Peter Behrens's Blog, page 470
May 5, 2014
Budweiser NASCAR, northern Kentucky
from Basha Burwell, along the Ohio River in northern Kentucky: "Drove along the river road, rt 8 from hebron/airport area into constance, then ludlow then Newport Ky en route to Cincinnati downtown. always best to get off the highways…beautiful , not well maintained road all along the Ohio River. saw the house w/ budweiser car & a ferry to take care across, $8 round trip.pokey little towns and lots of tugboats & other vessels along the river..."--BB
May 4, 2014
The Mineral Palace, Heidi Julavits, & Pueblo
Went down to Pueblo for a look around. Heidi Julavits' The Mineral Palace is a wonder works of a novel to read on that road trip. Or any road trip. For one thing, the original female road warrior, Bonnie Parker, turns up in Julavits' story.
The mineral palace in Pueblo didn't last long, but the gardens are a public park
Walking around downtown early one weekday morning, I was the only flaneur in town. Pedestrians are an odd enough sight that people in passing cars slow and stare--they seem...stunned. Downtown Pueblo has some great buildings but like so many once-urban centers it is essentially a dead zone. What life there is, commercially, happens out in the sprawl-malls. We've let the real estate industry decide where we live and work and how we organize space in America and this is the result, all over the country. It's hard to feel any dignity attached to the human condition in a shopping mall, isn't it? Whereas downtowns used to be lively & unpredictable spaces--anything can happen.
Apart from malls and big-box cantonments, the only other hives of activity in ex-industrial towns like Pueblo (or Bangor ME, or hundreds of others) are, typically, hospital medical centers which have evolved/swollen to engross significant acreage. In Pueblo the med center is the only zone that feels like it belongs to the economy of the 21st century. Lots of large people in pastels on those sidewalks. Lots of snazzy doctor Audis-and-up in the parking lots. Diabetes, and all the other horrors that are outcomes of our way of life, are a growth industry in the heartland, or kidney-land, or dialysis-land, or whatever you want to call it. The urban sequence in once-urban midsize America seems to be a)downtown decay, b)collapse of manufacturing, c)growth of enormous mega-medical center, d) a casino to sweep up any surplus nickels from the embattled population.
There are some glorious buildings in Pueblo: the Thatcher Building (1914) is one:
And the (former) Federal Building:
Pueblo used to be a hardworking steel mill town and, this being the West, the mills probably relied to a considerable extent on transient single males for labor. So in the older neighborhoods you see a variety of apartment buildings and rooming houses. The Fitch Terrace Apartments (below) were built in 1902. Reminded me of similar blocks same era, same function, in Montreal and, oddly, in Windsor, Vermont. In most of New England such building would be clapboard, and in any NE mill town the three-deckah would be ubiquitous. These buildings have dignity, don't they? Hard edges work well with that sharp Western light and big sky.
Below, a small part of the metastasizing Parkview Medical Center complex, the happening economic activity in downtown Pueblo. Check out any old mill town you choose, starting with Pittsburgh, PA--partly due to the horrendous health problems the 19th and 20th factories left in their wake, med centers are the job engines of otherwise economically defunct towns and cities all across America. No so many jobs for young males, though. Hell, they can join the army.
When Pueblo was prospering. some 'grand' houses were built in the neighborhood just north of downtown. You get the feeling that most of the money made here didn't stick around for long. The coal and steel barons didn't live in Pueblo. The real money built mansions on Fifth Avenue or the North Shore of Long Island.
I was lucky to find my way to Burrito Betty's for a breakfast burrito, which was 300% better than any I've ever had in New England.
The mineral palace in Pueblo didn't last long, but the gardens are a public park
Walking around downtown early one weekday morning, I was the only flaneur in town. Pedestrians are an odd enough sight that people in passing cars slow and stare--they seem...stunned. Downtown Pueblo has some great buildings but like so many once-urban centers it is essentially a dead zone. What life there is, commercially, happens out in the sprawl-malls. We've let the real estate industry decide where we live and work and how we organize space in America and this is the result, all over the country. It's hard to feel any dignity attached to the human condition in a shopping mall, isn't it? Whereas downtowns used to be lively & unpredictable spaces--anything can happen.Apart from malls and big-box cantonments, the only other hives of activity in ex-industrial towns like Pueblo (or Bangor ME, or hundreds of others) are, typically, hospital medical centers which have evolved/swollen to engross significant acreage. In Pueblo the med center is the only zone that feels like it belongs to the economy of the 21st century. Lots of large people in pastels on those sidewalks. Lots of snazzy doctor Audis-and-up in the parking lots. Diabetes, and all the other horrors that are outcomes of our way of life, are a growth industry in the heartland, or kidney-land, or dialysis-land, or whatever you want to call it. The urban sequence in once-urban midsize America seems to be a)downtown decay, b)collapse of manufacturing, c)growth of enormous mega-medical center, d) a casino to sweep up any surplus nickels from the embattled population.
There are some glorious buildings in Pueblo: the Thatcher Building (1914) is one:
And the (former) Federal Building:
Pueblo used to be a hardworking steel mill town and, this being the West, the mills probably relied to a considerable extent on transient single males for labor. So in the older neighborhoods you see a variety of apartment buildings and rooming houses. The Fitch Terrace Apartments (below) were built in 1902. Reminded me of similar blocks same era, same function, in Montreal and, oddly, in Windsor, Vermont. In most of New England such building would be clapboard, and in any NE mill town the three-deckah would be ubiquitous. These buildings have dignity, don't they? Hard edges work well with that sharp Western light and big sky.
Below, a small part of the metastasizing Parkview Medical Center complex, the happening economic activity in downtown Pueblo. Check out any old mill town you choose, starting with Pittsburgh, PA--partly due to the horrendous health problems the 19th and 20th factories left in their wake, med centers are the job engines of otherwise economically defunct towns and cities all across America. No so many jobs for young males, though. Hell, they can join the army.
When Pueblo was prospering. some 'grand' houses were built in the neighborhood just north of downtown. You get the feeling that most of the money made here didn't stick around for long. The coal and steel barons didn't live in Pueblo. The real money built mansions on Fifth Avenue or the North Shore of Long Island.
I was lucky to find my way to Burrito Betty's for a breakfast burrito, which was 300% better than any I've ever had in New England.
May 3, 2014
Now that's a keel...'Lark', ready to go in, Brooklin Boat Yard
She was built and launched at BBY 2012
1946 International Harvester. LaFleche, Saskatchewan
from our man in south Saskatchewan, Alex Emond:
"This Green machine was hanging out in Lafleche, (The Arrow) Saskatchewan. Looks to be from the mid 40's . I'm not sure if the windshield doesn't crank out. Built like a brick shithouse / Sherman tank . An International, let's say 1946. The war's over ,eh?... let's get back to work ."--AE
1966 Ford Ranch Wagon, Colorado Springs
Owner said it had been his mother's car.
May 2, 2014
Google Self Driver
First heard the word "Google" at UCross, Wyoming, in 2001, when Susan Choi, working in the next cabin, suggested I give it a try. Came too late to help me much with my first novel The Law of Dreams, but it certainly made the research on the next two, The O'Briens and Karin (forthcoming 2015) a lot easier. Want to know which U-bahn and surface train lines to take to Potsdam from Charlottenburg, in 1934?---not a problem! It's great for details like that, stuff that used to require a trip to the library, a hunt for probably the wrong books, and a long wait for interlibrary loans to deliver books that likely didn't have the information either.
So, thank you, Google.
But I wish you'd lay off this concept of the driverless car. Oh I guess some cars are pretty much driverless anyhow: all those Priuses (Priae?) drifting weirdly too slow or too fast on the Maine Turnpike, cars wherein I know the driver is deeply engaged in a phone conversation and not really behind-the-wheel in any meaningful sense.
But driving at it's best is a medium for connecting with the country, the lay of the land: it's about escape, and discovery, and all that crap. Seeing the country at speed makes you think about how it all fits together. Driving means a lot to me, always has. I was raised an Irish Catholic but driving, as a ritual, always meant way more to me than Mass. So, the driverless car fills me with horror. What are you supposed to do when you're not driving? Shop online via your iPhone, I guess. Really, any behavior not connected to the buying of stuff is disapproved of in our America. Walk in the woods? NO! Forbidden! DEER TICKS! Go for drive?! Where? What's the point?
Trevor Pitchford sends this report from California:
"I spotted it about 10 miles south of Gilroy while traveling north on Highway 101. I played side-by-side for a mile or two - mainly to get a closer look and get a reaction out of the woman behind the wheel… I'm not sure if she was actually driving the self-driving car, or just sitting there autopilot-style. She didn't seem too happy to have her picture taken; She sped ahead when she saw me pointing my iPhone at her."--TP
May 1, 2014
Jaguar XK at Motorland
Quanah Parker and the Llano Estacado
Quanah was a Comanche warrior and the son of Cynthia Parker, an Anglo women kidnapped by Comanches in the 1850s. The photo was taken in 1910 on the Matador Ranch, on the Llano Estacado. Those are Quanah's three wives in the buggy. I've just completed a novel which is set mostly in Germany 1919-38, but my characters--like many Germans of that era, including Einstein and Hitler--were obsessed with the Llano, having grown up on the Winnetou novels of Karl May.
April 30, 2014
1961 Dodge Dart Seneca. Chimayo, New Mexico
from Anne Lennox, on the road in northern New Mexico:"We found this at Rancho Chimayo Restaurante, April 25, 2014. Owned and restored by Eric Vigil. Modified into a low rider. The taillights are from a 1959 Cadillac, the grill and some other parts are also from different cars..."--AL
