19Aug 2017 by James No Comments

Children Play in a Pile of Autumn Leaves, Rockland County, New York, 1953.

I couldn't help but feel a strong twinge of nostalgia when coming across this photo from the LIFE archives. As we get older our memories from childhood fade and are replaced with new memories from adulthood. There are sensations, however, like a giant pile of leaves for me, that bring me right back to childhood. I, in fact, call October "leaf kicking month" to anyone who'll bother to listen to my maddening ramblings. The author of this LIFE archives passage says it best when he mentions, "for those of us who grew up in places where autumn meant crisp days, cold nights, falling leaves and the slight but unmistakable change in both the feel and the look of sunlight, one activity brings it all back home: playing around in a big pile of leaves." What…

18Aug 2017 by James No Comments

This is What A Meteor Shower Sounds Like

Looking Back

Sit back, turn out the lights, and get ready to be scared by mother nature. In August of 2011 The U.S. Air Force Space Surveillance Radar in Texas recorded echoes of the Perseid Meteors as they passed over the monitoring facility. Includes imagery of a meteor photographed by astronaut Ron Garan aboard the International Space Station. Give it a listen, it's haunting. (more…)

14Aug 2017 by James No Comments

Fourteen August, by Norman Corwin, Performed by Orson Welles

Looking Back

"Congratulations for being alive and listening on this night! ... Millions didn't make it." - Norman Corwin's opening line of Fourteen August: A Message for the Day of Victory, as read by Orson Welles on August, 14, 1945. Fourteen August is an impassioned message for the 1945 day of victory in Japan written, directed, and produced by Norman Corwin and movingly read by Orson Welles. While hints of racism towards the Japanese in this broadcast can't be ignored, we've got to remember the sentiment of the time. I'd like to think that since 1945 we've become, or are on our way to becoming, a much more open-minded society. As recent events tell us, we're not there yet, but I maintain hope that we're on our way. Remember we are all free…

01Aug 2017 by James 1 Comment

Black & White Photos of NYC in the Early 1950s by Larry Silver

Looking Back

Check out the fantastic photography of then-boy wonder photographer Larry Silver who was living in NYC at the time and shot these photos between 1949 and 1954. He didn't know it at the time, but Silver's work (specifically those shot among the hustle and bustle of the city streets in New York) was right in line with other members of the "New York School of Photography," which refers to a loosely defined group of photographers who lived and worked in New York City during the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s sharing influences, subjects and stylistic earmarks. These were the photographers like Ruth Orkin, Saul Leiter, Ernst Haas , Ted Croner, Vivian Maier, and Esther Bubley, who would capture life in New York not as "the big city," but as a collection of neighborhoods, people, and emotions that would later…

13Jul 2017 by James No Comments

Gorgeous Noir Gelatin Silver Prints of NYC in the 1940s by Ted Croner

Looking Back

Ted Croner was an American photographer and, like Saul Leiter and Ruth Orkin, was an influential member of the New York School during the 1940s and 1950s. His dynamic photographs often show or represent compositional movement. The New York School of Photography refers to a loosely defined group of photographers who lived and worked in New York City during the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s sharing influences, subjects and stylistic earmarks. These photographers captured life in New York not as “the big city,” but as a collection of neighborhoods, people, and emotions that would later define what we now consider top of mind when thinking about the nostalgic way New York used to be. Ted Croner's images are often haunting. He chose to shoot the city at night, during snowstorms, or generally…