Highlighting Slaves' Poor Living Conditions, One 'Sleepover' at a Time

Give Joseph McGill some credit for keeping the faith.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation employee will be doing some hard yards this year to call attention to the plight of enslaved African-Americans during this, the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the American Civil War. McGill is continuing a program he began last year, when he slept in former slave cabins in order to highlight the terrible conditions endured by many slaves. His unique project had him endure nights in 2010 on the ground in Alabama and South Carolina. This year, the "sleepovers" will take place in Louisiana, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, and Texas.

It's all part of a plan to help people remember just how horribly some people suffered at the hands of others. History, it is often said, is repeated if people don't remember the mistakes of the past. Many slave buildings have gone — the result of neglect, deterioration, or active demolition. Plantation houses remain, of course, some of them historically so; but that is a different matter.

McGill, who got the idea after sleeping in a slave cabin near Charleston, S.C., in 2010 as a Civil War re-enactor for the 54 Massachusetts Volunteer Regiment (the famed group that futilely stormed a heavily defended Fort Wagner). He is careful to take notes of his surroundings, including doing a little digging. Previous "sleepovers" have resulted in the discovery of bits of glass, bones, and other reminders of such buildings' slave past.

What, behind the rabbit? It IS the rabbit!

This was not the inspiration for Sir Bedivere's Large Wooden Rabbit.

Scientists have discovered that the world really did have a giant rabbit, though — or at least a one that was much bigger than today's furry-eared friends. This big Bugs Bunny ancestor was Nuralagus rex, or "the Minorcan king of the rabbits." The large rabbit was named that because of its size and also because of where the fossils were found — on the island of Minorca, off the coast of Spain. "Look at the bones, man [or woman]!"

That island connection is a huge one because it meant that the number of predators that Nuralagus rex would face was limited nearly entirely to what was already on the island (or introduced there by the occasional marauding ship full of conquistadors — those were usually rats, though, and so the rabbits would just kill the rats before they could transmit any dread diseases they happened to be carrying on their furry backs or feet). So, in the relative isolation, the "king of the rabbits" got to be six times of rabbits today and weigh in at 26 pounds. Check out the photo illustration: Those rabbits were huge! Lock up the carrot patch!

Notice, though, that you don't see a whole lot of big ears on those ancient rascals. See, the same evolution that dealt them a stacked deck in terms of predator paucity that enabled them to get that big also made sure that that lack of predators had some negative effects as well — namely, no big ears. If you don't need to hear that some bigger sharp-clawed, saber-toothed animal is barging toward you fangs bared, then you don't really need ears that are larger than normal, now do you?

In the same vein, these big bunnies didn't really have the ability to hop, like their modern counterparts do. (Not all that much like today's rabbits at all, are they?) Nuralagus rex had big long legs but didn't have the spine necessary to enable proper hopping, so they probably waddled around like ducks.

Other inhabitants of this island were bats and dormice. (Did Lewis Carroll pass through at any point?)

One more thing these ancient rabbits had a lack of: vision. Not too many carrots on Minorca, combined with that same lack of need to see the prey coming at you out of the corner of your very small eye, and you have something evolution just didn't provide. Good thing the biggest other animal on the island was a tortoise. Even a waddling rabbit could outrun that.

New site for Atlantis: Spanish swampland?

Atlantis, the famed kingdom of yore that was wiped out by massive waves, is 60 miles inland? Well, yes, if you believe a team of researchers who have been scouring the mud flats of southern Spain for the past few years.

The theory is that a tsunami powered up and over the "Pillars of Hercules," just as Plato said, and sent the Atlanteans to their doom. The site, according to this team of researchers, is not in the middle of the Atlantic or in the middle of the Mediterranean or off the coast of Florida (as Edgar Cayce thought) but right there on the European continent, just north of Cadiz, in modern-day Spain.

The proof is in so-called "memorial cities," which were built in the image of Atlantis — matching certain details set down by Plato in a dialogue so long ago — that show up on images taken by satellite cameras. It just so happens that the researchers have identified a site in the middle of the Dona Ana Park, one of the largest swamps in Europe, as the one being Atlantis.

The team also used ground-penetrating radar and underwater technology to piece together what they hope is a most monumental find indeed.

More details are to be revealed to the world via a National Geographic special. Stay tuned.

Dig Uncovers Sculptures of Emperors

It's not often anymore that digs in Rome yield exciting results, yet such is the case with a recent find announced by Italy's culture ministry.

Seems a team of archaeologists have found, in an ancient fountain, a group of marble sculptures of some large import and value, specifically because they contain marble heads that represent members of the imperial dynasty of the emperor Septimius Severus.

He it was who brought stability and a bit of respectability back to the emperor's throne after the free-for-all reign of Commodus (made famous in the relatively recent Ridley Scott film Gladiator) and the Year of the Five Emperors. Severus it was also who made the empire a military monarchy: The commander of the largest of Rome's armies, he was named emperor by his troops and set about making the army more of a force than the Senate in Roman government.

This emperor also started a dynasty, named after him (Severan Dynasty), and it is those emperors who are represented on the sculptures just dug up.

The way in which imperial officials were buried in those days suggests to modern historians that the sculptures, found on land that also contained the remains of an expansive villa, represent the onetime presence of someone very important indeed. (Also found in the dig was a statue of Zeus.) Mere plebeians didn't have money to either buy or bury such sculptures, so the owner of the villa and the burial ground must have been wealthy or at least influential.

The sculptures will soon reside at the Diocletian Baths, under the auspices of the National Museum of Rome.

Leonardo Exhibition Goes High-tech

Now this is a good use of 3D technology.

The Franklin Institute, in Philadelphia, is opening its doors on an exhibition of the paintings and drawings of Leonardo, and modern technology will be very much the star of the show.

OK, we've all gazed into the crystal ball to try to divine what Leonardo was thinking while he was painting The Last Supper. Turns out the folks at the Franklin Institute have some surprises in store for visitors, including results of digital restoration that clearly show something new — some fish and orange slices on plates on the table and a bell tower towering in the distance.

The buzz will most certainly be on the touchscreens, though, which can reveal not only a 2D representation of crossbows, flying machines, and robots that sprung from the fertile mind of the genius Leonardo but also a 3D simulation of what those things would have been like in real life. (Some of the inventions never made it off the page, so this will be a first indeed.)

One thing sure to stop people in their tracks will be a representation of the famed Mechanical Lion, a gift to King Francis I of France in 1515.

Also on display will be pages from Leonardo's famed Codex Atlanticus, his book of drawings in which he wrote backwards. Surely that touchscreen technology can be used to flip the writing and read what the true Renaissance Man had to say without getting out a pocket mirror.

More here.

Civil War Protest a Smokescreen for Stop Wal-Mart Drive

Sometimes, splitting hairs is the appropriate course of action, moreso than the broad brush approach. The case of Wal-Mart versus the ghosts of wounded Civil War soldiers is such a time.

The problem is this: Wal-Mart has gained permission to build a big-box store, the thing that the company does best, very near the borders of the national park that commemorates the American Civil War battle of the Wilderness. The key words in that sentence are very near — not inside, not right outside, but very near. The actual distance is more than a mile.

Wal-Mart has done all the right things, according to the local laws. The company has secured permission from the county Board of Supervisors. The special use permit gives the Bentonville, Ark., retailing giant all the permission it needs to build a Supercenter that would create 300 jobs in a county that needs them.

But the National Trust for Historic Preservation has been swayed by some angry local residents and their argument that the Supercenter will be built on some sort of sacred ground.

The Wilderness was a very bloody affair, a three-day gorefest that numbered 30,000 of dead, injured, or missing. The battle ended with neither Union nor Confederacy able to claim a solid victory. The war continued to drag on and grind both sides down for almost another whole year.

The Wal-Mart opponents' argument is that the place where the Supercenter is supposed to go was the site of Union hospital areas, where thousands of wounded soldiers were treated, and that therefore, the area is sacred ground, or some such silliness. This argument seems a bit weak on the surface anyway and gets even weaker when you factor in that a few other retail outlets are already squatting on the sacred ground, even the part that was the headquarters of Union commanding General U.S. Grant.

The Wal-Mart opponents have employed such Civil War luminaries as Ken Burns and James McPherson to stoke up the fires of remembrances past, recalling the glory days of brother versus brother — never mind the hundreds of local people who gave their approval for the Supercenter, knowing full well how "sacred" the ground was.

Really, does protecting the national heritage extend to things like this? There's a rather large national park that encompasses the Wilderness battlefield, filled with exhibits containing all manner of horrific details of how brother killed brother. That national park isn't going anywhere. People who visit that national park won't forget that Grant's headquarters were nearby or that Union soldiers were treated in medical tents very near the battlefield.

No, this classless action is all about stopping Wal-Mart from building a Supercenter. It's an economic stop action request dressed up to look like an appeal to historical legacy.

No one wants to forget the horrors of war — lest we repeat them; however, the building of a Wal-Mart Supercenter on top of a paved area once populated by bleeding, maimed Union soldiers will not make people forget "the last full measure of devotion" — especially when we can still drive a mile down the road and see for ourselves.

Bring Back the Mammoth? That is SO Yesteryear

I would have thought that we had all learned our lesson in Jurassic Park: "You bred raptors?"

Yet here are a bunch of scientists announcing their plans to bring back the mammoth. Remember those big, woolly beasts, with the tusks and the footsteps that sounded like Richter scale-breaking earthquakes? No? Well, there's a good reason for that. They haven't been around for a few million years!

For my money, that's the way it should stay. Can you imagine a bunch of mammoths getting loose from the zoo or wherever these Japanese scientists are planning the new not-so-wee beasties? Rampage City! (And no, that's not a new release by some punk or alternative band.)

I blame Dolly. That blasted cloned sheep made headlines a few years ago, and now cloning is all the rage. We're cloning mice (even some that can tweet like birds). Really, where does it end?

See, the researchers have found some tissue samples. Unlike the dinosaur cloning fictionally popularized in Michael Crichton's novel, which couldn't take place in real life because the only dinosaur remains we have are fossils, these mammoths can be created out still-usable tissue, placed in an elephant (after the proper DNA manipulations, of course), and brought to fruition a few months later — Viola! Woolly at your service.

That's probably OK, as far as biology and genetics go, because the mammoth is really just an ancestor of the modern pachyderm anyway. The female elephant in question probably won't even know the difference. (Yeah, right: tell it to the mother who has to bear that big woolly beast.)

Then, there's the question of where the team of scientists is going to keep these mammoths. All that big woolly fur was there for a reason — to keep the animal warm in the harsh winter climates the mammoth called home. Japan does have its wintry parts, but it's not exactly known for its bone-crushing cold the way Siberia is.

The scientists say that, what with experimentation and trial-and-error, they're probably five years away from success. That gives us plenty of time to run for the hills.