#Buildings and Projects 1932-1983

[spyskrapbook]

“Wolfson Institute”, Royal Postgraduate Medical School, University of London, London [1961] _ Architects:  Lyons Israel Ellis Gray.

Forsyth, A.,Gray, D. (eds.) (1988) Lyons Israel Ellis Gray: Buildings and Projects 1932-1983, London: Architectural Association Publications, pp. 130-139.

[xtruss]

‘Freedom is Untidy’: Remembering The Late (WAR CRIMINAL) Donald Rumsfeld, Dead at 88

— By Morgan Artyukhina | Sputnik | July 01, 2021

Donald Rumsfeld’s family announced on Wednesday that he had died from multiple myeloma, a type of blood cancer. Rumsfeld, 88, had been retired from politics for several years, but in his time was a titular figure on the world stage. Sputnik takes a look back at some of the major points in Rumsfeld’s political career, which spans six decades.

Rumsfeld was born in Chicago, Illinois, on July 9, 1932. His family were German immigrants, and he attended a Congregational church. He graduated from New Trier High School and Princeton University, where he was an accomplished wrestler and majored in politics. He was also part of the Navy Reserve Officer Training Corps, and served as a naval aviator and flight instructor from 1954 until 1957 before shifting to the naval reserve, where he remained until 1989 when he retired at the rank of captain.

He began his political career as an administrative assistant to an Ohio lawmaker in Washington in 1957, but won office for himself as a Republican in 1962, representing Illinois’ 13th congressional district from 1962 until 1969. According to his memoir “Known and Unknown,” Rumsfeld was critical of the Johnson administration’s handling of the Vietnam War, believing South Vietnam was too dependent on the US, and that the US was too overconfident in its fight against the southern National Liberation Front and North Vietnamese Army.

First Administration Posts

He resigned in 1969 to join the administration of then-US President Richard Nixon, where he headed the Office of Economic Opportunity, an anti-poverty program that he personally opposed. During the year he worked there he hired two men who would later become key political allies: Frank Carlucci and Dick Cheney.

Rumsfeld cycled through several other Nixon administration positions before being tapped to head up Gerald Ford’s transition to the presidency after Nixon resigned without a sitting vice president to replace him. He became Ford’s defense secretary in 1975, where he directly clashed with George H. W. Bush, who was head of the Central Intelligence Agency, and Henry Kissinger, who was Secretary of State. He left office with Ford in 1977.

After several years in the private sector, Rumsfeld was appointed Middle East envoy by then-US President Ronald Reagan in 1983, putting him in charge of ensuring, among other things, that Iraq win the war it had started with Iran three years earlier. He traveled to Baghdad and met with the Iraqi leader, Saddam Hussein, for 90 minutes on December 20, 1983, during which time they discussed a number of topics of unity, including their opposition to Syria as well as Iran, and building an oil pipeline through Jordan to the Red Sea port of Aqaba. He left the position when Reagan left office in 1989.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, 1976

Project for a New American Century

In 1997, Rumsfeld joined the Project for a New American Century, a think tank set up by William Kristol and Robert Kagan to continue and expand Reagan’s militaristic policies into the 21st century, where the US had become the world’s sole military superpower after the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991. The think tank regarded the Republican Party’s policies at the time as being insufficient to do this, helping to earn them the moniker of “neo-conservative.”

Of the 25 politicos who signed PNAC’s founding statement of principles, nine would later become members of the George W. Bush administration, including Rumsfeld and Cheney, but also Elliott Abrams, Eliot Cohen, Paula Dobriansky, Paul Wolfowitz, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Zalmay Khalilzad, and Peter Rodman. John Bolton, Richard Perle, and Dov Zakheim were also PNAC members who served in the Bush administration.

Bush Administration

Just months after Bush was declared by the US Supreme Court to have won the 2000 election, the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by al-Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 Americans, and Rumsfeld ordered the US military to DEFCON 3. At an emergency meeting of the National Security Council, Rumsfeld reportedly asked Bush: "Why shouldn't we go against Iraq, not just al-Qaeda?" The terrorist group was headquartered in Afghanistan.

As Pentagon chief, prosecuting the burgeoning War on Terror became his primary task, and the US launched an air campaign followed by a ground invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, overthrowing the Taliban government and setting up a puppet state against which the Taliban has rebelled ever since.

President George W. Bush announces his $74.7 billion wartime supplemental budget request in the Pentagon on March 25, 2003, as Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld (center) and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz (left) look on.

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, US Army Gen. Wesley Clark had a discussion with another senior officer in the Pentagon who revealed to him plans to go after not just Afghanistan, but a total of seven other countries in the next five years, including Iraq but also Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, and Sudan, he wrote in a 2003 book.

The plan dovetailed very closely with goals outlined to him by PNAC members like Wolfowitz, who had opined to him in 1991 that “with the end of the Cold War, we can now use our military with impunity. The Soviets won't come in to block us. And we've got five, maybe 10, years to clean up these old Soviet surrogate regimes like Iraq and Syria before the next superpower emerges to challenge us.”

‘There Are Known Knowns’: The Iraq War

Despite the suspicions of US intelligence, no firm evidence had been presented to show Hussein had continued to wield weapons of mass destruction after the 1991 Gulf War. Rumsfeld and other neo-cons continued to press for Iraq to be the next target of the War on Terror, however, creating the Office of Special Plans to hound out enough evidence to justify an invasion, and in February 2002, he uttered one of his most famous - and baffling - quotes of his career:

“Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tends to be the difficult ones.”

In March 2003, the US began its attack on Iraq, launching a “shock and awe” aerial bombardment prior to a ground invasion. Rumsfeld dismissed any notion the war would be long, costly, or demand a large number of troops, believing a swift strike to remove Hussein and his immediate cadres from office would be sufficient to turn Iraq into a reliable client state with some sort of democratic governance.

Instead, a massive insurgency erupted against the US occupation, and three-and-a-half years later, the war was no closer to being won and thousands of Americans and Iraqis were dead. Rumsfeld was at one point in 2004 accused of using an automatic signing machine for the condolence letters mailed to the families of fallen US soldiers.

“Freedom is untidy,” Rumsfeld remarked in April 2003 in response to reports of widespread looting in the Iraqi capital accompanying the fall of Hussein’s government, portraying it as part of the cost of the liberation.

U.S. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld (C) signs a Baghdad road sign at the request of a US soldier April 30, 2003 during his visit to US troops at Baghdad's international airport.

Nor were the purported weapons of mass destruction Rumsfeld had claimed Hussein possessed and threatened other nations with ever found, either. Months after the invasion, he continued to claim US intelligence knew the locations of the weapons, which were supposedly in the western desert near the Syrian border.

Rumsfeld also presided over the torture of detainees in US prisons like Guantamao and Abu Ghraib, admitting his culpability in the scandal in 2004. The American Civil Liberties Union and other human rights groups filed several lawsuits against him on behalf of torture victims, but a federal judge ruled he could not "be held personally responsible for actions taken in connection with his government job.”

Estimates of the number of Iraqis killed in the US war in Iraq range from 110,000 by the Associated Press, covering the years 2003 to 2009, to more than 654,000 by the Lancet medical journal, covering the years 2003 to 2006. US forces left Iraq in 2011, following the termination of a status of forces agreement by Baghdad. According to Pentagon statistics, 4,418 US soldiers were killed in the Iraq War.

Political Departure and Final Years

As the war continued to worsen, Rumsfeld faced increasing pressure to resign, including from US and NATO generals, to which he eventually gave in on Election Day, 2006.

After his departure, Rumsfeld published his memoir in 2011. He made occasional forays into political life, criticizing then-Secretary of State Condolezza Rice, the NATO overthrow of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, and sounding off in support of Donald Trump’s presidential bid in 2016. Until the end of his life, Rumsfeld remained adamant that he had made the right decisions about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

He died in Taos, New Mexico, surrounded by family on June 30, 2021, at the age of 88.

"History may remember him for his extraordinary accomplishments over six decades of public service, but for those who knew him best and whose lives were forever changed as a result, we will remember his unwavering love for his wife Joyce, his family and friends, and the integrity he brought to a life dedicated to country," his family said in a statement.

[architectnews]

Remembering the great architects and designers we lost in 2020

To round off our review of 2020, Dezeen looks back at the designers and architects who passed away this year, including Italian designer Enzo Mari, British entrepreneur Terence Conran and Bulgarian artist Christo.

A number of the people we lost in 2020 were victims of coronavirus. They include fashion brand Kenzo's founder Kenzo Takada, architect and critic Michael Sorkin, and Arper founder Luigi Feltrin.

The year also saw the passing of Manlio Armellini, one of the founding fathers of the Salone del Mobile, Hidden Art founder Dieneke Ferguson, French interior designer Christian Liaigre and Enrico Astori, co-founder of Italian design brand Driade.

Other creatives who passed away this year include Bill Menking, co-founder of The Architect's Newspaper, Italian architect Vittorio Gregotti, architect Adolfo Natalini and philosopher and architecture writer Roger Scruton.

In December, we also lost graphic designer Martin Lambie-Nairn, fashion designer Pierre Cardin and textile designer Jack Lenor Larsen.

Terence Conran

Iconic British furniture designer Terence Conran, the founder of furniture brand Habitat and London's Design Museum, passed away in September at the age of 88.

Conran was born in 1931 in Kingston upon Thames, UK. He founded Habitat in the 1960s, introducing a number of novel European designs such as flatpack furniture to the UK, and went on to found The Conran Shop in 1973. In 1983, Conran was knighted.

The designer, who established London's Design Museum in 1989 in a former banana warehouse at Butler's Wharf, is remembered as one of the most influential designers of his generation.

"No one has done more to create modern Britain than Terence Conran," said former Design Museum director Deyan Sudjic.

Find out more about Terence Conran ›

Christo

Bulgarian artist Christo was best known for wrapping buildings, including the Pont Neuf in Paris and Berlin's Reichstag, in fabric. He began creating the large-scale installations in the 1960s together with his late wife Jeanne-Claude.

She passed away in 2009 but Christo continued to work on the installations including his first major UK sculpture, the London Mastaba on the Serpentine Lake. Christo, who was born in 1935 in Bulgaria and escaped the then communist country to the west in 1957, died of natural causes at the age of 84.

Find out more about Christo ›

Enzo Mari

October saw the passing of Enzo Mari. The "giant" of Italian design died at age 88 from complications relating to coronavirus, followed by his wife Lea Vergine just a few hours later.

Mari, who was born in 1932, had a prolific career of 60 years that saw him design products for brands including Artemide, Alessi and Danese. Among them were the Delfina chair, which was designed for Driade in 1974 and won the Italian Compasso d'Oro industrial design award in 1979.

As well as working as a designer, Mari was an author and published the Autoprogettazione, a guide to making your own furniture from boards and nails, in the 1970s.

Find out more about Enzo Mari ›

Milton Glaser

Milton Glaser, the designer of the "I New York" logo, passed away in June in New York on his 91st birthday. He created the logo, which was designed to create a positive emblem for the then crime-ridden metropolis, in 1977.

Glaser's six-decade career also saw him design posters for Bob Dylan, design logos for DC Comics and co-found the New York Magazine. The life-long New Yorker was born in 1929 in the Bronx and studied at The Cooper Union in New York. In 1954 he co-founded Push Pin, an influential graphics studio, before striking out on his own with Milton Glaser Inc. in 1974.

His recent work includes contributing to the Get Out the Vote initiative ahead of the 2016 US presidential campaign.

Find out more about Milton Glaser ›

Cini Boeri

Italian architect and designer Cini Boeri, the founder of Cini Boeri Architetti and one of the first post-war female Italian designers to rise to prominence, died in Milan at the age of 96.

She was known for her iconic seating designs and modular furniture, much of which is still in production. Among her work is Strips, a modular seating system for which Boeri won the Compasso d'Oro industrial design award.

Boeri also worked as an architect and completed residential projects as well as offices, shops and exhibition designs. She is survived by her three sons, one of whom is architect Stefano Boeri.

Find out more about Cini Boeri ›

Kenzo Takada

Kenzo Takada, the Japanese designer who founded fashion brand Kenzo, was one of the creatives taken by coronavirus this year. The designer, who was based in Paris, died from the virus at the age of 81.

His Kenzo brand, founded in 1970 and originally called "Jungle Jap," was a success from the beginning. Rebranded as Kenzo, it opened its flagship Paris store in 1976 and would become influential due to its use of bright colours and Japanese prints and textiles.

One of the defining fashion designers of the 1970s and 80s, Kenzo retired from fashion in 1999 but continued to design costumes for the opera.

Find out more about Kenzo Takada ›

Michael Sorkin

The death of New York-based architect and critic Michael Sorkin shocked the architecture world in March when he passed away at the age of 71 from coronavirus complications.

Sorkin, who was head of his eponymous architecture firm and president of non-profit research group Terreform, was the architecture critic for New York news and culture paper The Village Voice for 10 years.

He was also the director of the graduate programme in urban design at City College of New York (CCNY) and had taught at institutions including London's Architectural Association and the Cooper Union and Harvard University in the US.

"The architecture world has lost a brilliant mind," said Harriet Harriss, dean of New York's Pratt Institute School of Architecture.

Find out more about Michael Sorkin ›

Jan des Bouvrie

Known as the "Grandmaster of the white interior" in his native country, Dutch designer Jan des Bouvrie introduced the white, minimalist interior to the Netherlands.

The designer, who celebrated 50 years in the design industry in 2019, was also known for creating the Cube sofa. As well as furniture, Des Bouvrie designed a number of residences in the Gooi area of Holland. He also worked on collaborations with Dutch mass-market brands such as hardware store Gamma and electronics company Philips.

Des Bouvrie was born in 1942 and died at the age of 78 after a long battle with prostate cancer.

Find out more about Jan des Bouvrie ›

Kansai Yamamoto

Japanese fashion designer Kansai Yamamoto, who was best known for his dramatic costume designs for David Bowie, died at the age of 76 from acute myeloid leukaemia. Yamamoto's career started in 1971 when the designer founded his studio Yamamoto Kansai Company.

Bowie saw his first collection and became a client, showcasing Yamamoto's exuberant designs on stage. In 1992, Yamamoto showed his final collection, but he stayed in the creative industries by becoming an events producer and, later, designing costumes for Elton John and Lady Gaga.

Find out more about Kansai Yamamoto ›

Henry Cobb

Pei Cobb Freed & Partners co-founder Henry Cobb passed away in 2020 at the age of 93. Cobb, who was called "one of the great architects of our time" by critic Paul Goldberger, was the architect of Boston's John Hancock Tower.

Other key projects during his career, which spanned almost 70 years, include the Charles Shipman Payson Building at Maine's Portland Museum of Art in 1983 and the Palazzo Lombardia in Milan, which was completed in 2013. At the time of Cobb's death, work was underway at a number of his projects, including the International African American Museum Charleston in South Carolina.

Cobb was born in Boston in 1926 and founded IM Pei together with Chinese-American architect Pei, whom he'd met at Harvard University, and American architect Eason H Leonard in 1955. The firm was renamed Pei Cobb Freed & Partners in 1989.

Find out more about Henry Cobb ›

Syd Mead

Industrial designer and concept artist Syd Mead was perhaps best known for his visual concept designs for Blade Runner, the 1982 sci-fi film. The American artist was born in 1933 and started his career in vehicle design for Ford Motor Company.

In the 1970s he started working on feature films and created the design for a number of sci-fi movies, including Tron, Johnny Mnemonic and Aliens.

He passed away at the age of 86 in his home in California due to complications from lymphoma cancer. Among those paying tribute to his work were Tesla's Elon Musk, whose Cybertruck is said to have been inspired by Blade Runner.

"Rest in peace Syd Mead. Your art will endure," Musk tweeted.

Find out more about Syd Mead ›

The post Remembering the great architects and designers we lost in 2020 appeared first on Dezeen.

[mariabblackyr2]

Manifesto Launch

Grayson Perry - controversial, political statements, gender fluid, has done quite a lot of documentation on art - created an alter ego with a manifesto, the manifesto into an artistic endeavour - the poster is portrayed as fun but looking closer deeper than that - political ethos  through art 

‘A manifesto is a public declaration, often political in nature, of a group or individual’s principles, beliefs, and intended courses of action.’

All manifestos contradict each other

Red Alan's Manifesto by Grayson Perry, 2014

10 game-changing art manifestos - ‘artistic intentions’ - Diebenkorn

Joshua Reynolds - ‘founding test of the British painting theory’ - painters work was more than what they saw before them 

The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism, FT Marinetti, 1909

‘1. We intend to sing the love of danger, the habit of energy and fearlessness.

2. Courage, boldness, and rebellion will be the essential elements in our poetry.

3. Up to now, literature has extolled a contemplative stillness, rapture and reverie. We intend to glorify aggressive action, a restive wakefulness, life at the double, the slap and the

punching fist.’

F.T. Marinetti, 1909

The futurists published quite a lot of manifestos to communicate their political views - supported fascism, strongly patriotic

Up until 1909 the manifestos were mostly political however these manifestos focused more on the art as well as politics, inspired by the technology of the new age.

‘Futurism was an Italian art movement that aimed to capture the dynamism and energy of the modern world in art. The Futurists were well versed in the latest developments in science and philosophy, and particularly fascinated with aviation and cinematography. Futurist artists denounced the past, as they felt the weight of past cultures was extremely oppressive, particularly in Italy. The Futurists instead proposed an art that celebrated modernity and its industry and technology.’

Elasticity (detail), (1912), Umberto Boccioni.

Photographed these new and wonderful machines with the new technology emerging

As early as 1922, László Moholy-Nagy (1895–1946) began to make metal sculptures. He believed that new materials called for a new kind of art, and metal was appealing for its connection to industry and modern machinery.

László Moholy-Nagy Dual Form with Chromium Rods

Following the futurist came the dada manifesto, - started political stance, believed the politicians were responsible for the first world war - posters, writing, performance and photography part of dada - rejected everything that was an ‘ism against nationalism and rationalism

Jean Hans Arp, bois gravé et collage pour la couverture de Dada 4-5, 1919

Hannah Höch - Known for political collages and photomontage, appropriated and rearranged images , making comment on consumerist society, rejected the german government 

Her work is bold in its outlook

Hannah Höch, Für ein Fest gemacht (Made for a Party), 1936

Hannah Höch, Cut with the Dada Kitchen Knife through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany, 1919

Man Ray - applied this movement to photography, pushed the boundaries, push the photogram medium further than it had gone before.

Man Ray, Rayograph, 1922

‘The Surrealists sought to overthrow the oppressive rules of modern society by demolishing its backbone of rational thought. To do so, they attempted to tap into the “superior reality” of the subconscious mind. “Completely against the tide,” said Breton, “in a violent reaction against the impoverishment and sterility of thought processes that resulted from centuries of rationalism, we turned toward the marvellous and advocated it unconditionally”. - Andre Brenton 

From the surrealist manifesto - “Psychic automatism in its pure state, by which one proposes to express...the actual functioning of thought...in the absence of any control exercised by reason, exempt from any aesthetic or moral concern.” influenced by Fraud

Max Ernst. Loplop Introduces Members of the Surrealist Group. 1931

Lee Miller, Portrait of Space, Nr Siwa, Egypt, 1937.

Situationist International - Were a revolutionary alliance of European avant- garde artists, writers and poets formed at a conference in Italy in 1957. - were originally artistic focus but shifted towards a more political stance

Guy Debord -his notion the ‘spectacle is key to understand the SI - SI was directly lead by Guy Debord 

The situationist were in the middle of the student riots in France 

The long term effect of SI - provide some of the most revolutionary theories of the time - have impacted art - ideas cans till be seen in art today

Peter Kennard - studying during the height of the situationists - involved in the campaign for the nuclear disarmament

Peter Kennard, Haywain with Cruise Missiles 1981 & Defended to Death 1983

Krzysztof Wodiczko, - projections onto political buildings with a political meaning

Krzysztof Wodiczko, Hirschhorn Museum Washington DC 2018 and Projection on to South Africa House 1985

The Guerilla Girls - formed in 1984, for the lack of females portrayed within art - working to expose sexual and racial discrimination in the art world - mostly New York 

They wear masks and assume pseudonyms to hide their identity

Their manifesto comes in the form of famous slogan artworks

Guerrilla Girls, [no title], 1985–90.

Guerrilla Girls, The Advantages Of Being A Woman Artist, 1988

The Stuckist Manifesto, 1999

‘Established in 1999, the British group the The Stuckists proclaimed themselves to be “Against conceptualism, hedonism and the cult of the ego-artist.” The movement was formed by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson to celebrate and promote figurative painting in a reaction to the proliferation of conceptual art. Every year, the Stuckists famously demonstrate outside Tate Britain as the winner of the Turner Prize is announced.

1. Stuckism is the quest for authenticity.

2. Painting is the medium of self-discovery.

3. Stuckism proposes a model of art which is holistic.

4. Artists who don’t paint aren’t artists.

5. Art that has to be in a gallery to be art isn’t art.’

The Stuckists, 1999

Protest  outside the Tate when the Turner Prize is happening

Outside the Turner Prize, Tate Britain, 2005: Stuckists demonstrate against the purchase of Chris Ofili's The Upper Room. The cutout is Tate chairman Paul Myners.

Manifestos within Photography 

Group f/64 - their name means extended depth of field, focused on the clarity of the un-manipulated photographic image, committed to practice ‘pure’ photography

"Pure photography is defined as possessing no qualities of technique, composition or idea, derivative of any other art form." —Group f/64, Manifesto, August 1932

The original 11 members of Group f.64 were Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, Edward Weston, Willard Van Dyke, Henry Swift, John Paul Edwards, Brett Weston, Consuelo Kanaga, Alma Lavenson, Sonya Noskowiak, and Preston Holder.

Dunes, Oceano, Edward Weston, 1936.

Two Callas, Circa 1925, Imogen Cunningham.

Magnum Photos - ‘Magnum is a community of thought, a shared human quality, a curiosity about what is going on in the world, a respect for what is going on and a desire to transcribe it visually.’ Henri Cartier-Bresson

Founded after WW2, most important art agency - some of the most famous photographs in history have been taken by magnum photographers

Robert Capa US troops assault Omaha Beach during the D-Day landings (first assault), 1944.

“Capa was the boss because, for one thing, he kept on the lookout for stories for all the Magnum photographers. But equally vital were his experience, generosity, connections, aggressiveness, and the vision he had for Magnum, which kept us going. Since few of us were married, we had much time to spend together. We talked a lot, but rarely about photography. Our discussions were more often about politics or philosophy or racehorses, pretty girls, and money. We constantly looked at each other’s work, and criticism could be tough if the work did not measure up to the expected standard.” - Inge Morath

Magnum photographs aren't always political stories - society and peoples, places of interest, news events, disasters and conflict

Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare, Henri Cartier-Bresson, 1932

An American young girl, Jan Rose Kasmir, confronts the American National Guard outside the Pentagon during the 1967 anti-Vietnam march. (1967) Marc Riboud

Henry Luce wanted to turn the magazine - “To see life; to see the world; to eyewitness great events; to watch the faces of the poor and the gestures of the proud; to see strange things — machines, armies, multitudes, shadows in the jungle and on the moon; to see man’s work — his paintings, towers and discoveries; to see things thousands of miles away, things hidden behind walls and within rooms, things dangerous to come to; the women that men love and many children; to see and take pleasure in seeing; to see and be amazed; to see and be instructed...” - manifesto for evolution ion of magazine 

Margaret Bourke -White -’ What the editors got from Bourke- White was a human document of American frontier life & the photo essay format was born.’ - took photographs of the community as well as the dam.

‘Photographer Margaret Bourke-White had been dispatched to the Northwest to photograph the multimillion dollar projects of the Columbia River Basin. What the editors expected were construction pictures as only Bourke-White could take them. What the editors got was a human document of American frontier life which, to them at least, was a revelation.” (time.com)’

Workers on Montana's Fort Peck Dam blow off steam at night, 1936.

Cindy Sherman Interview 

‘What are your three top tips for becoming an artist? Try to forget everything you learned about making art. Find a group of like-minded artists or creative people to hang out with. Take chances with what you do, make things that no one but you will ever see, unless it turns out so good you want to share it. Why do you make art? It’s my life and it’s what I’m most passionate about. And it’s fun! What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever been given? Find inspiration in reading’

Cindy Sherman, Untitled A 1975

Anthropcene - a collaborative group, grow an environmental debat, raise awareness of what is normally the unseen, 

The project’s starting point is the research of the Anthropcene Working Group, an international body of scientists who argue that the Holocene epoch ended around 1950, and that we have officially entered the Anthropcene in recognition of profound and lasting human changes to the Earth’s system.

Lithium Mines #1, Salt Flats, Atacama Desert, Chile, 2017

Gregory Crewdson - 

‘Gregory Crewdson is a photographer, but he calls himself a storyteller. He has

spoke of his belief that “every artist has one central story to tell,” and that the the artist's work is “to tell and retell that story over and over again,” to deepen and challenge its themes. True to this, Crewdson’s most recent body of work, Cathedral of the Pines, shares the aesthetic that has defined his career”

The Shed, 2013, Cathedral of the Pines, Gregory Crewdson

Sylvie McNamara , Paris Review, 2016’

His photographs and work aligns with his ‘manifesto

What's the purpose of an Artistic Manifesto in the 21st Century?

’Can refer back to the work you are creating, nail down your thinking ,nails down a plan, opportunity to reach larger audiences 

The Holstee Manifesto - had been working for big corporations  - wanted to get our and create an ethical company - their ethos, wrote a manifesto to make new company and make it clear what the plan was - they then put the manifesto online as a poster and the Washington post picked it up - started selling posters of manifesto - moved it into a moving image piece 

Examples of other manifesto posters:

[italianartsociety]

 By: Amy Fredrickson 

Ernesto Basile died on 26 August 1932. Born in Palermo on 31 January 1857, Basile grew to be a leading architect, designer, and chair of the architecture department at the University of Palermo. His father, Giovanni Battista Filippo Basile (1825-1891), who was also an architect, influenced his son’s style. In fact, after his father died, Ernesto Basile finished his father’s commission of the Teatro Massimo Vittorio Emanuele in Palermo.  Several exhibitions displayed Basile's work, including the 1892 National Exhibition in Palermo. For this exhibition, he drew on aspects of other cultures, such as Roman Baroque marble, influences of Catalan-Gothic, Islamic, and Norman inspirations.

Basile’s work was particularly popular between 1890 and 1914. During this time, Art Nouveau was considered the most popular form of architecture throughout Europe. Its counterpart in Italy, which was often referred to as Liberty Style architecture, was a combination of traditionalism and nationalism accompanied by Italian classical components. Palermo’s upper middle-class commissioned Basile’s architecture as a way to assert their newly established socioeconomic status after Italian unification. As a result, Palermo's city center was steeped in Liberty Style architecture.

Basile also studied traditional Sicilian architecture. He copied and measured Matteo Carnilivari’s (c.15th Century) drawings for practice. While his work is indicative of the Liberty Style, it also draws on important Sicilian architecture from the quattrocento.  The Villino Florio (1899-1902) is an example of how Basile executed elegant linear designs, which were representative of the Liberty Style.  Basile worked in conjunction with the prominent Florio family and The Villino Florio used some fifteenth-century aspects of Carnilvari’s work.  The villa is both original and eclectic in Basile’s inclusion of curved surfaces which are reminiscent of the Roman Baroque period, cylindrical towers like those of French castles, and Romanesque and Renaissance colonnades. Together these aspects create the eclectic facade that Basile made popular in Palermo.

Basile also designed interiors. The Hotel Villa Igiea (1899–1904) is the only interior that still survives today, and is steeped in the Liberty Style, from the large windows to the wrought iron bannisters and the inclusion of Art Nouveau frescos.  In addition to this Palermo project, he also acquired a prestigious commission in Rome. He designed a new addition to the parliament building in Rome, where he worked from 1902 to 1914. Basile produced an incredible work that was an addition to Bernini’s Palazzo Montecitorio.

Basile’s architecture assumed a more classical nature following World War I, which is evident in two buildings located in Palermo, the Istituto Provinciale Antitubercolare (1920- 1925) and the Albergo Diorno (1925).  These works are prime examples of his resistance to Functionalism, which became popular in twentieth-century architecture. Unfortunately, many of his works are no longer in existence; the buildings that remain, however, show Basile’s contribution to Italian architecture.

References

Curl, James Stevens, A Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (London: Oxford University Press, 2006) p. 68.

Helen M. Hills. "Basile." Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press, accessed August 19, 2017

Rusell, Frank, ed. Art Nouveau Architecture, (London: Academy Editions, 1983) p. 211.

Ernesto Basile, Villa Igiea Grand Hotel (Interior), 1908, Palermo, Italy

Ernesto Basile, Villa Igiea Grand Hotel (Interior), 1908, Palermo, Italy

Ernesto Basile and Giovanni Battista Filippo Basile, Teatro Massimo Vittorio Emanuele, 1897, Palermo, Italy 

Ernesto Basile, Villa Florio,1899-1902, Palermo, Italy

Ernesto Basile, Palazzo Montecitorio (addition), 1908-1919,nRome, Italy

[mockinnon]

CHARACTER STUDY 007 → MCKINNON TIMELINE.

1921. an ambitious and bold archibald mckinnon opens the first erised towers hotel in edinburgh, scotland at 24 years old.

1932. brochan mckinnon is born as the only child to archibald and heather mckinnon. 

1952. twenty years later, brochan becomes the next head of the company, with big plans to expand and improve upon his father’s company.

1957. after five years, the mckinnon men open the second hotel in london. this is where they really pick up momentum, with cities approaching them about building the next resort in their city. brochan also marries alisa fawley this year.

1960. their belfast location opens for business.

1961. after four years of struggling to get pregnant, alisa finally gives birth to a beautiful baby boy, victor mckinnon.

1965. marlene’s uncle, gavin mckinnon, is born.

1980. victor marries young --- at 19, his wedding is highly publicized. not because of the mckinnons, though, but the woman he’s marrying. astoria nott ties the knot in fall of this year

1981. victor steps up as the next in line to run erised towers.

1983. erised towers goes from a chain to something more official under the management of brochan and victor --- erised towers hotel group is born. and alongside it, matthew and davina mckinnon. the first mckinnon twins in five generations.

1989. under the main direction of victor, two more locations open. erised towers resort in venice and another hotel in barcelona. 

1992. marlene mckinnon is born.

1993. a few months later, erised towers france opens its doors with their new slogan --- providing your greatest desires.

1995. the mckinnon clan grows alongside their company. iain mckinnon is born.

1997. the final mckinnon is born --- malcolm mckinnon. 

2000. with the turn of the century, victor opens their most expansive resort yet on the balearic islands near palma. this will be the last location for years, as he focuses mostly on upkeep on the locations they already have established.

2005. something is the tipping point for him --- gavin leaves the family and returns to where he grew up in the highlands. 

2006. at 23, the twins step up and join their father as near-heads of the company. 

2008. matthew mckinnon dies in a hit and run. davina is left as the only proper heir to the company. 

2014. after a final scandal, marlene is cut off from the family. 

2017. a new location is in the works after seventeen years of nothing. this new project is backed by tom riddle, a wealthy investor who’s had ties to the family for years.

[agencyofarchitecture-blog]

TURNING INTO THE VOID. ARCHITECTURES THAT TALK – INES WEIZMAN

FORO – THE AGENCY OF ARCHITECTURE

TURNING INTO THE VOID. ARCHITECTURES THAT TALK – INES WEIZMAN

Architecture as agency.

Architecture as thick layer of infrastructures.

The agency of Architecture – could be tried.

Architecture not as only one object.

Swimming pool in Moscou – reconstructed and rebuilt. Difficulties of telling a story because of the place it is in.

Similarity between Soviet architecture and Amercian architecture. Idea of the King Kong movie and the statue.

Photo of Rem Koolhas – “Swimming pool” in Moskov.

Painting or architecture drawings – they look archaic but the style is not of this époque (1980). Go back to a time they have consider lost.

Drawing – St. Petersburg built of different buildings.

Competition in Japan (1980) price winner - some drawings. Speaking with metaphore. Narrative architecture. Impressed.

Dizidents which want an alternative project.

Villa Claustrophobia.

Alexander Brutski – Philipo Cathedral.

Reference to fantasy Diomede - dizidents to find concept of flying architecture as freedom. Inaccesible for the state.

Christian Ezmann and Bernd Effel – International competition – The topography of terror (1983/1984). Diktadur repetition.

Form ov dizidents where architects need to negotiate the architecture.

Alexander Galimov (in collaboration with Michael Fadeer). City Cathedral, 1989. Not quite right in reality. Just beautiful drawings, critical.

George Perece (1969, Paris). Needed to give up smoking but tired of hearing it. Tried to do things different.

What we need to question – concreate, glass.. materials extra ordinary.

Dizidents are never quite happy with anything. Not single ideology. Activism.

Political can change in unexpected moments.

History is full of events.

The significant is always negative - We should not be this way.

Idea of Utopia – 80’s modernism.

Political architecture to help human and practicist.

Architecture travels in history.

Object idea of architecture – Mies Van der Rohe archaeological dig for the Barcelona Pavilion, 1983. Complicated project.

Villa Tugendhat, Brno, 1930 – Mies Van der Rohe. After the war was a school for children with bone illness. Film Vila Tugendhat, different uses.

Afterlife – Things are not so easy to tell. There is a whole history coming.

Villa Savoy – Le Corbusier. Pere Burri photograph 1959 architecture ruin, almost.

Bernard Tschumi – Advertisement of Architecture.

“Sensuality has been known to overcome even the most rational buildings”.

Liz Diker – “Bad Press”.

ORDUS 100 – 100 vilas. Idea of conversation, to speak to each other.

Ghost cities.

 Adolf Loos, Josephine Baker House, Model 1928. Thought of commission of Josephine. Photography by Martin Gernartt, 1932.

How to design – Having one moment that brings memory, object that help us to remember.

Conversation between architect and environment has to happen.

Problem of the new. Fake might not be bad choice. Interpretation. Different point of interest.

—ESTHER BASTERRA RUIZ 

[stepchain46-blog]

That Not-So-Great Street: State Street in Transition

That Not-So-Great Street: State Street in Transition

by Patrick Steffes

Architectural Forum, 1933; highlights added by author

Fully 58 years before the Harold Washington Library Center was dedicated on October 4, 1991, the southern end of Chicago’s famed State Street shopping district was described in a 1933 edition of a national magazine as “horrendous” and teeming with “burlesque shows and midget radios”.

The battle between 1975 and 1991 to design, build, and open a new central Chicago Public Library is closely linked to the decades-long decline in the southern end of Chicago’s famed State Street shopping district, and the seemingly endless efforts to eradicate the more sordid portions of this internationally known retail destination. While a lively shopping, educational and residential neighborhood today, the area of South State Street around Congress Parkway was for decades seemingly stuck in a state of perpetual decline.

Northwest corner of Harrison St. and South State St., 10/26/63, Sigmund J. Osty visual materials (Chicago History Museum), box 2

Typical of the type of businesses on State Street south of Van Buren Street for decades was on the northwest corner of State and Harrison, seen above. Home to both the Funland Arcade (“Art Movies and “Art Books”) and Rialto Burlesque (“Girls Girls Girls”), behind it may be seen some of the extant buildings on South Plymouth Court, including one with a Linotype sign at top left.

With the Harold Washington Library Center turning 25 years old in 2016, Forgotten Chicago thought it an appropriate time to look at the long quest to reinvigorate South State Street, and the long and complicated saga of how the largest municipal library in the United States ended up in the midst of what had once been one of the most notorious urban sections in the Midwest. We hope you enjoy this look at the tremendous changes to South State Street, featuring images unseen in decades, with many that have never before been published online.

The second part of this article may be seen here, and describes the long journey to build what would ultimately become the Harold Washington Library Center.

Calumet412, 1944

In the above image dated from 1944, the west side of the 600 block of South State Street (two blocks south of the future site of the Harold Washington Library Center) features most of the seamier sides of urban life conveniently located in one block: burlesque, “high grade whiskey wine or gin”, tattoos, billiards (with illegal gambling?), and access to loans to pay for it all, presumably in the form of pawn shops. Seen in the images above and below is the still-extant Harrison Street entrance to the subway, underneath the burlesque sign.

South State St. at Harrison St., 1962, Sigmund J. Osty visual materials (Chicago History Museum), box 2

Virtually unchanged 18 years later, in 1962 the former Chicago Theatre was perhaps the dirty little cousin to the other Chicago Theatre about a mile to the north. Ironically, this one-time theatre building was at the time home to a Publix Cafeteria, with the Gayety and grandly named National Theatre both within easy stumbling distance.

Chicago Tribune, 1944

The near-comical prevalence of vice along South State Street was no laughing matter to Chicago’s civic and business leaders and retailers. Sears, Roebuck & Company, at its peak arguably the highest-profile, most influential and most successful company ever based in Chicago, was by far the largest department store chain in the country by the 1920s, and the second largest retailer in the U.S., trailing only grocer A&P.1 By 1963, Sears, Roebuck would be the world’s largest retailer,2 with its flagship store from 1932 to 1983 seen just two blocks north and right in the image above.

The Homeless Man on Skid Row, 1961

In an image published in 1961, nearly thirty years after the map describing South State Street as “horrendous” was published, the 600 block of South State’s “amazing diversity” of burlesque houses, low-rent hotels, and cafeterias were all going strong, as seen in this photograph taken from a City of Chicago Tenants Relocation Bureau publication.

Shown above is also the west side of the 600 block of South State, the same block as seen in the earlier image from 1944. In 2016 this entire block is the home of William Jones College Preparatory High School. The Pacific Garden Mission and its distinctive “Jesus Saves” neon sign above far left was relocated to the 1400 block of South Canal Street in 2007 for an expansion of Jones College Prep, completed in 2013.

C. William Brubaker Collection, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1978

At what would ultimately become the site of the Harold Washington Library Center on the 400 block of South State, little had changed for decades, as shown above in 1978. At that time, this side of the block featured two billboards advertising liquor, a burlesque theater, and a store at the northwest corner of Congress Parkway named “Cheap Willy’s”. Congress Parkway, the eastern end of the Eisenhower Expressway (I-290) was the main western gateway into central Chicago, and would carry tens of thousands of vehicles daily into the Loop, to Michigan Avenue, Chicago’s lakefront, and Lake Shore Drive.

State Street Responds to Outlying and Suburban Retail Competition, 1952-1979

Chicago Tribune, 1952

The dominance of State Street and Chicago neighborhood shopping districts in regional retail sales was unchallenged for decades, but new competition and rapidly growing suburbs and outlying Chicago neighborhoods would bring major changes after World War II. The grand opening in January 1952 of Lincoln Village, at the intersection of Lincoln Avenue and McCormick Boulevard in Chicago near the Lincolnwood border would begin a major shift in the retail landscape of the Chicago region. Designed by prolific retail architect Sidney Morris & Associates, Lincoln Village was the first of dozens of neighborhood and regional auto-oriented shopping centers to open in Chicago and its suburbs over the next 60 years.

Unlike several other pioneering auto-oriented city and suburban shopping centers like Evergreen Plaza (below), Lincoln Village continues to operate in 2016, and is well worth a visit for fans of overlooked landmarks of Chicagoland history and development. For an in-depth look at the history of Lincoln Village, visit this interesting link.

Honeywell Customized Temperature Control Ad, Architectural Record, 1953

In August 1952, just seven months after Lincoln Village opened, Evergreen Plaza, designed by Howard T. Fisher & Associates and Holabird & Root & Burgee, would open at West 95th Street and South Western Avenue in Evergreen Park. Briefly the largest shopping center in the Midwest until Northland Center in Southfield, Michigan opened in 1954, the mall portion of Evergreen Plaza closed in May 2013 and was demolished starting in October 2015.

Although outlying shopping centers would ultimately siphon hundreds of millions of dollars annually in retail sales from State Street and other neighborhood shopping districts, Chicago’s pioneering early shopping centers are often overlooked in the history of the Chicago region. Projects like Lincoln Village and Evergreen Plaza had an enormous impact on Chicagoland development, economics, and infrastructure.

Top: Chicago Tribune, 1958 Bottom: JaNae Contag, 2013

Recognizing Evergreen Plaza’s enormous historical significance, Forgotten Chicago made a concerted effort to rescue as much of Evergreen Plaza’s vast archives as possible. Following its closure in May 2013, we removed dozens of boxes full of thousands of pages of blueprints, business records, marketing material and ephemera from Evergreen Plaza that were left behind in the basements of this once-iconic regional shopping center.

Make No Little Plans for State Street Part I: The State Street Promenade

State Street Promenade, Chicago Plan Commission, 1953

In 1953, the year after Lincoln Village and Evergreen Plaza opened, the Chicago Plan Commission prepared a forgotten scheme that advocated building a nearly mile-long second-level skyway, the State Street Promenade, to connect all of the buildings on the east side of State Street from Randolph (150 North) to Congress (500 South). This expensive, complicated, and unrealized plan may have been prepared as a response to the outlying shopping centers that had recently opened or were in the planning stages.

Architectural Forum, 1951

A more detailed map of State Street in the early 1950s was published, ironically, in an article describing the planning for the massive new Old Orchard shopping center in North Suburban Skokie, announced in 1950. Sponsored by Marshall Field & Company, Old Orchard would open in 1956, the biggest competition up to that time for the dollars of well-heeled North Shore shoppers, and an enormous success that continues to thrive as of this writing. Note that the above map was published before the completion of the Congress / Eisenhower Expressway that would dramatically change the layout of the South Loop in the years ahead.

State Street Promenade, Chicago Plan Commission, 1953

Published 25 years before construction began on the ill-fated State Street Mall, the State Street Promenade was oddly presented in renderings as a destination for both families above left and single women attracting the attention of well-dressed men above right. Depicted as an up-to-the-minute shopping destination circa 1953, renderings depicted a “TV Theater” showing episodes of Milton Berle and Le Chat, presumably a cat-themed café. Note the second floor indoor “Promenade” entrance to Carson Pirie Scott showing their iconic three-part logo, depicted above center.

State Street Promenade, Chicago Plan Commission, 1953

Had the State Street Promenade been constructed, it would have profoundly changed retail and commercial real estate in the eastern part of the Loop. This plan would have also greatly diminished State Street’s greatest asset – the enormous numbers of street-level pedestrians and bustling street life that State Street was justifiably famous for, and the dream of every commercial real estate leasing agent today.

Inland Architect, 1968

The State Street Promenade apparently did not make it past the planning stage, and this scheme is not known to have been covered online or in any books or magazines on Chicago history until the publication of this article. While a limited number of skyways were constructed in and near the Chicago Loop, Chicago’s Pedway system is the modern successor of the State Street Promenade.

The first sections of Chicago’s modern Pedway connecting commercial and civic buildings opened by January 1966,3 centered around the former Brunswick Building at 69 West Washington. The Pedway has been greatly expanded in the ensuing 50 years.

The Economist, 1925

When Chicago’s modern Pedway system opened starting in the mid-1960s, it had been a civic improvement considered for at least 40 years. In the above 1925 scheme, leading local firm Graham, Anderson, Probst & White proposed a “Pedestrian Subway” under Randolph between LaSalle on the west and Beaubien Court and the Illinois Central railroad terminal on the east, with room for a future subway line, as seen above. The accompanying article noted the public safety benefit of such a scheme and that “Pedestrians would not be in imminent peril of being killed by some careless chauffeur as they are at the present time.”

Make No Little Plans for State Street Part II: The State Street Mall

C. William Brubaker Collection, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1979

Beginning at 9:30 a.m. CDT on Saturday, June 17, 1978, State Street would undergo its most radical change to date as traffic was banned for private vehicles along State Street from Congress Parkway to Wacker Drive in advance of construction of the State Street Mall.4 Shown above and below is a rendering of South State Street at the intersection of Madison Street, with the iconic Carson Pirie Scott store visible in images above and below at left.

Inland Architect, 1979

Despite renderings showing a lively mix with throngs of pedestrians and outdoor dining and food carts, the State Street Mall before it was demolished and the street reopened to traffic in November 1996 did not live up to its promise in revitalizing State Street, including the section where the Harold Washington Library Center would ultimately be built between Van Buren and Congress.

The demise of the State Street Mall is long and complicated. For insight by The Chicago Tribune upon its reopening to public vehicular traffic, visit here. The New York Times looked at State Street Mall prior to its de-malling here. Finally, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Art History, Architecture & Urban Planning at the University of Illinois at Chicago Robert Bruegmann discussed on WBEZ in 2011 why the State Street Mall failed here.

The Battle Over Chicago’s New Central Library

Chicago Tribune, 1975

In the mid-1970s, Chicago’s venerable central library on North Michigan Avenue between Washington and Randolph Streets was being converted to the Chicago Cultural Center, and the library began moving to the Mandel Building Warehouse at 425 North Michigan starting in August 1975.5In the ensuing 16 years, Chicago would see no fewer than six mayors, and a tremendous amount of discussion and controversy on where to permanently locate the new central library.

The second part of this article was also published in September 2016, and may be seen here. This article examines the many proposed plans of what would ulimately become the Harold Washington Library Center, as well as what remains of historic South State Street today.

Sources

1. Marc Levinson, The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America, (New York : Hill and Wang, 2011), pg. 113

2. Marc Levinson, The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America, (New York : Hill and Wang, 2011), pg. 257

3. First Outlet in Underground System Opened, Realty & Building, January 8, 1966, pg. 3

4. Building Begins on State Street, Realty & Building, June 24, 1978, pg. 1

5. Meg O’Connor, Downtown library is on the move, Chicago Tribune, August 28, 1975, pg. pg. N_B2

Read More

This article was last updated on Tuesday, September 13th, 2016 at 9:31 am.

Source: https://forgottenchicago.com/articles/that-not-so-great-street-state-street-in-transition/

[nicholerestrada]

A Tourist Guide to West Virginia

Stand Out – Be Seen – Be On Google Page 1 Before You Pay For Services – CLICK HERE! We call it RBI Marketing. You have heard of ROI which is Return On Investment and this is RBI which means Return BEFORE Investment! Let’s get the ball rolling and you will pay us for our services AFTER you see your site ranked on Google page 1 for your chosen keywords!.CLICK HERE!

***********

We are always on the lookout to hire quality, professional independent representatives for our local business pay per result search engine optimization services. Just use the form on the home page to contact us!

************

1. INTRODUCTION

West Virginia, endlessly covered with forests and known as the “Mountain State,” offers breathtaking scenery, natural resource-related sights, and year-round, outdoor activities.

Once rich in coal and timber, it was shaped by the mines and logging railroads which extracted them, but when decades of removal began to deplete these commodities, their rolling, green-carpeted mountains yielded secondary byproducts-namely, hiking, biking, fishing, rafting, climbing, and hunting to tourists and sports enthusiasts alike. Its New River Gorge, which offers many similar activities, is equally beautiful with its rugged banks and azure surfaces, while the principle city of Charleston, revitalized during the 1970s and 1980s, now features museums, art, shopping malls, restaurants, and world-class performance venues.

2. CHARLESTON

Located on the Kanawha River, and sporting an easily negotiable street grid system, it is subdivided into the Capitol Complex and the downtown area with the East End Historic District linking the two.

From the former, which is the heart of state government, juts the ubiquitously visible, gold-domed Capitol Building itself. Constructed of buff Indiana limestone and 4,640 tons of steel, which themselves required the temporary laying of a spur rail line to transport them, the building had been laid in three stages during an eight-year period: 1924 to 1925 for the west wing, 1926 to 1927 for the east wing, and 1930 to 1932 for the connecting rotunda. It was officially dedicated by Governor William G. Conley on June 20, 1932, on the occasion of West Virginia’s 69th birthday as a state.

Its gold dome, which extends five feet higher than that of the Capitol in Washington, is gilded in 23 ½-karat gold leaf, applied between 1988 and 1991 as tiny squares to cover the otherwise copper and lead surface.

Two-thirds of its interior, which encompasses 535,000 square feet subdivided into 333 rooms, is comprised of Italian travertine, imperial derby, and Tennessee marble, and the chandelier in the rotunda, its center piece, is made of 10,180 pieces of Czechoslovakian crystal illuminated by 96 light bulbs. Weighing 4,000 pounds, it hangs from a 54-foot brass and bronze chain.

Across from the State Capitol, but still within the complex, is the West Virginia Cultural Center. Opened in 1976 and operated by the West Virginia Division of Culture and History, it was created to showcase the state’s artistic, cultural, and historical heritage, and houses the West Virginia State Museum, the archives and history library, a gift shop, and a venue for cultural events, performances, and related programs.

The former, a collection of items which represents the state’s land, people, and culture, is subdivided into 24 significant scenes covering five periods: Prehistory (3 million years BC to 1650 AD), Frontier (1754-1860), the Civil War and the 35th State (1861 to 1899), Industrialization (1900 to 1945), and Change and Tradition (1954 to the 21st century). The 24 representations themselves trace the state’s evolution and include such periods as “Coal Forest,” “River Plains,” “Wilderness,” “The Fort,” “Harper’s Ferry,” “Building the Rails,” “Coal Mine,” “Main Street, West Virginia,” and “New River Gorge.”

Thirteen monuments, memorials, and statues honoring West Virginians for their contributions to the state and the nation grace the Capitol Complex’s landscaped grounds.

Culture can also be experienced at the Clay Center for the Arts and Sciences, a modern, 240,000-square-foot, three-level complex which opened on July 12, 2003 and represents one of the most ambitious economic, cultural, and educational projects in West Virginia’s history. Offering sciences, visual arts, and performing arts under a single roof, the center houses the dual-level Avampato Discovery Museum, an interactive, youth-oriented experience with sections such as Health Royale, KidSpace, Earth City, and Gizmo Factory. A 9,000-square-foot Art Gallery, located on the second floor, features both temporary and permanent exhibits, the latter emphasizing 19th and 20th century art by names such as Andy Warhol, Stuart Davis, Alexander Calder, Frank Stella, Vida Frey, and Albert Paley. The ElectricSky Theater, a 61-foot domed planetarium, offers daily astronomy shows and wide screen presentations. Live performances are staged in two locations: the 1,883-seat Maier Foundation Performance Hall, which is home to the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, but otherwise offers a variety of performance types, from comedy to popular singers, bands, repertory, and Broadway plays, and the 200-seat Walker Theater, which features plays and dances with cabaret-style seating for the Woody Hawley singer-songwriter program. The Douglas V. Reynolds Intermezzo Café and three classrooms are located on the lower level.

Shopping can be done at two major venues. The Charleston Town Center Mall, located adjacent to the Town Center Marriott and Embassy Suites Hotel, and near the Civic Center, is a one million square foot, tri-level complex with more than 130 stores, three anchor department stores, six full-service restaurants, and a food court with ten additional fast food venues, and is accessed through three convenient parking garages. Sporting a three-story atrium and fountain, the upscale, Kanawha Valley complex was the largest urban shopping center east of the Mississippi River when it opened in 1983.

The Capitol Market, located on Capitol and Sixth Streets in the restored and converted, 1800s Kanawha and Michigan Railroad depot, is subdivided into both in- and outdoor markets, the latter of which can only be used by bona fide farmers and receives daily, fresh, seasonal deliveries, usually consisting of flowers, shrubs, and trees in the spring; fruits and vegetables in the summer; pumpkins, gourds, and cornstalks in the fall; and Christmas trees, wreaths, and garlands in the winter. The indoor market sells seafood, cheeses, and wines, and offers several small food stands and a full-service Italian restaurant.

An evening can be spent at the TriState Racetrack and Gaming Center. Located a 15-minute drive from Charleston in Cross Lanes, the venue offers 90,000 square feet of gaming entertainment, inclusive of more than 1,300 slot machines, live racing, a poker room, blackjack, roulette, and craps, and four restaurants: the French Quarter Restaurant and Bar, the First Turn Restaurant, the Café Orleans, and Crescent City.

3. POTOMAC HIGHLANDS

The Potomac Highlands, located in the eastern portion of the state on the Allegheny Plateau, is a tapestry of diverse geographic regions and covers eight counties. Alternatively designated “Mountain Highlands,” it had been formed some 250 million years ago when the North American and African continental collision had produced a single, uplifted mass. Subjected to millennia of wind- and water-caused erosion, it resulted in successive valleys and parallel ridges, and today the area encompasses two national forests: Canaan Valley, the highest east of the Mississippi River, and Spruce Knob, at 4,861 feet, West Virginia’s highest point. Its green-covered mountains yielded abundant timber, the logging railroads necessary to harness it, two premier ski resorts, and a myriad of outdoor sports and activities.

The Potomac Highlands can be subdivided into the Tygart Valley, Seneca Rocks, Canaan Valley, and Big Mountain Country.

A. Tygart Valley

The town of Elkins, located in the Tygart Valley, is the transportation, shopping, and social center of the east central Appalachian Mountains and serves as a base for Potomac Highland excursions.

Established in 1890 by Senators Henry Gassaway Davis and Stephen. B. Elkins, his son-in-law and business partner, it originated as a shipping hub for their coal, timber, and railroad empire, the latter the result of their self-financed construction of the West Virginia Central Railroad, whose track stretched between Cumberland, Maryland, and Elkins, and served as the threshold to some of the world’s richest timber and mineral resources.

The town, serving the needs of the coal miners, loggers, and railroad workers, sprouted central maintenance shops and steadily expanded, peaking in 1920, before commencing a resource depletion-caused decline, until the last train, carrying coal and timber products to the rest of the country, departed the depot in 1959.

The tracks lay barren and unused for almost half a century until 2007, when the newly-established Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad again resurrected them-and the town-transporting the first tourists for scenic-ride purposes and resparking a slow growth cycle with a subsequently built restaurant and live theater in its historic Elkins Railyard and additional hotels nearby. Consistently ranked as one of the country’s best small art towns, it is once again the service hub of the Mountain Highlands, reverting to its original purpose of providing hotel, restaurant, shop, and entertainment services, but now to a new group-tourists.

The railroad remains its focus. The Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad offers three departures from the Elkins depot. The first of these, the “New Tygart Flyer,” is a four-hour, 46-mile round-trip run which plunges through the Cheat Mountain Tunnel, passes the towns of Bowdon and Bemis, parallels the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River, and stops at the horseshoe-shaped High Falls of Cheat, during which time it serves an en route, buffet luncheon. Upgraded table service is available in 1922-ear deluxe Pullman Palace cars for a slightly higher price.

The “Cheat Mountain Salamander” is a nine-hour, 128-mile round-trip to Spruce, and includes a buffet lunch and dinner, while the “Mountain Express Dinner Train” mimics the New Tygart Flyer’s route, but features a four-course meal in a formally set dining car.

The Railyard Restaurant, sandwiched between the Elkins depot and the American Mountain Theater, provides all on board meals. Emulating the depot itself with its exterior brick construction, the $2.5 million, 220-seat restaurant, leased to the Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad, serves family-style cuisine on its main level and upscale dinners in its second-floor Vista Dome Dining Room, its menus inspired by railroad car fare from the 1920s to the 1940s. It toted the opening slogan of, “Take the track to the place with exceptional taste.”

The Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad’s Rails and Trails Gift Shop is located on its main level.

Continuing the historic, red brick exterior, the adjacent American Mountain Theater, founded in 2003 by Elkins native and RCA recording artist, Susie Heckel, traces its origins to a variety show performed for tourists at a different location. But increasing demand merited the November, 2006, ground-braking for a $1.7 million, 12,784-square-foot, 525-seat structure with aid from her sister, Beverly Sexton, and her husband, Kenny, who owned the Ozark Mountain Hoe-Down Theater in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

Opening the following July, the theater offered family-oriented, Branson-style entertainment performed by a nine-member cast, with Kenny Sexton serving as its president and producer and Beverly writing the score. Two-hour evening shows include comedy, impressions, and country, gospel, bluegrass, and pop music.

Davis and Elkins College, located only a few blocks from the Historic Railyard, shares the same founders as the town of Elkins itself-namely, Senators Henry Gassaway Davis and Stephen B. Elkins. Established in 1901 when they donated land and funding to create a college associated with the Presbyterian Church, it was originally located south of town. Its Board of Trustees first met the following year and classes were first held on September 21, 1904.

Today, the coeducational, liberal arts college, located on a 170-acre hilled, wooded campus with views of the Appalachian Mountains, is comprised of 22 new and historic buildings in two sections-the north, which stretches to the athletic fields and the front campus, which is located on a ridge overlooking Elkins. Thirty associate and baccalaureate arts, sciences, pre-professional, and professional degree programs are offered to a 700-student base.

One of its historic buildings is Graceland Inn. Designed by the Baltimore architectural firm of Baldwin and Pennington, the castle-like, Queen Anne-style mansion, originally located on a 360-acre farm, was completed in 1893. Initially called “Mingo Moor,” and intermittently “Mingo Hall” after the area south of Elkins, the estate served as the summer residence of Senator Davis, who regularly transported a train of invited friends and associates during July and August so that they could escape the Washington heat and enjoy Elkins’ higher-elevation, cooler temperatures.

The estate was ultimately renamed “Graceland” after Davis’ youngest daughter, Grace. Following his wife’s death in 1902, he continued to conduct business from offices inside it, while Grace herself resided there during the summer months with her family.

The estate was finally ceded to her own children, Ellen Bruce Lee and John A. Kennedy, its last two owners.

Acquired by the West Virginia Presbyterian Education Fund in 1941, it was used as a male residence hall by the college until 1970, whereafter it was closed. Restored during the mid-1990s, it subsequently reopened as an historic country inn and as a dynamic learning lab for hospitality students.

Overlooking the town of Elkins, on the Davis and Elkins College campus, Graceland Inn, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, features a two-story great hall richly decorated with hardwoods, such as quartered oak, bird’s eye maple, cherry, and walnut, a grand staircase, a parlor, a library, and its original stained glass windows. The Mingo Room Restaurant, reflecting the mansion’s initial designation and open to the public, is subdivided into four small rooms lined with red oak and fireplaces and an outdoor verandah, and eleven guest rooms, located on the second and third floors and named after prominent family members, contain antiques, canopy beds, armoires, marble bathrooms, and claw foot tubs.

Graceland Inn, the David and Elkins College, the town of Elkins itself, the historic depot and railyard, their tracks, and the Appalachian Mountain’s coal and timber resources are all inextricably tied to the town’s past–and its future.

B. Seneca Rocks

“Seneca Rocks” designates both a region of the Potomac Highlands and the outcroppings after which that region is named.

Resembling a razor back, or shark’s fin, and located at the confluence of the Seneca Creek and the North Fork South Branch Potomac River, the 250-foot-thick, 900-foot-high Seneca Rocks, accessible by West Virginia Route 28, were formed 400 million years ago during the Silurian Period in an extensive sand shoal at the edge of the ancient Iapetus Ocean. As the seas decreased in size, the rock uplifted and folded, erosion ultimately wearing away its upper surface and leaving the arching folds and craggy profile they exhibit today.

Made of white and gray tuscarora quartzite, the formation features both a north and south peak, with a notch separating the two.

The current Seneca Rocks Discovery Center, which replaced the original visitor’s center, features relief models of the area, films, interpretive programs, and a bookshop.

A path leads to the Sites Homestead, part of the center. Constructed in 1839 by William Sites as a single-room log cabin below Seneca Rocks Ridge, it is typical of then-current Appalachian homes whose German Blockbau-style featured square logs and v-notched corner joints spread apart by stone and clay chinks.

In the late-1860s, one of Sites’ sons expanded the homestead, adding a second floor, and, after use as a hay barn, the Forest Service purchased it in 1969, restoring it during the 1980s. In 1993, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

The greater Spruce Knob-Seneca Rocks National Recreation Area, offering significant outdoor sports opportunities, contains a key portion of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, whose mountains and forests collect water which then flows into the Potomac River and the bay itself. Acting as a cleansing and filtering mechanism, its headwater forests purify the water before it reaches the streams. Spruce Knob is both the highest point in the Chesapeake Watershed and the entire state of West Virginia.

Aside from facilitating water, the area has provided sustenance to humans, who first lived in Native American villages within its mountains, and then created farming settlements and logging camps, extracting its resources and supporting life for some 13,000 years. Today, it is home to 15 million people.

The Spruce Knob-Seneca Rocks National Recreation Area itself is part of the much larger Monongahela National Forest. Established in 1920 with an initial 7,200 acres, the present 910,155-acre forest contains the headwaters of the Monongahela, Potomac, Greenbrier, Elk, Tygart, and Gauley Rivers; five federally-designated “wildernesses”-Dolly Sods, Outer Creek, Laurel Fork North, Laurel Fork South, and Cranberry-whose very remote and primitive areas only offer lower-standard trail markings; and four lakes.

A Mecca for outdoor sports enthusiasts, the national forest features 169 hiking, biking, and horseback riding trails which cover more than 800 miles, 576 miles of trout streams, 129 miles of warm-water fishing, 23 campgrounds, 17 picnic areas, and wildlife viewing of black bear, wild turkey, white-tailed deer, gray fox, rabbits, snowshoe hare, grouse, and woodcock.

C. Canaan Valley

Blanketed with bigtooth aspen, balsam fir, and spruce, Canaan Valley, stretching 14 miles, is the highest such valley east of the Mississippi River, its namesake mountain separating it from the Blackwater River and creating a deep, narrow canyon in the Allegheny Plateau.

The pristinely beautiful area encompasses two state parks-Canaan Valley Resort and Black Water Falls State Parks; two ski areas-again Canaan Valley Resort and Timberline Four Seasons Resort; and the nation’s 500th wildlife refuge.

Natural sports abound: hiking, horseback riding, fishing, golfing, swimming, rafting, and interpretive nature walking during the summer, and skiing, snowboarding, and tubing during the winter.

Nucleus of most of this is 6,000-acre Canaan Valley Resort State Park, which encompasses 18 miles of trails, wetlands, open meadows, northern hardwood forests, wildlife, 200 species of birds, and 600 types of wildflowers.

Canaan Valley Resort, located within the park, offers 250 modern guest rooms, 23 two-, three-, and four-bedroom mountain cabins with fireplaces and full kitchens, 34 paved, wooded campsites with full hook-ups, and six lounges and restaurants, including the Hickory Dining Room in the main lodge.

Its 4,280-foot mountain, whose longest run is 1.25 miles and whose vertical drop is 850 feet, features one quad and two triple lifts, and 11 trails for night skiing. Its winter activities, like those of the extended Canaan Valley, include skiing, snowboarding, airboarding, tubing, snowshoeing, and ice skating, while summer programs include scenic chairlift rides, guided walks, golf, tennis, and hiking.

D. Big Mountain Country

Big Mountain County, location of West Virginia’s second-highest peak, serves as the birthplace of eight rivers-the Greenbier, Gauley, Cheat, Cherry, Elk, Williams, Cranberry, and Tygart-while its Seneca State Forest, which borders the former in Pocahontas County, is the state’s oldest. An interesting array of sights include steam-powered logging railroads, astronomical observatories, preserved towns, a premier ski resort, and their associated assortment of outdoor sports and activities.

The Durbin and Greenbier Valley Railroad’s fourth excursion train, the “Durbin Rocket,” departs from the town of Durbin itself, located some 40 miles from Elkins.

Powered by a 55-ton steam engine built for the Moore-Keppel Lumber Company in nearby Randolph County, and one of only three remaining geared Climax logging locomotives, the train makes a two-hour, 11-mile round-trip run along the Greenbier River and through the Monongahela National Forest as far as Piney Island, where the rental “castaway caboose” is disconnected and pushed onto a very short spur track for a one or more night stay.

The ultra-modern, high-tech National Radio Astronomy Observatory, located a short distance away in Green Bank, offers an opportunity to learn about radio wave astronomy.

Designing, building, and operating the world’s most advanced and sophisticated radio telescopes, the observatory produces images of celestial bodies, such as planets, stars, and galaxies, millions of light-years away by recording their radio omission quantities.

The Green Bank Science Center, nucleus of this experience, features a museum which introduces the science of radio astronomy, radio waves, telescope operation, and what is being learned through them about the universe; the Galaxy Gift Shop; the Starlight Café; and the departure point for the escorted bus tour of the facility, prior to which an introductory film and lecture are presented in the theater.

The tour’s highlight is the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT), designed when the previous 300-foot device collapsed in 1988 and Congress was forced to appropriate emergency funds to design it.

Dedicated on August 25, 2000, after a nine-year development period, it is 485 feet tall, is comprised of 2,004 panels, has a 100-by-110 meter diameter, a 2.3 acre surface area, and weighs 17 million pounds. The world’s largest, fully maneuverable telescope with a computer-controlled reflecting surface, it is functionally independent of the sun, permitting 24-hour-per-day operation, and receives wavelengths which vary between 1/8th of an inch to nine feet.

Initially employed in conjunction with the Arecibo Observatory to produce images of Venus, it later detected three new pulsars (spinning neutron stars) in the Messier 62 region.

A 15-minute drive from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory is another significant sight, Cass Scenic Railroad State Park.

Tracing its origins to 1899 when John G. Luke acquired more than 67,000 acres of red spruce in an area which ultimately developed into the town of Cass, it became the headquarters of the West Virginia Pulp and Paper Company. The town, supporting the workforce needed to convert the raw resources into finished products, sprouted shops, services, houses, a sawmill, tracks, and a railroad to haul the timber.

Instrumental to the operation had been the Shay, or similarly-designed Climax and Heisler steam locomotives, whose direct gearing delivered positive control and more even power, allowing them to ply often temporarily-laid tracks, steep grades, and hairpin turns, all the while pulling heavy, freshly-felled timber loads. The Western Maryland #6, at 162 tons, was the last, and heaviest, Shay locomotive ever built. The railroad inaugurated its first service in 1901.

During two 11-hour, six-day-per-week shifts, the town’s mill was able to cut more than 125,000 board feet of lumber per shift and dry 360,000 per run with its 11 miles of steam pipes, adding up to 1.5 million board feet cut per week and 35 million per year. After 40 years of milling at Cass and Spruce, more than two billion board feet of lumber and paper had been produced.

Operating until 1943, the West Virginia Pulp and Paper Company sold the enterprise to the Mower Lumber Company, which maintained it for another 17 years, at which time it was closed and purchased by the state of West Virginia, in 1961.

The railroad and the town of Cass, which remain virtually unchanged, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Aside from the historic buildings, there are several other attractions. Connected to the large Cass Company Store is the railroad-themed Last Run Restaurant. Turn-of-the-century logging can be gleaned at the Cass Historical Museum. The Shay Railroad Shop, having once housed coal bins, offers additional books and crafts for sale. The metal, Cass Showcase building above it, having stored hay to feed horse teams, features an introductory film and an HO-scale train and town layout reflecting their 1930s appearance.

Escorted walking tours of Cass, usually conducted in the afternoon after the trains have returned from their daily excursions, offer insight into what it had been like to live and work in a turn-of-the-century company town, while the Locomotive Repair Shop tour includes visits to the Mountain State Railroad and Logging Historical Association’s shop, the sawmill area, and a look at Shay and Climax locomotive maintenance and repair.

An excursion on the Cass Scenic Railroad itself, which commenced tourist rides in 1963 and is therefore the longest-running scenic rail journey in the country, is a living history experience. Pulled by one of the original Shay or Climax steam locomotives, the train accommodates passengers in equally authentic logging cars which have been converted to coaches with wooden, bench-like seats and roofs, while a single enclosed car, offering reserved seating, sports booth-like accommodation and is designated “Leatherbark Creek.”

All trains depart from Cass’s reconstructed depot, at a 2,456-foot elevation, climbing Leatherneck Run, negotiating 11-percent grades, maneuvering and reversing through a lower and upper switchback, and arriving at Whittaker Station, which features a snack stand, views of the eastern West Virginia mountains, and a reconstructed, 1946 logging camp. The eight-mile round-trip back to Cass requires two hours.

A four-and-a-half hour, 22-mile round-trip continues up Back Allegheny Mountain, passing Old Spruce and the Oats Creek Water Tank, and plying track laid by the Mower Lumber company, before reaching 4,842-foot Bald Knob, West Virginia’s third-highest peak.

Limited runs are also offered to Spruce, an abandoned logging town on the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River. This train also transits Whittaker Station.

Although not affiliated with the Cass Scenic Railroad, the Boyer Station Restaurant, located six miles from Green Bank on Route 28, offers inexpensive, home-cooked, country-style meals amidst railroad décor with wooden, rail depot-reminiscent tables and benches, train and logging memorabilia, and large-scale, track-mounted model railroads. It is part of a 20-room motel and campground complex.

Winter sports account for a significant portion of the Big Mountain Country’s offerings. Ten miles from Cass Scenic Railroad State Park is Snowshoe Mountain.

Located in the bowl-shaped convergence of Cheat and Back Allegheny Mountain at the head of the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River, the area, striped of trees by logging between 1905 and 1960, had been discovered by Thomas Brigham, a North Carolina dentist, who had previously opened the Beech Mountain and Sugar Mountain Ski Resorts.

Reflecting European style, Snowshoe Village is located on the mountain’s summit and offers 1,400 hotel and condominium rooms, restaurants, shops, services, and entertainment. The 244-acre resort, which combines the Snowshoe and Silver Creek areas, has a 3,348-foot base; a 4,848-foot summit, making it the highest such ski resort in the mid-Atlantic and southeast; 14 chairlifts; 60 runs, of which the longest is 1.5 miles; and 1,500-foot vertical drops at Cupp Run and Shay’s Revenge. Average snowfall is 180 inches. Spring, summer, and fall activities include golf, boating, bicycling, climbing, hiking, horseback riding, canoeing, kayaking, skating, and swimming.

The extended area’s Seneca State Forest, named after the Native Americans who had once roamed the land, borders the Greenbier River in Pocahontas County and contains 23 miles of forest, 11,684 acres of woodlands, a four-acre lake for boating and trout, largemouth bass, and bluegill fishing, hiking tails, pioneer cabins, and rustic campsites.

4. NEW RIVER-GREENBRIER VALLEY

The New River-Greenbrier Valley region of West Virginia is topographically diverse and ruggedly beautiful.

Split by the Gauley River, its northern section is comprised of a rugged plateau in which is nestled the calm, azure Summersville Lake, while mountainous ridgelines, affording extensive interior coal mining, are characteristic of its central region. Horse and cattle grazing is prevalent on the flat farm expanses which intersperse the eastern edge’s lush, green mountain plateau, divided by the Greenbrier River, the largest, untamed water channel in the eastern United States, which flows through it. Its southern region is a jigsaw puzzle of omni-directional ridgelines and very narrow valleys.

New and Bluestone River-formed gorges provide a wealth of rock climbing, canoeing, kayaking, and white water rafting opportunities in this region of the state.

The area’s most prominent, and beautiful, topographical feature is the New River Gorge National River. Flowing from below Bluestone Dam, near Hinton, to the north of the US Highway 19 bridge near Fayetteville, it dissects all the physiographic provinces of the Appalachian Mountains. A rugged, white water river, and among the oldest in North America, it flows northward through steep canyons and geological formations. Approximately 1,000 feet separate its bottom from its adjacent plateau. On July 30, 1998, it was named an American Heritage River, one of 14 waterways so designated.

Its related park encompasses 70,000 acres.

Signature of the New River Gorge National Park is its New River Gorge Bridge. Completed on October 22, 1977 at a $37 million cost, the dual-hinged, steel arch bridge is 3,030 feet long, 69.3 feet wide, and has an 876-foot clearance. Carrying the four lanes of US Route 19, it was then the world’s longest, and is currently the highest vehicular bridge in the Americas and the second highest in the world after the Millau Viaduct in France. Its longest single span, between arches, is 1,700 feet.

There are three related visitor centers and vantage points. The Canyon Rim Visitor Center, located two miles north of Fayetteville on Route 19, offers exhibits, films, interpretive programs, trails, and a scenic overlook, while the Grandview Center is located in Thurmond off of Interstate 64 on Route 25. The park’s headquarters are in Glen Jean.

Fayetteville is the hub for New River Gorge kayaking and white water rafting.

Coal, as synonymous with West Virginia as logging, is an industry the tourist should experience sometime during his visit. The Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine, located in the city of the same name, offers just such an opportunity.

A 1,400-square-foot Company Store, coal museum, fudgery, and gift shop serves as a visitor’s center and threshold to the sight’s two major components. A coal camp, the first of these, depicts 20th-century life in a typical coal town, represented by several relocated and restored buildings.

Plying 1,500 feet of underground passages in the 36-inch, Phillips-Sprague Seam Mine, which had been active between 1883 and 1953, track-guided “man-cars” driven by authentic miners, encompass the complex’s second component and make periodic stops in the cold, damp, and dark passage to discuss and illustrate the advancement of mining techniques. The rock duster, for example, ensured that coal dust would not explode deep in the mine. Strategically positioned roof bolts avoided cave-ins. Pumps extracted water. Dangerously low oxygen levels dictated immediate evacuation.

Coal had fueled the world’s steam engines for industrial plants and rail and sea transportation.

The Phillips-Sprague Mine is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

5. CONCLUSION

West Virginia’s three principle regions of Charleston, the Potomac Highlands, and the New River-Greenbier Valley offer immersive experiences into the past which shaped the present by means of its pristinely beautiful and resource-rich mines and mountains that yielded coal, timber, logging railroads, and an abundance of outdoor sports.

Source by Robert Waldvogel

Source: https://garkomedia.com/2018/11/26/a-tourist-guide-to-west-virginia/

from Garko Media https://garkomedia1.wordpress.com/2018/11/26/a-tourist-guide-to-west-virginia-2/

[garkomedia1]

A Tourist Guide to West Virginia

Stand Out - Be Seen - Be On Google Page 1 Before You Pay For Services - CLICK HERE! We call it RBI Marketing. You have heard of ROI which is Return On Investment and this is RBI which means Return BEFORE Investment! Let's get the ball rolling and you will pay us for our services AFTER you see your site ranked on Google page 1 for your chosen keywords!.CLICK HERE!

***********

We are always on the lookout to hire quality, professional independent representatives for our local business pay per result search engine optimization services. Just use the form on the home page to contact us!

************

1. INTRODUCTION

West Virginia, endlessly covered with forests and known as the “Mountain State,” offers breathtaking scenery, natural resource-related sights, and year-round, outdoor activities.

Once rich in coal and timber, it was shaped by the mines and logging railroads which extracted them, but when decades of removal began to deplete these commodities, their rolling, green-carpeted mountains yielded secondary byproducts-namely, hiking, biking, fishing, rafting, climbing, and hunting to tourists and sports enthusiasts alike. Its New River Gorge, which offers many similar activities, is equally beautiful with its rugged banks and azure surfaces, while the principle city of Charleston, revitalized during the 1970s and 1980s, now features museums, art, shopping malls, restaurants, and world-class performance venues.

2. CHARLESTON

Located on the Kanawha River, and sporting an easily negotiable street grid system, it is subdivided into the Capitol Complex and the downtown area with the East End Historic District linking the two.

From the former, which is the heart of state government, juts the ubiquitously visible, gold-domed Capitol Building itself. Constructed of buff Indiana limestone and 4,640 tons of steel, which themselves required the temporary laying of a spur rail line to transport them, the building had been laid in three stages during an eight-year period: 1924 to 1925 for the west wing, 1926 to 1927 for the east wing, and 1930 to 1932 for the connecting rotunda. It was officially dedicated by Governor William G. Conley on June 20, 1932, on the occasion of West Virginia’s 69th birthday as a state.

Its gold dome, which extends five feet higher than that of the Capitol in Washington, is gilded in 23 ½-karat gold leaf, applied between 1988 and 1991 as tiny squares to cover the otherwise copper and lead surface.

Two-thirds of its interior, which encompasses 535,000 square feet subdivided into 333 rooms, is comprised of Italian travertine, imperial derby, and Tennessee marble, and the chandelier in the rotunda, its center piece, is made of 10,180 pieces of Czechoslovakian crystal illuminated by 96 light bulbs. Weighing 4,000 pounds, it hangs from a 54-foot brass and bronze chain.

Across from the State Capitol, but still within the complex, is the West Virginia Cultural Center. Opened in 1976 and operated by the West Virginia Division of Culture and History, it was created to showcase the state’s artistic, cultural, and historical heritage, and houses the West Virginia State Museum, the archives and history library, a gift shop, and a venue for cultural events, performances, and related programs.

The former, a collection of items which represents the state’s land, people, and culture, is subdivided into 24 significant scenes covering five periods: Prehistory (3 million years BC to 1650 AD), Frontier (1754-1860), the Civil War and the 35th State (1861 to 1899), Industrialization (1900 to 1945), and Change and Tradition (1954 to the 21st century). The 24 representations themselves trace the state’s evolution and include such periods as “Coal Forest,” “River Plains,” “Wilderness,” “The Fort,” “Harper’s Ferry,” “Building the Rails,” “Coal Mine,” “Main Street, West Virginia,” and “New River Gorge.”

Thirteen monuments, memorials, and statues honoring West Virginians for their contributions to the state and the nation grace the Capitol Complex’s landscaped grounds.

Culture can also be experienced at the Clay Center for the Arts and Sciences, a modern, 240,000-square-foot, three-level complex which opened on July 12, 2003 and represents one of the most ambitious economic, cultural, and educational projects in West Virginia’s history. Offering sciences, visual arts, and performing arts under a single roof, the center houses the dual-level Avampato Discovery Museum, an interactive, youth-oriented experience with sections such as Health Royale, KidSpace, Earth City, and Gizmo Factory. A 9,000-square-foot Art Gallery, located on the second floor, features both temporary and permanent exhibits, the latter emphasizing 19th and 20th century art by names such as Andy Warhol, Stuart Davis, Alexander Calder, Frank Stella, Vida Frey, and Albert Paley. The ElectricSky Theater, a 61-foot domed planetarium, offers daily astronomy shows and wide screen presentations. Live performances are staged in two locations: the 1,883-seat Maier Foundation Performance Hall, which is home to the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, but otherwise offers a variety of performance types, from comedy to popular singers, bands, repertory, and Broadway plays, and the 200-seat Walker Theater, which features plays and dances with cabaret-style seating for the Woody Hawley singer-songwriter program. The Douglas V. Reynolds Intermezzo Café and three classrooms are located on the lower level.

Shopping can be done at two major venues. The Charleston Town Center Mall, located adjacent to the Town Center Marriott and Embassy Suites Hotel, and near the Civic Center, is a one million square foot, tri-level complex with more than 130 stores, three anchor department stores, six full-service restaurants, and a food court with ten additional fast food venues, and is accessed through three convenient parking garages. Sporting a three-story atrium and fountain, the upscale, Kanawha Valley complex was the largest urban shopping center east of the Mississippi River when it opened in 1983.

The Capitol Market, located on Capitol and Sixth Streets in the restored and converted, 1800s Kanawha and Michigan Railroad depot, is subdivided into both in- and outdoor markets, the latter of which can only be used by bona fide farmers and receives daily, fresh, seasonal deliveries, usually consisting of flowers, shrubs, and trees in the spring; fruits and vegetables in the summer; pumpkins, gourds, and cornstalks in the fall; and Christmas trees, wreaths, and garlands in the winter. The indoor market sells seafood, cheeses, and wines, and offers several small food stands and a full-service Italian restaurant.

An evening can be spent at the TriState Racetrack and Gaming Center. Located a 15-minute drive from Charleston in Cross Lanes, the venue offers 90,000 square feet of gaming entertainment, inclusive of more than 1,300 slot machines, live racing, a poker room, blackjack, roulette, and craps, and four restaurants: the French Quarter Restaurant and Bar, the First Turn Restaurant, the Café Orleans, and Crescent City.

3. POTOMAC HIGHLANDS

The Potomac Highlands, located in the eastern portion of the state on the Allegheny Plateau, is a tapestry of diverse geographic regions and covers eight counties. Alternatively designated “Mountain Highlands,” it had been formed some 250 million years ago when the North American and African continental collision had produced a single, uplifted mass. Subjected to millennia of wind- and water-caused erosion, it resulted in successive valleys and parallel ridges, and today the area encompasses two national forests: Canaan Valley, the highest east of the Mississippi River, and Spruce Knob, at 4,861 feet, West Virginia’s highest point. Its green-covered mountains yielded abundant timber, the logging railroads necessary to harness it, two premier ski resorts, and a myriad of outdoor sports and activities.

The Potomac Highlands can be subdivided into the Tygart Valley, Seneca Rocks, Canaan Valley, and Big Mountain Country.

A. Tygart Valley

The town of Elkins, located in the Tygart Valley, is the transportation, shopping, and social center of the east central Appalachian Mountains and serves as a base for Potomac Highland excursions.

Established in 1890 by Senators Henry Gassaway Davis and Stephen. B. Elkins, his son-in-law and business partner, it originated as a shipping hub for their coal, timber, and railroad empire, the latter the result of their self-financed construction of the West Virginia Central Railroad, whose track stretched between Cumberland, Maryland, and Elkins, and served as the threshold to some of the world’s richest timber and mineral resources.

The town, serving the needs of the coal miners, loggers, and railroad workers, sprouted central maintenance shops and steadily expanded, peaking in 1920, before commencing a resource depletion-caused decline, until the last train, carrying coal and timber products to the rest of the country, departed the depot in 1959.

The tracks lay barren and unused for almost half a century until 2007, when the newly-established Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad again resurrected them-and the town-transporting the first tourists for scenic-ride purposes and resparking a slow growth cycle with a subsequently built restaurant and live theater in its historic Elkins Railyard and additional hotels nearby. Consistently ranked as one of the country’s best small art towns, it is once again the service hub of the Mountain Highlands, reverting to its original purpose of providing hotel, restaurant, shop, and entertainment services, but now to a new group-tourists.

The railroad remains its focus. The Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad offers three departures from the Elkins depot. The first of these, the “New Tygart Flyer,” is a four-hour, 46-mile round-trip run which plunges through the Cheat Mountain Tunnel, passes the towns of Bowdon and Bemis, parallels the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River, and stops at the horseshoe-shaped High Falls of Cheat, during which time it serves an en route, buffet luncheon. Upgraded table service is available in 1922-ear deluxe Pullman Palace cars for a slightly higher price.

The “Cheat Mountain Salamander” is a nine-hour, 128-mile round-trip to Spruce, and includes a buffet lunch and dinner, while the “Mountain Express Dinner Train” mimics the New Tygart Flyer’s route, but features a four-course meal in a formally set dining car.

The Railyard Restaurant, sandwiched between the Elkins depot and the American Mountain Theater, provides all on board meals. Emulating the depot itself with its exterior brick construction, the $2.5 million, 220-seat restaurant, leased to the Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad, serves family-style cuisine on its main level and upscale dinners in its second-floor Vista Dome Dining Room, its menus inspired by railroad car fare from the 1920s to the 1940s. It toted the opening slogan of, “Take the track to the place with exceptional taste.”

The Durbin and Greenbrier Valley Railroad’s Rails and Trails Gift Shop is located on its main level.

Continuing the historic, red brick exterior, the adjacent American Mountain Theater, founded in 2003 by Elkins native and RCA recording artist, Susie Heckel, traces its origins to a variety show performed for tourists at a different location. But increasing demand merited the November, 2006, ground-braking for a $1.7 million, 12,784-square-foot, 525-seat structure with aid from her sister, Beverly Sexton, and her husband, Kenny, who owned the Ozark Mountain Hoe-Down Theater in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

Opening the following July, the theater offered family-oriented, Branson-style entertainment performed by a nine-member cast, with Kenny Sexton serving as its president and producer and Beverly writing the score. Two-hour evening shows include comedy, impressions, and country, gospel, bluegrass, and pop music.

Davis and Elkins College, located only a few blocks from the Historic Railyard, shares the same founders as the town of Elkins itself-namely, Senators Henry Gassaway Davis and Stephen B. Elkins. Established in 1901 when they donated land and funding to create a college associated with the Presbyterian Church, it was originally located south of town. Its Board of Trustees first met the following year and classes were first held on September 21, 1904.

Today, the coeducational, liberal arts college, located on a 170-acre hilled, wooded campus with views of the Appalachian Mountains, is comprised of 22 new and historic buildings in two sections-the north, which stretches to the athletic fields and the front campus, which is located on a ridge overlooking Elkins. Thirty associate and baccalaureate arts, sciences, pre-professional, and professional degree programs are offered to a 700-student base.

One of its historic buildings is Graceland Inn. Designed by the Baltimore architectural firm of Baldwin and Pennington, the castle-like, Queen Anne-style mansion, originally located on a 360-acre farm, was completed in 1893. Initially called “Mingo Moor,” and intermittently “Mingo Hall” after the area south of Elkins, the estate served as the summer residence of Senator Davis, who regularly transported a train of invited friends and associates during July and August so that they could escape the Washington heat and enjoy Elkins’ higher-elevation, cooler temperatures.

The estate was ultimately renamed “Graceland” after Davis’ youngest daughter, Grace. Following his wife’s death in 1902, he continued to conduct business from offices inside it, while Grace herself resided there during the summer months with her family.

The estate was finally ceded to her own children, Ellen Bruce Lee and John A. Kennedy, its last two owners.

Acquired by the West Virginia Presbyterian Education Fund in 1941, it was used as a male residence hall by the college until 1970, whereafter it was closed. Restored during the mid-1990s, it subsequently reopened as an historic country inn and as a dynamic learning lab for hospitality students.

Overlooking the town of Elkins, on the Davis and Elkins College campus, Graceland Inn, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, features a two-story great hall richly decorated with hardwoods, such as quartered oak, bird’s eye maple, cherry, and walnut, a grand staircase, a parlor, a library, and its original stained glass windows. The Mingo Room Restaurant, reflecting the mansion’s initial designation and open to the public, is subdivided into four small rooms lined with red oak and fireplaces and an outdoor verandah, and eleven guest rooms, located on the second and third floors and named after prominent family members, contain antiques, canopy beds, armoires, marble bathrooms, and claw foot tubs.

Graceland Inn, the David and Elkins College, the town of Elkins itself, the historic depot and railyard, their tracks, and the Appalachian Mountain’s coal and timber resources are all inextricably tied to the town’s past–and its future.

B. Seneca Rocks

“Seneca Rocks” designates both a region of the Potomac Highlands and the outcroppings after which that region is named.

Resembling a razor back, or shark’s fin, and located at the confluence of the Seneca Creek and the North Fork South Branch Potomac River, the 250-foot-thick, 900-foot-high Seneca Rocks, accessible by West Virginia Route 28, were formed 400 million years ago during the Silurian Period in an extensive sand shoal at the edge of the ancient Iapetus Ocean. As the seas decreased in size, the rock uplifted and folded, erosion ultimately wearing away its upper surface and leaving the arching folds and craggy profile they exhibit today.

Made of white and gray tuscarora quartzite, the formation features both a north and south peak, with a notch separating the two.

The current Seneca Rocks Discovery Center, which replaced the original visitor’s center, features relief models of the area, films, interpretive programs, and a bookshop.

A path leads to the Sites Homestead, part of the center. Constructed in 1839 by William Sites as a single-room log cabin below Seneca Rocks Ridge, it is typical of then-current Appalachian homes whose German Blockbau-style featured square logs and v-notched corner joints spread apart by stone and clay chinks.

In the late-1860s, one of Sites’ sons expanded the homestead, adding a second floor, and, after use as a hay barn, the Forest Service purchased it in 1969, restoring it during the 1980s. In 1993, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

The greater Spruce Knob-Seneca Rocks National Recreation Area, offering significant outdoor sports opportunities, contains a key portion of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, whose mountains and forests collect water which then flows into the Potomac River and the bay itself. Acting as a cleansing and filtering mechanism, its headwater forests purify the water before it reaches the streams. Spruce Knob is both the highest point in the Chesapeake Watershed and the entire state of West Virginia.

Aside from facilitating water, the area has provided sustenance to humans, who first lived in Native American villages within its mountains, and then created farming settlements and logging camps, extracting its resources and supporting life for some 13,000 years. Today, it is home to 15 million people.

The Spruce Knob-Seneca Rocks National Recreation Area itself is part of the much larger Monongahela National Forest. Established in 1920 with an initial 7,200 acres, the present 910,155-acre forest contains the headwaters of the Monongahela, Potomac, Greenbrier, Elk, Tygart, and Gauley Rivers; five federally-designated “wildernesses”-Dolly Sods, Outer Creek, Laurel Fork North, Laurel Fork South, and Cranberry-whose very remote and primitive areas only offer lower-standard trail markings; and four lakes.

A Mecca for outdoor sports enthusiasts, the national forest features 169 hiking, biking, and horseback riding trails which cover more than 800 miles, 576 miles of trout streams, 129 miles of warm-water fishing, 23 campgrounds, 17 picnic areas, and wildlife viewing of black bear, wild turkey, white-tailed deer, gray fox, rabbits, snowshoe hare, grouse, and woodcock.

C. Canaan Valley

Blanketed with bigtooth aspen, balsam fir, and spruce, Canaan Valley, stretching 14 miles, is the highest such valley east of the Mississippi River, its namesake mountain separating it from the Blackwater River and creating a deep, narrow canyon in the Allegheny Plateau.

The pristinely beautiful area encompasses two state parks-Canaan Valley Resort and Black Water Falls State Parks; two ski areas-again Canaan Valley Resort and Timberline Four Seasons Resort; and the nation’s 500th wildlife refuge.

Natural sports abound: hiking, horseback riding, fishing, golfing, swimming, rafting, and interpretive nature walking during the summer, and skiing, snowboarding, and tubing during the winter.

Nucleus of most of this is 6,000-acre Canaan Valley Resort State Park, which encompasses 18 miles of trails, wetlands, open meadows, northern hardwood forests, wildlife, 200 species of birds, and 600 types of wildflowers.

Canaan Valley Resort, located within the park, offers 250 modern guest rooms, 23 two-, three-, and four-bedroom mountain cabins with fireplaces and full kitchens, 34 paved, wooded campsites with full hook-ups, and six lounges and restaurants, including the Hickory Dining Room in the main lodge.

Its 4,280-foot mountain, whose longest run is 1.25 miles and whose vertical drop is 850 feet, features one quad and two triple lifts, and 11 trails for night skiing. Its winter activities, like those of the extended Canaan Valley, include skiing, snowboarding, airboarding, tubing, snowshoeing, and ice skating, while summer programs include scenic chairlift rides, guided walks, golf, tennis, and hiking.

D. Big Mountain Country

Big Mountain County, location of West Virginia’s second-highest peak, serves as the birthplace of eight rivers-the Greenbier, Gauley, Cheat, Cherry, Elk, Williams, Cranberry, and Tygart-while its Seneca State Forest, which borders the former in Pocahontas County, is the state’s oldest. An interesting array of sights include steam-powered logging railroads, astronomical observatories, preserved towns, a premier ski resort, and their associated assortment of outdoor sports and activities.

The Durbin and Greenbier Valley Railroad’s fourth excursion train, the “Durbin Rocket,” departs from the town of Durbin itself, located some 40 miles from Elkins.

Powered by a 55-ton steam engine built for the Moore-Keppel Lumber Company in nearby Randolph County, and one of only three remaining geared Climax logging locomotives, the train makes a two-hour, 11-mile round-trip run along the Greenbier River and through the Monongahela National Forest as far as Piney Island, where the rental “castaway caboose” is disconnected and pushed onto a very short spur track for a one or more night stay.

The ultra-modern, high-tech National Radio Astronomy Observatory, located a short distance away in Green Bank, offers an opportunity to learn about radio wave astronomy.

Designing, building, and operating the world’s most advanced and sophisticated radio telescopes, the observatory produces images of celestial bodies, such as planets, stars, and galaxies, millions of light-years away by recording their radio omission quantities.

The Green Bank Science Center, nucleus of this experience, features a museum which introduces the science of radio astronomy, radio waves, telescope operation, and what is being learned through them about the universe; the Galaxy Gift Shop; the Starlight Café; and the departure point for the escorted bus tour of the facility, prior to which an introductory film and lecture are presented in the theater.

The tour’s highlight is the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT), designed when the previous 300-foot device collapsed in 1988 and Congress was forced to appropriate emergency funds to design it.

Dedicated on August 25, 2000, after a nine-year development period, it is 485 feet tall, is comprised of 2,004 panels, has a 100-by-110 meter diameter, a 2.3 acre surface area, and weighs 17 million pounds. The world’s largest, fully maneuverable telescope with a computer-controlled reflecting surface, it is functionally independent of the sun, permitting 24-hour-per-day operation, and receives wavelengths which vary between 1/8th of an inch to nine feet.

Initially employed in conjunction with the Arecibo Observatory to produce images of Venus, it later detected three new pulsars (spinning neutron stars) in the Messier 62 region.

A 15-minute drive from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory is another significant sight, Cass Scenic Railroad State Park.

Tracing its origins to 1899 when John G. Luke acquired more than 67,000 acres of red spruce in an area which ultimately developed into the town of Cass, it became the headquarters of the West Virginia Pulp and Paper Company. The town, supporting the workforce needed to convert the raw resources into finished products, sprouted shops, services, houses, a sawmill, tracks, and a railroad to haul the timber.

Instrumental to the operation had been the Shay, or similarly-designed Climax and Heisler steam locomotives, whose direct gearing delivered positive control and more even power, allowing them to ply often temporarily-laid tracks, steep grades, and hairpin turns, all the while pulling heavy, freshly-felled timber loads. The Western Maryland #6, at 162 tons, was the last, and heaviest, Shay locomotive ever built. The railroad inaugurated its first service in 1901.

During two 11-hour, six-day-per-week shifts, the town’s mill was able to cut more than 125,000 board feet of lumber per shift and dry 360,000 per run with its 11 miles of steam pipes, adding up to 1.5 million board feet cut per week and 35 million per year. After 40 years of milling at Cass and Spruce, more than two billion board feet of lumber and paper had been produced.

Operating until 1943, the West Virginia Pulp and Paper Company sold the enterprise to the Mower Lumber Company, which maintained it for another 17 years, at which time it was closed and purchased by the state of West Virginia, in 1961.

The railroad and the town of Cass, which remain virtually unchanged, are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Aside from the historic buildings, there are several other attractions. Connected to the large Cass Company Store is the railroad-themed Last Run Restaurant. Turn-of-the-century logging can be gleaned at the Cass Historical Museum. The Shay Railroad Shop, having once housed coal bins, offers additional books and crafts for sale. The metal, Cass Showcase building above it, having stored hay to feed horse teams, features an introductory film and an HO-scale train and town layout reflecting their 1930s appearance.

Escorted walking tours of Cass, usually conducted in the afternoon after the trains have returned from their daily excursions, offer insight into what it had been like to live and work in a turn-of-the-century company town, while the Locomotive Repair Shop tour includes visits to the Mountain State Railroad and Logging Historical Association’s shop, the sawmill area, and a look at Shay and Climax locomotive maintenance and repair.

An excursion on the Cass Scenic Railroad itself, which commenced tourist rides in 1963 and is therefore the longest-running scenic rail journey in the country, is a living history experience. Pulled by one of the original Shay or Climax steam locomotives, the train accommodates passengers in equally authentic logging cars which have been converted to coaches with wooden, bench-like seats and roofs, while a single enclosed car, offering reserved seating, sports booth-like accommodation and is designated “Leatherbark Creek.”

All trains depart from Cass’s reconstructed depot, at a 2,456-foot elevation, climbing Leatherneck Run, negotiating 11-percent grades, maneuvering and reversing through a lower and upper switchback, and arriving at Whittaker Station, which features a snack stand, views of the eastern West Virginia mountains, and a reconstructed, 1946 logging camp. The eight-mile round-trip back to Cass requires two hours.

A four-and-a-half hour, 22-mile round-trip continues up Back Allegheny Mountain, passing Old Spruce and the Oats Creek Water Tank, and plying track laid by the Mower Lumber company, before reaching 4,842-foot Bald Knob, West Virginia’s third-highest peak.

Limited runs are also offered to Spruce, an abandoned logging town on the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River. This train also transits Whittaker Station.

Although not affiliated with the Cass Scenic Railroad, the Boyer Station Restaurant, located six miles from Green Bank on Route 28, offers inexpensive, home-cooked, country-style meals amidst railroad décor with wooden, rail depot-reminiscent tables and benches, train and logging memorabilia, and large-scale, track-mounted model railroads. It is part of a 20-room motel and campground complex.

Winter sports account for a significant portion of the Big Mountain Country’s offerings. Ten miles from Cass Scenic Railroad State Park is Snowshoe Mountain.

Located in the bowl-shaped convergence of Cheat and Back Allegheny Mountain at the head of the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River, the area, striped of trees by logging between 1905 and 1960, had been discovered by Thomas Brigham, a North Carolina dentist, who had previously opened the Beech Mountain and Sugar Mountain Ski Resorts.

Reflecting European style, Snowshoe Village is located on the mountain’s summit and offers 1,400 hotel and condominium rooms, restaurants, shops, services, and entertainment. The 244-acre resort, which combines the Snowshoe and Silver Creek areas, has a 3,348-foot base; a 4,848-foot summit, making it the highest such ski resort in the mid-Atlantic and southeast; 14 chairlifts; 60 runs, of which the longest is 1.5 miles; and 1,500-foot vertical drops at Cupp Run and Shay’s Revenge. Average snowfall is 180 inches. Spring, summer, and fall activities include golf, boating, bicycling, climbing, hiking, horseback riding, canoeing, kayaking, skating, and swimming.

The extended area’s Seneca State Forest, named after the Native Americans who had once roamed the land, borders the Greenbier River in Pocahontas County and contains 23 miles of forest, 11,684 acres of woodlands, a four-acre lake for boating and trout, largemouth bass, and bluegill fishing, hiking tails, pioneer cabins, and rustic campsites.

4. NEW RIVER-GREENBRIER VALLEY

The New River-Greenbrier Valley region of West Virginia is topographically diverse and ruggedly beautiful.

Split by the Gauley River, its northern section is comprised of a rugged plateau in which is nestled the calm, azure Summersville Lake, while mountainous ridgelines, affording extensive interior coal mining, are characteristic of its central region. Horse and cattle grazing is prevalent on the flat farm expanses which intersperse the eastern edge’s lush, green mountain plateau, divided by the Greenbrier River, the largest, untamed water channel in the eastern United States, which flows through it. Its southern region is a jigsaw puzzle of omni-directional ridgelines and very narrow valleys.

New and Bluestone River-formed gorges provide a wealth of rock climbing, canoeing, kayaking, and white water rafting opportunities in this region of the state.

The area’s most prominent, and beautiful, topographical feature is the New River Gorge National River. Flowing from below Bluestone Dam, near Hinton, to the north of the US Highway 19 bridge near Fayetteville, it dissects all the physiographic provinces of the Appalachian Mountains. A rugged, white water river, and among the oldest in North America, it flows northward through steep canyons and geological formations. Approximately 1,000 feet separate its bottom from its adjacent plateau. On July 30, 1998, it was named an American Heritage River, one of 14 waterways so designated.

Its related park encompasses 70,000 acres.

Signature of the New River Gorge National Park is its New River Gorge Bridge. Completed on October 22, 1977 at a $37 million cost, the dual-hinged, steel arch bridge is 3,030 feet long, 69.3 feet wide, and has an 876-foot clearance. Carrying the four lanes of US Route 19, it was then the world’s longest, and is currently the highest vehicular bridge in the Americas and the second highest in the world after the Millau Viaduct in France. Its longest single span, between arches, is 1,700 feet.

There are three related visitor centers and vantage points. The Canyon Rim Visitor Center, located two miles north of Fayetteville on Route 19, offers exhibits, films, interpretive programs, trails, and a scenic overlook, while the Grandview Center is located in Thurmond off of Interstate 64 on Route 25. The park’s headquarters are in Glen Jean.

Fayetteville is the hub for New River Gorge kayaking and white water rafting.

Coal, as synonymous with West Virginia as logging, is an industry the tourist should experience sometime during his visit. The Beckley Exhibition Coal Mine, located in the city of the same name, offers just such an opportunity.

A 1,400-square-foot Company Store, coal museum, fudgery, and gift shop serves as a visitor’s center and threshold to the sight’s two major components. A coal camp, the first of these, depicts 20th-century life in a typical coal town, represented by several relocated and restored buildings.

Plying 1,500 feet of underground passages in the 36-inch, Phillips-Sprague Seam Mine, which had been active between 1883 and 1953, track-guided “man-cars” driven by authentic miners, encompass the complex’s second component and make periodic stops in the cold, damp, and dark passage to discuss and illustrate the advancement of mining techniques. The rock duster, for example, ensured that coal dust would not explode deep in the mine. Strategically positioned roof bolts avoided cave-ins. Pumps extracted water. Dangerously low oxygen levels dictated immediate evacuation.

Coal had fueled the world’s steam engines for industrial plants and rail and sea transportation.

The Phillips-Sprague Mine is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

5. CONCLUSION

West Virginia’s three principle regions of Charleston, the Potomac Highlands, and the New River-Greenbier Valley offer immersive experiences into the past which shaped the present by means of its pristinely beautiful and resource-rich mines and mountains that yielded coal, timber, logging railroads, and an abundance of outdoor sports.

Source by Robert Waldvogel

from RSSUnify feed https://garkomedia.com/2018/11/26/a-tourist-guide-to-west-virginia/

[spyskrapbook]

“309 Regent Street”, Polytechnic of Central London, London [1980] _ Architects: Lyons Israel Ellis Gray.

Forsyth, A.,Gray, D. (eds.) (1988) Lyons Israel Ellis Gray: Buildings and Projects 1932-1983, London: Architectural Association Publications, pp. 210-213.

[onthegoinmco]

DISCLOSURE: I am a member of D23 and passing along some great information in case you wanted to know about the 2018 member gift!

D23: The Official Disney Fan Club was established in 2009 for passionate Disney fans to celebrate their love of the Disney Parks to the legendary Walt Disney Animation Studios with special events, publications, online content, tours, and more.

D23 was established to bring Disney fans closer to the “magic” through one-of-a-kind experiences, special events, unique merchandise offerings, quarterly publications, exclusive online content, and opportunities to meet others who share the same affection for Disney. D23 offers fans an insider look at every corner of Disney, from the parks, animation, television and film to the treasures of the legendary Walt Disney Archives.

There are several levels of D23 memberships, you can find them all here, and every year for those opting to purchase a Gold Membership they offer a special gift.

And just this week D23 has announced that its 2018 Gold Member Gift will center around Mickey Mouse in honor of his upcoming 90th birthday, on November 18, 2018. The D23 Team worked with the Walt Disney Archives to curate this collectible box set of 23 items, and it looks awesome!

2018 D23 Gold Member Gift

D23

1 – Steamboat Willie Original Script Pages (1928) A star is born as Mickey dazzles audiences with antics set to animation’s first synchronized soundtrack. Predating the invention of the storyboard, this illustrated continuity becomes a treasured memento that Walt Disney keeps in his desk.

2 – Mickey Mouse Comic Strip Fan Card (1931) Newspaper “funny pages” bring Mickey into homes, and millions follow his serialized adventures. When Mickey poses for a formal photograph, readers are encouraged to write in to see the finished result… and find tag-along pal Butch making a surprise appearance!

3 – Miniature Cel from Parade of the Award Nominees (1932) Created for one showing at the 1932 Academy Awards dinner, Mickey appears in color for the first time on screen. Comic caricatures of the year’s Oscar nominees process alongside Minnie Mouse, Clarabelle Cow, and Pluto.

4 – Mickey and Minnie Doll—McCall Printed Pattern No. 91 (1932) Huggable Mickey and Minnie toys become a national craze, and when official doll maker Charlotte Clark cannot accommodate the overwhelming demand, Disney authorizes a home-use pattern so mothers can make mice for their eager little ones.

5 – Hyperion Studio “Ickymay Ousmay” Crest (ca. 1933) As the Disney Studio on Hyperion Avenue prospers and expands, a whimsical coat of arms appears on an interior door. With faux formality, a banner device in Pig Latin glorifies the source behind the success: Mickey Mouse!

6 – Carl Laemmle Scrapbook Page Art (ca. 1935) Hollywood pioneer Carl Laemmle’s Universal Pictures once distributed Disney Oswald cartoons and, later, Mickey’s as well. In tribute to Laemmle, Walt sends this historic greeting—likely the only time Mickey and Oswald will “meet” until the lucky rabbit’s 2006 “homecoming.”

7 – Walt Disney Productions Logo (1940s) The new, purpose-built Disney campus in Burbank allows increased productivity and possibilities. This elegant logo art appears on everything from electrical generators and location vehicles to mailroom bicycles and matchbooks.

8 – The Nifty Nineties Animation Drawing (1941) Mickey is not only “taken by surprise” by a coquettish Minnie in this nostalgic cartoon short, but also drawn with enormous appeal by Disney Legend Fred Moore.

9 – Aircraft Worker Insignia Sticker (ca. 1942)  With his wrench and propeller forming a “V” for victory, Mickey represents the “can-do” spirit of the American home front. Ultimately, Disney provides mascot and insignia art, buoying the resolve of thousands serving in military and civilian groups.

10 – “Walt Disney and Staff” Christmas Card (1947)  For Walt’s traditional holiday greeting, artist Hank Porter depicts Mickey as another beloved joy-giver: Santa Claus! Inside, a galaxy of Disney characters toasts the new year, including Mickey’s feature co-stars from Fun and Fancy Free.

11 – Television Prop “Book” (1954) and Portrait Enclosure (1953) In his first weekly television broadcast, Walt Disney not only introduces his innovative theme park concept but pays tribute to the mouse that started it all. Walt’s on-screen scrapbook contains Mickey’s portrait in oil by Disney Legend John Hench.

12 – Television Commercial Model Sheet (1954) For a brief time, Disney creates animated television commercials featuring simplified “modern” stylings of characters designed to read clearly on early TV screens. Artist Tom Oreb is the first to re-think Mickey in these geometric, contemporary terms.

13- The Sorcerer’s Apprentice Record Cover (Disneyland Records, ca. 1957)  Dramatic art by Disney Legend Al Dempster shows Mickey at his magical best, accompanying the original Fantasia recording of Paul Dukas’ classical composition. To make sure young listeners can follow along, clever narration by Sterling Holloway is added.

14 – “Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse Club” Mouseketeers Fan Card (1957) Featuring five themed days, catchy music, educational outreach, and unforgettable headwear, the Mickey Mouse Club is a broadcasting sensation. This card shows its young stars ready for their third season, along with “Mooseketeers” Jimmie Dodd and Roy Williams.

15 – Walt Disney World Mickey Mouse Revue Attraction Poster (1971) Mickey conquers a new medium of animation—as an Audio-Animatronics figure—headlining his own show in the new Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World. Hollywood designers John DeCuir Sr. and David Negron’s dynamic poster has motion in mind (plus a few hidden friends)!

16 – Disneyland Backstage Cast Magazine—Commemorative Issue (Summer 1978) Parodying Norman Rockwell’s famous Saturday Evening Post cover, Charles Boyer’s “Triple Self Portrait” fronts a celebration of both Walt and Mickey, including Mickey’s “own story,” a photo timeline, and a look at the wristwatch that became a generational icon.

17 – “Happy Birthday, Mickey” Button (1978) This jubilant logo honors the 50th anniversary of Mickey’s debut. Inspired by familiar cartoon title card art, legendary Disney animator Ward Kimball sports his pinback throughout a commemorative “whistle stop” train tour and for many years thereafter.

18 – “We Are Doing It” WED/MAPO Poster (ca. 1981) Based on art created for a Library of Congress exhibit, Disney Imagineers use this poster for inspiration as they hurry to build both EPCOT Center and Tokyo Disneyland. The original heading is optimistically overprinted as the projects near completion.

19 – “Oh, What a Merry Christmas Day” Vocal Lead Sheet (1982) After a 30-year absence, Mickey returns to the big screen in Mickey’s Christmas Carol (1983). Disney greets Dickens with this song, by Disney Legend Irwin Kostal (Mary Poppins) and Frederick Searles, seen here in its nascent pre-production form.

20 – Tron Film Print (Hidden Mickey) (1982) Only the sharpest eyes catch Mickey’s image as Flynn and Yori ride a “Solar Sailer” beyond the game grid of Tron. Within the electronic terrain, Mickey is on hand as computer animation makes magic that was unimaginable in the Steamboat Willie days.

21 – Tokyo Disneyland Souvenir Gift Bag (1983) A colorful array of classic attractions beckons visitors to explore the new “Kingdom of Family Dreams” in Japan. Mickey welcomes the world and ushers in an era of international Disney entertainment experiences that extend beyond movie and television screens.

22 – Disney Channel Launch Party Napkin (1983) When Disney inaugurates its premium cable service in April 1983, one of the first images broadcast is a mouse-shaped satellite—“ears” poised to beam entertainment to all. Launch parties celebrate another milestone (and medium) for Mickey.

23 – Shanghai Disneyland Mickey Avenue Seal (2016) Flanked by pals Donald Duck and Goofy, Mickey greets the sunshine of new horizons on Mickey Avenue. The cartoon-themed thoroughfare transports visitors to a “one-reel town” that’s also a gateway to the newest in Disney wonders.

D23

If you aren’t a D23 member? What are you waiting for?

You can find out more about the benefits of joining here.

Follow us for more updates:

The post D23 Announces 2018 Gold Member Gift appeared first on On the Go in MCO.

[pierrematierespace-blog]

Typologies variées de plans carrés ou circulaires. De gauche à droite et du haut en bas : Bertram G. Goohue, Nebraska State Capital, plan, Lincoln, Nebraska / Julian Elliott, plan de la Pilcher House, Zambia / Typical plan of ancient moorish dwelling / Emilio Ambasz, Houston Plaza Center, plan, Houston, Texas, 1982 / Linlithgow Palace, plan, Linlithgow, West Lothian, Scotland, 15Th-17th centuries / Oscar Niemeyer, Maison de la Culture, plan, Le Havre, France, 1972-1982 / Qasr Kharana, Plan / Frank Furness And George Hewitt, Jefferson Medical College Hospital, first floor plan, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania / Hans Hollein, Rauchstrasse, House 8, Plan, Iba Apartment Building, Berlin Germany, 1983 / E. Matveeva, E. Perel’man And L. Dunkin, Design for a sports complex with swimming pool, plan 1983 / Plan for the Margravate Of Azilia, Georgia, 1717 / Edward Durell Stone, North Carolina State Legislative Building, plan, Raleigh, North Carolina, 1960 / Anthony Ernest Pratt, Cluedo Board Game Patent, plan, 1947 / Philip Johnson and John Burgee, General American Life Insurance Company, plan, St. Louis, Missouri, 1977 / J.N.L. Durand And J.-Th. Thibault, plan of temple Decadaire / Le Corbusier, early plan for the Governor’s House, Chandigarh, India, 1952 / Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Boise Cascade Home Office, floor plan, Boise, Idaho / Loro Jongrang Prambanan, plan / James Stirling, low cost housing, floor plan, Basic Four House Clusters, Lima, Peru, 1969 / Mies Van Der Rohe, Sketch For A Concert Hall, Project, 1942 / Sebastiano Serlio, Château D'ancy-Le-Franc, Plan, France, 1544-1550 / Egyptian Labyrinth, Plan / Pyramid Of The Niches, Plan, El Tajin / Johannes Duiker, Open Air School, Plan, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 1930 -1932 / Harry Weese, Village Hall, Floor Plan, Oak Park, Illinois, 1971-1974

___

Pier Luigi Nervi, Sports Palace, Plan, Rome, Italy, 1958-1960 / Plan Of An Etruscan Tumulus / Jacques Molinos, Field Of Rest, Plan, Paris, France, 1799 / John Thorpe, Drawing For A House / The Concentric Stone Circle, Plan, Great Rollright, Oxfordshire, England / Manjak Chief’s House, Plan, Guinea Bissau, 1950 / Laurent Vaudoyer, Design For A Spherical House, 1784 / The Egyptian Hieroglyph For City / The Ambo, Plan Of A Kraal, Namibia / Adolf Loos, Chicago Tribune Tower Competition, Plan Showing Division Of Offices, Chicago, Illinois, 1922 / Restormel Castle, Plan, Lostwithiel, Cornwall, England / Welton Becket & Associates, Capitol Records Building, Plan, Los Angeles, California, 1956 / Orvill H. Sowl, United States Patent 115,577, Design For A Building, Plan, 1938-1939 / Neufforge Cemetery, 1778 / Skidmore, Owings, And Merrill, American Trust Company, Plan, San Francisco, California, 1960  / The Southwick House, Plan, Middletown, Rhode Island / Eduardo Paolozzi, Clock, 1983 / Plan Of The Round City Of Al-Mansur, Baghdad, 766 A.D. / Antoine Petit, Hotel Dieu, Plan, Paris, France, 1774 / Plan Of Zincirli / The Plan Of A Kipsigis House / E. Vincent Harris, The Manchester Central Library, First Floor Plan, Manchester, England, 1930-1934 / S. Minofiev, Circus Building, Plan, Ivanovo, Russia, 1931-1933 / Edwin Lutyens, Lambay Castle, Plan, County Dublin, Ireland, 1905 / Successful Home Plans, Design S 1428

Le tout sur le site : http://archiveofaffinities.tumblr.com/archive

[nhlabornews]

Today in labor history for the week of October 2, 2017

October 02 American Federation of Labor officially endorses campaign for a 6-hour day, 5-day workweek - 1934 Joining with 400,000 coal miners already on strike, 500,000 CIO steel workers close down the nation’s foundries, steel and iron mills, demanding pensions and better wages and working conditions - 1949 Starbucks Workers Union baristas at an outlet in East Grand Rapids, Mich., organized by the Wobblies, win their grievances after the National Labor Relations Board cites the company for labor law violations, including threats against union activists - 2007 (Grievance Guide, 13th edition: This easy-to-use handbook documents patterns in a wide range of commonly grieved areas including discharge and discipline, leaves of absence, promotions, strikes and lockouts, and more. The editors give a complete picture of the precedents and guidelines that arbitrators are using to address grievance cases today.) Union members, progressives and others rally in Washington D.C., under the Banner of One Nation Working Together, demand “good jobs, equal justice, and quality education for all.” Crowd estimates range from tens of thousands to 200,000 - 2010  October 03 The state militia is called in after 164 high school students in Kincaid, Ill., go on strike when the school board buys coal from the scab Peabody Coal Co. - 1932 The Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America is founded in Camden, N.J. It eventually merged with the Int’l Association of Machinists, in 1988 - 1933 Pacific Greyhound Lines bus drivers in seven western states begin what is to become a 3-week strike, eventually settling for a 10.5-percent raise - 1945 The United Packinghouse Workers of America (UPWA) is formed as a self-governing union, an outgrowth of the CIO's Packinghouse Workers Organizing Committee. UPWA merged with the Meatcutters union in 1968, which in turn merged with the Retail Clerks in 1979, forming the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) - 1943 The United Auto Workers calls for a company-wide strike against Ford Motor Co., the first since Ford’s initial contract with the union 20 years earlier - 1961 Folk singer/songwriter Woody Guthrie ("This Land is Your Land", "Union Maid" and hundreds of others) dies of Huntington's disease in New York at the age of 55 - 1967 Baseball umpires strike for recognition of their newly-formed Major League Umpires Association, win after one day - 1970 October 04 Work begins on the carving of Mt. Rushmore, a task 400 craftsmen would eventually complete in 1941.  Despite the dangerous nature of the project, not one worker died - 1927 President Truman orders the U.S. Navy to seize oil refineries, breaking a 20-state post-war strike - 1945 The United Mine Workers of America votes to re-affiliate with the AFL-CIO after years of on-and-off conflict with the federation. In 2009 the union’s leader, Richard Trumka, becomes AFL-CIO President - 1961 Distillery, Wine & Allied Workers Int’l Union merges with United Food & Commercial Workers Int’l Union - 1995 October 05 A strike by set decorators turns into a bloody riot at the gates of Warner Brothers Studios in Burbank, Calif., when scabs try to cross the picket line. The incident is still identified as "Hollywood Black Friday" and "The Battle of Burbank" - 1945 The UAW ends a 3-week strike against Ford Motor Co. when the company agrees to a contract that includes more vacation days and better retirement and unemployment benefits - 1976 Polish Solidarity union founder Lech Walesa wins the Nobel Peace Prize - 1983 Some 2,100 supermarket janitors in California, mostly from Mexico, win a $22.4 million settlement over unpaid overtime. Many said they worked 70 or more hours a week, often seven nights a week from 10 p.m. to 9 a.m. Cleaner Jesus Lopez told the New York Times he only had three days off in five years - 2004 (Mobilizing Against Inequality: Unions, Immigrant Workers, and the Crisis of Capitalism: Are immigrant workers themselves responsible for low wages and shoddy working conditions?  Should unions expend valuable time and energy organizing undocumented workers?  Unions in Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States have taken various approaches to confront the challenges of this significant segment of the workforce.  As U.S. immigration policy is debated, readers will gain insight into how all workers benefit when wages and working conditions for immigrant workers are improved.) October 06 First National Conference of Trade Union Women – 1918 The first “talkie” movie, The Jazz Singer, premiers in New York City.  Within three years, according to the American Federation of Musicians, theater jobs for some 22,000 musicians who accompanied silent movies were lost, while only a few hundred jobs for musicians performing on soundtracks were created by the new technology - 1927 Some 1,700 female flight attendants win 18-year, $37 million suit against United Airlines. They had been fired for getting married - 1986 Thirty-two thousand machinists begin what is to be a successful 69-day strike against the Boeing Co. The eventual settlement brought improvements that averaged an estimated $19,200 in wages and benefits over four years and safeguards against job cutbacks - 1995 October 07 Joe Hill, labor leader and songwriter, born in Gavle, Sweden - 1879 The Structural Building Trades Alliance (SBTA) is founded, becomes the AFL’s Building Trades Dept. five years later. SBTA’s mission: to provide a form to work out jurisdictional conflicts - 1903 Hollywood’s "Battle of the Mirrors." Picketing members of the Conference of Studio Unions disrupted an outdoor shoot by holding up large reflectors that filled camera lenses with blinding sunlight. Members of the competing IATSE union retaliated by using the reflectors to shoot sunlight back across the street. The battle went on all day, writes Tom Sito in Drawing the Line - 1946 October 08 Thirty of the city's 185 firefighters are injured battling the Great Chicago Fire, which burned for three days - 1871 Structural Building Trades Alliance organizes in Indianapolis with goal of eliminating jurisdictional strikes that were seriously disrupting the industry and shoring up the power of international unions over local building trades councils. Conflicts between large and small unions doomed the group and it disbanded six years later - 1902 In Poland, the union Solidarity and all other labor organizations are banned by the government - 1982 Upholsterers' Int’l Union of North America merges with United Steelworkers of America - 1985 —Compiled and edited by David Prosten  

Today in labor history for the week of October 2, 2017 was originally published on NH LABOR NEWS

[soorasaab]

Robert Taylor, whose ideas for using computers as communication devices were considered visionary, and who fostered several major advances that contributed to the development of the Internet and personal computers, died April 13 at his home in Woodside, California. He was 85.

He had Parkinson's disease, said a son, Kurt Taylor.

Taylor was not strictly an inventor, but as a research director at federal agencies and private research centers he had a knack for finding the right people and ideas to make the digital revolution possible. In the 1960s and 1970s, he had a direct effect on the invention of the computer mouse, the personal computer and the Internet itself.

"We have this cult of the inventor," Marc Weber, an Internet historian at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif., said Saturday in an interview. "We don't talk much about the people who make it happen. It's just as rare to have that talent."

Taylor said he had never been recognized in public by anyone outside the computer industry. But from his early days as a research manager at NASA, he had an intuitive sense that computers could be used as communications devices, not merely as high-powered adding machines.

In 1961, Taylor provided funding through NASA to a California researcher, Douglas Engelbart, who invented the computer mouse, which greatly increased the practical applications of computers.

Taylor soon moved to ARPA (now DARPA), a somewhat secretive agency with wide latitude to explore developments in technology. In the mid-1960s, he helped sponsor projects at three computer research centers, two in California and one in Massachusetts.

He had three computer terminals in his office, one for each project, but because they did not have a shared network, they could not communicate with one another.

"It doesn't take much of an imagination to realize this was kind of silly," Taylor told the Salt Lake Tribune in 2009. "You should have only one terminal that can go to any system that's on the network."

In 1968, Taylor and J.C.R. Licklider co-wrote a paper, "The Computer as a Communication Device," that proposed the revolutionary notion that ordinary people would someday communicate directly through their computers.

"In a few years," they wrote, "men will be able to communicate more effectively through a machine than face to face."

They predicted that users would take out subscriptions for information services and would form "communities" in cyberspace. Email and other forms of online interaction "will be as natural an extension of individual work as face-to-face communication is now."

By 1969, researchers under Taylor's guidance had developed ARPAnet, a system recognized as a forerunner of the modern Internet.

Taylor left ARPA in 1969, then spent a year at the University of Utah before moving to California in 1970 to develop a computer science laboratory for Xerox. Mr. Taylor quickly built the Palo Alto Research Center into a premier Silicon Valley think tank.

Asked by a Rolling Stone reporter in 1972 to describe his job, Taylor said, "It's not very sharply defined. You could call me a research planner."

Researchers in his lab built the Alto, one of the first personal computers, along with file-sharing systems and an early word-processing system that allowed users to cut and paste blocks of text. They also invented the first laser printer.

Much to Taylor's frustration, Xerox saw his team's work as largely experimental. Except for making laser printers, the company never became a major player in the computer world. Instead, Steve Jobs was reportedly inspired to develop his first personal computers after visiting the research center in 1979.

Robert William Taylor was born February 10, 1932, in Dallas. He was adopted soon after his birth by a Methodist minister and his wife and grew up throughout Texas.

Taylor served in the Navy during the Korean War, then majored in experimental psychology at the University of Texas at Austin, receiving a bachelor's degree in 1957 and master's degree in 1959.

From 1983 until his retirement in 1996, Taylor directed a research laboratory at Digital Equipment and helped develop AltaVista, an early Internet search engine.

His marriage to Joanne Honnold ended in divorce. Survivors include three sons, Kurt Taylor of Palo Alto, Calif., Erik Taylor of Sunnyvale, Calif., and Derek Taylor of San Jose; and three grandchildren.

In 1999, Taylor was awarded the National Medal of Technology by President Bill Clinton. He had a colleague pick up the medal, saying, "I don't intend to travel outside the Bay Area ever again, if I can avoid it."

At his hillside home overlooking Silicon Valley, he grew tomatoes and kept up with new developments in the online world he helped create.

Taylor had no major patents and said he had no regrets that the discoveries he inspired did not make him wealthy.

"I was able to pick and choose who I worked with for close to 40 years," he told the San Jose Mercury News in 2000. "Who else can say that? That's the kind of life I had. I deliberately avoided the business world, because frankly I didn't want to work with the idiots you have to work with in order to build a successful company."

#SooraSaab #Soora #Facebook #News #Gadgets #Technology #sports #Automobile #blog #youtube #smartphones #top #Tumblr