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Life is a Creative Process: Provenance and Value in Art
October 28, 2020 / ginnyburges / Leave a comment
"…Is there ever such a thing as a whole story, or an artist's triumph, a right way to look through the glass? It all depends on where the light falls."
Jessie Burton, The Muse
I love it when I come across a book I'd forgotten about. I purchased The Muse by Jessie Burton a few years ago, and as is my tendency, addiction even, to hoard books and novels, I added it to my 'to read and ongoing' piles around the house. Somehow it got buried.
As I've been decluttering and reorganising I came across it, just at the moment I decided I needed a break from research and non-fiction.
Jessie Burton is now my muse! It's a fantastic novel, it stimulated my creativity and motivation in many ways, which is auspicious with #NaNoWriMo (national novel writing month) coming up in November, where writers aim to get 50,000 words onto paper or screen.
I ended up studying it anyway, a masterclass in historical, literary fiction, I couldn't put it down.
The lives of two young women, thirty years apart and from different cultures are juxtaposed and intertwined in a riveting way, all connected to a work of art: Rufina and the Lion.
Maybe I loved it so much because the main protagonist is a writer, and the pivotal character a painter.
Odelle Bastien, a young woman from Trinidad, struggles to find fulfilling work in 1960s London. The story begins with her getting a new job at a respected London art gallery, The Skelton Institute.
Odelle writes in her spare time and works for the enigmatic Marjorie Quick, bearing witness to her descent into a destructive, downward spiral when Lawrie Scott, (Odelle's boyfriend), brings a mysterious painting to the gallery for valuation; the only thing left to him by his late mother after her un-timely death. Odelle is determined to get to the bottom of Quick's secrets.
In a parallel story the novel then jumps back to the past, and the life of the Schloss family who have just moved from London to Andalusia in January 1936. They are renting a large finca in Arazuelo, a village near Malaga.
This image captures how I imagined the Schloss's rented finca to look.
The father, Harold Schloss, a renowned Jewish Viennese art dealer with a gallery in Paris, becomes obsessed by what he thinks is a work of art by a promising local Spanish artist, Isaac Robles. His wife Sarah is a spoilt and unstable English condiment heiress, and their daughter, Olive, a painter, is coming to terms with her formidable artistic ability.
To her surprise, Olive finds the rural Spanish setting and the presence of their close neighbours, Isaac and Teresa Robles inspires her to express her authentic self. Olive has a letter from the Slade art school in her possession, but she has not shown it to her father, fearing his lack of approval, but also she does not wish to leave Spain and her lover, who also happens to be her muse…
Olive paints in secret, only Teresa is party to her acts of creation. Teresa burns with indignation for her friend's anonymity – that her talent goes unacknowledged and unappreciated. Her subversive actions on Olive's behalf are the crucible of how events unfold, of the inevitable apocryphal attributions.
Olive has a hard time persuading her reluctant muse to take the credit for her art.
"'Why do you and your sister think I'm so stupid? Do you know how many artists my father sells? Twenty-six, last time I counted. Do you know how many of them of them are women, Isaac? None. Not one. Women can't do it, you see. They haven't got the vision, although last time I checked they had eyes, and hands, and hearts and souls. I'd have lost before I'd even had a chance.
'But you made that painting-'
'So what? My father would never have got on a plane to Paris with a painting he thought was mine…'"
Harold Schloss entices Peggy Guggenheim in Venice (a real person and collector) to view the works that he believes are by Isaac Robles.
As Isaac and his younger sister Teresa become deeply involved in the complex dynamics of the Schloss family, they are all ultimately drawn into the Spanish civil war with devastating consequences.
Apart from being a brilliant and beautifully written story, The Muse subtly revealed and revelled in the themes of identity, provenance, the restitution of valuable paintings suspected of being stolen by the Nazis, the circumstances surrounding the creation of art and the cult of the artist.
Saints Justa and Rufina by Murillo
Very often an artist's appeal and allure increases after their death, although some are fortunate to become legends in their own lifetime. Death certainly creates and intensifies icons…
I'd like to think I'd hang a piece of art mainly because I loved to look at it, not because of who painted it, but very often the two are not mutually exclusive. Rarity adds value, as does sentimental attachment.
The Muse makes you think about what art's intrinsic value is: the actual work of art itself, which once completed stands independent from the artist, or whether that value should be tied to the person who made it; their story and the 'journey' of the work post creation.
The idea of provenance isn't unique to the art world, but is also applied in literature, music composition and the purchase of instruments. I readily admit that given the choice, I would love to own a violin made by Stradivarius or Guarneri rather than one produced by an unknown luthier. Their quality has been proven over the centuries.
Maybe time is a factor in how we appreciate art. Trends and tastes change, but geniuses never go out of fashion.
Can we really separate a purely aesthetic desire from financial value?
Any creative endeavour, whether we like it or not, is bound by some degree to the person who originated it.
"I'm doing the absolute opposite of giving myself away. As far as I'm concerned, I'll be completely visible. If the painting sells, I'll be in Paris, hanging on a wall. If anything, I'm being selfish. It's perfect; all the freedom of creation, with none of the fuss."
Romantic notions tend to creep in when purchasing art and sculpture. We are naturally attracted to the story behind a work of art, it heightens our understanding of it, gives us context to value and appreciate it. Is it right that there may come a point when the provenance or story behind a work is perceived as more important and valuable than the work itself?
Provenance is solely a human benchmark.
I think Banksy was very astute to keep his identity a secret. It's his trademark signature next to street art that has popped up on a wall or tube train overnight that almost seems to excite people as much as his original pictures…
And what about the artist? What value do they imbibe from their creative efforts?
View of the Grand Gallery of the Louvre by Hubert Robert, c.1796
Certainly they deserve financial remuneration, admiration and respect. Some of these external blessings never flow to an artist. So in many cases the inner joy of creating is paramount. Nothing is certain.
It's hard to believe that Vincent van Gogh only sold a handful of art works in his life, but now his colourful and distinctive oeuvre is one of the most sought after and popular in the world. How much value did he place in his own ability versus other people's opinions? Vincent struggled with his mental health, but he was compelled to paint regardless.
Real life scenarios in the art world where a lost masterpiece has been found, and subsequently authenticated, demonstrate how excitement builds and a bidding frenzy usually ensues…
Some amazing stories about lost and recovered masterpieces. And who wishes they had a Renaissance masterpiece hanging on the wall?
For various reasons authors sometimes choose to write under a pseudonym. J.K. Rowling penned the Cormoran Strike crime novels as Robert Galbraith, with modest sales. But once her true identity became public knowledge sales took a startling upward trajectory.
Like writing, art is highly subjective, and we each look at a work of art through our own prism or perceptive lens. Picasso is a big deal, but I don't personally gravitate to his work. But I love the likes of Monet, Pissarro, van Gogh, Klimt, Alma-Tadema, Waterhouse, and well, I could go on.
In The Muse, Odelle becomes choked up about not being good enough. And who hasn't experienced Imposter Syndrome to some extent at least once in their life?
Jessie Burton summed up these feelings that can capture and anchor a creative soul on the seabed of writer's block.
"She had told me that the approval of other people should never be my goal."
"You're not walking around with a golden halo beaming out of you depending on the power of your paragraph. You don't come into it, once someone else is reading. It stands apart from you. Don't let your ability drag you down, don't hang it round your neck like an albatross."
"Like most artists, everything I produced was connected to who I was – and so I suffered according to how my work was received. The idea that anyone might be able to detach their personal value from their public output was revolutionary. I didn't know if it was possible, even desirable. Surely it would affect the quality of the work? Still, I knew I'd gone too far in the opposite direction, and something had to change. Ever since I could pick up a pen, other people's pleasure was how I'd garnered attention and defined success. When I began receiving public acknowledgement for a private act, something was essentially lost. My writing became the axis upon which all my identity and happiness hinged. It was not outward-looking, a self-conscious performance. I was asked to repeat the pleasure for people, again and again, until the facsimile of my act became the act itself."
"…I'd been writing so long for the particular purpose of being approved that I'd forgotten the genesis of my impulse; unbothered, pure creation, existing outside the parameters of success and failure. And somewhere along the line, this being 'good' had come to paralyse my belief that I could write at all."
My takeaways are that we have to get out of our own way, have faith in our abilities, try to learn from the creative process and above all, enjoy it.
If every artist, writer or musician had decided to quit their projects out of fear of rejection or lack of recognition there would be no culture for us to enjoy, no legacy of human creative expression, no muses to inspire future generations.
"Although any collective answer to my question remains to be seen, personally I feel quite certain of it. Because if there's one thing I've learned, it's this: in the end, a piece of art only succeeds when its creator – to paraphrase Olive Schloss – possesses the belief that brings it into being. Odelle"
Project 'She Shed' Comes to Fruition!
December 5, 2019 December 6, 2019 / ginnyburges / 2 Comments
"We shape our buildings: Thereafter, they shape us."
~ Winston Churchill
The rise of the She Shed…
The rise of the #SheShed is no surprise to me! Mothers who have typically sacrificed either their time, money, career, space, privacy, sanity – or even all of these, are now claiming back some much needed space for their own projects.
Like other women, I have reached a point in my life where I feel justified in being a little bit selfish. It's hard to feel good about being selfish, because I'm used to putting my children's needs first. I love them unconditionally, but selfishness is a necessity that enables me to continue giving most of my energy, (and pretty much everything I have) to my family.
In my case, selfishness comes in the form of a dedicated garden office to write, study and hold meetings in.
Except, oh, wait a minute – my son beat me to it!!!
My perfect offspring, who walks around with a bright halo gleaming above his head most of the time, suddenly threw me the biggest curve-ball of his life two weeks ago.
I had not long sorted out an ongoing situation and emergency for my eldest son in New Zealand, and then the builders had a quiet week, so our bathroom and water damaged ceiling were ripped out and our home resembled a building site.
Chaos reigned.
I had been busy organising new furniture and moving my files, books and stationary across to the garden, looking forward to the peace and tranquillity it would afford; when he chose his moment to strike.
It is just as well the cabin was built, or I would be even more stressed than I am right now. For reasons which I won't go into, I will have to wait until the summer to move in full-time.
On the plus side it also means my daughter has her birthday/early Christmas present – a new piano to practice on when she comes home from school. She is preparing for her ABRSM Grade 1 exam.
#ProjectSheShed
Project She Shed began in the summer, with clearing the overgrown area at the bottom of our garden. I am grateful that we do have a relatively long, flat garden in the first place, otherwise a She Shed wouldn't have been an option.
Once the land was cleared by my step father and step brother the builders created a base and built the structure (which was delivered mostly in planks of varying sizes and thicknesses, except for the windows and roof panels), like giant Ikea furniture.
I opted for extra insulation knowing that I'm prone to feeling the cold, and I'm glad I did now. My next novel definitely won't get written with icicles hanging off my nose and my teeth chattering. My dad supplied two heaters which will keep out the chill this winter.
I spent many hours in the late summer and early autumn coating the cabin with protective undercoat and paint.
A local electrician updated the main electrics board of our 1930 built house and wired a Cat5 cable down the garden – then I had power and broadband. He even fixed motion sensor lights outside should inspiration strike in the middle of the night. But, I fully admit that's unlikely to occur in the middle of winter!
The oak wood floor was laid and my anticipation grew…
I had visions of meditating, journaling, planning, reading, writing and placing mind-maps around the walls, spreading out scene cards and getting stuck into my next novel.
"You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you."
~ Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing
Even the cats were keen to join me and test out my plush new seating arrangements with their muddy paws.
Sammy boldly ventures into the unpacking labyrinth…
Waiting to be admitted
Simba gives the sofa his seal of approval
However, in the tradition of being stoical, I have deferred to my family once again. I just hope there are no more curve-balls waiting to knock me sideways before Christmas.
The festive season gets pretty crazy chez Burges.
I don't mean to come across as whingeing when there are so many people suffering in the world. I am learning to embrace challenges and be thankful for my many blessings. My mother admonishes me whenever she senses a whiff of a moan, pointing out that there are plenty of people worse off.
And she is right.
A close relative is battling an extremely aggressive form of cancer and we thought we might lose her a few months ago.
Thanks to a stent she has been able to go home – hospital was not helping her – the machine she was hooked up to bleeped incessantly and so she rarely slept. To our horror she appeared to be wasting away over the weeks she was confined to a hospital bed.
But with the help of her iron will, nutritionally therapeutic supplements, a loving, supportive family and ongoing care, she is getting stronger and showing us all what grace under pressure looks like.
We are grateful and overjoyed to have her with us still, and hopefully for Christmas.
Despite life's challenges, if we have our health, that, in my opinion, will always be the greatest wealth.
I love and appreciate my family for everything they have done to make this project happen. I feel what's needed at this point is a hefty dose of patience rather than increased productivity.
Best writers' sheds in pictures
I visited Dylan Thomas's writing shed a couple of years ago whilst on a trip to Laugharne with my family, and it has the most stunning view out over the estuary. I think I would just sit and stare out the window all day…
I am fortunate to have my new She Shed sanctuary, (the place where my creativity will be unleashed and future novels will be written) waiting for me, one day…
"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion. Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly." ~ Franz Kafka
April 13, 2015 / ginnyburges / Leave a comment
"If a story is in you, it has got to come out." ~ William Faulkner
Once upon a time there was a riveting story waiting to be told; a tale so compelling that it would change multitudinous lives forever. That story could be your story. There is a story in all of us. It's the telling of it that makes the difference.
Will it be a page turner, will it suck them in to your world and spit them out at the end thinking about it for weeks, or maybe even years to come?
I love it when authors write books that do that to me. More often than not, it's the writers with extensive life experience that can encapsulate universal emotions on the pages of their books.
The title of this blog post is suggestive of a broad and in-depth subject, and I feel that perhaps I have bitten off more than I can chew. It will be tough to do justice to in around a thousand words, so forgive me if I exceed my usual post length. Here go the basics!
Just like painting, drawing and composing music, writing is an art form. Crafting a compelling story takes time and skill. When writers have ideas, they work to express and articulate them in a way which will draw readers into their imagination using their own unique voice. They have to craft their story into something that will take their readers on a journey, and nothing less than transformation will do…
Why is it certain stories are considered classics, being read and retold through the ages?
There's a reason Shakespeare has endured for 392 years since the first folios of his plays were published. They have captured our collective imagination in some measure because their themes hold as true today as they did in the Tudor period. Love, hate, jealousy, passion, ambition, religion and power struggles are every bit as evident in the world we now live in. Just watch the news.
The human family may have broadly evolved a bit since then – or maybe not – but there's nothing interesting about a perfect family. Give us a contentious, dysfunctional family and you have the basis for a story. A querulous quarrel kicks off a family feud and hey presto, a story is underway…
Conflict is one of the key ingredients. So is a quest of some kind, such as defeating the nefarious wizard that murdered your parents when you were a baby, or indeed any kind of pathos and unfulfilled desire. Desire and resistance push and pull at us all, shaping our experience of life, unless we are enlightened enough to practise the Buddhist ethos of detachment. But detachment doesn't work in fiction. Engagement does.
The full answer to this question is probably going to be different for each of us, depending on our personal preferences, but here is a list of what works for me:
An interesting or unusual opening with a hook to draw me in early on, but nothing too gimmicky. Novelty stimulates the brain.
A likeable, relatable protagonist to care about, facing a disaster or an unavoidable calling and orientation into his/her environment to place me at the heart of the action. Their unmet desire (either for their situation to return to normal, or for their situation to be different from the one they find themselves in is the platform for the choices they will make and the changes they will go through.
A mixture of three main types of struggle and conflict: internal, external and interpersonal.
Interesting characters that behave in accordance with their history and their unique personality traits, not acting in an incongruous manner just for the sake of a pre-determined plot.
A plot that is believable and makes sense (genre withstanding), where the scenes follow on logically and give me, as a reader what I want: both the familiar and the unexpected.
Enough tension and escalation to keep me interested in what happens next. That is not necessarily more action, but ramping up the tension in the form of not getting what they want and raising the stakes.
Well thought out descriptions to enhance the sense of place, not too much that will take me away from the story, but enough for me to visualise the scene and or the characters.
Pacing that naturally flows with the tension and action of the story, giving passages of intense action and also moments of perceived relief, building up to the climax of the story.
'Show don't tell' epitomised by Anton Chekhov's quote: "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass."
A theme that makes me question what I think I know; a quandary or moral dilemma that engages me and puts me in the characters' shoes. I want to learn something about another world or about myself.
Clear language and a consistent voice that lacks verbosity but contains enough words to convey the story in a way that flows naturally. Words that are beautiful when read aloud, that perfectly fit the genre and story. It annoys me if a writer is using a daedalean word or phrase as if they are attempting to show how clever they are. I'm not averse to looking in the dictionary – in fact I spend much of my time there and chez Thesaurus – but misused vocabulary is amaroidal in the extreme!
Once you come up with the premise there is a certain amount of planning to do, however; I believe a writer's imagination and creativity can be stifled by too much detailed outlining and deciding how it will end before you begin writing. Planning to the nth degree will kill off whole areas of undiscovered story because you are blinkered by following a set path.
I like to meander a bit. A trail that branches off from the main walkway can lead you to all sorts of terrain and unexpected views, ones that you wouldn't have set eyes on had you not strayed a little. Maybe it's because I'm quite a spontaneous person. New characters suddenly come to life, different settings appear, sub plots and possible outcomes fill your mind. The story emerges rather than suffocates.
Storytelling should be an organic activity. Sometimes ideas need time to incubate. You flesh them out, go back to them, change them and improve them. Characters take time to get to know; how they speak, how they react, what they want, what they desire and fear.
The best stories aren't planned - they evolve. Writers could be likened to sculptors, carving their masterpieces out of rock, only we are carving out of words, sentences, paragraphs and scenes. And as the body of the work starts to take shape we see new curves and angles that we didn't notice when we started with a solid block of stone. Grafting our material in this way will hopefully avoid writer's block and allow us to transfer our creations from the depths of our grey matter into the hearts and minds of our readers.
By allowing free reign (within reason), to your creative process, you can lull your readers into a fictive dream that they won't want to wake up from. You'll all be on that winding, dangerous path together, maybe scared, excited or angry about what's around the corner, but unable to stop yourselves from following it to its ultimate destination, instead of plodding along the yellow brick road to boredomville.
"Writing effective fiction requires being aware of the interplay of the unfolding narrative and your evolving ideas as you watch and respond to how everything merges and reforms itself into the final product. It's a dance, and we're just here to help introduce two partners – character and unmet desire – and then listen to the music and watch them take it from there within the constraints of our art form." ~ Steven James (Story Trumps Structure).
The only formula you really need to know is: there are no formulas. Just considerations, such as: genre, setting, point of view, tension, believability, escalation, reader empathy, character intention, causality, twists & turns, and of course reader expectations.
Steven James (author of the successful Patrick Bower thriller series) has come to the conclusion that he writes best when he asks himself these questions:
What would this character naturally do in this situation? This is where the saying "truth is stranger than fiction" applies. Fiction has to be believable.
How can I make things worse? This is where the increasing escalation and tension keep the story moving forward.
How can I end this in a way that's unexpected and inevitable? Readers want a great ending that both surprises them and gives them what they want at the same time.
By continually asking these questions you can avoid taking a detour down a dead end, whilst keeping all the key elements of your story on the right track.
"You can't please all of the readers all of the time; you can't please even some of the readers all of the time, but you really ought to try to please at least some of the readers some of the time." ~ Stephen King (On Writing).
A satisfying climax
In words, as in love, the climax is the pinnacle of the exercise! But getting there can be a lot of fun. Well, maybe not for your protagonist. Generally, they are going through hell. As a writer you want your readers to become so engrossed in your story that they will make it to the grand finale. They will be rooting for your protagonist, and when they arrive at the denouement, you don't want the last act to leave them cold. You want to bid farewell to your story by giving them the ending they want, but not necessarily expected.
There's plenty of advice out there. Stephen King in his book, On Writing states, "If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot."
A brilliant presentation and discussion about writing, linguistics and prose with Professor Steven Pinker and novelist Ian McEwan, from a recent gathering at the Royal Geographical Society:
I agree with Ian, please don't take away the pause comma! Even Jane Austen isn't free from criticism.
Useful Resources:
How Not to Write a Novel by Sandra Newman & Howard Mittelmark
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne & Dave King
Story Trumps Structure by Steven James
The Elements of Style by Strunk & White
The Sense of Style by Steven Pinker
From Pitch to Publication by Carole Blake
The Naked Author by Alison Baverstock
Getting Published by Harry Bingham
The Writers' & Artists' Yearbook
Blogs: Nathan Bransford, Joanna Penn, Catherine Ryan Howard
To become an artist takes faith in your own intuitive abilities. Trust your instincts and support them with intelligent review throughout the project. Let your voice be heard. I'd like to read your story someday…
"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible" ~ Vladimir Nabokov


Black dress with white screen printed image on front.
Dress body: 100% cotton Jersey knit with adjustable straps that tie behind the neck.
MADE IN USA - Machine washable.
Hemless top and strap edges for distressed look.


The team also looks forward to 2016, anticipating some of the topics that will be hitting the headlines during the next 12 months.
The Fonecast is a unique half-hour podcast for anyone working in - or interested in - the UK mobile phone industry. Follow us on Twitter or join our Facebook page and discover the latest mobile industry headlines as they happen. We're currently looking for sponsorship so that we can return to producing regular programmes.


text:
package Warmup;

import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Iterator;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.Map.Entry;
import java.util.Scanner;
import java.util.TreeMap;

public class _76IndeedChallenge {
	public static void main(String args[] ) throws Exception {
		Scanner scanner=new Scanner(System.in);
		long Q=Long.parseLong(scanner.nextLine());
		int M=Integer.parseInt(scanner.nextLine());
		List<Integer> list=new ArrayList<>();
		TreeMap<Integer, Integer> map=new TreeMap<>();
		long N=0;
		for (int i = 0; i < M; i++) {
			String arr[]=scanner.nextLine().split(" ");
			map.put(Integer.parseInt(arr[0]), Integer.parseInt(arr[1]));
			N+=Integer.parseInt(arr[1]);
			/*for (int j = 0; j < Integer.parseInt(arr[1]); j++) {
				list.add(Integer.parseInt(arr[0]));
			}*/
		}
		long noOfQuantiles=Q-1;
		Iterator itr=map.entrySet().iterator();
		Entry<Integer, Integer> entry=(Entry<Integer, Integer>) itr.next();
		int startIndex=0;
		int endIndex=entry.getValue();
		for (long i = 1; i <=noOfQuantiles; i++) {
			int value=(int)Math.ceil(N*i/Q);
			if(value>=startIndex && value<=endIndex)
			{
				System.out.println(entry.getKey());
				continue;
			}
			if(itr.hasNext()){
				entry=(Entry<Integer, Integer>) itr.next();
				startIndex=endIndex;
				endIndex+=entry.getValue();
				i--;
			}
		}
	}

}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


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Pal, Jim, cancer free 5+ years!
How is Appendix Cancer treated?
What are Appendiceal Cancer treatments?
Are you or a loved one preparing for surgery for Appendix Cancer treatment?
The PMP Pals' Network provides a wide variety of services to assist you in preparing for, and recuperating from, appendix cancer treatment and surgery as quickly as possible!
Our Preparing for Surgery Handbook and our weekly Newsletters provide step by step instructions to assist you with planning for your appendix cancer treatment!
We are here to assist you in returning to your full and active life, following treatment, as soon as possible!
Don't forget to review our Pal Profiles and to view just a few of the Pal Mentors who are ready to help YOU!
What is the treatment for appendiceal cancer?
Pal, Jeanie cancer free 10+ years!
The obvious goal for any cancer therapy and treatment is to increase and improve your options for long term survival. Treatment with the best specialist, focused on attending to your specific diagnosis, may increase your opportunities for survival!
Your surgical oncologist specialist will explain and review all treatment options for Appendix cancer. Your treatment plan will depend on your overall health, the type of tumor (pathology), the quantity (mass) size and location of the tumor, and whether the cancer has metastasized.
Pal Mentors help you navigate through treatment!
Whether you're treatment includes surgery or chemotherapy, our Pal Mentors are ready to assist you!
>Join the Pals and connect with our Appendix Cancer Mentors today!
Consult with an Appendix Cancer Treatment Specialist!
Find an appendiceal cancer treatment specialist in your region!
The PMP Pals' Network suggests that patients prepare a personal list of questions prior to meeting with a surgeon for a pre op evaluation.
Refer to the PMP Pals' Handbooks, Preparing for a Consultation with a Specialist and Preparing for Surgery for detailed lists of questions to ask your physician.
Is my diagnosis aggressive? Does it require treatment?
What are my treatment options for my particular diagnosis?
If you were me, which option would you choose and why?
What is my prognosis with the treatment you recommend?
What is my prognosis without treatment?
What does "watch and wait" mean?
Will any organs be removed?
If so, what, if any, are the ramifications of losing those organs?
Will I have an ostomy? If so, which type? Ileostomy? Colostomy? Urostomy?
If I have an ostomy, can it be "reversed?" If so, when?
Will I have the HIPEC treatment? Is HIPEC optional?
What, if any, are the risks/complications from this surgery? From HIPEC?
Will the HIPEC treatment and your fees as my attending surgeon covered by my insurance?
Will my family caregiver be able to visit me in the ICU?
How often will you visit me during my hospitalization?
Who will oversee my post op recuperation? You (my attending surgeon) or the Fellows or Residents?
How many patients with my diagnosis do you treat each year?
How many surgeries have you performed on patients with conditions like mine?
How often do you treat patients with the HIPEC procedure?
How experienced is your surgical team and post op nursing staff in treating patients with my condition?
Appendectomy refers to the surgical removal of the appendix. Appendectomies may be performed via laparscopy.
Debulking surgery: The purpose of debulking surgery for appendix cancer treatment is to remove as much tumor as possible. Debulking often includes the removal of the omentum and the right colon. Additionally, for women, debulking will likely include a hysterectomy, if this was not previously performed. Adhesions may more troublesome with any additional debulking surgeries.
CRS (cytoreductive surgery) consists of the removal of as much mucin and visible tumor as possible, from the abdominal or peritoneal cavity. Cytoreductive surgery refers to the removal of all visible tumors.
Cytoreductive Surgery includes thorough removal or destruction of all visible tumors throughout the surfaces of the peritoneum. Surgery may include the removal of segments of small and large bowel, gall bladder, liver, omentum, ovaries, pancreas, spleen, stomach and uterus.
The goal of cytoreductive surgery is to eliminate all tumor and metastatic tissues from the abdominal cavity, in order to effectively deliver intra-peritoneal heated chemotherapy (HIPEC).
Cytoreductive Surgery or Cytoreduction (CRS) is performed under general anesthesia. CRS time averages eight to ten hours.
Treatment for Appendix Cancer, Pseudomyxoma Peritonei syndrome, and other Peritoneal Surface Malignancies generally includes CRS (cytoreductive surgery) with or without systemic chemotherapy or HIPEC.
HIPEC (hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy) may be administered when complete removal of visible tumor (or debulking) is achieved through cytoreductive surgery. HIPEC involves perfusion of the peritoneal cavity with chemotherapy heated to approximately 40 degrees Celsius.
Hyperthermic Intraperitoneal Chemotherapy (HIPEC) may be included at the conclusion of the cytoreductive surgery for the treatment of pseudomyxoma peritonei and appendix cancer if substantial tumor debulking is accomplished through CRS.
HIPEC is administered with the infusion of heated chemotherapy during the last 90 minutes of the CRS procedure. Through HIPEC the surgeon(s) intend to destroy any residual tumor cells that may not have been surgically removed during CRS.
HIPEC treatment includes the infusion of the abdominal cavity with a specific chemotherapy, heated to approximately 40 degrees Celsius for a period of approximately 90 minutes. The purpose of the HIPEC treatment is to attempt to kill any tumor cells which were not removed during the actual surgery process..
Although this procedure may initially sound overwhlming to the newly diagnosed patient, rarely is resection and/or removal of all of these organs is required.
Each patient's case is unique/ Most patients live productive and healthy lives following surgery!
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Once thought to be ineffective for the treatment of Appendix Cancer and Pseudomyxoma Peritonei, cystemic chemotherapy treatment has become common during the past decade due to the development of several new colorectal cancer therapies.
Several systemic chemotherapies have become treatment options for Appendix cancer and pseudomyxoma peritonei patients. Systemic chemotherapy targets cancer cells throughout the body and is delivered throughout the bloodstream.
The "Chemo Pals' Resource & Support Group" is one of the largest, PMP Pal Resource Programs.
Participants in "Chemo Pals" are Pseudomyxoma Peritonei and Appendix Cancer patients who exchange information regarding the particular chemotherapy (ies) utilized, including results of their treatment regimens.
>Is systemic chemotherapy an appropriate treatment for you?
BACKGROUND: Although cytoreductive surgery and intraperitoneal chemotherapy have been advocated as standard treatment for appendiceal neoplasms with isolated peritoneal metastasis, the optimal method of chemotherapy administration has not been established. At our institution, patients undergoing complete cytoreduction in this setting typically receive multiple cycles of early postoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy.
OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to describe patients with appendiceal neoplasms and peritoneal dissemination treated with complete cytoreductive surgery and early postoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy and to document associated time to progression and morbidity.
DESIGN: This is a retrospective study at a single specialty institution. Hospital and departmental databases were searched for patients presenting with primary appendiceal neoplasms undergoing cytoreductive surgery, placement of intraperitoneal port, and subsequent intraperitoneal chemotherapy from June 1995 to September 2009.
SETTINGS: This study was conducted at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.
PATIENTS: We identified 50 patients (30 female), median age 48 (range, 26–66) who met the criteria.
INTERVENTIONS: Cytoreductive surgery, placement intraperitoneal port, and intraperitoneal chemotherapy were performed.
RESULTS: All patients underwent intraperitoneal catheter placement after complete cytoreductive surgery, followed by a median of 4 cycles (range, 1–9) intraperitoneal 5-fluoro-2′-deoxyuridine (1000 mg/m2 daily for 3 days) plus leucovorin (240 mg/m2). The median hospital length of stay was 9 days (maximum, 29). Thirty-four percent of the patients experienced complications; 12% experienced major complications (3 abdominal abscesses, 1 deep vein thrombosis, 1 abdominal hemorrhage, and 1 intraperitoneal port malfunction). There were no 30-day mortalities. Five-year recurrence-free interval was observed in 43%. Among 23 patients with recurrence, 18 had a recurrence only within the peritoneum. The median overall survival was 9.8 years.
LIMITATIONS: This is a retrospective study. Many patients had surgery first at other institutions; therefore, pathologic examination of resected material was not possible in every case. Other factors possibly impacting time to recurrence (ie, preoperative chemotherapy, duration between onset of disease and presentation to our institution) varied among patients and were not controlled for. In the absence of a control arm undergoing complete cytoreduction without early postoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy, we did not ascertain whether intraperitoneal chemotherapy confers additional benefit.
CONCLUSIONS: Cytoreductive surgery plus multiple cycles of early postoperative intraperitoneal chemotherapy is safe, achieving survival results similar to published outcomes of other protocols (including hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy). Prospective trials are warranted to compare various methods of intraperitoneal chemotherapy in this setting.
Objective: To evaluate the safety and efficacy of laparoscopy-assisted distal gastrectomy (LADG) in patients with early gastric cancer (EGC) to determine whether LADG is an acceptable alternative to open distal gastrectomy (ODG).
Background: LADG combined with less than D2 or D2 lymphadenectomy for EGC is still a controversial surgical intervention for its uncertain oncological safety and economic benefit. We conducted this systematic review and meta-analysis that included randomized control trials (RCTs) and non-RCTs of LADG versus ODG to evaluate whether the safety and efficacy of LADG in patients with EGC are equivalent to those of ODG.
Methods: A comprehensive search of PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, and China Knowledge Resource Integrated Database was performed. Eligible trials published between January 1, 1994, and December 31, 2010, were included in the study. Data synthesis and statistical analysis were carried out by RevMan 5.0 software. The quality of evidence was assessed by GRADEpro 3.2.2.
Results: Twenty-two studies with 3411 participants were included in this study.
The mean number of lymph nodes retrieved in LADG was close to that retrieved in ODG (in the less than D2 resection: weighted mean difference [WMD] = -1.79; 95% confidence interval [95% CI], -5.78 to 2.19; P = 0.38; heterogeneity: P < 0.00001, I2 = 98%; and in the D2 resection: WMD = -1.53; 95% CI, -3.56 to 0.51; P = 0.14; heterogeneity: P = 0.23, I2 = 26%). The overall postoperative morbidity was significantly less in LADG than in ODG (relative risk = 0.58; 95% CI, 0.46-0.74; P < 0.00001; heterogeneity: P = 0.94, I2 = 0%). LADG reduced the intraoperative blood loss, postoperative analgesic consumption, and hospital duration, without increasing the total hospitalization costs and cancer recurrence rate. The long-term survival rate of patients undergoing LADG was similar to that of patients undergoing ODG. However, LADG was still a technically dependent and time-consuming procedure. Conversion rate of LADG was 0% to 2.94%. The reported reasons for conversion were bleeding, adhesion, and safety resection margin requirement.
Limitations: There were potential biases and significant heterogeneity in some clinical outcome measures in this study. Methodologically high-quality controlled clinical trials were sparse for this new surgical intervention. According to The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation approach, when assessing the safety and efficacy of LADG by comparing with those of ODG with the defined clinical outcomes in patients with EGC, the quality of the currently available clinical evidence was very low.
Conclusions: LADG may be a technically feasible alternative for EGC when it is performed in experienced surgical centers in which patients undergoing LADG may benefit from the faster postoperative recovery. However, the currently available evidence cannot exclude the potential clinical benefits or harms, especially in the node-positive cases. Methodologically high-quality comparative studies are needed for further evaluation.
Is Patient Safety at Risk in Too Many Hospitals?
Learn suggestions for preparing for surgery, preventing infections, advocating for your own care, taking antibiotics and other medications, central lines, urinary catheters, and more!
Becker's Hospital Review has named "70 Hospitals and Health Systems With Great Oncology Programs." These hospitals are on the cutting edge of cancer treatment, prevention and research, and the Becker's Hospital Review editorial team selected them based on clinical accolades, quality care and contributions to the field of oncology.
The PMP Pals' Network has condensed this list to include those hospitals programs and who have been vetted by the PMP Pals' Network, and whose surgical oncologists are listed on our international HIPEC Treatment Centers page.
The PMP Pals' Network HIPEC Treatment Centers page lists other cancer treatment centers that have been vetted by the Network but do not appear on the Becker's Hospital Review list.
These hospitals have been recognized for excellence in this specialty by reputable healthcare rating resources, including U.S. News & World Report, HealthGrades, Thomson Reuters, the National Cancer Institute, the American College of Surgeons and the American Nurses Credentialing Center. They have demonstrated continual innovation in treatments and services, patient-centered care and the achievement of clinical milestones and groundbreaking discoveries.
The PMP Pals' Network reminds patients and family caregivers that he following content should be used for informational purposes only and is not intended to substitute professional medical advice. The PMP Pals' Network neither solicits, nor receives, funding or advertising revenue from cancer treatment centers, pharmaceutical companies, physicians who treat cancer or government agencies.
The following hospitals from Becker's are listed in alphabetical order with PMP Pals' Network vetted HIPEC Treatment specialists below each hospital's paragraph.
For an extended international listing of additional HIPEC Treatment specialists vetted by the PMP Pals Network, click here.
Our thanks to Becker's Review for sharing their listing with the public.
Froedtert Hospital's Clinical Cancer Center includes more than 200 oncologists, physicians and scientists in 13 disease-specific cancer programs. The center operates under a patient-centered "hub model," where physicians are grouped by the kinds of cancer they treat, not the type of service they provide.
It was recognized as a regional leader in cancer care in U.S. News & World Report's 2011 Best Hospitals list. The hospital, which uses tumor boards to develop patient-specific treatment plans, is also part of a cancer care network with two other local hospitals.
The Montefiore Einstein Center for Cancer Care is partnered for research with the Albert Einstein Cancer Center, which was one of the first cancer centers to receive National Cancer Institute designation in 1972.
Founded in 1898, Roswell Park was the country's first cancer center and remains the first and only facility in upstate New York designated as a Comprehensive Cancer Center by the National Cancer Institute.
It's accredited by the National Comprehensive Cancer Center Network, the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer and several other oncology-related organizations. Its patient satisfaction scores are consistently well-above the national average. In the past 10 years, the center has added more than 1,000 new jobs, dedicated an entire hospital facility to Phase I cancer research and formed international strategic partnerships with researchers.
University of Arizona Medical Center is the clinical affiliate of University of Arizona Cancer Center, a National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center established in 1976.
ACC patients receive inpatient and outpatient care from the UA Medical Center physicians. ACC is home to more than 300 oncologists and scientists, and it was recently awarded more than $19.5 million in grants to study skin cancer and colorectal cancer. It also offers the only genetic counselor in Tucson who specializes in cancer.
The Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center is a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center and is also accredited by the American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer. The center also has major partnerships with the state of Maryland, the American Cancer Society and other cancer organizations in the private industry.
UPMC partners in cancer care with the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, which combines UPMC's medical expertise with the academic research at the University of Pittsburgh.
UPMC Cancer Centers include more than 1,700 physicians, scientists and other healthcare professionals in 14 areas of expertise on specific types or treatments of cancer. The Hillman Cancer Center, a five-story facility located on the UPMC Shadyside campus, is the flagship facility for the UPMC Cancer Centers network. UPMC received nearly $174 million in government funding for cancer research in 2011, making it the National Cancer Institute's 12th most-funded research institution.
The UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center was established in 1979 and received designation from the National Cancer Institute as a Comprehensive Cancer Center in 2001.
Moores Cancer Center emphasizes a shared focus on bench-to-bedside research, preventive care and multidisciplinary treatment and has made waves in the field of cancer care. Its researchers pioneered intraperitoneal chemotherapy, which delivers high doses of anti-cancer drugs directly to ovarian tumors. In 2006, the federal government named that procedure, IP chemotherapy, as the new standard of treatment for ovarian cancer.
MD Anderson ranks first in the country for number of grants awarded and total amount of grant dollars from the National Cancer Institute.
Some of the largest strides in cancer research have occurred within the walls of MD Anderson. In the 1970s, researchers proved that metastasis is a non-random process. The center also pioneered chemotherapy in outpatient settings in the 1980s and early 1990s; a practice that is widely followed today and is more cost-effective for patients.
The Comprehensive Cancer Center at Wake Forest Baptist is home to more than 120 clinicians and oncologists with expertise in all aspects among the cancer continuum. The center is the first in the region to be fully accredited by the National Accreditation Program for Breast Centers, and the National Cancer Institute has also designated Wake Forest as a comprehensive cancer center.
Source: ESJO, 2008Are you scheduled for Appendix Cancer surgery? Would you like to talk with Appendix Cancer survivors who are living successful lives? Join PMP Pals! We'll provide you with Pal Mentors who will assist you today!
Peritonectomy refers to stripping the parietal peritoneum and resecting structures at the sites that contain adenomucinosis.
Ostomies: some patients require a temporary or permanent ostomy to assist them during recuperation.
The PMP Pals' Network provides many helpful resources, as well as Pal Mentors to assist you with your ostomy!
Tips to Fight Cancer Fatigue!
Amy addresses concerns about sleep deprivation and other sources of fatigue during cancer treatment and recuperation.
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This item is a used rear lower control rear driver coil / spring seat arm for a 2016 Honda Civic. The part numbers are 52355-TBA-A01 and 52355TBAA01. This OEM Genuine Honda part sells for $35 and comes with a warranty.


text:
Efficient Anonymizations with Enhanced Utility
Jacob Goldberger(a), Tamir Tassa(b),(*)
Transactions on Data Privacy 3:2 (2010) 149 - 175
(a) School of Engineering; Bar-Ilan University; Ramat-Gan; Israel.
(b) Division of Computer Science; The Open University; Ra'anana; Israel.
e-mail:goldbej @eng.biu.ac.il; tamirta @openu.ac.il
One of the most well studied models of privacy preservation is k-anonymity. Previous studies of k-anonymization used various utility measures that aim at enhancing the correlation between the original public data and the generalized public data. We, bearing in mind that a primary goal in releasing the anonymized database for datamining is to deducemethods of predicting the private data from the public data, propose a new information-theoretic measure that aims at enhancing the correlation between the generalized public data and the private data. Such a measure significantly enhances the utility of the released anonymized database for data mining. We then proceed to describe a new algorithm that is designed to achieve k-anonymity with high utility, independently of the underlying utility measure. That algorithm is based on a modified version of sequential clustering which is the method of choice in clustering. Experimental comparison with four well known algorithms of k-anonymity show that the sequential clustering algorithm is an efficient algorithm that achieves the best utility results. We also describe a modification of the algorithm that outputs k-anonymizations which respect the additional security measure of l-diversity.
Vicenç Torra, Last modified: 00 : 25 December 12 2014.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
2930) I Began To Recover My Armenian Identity On The Day I Became Aware Of The Turk Within Me
If American presidential candidates promise to recognize the Genocide and when elected they recant, it may be because they are exposed to the other side of the story and recognize themselves in Turks.
The expression "Young Turks" does not have a sinister connotation in English. It means enthusiastic or single-minded dedication to a cause or policy that may be unpopular in some quarters.
I remember, the first time I heard an Armenian say "The Turks won because they were better organized," I was outraged. That's when I knew only one side of the story.
To know only one side of the story is more dangerous than to know nothing.
Empires do not speak the same language as tribes. Americans and Turks understand one another better than Armenian understands Armenian.
When our "betters" divide us, they do so with the certainty their real motives will never be uncovered, and so far they have been right but only with an increasingly diminished fraction of the people.
We blindly trust those who make us believe, no matter how absurd the belief system, even when they have done nothing to earn our trust.
It pleases us to think what others believe is a lie, and what we believe is not.
I began to recover my Armenian identity on the day I became aware of the Turk within me.. .
"Who hates the Jew more than a Jew?" (Jewish saying).
My answer: The Armenian who hates an Armenian.
(Finally, I have hit on a field of human endeavor in which we can assert superiority over Jews.)
Q: All nations have their nationalist historians, why shouldn't we?
A: All nations also have dissidents who question their honesty.
Q: Why is nationalism wrong?
A: If its aim is to assert moral superiority, it is not just wrong but simple-minded. I do not believe in the moral superiority of any nation, including our own.
We are as good or bad as any nation, including Turks and Azeris, with whom we have coexisted for centuries.
Q: What makes you think you are right and your critics wrong?
A: I know they are wrong when they voice views that I held thirty years ago when I could not yet think for myself. I also know they are wrong when they go down into the gutter and shout at the top of their lungs. The gutter is no place for civilized discourse, and emotion is incompatible with reason.
Q: Are we really as bad as Turks? Do you really believe that? And if you do, do you really expect us to believe it?
A: Why not? I will go further and say, we may be worse.
Q: Have we ever massacred our minorities?
A: Do we have them? Did we ever have them? According to the most recent statistics I have read, the non-Armenian population living in Armenia today number less than 4%, and as far as I know none of them has ever risen against the state or engaged in acts of terrorism. When we say we are better than Turks or Azeris we confuse military inferiority with moral superiority. As for our claim that we have never been guilty of genocide: Are not violations of human rights crimes against humanity? What are assassinations if not isolated or interrupted massacres? What are mass exodus from the Homeland and the high rate of assimilation in the Diaspora if not "spitak chart" (white massacres)? And let us not forget that the Turks did what they did for a very pragmatic reason: they believed or they were led to believe they were defending the integrity of their Homeland in time of war when their very survival was at stake. Whereas we do what we do for no discernible reason. The smart, civilized, Christian Armenian is not just a myth or a lie but an absurdity.
Q: Do you ever ask yourself what an odar may think of us after they read you?
A: That not all Armenians are idiots?...Joking aside, odars have more important things to do than waste their time reading or thinking about us. How much time do you waste thinking about Patagonians? What about Romanians and Aramaeans? -- because most odars I talk to confuse us with them. As for politicians: they already know all they need to know. I can imagine the following conversation between an American presidential candidate and one of his young advisers:
"What do we know about Armenians?"
"A hundred years ago they were massacred by Turks."
"What's the Turkish side of the story?"
"They did to the Armenians what we did to our Indians."
"So what do I say to the Armenians?"
"You will recognize the Genocide."
"Why genocide and not massacres?"
"They need to hear the word, sir."
"Is that all? I will recognize the Genocide?"
"I love the Armenians. What about the Turks? What do I say to them?"
"Nothing, sir! They know the rules of the game."
"They ought to. They ran an empire for how many centuries?"
"Six, sir."
"Do you think we will last that long?"
"Hope so, sir."
"I do too. Maybe I should read a book about them to see what they did right."
"I'll see what I can do, sir. I could read one for you, if you like, and underline the relevant passages."
"Even better. You sure I don't have to say anything to the Turks?"
"Positive, sir."
"I love those Turks."
RAFFI AND I
Q: The difference between a writer like Raffi and you is that--
A: He is a 19th-century giant and I am a 21st-century midget.
Q: That wasn't my question. My question has nothing to do with literary greatness and everything to do with a balanced and fair view of reality. In Raffi's writings there are bad as well as good Armenians. In your writings there are only bad ones. Why?
A: That's because I write about our problems.
Q: And Raffi didn't?
A: Only obliquely and in the context of historical fiction.
Q: What is your context?
A: Analytical commentaries.
Q: Does that mean good Armenians don't exist?
A: They exist only as victims of humbuggers or as ineffective players.
Q: You say you write about our problems. If we have problems, and I agree that we do, don't we need solutions?
A: Only one: solidarity.
Q: How do we go about developing solidarity?
A: By ending divisions.
Q: How do we do that?
A: By realizing and admitting to ourselves that dividers are our real enemies.
Q: It seems to me we are going in circles here. Let me approach this question from a different angle: If we need solutions, it must be solutions that work, right? When a solution doesn't work, we should discard it and search for one that will do the job.
A: Excellent idea. If we are a failed nation, let's consider the case of successful nations...such as the United States of America.
Q: But there are all kinds of divisions in America – the rich and the poor, whites and blacks, pro-war and anti-war, pro-abortion and anti --
A: There is also a mechanism designed to resolve differences, it's called democracy. Now, throughout our millennial existence we have at no time experienced democracy. We have been and continue to be at the mercy of paternalistic, authoritarian, fascist and self-appointed pseudo-elites who place their own powers and privileges above the welfare of the nation.
Q: Maybe so, but you still haven't convinced me that emphasizing the positive is wrong.
A: It is wrong if it means covering up or minimizing the dangers and challenges we face.
Q: Is that what Raffi did? -- minimized and covered up?...
A: You seem to have adopted Raffi as a model. If all writers had done that, they would have written nothing but historical novels. Writers like Baronian, Odian, and Massikian wrote satire, where the emphasis is on bad characters. If we were to judge a writer's merits by how successful he has been in solving our problems, as you seem to suggest, we shall have to conclude that our literature as a whole, from Khorenatsi to our own days, has been a gigantic failure. If we are to assign failure, let's begin with our leaders and the dupes who support them. That is why I never get tired of saying and repeating, the smart, progressive, civilized, and westernized Armenian is not just a lie but an absurdity.
Q: Are you saying there are no smart Armenians?
A: If there are, they have been marginalized and rendered ineffective: they are, in other words, ahistorical. They neither formulate nor implement policies, and in that sense they are double victims – victims of foreign aggression as well as victims of domestic corruption and incompetence. Let's end this interview on a positive note, shall we? Let's consider the case of Naregatsi. There is one positive character in his LAMENTATION, namely God who, as everyone knows, is an Armenian. But the problem with God is that He has always been on the side of the powerful and against the weak, or rather, against dividers, their dupes, and fools who think they are smart.
Speaking of a small town in Mississippi, where he acted in Elia Kazan's BABY DOLL, Karl Malden writes in his memoirs: "The people were, for the most part, small-minded bigots, who had elevated poor white trash to a fine art."
About Archie Lee, his character in the film, he writes: "Archie Lee was poor white trash and the only thing that fed his feeble ego was the fact that no matter what, he could always believe that he (through no accomplishment of his own other than the color of his skin) held a higher status than the blacks."
Immediately I recognized my former self, after I had been "educated" by my "betters."
They brainwash children and they call it education. This is true of all nations. American history contains as many lies as, say, Turkish or Armenian history. All historians know this. They also know they are at the mercy of bureaucrats who are hired and fired by politicians whose central concern is to keep and whenever possible to increase their power.
After one of our eminent historians agreed to be interviewed, he refused to answer my questions.
Patriots are all alike in so far as they are willing to kill and die in defense of the Homeland, and to hate anyone who says patriotism is a fraud perpetrated by politicians (white trash) on dupes (themselves).
I define a fanatic as anyone who hates someone simply because he doesn't share his hatred of whatever it is that he hates.
Just because I say 2 plus 2 makes 4, or I call a spade a spade, I am immediately surrounded by a mob of civilized, progressive, and smart Armenians, descendants of the first nation that converted to Christianity, that would love to see me torn to shreds.
If we are as patriotic as we claim to be, we should at least allow a fraction of our love for our homeland to spill over on our fellow countrymen even when they speak like misguided fools.
Portrait of a patriotic Armenian: A damaged ego with an unsettled score in search of a victim.
ON BARBARISM
When primitive men engaged in cannibalism, they behaved like a pride of lions that kills and devours a zebra. We don't call that barbarism. We call it survival of the fittest.
The authentic barbarian was the Nazi during World War II: he was fully aware of what he was doing. He developed the consensus, the organization, the will, and the philosophy (that of Hegel's Master and Slave, for instance, and Nietzsche's Superman).
By contrast, when we burned a million books and slaughtered (according to Baez) a thousand defenseless women and children in Karabagh, out conduct may not have been that of officers and gentlemen but neither was it barbarism. It was closer to that of primitive men and hungry predators in the jungle.
We are not authentic barbarians because we lack the cold-blooded premeditation, the ability to develop a consensus and to organize, and the will to carry out our political agenda.
We are not barbarians.
We are worse than barbarians.
We are slaves of barbarians.
For 600 years the Turks were our masters.
Our boys fought their wars.
Our women satisfied their lust.
Our businessmen took care of their interests.
And our artists provided the entertained.
It is the same today.
Mikoyan, Gulbenkian, Khachaturian, Saroyan, Mamoulian...
They all served alien interests and entertained alien audiences.
By contrast, those who chose to serve our people and our homeland were invariably betrayed and slaughtered.
Barbarians? Hell no! We have a long way to go to qualify. We are only slaves and cowards. We can behave like bloodthirsty savages only towards the defenseless and the weak, namely, ourselves.
Why am I saying these things?
(one) The truth shall set you free, and
(two) Nobody is paying me to lie.
BORODAKHOSSOUTIUN
In his biography of John Cheever, Blake Bailey mentions "an Armenian named Harout," who introduces himself as an "architect" but is identified as an "unemployed waiter, a bore," and a freeloader. See CHEEVER: A LIFE (New York, 2009, page 439).
Speaking of this kind of borodakhos Armenian, I remember one of our elder statesmen saying: "They walk past an elementary school, and they claim to have a university degree."
There was a time when I would feel painfully embarrassed whenever I read about an Armenian like Harout. No more. I no longer feel responsible for their conduct probably because I no longer harbor tribal loyalties. I am a human being and all good men, regardless of race, color, and creed, are my brothers. As for Armenians like Harout: all I can do is to let them know that, if they think they are smart enough to fool all the people all the time, they are dead wrong. They may however succeed in fooling a handful of idiots like themselves.
We are told history is the propaganda of the victor. What if our own history is not just the consolation of the defeated but the borodakhossoutiun of our panchoonies? I am not making dogmatic assertions, just asking a question.
To those of my readers who get all worked up over what I write, I say: "Relax! No one gives a damn about what I think or, for that matter, whether I live or die. Take it easy, stop reading me, and enjoy your life. But if you insist in carrying on as you have been, let me warn you that I find all disagreement stimulating, especially disagreement with a touch of arsenic in it, because that's when I feel I have hit paydirt."
HASGANOUM ES?
To say we have problems but no solutions is a big lie.
Our only problem is big lies and their dupes.
Expose them and that will be the end of our problems.
Our liars know this better than anyone else.
As for our dupes: they are what they are because they prefer pleasant lies to painful truths. And the most painful truth of all is their identity as damn fools.
We have failed to solve our problems because our dupes think of themselves as smart and our liars have done their utmost to brainwash them to believe that.
How do you convince a fool that he is a fool?
It can't be done!
How do you convince liars they are liars?
No need. They already know.
How do you break up the bond that exists between liars and dupes?
Impossible! It is like the marriage of the mythical irresistible force with the immovable object.
There is no power in heaven and on earth that can budge them.
That is the only way to explain the millennial existence of organized religions, all of which assert a monopoly on truth even as they go about contradicting one another.
When liars and dupes conspire, honest men have as much chance as a drop of rain in the Sahara at high noon.
That's the only way to explain why all honest men -- from Socrates and Jesus Christ to Gandhi and Solzhenitsyn -- have been silenced, exiled, persecuted, jailed, and crucified.
THEREBY HANGS A TALE
To those of my readers who mistake me for someone who is plotting the destruction of the Republic, I say: Relax, our beloved homeland is in the best of hands because for everyone who says what I say, there are at least a hundred, not counting speechifiers, sermonizers, and dime-a-dozen pundits, who say the exact opposite, for which reason they are compensated handsomely. Besides, my word carries as much weight as an ant's fart. And speaking of farts...
It is said of an old lady in the Soviet era who had the habit of farting in public and declaring to all and sundry: "They can shut my mouth, but they can't shut my arse." And now – you guessed – a story about a wealthy Armenian merchant who is said to have hired the services of a notorious Kurdish bandit to take care (as we say in the underworld) of Raffi.
A minor digression here: If you think I am tough on Armenians, you should read Raffi. Compared to him, I don't even rate as a pussycat. Raffi was a tough hombre who wouldn't take no sh*t from nobody, including bosses, bishops, and wealthy Armenian merchants whom he called "the worse scum on earth. ("Profit," he said, "is their only homeland.") If there are wealthy merchants among my readers, may I add: "Present company suspected."
End of digression.
Well, naturally, one of these merchants, not being the kind that turns the other cheek, and wanting to get even with Raffi, he delegated the job to a Kurd with an impeccable reputation as a daring and fearless bandit, promising him an undisclosed amount of money.
But as the Kurd went about his business of casing the joint – namely, Raffi's domicile – he discovered to his astonishment that far from being a malefactor, his target was a totally harmless scribbler who spent most of his days and nights working at his desk. Being an honorable hitman, he therefore informed the merchant he was not up to handling the job because he did not relish the idea of adding the murder of an innocent and defenseless civilian to his résumé, or words to that effect; and advised the merchant to shove his money where the sun don't shine – if you know what I am saying.
Moral: You may rely on the honor of a Kurdish thief but, brother, after you shake hands with a benefactor, count your fingers.
A footnote on my sources.
As you may have guessed by now, I did not read this anecdote in Oshagan, Tololian, and Janashian (three of our most learned literary historians of the last century) but in a biographical study sent to me by one of Raffi's descendants (may she rest in peace) who asked me to read and return it. Which I did. As a result, I am sorry to inform you, I am in no position to give you chapter and verse. Feel free therefore to dismiss it as anti-Armenian propaganda.
ON BIAS
Two headlines grab my attention today:
"Overreactions are a sign of insecurity," and
"Politicians should be held to a higher standard."
We are not who we think we are.
Our enemies are not who we think they are.
Neither are we who they think we are.
And what we think is not what we really think
but what we were brought up to think.
What is history if not a tragedy of errors?
Now then, go ahead and make dogmatic assertions.
America has two faces: America the Beautiful and America the Ugly.
God Save America and God damn America.
Sarah Palin and Reverend Wright.
This could be said of all nations, including our own.
How to explain the smart, tough, savvy Armenian who turns into a sanctimonious prick when he speaks of his homeland?
The answer must be, textbooks. Textbooks by nationalist historians in whose carefully edited words colonizers and imperialists are represented as benefactors whose central concern is civilizing (or is it syphilizing?) barbarians; aggressive wars are called defensive wars; terrorists are identified as freedom fighters; and the massacre of defenseless women and children as enemy propaganda.
How to explain revolutions, civil wars, and internecine conflicts? That's a tricky one, but it can be done. One way to do is to see them as necessary and inevitable stages towards progress. If Hitler had won World II, the Holocaust would have been described as an act of sanitation.
Children will believe anything, including Santa Claus, the Tooth Faerie, and a shower of golden apples after each tale.
What happens when children grow up?
Some never do -- if by growing up means giving up illusions.
Speaking for myself, I loathe lies, liars, and propagandists. They are at the root of all intolerance, wars, and massacres.
Self deception is not a blessing but a curse.
Only after propaganda is seen as a crime against humanity may we have honest historians who will call a spade a spade. If this be an illusion, I like to believe it is a harmless one because its aim is to replace hatred with understanding and war with peaceful coexistence.
MAXIMS & REFLECTIONS
For every wise man who says "I know nothing,"
there are a hundred fools who know everything.
No one hates his fellow countrymen more than a superpatriot.
We assess ourselves in the hope others will agree with us.
When a man cannot come to terms with his reality,
he kills himself.
That doesn't mean everyone who is alive today
deserves to live.
My friends come in singles,
my enemies in bunches – fools, fanatics,
dupes, dividers, partisans, and in general
anyone who deals in more certainties than doubts.
When they praise us,
we don't ask for proof or documentation.
When in doubt, make dogmatic assertions.
Dupes are a dime a dozen.
"If he writes for Armenians, he must be a loser."
That's what the average Armenian reader thinks of me, and for once I agree with him. The offspring of a failed nation, I am a loser who writes for losers.
"If you want to succeed, write for odars."
When it comes to offering unsolicited advice, an Armenian's generosity knows no bounds.
Write for odars! Isn't that what Arlen and Saroyan did?
Zarian didn't (a greater writer than both) and he was ignored, neglected, and died in Yerevan (he believed he was murdered) a lonely, bitter old man. But he was luckier than most of his contemporaries who were betrayed and murdered at a much younger age.
We have been at the mercy of losers who have promoted a phony image of ourselves to cover up their own incompetence. If you don't agree with me, that's your business. My business is to be objective, because I believe only when we realize how low we have fallen may we hope to rise again.
A few years ago Leo Hamalian (may he rest in peace) published a book titled AS OTHERS SEE US. Around the same time (1979) I too published an anthology titled ARMENIA OBSERVED, travel impressions of Armenia by famous odar writers. Both books were published by Ararat Press in New York with AGBU money. Which means, the contents were carefully selected and edited to promote a positive image of Armenia and Armenians.
More recently, when I published a balanced and objective assessment titled DICTIONARY OF ARMENIAN QUOTATIONS, I received many hostile comments because I had dared to include unflattering opinions by, among others, Raffi, Baronian, Odian, Zohrab, Siamanto, Varoujan, Aghbalian, Shahnour, Zarian, and Massikian.
At one time our writers were not afraid to see things as they are to say what they think. The Genocide appears to have changed all that. Objectivity has now been replaced with compassion, compassion with pity, and pity with self-pity. Result? Writers have been replaced with brown-nosers, literature with propaganda, and patriotism with borodakhos and unpardavan verbiage signifying nothing.
Just when I think I have run out of things to say, I run into a gentle reader who recharges my batteries and renews my dedication to carry on. It is at times like these that I am tempted once more to believe in the existence of god and to say, "Thank you, Lord!"
ON PATRIOTISM AS CRYPTO-FASCISM
Patriotism means love of country as well as fellow countrymen. If you define patriotism only as love of country, remember that some of the worse criminals in the history of mankind (among them Hitler, Mussolini, Franco) were great patriots and it was Stalin that called World War II the "Patriotic War."
HOW TO RECOGNIZE A FASCIST
If he rhapsodizes about national pride and patriotic love but is silent about free speech and human rights, he qualifies.
If you plan to contribute a long-winded diatribe to a forum, don't worry about getting your facts straight or even making sense. Worry instead about being readable.
During an argument, resist the temptation of using abusive language, adopting a holier-than-thou stance, or going down into the gutter in the hope you will not be followed there. The gutter is not a place for victory but of defeat and surrender.
Ara Baliozian
Labels: Ara BALIOZIAN
S.S. Aya said...
Thanks to Ara for another warm self-analysis!
I know the "mirror" he is speaking about. I have a similar one and have been looking into it, fearlessly allmy life (the same way he dares)!
Re "Born Again":
We can be cheated "many times" by many; but NOT ALL TIMES, by everyone! It takes "time for TRUTH to PREVAIL" and less time to distort/invert it!


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text:
Governor Hugh Carey
Bicentennial Snapshot No. 37: Unsolved Arson Case – The Holiday Inn Fire of 1978
November 29, 2022 November 25, 2022 by Pat Worboys
Today we look back at the horrific fire at the Holiday Inn in Greece in which ten people lost their lives while staying at the Holiday Inn. Every year goes by when the generation of people who were are the scene of the horrific fire and the temperature was a balmy chilly 20°F (-6.7°C) temperature and winds out of the north around 10mph. Remember when we told you about the town of Greece didn't join the 9-1-1 call center and operations until around 1986, before that time you would have to call the station directly or if the business had an alarm system properly wired up to the fire company's alarm system to alert the firefighters that there was a fire at certain places of business, this also played a roll in the case of this tragic hotel fire that took the lives of ten people.
Even though the Ridge Road Fire District and North Greece Fire Department are celebrating their centennials this year there is one fire that has effect everyone at both. Every fire district in the town has battled large and small fires, auto accidents, attend training, practiced at the fire training grounds, routine fire inspections, community programs, and outreach, but never prepared them for what would become Ridge Road's most unique fire they had to deal with in the companies first 100 years of service.
Chase-Pitkin fire, August 30, 1980, courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Ridge Road Fire Department has battled many fires,
…and small.
Greece Baptist Church courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Holiday Inn Fire, 1978, courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
But never anything like the Holiday Inn Fire on November 26, 1978.
On Sunday, November 26, 1978, there were about 200 people staying at the Holiday Inn in Greece. According to the report Fire command, Volume 46. National Fire Protection Association, 1979 in that publishing it states there were 91 guest rooms at the hotel, but the exact number of guest rooms on November 28, 1978, is unknown due to the owner of the hotel began changing some of the guest rooms were converted into conference rooms. Among the guests were visitors from an Ontario, Canada bus tour here to take advantage of Thanksgiving weekend shopping specials, members of two wedding parties, a John Marshall alumna in town for her reunion, and attendees at the hotel's Saturday night singles party.
Holiday Inn postcard courtesy of Bill Sauers
Holiday Inn sign courtesy of Bill Sauers
Around 2:30 am that frosty Sunday morning, a fire started among the paper products and towels stored in a closet area tucked under a first-floor stairway and that metal door for the closet area was not fire-rated or UL-labeled. The blaze spread quickly up the stairs where the fire doors had been propped open, raced down corridors, ignited the ceilings, and invaded the roof. And with strong winds from out of the north-north-west, and the temperature was hovering around 24.2°F (-4.333 °C) but with a wind chill, it would make it feel like 16.1°F (-8.333°C).
Two off-duty firefighters, one from the Greece Road fire department, the other an Albion FD fire chief, each driving on Ridge Road on the way home from a different workplace, spotted the orange glow of the flames approximately eight minutes after the fire started. The Greece firefighter radioed in the fire from his car and they both entered the building to start evacuating guests. Other people were calling from nearby payphones to report the fire. 911 wasn't instituted until 1986 in Rochester (even later in Greece) and of course cell phones hadn't been invented yet.
Greece 1970 Interactive Historic Data Map Monroe County https://maps.monroecounty.gov/Html5Viewer2/index.html?viewer=Historic#
Fighting the inferno, 1978, courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Greece Ridge put in the call for mutual aid to help with the scene unfolding at the Holiday Inn on Ridge Road next to Corona Road. The companies that came to assist Greece Ridge were Barnard, North Greece, and the City of Rochester, who fought the blaze for two hours with more than 125 firefighters. Ten ambulances were needed at the scene. Gene Preston who was a member of Kodak Fire at the time, remembers that Kodak Fire did offer to lend assistance by connecting Greece Ridge trucks to Kodak's water source on the ground of the Latona Road Complex, but Greece Ridge turned down Kodak Fire Department's offer to hook up to their water source.
Rescue crews piloted 170 guests, most of them still in their night clothes and many barefoot, outside into the 16-degree cold.
As you can see on this map where (Greece Ridge) Ridge Ridge had command of the scene and the Greece Ridge chief became the incident commander, he issued the call to request mutual aid as Barnard, North Greece, and City of Rochester companies arrived at the scene, Greece Ridge fire chief began assigning the assisting companies where to deploy their firefighting equipment at the scene. The blue lines on this map are hoses that ran to the water from the fire hydrants to the trucks and from truck to truck. The green lines on this map of the scene represent the hoses that were in the firefighter's hands. A large contingent of the firefighting efforts was coming from pumper 253 on the west side of where the origin of the fire started. The red arrows represent the direction of where the fire was traveling outward from the origin to the shaded reddish, orangish zone was where the fire able to be stopped from consuming the rest of the structure.
What is a Squrt™ fire truck? The Squrt™ fire truck is a brand of fire truck Trademarked by SNORKEL FIRE EQUIPMENT COMPANY CORPORATION on November 4, 1969, as you can see in the Trademark filing on the USPTO website https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4810:yri038.2.3 and licensed to different manufacturers that built these kinds of fire trucks like the one in service in North Greece was built by Young Fire Equipment Corporation in Buffalo, New York.
Map of Units on Scene at Holiday Inn Fire courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Here is a list of the abbreviations of each of the different trucks at the scene means after each of the different fire fighting apparatuses is the number of that engine.
E – Engine
L – Ladder
M – Medic
R – Rescue Engine
P – Pumper
T – Truck
Squrt™
Squrt 1
After the fire, in 1978, courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
By 4:30 the fire was out, but the building was a total loss. A few guests leaped from second and third-story windows to save themselves. Thirty-five people were injured. Tragically, ten people perished in the fire from smoke inhalation.
We Remember the guest that perished that early morning on November 26th, 1978
List of Canadian citizens who died in the Holiday Inn Fire
They were: Rubina "Ruth" Cushinan, age 81, and her daughter Ruby Cushinan, age 61, from York, Ontario, Canada; four people from Etobicoke, Ontario, Maguerrette Duncan, age 57, 67-year-old Edward Farley and his 62-year-old wife, Lorene, and Pamela Sagriff, age 30, and from Bramalea, Ontario, Huguette Sundude, age 30.
Names of the remaining three people who died
Joyce Plumb age 42 from Arlington Virginia who had attended her 25th high school reunion from John Marshall High School the day before; Stephen Gregory Ford, age 29, from Ypsilanti, Michigan who was in Rochester for his best friend's wedding, and from Pompano Beach, Florida, Nancy Garrett, age 26.
Photo by Aidan Nguyen on Pexels.com
Results of the Fire Investigation
The hotel had a host of structural faults that contributed to the easy spread of the conflagration: The "primary factors that led to the fatalities in this incident were the combination of the highly combustible interior finish, [and] unprotected openings that existed in the stairway," there was only one vertical firewall between the two wings and the firewalls in the buildings did not extend to the roof, allowing the fire to rip through the top floor of each wing.
Aerial view of the hotel courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Sprinkler head from fessa.com.au
The hotel was equipped with a fire alarm system that included manual-pull stations and combination rate-of-rise, fixed-temperature thermal detectors as initiating devices yet it failed to do what it was intended to do to prevent the loss of life. It lacked a sprinkler system and Emergency Lighting. The alarm system wasn't connected to the Greece-Ridge Fire Department or any other security agency.
The alarm system consisted only of one bell in the middle of each of the two wings' five floors. The alarm didn't have a distinctive sound nor was it loud enough. Guests didn't recognize it as a fire alarm; they thought it was a phone in the room or an alarm clock. Furthermore, when hotel employees realized the alarms were ringing, they rushed to get people out, but no one remembered to call the fire department.
Burned-out corridor, courtesy of Matthew Pillsbury RRFD
Greece Police Headquarters Precinct 1, 1983 Office of the Town Historian
As news of the fire spread, the police department was flooded with calls. One volunteer Doug Worboys, recalls that after the fire he arrived home at 10:30 am, grabbed a little sleep, and returned to work the noon to 11 pm shift at the police dispatch office desk with fellow dispatchers Ron Timmons and Jim Leary. "We had callers from throughout the US and Canada; the farthest away, I think, was Puerto Rico. We referred most of the Holiday Inn inquiry calls to the front desk officer who was assigned to take all those types of calls. The next day they had a special line set up for further calls. You hear things like that happening in other places, but you never expect one like that in your own town. That day was a very busy day with all those calls along with calls for normal situations that occur day to day. That day was a very somber day for us dispatchers and all people involved in this fire."
Although at first it was said that the fire was accidental, Police Chief Gerald Phelan, when speaking to reporters at the time, said that "his gut told him the fire was nonetheless suspicious due to its speed and intensity."
Police Chief Gerald Phelan with Greece Town Supervisor Don Riley from the Office of the Town Historian
John Stickever joins the case
John Stickever, photo from his obituary New York Daily News, February 22, 2017
Butanone. (2022, November 8). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butanone
16×9 – Lost in the Flames: Legacy of historic Holiday Inn fire
Part 1 – A deadly blaze engulfs a Holiday Inn in upstate New York more than 30 years ago, claiming the lives of 7 Canadians. Investigators called it an arson but never caught the criminal responsible. Part 2 – Thirty years after the fire, a deadly arson remains unsolved.
16×9 Program on Global News From Canada
John Stickever joined the FDNY in 1959 and was assigned to Engine Co. 231 in Brooklyn. He became a fire marshal six years later. Durning Stickevers first 37 years as a fire marshall where he investigated numerous fire scenes where some were arson, and some were just accidents. In 1978, John Stickever, a New York City Fire Firefighter was just promoted to the rank of Supervising Fire Marshall in July 1978 and was an Investigator who specialized in arson and "essentially wrote the book on fire investigation training," which is linked below. Mid-week following the fire on November 26, 1978, is when then Greece Police Chief Gerald Phelan contacted Commission Augustus Anthony Beekman of the New York City Fire Department to see if the City could send someone to help the Greece Police and Greece Ridge Fire Department to examine the Holiday Inn fire scene. It was Commissioner Augustus Anthony Beekman who called Stickever at home and the commissioner said he was the one who was selected to head to upstate New York to help with a case in Greece, NY.
When Stickever arrived he started to have firefighters clear the floor and in front of doors and other areas in the hotel, he began to notice things that the Greece Police and Greece Ridge did not see at the time of the fire which stood out to him. Stickever concluded that an accelerant of some kind had been used in starting the fire and declared it arson and the ten deaths were now ten murders. Stickever with his knowledge found burn patterns, and damage to the kickplate on the fire doors, and when the results came back from the labs, they found traces of Methyl Ethyl Ketone (MEK) otherwise known as Butanone was used as an accelerant which made the fire grow quickly in the stairwell, and with the winds at 2 A.M. were at about 10 miles an hour out of the North which help spread the fire quickly through the hotel, with that information both Stickever and then Assistant Monroe County District Attorney Crane, during in 1978 knew it had to be someone with the knowledge of MEK. In 1978 Stickever and then ADA Crane believe that someone would have to have knowledge of MEK and firefighting skills to know that MEK according to ilo.org a website that has information on all different types of hazmat chemicals notes under PHYSICAL & CHEMICAL INFORMATION that the Physical State and Appearance is a colorless liquid with a characteristic odor from ILO and WHO 2021. The other types of accelerants would have been easily found but because MEK was used as the accelerant it made it more difficult for the firefighters to fight the fire. If the chief of Greece Ridge had requested the airport chemical fire truck from the airport which was a carbon dioxide, dry agents, or alcohol-resistant foam-based fire suppression agent in its tank would have halved the time for the first responders that day, but no one knew what accelerant was used to start it.
According to an interview Stickerver did with Crime Beat TV's 16×9 – Lost in the Flames: Legacy of historic Holiday Inn fire and aired April 30, 2012, on Global News a division of Shaw Media Inc., in Canada, he remembers the interview one Greece Ridge firefighter said on the news and the body language of that firefighter on video, it set off some signs that were a sign that Stickever could tell that he was the critical suspect because during that interview that firefighter said he was driving towards the My Apartment Bar when he called the fire in. Stickevers pushed for the state to give marshals "police officer" status so they can enforce just like the police officers but with the ability to issue tickets, fines, fees, and official notices on properties that violate fire codes, fire safety, or other aspects of a building that would make the fire marshals not want to give okay to open the building or had to close the place down until it was brought up to code to ensure that it was safe for the public to enter said structure with that state approved this the bill that created and gave the power to create a program on fire investigation and arson in every municipality in New York State you can read the bill along with the supporters and documentation by reading the New York State bill jackets – L-1979-CH-0225 by clicking the link here to see the full text of that bill https://nysl.ptfs.com/aw-server/rest/product/purl/NYSL/i/f6d59c1f-e1a7-405a-9359-6f4fe1deacd8
Here is a link to the article that was written by John Stickever in the Federal Bureau of Investigation Law Enforcement Bulletin in 1986 that describes the way he does arson investigations https://books.google.com/books?id=d_dcT71FVsUC&lpg=PA1&ots=auNtB2w7hF&dq=john%20stickever%20new%20york%20city%20fire%20department&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=john%20stickever%20new%20york%20city%20fire%20department&f=false
Phalen's Arson Taskforce
Phelan formed a special arson task force, operating a command center out of the Pop-Lar Motel down the road from the fire site. The team of 23 local and state investigators conducted more than 400 interviews in the days after the fire. They settled on five "persons of interest," but didn't have enough evidence to bring charges against anyone. The two main suspects were the Greece Ridge firefighter who had radioed in the fire and a man who "had lived in two apartments that had caught fire, then, using insurance coverage, moved temporarily to the Holiday Inn. However, he had a confrontation with a staff member shortly before the fire, and was booted out of the hotel." Monroe County Assistant District Attorney Crane along with his boss Monroe County District Attorney Lawrence T. Kurlander was given a list of 5 persons of interest and 2 main suspects that the Police gave to them as the possible suspects but without enough evidence from the fire scene and testimonial from guest, hotel employees, and people who lived around the area, it made the District Attorney office hard to pin a person to be held accountable for a change in one count of first-degree arson and ten counts of murder from the fire as well.
Here is what the New York State's statute says Arson in the first degree from New York Laws › Penal Law › Part 3 › Title I › Article 150 > Section 20:
N.Y. Penal Law § 150.20 Arson in the first degree.
1. A person is guilty of arson in the first degree when he
intentionally damages a building or motor vehicle by causing an
explosion or a fire and when (a) such explosion or fire is caused by an
incendiary device propelled, thrown or placed inside or near such
building or motor vehicle; or when such explosion or fire is caused by
an explosive; or when such explosion or fire either (i) causes serious
physical injury to another person other than a participant, or (ii) the
explosion or fire was caused with the expectation or receipt of
financial advantage or pecuniary profit by the actor; and when (b)
another person who is not a participant in the crime is present in such
building or motor vehicle at the time; and (c) the defendant knows that
fact or the circumstances are such as to render the presence of such
person therein a reasonable possibility.
2. As used in this section, "incendiary device" means a breakable
container designed to explode or produce uncontained combustion upon
impact, containing flammable liquid and having a wick or a similar
device capable of being ignited.
Arson in the first degree is a class A-I felony.
Postcard of Pop-Lar Motel, 2976 Ridge Road West, circa 1960 from mcnygenealogy.com
Assemblyman Roger Robach (right) with Governor Hugh Carey (center), 1979, from New York State digital archive
Assemblyman Roger Robach, who represented Greece, co-sponsored a bill in 1980 requiring hotels and motels with more than 30 rooms to have smoke detectors in every room and in hallways. It passed unanimously in the Assembly and after it was passed by the Senate was signed into law by Governor Hugh Carey.
Although an open case, it had laid dormant until 2010 when the Greece Police department, first under Chief Todd Baxter and then under his successor Patrick Phelan, gave new life to the investigation. Everything was reexamined and witnesses were interviewed again. They concluded that the firefighter was the arsonist. The Greece PD submitted its report to the Monroe County District Attorney in 2015. At the same as Cheif Baxter began his investigation, the Canadian Government want more answers from the hotel fire as well because this was an international issue and yet to date, the Canadain Government and the families of the seven Canadians that lost their lives have not gotten any answers and are left in limbo they wish this case could be solved.
Press release from the Greece Police Chief Patrick Phelan
The District Attorney's office, however, was not convinced that there was enough evidence to prosecute anyone. In the years since the 1978 fire, the science of arson has evolved and she didn't feel that it was still conclusive without a doubt that it was even arson.
So, the families and friends of ten souls lost in that fire may never see anyone brought to account. The Holiday Inn Fire of 1978 was not only the deadliest fire in the history of the Town of Greece but in all of Monroe County.
Front page of the Democrat and Chronicle, November 27, 1978, clipped from newspapers.com
Thank you for joining us today. Next week we pay tribute to "the greatest generation."
Posted in Bicentennial SnapshotsTagged 10 deaths, 1922, 1978, 200 Guest, 2022, 7 Canadians, 9-1-1, Archives, Arson Taskforce, Assemblyman Roger Robach, Barnard, Bicentennial of the Town of Greece, Bicentennial-SnapShot, Black Friday, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Butanone, Canada, City of Rochester, Commission Augustus Anthony Beekman, Crime Beat TV's 16x9, Don Riley, Doug Worboys, Engine Co. 231, FBI, FDNY, Fire Truck Abbreviations, Florida, Gene Preston, Gerald Phelan, Global News, Global News a division of Shaw Media Inc., Governor Hugh Carey, Greece, Greece Historical Society, Greece Ridge Fire Department, Holiday Inn, ILO, Jim Leary, John Marshall, John Stickever, Maureen Whalen, MEK, Methyl Ethyl Ketone, Michigan, Monroe County District Attorney Crane, Monroe County District Attorney Lawrence T. Kurlander, N.Y. Penal Law § 150.20, New York, New York City Fire Firefighter, North Greece Fire Department, Ontario, Patrick Phelan, Police Chief, Pompano Beach, Ridge Road Fire District, Ron Timmons, Sandra Doorley, Smoke inhalation, Supervising Fire Marshall, Thanksgiving, Todd Baxter, upstate New York, WHO, Young Fire Equipment Company, Ypsilanti