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Home / Articles / Wild People
Tales from the trailblazers
John Walsh spent 38 years working in the Waitakere Ranges. >em>Photo: George Driver
George Driver
20 December 201720 Dec '17
With more than 120 years combined experience, few people know the backcountry better than these three veteran rangers. They give a behind-the-scenes look at the development and evolution of the Kiwi outdoors experience.
A spiritual place
John Walsh, Waitakere Ranges Regional Park
John Walsh has had four death threats, has been shot at three times, found Maori relics, thousands of marijuana plants and dozens of bodies during nearly 40 years as a ranger in New Zealand's busiest regional park.
Walsh spent 38 years at Huia, on the southern end of the Waitakere Ranges, working as a ranger for Auckland Council, under various guises. On the doorstep of 1.5 million people, he says managing the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park involves everything from search and rescue, maintaining tracks and pest control, through to law enforcement issues ranging from illegal dumping to body recovery.
Walsh grew up in Auckland and was headed for a career in the insurance industry, before chasing his dream, combining his passion for tramping and hunting. He started working for the Department of Lands and Survey, a precursor to DOC, working on tracks and huts in Mt Aspiring and Fiordland national parks, including both the Routeburn and Milford tracks. But he was drawn back to the Waitakere Ranges, his favourite patch of forest.
"I developed a passion for that landscape – it's still special to me after 45 years. I'm not a religious person, but the Waitakere's are very spiritual for me."
He applied for a job working as a ranger, but the criteria at the time meant you had to be married. Still a bachelor, Walsh had to be content with a job on a work crew that helped build the Lower Huia Dam. But in 1974, when the Arataki Visitor Centre was established, he got a job as a senior ranger.
"By that stage, my knowledge of the area was extensive – I had tramped every track and walked every stream in the park."
Walsh helped set up an education programme, working with school groups to help children understand the importance of protecting the environment.
"It was a very progressive programme for the time," Walsh says. "We had issues with people lighting fires, dumping rubbish and cutting down trees for firewood. The idea was to work with the next generation to engender a sense of respect for the forest.
"We got the kids to plant trees so they had a vested interest in the forest. Within 10 years we saw a marked change in behaviour and offending dropped dramatically. I still meet people who did the course 30 years ago and they remember that experience fondly."
After seven years, Walsh moved on to become a 'homesteader', based at a ranger homestead in Huia, where he continued his work with the Kiwanis Huia Camp outdoor education centre.
"I soon fell in love with Huia, but it's a 24/7 responsibility. You were everything to everybody. We were the only authority figures out there, so you're like the country cop. I'd get called up at 3am because someone had heard a noise in their backyard – but you'd have to follow it up."
That included dealing with poachers and gang members.
"I had four or five death threats and I've nearly been run over twice. One poacher ran over my foot trying to run me down."
Walsh would often find poachers, including people hunting native woodpigeon/kereru. Marijuana growers were also prolific.
"We had a sweepstake one year to see who could find the most plots. I found 51 and still didn't win the money. Often the growers had cleared a quarter acre of forest for their plot."
Walsh's favourite part of the range is the Pararaha Valley, between Whatipu and Karekare Beach.
"It's the spirituality of the place that gets me and it's one of the only big open valleys in the range.
"It was a very popular place for early Maori. I used to do a lot of abseiling on the cliffs there and the Maori people used to use the caves in the cliffs like a cupboard to store things. I'd find a lot of personal items, like combs, adzes and fishhooks, but I'd just take a photo and leave them there. I also found a number of burial grounds there, which I'd just leave and respect. That's how I'd want my remains treated."
Walsh has also found a lot of items from the logging days in the range, including abandoned logging camps with boots, bottles and tools still lying around.
He says the forest has regenerated markedly since the council funded a major possum poisoning campaign in the early 1990s.
"One ranger in Piha put a poison bait under a large pohutukawa tree and came back and found 27 dead possums. Between Whatipu and Karekare we surveyed 1000 trees that were very badly defoliated and after the poisoning the recovery rate was 98 per cent. That's really gratifying."
Walsh was also involved in 36 body recovery operations.
"A lot were suicides. We had nine in nine weeks once. The winter was a particularly bad time for it."
He also joined more than 250 search and rescue operations.
"It's a very rugged landscape right on Auckland's doorstep, and most people don't have the skills to visit it safely."
Walsh retired in 2012.
John Walsh's top five
1 Omanawanui Track, Whatipu – "Outstanding views of Whatipu and the Manukau Harbour".
2 Mercer Bay Loop, Karekare – "The breathtaking spectacle of the highest sea cliffs in Auckland".
3 Karamatura Loop Walk, Huia – "Lush, dense rainforest with views of towering conglomerate bluffs".
4 Fairy Falls Track, Cascade Kauri – "A large waterfall with a dramatic outlook".
5 Gibbons Track, Whatipu – "An old logging road lined with relics of that era".
Ken Bradley worked on Fiordland's iconic tracks for nearly 50 years.
A good, fortunate life
Ken Bradley, Fiordland National Park
For nearly 50 years, the valleys and passes of Fiordland have been Ken Bradley's office.
From guiding on the Milford Track in the 1970s, to working on maintenance crews on the Dusky Track, developing the Kepler Track, and managing the Fiordland Great Walks, Bradley has been a central figure in the development of the park. He says enhancing the wilderness experience for others has been deeply rewarding.
Bradley spent his teens in Te Anau and first walked the Milford Track in 1968 when he was 16. Little did he know he would be managing the track 25 years later. Back then, the track was run by the Government's Tourist Hotel Corporation and people had to pay $3 to walk it (the equivalent of six hours wages for Bradley) and 50 cents for a night in a hut.
"People had to book as a group of 16 and had to write a letter informing the THC about their tramping experience," Bradley says. "The ranger at the start of the track would check everyone's packs to make sure they had the equipment on the gear list and you had to take a minimum of six days food in case the rivers flooded.
"If those rules were still in place, 90 per cent of walkers wouldn't be allowed on the trail today."
Most of the walkers were also women on guided walks, he says.
"It was about three-quarters females. The Milford Track wasn't the gung-ho thing to do as a man in the 1960s."
Bradley started working in Fiordland National Park in 1969, at first as a guide and on maintenance jobs for Fiordland Travel (now Real Journeys) at the Te Anau caves, Deep Cove and Milford Sound. He began guiding on the Milford Track in 1972.
"Most of the job was maintaining the track – the guiding was incidental. We guided in sections, so the main priority was to make sure walkers got out of your patch so you could get more maintenance done."
He got a job for the Fiordland National Park Board in 1976. At first he was working in the Manapouri and Doubtful Sound area and spent months cleaning up after the Manapouri Power Station construction in Deep Cove.
"Back then things like environmental protection and conservation weren't mentioned. There's been a huge change in attitudes since. That project was a catalyst for the conservation movement in New Zealand. Today, everything is done with a lot more awareness and the impact on the environment is kept to a minimum. It's a totally different mindset."
Bradley would also work up to two months a year maintaining the Dusky Track.
"We used to hand-slash it from one end to the other, working in 15 to 20-day stints. We'd eat porridge for breakfast, cabin bread and sardines for lunch and bully beef, dehydrated peas and spuds for tea and you did that every bloody day. I did that for 18 years.
"But it was a great place to be and it'd be the highlight of my year.
"Now the track might get three weeks worth of maintenance a year at best. It only gets about 400 walkers a year and numbers haven't shifted, so it's not a priority anymore."
In the 1980s, Bradley was involved in planning the route for the Kepler Track – which was built to take pressure off the Milford Track.
"I was on the first team that went right across the alpine section for the first time. The idea was to have a loop track close to Te Anau and a lot of the track just follows deer trails.
"The track changed the perception of a lot of local people who were very anti the park at first, as they saw it as locking up the land – once the park rules came in people got snippy. But building the Kepler Track was one of the things that reversed that mindset – they could see the value of it."
From 1992 to 2006, Bradley was in charge of managing the Fiordland Great Walk tracks. The Milford Track is still his favourite – he says it warrants the hype. Although he says the clientele has changed a lot since he first walked the track.
"When I went through the track with the Otago Tramping Club for the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Walk in 2015 [a protest against restrictions on access to the track], they would have been the first group of real trampers I'd met on the track in years. There are just tourists today. Anyone can put a sleeping bag in their pack and a few packs of noodles and listen to their iPhones the whole way. It means the hut rangers have to spend a lot of time looking after them.
"But I'm not too perplexed about that. It gives people that opportunity. A group may get together to walk the Milford Track for their first tramp and it leads on to other tramping, so it's a great introduction."
Bradley has noticed the birdlife has bounced back in the park, with greater emphasis on predator control.
"When I started there was only funding for weed control and protecting the takahe. Now the biodiversity section is far larger than recreation.
"We got a significant funding boost for biodiversity under the Helen Clark government, but there's still never enough money for that sort of work, or anything else for that matter.
"I've worked on the tracks extensively both before and after four 1080 drops and the change is incredible. There was a 1080 drop prior to last walking season and the result was phenomenal. The bellbirds were that noisy you just about had to yell at each other over the noise. After 1080 you don't need to set your alarm clock – big flocks of kaka will wake you up."
However, kea numbers have declined dramatically and there hasn't been any sign of a rebound, he says.
"There used to be a regular 40 to 50, but now 10 would be a big number."
In the last 20 years, the popularity of the Fiordland Great Walks has boomed, and managing numbers has been a big job. The Milford Track has been booking out every season since 1995 and Bradley says people will eventually have to book to visit Milford Sound.
"The department has some major issues to grapple with. I may not see that, but my children will, if tourism continues to grow the way it is.
"But it's a fickle thing. We've only got to have a financial crisis or a nutter with a gun at Auckland Airport and New Zealand may not be considered a safe place, or if the Alpine Fault ruptures, there would be no road to Milford."
Bradley retired in May, 2017, and is now focusing on building a museum in Te Anau to tell the history of Fiordland.
"I've been involved in the Fiordland Museum Trust for 20 years. Our target is to build a museum by 2020.
"I'm also volunteering to look after parts of the Milford Track. It's a pretty hard place not to enjoy. But I'm 65 now and my knees and ankles are not as good as they were, but I've had hut rangers who were walking the track in their 80s and 90s.
"Being out in the park, meeting people and making sure they enjoy the place, it's been a good fortunate life. I'm pretty pleased with what we've achieved.
"I'm really passionate about making sure Fiordland is as good as it has always been. Those who constructed the Milford Track had a pretty hard life – I like to think they are looking down and can see someone is still looking after it."
Ken Bradley's top five
Best area: Preservation Inlet – "For the heritage interest".
Best track: Milford Track – "I've had the longest association with this track".
Best hut location: Hidden Falls
Best local spot: The track system south of Manapouri, Hope Arm, Back Valley – "I built Back Valley Hut with my own materials".
Best day trip: Lake Marian – "Close on the tail is Key Summit".
Brad Lett has spent his life in and around forests.
A forestry life to the core
Brad Lett, Whirinaki Te Pua-a-Tane Conservation Park
After nearly four decades in one of the wildest spots in the North Island, Brad Lett says working among Tuhoe communities and seeing the birdlife and forest regenerate has been a dream job.
Lett started working as a logging apprentice in Kaingaroa Forest, near Murupara, before his interest in the bush drew him deep into Te Urewera, working as a possum trapper.
"In those days there was good money in possum skins," Lett says. "I spent a winter collecting skins and processing them."
At the end of the season, Lett was offered a job as a deer culler and started his career with the Forest Service, a precursor to DOC.
"We stayed in the bush for three months at a time and only came out for a couple of weeks before going back in for another three months. It was very isolated, but I really enjoyed it."
At the end of the season, Lett worked on track maintenance and environmental monitoring in Te Urewera, based in Ruatahuna, a stronghold of the Tuhoe iwi.
"Living amongst the Tuhoe people gave me a much greater appreciation and attachment to the area. They are still living their traditional values and it's a real Maori community. It was a life-changing experience.
"Initially it was a bit of a shock – I didn't know marae protocols and how to act. But you've got two options in a place like that. You either accept the place and the people and the way they are, or you don't. If you accept it, then they reciprocate and accept you. To this day, when I bump into people from Ruatahuna they give me a big hug and kiss."
Lett was transferred to Minginui in 1983 to work on the forestry operations, shortly after protests to stop the logging of Whirinaki Forest – one of the most ancient forests left in New Zealand. The protest movement eventually led to the end of logging in native forests nationwide.
"If you had any green inclinations you were well advised to stay clear of Minginui," Lett says. "I could see both sides of the argument. You don't live and work in a place like Te Urewera and Whirinaki without developing an affinity for it. Wholesale native logging as it was done in those days was just not sustainable. But I think there was a place for very selective logging."
Logging in Whirinaki ended in 1987 and Lett saw the aftermath, as the community was left without work or support.
"The Forest Service managed everything in that community and all of a sudden all that support was gone. So you've got all these people with limited skills who had been supported all their life and suddenly it's not there and a lot of people were unable to see a way out of it."
When the Forest Service was amalgamated to form DOC in 1987, Lett got a job doing track maintenance and biodiversity work in Whirinaki Forest. He left DOC in 1993 to do environmental work in Kaingaroa Forest, but returned in 1998, continuing to work on track maintenance and predator control. He says the early biodiversity restoration work in the forest is now having a big impact.
"I've seen huge changes. The vegetation has improved markedly with the reduction in predator and deer numbers. Whio and kaka numbers are slowly increasing and you can see flocks of kereru in the odd place now, where you'd never see that before."
But Lett says the under-resourcing of DOC led him to quit in September 2017.
"You're expected to do a lot more with a lot fewer resources now and people are actually struggling. We went through the last restructure in 2013 on the promise of more resources and time in the field, but the reality is there's less money and less people to do the work and it's having an effect.
"People are rebelling – I was the 27th staff member who left DOC in the central North Island in three months."
There has been a lack of funding for basic track maintenance, and some tracks were still closed from storm damage in 2016, he says.
"A lot of new funding is tagged for tourism, so none of that filters down to the likes of Whirinaki because the people aren't coming. But it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we had the money to get the tracks up to a decent standard, people would come.
"Over the last two years, it's got progressively harder and harder."
There is also a disconnect between decision making and the workers on the ground, with more decisions being centralised, he says.
"Decision makers aren't based locally and they don't have the commitment to meet local needs, so it's quite a difficult environment to work in. You start getting decisions that aren't in the interests of Whirinaki. We are meant to be working with Ngati Whare through a co-management agreement, but the staff in Wellington are just ignoring it. That puts stress on local staff, because we are having to deal with the impact on the ground.
"It's been an awesome job and it has a lot to offer. But slowly the benefits have been eroded and literally the fun went out of the job."
Lett now manages a quarry near Minginui.
Brad Lett's top 5
1 Whakatane River – "It's very picturesque, particularly from midway back to Ruatahuna".
2 Skips Hut, Whirinaki Forest Park – "A particularly nice walk from the Okahu Road end".
3 Lake Waikareiti, Te Urewera – "A magical spot even in the middle of winter".
4 Lake Waikaremoana Great Walk, Te Urewera – "Because of the scenery and history".
5 Central Te Hoe Hut, Whirinaki Forest Park – "A beautiful hut and location, and a very quiet spot".
More from January 2017:
2018's best water filters and purifiers
More from Features:
A fury unleashed
The last wilderness
Secrets of the Serpentine
Best in region
Limiting appeal
Revolutionary plan for Te Urewera
Curves with teeth
Get outside without breaking the bank
Where rangers go
Fractured landscape
Taking a stand one step at a time
West Coast high
Back to basics: Spring
That's Tongariro, to us
In search of six haunting notes
Your first bikepacking trip
Battle against dieback intensifying
Conservationists call for Waitakere Ranges closure
DOC reserve reopens in Waitakere Ranges


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Using an LGBTQ+ Cast, Invertigo Dance Theater Prepares to Bring Alan Turing's Story to Life
For almost a decade now, the curious, painful story of 20th-century genius Alan Turing has held a prominent place in the cultural mindset. Turing, as an ahead-of-his-time mathematician responsible for creating the same artificial intelligence we now use for computers, made a lasting contribution to 20th and 21st-century life. He helped crack Nazi codes during the second World War and was celebrated for his many achievements, until his homosexuality was disclosed after the war. Then a criminal offense, the disclosure of Turing's sexuality forced him to undergo mandatory "corrective" treatments that included estrogen injections and chemical castration at the British government's insistence. Homosexuality in Britain wouldn't be decriminalized until 1967. Turing committed suicide after two years of this treatment, in 1954, by cyanide poisoning.
Turing's martyrdom has been the source of inspiration for countless works of art, many of them quite recent. In 2011, the artist Henrik Olesen used Turing as the inspiration for a site-specific project at MoMA. In 2012, an exhibit in World War II's code-cracking center Bletchley Park honored Turing's contribution to the war effort. In 2014, Turing's story got big screen treatment in "The Impossible Game," a film that starred Benedict Cumberbatch as the pioneering mathematician. Now, Santa Monica's Moss Theater is about to be presented with 30 minutes of a new ballet set to run for the 2018/19 season, based on Turing's life.
"Formulae and Fairy Tales" is a reimagining of the Turing tragedy, set to music. The Los Angeles-based dance company Invertigo Dance Theater is celebrating its 10-year anniversary with "Formulae and Fairy Tales" on October 22. The 30-minute piece will serve as a teaser for the larger production, which is still in development. Using an LGBTQ+ cast and featuring choreography and direction by Invertigo founder Laura Karlin, "Formulae" will mix aspects of Turing's life with the story of his "favorite film," Disney's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."
When Turing took his own life, he chose to eat an apple poisoned with cyanide. Invertigo's interpretation of the Turing story uses this detail as a way to tie Turing's internal life to the structure of the classic fairytale. For Invertigo's 10th anniversary, the dance theater is mining this cruel, instructive moment in history to envision the future of dance, politics, and new American art forms.
By Henry Giardina October 24, 2017
Tags: Alan Turing, Ballet, Dance, Formulae and Fairy Tales, Invertigo Dance Theater, Laura Cariln, Snow White in THEATER
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Welcome to Number 16, the fun website that focuses on words, language and literature. It also contains quizzes and opinion pieces. Number 16 is named after my favourite number. I am Joanne Madden and I'm from Toronto, Canada. To find out what I have written on any topic, use the search box directly below. For TV trivia, please check my other website, TV Banter (www.tvbanter.net).
TV Trivia
Quiz Page
Sports Nicknames
Letters to America
Keeping children safe: Childproofing your home
Here is an inforgraphic with tips about childproofing your home. It's a guide to arrange your home so that your child is kept out of danger. It may remind you of something you hadn't thought about or missed. This guide takes you room by room as it shows you ways to better protect your child from the moment he or she begins crawling. I hope you'll find it useful and informative.
- Joanne
Childproofing Your Home by Radiator Valves 4u.
Posted by Joanne at 11:42 AM No comments:
The Danging Plague of 1518: Why did people in Strasbourg dance themselves to death?
The story of the Dancing Plague of 1518 is both mysterious and macabre. It happened in the city of Strasbourg, then a part of the Holy Roman Empire (now northeastern France). The Dutch scholar,and social critic, Erasmus, visited the city in 1514 and described it as "a monarchy without tyranny, an aristocracy without factions, a democracy without disorder, prosperity without luxury, happiness without insolence." However, despite Erasmus' favourable portrayal, of early 16th century Strasbourg, there was a much darker side to life in the city and its surrounding area. Prior the dancing plague of 1518, the region was hit by a number of terrible afflictions that turned it into a place of misery.
According to John Waller, author of two books on the subject - A Time to Dance, A Time To Die: The Extraordinary Story of the Dancing Plague of 1518 and Dancing Plague: The Strange True Story of an Extraordinary Illness - hunger and disease were rampant.
In the decade before the dancing plague of 1518, famine, sickness and terrible cold caused widespread despair in Strasbourg and its environs. Bread prices reached their highest levels for a generation, thousands of starving farmers and vine growers arrived at the city gates, and old killers like leprosy and the plague were joined by a terrifying new affliction named syphilis. (John Waller, The Psychologist, July 2009, "Dancing Plagues and Mass Hysteria")
In mid-July of 1518, Frau Troffea, a resident of Strasbourg, suddenly began dancing in the street for no apparent reason. There was no music associated with her dancing. Before long, however, she was joined by others and they were all dancing wildly in the searing summer heat. They danced for days without rest. Within a week, 100 people were consumed with an uncontrollable compulsion to dance. Within a month, the number of dancers in the city had swollen to 400. They were loaded onto wagons and brought to a healing shrine. Many died from exhaustion and heart attacks. the madness did not subside until early September.
Waller, a professor of the History of Medicine at Michigan State University, points out that this was not the first outbreak of a dancing frenzy in Europe. There had been about ten dance epidemics prior to 1518. One in 1374 swept over many towns located in present-day Belgium, northeastern France and Luxembourg. However, the 1518 outbreak is the best documented and probably the final one to occur in Europe.
The dancing plagues may seem quite bizarre and difficult to believe, but there is plenty of evidence that they happened. Waller contends that there is documentation from "scores of physicians, chroniclers, monks and priests." He says that during the time of the 1518 epidemic, municipal orders were written by nervous Strasbourg authorities.
How can the Dancing Plague of 1518 be explained. What was the the cause of such mass hysteria? Was a it a genuine illness? Was it some kind of social phenomenon? According to John Waller, one popular theory has been that the dancers had accidentally ingested ergot fungus, a psychotropic mould that grows on stalks of rye. However, Walker dismisses this theory, pointing out that although Ergotism can cause delusions and spasms, it cuts off blood supply to the hands and feet, making coordinated movement very difficult.
Professor Waller thinks it is plausible that the dancing outbreak of 1518 was caused by mass psychogenic illness (MPI), a symptom of mass hysteria that is brought on by the horrific conditions that were experienced in Strasbourg at that time. In a September 2008 BBC article entitled "Dancing Death," he asserts that "the poor of Strasbourg were experiencing famine and disease and spiritual despair on a scale unknown for generations." According to Waller, the dancer were in a trance state. Otherwise, he argues, they would not have been able to dance for such lengths of time.
Trances more often occur in people who are in extreme psychological stress, as were the people of Strasbourg, and in people who believe in spiritual possession. Waller believes that those conditions were met in the city of Strasbourg in 1518. He tells us that many people in the city were devotees of a saint called St. Vitas. Christian legend holds that Vitas, a Sicilian, died as a martyr in 303 A.D during the persecution of Christians by co-ruling Roman Emperors Diocletian and Maximian. People in Strasbourg believed that if anyone aroused the anger of St. Vitas, he would take over their minds and bring down plagues of uncontrollable dancing. Once they anticipated the St. Vitas curse, says Waller, it increased the chances that they would enter into a trance-like state. One they entered a trance-like state, they played the role of the accursed and possessed, dancing crazily for days at a time.
John Waller sums up his conclusions about the Dancing Plague of 1518 with these words: " So the epidemic, I argue, was a result of both desperation and pious fear."
St. Vitus is regarded as the patron saint of actors, comedians and epileptics. He is believed to have been only 12 or 13 at the time of his death. During the Middle Ages, people in places such as Germany and Latvia danced before his statue.
Vera Lynn on her 100th Birthday
We'll meet again
Don't know where
Don't know when
But I know we'll meet again
Some sunny day
- Refrain from the song We'll Meet Again, written by Ross Parker and Hughie Charles
Dame Vera Lynn celebrates her 100th birthday today. The English singer, songwriter and actress is a living treasure to those of the World War II generation. Her recordings and performances were extremely popular during that era. Her wistful tunes brought hope and comfort to the British people and their allies in their darkest days. Vera was nicknamed "the Forces sweetheart" and her most well known songs include "We'll Meet Again," "The White Cliffs of Dover," "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square" and "There'll Always Be an England." Their sentimental lyrics and unabashed patriotism resonated strongly with soldiers abroad who were homesick for their familiar surroundings.
Vera Lynn was born Vera Margaret Welch on March 20, 1917 in East Ham, Essex (now Greater London), England. She was born to a working class family and, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica, began singing at men's clubs by the age of seven. At 11, she assumed her grandmother's maiden name (Lynn) and joined a singing troupe.
After dropping out of school at 14, Vera caught the eye of a talent agent who found work for her at parties and events. By 1935, she was singing the refrain on big band recordings and performing on the radio. In 1936, she released her first solo recording, "Up the Wooden Hill to Bedfordshire."
In 1937, Vera Lynn collaborated with bandleader Benjamin "Bert" Ambrose, entertaining on his radio program, Life from Mayfair, until 1940. In late 1939, she performed her signature song, "We'll Meet Again," which was written by Ross Parker and Hughie Charles, two composers on Life from Mayfair. In 1941, Vera became the star of her own BBC radio show, Sincerely Yours, Vera Lynn. The next year, she recorded "The White Cliffs of Dover."
Vera was affiliated with the Entertainments National Service Association which was established in 1939 to entertain soldiers. During the war, she toured the world in order to perform for troops, often placing her own life in jeopardy.
When the war end, Vera travelled extensively throughout Europe and continued to broadcast her radio show for years. She has continually engaged in charitable activities, including establishing a fund for those suffering from cerebral palsy. She has also been a tireless advocate for veterans and their causes. In 2008, she became a patron of the Forces Literary Organisation Worldwide for ALL. In 2010 she became patron of the British charity Projects to Support Refugees from Burma/Help 4 Forgotten Allies In 2013, she lent her support to a People for Ethical Treatment of Animals' (PETA) campaign against pigeon racing, which she described as "utterly cruel."
To mark the centenary of Dame Vera's birth, her image will be projected over the White Cliffs of Dover today.
* Vera Lynn was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 1969 and was created a Dame of the British Empire in 1975.
* In 1941, Vera married Harry Lewis, a clarinetist and saxophonist in Bert Ambrose's orchestra. The couple had one child, a daughter named Virginia Penelope Anne Lewis. Harry Lewis, who worked as Vera's manager after the war, died in 1998,
* In September of 2009, Vera, who was then 92 years of age, became the oldest living artist to have a Number 1 record in Britain. when her album, We'll Meet Again - The Very Best of Vera Lynn, reached top spot.
* In August of 2014, Vera was one of the 200 public figures who signed a letter to The Guardian opposing the independence of Scotland during the referendum campaign on the issue that year.
* On March 17, 2017, in commemoration of her 100th birthday, Vera Lynn released a new album on the Decca Records label. It's titled Vera Lynn 100.
Vera Lynn in 2009
PHOTO ATTRIBUTION: Nicki (Growl Roar) from United Kingdom
EDITOR'S UPDATE: Vera Lynn died on June 18, 2020. Her family issued the following statement: "The family are deeply saddened to announce the passing of one of Britain's best-loved entertainers at the age of 103. Dame Vera Lynn, who lived in Ditchling, East Sussex, passed away earlier today, 18 June 2020, surrounded by her close family."
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How To Make Your Home a Happier Place Using Hygge
Do you want to improve the atmosphere of the place where you live. This infographic guides you in the task of improving the mood of your home. It provides you with tips on how to make your dwelling place happier by using the concept of Hygge or "well-being." I hope that you find it informative and useful. Note: Prices are listed in British pounds.
How to Make a Hygge Home by The Rug Seller by The Rug Seller
Eleven Missed Days: The Disappearance of Agatha Cristie
According to The Guinness Book of Records, Agatha Christie is the best selling novelist of all time. Her books have sold millions of copies and have been translated into over 100 languages. She is renowned as the author of numerous mystery novels and is credited with writing the world's longest running play, The Mousetrap.
In 1926, this famous crime writer was the subject of a real life detective story. Christie, the queen of the "whodunnit" found herself involved in a perplexing mystery of her own.. At a very difficult time in her life, she went missing for 11 days. The disappearance of the popular author caused quite a stir and there was an extensive manhunt for her. The public, not knowing whether she was dead or alive, feared greatly for her safety. The Daily Mail offered a reward of 100 pounds for her location. Without a doubt, Christie's 1926 disappearance remains the most intriguing episode of the great author's life.
Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller was born in Torquay, Devon, England on September 15, 1890, the youngest of three siblings. She came from an affluent upper-middle class family. Her mother, Clarissa "Clara" Boehmer, was a Belfast-born Englishwoman. Her father, Frederick Alvah Miller, was a well-to-do American stockbroker, born in New York in 1846. The couple married in April of 1878 and their first child, Margaret Fray "Madge" Miller (1879-1950), was born in Torquay.
Madge was followed by a son, Louis Montant "Monty" Miller (1880-1929), who was born in the United States. The Millers lived in America for a time, but eventually returned to England. While Frederick, who had financial interests in both Britain and the U.S., was away on business in New York, Clara purchased a Victorian mansion in Torquay, on the southwest coast of England. Upon his return, the family settled in the grand villa,called "Ashfield," where their youngest child, Agatha, was born.
For the most part, Agatha enjoyed a happy childhood in her little seaside town. Her life at Ashfield was secure, although fairly insulated. She had a nanny called "Nursie" and was home schooled, at her mother's insistence. At the same time, however, she experienced loneliness. According to her autobiography, Agatha Christie: An Autobigraphy. this childhood loneliness fuelled her active imaginations and her creativity. She made up stores and imaginary characters.
Agatha as a child
Agatha's idyllic childhood was shattered when her father, Frederick Christie, died on November 26, 1901. After his death, the 11-year-old Agatha and her mother experienced serious financial decline. Nevertheless, they continued to maintain their home by renting out Ashfield and travelling.
Frederick Miller
In 1906, at the age of 16, Agatha was sent to a finishing school in Paris to study vocals and piano, but was never able to establish a career as a musician due to shyness and stage fright. She did, however, retain a lifelong love of music and became a skilled pianist.
In October of 1912, Agatha met Colonel Archibald "Archie" Christie at a dance given by Lady Clifford at her home in Chudleigh, England, Archie, a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps, was born in India on September 30, 1889 and his father was in the Indian civil service. Agatha and Archie wed on Christmas Eve, 1914 and the nuptials took place at a church in Clifton, Bristol, England, the home of Archie's parents.
Archibald Christie in 1915
During World War I, Agatha served as a nurse and tended to wounded solders at a Red Cross Hospital in Torquay. She then underwent training to work in the pharmacy as an apothecary's assistant. As part of her training. Agatha studied chemistry and became knowledgeable about poisons, including their lethal dosages. This knowledge became invaluable when she was devising plots for her detective stories. It added to their authenticity. That is why poison became the method of murder in her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, and in many other of her works.
During the war, Archie was stationed in France, so he and Agatha were unable to see much of each other. It was at this time that Agatha first began writing detective fiction. After the war, she and Archie settled into a flat in northwest London and Archie took a position in a bank. On August 5, 1919, Agatha gave birth to the couple's only child, a daughter named Rosalind Margaret Clarissa.
Agatha with Rosalind
Agatha Christie published her debut novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, in 1920. Its plot centred on the murder of a wealthy heiress, but more importantly, the book introduced one of Christie's most enduring characters, Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. Christie's other major creation is Miss Jane Marple, an elderly village lady and amateur sleuth. Miss Marple's first appearance in a full-length novel was in The Murder at the Vicarage (1930).
By 1924, cracks had begun to appear in the Christie marriage, one of the irritants being Archie's passion for the game of golf. In 1926, Agatha released The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which was very successful and warmly received. Her career had begun to flourish, but her personal life was in turmoil. She suffered two devastating blows that year. It was "a period of sorrow, misery, heartbreak," she wrote in her autobiography.
In the early part of 1926, Agatha went on a vacation to Corsica without Archie. When she returned from her trip, she found her mother severely ill with bronchitis. Clara Miller died in April, just days after Agatha's return. In June, soon after Clara's passing, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was published and Agatha earned much acclaim. She was still grieving her mother's death, however, when she received a second devastating blow, this time delivered by her husband. Archie requested a divorce because he had fallen in love with another woman. The woman was Nancy Neale, a friend of the family who was a decade younger than Agatha. Unlike Agatha, Nancy shared Archie's interest in golf.
On the evening of Friday, December 3, 1926, around 9:45 p.m., Christie disappeared from her English estate in Sunningdale, Berkshire. She and Archie had argued and he had gone to spend the weekend with Nancy at Godalming, Surrey, England. A distraught Agatha left her sleeping seven-year-old daughter Rosalind and just drove away.
Police soon located her car, a green Morris Cowley, on a sharp slope at Newlands Corner, near Guildford. The abandoned vehicle contained a bag of clothing and an expired driver's licence. However, there was no sign of the famous author and there was no evidence that an accident had occurred. Many feared she was dead and volunteers failed to find her. There were even rumours that she had been murdered by her unfaithful husband, Archie.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, joined the search for Agatha. Conan Doyle, an occultist, attempted to use paranormal powers to find the missing writer. He brought one of Agatha's gloves to a medium in the hopes that it wold provide a clue to Agatha's whereabouts. British author and crime writer, Dorothy Sayer also tried to help. She searched for possible clues at the scene of Christie's vacated car. There was concern that she may have committed suicide, but no body was found.
Christie's disappearance made headlines around the world. The story was so was featured on the front page of The New York Times. There was so much speculation that the British Home Secretary at the time, William Joynson-Hicks pressured the police to expedite the search for her. Here is the police description of Agatha at the time: "Aged 35 (Editor's note; she was actually 36), height 5ft 7in, hair reddish and shingled, eyes grey, complexion fair. Well-built, dressed in grey and dark grey cardigan, small green velour hat, wearing a platinum ring with one pearl, but no wedding ring."
On December 14, 1926, Agatha finally surfaced in a spa at Harrogate, Yorkshire. She was registered at the elegant Swan Hydropathic Hotel (now the Old Swan Hotel) as "Mrs. Teresa Neele"(the same surname as her husband's lover) from Capetown, South Africa. A hotel musician, Bob Tappin, recognized her and alerted police. They informed Archie who rushed to the hotel, identified his wife and brought her home. Tappin claimed the reward money for informing police of Agatha's whereabouts.
Much of Agatha's disappearance remains unexplained. There is no reference to it in her memoir Agatha Christie: An Autobigraphy. Archibald Christie claimed that she'd suffered from amnesia as a result of the car crash. He publicly stated that his wife "has suffered the most complete loss of memory and does not know who she is." However, his comments failed to put a stop to the conjecture and numerous other theories regarding Agatha's disappearance. Some postulated that Christie's disappearance had been a publicity stunt for her novel.
Jared Cade put forth another theory in his book Agatha Christie and the Eleven Missing Days (1998). Cade contended that Christie staged her own disappearance to embarrass and humiliate Archie. This theory was roundly rejected by Agatha's grandson, Matthew Prichard, a staunch defender of his grandmother's memory.
In Agatha Christie: The Finished Portrait (2006), biographer Andrew Norman, who worked as a family doctor in the U.K. until 1983, argued that the crime writer may have been in a "fugue" state or psychogenic trance as a result of trauma or depression. Norman concluded that she was suicidal. "Her state of mind was very low," he declared, "and she writes about it through the character of Celia in her autobiographical novel Unfinished Portrait."
By the end of 1927, Agatha Christie had recovered from her traumatic experience and had begun writing again. In 1928, she divorced her philandering husband and he wed Nancy Neale. Archie became a successful businessman and he Nancy had a son, Archibald, who was born in 1930.
On September 11, 1930, Agatha married Sir Max Mallowan, a renowned British archaeologist who specialized in ancient Middle Eastern history. She met Mallowan while visiting her friends Sir Leonard and Katherine Wooley on an archaeological expedition at Ur, an important Sumerian city-state in ancient Mesopotamia.(now part of south Iraq's Dhi Qar Governorate). At the time of their wedding in Scotland, Agatha was 39 and Max was 26.
Agatha with Max Mallowan
Agatha accompanied her husband on his archaeological digs, taking photographs and keeping records. She often used the subect of archeology in her mystery novels, Below is a photo of her with Mallowan at Tell Halaf, an archeological site in northeastern Syria.
Max Mallowan was knighted in 1968. In 1971, Agatha Christie was made a Dame of the British Empire by Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace. That same year, she suffered a leg injury and her health went into decline. In 1974, Agatha made her final public appearance at the opening night gala of the theatrical version of Murder on the Orient Express. She died on January 12, 1976 in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, England at the age of 85. She and Max Mallowan remained married for 46 years - until her death. In 1977, Mallowan married Barbara Hastings Parker, a fellow archaeologist with whom he was reported to have been having an affair. Sir Max passed away on August 19, 1978 at the age of 85.
* Agatha Christie's daughter, Rosalind, died on October 28, 2004 at the age of 85 (coincidentally the same age at which her mother died). According to Rosalind's obituary in The Guardian, she "fiercely guarded her mother's estate, works and reputation.
* Nancy Neale died in 1958 at the age of 58. Archibald Christie died four years later, on December 20, 1962. He was 73 at the time of his death.
* Barbara Hastings Parker, the second Lady Mallowan, died on November 21, 1993 in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, England at the age of 85.
* Ashfield, Agatha Christie's childhood home, was demolished in the 1960s to make way for an apartment block. A blue plaque on Barton Road in Torquay marks the spot where the villa once stood.
* Agatha Christie wrote six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott and they were not detective novels. One of them, Unfinished Portrait (1934), was the fictionalized account of her first marriage, which is why she hid her real identity. In Agatha Christie: An English Mystery, a 2007 biography, Laura Thompson writes : "She felt an absolute freedom writing those books. She could go wherever she wanted, into every idea that had ever fascinated her, even into the recesses of her own past - there was a sense that the revelation of her identity had closed a door: the one that opened into her most private and precious imaginative garden."
In 1949, however, a London Sunday Times journalist blew Christie's cover. The last two of the Westmacott novels, A Daughter's Daughter (1952) and The Burden (1956), appeared after 1949 her secret was revealed.
SOURCES: Encyclopaedia Britannica; Agatha Christie: An English Mystery (2007), by Laura Thompson; The Guardian; Wikipedia; Agatha Christie: The Finished Portrait (2006). by Andrew Norman; The Complete Christie: An Agatha Christie Encyclopedia (2000), by Matthew Bunson; Agatha Christie; An Autobiography (1977).
NUMBER 16 FEATURE PHOTOS AND ART
TODAY IS FRIDAY,, JANUARY 21, 2022.
You can stop the spread. Protect yourself and others. Freedom does not mean you have the right to infect others. This is NOT political. It's a matter of protecting human lives. Unless you have a valid medical reason, please get vaccinated. Otherwise, the scourge of COVID-19 will go on for years to come.
CLIMATE CRISIS: TIME IS RUNNING OUT.
Climate change is real. It is not a hoax. It has been scientifically proven. The world must come together and deal with it decisively before it is too late. The hurricanes, floods and wildfires are becoming more frequent and more destructive. The clock is ticking. (Click on image above).
My novel CHILDREN OF DIEPPE
If you are interested in checking out my novel in ebook form, it is available on the Smashwords website. Please click on the image above.
TRUMPISM MUST BE DEFEATED
Although Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, his dangerous far-right supporters are still a force to be reckoned with. Trumpism is a cancer in the American body politic. It must be eradicated if democracy is to survive in the United States. Donald Trump must be held accountable for inciting the insurgents on January 6, 2021 and for other crimes he has committed. Nobody is above the law.
I am a native of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. For many years, I worked as a researcher and archivist at the Toronto Star, the largest newspaper in Canada. I like to share my interest in trivia, television, current events, politics, movies, quotes etc.
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TV Banter
Some of My Favourite Books
Anne of Green Gables (by L.M. Montgomery)
Crime and Punishment (by Fyodor Dostoevsky)
The Chosen (by Chaim Potok)
A Separate Peace (by John Knowles)
The Catcher in the Rye (by J.D. Salinger)
The Portrait of A Lady (by Henry James)
Pride and Prejudice (by Jane Austen)
The Great Gatsby (by F. Scott Fitzgerald)
To Kill A Mockingbird (by Harper Lee)
Life of Pi (by Yann Martel)
Wuthering Heights (by Emily Bronte)
Links to my favourite websites
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do nothing for 2 minutes
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Eleven Missed Days: The Disappearance of Agatha Cr...
For Valentine's Day - great quotes about love
Robert Frost and the road he took: His meeting with Khrushchev in 1962
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Alvin Toffler and Future Shock; High Park Photos
Richard Carpenter: 33 years after Karen's death
Photos of 50th Elmira Maple Syrup Festival
The nurse who survived Richard Speck's 1966 murder rampage
Whatever happened to Claudine Longet?
CHRISTMAS BIRTHS AND DEATHS


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Student's Rights Not Violated by ban on shirts bearing the American flag
By Ralph Turchiano on February 28, 2014
Thursday, February 27, 2014Last Update: 7:30 AM PT
By TIM HULL
(CN) – A high school administrator's Cinco de Mayo ban on shirts bearing the American flag did not violate the civil rights of his students, the 9th Circuit ruled Thursday.
Miguel Rodriguez, an assistant principal at Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill, Calif., told at least two students to turn their flag-bearing shirts inside out or remove them on Cinco de Mayo 2010. Rodriguez explained to the students that it was for their own safety, as he had received reports that day of possible "race-related violence."
The school uses the Mexican holiday to honor the culture of the region's Mexican-Americans, comparing it to "St. Patrick's Day or Oktoberfest." However, a fight between "Caucasian and Hispanic" students had occurred on Cinco de Mayo the previous year when some students hung a "makeshift American flag" on a tree and "began clapping and chanting USA," inspiring Hispanic students to confront them with obscenities, according to the 9th Circuit.
Hoping to avoid similar problems in 2010, and after receiving reports from students that violence was likely, Rodriguez sent two students home after they refused to remove their flag-emblazoned shirts.
Three students, who are referred to only by their initials in court documents, sued Rodriguez for violating their rights to freedom of expression, equal protection and due process.
U.S. District Judge James Ware in San Jose granted summary judgment to the assistant principal, and the federal appeals court unanimously affirmed on Thursday.
"School officials anticipated violence or substantial disruption of or material interference with school activities, and their response was tailored to the circumstances," wrote Judge M. Margaret McKeown for the three-judge panel. "As a consequence, we conclude that school officials did not violate the students' rights to freedom of expression, due process, or equal protection."
McKeown noted that Rodriguez had not punished the students, but had only "restricted the wearing of certain clothing."
"School officials have greater constitutional latitude to suppress student speech than to punish it," she added.
The students were represented by Robert Muise of the American Freedom Law Center in Ann Arbor, Mich.
Muise said Judge McKeown got it wrong because the students were punished for their speech.
"The point is that they are restricting speech," Muise said in a phone interview. "Whether you restrict speech with a one-dollar fine, a two-day suspension or by ordering kids to turn their shirts inside out or go home — they were punished."
Muise also disputed the finding that the student's rights were justifiably suppressed over safety concerns.
"For them to claim that they could reasonably forecast violence is nonsense," Muise said. "If the school district was truly that concerned about racial tensions disrupting the school environment, why in the world did they approve the very same celebration for 2010."
Muise said he will seek en banc review by the 9th Circuit.
"All of the evidence overwhelmingly shows that this was a pretext because they didn't want to offend the Mexican students," he added. "Not because there were any real concerns about violence."
http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/02/27/65720.htm
Court says school was OK in banning American flag T-shirts on Cinco de Mayo to prevent racial strife: Agree? (pennlive.com)
School bans American flag shirts on Cinco de Mayo (wtkr.com)
Court rules Calif. school can ban Amer. flag shirts on Cinco de Mayo (kdvr.com)
School bans American flag shirts on Cinco de Mayo (wtvr.com)
Court: School had Rights to Ban U.S. Flag Shirts on Cinco de Mayo (fox8.com)
Categories: Rebellion
Tagged as: Cinco de Mayo, Flag of the United States, Live Oak High School, M. Margaret McKeown, Robert Muise, Thursday, United States, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Germans mock new Italian PM – the new Mr Bean?
30 Armed People Block Maritime Border Guard Detachment In Sevastopol


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Chapter 1 THE WEAVING OF THE SHUTTLE
No man knew when the Shuttle began its slow and heavy weaving from shore to shore, that it was held and guided by the great hand of Fate. Fate alone saw the meaning of the web it wove, the might of it, and its place in the making of a world's history. Men thought but little of either web or weaving, calling them by other names and lighter ones, for the time unconscious of the strength of the thread thrown across thousands of miles of leaping, heaving, grey or blue ocean.
Fate and Life planned the weaving, and it seemed mere circumstance which guided the Shuttle to and fro between two worlds divided by a gulf broader and deeper than the thousands of miles of salt, fierce sea-the gulf of a bitter quarrel deepened by hatred and the shedding of brothers' blood. Between the two worlds of East and West there was no will to draw nearer. Each held apart. Those who had rebelled against that which their souls called tyranny, having struggled madly and shed blood in tearing themselves free, turned stern backs upon their unconquered enemies, broke all cords that bound them to the past, flinging off ties of name, kinship and rank, beginning with fierce disdain a new life.
Those who, being rebelled against, found the rebels too passionate in their determination and too desperate in their defence of their strongholds to be less than unconquerable, sailed back haughtily to the world which seemed so far the greater power. Plunging into new battles, they added new conquests and splendour to their land, looking back with something of contempt to the half-savage West left to build its own civilisation without other aid than the strength of its own strong right hand and strong uncultured brain.
But while the two worlds held apart, the Shuttle, weaving slowly in the great hand of Fate, drew them closer and held them firm, each of them all unknowing for many a year, that what had at first been mere threads of gossamer, was forming a web whose strength in time none could compute, whose severance could be accomplished but by tragedy and convulsion.
The weaving was but in its early and slow-moving years when this story opens. Steamers crossed and recrossed the Atlantic, but they accomplished the journey at leisure and with heavy rollings and all such discomforts as small craft can afford. Their staterooms and decks were not crowded with people to whom the voyage was a mere incident-in many cases a yearly one. "A crossing" in those days was an event. It was planned seriously, long thought of, discussed and re-discussed, with and among the various members of the family to which the voyager belonged. A certain boldness, bordering on recklessness, was almost to be presupposed in the individual who, turning his back upon New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and like cities, turned his face towards "Europe." In those days when the Shuttle wove at leisure, a man did not lightly run over to London, or Paris, or Berlin, he gravely went to "Europe."
The journey being likely to be made once in a lifetime, the traveller's intention was to see as much as possible, to visit as many cities cathedrals, ruins, galleries, as his time and purse would allow. People who could speak with any degree of familiarity of Hyde Park, the Champs Elysees, the Pincio, had gained a certain dignity. The ability to touch with an intimate bearing upon such localities was a raison de plus for being asked out to tea or to dinner. To possess photographs and relics was to be of interest, to have seen European celebrities even at a distance, to have wandered about the outside of poets' gardens and philosophers' houses, was to be entitled to respect. The period was a far cry from the time when the Shuttle, having shot to and fro, faster and faster, week by week, month by month, weaving new threads into its web each year, has woven warp and woof until they bind far shore to shore.
It was in comparatively early days that the first thread we follow was woven into the web. Many such have been woven since and have added greater strength than any others, twining the cord of sex and home-building and race-founding. But this was a slight and weak one, being only the thread of the life of one of Reuben Vanderpoel's daughters-the pretty little simple one whose name was Rosalie.
They were-the Vanderpoels-of the Americans whose fortunes were a portion of the history of their country. The building of these fortunes had been a part of, or had created epochs and crises. Their millions could scarcely be regarded as private property. Newspapers bandied them about, so to speak, employing them as factors in argument, using them as figures of speech, incorporating them into methods of calculation. Literature touched upon them, moral systems considered them, stories for the young treated them gravely as illustrative.
The first Reuben Vanderpoel, who in early days of danger had traded with savages for the pelts of wild animals, was the lauded hero of stories of thrift and enterprise. Throughout his hard-working life he had been irresistibly impelled to action by an absolute genius of commerce, expressing itself at the outset by the exhibition of courage in mere exchange and barter. An alert power to perceive the potential value of things and the possible malleability of men and circumstances, had stood him in marvellous good stead. He had bought at low prices things which in the eyes of the less discerning were worthless, but, having obtained possession of such things, the less discerning had almost invariably awakened to the fact that, in his hands, values increased, and methods of remunerative disposition, being sought, were found. Nothing remained unutilisable. The practical, sordid, uneducated little man developed the power to create demand for his own supplies. If he was betrayed into an error, he quickly retrieved it. He could live upon nothing and consequently could travel anywhere in search of such things as he desired. He could barely read and write, and could not spell, but he was daring and astute. His untaught brain was that of a financier, his blood burned with the fever of but one desire-the desire to accumulate. Money expressed to his nature, not expenditure, but investment in such small or large properties as could be resold at profit in the near or far future. The future held fascinations for him. He bought nothing for his own pleasure or comfort, nothing which could not be sold or bartered again. He married a woman who was a trader's daughter and shared his passion for gain. She was of North of England blood, her father having been a hard-fisted small tradesman in an unimportant town, who had been daring enough to emigrate when emigration meant the facing of unknown dangers in a half-savage land. She had excited Reuben Vanderpoel's admiration by taking off her petticoat one bitter winter's day to sell it to a squaw in exchange for an ornament for which she chanced to know another squaw would pay with a skin of value. The first Mrs. Vanderpoel was as wonderful as her husband. They were both wonderful. They were the founders of the fortune which a century and a half later was the delight-in fact the piece de resistance-of New York society reporters, its enormity being restated in round figures when a blank space must be filled up. The method of statement lent itself to infinite variety and was always interesting to a particular class, some elements of which felt it encouraging to be assured that so much money could be a personal possession, some elements feeling the fact an additional argument to be used against the infamy of monopoly.
The first Reuben Vanderpoel transmitted to his son his accumulations and his fever for gain. He had but one child. The second Reuben built upon the foundations this afforded him, a fortune as much larger than the first as the rapid growth and increasing capabilities of the country gave him enlarging opportunities to acquire. It was no longer necessary to deal with savages: his powers were called upon to cope with those of white men who came to a new country to struggle for livelihood and fortune. Some were shrewd, some were desperate, some were dishonest. But shrewdness never outwitted, desperation never overcame, dishonesty never deceived the second Reuben Vanderpoel. Each characteristic ended by adapting itself to his own purposes and qualities, and as a result of each it was he who in any business transaction was the gainer. It was the common saying that the Vanderpoels were possessed of a money-making spell. Their spell lay in their entire mental and physical absorption in one idea. Their peculiarity was not so much that they wished to be rich as that Nature itself impelled them to collect wealth as the load-stone draws towards it iron. Having possessed nothing, they became rich, having become rich they became richer, having founded their fortunes on small schemes, they increased them by enormous ones. In time they attained that omnipotence of wealth which it would seem no circumstance can control or limit. The first Reuben Vanderpoel could not spell, the second could, the third was as well educated as a man could be whose sole profession is money-making. His children were taught all that expensive teachers and expensive opportunities could teach them. After the second generation the meagre and mercantile physical type of the Vanderpoels improved upon itself. Feminine good looks appeared and were made the most of. The Vanderpoel element invested even good looks to an advantage. The fourth Reuben Vanderpoel had no son and two daughters. They were brought up in a brown-stone mansion built upon a fashionable New York thoroughfare roaring with traffic. To the farthest point of the Rocky Mountains the number of dollars this "mansion" (it was always called so) had cost, was known. There may have existed Pueblo Indians who had heard rumours of the price of it. All the shop-keepers and farmers in the United States had read newspaper descriptions of its furnishings and knew the value of the brocade which hung in the bedrooms and boudoirs of the Misses Vanderpoel. It was a fact much cherished that Miss Rosalie's bath was of Carrara marble, and to good souls actively engaged in doing their own washing in small New England or Western towns, it was a distinct luxury to be aware that the water in the Carrara marble bath was perfumed with Florentine Iris. Circumstances such as these seemed to become personal possessions and even to lighten somewhat the burden of toil.
Rosalie Vanderpoel married an Englishman of title, and part of the story of her married life forms my prologue. Hers was of the early international marriages, and the republican mind had not yet adjusted itself to all that such alliances might imply. It was yet ingenuous, imaginative and confiding in such matters. A baronetcy and a manor house reigning over an old English village and over villagers in possible smock frocks, presented elements of picturesque dignity to people whose intimacy with such allurements had been limited by the novels of Mrs. Oliphant and other writers. The most ordinary little anecdotes in which vicarages, gamekeepers, and dowagers figured, were exciting in these early days. "Sir Nigel Anstruthers," when engraved upon a visiting card, wore an air of distinction almost startling. Sir Nigel himself was not as picturesque as his name, though he was not entirely without attraction, when for reasons of his own he chose to aim at agreeableness of bearing. He was a man with a good figure and a good voice, and but for a heaviness of feature the result of objectionable living, might have given the impression of being better looking than he really was. New York laid amused and at the same time, charmed stress upon the fact that he spoke with an "English accent." His enunciation was in fact clear cut and treated its vowels well. He was a man who observed with an air of accustomed punctiliousness such social rules and courtesies as he deemed it expedient to consider. An astute worldling had remarked that he was at once more ceremonious and more casual in his manner than men bred in America.
"If you invite him to dinner," the wording said, "or if you die, or marry, or meet with an accident, his notes of condolence or congratulation are prompt and civil, but the actual truth is that he cares nothing whatever about you or your relations, and if you don't please him he does not hesitate to sulk or be astonishingly rude, which last an American does not allow himself to be, as a rule."
By many people Sir Nigel was not analysed, but accepted. He was of the early English who came to New York, and was a novelty of interest, with his background of Manor House and village and old family name. He was very much talked of at vivacious ladies' luncheon parties, he was very much talked to at equally vivacious afternoon teas. At dinner parties he was furtively watched a good deal, but after dinner when he sat with the men over their wine, he was not popular. He was not perhaps exactly disliked, but men whose chief interest at that period lay in stocks and railroads, did not find conversation easy with a man whose sole occupation had been the shooting of birds and the hunting of foxes, when he was not absolutely loitering about London, with his time on his hands. The stories he told-and they were few-were chiefly anecdotes whose points gained their humour by the fact that a man was a comically bad shot or bad rider and either peppered a gamekeeper or was thrown into a ditch when his horse went over a hedge, and such relations did not
Jean Wen sacrificed herself for family interests. Before her husband divorced her, she made every effort to please him.
"You are inexperienced in bed," he said coldly.
"You! Give that land to my family, or I won't agree to divorce," Jean replied furiously.
"Fine. It is exactly what I am thinking about," he sneered.
increase in the poignancy of their interest by being filtered through brains accustomed to applying their powers to problems of speculation and commerce. He was not so dull but that he perceived this at an early stage of his visit to New York, which was probably the reason of the infrequency of his stories.
He on his side was naturally not quick to rise to the humour of a "big deal" or a big blunder made on Wall Street-or to the wit of jokes concerning them. Upon the whole he would have been glad to have understood such matters more clearly. His circumstances were such as had at last forced him to contemplate the world of money-makers with something of an annoyed respect. "These fellows" who had neither titles nor estates to keep up could make money. He, as he acknowledged disgustedly to himself, was much worse than a beggar. There was Stornham Court in a state of ruin-the estate going to the dogs, the farmhouses tumbling to pieces and he, so to speak, without a sixpence to bless himself with, and head over heels in debt. Englishmen of the rank which in bygone times had not associated itself with trade had begun at least to trifle with it-to consider its potentialities as factors possibly to be made useful by the aristocracy. Countesses had not yet spiritedly opened milliners' shops, nor belted Earls adorned the stage, but certain noblemen had dallied with beer and coquetted with stocks. One of the first commercial developments had been the discovery of America-particularly of New York-as a place where if one could make up one's mind to the plunge, one might marry one's sons profitably. At the outset it presented a field so promising as to lead to rashness and indiscretion on the part of persons not given to analysis of character and in consequence relying too serenely upon an ingenuousness which rather speedily revealed that it had its limits. Ingenuousness combining itself with remarkable alertness of perception on occasion, is rather American than English, and is, therefore, to the English mind, misleading.
At first younger sons, who "gave trouble" to their families, were sent out. Their names, their backgrounds of castles or manors, relatives of distinction, London seasons, fox hunting, Buckingham Palace and Goodwood Races, formed a picturesque allurement. That the castles and manors would belong to their elder brothers, that the relatives of distinction did not encourage intimacy with swarms of the younger branches of their families; that London seasons, hunting, and racing were for their elders and betters, were facts not realised in all their importance by the republican mind. In the course of time they were realised to the full, but in Rosalie Vanderpoel's nineteenth year they covered what was at that time almost unknown territory. One may rest assured Sir Nigel Anstruthers said nothing whatsoever in New York of an interview he had had before sailing with an intensely disagreeable great-aunt, who was the wife of a Bishop. She was a horrible old woman with a broad face, blunt features and a raucous voice, whose tones added acridity to her observations when she was indulging in her favourite pastime of interfering with the business of her acquaintances and relations.
"I do not know what you are going chasing off to America for, Nigel," she commented. "You can't afford it and it is perfectly ridiculous of you to take it upon yourself to travel for pleasure as if you were a man of means instead of being in such a state of pocket that Maria tells me you cannot pay your tailor. Neither the Bishop nor I can do anything for you and I hope you don't expect it. All I can hope is that you know yourself what you are going to America in search of, and that it is something more practical than buffaloes. You had better stop in New York. Those big shopkeepers' daughters are enormously rich, they say, and they are immensely pleased by attentions from men of your class. They say they'll marry anything if it has an aunt or a grandmother with a title. You can mention the Marchioness, you know. You need not refer to the fact that she thought your father a blackguard and your mother an interloper, and that you have never been invited to Broadmere since you were born. You can refer casually to me and to the Bishop and to the Palace, too. A Palace-even a Bishop's-ought to go a long way with Americans. They will think it is something royal." She ended her remarks with one of her most insulting snorts of laughter, and Sir Nigel became dark red and looked as if he would like to knock her down.
It was not, however, her sentiments which were particularly revolting to him. If she had expressed them in a manner more flattering to himself he would have felt that there was a good deal to be said for them. In fact, he had put the same thing to himself some time previously, and, in summing up the American matter, had reached certain thrifty decisions. The impulse to knock her down surged within him solely because he had a brutally bad temper when his vanity was insulted, and he was furious at her impudence in speaking to him as if he were a villager out of work whom she was at liberty to bully and lecture.
"For a woman who is supposed to have been born of gentle people," he said to his mother afterwards, "Aunt Marian is the most vulgar old beast I have ever beheld. She has the taste of a female costermonger." Which was entirely true, but it might be added that his own was no better and his points of view and morals wholly coincided with his taste.
Naturally Rosalie Vanderpoel knew nothing of this side of the matter. She had been a petted, butterfly child, who had been pretty and admired and indulged from her infancy; she had grown up into a petted, butterfly girl, pretty and admired and surrounded by inordinate luxury. Her world had been made up of good-natured, lavish friends and relations, who enjoyed themselves and felt a delight in her girlish toilettes and triumphs. She had spent her one season of belledom in being whirled from festivity to festivity, in dancing in rooms festooned with thousands of dollars' worth of flowers, in lunching or dining at tables loaded with roses and violets and orchids, from which ballrooms or feasts she had borne away wonderful "favours" and gifts, whose prices, being recorded in the newspapers, caused a thrill of delight or envy to pass over the land. She was a slim little creature, with quantities of light feathery hair like a French doll's. She had small hands and small feet and a small waist-a small brain also, it must be admitted, but she was an innocent, sweet-tempered girl with a childlike simpleness of mind. In fine, she was exactly the girl to find Sir Nigel's domineering temperament at once imposing and attractive, so long as it was cloaked by the ceremonies of external good breeding.
Her sister Bettina, who was still a child, was of a stronger and less susceptible nature. Betty-at eight-had long legs and a square but delicate small face. Her well-opened steel-blue eyes were noticeable for rather extravagant ink-black lashes and a straight young stare which seemed to accuse if not to condemn. She was being educated at a ruinously expensive school with a number of other inordinately rich little girls, who were all too wonderfully dressed and too lavishly supplied with pocket money. The school considered itself especially refined and select, but was in fact interestingly vulgar.
The inordinately rich little girls, who had most of them pretty and spiritual or pretty and piquant faces, ate a great many bon bons and chattered a great deal in high unmodulated voices about the parties their sisters and other relatives went to and the dresses they wore. Some of them were nice little souls, who in the future would emerge from their chrysalis state enchanting women, but they used colloquialisms freely, and had an ingenuous habit of referring to the prices of things. Bettina Vanderpoel, who was the richest and cleverest and most promisingly handsome among them, was colloquial to slanginess, but she had a deep, mellow, child voice and an amazing carriage.
She could not endure Sir Nigel Anstruthers, and, being an American child, did not hesitate to express herself with force, if with some crudeness. "He's a hateful thing," she said, "I loathe him. He's stuck up and he thinks you are afraid of him and he likes it."
Sir Nigel had known only English children, little girls who lived in that discreet corner of their parents' town or country houses known as "the schoolroom," apparently emerging only for daily walks with governesses; girls with long hair and boys in little high hats and with faces which seemed curiously made to match them. Both boys and girls were decently kept out of the way and not in the least dwelt on except when brought out for inspection during the holidays and taken to the pantomime.
Sir Nigel had not realised that an American child was an absolute factor to be counted with, and a "youngster" who entered the drawing-room when she chose and joined fearlessly in adult conversation was an element he considered annoying. It was quite true that Bettina talked too much and too readily at times, but it had not been explained to her that the opinions of eight years are not always of absorbing interest to the mature. It was also true that Sir Nigel was a great fool for interfering with what was clearly no affair of his in such a manner as would have made him an enemy even had not the child's instinct arrayed her against him at the outset.
"You American youngsters are too cheeky," he said on one of the occasions when Betty had talked too much. "If you were my sister and lived at Stornham Court, you would be learning lessons in the schoolroom and wearing a pinafore. Nobody ever saw my sister Emily when she was your age."
"Well, I'm not your sister Emily," retorted Betty, "and I guess I'm glad of it."
It was rather impudent of her, but it must be confessed that she was not infrequently rather impudent in a rude little-girl way, but she was serenely unconscious of the fact.
Sir Nigel flushed darkly and laughed a short, unpleasant laugh. If she had been his sister Emily she would have fared ill at the moment, for his villainous temper would have got the better of him.
"I 'guess' that I may be congratulated too," he sneered.
"If I was going to be anybody's sister Emily," said Betty, excited a little by the sense of the fray, "I shouldn't want to be yours."
"Now Betty, don't be hateful," interposed Rosalie, laughing, and her laugh was nervous. "There's Mina Thalberg coming up the front steps. Go and meet her."
Rosalie, poor girl, always found herself nervous when Sir Nigel and Betty were in the room together. She instinctively recognised their antagonism and was afraid Betty would do something an English baronet would think vulgar. Her simple brain could not have explained to her why it was that she knew Sir Nigel often thought New Yorkers vulgar. She was, however, quite aware of this but imperfectly concealed fact, and felt a timid desire to be explanatory.
When Bettina marched out of the room with her extraordinary carriage finely manifest, Rosy's little laugh was propitiatory.
"You mustn't mind her," she said. "She's a real splendid little thing, but she's got a quick temper. It's all over in a minute."
"They wouldn't stand that sort of thing in England," said Sir Nigel. "She's deucedly spoiled, you know."
He detested the child. He disliked all children, but this one awakened in him more than mere dislike. The fact was that though Betty herself was wholly unconscious of the subtle truth, the as yet undeveloped intellect which later made her a brilliant and captivating personality, vaguely saw him as he was, an unscrupulous, sordid brute, as remorseless an adventurer and swindler in his special line, as if he had been engaged in drawing false cheques and arranging huge jewel robberies, instead of planning to entrap into a disadvantageous marriage a girl whose gentleness and fortune could be used by a blackguard of reputable name. The man was cold-blooded enough to see that her gentle weakness was of value because it could be bullied, her money was to be counted on because it could be spent on himself and his degenerate vices and on his racked and ruined name and estate, which must be rebuilt and restocked at an early date by someone or other, lest they tumbled into ignominious collapse which could not be concealed. Bettina of the accusing eyes did not know that in the depth of her yet crude young being, instinct was summing up for her the potentialities of an unusually fine specimen of the British blackguard, but this was nevertheless the interesting truth. When later she was told that her sister had become engaged to Sir Nigel Anstruthers, a flame of colour flashed over her face, she stared silently a moment, then bit her lip and burst into tears.
"Well, Bett," exclaimed Rosalie, "you are the queerest thing I ever saw."
Bettina's tears were an outburst, not a flow. She swept them away passionately with her small handkerchief.
"He'll do something awful to you," she said. "He'll nearly kill you. I know he will. I'd rather be dead myself."
She dashed out of the room, and could never be induced to say a word further about the matter. She would indeed have found it impossible to express her intense antipathy and sense of impending calamity. She had not the phrases to make herself clear even to herself, and after all what controlling effort can one produce when one is only eight years old?


Originally Published: November 22, 2017 8:18 a.m.
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The chosen player is "lynched", reveals his/her role and is out of the game. Werewolf is a social game that requires no equipment to play, and can accommodate almost any large group of players.
Deep in the American countryside, the little town of Millers Hollow has recently been infiltrated by Werewolves.
Each night, murders are committed by the Townsfolk, who due to some mysterious phenomenon (possibly the greenhouse effect) have become Werewolves.
It is now time to take control and eliminate this ancient evil, before the town loses its last few inhabitants.
For the Townsfolk: Kill all of the Werewolves.
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Q: Detecting Chinese Characters in HTML useful Link to understand Encoding
http://kunststube.net/encoding/ - shared by @deceze
I'm trying to detect for the chinese character but cant. When i try echo , i get this
"´Ë±¦±´ÒÑϼÜ". I don't need to display it, just need to detect the characters on the html page.
//Set the post parameters
    curl_setopt($ch, CURLOPT_URL, 'http://bit.ly/1y');
    //execute new request
    $htmlcode = curl_exec($ch);
    curl_close($ch);

    if (stripos($htmlcode, "已下架") !== false) {
    echo "True";
}else{
  echo "Fail";
}

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated

A: The page is encoded as GBK. You probably save your source as UTF-8, so "已下架" is UTF-8 encoded. Therefore stripos will not match, since it just compares bytes and is not encoding aware.
Either convert $htmlcode to the encoding of your file or convert "已下架" to the encoding of $htmlcode to perform string matching. Use mb_convert_encoding or iconv.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange