Rough Start For Lady Liberty...!

Ever wonder just how the Statue of Liberty made it to her present place of welcome? Come to find out, her trip was not an easy one at all!

A little bit of research (and this article from Listverse) shows that it took a lot of luck and hard work to finally bring Lady Liberty home!

Statue Of Liberty Stuffed In Storage

Millions of immigrants came from around the world to pass under Lady Liberty’s torch and find new lives in a nation that promised a better future. She has stood in the harbor attracting thousands of new visitors every year and representing the idealism of her country and its people.

You may know that the Statue of Liberty was a gift from France. This is both true and completely false. The artist, Auguste Bartholdi, originally approached Egyptian leaders during the World’s Fair with hopes of designing a massive statue to sit at the entrance of the Suez Canal. He was ultimately denied and searched for an alternative, turning to America with the hook of celebrating the young country’s independence.

It took 15 years and extensive fundraising to complete the statue, which was fully constructed in a Paris neighborhood with no significant funding from either government. In the end, Joseph Pulitzer saved the day by promising to print the names of every single contributor in his magazine. The plan worked. The gift was packed and shipped on the French ship Isere in 300 pieces in 241 crates across the Atlantic Ocean.

The cargo was nearly lost in rough seas. Once she reached the harbor, America’s icon was placed in storage for over a year. There it stayed, and there it would have remained indefinitely until it was de-mothballed and made the centerpiece of a publicity stunt, in which every person who donated to the cause of putting Liberty on her island got their name printed in New York World newspaper. Who could resist?

So bribery, luck, and good old-fashioned commercialism established America’s symbol in her current home.
Nice to finally know that the very symbol of our country had as rocky a start as we did a a new nation. However she finally made it home, regardless of the means. Let's hope she stays there for a very, very long time!

Coffee out on the patio this nice, cool morning.OK?

Japanese Ghost For Monday Mysteries...!

We don't often have too many mysteries from Japan that we study, so I figured this would be a great chance to expound on one.

This one is strange because of the main characters involved and the fact that they refuse to live in government provided housing (read mansions) because of the ghost! Sure they give other reasons, but after reading this article from Listverse I'm not so sure.

The Haunting Of The Kotei

Tales of ghosts stalking the White House in Washington DC are de rigueur, but reports out of Japan indicate that their Prime Minister’s home, the Kotei, might also be populated by spirits. The Kotei was built in 1929 in the architectural style of Frank Lloyd Wright, and former Prime Ministers and their first ladies have frequently complained of spectral happenings. The current Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, has resisted moving into the headquarters, instead living in his own private residence. Although he has gone on record as saying that the mansion is too large for his needs, Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun quoted him telling others, “I don’t feel like living here because there are ghosts.”

The mansion certainly has a bloody history; on May 15, 1932, Navy officers ambushed Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi, shooting him to death. The insurgents’ plot was originally even more sinister: at the time Inukai was murdered, he was hosting film star Charlie Chaplin at his estate. Luckily, Chaplin was attending a sumo match with the Prime Minister’s son when the soldiers arrived. Four years later, another military coup occurred at the Kotei, when a contingent of roughly 280 soldiers forced the gates open and engaged in a gun battle with four police officers and the new Prime Minsiter, Keisuke Okada. The police were killed, but their bravery gave Okada enough time to escape. Instead, his brother-in-law, Denzo Matsuo (who bore a striking resemblance to Okada), was gunned down.

Years later, the front entrance of the mansion is still pocked with bullet holes, but the violent legacy of the Kotei runs even deeper . . . several people have reported seeing spectral soldiers in the garden, and Abe himself acknowledged that former Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori had seen a ghost at the residence.

Hey...I don't blame them. If I knew that ghost lived in a place I was supposed to move to, I would think twice myself. Especially if those were caused by a bloody and violent death, know what I mean?

Coffee out on the patio this morning. Cool and pleasant out so far!

Gotta Love The Sunday 'Toons...!

Every Sunday I think of doing something different, but then think better of it. What would we do without the 'toons?

>

I wonder just what it is that makes us enjoy the cartoons so much? Going back to our childhood, I reckon!
We haven't seen any Speedy Gonzales in a while now, so here's a little taste!



Ya know...some of these are almost funny! Guess you just have to be in the right mood!



One more? Sure...why not!



OK, that should do it for this morning. Guess we have to start doing grown-up stuff now. BUMMER!

Coffee out on the patio this morning. Then we can act like grown-ups!

Dollhouse Murder Scenes...!

Some folks have hobbies that might seem strange to us. I've known a few people like that.

However, just because those hobbies may seem strange to us, doesn't mean they aren't useful to someone. Here is a case in point, straight from the folks over at KnowdgeNuts.

The Woman Who Built Dollhouse Murder Scenes

By Nolan Moore on Monday, September 29, 2014

Frances Glessner Lee wasn’t your run-of-the-mill heiress. Sure, she lived in a Chicago mansion, her parents were millionaires, and she enjoyed planning extravagant dinner parties. But Glessner Lee was fascinated by a rather lowbrow, “unladylike” topic—murder. Born in 1878, Glessner Lee was obsessed with medical books and murder mysteries and hoped to go to Harvard and become a physician. Sadly, her dad crushed her dreams, insisting college was no place for a woman.

However, everything changed in 1936. Her parents were dead, and she’d divorced her husband in 1914. Suddenly, she was filthy rich and could do anything she wanted. Still fascinated by forensic science, Glessner Lee established the Department of Legal Medicine at Harvard, a special school that trained future medical examiners. She also created the George Burgess Magrath Library of Legal Medicine, named after the family friend and pathology professor who sparked her interest in criminology.

But Glessner Lee wasn’t content with just shilling out money. She wanted to get in on the action, and that’s when she had a rather brilliant idea. In addition to homicide investigation, Glessner Lee also enjoyed building miniature models. What if she were to combine her two passions? Inspired, Glessner Lee set to work on one of the most unique teaching tools in forensic pathology. Over the next several years, this Chicago socialite built 20 incredibly detailed dollhouses, each one complete with a dead body.

Dubbed “The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death,” these dollhouses depicted actual crime scenes for detectives to investigate. Glessner Lee was worried that careless cops were destroying crime scenes, and really, it was a legitimate fear. In the early 20th century, there were quite a few detectives who didn’t know (or didn’t care) that it was a bad idea to walk all over a crime scene or handle evidence with their bare hands. By building intricate models based on actual cases, Glessner Lee hoped to train detectives how to properly read clues and observe evidence.

Each house cost between $3,000 and $4,500, and Glessner Lee analyzed crime reports and visited actual murder scenes to make sure her models were accurate. She had an amazing eye for detail, and her dollhouses were more than just teaching tools. They were art. You could actually lock the doors. There were little rolled-up cigarettes on the tabletops. She used wood from a 200-year-old barn to build her barn house murder scene, and she even took a blowtorch to one of her models to make it look like there’d been a fire.

But most important were the dolls. Each one was crafted by hand and wore clothes specially tailored by Glessner Lee herself. Most impressively, she paid special attention to the victims. If the bodies had been lying around a few days, they needed to look gross and swollen, and she painted the figures in such a way that they had that perfect corpse complexion. She then arranged them in grisly poses, perhaps drowned in a bathtub or sprawled out on the floor, covered in blood.

The dollhouses were then sent to Harvard where investigators practiced looking for clues. They searched for misplaced fibers or weapons hidden under furniture. They were taught to scan the room in a clockwise spiral so they wouldn’t miss anything. The real genius behind the “Nutshell Studies” was that sometimes, detectives had to consult with doctors or other scientists to learn what had happened. And from time to time, the dollhouses depicted a suicide or even a natural death.

What’s even cooler is that twice a year, Glessner Lee taught all these male doctors, detectives, and students herself. Even though she’d never attended a university or served with the police, she was considered an expert when it came to analyzing crimes. In fact, she was so good that she was made an honorary captain of the New Hampshire State Police. And after her seminars, she’d throw a banquet for all the detectives where they could eat dinner and swap murder stories.

Sadly, Frances Glessner Lee passed away in 1962, but her dollhouses live on. Today, they’re on display at the Maryland Medical Examiner’s Office, and believe it or not, students are still studying them. And while you’ll probably never see one of her dollhouses in person, there’s a good chance this Sherlockian socialite has affected your life, especially if you’re a fan of TV crime dramas. As it turns out, Frances Glessner Lee was the inspiration for everybody’s favorite fictional female detective, Jessica Fletcher from “Murder, She Wrote.”

Now here's a case of a hobby turned teaching aid. It is a good thing when something you like to do can be put to a worthy cause. It must have been a true joy for her to know that her creations were a tremendous help in developing the role of forensic science.

Coffee out on the patio this morning. It's still cool, but pleasant!

Devil's Fingers For Freaky Friday...!

Once more, a story that sort of ties in with the month of Halloween.

This fungus seems to be aptly named, if you ask me. I swear it looks like a gloved hand coming out of the ground, complete with the sleeve of a shirt! Scary stuff!

Devil’s Fingers Mushroom

Photo credit: Fendy/Blogger 

Clathrus archeri, better known as devil’s fingers or octopus stinkhorn, is a truly creepy mushroom. In its mature form, it has four to eight fingers as red as a fire engine with black spheres that resemble suction cups on an octopus’s tentacles. These black spheres are gleba, which emit a rancid smell reminiscent of rotting meat. This attracts flies, which disperse the plant’s spores. The smell explains the “stinkhorn” part of its name.

Like all stinkhorns, devil’s fingers start life in a white, partially buried, egg-like bulb. When it bursts from the bulb, the fingers are white and look like a corpse’s hand and sleeve rising from the grave. Eventually, the fingers stand erect, rising to 10 centimeters (4 in) in height and spreading out to 20 centimeters (8 in) in width. Although it is not toxic, its smell makes it inedible.

They don't have to tell me not to eat it, 'cause I have no intention of doing so!

Coffee out on the patio this morning, if you don't mind!

How Deep Is Your Well...?

Well, chances are these folks in England have you beat, especially for a hand dug well!

When you read a story like this, it gives you an idea just what folks can do if they don't give up. Of course, it helps to have a lot of friends to help as well!

Woodingdean Well

 In 1858, in the town of Woodingdean, England, plans were drawn up for a new building to be constructed and added to a nearby industrial school for troubled juveniles. A source of water was required, but it was decided that pumping water in from elsewhere was not cost-effective. The construction of Woodingdean Well began, supplemented with adult laborers from a nearby workhouse to further lower the costs. All digging was done by hand, with buckets of earth hand-winched up to the surface.

The initial plan was for a 122-meter (400 ft) brick-lined well. After two years of digging, the well had reached 134 meters (438 ft) below the surface (and slightly below sea level), and still no water had been found. At this point, horizontal shafts were dug in four directions, also without success. The men in charge of the project refused to admit defeat, and ordered a new vertical shaft started at the end of one of the horizontal ones.

This shaft was dug for another two years with men working 24 hours a day to dig and lay bricks. The only light was from candles, and conditions were such that many men worked naked in the cramped shaft. Finally, on March 16, 1862, a bricklayer noticed that the ground at the bottom was beginning to slowly rise upwards. He and the other workers spent a tense 45 minutes climbing up and out of the well before water rushed upward, finally signaling success. After four years of stubborn digging, Woodingdean Well had reached 392 meters (1,285 ft) deep, making it the deepest hand-dug well in the world.

Four years of digging with the only light being that from candles...that makes a hard job even harder. I'd say these diggers had no quit in them. What a job!

Coffee out on the patio this morning, OK?

John Browning For Western Wednesday...!

The Wild West might have been much wilder if it weren't for the inventions of one Mr. John Browning.

Thanks to his many firearm improvements and patents, weapons became easier to use for both the novice and experienced. Truly he was the "father of the modern firearm!"

Jan 21, 1855:

Gun designer John Browning is born

John Moses Browning, sometimes referred to as the "father of modern firearms," is born in Ogden, Utah. Many of the guns manufactured by companies whose names evoke the history of the American West-Winchester, Colt, Remington, and Savage-were actually based on John Browning's designs.

The son of a talented gunsmith, John Browning began experimenting with his own gun designs as a young man. When he was 24 years old, he received his first patent, for a rifle that Winchester manufactured as its Single Shot Model 1885. Impressed by the young man's inventiveness, Winchester asked Browning if he could design a lever-action-repeating shotgun. Browning could and did, but his efforts convinced him that a pump-action mechanism would work better, and he patented his first pump model shotgun in 1888.

Fundamentally, all of Browning's manually-operated repeating rifle and shotgun designs were aimed at improving one thing: the speed and reliability with which gun users could fire multiple rounds-whether shooting at game birds or other people. Lever and pump actions allowed the operator to fire a round, operate the lever or pump to quickly eject the spent shell, insert a new cartridge, and then fire again in seconds.

By the late 1880s, Browning had perfected the manual repeating weapon; to make guns that fired any faster, he would somehow have to eliminate the need for slow human beings to actually work the mechanisms. But what force could replace that of the operator moving a lever or pump? Browning discovered the answer during a local shooting competition when he noticed that reeds between a man firing and his target were violently blown aside by gases escaping from the gun muzzle. He decided to try using the force of that escaping gas to automatically work the repeating mechanism.

Browning began experimenting with his idea in 1889. Three years later, he received a patent for the first crude fully automatic weapon that captured the gases at the muzzle and used them to power a mechanism that automatically reloaded the next bullet. In subsequent years, Browning refined his automatic weapon design. When U.S. soldiers went to Europe during WWI, many of them carried Browning Automatic Rifles, as well as Browning's deadly machine guns.

During a career spanning more than five decades, Browning's guns went from being the classic weapons of the American West to deadly tools of world war carnage. Amazingly, since Browning's death in 1926, there have been no further fundamental changes in the modern firearm industry.

It's amazing to see that not many changes to his designs have been made over the years. I reckon it's like they say...if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Coffee out on the patio this morning. Temps in the high 60's, so it's pleasant