Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Dave goes by many names including "Dave the Potter," "Dave the Slave," Dave Drake, and simply Dave.  There is considerable mystery surrounding this Edgefield, South Carolina artist, but thanks to the former slave's unique ability to read and write, we've been left with an amazing autobiography, scrawled on the shoulders and sides of his remaining jugs and vessels.  Dave was born around 1801, presumably to South Carolina plantation-owner Harry Drake.  Dave may have had as many as five owners throughout his life as a slave.  Following the death of Harry Drake in 1832, Dave became the property of Dr. Abner Landrum.  Dr. Landrum owned a small pottery yard inhabited by about 15 slave-families.  Known in early years as Landrumsville, and in later years as Pottersville, the stoneware produced there was of great quality and beauty.  For use in plantation homes, it outshone its predecessor – earthenware pottery – as it was impervious to water and much stronger overall.  In addition to signing his name, Dave often wrote short poems or rhyming couplets on his pieces.  His poetry reflected any number of themes:  the size or use of the vessel, biblical teachings, or questions related to family members who had been bought and sold.  Pots were generally signed on the "shoulder," just below the lip or rim.  Occasionally, they would wind around the pot like a coiled snake.  See pictures and find links to books about Dave at http://www.sciway.net/afam/dave-slave-potter.html  On March 14 and 15, 2014, the University of Delaware presented a suite of dances based on the life and times of Dave the Potter.  The show also featured paintings of Drake’s pottery by Jonathan Green and poetry by P. Gabriel Foreman and Glenis Redmond.   http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2014/mar/dance-minor-031114.html

Michigan put cots in a library and is testing out a high-tech chair designed for napping, while James Madison is adding more bean bags to a nap room in the student center.  The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor is the latest school to make headlines for piloting a napping station through fall 2014.  In the walk-up to finals on April 23, 2014, six vinyl cots and disposable pillowcases were placed on the first floor of the University of Michigan's Shapiro Undergraduate Library, which is open 24/7.  First-come, first-serve, with a 30-minute time limit on snoozing, the area was the brainchild of rising senior Adrian Bazbaz, 23, an aerospace engineering major who came up with the idea as a member of U-M Central Student Government after watching countless students fall asleep in front of the library computers.  “They’ll just put their backpacks on the table and lie on them,” he says.  Olivia B. Waxman  http://time.com/3211964/nap-rooms-at-universities/

How Vehicles Are Tested  Fuel economy is measured under controlled conditions in a laboratory using a standardized test procedure specified by federal law.  Manufacturers test their own vehicles—usually pre-production prototypes—and report the results to EPA.  EPA reviews the results and confirms about 10-15 percent of them through their own tests at the National Vehicles and Fuel Emissions Laboratory.

Fuel economy tests show that, in short-trip city driving, a conventional gasoline car's gas mileage is about 12% lower at 20°F than it would be at 77°F.  It can drop as much as 22% for very short trips (3 to 4 miles).  The effect on hybrids is worse.  Their fuel economy can drop about 31% to 34% under these conditions.  Find out why winter fuel economy is lower at http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/coldweather.shtml

The Environmental Protection Agency wants auto makers to road test the mileage claims they submit after a rash of recent inflated fuel-economy claims based on wind tunnel and other laboratory measurements.  The proposal, which would require a public comment period, comes after several high profile cases in which estimates provided by Ford Motor Co. , Hyundai Motor Co.  and Kia Motors Corp. were inflated and triggered complaints to regulators and auto makers.  The EPA has adjusted the test over the years—most recently in 2008—to better match new-car window stickers to actual results  Mike Ramsey  http://online.wsj.com/articles/epa-wants-mpg-claims-road-tested-1405355624

September 5, 2014  Word of Scottish artist Katie Paterson’s Future Library made the rounds this summer when the artist launched her 100-year-long project to build a library literally from the forest floor up.  The first author to contribute a new work to the library will be none other than Man Booker Prize winner Margaret Atwood.  In May the artist planted 1,000 new trees in a Norwegian forest gifted to her by the city of Oslo.  In 100 years’ time, these trees will generate the paper for an anthology of books containing the works of 100 authors—many who aren't even born yet—whose words won’t be released or read until their 2114 publication.  Atwood is the first of the hundred authors to sign on to the project—an additional author will be announced each year until Future Library's completion—and it's hard to think of a better inaugural contributor.  The genre-defying Canadian author’s works are often written as a glimpse from the future looking back at the past and she sometimes conflates the novel itself with an artifact or cultural document—as she notably did in A Handmaid’s Tale (1985).  Her more recent MaddAddam trilogy, completed in 2013, presents a pessimistic view of a near and possible future from the perspective of survivors of a man made plague.  Atwood will turn over her manuscript in May 2015 and it will ultimately be entrusted to the new Deichmanske Public Library in Bjørvika, Oslo, where it will remain tantalizingly unread in a sealed box until publication in a century’s time.  Andrea Alessi  http://www.artslant.com/la/articles/show/40728

The National Museum of the Great Lakes in Toledo announced September 8, 2014 that what is believed to be the oldest commercial schooner ever discovered in the Great Lakes has been found in Lake Ontario off Oswego, New York.  The Three Brothers -- which sank in a gale in 1833 while en route from Pultneyville to Oswego with a cargo of apples, cider and 700 bushels of wheat -- was located in July by a team utilizing high-resolution, side-scan sonar equipment.  The ship's captain, two crewmen and a passenger were lost when the vessel, built in 1827, went down.  Only the ship's tiller, a barrel of apples and the captain's hat were found within a few days of the sinking.  The 45-foot-long, 13-foot-wide vessel is also the first fully working dagger-board schooner, which sailed the Great Lakes in the early 1800s, ever found.  The dagger board was a large wood panel that could be extended down through the keel of a shallow-draft ship.  It prevented a vessel from being pushed sideways when sailing windward or with the wind coming from one side (abeam) of the vessel.  The dagger board could be raised when the ship entered shallow harbors.  Brian Albrecht  See graphics at http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2014/09/oldest_commercial_schooner_eve.html


http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1189  September 10, 2014  On this date in 1846, Elias Howe was granted a patent for the sewing machine.  On this date in 1932, the New York City Subway's third competing subway system, the municipally-owned IND, was opened.

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