Archive for the ‘Long Island City’ Category
after cycles incalculable
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Romans had one of their very practical holidays scheduled for this week of the year, a mostly forgotten rite called the Lemuralia.
from wikipedia
In Roman religion, the Lemuralia or Lemuria was a feast during which the ancient Romans performed rites to exorcise the malevolent and fearful ghosts of the dead from their homes. The unwholesome spectres of the restless dead, the lemures or larvae were propitiated with offerings of beans. On those days, the Vestals would prepare sacred mola salsa, a salted flour cake, from the first ears of wheat of the season.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The notion of vengeful ghosts, whom the Romans would call- in hushed whispers- the Larvae is ancient and seems to be bred into the human specie.
Those who celebrated the Lemuralia, walked barefooted, washed their hands three times, and threw nine times black beans behind their backs, believing by this ceremony to secure themselves against the Lemures (Varro, Vita pop. Rom. Fragm. p241, ed. Bipont.; Servius, ad Aen. I.276).
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Egyptians had their Khu, and China has the Hungry Ghosts, even the Inuit tradition carries a haunting cadre of supernormal entities.
from wikipedia
In Roman mythology, lemures (singular lemur) were shades or spirits of the restless or malignant dead, and are probably cognate with an extended sense of larvae (sing. larva = mask) as disturbing or frightening. Lemures is the more common literary term but even this is rare: it is used by Horace, and by Ovid in his Fasti. Lemures may represent the wandering and vengeful spirits of those not afforded proper burial, funeral rites or affectionate cult by the living: they are not attested by tomb or votive inscriptions. Ovid interprets them as vagrant, unsatiated and potentially vengeful di manes or di parentes (ancestral gods of the underworld). To him, the rites of their cult suggest an incomprehensibly archaic, quasi-magical and probably very ancient rural tradition. Much later, St. Augustine describes both the lemures and the larvae as evil and restless manes that torment and terrify the living: lares, on the other hand, are good manes.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Of course, our life here in the Newtown Pentacle is defined by more mundane concepts and material realizations. The Larvae we experience in early May, like these enigmatic critters found near the Hunters Point Ave. Station on Skillman Avenue, are decidedly “normal” and also happen to be native New Yorkers.
Your humble narrator has stumbled before, but with extensive comparison to extant critter speciation via the google… I’m going to go out on a limb here and proclaim these squirming masses of endless hunger Malacosoma Americanum!!! That’s the Eastern Tent Caterpillar to you, Lords and Ladies!!!
and apologies for the “out on a limb” pun- couldn’t resist…
(and also, I could be totally wrong- but these guys look like Malacosoma Americanum to me- if you can confirm or deny, please leave a comment)
from wikipedia
The newly hatched caterpillars initiate the construction of a silk tent soon after emerging. They typically aggregate at the tent site for the whole of their larval life, expanding the tent each day to accommodate their increasing size. Under field conditions, the caterpillars feed three times each day, just before dawn, at mid-afternoon, and in the evening after sunset. During each bout of feeding the caterpillars emerge from the tent, add silk to the structure, move to distant feeding sites en masse, feed, then return immediately to the tent where they rest until the next activity period. The exception to this pattern occurs in the last instar when the caterpillars feed only at night. The caterpillars lay down pheromone trails to guide their movements between the tent and feeding sites. The insect has six larval instars. When fully grown, the caterpillars disperse and construct cocoons in protected places. The adult moths (imago) emerge about two weeks later. They are rather strictly nocturnal and start flying after nightfall, then possibly stop some hours before dawn. Mating and oviposition typically occur on the same day as the moths emerge from their cocoons; the females die soon thereafter.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Positively raining down from the trees, vast chaotics of these crawlers were observed the other day trying to cross Skillman Avenue, heading eastward.
The Eastern Tent Caterpillar, Malacosoma americanum (Fabricius) is reported to have been present in the United States since the 1600’s, and is responsible for forming unsightly silk-webbed nests at branch forks. Their population peaks every 8 to 10 years, when large infestations can completely defoliate trees in late spring/early summer.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Virtually impossible to find footing which did not render a horrible and crushing extermination, I nevertheless scuttled forth and picked my way amongst them. In the back of my mind, I wondered what evolutionary adaptations they might have developed to accommodate the environmental hostility of this section of Long Island City. There is a High School across the street, of course- surrounded by the tunnels, trains, highways, bridges, and the cemented reality of an area defined by the junction of the main waterway of the Newtown Creek with its bubbly tributary- the canalized Dutch Kills. Just a block away is the Empty Corridor.
from esf.edu
These caterpillars produce the conspicuous silken tents commonly seen in the spring on branches of favored host trees. The tents consist of numerous layers of dense silk webbing which contain much excrement and numerous molted skins.
The female moths are dull reddish-brown with a wing expanse of 1 1/2 to 2 inches. Males are smaller. The front wings of each are crossed by two whitish, oblique, parallel lines.
Mature larvae, or caterpillars, are 2 to 2 1/2 inches long. The head and body are generally deep black. There is a white stripe along the back of the body and a row of oval, pale blue spots on each side. There are many short, irregular brownish markings on the side of each body segment. Long, fine, brown hairs sparsely clothe the body.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
These wriggling americans were pursuing some unknown goal in the direction of that High School, and the actions of automotive traffic along Skillman Avenue upon their migration is a detail best left unheralded. Vast hatcheries of avian predators swirled above.
from nysipm.cornell.edu
Manual destruction of egg masses and tents is an excellent way to control populations. Be advised that the hairs on caterpillars may be irritating to skin.
Twigs encased by egg masses should be pruned out. Tents can also be pruned out or be destroyed by winding around a stick or with a strong jet of water (the best time to destroy tents is before caterpillars leave to feed). Do not attempt to burn tents as this can cause more harm than good.
Tent destruction has another benefit in that it exposes caterpillars to birds and other natural enemies which can help keep populations in check. Eastern tent caterpillars are parasitized by braconid, ichneumonid, and chalcid wasps.
Other control options are available: Bacillus thuringiensis var. kurstaki is useful in the early spring when applied to young larvae, as is insecticidal soap which should be used when caterpillars are out of tents and feeding on leaves. Take care to avoid applying soaps in unsuitable weather conditions (like hot temperatures) as this can lead to phytotoxicity and leaf damage.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The univoltine holocaust playing out all around me forced me to rumination, a meditative practice whose purpose is to ward off the periodic moments of panic and fainting which have so afflicted me in the past. Feckless quisling and physical coward both, your humble narrator revels in heroic tales of the past, for the future is a paralysis of logical progressions and dire portent.
from wikipedia
The origin of the festival of All Saints celebrated in the West dates to May 13, 609 or 610, when Pope Boniface IV consecrated the Pantheon at Rome to the Blessed Virgin and all the martyrs; the feast of the dedicatio Sanctae Mariae ad Martyres has been celebrated at Rome ever since. The chosen day, May 13, was a pagan observation of great antiquity, the culmination of three days of the Feast of the Lemures, in which the malevolent and restless spirits of the dead were propitiated. Liturgiologists of the Middle Ages based the idea that this Lemuria festival was the origin of that of All Saints on their identical dates and on the similar theme of “all the dead”.
The feast of All Saints, on its current date, is traced to the foundation by Pope Gregory III (731–741) of an oratory in St. Peter’s for the relics “of the holy apostles and of all saints, martyrs and confessors, of all the just made perfect who are at rest throughout the world”, with the day moved to November 1.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Negative thoughts, though, on a sunny warm day in the City of Greater New York will only attract attention to you. Best to throw open the psychic windows and air the mental house out, clean up and organize for the coming summer. Perhaps the Romans had something after all, the Lemuralia was always accompanied by a general cleaning of the home, a spring cleaning.
from wikipedia
On Sunday, 13 May 1917, ten year old Lúcia Santos and her younger cousins, siblings Jacinta and Francisco Marto, were tending sheep at a location known as the Cova da Iria near their home village of Fátima in Portugal. Lúcia described seeing a woman “brighter than the sun, shedding rays of light clearer and stronger than a crystal ball filled with the most sparkling water and pierced by the burning rays of the sun.” Further appearances are reported to have taken place on the thirteenth day of the month in June and July. In these, the woman exhorted the children to do penance and to make sacrifices to save sinners. The children subsequently wore tight cords around their waists to cause pain, abstained from drinking water on hot days, and performed other works of penance. Most importantly, Lúcia said that the lady had asked them to pray the rosary every day, repeating many times that the rosary was the key to personal and world peace. This had particular resonance since many Portuguese men, including relatives of the visionaries, were then fighting in World War I.
According to Lúcia’s account, in the course of her appearances, the woman confided to the children three secrets, now known as the Three Secrets of Fátima.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Lemures are always with us, after all, and they’ll always be back.
Have a good day on the 13th of May, eat something bad for you with someone you love- and fellows- wash your hands and throw some black beans around the neighborhood later. You never know.
I really have to recommend against walking bare footed, however.
The Hermetic Hungarian responds
Down under the Hell Gate Bridge Onramp- DUHGBO – photo by Mitch Waxman
A recent posting- Hungry Ghosts– detailed the lengthy and pedantic debate over the merits of Film vs. Digital photography enjoyed by myself and that erudite Manhattanite known to long time readers of this Newtown Pentacle as the Hermetic Hungarian.
The Hungarian responds:
32. Not 22. Two times 16. And they are all great. Ain’t gonna scan ’em. Projected ’em from my 2-1/4″ slide projector. Dee-lish.
And it’s not that I dislike digital, it’s that there is no digital equivalent of black & white. A photo-chemical process which leaves traces of its origins throughout the process. Palimpsests. Ghosts.
I’m probably gonna get a G-11 or used G-10 (it was the stupid human interface that put me off the S-90, not to mention Adobe’s brain-dead policies) to fool with while I wait for version 2 of Leica’s digital M-9 to come out. Upon which I will then be able to attach all but two of my 14 Leica lenses. (To be fair, one of my lenses can only go on my vintage 1948 Leica IIIf due to the extreme distance the rear element projects into the body. It would kill a modern body with a built-in meter).
–Légmentesen Magyar AKA “HH”
Review Ave. trucking – photo by Mitch Waxman
Back on track tomorrow, with a proper posting, did you realize we’re in the midst of the Lemuralia?
Circumnavigation 4
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After sliding past the Williamsburg Bridge, the Circle Line narrator began to talk about Queensboro (he called it 59th street bridge- grrrr) and didn’t mention the Newtown Creek. Tourists wouldn’t want to hear about that story, I guess. One thing that really annoyed your humble narrator were the constant references to pop culture icons like the Seinfeld sitcom and the Spiderman movies. Realization that that’s what tourists have as touchstones for NYC is obviated, but still… blurring the line between fantasy and reality is a real issue in the modern world.
from wikipedia
George Louis Costanza is a fictional character in the American television sitcom Seinfeld (1989–1998), played by Jason Alexander. He has variously been described as a “short, stocky, slow-witted, bald man” (by Elaine Benes and Costanza himself), “Lord of the Idiots” (by Costanza himself), and as “the greatest sitcom character of all time”. He is friends with Jerry Seinfeld, Cosmo Kramer, and Elaine Benes. George appears in every episode except for “The Pen” (third season). The character was originally loosely based on Seinfeld co-creator Larry David, but surnamed after Jerry Seinfeld’s real-life New York friend, Mike Costanza.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The power of cinema and television to present a cogent and absorbing telling of historical events is actually a dangerous thing. Again, I realize that the tourists aboard the Circle Line aren’t looking for hardcore history, but there’s a lot to say about the Queensboro bridge that doesn’t involve the Green Goblin or George Costanza. History is made not by accurate or cogent catalogs of events, but by distribution. The reason we know about Aristotle or Voltaire is that MANY copies of their work were made, distributed across a wide area, and were quoted by others. This means that distaff copies of their work survived the fires and floods. This means that to future eyes, the surviving copies of Spiderman and Goodfellas might be all they have.
Which makes me wonder if Pliny the Younger might have been the Dean Koontz of his time.
from wikipedia
As they watch over May in the hospital, Mary Jane tells Peter she has a crush on Spider-Man, and Peter expresses his own feelings for her. Harry catches them holding hands and tells his father about their love for each other. Now knowing that Spider-Man has feelings for Mary Jane, the Goblin lures him to the top of the Queensboro Bridge by taking Mary Jane and a Roosevelt Island Tramway car full of children hostage, then drops both at the same time. Spider-Man saves them all, but the Goblin takes him to an abandoned building for a fight. Spider-man eventually defeats and unmasks the Goblin, and Norman dies after asking Peter not to tell Harry that he (Norman) was the Goblin.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As the boat passed Roosevelt Island, the looming hotel construction sites of Queens Plaza rise behind it. Within a few years, tens of thousands of Queens Plaza and Dutch Kills hotel rooms will be serving the self same tourist trade which is satisfied by attractions like these Circle Line cruises. Perhaps this is what we New Yorkers are destined to become, apes in a steel and glass cage put on display for foreigners as we live out our funny lives. Just like on Seinfeld.
from wikipedia
Tourism in New York City includes nearly 47 million foreign and American tourists each year. Major destinations include the Empire State Building, Ellis Island, Broadway theatre productions, museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and other tourist attractions including Central Park, Washington Square Park, Rockefeller Center, Times Square, the Bronx Zoo, South Street Seaport, New York Botanical Garden, luxury shopping along Fifth and Madison Avenues, and events such as the Tribeca Film Festival, and free performances in Central Park at Summerstage and Delacorte Theater. The Statue of Liberty is a major tourist attraction and one of the most recognizable icons of the United States. Many New York City ethnic enclaves, such as Jackson Heights, Flushing, and Brighton Beach are major shopping destinations for first and second generation Americans up and down the East Coast.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Of course, the folks whose lives are a little too funny can be found on Ward’s Island at the psychiatric hospitals that serve the City of Greater New York. I’m never quite sure which building is which in this complex, as your humble narrator is convinced that getting too close to a madhouse would be injurious to his freedoms, but this is either the 509 bed Manhattan Psychiatric Center (I lean toward this) or the maximum security Kirby Forensic Psychiatric Center. The Circle Line narration didn’t mention either.
from soundportraits.org
There seem to be two constants to life on Ward 2-West. One of these is violence. The state considers the staffers who work on the ward to hold the single most dangerous job in New York, with the highest injury rate of any profession. The other constant on the ward is noise. There is nowhere to escape it, although there is one patient who seems to have adapted to it quite well. His name is Peter, and you can always find him at the front of the dayroom, hunched over a table peacefully drawing with yellow plugs stuffed deep into his ears. He is about 50 years old, has curly brown hair and a graying beard, gentle eyes behind thick glasses. Before committing his crime, Peter was a successful commercial artist. Today he’s working on a still life with pastels.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Amongst the more pleasant realities of the trip was this view of the Hell’s Gate with its two spans- the Triborough Bridge(s) and the Hellgate railroad Bridge. The plane taking off from nearby LaGuardia airport was pure serendipity.
from wikipedia
Hell Gate is a narrow tidal strait in the East River in New York City in the United States. It separates Astoria, Queens from Randall’s Island/Ward’s Island (formerly two separate islands that are now joined by landfill).
It was spanned in 1917 by the New York Connecting Railroad Bridge (now called the Hell Gate Bridge), which connects the Ward’s Island and Queens. The bridge provides a direct rail link between New England and New York City. In 1936 it was spanned by the Triborough Bridge (now called the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge), allowing vehicular traffic to pass between Manhattan, the Bronx, and Queens.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Hellgate Bridge has long graded approaches which sprawl out all the way to the Sunnyside Yards on one side and continental North America on the other, providing a freight and rail link between the archipelago of islands which form this City-State of ours. Triborough’s approaches and ramps are almost too numerous for me to count.
from wikipedia
The Robert F. Kennedy Bridge, better known as the Triborough or Triboro Bridge, is a complex of three separate bridges in New York City, United States. Spanning the Harlem River, the Bronx Kill, and the Hell Gate (part of the East River), the bridges connect the boroughs of Manhattan, Queens, and The Bronx via Randall’s Island and Ward’s Island, which are joined by landfill.
Often historically referred to as simply the Triboro, the spans were officially named after Robert F. Kennedy in 2008.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As the boat motored past Ward’s Island, where the Canadian theatrical provocateur’s called Cirque du Soleil had set up a circus tent, the Amtrak Acela rumbled over the Hellgate tracks. The last part of this trip that I can claim intimacy with until we returned to the Hudson, the Circle Line continued Northward.
Venturing into the “not part of my beat” areas of the City of Greater New York which your humble narrator is least familiar with- specifically the northeast sections of Manhattan and La Bronx, I actually got see a few things I didn’t even suspect…
from wikipedia
Acela Express (often simply Acela) is Amtrak’s high-speed rail service along the Northeast Corridor (NEC) in the Northeast United States between Washington, D.C., and Boston via Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York. It uses tilting technology which allows the train to travel at higher speeds on the sharply curved NEC without disturbing passengers, by lowering lateral centrifugal forces, based on the concept of banked turns.
Acela Express trains are the only true high-speed trainsets in the United States; the highest speed they attain is 150 mph (240 km/h), though they average less than half of that. Acela has become popular with business travelers and by some reckoning has captured over half of the market share of air or train travelers between Washington and New York. Between New York and Boston the Acela Express has up to a 37% share of the train and air market.
Searching for Gilman
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For several months I have been searching Calvary Cemetery in a non systematic manner for 2 particular locations. Thwarted time and again by false leads and incorrect addressing, both sites have remained elusive. One grave is the final resting place of Tess Gardella– the actress who portrayed Aunt Jemima- and the other is that of an enigma from the early 20th century whose name was Gilman.
from wikipedia
Aunt Jemima is a trademark for pancake flour, syrup, and other breakfast foods currently owned by the Quaker Oats Company. The trademark dates to 1893, although Aunt Jemima pancake mix debuted in 1889. The Quaker Oats Company first registered the Aunt Jemima trademark in April, 1937.
The name “Jemima” is biblical in origin. Jemima is the King James Version’s rendering of the feminine Hebrew name יְמִימָה (Yəmīmā), the first of Job’s daughters born to him at the end of his namesake book of the Bible.
The term “Aunt Jemima” is sometimes used colloquially as a female version of the derogatory label “Uncle Tom”. In this context, the slang term “Aunt Jemima” falls within the “Mammy archetype”, and refers to a friendly black woman who is perceived as obsequiously servile or acting in, or protective of, the interests of whites. The 1950s television show Beulah came under fire for depicting a “mammy”-like black maid and cook who was somewhat reminiscent of Aunt Jemima. Today, the terms “Beulah” and “Aunt Jemima” are regarded as more or less interchangeable as terms of disparagement in popular discourse.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Somewhere in the viridian depths of Calvary Cemetery lies an unremarked merchant from Massachusetts, who died in an accident along the delirious Newtown Creek in 1931. No obituary I can find discusses him, and Gilman slid unnoticed into the hallowed loam of Calvary’s charitable sections. His anonymity came to an end when, according to neighborhood sources and contemporary diarists, a relict 3 masted schooner arrived at the Penny Bridge docks and ordered an eccentric monument be erected on Gilman’s resting place. The captain of that black ship, a leathery bastard named Marsh, collected Gilman’s belongings and sailed via Newtown Creek to the East River, turning North toward Hell Gate- ultimately disappearing into the mists of Long Island Sound heading for New England.
from noaa.gov
Click here for : Hell Gate and Its Approaches
This nautical chart depicts Hell Gate, a narrow channel on the East River, at the confluence of the Harlem River, which connects Long Island Sound with New York Harbor. The chart shows Hell Gate in 1851, which is the year that the U.S. Army began blasting ledges and rocks within Hell Gate to ensure safe passage through the channel.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Rumors that this man was the same Gilman mentioned by members of the Boston Police Department in 1920, in connection with investigations into a string of sensational murders and for connections to a certain group of anarchists thought to be operating within the city. The Back Bay area of Boston, of course, is associated with the illustrious architect Arthur Delevan Gilman– but there doesn’t seem to be any involvement with Calvary’s mysterious Gilman other than a tangential coincidence of names.
from wikipedia
The Back Bay neighborhood was created when a parcel of land was created by filling the tidewater flats of the Charles River. This massive project was begun in 1857. The fill to reclaim the bay from the water was obtained from Needham, Massachusetts. The firm of Goss and Munson, railroad contractors, built 6 miles (9.7 km) of railroad from Needham, and their 35-car trains made 16 trips a day to the Back Bay. The filling of present-day Back Bay was completed by 1882; filling reached the existing mainland at Kenmore Square in 1890, and finished in the Fens in 1900. The project was the largest of a number of land reclamation projects, beginning in 1820, which, over the course of time, more than doubled the size of the original Boston peninsula. It is frequently observed that this would have been impossible under modern environmental laws.
Back Bay’s development was planned by architect Arthur Gilman with Gridley James Fox Bryant. Strict regulations produced a uniform and well-integrated architecture, consisting mostly of dignified three- and four-story residential (or once-residential) brownstones.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Both saint and sinner alike can be found in the emerald devastations of First Calvary- governors, mayors, and priests share in the loam with common laborer and notorious gangster. There are multitudes here, vast tomb legions awaiting only the advent of their messiah to rise and walk the earth. Gilman is amongst the many, lost in the crowd. I will find him, and the notable monument raised in his honor- it is just a matter of time.
from wikipedia
While the Christian doctrine of resurrection conforms to Jewish belief, there is, however, a minority point of view, held by certain Jewish mystics and others,[who?] which asserts that those Jewish beliefs are in contradiction with the resurrection as taught by Isaiah (Isaiah 8:16 and 26:19) and Daniel (12:1 and 13) in which the resurrection was understood as being a doctrine of physical ‘Rebirth’.
Jesus appears to have been in general agreement with the position held by the Pharisees, as illustrated by his response to a question regarding marriage at the resurrection (Matthew 22:23-32, Mark 12:18-27 and Luke 20:27-40).
Most Christian churches continue to uphold the belief that there will be a general resurrection of the dead at “the end of time”, as described Paul when he said, “…he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world…” (Acts 17:31 KJV) and “…there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust.” (Acts 24:15 KJV).
Many of the early Church Fathers cited the Old Testament examples listed in the Judaism section above as either foreshadowing Jesus’s resurrection, or foreshadowing or prophesying a future resurrection of all the dead.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Gilman, I have no first name or exact date of interment- which intensifies the difficulty in locating him- was supposedly a dealer in far eastern art. What his purpose was in coming to the Newtown Pentacle remains shadowed. Veiled references to the illegal importation of statuettes from the south Pacific, and distribution of these items to radical theosophists and heretic Masons in the Greenpoint and Maspeth neighborhoods can be gleaned from antiquarian sources but nothing definite enough for the consideration of the Lords and Ladies of Newtown has emerged. The statuettes it is said, are the product of the lost Saudeleur culture from Nan Madol found on fabled Pohnpei, and an item of particular interest to certain occultists.
from wikipedia
Nan Madol was the ceremonial and political seat of the Saudeleur dynasty, which united Pohnpei’s estimated 25,000 people. Set apart on the main island of Pohnpei, it was a scene of human activity as early as the first or second century AD. By the 8th or 9th century islet construction had started, but the distinctive megalithic architecture was probably not begun until perhaps the 12th or early 13th century.
Little can be verified about the megalithic construction. Pohnpeian tradition claims that the builders of the Lelu complex on Kosrae (likewise composed of huge stone buildings) migrated to Pohnpei, where they used their skills and experience to build the even more impressive Nan Madol complex. However, this is unlikely because radiocarbon dates have placed the construction of Nan Madol prior to that of Lelu. Like Lelu, one major purpose of constructing a separate city was to insulate the nobility from the common people.
A local story holds that when Nan Madol was being built a powerful magician living in the well inhabited region on the northwest of the island was solicited, and that his help was a major factor in completing the buildings. In particular, he was responsible for supplying the huge stone “logs” used in much of Nan Madol by “flying” them from their source to the construction site.
…Supposedly there was an escape tunnel beginning at the center of Nan Madol and boring down through the reef to exit into the ocean. Scuba divers continue to look for this “secret” route, but so far a complete tunnel has yet to be discovered.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Gilman is meant to have been killed in a curious accident on the Queens bank of Newtown Creek in Blissville, when a bail of paper fell from a second story warehouse window along the negligent shoreline of the Newtown Creek. Crushed, the peculiar condition of his body was remarked on by several hardened Detectives used to such sights. Speculations that he had been previously deformed by Polio or some other childhood disease were made, but before our era of “antigenic vaccination as public policy” was enacted, monstrous alterations of the human form by disease organisms were a common sight. Disfigurements caused by Smallpox and Leprosy or the ravages of Tertiary Syphilis are seldom observed by we happy few that enjoy the luxury of western modernity.
from wikipedia
Tertiary syphilis usually occurs 1–10 years after the initial infection, however in some cases it can take up to 50 years. This stage is characterized by the formation of gummas, which are soft, tumor-like balls of inflammation known as granulomas. The granulomas are chronic and represent an inability of the immune system to completely clear the organism. They may appear almost anywhere in the body including in the skeleton. The gummas produce a chronic inflammatory state in the body with mass effects upon the local anatomy. Other characteristics of untreated tertiary syphilis include neuropathic joint disease, which is a degeneration of joint surfaces resulting from loss of sensation and fine position sense (proprioception). The more severe manifestations include neurosyphilis and cardiovascular syphilis. In a study of untreated syphilis, 10% of patients developed cardiovascular syphilis, 16% had gumma formation and 7% had neurosyphilis.
Neurological complications at this stage can be diverse. In some patients manifestations include generalized paresis of the insane, which results in personality changes, changes in emotional affect, hyperactive reflexes and Argyll-Robertson pupil. This is a diagnostic sign in which the small and irregular pupils constrict in response to focusing the eyes, but not to light. Tabes dorsalis, also known as locomotor ataxia, a disorder of the spinal cord, often results in a characteristic shuffling gait.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Somewhere, amongst those who eternal lie, is Gilman. The disturbing detail that troubled the Detectives who investigated the reports of his death, the one that made for saloon conversation and idle speculation by neighborhood wags, was the fact that this deceased dealer in illicit eastern art had six fingers on both hands and that these polydactyl appendages were webbed all the way to the nail beds. Not much could be said about Gilman’s face, for the rodent population of Newtown Creek had discovered him long before the Police did.
Additionally, his shorter than normal legs also bore long healed scars that suggested some intense surgical experience- participation in the Civil War was speculated on by area Police, when Gilman would have been a young man. Amongst his few possessions was a watercolor postcard of some southern Plantation labeled as “Carfax Plantation, James River, Virginia”, which was quite out of place in the pockets of a Massachusetts trader who died alone during the middle of the night along Newtown Creek. Further speculations held out the possibility that Gilman hailed from a degenerate or illegitimate offshoot of the famed Gilman family of Exeter, New Hampshire.
Where and who is he? Where is Gilman?
from wikipedia
Winthrop Sargent Gilman (1808-1884) was head of the banking house of Gilman, Son & Co. in New York City. He was born in Marietta, Ohio to merchant Benjamin Ives Gilman and Hannah (Robbins) Gilman. Benjamin Ives Gilman, born in 1766, was a native of Exeter, New Hampshire, where his ancestors were among the most prominent early settlers and where he graduated in the first class of the Phillips Exeter Academy.
In 1837 Winthrop Sargent Gilman let the abolitionist Elijah Parish Lovejoy hide his printing press in one of Gilman’s warehouses in Alton, Illinois. In the ensuing riot the angry mob burned Gilman’s warehouse to the ground and killed Lovejoy. Following the Alton riots, Gilman moved to New York City and entered the family banking business.
He was married to Abia Swift Lippincott Gilman, who in 1900 narrowly escaped burning to death from a gasoline torch in front of the Charles Scribner mansion at 12 East Thirty-eighth Street.
Winthrop Gilman had an abiding interest in science and built a private observatory at his home ‘Fern Lodge’ at the Palisades, New York, where he frequently observed meteors.
Happy Earth Day
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My heart is calloused, blackened from a lifetime of disappointment and broken promises, one of which is the so called “Earth Day”. Like many of the utopian ideologies which emerged into the body politic during the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, the disestablishmentarian ethos of “saving the earth” have become corporatized, profitable, and serve as convenient talking points for a political and business class which still dumps battery acid and raw sewage into rivers. They’re working on it, they say.
from wikipedia
On April 22 1970, Earth Day marked the beginning of the modern environmental movement. Approximately 20 million Americans participated. Thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against the deterioration of the environment. Groups that had been fighting against oil spills, polluting factories and power plants, raw sewage, toxic dumps, pesticides, Freeway and expressway revolts, the loss of wilderness, and the extinction of wildlife suddenly realized they shared common values.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Feel good programs like municipal recycling and so called organic farming fall apart when you visit Newtown Creek, where reality is impossible to ignore, and is a location that the conversations of former hippies seldom mention. It is psychologically easier to attend a rally in the Shining City of Manhattan’s Central Park, or some concert and street fair plastered with corporate logos which present a vision of zero sacrifice coupled with affluent plenty. The hard realities of pollution, endemic and omnipresent, don’t sound good at cocktail parties.
from earthday.net
Forty years after the first Earth Day, the world is in greater peril than ever. While climate change is the greatest challenge of our time, it also presents the greatest opportunity – an unprecedented opportunity to build a healthy, prosperous, clean energy economy now and for the future.
Earth Day 2010 can be a turning point to advance climate policy, energy efficiency, renewable energy and green jobs. Earth Day Network is galvanizing millions who make personal commitments to sustainability. Earth Day 2010 is a pivotal opportunity for individuals, corporations and governments to join together and create a global green economy. Join the more than one billion people in 190 countries that are taking action for Earth Day.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The “Establishment” won the war, you see, and oddly enough the great hero of the environmental movement is the last person you’d ever think it is. It’s not Edmund Muskie, Gaylord Nelson, or Ralph Nader who should be celebrated on Earth Day- instead it should be the man who oversaw and implemented the widest and most powerful set of environmental regulations ever implemented in the United States.
The creations of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Water Pollution Control Act amendments of 1972, and the omnibus National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) were accomplished, funded, and implemented by the very face of the hated “Establishment”- Richard M. Nixon.
from earthdayny.org
Recognizing the importance of reaching youth and engaging them to be effective advocates for their future, we have decided to return to one of the original strategies of Earth Day 1970 – the environmental teach-in.
We are working together with the New York City Department of Education, the United Federation of Teachers Green Schools Committee and the Green Schools Alliance to create a dynamic and powerful Earth Week for New York City’s next generation of young environmental leaders and innovators.
In order to assist in making the 40th Anniversary of Earth Day special and memorable, we have developed and/or gathered a variety of resources for your use including an environmental speaker’s bureau, films and videos and lesson plans and activities. Many of these resources will also be appropriate for higher education, corporate or non-profit organizations.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Don’t get me wrong, things have improved somewhat since 1970- however, 40 years later- the Newtown Creek still pulses with unknown compounds and raw sewage, Big Allis still pumps millions of pounds of carbon into the atmosphere, and the toxic leftovers of the industrial revolution still gurgle through rusting and deeply buried pipelines just below the surface.
Just forget about that though, as you sort your trash and worry about impossible and poorly understood issues like climate change. Don’t mention anything that might disrupt the party line, as the hippies are now elderly and we wouldn’t want to upset them as they drink their fine wines and satisfy their “sense of themselves”. Don’t remind them that they elected Reagan.
Environmentalism is a marketing strategy now, so just enjoy those free trade, sustainable, and organic products you all love- secure in the knowledge that corporate america always has your best interests in mind and is focused on long term solutions.
from nytimes.com
So strong was the antibusiness sentiment for the first Earth Day in 1970 that organizers took no money from corporations and held teach-ins “to challenge corporate and government leaders.”
Forty years later, the day has turned into a premier marketing platform for selling a variety of goods and services, like office products, Greek yogurt and eco-dentistry.
The Newtown Pentacle 