Wednesday, January 16, 2008

THE MCKINLEY CRUISER

I have been collecting postcards that depict battleships, cruisers, and destroyers built prior to 1920 in all navies. It took a while, but I finally obtained cards with photographs of each of the battleships that were commissioned in the U.S. Navy. After that, I started to search for postcards that depict Navy cruisers.

On one of these searches, I located a card depicting the Warship “McKinley” at anchor in Whalom Park, near Fitchburg, Massachusetts. A close look at the card reveals that the “warship” is really just a big model. Although it resembles a cruiser of the ‘great white fleet,’ it has no guns.


The pseudo-warship puzzled me, so I decided to see what I could find out at the Fitchburg, Massachusetts web page and other sources. The Fitchburg Historical Society has a photograph of the cruiser proceeding from the upper common. I also found an archived article in the New York Times of October 29, 1896, that provided some more details about the cruiser.

The “McKinley Cruiser” was built in Fitchburg in 1896, for use in the Republican presidential campaign of that year. It was made from a flat construction car of the Fitchburg and Leominster Street Railway Company, and transported on streetcar trucks. The cruiser was forty feet long and carried four guns in sponsons, two turrets on the deck, boats, an anchor, and other fittings. It carried a 125-man crew composed primarily of members of the Fitchburg Athletic Club and prominent young Republicans from Fitchburg and vicinity. There were two companies of sailors in full uniform carrying oars with torches, a company of engineers carrying the sailing light colors, a company of marines with torch guns, and a drum corps of twenty men. The crew was led by a captain, a lieutenant commander acting as executive officer, a full staff of lieutenants and ensigns, a chief engineer, and marine officers.




The cruiser took part in torchlight processions in Fitchburg, Leominster, Lancaster, Clinton and other towns. The McKinley supporters even attempted to take the cruiser to Boston and then to Salem for a parade. The plan was thwarted when the West End Street Railway Company refused to handle the cruiser, claiming that the company had no legal right to transport the car, and expressing concerns about liability in case of an accident.

After the campaign, the McKinley cruiser was placed in Whalom Lake. Since it was not seaworthy, it could not be floated, and was not at the shoreline. It was installed on top of pilings, similar to an offshore oil rig, but with its hull partially submerged so as to appear to be floating. It was placed far enough out in the lake that the various steam launches (Naiad, Margaret, and others) used by the park to carry passengers on scenic lake tours would pass between it and the shoreline. Strings of electric lights were strung upon it, and it was illuminated at night.



On July 4 of 1908, the cruiser was set afire by pranksters. It burned down to the water line, leaving a platform almost flush with the water’s surface. Almost immediately after the fire, plans were made and executed to replace it. A floating replica was made and put into the lake, apparently during 1908. There are some subtle differences between the original and the replica in appearance. The first picture in this posting shows the replica; the others, I believe are all of the original cruiser.



Unfortunately, the replica fell into disrepair. It sank in either 1915 or 1922, and was never replaced. Visitors to Whalom Lake today, I am told, can see the cruiser lying on the bottom of the lake. If we could re-float it, the McKinley Cruiser would probably be the largest McKinley campaign item of all.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Philosophy--It's questions, not answers.

I have decided to find my own “inner peace.” I’m toying with the concept of meditation, and I have also started trying to see “the big picture” through an informal study of philosophy.

I began to read The Secret, just because it was on the best-seller list, but it turned out to be full of B.S. It’s folly, of course, to expect to find a “secret answer” to life’s conundrum in a single book by a babe who’s after a buck. I have to learn to ask the right questions in order to pursue meaningful answers.

I found a great “starter” book that is helping me to do just that: Why Is There Something, Rather than Nothing? 23 Questions from Great Philosophers, by Leszek Kolakowski. In about 200 pages I am sampling ideas of the big thinkers from Socrates to Nietzsche. It’s available on Amazon.

Friday, January 4, 2008

Silver Apples of the Moon--Irish Classical Music

A few months ago, while riding in my car, I heard a Suite for Strings, by Joan Trimble, on the local classical music radio station. The suite, based on traditional Irish melodies, was delightful. The announcer stated that it was on a CD entitled Silver Apples of the Moon. If you like the folk music-inspired compositions of Ralph Vaughn Williams and Gustav Holst, you will find this recording truly enjoyable.

On this CD, the Irish Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Fionnualla Hunt plays:
  1. Meath Pastoral, by Arthur Duff
  2. Mac Ananty's Reel, by John Larchet
  3. The Dirge of Ossian , by John Larchet
  4. O'Carolan Suite in Baroque Style, by Thomas C. Kelly
  5. Suite for Strings, by Joan Trimble
  6. Irish Suite for Strings, by Arthur Duff
  7. Elizabeth MacDermott Roe, by Aloys Fleischmann
  8. Three Pieces for Strings, by Thomas C. Kelly
I searched for the CD on Amazon.com. There is another CD with the same title, containing electronic music by Morton Subotnik, but I already own that one.

I found only 3 copies of the Irish Chamber Orchestra audio CD, released as Black Box Classics, BBM1003, ranging in price from (can you believe it?) $80.00 to $120.00. Apparently it is out of print. My pocket book cannot stand the $80.00+ price, so I did some more research on the recording.
I learned that the Irish Chamber Orchestra has its own web page.  Since I first wrote this post, they changed their URL: (http://www.irishchamberorchestra.com/).  However, when you click on the Order CD tab,Silver Apples of the Moon is not among the currently available CDs.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Happiness Is An Audience

If happiness is having an audience, I am happier today. Some new guests visited my other blog, Bullmoose Journal. Not only that, they posted comments.

The entries that seem to have caught attention are the one in which I challenge the concept of the "fair tax," and the one in which I dispute the existence of a consensus on global warming.

Everyone is quick to form opinions on those subjects, yet few people have a formal education in the underlying sciences, or even a solid informal understanding of those sciences.

Before anyone can tackle concepts such as global warming and fair taxation, he needs to understand more fundamental concepts such as supply and demand, cause and effect, and the difference between climate and weather. Most people don't have a clue. They cannot distinguish between sound science and faulty.

The politicians and the media take advantage of this ignorance by inundating the public with (often irrelevant) statistics and (usually convoluted) mathematics.

People get caught up in all the emotionality; they don't stop, analyze, and do the simple arithmetic.

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