Walking the Berkshires

Smith Grads

Mom is going to her 45th college reunion this weekend.  I found this slide from her graduation day in 1963 and scanned it. She and her three sisters all are alumnae of Smith College (classes of '59, '61, '63 and '68).

But it doesn't stop there.  My cousin Leila graduated in 1992: a third generation Smith legacy, for our grandmother Athalia (Ogden) Barker was Smith class of '34.  Her two sisters Margie and Esther were Smith '28 and '30.  Margie, Mom and my aunt Marty shared the same 5 year reunions.  The picture of Margie and Marty, below, was taken in June, 1968, the year Marty graduated and also the year she married my Uncle Colin. 

There probably should be a Smith weather vane over the family homestead.  In 1975 when Smith celebrated its centennial, my cousins and I all got "Smith College: A Century of Women on Top" T-Shirts.  Must be why we all turned out so progressive.

Happy reunion!

Pity the Poor Politician

In 1955, the President of the United States enjoyed a base salary of $100,000.  Today he is paid $400,000.  We have experienced annual inflation averaging 3.98% between then and now.  Strictly speaking, Ike made more than W, who would need a salary of $791,000 today for parity with 1955 dollars.

The Veep in 1955 was Nixon and he got $35,000, or $276,850 in today's money.   Today, Dick Cheney is paid $221,100. 

Executive compensation ain't what it used to be in the public sector.  Good thing they are all millionaires.

Cabinet of Curiosities #7: Ernst Haeckel Edition

This 7th edition of Cabinet of Curiosities draws its inspiration from the artistic vision of zoologist Ernst Haeckel. A staunch Darwinist, Haeckel established The Phyletical Museum for the theory of evolution in Jena, Germany.   His 1899-1904 Kunstformen von der Natur (Art Forms in Nature) is a masterpiece of blended art and science.  Haeckel was fascinated by natural forms and structures.  Stephen Worth of ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive describes his evolutionary aesthetic:

"Haeckel saw no contradiction in his role as scientist/artist. In fact, he considered his work to be an expression of his own natural place in the world he was attempting to represent. Instead of approaching the subject from an objective viewpoint, he subjectively and selectively edited what he saw to reduce it to a form that appealed to him on a basic level as an artist. Thus, the scales of a fish become arabesques, and microscopic diatoms become beautiful sculptural forms. Haeckel was using nature's imagery to express his own inner nature."

A love of reinvented natural form is something Ernst Haeckel has in common with the creator of Wing's Castle.  Millbrook, NY, the town where I grew up, actually has two castles: Daheim Castle, the gatehouse to the Hitchcock estate where Timothy Leary was long a guest in residence in the 1960s, and Wing's.  Peter and Toni Wing have been building their castle for more than 25 years, often from found or salvaged materials, and it continues to grow organically as time and whimsy takes them.  One visitor reports:

"Where another castle might have a plain wall, Mr. Wing has crafted a face out of stone fragments. Where another castle might have a bathroom in the shape of a square or a rectangle, Wing's castle has one shaped something like a 3 leaf clover. Seeing the bathroom alone was worth the price of the tour, you will never see another one like it. Anyone who is a castle lover and is passing through the area where Wing's Castle is located (not too far from Poughkeepsie), should make an effort to stop and see this one." 

Visitors may visit the castle for a small fee.  Other examples of Wing's public art include a variety of figureheads, cigar store Indians, and such that he carved for Millbrook merchants, some of which are still still on display, and a bronze Civil War memorial statue in nearby Stanfordville.

J.L. Bell of Boston 1775 reveals that members of the Massachusetts delegation to the 2nd Continental Congress visited Edward Arnold's Museum in Norwalk, Connecticut.  It made such an impression on John Adams that two years later, he considered sending such "American Curiosities" as rattlesnakes "Upon a Hint, from one of our Commissioners abroad... across the Atlantic as presents to the Ladies."   I'm sure Marie Antoinette would have been enchanted with her very own pit viper, but maybe it was intended for the Dutch.

Antiquarian's Attic reports the discovery of the oldest parrot fossil ever, a rare bird indeed as it made its home in what is now Denmark.  Nicknamed "the Danish Blue", there is no word as yet as to whether this ex-parrot died while pining for the fjords.

I've become enchanted by the pioneers of color photography from the early 20th century.  Decades before Kodachrome there was Autochrome, and there still exist some truly spectacular collections of these extraordinary images.  One of the finest was created by French millionaire philanthropist Albert Kahn, who set out in 1909 to record the peoples of the world in true color and promote cross-cultural understanding.  London Kills Me shares a few of Kahn's photographs: a window to a vanished time when many of the people and places he recorded were about to be forever altered by modernity and global war.

I am also partial to clothing from other eras.  The very first post from the Jungle Trader, which celebrated its 1 year blogiversary this month, recommends pith helmets from Lock & Co Hatters of St. James St., London, while everything from frock coats to Victorian ladies accessories abound at River Junction Trade Company. Lady Lavona's Cabinet of Curiosities has a curiosity shop to meet your magic charm needs, which calls to mind a few choice lines from Richard Thompson I've been saving up for just such an occasion:

"I've got war paints, the skulls of saints, don't you want to see 'em
The blood of popes, and Tyburn ropes from the Black Museum
I've got Frederick Delius' finger, Wordsworth's tattoo
And I'm going to love you with everything, and I think you're going to love me too

I've got all the magic I need, all the magic I need."

The blog chrisblassternardone has a marvelous bucket list of amazing geological oddities on showcase.  This way for the Moving Rocks of Death Valley, the Eye of the Sahara, and China's Stone Forest!

Damn Data: Cabinet of Wonders offers the All Things Small Edition of its recurring Compendium of Curiosities.  See the cast of the Wizard of Oz dancing on the eye of a needle and lavish doll house created for Queen Mary, royal consort of Britain's George V.

Lenzbreakr's Weblog features one of San Franciso's architectural oddities: The Roman Columbarium houses cremated remains and personal items in small boxes representing the lives of the departed.  "This is a truly unique place, as the San Francisco Columbarium is the only remaining Roman-style Columbarium in the world. It’s a place in which people can think outside the box, while at the same time being dead, and inside a box."

In an aftershock from CofC #5, Brass Goggles clues us in to a rather Gothic steampunk alphabet done in decorative ceramic tiles.  $600 buys the lot.  Z is for Zeppelin, naturally, but N is for No Man's Land and X is for Xenophobe.

L. H. Crawley's The Virtual Dime Museum has two submissions this month.  With Hasegawa's Untearable Crepe, a post that just missed the deadline for CofC #6 and has been patiently waiting for this edition, she shares images from a marvelous children's book from around 1900 made of crepe paper, a Japanese form called Chirimen-bon.  This month she shifts from the sublime to the ridiculous with a feature on sheet music about rat poison, an early advertising jingle pushing nearly pure arsenic that is "Rough on Rats!"  All together now!  "R-r-r-rats, rats, Rough on Rats! /Hang your dogs and drown your cats!"

Almost as fine a bit of brand marketing, according to Bioephemera is a dead lion, bees and syrup! 

Bill West of West in New England is collecting funny place names and invites you to join in.  See if you can top his Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg.  One of my personal favorites from Central Massachusetts.

Small & Big considers the noble spoon and muses why Shakespeare didn't say “He hath need of a long chopstick that eateth with the devil.”

eArtfair collects a grand assortment of portraits of the artist's mother from the likes of Rembrandt, Haring, Picasso...

Thomas MacEntee discovers a portrait of a different sort.  The subject was his Great Uncle and the artist was Bil Baird, who was also the puppeteer who designed and performed the Lonely Goatherd sequence of The Sound of Music!  A fabulous discovery and a great tale besides.

And so we come full circle with art inseparable from life.  Haeckel may not have crafted marionettes, but he would have recognized their forms in the filaments of jellyfish.  But who, or what, is the the puppet master: a deity or strands of DNA?   Divine what you will.

The 8th edition of Cabinet of Curiosities will be on June 16th.  Anyone who wishes to host a future edition is most welcome to do so.  Submissions for June are due by noon EST on the 15th and can be made directly at greensleevesenviro AT sbcglobal DOT net or with the handy submission form.

Hop to It

Instead of crying in your increasingly expensive beer, time to get in early on the hop revival.  People may cut back in other areas when times are tight, but they are unlikely to give up beer.  There was a time when central New York was the leading hop producing region in the country - 1879 and 1880 yields peaked at over 60 million pounds per year.  Downy mildew, aphids and Prohibition killed the crop, but new vigorous varieties and pest control strategies mean that hops could be viable in the Northeast United States once more.  And now with a worldwide hops crisis, demand could make this a very wise investment.  Some craft brewers are now growing their own hops. 

Doubtless there are processing and quality control issues to work out, but if I had 10-20 agricultural acres, I'd be planting hops (though not the invasive Japanese variety).  And if the market should suddenly become glutted, there is always cellulosic ethanol.

Morgan Bulkeley's Berkshires

Morgan Bulkeley, Sr. is one of the Berkshires' greatest treasures.  During the 1960s and 1970s, his "My Berkshires" column in the Berkshire Eagle animated the land, people, history and ecology of this special place with the keen eye of the naturalist and the sensitivity of a writer who studied with Robert Frost.  In 2004, the cream of more than 750 of these articles was lovingly edited by another great local writer Jon Swan and illustrated by local artist Morgan Bulkeley, Jr.   Published as Berkshire Stories, it abounds in exquisite story-telling and fascinating details about the history, nature, people and conservation of our region. 

"Have you ever held a spark of life in your palm?  One ten-year old boy will never forget it.  He was plying a butterfly net about the honey-suckled lattice of the summer cottage when all at once he had 'the tiny, pulsing, burnished green-gold gem' that is a ruby-throated hummingbird.  He rushed to show it to the one who had given him his own spark.  Little fingers opened gingerly, and the mystery, held for a moment, vanished into summer air, gone but not forgotten..."

I highly recommend you purchase a copy.  This blog can only aspire to write as evocatively about the topics that Bulkeley so masterfully reveals.

2008 Farm Bill Conservation Provisions

The $307 billion 2008 Federal Farm Bill is heading for the President's desk with veto proof majorities in the House (318-106) and Senate (85-15).  More than 2/3 of this amount ($209 billion) is for food stamps and other nutrition programs, compared with $35 billion for agricultural commodities.   Others will parse the wisdom or folly of this pile of pork and priorities, but here is what it holds for conservationists:

Conservation program spending increased by $6.6 billion;

Extends for 2 years the tax incentive for conservation easement donations retroactive to Jan 1, 2008 (which generally means a 50% reduction in AGI tax liability with up to 15 years to carry over the balance of the gift or bargain sale of a conservation easement).

Doubles funding for Farm and Ranchland Protection Program (more than $1 billion over 5 years, an increase of $560 million over the previous Farm Bill) to protect agricultural lands from urban and suburban development pressure;

Increases funding for Environmental Quality Incentives Program and Conservation Stewardship Program to enhance and protect our natural resources;

Continues funding for Grassland Reserve and Wetlands Reserve programs, increasing by 1.22 million acres the authorization for enrollment in the Grassland program with increased rolls for non-profits;

Creates an Open Fields Program to encourage public access to private land for hunting and fishing as well as a Chesapeake Bay program to help restore and protect the Bay watershed;

Creates a Community Forest and Open Space Conservation Program that will provide federal 50/50 matching grants to local governments and qualified non-profit organizations across the country to acquire forests and open spaces for local ownership and management.

A new qualified forest bond provision that would protect large forest ownerships near national forests.

None of the three senators running for president voted.  Nor did Ted Kennedy. If Congress votes to override the President's expected veto, it would be just the second time in his presidency that it has chosen to do so.

Nothing Beside Remains

Nothing like a ghost town in the desert to get me thinking on Ozymandias:

"Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

This place was called Kolmanskop and it lies in the restricted diamond area or Sperrgebiet about 10 kilometers inland from Namibia's sand swept port Luderitz.  In the early 1900s it was a German mining town, complete with wooden skittle alley, and now the dunes rise to the rafters.

A good place to explore if you are in the neighborhood.  There is precious little else you can do on the road from Aus to Luderitz except look for wild desert horses and drive around the sand that drifts across the tar road.  There is, or used to be, an L-shaped pool table in a German bar back up the road in Keetmanshoop that I have fond memories of playing.

The Battle of Egremont?

The Sons of the American Revolution maintain a list of every action of any size that occurred in the New England colonies during our war of Independence.  Aside from places, dates, and color codes to distinguish who came out on top, there is not additional data provided, which is going to cause me to do some digging because I find that something  of a military nature took place on 5/1/1777 in Egremont, Massachusetts, just up the road a piece from where I write in the Southern Berkshires.  Around here we remember the final act of Shay's Rebellion which played out in nearby Sheffield on the Egremont Road, but no one mentions a skirmish, raid or other standoff in Egremont during the Revolution. 

So naturally I had to do some sleuthing.  It turns out that the fight was probably not in Egremont but actually a raid launched from there in April, 1777 on Tories over in New York.  The Albany / Hartford Turnpike - now Rte 23 - passed over the Taconics between New York and Massachusetts in Egremont, and there was a longstanding feud over rival claims to the southern Berkshires between the Livingstons and Massachusetts patent holders.  According to the pension record of Egremont militia soldier Andrew Loomis:

"... in April 1777 I was called out with the militia of Egremont aforesaid under the command of Capt. Ephraim Fitch, & marched under his command to Livingston's Manor in the state of New York to subdue & disperse a party of British & Tories assembled there — we were out two or three weeks — the commander of the British, called Capt. Hooper (I think) was killed, several wounded, some taken prisoners & the rest effectually dispersed."

Ephraim Fitch, incidentally, would later vote against ratification of the Federal Constitution and though a justice of the peace was yet a strong supporter of Shay's Rebellion. 

This will take some digging into.  I'll let you know what I uncover.

If You're Happy and You Know it, Kiss a Fish

Bluefish, that is.  David Churbuck placates the fickle fates by offering the first Blue of the season back to Neptune.  Carpenters nail a tree branch to the ridge board of a new house to bestow good luck, so why not kiss a fish?

Don't Got Milk

Here's a swell idea. Tax dairy farmers for the methane produced by flatulent cows.  Now it is true that cows produce more greenhouse gas than any other source, including vehicle emissions.  Yes, livestock are major resource consumers and yes, overgrazing, deforestation and a host of other ills can be pinned on unsustainable farming practices.  But taxing the farmer for cow farts is a bit like punishing the prostitute and not the Johns.  Estonians must not like milk.  The Kiwis made a stink about a similar measure in 2003.