Deby Fredericks's Blog, page 105

The Dinosaur Court, Part 2

The Dinosaur Court of Crystal Palace Park was actually more of a menagerie. It included extinct mammals and some creatures we no longer consider to be true dinosaurs. They were divided roughly by age (as it was then understood) and placed on three islands in an artificial lake, where water levels could be raised or lowered to show more of the sculptures at certain times.

The sculptor, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, made every effort to depict dinosaurs in a realistic and accurate way. He consulted with top scientists of the day, including Sir Richard Owen, who first gave dinosaurs their name. Looking back from another century and a half of dinosaur science, it’s easy to laugh at the grotesquely squat Iguanodons, and the Ichthyosaurs basking on the shore like seals. It’s important to remember that Hawkins did his best with the limited knowledge then available.

The dinosaur installation was much talked about, and an immediate success at its unveiling in 1854. Hawkins made good money selling smaller replica sets for classroom use. Unfortunately, the creation of each sculpture was expensive and time consuming. Crystal Palace Park operators began cutting Hawkins’ budget as early as 1855. Ultimately he gave up on the project. Several more models that were in process were destroyed, despite a public outcry.

Hawkins went on to other achievements, including the first mounting of a dinosaur skeleton in the United States. Crystal Palace Park remained a popular destination for a time, but inevitably public tastes and world events moved on. There were fires at various times, including one in 1936 that destroyed the Crystal Palace itself. During World War II, other parts of the exhibit were taken down so that German bomber pilots couldn’t use them as a reference point.

After this, true neglect set in. Brush grew high enough to hide the figures from view. Other parts of Crystal Palace Park continued to see use, particularly the sports arena. Still, it seemed the world had forgotten the Dinosaur Court.

The story of this landmark continues on Tuesday. See you then.

The Dinosaur Court

Back in 1851, the British Empire was so powerful that it held its own World’s Fair. This Great Exhibition was housed in a remarkable structure of cast iron and glass dubbed the Crystal Palace. (Although, personally, I think it looked more like a gigantic greenhouse.) At the end of the Great Exhibition, investors bought the Crystal Palace and moved it to a site in South London, where it became the centerpiece of Crystal Palace Park, a major tourist destination. The Dinosaur Court was commissioned as part of the landscaping there.

The Dinosaur Court was born of an ambitious and original concept: constructing life-sized models of extinct animals for the education and entertainment of the public. Prior to this, most scientific work was done behind the doors of universities and a few exclusive gentlemen’s clubs. However, dinosaurs had been the subject of public fascination from the earliest recognition of what their fossils represented, in the 1840s. Dinosaur sculptures would have been a sure winner for the park, even without the effort at accurate science.

Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, who had been one of the directors of the Great Exhibition, was hired by the Crystal Palace Park to design and construct their Dinosaur Court. He consulted with noted paleontologists to make these models as accurate as possible, then spent months sculpting and casting concrete to create the final versions.

Although they look all wrong to us now, Hawkins’ dinosaurs were enormously influential. For nearly 100 years, they were the essential image of a dinosaur. On Saturday, I’ll talk more about their history. Meantime, here’s an image of the Megalosaur, taken by C. P. G. Grey in 2005.

Dragon Appreciation Day

It’s here! January 16th is Appreciate A Dragon Day, 2016. This holiday was created by Christian children’s writer Donita K. Paul in 2004 to commemorate the publication of her novel, Dragonspell. This was the first in her award-winning Dragonkeeper series.

Paul called upon her readers and fans to recognize the significance of dragons in cultures all over the world. She urged participants to choose one special dragon character and re-create it for others, explaining why the dragon is your favorite. Her web site includes a number of suggestions, such as puppetry, classroom or library activities, and various art projects.

How can I resist? My favorite dragon is Mnementh, the first speaking dragon character in another first-of-series book, Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonflight. This, of course, was the first in her ground-breaking Pern series. I read it as a teen. Until then, I had heard and read only of evil, destructive dragons. The idea that dragons and riders could bond in a friendship that nothing could destroy was captivating.

Mnementh was a bronze dragon who stayed calm and carried on while all the humans were getting frantic. He set the standard for me, and I went on to write lots of Pern fan fiction in my twenties and thirties. Many friends I met during that time are still close today. My husband, for one!

So here’s a toast to Mnementh and his writer, Anne McCaffrey.

Ms. Paul has gone on to create several other series. Check them out at her official web site.

Ten Things to Appreciate

Coming up on January 16th, it’s Appreciate a Dragon Day! In the spirit of the commemoration, I here offer ten things we should appreciate about our dragons.

10) Dragons are great and faithful guardians, whether you’re protecting a sacred artifact or some foolish enemy has threatened your family. They hardly ever eat their owners.

9) The lair is always toasty warm, even in the hearth of winter.

8) Dragons are excellent bankers. However, clients who default on their loans will be eaten.

7) Other monsters will never dare to attack you. Even some godlings will think twice.

6) Dragons are very wise and give excellent advice no matter how often you ignore it. There’s no better tutor for a future dictator or master wizard.

5) They are long-lived and can carry out your revenge for generations.

4) Dragons are very effective for clearing forests to plant new crops, or making sure enemy strongholds are properly razed.

3) They can eat anything, from thieving goblins to political prisoners to swamp demons.

2) Dragons are practically indestructible and can do battle under the most extreme conditions. Land, air or sea? Glacier or desert? No problem!

1) Incomparable beauty and terror. Dragons are the ultimate symbol of power, whether worldly or spiritual.

There you have it — all the great things to appreciate about our wonderful dragon friends!

Dragon Coast, by Greg Van Eekhout

We return to the alt-future Los Angeles of Van Eekhout’s Daniel Blackland trilogy for the con of a lifetime and the finale. If you haven’t read these books, perhaps you should skip the rest of this post because of spoilers.

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Ready?

At the end of Pacific Fire, Daniel and his adopted son, Sam, were racing each other for the right to sacrifice their own lives in order to destroy the pacific firedrake created by a consortium of bad guys (and one not so bad). Which is, by the way, one of the best father/son scenes I’ve read in years. Sam won the dubious honor. His personality now inhabits a fire-breathing monster that roams the kingdom of Southern California torching neighborhoods because it can.

Daniel has gathered a posse to try and somehow get Sam out of the dragon’s body. They include old friends Moth, Cassandra, and Sam’s sort-of girlfriend Em. After a failed rescue attempt, guerilla fighters from the enemy kingdom of Northern California swoop in to abduct the firedrake. Now the race is on. Joined by the not-so-bad mage, Gabriel Argent, and his BFF, Max the magic-hound, Daniel heads north to get the one object that can save Sam.

This he does by impersonating his clone-brother, Paul, who met his fate at the end of Pacific Fire. To be fair, Paul tried to kill Daniel but Daniel turned the tables. Now Daniel has to navigate the treacherous waters of Paul’s life, including mentors, friends, lovers,  and Paul’s four-year-old daughter (a monstrosity in her own right). Not to mention the mother who left Daniel behind all those years ago. Virtually everyone is insanely ambitious, and some of them keep trying to kill him.

Meanwhile, Sam struggles and fails to stop the firedrake’s rampages. He encounters a young woman named Annabel, one of the original Hierarch’s numberless victims. Together they search for answers, penetrating the thickets of the dragon’s brain, only to confront their mutual worst nightmare. All this while Cassandra, Gabriel and Max face their own moments of decision between loyalty and justice.

As in previous books, there’s a lot of crazy magic and horrific references, leavened by snappy banter. The caper moves throughout. But this series is really about characters who lay it all on the line for family and friendship. Add in the pacific firedrake, and there’s not much more you could ask for.

Deepflight Submarines

Not only are there dragons in space, thanks to the pioneering work of Elon Musk’s company, SpaceX. There also are dragons in the deep sea, courtesy of Graham Hawkes’s company, Deepflight.

Hawkes is a veteran designer of submarines, submersibles, and similar oceanographic equipment. He founded Deepflight in 1996 with the idea that people should have the ability to move around below the sea, just as we do in the air with small airplanes. As Hawkes states in his public appearances, the Earth is covered with oceans that have barely been studied. Deepflight aims to provide access for exploration, scientific research, and for average tourists who want to admire scenic vistas beneath the waves.

Unlike traditional submarines, which are intended to house humans and weapons while remaining under water for extended times, Deepflight’s craft are meant to submerge for a short time before returning to the surface. The company has developed a series of these “personal submarines,” the latest of which is called the Dragon.

Among several technical advances, Dragon submarines have a safety system allowing the craft to surface automatically in case of emergency. They have life support for up to 24 hours, for the same reason. Piloting is easy for anyone with just a little training, so you don’t have to join the Navy in order to have a beautiful undersea experience.

In the pictures I’ve seen, Dragon submarines appear rather like a drag-racing car, with stubby wings rather than wheels. There are domed seats for two people (pilot and passenger, presumably) so you can see all around you. Deepflight’s current plan is to market their Dragons to major resorts and tour operators, and also to the super-rich for their newest toys. The eventual hope is to bring prices down so that individuals can have private submarines the way we have private boats and cars.

It does sound like a pretty awesome experience, to soar undersea on the back of a dragon. If I was on a Caribbean vacation, I’m sure I would take that tour.

Hoard Vs. Horde

Let’s talk about one of my pet peeves. It’s the irritating misuse of two hapless words — hoard and horde. People seem to regularly confuse them. This is an important issue when talking about dragons, as I often do.

Horde and hoard are homophones. They are pronounced the same way, but are spelled differently and have separate meanings. Now, pay attention…

A hoard is a collection, usually of valuable objects which are hidden away and closely guarded. Although there are individuals with a psychological compulsion to hoard other things, such as cats, the most common meaning for hoard is treasure.

As we all know, dragons keep hoards of treasure.

A horde is a large group of people, with a somewhat negative connotation. A horde can be an army, such as the infamous Mongol Horde. Perhaps a horde of fans might want autographs from a movie star. Pests like locusts and rats can form hordes.

Dragons do not keep hordes. In fact, a horde would be likely to mess with their hoard. Not good.

So, friends, please remember. Hoard = treasure. Horde = army. In the name of all dragons, get it right!

2015 Year In Review

It’s my fourth blogging anniversary, and WordPress has kindly provided their annual report of my year in blogging. I always sit through the whole thing a couple of times, enjoying how those little fireworks soar up and burst.

Here are a few notable factoids from 2015.

Followers: on Dec. 31, 2014, I had 129 followers. Today I have 169. That’s an increase of 40 members — pretty fast growth for my humble blog. Welcome, all of you, and special thanks to those who have stuck around these four years.

Comments: My most talkative followers are Nila White, M. Q. Allen, David Lee Summers, Laura Palmer, and Craig Boyack. Thanks for helping keep Wyrmflight a lively place. And, of course, I’d love to hear from the other 164 of you.

Posts: the most popular post of 2015 in terms of raw visits was a guest post by Craig Boyack in February. Check it out here. This is not to be confused with my personal favorite post of 2015, Just For Fun 35, which was the most popular in terms of reader comments.

Tags: The tags that led the most viewers to Wyrmflight are “Dragons,” “Fantasy Author,” “Fantasy Fiction,” and “Dragon Folklore.” No surprises there.

On this day before the day before New Year’s Day, I have to thank all of you for following, commenting, and otherwise being my friends. My life as a writer would be awfully boring without you!

Pacific Fire, by Greg Van Eekhout

This is the second book of a trilogy, but there’s no “slumping middle” here. I enjoyed how this volume carries the story forward by bringing in new viewpoints, instead of going over and over the same set of characters. I savored learning more about the Emmas, a group of golems (magical clones, essentially) all grown from a woman named Emma, who have their own resistance network.

Ten years pass between California Bones and Pacific Fire. This allows several characters to mature enough to be fully active in the plot. Sam Blackland, Daniel’s adopted son and a golem made from the dreaded Hierarch, is most important of these. It also allows more consequences of Daniel Blackland’s powers to unfold. Other characters who were believed dead return here, and there’s continued reflection on how the powerful prey upon the weak.

This is, again, a heist novel set in an alt-history Los Angeles. Daniel learns that some of his old enemies have banded together and are trying to create their own dragon. Pacific drakes are one of the largest and most terrible species. They are also extinct. However, the consortium has gathered enough fossil bones from individual dragons to assemble a complete skeleton. They plan to use Sam’s life force to reanimate the beast.

Nobody really wants to know what would happen with such evil people controlling an unstoppable dragon. The only certainty is that a lot of innocents will die. It’s a twisty plot with a lot of heart, despite the occasional creepy cannibalistic references. Recommended for ages 12 and up.

Voyages of the Space Dragon, Part 3

This week has seen a major milestone for the SpaceX’s Dragon space program, which suffered a major setback in June of this year. SpaceX staff pulled off one of their most difficult technical challenges when they piloted their Falcon 9 rocket through a launch at Cape Canaveral, Florida, placed several small satellites into orbit, and then returned it to a perfect, upright landing back at Cape Canaveral.

It’s not only a great recovery for SpaceX after the loss of a previous Falcon 9 during launch, but a milestone in space travel. One of the big obstacles to regular space flight has been that so much of the support hardware — complicated, expensive equipment — has been deployed for only a single use. This feat promises that both rockets and crew modules can be returned to Earth and re-used.

Now that the rocket has successfully landed, it will be inspected to see how much wear and tear the mission caused. Once repaired, it can be used again and again.

Here’s some footage of the recent mission, in case you aren’t tired of seeing it yet.