what about the plastic animals?

The World's Largest Watermelon

Every June since 1954 Luling, Texas puts on the Watermelon Thump.  There's watermelon eating contests, seed spitting, and the biggest black diamond watermelon is crowned grand champion.  It's only natural that Luling would have the world's largest watermelon on the outskirts of town. 

I know what you're thinking.  Is there anything that could top experiencing the world's fourth largest pecan and the world's largest watermelon within half-an-hour of each other?  Yes, and that's why I had gone to Luling.

 

World's Third Largest Pecan

In 1962 this nut made it's debut as the world's largest pecan.  That title held true for twenty years, before it was surpassed by a concrete giant in Brunswick, Missouri.  To add insult to injury, the former world's largest pecan isn't even the largest pecan in Sequin.  In 2005 Pape's Pecan House brought out a ten-foot mobile pecan.  I can attest to the mobility of Pape's mega-pecan because it wasn't there when I stopped in.

BREAKING NEWS!  Two weeks after I visited, the world's newest largest pecan was unveiled in Seguin.  Will Brunswick, MO respond to the challenge?

San Antonio Neon

My work schedule was such that I didn't get to see much of San Antonio during the conference I attended.  I did go for a pre-sunrise walk one morning and saw a few neon signs.

There were sights I wanted to see outside of San Antonio, so I took a couple of vacation days while there, got a rental car, and went driving.

Guggenheim or Parking Garage?

It's a parking garage in downtown San Antonio.

More Morningside Markers

On Sunday mornings I'll often walk over to Morningside Heights to get the paper, visit the farmer's market, and perhaps get a chai latte and pastry from Oren's.  Sometimes that trip takes less than an hour and sometimes, like today, I start wandering around and the trip takes three hours.

Following up from last week I located two more markers this morning.  The marker at top is close to the 112th and Morningside Drive entrance to the park.  The marker in the second photo is the one I referred to in the previous post.  It is close to the 114th and Morningside entrance.  Unlike the arrow at 115th, which is not next to a park entrance, these two are pointing in the same general direction.  All three markers are on the west side of the stone border that lines the walking path.

The Andre Monument

Jumping back to New York, but staying with the revolution theme, this little monument within a circle certainly looks peaceful enough but it has had a contentious history.  The monument is to British Major John Andre, who plotted with Benedict Arnold to turn West Point over to the British.  Those plans went awry and Andre was soon caught in Tarrytown.  He was then brought across the Hudson to Washington's headquarters in Tappan.  Andre was tried and convicted in the '76 House tavern (still open after 230 years!).   The monument, is maybe a half-mile away from the center of Tappan and is where Andre was hung and buried.

Andre's remains were returned to England in 1821.  In 1879, Cyrus Field, who laid the first trans-Atlantic telegraph cable, paid for this monument.  Despite being a century after the revolution, the monument was controversial and was vandalized and blown up.  Field replaced the original monument with the current one and surrounded the new monument with the iron fence.  Someone tried again to blow it up in 1885, but it's been pretty peaceful since then.  After Field died his heirs refused to pay the property tax on the small plot of land and Rockland County, which could not find a buyer, took possession. 

The tacky brass plaque commemorating "the fortitude of Washington and his generals" was attached to the monument by the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society in 1905.

If you're really motivated and read the pages I've linked to you'll notice some confusion about the ownership of the land.  Rockland County says they took possession from the ASHPS in 1983.  Other sources say the county got the land in 1904.  If it weren't past my bedtime I'd investigate further.

Night and Day at the Alamo

Let's get away from New York and go to Texas.  Back in October I went to a conference in San Antonio and took a couple of days off while I was there.  The hotel I stayed at was a block away from the Alamo and I walked by the historic grounds several times a day.  As you can see it is much quieter at night!

The old mission building is a shrine to where a small group of Texas defenders held General Santa Anna's army at bay for nearly two weeks.  Elsewhere on the beautiful grounds is an excellent museum that tells the story of the events that led up to the Battle of the Alamo and the Texas revolution, a gift shop, and very large Koi swimming around in what was once the irrigation channels.  Definitely go if you're visiting San Antonio.

Morningside Park Mystery Marker

Happy Spring!  Or should I say Happy Summer?

Today I've got a mystery.  There is a marker with a metal arrow embedded in it in Morningside Park at the bottom of the grand staircase at 116th St.  There's enough metal in the marker to throw off my phone's compass.  The bottom photo is more accurate - the arrow is pointing westward.  Why is the marker there and why is it pointing toward the west?

To confuse matters, there's a similar marker a few hundred feet to the south that has an arrow pointing in a different direction.  I would show you a picture of that marker but this is not a professional blog where I think deeply about these sorts of things before putting them online.

A quick Google search reminds me that I wrote about yet another nearby marker six years ago. 

Coming Soon... Royal Pet Care

I noticed a sign for Royal Pet Care recently went up at the old Under D Tree storefront on Lenox Ave.  I miss Under D Tree's great Jamaican food, though I always got the impression they were selling something else as their main source of income.  While I have no need for a pet care store it will be nice to see these grates disappear.

Monday bonus:  If you haven't seen it already take an hour to watch Bruce Springsteen's keynote speech at SXSW 2012.  Be warned that he often drops the f-bomb if that sort of thing bothers you.

Little Abe On A Little Horse

Ha!  The weather was beautiful Saturday and I was in the mood to get out of town so off I went to Connecticut.  The "Circuit Rider" sculpture by Anna Hyatt Huntington is proudly displayed by the Bethel Public Library at one of the busiest intersections in town.  This was a small version of the sculpture.  It was maybe half the size, or smaller, than the versions in Syracuse, Lincoln City, Oregon, and at work.

Huntington donated the sculpture to the library in 1967.  Her studio was on a nearby estate owned by her husband, Archer M. Huntington.  After Anna's death in 1973 the estate was given to the state for use as a state park.  The entrance to the park, named after Archer's adoptive father, railroad magnate and ship builder Collis P. Huntington, is marked by two Anna Huntington sculptures:  A bear with two cubs and two howling wolves.

That's all the versions of the sculpture that I know about.  If anyone sees another one let me know.