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We'll Take a Cup of Kindness Yet: History of "Auld Lang Syne"
"Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and auld lang syne? For auld lang syne, my dear, for auld lang syne, we'll take a cup of kindness yet, for auld lang syne."
This is the classic song sung on New Year's Eve after the ball drops in Times Square each year, and all around the world as well, to usher in the new year and mark the ending of the old. Most would recognize it when they hear it, but what does it mean and where did the tradition of singing it at New Year's celebrations come from?
Let's start with what the title of the song literally means. "Auld lang syne" is Scots for "old long since" or "long long ago" or "old times." "For auld lang syne", as the words appear in the chorus of the song, could be translated as for the sake of old times. The song poses the question of whether old times should be forgotten and then answers that old friendships should be remembered.
The song was written as a poem by Robert Burns in 1788. The words are set to the tune of a traditional folk song. It has been used to mark the end of the year, but also other sorts of endings including funerals, farewells, and the ends of parties. The song also takes words from an earlier song by James Watson (1711). Used commonly in Scotland for Hogmanay (New Year's) celebrations, the popularity and use of the song has spread far and wide around the world.
Guy Lombardo is credited with popularizing the use of the song at New Year's Eve celebrations, at least in the United States. He and his band (His Royal Canadians) played the song live every year on his New York City radio (and later TV) New Year's Eve concert from 1929 to 1977. This concert was the popular precursor to Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin Eve. Originally from a part of Ontario that had a large Scots population, Lombardo and his band were accustomed to bands ending their shows with the Scottish standard. It is Lombardo's version that is played in Times Square every New Year's right after the ball drop. But the song has been covered extensively and is considered a musical standard.
Happy New Year everyone! May it bring new adventures, new memories, and joy to you all.
Like my writing? Thanks! I love researching history and writing about it. Everything has a history and a story. Let me find yours! I offer research and content creation (blog posts, newsletter articles, social media posts, etc.) for businesses, organizations, non-profits, museums & other institutions. Let's talk about how you can use your history to tell your brand's story. You can email me at bethbnevarez@gmail.com.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez January 1, 2020 January 1, 2020 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Oral HistoryTags:auld lang syne, Blogging, happy new year, History, music, music history, new year, new year's eve, new years, Preservation, public history, world historyLeave a comment on We'll Take a Cup of Kindness Yet: History of "Auld Lang Syne"
It's a Wonderful Life: 10 facts about the classic holiday film
One of my favorite Christmas traditions is watching "It's A Wonderful Life" with my mom and whoever else will join us. We have watched it on the big screen together twice, once in New York City when we visited my brother for Christmas, and once in my hometown, in downtown Wilson, North Carolina at our local historic theater. But most years, it's pajamas, fuzzy socks, and the fuzzy VHS tape at home. (Though this year, I have realized it's on Amazon Prime so we won't have to deal with the finicky VCR this year.) We've seen it a dozen times at least and yet the end still makes us cry.
I am so looking forward to this year's viewing and in honor of the tradition, I've compiled a few fun facts about this 1946 Christmas classic.
Both Frank Capra (the director) and James Stewart (who plays the main character George Bailey) served in World War II, with this film being the first they had worked on postwar. Frank Capra, Italian by birth, volunteered to enlist at the age of 44 after Pearl Harbor and put his film talents to patriotic use, creating documentaries about the war to boost morale among troops. Most notably he produced the "Why We Fight" series. James Stewart served as a pilot in WWII rising to the rank of Brigadier General in the United States Air Force Reserve and becoming the highest-ranking actor in military history. He was also the first Hollywood star to enlist to fight in World War II.
Donna Reed, who played Mary Hatch Bailey, the film's leading lady, said that the film was "the most difficult film I ever did. No director ever demanded as much of me."
The film didn't do as well as expected at the box office because of strong competition, but it was nominated for 6 Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (James Stewart), Best Film Editing, and Best Sound Recording.
The one award that the film won was the Technical Achievement Award given to the Special Effects crew for developing a new technique for simulating falling snow on motion picture sets. Before It's a Wonderful Life, snow was made using painted cornflakes; however, these were rather noisy when stepped on, causing scenes to need redubbing. The special effects team on It's a Wonderful Life developed a new way to create snow using water, soap flakes, foamite, and sugar, which was much quieter than cornflakes.
The film is based on a short story titled "The Greatest Gift" by Philip Van Doren Stern, which was written in 1939 and published privately in 1943. Good Housekeeping magazine published the story in their January 1945 edition under the title "The Man Who Was Never Born." The studio became interested in the story and Cary Grant was initially interested in playing the lead role that would ultimately go to James Stewart.
The swimming pool under the gym floor that features in the famous dance scene of the movie still exists at Beverly Hills High School where it was in use at least until 2013.
The film is listed on the American Film Institute's 100 Best American Films Ever Made, placing number 11 on the initial 1998 list and number 20 on the revised 2007 list.
The pet raven of Uncle Billy's was in several of Capra's films beginning with You Can't Take it With You. His name was Jimmy.
Like many of Capra's films, the movie told a moral story with a positive, heartwarming and patriotic message about a downtrodden "every man."
4.7 million people tuned in to NBC's Christmas Eve broadcast of the movie in 2017. Will you be watching this year?
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez December 20, 2019 December 20, 2019 Posted inDigital History, HistoryTags:100 greatest films, 1940s, Christmas, christmas movies, christmas traditions, donna reed, film, filmhistory, frank capra, greatest films, History, its a wonderful life, james stewart, public history, world war IILeave a comment on It's a Wonderful Life: 10 facts about the classic holiday film
It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year: Time for Scary Ghost Stories
"There'll be parties for hosting, marshmallows for toasting, and caroling out in the snow
There'll be scary ghost stories, and tales of the glories of, Christmases long, long ago."
A Christmas classic, this 1963 song by Andy Williams describes Christmas traditions, including some we no longer practice. What do scary ghost stories have to do with Christmas? Isn't that more for Halloween?
"It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" was written by Edward Pola and George Wyle in 1963 and recorded by Andy Williams that same year for his first Christmas album. It's an up tempo celebration of all things Christmas, particularly spending time with family and friends and general merriment of the season. The line about scary stories seems out of place in the Christmas classic, but it has its roots in Christmas traditions of the Victorian Era.
It was during the Victorian Era (1837-1901; the reign of Queen Victoria) that Christmas became more widespread and popularly celebrated in England and the United States. Queen Victoria's marriage to German Prince Albert brought many Germanic Christmas traditions to Britain, which also trickled over to the United States. One of the most noteworthy was that of decorating the Christmas tree.
Other modern Christmas traditions with roots in Victorian England include sending Christmas cards, caroling, and Christmas crackers (cookies/sweets). And one tradition that didn't quite carry over to today is the telling of ghost stories on Christmas Eve.
In Victorian England, families and friends would gather around on Christmas eve and tell each other spooky stories of ghosts and the supernatural. The tradition had roots even older stretching back hundreds of years to folk traditions of telling ghost stories in the winter as a way to pass the evenings. It was thought that winter, being dark and cold, was the best season for ghost stories.
It was during the Victorian era that Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol, in which Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by 3 spirits. A Christmas Carol also helped to popularize Christmas celebrations as well as notions that the holiday should be associated with family, gathering together, goodwill, and charity.
A Christmas Carol's continued popularity is actually one of the few ways our modern society continues to include those "scary ghost stories" of the Victorian era.
It's not surprising that Victorians would include the practice of ghost stories in their Christmas celebrations given that era's fascination with and culture surrounding darker topics such as death, including elaborate mourning etiquette, death photography, and more. (A topic for another day, perhaps, but you can read more here.)
Why the writers of the 1963 song decided to include the then relatively defunct tradition is uncertain. But the song itself has become a traditional part of Christmas and can be heard throughout the season, both the original and its many cover versions. The song's original version is regularly included in top 10 lists of the most popular Christmas songs.
Read more about Victorian Christmas traditions below:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/victorianchristmas/history.shtml
10 Strange Christmas Traditions From The Victorian Era
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/plea-resurrect-christmas-tradition-telling-ghost-stories-180967553/
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez December 17, 2019 December 17, 2019 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Oral HistoryTags:a christmas carol, andy williams, Blogging, Christmas, Christmas songs, History, its the most wonderful time of the year, music, music history, musichistory, victorian era, world historyLeave a comment on It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year: Time for Scary Ghost Stories
"Baby, It's Cold Outside:" Context & Controversy
Last holiday season controversy erupted over a radio station's decision to ban "Baby, It's Cold Outside." And this year, John Legend & Kelly Clarkson's new version has stirred up opinions on the song once again. What is the controversy all about? And what's the context for the original song's lyrics? Read more below about the historical context for the song, and how it comes off in the present.
Written in 1944 by Frank Loesser for him and his wife to sing together at parties, the song's lyrics are a call and response between a man and a woman discussing whether or not a woman should stay or leave the man's house on a cold winter night. Frank and his wife Lynn Garland sang it for the first time at the end of their housewarming party to indicate to guests that it was time to leave. They were then invited to lots of parties and asked to be the closing act. The song first appeared publicly in the 1949 film, Neptune's Daughter, a romantic comedy. It is performed twice in the movie–once in reverse gender roles with the woman wanting a man to stay.
For today's listeners, in an era of the #MeToo movement, high-profile sexual assault cases, and ongoing dialogue about consent and how often women face sexual harassment, some of the song's lyrics sound a bit alarming, most notably when the female voice asks "What's in this drink?" or when her clear "the answer is no" is met with the man's continued encouragement to stay.
Most women can imagine what that pushiness feels like or can remember a time when their "no" was ignored by a man–from requests as simple (yet still uncomfortable) as a drink at a bar, their phone number, or a dance, to situations much more serious and violent.
In today's society where efforts are helping to give women more of a voice, the lyrics to the song can sound a bit coercive at best and like ignoring lack of consent or date rape at worst.
However, there are several other lines in the song that demonstrate the woman's actual desire to stay at the man's house, especially when the lyrics are read in the historical context in which they were written.
The female voice expresses her desire to stay several times–first when she says, "Maybe just a half a drink more" and later when she says "maybe just a cigarette more" as well as the ending of the song where the male and female voices sing in unison that it's cold outside. While none of these lines are a clear yes, they can be interpreted as deciding to use that "excuse" for her staying.
But why did she need an excuse? For the same reason that none of her indications that she wants to stay are terribly clear or explicit–Because of societal expectations in that time period (1940s-1950s). Women faced much more scrutiny about their relationships and sexual behavior than they do now (when they still face more scrutiny than their male counterparts). Women with "good reputations" were expected to turn down a man's advances even if they actually wanted to stay the night, meaning men did not expect or try to get clear consent.
The woman's lines in the song also speak much more to her concern about what her family and neighbors would think about her staying than they do to her not wanting to stay. She names a number of family members that would be concerned or suspicious if she didn't return home including her mother, brother, father, sister, and aunt and also wondered what the neighbors would think. (Also, this point is poked fun at in the new John Legend & Kelly Clarkson version where he asks why she still lives at home. In the 1940s, many women would have lived at home until they married.)
"At least I'm going to say that I tried." This line really speaks to the heart of the issue–"good" girls had to at least say they tried to turn a man down. And she could say that given her many "attempts" to leave.
Today's conversations about consent are important. Historically, men didn't wait to get consent since they expected a woman to say no. Women in that time period did not have as much of a voice in their personal relationships because of those societal expectations. This song actually shines a light on why consent is so important–clarity is needed rather than trying to read body language and clues while men and women juggle society's expectations of them versus their own desires.
I can understand why some are uncomfortable hearing this song in today's society in which the man's lines sound coercive and pushy, but with the historical context in mind I hear the song as the woman wanting to stay and ultimately deciding to do so–society's opinion on her decision be damned. Though I also see the problematic societal standards that put the woman in a position in which a real no could have easily been ignored or misinterpreted.
In recent years, some artists have attempted to address issues with the song heard with a modern ear.
Some reverse the gender roles in the song such as She & Him's version (the video for which also addresses the "creepy" factor) or a live version performed by Lady Gaga and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Do those versions change any of the meaning for you?
A songwriting duo changed the lyrics to reflect conversations about consent. And John Legend's version also makes that effort. Take a listen and let me know if you think this song needs such an update.
Do you think the song should be taken out of radio rotation? Does it sound creepy to you? Does knowing the historical context change your take on it? Let me know in the comments!
Like my writing? Thanks! I love researching history and writing about it. Everything has a history and a story. Let me write yours! I offer research and content creation (blog posts, newsletter articles, social media posts, etc.) for businesses, organizations, non-profits, museums & other institutions. Let's talk about how you can use your history to tell your brand's story. You can email me at bethbnevarez@gmail.com.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez December 16, 2019 December 16, 2019 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Women's HistoryTags:baby it's cold outside, Blogging, Christmas, Christmas songs, controversy, frank loesser, History, history in song, music, music history, Music Monday, musicmonday, public history, song meaningLeave a comment on "Baby, It's Cold Outside:" Context & Controversy
Dumbarton Oaks Museum & Gardens
Recently, I toured Dumbarton Oaks, which is a research library and collection in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. The collection and estate was donated to Harvard University by Robert and Mildred Bliss, collectors of art and artifacts from around the world. The Blisses were particularly fascinated with Byzantine and Pre-Columbian art, as well as gardening and landscape design. The Dumbarton Oaks Museum and Garden reflects these interests.
We toured two main exhibits at the Museum and then spent the majority of our visit enjoying the gardens.
One exhibit we viewed focused on textiles from Byzantine. Entitled "Ornament: Fragments of Byzantine Fashion," it demonstrated the way that Byzantine garments were dismantled, with the ornamental sections of clothing cut away from the bulk of the garment which would have been plain or solid in color. These more ornamental fragments were sold by traders. The exhibit explores the themes in the designs commonly found on these Byzantine garments, and related objects.
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The Museum's display style was much more like that found in art museums or anthropology museums, rather than my area of expertise–history museums, and the Byzantine empire is far from the usual topics and time periods I study, but I enjoyed viewing these pieces, amazed by how well many of these textiles were preserved, several hundreds of years later. I was also interested to learn that researchers are able to gleam information about the people who wore these clothes from the stains and folds of these garments, which were removed from the burials of medieval Egyptians. They also speak to the aesthetics of the period.
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Of more interest to me were the Pre-Columbian artifacts from Mexico and South America. This exhibit was in a beautiful array of circular areas and hallways with floor-length windows all around. These artifacts spoke to the religious and cultural life of the pre-conquest indigenous groups of Latin America.
Finally, we toured the gardens, which were designed by Beatrix Farrand, in consultation with Mildred Bliss. Beginning in 1921, the two women drew on their knowledge of European garden tradition in order to create the gardens at Dumbarton Oaks. The garden consists of a series of terraces. It was designed and evolved over 30 years with every single element carefully considered and chosen. Read more about Dumbarton Oaks Museum & Gardens at their website.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez November 25, 2019 Posted inCollections, Exhibits, Historic Preservation, History, House Museums, indigenous history, Museum, Women's HistoryTags:art, dumbarton oaks, gardens, History, landscape design, Museum, museums, Travel, Washington DC, women, world historyLeave a comment on Dumbarton Oaks Museum & Gardens
"So This is Christmas:" A Holiday Song as Protest
"So this is Christmas and what have you done? Another year over, a new one just begun… A very merry Christmas and a happy new year, let's hope it's a good one without any fear."
"Happy Xmas (War is Over)" (1971) is a Christmas song by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, but it is also a protest song. Lennon and Ono made music and led activism promoting peace and condemning the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 70s and their Christmas song was no different.
Specifically, "Happy Xmas" promoted personal accountability and empowerment to stop the war in Vietnam with lines like "war is over if you want it" and "so this is Christmas and what have you done?" and "Let's stop all the fight."
The song shared the same message as a billboard campaign that Lennon and Ono put together in December of 1969, 2 years before the song's release. They had billboards put up in major cities all over the world that read, ""WAR IS OVER! If You Want It – Happy Christmas from John & Yoko."
A few more interesting facts about the song:
In the opening, whispered lines of the song Yoko wishes her daughter (from a previous marriage) Kyoko a happy Christmas followed by John doing the same to his son (from his previous marriage) Julian. The couple's son Sean had not been born yet.
The song was written and recorded in New York City and the children's voices featured on the song are from the Harlem Community Choir.
The song has been extensively covered over the years including by Sarah McLachlan, The Fray, Neil Diamond, Celine Dion, and many others.
The song was not an immediate hit, but has come to be a Christmas classic that invokes introspection and a renewed call for peace.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flA5ndOyZbI
Full lyrics:
(Happy Christmas, Kyoko
Happy Christmas, Julian)
And a new one just begun
I hope you have fun
The near and the dear ones
The old and the young
And a happy New Year
Let's hope it's a good one
Without any fear
And so this is Christmas (War is over!)
For weak and for strong (If you want it)
For rich and the poor ones (War is over!)
The road is so long (Now!)
And so happy Christmas (War is over!)
For black and for white (If you want it)
For yellow and red ones (War is over!)
Let's stop all the fight (Now!)
And what have we done? (If you want it)
Another year over (War is over!)
And a new one just begun (Now!)
We hope you have fun (If you want it)
The near and the dear ones (War is over!)
The old and the young (Now!)
War is over, if you want it
War is over, now!
Happy Christmas, Christmas
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez November 25, 2019 November 25, 2019 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Oral HistoryTags:1970s, Christmas, Christmas songs, History, holiday, John Lennon, johnlennon, music, Music Monday, musichistory, musicmonday, protest songs, The Beatles, Vietnam War, Yoko OnoLeave a comment on "So This is Christmas:" A Holiday Song as Protest
The Monster Mash: 3 Interesting Facts About the Halloween Classic
The Monster Mash. It was a graveyard smash.
Monster Mash was released in 1962. Written by Bobby Pickett and Leonard Capizzi and recorded by Pickett and "the Crypt-Kickers.," the single hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart from October 20-27, 1962 and has been a Halloween favorite ever since. Here are a few fun facts about this Halloween classic.
The song features Pickett doing an impression of Boris Karloff, a famed horror movie actor. He also does a Dracula impression for one line in the song.
The song was inspired by and danced to the Mashed Potato dance craze of the era. Monster Mash was danced like the Mashed Potato except with Frankenstein monster arm and hand movements.
Interestingly the sound effects in the song were very low budget. The coffin sound was created by removing a nail from a piece of wood; the cauldron bubbling was simply a straw bubbling water; and the chains rattling were just chains being dropped on a tile floor.
The song tells a story loosely similar to Frankenstein but with a fun, dance twist. A mad scientist's monster comes to life and performs a new dance which became very popular and led to a party with other monsters.
Below is the video from Bobby Pickett performing the song on American Bandstand October 13, 1964.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez October 31, 2019 October 31, 2019 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Oral HistoryTags:Blogging, bobby pickett, halloween, History, monster mash, music, music history, Music Monday, musicmonday, public historyLeave a comment on The Monster Mash: 3 Interesting Facts About the Halloween Classic
"I Put a Spell on You:" From Radio Ban to Disney Movie Favorite
The origins of a popular song that has become a Halloween Disney movie favorite? A drunken recording session, a blues singer with an amazing voice, a breakup, and a spooky production.
A song many know because of its numerous cover versions, "I Put a Spell on You" is now included on Halloween playlists, owing partly to its inclusion in the movie Hocus Pocus. However, even before its more overt connection to the Halloween holiday, the song was thought of as shocking, demented, and dark, but not solely for the lyrics which suggest witchcraft or voodoo. Originally written and performed by Jalacy "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins,"I Put a Spell on You" was released in 1956 and is the song that earned Jalacy the "Screamin' Jay" nickname. It was Hawkins' screaming delivery of the song and his resulting performance style that really gave the song its powerful yet outrageous and slightly sinister tone. The song transformed Hawkins' career and he became the pioneer of the subgenre of "shock rock," a genre later popularized by artists including Alice Cooper, KISS, Ozzy Osborne, and Marilyn Manson.
"I Put a Spell on You" was not originally intended to be associated with Halloween at all. It was Hawkins' delivery of the song in the 1956 recording and the resulting live performances that would change everything for the song and for Hawkins. Hawkins, who had operatic dreams, but was working as a traditional blues singer, originally wrote the song as a traditional blues love ballad with lyrics about getting a lover back after a breakup, influenced by his own personal life. He recorded it as such in 1955 but the track didn't go anywhere. However, the story goes that a year later when he decided to try rerecording it, the producer brought in food and large quantities of alcohol to the recording session and got everyone drunk resulting in the most well-known version of the song.
However, the resulting version of the song also got it banned from radio. In 1956, Hawkins' singing, screaming, and grunting, complete with animal noises, sounded overtly sexual to mainstream audiences. The fact that Hawkins was African American likely contributed to this take on the song. Even a toned down version wasn't played on most radio stations. Despite the radio ban, the song was Hawkins' most commercially successful one, though it never made the top charts.
Hawkins' live performances of the song did little to allay the concerns of many groups. He took to appearing on stage in a coffin, rising out dressed in a "screaming wardrobe" including zebra stripes, bright colors, sometimes a loin cloth, with a spear or a skull on a stick that would sometimes smoke his cigarette while he sang, and with tusks in his nose and a turban on his head.
The NAACP denounced his act with concerns that he was propagating stereotypes of African Americans as cannibals or witch doctors. Some African American newspapers and magazines ignored Hawkins, not wanting to promote his music. The song was released in the era of Jim Crow and segregation and understandably there were concerns about the act being consumed by white audiences for which it upheld dangerous and negative images of black people.
Despite all of this, the song was Hawkins' biggest hit, with Hawkins being featured in DJ Alan Freed's Rock and Roll Revue and has gone on to be covered by numerous artists. Some of the most well-received covers include those of Nina Simone, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Marilyn Manson, Bette Midler (in Hocus Pocus), and Annie Lennox, but there have been many more.
Nina Simone's cover was especially well done with the song taking on a whole new meaning when sung with her amazing voice. Simone slowed the track down more to the ballad tempo it was originally meant to be, but with powerhouse vocals and jazz style scatting. The track became so much a part of Simone's body of work that she titled her autobiography "I Put a Spell on You."
Bette Midler's rendition in Hocus Pocus has become particularly popular at Halloween owing to the movie's rising popularity as a cult classic. It seems to be more popular as it ages with references to it on signs, t-shirts, and more as Halloween approaches. Midler as Winifred Sanderson changes many of the lyrics to fit the spell she was casting while singing but hers is one of the more well known uses of the song, though it has appeared in several other movies and in commercials.
Jalacy Hawkins' song had a long life after him as artists continue to cover it. However, the song and its influence on his stage persona changed his career trajectory so much that he had difficulty getting other records taken seriously and many shied away from playing his records because of fear of associating with him, even when records were more traditional. He didn't really benefit financially from the song despite the fact that many covers of it happened in his lifetime.
Read more about Jalacy "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins, who had an interesting life with a difficult childhood, served in the armed forces, and had a relatively successful boxing career, all before the release of "I Put a Spell on You." Links to further reading below.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/2000-02/15/004r-021500-idx.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2000/02/13/blues-musician-screamin-jay-hawkins-70/73db046b-1556-46aa-b2c5-bb571d94c577/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.f7901799d72b
These first two links are obituaries for Jay Hawkins.
https://www.biography.com/news/screamin-jay-hawkins-i-put-a-spell-on-you-biography
Biography of Jay Hawkins.
http://flavorwire.com/503899/the-curious-history-of-i-put-a-spell-on-you
This is an especially interesting article that follows the trajectory of the song over time and speaks to the likelihood that Hawkins' version was unsuccessful because of racial biases of the time, while later white performers' versions of the song were more commercially successful and bigger hits on radio charts. It also suggests that Hawkins' performance style confronted white audiences' desire to appropriate black music while society still maintained segregation and oppression of African Americans.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez October 21, 2019 October 21, 2019 Posted inDigital History, History, Music Monday, Oral HistoryTags:Blogging, blues, halloween, History, hocus pocus, i put a spell on you, jay hawkins, music, music history, Music Monday, musicmonday, rock music, screamin jay hawkins, shock rockLeave a comment on "I Put a Spell on You:" From Radio Ban to Disney Movie Favorite
#19forthe19th: Women at Work
Women have always worked. But the nature of that work and where it took place has changed over time. In the United States, before the late 19th century, the majority of women's work was domestic, but as economic and social changes took place, women began working outside of the home and in more varied roles.
I wrote about women's work for a chapter of my master's thesis. Below is a short excerpt from that chapter that explains the changes over time and gives details about women's work including women-owned businesses. Since my thesis focused on the Wilmington area, it includes statistics and information from the Cape Fear region.
Many changes in women's work took place in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. One such change was in the demographic makeup of women entering the workforce. In 1890 more than 90 percent of women over the age of 35 were married. Before 1890, the "vast majority" of married women did not engage in paid labor, instead "contributing to the family economy in other ways."[1] After 1890 married women began to more frequently take jobs outside of the home. Women were having fewer children, resulting in fewer years spent in raising children. Technological advancements reduced and eased housework and made many goods previously produced in the home readily available for purchase. The reduction in family size and the new technology freed up time for many married women. Alice Kessler-Harris argued that these women, no longer spending much of their lifetimes birthing and raising children, "would need to find meaningful survival activity" and some, especially those who outlived their partners, "would need to support themselves by finding paid work outside the household."[2]
Kessler-Harris's arguments points to two main reasons for women engaging in work outside of the home, for economic survival and for mental or emotional fulfillment. Since colonial times, single women, widows, and poor women were more likely to work for wages, needing to support themselves in absence of a husband or father or contribute to the earnings of a husband.[3] However, with the changes in the home pointed out by Kessler-Harris, as well as changes in the 1920s resulting from women's wartime work, the flapper movement of the 1920s, and women's newly earned suffrage, the early twentieth century saw more women, married or otherwise, pursuing work for other reasons, including boredom, ambition, rebellion, and independence, as well as need. These motives, of course, differed by race and class.[4]
By the mid-twentieth century, women held a larger variety of jobs, but still remained less represented in the workforce than men.[5] These changes over the first decades of the twentieth century are also reflected in the census records. In 1940 there were still six times as many employed males as females in Brunswick County, but only about two times as many in New Hanover County. This is likely due to the city of Wilmington's increased population and urban employment opportunities. In terms of women as business owners and employers, in 1940 there were nearly ten times as many male as female employers and own-account workers in Brunswick County and 11.5 times as many male employers as female in the state of North Carolina. However, there were only 2.7 times as many in New Hanover County, making New Hanover County unique in the state for its higher proportion of women employers at that time.
Women's employment generally increased over the course of the twentieth century; however, their occupations were concentrated in certain fields, such as domestic service and professional occupations. Women's dominance in domestic service and professional occupations in the Cape Fear Region mirrors larger trends in women's work in the twentieth century. Domestic service was an especially predominant occupation for African American women. Tera Hunter found in her study of black women's work from the Civil War through the early twentieth century that "more than 90 percent of black female wage-earners were still confined to domestic work at the turn of the century."[7] In the Cape Fear region, domestic workers were also majority African American, with domestic work being one of the few options for black women in the early twentieth century. As late as 1995 African American women still made up 63% of housekeepers, child care workers, and cleaners.[8] In terms of professional occupations, Kessler-Harris found that "by 1920 a cadre of trained and eager women had carved out a series of professional areas, many of which were loosely construed as nurturing," such as nursing and teaching.[9] Cape Fear women's large numbers in professional fields and domestic service fields represent larger trends in women's growing presence in the paid labor force.
Beyond census records, another rich resource for contextualizing women's work and roles in business is the city directories for Wilmington. These sources list local businesses as well as individuals and organizations. The city directories for the years 1900, 1905, 1909-10, 1915-16, 1919-20, 1930, 1934, 1940, 1944-45, and 1950, published by Hill Directory Company, revealed several trends in women's work and were exceptionally helpful in gathering information about women-owned businesses.[1] By focusing on the business listings rather than the personal listings, some trends in women's businesses can be determined.
The most numerous occupations or businesses held by women from 1900 to 1950 were boarding houses, clothing retailers, bakers and confectioners, dressmakers, florists, grocers, music teachers, and nurses. Not only did these professions include large numbers of women, but they also largely excluded men, demonstrating the gender segregation of the workforce. Boarding houses were overwhelmingly one of the biggest businesses operated by women in Wilmington. The city directories revealed that in 1900 at least 21 women were listed as the proprietors of boarding houses. Of those 21, 19 were listed as "Mrs." and only two were listed as "Miss," indicating that boarding houses were predominantly operated by married or widowed women.[2] In 1905 even more women were listed as boarding house owners with the number reaching 45.[3] More than 40 women operated boarding houses in 1910.[4] The number continued to remain relatively high at 11 in 1930 and 19 in 1940.[5] However, in 1950 there were only two women listed as boarding house proprietors. This shift did not indicate an exodus from the profession though. Instead, 32 women were listed as the proprietors of "furnished rooms," many of them the same women once listed as boarding house owners.[6] Furnished rooms provided less amenities to lodgers, offering a room with either a hot plate or access to a shared kitchen where boarding houses had provided communal meals to their guests. Furnished rooms were thus less labor-intensive for landladies. The shift may have been caused by changes in women's access to other occupations as well as changes in ideas of family privacy.[7]
Other notable professions included dressmaking and millinery shops. For example, in 1950 there were twenty-eight dressmakers in Wilmington. Women also appeared increasingly in later years as stenographers, notaries, real estate and insurance agents, and other office-type jobs. There were a few notable instances of women working outside of "feminine" occupations, but alongside husbands. There was one lawyer, one physician (osteopath), and one chiropractor who fell into this category. Other trends in women's work in the Cape Fear Region included teaching, nursing, and clerical work.[8] By 1920, 80 percent of North Carolina's teachers were women, the James Walker School of Nursing graduated more than 1,000 nurses between 1902 and 1970, and by 1940 15 percent of employed women worked in retail, clerical work, or service professional jobs. Textile mills were also leading employers of women in the region, including Delgado Cotton Mill.[9]
As can be seen, many of the occupations or businesses that women engaged in used "traditional" domestic skills or catered to women clientele. Boarding house proprietors served as hostesses, managing a home and providing meals. Dressmakers made women's clothing, reproducing the traditional women's task of cloth production in the home, and producing goods for female consumers. These were considered acceptable, feminine professions and they attracted a largely female workforce. As Kessler-Harris found, "most women, even professionals, still found themselves in job categories that were heavily female."[10]
The ways in which businesses and individuals were denoted in the city directories also points to connections between race and gender when examining women's work and businesses in the twentieth century. The city directories differentiated individuals and proprietors of businesses by race and further differentiated women by marital status. African-American individuals or businesses are denoted with an asterisk or the letter 'c' in parenthesis alongside their names. This action denotes the racial segregation at the time, and helps to provide some information about the differences in African-American and white women's work.
African American women can predominantly be seen as the proprietors of eating houses and lunch rooms, as opposed to the separately named category of restaurants, a symptom of segregated establishments. African American women appeared much less often in other businesses such as boarding houses and as music teachers or nurses. African American women appeared as midwives where white women did not and are also among dressmakers and hairdressers. Personal listings in the city directories also revealed African American women to work often as washerwomen and seamstresses.[1] African American women appeared frequently in separate businesses from white women. Black women were more likely to be listed as hairdressers, eating house proprietors, and midwives. The businesses that African American women engaged in in Wilmington were also popular in other cities across the South. Hunter found that women in Atlanta also operated restaurants, clothing stores, hairdressing shops, and worked as midwives. Midwifery was also one of the few professional occupations African American women were able to break into, following teaching and nursing.[2] The differences in work of black and white women points to different gender expectations across race as well as different limitations in work opportunities.
[1] City directories, 1900-1950.
[2] Hunter, 112.
[1] Wilmington City Directories, Hill Directory Company, 1900-1950, North Carolina Room, New Hanover County Public Library, Wilmington, North Carolina.
[2] City of Wilmington Directory, Hill Directory Company, 1900, New Hanover County Public Library North Carolina Room, Wilmington, NC.
[3] City of Wilmington Directory, 1905.
[4] City of Wilmington Directory, 1909-1910.
[5] City of Wilmington Directory, 1930, 1940.
[7] Joanne J. Meyerowitz, Women Adrift: Independent Wage Earners in Chicago, 1880-1930, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), 1991, 73-75. Meyerowitz explores the changes in lodging of urban workers in Chicago around the turn of the twentieth century, offering some explanation of the differences between boarding houses and furnished rooms that can help explain the shift in Wilmington in the twentieth century.
[8] Women's Work A Century's Worth: A Cape Fear Scrapbook.
[10] Kessler-Harris, 116.
[1] Kessler-Harris, 109.
[2] Ibid, 110.
[3] See Cynthia Kierner, Beyond the Household: Women's Place in the Early South, 1700-1835, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press), 1998.
[4] Kessler-Harris, 224-229.
[5] Ibid, 114-115 and Historical Census Browser, 1940, University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, 2004, Retrieved May 23, 2014, http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu/.
[6] Historical Census Browser, University of Virginia, Geospatial and Statistical Data Center, 2004, Retrieved May 23, 2014, http://mapserver.lib.virginia.edu/.
[7] Tera W. Hunter, To 'Joy My Freedom: Southern Black Women's Lives and Labors After the Civil War, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press), 1997, 111.
[8] Women's Work A Century's Worth: A Cape Fear Scrapbook, (Wilmington, NC: Women's History Project Committee), 2001, Accessed May 14, 2015, Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/womensworkcentur00cape.
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez October 2, 2019 Posted inArchives, Collections, Digital History, Exhibits, Graduate School, History, Local History, Museum, Women's HistoryTags:excerpt, History, labor history, museums, public history, thesis, wilmington, women at work, Women's History, working womenLeave a comment on #19forthe19th: Women at Work
Ford's Theater: A Tour of Lincoln's Assassination
Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C. is an operating theater to this day, but historically it is best known as the site of Lincoln's assassination. On April 14, 1865, while Lincoln was attending a play at Ford's Theater with his wife and Major Henry Rathbone, John Wilkes Booth, an actor and Confederate spy, shot Lincoln in the back of the head. He died 9 hours later on April 15, 1865 of his injuries across the street at the Petersen House.
This moment in history, just after Lee's surrender and the ending of the Civil War, but just before Reconstruction, was a pivotal junction.
The tour of Ford's Theater which includes self-guided tours of exhibits, a ranger talk in the theater, and partially guided tours of the Peterson house, does a wonderful job of contextualizing both Lincoln and Booth as well as providing the context of what Washington, D.C. was like in 1865. All of this context helps the audience to better understand how the assassination was able to take place and why Booth targeted Lincoln.
Before entering the actual theater, we toured exhibits that presented Lincoln's Washington. These exhibits showed what D.C. was like in the 1860s, gave context about the Civil War, Lincoln's stance on slavery, the war, and reconstruction. The exhibits also gave background on John Wilkes Booth, his political leanings, his acting career, and more. The exhibits lead up to the night of the assassination and include on display the gun used to kill Lincoln.
The next stop was the theater itself where a ranger (since the site is a National Park) walks the audience through the series of events leading up to and immediately after Lincoln was shot. Again, the information provided is clear and does an excellent job of contextualizing the event and not sensationalizing it.
The tour follows the series of events, leaving the theater and crossing the street, just as Lincoln's body did that night, to the Petersen House where the aftermath of Lincoln's assassination is described including Mary Todd Lincoln's reaction, Lincoln's death, the succession of power, and Lincoln's funeral procession. More exhibits then detail Lincoln's legacy and the many ways he has continued to inspire people through the present.
I highly recommend visiting Ford's Theater and doing the full tour including the museum exhibits, the theater talk, and the Petersen House across the street. Tickets are $3.00 but are timed and it's recommended to reserve them in advance.
https://www.fords.org/visit/historic-site/
Posted byBeth Bullock Nevarez September 30, 2019 October 21, 2019 Posted inExhibits, Historic Preservation, History, House Museums, Local History, Museum, Slavery, TravelTags:Abraham Lincoln, Assassination, Civil War, ford's theater, historic travel, History, Lincoln's assassination, museum monday, museum review, museums, public history, Travel, Washington DC, world historyLeave a comment on Ford's Theater: A Tour of Lincoln's Assassination
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Q: QT Creator: Volume Slider Still Plays Audio When Program Starts I am creating a music player program in QT Creator and I have encountered an issue: I have the volume bar set to 0, so it should be muted at start, but when I start the program the music plays until I move the volume slider which it then works as it should.
This is the volume slider in question:
Slider {
        id: volumeBar
        maximumValue: 200.0
        stepSize: 1.0
        value: 0.0
        tickmarksEnabled: true
        anchors.verticalCenter: parent.verticalCenter
        onValueChanged: audio.on_sliderVolume_sliderMoved(volumeBar.value)
    }

This is the method being called:
void Audio::on_sliderVolume_sliderMoved(int position) {
player->setVolume(position);}

I believe that should be all the relevant code.  Note: I'm learning to code with QT Creator by doing this project, so any extra input or explanation into this solution or my code would be nice as well.

A: You can simply initialize it when you create an instance of audio (in your constructor) by calling your function and setting the position to 0 (ie: on_sliderVolume_sliderMoved(0);)

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How Inequality Kills
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David A. Ansell, MD, MPH is the senior vice president and associate provost for community health equity, as well as the Michael E. Kelly Professor of Medicine, at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. He began his career at Cook County Hospital holding a number of positions from intern to Chief of General Medicine. His research and advocacy has been focused on eliminating health inequities. In 2011 he published a memoir of his times at County Hospital, County: Life, Death and Politics at Chicago's Public Hospital. His latest book is The Death Gap: How Inequality Kills.
Rachel Bishop is pursuing an MPH in Social and Behavioral Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She is currently serving as a Rappaport Public Policy Fellow at the Joint Committee on Health Care Financing in the Massachusetts state house. She graduated magna cum laude from Brown University in 2013 with a major in neuroscience, where she co-authored several articles on synaptic plasticity in the spinal cord and mesolimbic dopamine system. Most recently, she worked as the Program Manager with Health Leads at Hasbro Children's Hospital, supervising the delivery of social service referrals to 1400+ Medicaid patients annually. She is primarily interested in reproductive justice, medical racism, and the socio-political determinants of health. Rachel brings her experience implementing a social determinants of health program as well as her passion for grassroots organizing to her graduate studies, where she is concentrating in Women, Gender, and Health.
General Internal Medicine Fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School
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Dr. Utibe Essien is a General Internal Medicine Primary Care and research fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School. His research focuses on the intersection between race and socioeconomic status on chronic and cardiovascular disease outcomes. As a resident, he co-founded the Social Justice Interest Group and was Chair of Resident and Fellows Committee of the MGH Center for Diversity and Inclusion for which he received the Department of Medicine Allan F. Moore Memorial Award for Community Service Award. He is currently pursuing a Master of Public Health degree at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Mariana Arcaya is an assistant professor of urban planning and public health in MIT's Department of Urban Studies and Planning. She is a social epidemiologist and urban planner whose work explores dynamic relationships between geographic contexts, particularly neighborhoods, and health. Arcaya conducts scholarly and policy-relevant research in two main areas: 1) bi-directional relationships between place and health, including how health considerations shape socioeconomic outcomes for individuals and communities, and, 2) applied and translational research on the social determinants of health, particularly health risk factors shaped by urban policy and planning decisions. Prior to joining MIT's faculty, Arcaya was a post-doctoral fellow at the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies. She holds a Doctorate of Science from the Harvard School of Public Health.
Obesity Medicine Physician at Massachusetts General Hospital/ Harvard Medical School
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Fatima Cody Stanford, MD, MPH, MPA is an obesity medicine physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and Instructor of Medicine and Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. She is one of only a handful of people in the United States who is fellowship trained in obesity medicine. She is a diplomate of the American Board of Obesity Medicine. Dr. Stanford received her BS and MPH from Emory University, her MD from the Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine, and her MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She served as a health communications fellow at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and worked as a behavioral sciences intern at the American Cancer Society. Upon completion of her MPH, she received the Gold Congressional Award, the highest honor that Congress bestows upon America's youth. Dr. Stanford has completed a medicine and media internship at the Discovery Channel, and authored a USMLE Step 1 medical review text. She has published fifteen articles in medical peer-reviewed journals. Her current research focuses on obesity, health disparities, and health policy. An American Medical Association (AMA) Foundation Leadership Award recipient in 2005, she was also selected for the AMA Paul Ambrose Award for national leadership among resident physicians in 2009. Dr. Stanford completed her internal medicine and pediatrics residency at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine/Palmetto Health. She recently completed her term as a member of the World Medical Association Junior Doctors Network executive board. The American College of Physicians selected her as the 2013 recipient of the Joseph E. Johnson Leadership Award, an award presented to the Associate member of the College who has demonstrated qualities that exemplify the College's mission "to enhance the quality and effectiveness of health care by fostering excellence and professionalism in the practice of medicine". At the MGH Weight Center, she serves as an obesity medicine & nutrition physician. She cares for adult and pediatric patients with overweight and obesity. In this capacity, she works to provide behavioral, pharmacologic, and bariatric surgery pre and post-op care. Dr. Stanford is a nationally recognized obesity medicine expert. She was invited as the keynote speaker on the topic of obesity prior to the 2013 American Medical Association vote to acknowledge obesity as a chronic disease. She has been the featured speaker for numerous other medical organizations, and she has been featured on all major broadcast news outlets in the United States. Dr. Stanford teaches 1st and 2nd year Harvard Medical School students in their nutrition and health policy courses. She is a 2014 recipient of the Certificate for Excellence in Tutoring in the Harvard Medical School Health Policy New Pathway course.
Barbara Gottlieb, MD, MPH has been a primary care physician at Brookside Community Health Center since 1981. Her clinical practice focuses on minority and underserved populations and women's health. She has developed clinical and community health interventions addressing the problems that underlie poor health outcomes in minority communities. She is Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Associate Program Director for Faculty Development of the Medicine Residency Program at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Associate Professor at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health where she teaches public health practice and gender and mental health. She participates in policy and advocacy work at the local and national level, focusing on reproductive health and the health of underserved communities.
Dr. Betancourt is the founder and director of the Disparities Solutions Center (DSC), Senior Scientist at the Mongan Institute for Health Policy Center at Massachusetts General Hospital, an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and a practicing Internal Medicine physician. He is also the founder and leader of Quality Interactions, an industry-leading company that focuses on training in cross-cultural communication for health care professionals. Dr. Betancourt is a nationally and internationally recognized expert in health care disparities and cross-cultural medicine, and has served on several Institute of Medicine Committees on this topic, including the one that produced the landmark report, Unequal Treatment. Dr. Betancourt has secured grants and contracts that have led to over 50 peer-reviewed publications, and advises private industry, government, and not-for-profit health systems on approaches to eliminating racial and ethnic disparities in health care. He sits on the Boston Board of Health; the Board of Trinity Health, a large national health system; and sat on the Board of Neighborhood Health Plan in Boston. He is a 2015 Aspen Institute Health Innovator Fellow.
Dr. Betancourt received his Bachelor of Science from the University of Maryland, his medical degree from Rutgers-New Jersey Medical School, and completed his residency in Internal Medicine at the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center. Following residency, he completed The Commonwealth Fund-Harvard University Fellowship in Minority Health Policy, and received his Master's in Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health.
In her role as Deputy Director at the Disparities Solutions Center, Ms. Tan-McGrory works closely with the Director to chart the Center's future growth and strategic response to an ever-increasing demand for the Center's services. Aswita Tan-McGrory is a key member of the senior management team and supervises the broad portfolio of projects and administration of the Center. These include collaborations with internal and external partners on guidance on collecting race, ethnicity, language and other social determinants of health data; developing disparities dashboards that stratify quality measures by race, ethnicity, and language; and developing recommendations for data collection in pediatric patients.
Ms. Tan-McGrory also oversees the Disparities Leadership Program, an executive-level leadership program on how to address disparities, as well as the Healthcare Quality and Equity Action Forum, a national conference for healthcare leaders interested in addressing disparities in quality. Ms. Tan-McGrory serves on several executive committees, including the MGH Diversity Committee, the MGH Executive Committee on Community Health and the Partners Health Equity and Quality Committee. In addition, Ms. Tan-McGrory sits on the board of the Massachusetts Public Health Association.
Her interests are in providing equitable care to underserved populations and she has over 20 years of professional experience in the areas of disparities, maternal/child health, elder homelessness, and HIV testing and counseling. She received her Master of Business Administration from Babson College and her Master of Science in Public Health, with a concentration in tropical medicine and parasitology, from Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. Ms. Tan-McGrory is a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer where she spent 2 years in rural Nigeria, West Africa, on water sanitation and Guinea Worm Eradication projects.
She received a YMCA Achievers award in 2017 for community service and professional achievement, and in 2016 was selected as a Pioneer as part of a groundbreaking initiative Children's Wellbeing initiative by Ashoka Changemakers and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Dr. Landry is Senior Faculty at the Disparities Solutions Center, Associate Director of the Office of Multicultural Affairs and Faculty Assistant Director of the Office of Diversity Inclusion and Community Partnership at Harvard Medical School. He received his BS from Prairie View A&M University in 2002, MD from the University of Alabama in 2006 and completed his residency in Emergency Medicine at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in 2009. In 2010, he earned an MPH from the Harvard School of Public Health. He completed the Commonwealth Fund/Harvard University Fellowship in Minority Health Policy in 2010 as well. In addition to his clinical interests, Dr. Landry is involved in research on emergency department utilization trends, disparities in care and quality of care. He works with numerous organizations to eliminate health disparities and increase diversity in the health care workforce. Dr Landry mentors students from high school to medical school encouraging careers in the health professions.
Dr. Lenny López is Senior Faculty at the Disparities Solutions Center, Chief of Hospital Medicine and Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of California San Francisco. Dr. López is an internist trained at the Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), who completed the Commonwealth Fund Fellowship in Minority Health Policy at the Harvard School of Public Health and a Hospital Medicine fellowship at BWH. Dr. López joined the Mongan Institute for Health Policy (MIHP) in 2008 after his research fellowship in General Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and was an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School until 2015. With an ultimate goal of reducing healthcare disparities in cardiovascular disease and diabetes, his current research addresses issues relating to patient safety and language barriers, optimizing primary care clinical services for Latinos with cultural and linguistic barriers, and using health information technology to decrease disparities. A second line of research is investigating the epidemiology of acculturation among Latinos in the US and its impact on the prevalence and development of cardiovascular disease and Type II diabetes. This research will help inform how to better design clinical interventions for improving chronic disease management among Latinos. Finally, Dr. López also teaches medical students and residents, with lectures and preceptorships. Dr. López received his medical degree from University of Pennsylvania in 2001, and completed his residency at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, in 2004. At Harvard University, he received a Master of Divinity in 1999 and a Master of Public Health in 2005.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


'T' is for types, like you find them in old psychology books. People with strange deformations and weird characters. I have created my own catalogue of all sorts of people in all kinds of situations. Loners and lovers, dreamers and dodgers, cheaters and children.
Four images grouped together begin to tell a story. Naked figures swimming away or towards each other, a man embracing his lovers, a woman in an earie landscape, a guy in front of a burning building. Reminiscences, perhaps, of some old fears.
Images are individually printed on a sheet high quality paper and hand colorized. At request, any grouping of any of the images from T-1 series is possible.
The deluxe edition of this series features nine images, grouped together in meaningful way. They represent elaborate stories, overlapping levels of interpretation, different ways of looking. You can even create your own story.
Images are individually printed on a sheet of high quality 250 gr. paper and hand colorized. At request, any grouping of any of the images from T-1 series is possible.
Any T series images can be custom printed in groups of four or nine in any combination, as requested.
After the Flood. A tidal wave has swept through a surreal landscape. You'd think people would be in anguish, but they're not, they're in playful mood. Elements from reality appeare here enlarged, twisted, and become absurd. This image is inspired by my stay at Curacao.
50 numbered images, printed on high quality 250 gr. Paper, each image is hand colorized.


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text:
Advising on back pain
Having green credentials is no longer enough to make products attractive to consumers. Savvy shoppers are now demanding ethical and sustainable guarantees from the things they buy too
Ethical sourcing and sustainability are increasingly in vogue for everything from food to furniture – and it seems that mindset is becoming just as important for healthcare products too.
Consumers are now more aware of the impact their buying choices have on the environment. This applies not just to what products are made of and packed in, but also to the ethics behind their manufacturing and the distance they travel to the retail shelf and how these impact on the environment. And they are expressing this awareness at the tills. "Customers are demanding that we don't just look after ourselves: we must look after each other and, more importantly, our Mother Earth," says Rose Brown, founder of PHB Ethical Beauty, a company that produces natural, vegan and alcohol-free halal beauty products at its facilities in the UK and Canada.
Buying trends
Graeme Hume, owner of Pravera, a UK distributor of natural and organic cosmetics and toiletries, believes that media attention has directed a groundswell of public opinion in two particular directions. "We are seeing a growing demand for vegan products," he says. "Of course, increasing awareness of the dangers caused by plastic in the oceans is also driving consumers towards more eco-friendly alternatives."
On the issue of plastics in particular, there is a growing trend towards using menstrual cups instead of plastic-heavy sanitary protection products. "At the last trade show I went to, there were three suppliers," says Graham. "However, most of these products are made of silicone, whereas ours are made from latex rubber, which means they are fully recyclable and biodegradable. They last up to two years and after that you can put them in your compost heap and they will break down."
Trust and transparency
With social media enabling consumers to question and take brands to task instantly when their actions cause concern or confusion, there also appears to be a genuine consumer demand for transparency in corporate social responsibility.
In its latest consumer trends report, market intelligence agency Mintel claims that at least half of all Europeans agree that the increased ability to communicate and fi nd information via social media and the internet is forcing companies to be more transparent. In future, Mintel predicts that consumers will expect greater transparency as standard, whether this is related to manufacturing processes or how efficacious a product is.
Jane Devenish, pharmacist at Well – which last year launched Dermawell, its own ethically-responsible range of skincare products – says this is especially important when it comes to companies that are focused on healthcare: "People want to be able to trust organisations who are supporting them with their health," she says, "especially because they or others may feel vulnerable, and transparency with corporate social responsibility helps to build that trust. But this trend also feeds into the GPhC standards of acting in a professional manner, with honesty and integrity."
Rose is not surprised by this. "For so long," she says, "the industry giants have dominated with product after product of chemical-enriched, animal-tested and frankly dangerous formulas that with new found knowledge, you wouldn't dream of putting in your home, let alone on your skin. They offer consumers affordable and healthy-looking products whilst knowingly distracting them from the dark side of their products. They are now answering for it due to the demand from forward thinking and active customers."
Nonetheless, Graeme warns that labelling can still be misleading: "The Soil Association is trying to stop manufacturers using the certified organic symbol to mislead consumers because it often only refers to part of the product, not all the product, so consumers should be aware of that and it's something that needs to be tightened up on.
"There is also no need to declare an ingredient if it's in a medical product," he says. "For example, did you know that most condoms are coated with a milk protein, which means they are not suitable for vegans, but you won't find that listed on the packaging in most cases. We list all the ingredients in all our products for the sake of transparency, but many manufacturers don't."
The importance of truth
Integrity is a key theme here. "People have the right to know and choose what goes onto their bodies," says Rose. "It's tremendously important that customers are not deceived when purchasing products with their hard-earned money."
With reputations at stake, Graeme says the integrity of the products he distributes is vital. "We rely on our brands to be ethical and sustainable so that our customers can keep buying from us with confi dence. And, of course, the other reason is because we are talking about protecting a planet that belongs to our children and grandchildren. My aim is to show that there are brands you can trust, that are not owned by big chemical companies giving dividends to shareholders. In fact, most ethical companies are still owned by the people who set them up, such as the Lavera brand we've distributed for 18 years, as well as Weleda and Dr Hauschka. My stance is that I won't distribute a brand that isn't owned by a person I know, as I feel I can only be confident selling something if I know the people behind it."
Consumer benefits
In theory, this holistic belief that what's good for the consumer is good for business goes full circle back to benefitting the consumer in other ways. For instance, says Graeme, there are psychological benefits to being an ethical consumer.
There can of course be perceived hurdles to overcome because some ethical healthcare products command higher prices than alternative options. Graeme's response is that while these products may seem to be more expensive at first, in the long term, they can work out to be better value. "For starters," he explains, "quite often, there is a lot less water in them, so a little goes a lot further. Plus, they usually lead to a quicker solution to a problem than trying lots of different products. You get what you pay for, so think of it as investing in your future: if it solves a problem, you've saved money."
By making ethical and sustainable choices, it's not just personal health that is being tackled. "We're only just beginning to understand the huge impact we have had on our planet," says Rose, "but it seems the general consensus is most certainly shifting towards a future that we can be proud to leave our children. We have the change that Earth needs in the palm of our hands, if we will it."
Case Study: Puressential
Puressentiel was created in France in 2005 by Isabelle and Marco Pacchioni (right). Born from their interest in aromatherapy and natural active ingredients, the company offers a range of healthcare products for everyday needs, including relieving muscle and joint pain and promoting respiratory wellbeing, sleep and weight loss.
As part of its commitment to being an ethical and sustainable business, the company has implemented a 'Pure Quality Charter', which frames all stages of a product's life from the selection of raw materials to the manufacture and transport of the finished product, and includes the preservation of nature at all production stages. "Harnessing nature's purest and most powerful ingredients in a way that's environmentally responsible and fair to producers has been the mission that Puressentiel has set itself from day one," explains Simon McCandlish, UK managing director.
"For example, we are committed to safeguarding ecosystems and biodiversity through organic and carefully considered production methods, so we make sure not to draw on a crop excessively, which would risk endangering it, and schedule planting several years before possible use." Puressentiel has also made a commitment to take care of the men and women who cultivate their crops, through the protection of their villages and families.
In addition, the company's commitment to eco-responsibility extends to grouping merchandise for shipment to reduce carbon tax, and reusing barrels and other containers. And its green credentials don't stop there. "Our tubes and bottles are recyclable," adds Simon, "and our packaging and notices are printed on recycled paper or cardboard from PEFC (Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification) schemes with vegetable inks and are also recyclable."
Case Study: Ben & Anna
In response to increasing fears about plastic polluting the planet, deodorant brand Ben & Anna has launched a certified organic, natural and vegan range of solid deodorants in cardboard tube packaging coated with a natural wax.
Explaining the thinking behind the product, managing director Jean-Pierre de Wild (right) says: "We heard the sad stories about the rubbish and plastic in our oceans and thought that we as a small producer should start to make a difference. We first had our deodorant in plastic packaging, but we thought: 'Hang on, we have such a great green product, every ingredient is certified natural or even organic but in the end we put it in plastic and we all know how bad plastic is for our environment. So how can a product in plastic packaging really be natural? This is nonsense.' And that was the start for us to think about paper packaging, which led us to this cardboard version made of certified wood that's responsibly managed and recyclable."
Jean-Pierre says the company's goal for the future is to develop even more everyday cosmetic products in environmentally-friendly packaging and with natural certifi cations. "The horror stories about plastic in our oceans are so tragic," he says, "yet so far no government in the world seems to be interested in this, so we all have to make a change to ban plastic from our daily lives."
This trend feeds into the GPhC standards of acting in a professional manner, with honesty and integrity
Healthy Living,
Consumer Trends,
Vegan,


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Luis Fortuño (F '82)
Former Governor of Puerto Rico (R) - Fall '15
More Information About Our Fellows Program
Luis Fortuño (F '82) served as the 10th Governor of Puerto Rico from 2009-2013. Luis served from 2005 to 2008 in the US House of Representatives, holding the roles of vice-president of his House Republican freshman class and later as vice-chair and then chair of the Congressional Hispanic Conference during the 109th and 110th Congresses, respectively. Additionally, he served as co-chair of the Congressional Friends of Spain Caucus. In 2007, he was appointed as the Republican minority's ranking member on the Natural Resource Committee's Subcommittee on Indian, Insular and Alaska Native Affairs. He also served as a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure, International Relations, and Education and Workforce committees.
He is currently a Partner at Steptoe in Washington, DC.
In Fall 2015, his discussion group was: "The 2016 Presidential Election: Can the GOP win the White House again?"


Order Inn (Food Services & Travel Technologies) is a national company based in Las Vegas, NV, USA, with offices in Costa Del Este, Panamá.
We are currently hiring additional Directors of Client Lodging to work out of our offices in Costa Del Este to secure hotel accommodations on behalf of our clients. The position supports and interacts externally with hotel managers and sales directors, and internally with multiple departments and personnel on a daily basis. A typical day centers around contacting, meeting with, and following up with hotel properties across the US to secure accommodations according to client requirements and demand. The position offers multiple opportunities for advancement into operations, management, and elevated sales roles.


French shipping company CMA CGM has announced the union of its Containerships and MacAndrews brands under the unique Containerships brand. This new alliance combines 26 maritime and 8 domestic services through a fleet of 32 vessels and 700 trucks. The new entity will be able to generate new synergies and focus on business development and improving customer services.
In addition, the integration of local agencies networks will allow for the creation of a tailored intra-regional service. Current CEO of MacAndrews, Claude Lebel is appointed as CEO of Containerships to promote the development of the new brand.
To reflect the integration of Containerships into the CMA-CGM group, a new logo has also been created.


The Powerex Tank Mounted Climate Control systems have been designed and tested to meet the most demanding specifications for low oil carryover and long life in the pneumatic climate control industry. The Powerex Tank Mounted Climate Control motors are NEMA Class B design. Powerex duplex configuration (AD models) are ideal for instrumentation systems requiring an alternate compressor for standby or overload capacity.
Climate Control Systems tank mounted Climate Control systems are the following: Low annual maintenance cost; 0-2 PPM Oil Carryover; UL listed controls; Low noise; NEMA 1 Enclosure; and High Efficiency and EISA compliant motors (except 3/4 HP models). The Powerex Tank Mounted Climate Control systems Features 3-5HP Simplex Models; 3-5HP systems are UL/CSA certified; Integral 13 gallon tank ASME/CRN; Inlet filtration with replaceable element; Front mounted control panel includes: On/Off switch; Power on light; High temperature shutdown with indication light; Run time hourmeter; Pressure gauge; Automatic start/stop operation; Control voltage starter with motor overload protection; Internal vibration isolators; Air-cooled aftercooler; and ODP Motor. The optional Powerex Scroll Tankmount Enclosure Systems Whisperair™ Sound Enclosure Cabinet Powerex's trademarked oil-free enclosure systems offer the lowest noise levels in the industry. Each Powerex Tank Mounted Climate Control systems is packaged in a rigid steel frame with powder coated panels and lined with sound-deadening insulation. The low noise levels are unmatched in the industry and allow installation at the point of use, while the small footprint simultaneously maximizes floor space.


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Leave the City may refer to:

 "Leave the City", a 2005 song by Magnolia Electric Co. from Trials & Errors
 "Leave the City", a 2018 song by Twenty One Pilots from Trench

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


We're back after a desperately needed break, last year was far too busy and problematic, hence the slow posting. Hope you all had a happy buying season and paid due obeisance to the gods of consumerism – at least you can be sure they exist.
Let's do a bit of a round up to get us started.
The elastic houses are made for those who like instability and precarious, who like to be awakened by the sound of the rain, those who like to sleep under the boats returned. They will be recalled at any time to the realities of gravity, rocked bywind and earthquakes. The elastic houses therefore ask its inhabitants a strong sense of balance and a real taste for the experiments.
And we are of course great lovers of the unstable and the precarious. But that image has already got a bit of a run from a few other blogs.
a more minimal interpretation of the hammock adaptively reused as a hang out, so to speak.
And the roof is also wonderful but the reason for its wonderfulness eludes us, it just has that certain minimalist indefinable je ne sais quoi.
Meanwhile the High Line adaptive reuse project is progressing nicely although this garden will be sadly missed by someone. It illustrates perfectly how it's the stolen places and lost spaces in the cracks of urbanisation that so often make cities livable. Here are some photos of the work in progress. And speaking of stolen places, just in case you missed this story, how about living (secretly) in a mall?
the temporary headquarters of Brussels group Rotor, also squeezed into a waste space if not exactly lost or secret.
In December 2006, Rotor took the initiative to build a temporary HQ in the rue de flandres. One year and a 2 months later, we are starting to plan its disassembly. Deconstruction is scheduled for 22, 23, 24 of February, and we are still looking for volunteers who can help us. Concretely, we are looking for 10 volunteers for each day, but if you can only spare a couple of hours, you are welcome as well.
If you're in Brussels with a hammer in your hand contact them through their new website .
We liked their kitchen of reused diecutting stamping boards but we doubt if there are enough to go round, just like there weren't enough of the book that has come out on our favourite architects Lacaton Vassal and sold out before we even heard about it. It's a hard life.
their new home is on the way.
Finally, we are so used to seeing great films stolen and fucked up by Hollywood remade (there is nothing in the universe that can't be made cheaper and nastier under the direction of an accountant) that it is great to see a project that could be described as an adaptive reuse of a film classic with the potential to be as interesting as the original.
Dziga Vertov's early cinematic masterpiece Man with a movie camera is being remade shot by shot on the internet in a sort of open source film making exercise where you can provide your own version of a scene from the original.
Individuals are invited to upload shots and scenes based on scenes from the original film, creating a database which then streams as a film. As a collection of personal visions this montage is in Vertov's terms "a continuous exchange of visible fact". Uploads to the site will take place continuously: the nature of the database is infinite.
This entry was written by Ian Milliss, posted on 25 Jan '08 at 9:44 pm, filed under architecture, art, household. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.