Coverage

Striking, modernist covers suit the succinct writing of John Fante.

You're there

Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand has touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there.

—Ray Bradbury

 Early Bradbury screenplay...

 influenced close encounters among many, many, other films.

Two teenage boys find more than they expected when they visit

a traveling carnival...

 ...like another couple of teenagers that meet mysterious 

travelers.

 Rocket Man was one of the stories in this collection...

...worth singing about.

In transit

Astronomical events differ in length and experience depending on your viewing location.  So, it comes as no surprise that there are eclipse chasers who find the natural phenomena a spectacular reason to travel the globe. No doubt plenty of heads will be star gazing tonight.

The transit of Venus begins at 3:06 p.m Pacific Daylight Time. Venus will pass directly between the earth and the sun; a rare alignment once used to measure our solar system. The next transit of Venus will occur in 105 years, in 2117.

Aftermath

The New Yorker

(August, 1946)

To Our Readers,

The New Yorker this week devotes its entire editorial space

to an article on the almost complete obliteration of a city by

one atomic bomb, and what happened to the people of that city.

It does so in the conviction that few of us have yet comprehended, the

all but incredible destructive power of this weapon, and that everyone

might well take time to consider the terrible implications of its use.

—The Editors

Before writer John Hersey's report on the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima was published as a book, it appeared in The New Yorker magazine. The 1946 issue was dedicated wholly to the single article, printed in its entirety; there were advertisements, but not a single cartoon.

School play

From 1876, a wood School House play set manufactured by 

Crandall's Building Blocks Company.

In the back, the requisite 'dunce' with cap and stool

In the front (as expected), the kids with all the answers. 

"Oh, oh, oh, me, me, me!!"

*Sigh*, there's one of these in every class.

Stamp collecting

All of the Legends of Hollywood stamps released by the United States Postal Service have been appealing. I especially like the images of Henry Fonda, James Stewart, John Wayne and Edward G. Robinson created by the artist Drew Struzan.