Cartographic Thoughts

 
                                                           

                                         

   The cartography section of Professor Sydney MacFarland's undergraduate course required the creation of a map. After instruction each student was given access to rudimentary instruments, a tall, portable table and a folded sheet of paper.  Our assignment was to map a single square block of Utica's Oneida Square. By the time I turned a second corner my projection was "off the chart". Oh well - I pushed on, taping additional pages to the original sheet. My final submission resembled a large, lumpy tarp - it was not a success. But I did retain a long-term interest in maps.
    My collection is small (75 or so pieces) and unpretentious. It includes for instance the 12 maps of the Royal Commission on Local Government in Greater London 1957-1960. If you Google "London Metro area maps" - with a single click access is acquired to over 100 representations. In addition to maps of metro areas; Baku, Berlin, Moscow, Vienna, others, I have subway maps - Boston, Moscow, Tokyo and of course London. The most influential was the London Tube Underground map created in 1931 by Harry Beck. Examine a Paris subway map - on one side the system utilizing Beck's model - turn over and there is a more distance and curve accurate representation. Beck's provides the user with "elegance, simplicity, order". * It has been emulated by subway maps around the world. But ultimately my map collection is just "stuff"- but for me it is "thought provoking stuff".
    Paris, a magnificent city and state of mind. Looking at a map I see the Av des Champs-Elysees. Walking west on a sunny afternoon I glanced into a shop and saw a rather striking, black-haired woman attired in silver slacks, dark belt and loose, white blouse. I continued walking - for 100 feet then abruptly reversed direction to have another glimpse. There she was - curious she lifted her head, embarrassed my head sank - I turned and walked away, but she remains etched in memory.
    Near the Metro Station Luxembourg.  A busy Friday evening, hotels full - but I secure a challenging room. The door was plywood cut to almost fit the opening, no door knob but a lock, the dull glow of a single light bulb. I slept there one night awakening occasionally to the sounds of inebriated citizens mumbling and whizzing outside my window.
    Cathedral Notre Dame. Two British ladies stop me and speaking "Frenclish" asked for directions. I responded in English. One shouted, "Oh thank God! He's an American!"
    London, legendary for courage, finance and friendliness. Near the Imperial War Museum a gentleman in suit and tie took my picture. Smiling he then approached and offered to develop the photo and mail it to me for $10.00. I thought he was joking. After 15 minutes of stimulating conversation he convinced me that he was wonderfully articulate and extremely interesting. I did not pay him - but I wanted to.
    Victoria Station. Waiting for a train I sat down at a table with a beer and sandwich. A man in a sports jacket, tie came over and uninvited sat down. With a broad grin he commenced a conversation. "What's your name?" A pause, "what do you do?"
    "Joe" I replied. "I am a welder from St. Louis. What's yours?"
    "Winston" he responded.  This introduction was followed by a solid half hour of deeply informed and absorbing conversation none of which I remember. At no time did talk of any possible "business" opportunity intrude. I had to depart and rising broke the spell. I wanted to ask my new friend, "Winston, what the hell was this all about - what were you after?" But I did not and shall never know.
    There are more maps of other cities and . . .

    *Daily Mail online 5/8/2010.
 

Go Maribor !

                                                     

                                            Maribor - Mother of Mercy Basilica

    Tuesday, August 22nd, 2017. Slovenia's finest soccer team, NK Maribor played Hapoel Beer-Sheva (Israel) in a UEFA Champion's League event. The winner would advance to Group Play against some of the world's greatest teams. Maribor (not to be confused with Marienbad, the Czech resort town) has a population of 95,000 and is at the heart and core of the nation's soccer. The Republic of Slovenia's total population is 2,000,000 (and should not to be confused with the Slovak Republic).

    The first "leg" of the series was won by Beer-Sheva 1 - 0.  In the second game Maribor scored first, Beer-Sheva matched it, and Maribor scored again - the aggregate score in the second half was 2 - 2. Play was furious. Beer-Sheva players were a red blur swarming the Maribor blue defense and goalie. Then a "header" streaking toward the far post - the frantic goalie is air born, horizontal to earth, stretching left . . . 

     Saturday in November, 1977. Annette and I rented a car and proceeded south on the three hour drive from Vienna to Yugoslavia. Early afternoon we crossed the Yugoslav border (that ceased to exist in 1991) into the province of Slovenia and arrived in Maribor. The city appeared tired, used, medieval and swathed in various hues of Soviet brown. We checked into the central hotel  and went for a stroll - finally ending at the hotel bar waiting for a dinner table. The bar filled with soldiers, smoke and chatter - the hot spot on a Saturday night. To my right two young Army noncoms, seriously discussing life, drinking draft beer, dining on a mountain of French fries and well-done meat. As we left I bought them a couple of beers. No smile but a "Thannnk youuu."

     We drifted into a nearby park. The evening was dark, the temperature mild, the air scented by grilled chestnuts. The occasional street light cast a yellowish "I am about to burn out" glow. Family groups squeezed around individual soldiers on park benches. Soldiers and girls sat close together sometimes holding hands. Families meandered over cobbled walks and cracked cement with children dangling from many hands.

    The next morning we went to church. I rarely attend church but when I do I prefer a church being harassed by state authorities. To my complete surprise the church we attended was wall to wall with worshipers all inhaling clouds of incense. Happily there were also souvenir tables available in the back where I purchased for my devout mother a pair of rosaries.

     . . .  his fingers scratching the side of the ball enough to slightly alter its flight away from the net to out of bounds. Beer-Sheva's corner kick fails to produce a goal - time expires - part of the crowd becomes euphoric - aggregate score is 2 - 2, which means of course that on the basis of "away goals scored" Maribor wins !  NK Maribor will next face Sparta Moskva (Russia), Sevilla (Spain) and Liverpool (England).

Bazilike - Matere Usmiljinja - Wikimedia.

    

Seafaring Moods

                                                 

                                       

                                                   

                                       

     "Queasy" is the best word to describe it - the emotion experienced when thinking about Ensign Kevin Burns, a grandson in a submarine underway and engaged in servicing a nuclear system. The Oklahoma City, SNN 723, has been in south Pacific seas training with ships of the Australian Navy - now as the predator, then the prey. Mentally, emotionally I am with that "boat" much of the time.
     Soothing the angst I remember a visit to another Los Angeles class submarine, the Newport News around 2000. Of the select spaces we were permitted to inspect was of course the galley. There four civilians chatted with four sailors amidst the aroma of  cookies fresh from an oven. These submarine sailors (and three others I met aboard) were articulate, smart and professional. They are the kind of people that Kevin is working with now. The memory of these conversations and the cookies reassure. Moods follow food.
     Hand shaking my shoulder - "Watch in 30 minutes! Go to the mess deck." A training cruise, I was 18. Dressing quickly - I passed through a dim, red lit passageway and dropped down a ladder into a dimly lit Destroyer Escort mess deck. There galley crew were passing out to those on midnight watch a sandwich - fresh, warm bread enclosing thick slices of Spam, slathered with yellow mustard and a cup of steaming, black coffee. That snack rushed me up to an edge - from midnight till 4:00 AM that DE had the most alert, far sighted, stern lookout in US naval history. Today, when thinking about that splendid sandwich and coffee I spring to a heightened vigilance and scan the Florida horizon for alien vessels.
     On the other hand - another cruise - another DE - having just completed a 4:00 to 8:00 AM  watch and exhausted, I dropped down the ladder into a noisy, crowded mess deck. On a steel tray I collected breakfast; beans, franks and two hard boiled eggs. In the ship's vernacular, "rat turds, dog turds and a pair of knockers". Finding a place to sit I glanced up just in time to watch a sailor with a tear in his jeans ascend the ladder - his ass crack flashed back and forth with every step up. My gaze returned to my tray and spoon. Words suddenly began pounding on the back of my head.
     "Get UP! Get your ass out of here! Now! Are you deaf?"
     I turned my head and considered an angry petty officer's face just inches away. He continued hollering as I was rising to address him. Then I was screaming at him - using "fuck" as noun, verb and direct object - threatening phrases, "your teeth in your hands" and "your nuts in a knot". He backed away to a bulkhead and slumped down into a semi-crouch. I paused, sensed a silence, then returned to my tray. The buzz on the mess deck revived back up. The sailor across from me looked sad, "you can't do that" and scooped up some beans.
     More screaming. "Stand up sailor!" I kind of jumped up and faced a Chief - almost - he was half my height. Again the mess deck was quiet.
    "You looking for a fight boy?"  -  "No Chief."
    "You pretty good with your hands?"  -  "No Chief."
    "You want to fight me?"  -  "No Chief."
    Disgusted he looked me over, up and down, turned and stormed out a hatch, almost without ducking, Again the mess chatter revived.
    As I sat down the sailor on the left, "Probably means a Captain's Mast." My sad eyed friend nodded in agreement and kept on eating. I skipped breakfast that morning. My flirtation with a mutiny did not result in a disciplinary hearing. Three decades would pass before my next meal of beans and franks. But now I have a deep affection for the sight, smell and taste of sugar cookies.
     US Navy photo: SNN 723 Breaching - by Fabio Pena.
     US Navy photo: SNN 723 - Chris Oxley.

The "Town" of Oneonta

                                          Susquehanna Valley, Oneonta from Hartwick College
      Oneonta, New York, with 14,000 residents is much larger that Thornton Wilder's "Grover's Corners", Vermont. But it has a river coursing through reminiscent of Meredith Wilson's "River City", Iowa and William Inge's Kansas town, the setting for "Picnic". The "town" has two distinguished colleges;  Hartwick and SUNY Oneonta. It also has two descriptive appellations; "The City of the Hills" and a terminal sounding epithet, "Life Enjoyed". It remains a "town" because the resident population has not increased since 1950, and the fictions, myths needed to bind together vast populations in cities, nations are deluded in smaller population centers. Living in a "town" we see individuals more clearly, relate to them better (or perhaps worse) but with less distortion created by the patinas of myth. Clips of life in Oneonta over nearly four decades illustrates the point, perhaps.
      Raised 50 miles north of Oneonta I still had no idea of its location. For a job interview in 1966, I followed a map from Utica to Cooperstown and then into Oneonta. Soon on a hill in front of Hartwick's Bresee Hall I absorbed for the first time the wonderful view of the Susquehanna River Valley.
     My introduction to the people of Oneonta occurred on a crisp Halloween night that same year. My wife Annette, two daughters and I had been living in town for just two months. We went downtown where half the population was parading in the center of Main Street, the other half lining the sidewalks watching. Happy, noisy, costumed children everywhere. I had felt that I knew no one. But going home my face muscles ached, stressed from constant smiling, grinning and chatting.
     We bought our first home - a large 1912 house that bordered six other properties. The day after closing I walked up the shared driveway to greet one of my neighbors, an elderly woman. 
     "Hi, I'm John, the new owner". She looked at me, then at the house and back at me. "So the Bards were finally able to get rid of that place". She turned and walked away. 
     Our third daughter Jennifer, was born the following year.
     Ox Johnson was the proprietor of the neighborhood Deli. Ox was a business man first, politically conservative, a bespectacled, suspender wearing Elk member, with a sense of humor so dry that one could rationally challenge its very existence. He considered me a lefty college professor who might mature, maybe, someday. Once he asked me if I could help him move some produce. He had hurt his back. Sure, I said. Three days later we were in his truck driving to my surprise, to New Jersey, his source for fresh vegetables. Soon I was loading bushels of tomatoes, melons, cucumbers into the truck. Ox bought lunch. We would also serve together for several years, along with banker Henry Bunn, on the City of Oneonta Tax Assessment Review Board. Later I helped carry Ox to his grave. 
     The officer issued the ticket to me for violation of the leash law - in Wilber Park I had let Swede run loose. I appeared in City Court before Judge Walter Terry who happened to be a fellow poker player. Judge Terry seemed to be suppressing a smile as I stood before him. I was reprimanded, first offense, fine suspended, then admonished, "and let this be a lesson to you".
     I was on my way to Washington. The radio reported that Harry and Cathy's 23-year old son John, had been killed in a plane crash. I doubled over with anguish. Two days later I returned to Oneonta and now stood poised to knock on Harry's front door. It popped open, Harry pasted me, "Let's go!" We walked down Roosevelt Ave, crossed Main Street, then down Grande Ave to Neawha Park. Passing through the Park, we headed west on River Street, A couple of miles later we were on Oneida Street heading north to Chestnut, then east to Main and finally back to Roosevelt Ave. Neither of us had uttered a word - words had no meaning - Johnny was gone. Slowly I followed Harry through his front door.
     Steve, his wife and two daughters lived across the street. Bob, his wife and two sons lived next door. Both were police officers. Joe Pigeon, wife and four children lived on the next block up. Joe was the Oneonta Fire Chief and his son Patrick would join OFD and become a future Chief. Patrick's cousin Jeff also became a firefighter. Whenever sirens wailed in Oneonta it became a moment to pause and think about our neighbors.
     Real "towns" are like that.

My New York Times

                                                   

                                                        September 12, 2001
     There are great print-news sources in the United States: the Washington Post, LA Times, Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal (minus its occasionally obnoxious editorial page) and several others. The Sarasota Herald Tribune is a very good paper. But all things considered the New York Times is the finest source of print-news and analysis on the planet. I like my "news" straight - a professionally written who, what, where, when and why. For analysis I seek columnists and  op-ed writers from across the intellectual spectrum. In the Times, Brooks, Douthat, Dowd, Cohen, Collins, Krugman and Blow satisfy my requirements. Thus, at a celebratory family dinner I grimaced when a perfect grandson referred to the Times as a "left wing media outlet". This idea had never occurred to me.
     The Times is not just a life-long, major source of my information but also a means to satisfy righteous outrage. Over the years I have dashed off numerous letters to the Times editors, several were published - one resulting in retaliatory efforts to have my employment at Hartwick College terminated. The Times also published a travel piece I authored identifying great Atlantic coast campsites.*
     A poor educator I would have been had I not tried to use the Times as an educational tool. The objective was to get the undergraduate student to touch, glance at, or read anything from the Times and then show up in class better informed. My efforts frequently bordered on the desperate. I would advise students to always carry a copy of the Times under their arm. Then when relaxing in the library, dining hall, wherever, conspicuously display the newspaper while doing something else. The bait set I promised that an exceptionally attractive member of the opposite sex would "bite", using the Times as an excuse to strike up a conversation. This could most certainly result in a relationship with an extraordinary individual (in a Darwinian sense) - a good provider, then much successful breeding. Should the student wish to "dial up", then instead of the Times, s/he could substitute anything by Einstein, Gibbons or Thucydides. Seek to dial down? Comic books or a novel with a "bodice busting" cover would work nicely. Unhappily the digital era, cell phones and tablets have rendered this excellent strategy moot.
     I have used the Times in Russia as a cudgel.  Traveling in the old USSR accompanied by undergraduates gave rise to the occasional issue. One blustery night my group of 25 arrived in a vast hotel lobby in Yalta. We were joined by a large group from Argentina and were informed by a surly Administrator that our luggage - not more than 90 pieces - was unfortunately missing. The Argentine tour guide went ballistic protesting incompetence and threatening to call their ambassador in Moscow. The Administrator was unflappable, armored - the threat bounced off. I was irritated. But one missing bag is theft, 90 missing is a "muck up". I had to register my displeasure.
     "I have a friend at the "New York Times" and smiled.
     Behind his eyeballs there was a flash of panic. But before my bluff could be exposed an Aeroflot truck with 90 pieces of luggage and a besotted driver was discovered parked off a nearby road. But I would use that line with excellent effect again - twice. Now I do have a friend at the Times, Michael McIntire, a Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter and Hartwick graduate.
     The Times also publishes on occasion something that becomes an instant "classic". In October, 2016, a Trump lawyer demanded that the Times retract and apologize for a libelous article featuring two women who accused Mr. Trump of inappropriate touching. Part of the reply (paragraph 2) by Times lawyer David E. McCraw;
     "The essence of a libel claim of course is the protection of one's reputation. Mr. Trump has bragged about his non-consensual sexual touching of women. He has bragged about intruding on beauty pageant contestants in their dressing rooms. He acquiesced to a radio host's request to discuss Mr. Trump's own daughter as a 'piece of ass'. Multiple women not mentioned in our article have publicly come forward to report on Mr. Trump's unwanted advances. Nothing in our article has had the slightest effect on the reputation that Mr. Trump, through his own words and actions, has already created for himself." **
     Mark Twain, H.L. Menken and Oscar Wilde are still smiling.

*John O. Lindell "In Search of the Perfect Beach Campsite" NYT Travel Section; June 26, 1977.
**New York Times October 13, 2016