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orthodoxydaily · 4 years ago

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Saints&Reading: Sun., Nov. 1st, 2020

Commemorated on October 19_Julian calendar

The Holy Prophet Joel ( -800 B.C.)

The Holy Prophet Joel lived 800 years before the Birth of Christ. He made prediction about the desolation of Jerusalem. He likewise prophesied, that upon all flesh would be poured out the Holy Spirit through the Saviour of the world (Joel 2: 28-32). Here is his book

THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET JOEL

Joel is the second of the twelve prophets in the Book of the Twelve in Hebrew Scripture. The Book of the Twelve Prophets was originally on one parchment roll because of the brevity of the text, and together formed one Book of the 24 Books of Hebrew Scripture. These twelve prophets were sometimes named the minor prophets, not because they are of lesser importance, but because their writings are brief. The Twelve include Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. The Book of the Twelve follows the writings of the four Major Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. All together the 16 prophets are called the Latter Prophets, as they began writing after the Division of the United Kingdom of Israel. The Prophets follow the Torah, the five Books of the Law of Moses beginning with Genesis, and preceded the Writings beginning with Psalms and the Wisdom Literature in Hebrew Scripture. The Latter Prophets follow Psalms and the Wisdom books in the Greek Septuagint, as well as our Christian Old Testament of the Bible. Joel - יוֹאֵל - was a prophet in the Southern Kingdom of Judah during the period of the Divided Kingdom (930-722 BC). The Book of Joel is apocalyptic in nature, referring to the "Day of the Lord." Chapters 1-2 refer to a plague of locusts which ravaged Judah at the time. Chapter 2 speaks of God's mercy (2:13-14), and the end reveals a future time of Divine intervention. Chapter 3 relates the Day of Judgement and the salvation of God's children. Cited in literary works such as Dante's Divine Comedy, the "Valley of Jehoshaphat" (3:2 and 3:12) is a symbolic name for the place of the Last Judgement. Jehoshaphat means "Yahweh judges" and may be the Kidron Valley. The most noted passage is Chapter 2:28-32, which is quoted by Peter the Apostle in Acts of the Apostles 2:17-21. Luke the writer sees the Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit, as the fulfillment of the first part of this passage. The following Scripture is from the Authorized King James Version of the Holy Bible, now in the public domain. King James I commissioned a group of Biblical scholars in 1604 to establish an authoritative translation of the Bible from the ancient languages and other translations at the time, and the work was completed in 1611. The original King James Bible included the Apocrypha but in a separate section. A literary masterpiece of the English language, the original King James Bible is still in use today.

THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET JOEL

CHAPTER 1Locusts Invade the Land

1 The word of the LORD that came to Joel the son of Pethuel. 2 Hear this, ye old men, and give ear, all ye inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or even in the days of your fathers? 3 Tell ye your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation. 4 That which the palmerworm hath left hath the locust eaten; and that which the locust hath left hath the cankerworm eaten; and that which the cankerworm hath left hath the caterpiller eaten. 5 Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine; for it is cut off from your mouth. 6 For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion. 7 He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white. 8 Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth. 9 The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the LORD; the priests, the LORD's ministers, mourn. 10 The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. 11 Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen; howl, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is perished. 12 The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men.

Call to Penance

13 Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house of your God. 14 Sanctify ye a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the LORD your God, and cry unto the LORD,

15 Alas for the day! for the day of the LORD is at hand, and as a destruction from the Almighty shall it come.

16 Is not the meat cut off before our eyes, yea, joy and gladness from the house of our God? 17 The seed is rotten under their clods, the garners are laid desolate, the barns are broken down; for the corn is withered. 18 How do the beasts groan! the herds of cattle are perplexed, because they have no pasture; yea, the flocks of sheep are made desolate. 19 O LORD, to thee will I cry: for the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame hath burned all the trees of the field. 20 The beasts of the field cry also unto thee: for the rivers of waters are dried up, and the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness.

CHAPTER 2The Day of the Lord

1 Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand; 2 A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations. 3 A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them. 4 The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run. 5 Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. 6 Before their face the people shall be much pained: all faces shall gather blackness. 7 They shall run like mighty men; they shall climb the wall like men of war; and they shall march every one on his ways, and they shall not break their ranks: 8 Neither shall one thrust another; they shall walk every one in his path: and when they fall upon the sword, they shall not be wounded. 9 They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb up upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief. 10 The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining: 11 And the LORD shall utter his voice before his army: for his camp is very great: for he is strong that executeth his word: for the day of the LORD is great and very terrible; and who can abide it?

12 Therefore also now, saith the LORD, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning: 13 And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the LORD your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.

14 Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing behind him; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the LORD your God? 15 Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: 16 Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children, and those that suck the breasts: let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber, and the bride out of her closet. 17 Let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O LORD, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen should rule over them: wherefore should they say among the people, Where is their God?

Blessings for God's People

18 Then will the LORD be jealous for his land, and pity his people. 19 Yea, the LORD will answer and say unto his people, Behold, I will send you corn, and wine, and oil, and ye shall be satisfied therewith: and I will no more make you a reproach among the heathen: 20 But I will remove far off from you the northern army, and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things. 21 Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice: for the LORD will do great things. 22 Be not afraid, ye beasts of the field: for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the tree beareth her fruit, the fig tree and the vine do yield their strength. 23 Be glad then, ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the LORD your God: for he hath given you the former rain moderately, and he will cause to come down for you the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain in the first month. 24 And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25 And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you. 26 And ye shall eat in plenty, and be satisfied, and praise the name of the LORD your God, that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed. 27 And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the LORD your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed.

28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: 29 And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit. 30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come. 32 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the LORD hath said, and in the remnant whom the LORD shall call.

CHAPTER 3Judgement Upon the Nations

1 For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, 2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land. 3 And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for an harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink. 4 Yea, and what have ye to do with me, O Tyre, and Zidon, and all the coasts of Palestine? will ye render me a recompence? and if ye recompence me, swiftly and speedily will I return your recompence upon your own head; 5 Because ye have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried into your temples my goodly pleasant things: 6 The children also of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians, that ye might remove them far from their border. 7 Behold, I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them, and will return your recompence upon your own head: 8 And I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the children of Judah, and they shall sell them to the Sabeans, to a people far off: for the LORD hath spoken it. 9 Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: 10 Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. 11 Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O LORD. 12 Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. 13 Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. 14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. 15 The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. 16 The LORD also shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the LORD will be the hope of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel.

Salvation for God's Elect

17 So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there shall no strangers pass through her any more. 18 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the LORD, and shall water the valley of Shittim. 19 Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. 20 But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation. 21 For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the LORD dwelleth in Zion.

John 21:1-14

1After these things Jesus showed Himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias, and in this way He showed Himself: 2 Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons ofZebedee, and two others of His disciples were together. 3 Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We are going with you also." They went out and immediately got into the boat, and that night they caught nothing. 4 But when the morning had now come, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5 Then Jesus said to them, "Children, have you any food?" They answered Him, "No." 6 And He said to them, "Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some." So they cast, and now they were not able to draw it in because of the multitude of fish. 7 Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, "It is the Lord!" Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment (for he had removed it), and plunged into the sea. 8 But the other disciples came in the little boat (for they were not far from land, but about two hundred cubits), dragging the net with fish. 9 Then, as soon as they had come to land, they saw a fire of coals there, and fish laid on it, and bread. 10 Jesus said to them, "Bring some of the fish which you have just caught." 11 Simon Peter went up and dragged the net to land, full of large fish, one hundred and fifty-three; and although there were so many, the net was not broken. 12 Jesus said to them, "Come and eat breakfast." Yet none of the disciples dared ask Him, "Who are You?"-knowing that it was the Lord. 13 Jesus then came and took the bread and gave it to them, and likewise the fish. 14 This is now the third time Jesus showed Himself to His disciples after He was raised from the dead.

Galatians 2:16-20

16 knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified. 17 But if, while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is Christ therefore a minister of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I build again those things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. 19For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

#orthodoxy #orthodxchristianity ancientfaith #originofchristianity #holyscripture #gospel #spirituality #wisdom

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howwelldoyouknowyourmoon · 5 years ago

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Sun Myung Moon’s lost Paraguay Eco-Utopia

▲ Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han visited their Puerto Leda mansion only once.

Outside magazine by Monte Reel February 20, 2013

Full story: https://www.outsideonline.com/1913791/sun-myung-moons-lost-eco-utopia

Extracts:

A decade before his death, Sun Myung Moon—multimillionaire founder of the controversial Unification Church / FFWPU—sent a band of followers deep into the wilds of Paraguay, with orders to build the ultimate utopian community and eco-resort. So how’s that working out? Monte Reel machetes his way toward heaven on Earth.

... In addition to overseeing the church, which he said aimed to fulfill Jesus’ unfinished mission by establishing a new “kingdom of heaven on Earth,” Moon managed vast commercial interests and called himself a messiah. He was frequently accused of cult practices, in part because some of his hundreds of thousands of followers turned over very personal decisions—including the choice of marriage partner—to him. More than a decade ago, Moon told some members of his church that he wanted them to lay the foundation for a new Garden of Eden in one of the least hospitable landscapes on the planet—northern Paraguay.

Moon was notorious for attention-grabbing gestures: conducting mass weddings in Madison Square Garden, taking out full-page ads in major American newspapers to support Richard Nixon during Watergate, spending 13 months in federal prison for tax fraud and conspiracy in the early ’80s. But during the final years of his life, his Eden-building project kept chugging along well out of the public eye, germinating largely unseen in this remote wilderness of mud.

In 2000, Moon paid an undisclosed amount for roughly 1.5 million acres of land fronting the Paraguay River. Most of that property was in a town called Puerto Casado, about 100 miles downriver from Puerto Leda. Moon’s subsidiaries wanted the land to open commercial enterprises ranging from logging to fish farming. But a group of Puerto Casado residents launched a bitter legal battle to nullify the deal. While that controversy continued to divide Paraguayans, the Puerto Leda project proceeded under the radar. Moon turned the land over to 14 Japanese men—“national messiahs,” according to church documents, who were instructed to build an “ideal city” where people could live in harmony with nature, as God intended it. Moon declared that the territory represented “the least developed place on earth, and, hence, closest to original creation.”

... The [twentieth] century brought utopian colonies of Australian socialists, Finnish vegetarians, English pacifists, and German Nazis. They all failed.

So how are Moon’s followers—or Moonies, as they don’t like to be called—holding up? Hard to say. I’m aware of two other journalists who’ve seen Puerto Leda. One, a British Catholic missionary, visited after the first colonists arrived and was unable to fathom their motives. Maybe they were smuggling drugs, she insinuated in a church magazine [The Tablet December 16, 2000].

... By the time I boarded the Aquidaban, I’d begun to suspect that the National Messiahs in Puerto Leda might have no clue we were coming.

[It was a three-day journey] aboard this muggy cargo boat [in 2012].

... one man, a portly Paraguayan navy guard in military fatigues, awaits [Toni Greaves and myself] at the end of the gangplank.

“Do you have repellent?” he asks.

My skin is lacquered in a stiff coat of stale sweat and deet. “Lots.”

“Good,” he says. “You’ll see at night. We can’t even talk to each other because of the mosquitoes that fly into our mouths.”

... The building in front of us has a peaked terra-cotta roof, brick-and-stucco walls, expansive glass windows, and no fewer than five remote-controlled Carrier air-conditioning units. At the front door, a dozen pairs of leather slippers wait for us. “Very Japanese,” Greaves observes. We remove our dirty shoes and take our first steps into Reverend Moon’s Victorious Holy Place.

All is silent. Wilson flips a switch, throwing light on what appears to be a dining hall. The large wooden tables, each covered with a plastic tablecloth, could accommodate about 100 people. They are vacant.

... A few hundred yards from the guard station, I spot a sportfishing boat docked at the riverside. It’s big—about 30 feet long, fiberglass, with a prominent cockpit. I ask Mister Date about it.

“Ah yes,” he says. “Reverend Moon designed that boat himself. It was brought here from New Jersey.”

... Apparently, the True Father’s fishing jones was a deciding factor in the placement of Puerto Leda. Moon first visited the Paraguay River on fishing trips in the 1990s, and by decade’s end he was cruising down it and ordering church members to wade along the muddy banks to plant 63 signposts demarcating the land he had decided to buy.

▲ Japanese “National Messiahs” with Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han (The Heavenly True Parents 天地父母님 ) on September 23, 1999.

In 1999, Moon called his most devoted Japanese followers to join him on a 40-day spiritual retreat outside Fuerte Olimpo, about 25 miles south of Puerto Leda. I’d read a brief description of those days on a church website. One Messiah had written: “It was very hot and we wanted to bathe in the water. But we could not because piranhas would come. It’s a big problem! Also there are problems with ants. One National Messiah became very sick from an ant bite. It’s a dangerous place. There are all these problems, but Father just says, ‘Ah, the purity of nature!’”

... In addition to calling for a return to Original Creation here, he told his devotees, in 2000, that “we need to build the best underwater palace in the world.”

... Near the end of their [40-days] together, Moon instructed them to build an ecologically sustainable city that could serve as a model for the whole world. The plan, such as it was, lacked specifics; not all of the founders agreed on what the city should look like. Yet they forged ahead, determined to create something extraordinary in a place where wilderness reigned.

Now, as I glance at the scene, I see huge dormitory buildings, guesthouses, and sheds for mechanical repairs. I count seven freshwater fish farms, fully stocked with pacu, a toothy species that looks like an overgrown piranha. I see no other people.

“Normally, there are about 10 of us who live here,” Mister Date tells me. “But this week six are away in Asunción. So there are just four now.”

We walk through early-morning light on smooth sidewalks, past manicured gardens of hibiscus and bougainvillea, beside an Olympic-size swimming pool. A young man hired from a nearby village slowly sweeps a filtering net through the deep end. Nothing—not a single foreign particle—seems to mar the clean blue rectangle of water. We enter a two-story communal building that resembles an office complex. I see Wilson in a small room, tapping away at a computer. We climb a stone staircase to the second floor, following Mister Date into what appears to be a rec room. There’s a television hooked up to a satellite system, and Mister Date pops a disc into a DVD player. The DVD, Mister Date tells us, explains everything.

The footage that flashes across the screen dates from 1999. We see the founding Messiahs walk across untamed wastes—the grounds where we now sit. They lay bricks in wet mud. They sand metal frames. They wash dishes in the river. They wear heavy clothing, light fires to keep the mosquitoes away, and sweat in the wavy heat. They stagger through gale-force winds.

Then, in a clip from 2000, we see Moon himself, touring the partially cleared grounds, wiping sweat from his brow, eating lunch, leaving in a private plane. The footage segues into scenes of the men working feverishly to build a luxury house for Moon and his wife, Hak Ja Han, who visited for a second and final time in late 2001.

▲ Sun Myung Moon and Hak Ja Han visited Puerto Leda twice, but only once after the mansion they ordered built for themselves was completed. They inaugurated the mansion on November 30, 2000 (above). Takeru Kamiyama is standing close to Moon, wearing a pale blue shirt.

▲ The view from the mansion.

The rest of the DVD covers more recent developments, and the highlights—set to swelling orchestral music—unfold like a training montage from Rocky. Messiahs erect the water tower. Man-made fishponds materialize on the grounds. A landing strip is planed flat by tractors. The Messiahs unload saplings from the Aquidaban, then plant them in sprawling groves. A group of about a dozen visiting Japanese students—the children of Unification Church members—help the Messiahs build a school in a nearby village. When the DVD ends and the lights come up, I’m exhausted just from watching all that drudgery. I look at Mister Date’s corded forearms, his gaunt face, his waspy waist. Every aspect of his being seems molded by toil. Even with the help of the local hires, the Messiahs labor all day, usually outside.

“It’s a lot of work just to maintain,” he admits.

The fact that only 10 men live here comes rushing back to me. The colony has actually lost population since its inception, despite all the construction. Four of the original Messiahs have returned to Japan. Only the hardest of the hardcore have stuck it out.

And this raises a couple of questions: Who are these guys? And why have they put themselves through this?

Mister Auki walks across the dining hall carrying a basket filled with whole fish freshly yanked from the river. He’s a short, balding Messiah whose task this morning, as on most days, is to catch something for the grill.

“I caught lots of piranha today,” he tells the men, his face splitting into a smile. “And also a five-kilogram pacu.”

The pacu is now part of the lunch buffet, which the four Messiahs plus Wilson, Greaves, and I spoon onto plates.

... In the beginning, the colonists hoped they would be joined by their wives (as well as many, many more followers). Every August, they invite children of Japanese church members to visit for a couple of weeks, but so far none have chosen to stay on. “My wife thinks that it is not realistic for her to move here yet,” Mister Owada says, “because we still have to raise the standard of living more.”

When I press him on how tough and lonely this must get, Mister Owada says it doesn’t bother him. Moon sanctified his personal sacrifices, promising the men that spiritual rewards would make up for their suffering. “Even if you die, what regret will you leave behind?” Moon asked the founders in 1999.

“We’re risking our lives for this cause,” Mister Owada says, his left eye twitching convulsively. “I like to risk my life,” he continues. “That is doing something worthwhile. We have continued to stick with this.”

Months later, after Moon’s death from complications from pneumonia, I will once again reach out to Mister Date to see if the True Father’s passing affects the Messiahs’ dedication. It doesn’t. They have the blessing of his widow, Mister Date says, and the ongoing feuds among the Moon children won’t affect them. They plan to work on Puerto Leda for at least another decade.

“Of course there is ecotourism potential here,” says Mister Date. We’re standing outside an unfinished three-story brick building near a shed that protects three car-size generators. Mister Date refers to the brick building as “the hotel,” but for the moment its only occupant is a stick-legged baby goat nosing around the food pellets being stored on the ground floor.

... “Why did you stop work on the hotel?” I ask.

He pauses and smiles politely. “In a small place, you can have disagreements easily,” he says. “They’re expecting us to be financially independent, but that’s not easy here.” The Messiahs, it seems, don’t always see eye-to-eye on the best way to reduce their dependence on member donations. Some want to concentrate on agribusiness and scrap the ecotourism idea. The hotel is unfinished because they aren’t sure whether opening the place to outsiders is a good idea.

▲ Puerto Leda from the air.

We walk on, past planted fields of lemongrass, oranges, mangoes, grapefruit, asparagus, sugarcane. The crops are struggling. If agriculture alone is expected to support the colony, there are some kinks to work out. The men have planted thousands of jatropha trees, which can be used to make biodiesel fuel, but hundreds of parrots zeroed in on them and ate all the fruit. During the most recent wet season, rising waters flooded many of the thousands of neem trees.

“It’s been a hard year,” Mister Date admits. “A lot of things have died because they were three months underwater.”

It’s clear that these guys have faith in miracles, and that’s exactly what’s needed here in Puerto Leda. Without one, the Victorious Holy Place seems destined to be another curious monument to human ambition and folly. But watching how hard the Messiahs work, I can’t help but admire their tenacity. The fanaticism that underlies their devotion to this cause must burn hot, but they hide it well. They’re not evangelical. They’re friendly and welcoming to those who don’t share their beliefs. They’re reflexively humble and generous and—whatever I might think of their motives—admirably tough. They’re underdogs. The kind of guys you root for.

During the last hours of my visit, Mister Date shows me something that might actually work out. “Japanese yams,” he announces, staring down at a plot of tilled soil. “They grow very large underground, up to 10 kilograms. They do well here.”

My immediate impulse is to celebrate this victory with hearty congratulations. I’m thrilled for his indefatigable yams. Maybe all the sweat that Mister Date has sunk into this plot will bear a little fruit. Maybe little victories like this can help other people in the Pantanal live richer lives. Maybe that’s enough.

Mister Date stares down at the dirt. “Unfortunately,” he says, “they taste very bad.”

... I head out toward the pool.

▲ The swimming pool at Puerto Leda.

He’s still there, the man with the net, sweeping as if he hasn’t let up since dawn. A shame: I didn’t bring any trunks. But I do have a pair of heavy cotton cargo shorts in my backpack. I walk to the dormitory and return wearing them. I ask the sweeper, “Does anyone ever use this pool?”

“Only the tourists,” he says.

The tourists? Based on a guest book I flipped through earlier, he must be referring to those Japanese students who visit every August, the occasional Paraguayan government official, and Greaves and me. ...

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Outside magazine https://www.outsideonline.com/

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Monte Reel’s Between Man and Beast: A Tale of Exploration and Evolution was published in March 2013 by Doubleday.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/between-man-and-beast-monte-reel/1113244445#/

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Sun Myung Moon organization activities in Central and South America

Actividades de la Secta Moon en países de habla hispana

FFWPU President of IAPP Prosecuted for Money Laundering and Drug Smuggling in US Court; may be connected to UC / FFWPU Leadership

#Paraguay #Puerto Leda #Moonies #Sun Myung Moon #FFWPU #Family Federation for World Peace and Unification #Unification Church #天地父母님

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northernriverslawnmowing-blog · 5 years ago

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Shower Love on Your Lawn by Hiring Professionals

Lawns and gardens are something that everyone admires. No matter where you live, a clean and beautifully cut lawn will surely become a spot of attraction. Along with being an imaginative landscape, lawn also increases the overall value of any property or place. However, with great things comes great responsibility. This saying fits correctly in case of maintaining a lawn, as it requires proper care at frequent intervals. The Internet is flooded with DIYs and tutorial that tells us how to create a beautiful and well-maintained lawn. Well, these tips and DIYs can be helpful, but you simply cannot waste your weekend with mowing and edging your lawn. Moreover, the equipment and tools used in the tutorials are not always available, due to which you cannot produce a great lawn. So, why don’t you call professionals for lawn mowing Ballina service instead? Regardless of the fact that you want to increase the value of home, or you are willing to attract buyers towards your property, or you just want a beautiful lawn to spend time with your family, lawn mowing professionals are there to help. Shower your lawn with the love that it deserves by getting in touch with the professionals. Lawn mowing professionals know that maintaining a lawn is a daunting chore, thus they take the burden off of your back. There is a list of good reasons to upgrade your lawn, so put down the weed wacker and let the professionals craft a beautiful piece of art out of your forest like lawn. If you don’t want to waste your weekend in mowing your lawn, contact Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing. It is a well-known Australia-based company that provides the best lawn mowing Lismore services so that you can peacefully watch the clouds roll by on your freshly mowed lawn. The professionals of Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing believe that nothing can beat the smell of freshly cut grass; therefore they provide the expert service of: Lawn Edging A beautifully designed lawn takes a lot of time and energy. The professionals of Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing provide quality edging service that will truly surprise you. Lawn Weed Control Do you want to get rid of the army of horrible weeds? Do not worry; you have got Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing by your side. Their professionals use natural and family-friendly pesticides to remove the weeds from your beautiful lawn. Besides this, Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing also provides various other lawn mowing services Ballina like lawn fertilizing, garden maintenance, lawn aeration and residential & acreage mowing. Call the professional lawn mowing service of Northern Rivers Lawn Mowing to increase the value of your property. For more details, visit https://www.northernriverslawnmowing.com.au Original Reference: http://bit.ly/2zbjSZe

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cameronf24 · 6 years ago

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Nuts About Pecans? – Then Grow Your Own

These days it seems everyone is talking about – and eating – nuts. The peanut – not a nut at all, but a type of bean – is of course central to American culture, but today it is the true nuts that everyone is eating. Taking care of our hearts is a big concern, and many nuts contain monounsaturated fats and antioxidants, both substances that improve cholesterol levels, so many doctors are suggesting eating nuts every Some are better than others, and pecans are at the top of the list. They also contain substances that reduce inflammation, something that seems to be at the root of many diseases, as well as boosting our immunity and perhaps even reducing the risk of some cancers. On top of all this, of course, they simply taste great, and the pecan is one of the most versatile nuts, working well in both savory and sweet dishes.

The biggest thing that probably reduces many people’s nut eating is price – and pecans are often at the top of the list for that too. So if you knew that you could have your own supply of pecans, for the trouble of picking them up off the ground, and add a beautiful shade tree to your garden at the same time, wouldn’t that seem like a great idea? Well you can – simply plant a pecan tree in your yard and sit back.

The pecan has the distinction of being America’s only native nut tree, and a big favorite of Native Americans long before the first Europeans arrived. The word ‘pecan’ is from the Algonquin language, meaning a nut that needs a stone to crack it. The tree, known to botanists as Carya illinoinensis, and a relative of both hickory and walnut, grew wild all the way from Illinois to Mexico, all along the rivers that cross the country, such as the Mississippi, because pecans like deep, moist soil. This also made them easy to harvest, and for Native Americans they were a big part of the fall food supply. When the first settlers arrived, they too found these new nuts a tempting food, and the first trees were planted in the 1770s. Both Washington and Jefferson had pecans in their gardens, but it was in the south that pecans became a big part of the economy. Harvested from wild trees, or from planted orchards, New Orleans became the center of the pecan trade, which in some parts even rivaled cotton for economic value.

The Pecan Tree

The pecan is a stately shade tree, and fast-growing too. A ten-year-old tree from seed is already 15 feet tall, and in time – a long time! – trees can pass 100 feet in height, be 50 feet or more across, and with a trunk 6 feet thick. So when you plant one, make sure there is room for it to mature, as all that growth and time will be wasted if it has to be removed because the space is too small. The tree has deeply-furrowed rugged bark, and the large leaves – up to 18 inches long, don’t look so large because they are divided up into about 15 leaflets, each up to 5 inches long.

At this point you are probably thinking you will need to be a monkey to harvest your nuts, but no, nothing could be easier, because the tree delivers them to you. When ripe the nuts fall to the ground, and all you have to do is pick them up. That is even easier than harvesting an apple. The most widely grown type of pecan is the southern native form, which has a thinner shell. You will know your new tree is going to have its first harvest when you see, hanging from the branches in spring, clusters of long, green structures called catkins. The wind will pollinate them, and later you will see the first small, green nuts developing. It will soon be time to start making that pastry for pecan pie!

Because the native tree grows over such a wide range, there are local varieties for both the north and the south. Choose one that fits your area for best results. In particular, in northern areas it is important to plant a tree that will ripen in a shorter time, so that you can grow a good crop.

Growing Pecan Trees

There is not much to say on this topic, since the main thing is to simply plant one or two and wait a while. Pecans grow best in areas with 200 days or more between the last spring frost, and the first one in fall, to allow time for ripening. They also prefer deep, moist soil, although they will grow in most good garden soils. The thrive in the long hot and humid summers of the south, and don’t grow so well in dry areas, especially on thin, sandy soils. Plant in sun, and choose a high spot, not a low-lying one, where a late frost can damage the catkins. The tree grows quickly, and you will soon be looking at your first harvest. Trees in poorer conditions may only produce a crop every second year, but still, it will be a bumper harvest, so worth waiting for.

Harvesting and Storing Pecans

For short-term use, you can simply shell your nuts and store the kernels in a plastic bag in the fridge, but for long-term storage the nuts should be left in the shell. When they fall to the ground there is still too much moisture inside them for storage, so they should be spread out in the sun, or in a warm, dry room, for 3 to 4 weeks, to dry thoroughly. The nuts can then be stored for up to a year in burlap of cloth bags – not plastic. Alternatively, store them in a freezer, especially if you are not sure if they are completely dry.

Time to Plant a Pecan Tree

Even if your conditions are not ideal, and you don’t particularly need a big crop of nuts, the pecan tree is such a handsome shade tree that it deserves a place in any larger garden. Its beautiful divided leaves, which turn golden in fall, cast a dappled shade, and the graceful form of the tree looks beautiful against the sky. Even in winter the sturdy branches have appeal, and this bold native tree deserves to be planted more often, for nuts or just for beauty.

Nuts About Pecans? – Then Grow Your Own posted first on https://www.thetreecenter.com

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elsielewi5 · 6 years ago

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Nuts About Pecans? – Then Grow Your Own

The Pecan Tree

Growing Pecan Trees

Harvesting and Storing Pecans

Time to Plant a Pecan Tree

Nuts About Pecans? – Then Grow Your Own published first on https://www.thetreecenter.com

#The Tree Center

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philipbrideaux · 7 years ago

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The Carboniferous Counties: The Brideauxs in Wales, Part One

Francis Philip Brideaux (son of Francois Brideaux and Mary Hamon, grandson of Thomas Brideaux and Ester Lempriere) married Mabel Guillou in St. Helier, Jersey, not long after the turn of the 1900s. At the time, they could not have imagined that their union would result in an enormous family dynasty centered in the Rhymney Valley of South Wales.

Francis Philip’s family were living at 4 Belmont Gardens, in St. Helier, when the Germans invaded Jersey and began their five-year occupation in World War Two. The family did not seem especially content with that, because two of the Brideaux sons, Dennis and Ronald, were imprisoned on different occasions for not playing along. Ronald was given five days in prison in October 1943 for “failing to appear at work without sufficient grounds.” In March, 1944, Dennis was imprisoned for three months by the occupiers for “offering resistance.”

One member of the family, however, had left the island by the time of the Occupation. Francis Philip’s son, Frank (1912-1966), settled abroad, in Wales, where he worked in the coal mining industry. There, he met and married Adele Matilda Meyrick (1914-1999). Together they had five sons and four daughters, all of whom went on to have families of their own, who in turn now have families of their own. Many of the clan have stayed in the Rhymney Valley, settling mainly in and near the towns of Maesycwmmer and Caerphilly, in some cases within a few doors of each other.

Most of the valley falls within the historic counties of Glamorgan and Monmouthshire (now largely Caerphilly County Borough). The Rhymney Valley itself is part of The Valleys, a series of valleys in South Wales fanning from Carmarthen in the west to modern Monmouthshire in the east, and from just below the Brecon Beacons in the north to the coastal plains of the Bristol Channel and Severn Estuary in the south. The Heads of the Valleys Road —the A465 — joins the northern ends of the South Wales Valleys, running westwards below the Brecon Beacons before curving down southwest towards Neath, near Swansea (where more Brideauxs live).

The Valleys are the heart of mining and mining heritage in Wales. They are a part of the great South Wales Coalfield, which was extensively developed from the late 1800s. The population rapidly increased as collieries spread throughout the valleys, with settlements terracing up their sides. Coal went back down the valleys by train to the shipping ports at Cardiff, Newport, Swansea and others. The waste rock from which the coal was extracted went mostly to the hilltops to form coal tips (spoil tips). As my Arriva train from Cardiff Central Station winds its way up the Rhymney Valley, I can see the remains of the tips on the tops of some hills. The valley is dramatic, curvy, and lush, and the line follows the west side of the valley.

My rail stop is Hengoed, on the west side of the Rhymney River. On the east side is my destination, Maesycwmmer, where Frank Brideaux first settled. The Hengoed rail station lies in the shadow of an impressively tall, stone railway viaduct named (depending on which side of the river you live) the Maesycwmmer Viaduct. I can’t help but notice it as we pull into the station. Built over 150 years ago, the viaduct once supported a coal-ferrying railway, but is now part of a regional cycling path network.

I disembark from the train to be greeted by Frank Brideaux’s third daughter, Janet, who is married to Owen. Janet has been my main contact since discovering the Welsh Brideauxs and, like me, is researching the Brideaux ancestral history. Their home is on the eastern side of the valley with a beautiful view south, back in the direction of Llanbradach and Caerphilly.

Janet has taken the time and trouble to round up most of the clan, who are all waiting in the Maesycwmmer Inn for me to meet. When we enter, it takes me a few moments to realize that every single table in the pub, except for one, is packed with Brideauxs. There are children running about, and infants being held in laps. All the adults have a pint. My short term memory is quickly overwhelmed as I’m introduced to Brideaux after Brideaux. Somewhere in the handshakes, I am introduced to Philip Brideaux, and for the first time in my life, I realize that I am not, in fact, the only Philip Brideaux alive. Not surprisingly, this leads to a photo of the two of us together, and I’m amazed to compare us: a bespectacled writer from Calgary, Canada, next to a hard-working coal miner from Maesycwmmer, Wales.

One of the few open chairs I can find puts me in front of Maurice “Banjo” Brideaux. Maurice is one of the family’s elders, born in 1947 in Maesycwmmer, where he has lived most of his life.

As we talk, I have to concentrate hard over the noise of the pub to understand his Welsh accent, particularly with Welsh place names. I can only guess how “American” my Western Canadian accent must sound by comparison.

“I got eight grandchildren, and two great granddaughters, they’re the two little ‘uns running around by you now,” he says. “When I first left school I started as a grocery boy for the cooperative, riding a push-bike delivering groceries. And then working on the buildings. From there then I went to work in steelworks. And then my cousin got me a job on the Gas Board. I stayed there then for twenty-two years. And I retired then when I was just over 45.”

Maurice’s retirement reminds me of Charles Brideaux’s in Sault Ste. Marie, who bought a pool with his retirement pension. “I had a lump sum then. Bought myself a car, passed my test, and never looked back,” says Maurice. “And I got a static caravan up in Tenby, where we go every year like. So we spend most of the time up there like, back and forth like.”

One of Maurice’s best memories is attending the Rolling Stones’ first concert ever in Cardiff, on September 11, 1964 at the Sophia Gardens Pavilion (which no longer exists). “We got down there, and they didn’t come on ‘til late. They was late comin on. So we missed the last train home. And we had to walk home from Cardiff then.” According to Google, this is apparently about a four-and-a-half hour walk. (“Oh aye, it was to the top of the mountain. Fair old way.”)

Maurice also had a penchant for dressing up as different characters, particularly around Christmas. “I’d dress up as somebody or other, dressed up as Boy George, or quite a few different people like, you know. One year I was dressed up as Wonder Woman. Well, I dress up as her, with a pair of shorts on, a little boob top, I had a pair of wellingtons, I painted them red, all glitter over them. And then, when I walked in, I had this tiara on and a wig. I walked in, and my son was playing a disco tune, he put Wonder Women on, and when that come on, I jumped out. And what I had done, I had a pair of rubber gloves, I’d blow them out and I had the fingers sticking out over the top.”

Sitting next to Maurice is one of his younger brothers, Peter Brideaux. As we introduce each other, Peter slips a small gift into my hand. It’s a lapel pin, depicting two crossed flags, that of Canada and of Wales. I think it’s a wonderful gift and immediately pin it to my coat. As Peter explains, it’s symbolic of the meeting of Brideauxs from either side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Peter is married to Helen, with a son, and a daughter and three grandsons. Like Maurice, Peter has lived in the valley all his life. When Frank Brideaux passed away, Peter was only 14. Out of economic necessity, he finished his schooling shortly afterward at the local secondary modern school and went straight into the building industry, based on experience he’d built up through a family friend driving construction vehicles. “I was basically told that I had to finish education as soon as I can, to come out and get a job and earn money, fetch money into the house, and that’s the way it was then, you know?” Without his father’s income, the family needed his help.

“I did have a job set up right there for me before I left school, so it wasn’t a big disappointment, I mean, but I really wanted to stay in school and do my exams, to come out there with some sort of qualification. But as it was, I left school at 15, and without any qualifications whatsoever, but 50 years later I managed to make a living for myself, and I’ve built a family, so I wouldn’t change anything now.”

Until he was 16, he could only drive the construction vehicles on building sites, and be ferried between sites by other crew members. When he was 16, he was able to drive himself and bought a motor scooter.

“I drive all types of machines, both wheeled machines and tracked machines. JCBs, Caterpillars, Komatsus, Kubotas, there’s all different makes. Hitachi machines, there’s loads and loads of them but they’re all basically the same to drive. It’s like jumping into different cars. It’s just a matter of sorting out where the controls are, you know. Different buttons and switches but all the controls are exactly the same on everything so if you can drive one, you can drive them all.” Dozers, graders, backhoes, crawlers… “Yeah, I can drive most things. I learned to drive them all basically, over the years. I’ve had 50 years driving them so there’s not a lot that I’ve come across that I can’t drive.”

Peter worked for his first company for over 12 years before layoffs sent him to another company for another year. His third job was driving machines around on the surface of the coal pits. “I’d be picking up coal with a machine and putting it on the conveyer belt, and feeding it into the washery. And the coal would go into a washery where it was washed and all the muck removed from it. Then the washed coal was loaded into a railway wagon and sent down to the local coal fired power station, which is still operating at the moment in Aberthaw, not far from Cardiff Airport. So, eight-and-a-half years there with that company, and then five-and-a-half years, with a local company from Caerphilly. And that was just going around to all the local building sites then, driving a JCB backhoe. But the company I’m with now, might’ve been 22 years.”

Being a licensed machine operator came in handy beyond the day job. In the early 1970s, Peter lived in Tirphil, further north up the valley, shortly after getting married. Early one morning, vandals jumped on a large 360 track machine, in a construction site across the street, and managed to start it up and put it in gear. Then they bailed out and fled, letting the machine run out of control.

“They were building a school opposite us. So, even in bed, me and the wife, we could hear this machine starting up, and I could hear this crashing going on. It smashed through the scaffolding, and out onto the road, and it was headed to our block of flats. So I jumped out of bed — I only had a pair of boxer shorts on — ran down the stairs, across the road, and into the machine. I stopped it just as it was comin’ out onto the road. If it was anybody else it would’ve come into the flats because there was nobody to stop it. The police come there, obviously. So the next morning, I had to phone work and tell them that I couldn’t get to work, because the police are coming to my flat to interview me, and the boss wasn’t very happy because I took the day off.”

* * *

In the morning, Janet and Owen take me out on a tour of the region, starting with an attempt to find a route to a coal tip I’ve spotted across the valley. We don’t manage to find a route up and in, but it’s still a great opportunity to get a sense of the valley and its terraced coal mining villages, including a stop at the Welsh National Mining Memorial and Universal Colliery Memorial Garden in Senghenydd. Young students from the local primary schools in the Aber Valley helped make countless ceramic name tiles making up the memorial. They are the names of men and boys who lost their lives in the many accidents and disasters in the collieries. Senghenydd is also the site of Britain’s worst coal mining accident, in which an explosion underground at the Universal Colliery killed well over 400 miners on October 14, 1913.

The coal tip I want to see is one of many in the valleys. The towering piles of black waste rock have extended the summits of hills, giving the grassy mounts dark, rocky peaks. Some of the older tips are a dirty olive from being grassed over. Over the years, many of the tips have been slowly, methodically removed, truckload by truckload, but swaths of the landscape of the South Wales Valleys has nonetheless been irrevocably shaped and transformed by coal mining. One of the more stunning examples of this is the view across the valley at the Big Pit National Coal Museum at Blaenavon, where Janet and Owen next take me.

The area around Blaenavon, including Big Pit, is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and Big Pit has remained open and accessible as a museum. Janet stays behind while Owen and I put on miner’s helmets with lamps and batteries, as well as emergency rebreathers around our waists, before being taken down into the mine from by a tour guide — who once worked Big Pit himself before its closure in as an operational mine in 1980.

We start by riding 300 feet down the mineshaft from the pit head in a large elevator. The air cools as we descend, and we emerge into a dark tunnel with old, thick, heavy wooden beams holding it up. Our helmet lamps provide light to see the way, bouncing and reflecting off wet stone walls with crystallized mineral stalactites. Water burbles in the dank silence through gutters running on either side of the tunnel. There are very few sources of electricity down here. Gas seepage from lower rock strata, deep below, and its possible buildup in mines (especially disused mines), has always been a serious threat to miners: the silent poison of carbon monoxide, the devastating volatility of methane and hydrogen (known as firedamp), or even the ability of coaldust to ignite explosively. Anything that contains a battery, or that could spark, must be taken off and turned over to pit head staff for safekeeping: watches, cellphones, penlights, matches, lighters, and so on. Tour guides carry gas monitors, and there are telephone stations at various positions.

In fact, it was firedamp and an electrical spark from signalling equipment that possibly caused the Universal Colliery explosion at Senghenydd. Any coal dust present (which was the cause of a previous explosion in the very same mine) would have exacerbated the explosion. Of the hundreds of miners who survived the initial explosion but were trapped, many or most died from asphyxiation by afterdamp, the mixture of poisonous gases remaining after all the oxygen is consumed by a firedamp explosion. Resulting fires blocked rescuers from reaching whomever might be still alive, and days passed before a recovery operation could begin.

The tunnel runs at a downward angle, turning back on itself in the opposite direction and going deeper. For large stretches we must stoop low as we walk to avoid banging our headlamps against the roof. In one passage, we turn off our headlamps to get a sense firsthand of absolute darkness. Miners trapped underground in an accident might have to await rescue in this absolute darkness for days.

Our guide shows us a series of empty stables, made of whitewashed stone and brick, where the mine’s pit ponies (or colliery horses) were housed in the 1800s through to the mid 1900s. The ponies spent most of the year underground in the dark tunnels, ferrying coal to the pit head, but were brought up once a year into the sunlight on “holidays.”

Pit ponies were eventually replaced with rail cars and conveyer belts. Our guide shows us the trestles for the conveyer belt at Big Pit, explaining how the quicker way out of the mine at the end of the day was to lie down on the conveyer instead of walking for hundreds of metres. This, of course, was not at all safe or sanctioned, and not only just because a miner had to know when to roll off the conveyer to avoid being entrapped in machinery.

Once back at the surface we rejoin Janet, and we tour the pithead baths building which has been converted to a cafeteria. The baths building was built around 1939 after growing social activism in coal mining communities was successful in convincing mining companies to provide facilities for miners to clean up at the end of the shift. That’s because coal dust and the underground environment left miners dirty beyond dirty. And combined with damp clothing, it caused health problems, including pneumonia and lung disease.

“Before the baths, the miners would go home to their families black with coal dust,” explains Janet. “In the villages, the wives would pull large tubs of hot water into the middle of the kitchen and get the bath ready for their husband before he came home every working day. The water would be black when he was done washing.” The pit baths relieved the burden on families and helped control coal dust in their homes.

From the Big Pit site, Janet and Owen take me to a beautiful lookout along B4246 above the Usk Valley, where Torfaen County meets Monmouthsire.

We then turn westward onto the Heads of the Valleys Road before taking the A470 north into the Brecon Beacons. Brecon Beacons National Park is large, and we only have time to drive through its centre. I’ve wanted to see the Beacons for a long time. The Beacons are very old, and most of the formations are a more visible example of a great swath of ancient sedimentary deposits, mostly red sandstone, found across the North Atlantic, that date back over 400 million years. The Beacons look like mountains, but they are, in part, large chunks of these red sandstone sedimentary deposits. These are sediments which came from the erosion of the mountains of the Caledonian Orogeny, during an impossibly ancient time in Earth’s history when life on land was only just beginning to flourish with any significance. The remains of the Caledonian mountain chains can be seen from the Northeastern United States, to Scotland and Norway, among other Nordic regions. The Beacons took their present shape when rivers, ice sheets and erosion from several cycles of glaciation cut through and carved them out over the past 2 million years.

About 100 million years or more after the rise of the Caledonian mountains, the region around South Wales was part of a different continent, and even at a different latitude much further south. What would become the Brecon Beacons was beginning to build from the outwash of the eroding Caledonian Mountains to the north. What are now the South Wales Valleys were then part of a shallow sea, which eventually filled with eroded sediment from the newer, eroding Variscan mountain chains to the south, and resulted in tropical swampland. The swampland became part of a vast band of tropical swamps and forests cutting across this ancient continent sitting astride the Earth’s equatorial region. The continent was Laurussia, and the period was the Carboniferous. Across the millennia and countless dry-wet cycles of the Carboniferous Period, the remnants of successive swamps and forests were lain down over the previous, until the crushing layers of sediment and peat baked and carbonified, forming vast pockets, or seams, of coal. Several hundred million more years passed as Laurussia became part of the Pangaean supercontinent. The region drifted into the northern hemisphere as Pangaea broke apart in all directions. At the dawn of the Anthropocene Epoch, humans discovered the surviving network of coal seams that had once been tropical swampland — the South Wales Coalfield.

* * *

The need for change in the pits of not only Wales, but all of Great Britain, spurred Prime Minister Clement Atlee’s Labour government to nationalize the coal mining industry following the Second World War. The National Coal Board was formed in 1947 to run the industry. By the early 1980s, the National Coal Board’s subsidies could not keep up with operating losses, the coal industry was in retraction, and cheaper coal from Europe was undercutting the board’s prices. Shifting government policy and pressures on the National Coal Board led to pit closures and layoffs.

The National Union of Mineworkers increasingly faced off against Margaret Thatcher’s neoconservative government. The union had staged a major strike in 1972 and again in 1974 in response to Edward Heath’s policies on miners’ wages. In 1984 the union’s leader, Arthur Scargill, decided that a major industrial action was again necessary in response to Thatcher’s pit closures and subsidy reductions.

In the middle of the resulting industrial action was Philip Albert Brideaux...

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