Another Waldo

What is this a picture of? I'm going to be real stingy with clues. There will definitely be no street names.

Barracuda!

Mark, what can you tell us about this woman? All I know is that she used to have the nickname 'Barracuda' when she played basketball.

My Great Great Great Grandpa (9 and out)

The modern graham cracker has no whole wheat, no fiber, lots of sugar and a ton of additives. I haven't checked it out but I would guess Kellog's Corn Flake hasn't fared much better.

Winding Down (MGGGG 8)

Sylvester Graham, from the time he was a child, was frequently sick. Some think he had tuberculosis. As a young man he knew he didn't have the constitution for normal work. He tried teaching but found it exhausting. He concluded that the only job he was fit for was the ministry.

Many famous people were his admirers. Henry David Thoreau (left) mentions Graham in Walden. Ralph Waldo Emerson called him "the poet of bran and pumpkins". The revivalist preacher, Charles Finney (right), was a strict Grahamite, but eventually rescinded and said he had become addicted to the diet. The famous editor and presidential candidate, Horace Greeley, was a follower. Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism, was an adherant.

As he advanced into late middle age his poor health was too much for even the Graham Diet to mask. He stopped lecturing, returned to eating meat and became taciturn and bitter. The Graham Diet faded as quickly as it had sprung up. He was 58 when he died.

In the next generation, John Kellogg was inspired by his reading of Graham to invent the corn flake and establish his sanitarium for quelling impure thoughts in Battle Creek, Michigan.

Puny Offspring (MGGGG 7)

You'd like to think that if the young men could just hold off until marriage, then they could relax and have fun. But in his book to young men Graham spends many pages warning of the dangers of having too much sex even within marriage.

Here's another quote from his book, and the last, I promise.

It is no uncommon thing for a young couple to enter into wedlock in good health, and in due time to be blessed with one and perhaps two or three healthy and vigorous children; and afterwards they will have, in succession two, three, four or five feeble and puny offspring which will either be still-born, or survive their birth but a few months, or at longest, but two or three years; and very probably during this time there will be several abortions; and all the while the unfortunate wife will be afflicted with great debility and extensive functional derangement, and almost constantly suffer those numerous and distressing pains and ailments which result from sexual excesses. Very frequently, also, the husband becomes severely afflicted with distressing consequences, debility, inflammation, swelling and excruciating pain of the spermatic cords, and also of the testicles, resulting, perhaps, in the necessity for castration, and sometimes death.

Sound familiar? An odd thing about this argument is that Sylvester was the 17th child and when he was born his father (my great great great great grandfather) was 73 years old!

A Chip Off The Old Block (MGGGG 6)

The things I'm reporting about my forebear are true. Just Google "Sylvester Graham" and see for yourself. The only thing you won't find on Google is the fact that I'm related. Well a picture is worth a thousand words. The resemblance is uncanny, don't you think?

Boys Trembled (MGGGG 5)

Remember, the diet was scientifically derived to squash impure thoughts and I referred to the women fainting because of his graphic diatribes against sexual passion.

One of the main targets of his diatribes was the sexual passions of young men. One of his most popular books was A Lecture to Young Men on Chastity.In the book and his lectures he was the champion of the notion, derived objectively and empirically, that "self stimulation" led to blindness and insanity. You can read the book in it's entirety here

You could tell, he claimed, who was a chronic abuser by the spread of acne. Here's the way he put it. "Ulcerous sores, in some cases, break out upon the head, breast, back and thighs; and these sometimes enlarge into permanent fistulas, of a cancerous character, and continue, perhaps for years, to discharge great quantities of foetid, loathsome pus; and not unfrequently terminate in death."

Students Boycotted and Teachers Were Fired (MGGG 4)

Oberlin College was, at the time, a bulwark of Christian Pietism. The leaders of the school were Grahamites. This included the famous revivalist preacher Charles Finney and William Alcott, the uncle of Lousa May who wrote Little Women.

They issued a decree that all meals on campus must follow the Graham diet to the letter of the law. Villagers guffawed claiming they could tell an Oberlin student by their gaunt and pale appearance. The experiment came to an end when two things happened. 1. A large number of students boycotted and began to eat off campus. 2. A faculty member was fired when he was found to be smuggling a pepper shaker onto campus in his pocket.

You may think I am making some of this up, but I'm not. You can read about it here. It's a history of Oberlin College. Check out, especially, chapter 22.

Men Rioted, Women Fainted (MGGGG 3)

Butchers and Bakers hated Sylvester Graham and caused problems at some of his lectures, especially in Boston.

Butchers didn't like him because he preached against meat. Bakers hated him because he was affecting the sale of white bread. Refined city folk were just beginning to get a taste for refined white bread which could only be bought at the bakery. So police and security guards were a staple at his lectures.

His diatribes against sexual passions were so graphic that it was commonplace for women of refined nature to faint. So a doctor was also a staple at his lectures.

Impure Thoughts (MGGGG 2)

The interesting thing about Graham is not so much the graham flour he invented but why and how it came about.

Sylvester was a Presbyterian minister whose passion was how diet affected morals. It was his view that many of the diseases and ills of society were caused by impure thoughts of a sexual nature and that the cause of impure thoughts was the eating of meat and processed white flour.

He developed the Graham Diet to help people control their passions! He was a strict vegetarian and one of the first opposed to the addition of chemicals and additives. Since he was opposed to "excitability" in any form he banned the use of spices - even pepper.

His diet was, in the 1850's, as popular as the Atkins Diet was a few years ago. Followers called themselves Grahamites. They formed societies and published magazines. Graham went up and down the East Coast delivering impassioned lectures to thousands at a time.

5K

I ran my first 5K race today. Up until a few weeks ago I had never run 3 miles. It's amazing a guy can live 51 years and never run that far. I came in 42nd place out of 89 men with a time of 31.39. It was a great experience - I'm already looking forward to next year.
I'm curious - how fast would Peter and Jonathon be able to run this race. I'm guessing 17-18 minutes. Am I close?

My Great Great Great Grandpa (MGGGG)

Awhile back Paul bragged about Faith being related to John Morton. Well, I'm going to do some bragging about my own famous forebear - Sylvester Graham. Some of you have heard this already but I'm going to get it down on the internet so all can see and be awed.

I think I've probably told most of you about being contacted by my cousin Glenda (daughter of Doris) whom I hadn't talked to in probably 40 years. She's been doing genealogical research on Grandma and Grandpa Peterson. Grandma was a Graham and it appears that one of here forebears was Sylvester Graham, the inventor of Graham Flour and the Graham Cracker.

Over the next few weeks I will tell you all about him in a series of posts. That way I can do my share to up the number of posts this year since we are falling way behind past years.

Waldo Park

Waldo Park consists of a solitary sequoia in Salem Oregon. Read about it here.

It can also be found in Wikipedia.

It was actually quite easy to find once I googled "Summer Street" and "Waldo" at the same time. It's kind of scary how little information one needs to find what one wants.





By the way Google Earth now has its own version of "Street View". Here's the tree from another view taken off of Google Earth.

Another Hint!

Remember, I need to know where the little oval sign is and what it says.

Waldomania!

Find the sign I've circled in the photo below. Tell us where the sign is and what it says. Hint: One of the words on the sign is 'Waldo'.

I'm afraid someone will get this relatively quickly - but if not, I will provide additional clues in a couple days. Good luck.

Wow!

I don't know how he did it but Dean did indeed find Willy. If you go to Google Earth, the first view is the entire world with the USA dead center. Don't go up or down, left or right, just zoom in more and more until you're about 12,000 feet up. To the right you should see the track and football field of the famed University of Kansas Jayhawks. At first I was going to do that, but I thought it would be too easy. Then I noticed a little to the left a smaller track and field. I went there and it is West Jr. High, home of the Warhawks. You can view their web site here. Take a virtual tour of the halls or West here.






If I'm not mistaken here we are in the halls of West looking out the very door to the place where Willy once stood like a dork staring at the camera.