Independence, Prohibition, and Fart Free Seating

Thought for the day:  Size ain't everything.

Good things may come in small packages, but that gold-covered fella in the picture isn't very small. (Or very dressed, either, for that matter.) The eleven-foot shivering statue, called Independent Man, stands tall atop Rhode Island's State House, 278 feet above the ground, and has been gazing out over the city of Providence since 1899.

Matter of fact, you could say he's looking out over the entire state. After all, the whole darned thing only measures thirty-seven miles from east to west, and forty-eight from north to south. Yep, that does make it one compact little package, but our smallest state is also one of our more independent ones. It's one of only two states (The other was Connecticut.) that refused to ratify the eighteenth amendment. In a state bearing the lofty motto Hope, and  founded on principles of religious freedom and free speech, I don't reckon folks had much interest in raising a glass to prohibition.


Okay, enough small talk. Let's get right to it, and check out some pictures, shall we?

The White Horse Tavern, the oldest operating tavern in the country, was originally built in 1652, and then expanded in 1673 into the barn-like structure you see at right. Over the years, this building served not only as a popular watering hole, but also as a meetinghouse, courthouse, city hall, Tory headquarters, and boardinghouse. Last restored in 1952, the tavern is still a mighty popular place to hoist a few. (No wonder the state didn't support prohibition.)

How'd you like to wander through THIS library? Built in 1747, the Redwood Library in Newport is the oldest library in the U.S. still housed in its original building. I dunno if they carry those Fifty Shades books there, but I'll bet you could find some dandy leather-bound books bearing the unmistakable scent of days gone by.

[credit: Jess Webb, Wikipedia]

The country's oldest one-room schoolhouse, built in 1716, stands in Portsmouth. Although it's undergone some renovations, its frame is original.

Walking into the building must feel like taking a step back into history. Children who once sat at the desks are long gone, but their centuries-old graffiti still lingers on the walls for visitors to see. Also on the wall is a list of the rules... and punishments... that once governed the classroom:

•  Boys and girls playing together – 1 lash
• Fighting at school – 5 lashes
• Quarreling at school – 3 lashes
• Climbing for every foot over 3 feet up a tree – 1 lash
• Telling tales out of school – 8 lashes
• Giving each other ill names – 3 lashes
•  Misbehaving to girls – 10 lashes
•  Leaving school without leave of the teacher – 4 lashes
• Wearing long fingernails – 2 lashes
• Boys going to the girls' play place – 3 lashes
•  Girls going to the boys' play place – 2 lashes
•  For every word you miss in your heart lessons without a good excuse – 1 lash
•  For not saying yes or no sir or yes or no marm – 2 lashes
• Telling lies – 7 lashes
•  Swearing at school – 9 lashes

It should come as no surprise that the country's first Baptist meetinghouse calls Rhode Island home. After all, Roger Williams fled to Rhode Island to escape the restrictive Puritanical society found in other colonies. He established America's first Baptist church in Providence in 1638, and for sixty years, the congregation met in private homes or, weather permitting, outdoors. The church's first buildings were small and simple, and the current one, shown in the picture, was built in 1775.

But would you be surprised to know that North America's oldest Synagogue is located in Rhode Island, too? First built in 1763, Touro Synagogue also houses the United States' oldest Torah.

In his day, Williams was a bit of an outcast and rebel for bucking Puritanical thinking to espouse freedoms of religion and speech. But  these rights, as expressed in the constitution he wrote when establishing his colony, were later embraced in our country's constitution.

The New England Museum of Wireless and Steam, located in East Greenwich,  has a ton of old radio gear, including an intact 1907 wireless station, as well as a wealth of old steam-run machinery.  I'm gonna share a couple videos with you now. The first shows some of the steam machines, and the second shows a spark gap transmitter in action. (The spark gap video wasn't taken at the museum, but the generator  in the video is very similar to one that's there.)

[credit: Matt H. Wade, Wikipedia]

The Breakers, a private home built for the Vanderbilt family in 1895, only has seventy rooms. To be more precise, the home was actually built in Newport as a summer home for Cornelius Vanderbilt, so I guess that explains why its rooms didn't number in the triple digits, huh? Sitting on thirteen acres, this place cost twelve million dollars to build back then. In today's world, that equates to approximately three hundred and thirty-five million, less than it takes to run some small countries. Today, the Breakers is a National Historical Landmark, owned and operated by the Preservation Society of Newport County. So we might not be able to live in it, but we can visit. (And be grateful we don't have to clean all those rooms and wash all those windows...)

In Cumberland is Nine Men's Misery, the country's oldest known memorial to U.S. veterans. It honors colonists who lost their lives during King Philip's War of  1676.

Also in Rhode Island is the Memorial to Black Soldiers, built in Portsmouth to honor the many black soldiers who died while fighting in the Battle of Rhode Island... August 29, 1778.

Watch Hill's Flying Horse Carousel is the nation's oldest.

The country's (heck maybe the whole world's!) largest bug can be found in Providence, Rhode Island. Nibble Woodaway, a big blue termite, is fifty-eight feet long. Hmmm, I don't know that I'd care about seeing him, but there sure are a lot of other things in this little state I'd like to see. Wooden you?

Okay, it's time to move along and check out some of the laws still languishing on the books in this tiny state.

• I guess kids there don't play cowboys and Indians anymore. Cap guns are illegal.
• It's against the law to string a rope across a highway.
• Control yourself. It's illegal to bite off another person's leg.
• Riding a horse over any public highway for the purpose of racing or testing the horse's speed is against the law. 
• Exercising any labor, business, or work, or using any game, sport, play, or recreation, or causing any of the above to be done to or by your children, servants, or apprentices on a Sunday results in a five dollar fee for the first offense, and ten dollars for the second. (How about ministers?)
• Professional sports, except ice polo and hockey, must obtain a license to play on Sunday.
• Any marriage where either of the parties is an idiot or lunatic is null and void. 
• It's illegal to throw pickle juice on a trolley. (How about beans? Can ya throw beans?)
• One must make a loud noise before passing a car on the left. (Better eat some of those beans.)
• In Newport, it's illegal to smoke a pipe after sundown.
• In Providence, it's against the law to wear transparent clothing. (Evidently, not all sightseeing is encouraged.) 
• And on Sundays, it's illegal to sell toothpaste and a toothbrush to the same customer. (This one's a real head-scratcher, isn't it?)
• In Scituate, it's against the law to drive down any street with beer in your car, even if it's unopened. (I guess they want you to do your drinking at the White Horse Tavern, huh?)

******

Okay, boys and girls. It's that time again. Time for (ta-DA!) the 

Weirdest News Stories of the Week

*** Have you ever done a backflip? In a car? On purpose...? A post about  a small state deserves a big story about a small car... a Mini, to be exact. Believe it or not, stunt driver Guerlain Chicherit recently executed an amazing back flip in his Mini at the ski resort of Tignes in the French Alps. Wanta see?

[image from seniorark]

*** A New Zealand police officer was running a wee hours of the morning routine patrol this week when things suddenly turned rather wild and woolly. He thought there was something odd about the 1994 Ford Laser hatchback he spotted... and he was right. Inside the very small car were four men. And ten hog-tied sheep. Nope, they weren't out on some kind of a kinky date. These very baaaaad men were stealing the tasty critters. Since it is currently the middle of a very hot summer in New Zealand, I suspect the men were't all that upset to be relieved of their hot dates. What? You don't think ten wool-covered critters in a compact car are hot... and smelly? (I'll bet they had to take a hose to the interior of that car.)

*** Remember TV's Mr. Ed? A horse is a horse, of course, of course, and no one can talk to a horse, of course, that is unless the horse, of course, is the famous Mr. Ed. Well, the Midland, Michigan horse in this short video may not be able to talk... at least, he hasn't said anything yet... but he does do a pretty good Houdini impersonation:

WE TOLD HIM NOT TO EAT THE BEANS! [image from seniorark]

***  An article in this week's New Zealand Medical Journal suggests that airplane passengers should damn the consequences and let those farts blast. After all, cabin pressurization can only go so far in easing intestinal discomfort exacerbated by pressure changes. Good manners, of course,  dictate that a person in distress try to be as discreet and polite as possible when seeking relief, but seeing's as how the air inside those cabins is constantly recirculated, fellow passengers may not take too kindly to frequent out-gassing, no matter how sweetly you say, Excuse me. (So it's probably best to let it out as quietly as possible and keep your mouth shut.) Dr. Rosenberg, the article's author, suggested that airlines should consider installing seats embedded with charcoal, or hand out blankets with the stink-zapping compound sewn into them. Or how about this? Travelers could be breath-o-lyzed for methane prior to boarding, and then those with high levels, indicating a higher probability of, you know, letting 'em rip, could be assigned to a special seating area. No more smoking and non-smoking sections anymore, but with the able assistance of this simple non-invasive test, planes could institute farting and non-farting sections. A Fart Free zone, if you will. (One can only wonder what one would do in the free zone if yesterday's burrito starts to kick in.) I guess passengers could always wear odor-absorbing undies, too.  (I mean, how uncomfortable could a crotch full of activated charcoal be?) Anyhow, so there ya have it. According to at least one medical authority, holding in that gas could be hazardous to your health, so the next time you're airborne, don't be afraid to scent the air, if need be. Just, um, don't sit next to me.

*** One final video, and this is especially for all the Star Trek fans out there. Would you believe computer scientists at the University of Illinois, in Chicago, have developed a 3-D Star Trek holodeck? Called CAVE2, scientists envision some mighty amazing possibilities for it:

              Pretty neat, huh? Here's to a weekend that's simply out of this world...

                                Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

[NOTE: Images lacking attribution come courtesy of Wikipedia and public domain.]