tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post4882789132900448768..comments2024-01-28T03:56:39.351-08:00Comments on TOM CLARK: GaslightUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger13125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-60641706045212919822010-01-21T09:13:49.844-08:002010-01-21T09:13:49.844-08:00Well yes, Z, I was born on his birthday and given ...Well yes, Z, I was born on his birthday and given his name. After those early employments I mentioned and several others of the same stripe, he became a rather kindly policeman who rose each morning at four, went to the station, returned at noon for lunch and a five minute nap preluded by the whistling of a few bars of some Irish tune, and then returned once again to the station. He was known as "The Chief," though his diminutive wife Kathleen, of Country Westmeath, called him "Daddy". <br /><br />He was once called out to attend to scene of the infamous Saint Valentine's Day Massacre. But it did not seem to have fazed him unduly.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-5841571112029759462010-01-21T08:22:32.569-08:002010-01-21T08:22:32.569-08:00Well, Tom, there are different ways of lighting th...Well, Tom, there are different ways of lighting the way. Also different ways to take people to somewhere else. <br /><br />Perhaps you're your grandfather's boy after all?Zephirinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02809525772159756122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-8131237387438277872010-01-21T02:34:11.733-08:002010-01-21T02:34:11.733-08:00Zeph,
Lovely that, the lamp lighting man who love...Zeph,<br /><br />Lovely that, the lamp lighting man who loves his job and would never wish to give it up...<br /><br />What was once the newfangled invention that helped turn London into the first great world city is now kept up as a palpable link with its past.<br /><br />Perhaps electricity is overrated.<br /><br />My maternal grandfather's first job as a very young man, a lad on his own trying to find a way for himself in a new world -- he was the son of a Kerryman who had migrated to South Dakota -- was lighting gas lamps in the streets of the city of Chicago, in the years before the turning of that century. He was, I believe, only fourteen at the time. He grew quickly into a strapping young fellow able enough to drive one of the city's first streetcars. In later years he would look back upon these jobs as a source of pride, recalling them for me as an object lesson in the hard work required in making something of oneself. (I wish I could say I had made better use of that lesson.)TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-42832303801647784942010-01-20T05:05:35.746-08:002010-01-20T05:05:35.746-08:00It must have been extraordinary to have street lig...It must have been extraordinary to have street light provided for you, as opposed to carrying a lantern and not quite knowing what shady things were going on just beyond your little personal circle of light...<br /><br />I knew there were still a few gas lamps in London, but discovering <a href="http://www.urban75.org/london/london-gas-lamps-and-gaslighting.html" rel="nofollow">this London blog entry</a>, I was suprised at how many there are.Zephirinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02809525772159756122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-34716545345226563582010-01-08T03:15:29.150-08:002010-01-08T03:15:29.150-08:00Forgive my terrible vanity, SarahA, but no, I do n...Forgive my terrible vanity, SarahA, but no, I do not tire of it. And in fact, so poor is my memory, each time feels as good as the first time. (Only slightly teasing.)<br /><br />Happy that you like the images. We forget what a curious development it must have been to have street lights at night. At this date only London had them, mind you. And what a lot was thus brought out into plain sight -- perhaps, as the pair hiding beyond the right edge of the Rowlandson seem to be suggesting (when you click on them), even some things that were properly meant to be kept in the gentle protection of the shadows.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-54071237074822331812010-01-08T02:05:04.673-08:002010-01-08T02:05:04.673-08:00Do you tire of me saying the same things about you...Do you tire of me saying the same things about your writings?<br />I am thinking, maybe I should just 'copy/paste'<br />I am liking the images here, very much so.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-45340843593640776802010-01-06T13:38:41.460-08:002010-01-06T13:38:41.460-08:00Maybe so -- having the same dream twice, I mean (w...Maybe so -- having the same dream twice, I mean (wish I could have the one I had this morning again!).<br />Meanwhile, how nice to check in here at 'midday' and find your Daniel Boone pictures & those new poemsSTEPHEN RATCLIFFEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12339481653546188412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-37930433908737051022010-01-06T10:59:27.024-08:002010-01-06T10:59:27.024-08:00Stephen,
No bother... a bit like having the same ...Stephen,<br /><br />No bother... a bit like having the same dream twice?<br /><br />Pale pink clouds, way out ahead of dreams of capital anyhow...TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-53380132365350892832010-01-06T07:37:49.998-08:002010-01-06T07:37:49.998-08:00Sorry to post that twice -- must have grown too ex...Sorry to post that twice -- must have grown too excited about such dreams. . . .STEPHEN RATCLIFFEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12339481653546188412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-20723265980939962522010-01-06T07:34:39.808-08:002010-01-06T07:34:39.808-08:00Thanks Tom, I was reading all the comments on Oura...Thanks Tom, I was reading all the comments on Ouray when this came in, looking for the next new thing, and here it is. Great to link up Cook in Hawaii to gas lights in London -- and New York, where "dreams of capital/ [still] grow visible/ and bright" . . . . <br /><br />Something for you here (alas, no "dreams of capital") ---<br /><br /><br />1.6<br /><br />first pale pink of cloud above blackness<br />of trees, white half moon next to branch<br />in foreground, sound of waves in channel<br /><br /> looking out window up there,<br /> perhaps I could do it<br /><br /> presence of flatness rather,<br /> reversed, of pictures<br /><br />grey-white of sky reflected in channel,<br />shadowed green slope of ridge above itSTEPHEN RATCLIFFEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12339481653546188412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-19148910139513910222010-01-06T07:34:29.443-08:002010-01-06T07:34:29.443-08:00Thanks Tom, I was reading all the comments on Oura...Thanks Tom, I was reading all the comments on Ouray when this came in, looking for the next new thing, and here it is. Great to link up Cook in Hawaii to gas lights in London -- and New York, where "dreams of capital/ [still] grow visible/ and bright" . . . . <br /><br />Something for you here (alas, no "dreams of capital") ---<br /><br /><br />1.6<br /><br />first pale pink of cloud above blackness<br />of trees, white half moon next to branch<br />in foreground, sound of waves in channel<br /><br /> looking out window up there,<br /> perhaps I could do it<br /><br /> presence of flatness rather,<br /> reversed, of pictures<br /><br />grey-white of sky reflected in channel,<br />shadowed green slope of ridge above itSTEPHEN RATCLIFFEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12339481653546188412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-47928493480629190082010-01-06T07:28:18.092-08:002010-01-06T07:28:18.092-08:00And... just in case anyone is interested in that g...And... just in case anyone is interested in that great mariner, explorer and bearer of Empire into the Pacific, <a href="http://tomclarkblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/apparitional-canoe.html" rel="nofollow">Captain James Cook</a>...TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4445844569294316288.post-25663903573374204772010-01-06T07:16:26.049-08:002010-01-06T07:16:26.049-08:00For those over twenty-one: click on the Rowlandson...For those over twenty-one: click on the Rowlandson at the bottom of the post, to see, at far right, the Shady Female conversing with the Shady Male.TChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05915822857461178942noreply@blogger.com