Honolulu 1954

As we left Fanny Holt Ames she was on the President Monroe steaming towards Honolulu while nursing her friend Agnes who had broken her arm. They arrived in Honolulu at 8:30, and after the traditional Hawaiian dancers and leis made of orchids, plumeria, and carnations, they headed to the St. Francis Hospital. Today the St. Francis is a small 52 bed hospital whose modern looking building couldn't have been the one Fanny visited. Its claim to fame is that it is the facility where former Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos died in 1989. After a comedy of errors arranging care that had her in "hysterics" despite the seriousness of Agnes condition, Fanny finally left the hospital and had a midnight supper of Martinis, 3" tenderloin, "real Hawaiian pineapples," and champagne before getting back to the ship at 1:30.

On the 29th Fanny was busy with trip issues-Agnes would have to abandon the tour and Fanny was making flight arrangements-, but managed to get to the Fisherman's Wharf restaurant for a lunch of Hawaiian fish and coconut milk ice cream. Fisherman's Wharf remained in business into the 21st century, but closed recently. Details taken care of she went to Waikiki Beach "for old times sake, but how it has changed." This hint of past trips was not explained. Fanny was back on board the ship and dead tired by 3:30. After a half hour concert by the Royal Hawaiian Band and singers featuring pleasing native specialties the ship sailed at 4. She would spend the next week and a half at sea on the way to Japan. We'll check in on shipboard life in the next few days.

The going is slow this morning as I'm watching the run-up to the royal wedding before running out to school. A beautiful scene just as it was in 1978, but oh, how the world has changed.

Am I the last person to discover Hayashi, the Japanese/Korean restaurant in the strip just north of the intersection of 106 and 123. I had been patronizing the spot since it was a Thai restaurant, but had more or less given up on sushi. Just last month ECAT was supposed to do a restaurant shoot at El Mariachi when our signals got crossed up. My camera crew made arrangements to go to Hayasi and came back raving about the food. I've been in three times since and am also impressed. The first thing you need to know, if you have a fear of raw fish, is that you can get an elegant, tasty, and healthy meal without ever seeing a piece of sushi or sashimi. Yesterday I had the $10.95 lunch box of Bul-go-ki. Bu-go-ki is a version of the Korean marinaded beef dish. The meal includes miso soup, salad, rice, a Japanese dumpling, a piece of shumai, and three pieces of california roll (made with cooked imitation crab). The miso soup was worth the price of the meal. Too often miso soup is just a bowl of oversalted broth, but at Hayashi the soup includes small pieces of scallion, tofu and seaweed and the broth is complex with the overwhelming sensation of umami the savory fifth taste. The bul-go-ki is another star of the meal. Milder than the versions I've had in Korean restaurants, the thin slices of beef are meltingly tender with a rich brown sauce with a hint of sweetness. The dumpling, gyoza in Japanese, was like a small Peking ravoli while the shumai is a tiny noodle cup with a tasty shrimp paste cooked inside. Another dish I would recommend is the Spicy Dumpling Soup at $9.95, a large bowl with half a dozen dumplings in a spicy broth with egg drop and veggies. Noodle dishes are on the menu as well and the Shrimp Yaki Udon I had the other day was an excellent mix of thick udon noodles, five medium shrimp and vegetables. On one visit I tried a special side order of torched salmon-a sashimi set up where the fish is lightly seared on the outside and on a second visit I tried the spicy salmon maki. The maki is a six piece serving with larger chunks of fish than I have seen in many sushi establishments. Like the Bul-go-ki, however, the spiciness was muted, and unlike the meat dish this didn't work quite as well. The salmon in the maki was rich, but both the seared and raw salmon was a little bland-next time I'm going to try yellowtail. It has a little stronger flavor, and it is a relatively sustainable fishery according to the Sierra Club. The restaurant has a beer and wine license and serves a variety of saki as well. One drawback to Hayashi is its tiny size. It's restaurant seats under thirty with an additional half dozen seats at the sushi bar. If you are looking to be buried under a pile of food, then a Chinese restaurant is still your best choice. On the other hand, if you are looking for high quality ingredients prepared elegantly and are looking for an alternative to Loco at a lower cost, you can't go wrong at Hayashi.

I'm a devotee of the Eat This, Not That books by David Zinczenko and Matt Golding. These are the books that tell you what the healthy choices are at the chain restaurants across the country. Two of the latest in the series, available at Paperback Junction by the way, are The Eat This, Not That Diet (2011) and Cook This, Not That (2010). Both books have the busy, picture filled pages people have come to expect in the series-making them both fun books to dip into at random moments.  The cookbook gives you 350 calorie alternative recipes to some of people's favorite restaurant foods. Some recipes are seemingly no brainers like the recipe for a grilled chicken sandwich with chimichurri sauce. The recipe is a no brainer, but learning that it costs $1.81 a serving compared to a similar sandwich at Panera's at $7.09 is worth the price of admission. Learning that I'd save 680 calories and almost 2,000 mg. of sodium is a big bonus, and being diabetic learning that most of the savings in calories come from empty carbos helps make this my new favorite cookbook (despite my army of Cook's magazine books). Add bonus tips such as if you don't want to cook use store rotisserie chicken and a lesson on the technique of roasting peppers and you have a really valuable resource for healthy eating. The diet book is heavier on nutritional information and more of the famous comparisons of restaurant meals, but there are some great recipes as well. A recipe for a smoked salmon sandwich, another no brainer really, helps you save 250 calories over a salmon and cream cheese bagel from Dunkins. By the way, Dunkins comes in for praise in the book because it provides and clearly labels healthy breakfast fast foods (unlike the sugary doughnut, I just ate at a school fundraiser). And anyone who eats a Dunkin Doughnuts bagel instead of the low calorie and carbohydrate free (I'm taking both on faith like a belief in the Easter Bunny) at Back Bay Bagel deserves to get hyperglycemic and fat. Both books show us ways to eat healthier with little effort-why don't we do it?

Wildlife in the Greystone

This little bird is a Carolina Wren. You may not have seen this sparrow-sized bird, but you probably have heard its very loud "teakettle, teakettle, teakettle" call. Carolina wrens are poster children for global warming. These little guys don't migrate, don't come to bird feeers and are susceptible to cold weather yet they have been expanding their range north through New England for more than a century. Scouts reached Connecticut in 1878 and these wrens first nested there in 1895. Carolinas are almost exclusively insect eaters and thrive in low, brushy undergrowth (aka my backyard). I've had a nesting pair in my yard for several years. All the guides note massive die offs of Carolinas in severe winters. You may have noticed a little snow on the roof this past winter so I did not hold out much hope for my little residents until I heard the familar teakettle call a few days ago. Is this one lucky bird or despite the snow is the world warming up? Republicans will be telling you, now that the ink is dry on the President's birth certificate, that my yard is just particularly buggy and if you just pretend hard enough global warming will just go away. They may be right about the bugs in my yard-another Climategate may be in the works!

By the way, Mr. Trump the constitution says "natural born citizen." That thing on your head seems to point to "unnatural" origins in my book.

What do Carolina wrens have to do with Greystone Way As we saw the other day,  trees and bushes have grown in around this subdivision since its start in the 1980s. Carolina wrens are the kind of birds who probably have benefited from this process. Backyard shrubbery is a boon for them, and they are not shy around people and our stuff. Carolina wrens have also developed strategies to survive on the edge-the line between forest and field. The problem of edges is the biggest problem for suburban subdivisions. An edge is any place a piece of forest touches an open space-a road, a trail with open canopy, a backyard. Theoretically, one acre lots create lots of edges. Take a look again at Greystone Way.

Compare 1855.

Not so different actually, but the laws of geometry suggest that one big open space has fewer edges than a convoluted squiggly shape (Rhode Island has a gigantic coast line for instance). For a Carolina Wren, the area surrounded by Greystone Way, Allen and Bay Roads would like paradise-like all wrens they have delusions of grandeur, and each pair defends a territory of about 10 acres from other wrens. What about other animals however? And would a smart growth development do any better?

We could look at raccoons, but they are they are the typical suburban predator easily adapted to living close to humans and actually enjoying the patches of woods and open space typical of subdivisions. Let's look instead at the fisher, Massachusetts largest member of the weasel family.

You may remember that during the height of the "big cat" scare back in 1996 or 1997, a fisher got into the nearly completed Olmted/Richardson school and couldn't find its way out. Being one big weasel with a nasty disposition, it then proceeded to tear through walls to make its escape. Back then no one had heard about fishers, but just as Carolina Wrens were moving up from the south Fishers were moving down from the north following the increasing acres of forest. Fishers, it was thought, require extensive acres of forest with relatively mature trees and continuous canopy. Think of canopy as the edge of the third dimension-if it is continuous arboreal animals like fishers can travel extensively from tree to tree.

This all fit in nicely with initial observations-fishers were first known to den at Wheaton Farm, our largest conservation area, but we should have known something was up when that fisher decided to go to school. Today, fishers have been reported in backyards off Spooner Street, one of the more densely populated areas in town, and at Sheep Pasture where they killed two ducks in 2010.  Unlike raccoons, fishers also have a large hunting territory ranging up to 7 square miles. Since fishers are known to den in conservation areas around Greystone Way, its highly likely this subdivision is part of the hunting ground of one or more fishers. Looking again at the map, one can see that any ambitious fisher who wants to go to school can cross Greystone Way without a foot touching the ground except to cross streets. Once across Bay Road, it's through the Town Forest and Kippy Grant Conservation area all the way to the school complex. However, for fishers roads are a real problem and the "typical" subdivision (outside Easton?) is full of roads. Even in northern Maine getting hit by a car was the third leading cause of death for radio collared fishers in a study, and I've seen at least one fisher as road kill in Easton. Still, I think we can conclude that for a town with a population density approaching 1,000 per square mile the mix of conservation land and "suburban sprawl" has proven attractive to fishers, once a symbol of the New England wilderness.

Very soon, I'd like to take a look at a cluster development and compare it to Greystone Way and also analyze the proposed 40R development along the Queset to see if "smart growth" offers the same wildlife benefits as developments of the past generation. To be fair, we'll also need to look at a large scale map of Easton to examine the overall pattern of development.

Tomorrow, however, some lighter fare including a restaurant and cookbook review.

Late Post

I know that about 95% of my readers visit the Curiosity Shop using a PC computer and that many of you choose a PC because when something goes wrong you get to meet wonderful people from all over the world like Bob from Bangladesh before you have to pack the machine up and send it back to the manufacturer who changes the tape on the box and mails it back to you. Let me tell you my experience today.

After three years of hard use, my Macbook began to act strangely over the weekend, and today it froze just as I was about to publish the blog. A shut down and reboot brought a clicking sound from the hard drive and a folder with a question mark on the screen. It looked like my hard drive had died, and I might have lost everything I hadn't backed up (honest, I really do back up occasionally). Feeling a dead hard drive would be too costly to repair, I used a school computer to design a brand new $2,000 computer before taking myself and the deceased machine to the Mac Store in Braintree. Entering the store I learned that I had to make an appointment to have someone look at my computer. Appointment is mac speak for having a guaranteed place in line to get help-the employee (in official mac speak they're called "geniuses")  told me he was entering a description of me in the system (black briefcase, sox hat, sad look?) so they could come and find me when it was my turn. After fifteen minutes of checking out all the gadgets in the store, Matthew called me over. We quickly determined that the hard drive was not completely dead, but I'd definitely need a new one. There was also hope that he could get the data off the decrepit drive and onto the new one. Unfortunately, my three year warranty had just run out in March! Not to worry, Apple has a "close enough" policy that would give me a completely new hard drive free, and, oh, how about a new top to the case because see, there's that little nick there in the corner-and oh, we'll throw in a complete cleaning inside and out. All free! How long was this miracle going to take-I figured at least a week. Nope, "we'll give you a call and you can pick it up this evening," Matthew said. Clearly, the man really was a genius. It's 8:15 and everything is fine again, my applications work, my data is back, the new top to the case has a sandpapery feel that keep my hands from slipping, and I can see the screen clearly again after three years of sneezing at it. Long live Steve Jobs! Kind of missed talking to Bob, however. I hear his mom's recipe for Mulligatawny Soup is sensational.

Back to Greystone Way in the next post.

Greystone Way

 Don't forget to vote today! Free candy for voters in Precinct 6 while it lasts.

For two hundred years homes in Easton were built close to roads unless you were a hermit or had something to hide. More exactly for many years if you built a house, a road would come as you and your cows walked back and forth to get some place else. Initially, outside North Easton, Furnace Village, and Eastondale homes were few and far apart since most folks were farmers and early farms were self-sufficient meaning they were large with acres for pastures, crops, and wood. Later in the 18th and throughout the 19th century, farm were subdivided among family members. These later farms could be smaller as they became more specialized with a market economy supplying more of the needs once derived at home. Still, into the first three decades of the 20th century new homes were built close to existing streets except in North Easton where small lots developed on new shorter streets.

This began to change right before World War II with the first modern subdivisions being approved off Central Street. The development of Hollis and Tyson Roads stopped during the war so the true age of subdivisions begins in the 1950s. Originally lots were small, but sometime in the 1970s or early 1980s lot sizes were increased to an acre-I was there for that town meeting, but don't expect me to remember my own life!  This set Easton up to become a typical sprawling suburb except that at the same time a conservation ethos was developing in town fostered by people like John Grant and, in his role as chair of the Planning Board, Fred Clark. Subsequently, there have been several change to zoning laws that have purported to be pro-conservation. It remains to be seen whether, ultimately, these turn out to be pro-developer. Now the smart growthers would tell you that suburbs are environmentally bad first due to their dependence on cars and second because single family homes burn up open space. How accurate is their analysis? Hard to argue that cars and suburbs go together just don't forget that the market seems to be fostering increased efficiency in cars if not in the roads needed to support them-are potholes a liberal plot to get us to use mass transit?

Let's take Greystone Way as a typical subdivision. It's located right across Allen Road from Borderland State Park and runs through to Bay Road. Take a look at the contrast in this Google Map picture.

Park on the left, housing development on the right. Typical of modern subdivisions Greystone Way is a road run through an old farm, the Thomas Shepherd place,  in order to add homes in old fields. This map shows the property in 1855.

The scrumbly lines show trees. Things didn't change very much for over 100 years as you can see in this 1971 aerial photo from historicaerials.com.

Note the Shepherd house and farm buildings and the open fields. Greystone Way came along in the mid-1980s and the old farm turned into a suburban wasteland right? Not quite. Here's a contemporary aerial from Google.

Yup, there are actually more trees in the Greystone Way area than there were in 1855. Stepping up a little further you can actually see even more greenery. Now trees alone might not necessarily be a measure of environmental health and open fields are actually an endangered habitat in Massachusetts, but clearly this area is not an environmental waste land.

Of course before we draw conclusions about 1980s subdivisions and their impact on the environment we should look at every single one, something that is outside the scope of this blog; but the other thing we can do is take a closer look at Greystone Way and its impact on the land-something we'll undertake tomorrow.

Comments on an Op-Ed piece

Paul McMorrow, writing in the Globe the other day had this provocative opening "after several decades as the country's dominant land-use pattern, the sprawling suburbs are entering their swan song." The rest of the op-ed piece goes on to decry the federal budget cuts to rail transport. Putting aside the issue of whether you can actually "enter" a song, the editorial is an interesting promotion of "smart growth" full of quotes like "it's no accident that large-scale development flocks to transit corridors, and that housing prices fall as commuting times rise." Just what smart growthers think we need: "large scale development" and higher housing prices although, of course, they and their developer friends will force communities to build 40B housing so they can pretend to help the disadvantaged while lining their own pockets.

Mr. McMorrow points out there is a right wing conspiracy to kill mass transit because conservatives see it as an attempt to collectivize the American Spirit.  The right clearly sees that saving the automobile while cutting billions from passenger trains will play very well with the NASCAR crowd. Those are the folks who will have to have their steering wheels pried from their cold dead hands even if gas goes to $8 a gallon. More recently, however,  smart growthers have seen a challenge coming from academia in the form of something called "landscape urbanism"which traces its origins back to Frederick Law Olmsted. Seeing a threat to their access to the public treasury, smart growthers have reacted to landscape urbanism with name calling and derision-just what you might expect from an intellectually bankrupt entrenched bureaucracy. As usual what we need is some combination of the insights of both sides and less of the dogmatic idealogy.

One of the key insights of landscape urbanism is that suburbs aren't "sprawl," but a natural outgrowth of the failure of cities in the 20th century. Suburbs can be good or bad based on how they are planned or where they are located. Even Mr. McMorrow notes that suburbs in "denser, more transit heavy real estate markets like greater Boston have weathered the housing bust much better than far-flung subdivisions in Arizona and California." There is clearly a difference between suburbs located near old, dense, and well established cities and ones built around cities that themselves were low density and "sprawly."

What we need to assess in Easton is how well our planning process has steered development and what alternatives we have beyond the "large scale development" that Mr. McMorrow says will follow the arrival of the T. McMorrow believes that $4 a gallon gas will have us all lining up to ride the train conveniently ignoring the transition that is already underway to high efficiency hybrid cars. I recognize the need for a public transportation option, but trains are great for hauling freight not people unless the population density is high (and even there it needs a subsidy). A flexible and forward looking bus system that might even link current commuter rail stops is the way to go. Put me down with Bubba-I like my car and love my truck. Now if I had just kept that moped from the '70s!

Along with the usual who-knows-what, tomorrow we'll be taking a look at Greystone Way-"Suburban Paradise or Smart Growth Hell." Later in the week we'll take a look at the Queset Commercial District Study a smart growth idea that might just benefit the town. Lighter fare might include a piece on Carolina Wrens-the happy side of global warming, the ground breaking of my fabulous radish crop, and the nine lives of Zahi Hawass, my favorite Egyptologist.

Happy Easter

Lot's to talk about today. For those who have asked about the NRT recipe project-remember you can send recipes to edh1620@gmail-as far as I know we're deficient in recipes in every category. I'll be blogging on local cookbooks soon. We've talked a little about the really old ones, but even main dishes from the '60s and '70s seem dated today in an age when everyone in the family down to the 12 year-old mowing lawns has a job. On the other hand cookie, cake, and pie recipes are still very popular. Party appetizers are always big in case you want to go back to bringing a cheese ball with the inevitable bottle of wine,

By the way, you can help spread the word that this blog exists by telling people they can find it at eastoncuriosityshop.blogspot.com. I've got to remember that address as I not so subtly drop conversational hints about my blogifying.

We haven' talked about our Union soldiers this week because I have been waiting to delve into the New York Times Complete Civil War 1861-65, This coffee table book has about 600 top articles in the print version and on a DVD 104,960 Times articles related to Slavery, Secession, the War, and Reconstruction from 1853 to 1876. The search feature to the DVD is pretty pathetic, but it works well enough to let us follow the Easton boys in the Fourth Regiment when they arrived in New York. Unfortunately, contrary to what we've been told about the effects of the Internet, New Yorkers in 1861 also had the attention span of a gnat. There was extended coverage of the arrival of the 6th Massachusetts including where they drank their morning coffee, but when the 4th showed up troop arrivals from upstate New York were already seizing the headlines and apparently most of our boys did not come ashore. You can learn that there were 500 members of the 4th on the steamer when it pulled into New York, but no mention of anyone being poisoned by whiskey. The boys stay in the city was a short one. They arrived on the 18th and left for Fortress Monroe, still on the steamer State of Maine, at 4 am on the 19th. Fortress Monroe is located in Hampton, Virginia at Old Point Comfort. It guarded the channel between Chesapeake Bay and Hampton Roads with a six-sided stone fort surrounded by a moat. Since it was actually in the state of Virginia, the boys on board the State of Maine had some reason to fear that the old fort had been taken over by the rebels. They were happy to find the Stars and Stripes flying when they arrived at sunrise on the 20th. The regiment would stay at Fortress Monroe for a month ultimately under the command of Massachusetts' own Benjamin Butler, the future grandpa of Blanche Ames. In order to learn more about first tour of duty for the 4th we'll have to go beyond the pages of Chaffin.

As noted yesterday, Fanny Holt Ames left San Francisco on the 23rd. While in the city she spent her time visiting friends. One was ill at St. Luke's Hospital. St. Luke's seems a little down on its luck today and seems to have been past its prime even in 1954. After visiting her friend at the hospital she ordered flowers from Podesta-Baldocchi, a florist shop that first opened it's doors in 1871. Today, based on the reviews I read, it is considered to be the finest florist in the city. Fanny and her friends had lunch at the Presidio Golf Course which also is still in business today. Fanny probably wouldn't eat their, however, since it now has a reputation for poor service. Despite being overpriced and not always in great condition, the course seems to survive as one of only a very few within city limits. It does have a good view of San Francisco Bay so that may have been the attraction for Fanny.

One day Fanny left the city and visited the "southern peninsula." She and her friends drove beyond Palo Alto to visit Allied Arts in Menlo Park. You can check out the beautiful gardens and buildings of this collection of shops and artists' studios at this website. The Rose Allee must have reminded Fanny of the Allee at Mrs. Parker's Unity Close. On another day, she visited the Cliff House, which I must say was the only landmark in San Francisco I knew beyond the Golden Gate Bridge when I started this project. The website features a spectacular slideshow of the place's history which has been open through many vicissitudes since 1863. Fanny's visit in 1954 came only four years after an extensive remodelling that is still in use today.

Back in the city two stand alone restaurants visited by Fanny have not fared as well. The first is El Prado named for a district in the city. Contrary to what you may think it did not serve Mexican food which apparently was not considered for high style dining in California in 1954. A menu from the '50s shows the restaurant was Italian with an eclectic bent to include some French and even a Chicken Bombay Style. Fanny enjoyed the food, but not the ambiance. This large and busy restaurant was too noisy for her. I could find no reference to the restaurant still being in business although memorabilia is on sale at ebay.

The other now defunct restaurant that attacted Fanny was the Paris Louvre, "The Home of Crepes Suzette." A menu from the 1950's features a column and a half of wine choices and a single column of main dishes. A half dozen flaming desserts were also offered. Beyond noting that there was an extensive list of  charbroiler items the rest of the menu is not legible in the ebay picture.

Fanny's ship was the American President Lines "President Monroe." It was 15 years old in 1954 and had seen service in World War II as a troop carrier. Ironically, she had been built at Newport News, Viriginia not far from Fortress Monroe. She was in naval service between 1943 and 1947 when she was refitted as a cruise ship. The President Monroe was sold to the Greek Shipping Line in 1965 and was scrapped in 1973.

The ship sailed at noon. Agnes Tuck of San Francisco had joined Fanny and her sister for the remainder of the trip. They lunched together and then went to their staterooms to unpack. The ship was apparently passing through rough waters because Fanny notes that it was rolling so badly she took a dramamine before going to cocktails at 6:20 followed by a "leisurely dinner." Unfortunately, Agnes never made it to dinner. On the way the roll of the ship "catapulted" her across a stair landing severely breaking her left arm near the shoulder. The remainder of the voyage would be spent nursing Agnes although Fanny's noted that while she and Louise missed the captain's cocktail party, he was kind enough to send down cocktails and hors d'oeuvres to Agnes cabin for "all three of us." It must have been a spectacular party for Agnes who was also being dosed with codeine!

Well, back to school and shorter posts tomorrow. One thing I'd like to begin looking at is the idea of so-called "smart growth." The proponents of this idea to end "suburban sprawl" are an arrogant bunch-else why would they call their proposal "smart" implying any alternatives are well, not so smart. Smart growth is one of the cornerstones of the MBTA bureaucracy's attempt to perpetuate itself so I think a closer look at it and any alternatives are warranted. Stay tuned, maybe us rubes in Easton aren't so dumb. Not that it makes any difference to the T.

A Variety Pack Today

Bits and pieces to talk about today.

I visited Beaver Brook Woods yesterday and discovered a hidden Easton gem. Beaver Brook Woods is owned by the NRT and is hidden off Poquanticut Avenue and abuts the town's Fox Mountain and Buck Field conservation areas. You'll actually have to search for its tiny three car parking lot, and I'm not going to help you! It's a unique property for many reasons-its full of beech trees mixed with white pine-a rare mix that is vulnerable to loss by fire. It has two little wooden bridges over the brook plus stream crossings on rocks. The second bridge offers a lovely woodsy view, and I bet if you stood quietly for a few minutes in the summer, bird life would surround you. The southern part of the property is an open forest while the north part has large rocks left over from the glaciers and more undergrowth. The most important thing is that it seems to have been informally adopted by the neighborhood. The trails are immaculate. In my two hour visit I found only a few branches down on the trails-this in a year when the woods are full of debris. Why? According to a neighbor who was walking his dogs, it's because the neighbors take care of the place rather than simply exploit it. They push the branches off the trail, pick up trash, and apparently pick up after their pets. Despite being sandwiched between two densely populated areas, it seems to be a park that works-a quiet respite in a busy life.

For folks looking for some intellectual stimulation today I suggest this interesting article on memes from Smithsonian.com. This is a fascinating article on the theory that ideas replicate themselves like genes. It's a good article on a controversial subject, and the comments posted after it are thought provoking as well.

Fanny Holt Ames left San Francisco today heading for Hawaii. It was not to prove a happy crossing. We'll talk about that and a few more things about old San Francisco tomorrow in an special Easter Edition of the Curiosity Shop.

I write this blog on a Macbook and once used Safari exclusively as my browser. I know that most folks who have PCs tend to use Internet Explorer. Despite being a fan of most things Google, I've never warmed to their browser Google Chome, but more and more these days I am turning to Firefox 4 to get on the Internet. Why? It's infinitely customizable with add ons that leave me just a click away from most places I want to go. It's indispensable for writing this blog. In fact, sometimes I don't even have to click-slide the cursor over the doppler radio icon and I can see it's going to rain today, slide one icon further and I find out the latest report from the National Weather Service in Taunton. If you use Windows, you might not know that you aren't chained to one browser. I still use Safari if I'm downloading research since its .webarchive collects all the web page in one file unlike Firefox's system that splits the page and the html into two packets (although I bet I could get it to stop doing that with a little research).

NRT CookBook and Home Garden News

Sorry for the late and short posting today. Hal Gershman, an NRT Board member, got the idea to produce a cookbook as a Sheep Pasture fundraiser. I didn't realize the recipe submission form had been posted on the NRT website. So far there have been very few submissions. I think part of the problem is that the form has to be downloaded, handwritten and then brought to the NRT or mailed. So 1950s. Anyway I spent most of my Maggie time this morning digging around for old recipes, no doubt getting a lung full of mold in my basement. Now, dear reader, I'm giving you a special opportunity to send recipes to me at edh1620@gmail.com and skip filling out this form with something as retro as a pen or pencil. For instance, if say, just randomly, you have a recipe for cranberry walnut relish you could type it in an e-mail and send it on.

Finally got my raised bed started yesterday. About the middle of June I should be swamped with lettuce, chard, broccoli rabe, tatsoi, and beet leaves. You may remember an earlier post about square foot gardening. Heading lettuce goes in 4 to the square foot, but leaf lettuce is spread thinly over the whole square foot and then harvested to thin out. Interestingly the chard and beet are treated the same way. The beets are planted only an inch apart and harvested very young for salads leaving some for cooking while the chard is 4 to a square. Thirty days to heirloom radishes!

Thunk, the sun must be on my picture window. The male robin whose lady is building a nest in my overgrown shrubbery is attacking his reflection in the window. This is day two and he seems to be contenting himself with pecking the window rather than flying at it full bore. I guess it beats the year he decided to attack the rear view mirror of my car for a week.

Boston's Top Restaurants

While we have been focusing on San Francisco 60 years ago, the 2011-12 Zagat survey listing Boston's top restaurants was released yesterday according to a report at CBS Boston. The story includes links to the winning restaurants. How many of the winner's have you eaten at?
O Ya
Oleana
La Campania
Neptune Oyster
Lumiere
Hamersley's Bistro
Uni Sashimi Bar
T. W. Food
Menton
Mistral

Legal Sea Foods, while it didn't make the "top restaurants list" was named the most popular in Boston. It's safe to say I haven't eaten at any of the top restaurants, but I have eaten often at the Legal's satellite in Braintree. Normally, I get a great meal, but the fried clams on my last visit were dreadful. The clams at Maguire's are clearly superior. Guess I'll stick to the excellent grilled fish at Legal.

CBS Boston is the website for WBZ radio and TV as well as Channel 38 and Sports Radio 98.5. The site has been revised recently and is now a good place to go for news updates. If you go to the home page and scroll down on the left you'll see the link to Jordan Rich, the late night weekend host on WBZ radio. There you can find audio of some of Jordan's recent interviews. Many, many years ago in Randolph, Jordan was a student in a class I team-taught with another teacher. Jordan was a star in our then topnotch drama program, but his two history teachers were most impressed by his dead-on impressions of us on the last day of school! Nice to see that didn't kill his chances in the business.

Bird Noses and Back to Frisco

Can you touch a baby bird that has fallen out of its nest? A complicated question that we will spend some time on closer to "falling out of the nest season," but for generations the received wisdom was that a human touch would leave a scent on the baby that would cause the parents to abandon it. 'Tain't so, songbirds sense of smell is not very good so they won't notice, as a chipmunk would, that you stink, dear reader. Scientists believed that birds spent a lot of evolutionary energy developing the senses of sight and balance which are essential for flying, leaving smell in the dust, but now an article from Discovery says otherwise. Scientists in Canada studied 157 bird and dino skulls for the size of the space where the olfactory bulb of the brain nestled in the skull and found that "the sense of smell actually improved during dinosaur-bird evolution." Birds apparently began to lose their sense of smell later, but some birds like turkey vultures still have great noses comparable to a little velociraptor called, wait for it, Bambiraptor. In the article there is a nice picture of a Bambiraptor standing over an opossum-take a look, it helps explain why possums aren't that afraid of cars! By the way, T. Rex had a great nose so the Jurassic Park scene where everyone stood really still so the T. Rex wouldn't eat them just wouldn't work in real life. The scientific record is silent on the other Jurassic Park T. Rex story-we still don't know if they actually preferred eating lawyers.

Fanny Holt Ames stayed in San Francisco until the 23rd. I failed to mention in my last posting that the hotel she stayed in, the Fairmont, was the place where Tony Bennett first sang "I Left My Heart in San Francisco." The song was actually written in 1954, the year of Fanny's tour,  for a singer called Claramae Turner, who never recorded it. Bennett debuted the song in December, 1961 in the Fairmont's Venetian Room.

As we have seen Fanny wasn't cooking on a hot plate in her room, so she visited a number of San Francisco landmarks to eat like the Top of the Mark at the Mark Hopkins Hotel. She also dined, on April 22, at the Palace Hotel. The original Palace Hotel, built in 1875, was said to have been the largest, most luxurious, and costly hotel in the world. Famed tenor Enrico Caruso was staying there when the great earthquake struck in 1906-he vowed never to return and kept his promise. The hotel building survived the shaking, but was lost in the subsequent fire. It was rebuilt and reopened in 1909 and remains open to this day with its famed Maxfield Parrish mural in the Pied Piper Bar. Like the Fairmont, several Presidents stayed there. President Harding checked in and then checked out permanently, dying in an 8th floor room. Crackpot conspiracy theories persist that the philandering President was poisoned by his wife; these rumors did not prevent President Clinton from staying at the Palace during his term. We don't know what Fanny ate at the Palace (she noted it was "delicious") or whether she had a highball in front of the Maxfield Parrish, but she could have ordered her salad with Green Goddess Salad Dressing. This was invented at the Palace in 1923 to honor a visit by actor George Arliss who was on a nationwide tour of the play "The Green Goddess." Arliss was a friend of Winthrop Ames and a frequent visitor to Queset House. One imagines that he performed on the little stage at Queset Garden during a family party. The salad dressing is a descendant of a fish sauce originally developed in France during the time of Louis XIII and was the #1 salad dressing on the West Coast until the invention of Ranch Dressing. Here's a recipe, allegedly from the Palace-it's an all-purpose dressing, but true to its heritage it is excellent in a seafood salad or as a sauce on poached fish.

Palace Hotel Green Goddess Dressing

10 anchovy fillets (minced or mashed presumably)
2 tsp. garlic oil

1/4 cup white onion

3 cups mayonnaise

2 Tbsp. fresh parsley, finely chopped

2 Tbsb. fresh tarragon, finely chopped

Coat a bowl with the garlic oil.
Mix the anchovies, onion, herbs, and mayonnaise in the bowl. Today the herbs are pulsed in a food processor with some of the mayo, making a greener final product.
If desired, thin slightly with tarragon vinegar

Like chowder there are a million variations including often the addition of a little fresh lemon juice.

Ruminations on an esoteric subject I'm not qualified to speak on!

Now that I'm on school break and no longer going into Sheep Pasture anymore, I decided to sleep in today and lo and behold 1/3rd of my audience  has already checked in and gone. Hope the two of them stop back later.

Fanny Holt Ames stayed in San Francisco for several days so we'll leave her tour and get back to her later in the week. I've found it amazing how much of her visit there could actually be recreated today. It's also amazing you can buy 60 year old restaurant menus on ebay.

An interesting article in the Globe Sunday about Edmund O. Wilson and group selection theory. Wilson you may remember is the entomologist who caused such a stir in the 1970's with the suggestion that there is a biological basis for human behavior and societies. In the 1980s he became an advocate for kin selection theory as a way of explaining altruistic behavior. This is a big deal to evolutionary biologists because if it's all about "survival of the fittest," the animal world should be completely full of competing individuals trying to pass on their genes alone. Think of the bar at the Stone Forge when the college crowd is in as an example. Yet examples of co-operation abound in nature-a squirrel gives off a warning cry when a predator approaches increasing the chance it might get eaten, but saving others. Kin selection suggests that since your brother shares about half your genes helping him pass along his genes is better than not passing on any of your genes at all. Since nearby squirrels are more closely related to each other than far away ones, it makes genetic sense that the squirrel should warn his kin.

Or so the theory goes. After three decades of supporting this idea, Wilson is now suggesting that the mathematical model the theory is based on doesn't work.

Stick with me here, folks, the inevitable Easton connection is coming!

Wilson has proposed a new theory that has come to be called group selection theory. He believes he has the math to show that any group of animals-take our squirrels for example- that accidentally develop a co-operative behavior will tend to have it reinforced because cooperative groups can often out compete individuals working non-cooperatively (ask any classroom teacher about that!). Kin selection only appears to be true because many groups are made up of related individuals, but Wilson claims to have evidence that genetically dissimilar animal groups also cooperate. This has all been met by hoots of derision from dozens of biologists who have come to accept kin selection as gospel and built their careers on it. We'll pass over those biologists as proof of Wilson's theory-banding together to protect themselves from a possible predator, and look at one implication of Wilson's theory-here comes the Easton part.

If natural selection blindly favors group cooperation, how might that work in human society? Do society's that promote cooperation have a better long term chance of survival? Can this be measured in any but the most facile way? Sociologists have created measures of social progress and have mathematical theories that predict things like societal violence and revolutions. Since Easton as a civic society seems to alternate between eras of cooperation and intense internal competition, can analysis show whether we fall behind in measures of social progress during periods of competition and surge ahead in times of cooperation? Sure would like to know since we seem to be moving away from an era of cooperation into an era of every squirrel for himself.

San Francisco 1954

Fanny Holt Ames was 68 when she went on her world tour with her sister Louise. On April 18, 1954 they disembarked from their cruise ship at about 9:15 a. m. and checked into the Fairmont Hotel. The Fairmont is a grand luxury hotel, and the first of the Fairmont Hotel chain that includes the Copley in Boston where OA has held its prom for many years. The Fairmont was built in beaux art style by Julia Morgan, then America's foremost female architect, for two sisters, Tessie and Virginia Fair. The Fair sister's daddy had struck it rich in California and they had married well-Ginny hooked a Vanderbilt-so the hotel project was more of a lark at the start, but it quickly became a symbol of the city's resilience.  The building was days away from opening when a little jiggler wiped out the city of San Francisco and severely damaged the hotel. Both rebuilt, and the hotel opened in 1907.

All the flags over the front door are to remind you that the United Nations Charter was signed here in 1945 just nine years before Fannie stayed there. Every President since Taft has stayed at the hotel. The Fairmont is a National Landmark. In 1999 the hotel spent $85 million to restore the hotel to its original splendor. You can see the results in a virtual tour.

It was Easter Sunday in 1954 so Fanny and her sister went with friends to the 10 o'clock mass at Old Saint Mary's catholic church. Old Saint Mary's is the official name even though this Saint Mary's is indeed old. Old Saint Mary's was built in gold rush times as California's first cathedral, but when the catholic population of the city and the bishop outgrew the building a New St. Mary's was built and Old St. Mary's became and remains a parish church. You can learn more here. 

As you can see Mrs. Ames didn't let the grass grow under her feet. Off the boat at 9:15, register at the Fairmont, mass at 10. The rest of the day was a whirl of meeting friends and a "long walk" through Chinatown. Lunch was held at the Fairmont's Camellia Room. I was unable to find a menu for 1954, but here's one from the following year:

Don't know if you can blow up the menu, but the Camellia Room Salad which was half an avocado stuffed with your choice of shrimp, chicken, or something illegible was $2.25. Fried Monterrey Abalone Steak, an entree, was apparently also in the same price range. Pistachio Layer Cake was 50¢. A Monte Carlo sandwich was 30¢ more than a Monte Christo sandwich-the Monte Carlo added ham to the French toast, turkey and cheese. Fanny also had cocktails and dinner at the Fairmont, probably again at the Camellia Room. After dinner Fanny was off to the Top of the Mark for a highball and the view-this bar at the top of the Mark Hopkins Hotel still has a spectacular view of the city.

Like the Fairmont, the Mark Hopkins is located on Nob Hill. It's built on the site of the mansion of Mark Hopkins which was destroyed down to its granite walls during the great quake. While Oakes and Oliver Ames were busy with the Union Pacific, Hopkins and friends were building east with the Central Pacific. I'm getting tired just writing this, but Fanny kept going with a visit to see friends off at the airport and finally made it to bed at 1:45. She was up and out by 10 the next morning!

April 17th: 1861 and 1954

Our boys in blue had spent the night at Faneuil Hall, and one hopes they awoke to a hearty breakfast. During the day they received overcoats, blankets, knapsacks, haversacks and three days rations (hardtack and salted meat probably). Their militia weapons were exchanged for brand new Springfield rifled muskets. These had been produced at the Springfield Armory. In its early days this Massachusetts-based, federally owned factory complex had pioneered the idea of interchangeable parts under the superintendency of David Ames, older brother of shovel company founder Oliver Ames. Old Oliver apparently did some of his apprenticing with his brother in Springfield. After getting fitted out the men were speechified by then Governor Andrew. Speeches passing for entertainment in those days perhaps the men appreciated the platitudes in a way that would be impossible today or even just a few years in the future. According to Chaffin, "The march to the Old Colony Station was made amid intense excitement." This meant folks lined the route and cheered as they would for departing regiments for the next few months. The "Old Colony Station" was the Boston station of that line-the boys were going to take the boat-train to New York. That route didn't pass through Easton at the time as the railroad tracks stopped at the shovel company. At 10 in the evening the troops boarded the "State of Maine" at Fall River. They got to New York City at 5 the next afternoon, a rather long trip by the standards of the line in later days-perhaps Chaffin meant 5 in the morning.

Fanny Holt Ames was the widow of William Hadwen Ames. She was his second wife and much younger. She was also blessed with extreme longevity. She married Mr. Ames in 1918. He died in 1920 and she lived on and on until dying in 1986 at age 98. In her early old age she was an inveterate traveler who often kept journals of her trips. On April 17, 1954 she was at sea between Los Angeles and San Francisco on a world tour. We'll join her for the rest of the tour starting tomorrow and see how the world has changed in the last 56 years. She had left Boston on March 27 by ship so in reality she's well into her tour-pretend we've taken the train to catch up with her. This vicarious travel in time and space is made possible by the Ames Free Library that published Fanny's travel journals.

Birthers and Breakfast

Clearly, the right wing nutballs are missing the point on President Obama's birth certificate.  They should be aiming at President Andy Jackson, the founder of the modern Democratic Party, instead. Legend has it that Old Hickory himself was not born in the good old US of A. Here's the scoop, or at least how I remember the story. The hero of the Battle of New Orleans in 1815 had actually, he claimed, fought the Brits when he was a little nipper back in the Revolution. Not just shooting a peashooter, but actually fighting at age 13. OK so the youngest kid from Easton to serve in the Rev War was 12, but his papa was the nefarious thief  "Old Bunn" Benoni who probably was working a con to collect a bounty. Clearly, 13 is a little young, but what if AJ was 15? Wake up, birthers, here's the nub of the argument-the future president's parents were Scotch-Irish (Ireland is just a little north of Kenya) who allegedly emigrated to the future US just two years before he was born. They apparently brought two boys with them, but what if there was a babe in arms, and when did they actually arrive?????? In the approved version of AJ's story, Jackson's dad died in an accident in February, 1767, three weeks before Andy was apparently born. Jackson apologists note the exact birth site is unclear because his mom was "making a difficult trip home from burying his father." In 1824 Jackson claimed he was born in an uncle's home in South Carolina, but other evidence points to North Carolina.  Aha! Or maybe Ireland??? We'll never know for sure because AJ's two older brothers and mother died during the Revolution conveniently taking any knowledge of the true story to their graves. Inconveniently, this left Andy an orphan at 14 or was he 16?????

Stay tuned. Tomorrow-Jefferson's red hair-early signs of communist leanings??????

Hope you all caught the wonderfully unfair use of allegedly or apparently and the pregnant question marks in the above. I particularly liked "the approved version of AJ's story" (AKA "historical fact"). I'm including the above paragraph in my resume to Fox News.  Jackson is not my favorite President, by any means; but I dislike him for his ridiculous policy decisions not the remote possibility he wasn't born here. Today, perhaps we could all do the same. We probably wouldn't solve the country's problems, but we'd sound a lot less stupid.

What might have been on the breakfast table in Easton as our boys were on the way to the Washington today 150 years ago? Lots of foods we'd recognize from scrambled and poached eggs to pancakes. Here's a little bit unusual pancake recipe from just after the war.

CORN-MEAL FLAPJACKS

1 qt. sour or buttermilk
2 eggs, beaten light
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda dissolved in hot water
2 tbs. molasses
1 tbs. lard, melted
1/2 c. flour
Corn meal

Add [to other ingredients] meal to make a batter a trifle thicker than flannel cakes.

From Common Sense in the Household by Mrs. Marion Harland, 1871 (New York)

A modern addendum says you add enough cornmeal to make the batter thin enough to ladle into a frying pan and thick enough to form the circles we all recognize as pancakes. I haven't tried this one yet, but it looks worth making.

Whales and More on Easton in the Civil War

With so much bad environmental news floating around it's nice to find a fun story every once and a while. It turns out that whales as well as chimps and that other more destructive ape all have culture. Culture can be defined as a group of learned behaviors that separate one group from another. Culture is what enables us to change our use of the environment without going to all the trouble of actually evolving (those of you waiting for your little finger to evolve into a Phillips head screwdriver are going to be disappointed). Two articles from England's Guardian newspaper document this story. The first story makes the case that sperm whales in the Galapagos Islands, while genetically similar, are divided into two groups that exploit the food environment in different ways. Of course, for us humans culture can also mean "getting cultured" by listening to high-falutin' music like them thar opery tunes. Turns out the whales are into this also. The other Guardian article documents the fact that tunes sung by boy humpback whales who are popular with the chicas get picked up by other guys and passed along across the ocean. Tunes by loser contestants on Whale Idol get dropped.

Today, 150 years ago, President Lincoln issued a call for 75,000 troops to serve for three months essentially to protect the capital from rebel attack until a full time army could be built. According to Chaffin "within twelve hours" of the President's call (delivered to the nation by telegraph), Easton men of the 4th Massachusetts Militia Regiment reported to Faneuil Hall where they slept on the night of the 16th. This rapid response was possible because Massachusetts had maintained the old system of local militias left over from colonial days. Some modifications had been made, the men reporting for duty were mostly young adults without the teenagers and the graybeards, and apparently they trained, at least part of the time, not at the Plains (Militia Park), but in a large field near the present site of Andrews Café. We know this since while the boys were on "break" they resorted to the rock outcrop called King Phillip's Cave where they carved names and dates in the rock, drank, and allegedly some even canoodled with working girls. Don't know the contemporary name for those ladies-"soiled doves" perhaps-Hooker's Brigade, named for Massachusetts General Joe Hooker was several years in the future.

The militia men like their ancestors made drill days into a giant picnic which raises the question of what Civil War food was like. More on that tomorrow!

Time to Paint the Yard Red

On April 12, the Stokes Birding Blog published an article called "Hummingbirds are Coming!" They were attempting to answer the question of when we should put out our hummingbird feeders. The surprising answer is right now. Our little Ruby-throated Hummingbirds spend the winter in Mexico and then cross the Gulf of Mexico in a continuous flight before resting in Texas and Lousiana. The birds have been in Texas since February, and recently they have spread across the country reaching Connecticut and southern Massachusetts. If you have one of those red hummingbird feeders mix up a batch of sugar water and put it out. If you don't have one and want to try to attract the most spectacular flier in the bird world, the round plastic feeders are available at many places including especially Wild Birds Unlimited on Belmont Street in Easton. The formula for the sugar water is one part sugar to four parts water. Bring the mix to a boil to make sure the sugar is completely dissolved and cool before putting it in the feeder. Feeders placed out now will help migrants moving further north and may attract a nest on your property. Hummingbirds are very territorial so it's fun to watch a resident try to chase away an intruder. Better to keep a couple feeders in different parts of the yard to increase the action. One problem this time of year is frost although the freezing point of sugar water is lower than for plain water. Later in the year try to keep the feeders out of direct sunlight. In warm weather the sugar water should be changed often lest you intoxicate the little birds or kill them with some kind of mold toxin.

Watch the feeder carefully because despite your best efforts it's likely ants will discover the feeder also. For a long time people believed hummingbirds were strictly nectar feeders, but there have been reports that hummers are not averse to picking off an ant or two at the feeders as well. See if you can catch these birds acting as our tiniest avian predator.

April 15 marks the unofficial beginning of the spring warbler migration as well. Be on the look out for these little birds that generally have some yellow markings. Many more species of warbler migrate through the state than actually nest here. The end of the peak migration period is around May 15 although both the start and finish of the season is weather dependent. Borderland, Wheaton Farm, and Sheep Pasture have the diversity of habitat that attracts a wide range of warbler species. Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge is also a legendary site for observing warblers because the birds pick up on the patch of green in the urban wilderness as a resting and refueling spot. I've actually been on a whale watch in Boston Harbor on a rainy day when a flock of warblers landed on the ship to rest while crossing from Cape Cod.

A Question for You Dear Readers

This is the 47th posting on this blog, and yesterday we set a record with 18 views of the site. My first thought on seeing that number this morning was "oh boy, I made somebody angry," but then I remembered yesterday's post was completely non-controversial unless you happened to live in South Carolina or are a direct descendant of the first Easton man to die in the war. For me this raises the question what, dear reader, do you want to see here? My idea was sort of a random tour through the too many things that interest me, but like any author, I like readers so what do you want to read here? Things we've looked at in the first 46 posts:

Food and Recipes
Easton History
Art
Gardening
Civil War and Easton in the War
Local and National Politics
Nature
Movies

You can post a comment here or e-mail me at edh1620@gmail.com. Should I focus on a topic or continue the way we've been going? If I should focus on what one, two or three topics?
Thanks
Ed

Bulletin: Firing on Fort Sumter Begins Civil War

Today is the 150 anniversary of the start of the Civil War. The war started when the folks of South Carolina fired on a federal fort in Charleston Harbor at 4:30 A.M.. You can learn more at the History Channel. What would be more amazing to the soldiers in the fort than getting shot at is the fact that the fort now has a Facebook page, a Twitter account, and a website. The website includes a video about the fort and the fun fact that the fort's commander knew the officer in charge of the Confederate bombardment-Colonel Anderson had been General Beauregard's  artillery instructor at West Point! You just never know what your students will get up to.

Interestingly, while Chaffin's History has a nice bit on how the news of Lexington and Concord reached Easton on April 19, 1775, he has no report on how the news of Fort Sumter reached town. Within a few days, however, Easton men were headed to Washington. On the 18th the town lost its first soldier to poisoned whiskey (or whiskey poisoning) in New York Harbor where the men had witnessed the arrival of Colonel Anderson the commander of Fort Sumter.

Rummage Sale

Just some random things today:

When I arrived at the future Bridgewater University in 1966, Bob Dylan was one of the hottest performers around. Upperclassmen took great pride in telling the freshmen that Dylan had played in our auditorium before he got famous. No tapes of that concert apparently exist, but the Globe brings news today that a 1963 concert at Brandeis, probably from the same tour, is being released this week. The concert preceded the release of "The Free Wheeling Bob Dylan," the album that made him famous.

I was a big fan of the old TV show "Hawaii 50" back when it was new and have a mild interest in the new reboot. Devotees of the old show know that Steve McGarrett's archenemy was Wo Fat. Turns out the villain's name was an in-joke by the writers-the oldest continuously operated restaurant in Hawaii (founded 1869) is Wo Fat.

Heard on the radio today that billions in federal budget cuts may came from rail transport including 1.5 billion for high speed rail. Hope that's true.

Did you see the Brainiac section in the Globe yesterday? It carried a story on how taxicabs in China are using smartphones and GPS to direct empty cabs to streets with the most prospective customers. For $1.8 billion I have a high school senior who could design (and operate efficiently) a system of hybrid minibuses to do the same thing.

Some Great Films

Sidney Lumet died yesterday at age 86. He was a very great director although he is  not as famous as some of his industry contemporaries, and I'm afraid no one today is making films the way he did. I've got two very serious student directors at OA who are working hard on entries for the Hockomock Film Festival who seem to feel that they have to do something every second of their film or it will fail. Lumet subtly created backgrounds and let his actors perform. Perhaps my guys would feel the same if they were working with Henry Fonda and Paul Newman, but I doubt it.

Lumet's first film was 12 Angry Men (1957) with Henry Fonda and Lee J. Cobb and 10 other stellar stage actors. It began as a stage play and has an excellent script. You sat in the theater and watched the fellas argue-how does Lumet turn this into a film? As the apparently cut and dried case is pulled apart by Henry Fonda, Lumet moves the camera down from the top of the room to the level of the table and goes from wider shots to close-ups. The acting and script are still excellent, but the subtle direction adds to the intensity and power for the viewer.

A second Lumet favorite of mine is the neglected Power (1982). Here Richard Gere starts the movie as a slimy amoral political campaign advisor who finally (and unbelievably) redeems himself by the end of the film. The vignettes of the multiple campaigns Gere is running highlights how politicians are sold to the American public. Not a great film, but one you should see so the next time you view a political add you know just what is going on. Lumet warned us and still America voted for Bush. Twice! Admittedly America didn't vote for him the first time, and the second time had no real choice, but the Swift Boat Incident could have been cooked up by Gere's character!

The last film I'll mention is one of my favorite's despite its unbelievable courtroom procedures. That's 1986's The Verdict starring Paul Newman. The other cast members are outstanding including two from 12 Angry Men, but this is Newman's movie, his finest acting job I think, as Frank Galvin the failed alcoholic lawyer who suddenly gets a case that ignites a spark of moral courage. Lumet paints a cold wintery Boston background and let's his actors act. This is the ultimate movie about having the odds stacked against you-both because of your own mistakes and those of the system-yet somehow coming out with something like redemption. Newman is unforgettable throughout and has "the great speech" in his summation, but most people feel the greatest five minutes of the film are the cross examination of the Irish nurse played by Lindsay Crouse by villain plaintiff's attorney James Mason. Imagine the cachet Lumet must have had with Newman to give this wonderful scene to the second male lead and a bit player. The film, Lumet, Mason, and Newman were all Oscar nominated, but Gandhi was the big winner that year. Lumet never won an Oscar until he was given an honorary lifetime achievement award. Newman not beating out Ben Kingsley was another Academy mistake. Which movie are you likely to watch today-here we all have a lot of Frank Galvin in us and we all need his kind of redemption.

Press Pass

Jason Daniels, the executive director of Easton Community Access Television, found a way to get me and two of my students into the National Conference for Media Reform for free. All the students  had to do was agree to shoot one of the seminars as part of pool coverage of the event. All I had to do was serve as chaperone, but I still managed to get my first official press pass. The host of the conference was freepress.net whose main cause is "net neutrality"-the idea that this blog and commercial sites should have similar access to getting on the Internet, but the overall theme of the conference was the changing nature of media and journalism in America. By the way, this blog passes for journalism today although a book I bought at the conference suggests that blogs are passé, and we should be meeting on Facebook. Hey, at least my readership is going up unlike the Herald.

The seminar we covered was Big News in Boston: The State of Boston Media. The panel discussion was moderated by Carly Carioli of the Boston Phoenix and included representatives from WGBH, WBUR, the Boston Globe, El Planeta, and the Dorchester Reporter. Don't want to say too much about the panel since we will be broadcasting it on ECAT. However, there were plenty of fireworks-WBUR fought with WGBH about poaching audience members when 'GBH radio switched to all news last year. The two smaller papers fought with the Globe over ethnic and neighborhood coverage. Caleb Solomon of the Globe outlined the new for-pay service that the Globe is starting on the Internet and I will talk about that a little. The boston.com website is a hub of Boston information on the Internet. The Globe has decided to split it in two. The new for-pay version (bostonglobe.com) will look more like a newspaper with easy navigation of content provided by the Globe's top reporters. If you're getting your Globe at the end of your driveway as you're rushing off to work instead of in your door when you're having breakfast like you used to, this may be the way to go. (Maggie reminds me she still needs the real paper for the times I'm not around to take her out, and I admit I take pleasure in leaving Dan Shaughnessy's sport's columns face up!) The free site will remain boston.com. It will contain local  navigation information, all the newspaper's sports stories, access to 60-70 blogs, headline news, and the five top stories from the paper-perhaps all you need if you have become your own editor of stories from the web. Many people suspected this was not going to work as a revenue generator and feared what it might do to the actual physical newspaper.

One concern that I came away from the conference with relates to the difference between niche news organizations and broadcasting. I attended a second seminar on media education which highlighted the techniques that advertisers use to hook customers. A second message there was now that broadcast news was entertainment these manipulative techniques are being used by the likes of Fox News and Rush Blimpbaugh. Meanwhile, the Boston media was patting itself on the back about narrowcasting to microaudiences. The reporter from El Planeta touted her coverage of the Latino community in East Boston for instance-Hispanics talking to Hispanics. So the right wing gets to manipulate millions while the left wing breaks into tiny groups that only talk to themselves-no wonder the revolution has been postponed indefinitely.

After filming the seminar, inquiring reporters Brian Wright and Bobby Miller began filming interviews to add to the ECAT program. I interviewed Carly Carioli of the Phoenix, and an interesting promoter of a magazine called Orion (more on that in a later blog). The guys talked to representatives of the Harvard Crimson and Al Jazeera (OK, I had to explain Al Jazeera after I got the question "Who is he?"), but after a little prep, the guys did great. Al, the Arab News Network, is coming to American cable with an English version as well as having a high tech web presence. The boys also got an interview with a Leslie professor that attended our seminar and apparently had something to do with founding the band Rush. It should make for interesting TV at ECAT. Thanks Jason, Brian, and Bobby-you make me wish I was still going to be teaching next year!

Shut the Government Down

Have to leave for a field trip to Boston by 6 am. Just time for a thought. Let's keep the National Parks open and shut down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and bring the boys and girls home. Bet you could save a few bucks that you could then apply to the deficit and funding the shortfall in Easton's school budget-let's cut hack politicians in D.C. instead of teachers in Easton. As a student of history, I don't think we've ever been blessed by a group of national "leaders" with less vision of what this country actually needs (except perhaps in the 1850s and look how well that ended!) . Welcome to the Chinese century and a plague on both your houses America (not the Capulets and Montagues, but the House and Senate).

More Recipes from the Dark Ages

My mother's mother left a small collection of recipes from the era between 1910 and 1930 with an emphasis on the early period shortly after she had become a bride. I had made a file of those recipes a few years ago, and they popped up on the computer a few days ago. Like most recipes from the era they lack cooking instructions for the most part. Apropos of our earlier discussion of chowders here is her recipe for Oyster Chowder including rare preparation directions.

Oyster Chowder

1/2 pint oysters

1 quart milk

6 small potatoes

1onion

3 thin slices salt pork

1dash of cayenne

1 dash of salt

1 teaspoon sugar

Cook potatoes to mush in a little water. Add to milk. Fry diced onions lightly in chopped pork. Season and add oysters 13 to 15 minutes before done. Thicken with flour.

The missing instructions probably included add onions to milk and bring to a simmer but don't boil. When at a simmer add oysters. One wonders with the potatoes as thickener whether flour would actually be needed. 

A recipe from February 14, 1913 gives us a salad dressing:

Salad Dressing

1 cup vinegar

1 cup water

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons flour

2 tablespoons mustard

1 tablespoon salt

1 egg beat up good

A piece of butter

Unfortunately no instructions are included. Caesar Salad Dressing wouldn't be invented for another 11 years and many salad dressings of this era are cooked, but it seems that the egg is used raw along with the butter as the emulsifier here. Raw egg leaves some concern about salmonella although many people believe the vinegar kills any bacteria. Some modern recipes for caesar salad briefly coddle the egg before adding to the dressing. Haven't tried this recipe myself, but it looks like it might be tasty.

A Civil War Reading Idea

A library in Licking County Ohio is sponsoring a special read along program for the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.  The library has developed reading lists for both kids and adults for fiction and non-fiction books related to the Civil War and people are being encouraged to read two books between now and May 21st. Successful readers would have their names entered in a drawing for a small prize. Unfortunately, they don't seem to have posted the reading list at the library website. Available lists on the web don't seem all that great either. My short, short  list would include:

Fiction:
Michael Shaara, Killer Angels. About Gettysburg

Nonfiction:
James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom. A good one volume history
Shelby Foote, The Civil War: A Narrative. A great three volume history
David H. Donald, Lincoln. Probably the best biography even though published 15 years ago.

Please support your local bookseller at Paperback Junction.

Oliver Ames and Wikipedia

I'm judging student created websites for the State National History Day competition this Saturday. While checking an entry on the Manhattan Project I ran across a reference to "the Ames process" and decided to follow up. The Ames process is a scientific technique for creating weapons grade uranium, but luckily it was not developed by the family here as a way of settling local disputes. When the Manhattan project was created pieces of this massive program were farmed out to various universities including the University of Iowa located at Ames, Iowa. Ames was named in honor of Congressman Oakes Ames when the place was being considered as a possible terminus for the Union Pacific. For those planning a pilgrimage don't miss the nearby Skunk River.

One thing lead to another and I was soon at the Wikipedia entry for Governor Oliver Ames the son of the Congressman. Lo and behold, next to a factual entry on the Governor was a photo, not of the beefy Governor, but his uncle, Oliver II. The nice thing about Wikipedia is that you the reader can offer corrections. When I did, I discovered that all contributions from Oliver Ames High School have been blocked due to a nearly infinite number of erroneous and malicious postings. A list was available and some were indeed malicious although many were mistakes made by enthusiastic but ineffective student researchers. Considering that I was once listed as a "beloved and prominent" citizen of Easton, one should take all Wikipedia entries with a grain of salt. However, when I revisited the site for the Governor this morning, the offending picture had disappeared and a link to a Wikipedia article on Oliver II was added to the entry. Checking back on the site a couple of sentences ago, a picture of the governor had now appeared in place of the wrong one. Who was that masked man (or woman) who was up early fixing Wikipedia? We don't know. In fact from the discussion posted with the article, it's been known since April that the picture was erroneous yet it was only changed today. I don't know whether this is an indictment of Wikipedia or a demonstration that the system worked-just thought you should know!

The Revenge of the Pigeon

An interesting article on dinosaurs at the Discovery News site. In case you didn't suspect it T. rex was a very aggressive dinosaur. The article begins with evidence that a 12 or 13 year old female T. rex had a disfigured face from the bite of another T. rex of about the same age. Since she had not reached sexual maturity, this was not some kind of love bite. Mammals have evolved play biting which can be seen in puppies for example, but reptiles and birds fight for real from an early age.

Reading further in the article we learn that a famous T. rex named Sue had what looked like similar bite marks. However, these holes in her skull more likely came from a parasite called tricomonosis which infected her jaws and probably led to her starving to death. In an examination of 61 dino skulls 15% had the parasite. Today, this same parasite affects birds further evidence that birds are dinosaurs. Ironically, pigeons can be asymptomatic carriers of the disease passing it on to any bird of prey that eats it and ultimately killing the predator. Revenge thy name is squab.

The 150th Anniversary of the Civil War

I thought the Red Sox starting pitching was going to be the weak link this year! Lester has always been a slow starter so let's not panic there, and hopefully Buchholz has become a quality starter. Lackey, DiceK, and Beckett don't fill me with much confidence. Can we make the playoffs with two good starters?

OK, today's real topic. The 150th anniversary is upon us. This is the third time a Civil War Anniversary has come during my lifetime. During the centennial I was a high school student intrigued with reading many of the excellent books that came out. For the 125th I was just finishing up my hobby as a living history reenacter, and now for the 150th I am again intrigued, but this time by the resources for research available on the Internet. I'll be sharing some of those in some of my blogs.

Virginia Tech seems to have gotten the online bug earlier than many more famous institutions with the announcement of an ambitious project to digitize a number of Civil War era newspapers from both the North and the South. The first paper to be put online comes from Macon, Georgia, but others are promised soon. The New York Times, by the way, recently published a book and CD of their Civil War coverage. Returning to Virginia Tech you can find a tiny collection of eight love letters sent during the war.

Cowboy Photos

Someone asked how to link to the Easton Curiosity Shop and, of course, I had no answer. Here's what to do. Use your browsers bookmark feature to bookmark this address:

http://eastoncuriosityshop.blogspot.com

I'm a big fan of Firefox as a browser despite the excellence of Google Chrome and the fact that this blog wouldn't be possible without Google Blogger, iGoogle, and Google Reader.

Today's theme comes from the Denver Post's Plog which is their name for a blog that features photos. I got this link from Arts and Letters Daily, and what a link it is. Between 1887 and 1892 photographer John C. H. Grabill sent 188 photos from the Wild West to the Library of Congress for copyright protection. He worked around Deadwood and is most famous for his pictures of the aftermath of the Wounded Knee Massacre. Grabill worked at the high point of black and white photo plates so the 66 photos of cowboys, Indians, miners, towns, trains are minutely detailed and many are spectacular. My favorite, however, is a simple shot of Wild Bill Hickok's gravestone erected in 1891 seventeen years after his death in 1874. The epitaph "Custer was lonely without him."

I'm also including another link to a Denver Post plog that features shots of American cities before 1950 (often much before like the famous shot of Richmond, Virginia buildings blown up with flour dust by retreating Confederates). Below is a shot of Irish clam diggers in Boston in 1882.

Blaming It All on Ike and a Word or Two on Mitigation

A couple of weeks ago Oliver Ames was in the midst of what passes for spring cleaning in education. "All students must wear their ids." "School is no place for cell phones and texting between 7:30 and 2:00." Inevitably I caught a student who was wearing her thumbs out texting. She indignantly told me it was my generation's fault. "You guys invented these things, and now you want to blame us for using them."

America is fat. I'm blaming it all on President Dwight David Eisenhower. Ike promoted the interstate highway system and that made America fat. I don't mean we stopped walking to New York and packed on the pounds. In the 1920's and 30's my grandfather would stop and go along Route 1 to take the family to New York according to my mother. Stop and think about it-you're a stranger driving through Easton-which restaurant is least likely to give you food poisoning? The increase in travel along the interstates made this question come up more and more often. Along came Ray Kroc who saw a restaurant operation in southern California producing burgers quickly and efficiently and invented the American fast food industry. Now every time you pull into a McDonald's in Missoula, Montana you know you'll get the same taste as the McDonald's in whatever town still has a McDonald's. Since fat and salt have the most desirable tastes, fast food is loaded with it. Thanks, Ike.

Many people fear that the arrival of a Panera with a drive through near Stonebridge, Andrews Cafe and Back Bay Bagel threaten those long established and quality operations. Hopefully, we'll all support those fine local establishments and bypass the chain. You know like we all started to boycott Walmart in Brockton in order to save that fine Easton business Target.

Fast food places are not all bad although what I'm about to tell you has certainly cut in to convenience store business. Yes, the rumors are true Wendy's in Easton has what is said to be one of only four super fountain drink dispensers in America. It's supposedly a reward for being one of the best Wendy's in New England. What does the magic machine do? It offers 27 different brands of Coca-Cola sodas (including that famous brand called "water"). You choose your brand on a touch screen and then another touch screen appears in many brands offering up to a half dozen flavors-cherry coke, vanilla coke, etc. Thanks to a student I learned that you can even mix flavors. Ever have a Strawberry-Peach Sprite Zero? Delish.

One Easton resident commenting on Monday's Selectman's Meeting explained the idea we should seek mitigation from the T as "we're going to roll over and ask the T to rub our tummy." I expect the plan is slightly more nuanced, but back in the day when we were fighting the T tooth and nail, it seemed they were throwing mitigations at us hand over fist. (I'm advertising for a literary cliche assistant, by the way). Wonder if that is going to happen with the new approach. My idea of negotiating mitigation comes from a very successful Italian-American Chicago businessman of the 1920s-"You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone."  Never thought I'd agree with George Will (except that we both love the Chicago Cubs), but his recent piece on high speed rail is interesting. Initially thought the idea that liberals were collectivizing the American spirit was far-fetched, focused goals not being a liberal strong suit, but think about the sidewalk that no one uses along Route 106. It was mandated by the state, cost tens of thousands of dollars, and it's there because YOU REALLY SHOULD GET OUT AND WALK. Thus, the government builds interstate highways to make us fat and sidewalks to make us thin. See, like my student said, it's never your fault!