P O T P O U R R I, P Jaime
- 1. P O T P O U R R I The following show is a random collection of images chosen from a wide range of subjects, a few of which may be known to some of you but, still are of perennial interest. An example of perennial interest would be this first slide which has been named by astronomers as the PILLARS OF CREATION This is an appropriate first slide because these pillars, found in the Eagle Nebula, consist of interstellar gas containing the remnants of previous stars. This interstellar gas can condense to create suns and solar systems like our own. Our primordial origin is star dust. We have mindboggling history. Did some of the atoms in our body once belong to another living creature a few billion years ago! The author of this show would also like to offer a couple of glimpses of his own origin. As for the rest of the slides, may they be a source of interest and diversion. AUDIO
- 3. CRAB NEBULA In the likes of which were created the atoms that make us think.
- 4. MICROSCOPIC PLANKTON This microscopic plankton was scanned by an electron microscope and reveals how stardust can evolve into simple yet complex life. The minute calcareous remains of a phytoplankton accumulated over eons created the great chalk cliffs. Diatoms, another salt and fresh water phyto- pkankton with silica shells, created diatomite rock-like beds hundreds of feet thick. These beds are mined today for multiple uses including the planting medium for growing orchids. One advantage is that diatomite is porous and retains some moisture without being wet. Most orchids are epiphytes and are watered by occasional rains; the roots will rot if they are constantly wet. Too, diatomite, a silica rock, never deteriorates as do organic planting mediums. The next three slides are of orchids from my greenhouse grown in diatomite.
- 5. C A T T L E Y A
- 6. V A R I O U S
- 7. PSYCHOPSIS PAPILIO MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE
- 9. THE MIGRANT MOTHER The well known and iconic photo of the determined mother of the dust bowl years migrating west in search of a way to stay alive. This could be in the early 1930s. This picture tugs at our hearts also because we too, though not in such dire straights, were driven from our small Nebraska farm by drought, dust, debt and desper- ation. Dad was quite apt at rough carpentry, and through a fortunate connection was almost assured of work when he left with Johanna and Marcella for southern California late 1936. When he was established he called for the rest of the family, and we followed in January of 1937, never to return again to farming.
- 10. S O L I T U D E This picture was taken in 2006, and there is no reason to believe it is no longer there. I am told that the original wooden tower was destroyed in a storm in 1923. So this tower, in 2009, would be 86 years old. When the farm buildings were sold the windmill was left because of the cattle in the adjacent pasture. All of us children, except Marcella , were born in a house about fifty feet this side of the windmill. The milk house stood right next to the left side of the windmill. It was called the milk house because the fresh milk was taken there for separating the cream from the milk using a hand-cranked machine for separating. The cream was saved in the old type metal milk cans kept cool in a tank of water fed by the pump. The separated milk (today called skimmed milk) was fed to the pigs; the cream was sold to the town creamery. Mom did at times make cottage cheese for the table and for feeding the chickens. We churned our own butter by flip-flopping the cream in the old metal Karo syrup cans After all these years the vane still points the asps to face into the wind, and the turning fan creaks a forlorn call of memories to ears too distant to hear. But there are nostalgic hearts that still guard those far-off and fond memories of the old windmill. Today hemp grows wild around its base.
- 11. CONFIRMATION PICTURE This picture dates from 1934 when I was nine years old. It was taken in the afternoon in front of the milk house mentioned above. Note the shadow of my father who was using a Kodak camera with bellows. My father was very proud of this camera because it was one of the better ones of its time. A corner back room of the milk house, with its own door on the opposite side, was used for home curing hams and bacon, always in the cold of winter. First there was the soaking in oaken barrels filled with brine, and then the smoking It was common to use Wright’s Liquid Smoke instead of the days-long process of natural smoke.
- 12. JIMMY - GERRY BILLY - NANNY This picture was taken in 1936 in front of the barn. Goats were very rare in this area; these were given to us from someone living in town. Later the nanny was given to a couple who had a sickly baby. It was believed that goat’s milk was more nutritious.
- 13. WEEPING FRENCHMAN This picture was taken June 14, 1940 as the German troops entered Paris. DISBELIEF - SORROW – HATRED – APPREHENSION
- 14. SADDAM CAPTURED SADDAM ON TRIAL SADDAM SENTENCED
- 15. INVERTED FOSSIL FOOTPRINTS These are from rancho San Antonio de los Álamos, and are found on a cliff of tuff composed of layers of volcanic ash varying in color and thickness. On one occasion an eruption deposited a layer of ash several inches thick, and shortly after there was a light rain that dampened the ash. Over this passed a herd of animals leaving deep prints. After this layer dried there was another ash eruption, seen here in the picture, that filled the footprints. Millions of years later this cliff was uplifted and began to weather. The ash rock below the prints is softer and fell away exposing the ‘bulging’ footprints. This picture was taken looking upward toward the overhanging rock containing the footprints. A paleontologist suggests the prints were made by an ancestor of the pig family. The following slide is a picture of this cliff.
- 16. THE CLIFF OF LAYERED VOLCANIC ASH The arrow middle left at the top of the talus slope points to where the fossil footprints are found. Actually the footprints can be traced intermittently along the entire cliff at the top of the talus slope. The lower left arrow points to the corrals – the ‘squares’. The middle bottom arrow points to the ranch house. The slanting arrow points to the entrance (hidden by the talus slope) to the mile long box-canyon. Note that the top hundred or so feet of the cliff is of a single composition. This indicates the final massive eruption and death-blow of the volcano. A million or more years later another volcano spewed flows of basalt on top of the tuff deposits .
- 17. INSCRIPTION – MARCH 6 1786 This is found at the entrance to one of the few shallow caves at the entrance to the canyon. Captain don Joséf Ventura Moreno with the militia of Coahuila attacked a numerous band of Indians in the Rinconado killing three and wounding many. Their herd of mules was taken away , and so the pillaging has been stopped. Lt. Cortez and two soldiers were wounded. March 6, 1786 This place, now San Antonio de los Álamos, was called the Rinconado, and was inhabited by Indians who settled there because of year-round little springs found in the canyon. The inscription was made with cinnabar, and so is still vivid today . There is an abandoned mercury mine about seventy miles away.
- 18. GYPSUMM CRYSTALS NAICA - CHIHUAHUA
- 19. LOCAL FASCIATION This grew on a colorín tree in the back yard of the rectory. This is an unusual form of fasciation growths. It was about a foot across.
- 20. Fasciation – agave inaequidens This is the form more com- monly found in fasciation, though this example is extra- ordinarily large. Note the two women on the right. It grew on a ranch called La Tinaja in the state of Michoacán, México
- 21. SCORPION FISH KESTRAL
- 22. Things children say It is the custom for all the priests of the parish, when the time comes around, to hear the first confessions of the children. On one occasion the lady in charge of this class suggested to the children that they write a note of thanks to the priest who heard his/her confession.
- 23. RUINS AS SEEN FROM THE STEET IN DOWNTOWN LA ESMERALDA . In the instance below already some of the salvageable materials, such as roof beams, had been removed. All the buildings in downtown were of adobe with mud roofs, and are a hundred and more years old. .Most have been maintained and now have sheet metal roofs, but some lost their importance and were abandoned
- 24. GOPHERUS FLAVOMARGINATUS A rare turtle. This species was known to paleontologists for many years from numerous fossils in the southwest US and northern Mexico, but it was considered extinct until in 1959 a herpetologist recognized it living in a reduced area of about 300 square miles starting about 25 miles from where I lived in Mexico. The one shown here is 14” across; they can attain 30”. They are herbivores and live in burrows. The people living in the area hunted and ate them until they were told how rare they are. Now they are rebounding. This one heard us and dashed for its burrow and did not let me get a better picture of it.
- 25. chaitÉn - Patagonia Massive electric storm generated within the ash plume ejected from the volcano.
- 26. Erotic saguaro A few hundred feet north of the Arizona / Mexico border.
- 27. GRAVE MARKER FOR BITTER BIERCE SIERRA MOJADA - COAHUILA - MEXICO BY REV. JAMES LIENERT, MSF Very trustworthy witnesses suppose that here lie the remains of Ambrose GWINNETT BIERCE a famous American author and journalist who suspected of being a spy was executed by a firing squad and buried at this spot .
- 28. LOCATION OF PREVIOUS SLIDE The town of Sierra Mojada is in the background at the center of the picture.
- 29. Qomolangma – Mt. Everest The sun had already set on this Rongbuk Buddhist guest-house compound. Elevation: 16,728”. We spent a cold night here.
- 30. B o r r e g o d e s e r t Thus is so much like it is around La Esmeralda that I use it as my Desktop.
- 31. S T. J O S E P H R E C T O R Y My present residence
- 32. AU REVOIR MUSIC: ROSE OF ALLENDALE By: SIDNEY NELSON P. JAIME August 2009