The recoil must have been spectacular!!!

 

I've known of the Colt 1855 Sidehammer revolver shotgun for years.  It was used (in the rifle version) by some sharpshooter units early in the Civil War, and sold reasonably well on the frontier and out West.  What I didn't know is that some unknown pioneer or trooper decided he wanted his Sidehammer to be somewhat more portable and accessible.  Well, "portable" is relative for a gun well over a foot long and weighing more than 6 pounds . . . but I'd say he succeeded.

If he tried to fire that beast one-handed from the back of a galloping horse, I suspect it would have been really hard to hold onto it.  The recoil must have been pretty snappy, to put it mildly!  Nevertheless, given the opportunity to modify a modern replica Sidehammer into that configuration, I'd kinda like to try it.  Typical 10ga. shotguns of the period used up to 1.5 to 2 drams of powder behind up to 1.5 ounces of lead shot.  The Sidehammer's chambers were shorter than sporting guns, so I daresay it wouldn't have used the top end of those ranges, but even so, I suspect it had a real kick on both ends.

Peter

A very sobering statistic

 

This headline caught my eye yesterday:

Day 1,419: The Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Just Surpassed Soviet War With Nazi Germany

This week has marked another grim milestone in the nearly four-year long Russia-Ukraine war. The conflict has just entered its 1,419th day - which means it has officially surpassed the entirety of the historic Soviet campaign against invading Nazi Germany, which lasted 1,418 days from June 1941 to May 1945.

Red Army forces eventually drove Nazi troops back from the Volga River all the way to Berlin, before seizing the German capital. But in today's war, the 1,419th day is just another in a long one in a tragic and grinding war of attrition, where it is believed each side has lost literally hundreds of thousands.

. . .

On both sides, a whole generation of young men is being wiped out.

There's more at the link.

We too often focus on the geopolitical and/or military and/or strategic and/or statistical aspects of the Russia-Ukraine war.  However, that misses the human tragedy that is playing out for both countries.

All nations involved in the two World Wars lost a significant proportion of their brightest and best young men.  After those wars, their absence was noteworthy in that the performance of most of those countries (in any sphere you care to name) was less than expected, and lower than pre-war forecasts would have anticipated.  My father, who fought in World War II, often said that the reason Britain descended into socialist chaos so fast after the war was that too many of the future leaders who could have kept her on track were dead.  Leaders tend to make themselves vulnerable simply by leading, because they're priority targets in war.  An army without effective leaders at all levels - NCO, junior officer, field officer, etc. - is a losing army, and, by extension, so is the nation that uses it.

We don't know what the future holds for either Russia or Ukraine, but we do know for certain that a lot of their young men aren't going to be there to help them.  Both countries will suffer from this loss for decades to come.

May the dead of both sides be forgiven their sins, if that is possible, and may they rest in peace.

Peter

Boxing Day

 

The day after Christmas is known as Boxing Day in Britain and most Commonwealth nations.  I've had a few questions from American friends about why it's named that.  Wikipedia supplies a simple answer:

The Oxford English Dictionary gives the earliest attestation from Britain in 1743, defining it as "the day after Christmas day", and saying "traditionally on this day tradespeople, employees, etc., would receive presents or gratuities (a 'Christmas box') from their customers or employers."

The term "Christmas box" dates back to the 17th century, and among other things meant:

A present or gratuity given at Christmas: In Great Britain, usually confined to gratuities given to those who are supposed to have a vague claim upon the donor for services rendered to him as one of the general public by whom they are employed and paid, or as a customer of their legal employer; the undefined theory being that as they have done offices for this person, for which he has not directly paid them, some direct acknowledgement is becoming at Christmas.

In Britain, it was a custom for tradesmen to collect "Christmas boxes" of money or presents on the first weekday after Christmas as thanks for good service throughout the year. This is mentioned in Samuel Pepys' diary entry for 19 December 1663. This custom is linked to an older British tradition in which the servants of the wealthy were allowed the next day to visit their families since they would have had to serve their masters on Christmas Day. The employers would give each servant a box to take home containing gifts, bonuses, and sometimes leftover food. Until the late 20th century, there continued to be a tradition among many in the UK to give a Christmas gift, usually cash, to vendors, although not on Boxing Day, as many would not work on that day.

There's more at the link.

As a child in South Africa, I remember my parents putting together "Christmas boxes" (usually envelopes) for the workers who delivered mail, bottles of milk, and other services to our home.  They'd give them to the workers a couple of days before Christmas, rather than the day after, because so many of them would be hung over after Christmas and might not make it to work that day!

With the passing of the "servant era" in Western society, the concept of Boxing Day has died away, too.  I think that's a pity.  It's worth remembering those on whose service we rely every day of the year, and acknowledging that in some practical way.

Peter

I did not know this

 

I was fascinated to read an account of the development of the term "bulldozer" and the machine known by that name.  The thing is, in our politically-correct society, I found it hard to believe the article's explanation of where, when and how the word originated.  Here's an excerpt.

According to an 1881 obituary in a Louisiana newspaper, the word “bulldozer” was coined by a German immigrant named Louis Albert Wagner, who later committed suicide by taking a hefty dose of opium dissolved in alcohol. Little else is recorded about Wagner, but his term became a viral sensation in late 1800s America, going from street slang to dictionary entry in just one year. It likely originated from a shortening of “bullwhip,” the braided tool used to intimidate and control cattle, combined with “dose,” as in quantity, with a “z” thrown in for good measure. To bulldoze was to unleash a dose of coercive violence.

If, like gods, we aspire to create machines in our own image, then it’s fitting that the original bulldozers were humans. Leading up to the corrupted U.S. election of 1876, as the Southern states were being reconstructed following the Civil War, terrorist gangs of predominantly white Democrats roamed about, threatening or attacking Black men who they thought might vote for the Republican Party. The men were the bulldozers, and the acts they carried out were bulldozing.

. . .

“The good people have been cowed down, brow-beaten, insidiously threatened, forced to silence or worse, the countenancing of outrages, blackmailed and their contributions made the lever for future extortions, their tongues muzzled, their hands tied, their steps dogged, their business jeopardized and themselves living in continual fear of offending the ‘bulldozers,’” read an article in the New Orleans Republican in June. By the following year, the association of “bulldozer” with rampant voter suppression during the election made it a common term across the U.S. for any use of brutal force to intimidate or coerce a person into doing what the aggressor desired.

It’s hard to trace when the word first became a label for machines. For decades, it floated around the language tree, resting a while on branches where some instance of terrific violence needed a novel and evocative label. A handful of arms manufacturers marketed various “bulldozer” and “bulldog” pistols in these years. As the 19th century came to a close, it popped up in a Kentucky newspaper as a term for a towboat used to smash through heavy ice and in an Illinois court case to describe a manufacturing machine that had ripped off a worker’s left arm.

The bulldozer we know today took shape in the first quarter of the 20th century. In 1917, the Russell Grader Manufacturing Company advertised a bulldozer in their catalog: a huge metal blade pulled by mules that could cut into the earth and flatten the land. Other manufacturers like Holt, Caterpillar and R. G. LeTourneau were working on similar devices, technological descendants of scraping tools developed in the American West and associated with Mormon farmers. In time, animals were replaced with tractors (on wheels or continuous tracks) powered first by steam, then gasoline and eventually diesel. The word, which at first referred only to the blade itself, started to mean the entire machine, one that was unrivaled in its ability to rip, shift and level earth.

There's more at the link.  It makes very interesting reading.  A tip o' the hat to Ted Gioia for including it in his list of the best online articles of 2025.

I decided to investigate further.  One of the meanings of the word "bulldozer" given in the Collins English Dictionary is "a person who intimidates or coerces".  Until I read the article above, I'd never heard the word used to mean that - but then, I learned to speak English-English (actually, colonial-English) rather than American-English, so it's not surprising I'd never heard of the historical American roots of the word.

Wikipedia (hardly a trustworthy source, I know) does not list that meaning under its disambiguation entry for "Bulldozer".  However, its sister site Wiktionary does list it:

3.  (historical, chiefly in the plural) A member of a self-identified group of white US Southerners who colluded to influence outcomes of post-Reconstruction elections by intimidating, coercing and bullying black voters and legislators, including burning down houses and churches, flogging and murdering opponents.

4.  (by extension) A bully; an overbearing individual.

Again, more at the link.

So, unlikely though it sounded to me, I guess the article is accurate.  I learned something new today.

Peter

A fascinating hunt for an emperor's jewels

 

I enjoyed reading an article in German magazine Der Spiegel about the jewels of the last Austro-Hungarian Empire ruler, Karl I, and how they ended up in a safe place in Canada.  Here's a lengthy excerpt.

It was the morning of November 1, 1918, and the end of his reign was nigh – that much was clear to Austria’s final emperor. His multi-ethnic empire of Austria-Hungary was rapidly disintegrating as crowds in the streets clamored for a republic. Given the direness of the situation, he turned to a loyal servant, Lord High Steward Leopold Count Berchtold and put him in charge of a sensitive mission. Emperor Karl I asked the count to secret the Habsburg family jewels out of the country.

Count Berchtold and his men retrieved dozens of pieces from the display cases of the Imperial Treasury in Vienna’s Hofburg. And in the chaotic days of the revolution, the emperor’s minions brought the riches safely across the border into Switzerland on November 4.

Among the pieces was the diamond crown of Empress Elisabeth (better known as Sisi), a cuff of brilliant-cut diamonds featuring a large emerald that Empress Maria Theresa used to wear for festive sleigh rides – and the legendary Florentine Diamond, a glorious, walnut-sized gemstone said to glow yellow. At 137 carats, it was said to be the fourth-largest diamond in the world. The only existing photograph of the diamond, a black-and-white image taken before 1918, shows it as part of a hat brooch.

Only three years after the clandestine operation, the treasure vanished without a trace. Since then, myths and conspiracy theories have swirled around its fate. It was stolen, said some, the Florentine Diamond cut up and transformed into cash. The rumors were myriad.

Now, though, those rumors can be put to rest.

. . .

At the center stands Zita of Habsburg, Austria’s last empress, Karl Habsburg’s grandmother. The grandson sketches the image of a brave, largely destitute woman, fleeing with her eight children.

The imperial couple eventually ended up on the Portuguese island of Madeira in the Atlantic Ocean. There, Karl I soon died of pneumonia.

Zita relocated with the children to the Basque Country and then to Belgium. Beginning in the mid-1930s, her eldest son Otto, Karl Habsburg’s father, rose to become an opponent of the Nazis. He was persecuted, and when the Wehrmacht attacked Belgium and France in 1940, Zita of Habsburg once again found herself on the run with her family.

They traveled through Bordeaux to the Spanish border, where hundreds of refugees were waiting to cross, but it was closed. A border guard, as Karl Habsburg tells it, recognized the former empress and allowed her to pass. "And then he asked who in the waiting crowd was part of her entourage and also needed to cross. And grandmother said: All of them.” Habsburg gestures expansively into the restaurant as though a long line of refugees were waiting there, desperate to cross a border in the Pyrenees.

And was the jewelry, was the giant diamond with them the whole time? That he does not know, Habsburg says. But in his narration, it isn’t difficult to visualize a delicate woman with a leather suitcase in her hand. In 1940, she resettled to Canada, in the Quebec City suburb of Sillery.

. . .

Christoph Köchert [co-owner of A.E. Köchert "Imperial and Royal Court and Chamber Jewelers and Goldsmiths since 1814”] in the sixth generation, is a man of gentile bearing.

On behalf of the Habsburgs, the jeweler recently traveled to Canada with a portable carat scale, a refractometer and an electronic diamond tester packed away in his suitcase. His task was determining whether the items in the safe were indeed those that had been missing for so long.

There is a note of reverence in Köchert’s gentle voice when he speaks of seeing the contents of the suitcase for the first time. "It was a sublime moment,” Köchert folds his hands, "possibly one of those you only experience once in a lifetime.”

Some of the pieces in the collection were made, augmented or worked on by his own forebears. He pulls out a photo of a watch set into a large, pear-shaped emerald with another emerald, ground wafer-thin, as its cover. Maria Theresa gave it to her daughter Marie Antoinette, who would later become queen of France and meet an untimely end at the guillotine.

There is a bodice bow of rubies, emeralds, and diamonds in the Hungarian national colors, once owned by Sisi. And there is the "stone of destiny,” that large, 137-carat yellow diamond.

"It is rare to see such a perfect stone,” Köchert says. It is extremely pure, he says, the color reminiscent of "a good Scottish whisky.” The cutter left the original surface in places on the edges. "This is one of the most famous diamonds in the world. The history, the craftsmanship – it is overwhelming.”

The diamond and the 15 other pieces in the safe are genuine, Köchert has no doubt about that. He has put it in writing in two authentication reports.

There's much more at the link.  It's a fascinating story.

Peter

Ten years ago today, the Paris massacres still horrify us

 

On November 13, 2015, a series of terrorist attacks took place in Paris, France.  Nine attackers, assisted by a tenth who escaped, used suicide bombs and assault rifles to strike a stadium, several restaurants, and the Bataclan theater.  137 victims died, most at the Bataclan, with a further 416 injured.

The echoes of the attacks continue to this day.  France commemorated them with public memorial services and other functions;  extremist Muslim terrorist groups celebrated them with paeans of praise to the "martyrs" who carried them out.  They are, in a sense, France's equivalent to the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States:  a landmark in our history that will never be forgotten.

As was only to be expected, the attacks inspired a wave of anti-Muslim rhetoric in France and elsewhere, and also inspired would-be fundamentalist terrorists to intensify their efforts.  Incidents like this always do that - they make the extremes more extreme, whilst driving most of society from the center towards those extremes.  The day after the attacks, I wrote:

The terrorists haven't thought about it, I'm sure, but they're going to produce a similar and even greater tragedy for their own people than they've inflicted on France.  The reaction from ordinary people like you and I won't be to truly think about the tragedy, to realize that the perpetrators were a very small minority of those who shared their faith, extremists who deserve the ultimate penalty as soon as it can be administered.  No.  The ordinary man and woman on the streets of France is going to wake up today hating all Muslims.  He or she will blame them all for the actions of a few, and will react to all of them as if they were all equally guilty.

One can't blame people for such attitudes.  When one simply can't tell whether or not an individual Muslim is also a terrorist fundamentalist, the only safety lies in treating all of them as if they presented that danger.  That's what the French people are going to do now.  That's what ordinary people all across Europe are going to do now, irrespective of whatever their politicians tell them.  Their politicians are protected in secure premises by armed guards.  They aren't.  Their survival is of more immediate concern;  so they're doing to do whatever they have to do to improve the odds in their favor.  If that means ostracizing Muslims, ghettoizing them, even using preemptive violence against them to force them off the streets . . . they're going to do it.

I've written before about how blaming all Muslims for the actions of a few is disingenuous and inexcusable.  I still believe that . . . but events have overtaken rationality.  People are going to start relating to 'Muslims' rather than to 'human beings', just as the extremists label all non-Muslims as 'kaffirs' or 'kufars' - unbelievers - rather than as human beings.  For the average man in a European street, a Muslim will no longer be a 'person'.  He's simply a Muslim, a label, a 'thing'.  He's no longer French, or American, or British, no matter what his passport says.  He's an 'other'.  He's 'one of them' . . . and because of that, he's no longer 'one of us'.  He's automatically defined - no, let's rather say (because it's easier to blame him) that he's defined himself - as a potential threat, merely by the religion he espouses.  He may have been born into it, and raised in a family and society and culture so saturated with it as to make it literally impossible, inconceivable, for him to be anything else . . . but that doesn't matter.  It's his choice to be Muslim, therefore he must take the consequences.  We're going to treat him with the same suspicion and exaggerated caution that we would a live, possibly armed hand-grenade.  He's asked for it, so we're going to give it to him.

That's the bitter fruit that extremism always produces.  It's done so throughout history.  There are innumerable examples of how enemies have become 'things'.  It's Crusaders versus Saracens, Cavaliers versus Roundheads, Yankees versus Rebels, doughboys versus Krauts . . . us versus them, for varying values of 'us' and 'them'.

. . .

And in the end, the bodies lying in the ruins, and the blood dripping onto our streets, and the weeping of those who've lost loved ones . . . they'll all be the same.  History is full of them.  When it comes to the crunch, there are no labels that can disguise human anguish.  People will suffer in every land, in every community, in every faith . . . and they'll turn to what they believe in to make sense of their suffering . . . and most of them will raise up the next generation to hate those whom they identify as the cause of their suffering . . . and the cycle will go on, for ever and ever, until the world ends.

There's more at the link.

And, sure enough, the cycle of the Paris attacks has produced yet more bitter fruit.  The BBC reports:

A former girlfriend of the only jihadist to survive the November 2015 attacks has been arrested on suspicion of plotting her own violent act.

The woman - a 27 year-old French convert to Islam named as Maëva B - began a letter-writing relationship with Salah Abdeslam, 36, who is serving a life sentence in jail near the Belgian border following his conviction in 2022.

When prison guards discovered that Abdeslam had been using a USB key containing jihadist propaganda, they traced its origin to face-to-face meetings that the prisoner had with Maëva B.

. . .

With France commemorating 10 years since the worst attack in its modern history, the arrest has focused minds on the enemy that never went away.

Six plots have been thwarted this year, says Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez, and the threat level remains high.

Again, more at the link.

Say a prayer today for those who died in Paris that day, and their survivors, who live with the burden of their loss.  Pray, too, for those who work day and night to protect us against more such attacks.

Peter

Armistice Day

 

All over the world (except the United States), this date, November 11th, is solemnly commemorated as Armistice Day.  On the eleventh day of November, 1918, at the eleventh hour, the guns fell silent across Europe as World War I, the so-called "War To End All Wars", finally ground to a halt.

Both of my grandparents fought in that war.  My paternal grandfather and his wife came to live with my mother and father in their declining years (as was common in an earlier generation - they weren't dumped into old-age homes).  One of my earliest memories was of my grandfather's constant hacking cough, the result of injuries sustained from a German gas attack on the trenches during that war.  His lungs never fully recovered, and the injury shortened his life appreciably.  Thus, even though the war had finished decades before I was born, it still touched my memory.  He died when I was three or four years old, I don't recall precisely which.  The house was somehow very still without his coughing . . .

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Peter

Happy birthday, USMC - and thanks for helping to keep me alive

 

Today is the 250th birthday of the United States Marine Corps, founded on 10 November 1775.  Congratulations to the Corps and all its members.

I have a particular reason to thank the Corps.  After the Vietnam War, a number of former US Marines didn't want to go back to the USA, because anti-war sentiment was rampant and they were fed up with being accused of being "baby-killers" and sundry other pleasantries.  Instead, they wanted to go on "killing commies", as some of them put it.  A number of them made their way to southern Africa, joining the armed forces of South Africa and Rhodesia.  I met several of them in both countries.

I've never forgotten one of them in particular.  I won't name him, at his request some years ago.  I was a raw recruit, lying prone on the firing line during basic training.  I was bored, shooting a few rounds, waiting for score, then doing the same again ad nauseam.  The blistering hot African heat didn't help matters.  I muttered something to the man alongside me, something like "When are we going to stop wasting time on this **** and do something more interesting?"

I felt a kick on my outstretched boot. Rolling halfway over and looking up, I saw one of our instructors, a former US Marine now wearing South African Warrant Officer insignia.  I shriveled internally, waiting to be reamed for talking out of turn and assigned punishment PT.  Instead, the Warrant Officer just looked tired.  Glaring down at me, he said, "Recruit, an amateur practices until he's got it right.  A professional practices until he can't get it wrong!"  He didn't wait for a reply, but turned away to sort out another recruit who wasn't doing what he was supposed to be doing.

I've never forgotten that moment, or his words.  They became a mantra for me, and I'm sure they kept me alive in some engagements during my military service and afterwards.  From 1976 through 1994, South Africa was plagued with constant internal unrest, terrorism and authoritarian crackdowns.  I had the misfortune to be on the scene, in and out of uniform, for over 100 shooting engagements.  I bear some of the scars of those years to this day.  I kept that former Marine's advice firmly in mind through it all, and that mental and physical preparedness (as well as, of course, the grace of God!) is probably the only reason I survived those years.

So, thank you, USMC.  I have personal cause to be grateful to you!

Peter

Is it possible for a politician to be even more cretinous than usual? Oh, yes...

 

The politician in question is Cory Booker.  Basically, if it moves, as far as he's concerned it's Fascist, and must be condemned as such.  It would help - greatly! - if he actually knew the meaning of the word Fascist, as illustrated a couple of days ago, when he appeared on a podcast titled "The Anti-Cult Club".  He came up with this gem of political wisdom:

Yes, indeed.  I've never heard of any "old African saying" that "sticks in a bundle can't be broken" - and I'm a damned sight more African (having been born and raised on that continent) than Senator Booker.  However, I do know the meaning of the Latin word "fasces".  According to Wikipedia:

A fasces is a bound bundle of wooden rods, often, but not always, including an axe (occasionally two axes) with its blade emerging. The fasces is an Italian symbol that had its origin in the Etruscan civilization and was passed on to ancient Rome, where it symbolized a Roman king's power to punish his subjects, and later, a magistrate's power and jurisdiction.

The image of fasces has survived in the modern world as a representation of magisterial power, law, and governance. The fasces frequently occurs as a charge in heraldry: it is present on the reverse of the U.S. Mercury dime coin, behind the podium in the United States House of Representatives, and in the Seal of the U.S. Senate; and it was the origin of the name of the National Fascist Party in Italy (from which the term fascism is derived).

So, when Senator Booker uses the image of the fasces to illustrate opposition to fascism, he's heading in precisely the opposite direction to what he means.  I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.  Far too many of our politicians, on both sides of the aisle, behave in precisely the same way.  It's as if election to office knocks several dozen points off some (but fortunately not all) politicians' IQ scores.

Meanwhile, if you're logged into X, go enjoy the whole thread in which Sen. Booker's gaffe is discussed.  It's giggle-worthy.

Peter

The fascinating history of string and rope

 

A very interesting article in Hakai magazine tells the story.

In his 1956 book The Marlinspike Sailor, marine illustrator Hervey Garrett Smith wrote that rope is “probably the most remarkable product known to mankind.” On its own, a stray thread cannot accomplish much. But when several fibers are twisted into yarn, and yarn into strands, and strands into string or rope, a once feeble thing becomes both strong and flexible—a hybrid material of limitless possibility. A string can cut, choke, and trip; it can also link, bandage, and reel. String makes it possible to sew, to shoot an arrow, to strum a chord. It’s difficult to think of an aspect of human culture that is not laced through with some form of string or rope; it has helped us develop shelter, clothing, agriculture, weaponry, art, mathematics, and oral hygiene. Without string, our ancestors could not have domesticated horses and cattle or efficiently plowed the earth to grow crops. If not for rope, the great stone monuments of the world—Stonehenge, the Pyramids at Giza, the moai of Easter Island—would still be recumbent. In a fiberless world, the age of naval exploration would never have happened; early light bulbs would have lacked suitable filaments; the pendulum would never have inspired advances in physics and timekeeping; and there would be no Golden Gate Bridge, no tennis shoes, no Beethoven’s fifth symphony.

“Everybody knows about fire and the wheel, but string is one of the most powerful tools and really the most overlooked,” says Saskia Wolsak, an ethnobotanist at the University of British Columbia who recently began a PhD on the cultural history of string. “It’s relatively invisible until you start looking for it. Then you see it everywhere.”

Precisely when people began to twine, loop, and knot is unknowable, but we can say with reasonable confidence that string and rope are some of the most ancient materials used by humankind. At first, our ancestors likely harvested nature’s ready-made threads and cordage, such as vines, reeds, grass, and roots. If traditional medicine and existing Indigenous cultures are any clue, early humans may have even used spider silk to catch fish and bandage wounds. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions of years ago, people realized they could extract fibers from the hair and tissues of animals, as well as from the husks, leaves, and innards of certain sinewy, pulpy, or pliant plants, such as agave, cannabis, coconut, cotton, and jute. By twisting these natural fibers around one another again and again, they formed a material of superb resilience and versatility.

. . .

Although string and rope began to take shape on land, it was the ocean that unleashed the full potential of cordage. The earliest watercraft were probably rafts lashed together from branches or bamboo, and dugout canoes carved from logs, such as the 10,000-year-old Pesse canoe discovered in 1955 during motorway construction in the Netherlands. At first, the only means of propulsion were oars, poles, and the whim of the currents. Sailing required a critical insight: that the wind, like a wild animal, could be caught, tamed, and harnessed. A mast and sail, which is really just a tightly knit sheet of string, could trap the wind; long coils of sturdy rope could hoist and pivot the sail. String transformed seagoing vessels from floating lumber to elegant marionettes, animated by the wind and maneuvered by human will.

There's much more at the link.

Most of us are never exposed to the intricacies of complex string and rope work, but sailors - particularly those on ships still powered by sail, rather than engines - deal with it every day.  I recall when I first went aboard a racing yacht in South Africa, and saw the skipper - a salty seaman indeed, the living definition of the term - splicing two lines together, not just as a simple joint, but one so carefully crafted that it could fit through a block without jamming it.  I didn't even know that was possible.

I've also read many books about how string and rope were vital in historic vessels.  Tim Severin's voyages of exploration, Thor Heyerdahl's adventures with Kon-Tiki and the Ra expeditions, and many others caught and have kept my imagination for decades.  After reading this article, they'll be even more interesting to me.

Peter

The day they blew up a river to save Yellowstone

 

I came across a very interesting article about the 1988 wildfires in and around Yellowstone National Park (the biggest and most dangerous in the Park's history), and how local farmers, ranchers and residents partnered with the National Park Service to save West Yellowstone from the encroaching flames.  Here are some excerpts.

The plan was to surround West Yellowstone with irrigation pipes and sprinklers to dampen the ground, stopping any flames before they reached homes and businesses. As the park’s busiest gateway community, ensuring West Yellowstone’s survival was critical.

Howell and several other farmers hauled all the industrial-sized irrigation pipe they had available to West Yellowstone, but that wouldn’t be enough to stop the fire.

The critical factor was finding an adequate water source to feed the pipes.

To pump water through the pipes, they needed a hole — and fast.

There wasn’t time to excavate the bank of the river, so they blasted it with explosives.

. . .

Bryers ... cut any trees that had fallen or were leaning into the trail to ensure large vehicles and their irrigation pipes could reach the river.

There was a surprise waiting for Bryers when he emerged from the forest at the riverbank: Yellowstone District Ranger Joseph Evans.

“Joe was scratching his head as I came out of the opening in an orange Ford truck,” Bryers said. “He said, ‘You can't be driving in here and using chainsaws.’ So I go, ‘I can't believe you haven't heard. I'm clearing the way for a big line of diesel trucks hauling pipe.’”

Despite having the full permission of the NPS and Clyde Seely, the fire commander, nobody had informed Evans that Bryer would be cutting through Yellowstone’s trees to get to the Madison River.

“He went off to see what in the world was happening,” Bryers said. “There was a lot of miscommunication back then.”

. . .

Soon, an unassuming Ryder rental truck arrived at the western bank of the river. Inside was a large amount of detonating cord, supplied by the federal government, that would be used to create the crater.

“They did one blast, and it turned out it wasn't quite enough to make the crater they needed,” Bryers said. “So, they put a bunch more of it in there for a second blast.”

. . .

After the second detonation, [Bryers] noticed that a 7,500-pound boulder had crashed through the top of the Ryder truck, landing on a massive coil of detonating cord.

“I wish that I would have got a picture of it, but I didn’t have my camera,” he said. “That rock was just sitting there on top of all the explosives.”

. . .

The fire got concerningly close. Bryers was laying out a line of pipe from Duck Creek to the Fir Ridge Cemetery north of town when the fire caught up to him.

“Me and another fella stripped naked and jumped into the deep part of Duck Creek,” he said. “We wanted to come out and dry off, but there were a bunch of surprised Idaho farm boys watching from the bank.”

. . .

The crater blasted into the Madison River is long gone, slowly filling with sediment until it disappeared completely a few years after the fires.

However, Bryers said the crater was a fishing hotspot until it was filled in.

“Trout liked to find a nice, deep, slow spot in the river, so I told my fly fishing friends about the crater,” he said. “They caught some big fish out there.”

There's more at the link.

It's a great story of ordinary folks working together to save a vital part of America's natural history.  It must have been utterly exhausting for all concerned, but they got the job done.  Highly recommended reading.

Peter

Victory in 1945: long in coming, and still affecting the whole world today

 

On August 15th, 1945, known ever since as VJ Day, World War II came to an end with the unconditional surrender of Japan.  Wild celebrations took place in all the victorious Allied powers, but the victory did not solve most of the problems that had led to the war in the first place.  Indeed, it created a host of new problems that would spark the decades-long Cold War and radical socio-political realignments on every continent.

This 45-minute documentary summarizes the last few months of World War II leading up to VJ Day.  It does a very good job of drawing together the many threads that came together on that day.  Most people today have little or no idea of all that was involved, which is why I'm posting it here.  I learned my first lessons about it from my parents, who fought from September 1939 through VJ Day with the armed forces of Great Britain.  For almost all my life, I've read and studied about World War II and its aftermath.  It created the world we live in today, more than any other event in history.

I think this documentary will be well worth your time to watch.

May all the millions who lost their lives during that terrible conflict rest in God's mercy.

Peter

"How Russia fights"

 

That's the title of an online compendium of analytical articles about how the Russian military is structured, and how it operates.  Strategy Page reports:

The analysis in the How Russia Fights project began when General Christopher Cavoli, commander of American army operations in Europe and Africa, realized something. U.S. Army Foreign Area Officers/FAOs assigned to the European theater lacked a detailed understanding of the Russian Armed Forces/RAF and were unable to adequately advise him and other senior officers. Between 1991 to 2014, the United States considered Russia to be a strategic partner. As a result, FAO training shifted its focus away from Russian military capabilities to areas like China and the Pacific. To address this training gap, Cavoli assembled a team of retired Russian speaking Army FAOs. These men had more than 200 years’ experience working on aspects of the Russian military and how they operated. This group called themselves the Troika, the Russian word for three. The Troika was asked to create a training course for FAOs focused on the RAF at the operational and tactical levels.

There's much more at the link.  Recommended reading.

The full course developed over several iterations, and is now available for download under the title "How Russia Fights: A Compendium of Troika Observations on Russia's Special Military Operations".  It makes very interesting reading.

Peter

Living history

 

Courtesy of a link provided by our Australian correspondent Andrew, here's a half-hour video of a flight aboard one of only two surviving B-29 Superfortress bombers from World War II.  Given that we're still in August, the month (in 1945) when two atomic bombs dropped by B-29's brought World War II to an end, I thought it might be interesting to see how the world looks from inside one of these bombers' big glass noses.

That was the highest of high-tech back in the day.  Those four big piston engines certainly make the plane "shake, rattle and roll" as it flew, and you can see from the pilot's actions how the controls were constantly in use to keep it straight and level.

A fascinating bit of history.

Peter

Pseudo-German, computer edition

 

Following this morning's first post, I remembered a "warning" that was often found in the coffee room used by mainframe computer operators back in the 1960's and 1970's.  It was very apt at the time, because it warned of something that many visitors actually did when they were allowed into those hallowed portals.  I was a computer operator way back when, and remember it well.  I think you can translate it without assistance.

Achtung! Alles Lookenspeepers!

Das computermaschine ist nicht für gefingerpoken und mittengrabben. Ist easy schnappen der springenwerk, blowenfusen und poppencorken mit spitzundsparken. Ist nicht für gewerken bei das dummkopfen. Das rubbernecken sightseeren keepen das cottenpicken hans in das pockets muss; relaxen und watchen das blinkenlights.

The term "blinkenlights" became computer shorthand for quite a while, until computers progressed to the point that flashing lights on the console were replaced by lines of text on a monitor.  Example, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Those were the days when a computer program might contain several thousand lines of code, each entered onto its own punched card.  They were carried in boxes, and careful programmers made sure to number each card in numerical sequence, in case accidents happened - which they did, from time to time.  If you want to see a computer programmer cry, tell him the operator dropped his boxes of program cards on the stairs while running down to the computer room, and he's going to have to sort seven thousand-odd cards back into the correct order before you can run his program.  If he'd failed to number the cards, you might need to call the suicide prevention team and have them on standby before you told him the good (?) news . . .

Ah, yes.  Memories!

Peter

Will history repeat itself?

 

Kim du Toit offers some trenchant thoughts about the impact of drastic events upon earlier human societies and culture, and applies that to today's "Information Revolution".  I'm not going to steal his thunder by quoting large chunks of his essay, which I find very apposite:  I'm simply going to recommend that you click over there and read it for yourself.

Here's how he concludes:

I have no idea how much the Information Revolution is going to change society.  All I know is that it will.  However, if I want to see how we will be affected by the next overturning of society, and get an idea of the misery we will endure, I just have to re-read Les Misérables and Loss Of Eden.

This time, Shakespeare’s “bare ruin’d choirs” will not be in our buildings, but in our souls. 

A gloomy conclusion, but from what I see all around me, I fear it may end up that way.  It's for us who care about the higher aspects of human society to fight against that, tooth and nail, to preserve what we can of the best that came before us.

Peter

Independence Day 2025

 

Here's wishing everyone a happy, relaxed, upbeat Fourth of July celebration this year.  When I think back to how things were last year, there's a vast difference, isn't there?  We have a President who may not suit everyone, but is doing his job the best way he knows how, and a Congress and Senate that are - however shakily - working together to move forward his agenda.  I think that beats stalemate, and I think most of the Founding Fathers would have approved.

May our Republic grow stronger every year, and become a land whose citizens may live in liberty and prosperity under the grace of God.

Peter

An amazing, interesting and sometimes amusing history lesson

 

Did you know that Noah's Ark had a Mesopotamian counterpart?  Not only were the Ark narratives very similar between the two cultures, but a replica of the Mesopotamian "ark" - in reality a very large coracle-type design - was actually built and launched.

The project was the brainchild of Irving Finkel.  He describes it in the video below.  I highly recommend making time to watch it if you have any interest in history, sacred writings, or early ships.  It's a fascinating story, and Finkel is a very absorbing lecturer.

Prof. Finkel wrote a book about the project titled "The Ark Before Noah".  After viewing the video above, it's on my must-read list.

Fascinating!

Peter

The fun - and pain - of fact-checking and research

 

During our recent perambulations around parts of the Civil War South, my wife and I enjoyed new scenery, new restaurants (hey, gotta sample the local cuisine to get the local "flavor"!), and new people.  We also were reminded - forcibly - that our bodies are older than they were when we last did this sort of thing, and quite a bit more decrepit.  I hadn't expected it to be so painful to spend so much time on foot.  If this goes on, I'll be exploring in a mobility scooter!

Savannah, Georgia was a pleasant surprise in many ways, the first being the weather.  Inland, Georgia was hot and muggy, very unpleasantly so, but on the coast it was a lot cooler and more pleasant.  The Savannah River runs through town, just off the old business and now tourist district, which adds to the cooling.  There are lots of old buildings, some almost as old as the American Revolution and many dating back to the Civil War period.  They've been done up as shops, restaurants and artsy touristy places, leaving the exteriors unchanged but updating the interiors.  Many of the streets are still cobbled rather than tarred, some of them very uncomfortable even in a modern SUV, forcing one to drive at little more than walking pace;  and the traffic through the tourist areas is very heavy, again slowing one down a lot.  On the other hand, the tourist zone is probably no more than a mile or two square, so everything is reasonably accessible.  Those who have land available for parking are doing a land-office business, with everything being run by text messaging or QR codes and visitors' cellphones, so the overhead is minimal.

I was very glad to be able to see the Civil War side of Savannah for myself.  It's all very well to read about what it was like, but to actually see the steps leading up from the river, and the buildings that housed ship chandleries and shops and warehouses dating back that far, and old Civil War forts and jetty pilings, and see old pictures of sailing ships lining the river bank to load and unload . . . it makes it much more real in my mind, and hence I can write about it much more realistically.  It was a very worthwhile visit from that perspective.

The Interstates and regional roads were in pretty decent condition, but traffic was very heavy at times east of the Mississippi River.  I didn't enjoy driving through it, particularly when traffic backed up near cities like Atlanta or Chattanooga.  It confirmed me in my belief that we needed to live west of the Mississippi, where there's room to breathe and space to maneuver.  We acted on that belief when we moved to Texas in 2016, and we were very happy to get back here when the journeying was done.  How all those people will cope - let alone move - if a really bad disaster hits, such as struck North Carolina last year, I hate to think.  (We wanted to visit North Carolina this trip, to see our friends at Killer Bees Honey, but so many of the roads, hotels, etc. in that area are still closed or heavily restricted due to hurricane damage that we gave up on that idea.)

Our cats, of course, were ecstatic to greet us . . . for about ten seconds.  Then the guilt trip started.  "You went away!  Without us!  Where were you?  Why did you abandon us?"  And so on, and so forth, ad nauseam - all while demanding, and getting, treats, petting and attention.  Cats are very good like that.  They forgave us in time to cuddle up with us that night, purring at us to reassure us that even though we didn't deserve it, they still love us.  Sound familiar?

Now we settle back into our normal routine.  I'll be preparing for surgery in a few weeks (of which more later), and must transcribe notes and observations from the trip into a usable format for writing.  My wife went back to work today, and found plenty waiting for her.  She has to get a root canal treatment do-over tomorrow, so she's not real happy about that - and who can blame her!  Me, I'll try to get some more blogging done after I take her in and bring her home.

Thanks to everyone who prayed for traveling safety for us.  Your prayers came in handy a couple of times, I can tell you - and they worked!

Peter

Remembering the Greatest Invasion

 

Back in 2014, the 70th anniversary of the D-Day invasion of France, Jean-Christophe Rosé produced this 90-minute documentary for France Télévisions.  It uses archival footage that was remastered and colorized, and is probably one of the best sources to understand what the run-up to D-Day involved (with training and other preparations) and the reality of combat on that day.

I'll also mention my father, who was not part of D-Day itself, but served in the Royal Air Force throughout World War II, and shouldered his share of the burden.

Finally, may all those who died on D-Day, on all sides, rest in peace.  There's no enmity beyond the grave.

(Oh - and for those wondering about the headline:  the D-Day invasion, known at the time as Operation Neptune, was the largest in history so far, in terms of numbers of people [on land, at sea and in the air], numbers of ships and aircraft, etc.  The largest invasions of the Pacific War were Operation Musketeer (the invasion of the Philippines), Operation Detachment (the invasion of Iwo Jima) and Operation Iceberg (the invasion of Okinawa), but none of them were as large as Operation Neptune in Normandy.  The planned invasion of Japan in Operations Olympic and Coronet would have been larger, by a significant degree, but those invasions never took place, thanks to the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.)

Peter