QUEEN MARY'S DOLLS HOUSE

The famous and priceless Queen Mary's Dolls' House is on public display at Windsor's Castle.

It stands five feet tall and was built by the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens who also designed the Cenotaph. This magnificent dolls' house was built for Queen Mary, the wife of George V. It is six-storey high, has a well equipped servant quarters, fully landscaped gardens and basement big enough for five cars. It was built in 1924 and never been played with.

When looking into the tiny chambers it feels like being transport back to a by-gone age. Everything was built to minute details and scale. It spells magic. It is a fantastic time capsule of British history preserved in tiny contents - one inch to one foot. Nothing was missed out of that life whether it is the Lux flakes in the kitchen, Rolls Royce Silver Ghost in the Garage, library containing original works from Rudyard Kipling and Arthur Conan Doyle - the size of two postage stamp - electricity, running water and a lift.

                                  ONE OF THE STAIRCASES 

                                                        

                                                                    THE STATE APARTMENT 

The dolls' house is much more that just a toy with which to play. It is the ultimate of craftsmanship and a showcase of talent. All put together in a time capsule of the life of British aristocracy. It was built just after the First World War as a memorial of continuation of that kind of life.

Princess Marie Louise had the inspiration to have it built for Queen Mary. Queen Mary was a well known and obsessive collector of 'tiny craft'. It was to be an appreciation for the support during the war. Princess Marie Louis asked her friend Lutyens to design it and it can be filled with all the small treasures collected.

Lutyen started with all the enthusiasm to design and built this dolls' house and his idea was to show generation to come how the King and Queen of England lived at the beginning of the 20th century.

The dolls' house has a collection of 750 works of art. Amongst the artist are Paul Nash, Edmund Dulac, William Nicholson and Frank Raynolds, the art editor of Punch magazine.

25 composers were asked for musical scores and included Gustav Holst but not Sir Edward Elgar. He thought that King and Queen are incapable of appreciate any art and thought it an insult to do such a thing.

THE LIBRARY

The walnut-panelled library has 200 original literatures. Princess Marie Louis sent to writers and musicians tine blank volumes for them to write in. A leather bound, hand-written story from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, How Watson learned the Trick, Rudyard Kipling submitted a 4x3cm book, hand-written poems, some unpublished and with his own illustration. Mr James wrote the haunted Dolls' House, Thomas Hardy wrote seven poems and Robert Grave five.

                                     THE DINING ROOM

It is a document of social history and a bygone age which makes it more and more valuable and interesting.

On the kitchen table you will find a tin of Colman's Mustard and Lea and Perrins Worcestershire sauce. By the sink tiny tins of Lifebuoy, sunlight soap and Lux flakes.

The five bathrooms and lavatories have running water. Each lavatory has a shiny Bromo paper.

The famous cigar and pipe manufacturer Alfred Dunhill supplied miniature cigars, cigarettes, pipes and custom built tobacco.

Carties built a longcase clock for the marble hallway. In the strongroom behind a gate are crown jewels weighing 1.5lbs instead 1.5 tons.

In the wine cellar are 200 bottles of Chateau Lafitte 1875 and five dozen bottle of Veuve Clicquot to name just the most important ones.

The nursery is decorated with fairy tales murals by Edmund Dulac. It also contains miniature gauze pneumonia jackets, to retain the body heat, which were used up till the time when penicillin were discovered.

The garden was designed by Gertrude Jekyll who was a famous gardener of the day. It also has a functional lawn mover. In the garage stand six horseless carriages which include a Daimler limousine and a Rolls Royce.

The Dolls' House was handed down the present Queen and is on show at the Windsor’s' Castle.

SUMMARY: Queen Mary's Dolls House is famous because of the highest craftsmanship in miniature which is harder to do then a full size furniture etc. It is an outstanding example what a craftsman of the highest capability can achieve. It is also a time capsule of by-gone age and a world we would never see otherwise. To see it in real is an unforgettable experience 

DAME ELISABETH MURDOCH RIP MOTHER OF RUPERT MURDOCH

                                                                                                        

Dame Elisabeth Murdoch was the mother of Rupert Murdoch, the newspaper tycoon. 

She was completely different to her son.

She died at the age of 103 on the 5 December 2012. Her son is more known in this country for ruin the News of the World through phone hacking but in Australia where she lived her name was wide spread for generosity and devotion to charities . All her life she worked for and with numerous charities.

How did she deserve a son like that?

She was born on 8 February 1909 and the third daughter of Rupert Greene and his wife Marie. Her father was a hard-drinking wool valuer. She was born in Melbourne and married newspaper publisher Keith Murdoch. He fell in love with her picture in a magazine. She was 18 years old and Keith Murdoch was 24 year older than her.  Keith Murdoch became the most powerful man in Australia. He hit the headlines when he uncovered the mismanagement of the Dardanelles campaign in the First World War.  Soon after that he became knighted and Lady Elisabeth Murdoch devoted herself being a mother to one son and three daughters and charity work.

DAME ELISABETH AND HER HUSBAND KEITH MURDOCH

She worked tirelessly on the board of the Melbourne’s Royal Children’s Hospital; established the Murdoch Children Research Institute and offered numerous patronages to organisations to health, welfare and arts. She stated once: “Probably the most useful contribution one can make is to forget oneself and care for others.” Apparently this statement describes her perfectly.

Her husband encouraged her interest in Arts and she became the first woman trustee of the National Gallery of Victoria and benefactor of Australia Ballet, Opera Australia and the Deafness Foundation.

Her husband died in 1952 after 24 years of a happy marriage and she was so heartbroken that she never married again.  After that she devoted her whole time and energy into charity work. One project she was very interesting in and chaired the planning committee for Melbourne’s new children’s hospital.

In 1963 she received the title Dame of the British Empire from the Queen. She saw herself as the busiest old lady and her son labelled her “the disciplinarian”. It gives a glimpse of her high standard of principles. Her opinion on Rupert’s divorce from his second wife Anna, his purchase of the News of the World and the following invasion into people privacy was well known. At the same time she was very proud of him.

Yet Rupert Murdock did not seem to come quite up to his mother’s standard of principles.

RUPERT MURDOCH AND HIS MOTHER DAME ELISABETH 

BOOKREVIEW: PETER PINE.

Peter Pine was born in the forest and grew up with all his brothers and sisters. He went to the forest school and grew big and strong. He and his brothers and sisters were chosen to be Christmas trees One night the trees heard bells from far away and then they saw Father Christmas coming on the sleigh. The author Eva Brooks described beautifully the live of Peter Pine and children will love to listen or read it themselves.

Available as ebook at Lulu.com  or  Barnes & Noble or Amazon
http://www.lulu.com/content/e-book/peter-pine/12137688

http://www.lulu.com/shop/eva-brooks/peter-pine/ebook/product-20556991.html

VEHICLES ADAPTED TO ICE AND SNOW

SNOWMOBILE

How to adapt vehicles to ice and snow conditions?

In extreme ice and snow conditions, like the arctic, planes, trucks, tractors and buses have to be adapted.To reach and harvest oil and gas in the bitter wasteland of the Arctic regions where the land is bare in the summer. On the top it is muddy and boggy and frozen solid of several hundred metres underneath. In the winter the whole area is covered with snow and ice, temperature reaching -50oC with blizzards raging. The drilling team have to have vehicles which are totally reliable in those conditions.

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Their trucks and support vehicles are fitted with enormous low-pressured tyres. This spreads the weight of the vehicle over a larger area. In both conditions, snow and mud, it stops the vehicle to be bogged down. It also prevents more damage to surface than necessary. These vehicles are used for transporting extreme loads like drilling rigs, supplies and exploration equipment.

A big-wheeled snow vehicle with 36,000 kg load will have ground pressure of 2.4 kg/cm2.and has a speed of 40 km/h

A tracked vehicle with the same load will have a ground pressure of 0.33 kg/cm2 and a speed of 15 km/h. No doubt it is slower but it is the ground pressure which is really of importance.

Tracked vehicles are used in the Antarctica and it carries supplies plus pulling large cargo sledges. The supplies to the scientific research station are once a year which are sent by ship and then transported over land for several kilometres.

The first who tried to use this method was Captain Scott in 1911. Unfortunately, his tractor was braking down too many times and eventually he abandoned it. Scott also refused to use dog-sleds and therefore they man-hauled their supplies.

SNO-CAT

The most famous polar vehicle is the big sno-cat. This was also used on the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1955-58. It weighs 3175 kg but is capable of carrying one tone of supplies and pulling two sledges with two tones each. The sno-cat has two tracked units, which are called pontoons, at the front and two at the rear. They are independently sprung and designed to enable it an almost 100 % traction. The front pontoons are steered to the left; the rear one automatically steers to the right; all four pontoons follow the same arc which enables the vehicle a maximum manoeuvrability. The sno-cat can be fitted with a straight blade or a curved blade. The range of blades is from 2.6m with 6 positions and up to 3.5m blade with 12 positions.

PREPARATION OF PISTE

To satisfy the skiers and make them come back year after year, the slopes (pistes) have to be in perfect condition. No effort is spared. After the skiers left the slops the maintenance team go over with their powerful, low-body and wide-tracked vehicles. These vehicles are with pusher blades in the front to shift the snow to the part which worn thin from skiers. At the rear rollers and smoothing blades to compact the new snow. It leaves the slope clean, smooth and with a firm surface. A tiller, mounted at the front will scoop up excessive snow and blows it 40m away with the ejector chute.

Small machines clear and repair the cross-country trails. Also tracks to and from ski-lifts.

Large machines which have a width of five metres smooth and surface the main slopes. This means 70,000 square metres are treated every hour.

The black runs are surfaced just the same but on a surface too steep to drive on. The tractor is fitted with a 650 metre winch cable which enables the driver to go up or down in safety.

In Canada, American Rockies, Scandinavia or the Alps a snowmobile is used to go to the store for supplies or for the weekend up to a cabin. The forest ranger, border guard and member of the mountain rescue team use it for work. There are also racing snowmobiles capable of up to 190 km/h.

The current sports model is sleek, low, aerodynamic body with a two-cylinder engine of 350-700cm3. On the front there is a pair of skies which is steered by the handlebar. The broad rubberised track under the rear, two-third, of the machine is to provide propulsion. They are also fitted with wind-deflecting shields, powerful headlights and electric hand-warmers for drivers and passengers. You definitely need padded, insulated windproof clothing, helmet, face-mask and goggles. These models can reach a speed up to 100km/h.

Snowmobiles were first invented by Canadian Joseph Amand-Bombardier in 1930. It was designed to carry troops. It was fitted with ski-like steering runners at the front. A petrol engine was fitted to a half-track drive at the back. Bombardier-Nordtrak is still a leading manufacturer.