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The Age of Ecology by Joachim Radkau
"BIG HISTORY" has become fashionable in recent years, what with all the talk about climate change and the Anthropocene and the like. Its rising currency can also be seen as an effort to fix a mistake made by one of the founding fathers of the discipline of history—a pious German by the name of Leopold von Ranke. About 150 years ago, he categorically limited the scope of historical scholarship to events since the invention of writing. Knowledge of the past, he declared, must be based on documents; all else is speculation or the realm of faith or natural science. And since there wasn't much in the way of writing before, say, Egyptian hieroglyphics, historians weren't really supposed to delve into anything prior to about five thousand years ago. Older events were to be handled by our colleagues in the snazzier buildings—housing fields like archaeology, paleontology, or physics.
Over the past few decades, however, with the growth of interest in "body history" and "material culture" (i.e., object history) and as historians try to transcend the conceit of "history for its own sake" the discipline has broadened its inquiries and horizons. More and more historians are starting to think big: "big data" has become fashionable (yes, even in the humanities!), opportunities for "digital history" are exploding, global history and mapping are back in fashion, and more and more historians seem to be willing to break Ranke's rules.
Why, after all, should the invention of writing be the be-all and 'begin-all' for the scholarly practice of history? Humans had bodies long before that time, and tools and homes and hopes and dreams—and some of these have left traces in the archaeological record. The oldest tools date from over two million years ago, bipedalism dates from about five million bp ("years before present"), binocular vision from tens of millions bp, and so forth. And since it's pretty much arbitrary what we mean by "human," historians shouldn't feel the need to confine what we write about to the last few millennia.
Environmental history is one such field that breaks with Ranke's myopia. One reason for its increasing popularity is, of course, the climate crisis, which threatens to make other human endeavors pale in significance by comparison. Another is the rapid growth of new methods for chronicling climates of the past, often in exquisite detail. Climate history can be inferred from ship captains' logs and tree rings and from paleo-thermometers derived from ancient corals and ice cores and the carbonates in caves. And into this heady new mix now steps Joachim Radkau, a German historian who has taken on the task of charting environmental movements over the past couple of centuries or so.
Historians sometimes make their mark by characterizing the essence of an age. We talk of the Progressive Era, or Cold War science, or Victorian morals and the like—or even seeming oxymorons like "early modern," meaning Europe in the 16th and 17th century. Radkau hopes to establish yet another periodization, which he announces in the title of his book: we are now living in an "Age of Ecology," he declares, which he dates from around 1970 with the founding of the EPA, a flood of environmentalist literature, and the launch of Earth Day in the spring of that year (April 22).
Often we can understand a scholar by looking at what was going on when they were 20 or 25 years old, and in our case this fits pretty well: Radkau was 27 with the birth of Earth Day, and clearly he has been marked by surrounding events. Born in 1943 to a Protestant Minister in a small town in northern Germany, he first made a name for himself studying business practices in the Third Reich, along with the emigration of Jews from Nazi Germany. This was followed by books treating Max Weber's sexual peccadillos, a social history of forests and forest conservation, and an in-depth analysis of Germany's anti-nuclear movement—the topic of his Habilitation (required for promotion to the rank of Professor). Radkau has since turned into one of Germany's foremost environmental historians; his 2002 Natur und Macht—translated into English as Nature and Power: A Global History of the Environment—sets a high bar for breadth and nuance, and has earned him numerous accolades. Radkau also practices what he preaches; in The Age of Ecology he confesses that he has never had a driver's license, and considers automobility one of the chief obstacles to environmental health and well-being.
Green Enlightenment
Here he turns to the history of environmental movements, with an over-arching thesis that the "ecological revolution" of 1970 owes more to the Enlightenment than to any kind of wistful romance. Unhappy with those who imagine environmentalists as a bunch of tree-hugging back-to-naturists, he instead stresses the sober tech-savvy aspects of such movements; ours is an age of "Green Enlightenment," an age that "essentially belongs in the history of the Enlightenment, more in the head than the belly." It is therefore wrong to regard environmentalists as apocalyptics or alarmists; indeed, "the main driving force of the eco-age is not panic or fear but intellectually mediated concern."
Part of the utility of Radkau's level-headed book—as of several of his previous tomes—is his recognition that environmental activism is much older than we usually think. Sustainability we tend to associate with the Arab oil crisis of the 1970s, for example, but Radkau reminds us that, by the 18th century, German woodsmen were already decrying the "death of the forest" as acre after acre was cleared for farming, fuel or building. "Tree hugging" similarly bursts into the western mind in the late 1970s as an activist tactic to obstruct logging, but Radkau recounts how, in the 1730s, Amrita Devi in Rajasthan tried to protect her sacred khejri trees from the axe by literally embracing them—for which she and 362 other "tree huggers" were hacked to death by the Maharajah's lumbermen.
Radkau also shows that appeals to solar energy are older than we might imagine. It's been known since 1938 that fusion powers the sun, and Radkau recalls how early atomic enthusiasts had hoped that nuclearity "would bring solar power down to earth in concentrated form, making it unnecessary to catch the sun's diffuse rays." Nuclear power was basically just solar power, re-created in the form of mini-suns here on earth. (Of course the sun runs on fusion and atomic plants exploit fission, but fusion still remains the Holy Grail in governmental mega-labs.) Radkau draws our attention to predictions from as early as 1900 that sunshine could drive the engines of the world: Friedrich Kohlrausch, President of Berlin's Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt, pleaded that year for "a solar colonialism in the sun-drenched deserts," observing that only "a few square miles in North Africa would be enough for a country like the German Reich."
Cheap oil and coal have always made solar hard to swallow, and, as recently as 1974, the chair of Nixon's Atomic Energy Commission (Dixy Lee Ray, who loved to hate what she called "militant vegetarians") scoffed that "Making solar energy use technically feasible is about as difficult as getting 10 million fleas to produce useable energy by hopping in the same direction at the same time." Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the roof of the White House, but Ronald Reagan took them down. For a long time coal was the presumptive alternative to oil for both Lefties and Greens—though Radkau does a good job of complicating our understanding of environmental allegiances. One might think that global climate concerns would fall squarely in the liberal camp, for example, but Radkau shows how Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s welcomed CO2 worries as a means to thwart her Labor Party adversaries, who were still enthralled with coal. Climate scientists never found much common ground with the antinuclear movement, he observes, since nuclear power was often seen as the solution to the climate problem: 'stop burning coal, switch to nuclear.'
Radkau has a sharp eye for environmental oddities, facts that might seem counter-intuitive in retrospect: that John Muir had no interest in birds, that Green voters burn more jet fuel than other German voters, that the Viennese author of Bambi—the fawn-friendly novel made into a Disney classic—was also the author of pornography. Radkau's is not the voice of an environmental "contrarian"— a much-abused word — but rather the voice of an astute observer with a relish for nuance and detail.
It is, however, easy to get impatient with reading Radkau. The book is encyclopedic in both a negative and positive sense: it covers a lot of ground, but is also spineless insofar as he clings to his Weberian (or even Rankean) understanding of history as just the laying out of facts as they've occurred, elucidating complexity while keeping his "values" pretty much to himself. (Weber was the foremost architect and defender of the ideal of "value-free science.") There is a lot of overwrought sociological theory in this volume—and the text is peppered with exclamation points that seem randomly placed! His focus is less on environmental ideas than on environmentalist institutions—groups like the Sierra Club and Greenpeace and EarthFirst! and a couple of dozen others, whose trials and tribulations he charts in moderate detail. He makes an admirable effort to cover the globe, though what is gained by breadth is sometimes at the cost of depth.
There are also lots of little annoying mistakes. On page 271, for example, he says that leaded gas was "completely banned" in the U.S. in 1988, but he doesn't seem to know that private aircraft still use this mind-addling fuel, as do specialty cars like those used in NASCAR. He rightly recognizes occupational health and safety as part of environmental history; indeed, he writes that "the origins of the modern environmental movement lie at least as much in toxicology as in ecology." But he doesn't get the name of the key figure in this bridgework right (it's Wilhelm Hueper, not Wilhelm Huper), and he doesn't say how Rachel Carson came to use Hueper's pioneering work for the cancer chapter of her Silent Spring. He also misses the interesting fact that Hueper was a secret devotee of the Nazi movement: Hueper had actually written a "Heil Hitler" letter when applying for a job back in Germany in 1933, which cannot have been known to Carson when she honored this environmental cancer giant.
There are more serious oversights. Radkau points to the importance of understanding the particulars of a people's historical and physical geography for understanding local environmental concerns, and surely he is right about this. But sometimes he blunders. In a section on "The Ecology of Ecologism," for example, he claims that "the United States and Australia lacked ancient temples and Gothic cathedrals; that left only natural landmarks as national monuments."
This is an astonishing lapse, given the multitude of ancient monuments in the U.S. and how central they have been for American memory, statecraft, and architecture. The Ohio Valley alone is home to thousands of native mounds and monuments; some of these involve circle and square geometry structures covering hundreds of acres. Native American architecture helped inspire the State Capitol building in Columbus: the edifice is a deliberate fusion of Graeco-Roman and Hopewell/Adena circle-square architecture crafted from plans drawn up by Thomas Cole, the brilliant landscape painter and founder of the Hudson River School. Roger G. Kennedy in his Hidden Cities points out that Thomas Jefferson incorporated native themes in building his house in Poplar Forest; the main structure is an octagon, with native mounds adorning the sides. Jefferson had excavated at least one Indian mound in his native Virginia, and recognized these as Indian in origin (contra later fancies of these being the works of Vikings, Celts or Jews). Indeed, when the American Antiquarian Society was formed in 1812—largely to investigate these magnificent works—Jefferson wrote to congratulate the Society, hoping that, "by their exertions, the monuments of the character and condition of the people who preceded us in the occupation of this great country will be rescued from oblivion before they will have entirely disappeared."
Radkau seems to have overlooked the vast scholarly literature on this topic, which stretches back to the 1840s, when George Squier and Edwin Hamilton Davis published their impressive Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, the first publication of the Smithsonian series on "Contributions to Knowledge." Time and apathy have taken their toll on many such monuments, but Ohio alone is home to the magnificent High Bank Works, the Marietta Works, the Newark Earthworks, the Portsmouth edifice, and the enigmatic (and gigantic) Serpent Mound east of Cincinnati, one of the most spectacular effigy mounds of the Americas. Outside of Ohio we have the great pyramids of Cahokia, the medicine wheels of Montana, the Poverty Point structure in Louisiana, Fort Center in Florida, and so forth.
Think Tank Denialism
A more serious oversight is the scant attention Radkau gives to the opponents of environmental thinking and policy. Radkau's focus is more on organized environmental movements—which is fair enough, but ignoring the organized opposition hampers our ability to make sense of why some movements have succeeded while others have failed.
Consider, for example, the pathetic record to date with regard to global warming. If a sizable fraction of the American populace still believes there to be a genuine "controversy" surrounding whether the earth is warming, then that is largely due to the dogged efforts of deep-pocket denialists. In the United States today there are several dozen right-wing "think tanks" cranking out the message that environmentalism is basically the thin edge of socialism; environmentalists by this reckoning are "watermelons": green on the outside but red on the inside. A sizeable and growing scholarly literature on such groups includes books like Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner's Deceit and Denial, David Michael's Doubt is Their Product, James Hoggan's Climate Cover-Up, Chris Mooney's Republican War on Science, or Naomi Oreskes and Eric Conway's Merchants of Doubt. My own Cancer Wars has a chapter on denialist trade associations ("Doubt is Our Product"), and denialism features in my Agnotology: The Making and Unmaking of Ignorance, co-edited with Londa Schiebinger. Movements triumph or dissipate according to the strength of the resistance they encounter, and this should be part of any effort to understand why we haven't (yet) seen the full flower of "Green Enlightenment."
In the case of global warming, it is imperative that we understand the force of elites like the Koch brothers who, by dint of their billions, are able to shape public ignorance and impotence. American events represent perhaps half of Radkau's 500-page book, but we find no mention of the Koch brothers, or Rupert Murdoch's Fox media empire, or bodies like Americans for Prosperity or ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council established to draft "model bills" for legislators willing to follow the paths cut by corporate fat cats. Radkau does mention the role of Fred Singer in fomenting climate denial, but he takes no notice of denialists' ties to "think tanks" like the Heartland Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Marshall Institute, the Cato Institute, the Ayn Rand Institute, and myriad others—all laboring to defend free market solutions to all social problems. Or to deny that such problems are problems. Environmentalists have to face such headwinds, precisely because such institutes (or their Astroturf appendages) are so effective in generating distraction science or data chaff.
Naomi Oreskes and Eric Conway in their Merchants of Doubt have shown how several of our most vocal climate deniers cut their teeth denying cigarette-cancer links; several were paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the tobacco manufacturers or their agents (Frederick Seitz and Fred Singer, for example.) Denialism thus became a sophisticated black art, with strikingly similar techniques deployed to deny the science linking CO2 to climate change, coal emissions to acid rain, CFCs to ozone depletion, and secondhand smoke to cancer. "Balance" was an effective lure to get journalists on the "two-sides" team, but a purported need for "more research" was also used "to keep the controversy alive." The brilliance of this scheme — devised by cigaretteers in the 1950s — was that by manufacturing doubt, liberal rhetorics of openness could be used as a kind of heat shield to neutralize critics. "Doubt is our product" was the cigarette industry mantra, memorialized in a 1969 secret document by the makers of Kool and Viceroy cigarettes. More recently, Stanton Glantz, Rachel Grana and Amanda Fallin at UCSF have described how Big Tobacco money was key to the rise of the Tea Party, with its blinkered devotion to free market fundamentalism. Chicanery seems to travel in packs.
Radkau deserves some credit just for mentioning cigarettes, given the historical tendency of the Greenish Left to regard smoking as a "lifestyle choice" and therefore not really part of environmental health. Many early Greens were smokers, and, as recently as 2012, the leader of Germany's cigarette lobby was a former Green Party member of the German Parliament. Radkau notes that movements to combat tobacco smoke and smokestack smoke have often ignored one another, but he fails to probe the history of this disconnect. For decades, the tobacco industry used "air pollution" to explain away the modern rise of lung cancer, providing massive funds to scholars willing to propagate the "air pollution theory" over and against "the cigarette theory." Experts in the field of occupational health and safety (including Wilhelm Hueper) were lionized by the industry to deflect attention from cigarettes. Radkau makes no reference to this strategy, part of an orchestrated conspiracy (according to the 1500 page ruling of a federal judge in USA vs. Philip Morris) to blame anything but tobacco for the deaths caused by cigarettes.
Radkau also underestimates the historical depth of movements against tobacco. At one point he writes that "Only the Nazi regime, which would have gradually eradicated such people [smokers] altogether, waged a campaign against tobacco." It's galling enough that he cites my Nazi War on Cancer to buttress this claim. More serious is that he gets the facts mixed up. It's true that the Nazi regime did have the world's strongest anti-cancer campaign, and it's also true that this included pioneering research into harms caused by tobacco, asbestos and radioactive isotopes; it's also true that Germans under Hitler had some of the world's strongest bans on smoking in public. But never was there any suggestion that smokers would be exterminated, though to be sure some industry shills tried to raise such a specter. It's also not true that "only the Nazi regime" opposed smoking. In the final decade of the 19th century, the U.S. already had a powerful anti-tobacco movement. As a result, fifteen U.S. states banned the sale of cigarettes from 1890 to 1927, when the last such law (in Kansas) was repealed.
Knowing this particular history could actually help solve one of Radkau's riddles, since he rightly wonders why concerns for secondhand smoke have so rarely been part of broader movements against air pollution. There are actually several reasons for this omission. For one thing, it is important to realize that, over a hundred years ago, smoking in public was widely regarded as an offense — a toxic pollutant — which is one reason cigarette sales were banned in so many U.S. states (until governments realized how much they could make from tobacco tax revenues). Fears were also that innocents would inhale the smoke, which is why municipalities like Kansas City banned smoking on all street cars. "Street smoking" was also regarded as impolite, as we learn from authorities like John Quincy Adams, the nation's fifth president. Restaurant smoking was not considered respectable until the American Tobacco Company launched its campaign urging diners to "Reach for a Lucky Instead of a Sweet" (in the late 1920s).
The whole idea of a distinctive secondhand or "environmental" smoke with uniquely toxic properties doesn't gain traction until the 1930s, when American Tobacco researchers claimed that the most dangerous stuff wafted safely away from the distal end of the cigarette, a "fact" deployed by the industry to reassure smokers that the really nasty stuff never got inhaled. "Environmental" smoke is thus not just a reification, it's also (at least in part) an invention of the industry.
Sticking with tobacco, another curiosity Radkau ignores is the threat of radioactivity from cigarette smoke. Radioactive polonium-210 was identified in cigarette smoke in 1964—following earlier fears of potassium isotopes—and while tobacco industry laboratories quickly confirmed this, they deliberately kept it quiet to avoid "waking a sleeping giant" (as Philip Morris executives confided in a secret memo from 1978). Anti-nuclear activists never liked this uncomfortable fact: that cigarette smoke is probably a far graver radioactive threat than anything ever spewed from a nuclear plant. How many Greens today even know that cigarette smoke exposes smokers and non-smokers alike to deadly radioactive isotopes—including a notorious alpha emitter? The myopia is hardly mysterious: radioactivity in cigarette smoke has long been used to diminish the harms from exposures coming from nuclear reactors. Radioactivity in smoke is also ignored by the tobacco control advocates, however, because they fear that a focus on a particular component and how it might be "fixed" could appear to be collaborationist. As for radiophysicists, they have tended to ally themselves with nuclearists, downplaying atomic threats more generally. In short: radioactivity in smoke has fallen into a kind of ideological gap or disinterest pit.
Necronomastics and Contingency in the Anthropocene
A thread running throughout Radkau's book is the ever-present danger of bureaucratization, which leads him to a certain cynicism. He discusses the rise of "conference tourism," including conferences so large that an effective published summary becomes virtually impossible. The Third World Water Forum in Japan in 2003, for example, he calls "a pointless megashow" with the de facto goal of pressing for "the privatization of the world's water." He postulates a "tendency to institutionalization" of environmental movements, and he is grim in his view that environmental associations "tend to define success not in terms of greater environmental protection but by the level of donations."
Taken one step further, however, one might question whether we are really justified in talking about ours as an "Age of Ecology." This brings us back to his failure to explore organized anti-environmentalism.
This is not a trivial complaint. I guess it's fair enough to name an age after what is being destroyed: 'place-names' often honor what was destroyed in creating that place: "Crystal Springs," "Ocean View," and the like—plus all those Midwestern counties named after vanished Indian tribes. Perhaps this same cruel irony can be found in calling ours an age of ecology rather than, say, an "Age of Ecocide" or "Climate Crisis"? If the ecological revolution began in 1970, it hardly seems fair (yet) to call it much of a success. Radkau recalls that the United States in the 1990s was producing 13,000 times more pesticides than in Rachel Carson's time (by weight, I'm assuming, though of course the formulas have changed). From the greenhouse point of view, we seem hell bent on burning up every last bit of carbon stored in the earth—even though the warming envisioned only as a possibility in the 1970s has now become an established fact, skeptics be damned. A more apt name might be "The Age of Melting Glaciers." If ours is an age of ecology, then perhaps we should rechristen Germany in the 1930s and 1940s "The Age of Jews."
Radkau's failure to historicize the opponents of environmentalism leads him to some notable oversights. He comments blandly on Nixon's 1971 call for a "war on cancer," but misses the fact that corporate kingpins were invited to help plan that war, which conveniently ignored the cancers caused by effluents from those same corporations. He stresses the importance of the spread of "information" for 1970s environmentalism, but he makes no mention of the campaigns of mis- and disinformation spread by trade associations to confuse and distract the public from thinking about hazards. He references (not altogether uncritically) our living in an "information society," but ignores the equally important manufacturing and distribution of ignorance to defend against product regulation (the proper study of which is agnotology).
Perhaps I am being too grumpy. Radkau is not a bad storyteller, and the material he covers is spiced with insights: that gardening cannot provide a model for environmental management, that conservation was born in the railroad age, that wood has been undervalued as a research object. Radkau recounts how Jane Jacobs helped preserve Greenwich Village from destruction (she called freeways "the sacking of cities"), and how Russia's Minister of Disaster Relief estimated 300,000 deaths from Chernobyl (in 2000). Anti-nuclearity is clearly at the center of Radkau's ideal of environmentalism, and he is at his best describing the impact of Chernobyl, including the significant role played by that disaster in the collapse of the Soviet Union.
So, if ours is not the Age of the Ecology, then what would be a better name? Michael Soulé at UC Santa Cruz has suggested "the Castrophozoic"; others have proposed the Homogenocene, or the Anthrocene ("cene" is from the Greek meaning 'recent'). The more popular term, however, is Anthropocene, a term coined in the 1980s by a Great Lakes diatomist named Eugene Stoermer to designate a new stage in human and geohistory. The word thus reflects the unprecedented capacity of Homo sapiens to change the planet. Geologists are now debating whether to allow this new category into their pantheon of epochal monikers; a decision by the International Commission on Stratigraphy is supposed to be rendered in 2016.
What's interesting about the Anthropocene is its conflation, or interweaving, of human works and geologic facts—violating that separation of human and natural history championed by Mr. Ranke. Paul Crutzen popularized the term in the early 2000s, culminating a career in which he had shown how CFCs were eroding the ozone hole. Ozone depletion turned out to be fixable in ways that the carbon crisis is not; indeed, the climate crisis is far more treacherous, given the centrality of fossil fuels in global capitalism. Geologists now talk in terms of an anthropogenic "signature" that is likely to be readable in rocks even millions of years in the future. We are also starting to see a certain philosophical unease, comparable perhaps to the unease felt by Copernicans first realizing that the earth is not the center of the universe, or by Darwinians discovering that humans are not the apples of God's eye (more like the unripened persimmon, one might think). Humans once thought of themselves as living on, off, or from the earth, and here in the Anthropocene we feel the earth itself—with its ice and wind and waves—literally shifting beneath our feet.
Perhaps it is premature to say how dramatically all of this will alter our understanding of human existence on the planet. Anthropocentrism is nothing new in human history, and neither is hubris, or apathy, or ignorance, or greed—or hope and despair. But the carbon economy does seem to force us to recognize a new kind of relationship with the planet, a new kind of action at a distance, a deep history we are part of and party to. In myth or in science, we used to imagine humans as having sprung from the earth, whether by acts of God or by natural selection. Humans inhabited the earth, but had limited powers to transform it—for better or for worse, apart from local improvements and pollutions. Now, with evidence of the de-icing of entire continents and prospects of famines and floods approaching biblical proportions, we are perhaps justified in talking about something new under the sun: a new kind of anthropo-geo-history that might help us find new ways to stave off the heat. Good history, after all, is always about the appreciation of contingency, and surely we can still hope and act in ways that ensure that our future will not be written only in stone.
LARB Contributor
Robert N. Proctor is a professor of history of science at Stanford University. He specializes in 20th century science, technology, and medicine. He also does work on human origins including: changing notions of the oldest tools, art and fire, changing body imagery, the history of molecular anthropology, visual rhetoric in phyletic diagrams, changing archaeological techniques and images of "humaness," the history of global creationism and of Evo Devo, catastrophic geology, global climate change, and environmental policy.
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Is He Beacon for the Jews of Lithuania?
With crucial help from Lithuania's ambassador to Washington, a Maryland cemetery employee has managed to position himself as a key mediator between Jews and the Lithuanian government in a little more than one year.
Harley Felstein launched his new organization, the Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project, at a party hosted by Ambassador Zygimantas Pavilionis at the Lithuanian Embassy in April 2011. By that fall, Felstein was invited to the Lithuanian Embassy once again, this time to participate in a roundtable discussion on Lithuanian-Jewish relations that included senior Lithuanian government officials, top Jewish communal leaders and America's special envoy to monitor and combat anti-Semitism, Hannah Rosenthal.
Pavilionis also features prominently on Felstein's marketing materials. A letter from the ambassador, printed on Lithuanian Embassy letterhead, accompanies a request for advertising and sponsorship related to fundraising concerts Felstein is planning for New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and Washington this September.
But Felstein has no academic or scholarly expertise on Lithuania and has never been to the country. Nor does he speak Lithuanian or Yiddish, the native language of Lithuania's Jewish Diaspora, many of whose members are Holocaust survivors.
Some of those Lithuanian Jews, known as Litvaks, and figures in Lithuania's own small, surviving Jewish community are joining others in criticizing Felstein for generating anger and division rather than good will. Many view as deeply wrongheaded Felstein's solicitous stance toward a government that even today, they say, has failed to come to terms with Lithuania's conduct during the Holocaust.
There are critics, too, who question Felstein's financial management of his not-for-profit groups, his own past financial history and key achievements he claims both here and in Lithuania.
Today, these critics are putting the spotlight on a rising, self-described grassroots activist who says that all he ever sought to do was help.
In an interview at the Forward's offices on June 21, Felstein explained that his passion to restore Lithuanian-Jewish relations was born after his teenage son returned from a school trip to Lithuania in 2010.
"What struck me was the condition of the cemeteries," Felstein said. "I said, 'We've got to look into this more to find out why the cemeteries are in this shape.'"
Felstein set up the Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project in the spring of 2011. He launched a sub-group, the Sunflower Project, that fall.
He said the groups' aims are to improve Lithuanian-Jewish relations through dialogue, youth and cultural exchanges, and restoration of abandoned Jewish cemeteries in Lithuania.
But Ruta Puisyte, assistant director of the Vilnius Yiddish Institute in Lithuania's capital, who lent the institute's name to Felstein's early fundraising, told the Forward, "When I spoke with him I understood he has no understanding of Lithuania, no understanding of what has already been done."
She has since withdrawn the institute's endorsement of his work.
Franklin Swartz, a Minsk, Belarus, based researcher who has run Jewish projects in Eastern Europe for almost 20 years, said, "He doesn't know any of the local languages, he doesn't know Lithuania, he has no academic background."
Felstein is simply a man who works in a cemetery, Swartz said.
Swartz should know. He is listed as a director of Felstein's group.
Felstein is a family services counselor at Maryland's Garden of Remembrance Memorial Park, in Clarksburg. Tall and imposing with an iron handshake that belies his swept back, white hair and bushy, gray-white eyebrows, the 66-year-old Felstein is given to grandiose statements.
When it comes to bringing together Jews and Lithuanians, Felstein said, "I have done more in 18 months than Litvaks and whomever else have done in 21 years in working with the Lithuanian people. The re-bridging has started, and it will continue."
Felstein said Swartz is no longer associated with his group.
Pavilionis, Lithuania's envoy in Washington D.C., said that since his appointment to D.C. two years ago, he has been trying to find people, like Felstein, to bring together Litvaks and Lithuanians. "We feel the Litvak community as part of our own heritage," Pavilionis told the Forward.
But in reaching out to Felstein, Pavilionis has only exacerbated already simmering tensions with Litvaks. Mistrustful of Felstein's expertise, they are particularly incensed at a couple of opinion pieces Felstein has published in the Times of Israel and The Jerusalem Post, calling on Jews to improve ties with Lithuania.
"Starting today, let's commend the American-Lithuanian-Israeli bond," Felstein wrote in the Jerusalem Post article, referring to a recent United Nations vote in which Lithuania opposed a Palestinian request to join UNESCO.
Grant Gochin, a Litvak in Los Angeles, said he found Felstein's opinion pieces in this vein highly skewed. He and other Litvaks pointed to recent controversies over the Lithuanian government's reckoning with its own history, such as its recent decision to reinter with full honors a Nazi puppet leader who died in the United States, Juozas Ambrazevičius.
"The information that he presents is one-sided," Gochin said.
The prominence that the ambassador's support has given Felstein in these circles also comes against a backdrop of suits filed against Felstein for nonpayment of debts.
One of several vendors who complained about being stiffed by Felstein was a Washington-area kosher caterer who has yet to receive payment for food his firm provided for a Felstein event last year.
"What bugs the heck out of you is he tells you: 'I'm coming right now to pay for it. I'll be here this afternoon,'" said Shaukat Karimi, of Signature Caterers, in Maryland. "And each time you talk, it's always the next time."
During his interview at the Forward, Felstein said he had spoken to Karimi that day and that Karimi is "going to have his funds next week."
When the Forward followed up with Karimi two weeks later, on July 13, Karimi said he never spoke to Felstein and that no payment had arrived.
Other businesses have sued Felstein for nonpayment of his debts.
Felstein was a defendant in three civil lawsuits in Maryland last year. Two of those suits related to the Jewish Cemetery Renewal Project of North America, a not-for-profit Felstein incorporated in 2011 with the aim of identifying "Jewish cemeteries which are abandoned or in distressed shape."
A consulting firm settled out of court in a suit over unpaid invoices totaling almost $2,000. A computer consulting company won a $5,000 lawsuit against Felstein for unpaid invoices.
Felstein lost a third lawsuit brought by a debt buyer, First Resolution Investment Corporation, related to more than $6,000 he owed from the time he lived in Oregon, where he ran a company called Premier Israeli Products. Felstein filed for personal bankruptcy in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Oregon, in 2008, the same year that he moved to Maryland.
Separately, the Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project has come to the attention of Maryland charities officials.
Last September, Felstein organized a concert at Tifereth Israel Congregation, in Washington, where five cantors performed in front of an audience of about 175 people. Tickets cost between $35 and $75.
Michael Schlein, a charities investigator in the Office of the Maryland Secretary of State, said that because Felstein has not filed fundraising paperwork with the Maryland secretary of state he is not allowed to solicit contributions.
"It's illegal," Schlein said. "The Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project and the Sunflower Project, if a part thereof, shouldn't be soliciting any money and should not be [part of] any charitable appeals."
Felstein said the event did not count as a fundraiser because it didn't make a profit.
"That's not true," Schlein said. According to Maryland's Solicitations Act, a contribution is defined as the sale of a ticket with a charitable appeal. "Even if he didn't sell a ticket at all," Schlein added, "the fact he is trying to sell a ticket requires registration."
Schlein sent Felstein a notice in June asking him to register. "We'll be taking care of that," Felstein said in a follow-up interview.
The Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project has applied for, but has not yet obtained, recognition as a tax-deductible charity from the Internal Revenue Service. Meanwhile, with help from an already established tax-exempt charity, Felstein is advertising his series of fundraising concerts, under the title "Music of The Vilna Ghetto Experience." They will be performed at high-profile venues in September, including the National Museum of American Jewish History, in Philadelphia, and the Center for Jewish History, in New York.
The concerts will be performed by the Embassy Series, a not-for-profit musical group that plays at diplomatic events "to promote international cultural understanding through excellent musical performance in unique settings." The Washington-based group has its own tax-deductible status with the IRS.
In order to allow people to make tax-deductible contributions to the Sunflower Project, the Embassy Series has agreed to accept money for ticket sales and to pass profits on to Felstein.
The arrangement is "not completely unusual," said Ellen Aprill, a tax specialist at Loyola Law School. "While people are waiting for an exemption to come through they can ask other charities" to accept money on their behalf.
Felstein is selling advertising in concert programs for up to $1,750 and concert sponsorship for up to $5,000. His letter soliciting contributions for the concerts promises donors they can make payments "to The Embassy Series (501C3), securing your taxable write-off receipt."
However, an accompanying payment form says checks for advertising or sponsorship should be made payable to the Lithuanian Jewish Heritage Project. Only ticket purchases should be made payable to the Embassy Series, the letter instructs.
In a telephone interview, Felstein said this was an error and that all checks must be made payable to the Embassy Series.
Participants in an email list devoted to Lithuanian-Jewish issues have questioned the substance of Felstein's activities, particularly the extent of his cemetery restoration projects in Lithuania.
In mid-June, after weeks of email list participants demanding proof that he had carried out any work in Lithuania, Felstein said he had restored one Jewish cemetery in Skaudvilė, in the western part of the country.
As evidence, Felstein brought to the Forward offices photographs of a local pastor and a group of young people clearing long grass from around the burial ground. Felstein said he would send carbon paper to the local pastor so that the pastor could "rub" the inscriptions. He also promised to have metal signs produced that could be affixed on each headstone.
Felstein says he has years of experience restoring cemeteries in North America. In several interviews, he has taken credit for ensuring that the Community Association for Jewish At-Risk Cemeteries secured a $140,000 grant several years ago to renovate Bayside cemetery, in New York.
Gary Katz, president of CAJAC's board, said: "That is completely inaccurate. The grant had already been awarded before I or anyone at CAJAC heard of Mr. Felstein."
Rather than helping secure the grant, Katz said, Felstein arranged for CAJAC to interview three contractors who gave quotes for cleaning up the cemetery, ranging from about $750,000 to about $1.5 million. "We wound up doing the entire cleanup for about $180,000 using other contractors," Katz said. "He appeared to have no experience [that would enable him] to actually clean up and restore a cemetery."
Felstein bridles at the insinuation.
"I have 45 years experience in the world of cemeteries," he said.
So which cemeteries has he restored?
"Well, we have one in Trenton [New Jersey] that we're working on right now."
Can Felstein name a project he has completed?
The chorus of anti-Lithuanian critics can at times seem shrill. And not everyone is critical of Felstein's work.
Ruth Franklin, a co-chair of the board of governors of Jewish genealogy website JewishGen, said, "Harley seems to be being vilified for his attempts, and I'm not sure he's so mal-intentioned or scandalous."
Franklin spoke at an event in June co-sponsored by the Sunflower Project at the Balzekas Museum of Lithuanian Culture, in Chicago. She said the event successfully brought together Lithuanians and Jews of Lithuanian heritage.
In his interview with the Forward, the more Felstein was questioned about what he's achieved, the angrier he became.
"I put in all the time, and I put this together. Me. Myself. My time. My effort. And all you can do is sit here and criticize," Felstein said.
He claimed to have made more progress "with the reconnection of the Jews and the Lithuanians" than his critics have made since Lithuania gained independence.
"I am an individual, I am a grassroots movement and I am making progress," Felstein said. "I speak on behalf of those who are buried in Lithuania, our forefathers, our history in Lithuania and not the current people who are running around, ranting and raving."
Contact Paul Berger at [email protected] or on Twitter @pdberger

subset: commoncrawl


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More than a million people have spoken out in favor of real Net Neutrality in public comments. More than 3.4 million took some kind of action urging Net Neutrality before the rulemaking began. This has been the biggest public response the FCC has ever gotten on a policy matter … but is the FCC listening? Will the voices of a million people make a difference?
Sadly, a top official at the FCC, Gigi Sohn, told NPR: "A lot of these comments are one paragraph, two paragraphs, they don't have much substance beyond, 'we want strong Net Neutrality." So, 1,067,779 people commenting will not make much difference. It is a very sad commentary on democracy in the United States and on the FCC.
We have always known that, so we occupied the FCC, interrupted their meetings, protested outside of it and supported other protests – and we know that is not enough. The FCC received so many phone calls and comments that their system could not handle it.
Our protests forced the FCC to listen and include our proposal for the Internet being reclassified as a public utility in their rulemaking. But, to win we need to build a mass movement that cannot be ignored, that balances the influence of big corporations like Comcast and Verizon.
Our next step is to demand that the FCC commissioners come out of their federal building that is infected with corporate lobbyists and actually listen to the people. How do they do that? They hold hearings around the country where people have an opportunity to fully talk to the commissioners.
It's been more than five years since all five FCC commissioners left Washington to meet with the public in an official capacity. Net Neutrality is the hottest issue the agency has dealt with in almost a decade. People like you and me have a lot to say about the open Internet and the FCC needs to hear it.
Join us in calling the FCC to hold hearings outside of Washington, DC where they hear from the people.
FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has held closed door meetings with Internet venture capitalists, with corporations and with people in Silicon Valley. In the one public event he has participated in he dodged questions, told people they were making assumptions about his plan and used technical jargon to avoid answering people's concerns for real net neutrality. The event, organized by the Media Literacy Project in New Mexico, drew hundreds of people who told Wheeler they want the Internet to be a public utility where there is equal access for all.
Tom Wheeler has been saying many of the right things, but his proposal does the opposite of his rhetoric. We've been asking whether or not Tom Wheeler gets it or is he intentionally trying to mislead the public. Public hearings will help push Wheeler to listen to people who explain how his proposal will break the Internet.
All of the commissioners need to hear from the people and take our views seriously. One way to do that is for the FCC Commission to hold hearings across the country where people can speak face-to-face with the commission.
Join us in telling the FCC to hold hearings because they have a responsibility to listen to us on an issue which is of the utmost importance.
The movement for reclassification of the Internet as a public utility where there can be no discrimination is rapidly growing. Public outcry is putting pressure on the FCC. We need to keep growing so the people cannot be ignored. Net neutrality groups have staged rallies, musicals and even camped outside the agency's doors. Congress is even starting to speak out with thirteen senators and 37 members of the House calling on the FCC to reclassify broadband and protect Net Neutrality. This week hundreds gathered outside fundraisers President Obama held in California to remind him of his commitment to the open Internet.
The public has a lot to say about this Net Neutrality which has become the biggest issue ever considered by the FCC.


text: Hey there sugar baby Saw you twice at the pop show You taste just like glitter mixed with rock and roll I like you a lot lot Think you're really hot hot I know you think you're special When we dance real crazy Glam-aphonic, electronic, disco baby I like you a lot lot All we want is hot hot Chorus: Boys boys boys We like boys in cars Boys boys boys Buy us drinks in bars Boys boys boys With hairspray and denim Boys boys boys We love them! Oh, oh Baby is a bad boy With some retro sneakers Let's go see The Killers And make out in the bleachers I like you a lot lot Think you're really hot hot Let's go to the party Heard our buddy's the DJ Don't forget my lipstick I left it in your ashtray I like you a lot lot All we want is hot hot Chorus I'm not loose, I like to party Let's get lost in your Ferrari Not psychotic or dramatic I like boys and that is that Love it when you call me legs In the morning buy me eggs Watch your heart when we're together Boys like you love me forever Oh, oh, oh, oh Chorus x2 We love them! Chorus (We love them!)


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The Panasonic GH1 is a 12.1-megapixel camera built on the Micro Four Thirds platform. The GH1 is Panasonic's follow-up to the G1, which was the first Micro Four Thirds camera offered by the company.
What makes this platform unique is the camera body's mirror-less design, which allow manufacturers to make smaller cameras while still using larger, DSLR-sized sensors. Additionally, the GH1, like other Micro Four Thirds cameras, has a detachable lens and will accept other lenses with the same lens mount – or even different lens mounts if you use an appropriate adapter.
Another powerful feature for Micro Four Thirds cameras is the use of full time live view. That is, the image that the lens sees passes directly to the image sensor rather than using a mirror to redirect it to the optical viewfinder.
The Panasonic GH1 adds 1080p video capture at 24fps to its predecessor's spec list. Additionally, the GH1 includes a new superzoom lens, specially designed for this camera – the 14-140mm f/4-5.8 HD MEGA O.I.S. lens. The GH1 was met with a lot of fanfare due to its impressive spec list and overall potential. While there is no doubt that the GH1 offers a lot of versatility and is fun to shoot with, it's not without a few chinks in its armor.
Panasonic GH1 Key Features
- 12.1-megapixel Live MOS sensor
- Full time live view via electronic viewfinder or 3-inch 460k dot LCD
- Tilt/swivel LCD
- 1080p at 24fps video capture
- Built-in stereo mic (2.5mm mic out jack)
- 2x crop factor
- Compatible with SD/SDHC memory cards
Panasonic GH1 Size and Handling
While one of the key attractions of the Micro Four Thirds system is supposed to be a more compact camera size, the Panasonic GH1 actually feels more like an entry-level sized DSLR, akin to the Nikon D3000 or Sony A330. However, I think this size discrepancy is attributable, in large part, to the large 14-140mm lens included in the GH1 kit. Take that large lens off and you feel like you are holding a much smaller camera. Still yet, the GH1 is only marginally smaller than most entry-level DSLRs and I don't really see the size advantage playing as big of a role here.
The GH1 handles quite well, even with the big kit lens attached. I actually find the balance quite pleasant. I don't think the camera is too small to turn off most of the men who like a larger camera in their hands, and it's not too large to rule out packing the camera for your family vacation. In fact, this may be the perfect vacationing camera when you consider all that it will do for you.
While the Olympus E-P1 has a thinner body overall, Panasonic opted for the inclusion of a rounded grip on the right side of the GH1. I, for one, welcome this compromise in size. I find the GH1 more ergonomically appealing as a result of the grip. With the E-P1, I always felt like I needed to hold on to something else other than just pinching the body in my hands. The GH1, however, gives me something to grab hold of.
In addition to well balanced size, I also loved the control layout of the GH1. It reminds me a lot of the more advanced Nikon cameras. There are plenty of buttons and switches on the outside of the camera, which makes adjusting common settings a breeze. There's no digging through menus to make simple adjustments. While newcomers may find the wealth of adjustment options intimidating, more seasoned photographers will appreciate the ease with which they can modify things like focusing mode, shutter release mode and ISO settings.
The inclusion of the 3-inch rotating and swiveling LCD is a plus in my opinion. It makes the camera a more versatile in still shooting and video situations. I found myself using it to get low to the ground for casual shots that I wouldn't otherwise crouch or lie down on the ground to capture. As a result, I caught more unique images in everyday shooting situations that I would have missed without the tilt/swivel display. As I have previously observed when reviewing the Nikon D5000, such a display adds more comfort to video shooting situations as well. Being able to hold the camera at other heights than eye level feels much more natural to me than awkwardly holding the camera out from your body as is required with the Canon Rebel T1i during video capture.
All-in-all, the Panasonic GH1 is an ergonomically sound camera. While it's not as compact as the Olympus E-P1 kit, it's not really supposed to be – given the zoom range that the GH1 offers. Throw a short prime lens on the GH1 though, and you've got yourself a much smaller package that's closer to the E-P1's overall size.
Panasonic GH1 Performance
The GH1's performance falls somewhere in between a fast point and shoot camera and a DSLR. While I found the autofocus performance sorely lacking in the E-P1, the focus speed of the GH1 is much quicker and, overall, acceptable. The biggest advantage of the GH1's autofocus system as compared to the Olympus E-P1 can be found when shooting video. The GH1's continuous AF system actually works when shooting video. The E-P1 was simply too slow to be of any use for video recording. The GH1 keeps your scene in focus and it stays quiet while it autofocuses, which is something else that Olympus can't do with its kit lens.
Shutter response is immediate with no sense of delay. You get the feeling that you're shooting with a DSLR when handling the GH1. Motion tracking with the LCD and electronic viewfinder works pretty well. As long as you don't have a subject moving too fast, you can follow smoothly with the with either one. Scurrying toddlers shouldn't give you too much trouble; however, if you're panning after race cars or motorcycles, then the electronic display system might have some difficulty keeping up.
The included 14-140mm HD MEGA O.I.S. lens performs pretty well for a superzoom lens. I was pleased with the optical image stabilization results for the most part. The biggest obstacle is finding suitable light at the long end of the zoom range when the maximum aperture is a rather dim f/5.8. This means that shutter speeds in all but the brightest light are going to be quite slow. As a result, it is difficult to use available light indoors when you're at the long end of the zoom. The 140mm telephoto point equates to 280mm on a 35mm camera, which means you might be able to stretch it down to 1/60s or 1/30s for the steadiest of hands with the help of image stabilization. Chances are though, if you are down in this shutter speed range, you'll have more luck getting your shots with the on-board flash turned on, especially if your subject is moving. The lens has its pros and cons, and by far the biggest limitation I found was shooting indoors without flash. I like the lens as a walkaround and think it really completes the GH1 as handy, family camera.
Overall, shooting with the Panasonic GH1 is a pleasure. So long as you treat the GH1 like a casual camera, you never really get the sense that you're handling something inferior to a DSLR. While it won't go toe to toe with prosumer DSLRs like the Nikon D300s and Canon 7D, the GH1 performs up to most of the expectations that I had for it.
Panasonic GH1 Image Quality
Image quality is another point where we have to say, "better than a point and shoot camera, but not quite as good as a DSLR." The GH1 will cover your family vacation with flying colors; however, I wouldn't book any weddings with the GH1 in hand. Aside from the performance limitations, I never found the GH1 to be a real knockout with the images it produced. I think part of that limitation can be chalked up to the lens. Generally speaking, superzoom lenses suffer from a compromise in optical quality for the sake of convenience of having such a large zoom range at your disposal.
Again, this isn't to say that it won't serve most consumers well, and the quality is definitely going to be an improvement over your $150 pocket camera. I just don't see the potential for anything beyond hobbyist photography from the images taken with the GH1. As a nod to E-P1 users, I thought the Olympus camera had better overall image quality than the Panasonic GH1. While I didn't have both cameras in hand for a side by side comparison, my general feeling was that the E-P1 with its kit lens outshines the GH1 kit by producing sharper images and images with lower noise throughout the range.
I also found ISO performance to be about par for the course with this camera. It's not going to best your Nikon D300s; however, it will show up your point and shoot camera throughout the ISO range. To really test out the noise performance and sensitivity of a camera, I prefer to shoot in darker environments and see what shows up. For the GH1, I took it out and captured several handheld shots in the city at night and then set the camera up on a tripod for an overlook of the cityscape and a full run-through of the ISO range.
The following images are the results of the low light test that I put the GH1 through. All images were captured using auto white balance and JPEG large / fine quality.
Feel free to click on any of the images or the links below the chart for the original files to inspect for personal use (or, right-click and choose "Save as…"). Please do not reproduce any images on the Internet or elsewhere without permission.
ISO 3200 – f/5.6 @ 1/5s mounted on a tripod. This image shows the scene used for the below ISO test.
Panasonic GH1 ISO Test
If you're interested in seeing some more images from the GH1, you can see the prior post of Panasonic GH1 Sample Images.
Panasonic GH1 Video Performance
The GH1 really impresses as a video camera. The 1080p video looks very good on my computer monitor. Unfortunately, the video editing software shipped with the camera is very limited and I was unable to get a video exported to share with you. While the software allows you to upload directly to YouTube, it appears to downsize it to a very odd size, which is actually smaller than the YouTube player itself. This was very disappointing when you consider the GH1 currently retails for $1500.
You can trim footage and burn DVDs directly from the included software; however, if you want to get fancier with the 1080p footage, which is encoded in AVCHD format, you'll need to have a more serious editing program and some time on your hands. You can more easily edit and process files that are shot a resolutions of 720p and lower with the GH1, which I wish I had done for the sample footage I shot with the GH1 for this review. If I were using this camera on a daily basis, I think I would just use 720p video capture and enjoy an easier editing and file portability format.
Image stabilization and continuous, automatic autofocus really help out with making the GH1 a viable video camera. The lens is practically silent for autofocus or zooming during playback, which is something the Olympus E-P1 can't say.
Other than the hiccups working with the AVCHD format in 1080p files, I was very pleased with the GH1's video performance. So far, it is my pick as the best all-around photo/video hybrid camera, with autofocus being the kicker. It's a still camera that I would actually use to capture casual videos.
Panasonic GH1 Accessories
As noted above, the GH1 is part of the larger Micro Four Thirds system, which means the GH1 can use and Micro Four Thirds lenses. Panasonic and Olympus' lens line is growing, and you will probably be able to find something to fit your needs in the specific Micro Four Thirds lineup. However, if you can't find exactly what you need, there are a number of lens mount adapters dedicated to expanding the options for Micro Four Thirds users.
Items that you might want to pick up when purchasing the GH1 include an SD memory card and a spare battery. I have a stash of Kingston SD cards. There's nothing really all that special about these cards, but they are cheap and work just fine in the GH1. If you demand the utmost speed out of your camera, then you can pony up for some SanDisk Extreme SD cards, which help clear the buffer a little faster if you are shooting repeated photos or lots of video. If you're going to shoot a lot of video with the GH1, I would suggest getting larger memory cards since the HD video files can chew up memory fast.
The GH1 uses the DMW-BLB13 rechargeable lithium-ion battery. These batteries retail at about $55, which isn't cheap, but it will save your neck if you're out when the battery in your camera dies. If you're the type that recharges religiously, then you could probably skip this accessory; however, if you like the peace of mind of having a backup, it probably wouldn't hurt to pick one up since you'll be using a lot of juice with the electronic viewfinder and LCD as well as the image stabilization system.
I was really pleased with the GH1 as a fun and capable alternative to a DSLR. It's certainly not a camera for everyone; however, it's a camera anyone can pick up and start using. If all the buttons are too intimidating, it's easy to pick the GH1 up, set it to Auto mode and start shooting. Users wanting to move up from a point and shoot camera to something with better image quality will instantly benefit from the GH1's larger sensor. Likewise, point and shoot owners will be familiar with the live view LCD on the camera's backside, while those more familiar with DSLRs will appreciate the bright electronic viewfinder, which has a very "DSLR" feel to it.
After familiarizing yourself with what the Panasonic GH1 can and can't do, weigh your needs and wants in a camera before you pull the trigger. Those who end up purchasing the GH1 after due consideration will likely have the camera that's just right for them. It's not a camera for everyone, but for the right crowd it's a great gap filler between the point and shoot and DSLR worlds.
Where to Buy the Panasonic GH1
I recommend B&H Photo as a trusted online resource for cameras like the Panasonic GH1, along with a range of lenses and accessories to go with it.


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Canon Control Ring Mount Adapter EF-EOS R
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Ask a question about this product
Similar to the Mount Adapter EF-EOS R, the Control Ring Mount Adapter EF-EOS R lets you expand your lens compatibility when using the EOS R camera, but with an added control ring for additional customization. Attach any EF or EF-S lens to the EOS R using the Control Ring Mount Adapter EF-EOS R without losing the control ring you'd have with an RF lens to control numerous settings and functions for fast and smooth performance on the go. It even comes with a clicking mechanism that delivers easily perceptible feedback, which can be removed for a fee to provide more silent operation if preferred. Featuring a matching design and resilient, dust- and water-resistant construction, the Control Ring Mount Adapter EF-EOS R is a no-compromise way to incorporate your EF and EF-S lenses into the EOS R system.
Technical Data


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Old Head Golf Links
Kinsale, Cork
Tel : +353 (0)21 4778444 Fax : +353 (0)21 4778022
The Old Head Golf Links is one of the most remarkable development ever conceived in the history of golf: An Atlantic promontory that will never be rivalled in terms of drama and beauty.
It rises hundreds of feet high above dramatic cliffs, surrounded by the ocean on all sides of the, and commanding the most spectacular views from every part.
Club facilities and amenities include full bar and restaurant offering a l'carte and bar menus. Clubhouse facilities include changing rooms, disabled toilet, soft spike changing.
From Dublin/Shannon/Killarney, follow the signs to Cork. From Cork, follow R600 through Kinsale, over bridge. Signposted from there on.
Further Information
Information herein provided by the club 18 March 1999.
Email: email@example.com
For more information on Old Head Golf Links see www.ol dheadgolflinks.com
Course Details
Course Name: Old Head Golf Links Holes: 18 Yardage: 7100 SSS: 72 |
The 220 acre promontory has allowed the composition of a 7100 yard, par 72, golf course, configured as two returning courses of nine holes, together with a practice ground facility, a chipping green and putting green. For an appreciation and independent view of this course please see golfer reviews. press here for Old Head Golf Links course reviews |


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Understanding Merino Wool
Named after a breed of sheep, merino wool is fast becoming the fabric of choice for many athletes and outdoor enthusiasts. No longer the itchy, scratchy wool of yesteryear, merino wool is composed of ultrafine fibers that are amazingly soft, breathable, and durable. This versatile fabric is now being used to make performance socks and base layers by brands such as SmartWool, Icebreaker, and Ibex. If it's been a while since you've worn wool, here are some reasons to give it another try.
100% Natural
The product of happy sheep in need of an annual haircut, merino wool's harvesting and processing requires much less energy than the manufacture of synthetic fabrics. Reducing your carbon footprint has never felt so good.
Temperature/Moisture Management
Wool is a uniquely versatile fiber that keeps you comfortable in both cold and warm conditions. Few other single fabrics work so well in such a broad range of temperatures.Merino wool insulates even when wet. This high-grade wool consists of naturally crimped fibers with tiny threads sprouting off them. The sheer number of thread surfaces is so vast that even when wet, wool fibers trap little pockets of air, which serve to insulate you. When dry, the number of air pockets increases, so the wool insulates even better.Miraculously, the same tiny crimped wool fibers that keep you warm in winter also keep you cool in sweaty conditions through the process of "evaporative cooling." The many fibers act as perfect little wicks to pull moisture up off your skin, move it across the face of the fabric, and expose it to the outside air where it can evaporate quickly. These wicks are what make wool a better moisture manager than many other fabrics.
Because of its unique combination of insulating and cooling qualities, a midweight merino wool piece can negate the need to pack both lightweight and heavyweight synthetics for variable weather conditions.
Properly cared for, wool will last for years and is one of the most durable fabrics available. The naturally crimped spring-like structure of the fibers retains its shape after multiple seasons of use, and has much greater tear resistance than cotton and many synthetic fabrics.
Wool fibers are very resilient and snap back to their original shape, creating a wrinkle-free fabric that's very travel friendly.
Because of the fibers' coil-like springs that compress and expand, they provide natural cushioning. It's this quality that makes merino wool an ideal fabric for socks.
Because wool wicks and evaporates moisture quickly, the individual fibers stay quite dry. This moisture-free environment helps prevent the growth of odor-causing bacteria, mold, and mildew.
Soft Texture
Again, wearing is believing. Slip on Icebreaker tights or a SmartWool top, and you'll be amazed at the soft texture of merino wool. Forget cotton flannel. This stuff is silky smooth!
Flame Resistance
Often worn by race-car drivers to retard flames, wool offers much greater fire resistance than synthetic fabrics.
Caring for Merino Wool
Naturally shrink resistant, merino wool stands up to washing and drying much better than traditional ragg wool. Some garments, like socks, can be thrown into the washer and dryer with all the other laundry. On the other hand, knit tops need to be gently machined washed and then laid flat to dry. (Be sure to follow the care instructions provided with each product.) In any event, avoid bleach! It will yellow the wool, or worse yet, break down the wool's individual fibers.
Founded by New England skiers who were trying to keep their feet warm, SmartWool was originally focused on creating the most comfortable shrink-resistant performance socks possible. The company now offers an expansive line of wool apparel, from boxers and tights to shirts and hats. CLICK HERE to see all of our SmartWool products.
A leading proponent of using merino wool as a performance fabric, this New Zealand company offers high-quality shirts, tights, socks, and underwear. CLICK HERE to see more.


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Coronavirus Cooking: The Most Searched Recipe In Every State During Quarantine
Photo Courtesy of Chowhound
If you're looking for new recipe inspiration, check out Google's list of the most searched recipes by state during quarantine. From sourdough bread comfort to burger bliss, these popular recipes will give your dinner rotation a needed lift.
Google Trends just broke the not-so-shocking news that search traffic around recipes has reached an all-time high. It's likely not a huge surprise to those of us who've been stuck in the house, cooking, baking, and seeking out new recipes to add to the new regular rotation. In fact, it's hard to imagine there's EVER been a time when more Americans were doing more cooking—and the data backs it up. But what the heck is everyone making in quarantine?
We're so glad you asked. Google has also released the top-searched recipes unique to each state so we could get a snapshot of what folks are making over the past month.
Comfort food is definitely hitting big with a search for hamburger recipes coming out on top in 12 states, by far the most. Bread, which seems to be in everyone's oven, came in second, with seven states searching for it most. Salmon swam to the top in four states.
In a twist, Utah is clearly out to prove its worldliness, searching for crêpe recipes more than any other state, with various other sweets turning up No. 1 in a smattering of states.
Curious about your state's most uniquely searched recipe? Check out the full results below with links to recipes or recipe roundups from our own library.
Uniquely Searched Recipes By State, Past 30 Days
Note: Unique is when a state searches for something more than all of the U.S.
- Alabama – chicken salad recipe
- Alaska – cinnamon rolls recipe
- Arizona – lemonade recipe
- Arkansas – hamburger meat recipe
- California – snickerdoodle recipe
- Colorado – egg salad recipe
- Connecticut – salmon recipe
- Delaware – salmon recipe
- Washington, DC – margarita recipe
- Florida – zucchini recipe
- Georgia – baked chicken recipe
- Hawaii – shoyu chicken recipe
- Idaho – cinnamon rolls recipe
- Illinois – pork tenderloin recipe
- Indiana – hamburger recipe
- Iowa – hamburger recipe
- Kansas – hamburger recipe
- Kentucky – hamburger recipe
- Louisiana – crawfish etouffee recipe
- Maine – bread recipe
- Maryland – salmon recipe
- Massachusetts – bread recipe
- Michigan – hamburger recipe
- Minnesota – bread recipe
- Mississippi – cornbread recipe
- Missouri – hamburger recipe
- Montana – cinnamon rolls recipe
- Nebraska – hamburger recipe
- Nevada – pork loin recipe
- New Hampshire – bread recipe
- New Jersey – salmon recipe
- New Mexico – tortilla recipe
- New York – charoset recipe
- North Carolina – pound cake recipe
- North Dakota – sloppy joe recipe
- Ohio – hamburger recipe
- Oklahoma – hamburger meat recipe
- Oregon – cinnamon rolls recipe
- Pennsylvania – egg salad recipe
- Rhode Island – chicken parm recipe
- South Carolina – pound cake recipe
- South Dakota – bread recipe
- Tennessee – baked chicken recipe
- Texas – hamburger meat recipe
- Utah – crêpes recipe
- Vermont – pancake recipe
- Virginia – banana pudding recipe
- Washington – sourdough bread recipe
- West Virginia – hamburger recipe
- Wisconsin – ham recipe
- Wyoming – sourdough recipe
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text: For years Eugene cyclists have been trying to get the city of Eugene to end the dangerous practice of storing leaves in bike paths. The spreading leaf piles create a slipping hazard, hide dangerous debris and force cyclists into rushing traffic. But the advocacy has apparently had little impact. Above is an image from the city's own website apparently urging people to store their leaf piles in bike lanes rather than safely up on the curb.


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Sindhi Kadhi is very delicious and nutritious. This tangy Kadhi is made with roasted besan, (gram flour) and mix of vegetables. Traditionally it is served with rice and also can be served as a soup.
Recipe will serve 3.
- 1/2 cup gram flour (besan)
- 3 tablespoons oil
- 1/2 teaspoon fenugreek seeds (mathi)
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds (jeera)
- 1/8 teaspoon asafetida (hing)
- 3 whole red peppers
- Approx. 10 curry leaves
- 1/2 teaspoon turmeric (haldi)
- 1/2 teaspoon red chili powder adjust to taste
- 1 tablespoon grated ginger
- Approx. 3 tablespoons tamarind pulp (imli)
- 1-1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 cups of mixed vegetables (I am using 8 okras slit into 2 vertically, 1/4 cup carrots sliced in rounds, 1 small potato cubed, 1/4 cup cut green beans about 1 inch longs)
- Also need 1 tablespoon oil for stir-fry okra
- 5 cups of water
- Wash and dry the okra. Remove the top of the okra and stir-fry in 1 tablespoon of oil over medium high heat until they are tender. Set aside.
- Heat the oil in a sauce pan over medium high heat, add fenugreek seed, and cumin seeds, as seeds crack add asafetida, red pepper, ginger, and curry leaves stir for few seconds.
- Reduce the heat to medium and add besan. Roast the besan stirring continually till the besan has become golden brown and aromatic (about 4-5 minutes).
- Add about 4 cups of water slowly, stirring continuously to avoid forming lumps.
- Add turmeric, salt, potatoes, green beans and carrots.
- After Kadhi comes to boil, lower the heat to low medium and cover the pan and let it simmer for about 8-10 minutes, until vegetables are tender. If needed add more water, this should be running consistency but not watery.
- Add okra and tamarind pulp to Kadhi, after kadhi comes to boil, let it simmer for another 6-7minutes over medium low heat.
- Serve hot. Sindhi kadhi taste great with rice or serve as a soup.