This slide show posted on YouTube turns out to be a good overview of the historic La Posada Hotel in Winslow, Ariz.

Quick idea:
If, after dehydrating your potatoes, you still have more you need to put by, make hash browns! Grate the potatoes with a cheese grater, spread them out on a cookie sheet or plastic cutting board, freeze until solid, then transfer the potatoes to a freezer bag. (The potatoes stuck somthin’ fierce to my nonstick cookie sheet, so next time I’ll probably line it with parchment paper.)
When you’re ready to make hash browns, melt butter in a hot skillet, break up the potatoes in the bag first, then pour them in the skillet. Do not stir the potatoes; just smash them down with a metal spatula and patiently wait for them to brown. Then flip and brown the other side. And voila! Ore-Ida, Oklavore style.

Do you any other ideas for preserving potatoes? Have you had luck freezing potato soup? Once I froze shepherd’s pie, which—once thawed—rendered it a disgusting, inedible mess. So, I’m hesitant to freeze cooked potatoes. Also, do you put ketchup on your hash browns? I’ll pass on the ketchup, but I love to place a slightly runny fried egg atop my crispy hash browns. I know what I’m having for breakfast tomorrow!

Pipe Shrine House, Mesa Verde

When I visited Mesa Verde this summer, I noticed a rather odd sandstone block at Pipe Shrine House, one of the mesa-top sites known collectively as the Far View Group.  These sites, like many others in the park, were excavated by Jesse Walter Fewkes in the early twentieth century, and documentation of the work done on them is correspondingly sparse.

Sandstone Block with Spiral Petroglyph at Pipe Shrine House, Mesa Verde

The block in question has a spiral pecked into it.  Not a whole spiral, though; rather, the middle of a spiral, with the upper and lower parts missing, as if the block were cut from a cliff face where a spiral petroglyph had been pecked.  Indeed, the only really plausible way to explain the block is that it was indeed cut from such a cliff face.

Block Incised with Zigzag Lines at Coyote Village, Mesa Verde

This is very odd.  I’ve never seen anything quite like it elsewhere.  There are a few other sites in the Far View Group that have blocks with designs on them, mostly parallel lines, but those are generally incised and they don’t bear much resemblance to common petroglyph designs.  They don’t show any particular evidence of the designs having been present on the stones before they were cut, either.  The spiral, though, is a very common type of petroglyph, and the Pipe Shrine block remains very puzzling.  Who cut that block?  Where?  Why?

Incised Parallel Lines in Building Block at Far View Tower, Mesa Verde

It’s very hard to say.  The fact that the block is at the top of the current wall strongly suggests that it was not originally part of the site.  In sites like this the top stones are generally modern capping put on with cement to protect the original walls beneath.  The spiral block, then, was almost certainly put on in the twentieth century.  It may have been put on by Fewkes himself after he excavated the site; recent dendrochronological research at the Sun Temple, which Fewkes also excavated and stabilized, has shown that he did a substantial amount of rebuilding there, and it’s quite plausible that he did the same at Pipe Shrine House.  If it wasn’t Fewkes, it was probably some later Park Service stabilization crew.

Plaque Describing Work by J. Walter Fewkes at Far View House, Mesa Verde

Regardless of who put the stone where it is now, though, the bigger question is where they got it, and how.  The mystery is amplified by the fact that Mesa Verde is known for having relatively few petroglyphs compared to many other areas with comparable ancient populations.  The stone looks like the same Cliff House Sandstone (Mesa Verde Formation) as the other stones in the wall, although its patina seems to be a slightly different color, which may or may not be relevant to its origin.  There’s no reason to think it comes from anywhere other than Mesa Verde, but that makes it all the more inexplicable that Fewkes or anyone else would have cut into one of the few petroglyph panels on the mesa for building stone when there are few things in the area more plentiful than sandstone.  I’m no expert on Mesa Verde, of course, so it’s quite possible that the story of this stone is well-known or at least published somewhere in the voluminous literature on the archaeology of the area, but if so I haven’t seen any reference to it.  It’s just very puzzling, and I don’t have a clue what the answer is.

Vent at Sun Temple, Mesa Verde

The old Pevely Dairy Plant, on the more-obscure Chouteau Avenue alignment of Route 66 in St. Louis, was named to the National Register of Historic Places effective Nov. 18, according to an e-mail from the National Park Service.

Pevely Dairy, especially its ice cream, was a St. Louis institution for more than a century. But Pevely Dairy laid off all its workers about a year ago and shut down the plant. Pevely remains as a division of Prairie Farms. Jim Fox wrote this nostalgic article in the Suburban Journals about Pevely’s long presence in the community.

It was announced in January that a developer had purchased the complex weeks after the layoffs, but one of the factory buildings was destroyed in a fire in March.

More pictures of the fire can be seen here. A video of the building collapsing as firefighters run for their lives is here.

Since the fire, there was speculation of whether the developer would continue to try to spruce up the site.

The plant was at Grand Boulevard and Chouteau Avenue in St. Louis. Chouteau was an alignment of Route 66 from 1929 to 1935. Here’s a decent Google Maps image of that corner at Chouteau and Grand, where the Pevely building and its huge sign on the roof have been a local landmark for decades. This is not the factory building that burned; it was the one about a half-block down the street.

Trees win in urban growth battle

Developers opposed additional tree protections

By PATRICK MALONEY, THE LONDON FREE PRESS

Last Updated: 27th November 2009, 7:20am

A legal challenge by several London developers relating to city hall’s protection of trees was struck down yesterday, ending the latest round of the fight over forests in the Forest City.

The decision yesterday by a divisional court to dismiss the appeal of an Ontario Municipal Board ruling is a major win for those who cherish London’s tree cover, a citizen activist says.

“It’s great news,” said Sandy Levin, a former city councillor who hired his own lawyer to argue against the developers’ appeal.

“It’s really a positive thing for the city and the people who care about woodlands in the city.”

At the root of the case were changes city hall made to rules governing the protection of trees in 2006, when it was feared by some that tree cover in London — the so-called Forest City — could fall below 5% without stronger protections.

While the old rules required a city ecologist to give a woodland a high score in three categories in order to grant it protection, the new rules required just one high score. The changes were challenged by developers.

Your argument is sound… nothing but sound.  —Benjamin Franklin

I, being of sound mind and body, am about to touch the third rail.  I do so reluctantly, yet resolvedly.  But before I do, I should like to say a very fond farewell to both of my readers (Hi mom!  Hi dad!) and it has been nice knowing you all.  Not that political suicide is the best way to go or anything.  I certainly wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.  But from time to time, it becomes necessary for one to sacrifice oneself for the sake of an important issue.  So, here I go.  I’m stretching forth my hand even as I type, reaching for that superconductor of electricity that is sure to send a shockwave through the ole’ system and land me flat on my back, perhaps pushing up daisies.  Just remember, I did it for the Gipper…

All Spark and No Fire

So, here go I.  Much of the controversy swirling around the King James issue centers on the question of whether or not the King James Version is inspired.  The English Preservationists have made this the particular sticking point on this issue, and of course, we who also consider ourselves KJVO’s are loath to challenge them on the question.  At least, if we value our place in the KJVO orbit, we better leave this one alone.

Which is exactly why I find myself anxious to address it.  First, there is just something about a third rail that is especially electrifying.  And secondly, I don’t believe that this particular third rail has enough juice to toast a piece of Wonder Bread.  It is all spark and no fire, or something like that.  I certainly don’t believe that this issue will be my undoing.  But then again, I’ve never stepped on a landmine before either.

The real issue here is in the definition of terms.  English Preservationists throw the term “inspiration” around as if it means nothing at all.  Then, they stretch the term around like Gumby, trying to make it sound rational to (a) deny double inspiration, and in the same breath to (b) claim inspiration for our English Version.  One might wish for a grain of honesty, just the size of a mustard seed, so that one could ascertain exactly what it is that they are arguing for, since they believe that the English version of the Bible is inspired, and deny that this means “double-inspiration.”

Since God inspired Hebrew words in the Old Testament and Greek words in the New Testament, and since, as far as we know, English words weren’t around at the time that holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, we are faced with a dilemma.  If we deny double-inspiration, then we can’t argue that our English version is inspired.  If we argue that the English version is inspired, then we must necessarily believe in double-inspiration.

Either that, or else we will need to admit that we have elasticized the word “inspired,” turning “inspiration” into a clay humanoid figure.  Logicians call it “equivocation.”  When we use the same term in two different senses, all within the same argument, we are guilty of equivocation.  Equivocation is very popular in humor.  But equivocation is always mis-leading when we change the meaning of our terms mid-argument, without offering any sort of explanation for the suddenness of our switch.

Depends on What the Meaning of “Is” Is

When a man says that the King James Version is inspired, we understand that to mean that the English words proceeded directly out of the mouth of God.  That would be the plain meaning of the statement.  That is, if we are applying the commonly understood, 2 Timothy 3:16 meaning of “inspired” (theopneustos).  If that same man then turns around and denies “double inspiration,” well then, either he is lying, or he is equivocating the meaning of his terms.

Humorous arguments rely on equivocation in order to make their point, and we generally understand that.  For instance, a student was arguing that there are no such thing as black or brown feathers.  In order to make his point, he argued that since a feather is light, and what is light cannot be dark, therefore a feather cannot be dark.  You might recognize the equivocation in that argument.  It is humorous, so long as he isn’t serious.

Worse examples can be found.  My wife really hated the man who argued that women are irrational because the only rational being is man, and women are not men.  She had an almost irrational desire to bash his brains out of his head.  Fortunately, I was there to point out his equivocation.  Necessity once required us to bring a man before the church because he argued that Ray Charles is God.  He claimed that God is love, and love is blind.  Since Ray Charles is blind, he concluded that Ray Charles must be God.  In his case, he should have understood what the meaning of “is” is.

The Non-Inspired Argument

Unfortunately, not all equivocations are equally apparent.  On the question of whether or not the King James Version is inspired, the definition-shift befuddles and be-muses at times.  This is never more the case then when a man takes it in hand to explain how it is that he believes our English version is inspired.  One favorite trick that he will use is to argue that if the King James Version is not inspired, then we have an “uninspired” or “non-inspired” Bible.  Take this statement from Shelton Smith of The Sword of the Lord as an example.  Under the head “If not inspired, then what is it?” he makes this statement:

As I hold the King James Bible in my hands, if it is not the inspired Word of God, then what on earth is it?

Are you telling me that it is somehow the Word of God but yet not inspired?  Are you saying it is the uninspired Bible?

Ironically, the next section is entitled, “An Inspired KJB is not Double Inspiration.”  And Dr. Smith goes on to say,

None of the men that I know who believe in a preserved, inspired text believe in “double inspiration.”  We do not believe that the KJB translators were gifted (theopneustos) with God’s inspiration!

What we very strongly believe is that the Lord God Almighty promised to “preserve” His inspired Word.  He did use those translators to preserve the text for us so that we have an authentic English Bible.

To automatically equate our insistence on a preserved inspired text as double inspiration reflects neither reality nor the truth.

I repeat – we do not now, nore have we ever, advocatied or believed in double inspiration!

As a side note, we should point out that neither does Peter Ruckman.

Nevertheless, we do struggle to answer this charge. If we say that the King James Bible is not inspired, then are  we saying that we have an uninspired Bible?

The charge really is not so difficult to answer.  Instead, the reader should note the shift in the terms of the argument mid-stream, because what we have here is a sort of extended equivocation — yet another mis-leading use of ambiguity employed by Shelton Smith and those who make this same argument.  We are discussing whether or not a translation of the Bible is inspired.  If I say that the translation was not inspired in the same sense that the original Greek and Hebrew words were inspired, am I saying that my King James Bible is the uninspired Bible?  Absolutely not.

You see, whether intentional or not, this kind of argumentation is dishonest.  Those who make it are glossing over what they mean, and they are doing this by shifting terms back and forth.  First we are discussing a translation, then without any warning whatsoever, we shift the argument to Scripture.  The Scriptures are inspired.  The King James Version is a faithful translation of Scripture.  So, we can say that the King James Version is the inspired Word of God.  It is not, however, contradictory on our part to say that the Authorized Version is not inspired.  You ask how that can be so?  Very simply.  When I said that “the King James Version is the inspired Word of God” a moment ago, I was referring to the KJV as Scripture.  And we know that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God.  When I said that “the Authorized Version is not inspired” immediately afterward, I was referring to the KJV as a translation.  The translation was not inspired — that would require double inspiration.  But the Scriptures are still inspired.  And since the Scriptures are not lost in translation, the King James Version is the Very Word of God.

When a preacher insists that the King James Version is inspired, and insists in the next breath that he is not arguing for double inspiration, he is equivocating.  He should explain what he means when he says that “the King James Version is inspired.”  Is he referring to the KJV as an English translation of Scripture, or is he referring to it as Scripture.  When he calls the KJV inspired, what does he mean by “inspired?”  Does he mean that God breathed it out in the same sense that God breathed out the Greek and Hebrew words?  Does he mean that God divinely superintended the translators as they translated?  Is he referring to the fact that translated Scripture is still Scripture?  There is a significant difference between each of these meanings of inspiration.

The point is that he needs to do a better job of defining his terms.  All arguments aside, it really is mis-leading to argue that the KJV is inspired, and then to turn around and say that you don’t believe in double inspiration, without any kind of explanation in between those statements.  If a man believes in inspiration for any translation, if he believes that the translation itself is inspired, then he believes that God re-wrote the Bible, re-gave the words, this time as English or Spanish or Russian or Latin words.  If he doesn’t believe that, then he needs to find a better way to say what it is that he means.

Given by Inspiration

We have discussed this before in our comments section, but we thought it appropriate once again to attempt a more complete treatment of the question.  In 2 Timothy 3:16, the Bible says, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.”  In English, this phrase is 8 words long.  It is the translation of 3 Greek words — and I apologize to the Greek purists who hate transliteration here, but — those three Greek words are, “Pasa graphe theopneustos.“  Literally, all Scripture is God-breathed.  Theopneustos is an adjective in the predicate position, hence the word “is.”

We have had some amount of debate in the past as to whether theopneustos refers to the product or the process.  In other words, does theopneustos refer to the process of giving the words, or to the words as the product of the process.  If we would understand the issue concerning the KJV and inspiration, we must understand the answer to this question regarding theopneustos.

Theopneustos is Product

An adjective in the predicate position makes an assertion about the noun.  All Scripture is theopneustos — God-breathed.  We understand the word “is” to refer to a state of being or existence.  We describe the nature of the existence of Scripture as “God-breathed.”  All Scripture exists as God-breathed Scripture, and that quality is never lost in any of those words.  In the past, we have argued that we know which words were the God-breathed words, because we still have them.  We have all of them.  Non-inspired words were lost, or lost for long periods of time before they resurfaced, thus proving that they were not God-breathed words.  The breath of God produced words, and those words formed Scripture.  All the writings of Scripture are God-breathed.

Theopneustos is Process

Our English Bible translates theopneustos as a verb — given by inspiration.  In fact, the phrase “by inspiration” modifies the verb “given.”  It explains how it was given, the instrument by which all Scripture was given.  If the product of theopneustos is God-breathed words, then the process must necessarily have been by God breathing out those words.  Our English Bible is correct then in its translation.  All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.  Inspiration was a process, and the result of inspiration was the product of the totality of inspired Scripture.

Inspiration as a process occurred over a fixed period of time.  We believe that God closed the canon, that God finished that process in time past.  The product continues, per the promise of God, forever.  But the process was completed almost 2,000 years ago.  God did not re-start or re-do that process somewhere around 1611.  But God did enable English-speaking men to give a faithful translation of His Words in English.  The product continues.  We have the ability to examine that product continually, and a great assistance in examining that product, through our English Bible.

But our English Version is not inspired.  To say that it is would be to say that God re-did the process.  Our English Bible is the inspired Word of God.  But that is different than saying that the English Version is inspired.  Our English Bible is the inspired Word of God because it faithfully translates God’s Word (the product) into English.  The product is not lost in translation, nor is the process re-done.

Much of the argument on this issue has revolved around the “breath of God” and whether or not it can be lost in translation.  I would agree with those who insist that the words retain that quality of being the “breath of God.”  But I would also point out the words that retain the quality of being the “breath of God” are not the English words.  The words that God originally gave, those are the inspired words.  We must understand our English translation in that context, or else we are undoing ourselves in this debate.

Property Preservation is crucial. If you don’t take care of your home, then it will decrease in value and will become a problem to deal with later. Professional help may be the answer if you can’t look after your properties personally

It’s lucky there are preservation companies who are in the business of maintaining properties for others. Companies like this are very useful for property owners who are not experts in property preservation themselves. Good property preservation companies will completely take over your property maintainance.

Let me give you some valuable tips in finding a reliable property preservation company:

Are they a reputable company. Good, reliable companies will have a good repuation in the field and it shouldn’t be too difficult to find. Talk to family and friends who may have had cause to use a particular company. Get opinions from as many people as possible and abandon those companies who have bad reports.

Talk to the management team. Talking and questioning the powers-that-be will prove useful. This will simply be a judgement call. Let your instinctive feelings make your decision – any doubts and bail out.

Have they been trading long. This isn’t the best way to judge a firm but it can help. A company that isn’t doing a good job generally won’t be trading for years and years.

See how much they will charge. You shouldn’t just go with the cheapest option you can find, as the cheapest is not always the best. In fact, it’s usually the opposite. Fair and reasonable is the best quote to consider. Neither the dearest nor the cheapest. Look at each price carefully considering what each includes.

Good property preservation is essential especially if you cannot do it yourself. If you don’t you’re only allowing potential problems to mount up, and thats where a good property preservation company will help.

Click here for information on Maxim Enterprises.

QUESTIONS YOU MAY BE ASKING

1) Where to start

2) What should be archived

3) Whats the right way to collect

4) Storage and Preservation

5) Finance

6) Vision

Funding Streams

FURTHER DETAILED READING

a. Physical care of archives – By Archives in Museums SSN

b. Preservation Guidelines – By National register of archives for Scotland

Property preservation is an important issue. Neglected properties will rarely hold their value. You must either look after your property or pay someone else to look after it

Fortunately, there are property preservation companies out there who will take care of your property if you don’t have the time to do so. Such companies are a godsend for property owners who are too busy to maintain their properties adequately themselves. The right property preservation company will thoroughly maintain your property on your behalf.

Please find here some tips on how to find a good property preservation company:

Check the companies reputation. Good companies will generally have well established reputations and they are quite easy to find. Check them out by talking to others in a simialr position to yourselves. If you find a lot of bad reviews about the company, then be wary.

Talk with the key players in the company. Communicating with the team early is very helpful. This will simply be a judgement call. If you feel you can trust them, great, if not, look elsewhere.

Are they going a good while or relatively new. Whilst its a little unfair to judge a company based on how long its been going, it can be helpful. The longer a firm has been trading means generally they’re doing a good job.

Get a detailed estimate. The cheapest price will very often not be the one you should choose. A reasonable and fair quote is a good indicator to go by. Do not go for the dearest nor cheapest. Bear in mind what all is included in prices.

Anyone who owns property must maintain it, themselves or by using others. If you don’t you’re only allowing potential problems to mount up, and thats where a good property preservation company will help.

Click here for information on Property Preservation.

Property preservation is an important issue. If you don’t look after your property then it may lose value and this will be problematic later. In other words, you need to either take care of the property or pay professionals to do it for you

Thankfully property preservation companies exist who can look after your properties if you can’t. Such companies are a godsend for property owners who are too busy to maintain their properties adequately themselves. Any good, reputable property preservation company will look after your properties in a professional manner.

Here are some pointers for choosing a good, solid property preservation company:

Check their reputation. Good, reliable companies will have a good repuation in the field and it shouldn’t be too difficult to find. You can do this by asking friends and family or just checking online. If you find a lot of bad reviews about the company, then be wary.

Talk to the management team. Talking and questioning the powers-that-be will prove useful. This is down to your instincts about people. If your gut feel is that the company is reliable then go with that, equally if you are uneasy then look for another company.

Are they well established. Whilst its a little unfair to judge a company based on how long its been going, it can be helpful. The theory is that the longer a company trades the better a job they’re supposedly doing.

Find out what their charges are like. You shouldn’t just go with the cheapest option you can find, as the cheapest is not always the best. In fact, it’s usually the opposite. Ideally you want to find something reasonable and fair. Discard those companies who give you the highest and the lowest quote. Bear in mind what all is included in prices.

If you are a property owner you absolutely must maintain your property. A good property preservation company will help you avoid dreadful problems later that may arise out of your neglecting basic maintainance.

Click here for information on Property Preservation.

Property Preservation is crucial. Those who don’t look after their home risk devaluation and therefore problems later. You must either look after your property or pay someone else to look after it

It’s lucky there are preservation companies who are in the business of maintaining properties for others. Such companies are a godsend for property owners who are too busy to maintain their properties adequately themselves. Any good, reputable property preservation company will look after your properties in a professional manner.

Please find here some tips on how to find a good property preservation company:

Check the companies reputation. A companies track record is relatively easy to guage. Check the company website for reviews and testimonials. Be conscious of any bad reports and don’t ignore them.

Talk with the key players in the company. Talking and questioning the powers-that-be will prove useful. Your gut instincts will help with this one. If your gut feel is that the company is reliable then go with that, equally if you are uneasy then look for another company.

Are they well established. This is quite spurious as there are many new, good companies. Older companies have had longer to establish their reputations.

Check out the price. Remember that the cheapest option is usually the wrong option. Ideally you want to find something reasonable and fair. Neither the dearest nor the cheapest. Bear in mind what all is included in prices.

Property preservation is critical and shouldn’t be ignored. If you don’t you’re only allowing potential problems to mount up, and thats where a good property preservation company will help.

Click here for information on Maxim Enterprises.

Kip Welborn, who is a Route 66 enthusiast in St. Louis, has been keeping up with the grave situation over the dilapidated Route 66 Bridge at Route 66 State Park near Eureka, Mo., that is scheduled to eventually be torn down for safety reasons.

Here are excerpts of an e-mail Welborn sent:

… I talked to Mark Miles, the director of the State Historic Preservation Office in the Department of Natural Resources.  I have worked with him for years and think highly of him.  He told me that MoDOT is well aware of the National Register listing of the bridge.  He also reminded me that MoDOT has an excellent record of working within the rules of the National Historic Preservation Act, including the Section 106 review process.  Here in St. Louis County, they took pains to save as many historic buildings and neighborhoods as possible when designing the new I-64, including some even I didn’t think were that important.  So Mark feels that the review process will be thorough, and it won’t be completed overnight.

Now, here are the issues that we should be addressing, as I see them:

1.  The park is an important economic generator for Missouri, one of the premier attractions along the whole length of the road.  Therefore it is in the state’s economic interest to see that visitors have the best possible experience so that they want to come back and tell their friends.

2.  Having the visitors center cut off from the rest of the park is unacceptable, regardless of how well marked the alternative routes are, for several reasons: It will result in lowered attendance to the visitors center, even if overall park attendance remains the same.It will diminish the visiting experience significantly. It will break the regional trail network that is being developed.

3.  If a bridge is necessary at this location, a restored bridge following the existing design is preferable to a new bridge following a different design, because it will retain its Route 66 significance that is the primary attraction of the park.  The argument that so many materials will have to be replace that it will no longer be the same bridge is not valid; replacement materials are acceptable if necessary under the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for both Rehabilitation and Restoration.

4.  Even if it is determined that restoration of the existing bridge is not feasible, that does not eliminate the need for a bridge of some type at this location.

5.  Because of the importance of this bridge to the park, these decisions about its fate should not be exclusively the prerogative of MoDOT.  The Division of Parks in DNR must also be involved, which doesn’t seem to be happening now.

6.  The current condition of the state budget should not determine the fate of the bridge.  Funds not available now may be available in future budgets, but once the bridge is gone, it is gone forever.

Mark Miles of the State Historic Preservation Office agreed that we should be expressing our opinions about this as strongly as possible.

With that, it was recommended that letters with these bullet points be written to Gov. Jay Nixon; Pete Rahn at the state Department of Transportation; Mark N. Templeton at the state Department of Natural Resources, Rep. Michael Vogt, District 66; Rep. Chris Carter, District 61; Rep. Rachel Storch, District 64; Rep. Michele Kratky, District 61; Rep. Jeanne Kirkton, District 91; Rep. Dwight Scharnhorst, District 93; Rep. Mike Leara, District 95; Rep. Michael Frame, District 105; Rep. Scott Dieckhaus, District 109; Rep. Charles Schlottach, District 111; and Rep. Brian D. Nieves, District 98. I’ve included contact page links to each of these legislators.

Time for an update…

I have been lucky to meet a bunch of very inspiring people here in NZ. I spent the fourth day on the program at the office together with Alex (fellow volunteer from LA). It was so nice to get to meet the people “behind” GVN (founder & CEO), and it’s uplifting to discover that there are still people out there who are willing to do make a difference and who have faith in the future.

Alex and I were working on our research projects while the rest of the group did trail and brush clearing on a very steep and scary mountainside that only sheeps and crazy people (GVN volunteers) should be walking on. Don’t have any photos, so you’ll have to do with the ones from the GVN office. I managed to arrange teacher interviews for Friday with two teachers on an “Enviroschool” here in Wellington.

GVN office

Hanging out with Alex (our way home from the office)

After work and dinner, Roger, Corbin and I went to “Battle of Bands” at Bodega Bar in Wellington – 5 bearable local rock bands battling… and a couple of good local beer “Sassy Red” (English bitter style). We had a great time, but the music was very loud (forgot my earplugs as always), so my voice wasn’t really working (and for those of you worrying, I am doing my best to take care…so believe it or not, mostly listening;-)).

Friday’s work was weeding to restore native coastal dune vegetationon on the sand dunes in Eastbourne, (east of Wellington). It was easy and beautiful work. The plants came up easily because the sand was all fine-grained and we had the beach and ocean as our “office”. David McDougall, 4th generation Kiwi, descending from Scottish ancestors who came to NZ in 1898, was our host of the day. David is, at age 72, an active campaigner for protecting and restoring the Eastbourne Dunes. GVN’s volunteers (in this case the 9 of us) “visit” him once a month to help him out. It was very nice to meet and talk to David about his take on how every one of us can contribute to the continuous global preservation. Personally I think it’s good to know that good people are still around – the ones who believe that we, consumers and citizens in a local community, can actually still make a difference. As usual the day started with our host, David inviting us to his waterfront house to visit his dog and to have morning tea/biscuits.

Morning tea at David's

Weeding in Eastbourne

Eastbourne weeding

Weeding with David

After tea we went back to weeding for a couple of hours before proceeding to Keena’s home for lunch. Keena is a very nice lady who enjoys preparing lunch for the volunteers and she lives in an amazing, tropical “getaway” house with her husband. Mostly one story, the house makes abundant use of glass and natural light, and it has a fantastic view of the bay and the trees (see photo below). The lunch involved my first Vegemite experience! I’m not addicted yet, but a part of me likes the taste especially when spread under melted cheese.

Lunch at Keena's

Keena's house

After lunch I went to Muritai school to interview Stu & Richard, who teach children from age 7 to 9. I spent 2 hours with them and obtained a lot of insight on how they involve environmental issues in their teaching. It was a great experience and I’m excited to getting started on my project.

The end of the first week and I’ve had a great time with a bunch of wonderful people around me.

Weekend…!! Bad weather, rain all day Saturday (apparently normal for Wellington), so I decided to stay in all day, bake a bunch of oatmeal/muesli buns for the team, drink hot chocolate and watch movies all day… very relaxing and just what I needed. Sunday was about the same… rain all day, movies, relaxing and a bit of laundry.

Proof that I actually baked 55 oatmeal buns

Monday’s work was at Te Hapua wetlands, northwest of Wellington. Monday’s hostesses, Jill & Joy, bought an 18-acre plot of land (a big part of it wetland) and have done a great job restoring, replanting and then protecting the native plants to ensure the future life of the native wetlands and prevent them from drying out. Just like David McDougall, Jill & Joy are inspiring and have put a lot of work into preserving the native NZ flora, and for me it’s just great to see that they haven’t given up, even at age 71 they’re still working hard and making sure the future generations can enjoy the nutritious native NZ plants and trees.

Joy, Jill & Susi (the dog)

As usual we were met with morning tea… scones & orange juice, and after about 30 min talking and snacking we started the work, tree releasing or “Treleasing” as we’ve renamed it. Basically removing the protectors around the native plants and trees, remove weed and put the protector back (gently). I don’t have photos of me actually working, but that’s because I’m the one taking the photos (guess you’ll just have to believe me).

Morning scones with Jill & Joy

Jill explaining how to tree release

Group photo

Beautiful surroundings

Tuesday was Seal Survey day (counting seals) and we were suppose to meet up with a guy from the Department of Conservation at Cape Palliser, the most southern point of the north island. Unfortunately he cancelled, but we decided to drive to Cape Palliser anyway. It was a beautiful day and the 2,5 hour drive there was a very good way to see the NZ countryside. We had lunch with the seals, “climbed” the 255 steps to the lighthouse, followed by a 1,5 hour walk in Aragorn’s footsteps – “The Paths of the Dead” (beautiful rock formations). Nathan, Corbin and I ended the day with a swim in the South Pacific Ocean…. very refreshing (refreshing just being another word for cold).

The view from Rimutaka hill road

The view from Rimutaka hill road

Nathan & me at the summit

Mr. Seal

The lighthouse

255 steps

The South Pacific Ocean

The Paths of the Dead

The Paths of the Dead

Clay war paint

The swimming team

Wednesday’s work is gardening in the Kowhai house garden and I’ll be back with more stories end of this week. Apparently we’re celebrating Thanksgiving on Saturday (suppose to be on Thursday, but we’re working and don’t have time to prepare Thanksgiving dinner on a weekday). Looking forward to making my first pecan pie… .

First off, a few words of gratitude in this season of thanks-giving. I am thankful for my job, where I learn every day about public service, local history, and get to use my skills as an archivist. I am grateful that our county finally decided to upgrade our outdated county website (including the public library) to CSS, and that it will be coming out in early 2010. Finally, I am grateful for the grants my department has received, most recently the NC SHRAB’s Traveling Archivist Program.

Speaking of grants, my library (in partnership with Wake Forest University) recently received an outreach grant from the State Library that provides digitization equipment and preservation training in locations throughout our county. This grant is unique to North Carolina and is being watched carefully by the State Library due to its somewhat unusual concept. Put simply, we are putting expensive scanners “out there” for the general public and providing preservation education for nonprofit groups and individuals.

This Saturday was our first workshop, which was focused on local nonprofit organizations. From genealogy clubs to food banks, churches to social clubs, we sent emails and postcards to as many groups as we could find. Our workshop’s limited RSVP list was filled within a week, and I began hearing from groups that I know I had not yet invited! We are having three more rounds of workshops in 2010.

On Saturday, we brought in Rachel Hoff, preservation expert from UNC Chapel Hill, as well as Barry Davis, multimedia coordinator at Wake Forest, to teach our community partners about preservation, repair, and digitization of their organization’s archives. The enthusiasm of our participants was absolutely contagious. Not only were they fully engaged from 10 am to 5 pm, but they were thrilled to learn about book repair, archival housing, and the steps to use our VHS-to-digital, cassette-to-digital, slide scanner, and flatbed scanner!

We need to get all of the public library staff involved with the equipment to the point where they are comfortable showing a customer how to use the scanners. At a small public library branch with a few full-time staff, it is hard enough to get the staff trained on the equipment, let alone ask them to spend time with a customer who is just getting started! So we’ve decided to expand our training on the digitization equipment to become part of our regular computer training classes, allowing for small seminars.

While it sounds simple, the grant is compelling in its implications. This equipment will be open to the public. There are no restrictions as to what can be digitized, and no requirements that digital objects be shared with our libraries or hosted on a designated server. It is empowering for community-based archives to be provided with training and resources to preserve their history their way. I will post more in the future as our project develops.

In related news: the NC Digital Heritage Center is coming…!

Secret passageways under Chinatown, remnants of a bygone Bowery beer hall, a rooftop film studio…Author David Freeland writes of these and more in his book Automats, Taxi Dances and Vaudeville: Excavating Manhattan’s Lost Places of Leisure.  Freeland seeks to find continuity through history, using the lens of leisure activity in New York. He is more interested in what’s hidden and forgotten, the “fossils and impressions of former existences,” as he explained in a talk at Columbia GSAPP on November 19th.  Though a historian by practice, his process is more archeological than pedagogical. He says that “looking at discordant architectural and design related spots can give you clues to the history of the place.” His inherent curiosity led him to uncover the original roof of the Atlantic Garden beer hall on the Bowery, which by all accounts had been completely demolished. Looking up at the ceiling of a souvenir shop in Times Square, he noticed patterns that turned out to be the remnants of a once elaborately decorated automat (waiter free restaurants with vending machines) from the early 20th century. Most poignantly, none of the buildings he writes about are landmarked, despite the history behind them.

Here’s a look at a few locations from his book that you can check out:

Underground Passageway in Chinatown

Doyers St. 1890 (Source: Flickr user Straatis)

On numbers 5-7 Doyer Street in Chinatown, the Chinese theater once stood on this curvilinear street. Folklore says that the obtuse angle of this street contributed to gang warfare, as rival gangs could approach each other from opposite ends of the street unseen. An underground escapeway leading from the theater to Chatham Square still exists, now populated by acupuncturists, feng shui and travel agencies. Actor Ah Foon was escorted through this tunnel in 1909 one night, knowing that his days were numbered after repeatedly taunting a rival gang in performances. He made it safely to his apartment but was shot on the landing in the middle of the night.
What to See: Enter on Doyer Street, between Pell St and the Bowery, from a doorway east of the yellow Co Co Fashion sign, descend through multiple staircases and wander along hallways until a staircase leads you out onto Chatham Square. Untapped pictures of this forthcoming…

The Atlantic Garden, 50 Bowery and 20-22 Elizabeth Street (backside)

Interior of the Atlantic Garden (Source: NYPL Digital Gallery)

The largest and most famous of the Bowery beer halls, this sumptuously decorated building opened in 1858. It had its own brewery, shooting gallery, an all female orchestra, a giant mechanical music box (the orchestrian) and movie screens. The battle over a Sunday liquor license lasted over forty years, with constant raids and arrests of bartenders, waiters and the owner himself. Despite all this, the Atlantic Garden was one of the more democratic sites in 1880s New York—a place for immigrant families (predominantly German and Italian, but there were even some Asians!) to escape the swelter of the tenements.

20-22 Elizabeth St. (Source: Curbed)

The clue for Freeland: the roof shape. From there, he discovered a 19th century stone projection off the roof.

What’s Left: On Elizabeth Street, now occupied by the Jing Fong Restaurant and the Cantoon Garden Restaurant. On Bowery, a row of jewelry stores.

How to Get There: N/Q/R/W/J/M/Z/6 trains to Chinatown

Ultimately, what is Freeland’s message? The epilogue encapsulates his wide-eyed, detective-like perspective. Not a strict preservationist, he wonders how history will be passed down when the physical signs disappear:

When future New Yorkers explore their neighborhoods, what will they see? Will they be able to trace history…by finding visual cues and investigating them? New Yorkers are a curious lot…The challenge they will face in the future is that exploring history becomes more difficult once the physical markers themselves are gone.

I’m playing a bit of catch-up, ever since I left town this past weekend to see Bob Waldmire’s Last Art Show. Here are a few things of interest to roadies …

– The Route 66 Marathon in Tulsa this year was a doozy, with more than 7,000 runners participating, along with 60 classic cars and 30 bands performing. The route essentially crossed Route 66 twice, with it going on the 1920s alignment near downtown and also the Southwest Boulevard alignment. Zac Freudenburg of St. Louis set a world record by running the 26.2 miles in 2 hours, 32 minutes, 10 seconds while pushing his son in a baby stroller (yes, there is such a record) and was the overall winner. He’d hoped to run it in 2:40, but blew that goal out of the water. The top women’s runner was Chelsea Jones, running it in 3 hours, 38 seconds.

— It looks like Bill Scales, who attempted a full restoration of the historic Eagle Hotel building on Route 66 in Wilmington, Ill.,  has dropped the asking price for the property to $150,000 if the buyer commits to preserving it. Scales tried to restore the building, but fell into financial trouble and kept missing deadlines set by the city. If you’re interested in buying the hotel, you can contact Scales at 815-806-1815.

— An apartment fire threatened the historic Hotel Cuba building in Cuba, Mo., but did not destroy it. There was some damage, but apparently not enough to seriously compromise the structure.

— Also in Cuba, the new owner of the historic Wagon Wheel Motel tore down an unsightly structure that was next to the Wagon Wheel Cafe building, revealing the smaller, most historically significant gas-station building underneath. This is part of a long-term project to restore the motel. The cafe building will be reopened as Connie’s Shoppe at the Wagon Wheel Motel as a gift shop and registration area for the motel rooms.

— Gordo of Handcolored66.com now has a Web site to display some of the striking images he shot during a Route 66 trip in August and September. He’s an old-school photographer who shoots with film and hand-colors the prints himself. You can see some of his work at Miller’s Grill in St. Robert, Mo. He’s looking for galleries to display his work and maybe acquire a storefront on or near Route 66 in mid-Missouri. If you know of anyplace, please drop him a line at the contact page.

— If you want a weird and wonderful holiday experience, go to the Santa’s Magical Kingdom, which is just off Route 66 west of Eureka, Mo., at the Jellystone Park Resort grounds. Santa’s Magical Kingdom combines a bazillion Christmas lights and decorations with a heapin’ helpin’ of Ozark hillbilly kitsch. It even has its own radio station. It has to be seen to be believed. It runs nightly through Jan. 3.

— Rand Elliott, the architect of POPS in Arcadia, Okla., and the Oklahoma Route 66 Museum in Clinton, Okla., and his firm of Elliott + Associates in Oklahoma City recently were honored by the International Architecture Awards in Florence, Italy.

We’ve all heard the saying, “everything old is new again.” At our place, we’ve challenged ourselves to find inventive ways to repurpose materials that might have otherwise left behind. As a result, our ceilings, parts of our deck and even our conference table are crafted from wood that would have otherwise been left at our Florida projects.

Never have I seen a truer personal example than in Sam Mockbee, a pioneer in pragmatic design whose biography I recently received. He made turning old things into something unique and usable his life’s passionate work.

Sam or “Sambo” as he was known to his friends, understood the “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” concept long before it became a slogan for sustainability and doing things right. He created the Rural Studio Program at the Auburn University School of Architecture, where students repurpose ordinary and recycled materials into houses and useful buildings for the residents of Hale County, Alabama. His creations take care of basic needs and in the process provide rays of hope.

Sam would tell his students that the places they create have got to be warm, dry and noble. He spent the last 10 years of his life building those spaces for many and that legacy continues. Using salvaged materials like lumber, bricks, discarded tires and hay bales, the Rural Studio produces inexpensive structures in a style that Mockbee described as “contemporary modernism grounded in southern culture.” As noted in this Metropolitan Magazine article, the process gives students hands-on experience in designing and building something real, extending their education beyond paper architecture.

Our Stewart Perry headquarters have always reminded me of Sam Mockbee’s work and about half way through the building process I found out why. I learned that Tommy Goodman, who designed our place and is now a professor or architecture at Mississippi State University, was Sambo’s business partner. The influence of the Rural Studio is woven all through our campus. We removed coal tailings from the lake and used them to repave parking area for a neighborhood church. Our hardwood floors are refurbished from a tobacco plant in Virginia. I feel our folks are always thinking of ways they can lower our environmental impact.

Are there opportunities to do similar things around your office, home or construction site?

___________________________________________________________________________

Merrill Stewart is Founder and President of the Stewart Perry Company, a commercial building contractor based in Birmingham, Ala. Contact him via email.

Last Saturday 14 interested folks came out to our Crowley Hilltop Preserve to learn about working with Global Positioning Systems (GPS). This fun group had signed up for the workshop to become more familiar with their own receivers or learn more before getting one of their own. The group included people who had never touched a GPS before to those who use them regularly for work, and even a couple who is using theirs to travel the world, all wanting to learn a little bit more about this technology and have a good day out on the land.

Lets start with the basics...the Earth is round right?

The workshop kicked off with a review of the theory behind the GPS including coordinate systems, satellites, maps and more. The remainder of the program was designed to get people using their units successfully on their own to locate and navigate to locations using maps and coordinates. In the end, the participants managed to navigate through a GPS course in rough terrain ending with a special treat while overlooking views of Crowley Lake and the Benton Range beyond.

Getting to know a Garmin

Based on the great feedback we go from participants, we have been thinking about more workshops in the future, anyone interested? What would you like to learn how to do? Map & Compass? Landscape Photography? Quilting with Natural Dyes?

Aaron

A really great article appeared in The Independent in anticipation of Ursula Doyle’s upcoming book, Love Letters of Great Women. Doyle is probably most noted for her book, Love Letters of Great Men, read by Carrie Bradshaw in last year’s Sex and the City movie. Say what you will about that movie, but it did a great job of raising the profile, not only of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building of the New York Public Library, but also of the lost art of paper love letters.

Granted, the reference to love letters in the movie was simply for sentimental reasons, but these letters can offer a unique look into the private, personal lives of some of history’s most fascinating figures. See Douglas Smith’s Love and Conquest: Personal Correspondence of Catherine the Great and Prince Grigory Potemkin. If reading about the colonization of the Russian steppe in history books strikes you as boring, try it through the correspondence of Catherine the Great and her lover. Don’t let my M.A. in Russian Studies fool you, it’s really great reading.

In discussing Ursula Doyle’s new book in her article, Joy Lo Dico raises some interesting points about the state of the love letter in today’s digital world. What will become of today’s born-digital love letters, currently residing in Sent and Saved folders in email accounts, or tucked away in a special folder on an unreliable hard drive? If they’re not written “with an eye to posterity,” will they make it to history books in the next century? The article offers an encouraging suggestion, that it’s not the decline of pen and ink that will result in the loss of love letters as historical documents, “but the absence of people to capture and collect love letters before the willful lover has a change of heart.”

Hopefully the personal information management habits of today’s lovers will keep these documents intact, so that digital archivists and librarians can make the billets-doux available to the prying eyes of future generations. And, you know, historians too.

"Because the deck of life is always shifting..."

Because the deck of life is always shifting balance can be nothing more than momentary synchronicity.  (Richard Pratt)

Balance is something that evangelicals know very little of.  We were birthed as a reaction against liberalism.  In doing so, much of the conservative theology and philosophy of ministry were an equal and opposite reaction against liberalism.  For much of fundamentalism-turned-evangelicalism’s existence, we defined ourselves anegativa against liberalism, rather than forming a positive definition from Scripture alone.  In many ways, early evangelicalism required liberalism to exist, in order for it to exist.

Moving forward, here are 9 (non-comprehensive) areas where evangelicals ought to seek balance:

1.  Words and Deeds

Some churches like to show the gospel, some like to preach the gospel – we should do birth.  The lost should see and hear Christ preached.

2.  Evangelism and Discipleship

Jesus called us to make disciples and this includes evangelism.  Jesus modeled evangelism as a part of his disipleship.  In many cases, Jesus sent out his disciples before him.  These two things go together.  When we do not model how to share our faith, we cannot expect that our disciples will ever multiply themselves.

3.  Boldness and Clarity

Boldness corresponds to preaching the gospel.  Clarity corresponds to showing the gospel in relationship.  Paul did both.

4.  Immanence and Transcendence

Immanence emphasizes God’s nearness.  Transcendence emphasizes God’s bigness and incomprehensibility.  Both are true and both need to be reflected in our personal and corporate worship.  Some like to emphasize God’s immanence at the expense of his transcendence (Pentecostalism).  Some like to emphasize God’s transcendence at the cost of his immanence (Liturgical).  We need to help people see both and not just pander to one or the other.  Who cares about the form of worship style if God is presented in both his immanence and transcendence.

5.  Preservation and Adaptation

We need to honor the vast tradition of the history of the church – preservation.  We need to innovate to adapt to the language of the culture (obviously, without over-contextualizing).

6.  Individual and Communal

We are saved as individuals.  We are called out to a community.  We are not saved by merely being in the church while we are called out to a church.

7.  “Already/Now” and “Not Yet”

Christ has already risen from the dead; Christ has not yet returned.  We stand between two worlds and must yearn for the one to come, while seeking to affect change on the one we reside.

8.  Reaching-up and Reaching-in and Reaching-out

Reaching-up is the vertical ministry of our relationship with God.  Reaching-in is the horizontal and inward ministry of those in our church.  Reaching-out is the horizontal outward ministry to the world.  If we fail to do any one of these, we have been deficient as a church.

9.  Orthodoxy and Orthopathos and Orthopraxis

All of the previous balances can be summarized in this final one.  Right belief, Right emotion, Right practice.  Balance is critical here.  If we are seeking sound doctrine it ought to produce right practice and right emotion.  If we are seeking right emotion it ought to produce right belief and right practice.  If we are seeking right practice it ought to produce right doctrine and right belief.

What balances would you add?

Moving forward, balance is critical.  Up next, we will look at some summarizing thoughts regarding evangelicalism in the future.

            I’m personally allergic to historical reenactments and most forms of interactive history telling. I think all too many museums and historical sites grasp at straws, technically and aesthetically, when they try to recreate the way history is told. But I acknowledge the problem of falling attendance, reduced engagement and the side effects for the history business of living in an over-entertained, over-stimulated, over-busy society.

            The comparison between the newspaper business and the history business is telling. Even the attendance figures at a place like Colonial Williamsburg are eerily familiar to the subscription numbers of major newspapers. They peaked at an annual high of 1 million in the 1980s, and have dwindled to about 700,000 recently, a downward curve remarkably similar to that of a large metropolitan daily. Who have they lost? Essentially the same people that newspapers are losing. And on what do they pin their hopes? In many cases it’s technological innovation that is just emerging but has yet to reveal its real impact (subscriptions on Kindle? iPhone aps that turn the museum into an enhanced reality zone?).

             I spent a lovely day at Williamsburg earlier this month, and wrote up some the changes that are happening there, in the guise of a story about their most recent addition (the first major reconstruction in more than fifty years) to the storied Duke of Gloucester Street. Williamsburg has the deep pockets to think this through, so their innovations will be closely studied by many less well-endowed museums. I wish them luck.