Harvey Girls

In 1875, businessman Fred Harvey (1835-1901) opened two restaurants in Kansas and Oklahoma along the Kansas Pacific Railway. At that time, the railways did not serve food on trains and Harvey's restaurants quickly became popular with travelers. Within a few years, Harvey contracted with the Santa Fe Railway to build and operate restaurants at dozens of stops throughout the Southwest. The Harvey House chain operated until the 1960s and at its height included 84 restaurants stretching from Kansas to California.

In 1883, Harvey implemented a policy of employing a female white only serving staff. He sought out single, well-mannered, and educated American ladies, and placed ads in newspapers throughout the east coast and midwest for "white, young women, 18 to 30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent". The girls were paid $17.50 a month (approximately $436 in today's terms) to start, plus room, board, and tips, a generous income by the standards of the time.

In a mythology that has grown around the Harvey Houses, these female employees are said to have helped to "civilize the American Southwest". This legend found its highest expression in The Harvey Girls, a 1942 novel by Samuel Hopkins Adams, and, more notably, the 1946 MGM musical which was inspired by it. The film stars Judy Garland and Angela Lansbury, and it was directed by George Sidney. It introduced the Johnny Mercer song "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe."

Harvey Girls Rules

Must be single the length of the contract

Must live in dorm on site

Must have a manicure once a week

Must never have a man in the dorms

Must keep uniforms spotless

Orange juice must be freshly squeezed

Must keep dorms dusted

Must obey 10 pm curfew

Must not wear any makeup

No jewelry

All silver must be polished continually

Mandatory haïr nets

Never talk to the patrons

Coffee must be fresh

Napkins must be precisely folded

Tables must be set precisely

Must be courteous to patrons always

Route 66

ROUTE 66


If you ever plan to motor west,

travel my way, take the highway that is best.

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.


It winds from Chicago to LA,

more than two thousand miles all the way.

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.


Now you go though Saint Looey

Joplin, Missouri,

and Oklahoma City is mighty pretty.

You see Amarillo,

Gallup, New Mexico,

Flagstaff, Arizona.

Don't forget Winona,

Kingman, Barstow, San Bernandino.


Won't you get hip to this timely tip:

when you make that California trip

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.


solo


Now you go though Saint Looey

Joplin, Missouri,

and Oklahoma City is mighty pretty.

You see Amarillo,

Gallup, New Mexico,

Flagstaff, Arizona.

Don't forget Winona,

Kingman, Barstow, San Bernandino.


Won't you get hip to this timely tip:

when you make that California trip

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.

Get your kicks on Route sixty-six.


- Bobby Troup, 1946

Trike on!

WHY RIDE TRIKES?

• 
  
• Stability - loose gravel, sand, ice, tire blowouts, etc. will not send a trike crashing to the ground.
• 
  
• Ride during the winter - hitting a patch of ice is fun on a trike.
• 
  
• Do you have trouble balancing? No problem with a trike.
• 
  
• Leaning into the turns makes cornering on a trike fun. They handle like a sports car. 
• 
  
• Pull up to a stop and never put your foot down on the road
• 
  
• Motorists give you a wider berth when passing - primarily out of sheer curiosity.
• 
  
• No need for a kickstand or leaning post.
• 
  
• Instant celebrity status  - people will know who you are.
• 
  
• Great platform for attaching fairings and accessories.

www.terratrike.com

The Blonde Coyote

An excellent blog by Mary Caperton Morton

http://theblondecoyote.com/

1943 Steel War Penny

The 1943 steel cent, also known as a steel war penny or steelie, was a variety of the U.S. one-cent coin which was struck in steel due to wartime shortages of copper. It was designed by Victor D. Brenner.

Due to wartime needs of copper for use in ammunition and other military equipment during World War II, including windings for massive uranium gas separation magnets as part of the Manhattan Project, the United States Mint researched various ways to limit dependence and meet conservation goals on copper usage. After trying out several substitutes (ranging from other metals to plastics) to replace the then-standard bronze alloy, the one-cent coin was minted in zinc-coated steel. It was struck at all three mints: Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco. Coins from the latter two sites have respectively "D" and "S" mintmarks below the date.

However, problems began to arise from the mintage. Freshly minted, they were often mistaken for dimes. Magnets in vending machines (which took copper cents) placed to pick up steel slugs also picked up the legitimate steel cents. Because the galvanization process didn't cover the edges of the coins, sweat would quickly rust the metal. After public outcry, the Mint developed a process whereby salvaged brass shell casings were augmented with pure copper to produce an alloy close to the 1941–42 composition. This was used for 1944–46-dated cents, after which the prewar composition was resumed. Although they continued to circulate in the 1960s, the mint collected large numbers of the 1943 cents and destroyed them.


-Wikipedia

American Bison

"In America today, all wild things and wilderness                           hang by the slender thread of individuals giving a damn." Dale F. Lott in "American Bison"

Under segregation black people were generally denied access to public libraries in the Southern United States. Rather than insisting on his libraries being racially integrated, he funded separate libraries for African Americans. For example, at Houston he funded a separate Colored Carnegie Library.

                                                                                                                                         -Wikipedia

Carnegie Libraries

Carnegie Library

Union, South Carolina

A Carnegie library is a library built with money donated by Scottish-American businessman and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. 2,509 Carnegie libraries were built between 1883 and 1929, including some belonging to public and university library systems. 1,689 were built in the United States, 660 in Britain and Ireland, 125 in Canada, and others in Australia, New Zealand, Serbia, the Caribbean, and Fiji. Few towns that requested a grant and agreed to his terms were refused. When the last grant was made in 1919, there were 3,500 libraries in the United States, nearly half of them built with construction grants paid by Carnegie.

The first of Carnegie's public libraries opened in his hometown, Dunfermline, Scotland, in 1883. The locally quarried sandstone building displays a stylised sun with a carved motto - "Let there be light" at the entrance. His first library in the United States was built in 1889 in Braddock, Pennsylvania, home to one of the Carnegie Steel Company's mills. Initially Carnegie limited his support to a few towns in which he had an interest. From the 1890s on, his foundation funded a dramatic increase in number of libraries. This coincided with the rise of women's clubs in the post-Civil War period, which were most responsible for organizing efforts to establish libraries, including long-term fundraising and lobbying within their communities to support operations and collections. They led the establishment of 75-80 percent of the libraries in communities across the country.

Carnegie believed in giving to the "industrious and ambitious; not those who need everything done for them, but those who, being most anxious and able to help themselves, deserve and will be benefited by help from others." Under segregation black people were generally denied access to public libraries in the Southern United States. Rather than insisting on his libraries being racially integrated, he funded separate libraries for African Americans. For example, at Houston he funded a separate Colored Carnegie Library.

Most of the library buildings were unique, constructed in a number of styles, including Beaux-Arts, Italian Renaissance, Baroque, Classical Revival, and Spanish Colonial. Scottish Baronial was one of the styles used in Carnegie's native Scotland. Each style was chosen by the community, although as the years went by James Bertram, Carnegie's secretary, became less tolerant of designs which were not to his taste.Edward Lippincott Tilton, a friend often recommended by Bertram, designed many of the buildings. The architecture was typically simple and formal, welcoming patrons to enter through a prominent doorway, nearly always accessed via a staircase. The entry staircase symbolized a person's elevation by learning. Similarly, outside virtually every library was a lamppost or lantern,meant as a symbol of enlightenment.

In the early 20th century, a Carnegie library was often the most imposing structure in hundreds of small American communities.

-Wikipedia

SIX MILE PRESS

Stephen T. Powell

Central, South Carolina

January 1, 2012

The Green Man

A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit. Commonly used as a decorative architectural ornament, Green Men are frequently found on carvings in churches and other buildings (both secular and ecclesiastical). 


"The Green Man" is also a popular name for English public houses and various interpretations of the name appear on inn signs, which sometimes show a full figure rather than just the head.

The Green Man motif has many variations. Found in many cultures around the world, the Green Man is often related to natural vegetative deities springing up in different cultures throughout the ages. Primarily it is interpreted as a symbol of rebirth, or "renaissance," representing the cycle of growth each spring.

-Wikipedia

AdBusters

       

The Adbusters Media Foundation is a Canadian-based not-for-profit, anti-consumerist, pro-environment organization founded in 1989 by Kalle Lasn and Bill Schmalz in Vancouver, British Columbia. Adbusters describes itself as "a global network of artists, activists, writers, pranksters, students, educators and entrepreneurs who want to advance the new social activist movement of the information age."

Characterized by some as anti-capitalist or opposed to capitalism, it publishes the reader-supported, advertising-free Adbusters, an activist magazine with an international circulation of 120,000 devoted to challenging consumerism. Past and present contributors to the magazine include Christopher Hedges, Matt Taibbi, Bill McKibben, Jim Munroe, Douglas Rushkoff, Jonathan Barnbrook,David Graeber, Simon Critchley, Slavoj Zizek, Michael Hardt, David Orrell and others.

Adbusters has launched numerous international campaigns, including Buy Nothing Day, TV Turnoff Week and Occupy Wall Street, and is known for their "subvertisements" that spoof popular advertisements.

                                                                                                                                       Wikipedia

http://www.adbusters.org/

EKKO STAMPS

   THE STAMP COLLECTING PROCESS

“The process was very simple. For only $1.75, the EKKO Company offered an album to the collector of new stamps. The album contains pages preprinted with an outline of each of the stamps currently available, a listing of broadcast station call letters and wavelengths, and a nice map on the inside cover showing the locations of these stations.

Spaces were also left for stations not yet participating, or stations that were just coming on the air. In addition, there was space to jot down up to four dial settings at your own time of reception.

"Proof of Reception" cards were furnished with the album.

Listeners needed only to send a few facts on these cards about when and where on the dial they had heard a broadcast, plus ten cents to cover mailing costs, to the station. There the card was checked against the station log for accuracy, and the listener was mailed a stamp with the station's call letters and design upon it.

An ad for this stamp album appeared in Radio News, April, 1925.

Interest in the hobby became so widespread that the February 1925 issue of Radio News featured the Ekko stamps on its cover.”

Credits: 

http://www.antiqueradio.com/gilbertcombs_ekko_6-97.html

http://pl703.pairlitesite.com/Ekko_Album.html 

Huffy Bicycles

1955

Huffy Radio Bicycle

The Huffy Radio Bicycle provided a radio built into the tank, with the antenna and battery pack on the rear carrier.

http://www.huffy.com/about/History.aspx

The Huffy Corporation was founded in 1887 when George P. Huffman purchased the Davis Sewing Machine Company and moved its factory to Dayton, Ohio. Seven years later, in 1894, Huffman adapted the factory to manufacture bicycles.

Wikipedia

The Art Of Ed Mell

The Art Of Ed Mell                                             "When painting a sunset or extraordinary rock configuration, I view it with an eye toward design integrity, I am an idealist attempting to elevate the power of the original vision by reducing it to its architectural elements." Commercial art teaches you techniques. It is always something I will be grateful for, that and the discipline. In commercial art school, skill is stressed as much as imagination. You needed to do things right. Students were taught to approach art that way so that somewhere in the future, when they discover their imagination is the most important thing, they will always have the discipline and the skill to draw upon."                                             http://www.overlandgallery.com/Artists/Mell.html

Thomas Jefferson's Laptop

Thomas Jefferson came up with the idea of a portable writing desk during his 200 mile coach rides between his home at Monticello, Virginia and the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

He designed this desk, with an adjustable book rest and a locking drawer. He gave the drawings to Philadelphia cabinet maker Benjamin Randolph to build.

The Declaration of Independence was written on this "lap box."

The original lap desk is on display at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/small_feb01.html

The Printing Press Project at Middle Tennessee State University

The Printing Press Project at Middle Tennessee State University

One of only a handful of operational, reproduction 18th century printing presses in the U.S., the Printing Press Project provides experiential learning opportunities on the MTSU campus, and in the K-12 school system.

Constructed in 2004 the press is based upon the English Common Press used by Benjamin Franklin when he worked as a journeyman printer in London in the 1720s. It was constructed of hand-hewn chestnut and white oak nearly 100 years old by two craftsmen on campus. 

Since that time it has been used in school and community demonstrations and workshops to illustrate the tremendous impact the press had on the development of our nation and the importance of care in designing and producing documents.

After learning about the press, students understand a little bit better what it feels like to be an eighteenth century printer.

The press project currently operates out of a room on the fourth floor of the library where classes receive instruction, visiting artists experience the rare opportunity to use an reproduction 18th century press, and school children can see history come alive.

The press project offers students and the community a dramatic and unforgettable experience through activities that integrate history, writing and letterpress printing. Activities include lectures to university and school students about historical printing, a visiting artist each semester, community print nights, and printing demonstrations for community groups.

The construction of the press was made possible with grant money awarded to Walker Library faculty members Dr. Alan Boehm, Director of Special Collections, and William Black, Administrative Services Librarian, and Janet Higgins, Department of Art.

http://pressproject.mtsu.edu/home.html

Bird Girl

Bird Girl is a sculpture made in 1936 by Sylvia Shaw Judson in Lake Forest, Illinois. It achieved fame when it was featured on the cover of the 1994 novel, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. It was sculpted at Ragdale, the summer home of her family.

Bird Girl is cast in bronze and stands 50 inches tall. She is the image of a young girl wearing a simple dress and a sad or contemplative expression, with her head tilted to the left. She stands straight, her elbows propped against her waist as she holds up two bowls out from her sides. The bowls are often described by viewers as "bird feeders."

The sculpture was commissioned as a garden sculpture for a family in Massachusetts. A slight, 8-year-old model named Lorraine Greenman (now Lorraine Ganz) posed for the piece.

-Wikipedia

Police Accountability

Cop Block is a decentralized project supported by a diverse group of individuals united by their shared goals of police accountability, education of individual rights and the dissemination of effective tactics to utilize while filming police.

We seek to highlight the double standard that some grant to those with badges. By documenting police actions – whether they are illegal, immoral or just a waste of time and resources – then calling the police stations involved (ideally while recording and then later sharing your conversation), we can work together to bring about transparency and have a real impact.

In addition to this direct pressure on police departments we want to be an educational resource on institutional changes that would curtail the common rights-violations and unaccountability today by those with badges and a place to showcase different techniques, viewpoints and courses of action.

http://www.copblock.org/

"To Protect and Observe"

Orlando Copwatch Goals

1) Reduce police violence by directly observing the police on the street, documenting incidents and keeping police accountable. We maintain principles of non-violence while asserting the rights of the detained person. We provide support to victims whenever possible. We also seek to educate the public about their rights, police conduct in the community and issues related to the role of police in our society.

2) Empower and unite the community to resist police abuse.

3) Encourage people to solve problems WITHOUT police intervention. We want to explore alternatives to calling the police.

4) Most importantly, we encourage people to exercise their right to observe the police and to advocate for one another.

http://orlandocopwatch.com/