I found a prime example of a corporate sign...must be many others, eh?

This one is at the center of the research universe for one of the major automakers

Got gas? Another fine example.

Any Brits here? I'm wondering whether "Essential British Company" is recognized as a slogan that makes use of a fairly high-brow pun (can gas be considered an essence?), or just as another stupid corporate tagline...

Transco, UK is a natural gas distributor via pipelines, and natural gas has a certain, unmistakeable by design, essence to it. LonghornFan, you do remember why they put Mercaptan in odorless natural gas to start with?

Quote:

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In 1937 New London, Texas, in northwest Rusk County, had one of the richest rural school districts in the United States. Community residents in the East Texas oilfields were proud of the beautiful, modern, steel-framed, E-shaped school building.

On March 18 students prepared for the next day's Inter-scholastic Meet in Henderson. At the gymnasium, the PTA met. At 3:05 P.M. Lemmie R. Butler, instructor of manual training, turned on a sanding machine in an area which, unknown to him, was filled with a mixture of gas and air. The switch ignited the mixture and carried the flame into a nearly closed space beneath the building, 253 feet long and fifty-six feet wide. Immediately the building seemed to lift in the air and then smashed to the ground. Walls collapsed. The roof fell in and buried its victims in a mass of brick, steel, and concrete debris. The explosion was heard four miles away, and it hurled a two-ton concrete slab 200 feet away, where it crushed a 1936 Chevrolet.

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Figures vary, but approximately 300 people, mostly children, died that day. This town lost a whole generation in a matter of seconds. Federal law was enacted shortly after requiring natural, or "green", gas have a distinct odor to it.
As a sidenote, one of the first reporters on the scene was a cub reporter working out of Dallas named Walter Cronkite. What a way to start a career, I probably would have quit right then. Glad he didn't, though.

Click here for more info about this disaster...

Texas has had an "interesting" history of record-setting disasters--New london, the Galveston Hurricane, the Texas City Grandcamp explosion... all rate pretty high in the history books. My Dad actually went to school in New London, dropped out and went on the road in the early 30's. One of the few cases where dropping out of school was for the best. New London never did recover from the explosion, I went through there about 10 years back, still just a little wide spot in the road.

Your dad was a lucky man, (or boy) considering only a 40% survival rate at New London. I don't like them odds.


You're right about Texas, they do things big down there, intentionally or not. 6000 dead in the 1900 Storm at Galveston (how's this for mind-boggling, 3,700,000 dead when the Huang He(Yellow) River flooded in China circa 1937...sorry, off on a tangent again), the highest figure I've found for New London is 311, and the Grandcamp explosion which is another interesting story.

"Texas City just blew up!" , a quote that tells it all. Workers loading the ship apparently started the fire with a lit cigarette. It smoldered for a little more than an hour, long enough to attract a sizeable crowd. A favorite pasttime of the locals was to gather and watch the occasional refinery fires. This one was unusual in that the smoke plume was " a pretty peach color", with people leaving work and children cutting class to get a better view. At 9:12am the fire had worked it's way to the 2300 tons of Ammonium Nitrate on board. For comparison's sake, Tim McViegh used 3 tons in Oklahoma City. Hundreds were killed instantly, including the entire Texas City Volunteer Fire Department. The explosion was heard 150 miles away, people knocked off their feet 10 miles away, and a mushroom cloud rose 2000 feet in the air. Flying red hot shrapnel rained down for miles, destroying hundreds of homes and igniting secondary explosions in various ships and refinerys. The freighter High Flier exploded the next day with an additional 100 tons of Ammonium Nitrate, and the Monsanto refinery was totally destroyed. All told, 576 people died that day with more than 3000 injured.

Used to fish a lot from the Texas City Dike, and right at the foot of the dike is the resting place of one of the Grandcamps 3000 pound anchors, 2 miles from Pier O where she was docked. Current resolution does not clearly show the anchor, but it is visible. Go south and you'll see the docks and adjoining refineries. Could not pinpoint Pier O, but believe it was located in the canal.

Hmm, I used to fish off the dike with my granddad all the time. Got Snow Cones at the little place at the begining of the road. Can't say I knew the whole story to the anchor though, Just that a ship had blown up and it landed there.

Loved to night fish at this pier at the end of the dike, which is 5 mi. long if I remember right. Good spot for specks & reds, dreaming about catching that 6' tarpon like the one mounted in the baitshop.

All accounts that I've found talk about an anchor flying two miles, but the plaque says this one went 1/2 mile. Where's the other one?

Here's more info on the Texas City disaster:
IAFF Local 1259
History Channel (Recording of radio news broadcast)

House of Staples....

Good chance to see Staples in 3D

Horse racing (I think!) in Japan. Must be visible to the incoming flights to Tokyo International to the SE.