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40 yrs. ago 2009/7/21 01:57
I watched the landing in the clubhouse of a golf course near Yokohama.
by joe (guest) rate this post as useful

Space men 2009/7/21 02:15
I recall watching the astronauts carrying their briefcase-shaped ventilators, like some otherworldly businesmen, on their way to board the rocket. I was a college sophomore and my primary concern then was staying one step ahead of the draft board. Walter Cronkite had pronounced the Viet Nam episode a failure and there had been three or four funerals for kids from my hometown high school who had been lost over there.
Interestingly, Cronkite also said "everything that has happened in our time is going to be an asterisk," meaning the trip to the moon was the kickoff to populating the heavens with humanity. But instead, the moon walk itself became a footnote. No man or woman has reached farther than low earth orbit since 1972. It's like we went 240,000 miles, then lost our road map and our nerve.
by Eric (guest) rate this post as useful

Men in space 2009/7/21 05:35
I was vacationing in Mexico City, and watched the astronauts on tv in the hotel lobby - everyone was so excited - on the way to LA to meet my first set of inlaws.

Eric makes some interesting points. Other dreams of that era also went unfulfilled - like how technology was going to lessen the number of hours people needed to work, how hunger would be eliminated by improvements in agriculture, how world peace would be achieved. We recently listened to some folk music of that era - certainly a lot more optimism then we experience now. But it was a chaotic, violent era as well.
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

40 years ago 2009/7/21 12:44
I was 12 years old. Don't remember where I was or what I was doing.
by Lori (guest) rate this post as useful

Barbara-san's Quabbin Reservoir concern 2009/7/23 07:01
This article is in the middle of the page.
http://www.necn.com/Boston/Health/2009/07/16/Zebra-muss...
Barbara-san, seems to me we lived a much simpler world back when we were riding the school bus in Yokohama.
Dave-san
by Dave Horne (guest) rate this post as useful

More Quabbin Reservoir News 2009/7/23 07:17
I love the headline on this one. If they really closed the reservoir would that mean no water for Boston?

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles...

Dave-san
by Dave Horne (guest) rate this post as useful

moon landing 2009/7/23 08:03
I was here on the Cape for the summer, with no tv, and the internet didn't exist, so I missed it completely until I visited friends and saw the clips of it.
by srcath (guest) rate this post as useful

No tv 2009/7/23 08:12
We still have no tv here in our Berkshire cottage - so if anyone lands on the moon or elsewhere in the next couple of months - we'll miss it also.
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

Re: Quabbin Reservoir 2009/7/23 15:26
Dave, thank you for posting the link to the news from Quabbin Reservoir. I'm surprised to hear about the boat access. When I was there, there were no boats to be seen, you could hear the silence, and a sign indicated that it was a wildlife sanctuary -- truly a beautiful place faraway from the bustle and noise of the twenty-first century. Likewise, yes, the old Bluff school bus and old Yokohama do represent a simpler world. That's probably why many of us participate in this forum -- to keep those memories alive and share them. Poet Sara Teasdale said that man's most important possession "is the safe-kept memory of a lovely thing." --Barbara
by Barbara (guest) rate this post as useful

Zebras and Mass. 2009/7/24 03:21
Unfortunately the state of Mass. Dept of Conservation has been extremely negligent in terms of educating the public here and protecting the lakes and reservoirs in the state. According to one of the govt. sites Dave sent us, the state had issued a report about these dangerous mussels way back in 2005 indicating a mission statement to educate the public, but apparently nothing was done by them. As of the beginning of this month, when we were told the zebras had landed in Laurel Lake, no one, including well-informed local newspaper-reading residents, had ever heard of this zebra mussel problem, and neither were any special steps taken to prevent an influx, even of the reservoirs, or local recreational lakes.

At this moment, the state has even forbidden local access ramp closures to protect local lakes, even though Laurel Lake now has zebras. There are no facilities for washing off boats that may be contaminated with zebras, and no state monitors present. Luckily our town has ignored this ruling and gone ahead and protected our lake - hopefully not too late. This state seems to always be one step behind and incapable of taking logical preventive action. Since no commercial interests are involved here, it would have been so easy!
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

Hope for Massachusetts 2009/7/25 00:25
Steffi-san, You've probably seen these.
http://www.mass.gov/dcr/waterSupply/lakepond/downloads/...
http://www.mass.gov/dcr/waterSupply/lakepond/hot_topic....

Here is the good news. There is only one confirmed report in Massachusetts and there was only one in Virginia. The link below lists all states.
http://nas.er.usgs.gov/queries/CollectionInfo.asp?Speci...

Here is the real good news. Virginia was able to eradicate them back before I ever heard of them.
http://nas.er.usgs.gov/queries/collectioninfo.asp?NoCac...
Dave-san
by Dave Horne (guest) rate this post as useful

More on zebras - Dave-san 2009/7/25 08:46
Thanks, Dave-san. I did see the first two sites, not the latter two. Congratulations on living in a state that apparently got rid of its zebras.

The following is a site my husband Ron found - about Oneida Lake, which is a large body of water in upstate NY. The report by the lake association is interesting in that it states what exactly has happened to the lake in the last 10 or so years since the zebras entered the water. Apparently some fish are still thriving, though others are not, mostly due to changes in water clarity and weed growth.

If you scroll down and read under "biological changes to the lake" it lists the bad and not so bad effects of the zebras - and for those fishermen on this post who are interested in how individual species of fish are affected, read on below under "portrait of a fishery" ---

http://www.oneidalakeassociation.org/about-oneida-lake....
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

Radio 2009/7/28 13:58
There have been several comments lately about not having access to TV. I listened to the moon landing on the radio and it was fascinating. True, I did see the pictures later and still can look at them through the magic of the Internet.
When I lived in Yokohama as a kid there was no TV but we had AFRN (Armed Forces Radio Network) and they did a pretty good job. I recall Lum & Abner and a music program called the Honshu Hayride. When I returned to Japan in 65 the only TV was Japanese but I enjoyed watching Bonanza with the Cartwright's speaking Japanese.
I rarely turn my TV on now. I get my news from the Washington Post and the Internet but I always have my radio on when I'm driving. If I had to chose between radio and TV I would keep my radio and get rid of the TV.
Dave-san
by Dave Horne rate this post as useful

Yokohama POWs 2009/7/28 14:28
I found an interesting site that shows some locations where POWs were held during WWII. Several places in Yokohama are shown, one near the racetrack and a few more near the docks. I did not find a reference for the Beach YoHi building but I remember when I went to school there hearing that POWs had been held in that building. There is also a listing for civilian internees that lists Karuizawa.
http://home.comcast.net/~winjerd/CmpGroup.htm
Dave-san
by Dave Horne rate this post as useful

Dave-san's post 2009/7/28 22:58
I have been reading some of the terribly sad testimonials of the former POW's - it is amazing that any soldiers survived these conditions. I guess there are a lot of sadists in this world. If their aim was to kill off the men, why didn't they simply shoot them? Why keep them in such horrific camps at all? Don't understand the rationale for all this cruelty.

Dave - have not managed to find any reference to Karuisawa, though there is a place further north from Tokyo that has a similar name. As I have mentioned, my Mom and I and other refugees from Europe were there during the war, so when "civilian internees" are mentioned, I guess that means us. I had not heard us referred to that way before. Could you kindly show me where Karuizawa is mentioned on this site?
by Dave (guest) rate this post as useful

American TV on NHK 2009/7/28 23:17
Dave;

Who could forget James Arness's quickdraw against the bad guys on the TV series Gunsmoke, then sharing a beverage with Ms. Kitty with dialogue in Japanese ? Ditto Clark Kent excusing himself in Japanese to slip into the nearby phone booth to change into his Superman suit--how fortunate Lois Lane wasn't on his trail !
NHK would occasionally run an English language movie on Sunday afternoon, usually a Hammer film from England. Every Sunday evening, everything on the American footprint came to a halt while we watched the Perry Como show, undubbed.
The Far East Network radio ran Don McNiel's Breakfast Club show, Bob & Ray's 15 minute show and in the evenings, old serials from radio's heyday including Inner Sanctum, Groucho Marx, Gunsmoke (the radio version) etc.
by Eric (guest) rate this post as useful

Civilian Karuizawa internees 2009/7/28 23:19
I found the site - wow. Thanks once again for amazing information.

As for tv vs radio - we also have no tv, not because it's not available - our neighbors all have cable - but because it isn't interesting or useful. We do listen to radio, especially the public noncommercial stations. On the computer we see terrific newspapers from around the world, magazines, some US think tank sites, and other terrific resources. We try to read things from different perspectives, and figure out what's really going on in this interesting world.
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

Sorry - wrong name 2009/7/28 23:22
Dave=san - sorry - I must have signed off with your name instead of mine in the "Dave-san" post.
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

US radio 2009/7/28 23:30
I heard my first radio from the US occupation in '45 - loved all the shows, though some of it I couldn't quite get at first. Also - saw my first regular western toilet, bathtub, indoor plumbing and modern heating, telephone, and movie.
by Steffi (guest) rate this post as useful

POWs in Japan 2009/7/29 00:20
We knew an American expatriate who spent the war years as a POW in Japan. His name was Robert Lang and was a free lance photographer. Mr. Lang and his much younger Japanese wife lived in Kamakura. They eeked out a living on short films and educational film strips he produced. These were sold to textbook publishing companies in the US and UK.
He survived the war years because he was also knew how to work with leather. He once said he spent the entire war repairing shoes and boots.
Mr. Lang was of Hungarian parentage. Any visit to the Langs for dinner meant a major dose of paprika that would stay with us for a day or so. The Langs had chickens and rabbits in cages in their tiny back yard and these animals provided most of their protein. I accompanied Mr. Lang on several of his photographic excursions. I got to see a lot of rural Japan including the silk making industry which is now disappeared
Mr. Lang passed away many years ago and I heard that his ashes are buried at a cemetery in Izu.
I still have some of his letters to us after we returned stateside. They're dated 1961-64 or so.
by Eric (guest) rate this post as useful

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