Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Let 'er rip - Sledding in Holyoke, Mass., 19th Century

Image Museum website
 

I don't when we're going to get the first big snowfall, but these kids are ready for it.  This is a late 19th century photo of some back alley fun in Holyoke, Massachusetts.  The contraption they're riding seems to be some sort of a "rip".   Do you remember rips?  Or did they call these sleds something else where you're from?

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

JFK - A 50th Anniversary



Fifty years is a long time, but still only the blink of an eye in the measure of eras, only one small thread in the enormous tapestry of history.  We see this event, this assassination, as the beginning of our modern, cynical, chaotic era, and most who remember the day--indeed, that entire waking nightmare weekend--remember not just the news but where they were, what they were doing, who they were at that time, fitting themselves into the larger context of national history.

 
 
It happened on Friday.  By the time Monday morning arrived to a bleak new world, we had suffered the shock of assassination, the agony of a young widow, been stunned at another murder on live television, and had in the course of it all become newly educated on the protocol of personal, communal, and national mourning.  Our world shut down for one day at the end of it in tribute, honor, and respect--and something more; a desire simply to pause and reflect before the world--as we suspected it might--got even crazier.
 


 
 
 
 
 
 




 
 
The newspapers (shown here from three different Springfield, Massachusetts, papers) are yellowed and fragile with age, but their images and words are still overwhelming.
 


Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Save the Leavitt Theatre - Ogunquit, Maine


Over at my Another Old Movie Blog we visited the Leavitt Theatre in Ogunquit, Maine, here in this post. Recently, a drive has been started to help the Leavitt adapt to the new digital projectors that are so costly, and without which many small independent movie theaters, like the Leavitt, will go out of business.  Here's the press release that was sent to me.  I thought you might like to have a look, and help out if you can.

____________
As many as 10,000 movie screens in North America could go dark by Dec 31st, 2013! http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/news/how-digital-conversion-is-killing-independent-movie-theaters-20130904
LEAVITT THEATRE KICKSTARTER: http://kck.st/HhQ8MO

Hello.

By Dec. 31st Hollywood will cease distributing films to all movie theaters on celluloid reels in favor of digital prints. America's movie screens have been forced to buy digital projectors that can cost as much as $100,000. An estimated 10,000 screens – one in every five screens in North America – will go dark because they can't afford to convert.


Over 1000 independent old-school, mom-and-pop-owned movie palaces in small towns are struggling to come up with the price of conversion. They lack the cash and resources of big chain cinemas.
And to make matters worse, the film companies are helping subsidize the large multiplexes' conversions but not the single screen movie houses.

The Leavitt Theatre in Ogunquit, Maine (est. 1923) is one of these theaters. A beautiful, classic, independent, family owned movie theater that has been showing first-run films for 90 years, they must go digital by Dec 31st or go dark!

Please click on the link below to find out more about a new KICKSTARTER drive. The Leavitt Theatre has just 25 DAYS (until Nov 30) to raise $60,000. They need help!
KICKSTARTER:http://kck.st/HhQ8MO

 Please spread the word, even if you are unable to donate.

Thanks everyone!

Article:
http://retroroadmap.com/2010/07/29/the-leavitt-theatre-ogunquit-me-youll-love-it/

Also on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Leavitt-Theatre/99336197126?ref=hl



Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Dismount and Murder - new mystery book



Dismount and Murder third in the Double V Mysteries series is now available in eBook, and paperback.  Elmer and Juliet continue their tentative relationship while investigating murder at a wealthy estate in Litchfield, Connecticut, in the summer of 1950, while a horse show on the grounds covers the tracks of a number of suspects.  Elmer, an ex-convict, is now off parole, the Korean War has just started, and television antennas are starting to spring up on rooftops all over the place. 

Then there's that missing corpse. 

It's the dawn of a new, unsettling day.

Available in eBook and paperback online here:
And other online merchants.
 
You can find the two first books in the series, Cadmium Yellow, Blood Red and Speak Out Before You Die also at the above online shops -- and in all of them, except currently for Amazon, the first book -- Cadmium Yellow, Blood Red -- is FREE as an eBook for a limited time.
Visit my Another Old Movie Blog this Thursday for a chance to win a free paperback copy of Dismount and Murder.