Aerial Photography

Aerial photography goes back 150 years. From Slate, here is a set of historic aerial photographs.

From National Geographic here is a video of one of their latest contraptions designed to take aerial photographs.

Happy Birthday George Ferris

Today is the 152th anniversary of George Ferris' birth. Here is a short video on his invention of the Ferris Wheel.



And here is the photograph I took last summer of the place in middle of the Midway Plaisance in Chicago where Ferris' original Wheel was built.

Viking Ship

A video about efforts to restore a Viking Ship that was built in Norway, and sailed to the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Not very much survives from that Fair, so it would be nice if this ship can be restored.

The Antikythera Mechanism

A Lego recreation of an ancient Greek device used to predict eclipses. More videos and information at the guardian.co.uk here.

At Home

I recently read Bill Bryson's latest book At Home: A Short History of Private Life. Bryson currently lives in a former Church of England rectory built in the middle 1800's. Going room by room through the house, he writes about the history of each type of room. Starting with pre-historic dwellings in Great Britain, he covers a lot of ground. His treatment is rather episodic, and sometimes he stretches to connect the history he wants to tell with the room he is relating it to. He briefly covers many topics, but his stories are always interesting, and often very entertaining.

This book reminded my of Witold Rybczynski 1987 book Home: A Short History of an Idea. Rather than going room by room, Rybczynski gives a chronological history of the home. Each of his chapters begins with a painting of a home from a specific time period, and then he discusses how the painting relates to changes in the concept of what constituted a home during that time period. This is the first book that I every read by Rybczynski, but he has since become one of my favorite writers. I have read many of his other books, and seen him speak twice. I would recommend anything that he has written.

Going back to Bryson's book, one of the episodes that he relates is the creation of the London sewers. I was already familiar with this from Stephen Halliday's book The Great Stink of London: Sir Joseph Bazalgette and the Cleansing of the Victorian Metropolis. In short, following the rise of the flush toilet in the early 1800's, the Thames River became on massive cesspool. The smell became so overwhelming that the Parliament had to be shut down. Joseph Bazalgette took on the task of creating a sewer system that would remove all the waste from London. In the process, he created the embankments that currently line the Thames through London, and built one of the technological wonders off the 19th Century. A century and a half later, the sewer Bazalgette build is still the backbone of the system London uses to dispose of sewage. All of this as a way of introducing this video which is a modern day descent into the sewer Bazalgette build. I am including the link to this video because, knowing the history, I thought it was interesting. That being said, it is very gross. So if you are squeamish you might want to skip it. On the other hand, this may be the only place you will ever see a discussion of affluent effluent.

Below the waste line: Inside London's sewer system

Picture ot the Day - 11/21/2010

Just back from two days in New York City. I will do more posts later this week. For now here is a picture of the stacked parking at 20th Street and 10th Avenue.

Pictures of the Day - 2010

Maryland Water Crossings

A two part video from the Maryland State Highway Administration on water crossings in Maryland, including the Casselman Bridge and Montgomery Meigs' Union Arch Bridge.

World Trade Center Site

A video of a day at the World Trade Center site.

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Happy 200th Birthday Tin Can

Patent (No 3372) for the tin can was granted on August 25, 1810 to Peter Durand by King George III of England.

Here is an article from the Washington Post commemorating the 200 year history of the can.

Celebrating the can: 200 years of history preserved

Thomas Viaduct turns 175

July 4th marked the 175 anniversary of the completion of the Thomas Viaduct, built to carry the B&O Railroad across the Patapsco River between Baltimore and Washington. Designed by Benjamin Latrobe, Jr., it was the the first multi-span masonry railroad bridge in the United States to be built on a curve. At the time of it's construction it was referred to as Latrobe's Folly, because many people thought it would collapse under the weight of crossing trains. Freight and commuter trains still cross the viaduct every day, and it has not collapsed yet. So I guess Latrobe has the last laugh.

Here is a video of a diorama from the B&O Railroad Museum in Ellicott City, MD. It displays the first thirteen miles of the B&O line out of Baltimore and includes the Thomas Viaduct.



Here is a current video of a CSX Train crossing the Viaduct.

Bell Tuning

An interesting video from the BBC demonstrating how bells are tuned.

The Eighth Wonder of the World

The guardian.co.uk has a video from inside the Thames Tunnel. Built by Marc Brunnel and opened in 1843, this was the first tunnel in the world to go under a river.

The Thames Tunnel

Water Wheel Powered Trash Interceptor

I found it. Here are some pictures of the Water Wheel Powered Trash Interceptor. It had been located where the Jones Falls empties into the Harbor, but it has been gone for a while and I did not know what happened to it. When I was out taking pictures Saturday, I found that it has been move to the outlet of Harris Creek, which was once a navigable stream, but has now been completely paved over, and is only visible where it empties into the Harbor.

Anyway the Water Wheel Powered Trash Interceptor is a water wheel powered contraption that lifts trash out of the water on a conveyor belt and empties it into a dumpster for more appropriate disposal. I am not sure why it was moved from the Jones Falls to Harris Creek, but I am glad it is being used somewhere.

Also this set includes a couple other pictures I took at the Harbor.

Water Wheel Powered Trash Interceptor

This To Shall Pass

It is almost impossible to believe that this was filmed in one continuous take.

Here is an article from Wired about the making of the video.

Legos & the Falkirk Wheel

A BBC video of a Lego model of Forth Rail Bridge.

Lego to build bridges between work and play

The end of the video contains a discussion of the Falkirk Wheel, which I had never heard of before. Here is more info, with pictures, about that:

The Surreal Appeal of the Falkirk Wheel