It's a small world after all.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Definitely the Glomar Explorer Trickfox. Summer of 1974 perhaps off the coast of Catalina? Elizabeth

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

From what Trickfox just sent ... this interesting phrase which I thought Paul might appreciate.

"The CIA claimed that any records that might exist which may reveal any CIA connection with or interest in the activities of the Glomar Explorer, or any evidence that might reveal the existence of records of this type would be classified, and therefore, exempt from disclosure under exemption 1 of the FOIA. They also insisted that exemption 3 applied, as the National Security Act of 1947 precluded them from releasing information related to the functions of CIA personnel. This was the first instance of an agency using the "can neither confirm nor deny" answer in response to a FOIA request. Since then, the terms "Glomar response," and "Glomarization" are used to describe an agency’s response when they can neither confirm nor deny whether records exist."

Sort of a precursor to " redaction"? I think that you have been " "Glomarized" too Paul! Elizabeth

[Trickfox]

Glomar explorer it is then, but please note how close these images look like each other, except for a few changes here and there all three images could be of the same ship.

Thank you CIA,

You are still as confusing as the MADHATTER.

Trickfox

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Thats what the cover story for the Glomar Explorer was " she was a mining ship"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/st ... ontier.htm

Its an interesting article but it looks like there was also some stiff arming going on on land while she was steaming for her secret destination .... a point over the ill fated Russian submarine ( which I understand now was found earlier by the US submarine Halibut. A pretty good spy ship all by herself.) Anyway I thought this was funny:.............................................

"While Howard Hughes was working with the CIA, the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating Hughes's financial empire and the takeover of Air West, a small regional airline. CIA overtures to have the SEC investigation sidetracked failed. The SEC was about to obtain a court order for Hughes's files when, on June 4, 1974, there was a mysterious break-in and robbery at his Los Angeles communications center. The files the SEC was after, along with $68,000 in cash and a memo discussing Hughes's work on Project Jennifer, disappeared. Having been denied access to the information it was after, the SEC investigation quickly ground to a halt. "..................................................................................

I don't know why we are looking in this direction particularly. Maybe we are just twidling our thumbs until Paul gets the next chapter up. OR maybe we are learning things ahead of time. Its all interesting in any case. Elizabeth

[Moldova]

Yet another "Challenger" steps into the picture. Was just playing around with mariana trench and... WHAM...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mariana_Trench
*************************************************************
The trench was first surveyed in 1951 by the Royal Navy vessel Challenger, which gave its name to the deepest part of the trench, the Challenger Deep.[1] Using echo sounding, the Challenger II measured a depth of 5 960 fathoms at 11°19′N, 142°15′E[2]
*************************************************************

Yeah I know off the beaten path, but seems to be A LOT of "Challengers" and deep ocean exploration/recovery work.

[SLicK-G]

Elizabeth,

That was a little before my time on Catalina. I didn't get there until Dec 75. But I do remember a submarine coming to the island and people were able to take tours on it. It was there for quite a few days. Then left, no one really thinking much about it. The some time later, another sub came to the island. But that one didn't allow people on board and was there for only a short time. I believe they were two different subs. But don't remember the names. I'm not sure, but I can try asking some friends that are left on the island if they can remember the names. Or see if the "Islander" would have any record of them. I'm sure it would be backed up on somewhere. Or put into the archives. I will see what I can come up with.

I was checking out the sites on the Challenger accident. A physicist named Richard Feynman popped out at me. His findings on the accident went into far more depth than most others. I started looking at some of his back ground and by looks of it. He was into some other things, like Quantum Elecrodynamics. Has anyone ever heard of this person, or am I looking in the wrong direction. Kind of odd, that most scientist die of cancer, as did Feynman.

Slick

[greggvizza]

SLicK-G,

Richard Feynman was one of the worlds greatest physicists. Born and raised in Brooklyn NY but spent most of his career at Cal Tech in Pasadena. He is very famous for his work in Quantum Physics.

GV

[flowperson]

Dr. Feynmann is one of my personal heroes. He spent his early career In Ithaca NY at Cornell and was one of the youngest staff members to work on the Manhattan Project. There are several really good books concerning his life and work. Yes Slick, he was the guy who figured out that freezing temperatures stiffened the o-rings separating propellant sections on the Challenger boosters, and the failure of which were determied to be a primary cause of the disaster.

Quantum chromodynamics was a ground breaking conceptual construct that paved the way towards our understanding of the modern theories concerning the standard model of the nature of matter and forces. He seldom missed the chance to travel to Brazil each year and participate as a drummer in the samba parades which are one of the features of Carnival. He was fascinated by the nature of rhythmic structure and said many of his ideas came to him while drumming.

flow....

[greggvizza]

My sister who worked at Cal tech only knew Richard Feynman as the bongo player. I was in a book store one day with her back east and I was looking at quantum physics books and I picked up one with Feynman’s picture on the front cover and my sister looked at it and said, I know that guy, he’s the bongo player from my Cal Tech theater. I said no, couldn’t be, he’s one of the worlds greatest physicists. She said I know definitely that that is the bongo player, he liked me and he did a pencil sketch of me on one of the desks while he was bored waiting for his part.

That was too much for me. Here I was a geek back in Pennsylvania buying books by a world famous physicist who I idolized, only to find out that he was hitting on my sister who thinks he’s an old hippie bongo player.

I asked her if she saved the sketch. She said it was on a desk, I couldn’t. I was getting disturbed, I said well why didn’t you take a picture of it? She said why? it was just some old man doodling. She just didn’t get it.

GV

[Chris Knight]

Dr. Richard Feyman was a physicist I admired as well. He was very different from the mainstream physicists I have known (although I only "know" Dr. Feynman him from his writings) in that he seemed to have a sincere curiosity about the universe, a great sense of humour, and the insight and balls to not only figure out when people were BS'ing but to call them on it. Pretty unusual for a physicist.

I spent the summer of 1988 in LA and spent a lot of time kind of kicking around Caltech, but I didn't arrive until early summer (he had just passed away a few months earlier). It would have been fun to meet him.

Wikpedia has a fairly decent breakdown of him at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman.

[Paul S.]

This is sure turning into one very interesting thread. There are some tangents (so what else is new?) but the stuff that's popped up here since Slick starte it all of is fascinating.

I'm gonna stick with the Glomar Explorer, Russian Sub, and Howard Hughes stuff. Hughes' name has come up before, but I have to rummage through the shadows to find the links and contexts. Something about Watergate, believe it or not, if memory serves me. Or there's another tangent.

Meanwhile, I followed the "K-129" lead a few posts back and found this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_sub ... _(Golf_II)

...among other things:

According to an official account, Glomar Explorer was able to lift the wreck of K-129, but as it was raised, the missiles fell out and the hull broke into three parts with the bow and stern falling back to the ocean floor. Thus, the missiles, the torpedo room, and the engine room were lost. What exactly was recovered is highly classified, but the Soviets assumed that the United States recovered torpedoes with nuclear warheads, operations manuals, codebooks and coding machines. According to another source, the U.S. recovered the bow section consisting of sections 1 and 2, containing two nuclear torpedoes, as well as conventional torpedoes.[2]

"What exactly was recovered is highly classified."

Musta been a smiling cat. Or a smile without the cat.

--PS

[twigsnapper]

Paul,

As Trickfox said, the smile remained perhaps but the Cat was long gone.

And at the same time, tourists in Hawaii enjoyed the end of a wonderful day.... and woke to enjoy the next. twigsnapper

[Langley]

Slick-G,

Your hair story rang a strange bell as well, German submarines to be precise, I am fairly sure they used human hair in them, its a sticky area to discuss , but it happened.

Kevin

Horse hair and I guess human hair specific gravity = to that of pure water.
Horse hair used in hydrometers. Lengthens in high humidity.

Used as suspension medium when measuring specific gravity of substances.
http://books.google.com/books?id=ypsAAAAAMAAJ&pg
(pages 446 and 447)

The Romans used horse hair to concrete to reduce the amount it shrank on hardening.

[Elizabeth Helen Drake]

Langley!

Thank you for that link about " hair"

As Paul says, this is an amazing " thread"

Or almost ..... hair ..... it has its own way of doing things , have you noticed, from when Slick started it. This particular little thread ( turning quickly into a big one) like those horsehair instruments just seems to quietly register the comings and goings of random thoughts. Holds them, responds to them just long enough for us to notice them and then like Mr. Twigsnapper said of the Cheshire cat. It is gone but the smile remains!

Regarding horsehair in objects. Some American Indians incorporated horsehair in their pottery and it is available to the tourists who drive through thier reservations. In some other cases, especially the Apache, horse hair is incorported into special honorary gifts.

Slick will appreciate this because she may remember Linda Browns horse on Catalina. Shadetree died of a very old age ( he is mentioned in Pauls " Ghost at the Corral"). and is buried not far from the scene that is mentioned. Linda apparently later recieved a gift from Mr. Twigsnapper .... a special object with a lock of Shadetrees mane woven into the material...... I guess that it meant alot to her and she must still have that gift. Mr. Twigsnapper later told me that Morgan had taken the lock of the horses hair years earlier when he visited Linda on Catalina. Good thing he was a spook and could do things secretly because I think she would have really been upset with him for messing with that horses beautiful mane. Mr. Twigsnapper never explained why Morgan did that. But the little gift with the horsehair wound in it was the result.

So I have a way of looking at this particular thread , Slick ... as alot like that particular gift. Somehow even more magic than the others, as wonderful as they all are. This thread has some history and connections to it that are above and beyond the rest. Interesting to see where it takes all of us.

Thanks Langley for that fascinating link! Still reading! Elizabeth

[flowperson]

I really didn't know of the similarity in specific gravity between horse and human hair, and their apparently transparent physical relationships with pure water. Very interesting.

After the American Civil War, much of the overstuffed furniture used in everyone's homes, at least in the U.S., was upholstered and filled with horsehair. My second wife had a matron aunt whom we visited often. Her guest room bed still was topped with an ancient horsehair mattress which was still usable in the 80's. It was a bit scrunchy and noisy when you shifted around on it, but comfortable nonetheless.

I already enjoyed eating oatmeal, but I didn't notice an increase in my consumption of it wihile visiting and sleeping in the guest bed. Over the years, I ran into a lot of the horsehair stuffed furniture as I pursued a hobby of restoring and refinishing furniture of that era.

My two cents.

Oh, and Mr Twigsnapper, just read a Clive Cusssler-Dirk Pitt thriller, Shock Wave, that was centered on sonic weapons and a potential threat to the well-being of Hawaii and Hawaiians. I just passed it along to my 90 yr. old mom for her reading pleasure. It'll be interesting to see what she thinks of it. Everyone needs to read some escapist mind candy stuff every once in awhile to divert one's attention from the all too real cares of the world

flow....