The other day I was walking in the local mall and I paused for a while to watch the “festivities” at the “Visit with Santa” booth. Thirty dollars – yikes! Let’s take the ca-ching out of Christmas! Anyway it was fun to watch the children waiting patiently with doubtful looks on their faces only to burst into tears when placed on Santa’s lap. I did however see one mother get exactly what she was looking for. Her two blonde, curly haired daughters gave the biggest and most beautiful smiles of delight for the camera.

It all took me back. I remember taking my son into Boston to see Santa. As it turned out this Santa was a delightful man from Puerto Rico and greeted my son with a Latin accent. America is beautiful. His beard however was as fake as fake can be. We still put out the photograph every Christmas. My son never cried around Santa. The Easter Bunny was another story.

As for myself, I do remember sitting on Santa’s lap when I was little. I think that it was at a local bank. I guess that was when they were putting the ca-ching into Christmas. But my fondest memory of Santa was going to the automat with my dad one December. I would always get franks with beans. On this particular day, Santa was there having lunch and he sat down and talked with us. That probably kept belief alive for another couple of years. It is hard to believe in Santa when you grow up in New York City. His presence on every street corner is kind of a giveaway that something about the concept isn’t quite right. And once you grow up and become a physicist, the visiting every child in the world in one night part defies credulity and several laws of physics. Still we delighted to see him tracked on his journey Christmas Eve by NORAD and prayed that the United States would not accidentally shoot him down with an anti-ballistic missile.

These musings caused me to search for old pictures of Department Store Santas. Their evolution was a phenomenon of post-war America, and I was pleased to find the image of Figure 1, which was taken in 1955 at a department store in New Orleans and pretty much tells the story in iconic fashion. Black and white speaks to its age, yes. But also, I think, speaks to a gentler and possibly less commercial time.

Santa is, of course, magical and symbolic of the best of human possibilities. You can see it in this image – the happy wonder in the eyes of the children. When does this wonder begin to fade? When do we become jaded? I received several Christmas cards today with the exaltation “Peace on Earth.” It will not happen unless we seek it.

“The evolution of the smile” sounds like a chapter of Charles Darwin’s “The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals.” Rather it was the subject of a piece on NBC’s Today Show yesterday. This highlighted a recent study of high school yearbook photographs over the past hundred years. Shiry Ginosar, doctoral student in the computer sciences department at the University of California Berkeley — and her colleagues, collected hundreds of U.S. high school yearbooks published from 1905 to 2013. The authors collected high school yearbook photos and then eliminated those where the subject was not looking directly at the camera. This left them with approximately 38,000 images, which they divided between male and female and also by decade. Using software they created the “typical” image – a kind of algorithmic Jedermann und Jederfrau. That is to say the typical male and female face.

A number of points are obvious. First, smiles have broadened. Second, woman started smiling first, which leaves us wondering why. Third, there is arguably a subtle but apparent ethnic shift in the population. An obvious point that I have made here before is that with the invention of photography people initially assumed the somber formalism of posed portraiture and only subsequently warmed up to the new medium. We are today more into revealing ourselves – or maybe not. Because formal portraits, even if they are quickly taken selfies, are about whom we wish to project to be. I remain amazed at how often I see people at the mall assuming a pose and snapping a selfie to send to friends.

I will finally, say that what really surprised me, when I looked at these photographs, is that while the 1930’s composite only slightly resembles my mother who would have been in high school then, The 1920’s male composite is an uncanny dead-ringer for my dad who spent his high school years in that decade.

 

I would guess that as we sat down at the Thanksgiving dinner table last Thursday, few of us realized the significance of the date November 26, 2015. It was, in fact, the 150th anniversary of the publication of Lewis Carroll’s (aka Charles Dodgson) publication of his historic masterpiece “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” As we have discussed, Dodgson was also a pioneer of photography. So I thought that I would celebrate with Figure 1 – a delightful image of the Liddell children: Edith, Lorina, and Alice posing the phrase “Open your mouth and close your eyes.” It seems almost a candid moment, but, of course, was posed. Alice was the inspiration of the story. Indeed, Dodgson told it to her, and she was the one that insisted that he write it down.

It was fairly unique among Victorian story in that it does not appear to have a moral. Indeed, within the story the point is made:

“I can’t tell you just now what the moral of that is, but I shall remember it in a bit.’
‘Perhaps it hasn’t one,’ Alice ventured to remark.
‘Tut, tut, child!’ said the Duchess. ‘Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.'”

The first edition was illustrated by the drawings of John Tenniel. These form the basis for the magnificent photographic illustrations by photographer Abelardo Morrel, who made cutouts of the Tenniel drawings and created little settings that cleverly illustrate the text. You may consider, for instance, his illustration of the Cheshire Cat. Cheshire was the Duchess’ cat, and, of course, there is no such thing as a Cheshire cat – Cheshire cheese yes, but no Cheshire cat. Cheshire Cat is important in that he was the only one that  listens to Alice. He is her guide, to the bizarre rules of Wonderland.

“`Cheshire Puss,’ [Alice] began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. `Come, it’s pleased so far,’ thought Alice, and she went on. `Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’
`That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’ said the Cat.
`I don’t much care where–‘ said Alice.
`Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,’ said the Cat.
`–so long as I get SOMEWHERE,’ Alice added as an explanation.
`Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, `if you only walk long enough.’”

Alice returns to a lazy summer’s afternoon. My mind is taken back to two delightful times: when I first read the book and when I first saw Morrel’s photographs. Both are fond memories.

Well, in the United States the Thanksgiving Day weekend holiday is winding down. I was quietly surfing the web for images late Sunday afternoon when I came upon a retrospective of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade in photographs. There is so much bad news that you feel guilty about a diversion. Still,  I thought that I would share this series from CBS News with you.. The point about it is that each photograph is a little time capsule defining who we were in our fantasies at any given point in the last 81 years. We start with a bizarre Captain Nemo, then move to Superman, then Sesame Street, Charlie Brown, and then a Power Ranger. The simple point however, is the very meaning of the story of Peter Pan, there is something to be said for retaining childhood fascination for never quite growing up.

 

I wish to share today this lovely image taken in 1939 of two women looking out the porthole of a ship. It is beautifully composed and tells a wonderful story of hope, excitement, and expectation. I love the simplicity of this photograph. The two women were on board the MS. St. Louis, the so-called “Ship of the Damned” as it sat in Havana Harbor.  The St. Louis was under the command of Captain Gustav Schröder, who was trying desperately to rescue 937  refugees seeking asylum from Nazi persecution. They were denied entry first to Cuba, then to the United States, and finally to Canada.

Where are

חסידי אומות העולם

khassidey umot ha-olam

The righteous among the nations?

Wow! I was looking today at a set of newly released digitized images of Frank Hurley’s photographs of the ill-fated Shackleton Trans Antarctic expedition and that is really the word to describe them. It is like seeing old friends again, but in a new light. A century ago the Endurance sank beneath the ice of the Weddell Sea off Antarctica. Sir Ernest Shackleton had been counting on Endurance to make it ashore, ahead of a trek across the continent past the South Pole, and, of course, to take his crew safely back to England. But it sank and there was no way to call for help back home – and back home was embroiled in the First World War. There began the Worst Journey in the World – so much of it documented by Hurley.

For those of you lucky enough to be in the UK, you can see this exhibit the Enduring Eye: The Antarctic Legacy of Sir Ernest Shackleton and Frank Hurley at the Royal Geographical Society in London from 21 November 2015 until 28 February 2016. The RGS is itself a living reminder of centuries of British exploration. Several years ago a friendly guard was kind enough to show me the lecture room where Livingstone and Burton spoke.

As for the digitizations, these relate to what we have so often spoken of – giving the breath of revitalization to people who lived a century ago. I was startled by the crispness of Hurley’s image of Endurance in full sail trying to break free of the pack ice. Then there is the highly human photograph of The crew back in “The Ritz“, celebrating the shortest day of the year in the Southern Hemisphere – 22 June 1915. And finally, there is Hurley at his photographic most expressive in an image of part of the crew huddled contemplatively sitting before the ship’s stove during the night watch. You would be happy to achieve this quality of image with a DSLR today, but this was remarkably taken with a plate camera with a very slow emulsion. It highlights not only Hurley’s technical ability but in a single photograph says everything about why the crew survived. It speaks to the enduring camaraderie of the men who sailed and suffered together, the men who placed their confidence in Shackleton. It is the truly stuff that legends are made of.

Today is Veterans Day, which used to be called “Armistice Day’ that commemorated the The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month – 11 am, November 11, 1918 when The War to End all War ended.That was ninety-seven years ago today, and sadly there have  now many wars and many veterans to remember and celebrate, people who fought for our freedom.

Let us celebrate with the long gone faces of the men of the US Army 64th regiment, 7th Divisor who had been to hell and back, and captured in that joyous moment by the miracle of photography. And let use never forget what all our veterans did and do.

“In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.”

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army