When all else fails, dazzle 'em with science

In my previous post, I introduced the McClurken boys and some of you commented that you thought the tallest of these skinny young men was on the far left. So I decided to take a closer look. A much closer look.

I recalled from an now ancient mechanical drawing class I suffered through, something about "vanishing points". To refresh my memory, I asked my good friend Google about it. He told me, "a vanishing point is a point in a perspective drawing to which parallel lines not parallel to the image plane appear to converge." Engineering drawings usually show an item in three flat, 90-degree views (top, side, and front) but there is another type of engineering drawing, called the orthogonal or one point perspective.

Noticing that the old photograph had a "vanishing point off to the far right, it was obvious to me that the left most objects appear bigger than they actually are - that is, as compared with objects to the right... (My apologies to my g-uncle McClurken for calling his lower leg an object).


So, I printed out a copy of the photo and determined just where the vanishing point was located. You see it there, way off to the far right. So what this means, is that the traverse lines at any distance from the vanishing point are of the same length (or in this case, height).


Looking more closely at the photo, we see the orthogonal lines passing through the top of the fence behind the young men as well as beneath them along the curbing of the flower garden (I admit, I "assumed" that the curb was parallel to the fence).


Interesting - the two young men on the left, appear to be of nearly identical height, although the one in the middle has a "longer" face. Going by a rough estimate based on the height of a typical forehead - the man on the left is about 3 inches shorter than the other two - which, as they say, "agrees well with the data" given we think one man was 5'7" and the other two were about 5'10".

So what does all this prove?

Well, absolutely nothing other than demonstrating the author of this post will go to great lengths to attempt to solve a perplexing problem (if he wants to).

Looking at the photo, I'm not even convinced myself.

What helped some was to locate the Selective Service Act of 1917 and learn that all males aged 21 to 30 were required to register for military service. At the request of the War Department, Congress amended the law in August 1918 to expand the age range to include all men 18 to 45.

This means originally, young men born between 1886 and 1896 were required to register (and hence drafted). Knowing this gives me greater confidence that the older and younger brothers where not drafted. It still leaves me with the possibility of four of the seven brothers being in the photo with Howard being left questionable as he was "just barely younger" than draft age.

So - does this mean James, Edwin, and George are in the photo (and not Howard)? I guess it will require further research to be sure - and finding WWI records that I have no known access to...

More Old Photographs

A while back, I wrote about my paternal grandmother's paternal grandfather and his numerous offspring. I am still going through the piles of old family photographs I "inherited," I've been able to identify some of the people that are in them, but sadly, most of them are unlabeled. Here are two that I'd like to share.


Someone once wrote that the poor were cannon-fodder for the rich. My great-great-grandfather Samuel McClurken was a poor Irish immigrant that lived in the "factory district" of Philadelphia called Kensington. Most of his sons served during the various wars the USA has been involved in. In the photograph, you see three of his sons, clowning around a bit in his backyard, sitting without a chair.

I think the three brothers in the photograph are James, Howard, and Edwin, but I'm not 100% sure which of these fellows is whom. I've found WWII draft cards for 4 of the 5 living brothers. It's amazing what you can learn from them.

Thomas (1880-1958) (WWII draft card image not available)

William Spence (1884-1924) (died in train-truck accident) Did not serve during WWI. He was my great-grandfather.


The only brother I've been able to determine to be in the photograph "for sure" is Corporal James (1888-1958) Co. D, 34 Infantry, 7th Division WWI (never married). James was a Chemist and he went on to make ice cream for Abbott's Dairy. He is listed as 5' 10", 140 pounds and light haired. He lived with his brother Raymond for a time.


George Richardson (1892-1976) is shown living with wife Emma and working for the John B. Stetson hat factory. 5' 10 1/2", 190 pounds and blond haired. With him being blond and husky (at least he was by 1940), I don't think George is in the old photograph.


Edwin Winfield (1894-1983) listed as married to Anna and also working for the John B. Stetson hat factory. 5' 7", 166 pounds, and brown haired. I think Edwin is the "short" guy on the far left in the old photograph.


Howard Wilson (1897-1982) 5' 11", 150 pounds, and brown haired. Howard is shown married to Edna and working as a partner with Morgan and Co., in the "Pakard" building. Howard was a CPA. I've not been able to determine where this building actually was/is, nor who the Morgan and Co. owners were. I guess the mailman knew how to find the place and I'll leave it as a rainy day project. I think Howard is in the old photograph. Being the tallest (but not by much) I'm guessing he is the one in the center.

Raymond Wesley (1901-1958) No WWII draft record. I think Raymond was too young to have served with his older brothers in WWI.

So there you have it, an educated guess (at best) that, from left to right, we see Edwin, Howard, and James in the old photograph.


This old photograph illustrates far more than what appears in it. You see two young babies, perhaps less than a year old - one with the hair parted in the middle and one with hair parted elsewhere. These two are twins and are my paternal grandmother's older brother William (center part) and his twin sister Margaret. Sadly, Margaret died at the age of five from childhood illness.

What has been a challenge to me - are the names. My grandmother's parents names were William and Margaret. They had the twins and named them after themselves. Margaret (Jr.) died - but William (Jr.) went on to marry a Margaret. Confused yet? My great-grandfather, in addition to being married to a Margaret, had a sister named Margaret. There are twelve Margarets in three generations in this family tree.

I know I'll never have any children, but if I did, I don't think Margaret would be on my list of possible names. I hope my ancestors can forgive me for that.

Bock Buck Buck Booooooock!

Well, you can blame Parsley of Seasons of My Mind for this... She dared folks to show a picture of themselves... and then when I demurred, she called me a big chicken!


Here is a picture of me in the reading room with my groupies. I'm probably reading "Scientific American" although I should be reading something historical since I'm in (or very near) Valley Forge National Historic Park in this shot. The famous steel balls are out of view to the left (here, here and here).


Here is a more dignified shot - I think I was showing my coworker my new digital camera when they mistakenly took a picture. Oh well, accidents happen. The camera seemed okay afterwards, anyway.


I love being near water - ponds, lakes, creeks, oceans, it matters not what form it's in except frozen. Here I am standing in the Aegean (Mediteranean) Sea at the beach in Mykonos, Greece. I think I had a couple servings of Kataifi, Baklava and Amygdalopita too many and a couple Loukoumades thrown in to boot.


Here I am with my last dog Gypsy. She was a very smart Border Collie that I rescued from the SPCA when she was an older puppy. She was one wild maniac when I first got her - and being a Border Collie, she was meant to run around and around and around...

She often went to work with me - and went everywhere else too, once she learned that she could go, if and only if she "behaved" - being smart, this lesson didn't take her too long to absorb - but there were days when she just had to stretch her legs and "herd the wild rabbits." Those days were usually rainy ones, and usually just as we were leaving the house to go somewhere! The last time she ran off in the morning rain, I had to leave her run - she just wouldn't come - and I had a major client who wouldn't take "I'll be a little late" for an excuse.

I came home after a most anxious day - and found her sleeping quietly on welcome mat by the front door of the house. She looked up at me with her big brown eyes and said, "I'm sooo sooo sorry." and that was that, we never spoke of it again - and she never ran off again.

Alex's Lemonade Stand

Today, while walking through a local cemetery, I came across this gravestone**


You may know of her, she was the brave and rather remarkable little girl that sold lemonade to help raise money for cancer research - in her own words, "when I get out of the hospital I want to have a lemonade stand" - wanting to give the money to doctors to allow them to "help other kids, like they helped me."

I copy her courageous story from the Alex's Lemonade Stand website:

"Shortly before her first birthday, Alex was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, a type of childhood cancer. On her first birthday, the doctors informed Alex's parents that if she beat her cancer it was doubtful that she would ever walk again. Just two weeks later, Alex slightly moved her leg at her parents' request to kick. This was the first indication of who she would turn out to be - a determined, courageous, confident and inspiring child with big dreams and big accomplishments.

By her second birthday, Alex was crawling and able to stand up with leg braces. She worked hard to gain strength and to learn how to walk. She appeared to be beating the odds, until the shattering discovery within the next year that her tumors had started growing again. In the year 2000, the day after her fourth birthday, Alex received a stem cell transplant and informed her mother, "when I get out of the hospital I want to have a lemonade stand." She said she wanted to give the money to doctors to allow them to "help other kids, like they helped me." True to her word, she held her first lemonade stand later that year and raised an amazing $2,000 for "her hospital."

While bravely battling her own cancer, Alex continued to hold yearly lemonade stands in her front yard to benefit childhood cancer research. News spread of the remarkable sick child dedicated to helping other sick children. People from all over the world, moved by her story, held their own lemonade stands and donated the proceeds to Alex and her cause.

...

In August of 2004, Alex passed away at the age of 8, knowing that, with the help of others, she had raised over $1 million to help find a cure for the disease that took her life."

**to honor her memory and right to rest eternally in privacy - I won't say where she is buried but will share her story and a picture of her final resting place - she was triumphant in a way - with her terrible battle with cancer. She will never be forgotten. I urge you to help find a cure in whatever way you can.