The Escalator, from Novelty Ride to Routine Vertical People Transporter

355 words

⇰ ⇰ ⇰

The yo-yo craze that swept America and the world last century (16-January-2022 blog) has interesting parallels to the invention and development of the modern escalator. Like the yo-yo, the escalator began its operational life as an amusement for people...the patent was developed by engineer Jesse W Reno (incorporating earlier patents of George Wheeler) into functionality, a moving staircase on a conveyor belt tilted at a 25 degree angle[§]. Reno first demonstrated his prototype in 1896 appropriately enough at New York’s Coney Island, promoted as a novelty ride. 

It was Charles Seeberger however who in 1899 redesigned Reno’s model and created the first modern commercial elevator (with wooden steps). Seeberger coined the name “escalator” by combining the Latin scala (= steps) with “elevator”. Seeberger went partners with the pioneering Otis Elevator Co of Yonkers, NY. In 1910 Otis bought Seeberger’s patent rights, followed a year later by Reno’s as well. By 1920 Otis had installed 350 escalators across the world (including the famed ones still in operation today at Macy’s Manhattan store), a number that escalated after Otis engineers improved the escalator giving it the cleated, level steps, as we recognise it today. Like the Duncan Company in the US who had a stranglehold on the yo-yo market in mid-century, Otis Co became the dominate force in escalators, however as with Duncan and the loss of its proprietorial rights over the word “yo-yo”, Otis suffered a similar setback in 1940 when the US Patent Office ruled that “escalator” was a common term for moving stairways and no longer the exclusive domain of one powerful escalator manufacturer. Fortunately for the Otis people, they avoided the fate of the Duncan company which eventually went belly-up after the yo-yo market was opened up to competition — the name “Otis” is still in the business of making elevators, escalators and the moving walkways you see in every large international airport.

Moscow subway’s long, long escalators

⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀ ⑀

[§] called an “inclined elevator” by Reno

⚘  ⚘  ⚘ 

Consulted articles: 

‘History of the Escalator’, Mary Bellis, ThoughtCo, Upd. 03-Dec-2019, www.thoughtco.com

‘Movin’ On Up: The Curious Birth and Rapid Rise of the Escalator’, Matt Blitz, Popular Mechanics, 06-Apr-2016, www.popularmechanics.com

The Coronavirus Pandemic, Expectations of a “Black Swan”?

499 山ㄖ尺ᗪ丂 

ཌ꧂ ꧁ད ꧁ད

The Covid pandemic, touching on two years old now and into its third or fourth viral mutation, has led many to label it metaphorically as a “Black Swan event”, an unpredictable and unexpected event with dire consequences. But not everyone agrees with this description of the current circumstance, least of all the very person who coined the concept itself, statistician and one-time Wall Street trader Nassim Nicholas Taleb. Taleb in fact disparages the widespread misuse of  Black Swan, “a cliché for any bad thing that surprises us” (‘The Pandemics Isn’t A Black Swan But A Portend Of A More Fragile Global System’,  Bernard Aviashai, The New Yorker, 21-Apr-2020, www.thenewyorker.com).

In his 2007 book—subtitled “The Impact of the Highly Probable”—Taleb sets down three principal characteristics necessary to constitute a Black Swan event: first, it is unprecedented and unexpected, “it is an outlier, as it lies outside of the realm of regular expectations, because nothing in the past can convincingly point to its possibility”. Second, it carries “an extreme impact”. Third, notwithstanding its outlier status, its occurrence “makes us concoct explanations after-the-fact, making it explainable and predictable”.

If we take the first of Taleb’s criteria, sheer unpredictability, the pandemic falls short...prior to the outbreak of Coronavirus, at least two recent US presidents, Bush (Junior) and Obama, had formally warned of the next pandemic in speeches. Bill Gates was another, such soothsayer, in forewarning of the pandemic to come. Furthermore it has a raft of precursors, a glance at the annals of epidemiological history shows the pandemic to be a recurring presence in human history. Looking at the world’s major epidemics (defined as killing 500,000 or more people), history records some 16 such events since 1850, both viral (influenza, smallpox, etc) and microbial (cholera, typhus, etc) (‘Was Covid-19 A Black Swan Event?’, John Drake, Forbes, 11-Nov-2021, www.forbes.com).

Willem  de Vlamingh, the first European to see a black swan ... in Western Australia in 1697 – hitherto they were thought not to exist 

Has the Coronavirus pandemic had a large, negative consequence?  Short of burying one’s head in the ground for the last two years it’s nigh on impossible not to arrive at the conclusion that the pandemic has had a massive impact on individuals, on public health systems and on national economies, one still being felt and likely to do so well into the foreseeable future.

Taleb’s conclusion is that the global pandemic unleashed by the Coronavirus is actually a “White Swan” event, “something that would  eventually take place with great certainty” (‘Corporate Socialism: The Government is Bailing Out Investors & Managers Not You’, Nassim Nicholas Taleb (with Mark Spitznagel), Incerto, 26-Mar-2020, www.medium.com).

So, if the all-embracing Covid-19 pandemic doesn’t cut it for a Black Swan event in Taleb’s book, what does? The options trader-cum-college professor offers the following partial list: the rise of the internet, the PC, the success of Google, the 9/11 disaster, WWI, the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Rareity | Extreme impact | Retrospective predictability (Taleb’s ‘triplet’)

The Yo-Yo, a Fad that Passes the Test of Time

714 words 

🪀 🪀 🪀

The yo-yo, like the term ‘cool’ is still around in 2022. Even with the bulk of millennials locked in the Svengali-grip of an interminable assembly line of ever newer electronic gizmos and increasingly sophisticated computer games today, the humble yo-yo has held its own. Not only that, looking back in time, the 20th century experienced regular peaks in the craze for yo-yoing. Why so perennially popular, well cost is one factor, they are an inexpensive, universally-available toy – and uncomplicated, simple to use if not necessarily that simple to master the more elaborate tricks. And they are highly portable, small transportable objects that slip easily into pockets al la the 21st century smartphone...in the 1960s “golden age of yo-yos”, the spinning disc on a string performed the same time-filler function as today’s iPhone or Samsung mobile phone卂.

Those of us who grew up in the Sixties probably associate the yo-yo with America and with Coca-Cola who product endorsed the yo-yo to the max, but the history of the toy predates the US and its slick marketing by vast epochs of time. The precise origins of the object and of the name are nebulous...one candidate for its genesis is Ancient China but the archaeology of antiquity reveals the earliest recovered evidence to be in the pottery of Ancient Greece. There are several contending theories as to the term’s origin, one is from the French word jou-jou (‘toy’)乃, another posits a Filipino origin of the word “yo-yo”, meaning in Tagalog “come back”  (‘History of the Yo-Yo, Valerie Oliver, Museum of Yo-Yo History, www.yoyomuseum.com).

Pedro Flores

The Philippines is also credited with the begetting of the modern yo-yo. Immigrant Pedro Flores brought the first Filipino-made yo-yo匚 to California in the 1920s and made the toy commercially successful in the US. An enterprising businessman Donald F Duncan bought Flores’ company and the Duncan brand name became synonymous with the yo-yo over the next few decadesᗪ. By copyrighting the name “yo-yo” Duncan strangled competition, monopolising the market, with extremely profitable results – selling a cool 42 million of the gadgets by 1962. The Duncan empire came crashing down with a thud in 1965 after a US court squashed it’s patent on the yo-yo. Duncan Toys went “belly-up” and in the aftermath the world was flooded with cheap (mostly plastic) yo-yos. 

Over the years manufacturers have innovated with the yo-yo to keep it fresh and contemporary to the juvenile and adolescent market, employing gimmicks such as yo-yos that glow in the dark like a solar beacon, personalised yo-yos, product identification with popular culture and TV icons, etc. Value-adding technological improvements made the toy gadget spin faster or longer, eg, the wing-shaped Duncan乇 Trans-Axtion in 1999.

Yo-Yo 101

While the rudiments of the yo-yoing craft remain a staple of the pastime—“the breakaway” and ‘sleeper’ throws and the popular tradition-honoured manoeuvres or tricks like “Walking the Dog”, “Rocking the Baby” and “Loop the Loop”—for the more serious yo-yoist new and more complicated string tricks are continually being developed千.

Endnote: Diverse uses of the yo-yo  As a toy the yo-yo has been more than a plaything for children, it has been embraced by all ages and by all classes and by many cultures (including royalty – eg, the Prince of Wales (the future King George IV), the Dauphin of France). Recorded accounts and paintings show it have also been employed through history as a stress-reliever. A further suggested use applied to hunters in 16th century Philippines who attached a rock to a yo-yo-like implement to hurl at animals for food (‘Yo-Yo’, www.collections.vam.ac.uk).  

•´¯`•»Ꮆ卄 «•´¯`•  •´¯`•»Ꮆ c̵̱̟̼̩͇̰̄̈́̄̈ę̴̩͓̟̳̼̱̘̯̀́͛͒卄 «•´¯`• •´¯`•»Ꮆ c̵̱̟̼̩͇̰̄̈́̄̈ę̴̩͓̟̳̼̱̘̯̀́͛͒卄卄 «•´¯`•  •´¯`•»Ꮆ卄 «•´¯`•

卂 for Fifties and Sixties kids it also acted as a sort of vade mecum in the same way the smartphone does today

乃 in 18th century England they were called ‘bandalores’

匚 modified so that the cord looped around the spindle, magifiying it’s spinning capacity

ᗪ Duncan moved the company’s headquarters to Luck, Wisconsin, to give it close access to the area’s hard maple, the optimal material for the wooden yo-yo...thus Luck became the “yo-yo capital of the world”

乇 after the Duncan Co folded, Flambeau Plastics Inc acquired the ‘Duncan’ brand name 

千 there’s even a “world championship” of yo-yoing, next stop the Olympics?

DH Lawrence on “the Road to Find Out”: Darlington, WA

417 words

◴◵◶◷

English writer DH Lawrence’s connexion with Australia resides predominantly with the couple of months he stayed at Thirroul, south of Sydney, in 1922, and the writing of Kangaroo, his Australian novel. The Thirroul chapter of the Lawrences’ visit is widely known, less well known is the Australian prequel on the other side of the Nullarbor and a second literary project about Australia undertaken by the Sons and Lovers author.

Lawrence and his German wife Frieda, having left Ceylon in April 1922, stopped off at Perth, Western Australia, on his highly personal odyssey across the globe. After one night in the Savoy Hotel in Hay Street, Perth, which proved to be beyond Lawrence’s means on his tight budget, the Lawrences swiftly decamped east to the Perth Hills to the small, outlying village of Darlington, staying at the ‘Leithdale’ guesthouse of Mollie Skinner in Lukin Avenue✳ . Lawrence described his two-week sojourn at Darlington (6—18 May), his sense of the place dictated by his characteristic ambivalence (physically beautiful yet too big and empty and that most accursed of things to the Laurentian sensibility, “too democratic”) and external restlessness, the irresistible itch to continually move on.

  "We are here about 16 miles out of Perth - bush all around - marvellous air, marvellous sun and sky - strange, vast, empty country -  hoary unending 'bush' with a pre-primaeval ghost in it - apples ripe and good, also pears. And we could have a nice little bungalow - but - but - BUT - Well, it's always an anticlimax of huts. - I just don't want to stay, that's all. It is so democratic, it feels to me infradig. In so free a land, it is humiliating to keep house and cook still another mutton chop."

DHL did stay put long enough however to lay the foundations of a literary collaboration, the only substantial one of his career. ‘Leithdale’ host Mollie Skinner, an aspirating writer, showed Lawrence the manuscript draft of a short story she has written entitled The House of Ellis. Later on when settled into his New Mexico Nirvana, Lawrence rewrote Skinner’s bush romance, altering her ending and imbuing the story with themes familiar to Lawrence’s readership, the escape from a corrupt western ‘civilisation’, a quest for regeneration, etc. In 1924 Lawrence published the now largely neglected novel (with Miss Skinner credited as co-author) as The Boy in the Bush. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

✳ he was to repeat this pattern of sudden decisions to flee the city for the bush later when they got to Sydney 

The ‘Savage Pilgrim’ Down Under: DH Lawrence’s Big Day Out on the Northern Beaches, 1922

409’words

ζ ζ ζ    ζ ζ ζ

Through the novel Kangaroo which David Herbert Lawrence wrote mostly while sojourning in Thirroul, NSW, May–August 1922, we have a good idea of what the celebrated English author thought of Australia and Australians –  in characteristic Laurentian fashion his ultimate assessment was blunt and harsh⌖ but tinged with equally typical ambiguity (profoundly admiring but at the same time fearful of the beauty of the land). 

DH Lawrence Literary Trail in Sydney 

After disembarking from the SS Malwa in Sydney, DH Lawrence and wife Frieda lodged temporarily at 125 Macquarie Street (Mrs Scott’s guest house) in the city. It was from here that Lawrence embarked on his day trip to Sydney’s Northern  Beaches, so vividly captured in Kangaroo. No harbour bridge in 1922 so DHL and Frieda made their way by “ferry steamer” (to Manly) and by “tram-car” (up the peninsula). Lawrence, walking up the Corso to the beach, thought Manly reminded him of Margate in Kent. They alighted the tram at the tram shed on Pittwater Road (Lawrence described it as “the end of everywhere”). From here the couple took in Narrabeen Lagoon (the suggestion is that they went to Narrabeen not just for sightseeing but to look at possible accommodation options to stay in Sydney). DHL however was less than impressed by the suburb’s 1922 shacks and bungalows... ”forlorn chicken houses” and “aura of rusty tin cans”...his distaste evident for “the endless promiscuity of cottages”. 

Ocean Street Narrabeen 

In the novel Richard and Harriet visit an “end-house” near the water called ‘St Columb’ as guests for afternoon tea...the actual location of the holiday home visited by DH and Frieda on that day is a matter of some contention, either it was ‘Billabong’ in Ocean Street, North Narrabeen (as Lawrence seems to imply in Chapter 18 of Kangaroo), or  it was ‘Hinemoa’ in Florence Avenue, Collaroy  (Robert Darroch, www.dhlawrencesocietyaustralia.com.au). 

  

 

Within two days, DH Lawrence, disillusioned with Sydney, (with a less-disillusioned Frieda in tow) were on the train heading for the South Coast where the author squirrelled himself away at ‘Wyewurk’ (‘Cooee’) in beachside Thirroul for two months, contemplating “the huge rhythmic Pacific” while writing his great Australian novel.

꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙꧙

⌖ Australians were “hollow, modern people”, uber-democratic (not a good trait in DHL’s eyes), an assessment dovetailing neatly into Lawrence’s thesis of modern Western industrial society as degenerate. He also uses other adjectives in Kangaroo to describe Australia – “alien”, “primeval”, “fern-dark indifference”, etc.