History, Natural History & the Arts
Ezra Ames was born on May 5th, 1768 in Framingham, Massachusetts. He was the fourth child of Jesse Emes and Betty Bent.
Prior to the 1800s, printed documents were scarce and there was usually no generally accepted spelling for many words. Most words were written phonetically; whatever combination of letters caused a person to say the intended word was accepted. [Read more…] about Albany Artist Ezra Ames: A Biography
Joseph Urban may be a somewhat forgotten figure in America’s annals of culture, but during his lifetime he enjoyed an almost legendary reputation. An all-round creative talent, Urban was a prolific Gilded Age illustrator, set designer, and architect of private dwellings, theaters, and a university building in the city of New York. His Gingerbread Castle was built for a fairy tale themed amusement park in Hamburg, New Jersey.
His feeling for color and choice of materials did much to revitalize American stage design and architecture. The contrast between two of Urban’s extant buildings shows the range of his talent as an architect. It goes beyond that: the marked stylistic difference seemed to foreshadow the divisiveness of contemporary society. [Read more…] about The Architecture of Joseph Urban: Mar-a-Lago & The New School
Summer Cabin Life
Joy came measured in water buckets hauled.
Heavy loads of firewood pushed out their songs.
We lived long lives daily in our semi-solitude.
As old age looms now, these moments matter.
Absence turns into its own strange presence.
The old fieldstone fireplace radiates warmth,
So that should-be field mice move in with us,
But conflict-free — if we secure all foodstuffs.
Hyperactive at night, they hold their Olympics.
We wish they’d hunker down, cap their appetite.
Of mice and men revolves around sleep routines.
Blackflies, Hence Wisdom
The summer after I got out of the Army
in February 1968, Chris and I, who had
married while I was still serving, lived at
Mateskared from mid-April into October.
This was, even to this day, my worst ever
experience of blackflies. My family’s habit
of August vacations put us in the “between
season,” as the late Earl Allen often said:
“First the snow flies, then the blackflies.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson would have added:
“Blackflies live up to the brag about them.”
[Read more…] about Poetry: Blackflies, Hence Wisdom
Spin Painting
Blood spurted out from pale nostrils,
White stars surrounded green eyes,
Rocks crashing down on soft foreheads,
Glaring shock, the result of hot lies.
Explosions occurred all around me,
The pole, for a moment, stood still,
Missions were burnt in a cloud-burst,
Sparks flew through the air in the chill.
Vines, breathing fire, began crawling,
While the globe lay there burning too fast,
Aqua leaves, off red branches, were falling,
Scarred women all wept for the past.
Kaleidoscope spun in the meadows,
The heavens awkward and still,
Illusions of love danced around me,
The cadence increased with the thrill.
Hot flash! Then it all started slowing,
Beads of sweat became salty and dried,
Flaming disc in my mind sank fast, glowing,
I just stared at the colors and cried.
Dear Teacher…
Thank you –
From the child you taught to read
From the battered child you held close
From the one you taught to act on stage
So she could be herself
From the one who couldn’t count
Until you convinced him he did
From the one who stuttered
And you waited
From the friendless one
You shared lunch with
From the heavy one
You taught to dance
From the immigrant
You welcomed
From the one they teased
And you told I’m with you
From the one who acted tough
But you weren’t fooled
From the one whose writing was an angry shout
That you read and corrected
From the one whose life was closed
And you opened a door
From the one who said no
And you said yes
From all the kids you taught were okay
And can be better
Thank You.
Tupper Arts and the CNY Home Improvements crew has been building, reinforcing, and renovating the Tupper Lake Arts Center, with a grand unveiling planned for early June.
The organization is also hoping to use some of the village’s recently awarded $10 million Downtown Revitalization Initiative grant money to purchase and renovate the neighboring State Theater. [Read more…] about Tupper Arts Eyes State Theater For Arts Center
The Holy Braille
Not seeing, but feeling. Not seeing, but being able to discern,
like the difference between bad and good………
Feeling correctness – eliminating prejudices and hatred.
Feeling the joy derived by giving pleasure to others.
Feeling the goodness in man.
Feeling the splendor of appreciating and living in harmony with Nature.
Feeling the balance by controlling our population.
Feeling our magnificence, by breeding out the undesirable,
inherent, qualities in man.
Feeling satisfaction, by differentiating which technologies are important
and which are products of greed and shortsightedness.
Feeling pride in having leaders with these qualities.
Feeling inner peace – finally being able to see.
Night Crawler Double Trouble
On a joint Schaefer-Zahniser expedition
into the Adirondack Flowed Lands area,
led by Moms Carolyn and Alice, we boys—
Cub Schaefer, my brother Matt and I—
decided we’d catch lots of trout to feed
our crew. So, we carried-in a big, bailed
construction bucket, with some dirt,
slung on a pole for two of us at a time
to transport night-crawlers, in shifts. [Read more…] about Poetry: Night Crawler Double Trouble
Opal
Come to the surface,
O dear stone, the time
to appreciate each other
is nearly over.