Long 19th- 20th centuries

Pinchot Lake

Gifford Pinchot and His Support of Environmental Conservation

Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , ,

  You are looking at Pinchot Lake, the defining geographical feature of the Gifford Pinchot State Park. A short drive south from the Harrisburg state capital, this recreational area is named after America’s famed environmental conservationist. Gifford Pinchot (1865-1946) worked with the likes of Theodore Roosevelt and female conservationist Mira Lloyd Dock to promote the […]

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LeTorte Trail

Pennsylvania’s LeTorte Trail

Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , ,

  On a lovely January morning, I walked the LeTorte trail, which runs along the eponymous nature preserve. LeTorte’s name comes from an early 18th-century French-Swiss explorer who built cabins in the area after receiving the land from William Penn. James and his wife Ann fought with the American Indians (probably Shawnee) in 1720, but

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Transcript

Dr. Joshua Eyler’s Book “How Humans Learn”

Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

Today at Shippensburg University I attended a fascinating talk by scholar Dr. Joshua Eyler, who presented on his new book _How Humans Learn_ (you can see him on the second photo). Eyler spoke about the ways science and evolution can help us best understand ways to obtain new knowledge.The aristocratic clergy writing books at the

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Alice Ball

Strong Women of Hawai’i

Fabulous Females, History of Science, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , , , ,

Hawai’i has generated many amazing things, but the trifecta of women featured here are superlative and worth knowing about. Alice Ball (d. 1916) is a scientist who created a way to end the suffering of people with Hanson’s disease — a.k.a leprosy. Published in a chemical journal during her undergraduate years, Ball went on to

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Geometrical Psychology

Grand Unified Theory

Fabulous Females, History of Science, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , ,

These shapely flowers come from one of the most peculiar texts from the late 19th-century Western world. _Geometrical Psychology, or the Science of Representation_, by Louisa S. Cook, smashes together mathematics, evolution/eugenics, Vedanta Hinduism, and Spiritualism. Shakespeare is also in there too, for good measure. Cook’s aim was as ambitious as physicists today who are

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Trail Maintenance

Potomac Appalachian Trail Club

Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , ,

Today while hiking, my friend Erin and I happily encountered a group of folks doing trail maintainace as part of the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club. This association has very long roots in the region, dating to 1927 when a group of people began with the goals to help build a section of the 2,100-mile A.T.

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Lilith Sculpture

The Strong Feminism of Lilith

Long 19th- 20th centuries, Medieval History / / , , , , ,

“Lilith” is a sculpture I would pay money to take a pilgrimage to see. Created by artist Kiki Smith in 1994 out of bronze and glass, the statue of Lilith crouches, tense and fierce. Her eyes stare out with a contact that seems physical.The stories of the demon Lilith emerged over hundreds of years, but

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Ada Lovelace

Ada Lovelace – “The Enchantress of Numbers”

Fabulous Females, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

Ada Lovelace (d. 1852) lived a supremely Victorian aristocratic life: multiple estates, famous friends, and noble title? :check. Tragic illnesses that caused her to be bedridden and/or die young? : check. Relatives concerned with her propriety despite having an adventurous and spirited personality? : also, check. Called “The Enchantress of Number” by her friend and

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The Green Man

The Folklore of The Green Man

Ancient History, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

A Roman (1st or 2nd c CE) and 12th-century examples of foliage faces that became known as “the Green Man.” For centuries, these carvings existed, adorning buildings, as a man’s face surrounded by leaves, or spewing greenery, or having hair that morphed into plants. But it wasn’t until folklorist Lady Raglan wrote an article that

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Shadow of Death

The Dark History of the Kittanning Trail

Early Americas, Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

In the southeastern part of Pennsylvania, a range of mountains that make up part of the Tuscarora State Forest (see second photo) run in a crescent shape from the nine o’clock to the twelve o’clock position. And running from south to north on the western side of these mountains is route 522, which goes across

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Anselm of Canterbury

Anselm of Canterbury’s “Proslogion”

Long 19th- 20th centuries, Medieval History / / , , ,

No, you are not looking at a university student’s blue book . . . But you are seeing a very famous logical proof. This is an image of an early copy of the Medieval philosopher Anselm of Canterbury’s (1033-1109) _Proslogion_, and it used logic to try to prove something unimaginably perfect: the existence of God.His

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Agrippa

Contrasting Opinions of Henricus Cornelius Agrippa

Ancient History, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

There is a tradition of misogynist scholarship which traces continuously from Ancient Greece to the early twentieth century. Legal, medical, philosophical, and theological arguements promoted the idea that women were inferior to men, and this was sincerely believed by many educated people. Yet this scholar pictured here — Henricus Cornelius Agrippa (1496-1535) — stood in

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Cat-O-Nine Tails Whip

Cat-O-Nine Tails Whip

Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , ,

This cruel object is a Cat-O-Nine-Tails whip, dating from about 1860. Slave owners from the American South used whips like these against the people they had enslaved. Notice the metal spurs at the end of each rope. Millions of people experienced this inhumane treatment, and the “peculiar institution” of slavery of course became a motivating

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Bite the Bullet

Biting the Bullet During the Civil War

Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , ,

Here you see a physical manifestation of the phrase “bite the bullet.” These two lead bullets came from a hospital serving soldiers wounded in the U.S. Civil War’s famous Battle of Gettysburg (July 1863). In an age preceding anesthetics, patients were told to bite down on these so-called “Hospital” or “Pain Bullets” before surgery was

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Robert Smalls

Robert Smalls and His Escape from the Confederacy

Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , ,

  In 1862, the port city of Charleston, South Carolina, witnessed one of the most impressive feats in the Civil War. An African-American named Robert Smalls stole an entire ship from the Confederacy and escaped to freedom with his wife, two young children, and several other enslaved people. He did this right under the noses

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Catoctin Park

Maryland’s Catoctin Park and the Convergence

Big History, Live Reporting, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , ,

In the north-central region of Maryland, the Catoctin Park has some of the oldest layers of the earth’s exposed mountains. The Appalachians rose out of a collision between plates in North America and Africa 200 million years ago, and parts of the convergence appear here, where the quartzite rocks you see are part of a

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Chien-Shiung Wu

The First-Lady of Physics – Chien-Shiung Wu

Fabulous Females, History of Science, Long 19th- 20th centuries / / , , , , ,

Scientists are enabling us to save lives and hopefully prevent disaster in this COVID-19 pandemic — and coming up with big solutions to health problems is one of the main reasons their profession is so valuable. But for me there is another equally praiseworthy aspect: their contributions to unveiling the forces that shape our universe.

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