Parsing the State of the Union

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 16 Feb 2005 21:08:00 GMT

Here's a site found by my friend, David Anderson, that lets you search for words within various State Of The Union speeches.

http://www.style.org/stateoftheunion

Mardi Gras & the Architecture of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 09 Feb 2005 23:36:00 GMT

Last night we had a gathering of the Yerba Buena Social Club. It was Fat Tuesday and so we met at Nancy's for some New Orleans styled fare, which included sausage, Louisiana beer (Abita Purple Haze Raspberry & Abita Turbodog), and dry fried chicken and salad. It was finished off with some home made pralines and sherbet ice cream.

After dinner, with our Mardi Gras beads jingling, we went down the street to a lecture presented by the SF Historical Society about the Architecture of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. It started a little late and began a bit slow, but once the presenter, David Parry, picked up the pace with slides from his extensive collection of post cards it was fascinating. One of the interesting images depicted the "Aeroscope", a ride that consisted of a small two-story structure mounted on the end of a 280 foot swing-arm. It was designed and built by Joseph Strauss, the designer and builder of the Golden Gate Bridge. It had a unique method of counter-balancing the people on the ride by displacing the weight of each rider by sensing the weight and then dumping an equivalent weight in water.

Yet another fun evening. Here are some pictures I took.

Map of the Exposition:
http://www.sanfranciscomemories.com/ppie/map/map-biggest.gif

San Francisco Museum and Historical Society

History

Parsing the State of the Union

Mardi Gras & the Architecture of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition