The Gregorian Calendar: Even Better than the Julian Calendar

In last month’s post, I wrote about the Julian Calendar, a huge advance in timekeeping technology that was introduced in 45 B.C. It was far more accurate than its predecessor, the Roman Calendar, which was based on a lunar year with extra days added in whenever a committee decided they were needed. The Julian Calendar wasn’t the first solar calendar ever made, but it was the first to be widely adopted across Europe. It had a standard year of 365 days, with a leap year of 366 days every fourth year.

That sounds an awful lot like the calendar we use today, doesn’t it? Well, almost, but not quite. It turns out that one leap year every four years is just a smidge too much. A tropical year—the time it takes the earth to complete exactly one revolution around the sun—is 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds. This means that, once standard and leap years have been averaged together, the Julian Calendar year is longer than an actual tropical year by around 0.0077 days, or 11 minutes.

That may not seem like much time, but it adds up. Over the course of a thousand years, the Julian Calendar will drift almost 8 days ahead of the tropical year.

And so it did. By the late 16th century, the calendar used by most of the Western world was 10 days at variance from the actual orbit of the earth.

It was time to make a change to a more accurate solar calendar. The motivating force behind the switch was Pope Gregory XIII, acting on concerns about errors in calculating the date for Easter. A reform commission was assembled, and after considerable study and consultation with expert mathematicians, its members agreed on a new calendar with a small but significant change. Unlike the Julian Calendar, the Gregorian Calendar has a leap year every four years except for years which are divisible by 100 but not by 400. Those years are common years of 365 days.

The reason most people in the Western world today aren’t aware of these centennial common years is that we’ve never experienced one. The most recent centennial common year was in 1900, and the next one will be in 2100. The year 2000 was a leap year, because 2000 is divisible by 400.

The Gregorian Calendar went into effect in October of 1582 by means of a papal bull, which had no authority beyond the Roman Catholic Church and the papal states. That same year, Philip II of Spain decreed that the switch be made in his dominions, comprising not only Spain but also Portugal and much of Italy. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth also adopted the new calendar.

By Aloysius Lilius - Biblioteca del Vaticano

Protestant, Eastern Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox Churches continued with the Julian Calendar, as did Protestant nations, who resisted what they saw as a Catholic innovation. The British ultimately found a work-around with their Calendar (New Style) Act of 1750, which established a system for the computation of Easter that achieved the same result without referencing Pope Gregory XIII. Britain and the British Empire, which at that time included the eastern part of the future United States, adopted the new calendar in 1752. Sweden followed in 1753.

Alert readers familiar with American history will notice that 1752 was just a little bit before the French and Indian War. If you've done any reading about that conflict, you've probably come across some parenthetical adjustments between the date systems used in different parts of Europe. During this period, the Julian Calendar was 11 days at variance from the Gregorian. So the birthdate of George Washington, who was born under the Julian Calendar, can be written as February 11, 1731/32 (Old Style, depending on whether the writer is using the English or Continental start to the new year), or as February 22, 1732 (New Style).

At various times throughout the following centuries, other nations in Europe and worldwide adopted the Gregorian Calendar, with Saudi Arabia being the most recent addition in 2016. Ethiopia continues to use its own calendar of 13 months, which is 7-8 years behind the Gregorian and has a new year that falls in the Gregorian September. Nepal uses a lunisolar calendar 56-57 years ahead of the Gregorian calendar, with a new year in mid-April.

Today’s world is far more tightly interconnected than that of the sixteenth century. A uniform system of global timekeeping has clear advantages across many sectors, including international finance and trade, transportation and logistics, telecommunications and internet, science and research, military and defense, emergency and disaster response, and education and academia. The Gregorian Calendar didn't altogether unite the world in a global timekeeping standard, but it went a long way toward streamlining operations and ensuring clarity in planning, record-keeping, and communications.

Kit Hawthorne makes her home in south central Texas on her husband’s ancestral farm, which has been in the family for seven generations. When not writing, she can be found reading, drawing, sewing, quilting, reupholstering furniture, playing Irish pennywhistle, refinishing old wood, cooking huge amounts of food for the pressure canner, or wrangling various dogs, cats, horses, and people. Visit her at https://kithawthorne.com/.

The Julian Calendar: Technological Breakthrough of the Past

by Kit Hawthorne

We talk a lot about how technology has transformed the modern world, and for good reason. The 20th century saw the rise of automated production, the digital revolution, and global connectivity—and things have only sped up since then. Starting in the 21st century, computational power has doubled approximately every two years, leading to snowballing advances in automation, data analysis, and artificial intelligence.

But a lot of the everyday conventions and devices that we take for granted were huge innovations when they were first introduced (and, of course, provide the foundation for later advancements). Arabic numerals, alphabetic writing, libraries, indexes, concordances, classification systems for living organisms, measurement systems, navigation, cartography, standardized coinage, postal services, mechanical clocks, codified systems of law—these intellectual technologies didn’t just make it easier for people to perform physical tasks. They revolutionized the way people thought. Every one of them has its own complex and fascinating history, often reaching back to the ancient world.

But the intellectual technology that I want to drill down on today is calendars—specifically, the Julian Calendar, which made its first appearance in 45 B.C.

The Tusculum Portrait of Julius Caesar

We deal with calendars in some form or other just about every day but rarely pause to think about how very useful they are or how marvelous it is that we have them at all. Agricultural planning, religious and cultural ceremonies, navigation and timekeeping, economic and administrative coordination, political stability, and the keeping of historical records would be impossible in the absence of an accurate shared calendar.

A 2007 Wall Calendar by Claudio Elias

The Julian Calendar was a big improvement over its predecessor, the Roman Calendar, which was based on a lunar year. It’s easy to see the trouble with a purely lunar calendar. A period of twelve lunar months is roughly 354 days, 11-12 days shorter than a solar year, which meant that the Romans had to keep fiddling with theirs to correct the inevitable drift with respect to astronomical events like vernal equinox and winter solstice. The adding and removing of days was managed by a committee within the College of Pontiffs, a priestly group that had a lot of other duties to attend to.

Julius Caesar decided that Rome could do better. Acting with characteristic pragmatism and dispatch, he consulted an Alexandrian astronomer called Sosigenes and developed a solar calendar with a common year of 365 days. In reality, it takes approximately 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 45 seconds for the earth to complete a full orbit around the sun. To make up the difference, the Julian calendar added an extra day every four years.

The Julian calendar was soon adopted throughout the Roman Empire and by various Christian churches. It is still used by the Berber people of North Africa and by some Orthodox churches, which employ it to calculate the dates of movable feasts, but in most of the world it was eventually replaced by the even more accurate Gregorian Calendar, the calendar with which most of us are familiar today.

The monastic community at Mt. Athos still uses the Julian Calendar.
Photo of Agiou Pavlou Monastery by Explorer1940.

At this point, you might be thinking, “Hold on. A calendar with three 365-day common years, followed by one leap year of 366 days—isn’t that what we use now?” Well, almost. The Gregorian Calendar is very similar to the Julian Calendar, with one small but important difference. Getting it adopted as the international standard was a wild ride that took 345 years…and, Lord willing, that’ll be the subject of my December post.

Kit Hawthorne makes her home in south central Texas on her husband’s ancestral farm, which has been in the family for seven generations. When not writing, she can be found reading, drawing, sewing, quilting, reupholstering furniture, playing Irish pennywhistle, refinishing old wood, cooking huge amounts of food for the pressure canner, or wrangling various dogs, cats, horses, and people. Visit her at https://kithawthorne.com/.

IT'S ABOUT TIME

Several years ago, I was writing a time travel novel. Because I had two timelines running simultaneously, I needed to outline them so I kind of knew what was going on and when. My heroine got trapped ninety years in the past and had to solve a murder before she became the new victim. 

In the present, the hero was trying to figure out how to get her back before the murder. He went over to his best-friend’s place to do the math. I had their conversation all figured out until his friend said, “I assume you’ve figured Daylight Saving Time into your calculations.”

Where did that come from? I certainly hadn’t thought about Daylight Saving Time (DST). One of the things I love about writing is that my characters often surprise me.

I jumped online to do a quick search: “When did DST start?”

A simple question.

But not so simple of an answer.

If asked who invented Daylight Saving Time, what would your answer be? A lot of people would say Benjamin Franklin. He is credited for inventing it. But did he? Let’s take a step back through time. (Pun intended.)

Ancient civilizations had a strange relationship with time. They divided the daylight hours into twelve equal parts. So, in the spring, those parts (or hours) got progressively longer (one could get more done in an “hour”), and in the autumn, they got shorter (less done in and “hour”). The Romans used water clocks and had different scales for different months. At one time of year, an “hour” could be forty-four minutes and at another seventy-five. Sounds like higher math to me. 

In 1784, Benjamin Franklin wrote a satirical essay on how the Parisians could save money and candles. He suggested the daylight could be better utilized by rising one hour earlier in the morning. No mention of altering time or changing clocks.

The “invention” of DST came much later by two British men almost at the same time, scientists George Vernon Hudson and builder William Willett. In 1895, Hudson proposed changing clocks two hours in October and back in March. It didn’t catch on. Ten years later, he suggested it again, but this time changing clocks ahead twenty-minutes each Sunday in April and then reversing the process on the Sundays in September. That meant changing clocks eight times a year. Twice is more than enough for me. 

Though Britain didn’t embrace this idea, in 1908, residents of Ontario, Canada were the first to utilize DST. Several other locations in Canada followed suit. 

On April 30, 1916, Germany and Austria began Daylight Saving Time to save resources during WWI. Other European countries quickly jumped on the time-saving bandwagon that same year; Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Turkey, Tasmania, Nova Scotia, Manitoba, and Britain. In 1917, Australia and Newfoundland joined the DST crowd. 

DST was formally adopted in the U.S. on March 19, 1918. The law also set standard time zones. 

Yes! I had my answer. 

But . . . 

Because of its unpopularity, Daylight Saving Time was revoked after the war. The federal government left it up to states and localities to decide if they wanted to utilize DST or not. Some states like Massachusetts and Rhode Island kept DST as well as cities like New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia (a.k.a. “City Time”). But this meant, some cities would have DST but not the whole state? So, you could be in one time standing in one of these cities, but take a step to the left outside the city limits and you suddenly time traveled an hour. 

None of this helped me. I still didn’t know if the part of the country my story was set in had DST or not. Nor if the town I modeled my town after did or not. I was left scratching my head. 

Then along came WWII and a standardized Daylight Saving Time was instituted year-round from February 9, 1942 to September 30, 1945 and called “War Time.” 

From 1945 to 1966, Daylight Saving Time was once again a free-for-all left up to each individual location to decide. Each different place could choose not only if they would have DST but when it would start and stop. This caused a lot of confusion for the TV and radio broadcasters as well as transportation like trains, buses, and commercial flight schedules. Transportation and broadcasting companies had to publish new schedules every time a state or city started or stopped DST. 

There was even a thirty-five-mile stretch of highway from Moundsville, W.V. to Steubenville, Ohio where a bus driver and the passengers passed through seven distinctive time zones. Seven! 

So, if a train left Chicago at two o’clock and traveled fifty miles an hour in any direction for fifty miles, what time would it arrive? Um . . . two o’clock? Did Scotty beam it there? I’m confused. I never liked those train math word problems. 

On April 12, 1966, the U.S. federal government signed into law the Uniform Time Act. Whew. Finally, some sanity. More or less. Hawaii and Arizona don’t participate in DST, but the Navajo Nation in Arizona does while the Hopi Reservation, which is surrounded by the Navajo Nation, doesn’t. I would be all kinds of time challenged there.

On March 5, 2018, Florida passed the Sunshine Protection Act, keeping them on Daylight Saving Time year-round.

In the end, I did like I usually do in all my fiction, I made it up. After all, the town was fictional so its time could be as well. If anyone is wondering where to get my time travel story, sadly it’s caught in a time warp and hasn’t been published yet but hopefully at some point in the future.

Or the past?

Isn’t history fun! 


NEW RELEASE: “Holly & Ivy,” my historical romance novella in A BOUQUET OF 

BRIDES COLLECTION, takes place in 1890, in Washington State. It’s about a young woman who accompanies her impetuous younger sister on her trip across the country to be a Christmas mail-order bride and is helped by a gallant stranger. 

#BouquetOfBrides #ChristianRomance #HistoricalRomance #Romance

MARY DAVIS is a bestselling, award-winning novelist of over two dozen titles in both historical and contemporary themes. She has five titles releasing in 2018; "Holly & Ivy" in A Bouquet of Brides Collection in January 2018, Courting Her Amish Heart in March 2018, The Widow’s Plight in July 2018, Courting Her Secret Heart September 2018, & “Zola’s Cross-Country Adventure” in MISSAdventure Brides Collection in December 2018. She is a member of ACFW and active in critique groups.

Mary lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband of over thirty-three years and two cats. She has three adult children and one incredibly adorable grandchild. Find her online at:
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Blacksmithing: A Critical Part of Communities of the Past

by Pam Hillman

My hero in The Road to Magnolia Glen is a blacksmith. Quinn O’Shea learned the trade back home in Ireland, but then uses his skills once he arrives in the colonies in the Natchez District in 1792.

There’s one thing about authors. We have to know just a little bit about just about everything. And if we don’t know it, we get to research it. So I spent some time researching the tools of the trade of a blacksmith.

The blacksmith was an important part of any community for centuries.

The term blacksmith has been in use since 1250-1300 AD. The blacksmith forged everything from horseshoes to hoes, shovels, candleholders, iron rings, andirons (firedogs) for fireplaces. Typically a male in times past, the blacksmith might also be called a smith, smithy, farrier, plover, horseshoer, shoer.

The blacksmith’s workshop was called a smithy. The term forge might refer to the blacksmith’s workshop, or to the fireplace, hearth, furnace in which the metal is heated to make it pliable.

A critically important piece of a blacksmith’s arsenal was his anvil. Anvils are made of cast or wrought iron with a tool steel face welded on or of a single piece of cast or forged tool steel. On a quality anvil, the smith's hammer should rebound with almost as much energy as the smith puts into the downward stroke, ultimately making the smith's job easier and less physically strenuous. There were anvils specifically made for farriers, general smiths, cutlers, chain makers, armorers, saw tuners, coach makers, coopers, and many other types of metal workers.

In addition to an anvil, the blacksmith needed an arsenal of hammers, tongs, fullers, and specialized forming and cutting tools, called Hardy tools.

Depending on the location of the smithy, the forge might be inside or under a lean-to. Or in some cases, a successful smithy might have an indoor forge and an outdoor forge for use in the sweltering summer months. Or even large doors that could be opened to allow a draft of cooler air to flow through and cool the building.

The work was hard and hot and required precision and skill with hammer. The blacksmith had to know how hot to heat the forge, how long to heat the metal, exactly when to cool it in the “slack tub” in order end up with a strong piece of iron when he was done.

While modern mechanized production has made the need for one-off handmade pieces from blacksmiths not feasible for production purposes, the skill is still being practiced here and there, with tough, muscular men (and women) passing the techniques of forging steel from one generation to the other.

The Road to Magnolia Glen
by Pam Hillman

1792, Natchez Trace, MS

Bitter since his eldest brother abandoned their family in Ireland, Quinn O’Shea travels to Natchez, Mississippi, ready to shuck the weight of his duty and set off on an adventure of his own. It’s time Connor, as head of the family, took responsibility for their younger siblings. While aboard ship, a run-in with three Irish sisters lands Quinn in the role of reluctant savior. Though it may delay his plans, he cannot abandon the Young sisters, especially the tenacious yet kind Kiera.

Upon arriving in the colonies, Kiera Young prepares to meet her intended and begin her new life. But she soon discovers the marriage her brother-in-law arranged was never meant to be, and a far more sinister deal was negotiated for her and her sisters.

Quinn offers to escort his charges safely to Breeze Hill Plantation and his brother’s care, fully intending to seek his freedom elsewhere. But the longer he remains, the greater his feelings toward Kiera grow and the more he comes to realize true freedom might be found in sacrifice. (Coming June 5, 2018 - Available for Pre-order Now.)

Hedy Larmarr, More than a Beautiful Face

Susan Page Davis here.

Hedy Lamarr in 1940

Public Domain photo

Hedy Lamarr is best known as an actress, but she had many other talents, too. In fact, she contributed to wireless communication technology that helped win World Wars and has been used in many other applications, including cell phones.

Hedy in Lady Without a Passport, 1950, public domain photo

Born in Austria in 1914, Hedy lived in Vienna during the time when Nazi Germany was on the rise. Her original name was Hedwig Kiesler, and she became an actress in the 1920s. She was taken to Berlin for training in theater, then returned to Vienna. She acted both on stage and in films.

In 1933, she married Friedrich Mandl, a wealthy Austrian arms dealer and munitions manufacturer. She was 18, and Mandl was fifteen years older. Hedy later described him as extremely controlling and said she was a prisoner in their luxurious home. Mandl took her to all his business meetings, and it was there that Hedy paid attention and learned about advanced weaponry.

Hedy grew to hate the Nazis. After four years of marriage, she escaped to London. There she met Louis B. Mayer, and he brought her to the United States and gave her a movie contract and a new name (Lamarr).

Clark Gable and Hedy Lamarr in Comrade X, 1940

Public domain

After she came to the United States, Lamarr forged an illustrious career in Hollywood. Among other credits, she starred with Clark Gable in Boom Town and Comrade X, with Spencer Tracy in I Take This Woman and Tortilla Flat, opposite Bob Hope in My Favorite Spy, and Jimmy Stewart in Ziegfeld Girl and Come Live with Me. She appeared in about thirty films during her career.

She met American composer George Antheil, and with him devised a plan to help the war effort. They developed a communications system that could be used in radio-controlled torpedoes to help defeat the Nazis. This worked by manipulating radio frequencies at irregular intervals. This system could also prevent the enemy from intercepting messages. They received a patent in 1941.

Unfortunately, when Hedy offered her invention to the U.S. government, they rejected it.  They did not realize how important this invention could be. The pair donated their invention to the war effort. Hedy was encouraged to stick with her successful acting career. One of her many patriotic efforts was to sell war bonds, which she did very successfully.

Hedy in 1939 film Lady of the Tropics

Public domain photo

The communications idea wasn’t used until the navy implemented it on blockade ships during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. After that, its significance was acknowledged, and it was used in many military applications. However, it was first used three years after the Lamarr-Antheil patent expired, and they did not receive any compensation for their patent.

In addition to its usefulness to the armed forces, the technology was a big step forward in digital communications. Cell phones, fax machines, and other modern devices are possible in part because of this system.

In 1997, Lamarr and Anthiel were finally honored with the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) Pioneer Award. The same year, Lamarr became the first female recipient of the BULBIE™ Gnass Spirit of Achievement Award, a lifetime accomplishment prize for inventors that is referred to as the Oscar of inventing.

Leave a comment below to be entered in a drawing to win your choice of one of my novels. Pick an old favorite like Frasier Island or a new release such as Seven Brides for Seven Texas Rangers.

Susan Page Davis is the award-winning author of more than eighty novels and novellas in the historical, romance, mystery, and suspense genres. She’s always interested in unusual events of the past. A Maine native, she now lives in western Kentucky.

A Woman Invented That!

forerunner of Monopoly

By Marilyn Turk

For centuries, our lives have been changed by inventions. Progress – the advance of human society and industry toward a greater standard of living – would not have happened without someone deciding to improve upon the status quo. Instead of accepting things the way they were, these people created improvements to make life and work easier and more efficient.

Most of what we accept as commonplace in our day-to-day lives was invented by someone whose name we don’t know or remember.

We’ve heard of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Henry Ford, George Washington Carver, and Steve Jobs. But what female names do you know?

Here are a few you might wish you could thank.

Nancy Johnson gets the credit for inventing the ice cream maker in 1843, a design still in use today.

Josephine Cochrane invented the dishwasher in 1887, then marketed her machine to hotel owners.

Margaret Wilcox, a mechanical engineer, invented the first car heater in 1893. In addition, she invented a combined clothes and dishwasher machine. 

Maria Beasley was one of the few women who became wealthy from her inventions. Between 1878 and 1898, she received at least fifteen patents. Her first patent for a barrel-making machine made her fortune. In those days, wooden barrels were in high demand, used for food preservation and wine making. Beasley earned almost twenty thousand dollars a year from her invention in a time when the few women who did work earned an average of three dollars a day.

Maria also invented a foot warmer, a steam generator and an anti-derailment device for trains. But of all of her inventions, it’s the life raft she invented in 1882 that stands out as her greatest contribution to saving lives.

Mary Anderson invented the windshield wiper in the year 1903. Her goal was to improve driver vision during stormy weather, cleaning both water and snow off the windshield.

Elizabeth Magie (1866-1948) was a stenographer, a short story and poetry writer, newspaper reporter, comedian, stage actress, feminist, and engineer. In 1904, she received the patent for The Landlord's Game, designed to demonstrate the bad effects that land monopolies had on the economy and the use of land value tax as a remedy. Magie invented other games which Parker Brothers bought before they purchased The Landlord’s Game which eventually became known as Monopoly.

Florence Parpart – invented the electric refrigerator in 1914 She also invented an improved street cleaning machine.

Early electric refrigerators

Dr. Maria Telkes – invented solar heating for residential housing in 1947. Another important invention of Dr. Telkes was a solar distiller capable of vaporizing seawater and recondensing it into drinkable water. She also helped develop material capable of enduring the temperature extremes of outer space. 

Hedy Lamarr

Hedy Lamarr was known as a world-famous film star, but during World War II, she helped invent a secret communications system for radio-controlling torpedoes. This wireless transmission technology paved the way for Wi-Fi and GPS.

Dr. Grace Murray Hopper was a computer scientist that invented COBOL the first user-friendly business computer software system in the 1940’s.  She was also a rear admiral in the U.S. Navy and the first person to use the term “bug” in reference to a glitch in a computer system when she literally found a bug (moth) causing problems with her computer.

Stephanie Kwolek invented life-saving Kevlar in 1965, a material that is five times stronger than steel used to make bulletproof vests.

Marie Van Brittan Brown invented closed-circuit television security (CCTV)  because of the slow response of police officers in 1969 to help people ensure their own security. This invention influenced modern CCTV systems used for home security and police work today.

Dr. Shirley Jackson

Dr. Shirley Jackson - Some of the today's most important telecommunication technology was developed by this American physicist and includes portable fax, touch tone telephone, solar cells, fiber optic cables, and the technology behind caller ID and call waiting.

Did you know about these ladies? Were you surprised?  What would you invent if you could?

A multi-published author, Marilyn Turk writes historical fiction about and lives in the coastal South. Her fascination for lighthouses spawned her popular weekly lighthouse blog @ http://pathwayheart.com, and inspired her Lighthouse Devotions – 52 Inspiring Lighthouse Stories. Her novel, A Gilded Curse, releases March 2016 from Heritage Beacon Fiction, an imprint of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas.

Meet Marilyn in April at the Blue Lake Christian Writers Retreat.
For more details, see http://bluelakecwr.com/

On this day in 1913 American Lives were Changed

                                                     Public Domain Wiki

Henry Ford, a man of dreams sees the beginning of one of his biggest dreams come true. And with that dream, he changes the lives of the working class American. 

Because of the high cost of producing automobiles, the targeted populations for this handy invention was the wealthier Americans. Up until Henry Ford stepped into the picture the average working American couldn't afford to go down the street and buy himself a new car. Even with Ford's Model T, a car he had designed for the middle class man by making it durable, easy to maintain,and economical, most American's couldn't afford the $850 price tag.

When Henry Ford introduced the Model T in 1908 he'd said he'd build a great car for the multitude. Realizing that the only way he could reduce the price of an individual motorcar was to up the production, Ford Motor Company got to work on how they could do that. 

Motivated by Chicago and Cincinnati meat-packing plants where they used trolleys to slaughter, dress and pack both cows and hogs, the Ford Company set about to make their own type of continuously moving assembly line.

                                 PUblic domain Wiki By Unknown author - Archive.org, Public Domain,                                                    https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9545581

On October 7, 1913 Henry Ford revolutionizes the automotive industry with his new assembly line. In his Highland Park, Michigan factory, he used a motor and a rope to pull the frame of the automobile past the workers. By doing this they were able to cut the time to make one Model T from the usual 12 1/2 hours down to 6 hours. 



But even that wasn't enough for the Ford Company. They continued to work on their assembly line making it more efficient and improving productivity. By 1916 the Ford Motor Company had managed to reduce the price of their Model T to $360, tripling their sales in just 4 years. As they continued to improve their assembly line, one plant was able to put out one Model T every 24 seconds, allowing them to drop their price down below $300.


Truly, Henry Ford changed the course of the United States by his ingenuity and determination to make a car affordable to the average American. By doing that he changed the way manufacturing and production lines were done and made automobile transportation accessible to the American public.

QUOTES BY HENRY FORD:

It is not the employer who pays wages - he only handles the money. It is the product that pays wages.

 Failure is only an opportunity to begin again more intelligently.

 Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs

 One who fears failure limits his activities.

And my favorite:
I believe God is managing affairs and that He doesn't need any advice from me. With God in charge, I believe everything will work out for the best in the end.


What are some inventions that you think changed our lives forever?


When her father died, she had promised herself no man would own her

again, yet who could defy an edict of the king? After the death of her cruel father, Brithwin is determined never again to live under the harsh rule of any man. Independent and resourceful, she longs to be left alone to manage her father’s estate. But she soon discovers a woman has few choices when the king decrees she is to marry Royce, the Lord of Rosencraig. As if the unwelcome marriage isn’t enough, her new husband accuses her of murdering his family, and she is faced with a challenge of either proving her innocence or facing possible execution.
Royce of Hawkwood returns home after setting down a rebellion to find his family brutally murdered. When all fingers point to his betrothed and attempts are made on his life, Royce must wade through murky waters to uncover the truth. Yet Brithwin’s wise and kind nature begin to break down the walls of his heart, and he soon finds himself in a race to discover who is behind the evil plot before Brithwin is the next victim.  

 

 Debbie Lynne Costello has enjoyed writing stories since she was about eight years old. She studied journalism at Heritage University. She raised her family and then embarked on her own career of writing the stories that had been begging to be told. She and her husband have four children and live in upstate South Carolina. She has worked in many capacities in her church and is currently the Children's Director. Debbie Lynne has shown and raised Shetland Sheepdogs for eighteen years and still enjoys litters now and then. In their spare time, she and her husband take pleasure in camping and riding their Arabian and Tennessee Walking horses.

Real Photo Post Cards of the early Twentieth Century

by Guest Brandy Heineman

 

In July 2008, the “Facebook for iPhone” app launched. Soon it was possible to attach a message to a photograph and wirelessly send it to almost anyone, all with a device that fit right in your pocket. In other words, Facebook caught up with the Eastman Kodak Company’s innovation of the 3A Folding Pocket Camera from 1903!

By the dawn of the twentieth century, photography had been around in various forms for over two generations. Card mounted portraits called cabinet cards, introduced in the 1860s, required a trip to a professional photographer’s studio for a formal sitting, and developing the images required a darkroom, messy plates, and a complex chemical process. It was only a matter of time before advancing technologies simplified photography for the average consumer.

Beginning in 1878, George Eastman spent years innovating with photographic dry plates, negative papers, and photographic film, and building up the company that would become Eastman Kodak Company of Rochester, NY. When the first Kodak camera came to market in 1888, advertised with the slogan, “You press the button, we do the rest,” cabinet cards quickly fell out of vogue throughout the 1890s as photography became more accessible to amateurs.

From Wikimedia Commons: “A composite photograph showing a photographic studio interior. One man is seated on a stool near an adjustable clamp to hold his head steady during a long portrait exposure. The second man, standing next to a large view camera, looks like the person being photographed. Satire on photographic practices.” (A. H. Wheeler, photographer, Berlin, Wis., 1893. Image from the United States Library of Congress. Public domain.)

Introduced in 1903 as a part of a line of relatively inexpensive cameras sold by Eastman Kodak, the 3A Folding Pocket Kodak cameras used No. 122 film which created 3¼ X 5½ inch images which could then be produced onto postcard stock. These cameras were made of aluminum and covered in seal grain leather, and boasted features such as daylight loadable cartridges, a Double Combinations Rapid Rectilinear lens of 6½ inches, and a shutter speed of f.8. Furthermore, as per the name, they were designed to fit in a gentleman’s top coat pocket.

Detail from The Evening times. (Grand Forks, N.D.), 27 April 1909, page 10. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85042373/1909-04-27/ed-1/seq-10/>

On March 1, 1907, U.S. postal regulations changed, allowing both the address and message to appear on the same side of a postcard. Divided-back postcards became commonplace, and corresponding via “Real Photo Post Cards,” (often shortened to RPPC) grew into a popular pastime. Like many more recent communicative innovations, these postcards provided a simple and inexpensive way for people to overcome the limits of proximity and share their lives in more meaningful ways with the ones they loved.

“I tho’t I would send you a picture of our home here. … You can notice these pictures are not very good.”

Of course, the novelty of the technology is often evident in the messages included with Real Photo Post Cards, too.

“Do you know any of these people.”

The Eastman Kodak Company was not the only manufacturer vying for a share of the photography market—indeed, a number of their advertisements show concern for protecting their brand with slogans like, “If it isn’t an Eastman, it isn’t a Kodak.” Rival company Ansco also produced a pocket folding camera that produced postcard sized images, and they also gave these cameras the 3A designation. (Seems like most companies wouldn’t even try transparent shenanigans like that today!)

Kodak produced its 3A Series until 1915, although cameras that took No. 122 postcard format film continued to be produced until 1943. If you have one of these antiques, you’ll have a hard time using it. No. 122 film was discontinued in 1971, and today the rolls are both rare and expensive.

The technology changes with the decades (or in our time, with the seasons!), and it sometimes gets in our way, becoming a focal point instead of a means to an end. In the age of social media, antique RPPCs are a reminder that media—the channels of communication we use and the messages we send—are inherently social. At $20.00 in 1903, the 3A Folding Pocket Kodak was definitely a luxury item, but one that touched a felt need that we continue to share today: to remain connected and engaged with the people we care about across all distances.

BRANDY HEINEMAN is a Christ-follower. She’s also a book hoarder, a cat herder, a first-generation Southerner, and a self-appointed family historian. She likes to cook when it’s convenient, and to order pizza when it’s not. An alumna of Wesleyan College (Macon, Ga.), she has written for ACFW’s The Journal, Writer Interrupted, and Book Fun Magazine. Brandy resides in metro Atlanta with her Captain of Street Cred and super-hero hubby, Michael. Find her on Facebook, Twitter, and at brandyheineman.com.

Whispers in the Branches

“As a lover of research and genealogy, this novel was a soul-treat. Abby Wells hears the siren call of buried family secrets. Add to that a ghost and a love triangle, and Whispers in the Branches is one suspenseful read. I was hooked and couldn’t put it down. Heineman is a talented storyteller.” –Nicole Seitz, author of Saving Cicadas and The Spirit of Sweetgrass