Filed under: Architecture, Art, Cool Site of the Day, History, The United States | Tags: Early 20th Century, Municipal Archives, New York City Photographs
New York City’s Municipal Archives have just released over 870,000 images from its photographic collection. It is, as the Atlantic describes it,”a visual coming-of-age story, documenting its maturation into one of the world’s most influential cities.”
The Atlantic’s Alan Taylor has sifted through the images, and come up with 53 early and mid-20th century images for their magazine. The Atlantic has done a number of these spectacular photo essays, and they are always worth your time. There is a link to the whole collection, but they warn the website is swamped, and you may have difficulty reaching it. I loved this early street sweeper. Click on the image to enlarge.
Filed under: Art, Cool Site of the Day | Tags: Lavatory Portraits, Nina Kachadourian, Renaissance Style
To pass the time during long flights, artist Nina Katchadourian goes to the lavatory, adorns herself in tissue costume, and creates hilarious self-portrait photos in the style of Flemish Renaissance paintings. She calls the series
“Seat Assignment Lavatory Self-Portraits in the Flemish Style”
(h/t: Laughing Squid)
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, Heartwarming, Science/Technology | Tags: A Baby Lemur, Bookmark This Website., Raising Aye-ayes
Good Morning! This is Elphaba, a baby Aye-aye who was born November 29 at the Duke Lemur Center. She is one of the many baby animals featured at Zoo Borns, a website that features all sorts of animals being raised in the world’s zoos to save endangered species.
Aye-ayes are considered one of the most unusual primates. It is nocturnal, lives in tropical rainforest, and has a very specialized diet, consisting mostly of the interior of Ramy nuts, nectar from the Traveller’s Palm tree and some fungi and insect grubs. They are known to raid coconut plantations and have been seen eating lychees and mangoes.
This is a great website to visit, especially after a bad meeting. Who can resist cute baby animals, and www.zooborns.com has pages and pages of cuteness. In addition to the baby wolves and lions and gorillas, all sorts of animals that I had never heard of. Have you ever seen a baby forest buffalo? Or a baby Bongo? Be careful though, you can get lost in the pictures and spend hours.
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, Environment, Junk Science | Tags: Aboriginal Elders Know, Environmental Excess, The Beverly Caribou Herd
The splendid Canadian blog Small dead animals calls our attention to:
Across the tundra 1,000 miles to the east, Canada’s Beverly herd, numbering more than 200,000 a decade ago, can barely be found today.[...]
From wildlife spectacle to wildlife mystery, the decline of the caribou — called reindeer in the Eurasian Arctic — has biologists searching for clues, and finding them.
You know, of course, what comes next —climate change, decimating species, inhuman, lugubrious etc, etc.
A vast herd of northern caribou that scientists feared had vanished from the face of the Earth has been found, safe and sound — pretty much where aboriginal elders said it would be all along. …
“Many of the community people reported that elders think this is nothing new. Caribou move.”
Do read the whole thing, and bookmark Small dead animals while you’re at it. Always good sense and something interesting.
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, Freedom, Fun n Games | Tags: A Treehouse to Die For, Every Kid's Dream, Ontario Canada
This treehouse was built in Ontario, Canada, featuring little over seven-hundred square feet of platform spread over eight levels. There are two cabins, a 50-foot rope bridge, a 120-foot zip-line, an elevator, a full bar and a barbecue. It was built over several summers, totalling about a month. The song in the video is the Flower Duet.
I once had a treehouse when I was small. Well, more of a tree platform, about four feet square. It sat about seven feet up in a cottonwood by the river. Our trees were largely either Ponderosa pines or Douglas fir, and that cottonwood was the only non-evergreen of any size. I found it very scary because it was so high. Wimp, yes, but I was little, probably 6 or 7.
(Borrowed shamelessly from The Borderline Sociopathic Blog for Boys)
Filed under: Architecture, Art, Cool Site of the Day, History | Tags: But Where Did They Go?, Evidence Left Behind, Vanished Civilizations
The Olmec civilization existed from around 1400 BC in the tropical lowlands of south-central Mexico. They were master builders and their major sites included ceremonial courts, house mounds, large conical pyramids and stone monuments. They relied heavily on trade, but by 400 BC they had largely disappeared. Did volcanic activity cause them to relocate? Were they invaded? By whom? Nobody knows.
Here are nine other civilizations that disappeared completely, but without leaving forwarding addresses. Where did they go?
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, History | Tags: Deadwood, Lakota Encampment, Western History 1887-1892
Between 1887 and 1892, John C.H. Grabill sent 188 photographs to the Library of Congress for copyright protection. Grabill is known as a western photographer, who documented many areas of western life, Native Americans and western landscapes. Much of his work was centered around Deadwood. He was particularly known for his photographs in the aftermath of the Wounded Knee Massacre on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
This is a fascinating glimpse of western history. You could spend hours in this album, or revisit frequently. Worth all the time you can spare.
Filed under: Capitalism, Cool Site of the Day, Developing Nations | Tags: Colombia, Jobs for colombians, The Flower Industry
March comes in, they say, like a lion and goes out like a lamb. Could be. Today started off with sunshine, and has devolved into brief cloudbursts, short windstorm–the kind that would shut down the turbines— another cloudburst and more sunshine. It’s 45° and I can still see a patch of blue sky out the window, but clouds dominate. Fortunately, the grocery stores are full of blooms to assuage the gloom.
There are various bursts — Valentine’s Day flowers were a reminder to every man who entered the store that he’d better not forget to take some home. We’ll have some green-dyed carnations for St. Patrick’s Day, and then explosions of flowers for Easter and Mother’s Day. But where do they all come from when the weather is so miserable here?
This fascinating article from the Smithsonian tells the story about how Col0mbia became our major supplier of flowers. It is a remarkable story of specialization and innovation.
Filed under: Capitalism, Cool Site of the Day, Economy, Energy | Tags: Michael Ramirez, Not Gonna Work, Obama's Green Economy
Michael Ramirez always has an appropriate comment on the political affairs of the day. You can see all of his cartoons at Investors.com. I stand in awe of his talent.
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, Humor, Movies | Tags: New York, Snowmageddon, Star Wars
Things in New York are worse than we’ve been told.
(via HotAir)
Filed under: Cool Site of the Day, Fun n Games, Music | Tags: Autumn, Fall, Fire, Screensaver, Wallpaper
With autumn quickly giving way to winter, I headed out into the crisp cool air to clean up the last vestiges (fingers crossed) of fall leaves today — particularly from the roof — which leaves me feeling fallish (ba domp bomp!).
Sometimes, living in Seattle, we don’t always have the most distinct change of seasons. We usually have a nice, sunny, warm summer followed by nine months of different gradations of wet, drizzly gray in between. Other years, thankfully, the seasons are more pronounced. This looks to be one of those years. I was shocked to look at the weather gadget on my desktop to find that we may actually get our first snow tomorrow (the reason for the roof cleaning.) But because the seasons are not always as distinct as I would have them here in the drizzly dank Pacific Northwest, I look to other sources for my seasonal fix.
And before fall fleets away, I thought I’d share the fun fall freebies I’ve found on the web to help bring the season indoors. More after the jump…
Filed under: Art, Cool Site of the Day, History, Science/Technology | Tags: 17300 year-old paintings, A Visit to the Cave, The Lascaux Caves
Lascaux is the setting of a complex of caves in southwestern France noted for its Paleolithic cave paintings. The cave was discovered on September 12, 1940 by four teenagers and their dog. The cave was opened to the public in 1948. By 1955, it was determined that the carbon dioxide produced by 1,200 visitors a day had visibly damaged the paintings. The cave was closed to the public in 1963 in order to preserve the art.
The caves are now carefully monitored, and only a few scientific experts are allowed to work inside the caves. Some efforts at preservation have met with unintended consequences. A black mold may have been the result of air conditioning or lights intended to protect the paintings.
The caves contain nearly 2,000 images which have been painted onto the walls using mineral pigments, although some have been incised into the stone. The Hall of the Bulls is the most famous, with four black bulls that are the dominant figures. One of the bulls is 17 feet long.
The paintings are estimated to be 17,300 years old, mostly of large animals, many of which are known from the fossil evidence to have lived in the area at the time. There are varied theories about some of the other images and dot clusters, ranging from star charts to visions experienced during ritualistic trance-dancing. Others suggest that the images could be a record of hunting success, or a ritual in advance to insure hunting success.
The website is huge, and rewards patient investigation. Clicking on a British flag will get you the English language. Sometimes the view can be dragged with your mouse, and sometimes not. The Wikipedia article about Lascaux is available here. If the Paleolithic music gets on your nerves, it can be turned off by clicking on the word ‘sound’ at the bottom of the page. Beyond that, you’re on your own. Enjoy.
