Another Roadside Survey

Collecing data on Colorado highways:

It's a data collection system on wheels!

It's just the thing "Roadside Mysteries" could use to check out stuff. You know: Take terebytes of data along the Roadside and then mine the hell out of it for Mysteries!

A Pathways Services Data Van

Pathway provides automated road and surface condition data collection products and services. "We provide technology to the transportation industry to aid in information upkeep about road conditions. " It's the kind of van that Team Roadkill would die for.

They could be using the van to collect data on the Harmony bridge crossing Interstate 25 seeing as they need to start repairing the bridge like any day now. Hint: Stay away from that intersection for the next six months!

Three Forensic limitations!

At a lecture about Forensic Entomology:

So, what does it mean?

1) On hot days, the maggots thrive!

2) There are computer programs out there for calculating the postmortem interval (PMI) from arthropod successional data. Entomology-assisted determination of the PMI promises to be a reliable technique in cases of homicide, suicide, accidental death, and unattended death due to natural causes.

3)The corpse could be ANYWHERE!

Dr. Boris Kondratieff (on the right)

CSU Entomologist, Dr. Kondratieff was on hand to help us understand how blowfly maggots help determine the time of death. Here he is pointing out a "maggot mass", where the maggots cluster together when feeding in order to maximize the benefits of combined metabolic heat.

After the lecture, we went out for dinner!

For further reading:

Necrosearch revisited: further approaches to the detection of clandestine graves. In: "Forensic Taphonomy. The Postmortem Fate of Human Remains."

Jacob's Escalator: Looking Back, Part 2

In memory of Surrational Images

Scott Mutter 1944 - 2008

I remember Scott Mutter. Back in the late 60's he would show his collection of movies at the Red Herring Coffeehouse. We were both into cinematography and liked to talk about the current technology; Those days it was non-digital !
He was a good friend and I would always try to find him and talk to him whenever I was in town.
He later became famous for his "Surrational Images"; I remember reading about him in the Chicago Tribune Magazine in the late 70's, and I was happy to see that he was finally being rewarded for his work. In 2006, while consulting at BP Amaco in Naperville, Illinois, I came across copies of his work on the walls in second floor of the research center. I hadn't thought of him for some time, so it was really neat to see his pictures on view in corporate America. Scott would have had a laugh over that!

Mysteries In Illinois...

Smith & Northwest Highway, Palatine, IL:

Brown's Fried Chicken Massacre

We would pass this way on the way to church! No building remains on this spot!

The Little Jewel in Arlington Heights:

Tylenol Terrorist !

We just moved to Arlington Heights when some neighbors accross the street started getting real sick!

Railroad dog revisited

Remember Annie the Railroad Dog?

There is a statue of her in front of the main library, but I had heard that her grave site is someplace else.

I had asked around town. Some people believed that it existed, but where they knew not. Even Roadside America does not give the exact details.

I missed it about four times because I didn't think that there would be a metal gate and brickwork protecting the dog's grave site. Must be lots of disrespecting dogs around town!

El Dia de los Muertos

Students of FRCC PSY 227 Psychology of Death and Dying put some of their altars up for display. The public was invited to create altars for display in the main library. I was too late to enter an alter this year, but next year, JUST WAIT AND SEE!!!

We saw Dead People!

The 13th Annual Cemetery Stroll

Today we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Cache la Poudre Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution by going to Grandview Cemetery and listening to dead people talk about what life was like way back then.

Charles Warren Speaks!

This dead lady read a poem

Dead Bug Man
Clarence Preston Gillette, the first entomologist in Fort Collins and head of the zoology department at CSU. He worked principally on the taxonomy of the Cynipidae, the Cicadellidae and the Aphidoidea.

Yet another costume party in this town! What do they do on Halloween?

Annie, The Railroad Dog

We were in Denver last night to see Avenue Q. It's sort of like an adult version of Sesame Street.
Check it out!

Annie the Railroad Dog: This is not the first time we have seen statues of dogs.

Here is the statue of Annie at the Fort Collins main library building.

...and this is Greyfriars Bobby in Edinbourgh.

I just found out that there was a community celebration in honor of Annie the Railroad Dog on August 23! Oops. Maybe next year!

Fashion and Traditions of Mourning in Victorian Society

Time for some Fort Collins History!
The Avery House is an historic home in Fort Collins, built in 1879, by Franklin Avery - founder of the FoCo First National Bank. This week the historical society exhibit was "Fashion and Traditions of Mourning in Victorian Society". I think the exhibit will continue through October, as it is listed in Hauntedcolorado.net's "Fun & Spooky things to do October 2008 during this Halloween season!'

Marcia, our Avery House docent for this day, is shown here next to the piano in the Avery living room. She is wearing traditional mourning clothes of the early 1900's.

Fort Collins has Franklin Avery to thank for the wide streets in Fort Collins; he took advantage of the open spaces when he surveyed the town in 1873.