Old Photos: Ali Vs. Bonavena at the Madison Square Garden
On December 7, 1970 Mohammad Ali fought Oscar Bonavena at the Madison Square Garden.
*even if you don’t like boxing you should watch this video all the way to the end.
I am not a fan of boxing but I am posting these photos just for the awesome 1970 outfits people were wearing to the fight.
Continue reading →Old Photos: Kansas City Severe Local Storm Warning Center SELS
One of my favorite scenes from the movie Apollo 13 is when a bunch of engineers remap the spaceship’s trajectory with nothing but a pen, paper and a slide rule.
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This almost seems impossible in this day and age, when we delegate all of our calculations to a computer. I may be a part of a dying breed of people who can still figure things out without the calculator, but I can’t take credit for this – in my day we just didn’t have calculators; I got my first one after the 8th grade. Trigonometric tables, slide rules, pen, paper or even a chalkboard were just as much a part of my education as computers in today’s schools. There is nothing wrong with using technology but it’s amazing what we can do without it.
This was a long and winded introduction to the old photos of the Severe Local Storm Warning Center (SELS) which was located in Kansas City from 1954 to 1997 (brief history of SELS could be found here). Long before the word meteorologist was associated with associated with clueless jokers on TV, these people were saving lives without 3-D motion maps, scary graphics and “one degree guarantees”. I don’t know how accurate these guys were but given what they had to work with our modern TV meteorologists wouldn’t know where to start. Apparently technology does not a meteorologist make.Memphis
The shortest route from Kansas City to Memphis is via Springfield, MO and rural Arkansas where highway is controlled by the roaming gangs of deer who stand around the road contemplating if they will let you live. I wouldn’t recommend driving there in the dark.
I didn’t want to go to Memphis. Even though I learned English trying to sing along with Elvis (and that’s why people often ask me if I am from Tupelo), I didn’t feel the need to visit his house and other Memphis attractions didn’t really seem worthy of a fairly boring 8-hour drive. Usually we try to see things along the way, but there wasn’t much to see and the only memorable item was a town called Cabool, mostly because of how out-of-place the name seemed somewhere in rural Missouri.
Memphis turned out to be a fun place for a weekend trip, with enough things to keep you busy for a few days.
Continue reading →Old Photos: One Day In Life Of Kansas Farm Boy
Here are some photos featuring Kansas farm boy – Dan Gardner taken in June, 1947.
Here we see Dan in front of some kind of pre-historic computer.
Before the scientists figured out the evil formula for the hog feed, hogs were fed skim milk and Oreo cookies.
Late dinner with the family, the clock shows 7:50PM.
Malted milk – the gateway drink to other malted beverages.
After a cup of malted milk, the only thing you want is some square-dancing. The kid seated next to the door looks like he is doing community service, the girl standing on the right stuck her tongue out; must be thirsty for some of that milk.
Continue reading →There is no place like home
Every time I visit my friends and relatives on the East Coast the question I am being asked the most is “when will you finally move here”. I have to admit that it’s a pretty tempting idea that ocasionally visits me since I moved to Kansas City almost 16 years ago.
After all they have things like:
Broadway
Nathan’s Hot Dogs and PotatoE Balls:
Skyline, Empire State Building and The Statue of Liberty
Astroland at Coney Island
Ocean with $2,000,000 condos facing it.
Mermaids
Russian Stores and Restaurants
People who mastered parallel parking
So why do I come home every time to the city that doesn’t have any of it? Maybe that’s the reason – it doesn’t have any of it.
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