Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist

Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Md Troopers Assoc #20 & Westminster Md Fire Dept Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Showing posts with label Art Library Frankenstein. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Art Library Frankenstein. Show all posts

Sunday, July 12, 2009

1816 Frankenstein and the Year Without Summer

1816 Frankenstein and the Year Without Summer

'Year without summer' killed crops ... and created a monster

(This is the long – unedited version of the column that appeared in the) EAGLE ARCHIVE By Kevin Dayhoff Posted on www.explorecarroll.com 6/21/09

Well, it’s half-way through June and for those of us who love Maryland’s stultifying heat and humidity many are wondering “where’s summer?”

For me, my thoughts wander to the birth of Frankenstein.

Perhaps I need to explain.

So far all we have seen is below average temperatures and above average precipitation. Yeah, we need the rain all right – but enough already.

“News” circulating on the Internet recently has been forecasting that 2009 is going to be the year without summer. While attempting to track down the story at its source, My research led me to I came across an article on livescience.com, “Year Without Summer? Don’t Believe It,” by Robert Roy Britt.

Britt explains that the “year without summer” hype began with a news story on Accuweather.com, and “involves a misconstrued quote” from a long-range forecaster. What the Accuweather article meant was that summer would behas been delayed because the “jet stream has been farther to the south than normal this spring.

In the article, Accuweather Ssenior meteorologist Henry Margusity explained a “‘cold pool of air over Canada for the past two months has delayed summer… We will see some moderation happening…’ meaning summer will get here, but “‘it won't be a real hot summer…’”

In the annals of weather history, in 1816, there really was a “year without summer.” The phenomenon event is known by various names such as “the poverty year.”

In the book, “Legacy of the Land,” by Carol Lee; she explains that “the year without summer” caused quite a bit of hardship in Carroll County. According to Lee: “Farmers in Maryland and elsewhere would remember 1816 as… ‘eighteen hundred and starve-to-death,’” and there were freezing temperatures well into June.

For Carroll County the year without summer followed the equally disastrous economic collapse caused by the “War of 1812,” with Great Britain, which witnessed the naval blockade of the Chesapeake Bay which “cut off trade, stopped the mill wheels, and left the plow still in its furrow.

“Then in 1815, after the Treaty of Ghent restored peace between Britain and the United States, England enacted “Corn Laws” that placed (a) prohibitive tariff on American wheat products… The export market virtually disappeared.”

So you may ask, what in the world caused the year without summer? Well, according to a July 2002 article in Smithsonian magazine, “Blast from the Past,” by Robert Evans; he quoted historian John D. Post to identify that year as the “last great subsistence crisis in the Western world.”

The agricultural and economic catastrophe of 1816 was a volcanic winter, caused by the April 5 – 15, 1815 eruptions of Mount Tambora on the island of Sumbawa, in what we now know as Indonesia.

Evans describes the eruption as the “most destructive explosion on earth in the past 10,000 years” which “blasted 12 cubic miles of gases, dust and rock into the atmosphere,” and killed an “estimated 90,000 people on Sumbawa and neighboring Lombok.”

This caused “Pharaoh Chesney, of Virginia,” notes Evans, to recall that in June, the following year, “another snowfall came and folk went sleighing… On July 4, water froze in cisterns and snow fell again…”

In addition to the resulting crop failure, famine, and economic collapse; the volcanic winter had widespread psychological and sociological impacts that are still felt, to a certain degree, to this very day.

Thomas Jefferson, reports Evans, “having retired to Monticello after completing his second term as President, had such a poor corn crop that year that he applied for a $1,000 loan.”

For one thing, the volcanic winter spurred the westward expansion of the United States: “Thousands left New England for what they hoped would be a more hospitable climate west of the Ohio River. Partly as a result of such migration, Indiana became a state in 1816 and Illinois in 1818.”

In Europe, Great Britain – and Ireland, the disastrous weather caused widespread crop failures and prompted many folks to pack up and leave – for America.

“It rained nonstop in Ireland for eight weeks. The potato crop failed. Famine ensued,” says Evans.

Meanwhile in Switzerland, in 1816, “Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley and his soon-to-be wife, Mary Wollstonecraft … sat out a June storm reading a collection of German ghost stories…”

“The mood was captured in Byron’s “Darkness,” a narrative poem set when the ‘bright sun was extinguish’d’… John Polidori wrote The Vampyre, and the future Mary Shelley… began work on her novel, Frankenstein, about a well-meaning scientist who creates a nameless monster from body parts and brings it to life by a jolt of laboratory-harnessed lightning.”

Evans notes that Frankenstein has long-since served as a cautionary allegory that serves “as a warning not to overlook the consequences of humanity’s tampering with nature.” Think about it.

When he is not playing with laboratory-harnessed lightning, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at kevindayhoff AT gmail.com or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/kevindayhoff

www.explorecarroll.com 1816: 'Year without summer' killed crops - created a monster - K Dayhoff http://tinyurl.com/krpqny

http://explorecarroll.com/community/3036/year-without-summer-killed-crops-created-monster/ http://tinyurl.com/krpqny

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For other recent columns in Explore Carroll by Kevin Dayhoff:

Bringing Corbit's Charge, and Douglass, back to Westminster
Published July 5, 2009 by Carroll Eagle http://tinyurl.com/mxbkjp
http://explorecarroll.com/community/3099/bringing-corbits-charge-douglass-back-westminster/

DAYHOFF: Margaret Mitchell wrote what she knew; the rest is gone with the wind
Published July 2, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
... And that is all I know for right now. Hope you and your family have a great Fourth of July weekend. Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster. …visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net....

Westminster was all abuzz for the great fly roundup of 1914
Published June 28, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
... reminds me that it was Groucho Marx who once said, "Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana." When he is not swatting flies, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at … or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net....

DAYHOFF: Hoffa Field and the Sheathing of the Sword
Published June 23, 2009 by Carroll Eagle, Westminster Eagle
... . Lightner and the June 1922 American Sentinel newspaper article have left us with an extensive and fascinating account of the “The Sheathing of the Sword.” … visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net....

'Year without summer' killed crops ... and created a monster
Published June 21, 2009 by Carroll Eagle, Westminster Eagle
... village folk that it's not a bad idea to keep a torch handy on these cool summer nights. When he is not playing with laboratory-harnessed lightning, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at … or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net. ...

Historic Blue Ridge College bell dedicated In Union Bridge
Published June 20, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
UNION BRIDGE — Several hundred folks braved threatening weather June 20 to witness the unveiling and dedication of the historic 1900 Blue Ridge College bell in Lehigh Square, the original site of the college which had thrived in Union Bridge from 1898 to ... ...

When city got 'sole' in the 1920s, it was cause for a celebration
Published June 14, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
... be the guest speaker. There will be a retirement ceremony for worn flags. Guests may bring old flags for retirement. When he is not waving the flag, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at… or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net....

Remember when you could walk to work in Westminster?
Published June 7, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
... . When he's not on a "walk-about" in Westminster, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached …

Company H: from the Frizellburg greenhouses to the sands of Omaha Beach
Published June 3, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
… (have) come a long way from the old parade field in Frizellburg.” Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster.

Dayhoff: New councilmember tackles alleged hit and run driver
Published June 1, 2009 by Westminster Eagle, Carroll Eagle
... Westminster city police arrived and took control of the situation The accident is under investigation. All in a day’s work. Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster.

20090705 sdosm Recent columns in Explore Carroll by Kevin Dayhoff
20090621 SDOSM KED SCE Year without summer created a monster.
*****

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Recent columns and articles by Kevin Dayhoff


Recent columns and articles by Kevin Dayhoff

Westminster was all abuzz for the great fly roundup of 1914
Published June 28, 2009 by Carroll Eagle

On Tuesday, June 16, President Barack Obama was interrupted by a pesky, deranged and suicidal housefly during an interview with CNBC's John Harwood.

The drama was captured on video, with a life and death struggle befitting a History Channel segment pertaining to World War II.

It has since unfolded hundreds of thousands of times on YouTube.

One published account referred to the president as "Obamazilla." A writer for the Washington newspaper, Politico, regaled that the "president has been getting lots of kudos for a lightning-fast, Mr. Miyagi-worthy swipe he employed to slay a pesky house fly that was buzzing him ..."

Politico wrote a play-by-play description of the president's performance: " 'Get out of here,' Obama said as the fly buzzed him during his interview. The pest persisted, and when it landed on his left forearm, Obama smacked it. 'Now, where were we?' the president said without missing a beat. Pleased with himself, he added, 'That was pretty impressive, wasn't it? I got the sucker.' "

Many were impressed. That is, with the exception of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Politico reported that PETA called it an "execution," and wants the commander-in-chief to show a little more compassion to even "the least sympathetic animals."

It made me think that if PETA was alarmed over the president killing a fly, one can only wonder what that organization would have thought of the 1914 "Swat the Fly" campaign in Westminster.

[…]

... reminds me that it was Groucho Marx who once said, "Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana." When he is not swatting flies, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at … or visit him at http://www.westminstermarylandonline.net/....

DAYHOFF: Hoffa Field and the Sheathing of the Sword
Published June 23, 2009 by Carroll Eagle, Westminster Eagle

On Saturday, June 10, 1922, the formal dedication of the Hoffa athletic field took place on the campus of Western Maryland College — now McDaniel College.

Of course, many know the field as where the Baltimore Ravens hold their summer practices.

Others know the field for the great tradition of tailgating at McDaniel football games. The running track, which circles the field, is always a favorite spot for health conscious walkers and runners.

Today McDaniel College is accepted as presiding prominently in the center, more or less, of Westminster. However, this was not the case until around the 1970s when housing developments began to grow to the west of the campus.

In 1922, the campus was on the outer western edge of Westminster on the brink of a frontier of forest and farmland that stretched for ten miles until one arrived in Taneytown.

According to a definitive history of the college, “Fearless and Bold,” published just recently by Dr. James E. Lightner; the Geiman property, a 65-acre farm contiguously situated to the west of the campus became available to the college, in 1920, upon the death of W. H. Geiman.

[…]

... . Lightner and the June 1922 American Sentinel newspaper article have left us with an extensive and fascinating account of the “The Sheathing of the Sword.” Kevin Dayhoff may reached at … or visit him at http://www.westminstermarylandonline.net/....

'Year without summer' killed crops ... and created a monster
Published June 21, 2009 by Carroll Eagle, Westminster Eagle

It's halfway through June, and for those of us who love Maryland's melting heat and humidity, many are wondering — where is summer?

For me, though, thoughts turn to the birth of Frankenstein.

First things first. In 1816, there really was a "year without summer." Carol Lee, in her book, "Legacy of the Land," explains that the year without summer caused quite a bit of hardship in Carroll County. "Farmers in Maryland and elsewhere would remember 1816 as ... 'eighteen hundred and starve-to-death.' " According to Lee, there were freezing temperatures well into June.

What caused the year without summer? According to a July 2002 article in Smithsonian magazine, "Blast from the Past," by Robert Evans, the agricultural and economic catastrophe of 1816 was a volcanic winter, caused by the eruptions of Mount Tambora on the island of Sumbawa, in what we now know as Indonesia, April 5-15, 1815.

[…]

... village folk that it's not a bad idea to keep a torch handy on these cool summer nights. When he is not playing with laboratory-harnessed lightning, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at … or visit him at www.westminstermarylandonline.net. ...

Historic Blue Ridge College bell dedicated In Union Bridge
Published June 20, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
UNION BRIDGE — Several hundred folks braved threatening weather June 20 to witness the unveiling and dedication of the historic 1900 Blue Ridge College bell in Lehigh Square, the original site of the college which had thrived in Union Bridge from 1898 to ... ...

When city got 'sole' in the 1920s, it was cause for a celebration
Published June 14, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
... be the guest speaker. There will be a retirement ceremony for worn flags. Guests may bring old flags for retirement. When he is not waving the flag, Kevin Dayhoff may be reached at … or visit him at http://www.westminstermarylandonline.net/....

Remember when you could walk to work in Westminster?
Published June 7, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
... . Think you know? If so, drop me a line at … and be sure to put Carroll Eagle in the subject line. Thank you. When he's not on a "walk-about" in Westminster,

Company H: from the Frizellburg greenhouses to the sands of Omaha Beach
Published June 3, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
... (have) come a long way from the old parade field in Frizellburg.” Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster.

Dayhoff: New councilmember tackles alleged hit and run driver
Published June 1, 2009 by Westminster Eagle, Carroll Eagle
... Westminster city police arrived and took control of the situation The accident is under investigation. All in a day’s work. Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster

In 1925, planting the seeds of employment, production
Published May 31, 2009 by Carroll Eagle
When he's not roaming the streets of historic Westminster looking for old factories,

Celebration of memory and change
Published May 26, 2009 by Westminster Eagle
This year’s Westminster Memorial Day ceremonies witnessed many changes over the past — although the solemn tradition of 142 years continued.On Memorial Day the normal hustle and bustle of downtown Westminster paused to remember fallen veterans, and ... ...

20090622 sdosm Recent columns and articles by Kevin Dayhoff