Quantcast
Channel: Atlas Obscura: Articles
Viewing all 11437 articles
Browse latest View live

Beijing's Latest 'Toilet Revolution' Includes ATMs and Free Wifi

0
0
article-image

A 21st-century public toilet in Beijing's Olympic Forest Park. (Photo: SuSanA Secretariat/CC BY 2.0)

Your average toilet serves it purpose. Your average public toilet, even more so. But have you ever wished they could do more?

You may want to keep an eye on Beijing. The city's Municipal Commission recently announced a "Toilet Revolution" that will upend the restroom landscape, fulfilling contemporary needs along with age-old ones, Xinhua News reports.

The city plans to build one hundred toilets this year across the districts of Tonzhou and Fanshan. Along with their regular capabilities, these newcomers will feature free Wifi, charging stations for cell phones and electric vehicles, built-in ATMs, and ventilation systems. Women's restrooms will also have baby seats, "so that mothers can free their hands when nature calls," Xinhua News writes.

This is the fifth Toilet Revolution for Beijing—the first four got rid of pit toilets and entrance fees, and renovated existing facilities. If all goes according to plan, this one will get even more radical, unveiling new energy-saving and deodorization technologies and setting up blacklists to shame unruly toilet-users. As Li Shihong told China Daily earlier this year, "Toilet civilization has a long way to go in China."

Every day, we track down a fleeting wonder—something amazing that's only happening right now. Have a tip for us? Tell us about it! Send your temporary miracles to cara@atlasobscura.com.


Inside the Bizarre, Racist Scheme to Import Siberian Workers to Hawaii in 1909

0
0
article-image

A photo from a passport application for a Russian couple in Hawaii, c. 1917. (Photo: Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

On October 21, 1909, a crowd of curious onlookers gathered in Honolulu Harbor to catch a glimpse of Hawaii’s future: A cavalcade of Siberians, 200 of them, dressed in colorful peasant smocks and comically unseasonable sheepskin coats, making their uncertain way down the gangplank of their newly-arrived steamer. This was only the beginning —1,300 more recruits would shortly arrive in O’ahu from the deepest, icebound interior of Russia.

If the promise of this burgeoning Siberian colony were fulfilled, the Hawaii Bulletin rhapsodized, “the greatest problem of the islands would be solved.”

The “problem” was Hawaii itself — or rather, the people inhabiting it. The Russians had been told they were coming to Hawaii to work the sugar fields, but they would also provide the valuable, if considerably more passive, contribution of making the islands more white. For decades, Hawaii’s “Big Five” plantations had relied on contract workers from places like Japan, the Philippines and China, who built the sugarcane industry into a juggernaut while swelling the island’s Asian population. The contract system was, however, notoriously exploitative, confining laborers to a life of exhaustion and poverty with little hope of escape. When Hawaii officially annexed the islands in 1900, the contract system was abolished and the sugarcane workers rebelled, whipping the underlying racism of the white ruling class into a kind of paranoiac madness. Newpaper editorials warned of a dystopian future under Asian rule. Ministers raved about the threat of Buddhist missionaries. In 1905, President Roosevelt himself issued a strongly worded pronouncement that Hawaiian immigration must proceed under “traditional American lines.”

article-image

Japanese workers on a plantation in Hawaii, c. 1910. (Photo: Library of Congress/LC-DIG-ggbain-13386)

Importing Siberian labor was part of a desperate, last-ditch effort to turn the demographic tide in Hawaii, orchestrated by the sugarcane planters, the island elite, and a U.S. congress that feared Hawaii would do the unthinkable and send an Asian senator to Congress. But the weirdest immigration scheme ever proposed by a U.S. territory, also turned out to be the most disastrous. The Russians never provided anticipated relief from Asian workers, because they refused to work at all.


The idea was hatched two years earlier in the far eastern city of Vladivostok, when James Low, a visiting plantation manager, happened to meet a mysterious man by the name of A.W. Perelstrous, a contractor for the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Exactly what Low and Perelstrous discussed is unknown, but at the time Hawaii’s sugar industry was still reeling from a strike at one of O’ahu’s biggest plantations, one that ended with workers winning nearly every concession. Perhaps Low complained about the powerful unions Japanese and Filipino laborers had formed, or maybe he spoke more bluntly about the “yellow peril” menacing the islands. Either way, two years later in July of 1909, Perelstrous mysteriously turned up in Hawaii for a “vacation,” but ended up meeting with Walter Frear, the island’s governor, to suggest his ingenious solution to the island’s labor crisis— recruiting sugarcane workers from Siberia. 

article-image

Shustov Nikolai Mikhailovich arrived in 1910 with his family - a wife and four children - to work on a plantation. He returned to Russia with his wife and one of their children. (Photo: Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

At the time, anti-Asian sentiment was at a fever pitch: 7,000 Japanese sugarcane workers were on strike (among their demands: capping the workday at 10 hours), and plantation owners were hemorrhaging money paying strikebreakers double the usual daily wage.

“There seems to be a general feeling that every available source of white immigration should be tested,” the Hawaii Advertiser wrote of Perelstrous’ proposal. Before the month was over, he had been dispatched to Siberia to launch the recruitment effort. 

Three months later, the first group of Siberians reached Honolulu, so jubilant to be free of Russia, according to the local press, that they tore up their passports and scattered them over the Pacific. Despite their “queer” Cyrillic writing, “odd-looking costumes,” and quaint disbelief in eternal summer, the Hawaiians generally delighted with the “comely” girls and “fine-looking” men, who were declared to be the “very kind [the] islands need.”


 

article-image

A photo of a Russian family for their passport application for repatriation. (Photo: Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Perelstrous assured the local Immigration Board there was no limit to the number of Russians he could bring to Hawaii. “No promises were needed to bring these hardy peasants, these sons and daughters of the soil,” the Pacific Commercial Advertiser wrote of the businessman’s recruitment campaign. “Women and men fell upon their knees before the agents and made tearful pleas to be allowed to journey to the middle of the Pacific.” What kind of peasant, Hawaiians reasoned, would turn down the chance to swap Siberia’s lunar cold for the tropical beaches of Waikiki?

 Yet it turned out Perelstrous (who was doing well enough by then to enroll both of his children at the elite Punahou School, Obama’s alma mater) had made promises to the Siberians, concrete ones, about wages and housing and most importantly, an eventual share in the land they helped farm. They were told that horses were free and food and clothing cost half what it actually did in Hawaii. It was only after the Russians arrived at the plantations to take up the brutal work of sugarcane farming, that they discovered Perelstrous had lied.

article-image

The passport application for Chistiakov Petr Markelovich and his family. He had arrived in Hawaii in 1909 on the ship Siberia. (Photo:Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

The laborers began circulating a petition stating they’d been “deceived in every word,” and when a second group of Siberians arrived in February of 1910, their malcontent quickly spread. By the time Perelstrous arrived from Russia with yet a third group in March, his countrymen had united against him. A mob of Russians swamped his steamer, angrily brandishing their patched underwear. 

“I think there is a big mistake somewhere,” a distraught Perelstrous told reporters. The Immigration Board ordered him to sort out the mess, but when he tried to visit the Russian encampment, he was turned away. 

Just like their Asian counterparts, the Russians decided to strike, and what had started out as a hopeful solution to Hawaii’s labor crisis soon turned into a public fiasco sparking protests as far away as Manhattan’s Union Square.

On April 1, 1910, the government made a desperate last attempt to appease the Russians. A meeting was called at ‘Iolani Palace, the former residence of Hawaii’s royal family, where the planters presented the best terms they were willing to offer. The meeting ended in a riot when a group of Russians tried to attack Perelstrous. “We would rather starve and die,” the Russians announced, than work the sugar fields under the planters’ terms,

Their lawyer’s only response was to ask how many coffins he should order. 

article-image

Iolani Palace, c. 1922. (Photo: Public Domain)

After the failed April meeting, the Siberians were ejected from Quarantine Island, where they’d been housed by the government, and set up camp in the red-light district of Iwilei. Their colorful shantytown, built from tents and packing cases, became a tourist attraction as the Russians were reduced to taking charity and selling their prized samovars for $10 a piece. Lurid tales began to spread about “Russian maidens being sold to the Chinese.” 

Six months after their first steamer docked, the dream of a white majority on the island was dead; Hawaii wanted nothing more than to have the Siberians gone. The feeling, it turned out, was mutual. Working piecemeal jobs, hundreds of Russians saved enough money to flee Hawaii for California by the end of 1910. Many returned to Russia. The remaining few eventually assimilated, finding jobs at pineapple canneries, sawmills—even, yes, plantations—and trading their Russian smocks for palaka shirts. The Siberian experiment ended up costing the Hawaiian government $143, 581—about $3.7 million in today’s dollars.


 

article-image

Fominykh Afranasii Ivanovich arrived in 1909 and worked on a plantation for 5 months before leaving for San Francisco. He returned in 1913, and decided against repatriation. (Photo: Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

Today there is almost no trace of the Siberians left on the islands, save for a few gravestones and the intriguing scrapbook of a Russian diplomat, who arrived shortly after the Russian Revolution of 1917 to convince 165 remaining families to help build a new communist utopia back home.

As for Perelstrous, his scheme of turning Hawaii into Little Siberia remarkably lingered on for another year and a half with the patronage of Victor S. Clark, Commissioner of Hawaii’s Board of Immigration and a diehard believer in the white settler cause. Their partnership ended when Clark discovered Perelstrous had misappropriated Board funds and smuggled Siberians across the border to China without a passport. In the summer of 1912, Perelstrous and his family said a final aloha to Hawaii, setting sail from the islands and disappearing forever from the pages of history. Clark was forced to issue an embarrassing mea culpa, reassuring Russia that “Hawaii would engage in no further immigration business without official consent.” 

article-image

Burilov Andrei Stpanovich arrived in 1910 and worked on plantation. He decided he would not return  "until life in Russia becomes better". He moved to California instead. (Photo: Russian Collection, Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii at Manoa

In the ensuing years, Hawaii resumed its course to become the most diverse state in the country, the only one with an Asian majority. When it achieved statehood in 1959, the people elected Daniel Inouye to the U.S. House of Representatives. He went to the Senate a few years later, in 1963, where he served until his death in 2012 as the highest-ranking Asian American politician in U.S. history.

The Combat Ration Collectors Who Eat Decades-Old Military Meals

0
0
article-image

A G.I. eating a compressed dehydrated vegetable bar in 1971. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Even if they’ve been baked to perfection and stored in an airtight tin, cookies just don’t taste so scrumptious when they’re 71 years old. Youtube user Steve1989 can tell you this from personal experience.

In January, Steve—who keeps his last name secret—uploaded a video to YouTube in which he opened a tin of Canadian army rations that had been packaged in 1945. “Oh, man. Those smell awful,” he said, as he unwrapped the foil surrounding a dozen cookies.

He tasted one.

“Hmm. That’s pretty disgusting.”

He ate the whole cookie. Then he ate four more. Satisfied with the breadth of that taste taste, he moved on to sample the next packet: a cylinder of 71-year-old chocolate pellets.

Steve1989 is a ration reviewer. He’s part of a growing online community of people around the world who collect, swap, and taste-test military MREs—the self-contained, robustly packaged “Meals, Ready to Eat” that get doled out to soldiers in the field.

article-image

A typical long-range patrol ration pack. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Whether decades old or freshly packaged, MREs are not known for their gourmet flavors. Designed to provide sustenance to active troops in combat situations, they generally consist of an entree, side dish, dessert, and vacuum-packed snacks, which together form one high-calorie meal. Utensils, powdered drink mixes, and a flameless heating device for warming up the main dish round out the package, which is often colored khaki to blend in to the rest of a soldier's kit.

This less-than-appetizing meal might be assumed to have little appeal outside the military. But civilians are interested in MREs for a few reasons. Some are ex-military, and develop a nostalgic curiosity. Others are concerned with emergency preparedness. Still others fall into a YouTube hole, end up watching a guy sample a vacuum-packed tuna-noodle entree from 1989, and get hooked on the MRE buy-swap-sell phenomenon.

Fifteen years ago, MRE enthusiasts had no way of establishing a community. Then a man named Kinton Connelly arrived on the scene. In 1999, Connelly, who lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, started noticing MREs—"these little, almost unmarked brown packages," as he calls them—popping up as part of emergency preparedness plans for Y2K. "I’d seen them at various shows and army surplus stores," he says. "I’d never tried one, but I was always fascinated by it, so when Y2K came around I started looking for some more information about them."

article-image

MRE pouches, opened to display the enticing contents. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

The Y2K disaster, of course, was a huge anti-climax. But the lead-up did take Connelly in a new direction—having found scant information on MREs, he "kept digging and digging," eventually amassing a wealth of details on MRE history and menus. He launched MREinfo.com in 2003 with the aim of sharing his knowledge. Two years later, in response to multiple requests, Connelly added a forums section to the site so MRE collectors could talk to one another.

"To my shock and surprise, it really took off—and not just with people in the U.S., but people from all over the world,” he says. “Once the international visitors started coming in, there was a lot more trading that started happening."

American collectors could finally get their hands on the fabled Italian army rations that came with mini liquor bottles. Packages started zooming around the world. Coveted French and British army rations began landing in U.S. mailboxes, ready to be sampled and reviewed. 

article-image

Egyptian combat rations from 1992. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Today, most reviewers get their military MREs from other collectors, or buy them on eBay. Some of the companies that supply MREs to the military also sell civilian versions of their meals, but the authentic combat versions are the most sought-after among collectors. 

Technically, U.S. military MREs aren't supposed to be sold to civilians—the phrase "Commercial sale is prohibited" is printed on snack packets. “I wouldn’t say it’s strictly illegal to get them," says Connelly, "but I’d also be remiss if I didn’t say that sometimes MREs didn’t fall off a truck.” Though he knows of "cases where the army’s criminal investigation unit has tracked down eBay auctions to see who’s selling them,” Connelly says it's rare for MRE collectors to run into trouble over the legality of their hobby.

This is good news for the small but dedicated bunch of MRE reviewers who post their taste tests on YouTube. This is a relatively new part of the MRE community, having popped up in the last five years. In May 2011, a Brookline, Massachusetts-based man who goes by gschultz9 posted a review of an eight-year-old MRE that he tasted while camping on Cape Cod. Encouraged by the positive response among collectors, he started posting more videos, and hasn't stopped since. 

article-image

An MRE featuring the widely reviled ham-and-chicken loaf entree. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Unlike Steve1989, who specializes in eating decades-old army rations while reminding viewers he doesn't have health insurance, gschultz9 doesn't aim for daredevilry in his taste tests. “My style isn’t that exciting,” he says, referring to his reviews as “straightforward, informational kind of videos.” He has a theory that "a good chunk" of his audience tunes in because his soothing voice helps put them to sleep. Still, enough people must be watching all the way through—his home is currently filled with MREs from around the world, sent to him by people seeking reviews.

Though gschultz9 does occasionally taste-test MREs that are over a decade old, "it hasn’t really been my thing, per se," he says. "It’s always kind of scary. I actually just did one yesterday that was only eight years old, but it had Pop Tarts in it, and they had this strange white thing on them, I couldn’t figure out if it was crystallized sugar or mold. I decided not to eat more than two bites of it.” 

article-image

Rehydrated U.S. army ration entrees from 1979. (Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Usually, it's pretty easy to tell if a ration pack has gone off. Sometimes all you need to do is look at the packaging. "When an MRE’s been punctured and bacteria’s gotten inside, that sucker swells up pretty bad," says Connelly. Other times, the realization hits when a reviewer opens a can or package to find black applesauce, sour jam, or M&Ms that have turned to dust.

The condition of the food often depends on how the MRE was stored over the years, and whether it was knocked around or exposed to extreme temperatures. In a particularly entertaining MREinfo.com review of a 1982 pork patty meal, the taster declared that the only edible thing I found in this MRE was the salt.” 

article-image

(Photo: Natick Soldier Systems Center Photographic Collection/CC BY 3.0)

Though it's disappointing to open an MRE and find it's gone bad, that's all part of the adventure—and an opportunity to consult the community. Collectors commiserate in YouTube comments and on the MREinfo.com forums, sharing stories of horrid, rancid smells and seeking advice on whether to eat meal components that seem iffy. 

“Everybody’s pretty supportive of each other,” says gschultz9, citing YouTube users Kiwi Dude, gundog4314, and steve1989 as the recently emergent go-to gurus for MRE swaps and advice. “It’s still a very niche thing, obviously,” he says, but the small group is “a very calm, cool community."

The appeal of military MREs is still lost on many, however. Connelly notes that he receives "emails saying ‘Why do you have a website about this? I was in the service, and I never want to see one of these things again.’” But to collectors, they are historic packages of combat cuisine just waiting to be unwrapped and tasted.

Steve1989 sums it up as he struggles to swallow a stale, rancid-smelling World War II cookie: “Why? Why not. This is what we do.”

Get Hypnotized By This Interactive Map of the Winds

0
0
article-image

What a lovely map of all the particles in the air. (Photo: All images from the Earth wind map. Screenshots by Eric Grundhauser)

While the elegance of hand-crafted old maps is self-evident, finding beauty in modern satellite maps is a bit more challenging. Thankfully we have visionary modern mapmakers like Cameron Beccario who created the Earth wind map. Don’t let the understated title fool you—his creation is one of the most mesmerizing interactive maps ever made.

Inspired by an earlier, also lovely, map of the wind currents in the United States, Beccario created his robust global tracking map in 2013. Using data from the Global Forecast System, which updates every three hours, the Earth wind map is able to show all of the wind currents across the globe in almost real-time. The information is displayed as a swirling, flowing stream of green lines that get brighter the faster the wind is blowing. The effect is an irresistibly hypnotic look at the invisible forces covering the globe.

article-image

The winds swirling around South America.

Want to know how windy it is in China right now? See a tornado warning and want more accurate data? Trying to find the windiest place on the planet? Double clicking a spot anywhere on the globe will pinpoint the spot to its latitude and longitude, and tell you how strong the wind is there. The elevation of the wind information can also be changed so that you can get on-the-ground map data, as well as look at what’s going on in the stratosphere.

It’s not just the wind that the map can track. The control panel can show other meteorological data. Click on the “Ocean” display and the world’s landmasses will go dark, but every wave in the ocean will be shown coursing over the waters. There are also options to look at the amount of chemicals (aerosols and sulfates) and particulates in the air. Each of these other views changes the patterns of swirls and whorls that move over the map. Where the wind map is a neon green and blue system, the chemical chart turns into an earthy pink and green display. The chemical and particle views are informed with near-live information from places like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.

article-image

The chemicals over Southeast Asia. 

While the default display of the map is a 3D globe, it can also be displayed in a number of more traditional formats including in an equirectangular setting and as a Winkel Tripel projection. Really no matter how you prefer to look at the maps, the waves and winds end up forming a stunning image of our world.

article-image

The wave activity at the South Pole.

Years after creating the map, Beccario continues to make tweaks and improvements like adding navigational hot keys, and spotlighting particular storms on the project’s Facebook page. No matter which way the wind blows, the Earth wind map is one of our most lovely modern maps.

Map Monday highlights interesting and unusual cartographic pursuits from around the world and through time. Read more Map Monday posts.

Bitcoin's Creator Unmasks Himself After Months of Suspicion

0
0

Craig Steven Wright, an Australian entrepreneur, publicly identified himself Monday as the creator of the digital currency Bitcoin, apparently ending months of speculation.

Wright gave interviews to the BBC, the Economist, and GQ, and provided proof to the BBC by using coins that are known by other Bitcoin users to be owned only by the currency's creator. 

Wright's name first surfaced in December 2015, when Wired and Gizmodo both published stories that identified Wright as the probable creator.

After the publication of those stories, Wright scrubbed his online presence and Australian authorities raided his home, later announcing that Wright was not the creator of Bitcoin, according to the New York Times

Wright said he was speaking out now because he was tired of being pursued. 

"I didn’t take the decision lightly to make my identity public," Wright said in a press release. "I want to be clear that I’m doing this because I care so passionately about my work and also to dispel any negative myths and fears about bitcoin."

In 2014, Newsweek identified a Californian man named Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto as the creator of Bitcoin. But that man "unconditionally denied" that report, which was widely criticized.

Other publications have also tried and failed to unmask Bitcoin's creator, but Monday's revelation seems like something close to definitive–even if some have already expressed skepticism. Reddit users, of course, have been hotly debating the matter.

So is it Craig Wright or not? Probably–though we may never know for sure. 

Watch This Sneaky Octopus Roll Around the Ocean Floor in a Coconut

0
0

Who would have thought a couple of coconut shells would be a smooth way to travel?

Amphioctopus marginatus, commonly known as the coconut octopus, has cracked open the power of the coconut. As the video above shows, this fuchsia-veined cephalopod squeezes each of its six-inch-long tentacles around its three-inch body, forming a tight ball that fits snugly inside two halves of a coconut shell. Coconut octopuses can be spotted clunking down the sloping, rocky terrain of the western Pacific Ocean floor.

Using shells and objects found on the ocean floor for protection is quite common among octopuses (although scientists have long debated whether the animals are using them as tools). However, the coconut octopus’ distinct way of picking up shell halves and waddling around with them under its tentacles for later use sets the species apart from others.    

In a 2009 paper in Current Biology, biologists at Museum Victoria in Australia studied the coconut octopus’s behavior and described its uniqueness: “The discovery of this octopus tiptoeing across the seafloor with its prized coconut shells suggests that even marine invertebrates engage in behaviors that we once thought the preserve of humans.” 

Every day we track down a Video Wonder: an audiovisual offering that delights, inspires, and entertains. Have you encountered a video we should feature? Email ella@atlasobscura.com.

The Unfathomable Collection of Lonnie Hammargren

0
0

(All photos: Dylan Thuras)

Las Vegas, with its bright lights and constant whirl, can feel like another dimension. Visitors to the city can stay in an "ancient" castle, take an elevator to the top of a half-scale Eiffel Tower, or eat from a buffet line in an Egyptian tomb. But perhaps the most idiosyncratic of Las Vegas's many spectacles sits far from the strip in a leafy residential neighborhood. 

Even for residents of Las Vegas, used to the pageantry of their surroundings, the home of retired neurosurgeon Lonnie Hammargren can be difficult to wrap their minds around. This house is not a museum, nor a mere collection. It is a lifelong obsession. It is an incomparable wonder. It is a panoramic window into one man’s overflowing creative mind.  

article-image

Sitting among manicured lawns and suburban ranch homes is a three-story Aztec temple. There's a Batmobile parked in its driveway, guarded by a ten-foot-tall pharaoh. Inside is an explosion of objects that are by turn incredible, funny, and alarming. 

article-image

Known as the “Hammargren Home of Nevada History,” the "Castillo del Sol," and the "Principality of Paradise," this is the 12,000-square-foot estate and endless collection of Lonnie Hammargren. While many collectors specialize in one kind of object, Hammargren embraces..all the objects. Over time, his stockpile of the strange and unusual grew so large that he had to purchase the houses next door to make room for them. The three houses have become an endless maze of collectables: priceless artifacts, museum pieces, tchotchkes, and total junk, all arranged in loose thematic groups that perhaps only Hammergren himself can truly understand.

article-image

Standing here with a portrait of himself drawn by a visitor to the collection, it would be easy to see 78-year-old Hammargren as simply an eccentric with a collector's eye and hoarder's habits. But just as the collection has a story, so does the man.

Hammargren was born on Christmas in 1937 in a cottage behind an inn (like someone else born on Christmas, he likes to point out) in Harris, Minnesota. As a young man attending the University of Minnesota, he rose to the top of his class. Like everything in Lonnie's life and collection (wives, homes, moose heads) one was hardly enough, and he eventually graduated with five degrees. 

While his original aim was to become an astronaut, Hammargren was happy to settle for being a brilliant neurosurgeon in the short term. After becoming certified in neurosurgery, he was granted a fellowship at the Mayo Clinic. Hammargren volunteered for Vietnam as a flight surgeon, flew in over 100 missions, received the bronze star, and was given five Air Medals for valor proving once again, that for Hammargren, one of anything is several too few.

article-image

Hammargren moved to Nevada in 1971 and became one of only two neurosurgeons in the state. A talented surgeon, Hammargren was in high demand. Over the years, he has performed brain surgery on hundreds of people, including a number of stars. His most famous patient was undoubtedly Roy, of Siegfried & Roy, after Roy was attacked onstage by his tiger. Hammargren also had a political career, twice serving as Nevada's Lieutenant Governor. 

Between his brain surgeries and politicking, Hammargren was acquiring new pieces for his treasure trove. Whenever a Vegas casino, restaurant, or institution of any kind was being destroyed, Hammargren would show up and see what he could take off their hands. Whenever an entertainer decided they had enough and wanted to pack it up, Hammargren was there, happy to drag off any unwanted stage props. 

Lonnie Hammargren is less a “collector” and something closer to a bower bird, a kind of nest-maker, driven by a compulsive love of all things kitschy, Las Vegas, Nevadan, curious, unusual, and strange. What makes something belong in his collection is less about its inherent monetary value and more about how it makes Dr. Hammargren feel. Anything large or small that amuses, interests, or intrigues Lonnie can end up on display in the sprawling estate.

article-image

A lover of American history, presidents, and tiny versions of huge monuments, a small Mount Rushmore combines those interests into one pure joy.

article-image

While Lonnie Hammargren didn't become an astronaut, he did serve as the flight surgeon for the astronauts on the Apollo mission. His love of all things space has continued through his whole life and shows up in pieces throughout the house. This, for example, is an authentic Saturn rocket capsule, once used for training.

article-image

The space capsule is filled entirely with old electronics. The more time you spend in the house and with Lonnie himself the stranger it all becomes. What looks like junk has an amazing story, what looks like a priceless object was pulled from the trash. 

article-image

As fascinated with the deep sea voyages as he is with space travel, the pool serves as a kind of mini Mariana trench, home to submersibles and bathyspheres of all sorts.

article-image

Chief among Lonnie's obsessions are Nevada and Las Vegas history. This is part of the old Showboat casino sign and bandstand. 

article-image

A full-scale, fire-breathing dragon lunges out of the house, next to an large pink egg Liberace emerged from during his Easter shows. One can be forgiven for failing to even notice the blacksmith shop.

article-image

Long forgotten Las Vegas acts such as Frankie Moreno live on in Hammargren's collection. 

article-image

Seated in, what he claims to be, the original Beverly Hillbillies car, mannequins of Bill and Hillary become the "Beverly Hillary-Billies."

article-image

In fact, mannequins populate the entire house.

article-image

Cosmonauts and astronauts alike float around in the multiple space themed paintings found around the house. Why this particular painting has been relegated to the back yard is unclear. 

article-image

Somewhere midway through the house words begin to fail you. Best described in refrigerator poetry this is "moose with foot."

article-image

A full sized T-Rex and elephant cavort in the backyard. 

article-image

Bits of the tops of the collection can be seen from the adjacent highway leading to many a curious passersby. 

article-image

Beneath the house is a dungeon used for halloween parties and scaring children. This is also where Lonnie has said he wishes to be buried.

article-image

Props from a long-defunct haunted house.

article-image

Though Teddy Roosevelt is  Hammargren's favorite president he has a soft spot for both Lincoln and Reagan. 

article-image

Why Lonnie's office has been turned into a scary dentist office went unexplained. 

article-image

Hammargren plays a number of instruments including the piano and accordion. 

article-image

Part of a collection about his love of music, the Elvis head sings on command. 

article-image

There is never just one of something. 

article-image

Elvira sits nearby the wedding chapel which includes a full-scale Gondola salvaged from The Venetian. 

article-image

Part of a Western themed casino, this display was rescued by Hammargren, who felt a caveman was missing.

article-image

Dinosaurs are another of Lonnie's favorites. The second floor includes a full scale brontosaurus skeleton -- minus the head which he has replaced with an E.T. mask. 

article-image

More pieces rescued from a Western themed Casino.

article-image

A true Nevada convert, Hammargren was twice elected Lieutenant Governor. Though mostly a ceremonial role, Hammargren took his political career seriously and ran for Nevada governor in 2000 (though he did not earn the backing of the Republican party).

article-image

Hammargren has set up his own astronomy station on his rooftop, which complements the planetarium he's built inside.

article-image

The roof remains one of the only places with any available space. Hanging off the edge and looking down over the neighborhood is a mannequin standing in a roller coaster holding an African staff. There's also a full-sized plywood space shuttle up there...

To try and wrangle what Hammargren has created into a narrow definition would be a mistake. Among the wild glamor and strangeness of Las Vegas, he has singlehandedly created something unexpected and completely original. The collection, like Lonnie Hammargren himself, is truly one-of-a-kind.

Hammargren opens his house to the public every October on Nevada Day and has been doing so for over 20 years. For the last three years he has been saying it would be his last. Hope that he makes it four.

These posts are a partnership with TravelNevada. As you may suspect, the state that's home to Lonnie, camel races, cowboy poets, neon museums and Burning Man is not really big on conformity. Head here to get started on your adventure.

American Cruise Ship Arrives in Cuba for the First Time Since 1978

0
0

An American cruise ship anchored in Havana Monday, making it the first time since 1978 that a U.S. cruise has docked in the country and marking a further thaw in relations between the two countries.

The ship, named the Adonia, has around 700 passengers, and was allowed to travel to Cuba after the country recently lifted a rule barring Cuban-born people from departing or arriving by sea. Until the ban was lifted, Carnival, the company behind the cruise, could not allow Cuban-born Americans as passengers. This forced the company to postpone the cruise until Sunday, when it set off from Miami. 

The ship is on a seven-day journey, also stopping in the Cuban ports of Cienfuegos and Santiago de Cuba, before returning to the United States. Carnival is planning regularly scheduled trips to the country, which has slowly reestablished a formal relationship with the U.S. (President Barack Obama visited in March.)

Before Adonia, the last cruise to Cuba occurred aboard the MS Daphne in 1978, according to CBS. The ship regularly went from New Orleans to Havana, but later stopped after protests. 

If you're interested in a leisurely voyage to Cuba, the Adonia is set to depart from Miami twice a month. Tickets start at around $2,600


The History of GeoWorks, Microsoft Windows' Upstart '90s Competitor

0
0
article-image

A Commodore 64 computer. (Photo: Luca Boldrini/CC BY 2.0)

A version of this post originally appeared on Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail. 

Back in the early '90s, it wasn't a sure thing that Microsoft Windows was going to take over the market, even though they had a clear lead over many of their competitors, thanks to MS-DOS.

In fact, one of the iconic GUI-based experiences of the era, AOL, hedged its bets for a while, creating and maintaining a DOS version of its iconic pseudo-internet software using a graphical user interface platform few were familiar with: GeoWorks.

It was an operating system for an era when it wasn't even a sure thing we'd have a modem.

And it was absurdly lightweight, something it gained from its earliest form—as GEOS (Graphical Environment Operating System), an operating system option for the Commodore 64.

The platform, built by Berkeley Softworks—not to be confused with Berkeley Systems, which built the famous "flying toasters" screensaver—was one of the most popular pieces of software on Commodore 64 for a time, thanks to the fact that it was very functional and worked on very inexpensive hardware.

"GEOS did not pioneer the GUI; most of its features were already present in the larger OSes of the day, like the classic Mac (albeit, not Windows)," writer Kroc Camen wrote of GEOS for OS News back in 2006. "What GEOS did show is that cheap, low-power, commodity hardware and simple office productivity software worked. You did not need a $2,000 machine to type a simple letter and print it."

The operating system eventually moved to the PC in the early '90s in a more advanced form, and Berkeley Softworks changed its name to GeoWorks.

I had some experience with Commodore 64 thanks to a childhood friend of mine who owned one and let me mess around with it a bit, but ultimately, I caught onto the PC version of GeoWorks because it came bundled with a 386 I used when I was a kid.

That computer wasn't super-fast—what, with its 40-megabyte hard drive and one megabyte of RAM—and, as a result, it really benefited from the lightweight, object-oriented approach of GeoWorks. The operating system took up maybe 10 of those megabytes, tops. And in an era where connecting to the wider world wasn't really a big thing, the simplicity of the format was actually kind of nice.

Among the more interesting things about the platform:

Different interfaces for different skill levels: DOS was not a simple operating system for novices to jump into, and GeoWorks Ensemble made an effort to ensure it was more approachable. It offered two different tiers of usage—"appliances" and "professional," along with a shell to jump into DOS programs, so you could play Commander Keen without a problem if you really wanted to. For people who had never used a PC before, the strategy was perfect—it had built-in training wheels.

Built-in office tools: The software included a variety of apps that were roughly comparable to anything you could find on other operating systems, such as the Mac including a word processor, calendar, and spreadsheet. It also included a Print Shop Pro-style banner-maker, which came in handy if you owned a dot-matrix printer. Overall, these offerings were great for home users, an audience that Microsoft hadn't really emphasized early on in Windows' history. It wasn't as flashy as, say, Microsoft Bob, but it worked a lot better.

article-image

Geoworks' welcome page. (Photo: Ernie Smith)

Strong capabilities, low power: But the best part of GeoWorks was the fact that it worked well without really strong hardware. Windows 3.1 really needed a 486 to shine, but GeoWorks could effectively run on a 286 or 386 without any problem. It was stable, and despite the fact that (like early versions of Windows) it was essentially a graphical shell for DOS, it rarely ran into hiccups.

The software had a cult fanbase, especially among German computer users, who have done a lot to keep its memory alive.

And Quantum Computer Services, another company that had built early success on the Commodore 64, saw GeoWorks as its opportunity to dive into the PC sphere, launching its first online network for IBM's PS/1 line of computers.

“The Promenade interface makes it easy for all family members to use the services, without dealing with the frustrations of complicated commands and functions," Quantum Executive Vice President Steve Case said in a 1990 press release. "Yet the software is advanced enough to satisfy experienced users of online services.”

Within a year, the platform had been reworked into America Online, a company Case famously led throughout the '90s, and within a decade, the company would be in the middle of an audacious merger with Time Warner—with AOL as one of the defining programs of the Windows era.

GeoWorks had AOL before it was cool—a golden opportunity to take over the home PC market, especially as AOL's early disks essentially included barebones versions of GeoWorks. That essentially allowed modem owners toget a taste of GeoWorks for free.

But that wasn't enough. Beyond AOL, GeoWorks had few third-party apps. Part of the reason for this was that, early on, you needed a Sun workstation to develop software for the platform, a deeply ironic requirement—essentially, you needed a $7,000 computer to develop software for low-end PCs, which meant mom-and-pop shops had no chance to even get on board.

At the time, Microsoft was releasing Windows-native development platforms like Visual Basic to win over small developers.

But those limitations could have been dealt with, honestly, if the desktop operating system itself gained a significant audience. Even GeoWorks' biggest fans knew it didn't stand a chance against Windows, due to Microsoft's already-established goodwill.

"I feel badly that this truly amazing program will never be given a chance, as IBM and Microsoft would never allow it," one such fan wrote to PC Magazine in 1991. "I hope that software developers will see Ensemble's amazing potential and will begin developing it. Without third-party developers, Ensemble will never survive."

Microsoft was standing on the shoulders of giants. GeoWorks could barely even reach the ankles.

article-image

An old IBM PS/2 with an Intel 386 processor. (Photo: Wolfgang Stief/CC BY 2.0)

But even though GeoWorks failed to win over PC users won over by Windows, the operating system still had a little life in its bones. That's because, ultimately, operating systems often live multiple lives even if they fail. They show up in random places, because the software is still useful in certain cases.

Palm's sadly-discarded webOS, for example, currently drives LG's smart televisions.

GEOS was much the same way. Like a cow shoved through the food manufacturing process and split into a million pieces, parts of GEOS showed up in the ingredient lists of all sorts of weird products. Among the places where GEOS showed its bones:

Personal digital assistants: Before Palm Computing founder Jeff Hawkins came up with the PalmPilot, he formulated an early take on the platform using a stripped-down version of GEOS. The Tandy Zoomer, which came out in 1993, wasn't a hit, but the collaboration with GeoWorks, Tandy, and Casio proved informative for Hawkins and his team. It helped set the stage for the first truly successful PDA a few years later—one that didn't use GEOS. (Not to be outdone, Hewlett-Packard created a PDA for the platform itself.)

Early smartphones: GEOS' role in the mobile revolution wasn't limited to Palm. In the late '90s, the operating system was a key part of the Nokia 9000 Communicator, one of the earliest smartphones, and one that was well-loved. It was capable of basic word-processing, graphical web-browsing, and could even edit a spreadsheet. For those perks, it wasn't cheap, costing $800 at launch, and it was Zack Morris huge. "Modern users take features like mobile email and web browsing for granted, but the Nokia 9000 Communicator was the first device to offer these in a single device," tech writer Richard Baguley wrote on Medium in 2013. "It may have been a bulky, clunky device, but we still miss it."

article-image

A Nokia 9000 Communicator. (Photo: textlad/CC BY 2.0)

Electronic typewriters: The '90s were a bad time to be a typewriter-maker, and Brother was not well-positioned to handle the internet revolution. But it did have something up its sleeve: GEOS. The company collaborated with GeoWorks on a set of printer variations that added basic word processing and desktop publishing capabilities to the mix. They were still typewriters, but they did slightly more interesting things than write type.

Primitive netbooks: Brother's interest in GEOS didn't just extend to typewriters; it saw GEOS as an opportunity to bring "computing to the masses," as one press release put it. In 1998, years after GEOS had faded from view for just about everyone else, the typewriter company launched an alternative platform—the $500 GeoBook, a low-power laptop that preceded the rise of netbooks by about a decade. It could surf the web and had much of the software available in the DOS version of GeoWorks, but it didn't have a hard drive, which helped keep the price down. And much like netbooks, reviewers hated them. "For the price of this unit, you can easily find a discontinued, refurbished or used Windows computer and maybe even a new one. It will do hundreds of things that this machine cannot dream of," a negative 1998 New York Times review explained.

There aren't any crazy GEOS projects like this nowadays that I'm aware of, but hey, maybe it's running an ATM somewhere.

Despite the number of extra lives GeoWorks has had, the outlook of the platform looks more dire than ever in 2016.

This is partly due to the complicated corporate history around GEOS. After the company that created the software dissolved in the late '90s, the technology was sold off to a firm named NewDeal, which built an office suite out of GEOS, one that looked a lot like Windows 95 and took away a lot of the platform's unique charm.

At one point, the operating system was owned by Ted Turner's son, who attempted to run a low-cost PC company called MyTurn.com, with the GeoWorks software as its centerpiece. (When Teddy Turner ran for Congress in 2013, his MyTurn.com days came back to haunt him.)

article-image

Eventually, the operating system ended in the hands of a company called Breadbox, which had essentially treated GeoWorks as a volunteer upkeep project, with the eventual goal of turning the GEOS into an educational software platform that worked in tandem with Android.

But recently, Breadbox went into hibernation. In November, founder Frank S. Fischer died unexpectedly as they were in the midst of creating a version of the software for tablets.

John F. Howard, his longtime partner on Breadbox, is currently working on next steps, talking things over with Fischer's family as well as other developers who are interested in the platform.

"There are still some legal issues to resolve, but I am confident that there is still some life in the GEOS code," he wrote on the Breadbox website last month. 

A version of this post originally appeared on Tedium, a twice-weekly newsletter that hunts for the end of the long tail. 

article-image

Horse Racing Rules Found on 2,000-Year-Old Tablet

0
0

Horse racing these days is a dying sport, but its roots stretch back millennia, from Greece to ancient Babylon.

Horses were also raced in ancient Turkey, where, on Monday, some proof of it was discovered, in the form of a set of rules, according to the Hurriyet Daily News.

The rules, found in Konya, around 370 miles southeast of Istanbul, were less about the race themselves and more about who can compete.

Specifically, the winners of previous races could not compete in new races, and other horses owned by a winning owner also could not enter other races. 

“In this way, others were given a chance to win," Hasan Bahar, a professor at Selçuk University, told the Hurriyet Daily News. "This was a beautiful rule, showing that unlike races in the modern world, races back then were based on gentlemanly conduct."

A similar rule in modern racing would make the sport's most famous award, known as the Triple Crown and given for winning three prestigious races, impossible, of course. 

5 Amazing LEGO Jobs Currently Open

0
0
article-image

Stop dreaming of working at LEGO and apply for these jobs! (Photo: Jay Reed/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Welcome back to AO Jobs, the weekly column where we spotlight jobs and career opportunities that you can apply for right now, to bring some wonder and adventure into your working life. See any listings? Get in touch!

When many of us were kids, we played with LEGO bricks like it was our job. Most of us put the bricks away as we got older, but for those LEGO maniacs who never lost the fever to build, working with LEGOs can actually become a career.

LEGO is the biggest toy brand in the world, thanks in part to its many licenses (Star Wars, Harry Potter, everything) and digital products, but their good old plastic building brick sets are still the core of the company. At any given time, the company website offers hundreds of jobs, at locations all over the world. If you’re looking for that new dream job with your favorite toy company, we sifted through the jobs available on their website right now, and picked out the coolest ones that you could apply for right now.

But scoring a sweet position at LEGO is no walk in the park.

According to a 2013 article in the Wall Street Journal that delved into the process of becoming a LEGO designer, applicants traveled from all over the world to the company’s headquarters in Billund, Denmark, to compete for the job. Hailing from Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, and beyond, the pre-screened applicants performed in an impromptu build-off where they were judged by everything from their creation’s build-ability and imagination to how they interacted with the other builders. Out of the 21 people who competed for the position, only eight were selected for the job. While every not position with LEGO has quite such a rigorous bar to entry, the company’s high standards, and the competition for their jobs is evident. But if you are still undaunted, why not look into some of these positions.

Job: Head of Large Scale Model Design
Where: Kladno, Czech Republic

article-image

(Photo: swimfinfan/CC BY-SA 2.0)

In a nutshell: Ever see those large-scale LEGO models at malls or comic-cons that use an unfathomable amount of bricks to create a life-size Batman, or scale model of the Sphinx? Well this job lets you come up with, design, and implement such monumental, one of a kind builds. You would get to play with an infinite amount of LEGOs to build things as large and crazy as you can imagine.

Job: Environmental Consultant
Where: Nyíregyháza, Hungary

article-image

(Photo: Brian Rinker/CC BY 2.0)

In a nutshell: Work with the LEGO factory in Nyíregyháza, which produces all of the company’s DUPLO blocks, among others, to make sure that it continues to meet local environmental and sustainability standards. Work with LEGO AND do something good for the planet. Win-win.

Job: Senior Concept Artist
Where: Billund, Denmark

article-image

(Photo: Zaneology/CC BY 2.0)

In a nutshell: Become one of the driving creative forces in the LEGO machine, by working with playset designers, scriptwriters, and just about every other position in the LEGO creation pipeline to invent brand new LEGO product lines. Essentially anyone in this position would get to help create their dream LEGO project from start to finish.

Job: Freeform Designer
Where: Shenzen, China

article-image

(Photo: Kenny Louie/CC BY 2.0)

In a nutshell: This job is for all about bringing new LEGO brick products from the computer into the real world. It asks that you use your experience as a designer to make sure that LEGOs new bricks can be manufactured correctly and efficiently. If the artist’s can dream it, you get to build it.

Job: Engineer for Technical Design of LEGO Bricks
Where: Billund, Denmark

article-image

(Photo: marie-lyse briffaud/CC BY-SA 2.0)

In a nutshell: This job asks engineers to take designs and work them into real 3D models using structural design software, helping LEGO bricks move from conception to production. In the position, you’d get to study and refine LEGOs on a brick-by-brick basis, making sure they are both safe and how best to manufacture them.

 

An Australian Island Paradise's Century-Long Rat War

0
0
article-image

A group of ratters on Lord Howe Island, holding their kill by the tail. (Photo: Courtesy of the Lord Howe Island Museum)

When the Lord Howe stick insect limped back into the limelight from the brink of extinction 15 years ago, the event sparked renewed celebrations of biodiversity on Lord Howe Island, the insect's native home off the east coast of Australia. Tributes to the charismatic “tree lobster” or “walking sausage” proliferated and even included an animated documentary featuring “Stickyas the lead. Yet behind every fêting of Lord Howe’s endemism lurks an uninvited guest: Rattus rattus, the common black rat.

Over the past century, Lord Howe Island residents, the local state government, and even the U.S. Department of Commerce—aided by a flock of barn owls—have waged a multipronged, multispecies war on these invasive rats.Their efforts were united in the name of ecological and economic protectionism, with one species in particular garnering the most attention: the kentia palm.

article-image

Lord Howe Island, off the east coast of Australia. (Photo: Public Domain)

Whereas black rats have staked a claim to every continent on the planet, the elegant kentia palm (Howeaforsteriana)is native only to Lord Howe. Originally known as the “thatch palm” for its use in thatched roofing in island homes, by the late 1800s the kentia had become a horticultural icon and specimen plant for greenhouses and ballrooms around the world, an accolade that endured well into the 20th century.

“Society in every civilized city of the world demands these palms for decorative purposes,” wrote the Los Angeles Times in 1929. “These dainty little palms in pots and tubs give a freshness and grace to every occasion.” Unlike tropical palms, kentias evolved in Lord Howe’s temperate climate, rendering them adaptable to lower humidity, less light, and cooler temperatures—prime for export to the Western market.  

article-image

Foliage and palms on Lord Howe Island. (Photo: Ian Cochrane/CC BY 2.0)

Ecological disaster struck Lord Howe on June 15, 1918, the day the SS Makambo ran aground near Neds Beach and wallowed for over a week. While repairs were made to the vessel, stowaway rats drifted aboard flotsam and jetsam towards the beach. Once ashore, they discovered a cornucopia of tasty delights: land snails, spiders, the eggs of flightless birds, and every endemic morsel in between. To date, rodents are credited with the extinction of five species of birds and 13 invertebrates on Lord Howe, and would have been guilty of exterminating the giant stick insect had a handful of the limby creatures not survived beneath a bush on Ball’s Pyramid, a razor-sharp volcanic stack 12 miles southeast of Lord Howe.

article-image

A Lord Howe Island stick insect. (Photo: Granitethighs/CC BY-SA 3.0)

For the palm industry, the arrival of rats was devastating. “The seeders quickly noticed that the rats were eating the green seed at a rate of knots,” says islander Jack Shick, who comes from a long line of palm harvesters and now operates Sea to Summit Expeditions, a fishing and hiking outfitter. Indeed a contemporary article in the Royal Botanic Gardens’ Kew Bulletin, reveals that in the seven years following the rats’ arrival, the palm crop was decimated by a whopping 80 percent, from 4,494 bushels in 1919 to just 877 bushels in 1925.

To protect their livelihoods and the palm seed business, the Lord Howe Island Board distributed light shotguns and levied a bounty on the rats, prompting many islanders to moonlight as ratters. At six pence per tail, “a reasonable living could be made ratting with a couple of terrier dogs and a shotgun,” wrote local author Kerry McFadyen in her book Pinetrees: Lord Howe Island 1842-1992.  

Payment for culled rats came intermittently, but stockpiling dead rats until payday in a subtropical climate was a stinky proposition. More often than not, hunters would remove rat from tail, trash the former and organize the latter in matchboxes. In essence rattails became an alternate currency. (One probably apocryphal story tells of a family slipping a bundle of rattails into the offertory at church in lieu of coins.)

article-image

Bundles of rats' tails, organized into matchboxes. (Photo: Courtesy of the Lord Howe Island Museum)

Jack Shick grew up hearing the ratter lore from his elders, many of whom kept fox terriers (“foxies”) for rat hunting. “The dogs would find a burrow, then the hunter would screw up some fiber from the palm tree and light a fire in it. The flames were fanned with an old hat to force smoke down the burrow. The dogs would wait at the exits until the smoke became too much and the rats would run out... into the waiting mouth of a dog!” If the rat tried to escape his smoky grave by scampering up a tree, the hunter would be ready with a shotgun.

Anticipating that the rat-hunting bonanza might need a boost, in 1927 the U.S. Department of Commerce dispatched a flock of barn owls from San Diego to Lord Howe. (At the time California nurseries were a major importer of kentias.) There the American owls joined the raptorial ranks of Australian barn owls and Tasmanian masked owls, fellow draftees in the war on rats.

American newspapers covered the event with bellicose glee: “Native Owls Off to War On Rats,” wrote the New York Times, while The Washington Post praised the owls’ fearsome “war hoot.” It wasn’t just the palm seeds that the owls were meant to rescue, but the people whose livelihoods depended on the sale of those seeds. “It is up to the old-time barn owl to play the hero then and save the inhabitants,” wrote the Post.

Thanks to the combined efforts of both ratters and owls, the seed harvests leapt from a paltry 955 bushels in 1926 to 3,037 bushels the following year. The owls were effective if indiscriminate mercenaries in their hunting of both rats and flightless woodhens. (The Post somewhat presciently surmised that if the owls were successful, the islanders might find themselves in the “embarrassing position of having to shoot their benefactors.”)

article-image

The view across Lord Howe Island. (Photo: patchtok/CC BY 2.0)

In the years following World War II, the trade in palm seeds took a backseat to the blossoming tourism sector, and the focus on pest control shifted from palm protectionism to conservation of Lord Howe’s delicate biosphere as a whole. By the 1940s steel spring-back traps were commonplace, and in the 1950s the aptly named warfarin rat poison came on the scene.

Today the rodenticide coumatetralyl is used at roughly 2000 bait stations scattered through the settlement area. “The rats have the other 90 percent of the island to roam and wreak havoc on seeds, roots, lizards, bird eggs, birds, beetles, snails, spiders, etc.” says naturalist and author Ian Hutton, who has written several books on Lord Howe’s endemism and leads eco-tours of the island.“This is why a rodent eradication proposal is being looked at now.”

In 2017, an ambitious aerial-baiting program will launch with the goal of ridding the island of rats once and for all and restoring balance to the island ecosystem. “The driver for rodent eradication all along has been to protect the island’s biodiversity,” says Hutton. “The economic benefit of palm seed protection was just the initial carrot.”

Lord Howe Island may soon be free of the chronic threat of rodents, just in time for the centennial anniversary of the stranding of the SS Makambo and the arrival of rats on Lord Howe. It only took a hundred years’ war.   

Found: An Incredibly Rare and Giant Violet Diamond

0
0
article-image

That's a very large greyish bluish violet diamond. (Photo: Rio Tinto)

Diamonds, most famously, are colorless and sparkly. But some diamonds, either because of chemical impurities or structural differences at the molecular level, have color. Among these rare diamonds are pink diamonds—most of which have been turned up at just one mine, in Western Australia. Now, that same mine has coughed up an even rarer violet diamond, the largest the mine has ever produced.

In its original, rough state, the diamond was more than 9 carats; after being cut and polished, it is 2.83 carats—more than twice the size of the largest violet diamond this mine, the Rio Tinto Argyle mine, had previously produced.

Colored diamonds are graded on a different color scale than regular colorless to yellowish diamonds; they’re described with a degree of saturation and a color. This one has a “fancy deep” saturation and a “bluish violet” color (as opposed to violetish-blue or just violet) and a tinge of grey. So, officially, it’s a Fancy Deep Grayish Bluish Violet diamond.

Bonus finds: Boiling Mars water

Every day, we highlight one newly found object, curiosity or wonder. Discover something amazing? Tell us about it! Send your finds to sarah.laskow@atlasobscura.com. 

The Weird History Of The Space Blanket

0
0

article-image

The mysterious "Black Knight Satellite"—or, a space blanket that escaped from NASA and reinvigorated a decades-old conspiracy theory. (Photo: NASA/Public Domain)

Over the past year, over a million refugees landed on the shores of Europe, seeking asylum, aid, and, eventually, a new life.

Initially, at least, they got something else: A golden, crinkly space blanket.

Where disaster strikes, space blankets follow. Cheap, lightweight, and great at containing body heat, they are an indispensable first aid tool, used to warm people up after they've suffered through a shark attack, overexposure, or a treacherous sea crossing. The 2005 earthquake that devastated the Middle East inspired a stateside hiker to get 150,000 space blankets sent to Pakistan. After last year's Paris attacks, photos showed shocked survivors draped in the gold fabric, gleaming in the dark.

Space blankets look the way they do for practical reasons: they're made out of plastic and thinly layered with vaporized aluminum, to maximize reflective capabilities while minimizing weight. But their incongruous appearance has given them additional, symbolic utility. As the refugee crisis continues, leaving them strewn across Greek and Italian beaches like strange jellyfish, they've become irresistible to artists, who have turned them into banners, moving sculptures, and, most controversially, celebrity outerwear.

article-image

"Emergency Thermal Blanket," by Dionisis Christofilogiannis, recreates the Greek stripes and cross using space blankets. (Photo: Dionisis Christofilogiannis)

For another segment of the population, though, one particular space blanket has never been just a space blanket. It has a starring role in a Space Age conspiracy theory known as the Black Knight Satellite.

As with most long-lasting conspiracy theories, the Black Knight is a kind of catchall—it has no set identity, mythos, or sequence of events. Some think the entity—which manifests most often as a mysterious object in the sky—is an ancient Chinese technology, or an evil sort of ego incarnate; others don't care what it is, as long as it's real. A true believer will tell you it started about 13,000 years ago, when an alien civilization sent a satellite to circle Earth, for unknown but nefarious reasons, and for a limitless length of time. Others say it first made itself known in 1923, when it contacted Nicolai Tesla through a wireless receiver he built in Arizona (Tesla himself thought he was hearing from Martians). Still others tie it to mysterious radio echoes first heard in 1927, or trace it back to the 1960s, when Cold War panic turned every piece of space debris into a "dark satellite."

But one thing is for certain. While most mystery satellites burned up in the collective consciousness in the late 1960s, the Black Knight returned with a vengeance in 1998—all thanks to a space blanket.

article-image

The loose space blanket floats above the earth. (Image: NASA/Public Domain

Before space blankets were human first-aid essentials, they were basically interstellar ponchos, designed to shield Earth-built machines from the harsh environment of space. First deployed in 1973 to keep Skylab from overheating, they're now an essential part of most crafts, custom-cut to fit everything from the Hubble Space Telescope to the 2005 Titan probe. "Space blankets are to spacecraft as clothes are to people," Mike Weiss, a Hubble manager, said in 2007. Basically, don't leave the home planet without them.

So in December of 1998, when six astronauts flew the NASA shuttle Endeavour up to the International Space Station, they brought along four space blankets, explains James Oberg, a former NASA Mission Control operative, science writer, and expert space conspiracy debunker. The team was tasked with with attaching the new American-made module to the existing Russian one, thus making the station truly international. After the successful attachment, some of the module's trunnion pins—long metal rods that had attached it to the shuttle during transport —would suddenly be naked. Bare metal sticking out of a spacecraft acts like a hatless head in the winter, leaking heat out into space. So the team had brought space blankets to tuck in the trunnions, insulating them.

Space walks are tricky, though. At some point during the task, Jerry Ross, given several extra blankets to hold after he got ahead of schedule, dropped one. Video footage shows it flapping from his wrist; though the camera switches perspective before the blanket comes loose, one can easily imagine it drifting away, like a silvery balloon slowly slipping out of a child's hand. "Jerry, one of the thermal covers got away from you," radios Commander Robert Cabana from inside. "How did it do that?" Ross asks, with audible frustration. "Where'd it go? I don't believe this." They watch it float off, and discuss whether to attempt a retrieval.

But there was no getting it back. After radioing the news to mission control, someone in the shuttle began snapping photos of the runaway blanket. NASA gave it an official object number (025570), as they do with all sizeable pieces of space debris. After a couple of days spent in near-earth orbit, the blanket disappeared. Most likely it took a last dive through the atmosphere, and burned up.

But its symbolic life was just beginning. "After decades of no interest, some people found some pictures from the mission," says Oberg. It isn't clear exactly who resurfaced them, but even a quick glance at one of the images is enough to explain why they did. In some images, the blanket hangs just beneath the edge of the earth; in others, it swims across the clouds like a strange-angled shark. If there were a 13,000 year old alien satellite, it would probably look just like this. "That blanket is undoubtably the weirdest-looking whatzit people have seen in a space picture," says Oberg. "It definitely looks like something Klingon."

 

#cinemaforpeace Berlin

A photo posted by Ai Weiwei (@aiww) on

Attracted by this new photo evidence, all the old Black Knight stories zoomed together again, like scattered filings to a magnet. Ominously scored YouTube videos popped up, moving from Tesla through the Cold War and straight on to the blanket. Redditors and other forum truthers shared political theories and shroom-tinged encounters. Weirdly, even Pepsi jumped on the bandwagon, producing a short film about the conspiracy that came out last year.

In the mid 2010s, after speaking with Ross, Oberg publicly diagnosed the strange photos as blanket shots. Most mentions of the Black Knight now have this debunking baked in (sometimes in the form of a brusque "its a blanket")—but despite this explanation, many remain in the Knight's thrall.

Oberg, who has spent years trying to fathom why people cling to conspiracies, thinks he understands. After all, the blanket's material, color, and even its shape are designed for otherworldy purposes. Outer space provides few perspective markers—a posterboard-sized blanket, shot at close range against the Earth's surface, is hard to distinguish from, say, a huge alien machine photographed from far-off. "If you're not used to looking for these unearthly clues," Oberg says, "it's absolutely normal that people would freak out."

The blanket's meaning isn't fixed as an earthbound object, either. "The first time I saw migrants wearing thermal blankets," writes Greek artist Dionisis Christofilogiannis in an email, "I had the feeling I saw gold flags fluttering." For others, they spur despair and disenchantment: "We are still pulling bodies from the water wrapped in material which was meant to send us into space," writes artist James Bridle in a recent blog post. It seems that in the sky or on the ground, the shiny fabric is really more of a lightning rod. 

Olympic Flame Lands On Brazilian Runway

0
0

Picturing the Olympic torch conjures up grand images: a flame held aloft by sweaty runners, moving from city to city, cheered by uproarious crowds until it reaches its final destination. This year, in the lead-up to Brazil's summer games, 12,000 torchbearers will spend three months relaying the beacon throughout the country.

But before the flame can start its dramatic handheld journey, it has to fly coach just like anyone else. Early this morning, the flame landed in Brasilia aboard a TAM jet. Early Reuters footage shows organizing committee president Carlos Nuzman walking down the mobile stairway holding a gleaming safety lantern, with the official fire trapped safely inside.

This incarnation of the flame was originally lit in Athens in late April. It was relayed through Greece, and then traveled to Switzerland, where it made an appearance at UN Headquarters before heading to the Olympic Museum via eight-man rowing boat. Yesterday, it boarded the plane to head to Brazil.

According to Yahoo Sports, many Brazilians are more airplane-staircase-level excited about the torch relay than they are 12,000-person-relay-level excited. "The games themselves have not attracted that much attention," Juliana Barbassa told the outlet. People are more concerned with the country's fluctuating currency, the Zika virus, and the potential impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff.

Rousseff spoke at the opening ceremony this morning in Maracanã. "This flame can be a guide for humanity," she told guests and viewers, according to Around the Rings. If nothing else, it's probably racked up crazy frequent flier miles.

Every day, we track down a fleeting wonder—something amazing that's only happening right now. Have a tip for us? Tell us about it! Send your temporary miracles to cara@atlasobscura.com.


A Mother's Day Gift Idea from Imperial Russia

0
0
article-image

(Photos: The Walters Art Museum/Creative Commons)

When your mother's a dowager empress, it can be hard to find a gift for her that's impressive and original. Faced with this situation in 1901, Russian Tsar Nicholas II came up with a novel idea: he tasked a master craftsman with putting his mom's house in an egg.

Inside the hand-painted, five-inch-tall enamel egg is a tiny golden replica of Gatchina, the palace southwest of St. Petersburg where the royals resided in winter. The details of the miniature Gatchina were rendered with extraordinary care. Fabergé egg artist Mikhail Perkhin sculpted itty-bitty lampposts, cannons, and foliage to adorn the mini manor. 

article-image

(Photo: The Walters Art Museum/Creative Commons)

Nicholas II presented this gift to his mother, Maria Feodorovna, for Easter 1901. By that time, the yearly handing over of a Fabergé egg was a long-established tradition within the Russian Imperial family. It had begun in 1885, when Nicholas II's father, Tsar Alexander III, commissioned a jeweled egg with a golden hen inside as the 20th anniversary of his nuptials to Maria Feodorovna approached.

The tsar and tsarina were so delighted with the execution of this golden egg that Alexander III continued to order a Fabergé egg for his wife every year, always with a new surprise inside. After Alexander III died in 1894, Nicholas II continued the tradition for his mother.

In all, over 50 Fabergé eggs were made for the Imperial family between 1885 and 1916—after which the Russian Revolution put an end to the tradition. The Gatchina Palace egg, now kept at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, is among the most intricate and impressive. Other stand-outs include the 1897 Coronation Egg, which contained a working replica of a royal golden carriage, and the 1906 Moscow Kremlin egg, an elaborate mini cathedral that stands over 14 inches tall and contains two chiming clocktowers. 

Object of Intrigue is a weekly column in which we investigate the story behind a curious item. Is there an object you want to see covered? Email ella@atlasobscura.com

Safe Zones For Exchanging Internet Purchases Are Popping Up Around the U.S.

0
0
article-image

Go ahead and buy things from strangers without worry at spots like this South Carolina safe zone. (Photo: North Charleston/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Finally found that perfect used bike on Craigslist, but a little skeeved out by meeting the seller IRL? Well thanks to internet purchase safe zones, you’ve got nothing to fear. These safely surveilled areas for exchange are popping up in towns across America, the latest of which is in Denton, North Carolina.

According to TheDispatch.com, the new Denton safe zone was inspired by a similar safe space in the North Carolina town of Apex, which set aside a parking spot outside its police station as a point of exchange. These safe spaces are generally established in highly visible spots that are monitored by cameras so that no funny business can go unrecorded. In the case of the Denton safe area, it is located across the street from a farmer’s market pavilion, and marked off by a sign post.

One of the biggest issues with these safe spaces seems to be that people don’t know they are there. A safe internet exchange zone in Marlborough, Massachusetts was established in early 2016, but according to police officials, it has only been used a couple of times. (In case you are wondering if there is such a safe space near you, there is a growing database site, Safe Trade Stations, that can help you find out.)

As unregulated internet commerce and trade continues to grow, the likelihood of getting hoodwinked or worse when meeting an unknown seller, grows as well. So it’s little surprise that these Internet exchange spaces are quickly becoming a standard location in towns across America. The next step is for people to actually use them.

Watch These Chemicals Create Trippy Colorful Patterns

0
0

A puff of smoke. Billowing clouds. Blobs of wax in a lava lamp. The neon blue and green undulating chemicals glowing under ultraviolet light evoke the imagination.

In a lab in Paris, a group of artists plays with chemical reactions in a project called Chemical Bouillon to get these wild and colorful visual displays. They use all kinds of strange and common products to form patterns that sometimes look similar to objects and phenomena in our natural world.

This video of blue and green fluorescein—a dark orange powder commonly used as a fluorescent marker when dissolved—is a part of Chemical Bouillon’s most recent series of UV dye videos. When added to water, alcohol, or other solvents, the fluorescein creates a smoky quality.

At the 20-second mark, the dye gives off small puffs, but it quickly expands like smoke filling a room.

Aside from creating psychedelic patterns, the non-toxic, biodegradable powder has a lot of different practical uses. It helps ophthalmologists with detecting corneal injuries, doctors with administering angiograms, and aerospace engineers in tracking landed space shuttles in the ocean. You can even create these trippy patterns yourself by extracting fluorescein from highlighters.

This video shows how to do it safely:

In other videos in Chemical Bouillon’s UV dye series, the dyes resemble molten magma, mushrooms, and kelp forests. Check out Chemical Bouillon’s entire video collection to see all kinds of beautiful, abstract patterns. For now, you can enjoy these highlights.

Purple ink reacts with alcohol and hydrocarbons.

Viscous fluids on repulsive surfaces. This was Chemical Bouillon's first experiment with hydrophobic surfaces.

Blue ink that the artists' describe as "intergalactic space travel."

Growing fractal trees.

Every day we track down a Video Wonder: an audiovisual offering that delights, inspires, and entertains. Have you encountered a video we should feature? Email ella@atlasobscura.com.

The Kati Roll Can Be Traced Back to One Kolkata Restaurant

0
0

article-image

 A stack of kati rolls served on a plate in Kolkata. (Photo: Satyajit Dhawale (Satyajit888)/CC BY-SA 4.0)

Behold, the kati roll: the spicy street wrap that is springing up in cities all over the world. It is not unusual to see revelers heading to a kati roll stand at the end of a night out in Manhattan, or besuited office workers standing patiently in lunch lines at kati roll spots in London. 

The kati roll was invented in the first half of the 20th century in the city of Kolkata, India, and its origins can actually be traced back to a single restaurant, known as Nizam's. At the time of the kati roll's conception, Kolkata was the capital of the British Empire. The story goes that British patrons did not want to eat kebabs with their hands, so someone at Nizam's decided to roll the meat up in a paratha–a crispy, buttery unleavened flatbread–and then serve it in a paper wrapper. 

Although no official version of this story exists, it is generally agreed upon that the kati roll concept came out of Nizam's. Nizam's began as a stall vending kebabs and parathas, and expanded into a brick-and-mortar restaurant in 1932. In fact, the restaurant is still going strong in the city's New Market area, and continues to be considered one of the best places in the city for a kati roll.

article-image

A kati roll being prepared in a street vendor's stall in Kolkata, India. (Photo: Scott Dexter/CC BY-SA 2.0)

The new snack quickly gained popularity among the masses. In its original form, a kati roll consisted of skewer-roasted kebabs wrapped in paratha, layered with eggs and topped with chutney. Soon, vegetarian filling options such as paneer and chickpeas were offered as an alternative to kebab meat. As food critic Vir Sanghvi writes in an essay about kati rolls, a kati roll is a dish in itself–not a wrap designed as a means to eat kebabs on the run.

At some point in the 1960s, Nizam's swapped out the traditional metal skewers used to cook the kebab meat for bamboo ones. The heavy iron skewers, though long-lasting, were too expensive to buy in the amount necessary to meet the growing demand. It was the new bamboo sticks used to replace the iron skewers which led to the name, "kati roll," as the word kathi in Bengali means "stick."

Before the kati roll found sophisticated new digs in cities around the world, it was most commonly seen at street vendors in Kolkata, which embraced the dish after Nizam's popularized it. Indeed, the dish finds its finest form when it is cooked in front of diners. After you place your order at one such stall, the cook rolls out the dough onto a flat griddle or pan known as the tawa, cracks an egg onto it, and rolls in the spicy fillings. The whole thing is wrapped in paper and presented to you piping hot, in a matter of minutes from when you placed your order.

article-image

Kati rolls are made by wrapping a hot egg paratha around either kebab meat or vegetables–the perfect snack food. (Photo: Josiah Lau Photography/CC BY-ND 2.0)

While the kati roll rapidly gained popularity in Kolkata for its delicious range of fillings and its portability, it did not really get similar traction in other Indian cities. As Sanghvi explains, other cities each have their own version of the roll–such as the Frankie roll in Mumbai and the Khan Chacha roll in Delhi, which have little in common with the original Nizami roll from Kolkata. 

When the kati roll crossed Indian borders, however, it was a different story: the delicacy caught on like wildfire. Businesswoman Payal Saha, who hails from Kolkata, lays claim to being the first person to bring the kati roll concept to the United States. Saha owns popular Kati Roll Company chain of restaurants, which she established in 2002. There are now three outlets in Manhattan, and one in London.

Following the kati roll's introduction to the United States, new storefronts that specialize in the snack have opened at a brisk pace. If you're lucky enough to have one near you, stop by to grab a taste of what made Nizam's famous all those years ago.

The Kentucky Derby Puts the Mad Hatter to Shame

0
0
article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

“I’m out of my mind—Oh my god, I hardly know my name. It’s crazy, always crazy this time of year. It’s hat Christmas.”

That’s Gena Conti, the owner of Gena Conti Millinery, speaking over the phone five days before the 2016 Kentucky Derby. This week is when the final custom-made hats get shipped straight to ladies’ hotel rooms, and Derby-goers wait to don the elaborate hats and fascinators for all to see.

article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

The Kentucky Derby, first held in Louisville in 1875, was first inspired by European horse races. The term “derbies” goes back to the 18th century and typically describes a race for three year-old horses, and the Kentucky Derby has become known in the U.S. as “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports.”

But what sets it apart from every other sporting events is the head decoration—the “chance for every female to express her inner Southern Belle,” as the official website states.

article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

“The Kentucky Derby is theater, a grand, glorious stage that is now 142 years young,” says Sally Steinmann, a milliner and the owner of Maggie Mae Designs, a one-woman business in Massachusetts. 

“From the fantastic to the sublime, there are no rules or limits when it comes to choosing your Derby hat,” says the Derby website. Many women who don extraordinary hats, however, prefer to keep the rest of their outfit simple, so as to not distract from the brilliance of their hats. 

article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

Derby hats are all about expressing creativity and individuality—through flowers, feathers, and color coordination with the rest of your outfit. We’re not so much talking about large-brimmed hats decorated with World of Warcraft figurines or featuring an intricate diorama of Beyoncé’s Super Bowl Halftime Show. It’s more a matter of choosing flowers or feathers to craft an elegant garden or aviary, possibly ornamented with veiling, bows, and ribbon.

“The idea is that you don’t run into yourself at the Derby,” says Conti. “God forbid your hat look like somebody else’s.” Milliners like Conti and Steinmann craft their hats by hand, one at a time.

article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

But you’ve got options. You can have your hat made by a professional milliner, or buy one from a department store, Etsy, or Amazon. Some ambitious hat fans even design and make their own headpieces for horse races, tea parties, garden parties, church and social events. 

Dee’s, a craft and gift store in Louisville, Kentucky, has offered hat-making classes for around 20 years. Though their store sees a huge swell in business at Christmas, Derby is in fact their biggest season, says Kathy Olliges, the store’s owner. The season starts in January, hat-making classes take place in February and March, and everything quickly crescendos to the second Saturday in May; this year, Dee’s designed 2,500 hats.

article-image

(Photo: MAGGIE MAE DESIGNS®)

Interestingly, despite the Derby being a historic ground for cultural and racial conflict, politics and opinions don’t make it onto people’s heads. It’s very much about style, not statement. Most women go for a classic look, “one that embodies elegance and innovation achieved through color, design and balance,” says Steinmann.

article-image

(Photo: Dee’s of Louisville)

However, she adds, “It is possible that some women have worn Derby hats with a conscious intention of making certain political or culturally significant statements.” Steinmann also thinks it is impossible to separate what one calls “fashion” from one's sociopolitical identities—rather, they are often intertwined and mutually inform one another in very complex ways.

article-image

(Photo: Dee’s of Louisville)

Perhaps its easiest to simply enjoy Derby hats, then, as pieces of art. Perhaps they’ll provide you with inspiration in the case that you ever find yourself in Louisville on the second Saturday of May.

Viewing all 11437 articles
Browse latest View live




Latest Images