Tuesday, May 14, 2024
AESOP’S FABLE
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The Ant and the Dove
An ant went to the bank of a river to quench its thirst, and being carried away by the rush of the stream, was on the point of drowning. A dove sitting on a tree overhanging the water plucked a leaf and let it fall into the stream close to her. The ant climbed onto it and floated in safety to the bank. Shortly afterwards a birdcatcher came and stood under the tree, and laid his lime-twigs for the dove, which sat in the branches. The ant, perceiving his design, stung him in the foot. In pain the birdcatcher threw down the twigs, and the noise made the dove take wing.
Moral:
One good turn deserves another
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Another version:
A Dove saw an Ant fall into a brook. The Ant struggled in vain to reach the bank, and in pity, the Dove dropped a blade of straw close beside it. Clinging to the straw like a shipwrecked sailor to a broken spar, the Ant floated safely to shore.
Soon after, the Ant saw a man getting ready to kill the Dove with a stone. But just as he cast the stone, the Ant stung him in the heel, so that the pain made him miss his aim, and the startled Dove flew to safety in a distant wood.
A kindness is never wasted.
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A further version:
An Ant, going to a river to drink, fell in, and was carried along in the stream. A Dove pitied her condition, and threw into the river a small bough, by means of which the Ant gained the shore. The Ant afterward, seeing a man with a fowling-piece aiming at the Dove, stung him in the foot sharply, and made him miss his aim, and so saved the Dove’s life.
Little friends may prove great friends.
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Moral of the fable:
The moral of the story is that a good deed never goes unnoticed and comes back to us in one form or another.
The dove’s act of kindness returned to him when the ant saved his life from the hunter, i.e., if you do good, good will come to you.
Similarly, in life, doing good deeds and helping people might come back to us in some form. It’s the same with evil deeds, which may come back to us in some form.
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From Wikipedia:
There has been little variation in the fable since it was first recorded in Greek sources. An ant falls into a stream and a dove comes to the rescue by holding out a blade of grass to allow it to climb out. Then, noticing that a fowler was about to catch the dove, the ant bit his foot and his sudden movement caused the bird to fly away.
Other interpretations have been made of the fable. In a 1947 postcard series it is turned into a political statement in the aftermath of the occupation of France by the Nazis. There a little boy with a slingshot distracts a man with an armband labelled "Law" from chasing a girl who is running away with stolen apples in her pinafore.
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By the way:
The expression ‘one good turn deserves another’ has been in the language since at least 1636, as here in William Camden’s Remaines concerning Britaine:
“One good turne asketh another.”
‘One good turn deserves another’ is in use in colloquial English but is also a legal concept in the area of trade or exchange of goods or services. A contract has been said to be binding if it is ‘One good turn deserves another’, that is, if it involves an exchange of goods or services for something of value, usually money.
The proverb is often used to describe corrupt practice, where favours (notably political or sexual favours) are illicitly given in exchange for cash. that is, ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours’.
A little wordplay involving the synonyms ‘turn’ and ‘tern’ was used by the scriptwriters of the 1991 thriller movie ‘The Silence of the Lambs‘, starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins as Clarice Starling and Dr. Hannibal Lecter:
Hannibal Lecter: Plum Island Animal Disease Research Center. Sounds charming.
Clarice Starling: That’s only part of the island. There’s a very, very nice beach. Terns nest there. There’s beautiful…
Hannibal Lecter: Terns? If I help you, Clarice, it will be “turns” for us too. I tell you things, you tell me things. Not about this case, though. About yourself. One good turn deserves another. Yes or no?
Monday, May 13, 2024
CULINARY MOMENTS
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If you have a sensitive stomach, better to avoid the following item.
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Not something that you would find on the Japanese TV series Iron Chef . . .
in 2012 Japanese performance artist Mao Sugiyama had his genitalia surgically removed.
As if that wasn’t strange enough, he took the bits home and cooked them, serving them to guests.
About that:
- He charged guests around $250 per person to eat his severed genitalia in Tokyo, Japan.
- They were garnished with mushrooms and parsley.
- He had initially considered eating his own penis but decided to serve them up instead.
- He cooked the genitalia himself as he was supervised by a chef.
Mao Sugiyama, 22, wearing a chef’s hat, prepares to serve up his genitals as dinner for five paying guests at a party he organised in Tokyo, Japan
- In a Tweet, he offered to cook his penis for a paying guest but ultimately decided to split the ‘meal’ among six guests. He wrote on Twitter: ‘I am offering my male genitals (full penis, testes, scrotum) as a meal for 100,000 yen. I’m Japanese.
- In total around 70 people attended the event in the Suginami ward of Tokyo. While five people tucked into Mao Sugiyama’s genitalia, the rest of them ate beef or crocodile.
- The five people who shelled up the money included a curious couple, a male manga artist, a 22-year old woman, and an event planner. All were between the ages of 22 and 32.
- Japanese authorities were notified but chose not to act, as cannibalism is not illegal in Japan.
- Unfortunately for the diners, the meal was underwhelming, with some describing the penis as having a rubbery texture and bland taste.
- When Managing Culinary Director of Serious Eats J. Kenji Lopez-Alt read about the less-than-satisfying entrée, he wrote to CalorieLab saying, “The chef didn’t cook it right. What a waste of a perfectly good penis! Penis is pretty tough and needs to be slow cooked, either sous-vide or in a braise.”
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#2:
San Lorenzo is the Italian and Spanish name for Saint Lawrence, the 3rd-century Christian martyr.
Some facts:
- St Lawrence is the patron saint of cooks, brewers and vintners, butchers, bakers, confectioners, restaurateurs and more.
- Due to his conspiring to hide and protect the written documents of the Church, Lawrence is also known as the patron saint of archivists and librarians.
- August 10 is Saint Larence’s feast day for Italians.
- Lorenzo’s involvement in what was considered a heretical, anti-establishment religion led to his martyrdom: on August 10 in year 258 CE (ie AD), Roman officials sentenced Lorenzo to death, as punishment for his refusal to hand over various goods and treasures he oversaw as a church deacon. He had distributed them to the poor instead.
- According to Christian lore, Lorenzo was placed on a gridiron to “cook” over hot coals, a tale that accounts for the saint’s now-legendary final words: “I’m well-done on this side. Turn me over!”
- While some historians dispute the accuracy of Lorenzo’s martyrdom, associations between the saint and his “death by grilling” remain strong. He is patron saint of barbecues and barbecuing, for instance, and cooks are known to invoke his protection in the kitchen, where burns by heat or fire are a very real threat. Italian kitchens commonly feature small Lorenzo statues, plaques or holy cards.
San Lorenzo
St. Lawrence Distributing the Treasures of the Church
The Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence by Rubens (1614)
Martyrdom of San Lorenzo- by Palma il giovane
The Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence by Girolamo da Santa Croce
Sunday, May 12, 2024
BIG TREES
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The following item was sent to me by colleague and friend Tony Z. Thanks Tony.
Take the time to have a close look at the pics and sppot the human figures for scale, it's like a Where's Wally.
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Just a quiet life in a California forest for all these years ... 3,200!
Not every tree has a nickname, but 'The President' has earned it.
This giant sequoia stands at 247 feet tall & is estimated to be over 3,200 years old.
Imagine, this tree was already 700 years old during the height of ancient Greece's civilization and 1200 years old when Jesus lived while Rome was well into its rule of most of the western world and points beyond.
The trunk of The President measures 27 feet across, with 2 BILLION needles from base to top.
Because of its unbelievable size, this tree has never been photographed in its entirety, until now.
National Geographic photographers have worked along with scientists to try and create the first photo that shows The President in all its glory.
They had to climb the tree with pulleys and levers and took thousands of photos.
Of those, they selected 126 and stitched them together to get this incredible portrait of The President.
And here it is:
The man standing near the trunk of the tree is a good indicator of the tree's size.
Incredible, isn't it?
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Plus some more . . .
The President Tree, July 2023
President Tree, with humans surrounding it with interlocked hands for scale in July 2023
The President Tree, before the "T" came off of its sign (March 2016)
The President is a giant sequoia located in the Giant Forest of Sequoia National Park in the United States, east of Visalia, California. It is approximately 247 feet (75 m) high, and 27 feet (8.2 m) in diameter at the base. The President is the second-largest tree in the world, measured by volume of trunk, and the oldest-known living sequoia, about 3,240 years old. As of 2012, the volume of its trunk measured at about 54,000 cubic feet (1,500 m3), with an additional 9,000 cubic feet (250 m3) of branches.
The tree was named after President Warren G. Harding in 1923. Nearby trees include Chief Sequoyah, the 27th-largest giant sequoia in the world, and the Congress Group, two dense stands of medium-sized sequoias that represent the "House" and "Senate".
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General Sherman is a giant sequoia tree located at an elevation of 2,109 m (6,919 ft) above sea level in the Giant Forest of Sequoia National Park in Tulare County, in the U.S. state of California. By volume, it is the largest known living single-stem tree on Earth.
The General Sherman tree was named after the American Civil War general William Tecumseh Sherman. The official story, which may be apocryphal, claims the tree was named in 1879 by naturalist James Wolverton, who had served as a lieutenant in the 9th Indiana Cavalry under Sherman.
Seven years later, in 1886, the land came under the control of the Kaweah Colony, a utopian socialist community whose economy was based on logging. Noting the pivotal role that Sherman had played in the Indian Wars and his forced relocation of native American tribes, they renamed the tree in honor of Karl Marx. However, the community was disbanded in 1892, primarily as a result of the establishment of Sequoia National Park, and the tree reverted to its previous name.
In 1931, following comparisons with the nearby General Grant tree, General Sherman was identified as the largest tree in the world. One result of this process was that wood volume became widely accepted as the standard for establishing and comparing the size of different trees.
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Saturday, May 11, 2024
MOTHER’S DAY AROUND THE WORLD
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The second Sunday in May is Mother’s Day. A happy Mother’s Day to Byters and readers who are mums.
Here are some traditions for Mother’s Day around the world.
From:
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Millions of families honour their mothers every year with cards, flowers, special meals and other gifts on the second Sunday in May thanks to the work of Anna Jarvis, the founder of US Mother’s Day. A single woman without children, Jarvis relentlessly lobbied for the holiday in honour of her own mother’s death, which took place on the second Sunday of May 1905. By 1914, the celebration had become so popular that it was declared a national holiday (Jarvis later regretted lobbying for the official holiday after it became commercialised.)
Today almost every country in the world observes a version of Mother’s Day to thank mothers for the critical role they play in the family.
“Despite the many cultural differences that exist and differing expectations of motherhood throughout history and the world, one thing remains constant: a recognition that mothers have a uniquely important, valuable role in helping children to thrive,” says Christine Gross-Loh, author of Parenting Without Borders: Surprising Lessons Parents Around the World Can Teach Us.
While many countries celebrate on the second Sunday in May and with similar traditions, others observe different dates and follow their own unique customs. Here’s a look at how seven other countries celebrate Mother’s Day around the world.
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United Kingdom
Mother’s Day in the United Kingdom takes place on the fourth Sunday of Lent, a date that varies each year. The celebration originated in the Middle Ages as a religious holiday known as Mothering Sunday, when people in domestic service were allowed to return to their home, or mother, church and often visited family.
Influenced by the modern American celebration, Mothering Sunday became largely secular by the 1950s, though it retained the traditional date in Lent. Today the holiday is known in the United Kingdom both as Mother’s Day and Mothering Sunday and is celebrated much as it is in the United States. One traditional Mothering Sunday food is the Simnel cake, a light fruitcake made with marzipan, which is also popular at Easter.
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Mexico
Mexico has celebrated Mother’s Day since 1922, when it was established as part of an effort to promote motherhood as the roles of women expanded outside the home. Rafael Alducin, founder of the Mexico City newspaper El Excelsior, organised the first celebration on May 10, 1922.
Today, in addition to giving mothers flowers, cards, and other gifts, families enjoy traditional Mexican foods and music. The celebration also frequently includes serenading mothers in the morning, some families even hire mariachis to accompany them, and continues with special masses and school performances.
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Japan
Mother’s Day in Japan was originally held on March 6, 1931, to celebrate the birthday of Empress Kojun, the mother of Emperor Emeritus Akihito, but it was banned as a Western influence during World War II. In 1949, Japan began celebrating Mother’s Day on the second Sunday in May. Today it is marked by families giving their mothers gifts, cards, and flowers, usually red carnations, which symbolise a mother’s love and sacrifices, and enjoying traditional Japanese egg dishes.
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Ethiopia
Mother’s Day in Ethiopia takes place during Antrosht, a three-day celebration held whenever the rainy season ends, sometime between October and November. Families come together with traditional singing, dancing, and a feast that includes a hash made by the mother. The ingredients for the hash are brought by the children with boys bringing lamb or bull meat and the girls bringing vegetables, spices, and dairy.
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Peru
While Peru marks Mother’s Day on the same date as the United States and with many of the same customs, including giving flowers and sharing meals, many Peruvians also honour their deceased female relatives. They gather at their graves to celebrate them, often bringing flowers and sharing food and drinks. The tradition is so popular that vendors sell flowers, balloons, and signs outside the cemeteries.
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Thailand
When Thailand first celebrated Mother’s Day in 1950, it took place on April 15, close to Songkran, the Thai new year, but it was moved to August 12 in 1976 to honour the birthday of Queen Sirikit, who is considered the mother of the nation. Children give their mothers garlands of jasmine, which symbolizes purity and love, while families often give alms to Buddhist monks and make charitable donations. Schools host performances for mothers, while candle-lighting ceremonies, parades, and fireworks honour the Queen.
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France
The French honour their mothers nationally on the last Sunday in May, unless it falls on the same day as the Christian holiday of Pentecost, in which case it moves to the first Sunday in June. Although the day originated as a way to honour mothers of large families and has been celebrated nationally since the 1920s, it was not until 1950 that the government gave it a fixed date. Like many other countries, French families give mothers gifts, cards, and flowers, though in France, Lily of the Valley is preferred. Special meals are followed by children reciting poems and giving cakes shaped like floral bouquets or hearts.
Friday, May 10, 2024
FROM THE VAULT
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From Bytes, Thursday, February 21, 2013
You pays your money . . .
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Whatever you want
Whatever you like
Whatever you say
You pay your money
You take your choice
Whatever you need
Whatever you use
Whatever you win
Whatever you lose
Whatever you want
- Lyric from Whatever You Want, Status Quo
Driving home the other day I was thinking about the Federal election coming up in September when the above song came on the radio. The lyrics “You pay your money, you take your choice” seemed particularly apt for the election - according to one internet comment: “The saying is of course taken to mean that it is entirely up to you which of the available choices you spend your money on, although there is also the unspoken implication that there isn't actually that much difference between the choices on offer.”
Which had me wondering on the origin of the phrase.
My recollection was that the wording was actually “You pays your money, you takes your choice”, which turned out to be correct. There is also a variation “You pays your money, you takes your chance”. In the US it is commonly "You pays your nickel, you takes your choice."
The expression appears in Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, dating from 1884:
“Here’s your opposition line! Here’s your two sets o’ heirs to old Peter Wilks—and you pays your money and you takes your choice!”
Although many believe that it dates from that reference, it first appeared in an 1846 Punch cartoon and is believed to have already been in use, probably as a Cockney expression yelled out by stall holders at the markets, well before that date.
In 1845 the Ministry of John Peel faced a crisis over the repeal of the Corn Laws. These laws were trade laws designed to protect cereal producers of the United Kingdom against foreign imports. They also ensured that British landowners reaped the profits from farming in that the corn laws made it too expensive to import grain from elsewhere, even when Great Britain and Ireland were experiencing famine and food shortages. In 1845 Ireland was hit by a potato blight. Over the next 4 years over a million died in the Great Famine and a million more left Ireland.
Many Tories were opposed to the repeal of the laws but Peel, Queen Victoria, the Whigs and some Tories were strongly supportive. When Peel’s cabinet failed to back him on repeal, he resigned as Prime Minister on 5 December, 1845. The leader of the Protectionists, Lord Stanley, refused to step into Peel’s shoes and form a government. Efforts by Lord Russell to form a Whig government also failed. Victoria invited Peel to form a government again, which he did. (Peel resigned again in 1846, after the repeal narrowly passed, and he was replaced by Lord Russell).
The 1846 Punch cartoon, headed The Ministerial Crisis, above, is from the period when there was no Prime Minister. It depicts a showman inviting John Bull to look into a display box.
The following conversation is printed below the cartoon:
Showman.
"On your right you will perceive a Prime Minister a bolishing of hisself. And over your left is another Prime Minister a bolishing of the Corn-Laws."
Master John Bull.
"But which is the Prime Minister?"
Showman.
"Which ever you please, my little dear. You pays your money, and you takes your choice."
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You pays your money and you takes your choice.
- Foreword to Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley.
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From reader Alvin Harper,
June 26, 2016 at 10:07 AM
Where I grew up, in rural California, the expression was, "You pays your money and you takes your chances." This is not merely a variation, it is a different expression altogether. What this phrase implies is that there is a substantial difference between alternatives, but you are not afforded a choice. You pay your money and get what you get. For example, in the summer time, an ice cream truck would slowly patrol the residential areas, playing a music-box tune over loud speakers. When you heard it, you had just enough time to scrape together the amount of money needed to but one for everybody, take their orders, then chase down the truck. The transaction began with the ice cream man counting out your money. Once he confirmed you gave him the correct amount, the change was tossed into his cash register. You had paid your money. Then you had to take your chances that he would have the flavors everyone wanted. Sometimes he did, sometimes he didn't. But since any flavor of ice cream is better than no ice cream at all, "You pays your money and you takes your chances."
Thursday, May 9, 2024
FUNNY FRIDAY
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G’day Byters and readers.
Given that last week’s Funny Friday theme was food, it is fitting that this week’s theme should be drink. There is also some Jewish humour, just because I love it.
Enjoy.
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SOME HUMOUR:
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A guy sits down at the bar and orders drink after drink. "Is everything okay, pal?" the bartender asks. "My wife and I got into a fight and she said she wasn’t going to talk to me for a month.”
Trying to put a positive spin on things, the bartender says, "Well, maybe that's kind of a good thing. You know... a little peace and quiet?"
"Yeah, but today is the last day...”
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Johnny sits at the bar staring at his drink when a large, trouble-making biker steps up next to him, grabs his drink, gulps it down in one swig, and menacingly says, “Well thank you! Whatcha gonna to do about it?"
Johnny burst into tears. "Come on, man," the biker says, "I didn't think you'd cry. I can’t stand to see a man crying. What’s your problem?"
"This is the worst day of my life," Johnny says. "I'm a complete failure. I was late to a meeting and my boss fired me. When I went to the parking lot, I found my car had been stolen and I don't have any insurance. I left my wallet in the cab I took home. I found my wife in bed with the postman, and then my dog bit me. So, I come to this bar to work up the courage to put an end to it all. I buy a drink, drop a capsule in, and sit here watching the poison dissolve, and then you show up and drink the whole thing!
But enough about me, how's your day going?”
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Schlemiel: a Yiddish term meaning "inept/incompetent person" or "fool".
Ruthie told Mo:
"You’re a schlemiel! You always were a schlemiel, you always will be a schlemiel! You look, act and dress like a schlemiel! You’ll be a schlemiel until the day you die! And if they ran a competition for schlemiels, you’d take second place as the world’s second biggest schlemiel!"
"Why only second place?" Mo asked.
"Because you’re a schlemiel!”
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(AAA is the American Automobile Association, also the Australian Automobile Association).
"Hi my name is Jeff and I’m an alcoholic."
"Sir, this is Triple A, not AA."
"I know, I’m trying to explain why my car is in the lake."
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A homeless man asked me for money I had 20 dollars in my pocket and didn’t want it to just go towards crack and alcohol.
So I gave it to the homeless man
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An Englishman is hiking in Scotland and he pauses to drink from a stream. A passing shepherd calls out "Dinnae drink frae that, it's all fulla coo piss an shite!"
The Englishman says to him in a cut-glass accent "I'm terribly sorry, my good fellow, would you very much mind repeating that in the Queen's English?"
And the shepherd says "I'm terribly sorry sir, I was only asking if you would like to borrow this tin cup and get a proper drink?"
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A man walks into a bar and orders a drink. The bartender gives the man his drink and the man asks "If I show you something crazy, would let me have free drinks for the rest of the night?"
The bartender thinks for a minute and then says "It would have to be something spectacular to take that offer." The man leans down and picks up a box and sets it on the bar. He opens the box and inside is a small piano man, who is only 1 foot tall, and beside him a little piano. The piano man starts playing classical music like Beethoven and Chopin.
Once he finishes, the bartender is in utter disbelief. He tells the man "You can have free drinks for the rest of the night, but only if you tell where you got this." The man says "In the alley behind your bar, there is a genie who is granting free wishes to everyone who wants them." Elated, the bartender heads behind his bar to see if it was true.
A few minutes passed and out of the alleyway erupts a cacophony of quacking. The bartender rushes back into the bar and shuts his door against a wave of thousands of ducks. He manages to secure the door and says to the man "I think that the genie is hard of hearing, because after I asked for a million bucks, these ducks appeared by the thousands."
The man says "Did you really think I wished for a 12 inch pianist?"
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Woman:
Do you drink beer?
Man:
Yes
Woman:
How many beers a day?
Man:
Usually about 3
Woman:
How much do you pay per beer?
Man:
$5.00 which includes a tip
Woman:
And how long have you been drinking?
Man:
About 20 years, I suppose
Woman:
So a beer costs $5 and you have 3 beers a day which puts your spending
each month at $450. In one year, it would be approximately $5400
…correct?
Man:
Correct
Woman:
If in 1 year you spend $5400, not accounting for inflation, the past 20 years puts your spending at $108,000, correct?
Man:
Correct
Woman:
Do you know that if you didn't drink so much beer, that money could have been put in a step-up interest savings account and after accounting for compound interest for the past 20 years, you could have now bought a Ferrari?
Man:
Do you drink beer?
Woman:
No
Man:
What color is your Ferrari?
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LIMERICK OF THE WEEK:
A young girl, imprudent and errant,
Did things that more cautious girls daren't.
She hoped and expected
To go undetected,
But is slowly becoming ap-parent.
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GALLERY:
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CORN CORNER:
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My wife says I get mean when I drink whiskey. Now I drink Canadian whiskey.
I am still mean but I am sorry, too.
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Did you hear about the new drink called "Karen"?
It's an aged, white wine.
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Alabama changed the drinking age to 34
They wanted to keep alcohol out of the high schools.
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My wife and I did the Jewish divorce custom where we took a broken glass and we put it back together.
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I was arguing with a guy today who said he was a big pop star in the 80's.
I didn't believe him, but he was adamant.
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Wednesday, May 8, 2024
PHOTOGRAPHS
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Historical Photographs of the Old Wild West
Photographs and text from:
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Chinese Labourers.
The idea of foreigners taking local jobs is not isolated to the United States nor modern times. Long before the working class of the U.S. blamed Mexicans for taking their jobs, it was the Chinese. Immigrants from China worked for less than their American counterparts, $1.00 a day instead of $2.50. They also required less of their employers. They moved and managed their own labor camps, unlike the white laborers who demanded help.
By the way (my comment):
Is that Kwai Chang Caine from the 70's TV series Kung Fu either on right or second from left?
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True Cowboys.
These true cowboys of the Wild West are not what one tends to imagine. They were hardworking laborers, who wrangled cows on horseback. Life was simple, dirty, and happy for most of them. The guns they carried were more a matter of fashion than protection from outlaws; good for putting down a sick animal or fighting off a wild one.
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Terry’s Texas Rangers.
Assembled in 1861, by Colonel Benjamin Franklin Terry for the Confederate Army, the 8th Texas Cavalry was a fierce regiment of fighters. Folks called them Terry’s Texas Rangers for short. In their four years together, they fought in 275 engagements over seven states. In 1865, they surrendered with the Tennessee Army.
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General Custer.
Born George Armstrong Custer, on December 5, 1839, Custer made his way up the ranks of the U.S. Army during the Civil War and the Indian Wars. He graduated from West Point in 1857 but at the bottom of his class. That might be why lost the Battle of Little Bighorn against a fierce Lakota-Cheyenne coalition.
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Belle Star.
Starr was another female outlaw in the Wild West. She was born on February 5, 1848, named Myra Maybelle Shirley Reed Starr, but better known as Belle Star. An outlaw, yes, but she was also a lady, She rode sidesaddle because that’s how ladies rode a horse, but she still carried two pistols at all times. Star was a horse thief or that’s what they were able to pin on her. She died of a gunshot wound in 1899, the source of which remains a mystery.
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Sierra Nevada Mountain Trail.
Crossing the fields of the Midwest were not so bad, save crossing rivers and dealing with bandits. It was the trek over the Sierra Nevada Mountains that proved challenging. It was dangerous. Wealthy travellers hired armed men to keep them safe on the dangerous trails. Nobody, however, could keep travellers safe from rock slides.
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Kit Carson.
Born in 1809, Christopher Houston Carson was a frontiersman, a mountain man, and a trapper, who was key to the development of California later in life. People knew him as Kit Carson. He spent a good deal of time with Native people during his life. Carson married three times in his life, twice to Native American women. The third woman was a Mexican.
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Pearl Hart.
Born Pearl Taylor, Hart was a Canadian-born outlaw who made a name robbing stagecoaches. She was also one of the few female outlaws of the Wild West. Inspired by Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, Hart left her husband at age 22 to chase the Wild West. He found her and talked her into coming home, but she left him again, then robbed a stagecoach on a whim in Arizona. That started a string of robberies, which caught up to her that same year. They arrested her, and despite a brief escape, she spent three years on a five-year sentence.
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Bloody Bill.
His parents didn’t name him that. When they had him in 1840, they called him William T. Anderson. Bill, as he preferred, worked on the Confederate side of the Civil War. He was a leader of the Quantrill’s Raiders, a band of guerrillas who went rotten. His band targeted Union loyalists in Missouri and Kansas. In September 1864, in Centralia, Missouri, Bill’s band killed some 124 Union soldiers in an attack. A month later, at age 24, Bill died in battle. Someone snapped this image several hours after he passed.
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Rufus Buck Gang.
A unique gang of outlaws, the Rufus Buck Gang was a collection of black and Creek Indian men. They were not a group of misunderstood outlaws. These were bad men. Operating in the Arkansas-Oklahoma area from 1895 to 1896, history remembers them for robbery, murder, and rape. No surprise, when the law finally caught up with the Gang, the people hung them.
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Mining Money. Montana—1889.
The story of mining hasn’t changed much in the last 200 years. It was dirty work, where owners made bank, and laborers made decent wages, but at a cost. The dangers associated with mining were high. If it wasn’t collapsed mines, it was noxious gases, inhaled crud or the constant pain from working in a hunched over position.
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Wild Western Man.
This image appeared in a Kansas City newspaper. What’s interesting about the image is how it captures the traditional clothing worn by cowboys. Large brimmed hats, in this case, a Mexican sombrero-style hat, were less about fashion and more about function. The brim kept the oppressive sun off the body, enough to keep a cowboy from overheating.
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19th Century Move.
Making the move west started long before humans Paved Route 66 to Hollywood. In the 19th century, however, it was a more treacherous journey. This is a couple taking a break in Kansas en route to the fancy Wild West. What would possess someone to brave the elements, wild animals, and nut jobs on the route is beyond this writer.
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More to come.
