It's about time!

Wilde Imagination

Momma and I have been in mourning ever since Wilde Imagination announced in December 2012 that it was discontinuing its Imperium Park steampunk line.

It took a year, but photos of the newest Ellowyne Wilde were released today in all her steampunk glory.

Introducing, Just in Time!

Pru insisted we take a walk by the bay
But I didn't want to come out to play.
It's much too early, I rightly say.
But she talked me into it, Hip Hip Hooray.
I had to scurry, I had to race
to make it before the sun bared her bright face.
A stroke of luck!
I'm JUST IN TIME.
I get to see the sun rise,Isn't it sublime?

Just in Time Ellowyne features a hip steampunk-inspired ensemble and arrives bearing shiny hazel inset eyes behind thick lashes and a full rooted mane of mink. Including a cream bodysuit with elaborate collar, rich burgundy wool jacket with golden buttons and cameo detail, burgundy stripe skirt with fashion chain and bow detail and ribbed cotton tights, even Jules Verne himself would be proud! Our fashionable time traveler's ensemble is complete with sassy period button-up booties, a burgundy top hat with ribbon and chain deco, and of course, goggles. I dare say, the game is afoot! 

A limited edition of 1,000 dolls is scheduled to be available in April.

How shall I wait until then? Thank heavens my birthday is April 9!

Those magnificent men and their flying machines

© Jean-Dominique Billaud

I think, by now, that it is no secret that I am a geek.

Momma is too, so imagine our delight when we spotted this fantastique French carousel while reading one of our favorite blogs, Epbot.

Les Machines de I’île (The Machines of the Isle of Nantes) is a blend of the invented worlds of Jules Verne, the mechanical universe of Leonardo da Vinci, and the industrial history of Nantes, France on the site of the former shipyards.

Open to the public since July 1, 2007, the project of Machines de I'île in Nantes aims to promote city's image and tries to build an identity as a creative metropolis of dream and of fantasy.

The Great Elephant (2007) is 12 meters high and 8 meters wide, made from 45 tons of wood and steel. It can take up to 49 passengers for a 45-minute walk!

The Marine Worlds Carousel (2012) is a huge carousel, rising nearly 25 meters high and measuring 20 meters in diameter. It features 35 moving underwater creatures on three levels: the ocean floor, the depths, and sea and boats. Visitors will be able to move about amidst a ballet of aquatic animals (The squid! The sea dragon!) and sea carriages, as well as climb aboard and guide the movements of the Machines.

The Heron Tree (2014) is a steel structure of 45 meters in diameter and 28 meters in height, topped with two herons. The project plans to allow visitors to climb either onto the back or onto the wings of the birds for a circular flight over the hanging gardens of the tree.

Momma can only dream of going.

But as for Moi....

Well, color me surprised

I have now seen it all.

Dover Publications released a Steampunk Stained Glass Coloring Book last week.

Sixteen imaginative stained glass illustrations transport colorists into an alternative reality. Dressed in eccentric adaptations of Victorian fashions, these steampunkers operate flying machines and submarines, build robots, conduct experiments, and engage in other activities reminiscent of the futuristic fiction of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne.

Momma has got to get one of these for my Big Sister.

What really cracks me up is that amazon.com has used copies for sale already.

Really? Used coloring books?

And just to keep this educational, the McLoughlin Brothers produced the first known coloring book, The Little Folks' Painting Book, in the 1879 with the prolific English children's book illustrator and writer, Kate Greenaway.

Pipe dreams

According to my friend Betsy, I am now a Perfectly Awful Girl.

You see, she caught me with a pipe ... one that does not work since there is no hole in it!

So why a non-functional pipe? Tis the season!

1. Sherlock Holmes 2: A Game of Shadows is coming out Dec. 16.
   
   I need to practice my sleuthing skills ... and appearance. Sidney Paget in his illustrations usually had Holmes smoking a long-stemmed pipe. Paget is also credited with giving the first deerstalker cap and Inverness cape to Holmes, something that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle never mentioned.
   
   
2. Santa smokes one.
   
   "The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
   And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath"

   A Visit from St. Nicholas
   Clement Clarke Moore

3. And even some of the boys in Betsy's Crowd!

Betsy started reforming Phil. He smoked. He smoked a pipe. He was the only boy in Betsy's circle who smoked, except behind the barn. It was a wonderful evening when Phil gave Betsy his pipe. She hung it on a ribbon over her dressing table.

Betsy in Spite of Herself

Sometime before she had revived her last year's successful experiment in “reforming.” Phil's pipe still hung beside her dressing table. She discovered that Dave had a pipe and secured it to hang beside Phil's. Dennie gave her a sack of tobacco and some cigarette papers. Cab contributed a cigar.

Betsy had protested that. "You don't smoke! You're giving me one of your father's cigars."

"Well, gosh, Betsy!" Cab grinned. "If everyone else is going to be reformed, I want to be reformed, too."

Her father teased her about this enterprise....

"Have you heard about Betsy turning Carrie Nation?"

Betsy was a Junior

So now she has gone all Carrie Nation on Me and is demanding my pipe!

She even called me in front of the rest of The Crowd hoping I'd give in.

Betsy doesn't know me very well yet, does she?

Around the world in 72 days

My hero.

On Nov. 14, 1889 pioneering female journalist Nellie Bly (aka Elizabeth Cochrane) began a successful attempt to travel around the world in less than 80 days.

She only took with her the dress she was wearing, an overcoat, several changes of unmentionables, and a small bag carrying her toiletries. She carried most of her money in a chamois bag tied around her neck.

While on her trip she met Jules Verne, author of Around the World in Eighty Days which was first published in 1873.

(When Verne asked Bly why she wasn't going to Bombay, India as Phileas Fogg had, she said, "Because I am anxious to save time, not a young widow.") 

Bly completed the trip in 72 days.

I'll bet she asked for directions.

Dumas vs. Verne

What would have happened if Jules Verne wrote The Three Musketeers instead of Alexandre Dumas?

Something like this, I'd wager.

I admit I'm not a purist. I like it when someone can give a fresh look to something that has been done a thousand times before.

I love Guy Ritchie's version of Sherlock Holmes so I admit my curiosity is piqued by this alternate take (one scathing review said "steampunk'd"!) of The Three Musketeers.

But imagine my excitment when I learned they have a flying war machine!!!  From the same review:

Leonardo da Vinci, we learn, has drawn up plans for a deadly flying “war machine,” a combination of dirigible and seafaring galleon. In the prologue Athos, Aramis and Porthos sneak into Venice on a special-ops mission.

Woo hoo! Count me in!

My only difficulty is choosing which boots to wear since nothing can compare to those worn in the movie....

The Eighth Wonder of the World

- .... . / ..-. .. .-. ... - / - .-. .- -. ... .- - .-.. .- -. - .. -.-. / - . .-.. . --. .-. .- .--. .... / -.-. .- -... .-.. . / .-- .- ... / -.-. --- -- .--. .-.. . - . -.. / --- -. / .- ..- --. .-.-.- / ..... --..-- / .---- ---.. ..... ---.. --..-- / -.-. .-. --- ... ... .. -. --. / - .... . / .- - .-.. .- -. - .. -.-. / --- -.-. . .- -. / ..-. .-. --- -- / .. .-. . .-.. .- -. -.. / - --- / -.-. .- -. .- -.. .-

(The first transatlantic telegraph cable was completed on Aug. 5, 1858, crossing the Atlantic Ocean from Ireland to Canada!)

Why my excitement? The cable is one of the many underwater landmarks observed by the Nautilus in original steampunker Jules Verne’s 1869 novel, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.

It would normally take at least 10 days to deliver a message by ship, but the transatlantic cable allowed an inquiry and a response within the same day.

Messages were sent by an operator using Morse code, a series of dots and dashes. The reception was bad on the 1858 cable, and it took two minutes to transmit just one character, which translates to about 0.1 words per minute.

On Aug. 16, 1858, the first message (which took more than 17 hours to transmit!) sent across the cable was, "Glory to God in the highest; on earth, peace and good will toward men."

Queen Victoria (have I mentioned that I like the Old Girl?) sent a congratulatory telegram to President James Buchanan through the line, expressing a hope that it would prove "an additional link between the nations whose friendship is founded on their common interest and reciprocal esteem."

Buchanan replied that, "it is a triumph more glorious, because far more useful to mankind, than was ever won by conqueror on the field of battle. May the Atlantic telegraph, under the blessing of heaven, prove to be a bond of perpetual peace and friendship between the kindred nations, and an instrument destined by Divine Providence to diffuse religion, civilization, liberty, and law throughout the world."

A new cable was installed in 1866 which could transmit eight words a minute — 50 times faster than the 1858 cable.

It wasn't until the 20th century though that message transmission speeds over transatlantic cables would reach even 120 words per minute.

Think about that the next time you complain about your slow internet connection or cell phone reception!

This Week in The Civil War: Sunday, July 10

Views on Independence

As the Union calls up more troops, the 11-state Confederacy is also marshaling its soldiers for war. From farms and cities throughout the South, more units are organizing for the fight, the names of the officers and numbers of rank-and-file troops listed in newspaper accounts of the era. Some of the men are so young, teenagers still, that they must ask their fathers' permission to fight. The Southern Recorder of Milledgeville, Ga., editorialized on July 9, 1861, about what the recently concluded Independence Day meant for many in the South: "Hitherto, when strangers visited Philadelphia their first inclination, and, as they esteemed it, their first duty was to see Independence Hall ... The Day, however, which has been thus consecrated in the annuals of Liberty, does not attach as the exclusive property of the North, like Independence Hall in which the Congress of 1776 framed and signed the immortal Declaration. The people of the Southern Confederacy freely give up the Hall, and wish that the North may carefully preserve it as a hallowed memento of a common struggle and a common triumph; but the principles of the Declaration the South will forever cherish, as they are taught by it that Governments derive their powers from the consent of the governed."

I'm getting steamed

Honestly, do you people in the 21st century never read?

I keep hearing, "What is steampunk?"

Have you not read such illustrious authors such as H. G. Wells and Jules Verne? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?

No? How about L. Frank Baum?

According to Wikipedia:

Steampunk is a sub-genre of science fiction, alternate history, and speculative fiction that came into prominence during the 1980s and early 1990s. Specifically, steampunk involves an era or world where steam power is still widely used—usually the 19th century and often Victorian era Britain—that incorporates prominent elements of either science fiction or fantasy. Works of steampunk often feature anachronistic technology or futuristic innovations as Victorians may have envisioned them; in other words, based on a Victorian perspective on fashion, culture, architectural style, art, etc. This technology may include such fictional machines as those found in the works of H. G. Wells and Jules Verne or real technologies like the computer but developed earlier in an alternate history. 

Steampunk as a genre has been around for years, but it didn't get its name until 1987 when author K.W. Jeter wrote Locus magazine,

Dear Locus,

...Personally, I think Victorian fantasies are going to be the next big thing, as long as we can come up with a fitting collective term for Powers, Blaylock and myself. Something based on the appropriate technology of the era; like "steampunks", perhaps...

K.W. Jeter

Now, gosh darn it all (and I use that bold language only because I'm getting, well, "steamed") go read something, even if it's a graphic novel or comic book.

You'll be amazed at what you've been missing.