Quote:In quotes provided by Just Stop Oil, Miss Lynch, said to be a student from Oxford, said the continued burning of oil, coal and gas was leading to 'death and suffering'.

'It's time for us to think about what our civilization will leave behind - what is our legacy?' she said. 'Standing inert for generations works well for stones - not climate policy.'

Miss Lynch's social media profiles reveal that she has a keen interest in birds as the current president of the Oxford Ornithological Student Society and a Youth Representative at the British Trust for Ornithology.

Others said the heroic woman who can be seen wrestling with the Just Stop Oil protesters is a staff member who works at Stonehenge.

Tourists also said after the incident they were banned from walking around the stones and that staff 'hosed down' the powder paint but couldn't remove it all.

A druid was also seen 'cursing' the 'two idiots' who staged the protest.

Quote:At dawn on June 21, another enormous crowd gathered to usher in the official start to the season with a summer solstice celebration at Golden Gate Park. But even as the “Summer of Love” formally commenced, the scene had already started to spoil. By July, San Francisco was overwhelmed with the new influx of visitors, including a burgeoning population of teenage runaways. And the district’s latest occupants brought a harder edge. TIME noted that “[m]ost of them—perhaps 80%—are steadily high on drugs ranging from LSD to such synthetic stimulants as Methedrine, Dexedrine and Benzedrine, which are known collectively as ‘speed.’” The siren song that took over top-40 radio that summer, Scott McKenzie’s “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair),” proved to be a death knell, and by the fall, many of the summertime pilgrims returned home. On October 6, members of the district’s remaining counterculture community, tired of the commercialization and publicity of their alternative lifestyle, marched along Haight Street for a “death of hippie” funeral service. Written on the side of their faux coffin was the phrase “Hippie, Son of Media.”

When the “Summer of Love” Took over San Francisco

Quote:On 24 June 1948, all rail traffic into Berlin from the Western Zones of Germany, amounting to 12 or 15 trains per day, was stopped by the Soviet government for "technical reasons, and the strangulation coils which had been slowly tightening about the city since the previous January, took their final hold. Berlin became virtually a besieged city, an island cut off from the rest of the world, entirely surrounded by the Soviet Zone. Official access was permitted only by air, through three 20-mile wide "corridors" extending on straight lines to Berlin from the three westerly cities of Hamburg and Buckeburg in the British Zone and Frankfurt am Main in the American Zone.

Quote:Famed ‘Candy Bomber’ of Berlin Blockade, Gail Halvorsen Dies at 101 (Feb. 16, 2022)

Halvorsen grew up in Utah and earned a private pilot’s license at the age of 21, when he joined the Civil Air Patrol. Following the outbreak of WWII, Halvorsen joined the Army Air Forces and flew ferry flights of C-46s and C-47s in the South Atlantic theater of operations.

He stayed in the Air Force after the war and in July 1948 was assigned as one of the pilots in the Berlin Airlift, flying C-54s and C-47s into Tempelhof Airport with crucial sustenance for the citizens of divided Berlin, who were cut off from land resupply by a Soviet blockade. On a sightseeing tour of Berlin during time off, he saw children watching the cargo aircraft operation. Talking to them, he was touched by their appreciation for the airlift and one’s comment that “when the weather gets bad, don’t worry about us. We can get by on little food, but if we lose our freedom, we may never get it back.” He offered them a few sticks of gum, which 30 children shared eagerly but politely. He resolved to do more, and promised to drop candy to them from his plane the next day. He would “wiggle” his wings to let them know which plane to watch for.

Starting with candy rations pooled with friends, Halvorsen devised small parachutes made from handkerchiefs, so the falling candy parcels wouldn’t hurt the children waiting below. For three weeks, he made candy drops once a week. As the weeks passed, the number of children waiting below grew.

The commander of “Operation Vittles,” as the Berlin Airlift was called, was Lt. Gen. William H. Tunner. When he found out about Halvorsen’s unauthorized airdrops, he approved and ordered them expanded as Operation “Little Vittles.” Soon Halvorsen’s whole squadron was buying candy and gum and assembling the parcels with small parachutes. As word reached the U.S. of the mini-airlift, American schoolchildren and confectionary companies donated candy, and soon many other pilots were making candy drops as well. Halvorsen became known as “Uncle Wiggly Wings” or “The Chocolate Flier,” among other names, by the children of Berlin, and the “Candy Bomber” in the U.S.

“Little Vittles” continued from September 1948 through May 1949, when the Soviet Union lifted its blockade and the larger airlift ended. Halvorsen had rotated home in January 1949, but the operation was taken up by his squadron mate, Capt. Lawrence Caskey. “Little Vittles” had dropped an estimated 46,000 pounds of candy tied with more than 250,000 parachutes, and Halvorsen received international attention for his efforts. In his autobiography, Halvorsen recalled that a Berlin child told him the candy was not just chocolate, “it was hope.”

After the airlift, Halvorsen received a permanent USAF commission and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from in aeronautical engineering from the University of Florida. He worked on cargo aircraft development at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, from 1952 to 1957 then joined the new Air Force Space Systems Division in California. There he worked on the Titan III launch vehicle and the X-20 Dyna-Soar reusable spacecraft programs, serving with Air Force Systems Command through 1962. Subsequent assignments took him back to Germany and technology offices at Headquarters, USAF. He developed plans for the Manned Orbiting Laboratory program, which would have put a small Air Force space station in orbit for reconnaissance purposes. He commanded the 6596th Instrumentation Squadron at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., supporting space launch and satellite operations.

Halvorsen organized or supported candy drops in other war zones during his career as well, in Japan, Albania, Guam, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Iraq. He was also a continuous goodwill ambassador for the Air Force and the United States, making thousands of speeches and visits, especially to schools, to discuss Operation Little Vittles.

He wrote the books “The Berlin Candy Bomber” and “The Candy Bomber: Untold Stories from the Berlin Airlift’s Uncle Wiggly Wings.”

Quote:Philippine Folk Tales (1916)

According to the American anthropologist Mabel Cook Cole, compiler of this volume, this collection of folk tales from the Philippines was the first of its kind, at least in the English language. There's a huge variety of stories presented, sourced from both the more traditional tribes, including the headhunters of the rugged mountain regions, and from those "Christianized natives" whose examples bear evidence of their European influence. Most of the stories are from the former, however, with many of these hailing from what are called the "first times", involving mischievous spirits, talking jars, and the antics of personified celestial beings, bickering suns and moons. There are also several origin and "pourqoi" stories, such as an explanations as to why dogs wag their tales (which apparently is to show that they are not that dog who lost a magic ring). Cole also includes what she calls "fables", many which share similarities with European stories, and which are "told to children or to while away the midday hours when people seek shaded spots to rest or stop on the trail to rest".

Here's a story from the Igorot, a headhunter tribe, about how the first head was taken.

Quote:One day the Moon, who was a woman named Kabigat, sat out in the yard making a large copper pot. The copper was still soft and pliable like clay, and the woman squatted on the ground with the heavy pot against her knees while she patted and shaped it. Now while she was working a son of Chal-chal, the Sun, came by and stopped to watch her mould the form. Against the inside of the jar she pressed a stone, while on the outside with a wooden paddle dripping with water she pounded and slapped until she had worked down the bulges and formed a smooth surface. The boy was greatly interested in seeing the jar grow larger, more beautiful, and smoother with each stroke, and he stood still for some time. Suddenly the Moon looked up and saw him watching her. Instantly she struck him with her paddle, cutting off his head. Now the Sun was not near, but he knew as soon as the Moon had cut off his son’s head. And hurrying to the spot, he put the boy’s head back on, and he was alive again. Then the Sun said to the Moon, “You cut off my son’s head, and because you did this ever after on the earth people will cut off each other’s heads.”

Cole spent four years amongst the traditional Philippines tribes along with her husband Fay-Cooper Cole who was an ethnologist for the Field Museum of Natural History and whose photographs of daily village life are dotted throughout the collection. The stories were apparently noted down first hand, from around campfires, visits to homes, and also as heard "chanted by the pagan priests in communion with the spirits".

Quote:One person's misfortune is another's opportunity—not to mention hilarity. This photo shows Miss New Zealand—Moana Manley—passed out during the 1954 Miss Universe Pageant, staged today that year in Long Beach, California. Manley fainted during an outdoor photo session. Some accounts say heat exhaustion got her, but it was not especially hot that day—about 72 degrees Fahrenheit, or 22 Celsius. It was more likely stress. She was, after all, not only the first woman from her country to compete at Miss Universe, but the first woman of Maori descent to win the title of Miss New Zealand. That'll apply a bit of pressure. You'll often see the photo labeled as a 1957 shot, but that's incorrect. There was no representative from New Zealand in the pageant that year. No, the shot is definitely from 1954, and the winner was ultimately Miss U.S.A., Miriam Stevenson, who was probably like, “Yup, when that Kiwi hit the ground I knew I had it in the bag.”

Quote:The flag was created by Gilbert Baker—an activist, drag queen, and artist—who described his rainbow-striped design as “something beautiful, something from us… it really fits our diversity in terms of race, gender, ages, all of those things.”

The same day during the parade, two pride banners replaced the United States and United Nations flags hoisted at the United Nations Plaza in San Fran, and the world saw the first LGBQ+ flags.

The different colors of this flag were often associated with “diversity” in the gay community (but actually have literal meanings), including:

    Red for life.
    Orange for healing.
    Yellow for sunlight.
    Green for nature.
    Blue for harmony/peace.
    Purple for spirit.
    Pink for sexuality.
    Turquoise for art/magic.

Pink and turquoise were removed for production purposes, and the six-band variant, now simply known as the “Gay pride” flag, has been the most well-recognized symbol of the LGBT movement since 1979. It has been built on for them at various times, including with the addition of black-and-brown for people of color in 2017 for the Philadelphia Pride Flag, and white-pink-blue for transgender and queer people in 2018 for the Pride Progress flag.

The original LGBTQ+ flag, a segment of the original Gilbert Baker rainbow flag, was recently rediscovered and donated to San Fransisco’s GLBT Historical Society Museum and Archives.

(06-26-2024, 02:53 AM)EndtheMadnessNow Wrote: The Iberian lynx is back from the brink of extinction...



The Iberian lynx is back from the brink of extinction

Quote:On the Boardwalk

On June 26, 1870, the first section of the Atlantic City Boardwalk opened along the New Jersey beach. Dr. Jonathan Pitney and civil engineer Richard Osborne began developing the area on Absecon Island in the early 1850s. Long before this time, members of the Lenni-Lenape tribe were the first seasonal visitors to enjoy the summer splendor of the island.

Beautiful beaches, fresh sea air, luxurious hotels, fine restaurants, alluring shops, and a connecting railroad line from Camden, New Jersey, drew visitors from all over the world. Atlantic City soon became a popular summer resort and winter health spa.

Alexander Boardman, a railroad conductor, and Jacob Keim, a hotelier, conceived of the idea of constructing a boardwalk as a means of keeping sand out of the railroad cars and hotels. The city used its tax revenues to build an eight-foot-wide temporary wooden walkway from the beach into town that could be dismantled during the winter.



The rolling chair, introduced in 1884, was the only vehicle allowed on the boardwalk. The boardwalk was soon extended by an enormous amusement pier, Young’s Pier, visible in the background of the photograph above.

Any consideration of the boardwalk demands at least a nod to salt water taffy, a favorite beachside treat. Taffy, a candy made of corn syrup and white sugar is boiled; the confection is pulled and folded, then rolled into a long strip from which shorter (about two-inch-long) strips are cut, wrapped in stick resistant paper, and sold. Along the Atlantic City Boardwalk folks have purchased the product since at least the early 1880s. In 1925, the Supreme Court ruled that the term “salt water taffy” could not be trademarked, a decision which saved candy manufacturers from paying millions of dollars to John R. Edmiston of Wildwood, New Jersey, who claimed to be the originator of the candy and had applied for registration of the term with the U.S. Patent Office.



Early bathers wore bathing dresses of wool flannel with stockings, canvas shoes, and large straw hats. The more daring bloomer suits and stockings worn by these bathing beauties did not catch on until 1907. Censors roamed the beaches monitoring bathers’ self-exposure and looking for offenders who showed more flesh than the local code allowed.

Originally titled “Atlantic City’s Inter-City Beauty Contest,” and traditionally held in Atlantic City since 1921, the Miss America pageant moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, in 2006. The above photograph captures the 1926 contestants vying for the Golden Mermaid trophy.

(06-27-2024, 02:51 AM)EndtheMadnessNow Wrote:

Quote:On the Boardwalk

On June 26, 1870, the first section of the Atlantic City Boardwalk opened along the New Jersey beach. Dr. Jonathan Pitney and civil engineer Richard Osborne began developing the area on Absecon Island in the early 1850s. Long before this time, members of the Lenni-Lenape tribe were the first seasonal visitors to enjoy the summer splendor of the island.

Beautiful beaches, fresh sea air, luxurious hotels, fine restaurants, alluring shops, and a connecting railroad line from Camden, New Jersey, drew visitors from all over the world. Atlantic City soon became a popular summer resort and winter health spa.

Alexander Boardman, a railroad conductor, and Jacob Keim, a hotelier, conceived of the idea of constructing a boardwalk as a means of keeping sand out of the railroad cars and hotels. The city used its tax revenues to build an eight-foot-wide temporary wooden walkway from the beach into town that could be dismantled during the winter.



The rolling chair, introduced in 1884, was the only vehicle allowed on the boardwalk. The boardwalk was soon extended by an enormous amusement pier, Young’s Pier, visible in the background of the photograph above.

Any consideration of the boardwalk demands at least a nod to salt water taffy, a favorite beachside treat. Taffy, a candy made of corn syrup and white sugar is boiled; the confection is pulled and folded, then rolled into a long strip from which shorter (about two-inch-long) strips are cut, wrapped in stick resistant paper, and sold. Along the Atlantic City Boardwalk folks have purchased the product since at least the early 1880s. In 1925, the Supreme Court ruled that the term “salt water taffy” could not be trademarked, a decision which saved candy manufacturers from paying millions of dollars to John R. Edmiston of Wildwood, New Jersey, who claimed to be the originator of the candy and had applied for registration of the term with the U.S. Patent Office.



Early bathers wore bathing dresses of wool flannel with stockings, canvas shoes, and large straw hats. The more daring bloomer suits and stockings worn by these bathing beauties did not catch on until 1907. Censors roamed the beaches monitoring bathers’ self-exposure and looking for offenders who showed more flesh than the local code allowed.

Originally titled “Atlantic City’s Inter-City Beauty Contest,” and traditionally held in Atlantic City since 1921, the Miss America pageant moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, in 2006. The above photograph captures the 1926 contestants vying for the Golden Mermaid trophy.

Atlantic City’s Inter-City Beauty Contest super-size view if you download the TIF image. Tall, short, average height, short & long hair, many look like teens. Out of 63 girls, this cutie on the right I've chosen as the spicy sassafras high society butterfly type...




1946 Charioteers - On The Boardwalk (In Atlantic City)




June 26, 1942: the Grumman F6F Hellcat flew for the first time. The F6F would become the most successful Navy fighter of WWII, with Hellcat pilots claiming 5,163 victories and a 19:1 kill-to-loss ratio. The "Timex" idea of fighter design; built to "take a lickin’ and keep on tickin’" not the most maneuverable or the fastest, but could absorb the most damage without going down. The ability to absorb that first shot and allow your wingman to take out your adversary proved invaluable. Not done purposefully, but statistically seemed to work out that way.




June 26, 1944: USS Mercury was attacked by a Japanese torpedo bomber that clipped the ship's cargo boom and cartwheeled into the sea. It was the first and only "Boom" in the Navy to be credited with downing an enemy plane. A victory mark was painted on it by the ship's winchmen.
Boom, splash one! USS Mercury (AK-42) newspaper article:




June 26, 1948: cover of The New Yorker.

Inside: Shirley Jackson's dystopian short story "The Lottery"



Too bad we can't make this an annual tradition for politicians.


June 26, 1963: President, John F. Kennedy, gave his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech in Berlin. He meant "I am a citizen of Berlin" not as is often wrongly claimed: "I am a doughnut". The speech aimed to show solidarity to the people of West Berlin in the divided city. Speech card for JFK, with phonetic spelling of "Ich bin ein Berliner."


"All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words "Ich bin ein Berliner."

Remarks of President John F. Kennedy at the Rudolph Wilde Platz, Berlin, June 26, 1963
One Day in Berlin, 26 June 1963 - JFK video


LOL, Berlin...


The Capital's Economic Power


June 26, 1987: Stanley Kubrick's FULL METAL JACKET was released. The film is based on the semi-autobiographical novel THE SHORT-TIMERS by Gustav Hasford. Hasford served in Vietnam as a combat correspondent with the 1st Marine Division during the Tet Offensive.


And filmed entirely in the UK.


RIP to actor Spencer Milligan. He's best known as dad Rick Marshall on the first 2 seasons of the iconic 70's Saturday morning show, "Land of the Lost".  For the past 20 years, he taught acting in Sturgeon Bay, WI. He died April 18, 2024, age 86 in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin.

Quote:Team Tinker participates in humanitarian relief mission to Panama

TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. -- Airmen at the 72nd Logistics Readiness Squadron played a major role in delivering humanitarian relief to Panama utilizing the Air Force’s largest airframe.

Following the arrival of a C-5M Super Galaxy at Tinker Air Force Base May 31, 2024, 72nd LRS assisted airmen from the 433rd Airlift Wing in loading 166,000lbs. of food to be delivered to Panama Pacifico International Airport, just outside Panama City, as part of a humanitarian relief mission.

The mission falls under the Department of Defense’s Denton Humanitarian Assistance Program, which moves humanitarian cargo, donated by U.S. based Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), to developing nations to ease human suffering. Approved cargo is transported by DOD land, air or sea assets on a space-available basis.

Quote:The Denton Program allows private U.S. citizens and organizations to use space available on U.S. military cargo planes to transport humanitarian goods to countries in need, including:

    Agricultural equipment
    Clothing
    Educational supplies
    Food
    Medical supplies
    Vehicles

The program is jointly administered by USAID, the Department of State (DOS), the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) and the Department of Defense (DoD); although DSCA is the primary agency responsible for administering the program.

Quote:Malleus Maleficarum, usually translated as The Hammer of Witches, is the best known treatise on witchcraft.

It was written by the German Catholic clergyman Heinrich Kramer, and first published in the German city of Speyer in 1486. It has been described as the compendium of literature in demonology of the 15th century.

The top theologians of the Inquisition at the Faculty of Cologne condemned the book as recommending unethical and illegal procedures, as well as being inconsistent with Catholic doctrines of demonology. The Malleus elevates sorcery to the criminal status of heresy, and recommends that secular courts prosecute it as such.

The Malleus suggests torture to effectively obtain confessions, and the death penalty as the only certain remedy against the evils of witchcraft. At the time of its publication, heretics were frequently sentenced to be burned alive at the stake, and the Malleus encouraged the same treatment of witches.

Quote:The United States Navy and 28 partner nations will begin the 29th biennial Exercise Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) 2024 exercise on Thursday around the Hawaiian Islands with 40 surface ships, three submarines, 14 national land forces, over 150 aircraft and more than 25,000 personnel taking part in the drills that will end on Aug.1 according to a navy release.

Partner nations for RIMPAC 2024 are Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, Republic of Korea, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Tonga and the United Kingdom.

Full list: Carrier USS Carl Vinson, International Warships Arrive in Hawaii for RIMPAC 2024

(06-28-2024, 09:13 AM)727Sky Wrote: Those darn submarines always look so wet without a dry place to stand !!

Quote:The crime syndicate saw profit in catering to shunned gay clientele, and by the mid-1960s, the Genovese crime family controlled most Greenwich Village gay bars. In 1966, they purchased Stonewall Inn (a “straight” bar and restaurant), cheaply renovated it, and reopened it the next year as a gay bar.

Stonewall Inn was registered as a type of private “bottle bar,” which did not require a liquor license because patrons were supposed to bring their own liquor. Club attendees had to sign their names in a book upon entry to maintain the club’s false exclusivity. The Genovese family bribed New York’s Sixth Police Precinct to ignore the activities occurring within the club.

Quote:1969: The Stonewall Uprising

While the events of Stonewall are often referred to as "riots," Stonewall veterans have explicitly stated that they prefer the term Stonewall uprising or rebellion. The reference to these events as riots was initially used by police to justify their use of force.

"The rebellion (it was never a 'riot') lasted five inconsecutive nights (they were not 'riots')..." -STONEWALL Veterans' Association

It is important to note that there were a number of uprisings against police & state brutality, harassment and entrapment of the LGBT+ communities in the U.S. in the years before Stonewall. These events and the people involved have not received as much historical attention as Stonewall, but are just as central to understandings of U.S. LGBTQIA+ histories.