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Steve Jobs: The Man Whose Myths Created A Global Phenomenon

Yellow Magpie — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 18:10:43 +0000

Although a few of us may not perceive this, virtually all human beings are complex creatures. We are full of intricacies some of which we will never be aware of, such is human nature. We all have inherent contradictions, we are hypocritical and we are inconsistent. All of this, together with our choices, makes us who we are, unique in a crowd of billions.

Steve Jobs the co-founder of Apple was one such person. His self-belief and ability to convince others helped found one of the most successful companies in the world. He even managed to convince a large following of people that his company was not a company. Ultimately his self-belief, which at times bordered on delusion would prove to be his downfall and would have fatal consequences.

‘Woz’

At the heart of Steve Jobs’s success was a computer whiz-kid called Steve Wozniak, known affectionately as ‘Woz’. Jobs met Woz while they both attended Homestead High School in California. They would strike up a productive relationship effectively turning the two Steve’s into the Paul McCartney and John Lennon of the computer industry.

After seeing Woz’s home-made computer, the Apple 1, Jobs convinced him that they could sell the computer to people. Woz expected the proceeds to be split right down the middle but was deeply hurt when he later found out the Jobs had taken the lion’s share of the profits.

This example sheds light into the character of Steve Jobs in which he saw himself as the dominant member of the duo. Able to manipulate the naive Wozniak with his more clever personality, this was to be the dynamic that would characterise their relationship.

Early Apple

Wozniak fully created the first Apple computer, the Apple 1, from the ground up. The computer was a bare bones machine designed for the computer hobbyist market. The user had to supply their own monitor, keyboard and case for the computer.

It was a very humble beginning for the young company. The Apple 1 allowed the user to create their own programmes. However, at $666 dollars the computer was far more expensive than its rival, the Alastair 8800.

The Apple II was one of the company’s most successful computers. Once more it was the brainchild of Steve Wozniak. The Apple II and its various incarnations sold between five and six million units.

The Xerox Mouse

During a visit to Xerox Jobs was shown the first mouse, a graphical user interface. Stunned at this innovation Jobs decided that Apple most have a computer with this function and ripped off Xerox’s concept. The Xerox mouse, albeit in a different format, would find itself in the initially highly successful Wozniak-led Apple Mackintosh.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSiQA6KKyJo

Bill Gates

This juncture in time saw Bill Gates strike up a partnership with Jobs and Apple. Gates, through his company Microsoft, wanted to design software for both IBM PCs and for Apple.

However, Jobs strongly disliked this idea. He also grew suspicious of Gates believing him to be using Apple for his company’s gain.

This belief was well-founded when Bill Gates stole the march on Apple’s graphical user interface. After reportedly shouting furiously at Gates (something that was not uncommon with Jobs), the Microsoft head replied calmly reminding Jobs that he had only done what Jobs had done to Xerox.

The Ejection

Shortly after the launch of the Apple Macintosh unit sales of Apple computers were unexpectedly poor. Uncertainty within the company grew and the board of directors where unhappy with the direction that Jobs was taking Apple. Apple’s CEO, John Sculley, was told by the board to limit Jobs’s scope.

Unhappy with this arrangement Jobs’s sought to remove Sculley. But lacking the boardroom experience of Sculley, Jobs found himself on the losing side and was kicked out of his position in the company he co-founded in 1985. He subsequently resigned.

After some initial success without Jobs the company floundered producing too many products and too many models of certain items. This scatter-gun approach diluted their appeal and made consumers question where Apple was heading.

The Unsuccessful NeXT

Jobs after departing from Apple set up NeXT a computer company which he started after talking to Paul Berg, a Nobel Prize-winning chemist who asked him if he would design a computer that would be suitable to run complex, resource intensive programmes. Such a machine would need to have more than one megabyte of RAM, a megaflop in processing capabilities and more than a megapixel display.

Being ousted by Apple gave Jobs the opportunity to implement this new, high-end approach.

Using seven of Apple’s employees Jobs founded NeXT. From a technical perspective the company was highly successful with revolutionary dynamic web page generation capabilities, one of the first CD-ROM drives and, at the time, a huge 128 megabytes of RAM. Nonetheless, the company was a business flop plagued as it was by inconsistent standards and hardware problems that stemmed from running such advanced compontents.

With just 50,000 units sold in total during the life of the company NeXT was a commercial failure it did change the course of the computer industry and made the modern-day Internet communications, newly created by the European Particle Physics research centre, CERN a reality.

Marketing Pixar

Conveniently assisted by financial problems being experienced by George Lucas, Jobs bought Pixar. Co-founded by Alvy Ray Smith and Ed Catmull, Pixar was responsible for creating award-winning computer generated imagery CGI.

Jobs installed himself as head of the company and a fractious relationship with key Pixar staff began. The tensions became so great, according to Smith, that staff much preferred to be free of Jobs’s controlling personality.

Smith and Jobs would come to an acrimonious ending after Jobs started shouting in his face. Smith knowing Jobs’s control-freak nature, grabbed a marker and wrote on the whiteboard. There was an unspoken rule that only Jobs wrote on the whiteboard. Smith quit Pixar shortly afterwards.

Jobs contemplated selling Pixar on more than one occasion. However, the breakthrough success of Toy Story changed all this. The film made over $360 million at the Box Office and was one of the biggest movies of 1995.

In the Channel 4 documentary, Steve Jobs: iChanged The World, Alvy Ray Smith recalls of the staff’s reaction to Jobs and his disruptive influence:

‘They were just looking up at him with big doe eyes, soaking in everything he was saying as if it was true, and it wasn’t. Our management style was to be two hours away from him (and) try not to have him come into the building.’

According to Smith, it was only when Disney executives commented that Toy Story would be a huge success, after critics loved the film, that Jobs realised that he had a major success on his hands.

Jobs was then able to put his incredible marketing prowess to use and Pixar went from strength-to-strength before it was eventually bought out by Disney.

Apple Rebooted

NeXT was bought out by Apple in 1996. After Apple CEO Gil Amelio was removed by the board of directors, Jobs was reinstated as the new Chief Executive Officer.

With Apple’s huge debts, Jobs turned to Bill Gates and Microsoft for help. Gates bailed Apple from bankruptcy and saved the company. Besides investing $150 million Gates promised that Microsoft would continue to produce Apple compatible Windows operating software for the next five years.

With these lifelines Jobs set about making Apple profitable. He immediately began to cut Apple’s bloated product line. Now the company began to focus on its core products.

This time Jobs luck was firmly in as a talented young designer by the name of Jonathan Ive who had some radical ideas that would propel Apple into the computer stratosphere.

Jonathan Ive And The New Aesthetic

Apple computers before Jonathan Ive were never things of great beauty. Dull, aesthetically banal boxes of beige and off-white they never created a large impact. All of this changed when Jonathan Ive showed Steve Jobs his design for what was to become the iMac.

If the previous Apple computers were uninspiring the new iMac was anything but. It looked liked a computer clad in a colourful sweet. It was translucent and it was possible to see its innards. In short, there was simply nothing like it at the time and it grasped people’s attention.

Ive’s computer would soon pave the way for more aesthetically-pleasing products. The iPod soon followed and would be subsequently joined by the iPad.

Though there was nothing revolutionary or unique about these products, all of them followed in the footsteps of rival breakout products, there was one key difference. These products had very strong, appealing aesthetics. Ive’s designs were much sought-after. Always quick to realise changes in consumer trends, Jobs figured out that these products could be something special.

Jobs also utilised clever marketing strategies with both the iPod and the iPad. Both products were under-supplied. This allowed Apple to create a crazed, demand-fed response and allowed the company to claim that they were always selling-out. This in turn created further frenzy as both products became must-haves.

Changing The Music Industry

Jobs realised that the music industry was in great decline and used this advantage to position Apple at the fulcrum of online music. Due to his success with Pixar and the revival of Apple, Jobs started negotiations with the big name players of the music industry from a very strong vantage point.

Music was in decline and many people were simply downloading the singles and even entire albums of their preferred singers and bands for free. Jobs’s iTunes would wrestle back control into the hands of the music industry and allow record labels to obtain money from what would otherwise be lost revenue.

To this day, Apple, through iTunes, is one of the biggest players in the music scene and virtually every band of note has a presence on Apple’s online interface.

Death And Delusion

Jobs was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2003. Despite the grave nature of his illness, Jobs dallied for over nine months with alternative treatments before finally taking the recommended surgical procedure. Jobs’s ability to convince both himself and others was an enormous asset in the business world and without it is doubtful whether Apple could have been as successful as it became.

Yet it was this inner belief that now was acting against Jobs and many medical professionals believe that this delusional doggedness was the chief reason he died so young.

On the 5th of October, 2011, Steve Jobs died. His lasts words on his deathbed were reported to have been ‘oh wow, oh wow, oh wow.’

His passing on caused worldwide headlines, crowds of Apple fans queued up at Apple stores across nations to pay their respect. From these actions alone it is clear that Jobs meant a lot to a huge amount of people. But who was Steve Jobs?

What Was Steve Jobs?

Jobs was a complicated character and was certainly far from the nicest of people. What made him so unique was his ability to spot trends and go with them. He may not have been a great innovator. But perhaps he didn’t have to be as he surrounded himself with people that could realise his aims for him.

He was a futurist. When it came to large scale, big-picture thinking in the computer industry Steve Jobs was unrivalled.

Yet Steve Jobs had, not just a darker side, but a brutal uncaring selfishness without empathy that permeated his every existence. Steve Jobs was, according to the author, Michael Maccoby, a productive narcissist. Maccoby writing in the Washington Post in 2009 stated:

‘Steve Jobs is one of the most creative business leaders of our time. His products combining technological innovation with beauty of design are a gift that keeps giving. But he is not a good model for others to imitate.
Who would want to follow a leader who is often insulting to his subordinates, who uses people only as long as he needs them and then discards them, and who demands that they are on call at all hours? Some people would and do, because Jobs creates great products that change people’s lives and those who can stand him are inspired by him and can also make a lot of money. Steve Jobs is unique, but he resembles other leaders who want to change the world. I call them productive narcissists…’

Some people who worked closely with Jobs for any long period of time have testified to this. Writer, Robert Cringely, who worked with Jobs during the early years of Apple, certainly was not enamoured with the personality of the head of Apple.

‘Everyone in Steve Jobs’s life went through three phases. They were either being seduced, ignored or scourged. And it all depended upon whether he needed you or not. If he needed you he was your best friend and he would seduce you. And then you would work like a dog and if you weren’t working hard enough he would scourge you. And ultimately he would throw you away… Steve ultimately betrayed everyone.’

Despite this it is important to acknowledge the importance of Jobs. He changed the nature of the computer industry by leading the way in transforming consumer patterns. Jobs didn’t so much predict changes in trends as create them.

His marketing ability was second-to-none. He created a narrative for Apple products which focused people’s attention. In 1984 he shifted the focus on a perceived battle, whether real or not, between IBM and Apple in what was a great marketing coup.

Jobs succeeded in transforming a company into a movement. Instead of consumers Apple had followers. This gave the company unprecedented power and a voice that went beyond the normal constraints of a consumer products company.

Where To From Here?

The biggest question on everyone lips now is what will happen to Apple without its leader? What will befall the company? No one knows the answer to this. What we do know is that previously without Steve Jobs the company did poorly.

Lacking the necessary focus it launched too many products causing sales to plummet. It had missed out on what makes Apple so successful, its cache. Having loads of products destroys the impression of prestige. To ask the question of whether the products truly were premium or not would miss the point. The fact that people perceived that they were was the most important aspect. Jobs played an integral part in this.

With Steve Jobs death the true question is can followers of Apple attribute the same status to the company’s products or will they start to see them as vastly overpriced compared to their competitors. Only time will tell.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc

Highly Recommended Reading

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson is so far the best biographer on Steve Jobs. It does suffer due to Isaacson spending too much time with Jobs but it is one of the most comprehensive

You can obtain Steve Jobs here from Amazon.

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Roy Lichtenstein: The Artist Who Shocked The World

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 21:53:32 +0000

You will know it when you see it. Instantly recognisable and plainly ubiquitous it can be seen everywhere. From advertising billboards, to television, to comic books to art galleries the work of Roy Lichtenstein has permeated the fabric of our everyday lives.

The Early Days

Roy Lichtenstein grew up in the wealthy, West Side of New York city. His father was a real estate agent while his mother was a housewife with a talent for the piano. The family lived next door to the famous Russian pianist and composer, Sergei Rachmaninoff.

According to Roy Lichtenstein’s sister, Renee Tolcott, their mother was quite emotionally cold, distant and seemingly indifferent to the needs of her children.

His parents had very low expectations for their son. Lichtenstein was drafted into the U.S. Air Force during World War Two. There he served his time as a cartographer.

The Moulding Of An Artist

Lichtenstein had an initial dislike of cartoons and resented drawing them as he believed they did not constitute true art.
Roy sought out active duty and was a soldier in the Battle of Bulge.

Lichtenstein’s early art was very different from his famous, iconic images. His era coincided with the two great movements of 20th century art, abstract expressionism and pop art. Although Lichtenstein dabbled in abstract expressionism it was pop art that would shape and ultimately create his name.

Ben-Day Dots

The signature of Roy Lichtenstein’s art is his exaggerated use of Ben-Day dots. These small coloured dots were used in the magazine industry to produce cost-effective shading and colouring in their publications. They were used especially in comic books.

Lichtenstein used Ben-Day dots in a way that was certainly not intended by their inventor, Benjamin Henry Day. Instead of having barely discernible dots he blew them up in scale, so much so that some people considered them to be grotesque and shocking.

The Making Of Pop Art

Lichtenstein took art in a new direction, out of the galleries and into the everyday. Soviet art critic, Viktor Shklovsky encapsulates the nature of art and is a textbook example of what Lichtenstein’s paintings achieved.

‘The purpose of art is to impart the sensation of things as they are perceived and not as they are known. The technique of art is to make objects ‘unfamiliar,’ to make forms difficult to increase the difficulty and length of perception because the process of perception is an aesthetic end in itself and must be prolonged.’

The nature of some art and its masters who breathe it life and give it existence is often circular and all together human. People have an ambiguous relationship with change. Many of us like things to remain the same, we find comfort in the familiar, the objects, activities and faces that surround us in the everyday.

Yet we still need variety and change, although when it does arrive it can often create shockwaves. Art is not far removed from this. Someone comes up with a new style that turns out to be so radically different from its predecessor that it is deemed iconoclasm. Gradually, over time, the mainstream encroaches and what was once unsettling and radical becomes absorbed and part of the furniture. And then the process repeats itself, again and again.

Roy Lichtenstein was a paragon of the path new art takes. He work stunned and horrified people when it first appeared. There was nothing quite like it. His work basically seemed to suggest that art was everywhere and comic books and advertisements were just as valid as anything found in the art gallery.

End Game

Unlike his contemporary, Andy Warhol, Lichtenstein was never comfortable with fame and resisted being in the limelight. He continued creating art virtually up the his death in 1997.

Like all maverick, trail-blazing artists, Roy Lichtenstein’s work, initially so shocking, has been absorbed into established art. Many of his paintings are considered to be the best pop art has to offer. Through these Lichtenstein has taken his place amongst the pantheon of great artists.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jowA-pH-Y8

Charlie Teo: The Neurosurgeon Who Saves Lives

Yellow Magpie — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 19:33:37 +0000

In the entire Universe, it is the most precious gift of all. A gift that is often taken for granted but throughout all of our lives we will be reminded just how special life truly is.

His methods have caused numerous controversies amongst his peers. Some in the medical profession despise him. Yet, this remarkable man gets results no else does. For some surgeons there are inoperable tumours, not for Charlie Teo.

Addressing his critics during the Australian television programme, Sixty Minutes Teo stated:

‘I think it is a combination of having to admit that they may have been wrong with their initial criticism of the techniques, and probably some professional jealousies. It boils down to basic human failure of fear of the unknown. If they came to watch some of the surgery, they would see that it’s not anything too difficult then they may be converted to use some of the techniques.’

Non-Invasive Surgery

Teo is a whole-hearted practitioner of non-invasive surgical techniques such as keyhole surgery. He maintains that these techniques are relatively easy for surgeons to learn.

Keyhole or laparoscopic surgery has many benefits. The advantages of these types of precedures are manifold. They reduce blood loss, have a smaller incision poin which keeps pain to a minimum and also reduces recovery time. Keyhole surgery also has the added benefits of faster discharge times which means hospital resources are better managed. There is also less risk of the patient becoming infected.

‘Most skilled and experienced neurosurgeons could learn keyhole techniques with simply a course, a hands on practical course, followed by two or three weeks of observation. I know this is hard to understand, but it’s not so much the techniques, it’s more about mindset, it’s about a mind shift in the way that one approaches brain tumours.’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrCvMX4B9dI

Maintaining A High Success Rate

Charlie Teo’s surgical success rate is very high above 90 per cent mark. Using the latest technology and the best medically trained team allows such high success rates.

In terms of successful surgery, the rate is very high, higher than 90 per cent. If you quantify success by survival and cure, it is very low, because 70 per cent of all brain tumours that we see are malignant and it doesn’t matter how good your technique, these patients will succumb to the disease.

The question on whether to operate ceases to be a question and more an equation. If the cost-to-benefit ratio is higher to the patient then surgery is probably not a good idea. This is the method Teo uses. Nonetheless, for the vast majority of patients the benefit of surgery outweighs the risks.

Mobile Phones And Brain Cancer

Charlie Teo is also part of a group of doctors and scientists who completed research into mobile phone usage and brain cancer. They found that at a conservative estimate long-term use of ten years of more doubled the odds of developing cancerous brain tumours.

Teo maintains that brain tumours were once thought to be relatively rare. However, he believes that the dramatic explosion in brain cancer is a direct result of our use of mobile phones.

There is a simple way of limiting exposure to the electromagnetic radiation of mobiles and that is to use the speakerphone instead of putting the phone to your ear.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hATwd6erMRY

Oprah Winfrey: The Most Popular Woman Of Today

Yellow Magpie — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 17:30:21 +0000

Oprah Winfrey, is one of the most influential women in the world. Loved by millions, she is arguably the most successful, talk show host on the planet. Smart, funny, generous and mega rich, Oprah, has taken her life and made it a triumphant success.

However, things were not always easy for Oprah, who came from very humble beginnings. Her early life was often filled with hardship and abuse, but even at a young age, Oprah said she knew she was born for greatness, and how right she was.

Humble Beginnings

Born in Kosciusko, Mississippi, on January 29, 1954, to Vernita Lee and Vernon Winfrey. Oprah,was supposed to be named after the biblical character ‘Orpah’, but it was misspelled on her birth-cert, and so she became known as Oprah.

Her parents separated when Oprah was still very young and she went to live on a farm with her grandmother, Hattie Mae Lee. It was her grandmother who instilled in Oprah, a love of books and reading. Oprah is still a voracious reader, reading up to three books a week.

It was this passion for reading, that inspired Oprah, to yearn for a better life for herself.

At the age of six, she went to live with her mother Vernita Lee in Milwaukee. However, her mother worked long hours as a cleaner and so was unable to look after her daughter properly, nor was she able to give Oprah, the support and encouragement that she had become accustomed to while she lived with her grandmother.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGRi4mU3qcI

Childhood Abuse

Oprah’s life took a radical turn for the worst, when at the age of nine she was raped by a cousin, then later by an uncle, she was also sexually molested by a so-called friend of the family.

The abuse had a devastating effect on her and she rebelled by becoming wild and promiscuous, roaming the streets of Milwaukee. At the age of 14, she became pregnant, however the baby was born prematurely and later died.

Eventually, Oprah became too much for her mother to handle, and she sent her to live with her father Vernon, in Tennessee. Vernon, was a strict disciplinarian, with high moral standards. He insisted on good study habits and created boundaries. Vernon, encouraged Oprah to read a book a week, and to learn five new words every day. Oprah, credits her father, with helping her to turn her life around.

With this new-found support, Oprah quickly forged ahead in school, becoming a grade A student. In addition, she was voted Most Popular Girl. She, then went on to secure herself a full scholarship to Tennessee State University, where she studied radio and television broadcasting.

Burgeoning Broadcasting Career

Oprah, began her broadcasting career, at the age of 17, at her local radio station WVOL where she worked as a newsreader, while still a student.

In 1976, she relocated to Baltimore, to co-anchor the Six O’Clock News, on WJZ-TV. She later co-hosted the talk show, People Are Talking, which became hugely popular with listeners.

But bigger and better opportunities awaited the talented Oprah, and she was invited to host A.M. Chicago, in Illinois. The most popular show at the time was hosted by Phil Donohue, however within a few months, Oprah’s show had won her 100,000 more viewers than Donohue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ajg2FMhqBYU

A Star Is Born

The show was renamed ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’, and neither Oprah, nor the show have ever looked back.

Being an astute business woman, she then formed Harpo productions thereby gaining ownership of the show. The next year the show was syndicated.

In June 1987, ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’, scooped three Daytime Emmy Awards. The following year, the show received its second Emmy award for ‘Outstanding Talk/Service Program. Oprah, herself was awarded the International Radio and Television Society’s Broadcaster of the Year’, making her the youngest person to every receive the award in the IRTS’s 25 year history.

2008 Presidential Election

In 2008 Oprah Winfrey formally gave her support to Barack Obama in the U.S. Presidential Elections. It is thought that her endorsement, so far her only support for a presidential candidate, helped to significantly increase Obama’s profile and contributed towards him winning the elections that year.

The End Of An Era

‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’, which finished in May 2011 after 25 years was watched by millions of people all over the world. Throughout that time Oprah, became a role model for women everywhere, her warmth, intelligence, and good humour, were a constant inspiration. She is quoted as saying “I knew there was a way out,I knew there was another kind of life because I had read about it. I knew there were other places, and there was another way of being.”

In November 2011 Oprah received an honorary Oscar for her humanitarian work. She received her award from a young girl she had funded through college.

Oprah now runs OWN television network. She describes it as a multi platform media network to entertain, inform and inspire people.

Her final Oprah Winfrey show attracted 16.4 million people. However, repeat shows still air in many countries around the world.

Oprah Quotes

‘Every one of us gets through the tough times because somebody is there, standing in the gap to close it for us’.

‘I define joy as a sustained sense of well-being and internal peace – a connection to what matters’.

‘I finally realized that being grateful to my body was key to giving more love to myself’.

‘I know for sure that what we dwell on is who we become’.

‘I trust that everything happens for a reason even when we’re not wise enough to see it’.

‘Though I am grateful for the blessings of wealth, it hasn’t changed who I am. My feet are still on the ground. I’m just wearing better shoes’.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaaPTUbaH_s

Mary McAleese: Former President Of Ireland

Yellow Magpie — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 16:30:43 +0000

Mary McAleese, was born Mary Patricia Leneghan, in Ardoyne, Belfast, on June 27, 1951. The first born of a family of nine other children.

Mary McAleese grew up in Northern Ireland, at the height of ‘the troubles’ and just like other families, at the time, her own family suffered attacks and murder attempts. In the end they were forced to leave the area by the paramilitary violence.

In 1973, she graduated in Law from Queen’s University Belfast, and was called to the Bar in 1974. In 1976, she married Dr Martin McAleese, a dentist and accountant. They have three children Emma, born 1982 and twins Justin and Sara Mai, born 1985. She was appointed Reid Professor of Criminal Law, Criminology and Penology at Trinity College, Dublin, in 1987.

Mary McAleese returned to Belfast’s Queen’s University to take up the position of Director of the Institute of Professional Legal Studies, in 1987 and in 1994, she became the first female Pro-Vice Chancellor of Queen’s University Belfast.

Broadcasting Career

During that time Mary McAleese, also worked as a journalist and broadcaster with RTE television, reporting for the News, and other political programmes.

Her impressive CV also includes Director of Channel 4 Television; Member of Catholic Church delegation in 1996 to the North Commission on Contentious Parades; founder member of the Irish Commission for Prisoners Overseas; Director of Northern Ireland Electricity Delegate to the 1995 White House Conference, on Trade and Investment in Ireland and to the subsequent Pittsburg Conference.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_J4zBW3Pwk

Irish Presidency

In 1997, Mary McAleese, famously defeated former Fianna Fail, Taoiseach (or Prime Minister as the office is referred to in other countries) Albert Reynolds, in an internal party election to be nominated to run for the Presidency. The nomination cause quite a stir, with many believing a Belfast Catholic, President could harm relations with Britain.

Nonetheless, Mary McAleese won the election, beating off opponents, Mary Banotti, of Fine Gael, Labour candidate Adi Roche, former Eurovision Song Contest Winner, Dana Rosemary Scallon, and Derek Nally.

In 1997, she was inaugurated the eighth President of Ireland, and the second woman President. She also made world history by being the first woman to succeed another woman, the first being Mary Robinson.

The theme, Mary McAleese adopted for her presidency was, ‘Building Bridges’.

President McAleese travelled widely, during her Presidency, meeting with heads of state from other countries. She was a frequent visitor to Northern Ireland, where she was warmly welcomed by both sides of the political divide.

Courting Controversy

No stranger to controversy, in 1997 she incurred the wrath, of the Catholic Church by receiving communion in an Anglican Church in Dublin. With Archbishop Desmond Connell describing as a ‘sham’ Catholics receiving holy communion in a non-Catholic church.

In January 2005, at a ceremony to commemorate the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz concentration camp President McAleese once more courted controversy.

Northern Ireland Unionist politicians were furious when President McAleese made reference to the manner in which Protestant children in Northern Ireland, had been reared to hate Catholics, just like German children had been brought up to hate Jews under the Nazi regime. She later apologised, for her remarks, describing them as unbalanced.

Nevertheless, with a doubt the most contentious thing she did during her Presidency was signing the Credit Institutions Stabilisation Bill into law, a move which saw billions of euro being injected into the banks.

Historical Visits

Known to be an admirer of Queen Elizabeth II, whom she came to know, while she was Pro-Vice Chancellor of Queens, President McAleese welcomed the Queen to Ireland in May 2011. The historic visit was a huge success and Mary McAleese was widely praised and admired for the way she carried out her duties marking the occasion as one of the highlights of her Presidency.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COVcOlJBppw

A week later President Barack Obama also arrived in Ireland and President McAleese was called on once again to meet one of the most powerful men in the world. But as always she carried out her duties with her usual aplomb.

In November, 2011, President McAleese completed her second term in office and was succeeded by President Michael D. Higgins.

On one of her final engagements she said she had loved every day of her Presidency and felt extremely grateful for the honour.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysmQEIZp478

Nikola Tesla: The Inventor Genius Who Irrevocably Changed The World

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 22:16:02 +0000

A thin, immaculately dressed man makes his way through New York. The same city which had undergone an electric revolution where streets at night were dazzlingly lit by arc lights, and Wall Street had been recently electrified through Edison’s direct current.

‘I have done better than that.’

Yet, this wondrous new world was confined to the very rich and mainly commercial buildings. It had still to reach the homes of people. Not everyone was amazed by Edison’s invention and one individual was particularly unimpressed.

The sharp-suited, rather withdrawn man worked long hours day and night in a workshop landscape that would have terrified the uninformed. Every now and then brightly lit sparks would fly and suddenly the whole room would be aglow as giant coils surged with electricity. This was no mere mortal pottering randomly away at machines this was Nikola Tesla – the man who would turn the world on its head.

A Transformational Force Of Nature

Changing the course of human history is something very few individuals can claim. People can change the world in two main ways, for better or for worse. For every positive contribution there are negatives ones.

Fewer people manage to transform human actively in a solely positive way. Nikola Tesla was one of those select few.

Early Years

A Croatian-born Serb, Nikola Tesla was from the village of Smiljan. He was born on July 10 (June 28 under the old Julian calendar) 1856 to a priest and a priest’s daughter.

A prodigious learner, from a young age Tesla showed promise. Finishing four years of school in three was an early indication of such potential. He would go on to Austrian Polytechnic, Graz, and study electrical engineering.

During this period hints of a troubled mind emerged. Tesla cut himself completely off from his family after dropping out from Graz’s university. This marked Tesla’s first nervous breakdown but he was later persuaded by his father to enroll with Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague.

He would have to deal also with severe obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). He would find himself being forced to do things in threes, counting steps, avoiding handshakes, and having phobias of women wearing ear-rings as well as human hair.

Memories Beget Us

Many people maintain that one of the keys to Tesla’s genius was his memory. It is believed that Tesla possessed eidetic memory, which is sometimes mistakenly called photographic memory. This allowed the inventor to recall both sounds, images and objects with great precision and clarity. Tesla would use this ability to memorise entire texts and visualise objects and ideas that he was working on.

Instead of putting pen to paper Tesla would ‘see’ the object in front of him in both detail and three-dimensions. These abilities were not without cost however as blinding flashes and unwanted visions would strain at the inventor’s sometimes fragile mental state.

The Land Of Opportunity

After moving to the United States in 1884 Tesla worked for Edison in New York city where he quickly began to improve on the companies electrical problems. Edison himself promised $50,000 to Tesla if he could make the companies inefficient direct current motors more efficient. However, Edison later stated that he was joking. Tesla subsequently quit after he was refused a pay rise.

In order to survive, Tesla performed manual labour tasks digging ditches while he started to plan ahead. 1886 saw Tesla set up the Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing and despite some initial setbacks he began a partnership with Westinghouse.

The following year Tesla would discover X-rays and take the first X-ray photograph of his hand. This was several years before Wilhelm Rontgen who is credited with their discovery.

In 1891 Tesla demonstrated wireless communications for the first time. However, once again it was Marconi’s that was credited with the invention of the radio.

Once more contrary to being several years before Marconi’s invention it was the Italian, not Tesla, that was unjustly credited with the invention of the radio.

The War of The Currents

Tesla’s invention of both alternating current and the AC motor meant he was on a direct collision course with Edison’s outdated and inefficient DC system. Yet Edison refused to concede defeat and began a vicious propaganda campaign in which he sought to portray AC power as being highly dangerous. He emphasised the thousands of volts by demonstrating live electrocutions to the public in which stray dogs and even elephants were killed to somehow prove that DC was superior.

In a stroke of genius Tesla swept aside all doubts by passing thousands of volts through his body in a magnificent live display of audacity and bright sparks. At the 1893 Chicago World Fair Tesla would use his AC system to light the exhibitions. Three years later in partnership with Westinghouse he would build the first hydroelectric AC system at Niagara Falls.

Tesla brought electricity to the masses. His complete alternating current (AC) made it possible to produce electricity cheaply and allowed for its transportation over huge distances. Alternating current could travel these distances without needing to be constantly amplified.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kwps2-5cWSk

The Polyglot Polymath

Nikola Tesla was multi-talented. Unlike his contemporary, Thomas Edison, Tesla was both a theorist and an empiricist. Yet his abilities were not just confined to science and mathematics. The Serbian was also both a convergent and divergent thinker, a polyglot as well as a poet and writer.

Tesla had a gift for languages and along with his native Serbian he could speak English, French, German, Italian, Czech, Hungarian and Latin.

Naive Business Acumen

Tesla’s generous personality caused him to make a disastrous business decision with Westinghouse that would return to cause him difficulties. After agreeing to waive his patent rights when Westinghouse’s company got into financial difficulty. These rights would have guaranteed Tesla becoming the world’s first billionaire such was their value.

The waiver would also result in Tesla being unable to complete Wardenclyffe tower which was co-financed by J.P. Morgan. Wardenclyffe tower was designed to transmit the first transatlantic wireless communication but it overran its budget and remained unfinished. Tesla also had a second motive for building the tower which was the wireless transmission of free electricity. Having no funds meant Tesla would never have the opportunity to see if he could have made Wardenclyffe a success or not.

Death And Demise

On January 7, 1943 Tesla died alone from the effects of a heart thrombus in room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel in Manhattan. He was 86 years old. All his work was seized by the Alien Property Custodian Office and subsequently by Herbert Hoover and the FBI.

After many years of struggle, his work and possessions were returned to his family. However, many pieces are believed to have been kept by the United States government.

The Legacy And The Man

The modern poly-phase induction motor, wireless communications (radio), RADAR, X-rays, the remote control, the spark plug for internal combustion engines and neon lighting as well as LASER, alternating current, Tesla Coils and more hypothetical technology such as Star Wars weaponry, particle beam guns and ion-propulsion are just some of the many things that Tesla invented.

Nevertheless, a lot of myths and fanciful notions surround the inventor. He was a complicated man. A feminist before his time he maintained that women would shortly take over from men as the dominant sex on Earth. His OCD obsessions meant that he fell in love with a white pigeon and was devastated when the bird died.

This was a man with many strings to his bow. The length and breadth of his inventions are simply staggering. Tesla invented the radio, the remote control and defeated one of the world’s first propaganda campaigns based on fear and manipulation.

However, his myriad of achievements ultimately pales into comparison with what he did for community. The liberation of a huge portion of the population, and a huge swathe of women from domestic drudgery, would not have been possible without Nikola Tesla.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj-xVf8sNq4

Marc Martel: A Pavarotti Of Contemporary Music?

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 21:44:35 +0000

Every once in a while a rare occurrence happens. A talent emerges with the potential to redefine standards and elevate their chosen field to dizzying heights. In the classical music world the most obvious example of this was Luciano Pavarotti. Pavarotti appeared to be able to produce the most glorious of sounds without any effort whatsoever on his behalf.

Even as part of a lineup of Internationally renowned tenors, his voice soared above those of Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras in The Three Tenors. It was Pavarotti’s ability to sing with such clarity and the unique manner in which produced crystal clear high notes with no distortion that set him apart from other singers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0Sx5lbVlQA

A Unique Talent

Pavarotti was a once in a generation performer and was rightly recognised as such. Even though he was a unique talent it is still only a question of time before someone else comes along to take up the mantel. And as luck may have it, one may have just arrived.

Marc Martel has become a Youtube sensation. His cover of Queen’s Somebody To Love provokes immediate comparisons to Freddy Mercury. In fact, Martel is vocally stronger than the late singer. Here is the performance that has captured everyone’s attention.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dREKkAk628I

Amazing Vocal Agility

What’s surprising about Martel is his vocal dexterity. He has an extraordinary ability to sing various styles of songs, from pop to rock, to even the physically demanding opera. Not only does Martel pull off these styles with aplomb, he excels at each of them. While the crown of operatic tenor is still being worn by Pavoritti, Martel has the potential to do something similar in the world of pop and rock music.

While it is possible for pop and rock singers to successful sing pop songs rarely does the inverse happen. Not too many opera singers can sing contemporary songs. There are two obvious exceptions to this, Russell Watson, and the most successful exponent, Sarah Brightman. However, many others fail to have any impact when they are deprived of the use of their big voice.

Where To From Here?

Currently, a member of the Canadian Christian rockband, Downhere, Martel could soon be forced to make a choice. On the one hand he can continue to be part of a relatively small band with limited appeal. On the other, he can choose to perform on the world’s stage with a global audience. No matter what choice he makes a lot of people will take an interest in his career from now on.

Although it is unlikely that Martel will reach Pavarotti’s level in the classical operatic world he has a great chance to do something similar with contemporary music. Despite not being the finished product, his work ethic and his willingness to learn new things, typified by his interests in other musical genres, are all good, encouraging signs. Perhaps in ten years we will all know the answer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNMZfFPLoKg

Walt Disney: The Individual That Lay Beneath The Mask

Yellow Magpie — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 20:51:48 +0000

Image is perhaps the most crucial component in human life. We base so much of our daily activities around appearances often without being aware of what is occurring. We use image and appearance to immediately identify what is right and wrong and what is safe and good. More critically it is also used to distinguish between individuals that benefit us and those that are positively harmful.

This sophisticated system based solely on impressions is not without its flaws and a good portion of people can be taken in by a false smile and a mask of decency.

Walt Disney is one such person. Loved by millions, his work has created an entertainment empire that has spanned more than half a century. A multi-billion dollar industry, the Disney Corporation is almost based exclusively on creating a reality far removed from our own world.

The Power Of Disney

The Disney universe is full of smiling, happy people – a place where pure imagination interacts with us. Few people in the western world have not experienced Disney, be it the films or the theme parks. Whole generations of human beings have had their childhoods partly informed by this peculiar section of the entertainment industry.

A fantasy made reality, all of this is the dreamworld of one individual. The vision of a man, liked and adored by tens of millions of people who held a special place for him and the films his company produced. Yet underneath this seemingly friendly exterior lay someone that was very different from his projection.

Although his following was huge, Walt Disney was very far removed from ‘Uncle Walt’ and this was quickly noticed by people who paid attention.

A Cartoonist Who Couldn’t Draw

Early on in his career, in 1922, Walt Disney was sacked from being a cartoonist. The truth of the matter was that Disney was terrible at drawing. Disney even had great difficulty in drawing his most famous character, Mickey Mouse. According to Channel 4′s Secret Lives documentary, he had to be shown by animator, Fred Moore, how to draw a simple side portrait of the famous mouse.

In an exhibition entitled ‘The Art of Walt Disney’ many paintings were drawn by artists. Yet Disney had no scruples about signing his name to work done by these people.

Disney won 26 Academy Awards. All of these accruing prizes began to foster a growing sense of resentment towards Walt Disney constantly taking credit for other people’s work. Some of Disney’s awards were for films that he had little or no input into.

A Controlling Sexist

In the early Kansas Disney studio many worked without remuneration. The film Snow White was created in such an environment. The Disney operation was moved to the Hyperion Studios, in Burbank in 1940.

Animators in Disney’s world were exclusively male. Disney, according to former workers, maintained that women were inferiour to men and only used them to painstakingly colour and ink the individual stills. Only men were allowed to hold the position of animators in Walt’s world.

Anyone who disagreed with Disney over even what were trivial matters ran the risk of losing their job. It has been noted that Disney fired a producer who had been in his employ for over two decades when the producer disagreed with Disney’s choice of a film location.

The Strike

Finally, the workers for Disney had enough of his poor behaviour and went on strike in 1941. Disney took the matter highly personally. His large ego, coupled with stress-induced paranoia meant he came to believe that no one could willingly strike against him. Instead he imagined that communists were behind the strike.

After the pickets had gone on for over six weeks, Disney turned to the mob to end the strike. Despite using these scare tactics the strikers resolve remained steadfast.

Roy Disney, Walt’s wise brother, stepped in. Recognising that his brother was now a liability, Roy sent Walt off on a trip to Latin America. With Roy in charge the strike was quickly over and the Disney corporation agreed to virtually all of the striker’s demands.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L2CEAdklmg

The Communist Conspiracy And Revenge

Disney had an unedifying relationship with Herbert Hoover. The FBI Director made Disney a Special Agent in Charge. Disney, over 20 years fed, the FBI his thoughts about various people within the Hollywood Industry. Huge chunks of Walt Disney’s 600 page file is still classified many years after his death. The FBI maintain that this is to protect the identity of the sources. However, others have postulated that the real reason is not to protect the sources but rather Walt Disney himself.

Disney contributed to the McCarthy communist obsession in what would turn out to be the 20th century’s version of the Salem Witch hunt. Disney testified before The House Of Un-American Activities Committee and used this opportunity to destroy the lives of people who led the Disney strike in an act of sheer revenge.

How Did Disney Become So Popular?

With all of the above flaws one wonders how Disney ever became a successful company. The reasons are manifold. Walt Disney had a talent for getting the best out of his workers. A taskmaster, he had high expectations but more importantly he had a vision with which to adhere to. He knew in which direction he wanted to take his company.

However, without Roy the Disney brand would have collapsed. Roy intervened to save the day on several occasions when bankruptcy threatened to destroy the company. He also stepped in when Disney suffered a mental breakdown during the worker’s strike. Without his brother, who had a keen business mind and an empathetic nature, Walt’s dream would never have happened.

Without this fortuitous portion of good luck, Disney would not have become the company it is today. But such is the story with any large corporation.

If the end justifies the means then Walt Disney deserves unreserved praise. His creations have brought countless joy and smiles to children and adults alike. Despite the dark shadows in his character it is his legacy that is remembered best.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtzyaoFe_wo

Norman Borlaug: The Man Who Saved One Billion People

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 21:11:28 +0000

He was a man that changed the world. While most people try to make a difference, the impact that they create is often very hard to quantify – one cannot say the same thing about Norman Borlaug.

A Human Variety

There have been people who have influenced the world negatively, one doesn’t need to be reminded of the tragedies of the two World Wars or the regular humanitarian disasters that occur every few years. In the twentieth century we generally point to the actions of John F. Kennedy and how he saved the world from entering a nuclear Armageddon. Nonetheless, we still cannot say for certain if the U.S.S.R. would have started a war with the United States.

No, there is but one man who we can be sure about and that is Norman Borlaug. Borlaug’s work has saved a conservatively estimated one billion people. So far in the history of humanity no other single individual has even come close to this number.

Work With Wheat

Borlaug began to make a name for himself as a microbiologist in the 1940′s. It was in this profession that he would become au fait with preservatives, fungicides and bactericides. The firm foundations in these subjects would later come in the very useful for his subsequent work. In 1944, Borlaug would go to Mexico to work in the field of genetics and phytopathology (the study of plant diseases).

While in Mexico, Borlaug developed wheat that was both disease-resistant and produced high crop yields. Perhaps the pinnacle of his success in Mexico was recognising that tall varieties of wheat could not support their own weight when they reached a certain height. To overcome this problem, Borlaug developed a dwarf variety that was free of the problems of their taller kind.

From Mexico To The World

As a stroke of good fortune, Borlaug’s new variety was extremely adaptable and could be grown in virtually any type of latitude, and at varying altitudes.

He took his work to Africa, India, Pakistan, South America, and the Middle East. These regions were on the brink of starvation before Borlaug commenced his work. He, and his teams, succeeded in dramatically increasing yields and alleviating hunger. His work has also transferred to rice crops where yields and disease-resistance has helped agriculture become more efficient.

A Lasting Legacy

Borlaug was honoured for his achievements by being the recipent of the Nobel Peace Prize, the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The increases Borlaug achieved in crop production is widely thought to have saved the lives of over one billion people.

The problems with feeding an ever-increasing world population is apparent to all who understand the situation. As the world’s population nears seven billion – it will become more and more difficult to feed everyone. At some point, if this growth rate continues, even with all of the technological advances created by agricultural scientists and geneticists, we will not be able to feed the entire population.

The Most Pressing Danger To Our Food Supply

Currently, one of the greatest concerns to the future production of food is the organic industry and their over-zealous proponents. Rationality is the poor first cousin of emotion, it doesn’t matter how much scientific evidence is put forward – it can be easily swayed by a well-timed emotive argument.

This is one of the keys to the organics movement. There is no scientific evidence that states that organic food is superior to non-organic produce under any criteria.

On the contrary, if the organic industry were to be adopted world-wide – the consequences would be devastating. One-third of the world’s population would die from starvation. Organically-grown food is just too resource-intensive to make sense.

Already propaganda, spread from anti-genetically modified food groups and some extremists within Greenpeace, has resulted in some African nations rejecting crops which would prevent starvation. Disinformation is a powerful weapon but through Borlaug’s work – the success of genetically modified food is there for anyone willing to look.

There is nothing wrong with organic food per se - but it should be confined to a small niche market as it is simply too resource-intensive with no scientific benefits over non-organic food.

Check out Yellow Magpie’s Norman Borlaug Quotes: Words From The Man Who Saved A Billion to see what the man had to say about starvation, the developing world and the importance of food.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2TmEdiXTvc

Franklin’s Northwest Passage: PR And Mistruths

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 19:19:06 +0000

They were on a quest for fame, glory and national pride. They wanted to become the first expedition to navigate the infamous Northwest Passage, a treacherous journey so hazardous that many considered it foolhardy to even try.

Their trek would reveal more truths than Britain was comfortable with and one of the great PR spins was put in place to hide an unpalatable reality.

The Fabled Northwest Passage

The Northwest Passage is an almost mythical sea route between the Arctic, Canada and Alaska. For hundreds of years, since the times of the Vikings, this route has allured many intrepid explorers who wished to be the first people to conqueror it. For more pragmatic business people it represented great riches and promised a fast and quick route between the West and the East.

However, it was, and still is, a perilous journey that is fastidiously ever changing. One moment a route can appear offering great promise, the next it can close, with great walls of ice crushing any ship that was unfortunate enough travel into its domain.

In 1885 one man tasked to lead a British Expedition was John Franklin who was given two ships and a crew of 129 men to complete the challenge.

State Of The Art Equipment

The ships at Franklin’s disposal utilised the cutting-edge technology of the time. The two ships, the Erebus and the HMS Terror had iron-reinforced bow and hulls as well as steam engines that allowed the ship to move at a very modest 4 knots per hour using steam alone. They also had a steam-powered heating mechanism that kept the crew warm while outside in the Arctic sub-zero temperatures would reign supreme.

The ships also had enough preserved food to last for at least four years. However, the man who obtained the contract, Stephen Goldner, used crude, sub-standard manufacturing that would be partly responsible for the demise and doom of the crew. One other piece of technology that would play a crucial role in the lives of the crew was the water distillation system which removed salt from sea water to make it drinkable.

Doomed Disappearance

After two years with no communications from the two ships people started to become concerned. It quickly became apparent that something must have happened the expedition and a search party was launched. Given the environment of the Arctic, there was a high risk that those mounting a rescue party could get in to difficulty. Especially given the advance technology at the disposal of Franklin. Thus the man chosen to lead the investigation had to be selected very carefully.

The Remarkable Dr. John Rae

An explorer and medical doctor by the name of John Rae was commissioned with the challenge of finding out what happened to the Franklin Expedition. Dr. Rae, a Scot, was very different to most western explorers of his time. He knew that native people possessed all skills and wisdom that were necessary to survive in the harsh lands of the Arctic.

He also had a tremendous respect for Inuit culture and traditions. What’s more, he was opposed to the racist imperialist attitude of many of his peers who believed that native people’s were primitive and had little values.

Dr. Rae’s record when it came to exploring the Arctic speaks for itself. During all his years leading expeditions across the frozen wastelands of the Arctic, only one man under his tenure died.

It was through his deep affinity with the Inuit community, and the knowledge that he gained through them, that enabled Dr. Rae to discover the Northwest Passage. Although Franklin was erroneously credited with this discovery mainly through the untruthful spin of his widow, Lady Jane Franklin.

A Troubled Inuit Tale

Dr. Rae consulted with a local Inuit man who relayed to him accounts of a crew that had slowly turned insane displaying strange, irrational behaviour. More shockingly, he claimed they ate the bodies of the deceased in an act of cannibalism after their boats had got stuck in ice. The man backed up his account by showing the doctor artifacts that belonged to the crew. Dr. Rae reported this back to the admiralty but his account was leaked to the newspapers. A stunned and horrified public were aghast by the account.

Mrs. Franklin’s PR Spin

One person who was extremely horrified with the leaked report was Jane Franklin, John’s widow. Lady Franklin, a forceful character, immediately set about to repaint her husband in a different, more flattering light.

She employed Charles Dickens to condemn Dr. Rae in a series of pamphlets. So successful was this campaign that still Franklin is credited with discovering the Northwest Passage even though it was Dr. Rae who uncovered it.

In an especially distasteful, racist passage, based upon nothing other than Dickens’s imagination he accused the Inuit of killing the Franklin party writing: ‘We believe every savage to be in his heart covetous, treacherous, and cruel.‘

The Racist British Empire

One of the false beliefs that pervaded British colonialism, and all previous empires, was a mistaken sense of superiority. Believing that British people were intellectually and morally superior allowed people to justify and legitimise their dominion over others. It was no surprise that Lady’s Franklin’s spin caused racist invective to be flung at the Inuit community. This damage has still to be fully repaired.

The Truth Finally Revealed

Dr. Rae’s account was finally vindicated in the 1980′s when scientists discovered the remains of the crew. Deep knife marks were found on some of the bones of the deceased. This firmly suggested that the flesh had been de-boned giving credence to both Dr. Rae and the Inuit’s account.

In 1984 Owen Beattie, an anthropologist, lead a team to investigate the cause of the deaths of the Franklin crew. After performing an autopsy on the bodies, it was concluded that the members of the expedition had suffered severe lead poisoning which would have accounted for the strange behaviour that was described by the Inuit. Upon examining some of the empty food containers that were thrown away by Franklin’s men, Beattie concluded that the lead seams were poorly manufactured and that lumps of lead had seeped into the food.

Previous to this, it was discovered that lead in the remains of the dead expedition members was more than ten times higher than the levels found in the remains of native Inuit. Others have argued that the lead from the tins alone would not have been sufficient to cause such extreme lead poisoning and suggest that the water distillation system created much larger quantities of lead than those present in the food.

Over a period of twenty years a more detailed picture has emerged. A combination of pneumonia, starvation and diseases such as scurvy and tuberculous caused the death of the crew who were not helped by severe lead poisoning.

We now know that the cannibalism of the deceased is a natural and logical step to take in desperate situations when faced with starvation. Although, even in these extreme situations, it still caused great stigma – in some scenarios it is the only option left open to people other than death. There are several examples of horrific incidents where survivors have had to eat the bodies of the deceased in order to survive. The most famous example is the Andes Flight Disaster which spawned the feature film Alive.

Highly Recommended Reading

Fatal Passage: The Story of John Rae, the Arctic Hero Time Forgot is a fascinating account of Dr. John Rae and his discovery of what happened to the Franklin Expedition.

Fatal Passage: The Story of John Rae, the Arctic Hero Time Forgot

Amazon.co.uk
For people living in Ireland or the United Kingdom, you can access: Fatal Passage.

Amazon.ca
For those who live in Canada, you can obtain:Fatal Passage: The Story of John Rae, the Arctic Hero Time Forgot
here.

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For Germany: Fatal Passage.

Amazon.fr
For France: Fatal Passage.

John F Kennedy: The Man Behind The Image

Yellow Magpie — Tue, 31 May 2011 01:14:46 +0000

As people, we have a habit of placing our more successful and famous peers upon pedestals. We cherish them, we worship them and we create their image to suit our desires.

Essentially, those that are deemed worthy are distorted and sanitised into perfect people. We make them into something that they never were or could never be. John F. Kennedy was such a person.

Untimely Plucked From The Earth

One of the most powerful forces to govern humanity isn’t peace or war. It isn’t justice or injustice. It is martyrdom. Martyrs have shaped the world in revolutionary ways. Just ask any follower of Christianity.

John F. Kennedy was perhaps one of the most popular presidents in the modern era. But his popularity transcended into a lasting legacy due to his untimely and tragic death.

The Man Behind The Mask

The real man was very different from the santised version that was available for public consumption. John F. Kennedy was a keen proponent for assassinating Fidel Castro, such aspirations jarred with his campaign idealism and optimism.

Incredibly charismatic and memorable, John F. Kennedy was a master of oratory and rhetoric. Ostensibly from the outside, he was one of America’s greatest presidents. However, delve closer and some painful truths begin to emerge that rip apart the ideal and restore the human.

John F. Kennedy was an extreme womaniser, even going as far as having an affair on his honeymoon at the expense of his wife, Jacqueline.

One of his most famous affairs was with the famous Hollywood actress, Marilyn Monroe, a highly intelligent but deeply insecure woman. Their relationship came very close to being made public when she sang her famous ‘Happy Birthday, Mr. President.’ Their tryst was quickly ended following that close call.

Please check out Yellow Magpie’s Marilyn Monroe: The Original Blonde Bombshell for further insight.

A Deeply Unhealthy President

To those looking on from the outside, John F. Kennedy seemed to espouse the desired characteristics of vibrancy. He was very young for an American President and appeared to be fit. Certainly, this was also helped by his good looks.

But those closer to him knew that the truth was very different. If one took a close look at John F. Kennedy’s face they would have noticed that this was a man who looked much older than his years suggested. His face look tired and worn.

The truth is that Kennedy concealed a fact that may have made him unelectable in the public’s eyes. Kennedy had Addison’s disease. This affects the adrenal glands causing them to produce insufficient quantities of hormones.

Addison disease has a whole raft of symptoms that have serious effects on those that suffer from it. Some of the main symptoms include fatigue, muscle weakness, weight loss, profuse sweating and muscle and joint pain. One of the most common identifiers of Addison’s is a deep tanning of the skin, even if the person is not exposed to the Sun at all.

The fact that Kennedy persevered and carried on his duties is a testament to his commitment and courage as a politician.

The Surrounding Conspiracy

A man whose name will be forever inked in infamy on December, 1963, is Lee Harvey Oswald. Yet many people believe that Oswald did not actually kill President Kennedy.

A former marine, Oswald has contributed to one of the most horrific and controversial assassinations in the world’s history. To this day, many people have doubts as to whether or not, one single gunman could fire so many shots in such a quick succession from such a difficult vantage point.

The Sunday Times published an article mentioning an international team of men who they claim were really responsible for Kennedy’s death. The article goes on to state that the assassination team were arranged at the behest of the then U.S. Vice-President, Lyndon Johnson.

Jackie Lee Bouvier

In the history of the U.S. presidency only two men have ever been elected while unmarried. It seems unlikely that JFK would have become president if he remained single. Jacqueline Lee Bouvier was the woman that Kennedy needed to bedrock his election bid. She provided domestic credibility which was necessary for a successful campaign.

Jackie, as she was affectionately called by the public, put up with Kennedy’s numerous affairs, including a desperate phone-call from Marilyn Monroe, and nursed him to health during the period when Addison’s sapped his strength.

During his presidential bid she was a rock offering support and doing all she could to ensure that her husband would become America’s next leader.

Check out Yellow Magpie’s Jacqueline Kennedy: Wife Of President John F Kennedy to read more about this remarkable woman.

The Dark Cloud

All throughout Kennedy’s life there was a shadow lurking over him. This shadow was in the form of his domineering, manipulative father, Joe. Joe Kennedy coloured the lives of his children in horrific ways. He constantly had indiscreet affairs with other women, including a nine-year affair with his secretary. He would also have illicit relationships with the girlfriends of his sons.

Joe Kennedy was so brutal that he had his own daughter, Rosemary, who suffered from development difficulties, lobotomised. Under this malign influence John F. Kennedy was brought up in a world that on the surface looked wholesome but underneath was very different from its idyllic portrayal.

Check out Yellow Magpie’s Joseph ‘Joe’ Kennedy: The Patriarchal Shadow That Hangs Over The Kennedys for further insight into Joe Kennedy.

The Same But Strikingly Different

One can never fully escape the past and your upbringing. Certainly Kennedy inherited some of his father’s traits including his womanising habits but he was a far cry from Joe’s relentless egotism and quest from power.

Whereas his father only cared about self-positioning, his son could see from other’s perspective and was highly thoughtful. He would use both of this characteristics when undertaking his greatest challenge.

One other area that John F. Kennedy differed from his father was that of oratory. Although his father was used to public speaking, John F. Kennedy is widely recognised as one of the greatest orators of the 20th century.

The Cuban Missile Crisis

By far the biggest test of Kennedy’s career, and arguably the biggest in human history, was the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Soviet heavyweight, Nikita Khrushchev would test the resolve of the rather young Kennedy in an ordeal that terrified millions. Khrushchev misunderstood and underestimated Kennedy who he saw as a light touch.

It was under Khrushchev that the Berlin Wall was erected after serious blunders By the U.S. Ambassador to Moscow, Charles Bohen, who publicly stated that the USSR had a rest to restrict movement in East Germany.

Emboldened by Bohen and other American foreign diplomats’ foolhardiness, Khruschev set his sights on supplying missiles to Cuba in an attempt to build a Soviet base. Backed into a corner by Khrushchev, Kennedy would have to face a gauntlet that twenty years previously had not existed.

The nuclear arms race and the presence of the fusion bomb, meant that Kennedy could not afford to back down and let the USSR have a base so close to American soil. Yet, he could not directly engage with the soviets either and risk a full-scale nuclear war. He settled for the only option that worked. A military blockade of Cuba to prevent the USSR from arming the island.

Kennedy: Saint Or Sinner?

In the end the question of whether Kennedy was a virtuous paradigm of human behaviour must be asked? This has been the way he is portrayed. The answer must be that he was neither an angel nor a devil, he was just another human who rose to tremendous prominence. John F. Kennedy secured his place in history when his mortality was cruelly and crudely cut short on that faithful winter’s day in November.

The ultimate legacy of Kennedy is easy to understand if we remove him from the equation. If he was not president, if the United States had selected someone less capable and with a heavy trigger finger then the world would now be a heavily scarred and entirely different place to live. The human race could be a dying species ill-equipped to deal with radiation poisoning and tainted food sources.

Our lives rest on the decisions we make. Whether we decide to excel our careers or flounder in a sea of underachievement. Whether we choose to be better citizens or plunder from others. Whether we pick ourselves off the ground or whether we lay there permanently. The choice is ours.

Generally our choices affect ourselves and those we interact with. At the most a single decision that we make will on average affect perhaps one thousand people both directly or indirectly. John F. Kennedy made a decision that affected billions and future billions. With one gesture, a few spoken words he cast in motion a sequence of events that guaranteed our safety for a few more decades at least. It was but one call but it was the right one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouRbkBAOGEw

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Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years is an engrossing and thrilling read that highlights the roles the unruly FBI and CIA played in both the brother’s lives. It also details the dangerous trigger-happy joint chefs of staff and their desires to go to war with the USSR.

An absorbing book – your eyes will be firmly ajar after reading this.

You can obtain Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years here from Amazon.

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Joseph ‘Joe’ Kennedy: The Patriarchal Shadow That Hangs Over The Kennedys

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 23 May 2011 22:08:13 +0000

‘Out of the furnace of flames and torrid heat comes the hardened steel blade. A blade that owes it very existence to its hellish birth.’

He was the dominant figure that ruled over the Kennedy family but he was far from perfect. Power-hungry and filled with ambition, if anybody got in his way Joe would simply use what ever means, either fair or foul, to get his desired result.

The third generation of a family that had fled Ireland to escape the famine during the 1840′s, Joseph Kennedy was born into a high achieving clan. His father, business man, P.J, and mother, Mary, brought Kennedy up in Boston, Massachusetts. P.J. was one of the Catholic leaders and was head of a local ward, or ward boss.

From this background, Kennedy was encouraged to achieve and while in Harvard College, the private University, he began furiously networking to gain entry into Harvard’s privileged clubs.

A Heart Of Infidelity

Joe Kennedy would go on to marry his wife, the highly-sought-after, Rose Elizabeth Fitzgerald, on October, 1914. Despite being wed to Rose, Kennedy had many extra-martial affairs, some of which were indiscreet. He had relationships with several actresses. The most famous of all was Gloria Swanson, who rose to fame during the silent film era.

These affairs would be part and parcel of Kennedy’s life.

Bootlegging Alcohol

Kennedy was never one to let the law get in the way of his plans and there is considerable evidence to suggest that he was responsible for a multitude of unsavoury and highly illegal tactics during his life.

Critics have implicated him in importing and selling alcohol (bootlegging) in America during the Prohibition. It is thought that he was a major player in this practice. Something which mob boss Frank Costello attested to.

Insider Trading And Market Manipulation

Insider Trading, the practice of financially benefiting from inside knowledge, was not given proper legislation until 1934. Neither was market manipulation. Joe Kennedy was therefore free to engage in these practices.

In 1923, the huge Bull market made Kennedy quite rich. He would become even more wealthy for betting short on companies that he would spread scurrilous rumours about. It should be noted that Kennedy was not the only one who benefited from these tactics and J.P. Morgan also became rich from actions that would now earn serious jail-time.

Insinuating Rape

During the mid-1920′s Kennedy moved into the Film Industry and Hollywood. After buying out the Film Book Offices of America with a group of investors he set his sights on purchasing film theatres. One company that he wished to purchase was Pantages Theatre and he set about making an offer for the company.

Nonetheless, Alexander Pantages refused to sell the company for the large sum of $8 million (over $103 million in today’s money).

Strangely, Pantages would later be accused and tried for rape. Pantages Theatre lost their goodwill and Pantages was forced to accept Kennedy’s revised offer of $3.5 million ($45 million).

Later Pantages would allege that Kennedy was responsible for the rape allegation. He was later vindicated of rape after a second trial.

A Hand In The Wall Street Crash?

Some commentators maintain that Joe Kennedy had a contributing part to play in the Wall Street Crash of 1929. He was thought to be the main man behind the ‘Bear Raid’ that weakened the stock exchange just before the crash.

The Bear Raid consisted of investing money in certain shares going short. In other words, if the shares in a company lost value Kennedy would gain financially. To facilitate the shares collapsing, negative rumours would be put into the public domain about certain companies that would scare investors and their shares would plummet.

British Ambassador And Caustic Coughlan

During the 1930′s an Irish-Canadian priest called Charles Coughlan gained notoriety for his bigoted and racist radio broadcasts. The inflammatory and highly egotistical Coughlan was starting to become a menace to the authorities. American president, Franklin Roosevelt sought out prominent leaders of the Catholic community, Kennedy among them, to quell Coughlan’s influence.

Roosevelt rewarded Kennedy for his contribution with the post of British Ambassador.

Condoning Hitler And Nazism

Kennedy’s strong political ambitions were to be dashed by his inability to recognise Adolf Hitler’s ruthless nature. He believed in Neville Chamberlain’s erroneous policy of appeasement. Kennedy publicly endorsed this view contrary to the word of warning offered from Winston Churchill.

Prior to the actual war occurring, Kennedy, twice acting unilaterally, sought personal meetings with Hitler.

While Great Britain was being bombed in 1940 by Nazi Germany, Kennedy was adamant that America should not send either economic or military aid to Britain.

Kennedy was putting himself in the limelight to position a run for the American presidency. A critic of Ambassador Kennedy, Josiah Wedgwood keenly noted, ‘We have a rich man, untrained in diplomacy, unlearned in history and politics, who is a great publicity seeker and who apparently is ambitious to be the first Catholic president of the U.S.‘

Meanwhile, Kennedy, once more acting on his own, stated ‘Democracy is finished in Britain.’ This was the final straw for the U.S. authorities who now realised that Kennedy could not be trusted with the Ambassadorial role. Kennedy would resign before he pushed.

An ‘Unperfect’ American

Joe Kennedy was far from the perfect model citizen. Manipulative and power-hungry, there were few things that he was unwilling to do for personal gain.

Out of this background, with the dark paternal shadow hanging over him, John. F. Kennedy would become the most famous president in U.S. history. Would he have achieved what he did without having a ruthless father? We will never know.

Check out Yellow Magpie’s John F Kennedy: The Man Behind The Image for further insight.

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Check out Yellow Magpie’s Joseph P. Kennedy Quotes: John F. Kennedy’s Harsh And Sometimes Brutal Father to find out what the man’s thought’s were on his son being president, voting and men.

The Sins of the Father: Joseph P. Kennedy and the Dynasty he founded is a riveting read about a highly manipulative and devious character that would become the head of one of the most powerful and famous families in American history.

Written by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Ronald Kessler, it chronicles a darker side of the Kennedy’s that is often glossed over. What is also noteworthy about the book is that it pays special attention to Joe Kennedy’s effect on his wife and her resultant depression.

You can obtain The Sins of the Father: Joseph P. Kennedy and the Dynasty he Founded here from Amazon.

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Joyce Hatto: The Great Pianist That Fooled The World

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 16 May 2011 20:09:51 +0000

In 2003, she would become the most famous pianist in the world. The toast and the envy of the music industry, Joyce Hatto rose from a place of previous obscurity to temporarily become the world’s transcendent piano player as a series of her recordings caused tidals waves throughout the classical music sphere.

A Musical Genius?

So what made her performances so special? The reasons were two-fold. Hatto’s recordings were exquisite and masterful. More importantly though was the astonishing breadth of her repertoire. She appeared to be able to play the works of every famous composer with equal virtuosity and brilliance. From the classical style of Mozart to the romanticism of Tchaikovsky and Chopin, Hatto, it seemed, could play anything with equal aplomb.

To put this in context Hatto’s ability would be the musical equivalent of a doctor being an expert in all fields of medicine, a scientist excelling in all scientific fields, an engineer intimately knowing all aspects of machines and building construction. To put it mildly Hatto was a musical oddity.

Who Was She? Where Did She Come From?

As soon as her recordings began to cause a stir people wanted to know the person behind the music. Who was this woman and where had she been hiding all these years? The answers to these questions were to come thick and fast. Not only that, but they were nearly as unbelievable as the recordings themselves.

Joyce Hatto was born in London on the 5th September, 1928. She was a promising young concert pianist who performed as a soloist in Britain and Europe during the 1950′s and 1960′s with some critical acclaim.

However, during the 1970′s Hatto suddenly disappeared from public view. It wasn’t until 2003, with the realease of her remarkable recordings, that she had come out again.

When more details of how and why the recordings were made began to filter into the public. Hatto’s story turned surreal, when it emerged that she was dying of cancer and had recorded her now world-famous music in a shed in her back garden.

Unending Virtuosity

Outstanding recording after outstanding recording continued to emerge from Hatto as the music industry listened mouths agape in wonderment. In all, Hatto would produce over 100 recordings of the most stunning performances the music world had ever heard. All of this came from a shed in a back garden while Hatto was fighting cancer.

Doubts About Hatto’s Authenticity

In May, 2005, a comment by the musicologist Marc-Andre Roberge on a Yahoo group would later hint at disquiet beneath the surface. Roberge said that on a Chopin-Godowsky recording, a misread chord was identical to one played by the highly accomplished Italian pianist, Carlo Grante. No further heed was paid to this comment until much later.

But doubts were beginning to emerge about the likelihood of a pianist, who had disappeared for over three decades from public consciousness, producing such sterling works while being in the last years of her life.

On June 29th, 2006, Joyce Hatto died.

A Shattered Legacy

The revealing of the true nature of Joyce Hatto’s works would come from a rather unexpected source. A New York financial analyst one day noticed that Joyce Hatto’s Liszt Transcendental Studies were credited to another composer, a hungarian called Laszlo Simon. He informed the classical critic, Jed Distler, of this strange quirk.

Hatto’s musical legacy was destroyed when Distler and others carefully uncovered the true sources of the works. It quickly became apparent that all of the recordings were from other musicians.

The Brainchild Of Hatto’s Husband

Hatto’s husband, William Barrington-Coupe, was the man responsible for the fraud. It would emerge that pianists, Carlo Grante, Andre Previn, Laszlo Simon and John O’Connor, amongst others, were the actual sources for the music.

It would later emerge that Barrignton-Coupe, a record producer by profession, had not just copied from other recordings. In some cases the plagiarised music was sped up or slowed down. This digital manipulation was so good that it even fooled those whose material was stolen. When their own music was played to them many just did not recognise it as being their own playing.

Lingering Questions

Her music may have taken the world by surprise and prior to the true nature of ‘her’ recordings she was many people’s favourite pianist. What role, if any, she played in her husbands scheme is open to conjecture. Barrington-Coupe claims that she believed the recordings to be her own and he didn’t tell her otherwise.

Alain Robert: The Life Of The Human Spider

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 09 May 2011 19:42:52 +0000

He has a developed a talent like no other. The Human Spider. Unlike the comic book character, his life is not governed by the whims of writers. When he puts his life on the line no amount of words will breathe life into him if he misplaces a hand or foot from high above a skyscraper.

It is the harshest sport on the planet. Perched high atop a tall building, with no safety harness, no ropes to prevent loss of life, there is no room for error. This is the world that French man Alain Robert inhabits. In many ways it is more like the creation of fantasy writers than the reality that each of us is familiar with.

Scaling The 7th Floor Apartment

From the tender age of 12, when he found himself locked out from his family apartment, Robert displayed a keen talent for climbing. He scaled the building making his way up to an open window on the seventh floor. Previous to this incident he had climbed cliffs and rocky outcrops, but this was the first time he ascended an urban structure. It was to ignite a passion that would go on to make him world famous.

The Obsession With Skyscrapers

His need to scale high-rise buildings was stoked initially by an invitation. He was asked to climb a building for a documentary. This led to Robert climbing Chicago’s 59-storey, 279 metre (915-foot) Citicorp Center (now known as the Citigroup Center). This was to inure an obsession that saw him conquering all of the largest skyscrapers in the world.

1994 would also see him conquer the 102-floor, 381 metre (1,250-foot) Empire State Building in New York. The following year he climbed several buildings over 150 metres (500 feet) in London, Paris and Frankfurt.

So far he has climbed over 80 buildings throughout the world. Some of the most notable have been the 452 metre (1,483 feet) Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, the 508 metre (1,667 feet) and the tallest building in the world, the 828 metre (2,716 feet) Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

His most difficult climb was undoubtedly the 443 metre (1,453-foot) Sears Tower (now renamed the Willis Tower) in Chicago. With 20 stories left to scale on the 102 floor structure a heavy mist surrounded the building and the walls where saturated with a layer moisture which was incredible slippery. Several hours later a very relieved Robert managed to reach the summit after inching his way to the top.

A Life Not Without Its Cost

Robert has had some serious accidents. Before the age of 20 he had fallen over 15 metres (50 feet) twice. The first fall resulting in fractures to his nose, his heels and his wrists. The second was more serious and led to him spending five days in a coma with more multiple fractures including his pelvis, elbow and forearms. He suffered brain swelling (cerebral edema) and vertigo – which has become permanent.

Thirteen years later a head-first fall from eight metres (26 feet) put him in another coma and required two months of hospitalisation.

The French government now classify Robert as disabled. In an interview with The Sunday Times, he revealed that he is considered to be 66 per cent disabled and that his doctor believes it to be a miracle that he can walk, let alone climb.

Anti-Authoritarian And Arrests

Being a rebel and not accepting convention plays a large part in Robert’s climbs. The fact that the majority of his ascents have been illegal has spurred him on. Authorities have reacted to his climbs by tightening security and making it much more difficult for him to climb.

He has been arrested on several occasions including once when he was charged for possession of a controlled substance in Texas during a climb of the One Houston Center. Robert strongly argued that this was a prescription drug designed to prevent epileptic seizures producing evidence to prove this. The drug charges were dropped and he was fined $2,000 for trespassing.

He was also fined $567 in Malaysia for criminal trespass after successfully scaling the Petronas Towers are two previous attempts in which he was thwarted by the authorities.

Now some of his climbs are legally sponsored so he does not face the threat of jail and prison. The scaling of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai was one such sponsored climb.

A One-Of-A-Kind Remarkable Athletic

Alain Robert is incredibly slight. At no more than 1.62 metres (5’4″) and 50 kg (8 stone (112 pounds), he is not the most physically imposing. But his dedication to the craft of climbing has meant he posses some very unusual physical attributes. He can hang upside using only his arms to keep him upright for up to half an hour at a time. He can also do something that not many people on the planet can achieve – one finger pull ups.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAkqIG2Zbn4

At 48 years of age, whether or not Alain Robert gives up his dangerous sport in the future is unclear. Despite having a wife and children, his desire to climb remains a strong as ever. Only time will tell if the sport that he enjoys so much will claim his life or if he will eventually retire when he reaches the limits imposed by old age.

Check out Yellow Magpie’s Alain Robert Quotes: Thoughts From The Human Spider to find out what the man thinks about jail, adrenaline, climbing and perhaps, more importantly, what his wife thinks about her husband’s dangerous activities.

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Alain Robert’s book, With Bare: Hands: The Story Of Alain Robert, the Real-Life Spiderman is a fascinating account of his life so far. It manages to articulating place the reader right amidst the nerve-tingling adrenaline feelings that arise from Robert’s climbs.

You can obtain With Bare Hands: The True Story of Alain Robert, the Real-life Spiderman here from Amazon.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2TJ3tU8mbo

Antonie Van Leeuwenhoek: The Linen Trader Who First Glimpsed The Microscopic

Yellow Magpie — Mon, 02 May 2011 15:36:07 +0000

In a time when science was well-funded and complex technology was improving all the time, one man went against the grain with wonderful results.

Without scientific training and without huge resources, he was the first person to see the invisible world of the microscopic, the first to watch tiny, single-celled animals hurling across their watery environment. Antonie Van Leeuwenhoek, a Dutch business man with an obsession with lens, forever changed the world.

Early Life

Antoine Van Leeuwenhoek was born in Delft, Netherlands on October 24, 1632. He would live to be 90 years of age and would die in Delft on August 26, 1723.

It’s All About The Lens

Van Leeuwenhoek’s linen business meant that magnifying lenses were needed to examine the quality of the linen fibres. But Van Leeuwenhoek was a keen lens enthusiastic. It was this hobby that would give him access to a world that people never knew existed. From this pastime he created microscopes which were much more powerful than the microscopes of the time.

The secret to Van Leeuwenhoek’s microscopes was the lens. Unlike conventional lens that were created through a cutting and polishing process, his lens used a completely different process. He melted and stretched pieces of glass moulding them into the desired shape. His lens were tiny but they were much more spherical than any of the lens used by the compound microscopes of the 17th century and as a result they had a far higher magnification.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txg1FlBPFHM

Whereas compound microscopes could only magnify up to a certain point without distorting the image, Van Leeuwenhoek’s microscopes could magnify up to 500 times without losing distortion. Images that were only one or two microns (one/thousandth of a millimetre) in size could be observed in razor-shape detail.

The Microscope

With lens that were superior to anything that was available in the world, Van Leeuwenhoek could set about building his simple microscopes constructed from metal ores which he melted down and moulded to form the metalwork of the scope.

With his custom-made microscope he could control the focus very precisely it also allowed him to move the samples around the scope with equal precision. Throughout his life, Van Leeuwenhoek created over 500 lenses and some 250 microscopes.

The Brave New World Of The Microscopic

What an amazing world Van Leeuwenhoek saw. Tiny, unknown animals were everywhere. They were in our water, in our food, abundant in everything.

In 1674 Van Leeuwenhoek saw the first protists (unicellular micro-organisms), infusoria. He saw the first bacteria in 1676 and the first human sperm a year later. He would become the first person to see life in water, the first to see the patterns of fibrous muscle, and also the first to see human red blood cells.

Royal Society Recognition

Van Leeuwenhoek realised quite quickly that in order to achieve recognition and to secure his place in history his work would have to gain credibility. He saw that his best hope of getting recognition was receiving approval from the British Royal Society. He sent many letters to the society detailing his discoveries and what he had seen.

Initially, the two enjoyed a good relationship but this was mainly because Van Leeuwenhoek wasn’t straining convention and his initial drawings were close-ups of parts of bees. When Van Leeuwenhoek broached the subject of his discoveries of micro-organisms in 1676 the relationship became highly strained. It wasn’t until 1680, at Van Leeuwenhoek’s determined insistence, that the Royal Society accepted his account after sending over a team to the Netherlands to look through Van Leeuwenhoek’s microscope.

Van Leeuwenhoek’s Business Acumen

Van Leeuwenhoek’s business background helped to copper-fasten his legacy. He realised that if anyone discovered how easy it was to make his microscope lens – it would undermine his place in history. Therefore, he resolved to keep it a secret and instead told people of supposed countless hours that he would spend toiling away making his lens. In reality they were relatively easy to make and could be completed quite quickly.

In keeping it a secret, Van Leeuwenhoek added to their mystic. It would be over 200 hundreds years later, in the 1950′s, that people discovered how he made his lenses. It would take 100 hundred years for technology to surpass his lens and it wasn’t until the 19th century that scientists had more powerful microscopes at their disposal.

Legacy

Antoine Van Leeuwenhoek created his own legacy. He designed something that on the surface appeared simple – yet no one had every done it before. His persistence in corresponding continuously with the Royal Society is a lesson in how you have to fight for your accomplishments and recognition.

His hard work paid off and Van Leeuwenhoek became known as ‘The Father Of Microbiology‘. He met countless celebrities, Kings and Queens who all wanted to seek tantalising glimpses into this alien universe, the place of the tiny.

He gave us access to a world that was invisible. Antoine Van Leeuwenhoek literally changed the world.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D5Gu_9hEus

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