For the historical record: Diego Maradona. ESPN.
Obit watch: November 25, 2020.
November 25th, 2020“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 239
November 24th, 2020Techmoan is kind of a fun channel, but one that I try to avoid overusing. I’m using it today because this video popped up, and it answers a question that’s been in the back of my mind.
Whatever happened to portable televisions? Remember the Sony Watchman?
Obviously, the digital transition killed off the old analog portables. But why don’t we have portable digital televisions?
Short answer: we do, but not from any major manufacturers, and they’re pretty much crap as televisions. (Some of them may be decent portable media players, but do they do anything you can’t do with a small laptop or tablet?)
When I’m out shopping in thrift stores and other odd places, and see one of those cool looking old portable devices with a TV built in, I think about picking it up and hooking up a converter box, just for the lulz.
Bonus: “Prison Tech”. Not really the kind of thing people in prison improvise, but rather what kind of tech you’re allowed to have (and can purchase) for prison use.
How do you like them Apples?
November 24th, 2020This is another one of those weird intersections.
Apple’s head of security, Thomas Moyer, was indicted last week along with three other people. The others were Harpreet Chadha (an insurance broker), Santa Clara Undersheriff Rick Sung and Captain James Jensen.
Why is this weird? Because it is also a gun thing, and you don’t often see “Apple” and “guns” together.
Specifically:
…
In another incident, Sung “extracted” a promise from Chadha for $6,000 worth of luxury box suites at a San Jose Sharks game on Valentine’s Day, 2019, before issuing Chadha a CCW permit, [DA Jeff] Rosen said.
“Sheriff Laurie Smith’s family members and some of her biggest supporters held a celebration of her reelection as sheriff in Chadha’s suite,” Rosen said.
All of this is part of an ongoing investigation into Sheriff Smith’s office. Captain Jensen was previously indicted in August:
Obit watch: November 24, 2020.
November 24th, 2020An obit roundup, because I’m a little behind.
Jan Morris, British writer and historian. I haven’t read any of Morris’s work, yet. But John Crowley in his beautiful novella “Great Work of Time” cites Morris’s history of the British empire as a major source, and I’ve been hunting for reasonably priced copies. (Like I need three more volumes of history to read, in addition to Gibbon and the two volume history of the Canadian transcontinental railroad.)
Ken Spears, co-creator of “Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!”. The other creator, Joe Ruby, passed away in September.
Daniel Cordier, one of the legendary figures of the French Resistance. He was 100.
David Dinkins, former mayor of New York City.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 238
November 23rd, 2020Since I’ve done copper mining, I thought it might be fun to do another element.
Lead. Sweet, sweet, lead.
From 1972, “The Lead Matrix”, brought to you by the Lead Industries Association.
And as a bonus: “A Story Of Lead”, from the Department of the Interior Bureau of Mines circa 1948.
Your loser update: week 11, 2020.
November 22nd, 2020NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
New York Jets
Next week: the 6-3 Miami Dolphins.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 237
November 22nd, 2020Science Sunday!
It seems like it has been a while since I’ve done any computer science, so today I thought I’d focus on someone I find interesting, and who died far too young: John von Neumann.
Short: an explanation of Von Neumann architecture from Computerphile.
Long: a documentary about John von Neumann from the Mathematical Association of America.
I should probably mention that von Neumann wasn’t just an early computer scientist: he was also a brilliant mathematician and theoretical physicist, which I think comes out in this video.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 236
November 21st, 2020I guess technically this could fall under travel. But I decided I wanted to treat this separately, because:
“What Owning a Love Hotel in Japan is Like”, from the “Abroad In Japan” channel.
I don’t think this is a business opportunity for FotB RoadRich, as I have another much better opportunity for him that does not involve moving to Japan.
Bonus #1: since I’ve touched on the Mongols before (in the context of the Feds trying to seize their trademark) and since I received some positive feedback on my last biker war post: a documentary about the Mongols from “Hidden In America”.
Bonus #2: This is another one of those people who is right on the edge of annoying me, but: I’ve posted about copper mining before, and, frankly, if I’m ever up near Butte, I’d absolutely pay the $3 to see the giant toxic waste pit that used to be the world’s largest open pit copper mine.
Gift shop? I’m sold!
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 235
November 20th, 2020This is another video that I just flat out could not pass up. People who know me well will understand why.
“The Devil’s Cigarette Lighter”, from 1962 and the Red Adair Company, featuring (of course) Red Adair.
Bonus video #1: Remember these commercials?
I have this mental image of Red Adair placing phone calls to get well heads…and charging them on his AmEx card. (In reality, I expect that his company probably had open accounts with everyone who provided equipment: no AmEx needed.)
(Side note: Red Adair’s biography is kind of pricey on Amazon, even in used paperback form. Interestingly, Boots Hansen’s book (affiliate link) is available in a Kindle edition.)
Bonus #2: this is a two-part biographical video about Red Adair. Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 2 does include a brief discussion of Piper Alpha and Adair’s role in putting out the fire.
You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#68 in a series)
November 20th, 2020Alexander Sittenfeld of the Cincinnati city council was arrested yesterday.
Prosectors said Mr. Sittenfeld had accepted six checks totaling $40,000 from federal agents posing as real estate investors and had stashed the money in a political action committee that he secretly controlled.
According to a six-count indictment, Mr. Sittenfeld accepted the bribe money in 2018 and 2019, while promising to “deliver the votes” and perform other official acts for the downtown development project, which needed City Council approval.
…
At a meeting in November 2018 set up with Mr. Ndukwe’s help, Mr. Sittenfeld went for lunch at a downtown Cincinnati restaurant and indicated to undercover agents that he would shepherd votes for the real estate project, prosecutors said.
He presented voting data showing that he was politically popular in Cincinnati and said he was likely to be the next mayor, according to prosecutors.
“I can move more votes than any other single person,” Mr. Sittenfeld said, according to the indictment. On another occasion, in December 2018, he said, “Don’t let these be my famous last words, but I can always get a vote to my left or a vote to my right,” according to prosecutors.
Nr. Ndukwe is Chinedum Ndukwe, a former player for the Bengals, who was one of the people behind the downtown development project.
Bonus #1: Mr. Ndukwe was also working with the Feds.
Bonus #2, and I’m embarrassed to admit I missed this: Mr. Sittenfeld is the third member of the nine-member city council to be indicted this year.
The first blow came in February when Tamaya Dennard, the president pro tem of the Cincinnati City Council, was arrested and charged with accepting $15,000 in bribes in exchange for a vote on the Council. She pleaded guilty in June and faces up to 20 years in prison when she is sentenced in federal court next week.
The second landed last week when Jeffrey Pastor, another member of the City Council, was charged with taking $55,000 in bribes in return for promising to help city development projects, including the redevelopment of a downtown building. Mr. Pastor has pleaded not guilty and has resisted calls to step down.
Apologies for linking to the NYT. I prefer to link to local sources whenever possible, but the Cincinnati Enquirer is unreadable and unlinkable without a subscription.
I may have spoke too soon.
November 19th, 2020This might be the headline of the day:
More context:
Authorities said Dupree G.O.D was arrested on charges of reckless endangerment and criminal possession of a weapon. There was no information on when he would be arraigned. He was in police custody Wednesday night.
The musical artist was filmed earlier this month in an unauthorized stunt that he said was part of a tribute video for the hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan. The clip gained attention on social media after a police union tweeted it as an example of the city becoming less safe.
And of course:
A rapper turned himself into authorities and was charged with reckless endangerment and criminal possession of a weapon after firing a flamethrower into the sky atop an occupied city bus. https://t.co/j1x8eb0cS4 pic.twitter.com/s6ibiJy1zV
— ABC News (@ABC) November 19, 2020
I’m really not sure I see the “reckless endangerment” part of that charge. It seems to me that he was pointing it away from and above people. As for the “criminal possession of a weapon” charge, well, maybe, given that this is NYC.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 234
November 19th, 2020Travel Thursday!
Where would you like to go this week? Would you like a relatively short trip to someplace that hadn’t become a banana republic at the time?
Okay then. From our favorite defunct airline, Pan Am, “Wings to New York”. circa 1948.
Bonus: I’m probably fudging the definition of “travel” a bit here, but I don’t have a better place to put this. Here’s a Pan Am promo film documenting their history of crisis and emergency response, including the 1979 airlift out of Iran.
Headline of the day.
November 19th, 2020(Though this actually is datelined yesterday.)
The story is exactly as it says on the tin:
Obit watch: November 18, 2020.
November 18th, 2020…
He was 36 years old. According to the NYT obit, he died in a training accident.
Ben Watkins. My feelings about reality TV are well known, but nobody should have that hard a life, and nobody should die at 14.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 233
November 18th, 2020This is an amazing video that popped up in my recommendations, and that I could not pass up.
“Out Of The Sun” is a General Dynamics promo film for the F-16. Unlike a lot of plane specific promo films I’ve run across, though, this one concentrates mostly on air combat history and tactics, building towards a case that the F-16 is the “fighter pilot’s fighter”.
What makes this amazing to me is the interviews in this video:
As best as I can tell, all of these interviews were done specifically for this film. (Mr. Lambert and Sir Bader both passed in 1982: according to the YouTube notes, this dates to 1983, so I think it is possible that the makers managed to get in interviews with both men before they passed.)
While I was checking Sir Bader’s date of death, I ran across this story that I had not heard before:
During one visit to Munich, Germany, as a guest of Adolf Galland, he walked into a room full of ex-Luftwaffe pilots and said, “My God, I had no idea we left so many of you bastards alive”.
Bonus #1: here’s a 1965 interview with Sir Douglas Bader.
Bonus #2: I don’t have any other place to put this, and it is kind of related. The backstory: Saturday night, we were watching “The High and the Mighty” and we noticed the Coast Guard was flying B-17s. This, in turn, led me to research the operational history of the B-17 (and, yes, the Coast Guard did use B-17s, in the PB-1G variant, as late as October of 1959). That in turn led me to this rather remarkable paragraph:
As great and good FotB RoadRich said when I brought this up, it’s a wonder that they were even able to get into the air, given the weight of the giant brass balls on everyone involved.
“Fishing from Airplanes for Soviet Secrets: What was Skyhook – Operation Coldfeet?” from Dark Docs.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 232
November 17th, 2020There’s a British gent named Guy Martin who has a YouTube channel. He used to race motorcycles, but more recently he’s become a television personality who seems to specialize in engineering and technical stuff.
I thought I’d do two videos today, one short, one longer. The short one: Mr. Martin goes to Japan and forges a sword with a master sword maker. As you know, Bob, I love hot metal and knives, so this is right in my wheelhouse.
The long: this is the first part of a series, “How Britain Worked”.
This one covers “The Railway”. The other parts are available on his channel.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 231
November 16th, 2020I’ve got an eye doctor’s appointment today, so I’m being a little lazy again. I thought I’d dabble a bit in true crime.
This is an odd one, as it is from that Canadian program “The Fifth Estate”, but deals with a case in the United States: Dixon Illinois, to be exact, which is a little far south to be considered Southern Canada.
The town’s Comptroller, Rita Crundwell, embezzled an estimated $53 million between approximately 1990 and 2012 (when she was indicted). That seems to me to be an astonishing amount of money, especially for a town with a population of about 15,000. (That’s close to $2.5 million a year.)
And did she spend it on moving to a country without an extradition treaty? Nope. She spent it on…quarter horses. Supposedly, she became one of the leading quarter horse breeders in the US: at least, until she was indicted, tried, and sentenced to 19 1/2 years in prison.
I personally am kind of baffled by this: there’s nothing wrong with raising horses (though stealing money from taxpayers is objectionable) but if you’re going to do it, why not raise whole horses? Why raise just a quarter of a horse? What can you do with a quarter horse?
(Yes, I will be here all week.)
Bonus: True confession, I have not watched this yet, but “All the Queen’s Horses” is a longer documentary about Rita Crundwell and the Dixon fraud.
Your loser update: week 10, 2020.
November 16th, 2020NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
New York Jets (bye week)
Next week: the worthless Los Angeles Chargers.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 230
November 15th, 2020Science Sunday!
I thought I’d do a variety package today.
First up: from the ” Megaprojects” people, “Project HARP”. Yet another thing that fascinates me, and only in part because who doesn’t like the science of big cannons?
The other reason this fascinates me, of course, is: Gerald Bull.
Next: I’m kind of borderline about including these. The hosts are just on the ragged edge of annoying me. But: fire science is science, and this was actually filmed in Del Valle, near Austin.
From “The Slow-Mo Guys”, a backdraft in 4K and slow motion.
And: “How to avoid a Backdraft”.
Finally: I know this is long-ish and very talking head, but I’ve read a couple of Paul De Kruff’s books, so this is relevant to my interests. Also: medical science is science, even if medicine is magical and magical is art.
“Paul De Kruif: The Microbe Hunter and Author”.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 229
November 14th, 2020Wrapping up this week’s theme, I promise. Tomorrow will be Science Sunday, and after that, I plan to strive for a little more variety.
Since it is Saturday, I don’t feel so bad about doing something a little on the long side: “How The Dambusters Sunk Hitler’s Invincible Battleship”.
Also, as I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, I’m a big fan of the Dambusters and of Barnes Wallis. And speaking of Barnes Wallis, the Barnes Wallis Foundation has a YouTube channel.
So your bonus video for today is: “Dambusters Revealed”.
And your second bonus video for today is much shorter, but from the same source: vintage test footage of Barnes Wallis’s bombs.
Obit watch: November 13, 2020.
November 13th, 2020…
Hornung scored a record 176 points in the 12-game 1960 season on 15 touchdowns, 41 extra points and 15 field goals. He also passed for two touchdowns that year.Hornung was the league’s most valuable player in 1961, when he scored a championship-game record 19 points (on a rushing touchdown, four extra points and three field goals) in the Packers’ 37-0 victory over the Giants.
All the while he pursued a robust night life of women and drink that seemed to have little effect on his on-field performance. His movie-star looks certainly had something to do with the attention: He was blond and handsome, 6 feet 2 inches and 215 pounds. He wore No. 5 in honor of his boyhood idol, Joe DiMaggio.
But Hornung’s career was marred when the N.F.L. commissioner, Pete Rozelle, suspended him indefinitely in the spring of 1963 for gambling on pro football, including Packer games, over several seasons. Hornung said he had bet on Green Bay only to win, and the league found no evidence to the contrary, but he remained suspended for the entire season. The ban was an outgrowth of an N.F.L. drive against gambling by players that also brought a one-year suspension for Alex Karras, the Detroit Lions’ star defensive tackle.
…
Hornung expressed few regrets about his nightlife.
“I’m sure that during my playing days I wasn’t considered a good role model for the nation’s youth,” he wrote in his memoir. “But the way times have changed, I’d look like an altar boy if I played today. I never beat up a woman, carried a gun or a knife, shot somebody, or got arrested for disturbing the peace. I never even experimented with drugs during the season.
“All I did, really,” he went on, “was seek out fun wherever I could find it. Everything was all tied in together — the drinking, the womanizing, the partying, the traveling, the gambling. And, of course, football made it all possible.”
In other totally unrelated news, Hell is having a busy day today:
Tom Metzger, white supremacist.
Peter Sutcliffe, the “Yorkshire Ripper”.
…
…
Sutcliffe’s 13 known murder victims were Wilma McCann (1975), Emily Jackson (1976), Irene Richardson (1977), Patricia “Tina” Atkinson (1977), Jayne MacDonald (1977), Jean Jordan (1977), Yvonne Pearson (1978), Helen Rytka (1978), Vera Millward (1978), Josephine Whitaker (1979), Barbara Leach (1979), Marguerite Walls (1980) and Jacqueline Hill (1980).
He is also known to have attacked at least 9 other women: an unnamed woman (1969), Anna Rogulskyj (1975), Olive Smelt (1975), Tracy Browne (1975), Marcella Claxton (1976), Marilyn Moore (1977), Upadhya Bandara (1980), Maureen Lea (1980) and Theresa Sykes (1980). Claxton was four months pregnant when she was attacked, and lost the baby she was carrying.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 228
November 13th, 2020I thought I’d take a break from WWI today and go back to something slighlty more contemporary.
I know some folks who are fans of the F-8 Crusader. I never quite acquired that gene myself, but this is a kind of fun (and short) documentary about the F-8 from “Dark Skies”: “The Last Gunfighter”.
Bonus #1: I don’t know where this came from (other than the “AVHistoryBuff” channel) but here’s a second, shorter documentary: “Chance Vought’s F-8 Crusader II and III – the Mig Masters”. It seems very professionally done, like a corporate promotional video.
Bonus #2: Here’s a vintage US Navy training film on the F8U-1P, the photo recon version of the F-8.
Bonus #3: And for those of you who haven’t had enough Crusader yet, “Last of the Gunfighters”. This one’s a bit longer.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 227
November 12th, 2020Travel Thursday!
If you’ve figured out what my theme this week is, you’re probably wondering: how do military history and military heroism fit in with travel?
Answer: This is an episode of a documentary series called “True Adventure”, which according to the YouTube notes, ran in the 1950s and 1960s.
This episode is “Return to Guadalcanal”. One of the men in this video, Martin Clemens, was on Guadalcanal when Japan invaded: instead of evacuating, he stayed behind and became a coast watcher. He later wrote a book, Alone on Guadalcanal: A Coastwatcher’s Story (which is available in reprint and Kindle editions from Amazon).
Bonus: from the Kadena Air Base channel, members of the 18th Wing tour Iwo Jima.
“What you gonna do when you get out of jail?…” part 226
November 11th, 2020It seems like there are a lot of WWI aviation documentaries on the ‘Tube. This is one aspect of the war that I have found fascinating for a long time: wooden planes and iron men.
Unfortunately, pretty much all of them I’ve found so far are long. Like, multiple parts with each part about 90 minutes long. If you’ve got the time and inclination, you might look for “4 Years of Thunder” or “Flying Coffins“. I have not watched these myself yet.
Here’s one I found, “Cavalry Of The Clouds” that is a little on the long side, but not quite as long.
Bonus #1: From “The Great War” channel, a special, “Sharpshooters and Snipers in World War 1”.
Bonus #2: I’m pulling this somewhat out of context, as it is part of the “Over There” series from the NRAPubs channel, but I think it stands alone: the story of Alvin C. York, Medal of Honor recipient.
Father Charles Joseph Watters.
November 11th, 2020Father Watters was born in 1927 and ordained in 1953. He served in various parishes around New Jersey.
He was also a licensed private pilot. In 1962, he joined the New Jersey Air National Guard as a chaplain. In 1964, he went full time with the US Army, and started his first tour of duty in Vietnam in July of 1966. During this tour, he was awarded the Air Medal and a Bronze Star for Valor.
At the end of this first tour (July of 1967), he volunteered for a six-month extension, “simply stating, ‘His boys needed him.’”
On November 19, 1967, his unit became involved in the battle of Dak To.
He was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously.