Category Archives: America

Color Footage of London, 1927

This is archive footage based on images captured by Claude Frisse-Greene, an early British pioneer of film. Nearly 90 years ago, he created a series of travelogues using a color process developed by his father William Frisse-Greene, a British portrait photographer and a well known inventor. His experiments in the field of motion pictures led him to be known as one of the fathers of cinematography.

One of William’s inventions was an additive color film process known as “Biocolour”, a rather cumbersome early color process. It works by exposing every other frame of standard black-and-white film through a different-colored filter, and then staining the resulting monochrome prints either red or green. In a motion picture projection, the combined frames create an illusion of real color.

Using computer enhancement, the British Film Institute reduced the flickering seen in the original footage.

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Chuck Yeager Turns 90

One of the greatest and most inspiring living Americans, US Air Force Major General (ret.) Chuck Yeager is celebrating his 90th birthday today. He still lives in California, and I hear he is still keeping his pilot’s license current.


[P.S.: Chuck Yeager passed away on December 7, 2020].


Chuck Yeager’s autobiography, Yeager is one of my favorite books, and I own several, slightly tattered copies. (It was co-written with Leo Janos, a speechwriter and ghostwriter who was known for writing speeches for the President Lyndon Johnson. He authored and co-authored notable books including Skunk Works – A Personal Memoir Of My Years At Lockheed).

Yeager is a captivating account not only of the man’s boyhood and military flying career, but also an insight into the mindset and values of the generation of pilots who ushered in the jet age, built the U.S. Air Force, and fought the Cold War.

yeagerbook
The first edition of Yeager was published by Bantam in 1985, but it is still in print as paperback.

In 1989, a follow-up appeared: Press On – Further Adventures In the Good Life (co-written by former Newsweek editor Charles Leerhsen and Yeager) deals mostly with the legendary pilot’s life after retirement and his love for fishing, hunting and backpacking.

Charles Yeager on Wikipedia.

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Obama The Skeet Shooter

In an effort to show that US President Obama is not an enemy of all gun owners, the White House released a picture of the president using a shotgun at Camp David. (Sources who were present at the time the picture was taken reported it was a five minute affair, and the president appeared visibly uncomfortable during the photo-op). The picture came with a stern warning not to photoshop or alter it. Of course, it did not take long …

 

 

 

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Ernest Hemingway Playing In The Snow

One of my heroes, Ernest Hemingway playing in the snow. On the reverse of this print, Papa wrote: “This is to re-assure you if you hear reports of another of your authors dying of drink.” Signed, “Ernest Hemingway, Feb 1927.

Photo Credit: Ernest Hemingway Photograph Collection, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston. Click to enlarge.

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US Marines Volunteering To Guard Schools

In the aftermath of the Sandy Hook school massacre, reports are coming in from several cities in which US Marine Corps reservists, retirees and active duty personnel are standing uniformed guard in front of elementary schools.

They are unarmed volunteers and strive to greet and reassure the kids coming to school each day. Some have said they will keep this up for weeks or as long as needed. I don’t know where this got started, but it seems to be a spreading.

This too, is America.


Sorry, I have no photographer credit for the image.

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You Are Here

Click to enlarge.

This is the current map of the Milky Way, as best we can make it out from our viewpoint inside. Our home galaxy has about 200 billion to perhaps 500 billion other stars beside our own. Orbiting them are billions to trillions of planets and moons. And that’s just one of billions of galaxies in the universe.

We cannot take pictures of our galaxy, so this image is a model. It is based primarily on results from the Galactic Legacy Infrared Mid-Plane Survey Extraordinaire (GLIMPSE) and the Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer Galactic Plane Survey (MIPSGAL). Both are key projects for the infrared Spitzer Space Telescope. This particular image was released on June 3, 2008 at the 212th meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

I hope your head is spinning. (It should be).

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Never Will I Falter

America’s entire East Coast is under assault from “Frankenstorm” Sandy tonight.

All of New York is shut down, partially flooded, and half the city has lost power. Nine state governors have declared emergencies and millions of residents are without electricity and under evacuation orders.

In the middle of all this, a sleeper story of human resilience and determination has taken the social media by storm.

Since midnight of July 2, 1937, the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery has been guarded around the clock, without any interruptions. In 1948, guard duty was assigned to the U.S. Army’s 3rd Infantry Regiment, also known as “The Old Guard“. Since then, they have been true to their credo to “never falter”. Never have the remains of the soldiers buried at the tomb been left alone.

On their Twitter feed and Facebook page, the Old Guard has made it clear that come Sandy, they have no intention of abandoning their post. Their Facebook statement from Monday reads:

“The Sentinels at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier maintain their vigil even as Hurricane Sandy bears down on the Eastern Seaboard. The Old Guard has guarded the tomb every minute of every day since April 6, 1948. Today will be no exception.”

The message widely resonated in a nation full of doubt, uncertainty and crisis. And now, as the outpouring of encouraging social media postings indicates, the Old Guard clearly have a cross section of America high-fiving and rooting for them.

Here is a photo taken during a storm last month. (I could not determine who the photographer was. Internet users have mistakenly connected the picture with Sandy).

Inspiring indeed!

The Old Guard on Twitter
The Old Guard on Facebook

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