Vancouver! Vancouver! This is it!

The thirtieth anniversary of the eruption of Mt. St. Helens is on May 18 at 8:32 am. But for a thirteen year old science geek in Columbus, OH, the eruption was only the culmination of two months of volcano watching--which was a lot harder in 1980 than it is today.


St. Helens had been dormant for over 120 years, and while I knew there were volcanoes in the Pacific northwest, I'd never given them much thought. I'd read books about the fascinating eruptions of the past. My interest in volcanoes and the earth's crust was probably fueled by a set of Time-Life books my parents owned. There, I read about continental drift and saw images of the buried city of Pompeii. I went on to read every book I could about volcanoes--about Krakatoa, whose eruption in 1883 was heard thousands of miles away), or Thera, whose eruption is thought to have hastened the end of the Minoan civilization.

So when we got our very own active volcano, I was fascinated. Over those two months in 1980 I read everything I could. I followed the progress of the initial eruptions a growing bulge on the mountain's north face, wondering what might happen.



The photo shows St. Helens on May 17. The bulge can actually be seen on this photo on the left flank of the mountain. Geologists, including Dave Johnston (whose final words are above) had been convinced an eruption was likely, and the area had been evacuated--but some would not leave, and some were drawn closer to watch the progress. The volcano had actually stopped erupting on May 16. Fifty-seven people were killed--but the toll could have been much higher had the eruption not taken place when it did (on a weekend, which meant loggers were not in the area, and early in the morning--evacuated homeowners were due to be let into the area at 10 am on the 18th to gather belongings.)

Most stratovolcanoes (like St. Helens) erupt from the summit. The St. Helens eruption was triggered by an earthquake causing a landslide on the north slope where the bulge was located. As a result, St. Helens erupted laterally. The photo below was taken not long after the eruption from the same vantage point as the photo above.



St. Helens is still considered an active volcano today, although all of the eruptions since 1980 have been relatively quiet lava dome building events. The last activity was in 2008. The ruins of the volcano have gradually become green again as plant and animal life return to the blast zone, but the shape of the peak itself testifies to the highly unusual and catastrophic event that took place there, forever changing a mountain that had once been called "the Mt. Fuji of America"

I wrote my first high school term paper on Mt. St. Helens, using a book and newspaper clippings I had saved for several years. I also still have a jar of ash from the eruption--acquired, believe it or not, in a garage sale. St. Helens is high on the list of ruins I hope to someday see.

Four dead in Ohio

It's been a month and a half since my last post. In the interim, I've packed, moved to a new house, and unpacked, and been very busy. However, this is a year of some significant anniversaries of historical events that produced ruins of some kind or another. One of them is coming up in two days: the fortieth anniversary of the Kent State shootings.



This is a bullet hole that survives to this day in a sculpture outside Taylor Hall on the Kent State campus. There are some other relics and ruins to be seen at the site of this tragic event, but first, my own history of this event.

Of course, I don't remember it. I was three at the time. But as I grew up, I became aware that the governor of Ohio, James Rhodes, had played a part in the events. Jim Rhodes lived in Upper Arlington in a big white house on Tremont Ave., even while he was governor (eschewing the traditional Governor's Mansion in Bexley). No one really talked about it, other than mentioning that some rioters had gotten killed when the National Guard was sent in. The mere name "Kent State" had a whiff of scandal about it. Kids from my high school generally didn't go there. And I wasn't really inclined to find out more. As an 80s kid, I felt very much different than the hippies and protesters of the late 60s and 70s. That was a different era. This was despite the fact I was fairly liberal (much more so than most kids at my high school)

I ran across a copy of James Michener's book on the events sometime well into my grad school years, and ended up reading it from cover to cover in one sitting. Even though I've since learned it has its detractors, it put a human face on the events, particularly on the students who were killed. I've since looked at many photographs and read and listened to various accounts of what happened. The part that struck me over and over was how far away from the Guardsmen the students were when they were killed or wounded. All of them were in a parking lot downhill from where the Guardsmen took aim.



This shot was taken from the hill where the shots were fired. You can see the sculpture with the bullet hole on the right and several pillars erected as a memorial to one of the slain students in the parking area (just beneath the red car). The distance is about the length of a football field. The trees in the photos blocking the sitelines to the parking lot were not there at the time of the shootings.



More of the parking lot memorials showing where the students were killed:



These memorials were only put up in 1999, 29 years after the events of May 4, 1970. The shootings are unusually well documented in photographs, partially due to the fact that Taylor Hall housed the school of journalism, and therefore a large number of eyewitnesses that happened to have cameras. The small photograph above was one of many that helped pinpoint the spots where the memorials should go.

Oddly enough, I've never been to Kent. I've driven past the exit many times driving on I-76, or caught WKSU on a trip down or back to Columbus. Some day, if I have a reason to be there, I may stop by, if only to see the lay of the land and catch some echo of a warm May day 40 years ago.

Olympic stadiums...the good, the bad, and the ugly

The opening of the Winter Olympics in Vancouver and recent news items about the lack of use of the spectacular "Bird's Nest" Olympic stadium in Bejing prompted me to do a little research as to the fates of Olympic stadiums past. I was particularly interested in the Olympic Stadium in Montreal--the only one of these stadiums I have ever been to. The results reveal a surprising spectrum of utility.

Some of these stadiums are now historic landmarks. This applies to the Los Angeles Memorial Stadium, the only stadium to host two Olympics; and the Panathinaiko stadium in Athens (built entirely of marble, and the site of the first modern Olympic games in 1896, this stadium was also used in ancient Greece as the site of athletic competitions).

The Olympic Stadium in Berlin survived almost completely unscathed from WWII (given that up to 90% of Berlin was destroyed, this counts as a minor miracle). It was used for soccer matches after WWII before being renovated in the 90s; it hosted the final game of the World Cup in 2006. Given its connection with Nazi Germany, the fact that it was restored in a historically sensitive manner is quite amazing.

Some stadiums used in the Olympics are now completely gone in their original forms. Wembley Stadium was not purpose-built for the 1948 Olympics--it was already a landmark by the time those Games took place. The old Wembley was torn down and replaced by a new Wembley in 2007.

Most Olympic stadiums seem to have fared fairly well. Almost all of those in Europe and Asia are used for soccer. The stadium from the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta was converted for baseball. This was also the intended use of Olympic Stadium in Montreal--but the Expos are now gone, and the "Big O" is now used very little.

As originally designed, the stadium was considered a masterpiece for its inclined tower and unique retractable roof, one of the first in the world. However, due to strikes and the difficulties of the design, the stadium was not completed in time for the Olympics, so instead of the silhouette you can see in the photo above, this is what you saw:



Note the rather flimsy crane that held the spot that should have been occupied by the soaring, inclined tower.

Work on building the tower began again in the 80s, suffering more delays due both a fire and an accident where a piece of the tower fell onto the field during a Montreal Expos game. The original retractable roof was installed in 1987--and subsequently ripped. The roof was eventually closed permanently and eventually replaced, but continued to suffer problems.

The stadium was finally paid off in 2006, but the Montreal Expos were already gone. Now the stadium hosts the occasional CFL game (including a recent Grey Cup), concerts, and conventions. It is still plagued by leaks and structural issues, and is apparently grimy and not aging well. And Montrealers are ambivalent towards it--some see it as an architectural treasure; others as the visible sign of the huge debt the Games incurred.

In 1976, just a couple of weeks after the Games ended, my family visited Montreal. I had become a confirmed Olympics junkie that year; visiting Montreal to see the venues was almost like attending in person. It wasn't that long after the Games had wrapped up, and I remember many of the gift stores were still open (I got a T-shirt and a keychain with the mascot). But I specifically remember touring the stadium, seeing the swimming pools and looking out over the field where Bruce Jenner had won the decathalon (remember when the decathalon was a big deal?) At the time, I had no idea that the stadium wasn't finished.

The Big O isn't a ruin yet, although parts of it have definitely declined. It remains to be seen what will happen in its future. But I will always have a soft spot in my heart for it, with all its flaws

Ice House Detroit

I have been watching the progress of an amazing project in Detroit to take one of the over 20,000 abandoned houses there and turn it into artwork by encasing it in ice.



The two people involved are a photographer and an architect. I highly recommend reading their project blog--contains some amazing photos (that I will not copy here since the photographs are part of their project).

Video from CNN of the freezing process....

There's one of the posts to their blog that really caught my eye. As has been documented in a number of places, parts of Detroit are returning to what's been called Urban Prairie. These are neighbourhoods once full of houses, now reduced just a few scattered homes here and there. The rest have been torn down and the area is returning to nature. Some enterprising people are even setting up guerilla farms and gardens in the new green space.

The post shows a couple of aerial shots of Detroit neighbourhoods in the 50s and 60s vs. what they look like now. They're astounding. Take a look.

Another incidental relic

While I continue to research Ellis Island (trying to track down the name of the documentary I saw in the eighth grade, mostly), I was searching through my photos of last May's trip to New York to see what I'd taken there, and ran across another incidental relic, spotted as we headed through Battery Park towards the ferry that would take us to visit Liberty Island and Ellis Island. It looked familiar:

I had some time to think about it over the next three hours or so. By the time I returned, I was 99% sure I knew what it was, because in 1985 I once sat down right next to it.



This was -- and is-- "The Sphere" by Fritz Koenig, and it once sat in the plaza in front of the World Trade Center. It awaits return to its original site, where it will be part of the World Trade Center memorial Given what happened around it, it survived remarkably well.

The dish-like structure to its right in my photo is an eternal flame.



This is the World Trade Center site itself. You get a better sense of what went before if you go to the little memorial site set up in a storefront across the street on the south side and look north. They've provided you with some photos of what it looked like from the same storefront window before the towers fell, and if you had ever been there before--and I had--suddenly they spring back into place.

Old ruins, new finds

One of the joys of researching some of my favourite ruins is coming across other people who have the same passion for the abandoned that I do. I am working on a fairly good-sized post or two on Ellis Island, which I discovered in Grade 8 in a movie that probably bored 75% of the rest of the class to tears.

In looking for images, I ran across Phillip Buehler's Modern Ruins site. I won't reproduce his Ellis Island photos here, but I highly recommend taking a look.

I will, however, link to one photo, because there is a story that goes with it.



My husband and I were touring the SS Olympia in Philadelphia (fascinating transitional period warship; Admiral Dewey's flagship in the Spanish-American War). We looked south and saw the unmistakable shape of steamship funnels seemingly parked right there in the Delaware River. "What on earth is that?" we wondered.

It was--and is--the SS United States, one of the last great classical era passenger liners, the largest ever built in the US, completed in 1952. To this day, it still holds the Blue Riband (westbound), given to the passenger liner with the speed record for crossing the Atlantic. It was taken out of service in 1969 and stripped of its finishings in 1984. Asbestos was removed in 1992 as part of a plan to return it to service It is currently derelict and docked permanently across from an IKEA. It's owned by a cruise line, and periodically rumours that it will be restored surface, but other rumours also circulate that it will be sold for scrap.

A number of groups are fighting to save it, including the SS United States Conservancy. I hope they are successful. There are so few actual ships left from this era, an era that began with the great luxury liners such as Titanic. Most are either at the bottom of the ocean or have long since been scrapped.

Wounded Land I'll Never See

I prefer my ruins to be created the old fashioned way, through years of decline and neglect. If they are the result of a catastrophic event, I prefer that the horror of that event will have receded in history so that we can only guess at what the victims might have gone through.

Haiti is not that kind of ruin.





The images above are of the Presidential Palace. The building has pancaked, like many other buildings in Port-au-Prince. Washington Post writer Lee Hocksteder filled in a little background about this building, "almost a mirage in a city of mean, sprawling slums, rickety tin shacks and jury-rigged infrastructure." It was built in the 1920s when the US Marines occupied Haiti. Haiti has a tragic history of violence and corruption under the infamous Duvaliers and their successors, but recently had achieved a fragile measure of stability under Rene Preval. However, the country remained the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, with 80% of its people in poverty, 50% in abject poverty. The Presidential Palace was in some ways a beacon of hope, something Haiti could be proud of.

Hope for Haiti will come from elsewhere now.



The video is Arcade Fire's beautiful song "Haiti." Singer Regine Chassagne is of Haitian descent. They're suggesting donations to Partners in Health, an organization they also supported on their last tour. Given the Canadian Government's offer to match donations made by Canadians, I have taken them up on this suggestion. This is also the group that will receive the $5 donations made by texting HELP to 1291 on Rogers cell phones.

Paul's Church, with all the roof fallen

Last week I caught a show on the building of St. Paul's Cathedral in London. The building is so iconic (and such an interesting feat of engineering) that few people remember what came before.

Old St. Paul's was one of the largest Gothic cathedrals in Europe, with an enormous nave known as "Paul's Walk", beautiful stained glass and the tallest spire in Europe.





It was not just a pretty building, but became the centre of London life--its nave was used for business, for learning the latest news, and later, during its decline, for all manner of buying and selling. London's booksellers were located nearby on Pater Noster street. But, like many churches, the Reformation was not kind to it. By the 16th century it had begun its long decline, and was actually sacked by a mob. Horses were even bought and sold there at one point. In 1561 the spire was destroyed by lightning. A belated attempt to stop the decline was made with the addition of a classical portico in the 1630s.



However, at the moment of its death there had been hope--scaffolding had gone up to start a long-promised restoration. The scaffolding instead contributed to its demise in the Great Fire of 1666.



The cathedral lay in ruins for many years while debates raged as to what to do next--restore what was left, rebuild in a similar style, or build something completely new. The decision was eventually made to give the commission to Christopher Wren, who had done an initial investigation into restoring the church before the fire. In the meantime, the ruins stood:



The ruins did not come down until 1675, and were apparently tougher than they looked. When it came time to lay out the new church, a piece of gravestone was used to mark the centre of the new dome. Upon that gravestone, one word: Resurgam. (I shall rise again). And it did.

I retain my fondness, however, for the beautiful cathedral which fell into ruins and then perished in the fire. The sad depictions of its last few years, with its truncated spire, are particularly evocative. Today, nothing remains but a few scattered remnants of funerary momuments of the old, where bishops and counts and poets were buried--just enough to recall what came before.