The Man In 1A, page 3 (wip)

One for the Retronaut: Franz Marc Holding a Cell Phone » italiangreyhounds.org

Franz Marc Holding a Cell Phone » italiangreyhounds.org

Franz Marc holding a cell phone, 1915.

Here is a mysterious photograph from Franz Marc – Paul Klee: ein Dialog in Bildern, a volume beautifully illustrated with the artists’ postcards to each other and some interesting photographs. Klee seems more vulnerable and less arch than you might expect in these letters and drawings. Marc, maybe predictably, sort of absorbs and reflects Klee; yet the images and texts on the cards seem both entwined and quotidian. One of the photos is this fascinating unsourced image, captioned “Franz Marc im Unterstand, 1915/1916.” It’s hard to tell what kind of shelter this is…it appears shell-shocked and comfortable at the same time. There are some binoculars and map cases hanging, and an eerie prophetic broken mirror. FM is smoking, of course, but the captivating question is what is he holding?
It looks like a cell phone, the kind you would expect FM to have, not a Blackberry or an iPhone, just a functional Nokia with Alpenlaendische Volksmusik ringtones. Photography professors, librarians, and two photo archivists who specialize in early 20th Century images looked at this photo and everyone was perplexed about the photo shows. That’s just how FM rolls.

Steamtown: The Laws of Time

Steamtown: recent pages

Rod Sturt Taylor and The Time Machine: The Journey Back

Born on 11 January 1930 in Lidcombe, a suburb of Sydney, Taylor was the only child of William Sturt Taylor, a steel construction contractor and commercial artist, and the former Mona Thompson, a writer of more than a hundred short stories as well as children's books. His middle name comes from his great-great grand uncle, Captain Charles Sturt, a famous British explorer of outback Australia in the 19th century.
Taylor attended Parramatta High School and later studied at the East Sydney Technical and Fine Arts College. For a time he worked as a commercial artist before deciding to become an actor upon seeing Laurence Olivier in an Old Vic touring production in Australia.

Time Machine: The Journey Back is a documentary film, produced in 1993 for airing on PBS stations. It was hosted by Rod Taylor and produced and directed by Clyde Lucas. The film was made about the Time Machine prop, not the movie, but during filming, Bob Burns surprised director Clyde Lucas by having Gene Warren, Sr. drop by. Warren, the award winning effects creator for the original movie, kindly consented to an on-air interview in which he discussed creating the special effects for the film. This led to an interview with one of Warren's partners, Wah Chang, in Northern California. Chang and Warren shared more details about creating the effects and how the little Time Machine prop was made.

Lucas contacted the original screenwriter, David Duncan, who agreed to write a mini-sequel to George Pal's classic. The mini-sequel reunited George (Rod Taylor) with Filby (Alan Young). Lucas first filmed Whit Bissell for the opening, recreating his role as Walter. It would be Bissell's last acting performance. Note: Bissell is wearing one of the jackets Rod Taylor wore in the original film.
The film won a Saturn Award and a Telly Award. It was included as a "special feature" on the DVD for George Pal's film The Time Machine, released by Warner Bros. and was featured in Starlog Magazine.

Eloi and Morlocks

"But in our world it's the other way round. The Morlocks are in the minority, and they are running the show, because they understand how everything works. The much more numerous Eloi learn everything they know from being steeped from birth in electronic media directed and controlled by book-reading Morlocks. So many ignorant people could be dangerous if they got pointed in the wrong direction, and so we've evolved a popular culture that is (a) almost unbelievably infectious and (b) neuters every person who gets infected by it, by rendering them unwilling to make judgments and incapable of taking stands."

-Neal Stephenson