Good morning, Whitewater.

It’s midweek already, and Wednesday in town will see thunderstorms and a high of eighty-four.  Sunrise is 6:27 AM and sunset is 7:17 PM, for 12h 49m 46s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 31.2% of its visible disk illuminated.

The Summer Paralympics begin today in Rio.  They’ll continue through September 18th.

On this day in 1927, Philo Farnsworth tests a version of television (an ‘image dissector’):

Philo Taylor Farnsworth (August 19, 1906 – March 11, 1971) was an American inventor and television pioneer.^[2] He made many contributions that were crucial to the early development of all-electronic television.^[3] He is perhaps best known for his 1927 invention of the first fully functional all-electronic image pickup device (video camera tube), the “image dissector“, as well as the first fully functional and complete all-electronic television system. He was also the first person to demonstrate such a system to the public.^[4][5] Farnsworth developed a television system complete with receiver and camera, which he produced commercially in the form of the Farnsworth Television and Radio Corporation, from 1938 to 1951, in Fort Wayne, Indiana.^[6][7]

In later life, Farnsworth invented a small nuclear fusion device, the Farnsworth–Hirsch fusor, or simply “fusor”, employing inertial electrostatic confinement (IEC). Although not a practical device for generating nuclear energy, the fusor serves as a viable source of neutrons.^[8] The design of this device has been the acknowledged inspiration for other fusion approaches including the Polywell reactor concept in terms of a general approach to fusion design.^[9] Farnsworth held 300 patents, mostly in radio and television….

Farnsworth worked out the principle of the image dissector in the summer of 1921, not long before his fifteenth birthday, and demonstrated the first working version on September 7, 1927, having turned 21 the previous August. A farm boy, his inspiration for scanning an image as series of lines came from the back-and-forth motion used to plow a field.^[50][51] In the course of a patent interference suit brought by RCA in 1934 and decided in February 1935, his high school chemistry teacher, Justin Tolman, produced a sketch he had made of a blackboard drawing Farnsworth had shown him in spring 1922. Farnsworth won the suit; RCA appealed the decision in 1936 and lost.^[52] Although Farnsworth was paid royalties by RCA, he never became wealthy. The video camera tube that evolved from the combined work of Farnsworth, Zworykin and many others was used in all television cameras until the late 20th century, when alternate technologies such as charge-coupled devices started to appear.^{[citation needed]}

Farnsworth also developed the “image oscillite”, a cathode ray tube that displayed the images captured by the image dissector.^[53]

Farnsworth called his device an image dissector because it converted individual elements of the image into electricity one at a time. He replaced the spinning disks with caesium, an element that emits electrons when exposed to light.

On this day in 1977, Wisconsin holds her first judicial recall election:

Dane County citizens voted Judge Archie Simonson out of office. Simonson called rape a normal male reaction to provocative female attire and modern society’s permissive attitude toward sex. He made this statment while explaining why he sentenced a 15-year-old to only one year of probation for raping a 16-year-old girl. After the recall election, Simonson was replaced by Moria Krueger, the first woman judge elected in Dane County history. [Source: Initiative & Referendum Institute].

Wednesday’s JigZone puzzle is of a kayak by a lake:

Good morning, Whitewater.

Tuesday in town will be partly cloudy with a high of eighty-nine.  Sunrise is 6:26 AM and sunset is 7:19 PM, for 12h 52m 36s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 22.6% of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Alcohol Licensing Committee meets at 6:15 PM, and her Common Council at 6:30 PM.

A century ago, on this day in 1916, Piggly Wiggly opens the first self-service grocery in America:

Piggly Wiggly was the first true self-service grocery store.^[3] It was founded on September 6, 1916, at 79 Jefferson Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee, by Clarence Saunders. A replica of the original store has been constructed in the Memphis Pink Palace Museum and Planetarium, a mansion that Saunders built as his private residence, which was later sold to the city.

The origin of the name “Piggly Wiggly” is unknown. When asked why he had chosen it, Saunders said “So people will ask that very question”. Theories include Saunders seeing some pigs struggling to get over a fence, or a reference to the “This Little Piggy” nursery rhyme.^[4]

At the time of its founding, grocery stores did not allow their customers to gather their own goods. Instead, a customer would give a list of items to a clerk, who would then go through the store himself, gathering them. Like full-service gas stations, this created a greater cost, therefore higher prices. Piggly Wiggly introduced the innovation of allowing customers to go through the store, gathering their own goods. This cut costs, allowing for lower prices.^[5] Others were initially experimenting with this format as well, which initially came to be known as a “grocerteria”, reminding people of cafeterias, another relatively new, self-service idea.^[6]

Piggly Wiggly Corporation secured the self-service format and issued franchises to hundreds of grocery retailers for the operation of its stores. The concept of the “self-serving store” was patented^[7] by Saunders in 1917. Customers at Piggly Wiggly entered the store through a turnstile and walked through four aisles to view the store’s 605 items sold in packages and organized into departments. The customers selected merchandise as they continued through the maze to the cashier. Instantly, packaging and brand recognition became important to companies and consumers.

JigZone today offers a puzzle of a window:

Good morning, Whitewater.

Monday in town will be partly cloudy with a high of eighty-six. Sunrise is 6:25 AM and sunset 7:20 PM, for 12h 55m 26s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 15.3% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1774, the First Continental Congress assembles in Philadelphia:

The First Continental Congress was a meeting of delegates from twelve of the Thirteen Colonies that met on September 5 to October 26, 1774 at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, early in the American Revolution. It was called in response to “The passage of the Coercive Acts” (also known as Intolerable Acts by the Colonial Americans) by the British Parliament. The Intolerable Acts had punished Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party.

The Congress was attended by 56 delegates. The Pennsylvania delegation was appointed by the colonial assembly. Georgia declined to send delegates because they were hoping for British assistance with Native American problems on their frontier and did not want to upset the British.^[1]

The Congress met briefly to consider options, including an economic boycott of British trade; rights and grievances; and petitioned King George III for redress of those grievances.

The Congress also called for another Continental Congress in the event that their petition was unsuccessful in halting enforcement of the Intolerable Acts. Their appeal to the Crown had no effect, and so the Second Continental Congresswas convened the following year to organize the defense of the colonies at the onset of the American Revolutionary War. The delegates also urged each colony to set up and train its own militia.

JigZone has a puzzle of a colorful fish for Monday:

Good morning, Whitewater.

Ted Yoder covers Everybody Wants to Rule the World on a dulcimer. Quite something –

Sunday in town will become increasingly sunny with a high of seventy-nine. Sunrise is 6:24 AM and sunset 7:22 PM, for 12h 58m 15s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 9.1% of its visible disk illuminated.

Friday’s FW poll asked whether readers thought that Vladimir Putin was, in fact, ignorant of the hacking of a major American political party’s servers. Most respondents thought that he was lying (84%), but 16% thought he was ignorant of the hacking’s perpetrators.

On this day in 1884, George Eastman patents the film-roll camera:

George Eastman (July 12, 1854 – March 14, 1932) was an American innovator and entrepreneur who founded the Eastman Kodak Company and popularized the use of roll film, helping to bring photography to the mainstream. Roll film was also the basis for the invention of motion picture film in 1888 by the world’s first film-makers Eadweard Muybridgeand Louis Le Prince, and a few years later by their followers Léon Bouly, William Dickson, Thomas Edison, the Lumière Brothers, and Georges Méliès.

He was a major philanthropist, establishing the Eastman School of Music, and schools of dentistry and medicine at the University of Rochester and in London; contributing to the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) and the construction of several buildings at MIT‘s second campus on the Charles River. In addition he made major donations to Tuskegee and Hampton universities, historically black universities in the South. With interests in improving health, he provided funds for clinics in London and other European cities to serve low-income residents….

In 1884, Eastman patented the first film in roll form to prove practicable; he had been tinkering at home to develop it. In 1888, he perfected the Kodak camera, the first camera designed. Eastman was progressive for his era. He promoted Florence McAnaney to be head of the personnel department, one of the first women to hold an executive position in a major U.S. company.

 

 

Good morning, Whitewater.

Saturday in town will be mostly sunny with a high of seventy-seven. Sunrise is 6:23 AM and sunset is 7:24 PM, for 13h 01m 05s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 4.5% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1783, representatives of America and Britain sign the Treaty of Paris, formally ending the Revolutionary War:

The Treaty of Paris, signed in Paris by representatives of King George III of Great Britain and representatives of theUnited States of America on September 3, 1783, ended the American Revolutionary War. Britain acknowledged the United States to be sovereign and independent. The treaty set the boundaries between the British Empire and the new country, on lines “exceedingly generous” to the United States.^[2] Details included fishing rights and restoration of property and prisoners of war.

This treaty, along with the separate peace treaties between Great Britain and the nations that supported the American cause—France, Spain, and the Dutch Republic—are known collectively as the Peace of Paris.^[3][4]

….Historians have often commented that the treaty was very generous to the United States in terms of greatly enlarged boundaries. Historians such as Alvord, Harlow, and Ritcheson have emphasized that British generosity was based on a statesmanlike vision of close economic ties between Britain and the United States. The concession of the vast trans-Appalachian region was designed to facilitate the growth of the American population and create lucrative markets for British merchants, without any military or administrative costs to Britain.^[14] The point was the United States would become a major trading partner. As the French foreign ministerVergennes later put it, “The English buy peace rather than make it”.^[15] Vermont was included within the boundaries because the state of New York insisted that Vermont was a part of New York, although Vermont was then under a government that considered Vermont not to be a part of the United States.^[16]

On this day in 1970, Coach Lombardi passes away:

On this date famed Green Bay Packer coach, Vince Lombardi, died at the age of 57. Lombardi played college football at Fordham, where he was one of the legendary “Seven Blocks of Granite.” Lombardi served as coach and general manager for the Green Bay Packers from 1959 to 1967. He directed the team to five NFL championships in seven years (1961-62 and 1965-67). His 1966 and 1967 teams also made history by winning the first two Super Bowls.

Good morning, Whitewater.

Friday in town will be partly cloudy with a high of seventy-five. Sunrise is 6:22 AM and sunset is 7:25 PM, for 13h 03m 53s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 1.3% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1666, the Great Fire of London began:

The Great Fire of London was a major conflagration that swept through the central parts of the English city of London from Sunday, 2 September to Wednesday, 5 September 1666.^[1] The fire gutted the medieval City of London inside the old Roman city wall. It threatened but did not reach the aristocratic district of Westminster, Charles II‘s Palace of Whitehall, and most of the suburban slums.^[2] It consumed 13,200 houses, 87 parish churches, St Paul’s Cathedral, and most of the buildings of the City authorities. It is estimated to have destroyed the homes of 70,000 of the City’s 80,000 inhabitants.^[3] The death toll is unknown but traditionally thought to have been small, as only six verified deaths were recorded. This reasoning has recently been challenged on the grounds that the deaths of poor and middle-class people were not recorded, while the heat of the fire may have cremated many victims, leaving no recognisable remains. A melted piece of pottery on display at the Museum of London found by archaeologists in Pudding Lane, where the fire started, shows that the temperature reached 1250 °C.^[4]

The Great Fire started at the bakery of Thomas Farriner (or Farynor) on Pudding Lane shortly after midnight on Sunday, 2 September and spread rapidly west across the City of London. The major firefighting technique of the time was to create firebreaks by means of demolition; this, however, was critically delayed owing to the indecisiveness of Lord Mayor of London Sir Thomas Bloodworth. By the time that large-scale demolitions were ordered on Sunday night, the wind had already fanned the bakery fire into a firestorm which defeated such measures. The fire pushed north on Monday into the heart of the City. Order in the streets broke down as rumours arose of suspicious foreigners setting fires. The fears of the homeless focused on the French and Dutch, England’s enemies in the ongoing Second Anglo-Dutch War; these substantial immigrant groups became victims of lynchings and street violence. On Tuesday, the fire spread over most of the City, destroying St Paul’s Cathedral and leaping the River Fleet to threaten Charles II’s court at Whitehall, while coordinated firefighting efforts were simultaneously mobilising. The battle to quench the fire is considered to have been won by two factors: the strong east winds died down, and the Tower of London garrison used gunpowder to create effective firebreaks to halt further spread eastward.

The social and economic problems created by the disaster were overwhelming. Evacuation from London and resettlement elsewhere were strongly encouraged by Charles II, who feared a London rebellion amongst the dispossessed refugees. Despite numerous radical proposals, London was reconstructed on essentially the same street plan used before the fire.^[5]

JigZone ends the week with a wagon-wheel puzzle: