical thrust firmly with a ribbed and hemispherical dome. The domed chapel is centrally placed to dominate the court of honour. It was finished in 1708.
The interior of the dome (illustration, right) was painted by Le Brun's disciple Charles de La Fosse (1636–1716) with a Baroque illusion of space seen from below (sotto in su perspective, the Italians were calling it). The painting was completed in 1705.
From Wikipedia!
I don't usually do shit like this without a lego build, but whatever. fuck it, right?
SPOOPERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED
I don’t really know what to say. I’m writing this hours after seeing fant4stic and still trying to process this...I hesitate to call it a movie. There are parts that are definitely a movie, and an interesting movie, even. It’s DEFINITELY not a fantastic four movie. Like, not in the slightest. I’m not really sure what to describe it as, honestly. Ok, but enough stalling, what did I actually think of this movie?
Well… I think it has a great 1st act. The build up to them going into the machine was well done, all the actors have chemistry, and it felt like an adventure. And when they get into the other dimensions...planet...thing, they don’t really explain it, it’s really cool. Shot well, interesting color, and it feels like an adventure!
Then everything goes to shit. It really feels like two completely different movies taped together. Actually, no. It feels like one movie was in development about interdimensional travel, then they cut it in half and stuck a bunch of random plot ideas about the fantastic four in there, that don’t feel in any way like the fantastic four, and just shoved it out the door without any thought about, well, anything! It’s shocking how incoherent the second and third acts are compared to the first. There’s a point where the film jumps ahead a year for no real reason. No one feels developed past that point, it’s just, uhg.
But now for my biggest problem with this film. WHERE THE FUCK IS THE THINGS COCK?! Like, this is just one of those decisions you have to think about all the people who were ok with it. Like, the director, art designer, producer, and studio executives all had to think, “Huh, it’s not weird or awkward at all for him not to have a schlong. We should put that in a film!” And they don’t even explain it! It’s just not there! They have this talk at the end about how everything is going to be ok, and how they’re going to be a team or some bullshit, and all I can think of is, “dude, you don’t have a fucking dick!” Like, was it that hard to stick a pair of pants or shorts of something on him? You absolutely had to go with weird dickless thing? It’s so fucking distracting that any scene with him is instantly ruined by his lack of junk. Also his voice sucks.
The other character that got royally fucked in this film was doctor doom. I saw this with my dad, and when he showed up in all his rubber suited glory, he whispered to me and said, “This is the worst thing in the film.” Well, it’s certainly not dr doom, but I honestly kind of liked it, whatever it was. It kind of reminded me of a monster from dr who in a weird way. Its mouth never moves when he talks, and it’s just kinda creepy in a way I can’t really explain. Like I said, it’s not dr doom in any way shape or form, but it was kind of cool, whatever it was. It also has the weirdest set of powers I’ve ever seen. One scene he has telekinesis, then he has these high pitched screams that explode peoples heads, then he’s a fucking earth-bender for some reason. He like merged with the planet thing and that’s why he has these powers, but it’s not explained at all.
Other than the fucking up of those two beloved comic characters, the rest of the film just feels like a mess. Like I said, there’s such a disconnect between the first act and the last two acts, it just leaves you confused as to what the hell happened here. There are some horror stories from the set about the director not showing up and being on some kind of substance whilst filming, which wouldn't be surprising to me, since this feels like it had 5 or 6 directors. Don’t want to gossip, just saying that I could see this reshot by different directors and not really knowing what to do with the script. Chunks feel missing from the movie, and it just doesn't mesh in so many places.
I love the fantastic four, guys, so it’s hard that this doesn't work as much as it does. I can tell you now, there will not be a fant4stic fant2stic any time soon. But on the upside, congrats to Disney/marvel when they announce in a month that they got the rights back!
Also, one other random note, there was a trailer for that Goosebumps movie with jack black in it, and aside from it looking like absolute shite, please don’t support this movie! It’s blatantly stealing from gravity falls, one of my favorite shows on right now, and it’s just not cool to do
without a doubt, one of the most inspiring and talented friends I am so very blessed to have in my life.
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BUCAREST: a city that still bears so strong signs of suffering.
walking down the street in the center feels a strong desire for rebirth that this people.
In the vast avenues, those built during the regime, gutting about one-fifth of the historic center, many Western and huge billboards completely cover the buildings, flat screens that continuously transmit advertising or dazzling that I think almost anyone can afford.
modern megalomania ...
He knows well the man with his suitcase crossing the road without prejudice and without..... crosswalks .... .....
--------------Canon EOS 3 Agfa scala----------------
my set on Romania:
www.flickr.com/photos/106833102@N02/sets/72157643347956384/
see on 1X: 1x.com/photo/671954/all:user:478999
www.theinspiredeye.net/submit-your-shots-for-the-septembe...
© All rights reserved Davide Zappettini 2015
Use without permission is illegal
contatti: groovemagic@hotmail.it
BUCAREST: una città che porta ancora così forti i segni della sofferenza.
Camminando per le vie del centro si sente forte la voglia di rinascita che ha questo popolo.
Negli immensi vialoni, quelli costruiti durante il regime, tantissimi ed enormi cartelloni pubblicitari occidentali coprono completamente i palazzi, schermi piatti che continuamente trasmettono pubblicità abbaglianti che penso nessuno o quasi possa permettersi.
Megalomania moderna...
Lo sa bene quest'uomo con la sua valigia che attraversa la strada senza pregiudizi e senza....strisce pedonali.....
The eyes of the Koh Tao caecilian are minute, without lids, and are buried below the skin. Its sensory tentacle lies between the eye and nostril on each side of the body. Along the length of the body there are about 360 cutaneous ring-like folds. The body coloration is brownish-black above, with a yellow, longitudinal band on each side running down the length of the body.
The larvae are completely aquatic and have a short tail with a thin laterally compressed fin that extends from the body of the tail dorsally; it curves ventrally around the tip of the tail. The larvae have what appears to be a gill slit, called the gill spiraculum--a small chamber that encompasses the area where three gills are attached. There is a lateral line on both sides of the head and neck that serves as a sense organ for water movements.
Widespread through southeast Asia, including south and western Yunnan, central and southern Guangdong west through Guangxi to western Yunnan in southern China, and into montane northern Vietnam, Laos, northern and eastern Thailand. Presumed to be found in adjacent northeastern and peninsular Myanmar and southeastern Cambodia, including Koh Tao Island and throughout mainland Thailand. Exactly distributional limits are not known.
This species has an aquatic larval stage and a terrestrial adult phase. The adults inhabit loose soil along small mountain streams with abundant plant cover, also seen along moist shores beside pools or rice-fields. During April to May, females deposit about 30 eggs in a depression they dig close to water. Soon after hatching, the larvae make their way into the water where they feed on algae or plankton. Later in their development, they feed on aquatic invertebrates. Metamorphosis is completed at a total length of 180 mm. In captivity adults feed exclusively on earthworms.
Populations appear to be at high risk as they have declined rather quickly because of human activities including cultivation of the land, destruction of forest, and pollution, but there is little published data available to support these hypotheses.
Photo by Nick Dobbs, Koh Yao Yai, Thailand 28-12-2024
PGB Photographer & Creative - © Philip Romeyn - Phillostar Gone Ballistic 2021 - Photo may not be edited from its original form. Commercial use is prohibited without contacting me.
I can't let today pass without remembering all those taken so terribly soon, twelve years ago today. The names and faces behind the numbers:
www.nytimes.com/interactive/us/sept-11-reckoning/portrait...
Graffiti (plural; singular graffiti or graffito, the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall paintings, and has existed since ancient times, with examples dating back to ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire (see also mural).
Graffiti is a controversial subject. In most countries, marking or painting property without permission is considered by property owners and civic authorities as defacement and vandalism, which is a punishable crime, citing the use of graffiti by street gangs to mark territory or to serve as an indicator of gang-related activities. Graffiti has become visualized as a growing urban "problem" for many cities in industrialized nations, spreading from the New York City subway system and Philadelphia in the early 1970s to the rest of the United States and Europe and other world regions
"Graffiti" (usually both singular and plural) and the rare singular form "graffito" are from the Italian word graffiato ("scratched"). The term "graffiti" is used in art history for works of art produced by scratching a design into a surface. A related term is "sgraffito", which involves scratching through one layer of pigment to reveal another beneath it. This technique was primarily used by potters who would glaze their wares and then scratch a design into them. In ancient times graffiti were carved on walls with a sharp object, although sometimes chalk or coal were used. The word originates from Greek γράφειν—graphein—meaning "to write".
The term graffiti originally referred to the inscriptions, figure drawings, and such, found on the walls of ancient sepulchres or ruins, as in the Catacombs of Rome or at Pompeii. Historically, these writings were not considered vanadlism, which today is considered part of the definition of graffiti.
The only known source of the Safaitic language, an ancient form of Arabic, is from graffiti: inscriptions scratched on to the surface of rocks and boulders in the predominantly basalt desert of southern Syria, eastern Jordan and northern Saudi Arabia. Safaitic dates from the first century BC to the fourth century AD.
Some of the oldest cave paintings in the world are 40,000 year old ones found in Australia. The oldest written graffiti was found in ancient Rome around 2500 years ago. Most graffiti from the time was boasts about sexual experiences Graffiti in Ancient Rome was a form of communication, and was not considered vandalism.
Ancient tourists visiting the 5th-century citadel at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka write their names and commentary over the "mirror wall", adding up to over 1800 individual graffiti produced there between the 6th and 18th centuries. Most of the graffiti refer to the frescoes of semi-nude females found there. One reads:
Wet with cool dew drops
fragrant with perfume from the flowers
came the gentle breeze
jasmine and water lily
dance in the spring sunshine
side-long glances
of the golden-hued ladies
stab into my thoughts
heaven itself cannot take my mind
as it has been captivated by one lass
among the five hundred I have seen here.
Among the ancient political graffiti examples were Arab satirist poems. Yazid al-Himyari, an Umayyad Arab and Persian poet, was most known for writing his political poetry on the walls between Sajistan and Basra, manifesting a strong hatred towards the Umayyad regime and its walis, and people used to read and circulate them very widely.
Graffiti, known as Tacherons, were frequently scratched on Romanesque Scandinavian church walls. When Renaissance artists such as Pinturicchio, Raphael, Michelangelo, Ghirlandaio, or Filippino Lippi descended into the ruins of Nero's Domus Aurea, they carved or painted their names and returned to initiate the grottesche style of decoration.
There are also examples of graffiti occurring in American history, such as Independence Rock, a national landmark along the Oregon Trail.
Later, French soldiers carved their names on monuments during the Napoleonic campaign of Egypt in the 1790s. Lord Byron's survives on one of the columns of the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion in Attica, Greece.
The oldest known example of graffiti "monikers" found on traincars created by hobos and railworkers since the late 1800s. The Bozo Texino monikers were documented by filmmaker Bill Daniel in his 2005 film, Who is Bozo Texino?.
In World War II, an inscription on a wall at the fortress of Verdun was seen as an illustration of the US response twice in a generation to the wrongs of the Old World:
During World War II and for decades after, the phrase "Kilroy was here" with an accompanying illustration was widespread throughout the world, due to its use by American troops and ultimately filtering into American popular culture. Shortly after the death of Charlie Parker (nicknamed "Yardbird" or "Bird"), graffiti began appearing around New York with the words "Bird Lives".
Modern graffiti art has its origins with young people in 1960s and 70s in New York City and Philadelphia. Tags were the first form of stylised contemporary graffiti. Eventually, throw-ups and pieces evolved with the desire to create larger art. Writers used spray paint and other kind of materials to leave tags or to create images on the sides subway trains. and eventually moved into the city after the NYC metro began to buy new trains and paint over graffiti.
While the art had many advocates and appreciators—including the cultural critic Norman Mailer—others, including New York City mayor Ed Koch, considered it to be defacement of public property, and saw it as a form of public blight. The ‘taggers’ called what they did ‘writing’—though an important 1974 essay by Mailer referred to it using the term ‘graffiti.’
Contemporary graffiti style has been heavily influenced by hip hop culture and the myriad international styles derived from Philadelphia and New York City Subway graffiti; however, there are many other traditions of notable graffiti in the twentieth century. Graffiti have long appeared on building walls, in latrines, railroad boxcars, subways, and bridges.
An early graffito outside of New York or Philadelphia was the inscription in London reading "Clapton is God" in reference to the guitarist Eric Clapton. Creating the cult of the guitar hero, the phrase was spray-painted by an admirer on a wall in an Islington, north London in the autumn of 1967. The graffito was captured in a photograph, in which a dog is urinating on the wall.
Films like Style Wars in the 80s depicting famous writers such as Skeme, Dondi, MinOne, and ZEPHYR reinforced graffiti's role within New York's emerging hip-hop culture. Although many officers of the New York City Police Department found this film to be controversial, Style Wars is still recognized as the most prolific film representation of what was going on within the young hip hop culture of the early 1980s. Fab 5 Freddy and Futura 2000 took hip hop graffiti to Paris and London as part of the New York City Rap Tour in 1983
Commercialization and entrance into mainstream pop culture
Main article: Commercial graffiti
With the popularity and legitimization of graffiti has come a level of commercialization. In 2001, computer giant IBM launched an advertising campaign in Chicago and San Francisco which involved people spray painting on sidewalks a peace symbol, a heart, and a penguin (Linux mascot), to represent "Peace, Love, and Linux." IBM paid Chicago and San Francisco collectively US$120,000 for punitive damages and clean-up costs.
In 2005, a similar ad campaign was launched by Sony and executed by its advertising agency in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Miami, to market its handheld PSP gaming system. In this campaign, taking notice of the legal problems of the IBM campaign, Sony paid building owners for the rights to paint on their buildings "a collection of dizzy-eyed urban kids playing with the PSP as if it were a skateboard, a paddle, or a rocking horse".
Tristan Manco wrote that Brazil "boasts a unique and particularly rich, graffiti scene ... [earning] it an international reputation as the place to go for artistic inspiration". Graffiti "flourishes in every conceivable space in Brazil's cities". Artistic parallels "are often drawn between the energy of São Paulo today and 1970s New York". The "sprawling metropolis", of São Paulo has "become the new shrine to graffiti"; Manco alludes to "poverty and unemployment ... [and] the epic struggles and conditions of the country's marginalised peoples", and to "Brazil's chronic poverty", as the main engines that "have fuelled a vibrant graffiti culture". In world terms, Brazil has "one of the most uneven distributions of income. Laws and taxes change frequently". Such factors, Manco argues, contribute to a very fluid society, riven with those economic divisions and social tensions that underpin and feed the "folkloric vandalism and an urban sport for the disenfranchised", that is South American graffiti art.
Prominent Brazilian writers include Os Gêmeos, Boleta, Nunca, Nina, Speto, Tikka, and T.Freak. Their artistic success and involvement in commercial design ventures has highlighted divisions within the Brazilian graffiti community between adherents of the cruder transgressive form of pichação and the more conventionally artistic values of the practitioners of grafite.
Graffiti in the Middle East has emerged slowly, with taggers operating in Egypt, Lebanon, the Gulf countries like Bahrain or the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and in Iran. The major Iranian newspaper Hamshahri has published two articles on illegal writers in the city with photographic coverage of Iranian artist A1one's works on Tehran walls. Tokyo-based design magazine, PingMag, has interviewed A1one and featured photographs of his work. The Israeli West Bank barrier has become a site for graffiti, reminiscent in this sense of the Berlin Wall. Many writers in Israel come from other places around the globe, such as JUIF from Los Angeles and DEVIONE from London. The religious reference "נ נח נחמ נחמן מאומן" ("Na Nach Nachma Nachman Meuman") is commonly seen in graffiti around Israel.
Graffiti has played an important role within the street art scene in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), especially following the events of the Arab Spring of 2011 or the Sudanese Revolution of 2018/19. Graffiti is a tool of expression in the context of conflict in the region, allowing people to raise their voices politically and socially. Famous street artist Banksy has had an important effect in the street art scene in the MENA area, especially in Palestine where some of his works are located in the West Bank barrier and Bethlehem.
There are also a large number of graffiti influences in Southeast Asian countries that mostly come from modern Western culture, such as Malaysia, where graffiti have long been a common sight in Malaysia's capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Since 2010, the country has begun hosting a street festival to encourage all generations and people from all walks of life to enjoy and encourage Malaysian street culture.
The modern-day graffitists can be found with an arsenal of various materials that allow for a successful production of a piece. This includes such techniques as scribing. However, spray paint in aerosol cans is the number one medium for graffiti. From this commodity comes different styles, technique, and abilities to form master works of graffiti. Spray paint can be found at hardware and art stores and comes in virtually every color.
Stencil graffiti is created by cutting out shapes and designs in a stiff material (such as cardboard or subject folders) to form an overall design or image. The stencil is then placed on the "canvas" gently and with quick, easy strokes of the aerosol can, the image begins to appear on the intended surface.
Some of the first examples were created in 1981 by artists Blek le Rat in Paris, in 1982 by Jef Aerosol in Tours (France); by 1985 stencils had appeared in other cities including New York City, Sydney, and Melbourne, where they were documented by American photographer Charles Gatewood and Australian photographer Rennie Ellis
Tagging is the practice of someone spray-painting "their name, initial or logo onto a public surface" in a handstyle unique to the writer. Tags were the first form of modern graffiti.
Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies. For example, Graffiti Research Lab has encouraged the use of projected images and magnetic light-emitting diodes (throwies) as new media for graffitists. yarnbombing is another recent form of graffiti. Yarnbombers occasionally target previous graffiti for modification, which had been avoided among the majority of graffitists.
Theories on the use of graffiti by avant-garde artists have a history dating back at least to the Asger Jorn, who in 1962 painting declared in a graffiti-like gesture "the avant-garde won't give up"
Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art. According to many art researchers, particularly in the Netherlands and in Los Angeles, that type of public art is, in fact an effective tool of social emancipation or, in the achievement of a political goal
In times of conflict, such murals have offered a means of communication and self-expression for members of these socially, ethnically, or racially divided communities, and have proven themselves as effective tools in establishing dialog and thus, of addressing cleavages in the long run. The Berlin Wall was also extensively covered by graffiti reflecting social pressures relating to the oppressive Soviet rule over the GDR.
Many artists involved with graffiti are also concerned with the similar activity of stenciling. Essentially, this entails stenciling a print of one or more colors using spray-paint. Recognized while exhibiting and publishing several of her coloured stencils and paintings portraying the Sri Lankan Civil War and urban Britain in the early 2000s, graffitists Mathangi Arulpragasam, aka M.I.A., has also become known for integrating her imagery of political violence into her music videos for singles "Galang" and "Bucky Done Gun", and her cover art. Stickers of her artwork also often appear around places such as London in Brick Lane, stuck to lamp posts and street signs, she having become a muse for other graffitists and painters worldwide in cities including Seville.
Graffitist believes that art should be on display for everyone in the public eye or in plain sight, not hidden away in a museum or a gallery. Art should color the streets, not the inside of some building. Graffiti is a form of art that cannot be owned or bought. It does not last forever, it is temporary, yet one of a kind. It is a form of self promotion for the artist that can be displayed anywhere form sidewalks, roofs, subways, building wall, etc. Art to them is for everyone and should be showed to everyone for free.
Graffiti is a way of communicating and a way of expressing what one feels in the moment. It is both art and a functional thing that can warn people of something or inform people of something. However, graffiti is to some people a form of art, but to some a form of vandalism. And many graffitists choose to protect their identities and remain anonymous or to hinder prosecution.
With the commercialization of graffiti (and hip hop in general), in most cases, even with legally painted "graffiti" art, graffitists tend to choose anonymity. This may be attributed to various reasons or a combination of reasons. Graffiti still remains the one of four hip hop elements that is not considered "performance art" despite the image of the "singing and dancing star" that sells hip hop culture to the mainstream. Being a graphic form of art, it might also be said that many graffitists still fall in the category of the introverted archetypal artist.
Banksy is one of the world's most notorious and popular street artists who continues to remain faceless in today's society. He is known for his political, anti-war stencil art mainly in Bristol, England, but his work may be seen anywhere from Los Angeles to Palestine. In the UK, Banksy is the most recognizable icon for this cultural artistic movement and keeps his identity a secret to avoid arrest. Much of Banksy's artwork may be seen around the streets of London and surrounding suburbs, although he has painted pictures throughout the world, including the Middle East, where he has painted on Israel's controversial West Bank barrier with satirical images of life on the other side. One depicted a hole in the wall with an idyllic beach, while another shows a mountain landscape on the other side. A number of exhibitions also have taken place since 2000, and recent works of art have fetched vast sums of money. Banksy's art is a prime example of the classic controversy: vandalism vs. art. Art supporters endorse his work distributed in urban areas as pieces of art and some councils, such as Bristol and Islington, have officially protected them, while officials of other areas have deemed his work to be vandalism and have removed it.
Pixnit is another artist who chooses to keep her identity from the general public. Her work focuses on beauty and design aspects of graffiti as opposed to Banksy's anti-government shock value. Her paintings are often of flower designs above shops and stores in her local urban area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Some store owners endorse her work and encourage others to do similar work as well. "One of the pieces was left up above Steve's Kitchen, because it looks pretty awesome"- Erin Scott, the manager of New England Comics in Allston, Massachusetts.
Graffiti artists may become offended if photographs of their art are published in a commercial context without their permission. In March 2020, the Finnish graffiti artist Psyke expressed his displeasure at the newspaper Ilta-Sanomat publishing a photograph of a Peugeot 208 in an article about new cars, with his graffiti prominently shown on the background. The artist claims he does not want his art being used in commercial context, not even if he were to receive compensation.
Territorial graffiti marks urban neighborhoods with tags and logos to differentiate certain groups from others. These images are meant to show outsiders a stern look at whose turf is whose. The subject matter of gang-related graffiti consists of cryptic symbols and initials strictly fashioned with unique calligraphies. Gang members use graffiti to designate membership throughout the gang, to differentiate rivals and associates and, most commonly, to mark borders which are both territorial and ideological.
Graffiti has been used as a means of advertising both legally and illegally. Bronx-based TATS CRU has made a name for themselves doing legal advertising campaigns for companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Toyota, and MTV. In the UK, Covent Garden's Boxfresh used stencil images of a Zapatista revolutionary in the hopes that cross referencing would promote their store.
Smirnoff hired artists to use reverse graffiti (the use of high pressure hoses to clean dirty surfaces to leave a clean image in the surrounding dirt) to increase awareness of their product.
Graffiti often has a reputation as part of a subculture that rebels against authority, although the considerations of the practitioners often diverge and can relate to a wide range of attitudes. It can express a political practice and can form just one tool in an array of resistance techniques. One early example includes the anarcho-punk band Crass, who conducted a campaign of stenciling anti-war, anarchist, feminist, and anti-consumerist messages throughout the London Underground system during the late 1970s and early 1980s. In Amsterdam graffiti was a major part of the punk scene. The city was covered with names such as "De Zoot", "Vendex", and "Dr Rat". To document the graffiti a punk magazine was started that was called Gallery Anus. So when hip hop came to Europe in the early 1980s there was already a vibrant graffiti culture.
The student protests and general strike of May 1968 saw Paris bedecked in revolutionary, anarchistic, and situationist slogans such as L'ennui est contre-révolutionnaire ("Boredom is counterrevolutionary") and Lisez moins, vivez plus ("Read less, live more"). While not exhaustive, the graffiti gave a sense of the 'millenarian' and rebellious spirit, tempered with a good deal of verbal wit, of the strikers.
I think graffiti writing is a way of defining what our generation is like. Excuse the French, we're not a bunch of p---- artists. Traditionally artists have been considered soft and mellow people, a little bit kooky. Maybe we're a little bit more like pirates that way. We defend our territory, whatever space we steal to paint on, we defend it fiercely.
The developments of graffiti art which took place in art galleries and colleges as well as "on the street" or "underground", contributed to the resurfacing in the 1990s of a far more overtly politicized art form in the subvertising, culture jamming, or tactical media movements. These movements or styles tend to classify the artists by their relationship to their social and economic contexts, since, in most countries, graffiti art remains illegal in many forms except when using non-permanent paint. Since the 1990s with the rise of Street Art, a growing number of artists are switching to non-permanent paints and non-traditional forms of painting.
Contemporary practitioners, accordingly, have varied and often conflicting practices. Some individuals, such as Alexander Brener, have used the medium to politicize other art forms, and have used the prison sentences enforced on them as a means of further protest. The practices of anonymous groups and individuals also vary widely, and practitioners by no means always agree with each other's practices. For example, the anti-capitalist art group the Space Hijackers did a piece in 2004 about the contradiction between the capitalistic elements of Banksy and his use of political imagery.
Berlin human rights activist Irmela Mensah-Schramm has received global media attention and numerous awards for her 35-year campaign of effacing neo-Nazi and other right-wing extremist graffiti throughout Germany, often by altering hate speech in humorous ways.
In Serbian capital, Belgrade, the graffiti depicting a uniformed former general of Serb army and war criminal, convicted at ICTY for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnian War, Ratko Mladić, appeared in a military salute alongside the words "General, thank to your mother". Aleks Eror, Berlin-based journalist, explains how "veneration of historical and wartime figures" through street art is not a new phenomenon in the region of former Yugoslavia, and that "in most cases is firmly focused on the future, rather than retelling the past". Eror is not only analyst pointing to danger of such an expressions for the region's future. In a long expose on the subject of Bosnian genocide denial, at Balkan Diskurs magazine and multimedia platform website, Kristina Gadže and Taylor Whitsell referred to these experiences as a young generations' "cultural heritage", in which young are being exposed to celebration and affirmation of war-criminals as part of their "formal education" and "inheritance".
There are numerous examples of genocide denial through celebration and affirmation of war criminals throughout the region of Western Balkans inhabited by Serbs using this form of artistic expression. Several more of these graffiti are found in Serbian capital, and many more across Serbia and Bosnian and Herzegovinian administrative entity, Republika Srpska, which is the ethnic Serbian majority enclave. Critics point that Serbia as a state, is willing to defend the mural of convicted war criminal, and have no intention to react on cases of genocide denial, noting that Interior Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin decision to ban any gathering with an intent to remove the mural, with the deployment of riot police, sends the message of "tacit endorsement". Consequently, on 9 November 2021, Serbian heavy police in riot gear, with graffiti creators and their supporters, blocked the access to the mural to prevent human rights groups and other activists to paint over it and mark the International Day Against Fascism and Antisemitism in that way, and even arrested two civic activist for throwing eggs at the graffiti.
Graffiti may also be used as an offensive expression. This form of graffiti may be difficult to identify, as it is mostly removed by the local authority (as councils which have adopted strategies of criminalization also strive to remove graffiti quickly). Therefore, existing racist graffiti is mostly more subtle and at first sight, not easily recognized as "racist". It can then be understood only if one knows the relevant "local code" (social, historical, political, temporal, and spatial), which is seen as heteroglot and thus a 'unique set of conditions' in a cultural context.
A spatial code for example, could be that there is a certain youth group in an area that is engaging heavily in racist activities. So, for residents (knowing the local code), a graffiti containing only the name or abbreviation of this gang already is a racist expression, reminding the offended people of their gang activities. Also a graffiti is in most cases, the herald of more serious criminal activity to come. A person who does not know these gang activities would not be able to recognize the meaning of this graffiti. Also if a tag of this youth group or gang is placed on a building occupied by asylum seekers, for example, its racist character is even stronger.
By making the graffiti less explicit (as adapted to social and legal constraints), these drawings are less likely to be removed, but do not lose their threatening and offensive character.
Elsewhere, activists in Russia have used painted caricatures of local officials with their mouths as potholes, to show their anger about the poor state of the roads. In Manchester, England, a graffitists painted obscene images around potholes, which often resulted in them being repaired within 48 hours.
In the early 1980s, the first art galleries to show graffitists to the public were Fashion Moda in the Bronx, Now Gallery and Fun Gallery, both in the East Village, Manhattan.
A 2006 exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum displayed graffiti as an art form that began in New York's outer boroughs and reached great heights in the early 1980s with the work of Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. It displayed 22 works by New York graffitists, including Crash, Daze, and Lady Pink. In an article about the exhibition in the magazine Time Out, curator Charlotta Kotik said that she hoped the exhibition would cause viewers to rethink their assumptions about graffiti.
From the 1970s onwards, Burhan Doğançay photographed urban walls all over the world; these he then archived for use as sources of inspiration for his painterly works. The project today known as "Walls of the World" grew beyond even his own expectations and comprises about 30,000 individual images. It spans a period of 40 years across five continents and 114 countries. In 1982, photographs from this project comprised a one-man exhibition titled "Les murs murmurent, ils crient, ils chantent ..." (The walls whisper, shout and sing ...) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
In Australia, art historians have judged some local graffiti of sufficient creative merit to rank them firmly within the arts. Oxford University Press's art history text Australian Painting 1788–2000 concludes with a long discussion of graffiti's key place within contemporary visual culture, including the work of several Australian practitioners.
Between March and April 2009, 150 artists exhibited 300 pieces of graffiti at the Grand Palais in Paris.
Spray paint has many negative environmental effects. The paint contains toxic chemicals, and the can uses volatile hydrocarbon gases to spray the paint onto a surface.
Volatile organic compound (VOC) leads to ground level ozone formation and most of graffiti related emissions are VOCs. A 2010 paper estimates 4,862 tons of VOCs were released in the United States in activities related to graffiti.
In China, Mao Zedong in the 1920s used revolutionary slogans and paintings in public places to galvanize the country's communist movement.
Based on different national conditions, many people believe that China's attitude towards Graffiti is fierce, but in fact, according to Lance Crayon in his film Spray Paint Beijing: Graffiti in the Capital of China, Graffiti is generally accepted in Beijing, with artists not seeing much police interference. Political and religiously sensitive graffiti, however, is not allowed.
In Hong Kong, Tsang Tsou Choi was known as the King of Kowloon for his calligraphy graffiti over many years, in which he claimed ownership of the area. Now some of his work is preserved officially.
In Taiwan, the government has made some concessions to graffitists. Since 2005 they have been allowed to freely display their work along some sections of riverside retaining walls in designated "Graffiti Zones". From 2007, Taipei's department of cultural affairs also began permitting graffiti on fences around major public construction sites. Department head Yong-ping Lee (李永萍) stated, "We will promote graffiti starting with the public sector, and then later in the private sector too. It's our goal to beautify the city with graffiti". The government later helped organize a graffiti contest in Ximending, a popular shopping district. graffitists caught working outside of these designated areas still face fines up to NT$6,000 under a department of environmental protection regulation. However, Taiwanese authorities can be relatively lenient, one veteran police officer stating anonymously, "Unless someone complains about vandalism, we won't get involved. We don't go after it proactively."
In 1993, after several expensive cars in Singapore were spray-painted, the police arrested a student from the Singapore American School, Michael P. Fay, questioned him, and subsequently charged him with vandalism. Fay pleaded guilty to vandalizing a car in addition to stealing road signs. Under the 1966 Vandalism Act of Singapore, originally passed to curb the spread of communist graffiti in Singapore, the court sentenced him to four months in jail, a fine of S$3,500 (US$2,233), and a caning. The New York Times ran several editorials and op-eds that condemned the punishment and called on the American public to flood the Singaporean embassy with protests. Although the Singapore government received many calls for clemency, Fay's caning took place in Singapore on 5 May 1994. Fay had originally received a sentence of six strokes of the cane, but the presiding president of Singapore, Ong Teng Cheong, agreed to reduce his caning sentence to four lashes.
In South Korea, Park Jung-soo was fined two million South Korean won by the Seoul Central District Court for spray-painting a rat on posters of the G-20 Summit a few days before the event in November 2011. Park alleged that the initial in "G-20" sounds like the Korean word for "rat", but Korean government prosecutors alleged that Park was making a derogatory statement about the president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, the host of the summit. This case led to public outcry and debate on the lack of government tolerance and in support of freedom of expression. The court ruled that the painting, "an ominous creature like a rat" amounts to "an organized criminal activity" and upheld the fine while denying the prosecution's request for imprisonment for Park.
In Europe, community cleaning squads have responded to graffiti, in some cases with reckless abandon, as when in 1992 in France a local Scout group, attempting to remove modern graffiti, damaged two prehistoric paintings of bison in the Cave of Mayrière supérieure near the French village of Bruniquel in Tarn-et-Garonne, earning them the 1992 Ig Nobel Prize in archeology.
In September 2006, the European Parliament directed the European Commission to create urban environment policies to prevent and eliminate dirt, litter, graffiti, animal excrement, and excessive noise from domestic and vehicular music systems in European cities, along with other concerns over urban life.
In Budapest, Hungary, both a city-backed movement called I Love Budapest and a special police division tackle the problem, including the provision of approved areas.
The Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 became Britain's latest anti-graffiti legislation. In August 2004, the Keep Britain Tidy campaign issued a press release calling for zero tolerance of graffiti and supporting proposals such as issuing "on the spot" fines to graffiti offenders and banning the sale of aerosol paint to anyone under the age of 16. The press release also condemned the use of graffiti images in advertising and in music videos, arguing that real-world experience of graffiti stood far removed from its often-portrayed "cool" or "edgy'" image.
To back the campaign, 123 Members of Parliament (MPs) (including then Prime Minister Tony Blair), signed a charter which stated: "Graffiti is not art, it's crime. On behalf of my constituents, I will do all I can to rid our community of this problem."
In the UK, city councils have the power to take action against the owner of any property that has been defaced under the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 (as amended by the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005) or, in certain cases, the Highways Act. This is often used against owners of property that are complacent in allowing protective boards to be defaced so long as the property is not damaged.
In July 2008, a conspiracy charge was used to convict graffitists for the first time. After a three-month police surveillance operation, nine members of the DPM crew were convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal damage costing at least £1 million. Five of them received prison sentences, ranging from eighteen months to two years. The unprecedented scale of the investigation and the severity of the sentences rekindled public debate over whether graffiti should be considered art or crime.
Some councils, like those of Stroud and Loerrach, provide approved areas in the town where graffitists can showcase their talents, including underpasses, car parks, and walls that might otherwise prove a target for the "spray and run".
Graffiti Tunnel, University of Sydney at Camperdown (2009)
In an effort to reduce vandalism, many cities in Australia have designated walls or areas exclusively for use by graffitists. One early example is the "Graffiti Tunnel" located at the Camperdown Campus of the University of Sydney, which is available for use by any student at the university to tag, advertise, poster, and paint. Advocates of this idea suggest that this discourages petty vandalism yet encourages artists to take their time and produce great art, without worry of being caught or arrested for vandalism or trespassing.[108][109] Others disagree with this approach, arguing that the presence of legal graffiti walls does not demonstrably reduce illegal graffiti elsewhere. Some local government areas throughout Australia have introduced "anti-graffiti squads", who clean graffiti in the area, and such crews as BCW (Buffers Can't Win) have taken steps to keep one step ahead of local graffiti cleaners.
Many state governments have banned the sale or possession of spray paint to those under the age of 18 (age of majority). However, a number of local governments in Victoria have taken steps to recognize the cultural heritage value of some examples of graffiti, such as prominent political graffiti. Tough new graffiti laws have been introduced in Australia with fines of up to A$26,000 and two years in prison.
Melbourne is a prominent graffiti city of Australia with many of its lanes being tourist attractions, such as Hosier Lane in particular, a popular destination for photographers, wedding photography, and backdrops for corporate print advertising. The Lonely Planet travel guide cites Melbourne's street as a major attraction. All forms of graffiti, including sticker art, poster, stencil art, and wheatpasting, can be found in many places throughout the city. Prominent street art precincts include; Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick, St. Kilda, and the CBD, where stencil and sticker art is prominent. As one moves farther away from the city, mostly along suburban train lines, graffiti tags become more prominent. Many international artists such as Banksy have left their work in Melbourne and in early 2008 a perspex screen was installed to prevent a Banksy stencil art piece from being destroyed, it has survived since 2003 through the respect of local street artists avoiding posting over it, although it has recently had paint tipped over it.
In February 2008 Helen Clark, the New Zealand prime minister at that time, announced a government crackdown on tagging and other forms of graffiti vandalism, describing it as a destructive crime representing an invasion of public and private property. New legislation subsequently adopted included a ban on the sale of paint spray cans to persons under 18 and increases in maximum fines for the offence from NZ$200 to NZ$2,000 or extended community service. The issue of tagging become a widely debated one following an incident in Auckland during January 2008 in which a middle-aged property owner stabbed one of two teenage taggers to death and was subsequently convicted of manslaughter.
Graffiti databases have increased in the past decade because they allow vandalism incidents to be fully documented against an offender and help the police and prosecution charge and prosecute offenders for multiple counts of vandalism. They also provide law enforcement the ability to rapidly search for an offender's moniker or tag in a simple, effective, and comprehensive way. These systems can also help track costs of damage to a city to help allocate an anti-graffiti budget. The theory is that when an offender is caught putting up graffiti, they are not just charged with one count of vandalism; they can be held accountable for all the other damage for which they are responsible. This has two main benefits for law enforcement. One, it sends a signal to the offenders that their vandalism is being tracked. Two, a city can seek restitution from offenders for all the damage that they have committed, not merely a single incident. These systems give law enforcement personnel real-time, street-level intelligence that allows them not only to focus on the worst graffiti offenders and their damage, but also to monitor potential gang violence that is associated with the graffiti.
Many restrictions of civil gang injunctions are designed to help address and protect the physical environment and limit graffiti. Provisions of gang injunctions include things such as restricting the possession of marker pens, spray paint cans, or other sharp objects capable of defacing private or public property; spray painting, or marking with marker pens, scratching, applying stickers, or otherwise applying graffiti on any public or private property, including, but not limited to the street, alley, residences, block walls, and fences, vehicles or any other real or personal property. Some injunctions contain wording that restricts damaging or vandalizing both public and private property, including but not limited to any vehicle, light fixture, door, fence, wall, gate, window, building, street sign, utility box, telephone box, tree, or power pole.
To help address many of these issues, many local jurisdictions have set up graffiti abatement hotlines, where citizens can call in and report vandalism and have it removed. San Diego's hotline receives more than 5,000 calls per year, in addition to reporting the graffiti, callers can learn more about prevention. One of the complaints about these hotlines is the response time; there is often a lag time between a property owner calling about the graffiti and its removal. The length of delay should be a consideration for any jurisdiction planning on operating a hotline. Local jurisdictions must convince the callers that their complaint of vandalism will be a priority and cleaned off right away. If the jurisdiction does not have the resources to respond to complaints in a timely manner, the value of the hotline diminishes. Crews must be able to respond to individual service calls made to the graffiti hotline as well as focus on cleanup near schools, parks, and major intersections and transit routes to have the biggest impact. Some cities offer a reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of suspects for tagging or graffiti related vandalism. The amount of the reward is based on the information provided, and the action taken.
When police obtain search warrants in connection with a vandalism investigation, they are often seeking judicial approval to look for items such as cans of spray paint and nozzles from other kinds of aerosol sprays; etching tools, or other sharp or pointed objects, which could be used to etch or scratch glass and other hard surfaces; permanent marking pens, markers, or paint sticks; evidence of membership or affiliation with any gang or tagging crew; paraphernalia including any reference to "(tagger's name)"; any drawings, writing, objects, or graffiti depicting taggers' names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or any mention of tagging crew membership; and any newspaper clippings relating to graffiti crime.
British postcard in the Picturegoer Series, London, no. D 769. Photo: Warner Bros. Publicity still for Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955).
American actor James Dean (1931-1955) was the quintessential 1950s teenager, brooding and romantic. An air of androgyny attributed to his iconic appeal to both men and women. The three roles that defined his stardom are as troubled teenager Jim Stark in Rebel Without a Cause (1955), loner Cal Trask in East of Eden (1955) and surly ranch hand Jett Rink in Giant (1956). After his death in a car crash, the only 24-years-old Dean became the first actor to receive a posthumous Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
James Byron Dean was born in 1931, in Marion, Indiana, the only child of Winton Dean and Mildred Marie Wilson. Six years after his father had left farming to become a dental technician, Dean and his family moved to Santa Monica, California. In 1938, his mother was suddenly struck with acute stomach pain and quickly began to lose weight. She died of uterine cancer when Dean was nine years old. Unable to care for his son, Dean's father sent him to live with his aunt and uncle, Ortense and Marcus Winslow, on their farm in Fairmount, Indiana, where he was raised in their Quaker household. Dean's overall performance in school was exceptional and he was a popular student. He played on the baseball and varsity basketball teams, studied drama, and competed in public speaking through the Indiana High School Forensic Association. After graduating from Fairmount High School in May 1949, he moved back to California with his dog, Max, to live with his father and stepmother. He enrolled in Santa Monica College (SMC) and majored in pre-law. He transferred to UCLA for one semester and changed his major to drama, which resulted in estrangement from his father. While at UCLA, Dean was picked from a group of 350 actors to portray Malcolm in Macbeth. At that time, he also began acting in James Whitmore's workshop. In January 1951, he dropped out of UCLA to pursue a full-time career as an actor. Dean's first television appearance was in a Pepsi Cola commercial His first speaking part was as John the Beloved Disciple, in Hill Number One (1951), an Easter television special dramatizing the Resurrection of Jesus. Dean subsequently obtained three walk-on roles in films: as a soldier in Samuel Fuller’s moody study of a platoon in the Korean War, Fixed Bayonets! (Samuel Fuller, 1951), a boxing cornerman in the Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis comedy Sailor Beware (Hal Walker, 1952), and a youth in the comedy Has Anybody Seen My Gal? (Douglas Sirk, 1952) with Rock Hudson. While struggling to get jobs in Hollywood, Dean also worked as a parking lot attendant at CBS Studios, during which time he met Rogers Brackett, a radio director for an advertising agency, who offered him professional help and guidance in his chosen career, as well as a place to stay. In July 1951, Dean appeared on Alias Jane Doe, which was produced by Brackett. In October 1951, Dean moved to New York City. There, he worked as a stunt tester for the game show Beat the Clock, but was subsequently fired for allegedly performing the tasks too quickly. He also appeared in episodes of several CBS television series The Web, Studio One, and Lux Video Theatre, before gaining admission to the Actors Studio to study method acting under Lee Strasberg. There, he was classmates and close friends with Carroll Baker, alongside whom he would eventually star in Giant (George Stevens, 1956). Dean's career picked up and he performed in further episodes of several early 1950s television. One early role, for the CBS series Omnibus in the episode Glory in the Flower (1953), saw Dean portraying the type of disaffected youth he would later portray in Rebel Without a Cause. Positive reviews for Dean's 1954 theatrical role as Bachir, the blackmailing Arab house boy, in an adaptation of André Gide's book The Immoralist, led to calls from Hollywood.
In 1954, James Dean was cast in the emotionally complex role of 'Cal Trask' in East of Eden (Elia Kazan, 1955), an adaptation of John Steinbeck's 1952 novel East of Eden. The lengthy novel deals with the story of the Trask and Hamilton families over the course of three generations, focusing especially on the lives of the latter two generations in Salinas Valley, California, from the mid-19th century through the 1910s. In contrast to the book, the film script focused on the last portion of the story, predominantly with the character of Cal. Though he initially seems more aloof and emotionally troubled than his twin brother Aron (Richard Davalos), Cal is soon seen to be more worldly, business savvy, and even sagacious than their pious and constantly disapproving father (Raymond Massey) who seeks to invent a vegetable refrigeration process. Cal is bothered by the mystery of their supposedly dead mother, and discovers she is still alive and a brothel-keeping 'madam'; the part was played by actress Jo Van Fleet. Much of Dean's performance in the film was unscripted, including his dance in the bean field and his fetal-like posturing while riding on top of a train boxcar (after searching out his mother in nearby Monterey). The most famous improvisation of the film occurs when Cal's father rejects his gift of $5,000, money Cal earned by speculating in beans before the US became involved in World War I. Instead of running away from his father as the script called for, Dean instinctively turned to Massey and in a gesture of extreme emotion, lunged forward and grabbed him in a full embrace, crying. Kazan kept this and Massey's shocked reaction in the film. Wikipedia: “Dean's performance in the film foreshadowed his role as Jim Stark in Rebel Without A Cause. Both characters are angst-ridden protagonists and misunderstood outcasts, desperately craving approval from their fathers.” In recognition of his performance in East of Eden, Dean was nominated posthumously for the 1956 Academy Awards as Best Actor in a Leading Role of 1955, the first official posthumous acting nomination in Academy Awards history. East of Eden was the only film starring Dean that he would see released in his lifetime.
James Dean quickly followed up his role in Eden with a starring role as the brooding red-jacketed teenager Jim Stark in Rebel Without a Cause (Nicholas Ray, 1955) with Sal Mineo and Natalie Wood. The film depicts the dilemma of a typical teenager of the time, who feels that no one, not even his peers, can understand him. The film scrupulously follows the classic theatrical disciplines, telling all within a 24-hour period. Jim Stark was Dean’s true starring role, and Rebel Without a Cause proved to be hugely popular among teenagers. The landmark juvenile-delinquent drama fixed James Dean’s image forever in American culture. In his next film, Giant (George Stevens, 1956), Dean played a supporting role to Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson. This was due to his desire to avoid being typecast as a rebellious teenager like Cal Trask or Jim Stark. In the film, he plays Jett Rink, a Texan ranch hand who strikes oil and becomes wealthy. His role was notable in that, in order to portray an older version of his character in the film's later scenes, Dean dyed his hair gray and shaved some of it off to give himself a receding hairline. Giant would prove to be Dean's last film. At the end of the film, Dean was supposed to make a drunken speech at a banquet; this is nicknamed the 'Last Supper' because it was the last scene before his sudden death. Due to his desire to make the scene more realistic by actually being inebriated for the take, Dean mumbled so much that director George Stevens decided the scene had to be overdubbed by Nick Adams, who had a small role in the film, because Dean had died before the film was edited. Dean received his second posthumous Best Actor Academy Award nomination for his role in Giant at the 29th Academy Awards in 1957 for films released in 1956.
Today, James Dean is often considered an icon because of his perceived experimental take on life, which included his ambivalent sexuality. Most of his so-called affairs with various starlets were made up by the Warner Brothers public relations. Dean's best-remembered relationship was with young Italian actress Pier Angeli, whom he met while Angeli was shooting The Silver Chalice (1955) on an adjoining Warner lot, and with whom he exchanged items of jewelry as love tokens. Angeli's mother disapproved of Dean. After finishing his role for East of Eden, he took a brief trip to New York in October 1954. While he was away, Angeli unexpectedly announced her engagement to Italian-American singer Vic Damone. The press was shocked and Dean expressed his irritation. Angeli married Damone the following month. Dean also dated Swiss actress Ursula Andress. She was seen with Dean in his sports cars, and was with him on the day he bought the car that he died in. The Gay Times Readers' Awards cited him as the greatest male gay icon of all time. Dean’s ambiguous relationship with Sal Mineo in the angst-ridden Rebel Without A Cause has led many to speculate and view this golden age film as years ahead of its time. When questioned about his sexual orientation, Dean is reported to have said, "No, I am not a homosexual. But I'm also not going to go through life with one hand tied behind my back." Dean, with time on his side during down times of filming, often frequented gay bars in mornings, afternoons and evenings in both Hollywood, Studio City and North Hollywood. He and screenwriter and theatre student from UCLA, William Bast lived together as roommates for a number of years. Bast later became Dean's first biographer and told he and Dean ‘experimented’ sexually. Journalist Joe Hyams suggests that any gay activity Dean might have been involved in appears to have been strictly "for trade", as a means of advancing his career. However, the ‘trade only’ notion is contradicted by Bast and other Dean biographers. Biographer Val Holley: “There's been quite an evolution in the thinking since Dean's death in 1955, moving from ‘James Dean was straight’ to ‘Dean had sex with men but only to advance his career’ to ‘Dean had sex with women but only to advance his career.’ In 2016, a new gossipy biography was published, James Dean: Tomorrow Never Comes, by Darwin Porter and Danforth Prince. The authors claim Dean was in love with Marlon Brando and the two would had a long affair with S&M overtones. We may never know for certain if Dean identified as gay, straight, bisexual, but, regardless, what he’s come to represent still resonates with many LGBT audiences.
In 1954, James Dean had become interested in developing an auto racing career. He purchased various vehicles after filming for East of Eden had concluded, including a Triumph Tiger T110 and a Porsche 356. Just before filming began on Rebel Without a Cause, he competed in his first professional event at the Palm Springs Road Races, which was held in Palm Springs, California on March 26–27, 1955. Dean achieved first place in the novice class, and second place at the main event. His racing continued in Bakersfield a month later, where he finished first in his class and third overall. Dean hoped to compete in the Indianapolis 500, but his busy schedule made it impossible. Dean's final race occurred in Santa Barbara on Memorial Day, 30 May 1955. He was unable to finish the competition due to a blown piston. His brief career was put on hold when Warner Brothers barred him from all racing during the production of Giant. Dean had finished shooting his scenes and the movie was in post-production when he decided to race again. Dean was scheduled to compete at a racing event in Salinas, California on 30 September 1955. Accompanying the actor to the occasion was stunt coordinator Bill Hickman, Collier's photographer Sanford Roth, and Rolf Wütherich, the German mechanic from the Porsche factory who maintained Dean's Porsche 550 Spyder "Little Bastard" car. Wütherich, who had encouraged Dean to drive the car from Los Angeles to Salinas to break it in, accompanied Dean in the Porsche. At 3:30 p.m. Dean was ticketed for speeding, as was Hickman who was following behind in another car. As the group traveled to the event via U.S. Route 466, (currently SR 46) at approximately 5:15 p.m. a 1950 Ford Tudor was passing through an intersection while turning, ahead of the Porsche. Dean, unable to stop in time, slammed into the driver's side of the Ford resulting in Dean's car bouncing across the pavement onto the side of the highway. Dean's passenger, Wütherich, was thrown from the Porsche, while Dean was trapped in the car and sustained numerous fatal injuries, including a broken neck. The driver of the Ford, Donald Turnupseed, exited his damaged vehicle with minor injuries. Dean was pronounced dead on arrival shortly after he arrived by ambulance at the Paso Robles War Memorial Hospital at 6:20 p.m. The Failure Analysis Associates later reconstructed and recreated all details of the accident and have concluded that James Dean was travelling 55 to 56 mph when the fateful accident occurred, thereby proving he had not been speeding, as rumor had it. Ed Stephan at IMDb: “At age 24, James Dean was killed almost immediately from the impact from a broken neck. His very brief career, violent death and highly publicized funeral transformed him into a cult object of apparently timeless fascination.”
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Ed Stephan (IMDb), Daniel Bates (Daily Mail), Towleroad, Wikipedia, and IMDb.
Without any visible railhead treatment, DRS 37422 'Victorious', with 37419 'Driver Tony Kay 1974-2019' at the rear near Seamer, working the 40 minutes late running 3J51 09:50 York Thrall Works - York via Scarborough, Hull & Selby Rail Head Treatment Train on Monday 2nd October 2022.
© Gordon Edgar - All rights reserved. Please do not use my images without my explicit permission
The Flatiron Building, originally the Fuller Building, is a triangular 22-story, 285-foot-tall (86.9 m) steel-framed landmarked building located at 175 Fifth Avenue in the eponymous Flatiron District neighborhood of the borough of Manhattan, New York City. Designed by Daniel Burnham and Frederick Dinkelberg, it was one of the tallest buildings in the city upon its 1902 completion, at 20 floors high, and one of only two "skyscrapers" north of 14th Street—the other being the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Tower, one block east. The building sits on a triangular block formed by Fifth Avenue, Broadway, and East 22nd Street—where the building's 87-foot (27 m) back end is located—with East 23rd Street grazing the triangle's northern (uptown) peak. As with numerous other wedge-shaped buildings, the name "Flatiron" derives from its resemblance to a cast-iron clothes iron.
Called "one of the world's most iconic skyscrapers and a quintessential symbol of New York City", the building anchors the south (downtown) end of Madison Square and the north (uptown) end of the Ladies' Mile Historic District. The neighborhood around it is called the Flatiron District after its signature, iconic building. The building was designated a New York City landmark in 1966, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1989.
The Flatiron Building sits on a triangular block formed by Fifth Avenue to the west, Broadway to the east, and East 22nd Street to the south. The western and eastern facades converge, forming a "peak" at its northern corner where Fifth Avenue and Broadway intersect with East 23rd Street. The shape of the site arises from Broadway's diagonal alignment relative to the Manhattan street grid. The site measures 197.5 feet (60.2 m) on Fifth Avenue, 214.5 feet (65.4 m) on Broadway, and 86 feet (26 m) on 22nd Street. Above the ground level, all three corners of the triangle are curved.
Adjacent buildings include the Toy Center to the north, the Sohmer Piano Building to the southwest, the Scribner Building to the south, and Madison Green to the southeast. Entrances to the New York City Subway's 23rd Street station, served by the R and W trains, are adjacent to the building. The Flatiron Building is at the northern end of the Ladies' Mile Historic District, which extends between 15th Street to the south and 24th Street to the north. By the 1990s, the blocks south of the building had also become known as the Flatiron District
At the beginning of March 1901, media outlets reported that the Newhouse family was planning to sell "Eno's flatiron" for about $2 million to Cumberland Realty Company, an investment partnership created by Harry S. Black, CEO of the Fuller Company. The Fuller Company was the first true general contractor that dealt with all aspects of buildings' construction (except for design), and they specialized in erecting skyscrapers. Black intended to construct a new headquarters building on the site, despite the recent deterioration of the surrounding neighborhood. At the end of that March, the Fuller Company organized a subsidiary to develop a building on the site. The sale was finalized in May 1901.
Black hired Daniel Burnham's architectural firm to design a 21-story building on the site in February 1901. It would be Burnham's first in New York City, the tallest building in Manhattan north of the Financial District, and the first skyscraper north of Union Square (at 14th Street). The Northwestern Salvage and Wrecking Company began razing the site in May 1901, after the majority of existing tenants' leases had expired. Most of the Cumberland's remaining tenants readily vacated the building in exchange for monetary compensation. The sole holdout was Winfield Scott Proskey, a retired colonel who refused to move out until his lease expired later that year. Cumberland Realty unsuccessfully attempted to deactivate Proskey's water and gas supply, and Proskey continued to live in the Cumberland while contractors demolished all of the surrounding apartments. By the end of May 1901, Cumberland Realty discovered that Proskey was bankrupt, and his creditors took over the lease and razed the rest of the Cumberland that June.
The New York Herald published an image of the site on June 2, 1901, with the caption "Flatiron Building". The project's structural engineer, Corydon Purdy, filed plans for a 20-story building on the site were filed that August. The Flatiron Building was not the first building of its triangular ground-plan, although it was the largest at the time of its completion. Earlier buildings with a similar shape include a triangular Roman temple built on a similarly constricted site in the city of Verulamium, Britannia; Bridge House, Leeds, England (1875); the I.O.O.F. Centennial Building (1876) in Alpena, Michigan; and the English-American Building in Atlanta (1897). The Real Estate Record and Guide published a drawing of the building in October 1901; though the drawing was captioned "The Cumberland", it was very similar to the Flatiron Building's final design.
The Atlantic Terra Cotta Company began producing architectural terracotta pieces for the building in August 1901. Around the same time, the New York City Department of Buildings (DOB) indicated that it would refuse to approve Purdy's initial plans unless the engineers submitted detailed information about the framework, fireproofing, and wind-bracing systems. Purdy complied with most of the DOB's requests, submitting detailed drawings and documents, but he balked at the department's requirement that the design include fire escapes. For reasons that are unclear, the DOB dropped its requirement that the building contain fire escapes. In addition, the building was originally legally required to contain metal-framed windows, although this would have increased the cost of construction. The city's Board of Building Commissioners had granted an exemption to Black's syndicate, prompting allegations of favoritism. A new Buildings Department commissioner was appointed at the beginning of 1902, promising to enforce city building codes; this prompted general contractor Thompson–Starrett Co. to announce that the building's window frames would be made of fireproof wood with a copper coating.
The building's steel frame was manufactured by the American Bridge Company in Pennsylvania. The frame had risen above street level by January 1902. Construction was then halted for several weeks, first because of a delay in steel shipments, then because of a blizzard that occurred in February. Further delays were caused by a strike at the factory of Hecla Iron Works, which was manufacturing elevators and handrails for the building. The steel was so meticulously pre-cut that, according to The New York Times, the steel pieces could be connected "without so much as the alteration of a bored hole, or the exchange of a tiny rivet". Workers used air-powered tools to rivet the steel beams together, since such equipment was more efficient than steam-powered tools at conducting power over long distances. The frame was complete by February 1902, and workers began installing the terracotta tiles as the framework of the top stories were being finished. By mid-May, the building was half-covered by terracotta tiling. The terracotta work was completed the next month, and the scaffolding in front of the building was removed. The Fifth Avenue Building Company had invested $1.5 million in the project.
Officials of the Fuller Company announced in August 1902 that the structure would be officially named after George A. Fuller, founder of the Fuller Company and "father of the skyscraper", who had died two years earlier. By then, the site had been known as the "flatiron" for several years; according to Christopher Gray of The New York Times, Burnham's and Fuller's architectural drawings even labeled the structure as the "Flatiron Building". Although the Fuller name was used for some time after the building's completion, locals persisted in calling it the Flatiron, to the displeasure of Harry Black and the building's contractors. In subsequent years, the edifice officially came to be known as the Flatiron Building, and the Fuller name was transferred to a newer 40-story structure at 597 Madison Avenue.
In the weeks before the official opening, the Fuller Company distributed six-page brochures to potential tenants and real-estate brokers. The brochures advertised the building as being "ready for occupancy" on October 1, 1902. The Fuller Company took the 19th floor for its headquarters. When completed, the Flatiron Building was much taller than others in the neighborhood; when New York City Fire Department officials tested the building's standpipes in November 1902, they found that "the 'flat-iron' building would be of great aid in fighting the fire" in any surrounding buildings. Following the building's completion, the surrounding neighborhood evolved from an entertainment district to a commercial hub. Initially, the building was topped by a flagpole, which was maintained by one man, "Steeplejack" Kay, for four decades. Henry Clay Frick expressed interest in purchasing the structure in 1904 for $5 million, but he ultimately withdrew his offer.
During the building's construction, Black had suggested that the "cowcatcher" retail space be installed at the northern tip of the building, occupying 93 square feet (8.6 m2) of unused space at the extreme northern end of the lot. This would maximize use of the building's lot and produce some retail income. Burnham initially refused to consider Black's suggestion, and, in April 1902, Black asked a draftsman at the Fuller Company to draw up plans for the retail space. Black submitted plans for the annex to the DOB in May 1902. The DOB rejected the initial plans because the walls were too thin, but the department approved a revised proposal that June, to Burnham's disapproval. The retail space in the "cowcatcher" was leased by United Cigar Stores.
Another addition to the building not in the original plan was the penthouse, which was constructed after the rest of the building had been completed. By 1905, the Fuller Company needed to expand its technical drawing facilities. As a result, the company filed plans for a penthouse with the New York City Department of Buildings that March. The penthouse would cost $10,000 and would include fireproof partitions and a staircase from the existing 20th floor. The penthouse, intended for use as artists' studios, was quickly rented out to artists such as Louis Fancher, many of whom contributed to the pulp magazines which were produced in the offices below.
New York, often called New York City or simply NYC, is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each of which is coextensive with a respective county. It is a global city and a cultural, financial, high-tech, entertainment, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care, scientific output, life sciences, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, dining, art, fashion, and sports. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy, and is sometimes described as the world's most important city and the capital of the world.
With an estimated population in 2022 of 8,335,897 distributed over 300.46 square miles (778.2 km2), the city is the most densely populated major city in the United States. New York has more than double the population of Los Angeles, the nation's second-most populous city. New York is the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the U.S. by both population and urban area. With more than 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York City is one of the world's most populous megacities. The city and its metropolitan area are the premier gateway for legal immigration to the United States. As many as 800 languages are spoken in New York, making it the most linguistically diverse city in the world. In 2021, the city was home to nearly 3.1 million residents born outside the U.S., the largest foreign-born population of any city in the world.
New York City traces its origins to Fort Amsterdam and a trading post founded on the southern tip of Manhattan Island by Dutch colonists in approximately 1624. The settlement was named New Amsterdam (Dutch: Nieuw Amsterdam) in 1626 and was chartered as a city in 1653. The city came under English control in 1664 and was renamed New York after King Charles II granted the lands to his brother, the Duke of York. The city was temporarily regained by the Dutch in July 1673 and was renamed New Orange; however, the city has been named New York since November 1674. New York City was the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790. The modern city was formed by the 1898 consolidation of its five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island, and has been the largest U.S. city ever since.
Anchored by Wall Street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan, New York City has been called both the world's premier financial and fintech center and the most economically powerful city in the world. As of 2022, the New York metropolitan area is the largest metropolitan economy in the world with a gross metropolitan product of over US$2.16 trillion. If the New York metropolitan area were its own country, it would have the tenth-largest economy in the world. The city is home to the world's two largest stock exchanges by market capitalization of their listed companies: the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. New York City is an established safe haven for global investors. As of 2023, New York City is the most expensive city in the world for expatriates to live. New York City is home to the highest number of billionaires, individuals of ultra-high net worth (greater than US$30 million), and millionaires of any city in the world
The written history of New York City began with the first European explorer, the Italian Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1524. European settlement began with the Dutch in 1608 and New Amsterdam was founded in 1624.
The "Sons of Liberty" campaigned against British authority in New York City, and the Stamp Act Congress of representatives from throughout the Thirteen Colonies met in the city in 1765 to organize resistance to Crown policies. The city's strategic location and status as a major seaport made it the prime target for British seizure in 1776. General George Washington lost a series of battles from which he narrowly escaped (with the notable exception of the Battle of Harlem Heights, his first victory of the war), and the British Army occupied New York and made it their base on the continent until late 1783, attracting Loyalist refugees.
The city served as the national capital under the Articles of Confederation from 1785 to 1789, and briefly served as the new nation's capital in 1789–90 under the United States Constitution. Under the new government, the city hosted the inauguration of George Washington as the first President of the United States, the drafting of the United States Bill of Rights, and the first Supreme Court of the United States. The opening of the Erie Canal gave excellent steamboat connections with upstate New York and the Great Lakes, along with coastal traffic to lower New England, making the city the preeminent port on the Atlantic Ocean. The arrival of rail connections to the north and west in the 1840s and 1850s strengthened its central role.
Beginning in the mid-19th century, waves of new immigrants arrived from Europe dramatically changing the composition of the city and serving as workers in the expanding industries. Modern New York traces its development to the consolidation of the five boroughs in 1898 and an economic and building boom following the Great Depression and World War II. Throughout its history, New York has served as a main port of entry for many immigrants, and its cultural and economic influence has made it one of the most important urban areas in the United States and the world. The economy in the 1700s was based on farming, local production, fur trading, and Atlantic jobs like shipbuilding. In the 1700s, New York was sometimes referred to as a breadbasket colony, because one of its major crops was wheat. New York colony also exported other goods included iron ore as a raw material and as manufactured goods such as tools, plows, nails and kitchen items such as kettles, pans and pots.
The area that eventually encompassed modern day New York was inhabited by the Lenape people. These groups of culturally and linguistically related Native Americans traditionally spoke an Algonquian language now referred to as Unami. Early European settlers called bands of Lenape by the Unami place name for where they lived, such as "Raritan" in Staten Island and New Jersey, "Canarsee" in Brooklyn, and "Hackensack" in New Jersey across the Hudson River from Lower Manhattan. Some modern place names such as Raritan Bay and Canarsie are derived from Lenape names. Eastern Long Island neighbors were culturally and linguistically more closely related to the Mohegan-Pequot peoples of New England who spoke the Mohegan-Montauk-Narragansett language.
These peoples made use of the abundant waterways in the New York region for fishing, hunting trips, trade, and occasionally war. Many paths created by the indigenous peoples are now main thoroughfares, such as Broadway in Manhattan, the Bronx, and Westchester. The Lenape developed sophisticated techniques of hunting and managing their resources. By the time of the arrival of Europeans, they were cultivating fields of vegetation through the slash and burn technique, which extended the productive life of planted fields. They also harvested vast quantities of fish and shellfish from the bay. Historians estimate that at the time of European settlement, approximately 5,000 Lenape lived in 80 settlements around the region.
The first European visitor to the area was Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian in command of the French ship La Dauphine in 1524. It is believed he sailed into Upper New York Bay, where he encountered native Lenape, returned through the Narrows, where he anchored the night of April 17, and left to continue his voyage. He named the area New Angoulême (La Nouvelle-Angoulême) in honor of Francis I, King of France of the royal house of Valois-Angoulême and who had been Count of Angoulême from 1496 until his coronation in 1515. The name refers to the town of Angoulême, in the Charente département of France. For the next century, the area was occasionally visited by fur traders or explorers, such as by Esteban Gomez in 1525.
European exploration continued on September 2, 1609, when the Englishman Henry Hudson, in the employ of the Dutch East India Company, sailed the Half Moon through the Narrows into Upper New York Bay. Like Christopher Columbus, Hudson was looking for a westerly passage to Asia. He never found one, but he did take note of the abundant beaver population. Beaver pelts were in fashion in Europe, fueling a lucrative business. Hudson's report on the regional beaver population served as the impetus for the founding of Dutch trading colonies in the New World. The beaver's importance in New York's history is reflected by its use on the city's official seal.
The first Dutch fur trading posts and settlements were in 1614 near present-day Albany, New York, the same year that New Netherland first appeared on maps. Only in May 1624 did the Dutch West India Company land a number of families at Noten Eylant (today's Governors Island) off the southern tip of Manhattan at the mouth of the North River (today's Hudson River). Soon thereafter, most likely in 1626, construction of Fort Amsterdam began. Later, the Dutch West Indies Company imported African slaves to serve as laborers; they were forced to build the wall that defended the town against English and Indian attacks. Early directors included Willem Verhulst and Peter Minuit. Willem Kieft became director in 1638 but five years later was embroiled in Kieft's War against the Native Americans. The Pavonia Massacre, across the Hudson River in present-day Jersey City, resulted in the death of 80 natives in February 1643. Following the massacre, Algonquian tribes joined forces and nearly defeated the Dutch. Holland sent additional forces to the aid of Kieft, leading to the overwhelming defeat of the Native Americans and a peace treaty on August 29, 1645.
On May 27, 1647, Peter Stuyvesant was inaugurated as director general upon his arrival and ruled as a member of the Dutch Reformed Church. The colony was granted self-government in 1652, and New Amsterdam was incorporated as a city on February 2, 1653. The first mayors (burgemeesters) of New Amsterdam, Arent van Hattem and Martin Cregier, were appointed in that year. By the early 1660s, the population consisted of approximately 1500 Europeans, only about half of whom were Dutch, and 375 Africans, 300 of whom were slaves.
A few of the original Dutch place names have been retained, most notably Flushing (after the Dutch town of Vlissingen), Harlem (after Haarlem), and Brooklyn (after Breukelen). Few buildings, however, remain from the 17th century. The oldest recorded house still in existence in New York, the Pieter Claesen Wyckoff House in Brooklyn, dates from 1652.
On August 27, 1664, four English frigates under the command of Col. Richard Nicolls sailed into New Amsterdam's harbor and demanded New Netherland's surrender, as part of an effort by King Charles II's brother James, Duke of York, the Lord High Admiral to provoke the Second Anglo-Dutch War. Two weeks later, Stuyvesant officially capitulated by signing Articles of Surrender and in June 1665, the town was reincorporated under English law and renamed "New York" after the Duke, and Fort Orange was renamed "Fort Albany". The war ended in a Dutch victory in 1667, but the colony remained under English rule as stipulated in the Treaty of Breda. During the Third Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch briefly recaptured the city in 1673, renaming the city "New Orange", before permanently ceding the colony of New Netherland to England for what is now Suriname in November 1674 at the Treaty of Westminster.
The colony benefited from increased immigration from Europe and its population grew faster. The Bolting Act of 1678, whereby no mill outside the city was permitted to grind wheat or corn, boosted growth until its repeal in 1694, increasing the number of houses over the period from 384 to 983.
In the context of the Glorious Revolution in England, Jacob Leisler led Leisler's Rebellion and effectively controlled the city and surrounding areas from 1689 to 1691, before being arrested and executed.
Lawyers
In New York at first, legal practitioners were full-time businessmen and merchants, with no legal training, who had watched a few court proceedings, and mostly used their own common sense together with snippets they had picked up about English law. Court proceedings were quite informal, for the judges had no more training than the attorneys.
By the 1760s, the situation had dramatically changed. Lawyers were essential to the rapidly growing international trade, dealing with questions of partnerships, contracts, and insurance. The sums of money involved were large, and hiring an incompetent lawyer was a very expensive proposition. Lawyers were now professionally trained, and conversant in an extremely complex language that combined highly specific legal terms and motions with a dose of Latin. Court proceedings became a baffling mystery to the ordinary layman. Lawyers became more specialized and built their reputation, and their fee schedule, on the basis of their reputation for success. But as their status, wealth and power rose, animosity grew even faster. By the 1750s and 1760s, there was a widespread attack ridiculing and demeaning the lawyers as pettifoggers (lawyers lacking sound legal skills). Their image and influence declined. The lawyers organized a bar association, but it fell apart in 1768 during the bitter political dispute between the factions based in the Delancey and Livingston families. A large fraction of the prominent lawyers were Loyalists; their clientele was often to royal authority or British merchants and financiers. They were not allowed to practice law unless they took a loyalty oath to the new United States of America. Many went to Britain or Canada (primarily to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia) after losing the war.
For the next century, various attempts were made, and failed, to build an effective organization of lawyers. Finally a Bar Association emerged in 1869 that proved successful and continues to operate.
By 1700, the Lenape population of New York had diminished to 200. The Dutch West Indies Company transported African slaves to the post as trading laborers used to build the fort and stockade, and some gained freedom under the Dutch. After the seizure of the colony in 1664, the slave trade continued to be legal. In 1703, 42% of the New York households had slaves; they served as domestic servants and laborers but also became involved in skilled trades, shipping and other fields. Yet following reform in ethics according to American Enlightenment thought, by the 1770s slaves made up less than 25% of the population.
By the 1740s, 20% of the residents of New York were slaves, totaling about 2,500 people.
After a series of fires in 1741, the city panicked over rumors of its black population conspiring with some poor whites to burn the city. Historians believe their alarm was mostly fabrication and fear, but officials rounded up 31 black and 4 white people, who over a period of months were convicted of arson. Of these, the city executed 13 black people by burning them alive and hanged the remainder of those incriminated.
The Stamp Act and other British measures fomented dissent, particularly among Sons of Liberty who maintained a long-running skirmish with locally stationed British troops over Liberty Poles from 1766 to 1776. The Stamp Act Congress met in New York City in 1765 in the first organized resistance to British authority across the colonies. After the major defeat of the Continental Army in the Battle of Long Island in late 1776, General George Washington withdrew to Manhattan Island, but with the subsequent defeat at the Battle of Fort Washington the island was effectively left to the British. The city became a haven for loyalist refugees, becoming a British stronghold for the entire war. Consequently, the area also became the focal point for Washington's espionage and intelligence-gathering throughout the war.
New York was greatly damaged twice by fires of suspicious origin, with the Loyalists and Patriots accusing each other of starting the conflagration. The city became the political and military center of operations for the British in North America for the remainder of the war. Continental Army officer Nathan Hale was hanged in Manhattan for espionage. In addition, the British began to hold the majority of captured American prisoners of war aboard prison ships in Wallabout Bay, across the East River in Brooklyn. More Americans lost their lives aboard these ships than died in all the battles of the war. The British occupation lasted until November 25, 1783. George Washington triumphantly returned to the city that day, as the last British forces left the city.
Starting in 1785 the Congress met in the city of New York under the Articles of Confederation. In 1789, New York became the first national capital under the new Constitution. The Constitution also created the current Congress of the United States, and its first sitting was at Federal Hall on Wall Street. The first Supreme Court sat there. The United States Bill of Rights was drafted and ratified there. George Washington was inaugurated at Federal Hall. New York remained the national capital until 1790, when the role was transferred to Philadelphia.
During the 19th century, the city was transformed by immigration, a visionary development proposal called the Commissioners' Plan of 1811 which expanded the city street grid to encompass all of Manhattan, and the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, which connected the Atlantic port to the vast agricultural markets of the Midwestern United States and Canada. By 1835, New York had surpassed Philadelphia as the largest city in the United States. New York grew as an economic center, first as a result of Alexander Hamilton's policies and practices as the first Secretary of the Treasury.
In 1842, water was piped from a reservoir to supply the city for the first time.
The Great Irish Famine (1845–1850) brought a large influx of Irish immigrants, and by 1850 the Irish comprised one quarter of the city's population. Government institutions, including the New York City Police Department and the public schools, were established in the 1840s and 1850s to respond to growing demands of residents. In 1831, New York University was founded by U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin as a non-denominal institution surrounding Washington Square Park.
This period started with the 1855 inauguration of Fernando Wood as the first mayor from Tammany Hall. It was the political machine based among Irish Americans that controlled the local Democratic Party. It usually dominated local politics throughout this period and into the 1930s. Public-minded members of the merchant community pressed for a Central Park, which was opened to a design competition in 1857; it became the first landscape park in an American city.
During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the city was affected by its history of strong commercial ties to the South; before the war, half of its exports were related to cotton, including textiles from upstate mills. Together with its growing immigrant population, which was angry about conscription, sympathies among residents were divided for both the Union and Confederacy at the outbreak of war. Tensions related to the war culminated in the Draft Riots of 1863 led by Irish Catholics, who attacked black neighborhood and abolitionist homes. Many blacks left the city and moved to Brooklyn. After the Civil War, the rate of immigration from Europe grew steeply, and New York became the first stop for millions seeking a new and better life in the United States, a role acknowledged by the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886.
From 1890 to 1930, the largest cities, led by New York, were the focus of international attention. The skyscrapers and tourist attractions were widely publicized. Suburbs were emerging as bedroom communities for commuters to the central city. San Francisco dominated the West, Atlanta dominated the South, Boston dominated New England; Chicago dominated the Midwest United States. New York City dominated the entire nation in terms of communications, trade, finance, popular culture, and high culture. More than a fourth of the 300 largest corporations in 1920 were headquartered here.
In 1898, the modern City of New York was formed with the consolidation of Brooklyn (until then an independent city), Manhattan, and outlying areas. Manhattan and the Bronx were established as two separate boroughs and joined with three other boroughs created from parts of adjacent counties to form the new municipal government originally called "Greater New York". The Borough of Brooklyn incorporated the independent City of Brooklyn, recently joined to Manhattan by the Brooklyn Bridge; the Borough of Queens was created from western Queens County (with the remnant established as Nassau County in 1899); and the Borough of Richmond contained all of Richmond County. Municipal governments contained within the boroughs were abolished, and the county governmental functions were absorbed by the city or each borough. In 1914, the New York State Legislature created Bronx County, making five counties coterminous with the five boroughs.
The Bronx had a steady boom period during 1898–1929, with a population growth by a factor of six from 200,000 in 1900 to 1.3 million in 1930. The Great Depression created a surge of unemployment, especially among the working class, and a slow-down of growth.
On June 15, 1904, over 1,000 people, mostly German immigrant women and children, were killed when the excursion steamship General Slocum caught fire and sank. It is the city's worst maritime disaster. On March 25, 1911, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in Greenwich Village took the lives of 146 garment workers. In response, the city made great advancements in the fire department, building codes, and workplace regulations.
Throughout the first half of the 20th century, the city became a world center for industry, commerce, and communication, marking its rising influence with such events as the Hudson-Fulton Celebration of 1909. Interborough Rapid Transit (the first New York City Subway company) began operating in 1904, and the railroads operating out of Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station thrived.
From 1918 to 1920, New York City was affected by the largest rent strike wave in its history. Somewhere between several 10,000's and 100,000's of tenants struck across the city. A WW1 housing and coal shortage sparked the strikes. It became marked both by occasional violent scuffles and the Red Scare. It would lead to the passage of the first rent laws in the nations history.
The city was a destination for internal migrants as well as immigrants. Through 1940, New York was a major destination for African Americans during the Great Migration from the rural American South. The Harlem Renaissance flourished during the 1920s and the era of Prohibition. New York's ever accelerating changes and rising crime and poverty rates were reduced after World War I disrupted trade routes, the Immigration Restriction Acts limited additional immigration after the war, and the Great Depression reduced the need for new labor. The combination ended the rule of the Gilded Age barons. As the city's demographics temporarily stabilized, labor unionization helped the working class gain new protections and middle-class affluence, the city's government and infrastructure underwent a dramatic overhaul under Fiorello La Guardia, and his controversial parks commissioner, Robert Moses, ended the blight of many tenement areas, expanded new parks, remade streets, and restricted and reorganized zoning controls.
For a while, New York ranked as the most populous city in the world, overtaking London in 1925, which had reigned for a century.[58] During the difficult years of the Great Depression, the reformer Fiorello La Guardia was elected as mayor, and Tammany Hall fell after eighty years of political dominance.
Despite the effects of the Great Depression, some of the world's tallest skyscrapers were built during the 1930s. Art Deco architecture—such as the iconic Chrysler Building, Empire State Building, and 30 Rockefeller Plaza— came to define the city's skyline. The construction of the Rockefeller Center occurred in the 1930s and was the largest-ever private development project at the time. Both before and especially after World War II, vast areas of the city were also reshaped by the construction of bridges, parks and parkways coordinated by Robert Moses, the greatest proponent of automobile-centered modernist urbanism in America.
Returning World War II veterans and immigrants from Europe created a postwar economic boom. Demands for new housing were aided by the G.I. Bill for veterans, stimulating the development of huge suburban tracts in eastern Queens and Nassau County. The city was extensively photographed during the post–war years by photographer Todd Webb.
New York emerged from the war as the leading city of the world, with Wall Street leading the United States ascendancy. In 1951, the United Nations relocated from its first headquarters in Flushing Meadows Park, Queens, to the East Side of Manhattan. During the late 1960s, the views of real estate developer and city leader Robert Moses began to fall out of favor as the anti-urban renewal views of Jane Jacobs gained popularity. Citizen rebellion stopped a plan to construct an expressway through Lower Manhattan.
After a short war boom, the Bronx declined from 1950 to 1985, going from predominantly moderate-income to mostly lower-income, with high rates of violent crime and poverty. The Bronx has experienced an economic and developmental resurgence starting in the late 1980s that continues into today.
The transition away from the industrial base toward a service economy picked up speed, while the jobs in the large shipbuilding and garment industries declined sharply. The ports converted to container ships, costing many traditional jobs among longshoremen. Many large corporations moved their headquarters to the suburbs or to distant cities. At the same time, there was enormous growth in services, especially finance, education, medicine, tourism, communications and law. New York remained the largest city and largest metropolitan area in the United States, and continued as its largest financial, commercial, information, and cultural center.
Like many major U.S. cities, New York suffered race riots, gang wars and some population decline in the late 1960s. Street activists and minority groups such as the Black Panthers and Young Lords organized rent strikes and garbage offensives, demanding improved city services for poor areas. They also set up free health clinics and other programs, as a guide for organizing and gaining "Power to the People." By the 1970s the city had gained a reputation as a crime-ridden relic of history. In 1975, the city government avoided bankruptcy only through a federal loan and debt restructuring by the Municipal Assistance Corporation, headed by Felix Rohatyn. The city was also forced to accept increased financial scrutiny by an agency of New York State. In 1977, the city was struck by the New York City blackout of 1977 and serial slayings by the Son of Sam.
The 1980s began a rebirth of Wall Street, and the city reclaimed its role at the center of the worldwide financial industry. Unemployment and crime remained high, the latter reaching peak levels in some categories around the close of the decade and the beginning of the 1990s. Neighborhood restoration projects funded by the city and state had very good effects for New York, especially Bedford-Stuyvesant, Harlem, and The Bronx. The city later resumed its social and economic recovery, bolstered by the influx of Asians, Latin Americans, and U.S. citizens, and by new crime-fighting techniques on the part of the New York Police Department. In 1989, New York City elected its first African American Mayor, David Dinkins. He came out of the Harlem Clubhouse.
In the late 1990s, the city benefited from the nationwide fall of violent crime rates, the resurgence of the finance industry, and the growth of the "Silicon Alley", during the dot com boom, one of the factors in a decade of booming real estate values. New York was also able to attract more business and convert abandoned industrialized neighborhoods into arts or attractive residential neighborhoods; examples include the Meatpacking District and Chelsea (in Manhattan) and Williamsburg (in Brooklyn).
New York's population reached an all-time high in the 2000 census; according to census estimates since 2000, the city has continued to grow, including rapid growth in the most urbanized borough, Manhattan. During this period, New York City was a site of the September 11 attacks of 2001; 2,606 people who were in the towers and in the surrounding area were killed by a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, an event considered highly traumatic for the city but which did not stop the city's rapid regrowth. On November 3, 2014, One World Trade Center opened on the site of the attack. Hurricane Sandy brought a destructive storm surge to New York in the evening of October 29, 2012, flooding numerous streets, tunnels, and subway lines in Lower Manhattan. It flooded low-lying areas of Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island. Electrical power was lost in many parts of the city and its suburbs.
Modest? Coy? Contemplative? Another pic without the smile. I'm bracing myself for my dear friend Katie O'Malley's analysis of the scenario! I actually think this was meant as a close-up of my eye makeup, which I struggle with mightily, being blind as a bat.
Maybe I'm saying a quick prayer for all the folks in the DC area who, like me, are about to be pummeled with 2 feet of snow!
The hair and makeup won't look quite the same after I'm done shoveling! Hugs to all.
"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.
Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets
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One of Harvey's friends who also agreed to be photographed but having lost my pen earlier in the evening and with a memory like a sieve I'm afraid I forgot her name.
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From a visit by members of the Dundee Mirrorless Group on Monday of this week.
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I hit the road without any lodging reservations. In the arid, rain shadow of the Cascades, I was wandering with a recently-full fuel tank, lots of water, and MREs. I ended up on an unpaved stagecoach road in Malheur County, Oregon. I stopped to gawk at a lake, wading birds, and some adobe stagecoach stop ruins. The wind made a shimmering pattern on the lake that I took a minute to video-record. A 2,000 gallon (7,600 liter) septic tank vacuum truck seemed like an odd sight out here. It crackled over the soil, going that about 50 miles per hour, trailed by a dust cloud.
Soon, I found myself in an eastern Oregon traffic jam: idling behind about 30-40 head of cattle being moved over the road from a grazed-out area to fresh range. About five people on horseback — wearing cowboy hats and ironed white shirts, and a Border Collie — were the steering mechanism. This sea of cattle partly surrounded my car. A woman on horseback yelled to just nose my car into the herd and the cattle would yield. I wasn't in a hurry and the cattle seemed unfamiliar with "right of way." I didn't want to injure any animals. So I backed off and my clown car brought up the rear of the bovine parade.
Along with the steady pace of the cattle, there was rapid alimentation. I ended up with a few pounds of freshly-crafted cattle excrement all over the sides of the car. That stuff sticks to Goodyear traction tires like it's magnetic or something. Once you speed up, you get rooster tails of crap flying off the tires. I was thoroughly satisfied with myself and the stripes of green/brown goo all over the paint. I wanted to park in the closest handicapped spot — right in front of church — so the locals could appreciate my work.
Finally, I hit pavement. I was somewhere on US95. I headed north for Idaho. There was a small, green guide sign that said,
"<- Charbonneau's Grave 5." The photo shows what I found.
A few days later, I saw Pompey's Pillar which was named for Charbonneau.
This guy was quite the explorer and he still has fans.
Moving [Lewis and Clark's]Keelboat and [canoes] upriver required a tremendous effort by each man; consequently, they ate prodigiously. In comparison with beef, the venison and elk were lean, even [though it was Fall]. Each soldier consumed up to nine pounds of meat per day, along with whatever fruit the area afforded and some cornmeal, and still felt hungry.
— Stephen E. Ambrose
Journalism grade images.
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I have been without internet for days in a row, and intermittent for weeks. My fiber optic installation was pushed back, but now the DSL is working again...but for how long. Recently, I was playing with my small camera collection. Only one camera is a current model, and the oldest is the 8MP Canon Rebel XT (350D).
On the one hand I am dying for an even better camera than my flagship camera the 90D. On the other hand, really, we are pretty spoiled, aren't we? Any decent camera can do great things!