Rubbermaid red

Found today at our friendly neighborhood multinational retailer, the large Rubbermaid drain board in red. Call it the midlife-crisis drain board. Call it Big Red. For years Elaine and I have been on the lookout for Big Red. Small red drain board? Yes. Large red? No. Never no large. But there it was today, and here it is now, in our crisis-free kitchen.

A tenuously related post
Repurposed dish drainer (Also Rubbermaid red)

Bob Montgomery, typewriter repairman

“I’m catering to people who are willing to pay $125 for a machine that was obsolete fifty years ago”: Bob Montgomery, who will be ninety-three in January, is a typewriter repairman.

Related reading
All OCA typewriter posts (Pinboard)

Merriam-Webster in Ebony

Given the all-white world of Merriam-Webster’s 1965 and 1966 Life advertisements, I wondered: did the company ever advertise its products to African-Americans? I checked the Google Books holdings for Ebony and Jet and found a single ad, which appeared in Ebony in October 1967. It’s clearly pitched to parents wanting to do right by their children. No reference to “friends at the office” or “families having fun with word games and puzzles”: here the dictionary is a means to academic success. Which it is. Consider The Dictionary Project.

And now I remember what we had in the house when I was a kid: the World Book Dictionary, and of course, the World Book Encyclopedia. Great bathroom reading.

But that table, that chair: now I’m back in my high school’s library. It’s study hour again.

Related reading
All OCA dictionary posts (Pinboard)

Merriam-Webster holiday shopping

[Life, November 26, 1965.]


[Life, November 25, 1966. Click either image for a larger view.]

Sixteen of twenty people on your Christmas (or “holiday”) list need a Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary. I used to recommend that students acquire and use a collegiate dictionary. Now I say college-level . Can you guess why?

The four people who have no need of a dictionary will be happy with Parker T-Ball Jotters.

Related reading
All OCA dictionary posts (Pinboard)

Thanksgiving 1914

[“Army of Beggars Mars Thanksgiving: Thousands of Ragamuffins in Fantastic Garb Beset Persons in the Street. Churches Hold Services. Turkey and Cranberry Sauce Provided for the Destitute and for Jail Inmates.” The New York Times, November 27, 1914.]

My 2012 and 2013 Thanksgiving posts also dropped in at the Ludlow Street Jail.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Recently updated

Grammarly, WhiteSmoke WhiteSmoke now has a demo, and the results do not inspire confidence.

Old Grote

[2" x 1 1/8". 1 7/16" x 5/8". Click for a larger view.]

From a brief history:

In 1943, the Grote companies combined under the name Grote Manufacturing Co. Like most other manufacturers of the time, Grote refocused its production on the war effort. It began making items for paravanes (devices that cut underwater mine cables), acrylic radio-controlled shells, and blackout lights. Once the war was over, the company converted its metal stamping machines to make medicine cabinets.

Grote Mfg. Co. sold its medicine-cabinet division in 1970. As Grote Industries, the company rolls on.

Our Grote medicine cabinet is now gone, along with our other bathroom fixtures. Goodbye, old Grote. Goodbye, inside-cabinet-door labels. Bathroom-wise, we are stepping into the world of tomorrow, or at least the world of the next week or two. I had to stop myself from saving the blades of shavers past.

Supporting the Ferguson Library

We are open 9-4. Wifi, water, rest, knowledge. We are here for you. If neighbors have kids, let them know teachers are here today, too.

— Ferguson Library (@fergusonlibrary) November 25, 2014

I don’t know who first suggested donating to the Ferguson Library, but I like the idea:

Ferguson Municipal Public Library
35 North Florissant Road
Ferguson, MO 63135

A call-number surprise

I was browsing in the library and noticed Castiglione’s The Book of the Courtier. I still have it in paperback from undergrad days.

And then, just two books away on the library shelf: Ted Allen, et al., Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Did someone stash it for further browsing, as library patrons sometimes do when they’d rather not borrow a book? No.

Let’s review our Library of Congress Classification Titles:

B: Philosophy. Psychology. Religion.

BJ: Ethics.

BJ1518-1697: Individual ethics. Character. Virtue. Including practical and applied ethics, conduct of life, vices, success, ethics for children.

Castiglione’s call number: BJ1604 .C43 1967. Allen, et al.: BJ1601 .Q44 2004.

A related post
Know Your Library of Congress Classification Title (Fun, really)

The past, for sale

[Click for a larger view.]

For sale: a letter of transit, used only once. Also a piano, restored. And many other pieces of film history. The New York Times has an article about a Bonham’s auction.

*

November 25: The Times article now has auction results. The letter of transit sold for $118,750; Sam’s piano, for $3,413,000.