A temporary cathedral made from cardboard will be built in Christchurch to replace the historic Anglican building destroyed in last year's earthquakes, Church officials said April 16. The spire of the original cathedral, a symbol of the New Zealand city, collapsed in the February 2011 quake that killed 185 people and the structure was condemned after sustaining more damage during tremors in June and December. The Church unveiled plans Monday to erect a temporary cathedral designed by Japanese architect Shigeru Ban by the end of the year, describing it as a "symbol of hope" for the shattered city, which is still struggling to rebuild.
Costing NZ$4.5 million ($3.7 million) and capable of seating 700 people, the cathedral will be made from cardboard tubes, timber beams and structural steel on a concrete pad. Ban has previously built cardboard and paper structures following earthquakes in Japan's Kobe, L'Aquila in Italy, and Haiti, although the A-frame cathedral is his largest so far. "The strength of the building has nothing to do with the strength of the material," he said. http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gGaCBRiY2ktoUP41nsflrsb3Luhw?docId=CNG.00b32a84b8245bf213f6cd8ff1a9e51b.7f1

Inspired by the successful 1987 Year of the Reader program, the 1989 YYR project promoted activities with public service announcements featuring actor LeVar Burton acting as "host/spokesperson" and camera-ready logos with the slogan, "Give Us Books, Give Us Wings." The Library of Congress issued kid-size four-color "Readin' and Rollin' " T-shirts. http://articles.latimes.com/1989-03-05/books/bk-546_1_young-reader

Evolution of a Logo The Center for the Book's distinctive "Books Give Us Wings" logo was inspired by a statement in Paul Hazard's "Books, Children & Men" (1944). It first appeared on a 1989 refrigerator magnet and was condensed for the 1991 "Lifetime Reader" campaign, and presented two themes simultaneously ("Books Change Lives" and "Explore New Worlds—Read!") in 1992 before it settled into its present form. See four logos at: http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/0212/cfb2.html

The Library of Congress Gets its Wings It’s quite uplifting, in an Internet kind of way, that one of the most progressive, enriching and engaging content-driven web sites belongs to a 200-year-old American Government institution, the Library of Congress (LOC). In case you have never been, start at the Digital Collections landing page and click, just click — see you back here tomorrow. The LOC, founded in 1800, “is the largest library in the world, with nearly 142 million items on approximately 650 miles of bookshelves. The collections include more than 32 million books and other print materials, 3 million recordings, 12.5 million photographs, 5.3 million maps, 5.6 million pieces of sheet music and 62 million manuscripts.” Housed in Washington, D.C. across three buildings, the LOC is open to the public — 1.6 million annually — making its books available for reading on site only. See "before" and "after" logos at: http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/the_librabry_of_congress_gets_its_wings.php

When the Titanic began sending out distress signals, the Californian, rather than the Carpathia, was the closest ship; yet the Californian did not respond until it was much too late to help. At 12:45 a.m. on April 15, 1912, crew members on the Californian saw mysterious lights in the sky (the distress flares sent up from the Titanic) and woke up their captain to tell him about it. Unfortunately, the captain issued no orders. Since the ship's wireless operator had already gone to bed, the Californian was unaware of any distress signals from the Titanic until the morning, but by then the Carpathia had already picked up all the survivors. http://history1900s.about.com/od/1910s/a/titanicfacts.htm

See chart of Routes Across the Atlantic of Four Ships: Titanic, Carpathia, Californian and Mount Temple at: http://www.glts.org/articles/halpern/1235_ats_carpathia.html

After the Titanic disaster, recommendations were made by both the British and American Boards of Inquiry stating, in part, that ships would carry enough lifeboats for those aboard, mandated lifeboat drills would be implemented, lifeboat inspections would be conducted, etc. Many of these recommendations were incorporated into the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea passed in 1914. The United States government passed the Radio Act of 1912. This act stated that radio communications on passenger ships would be operated 24 hours along with a secondary power supply, so as not to miss distress calls. Also, the Radio Act of 1912 required ships to maintain contact with vessels in their vicinity as well as coastal onshore radio stations. In addition, it was agreed in the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea that the firing of red rockets from a ship must be interpreted as a distress signal. The U.S. Navy assigned the Scout Cruisers Chester and USS Birmingham (CL-2) to patrol the Grand Banks for the remainder of 1912. In 1913, the United States Navy could not spare ships for this purpose, so the Revenue Cutter Service (forerunner of the United States Coast Guard) assumed responsibility, assigning the Cutters Seneca and Miami to conduct the patrol. The Titanic disaster led to the convening of the first International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) in London, on 12 November 1913. On 30 January 1914, a treaty was signed by the conference that resulted in the formation and international funding of the International Ice Patrol, an agency of the United States Coast Guard that to the present day monitors and reports on the location of North Atlantic Ocean icebergs that could pose a threat to transatlantic sea traffic. Following the Titanic disaster, ships were refitted for increased safety. For example, the double bottoms of many existing ships, including the RMS Olympic, were extended up the sides of their hulls, above their waterlines, to give them double hulls. Another refit that many ships underwent were changes to the height of the bulkheads. The bulkheads on Titanic extended 10 feet (3 m) above the waterline. After the Titanic sank, the bulkheads on other ships were extended higher to make the compartments fully watertight. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changes_in_safety_practices_following_the_RMS_Titanic_disaster