Wednesday, May 31, 2006

More eeriness at Cheekwood

This isn't an unknown quest, but it felt surrealistic. "The Glass Bridge" was never a Lovecraft story, but can you imagine one? Below, two angles of the glass bridge on the sculpture walk at Cheekwood, Franklin, TN and a topsy-turvy Chrispy picture.

Don;t forget, many of the pictures I include in the blog can be clicked and they might expand larger into a new window.

{c) Chrisp Perridas, 2006



Monday, May 29, 2006

My recent Lovecraftian adventure

On a trip to Franklin, Tennesee, I discovered the most amazing sculpture hike. I feel that if HPL were alive, and could have traveled to see these sculptural marvels, he would have included them in one of his stories. Indeed, he often spoke of Klarkashton's work and others.

Here is one of those outdoor exhibits. I will take you on a little tour.




On the estate of Cheekwood, Franklin, Tennessee is a wonderful sculpture walk. As you wander the woods, here is a startling architectural wonder. The open door of stone set into the natural limestone and hillside compels ... compels ... compels ... you ... to ... enter.





Inside, the hallway pulls at you to what appears to be a screen - but is really a wall. You can see the benches of concrete. Before you is what you might think a gaping chasm.



It is a pit of black sand. It forces you to meditate on the contrast of the white concrete and then you are forced to look up ... up ... up .. to ...






...an aperture that is open to the sky. The edges are illuminated so that the natural light of day is smoothly integrated with the light from the sky. The heavens are always changing and you stare at the sky for minutes. Then, slowly you merge into eternity. Whether you are looking at the sky of a million years from now or the same sky as our ancestors of 50,000 years ago - it is the ever changing always the same sky.

This is the first of several sculptures I'll share. If you've been there, share your experiences. Or perhaps you can share your own Lovecraftian experiences with the community.

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: Crawford Street Bridge, Part 2










This postcard was mailed when Lovecraft was 16! Time travel back to those heady riverfront days, as he might have bicycled past the docks.




















This reads, "Annie and I pass here every morning. Lena." Lovecraft took walks, often at night, and the smell of fish would have turned his stomach.

















Detail.















Detail.















Ah, yes! The days when postage was but a copper penny.

Arthur Jermyn: Lovecraft's Intuition Confirmed?

"For the nebulous utterances concerning a nameless, unsuspected race of jungle hybrids he had a peculiar feeling of mingled terror and attraction ... "

In the May 20, 2006 issue of Science News, it's reported that "various parts of the human genome diverged from those of chimps at times that span 4 million years ... clues to ancient interbreeding lie on the X chromosome ... something very unusual happened at the time of human-chimpanzee speciation. 20 million base pairs assessed the extent to which humans and chimps ... shared gene variants."

Gentle readers, Chrispy does not make this up!! It is on page 308 of my recent journal and the researchers are led by David Reich of Harvard Medical School in Boston!!

Sunday, May 21, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: Crawford Street Bridge, Part 1

Back in HPL's day, the city’s three rivers [1] were completely covered by the massive Crawford Street Bridge. The original bridge was built in the 1890s, and it was expanded progressively over the next 30 years to provide more space downtown for roads, trolleys, and parking.

By 1930, the rivers lay hidden under the world’s widest bridge — a slab of concrete 1,147 feet wide, barely recognizable as anything other than a roadway or parking lot.

That's the way Lovecraft would know it - years of road construction to bury the river beneath concrete. He passed in 1937.

Beginning in 1982, a redevelopment project reclaimed part of the waterfront to build Waterplace Park, an outdoor amphitheater and public gathering place. [2] In later phases, city planners redirected the three rivers, removed the concrete decking, and built seven new bridges.

The last piece of decking over the Providence River was removed in October 1995, exposing the waterways in downtown Providence for the first time in a century.

One wonders if HPL would be pleased. I think so. He was an advocate of preserving the past. Though he loathed (unlike Derleth who admired) Thoreau, HPL certainly loved the woods, hiking, and biking. I think he would have been an advocate of preserving nature and integrating with nature to rpeserve biodiversity.

1 The rivers are Woonasquatucket and Moshasseck which join at Washington Street in the heart of the city to make the Providence River.

2 Providence is like most major American cities in reclaiming the river or lake fronts to make them pedestrian and commerce malls. Chrispy has seen where Indianapolis, Cincinnatti, Nashville, and now Louisville (my home town) has taken old railroad or obslolete auto bridges and made them pedestrian pedways, and $ millions spent to remove sand dredgers, junkyards, and other eyesores to landscape with grass and playgrounds and restaraunts.

(Part 2, a scene from HPL's teen years of Crawford Street Bridge)

Driftwind

I'll tell you more about this interesting periodical over the next few weeks. I recently acquired this 1936 limited edition New England magazine of poetry. It was published by Walter John Coates of North Pelier, Vermont.

What I've found amazing is that it was bound in wallpaper!

The document is rather fragile, so I have to be careful to scan this 70 year old ephemera.

Established in 1926, the deitorial fellowship consisted of:

Hugh Stevenson Tigner, Middleton, NY
Homer C. House, College Park, Md
D. Sanial Gill, Dade City, FL (RFD 3, i.e rural free delivery 3)
Howard P. Lovecraft, Providence , RI
Jeannette Slocomb Edwards, Wilmington, Del
Howard Davis Spoerl, Springfield, MA
Berniece L. B. Graham, Manchester, Vt
W. Paul Cook, East St. Louis, Ill.

The book review editor was Clara Edmunds-Hemingway, Chicago, IL.

This issue has 43 poems.

While Lovecraft's poem was a part of his Fungi From Yuggoth, this was interesting by Lilith Lorraine:

Orgies

I have seen old women gossiping
And thrilling to the soft vicarious touch
Of other women's lovers.
I have seen their shrivelled souls
Wallowing in fetid slime
Of rank, unclean imaginings.

Better the frankness of untrammeled mating,
Better the searing of the white-hot flame,
Than half-life in the charnel-vault of virtue,
Where vampires sap the blood of holy passion
And leave their mark on the white throat of love.

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: Dexter Asylum

On the 1904 map of Providence in Chrispy's collection, it shows Dexter Asylum. A commenter, M of StrangeMaine fame, wondered about this.

Dexter Asylum was originally a "poor house" where indigents gathered to survive by working for a meager living.

"Continuing west you will quickly come to an area where the north side of Angell Street is bordered by a high stone wall. This surrounds a forty acre tract, now Brown {University} playing fields, but originally set aside and walled as Dexter Asylum, a poor farm, in the nineteenth century. The wall is three feet thick at ground level and eight feet high. Within was a marvelously Charles-Addamsish residence for the inmates {buit by} John Holden Greene, now demolished. At the time Brown {University} took over the property, there was an auction of furnishings and other items in the building. One of the more interesting lots {of items for bid} was a group of old wooden coffins, including some for infants." [1]

Lovecraft {coordinating Beckwith's tour to the 1904 map) lived about 800 feet from the wall of Dexter Asylum as a boy. 454 Angell was on the northwest corner of Angell and Elm Grove Ave - and that was a half-mile from Blackstone Park [2] bordering the Skeekonk River.

College Hill was always a steep sided place and Angell and Waterman were the only thoroughfares even back into colonial days.

As you can see, Chrispy is still building the case that when HPL uttered, "I am Providence" he sincerely meant that primal cry. Lovecraft was intoxicated by the love affair of his hometown. In Meet Me in St. Louis, a young Trudy tells Chill Wills, "Ain't it grand that I was born in my favorite city." Read HPL's stories and see Providence oozing from the pores.

1 Lovecraft's Providence & Adjacent Parts, Henry L. P. Beckwith, Jr., Donlad M Grant Publisher, West Kingston RI, 1979, p. 59
2 Recall that HPL was a member of the Blackstone Band as a boy.










{circa 1911)

Monday, May 15, 2006

Lovecraft's Legacy: Stephen King

Recently seen note by Stephen King.

"Have you ever scared yourself?" King recounted being at a World Horror Convention in 1979 in Providence, RI and peering into a pawnshop window. King's "Mr. Idea Man said, 'What if there was a pillow in that window? Just an ordinary old pillow in a slightly dirty cotton slip? And suppose somebody curious about why such an item would be on display- a writer like you, maybe- went in and asked about it, and the guy who ran the pawnshop said it was H.P. Lovecraft's pillow, the one he slept on every night, the one he dreamed his fantastic dreams on, maybe even the one he died on.' Reader I cannot remember - even now, a quarter century later - ever having an idea that gave me such a chill."

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Little known Lovecraft anecdote

Fire occasionally came to bear in HPL's stories.

"At ... seven or eight, he joined some neighboring youngsters in forming a fire fighting brigade which moved up and down the streets of the Antient {sic} Hill with hook-and-ladder equipment of miniature size which they managed to put together fromwooden crates and garden hoses."















PROVIDENCE RI WATER WITCH HOSE CO 6 ON BENEVOLENT ST PC












PROVIDENCE RI FIRE KING HOSE NO 3 FIRE DEPT. ON POND ST












PROVIDENCE RI PROTECTIVE FIRE DEPT. ON RICHMOND ST PC


These vintage images and their real life counterparts inspired the Lovecraft gang to play firemen.


amer on the Night Side, 1975, p. 29

Saturday, May 13, 2006

Interlude

[Hope you didn't miss Chrispy too much - he was away on a variety of obligations. So here is a little treat.]












Gather and hug your loved ones tight,
The dark wisps have gathered in the night,
'Tis terror afoot in the full moon's light,
Beware, be in fear of the werewolf's bite.

We mortals tremble at such a plight,
As the clouds of evil gather at midnight.
Outside the window, oh, such a sight!
Gather and hug your loved ones tight.

Pic & Poem (c) Chris Perridas, 2006

Thursday, May 11, 2006

Lovecraftiana: William Crawford

One of the first specialty science fiction publishers was William Crawford. Below is a recently seen piece of ephemera that links Crawford's 1935 Fantasy Publishing Company with his slightly later Visionary Publishing Company. It was the Visionary Publishing Company which published Lovecraft's THE SHADOW OVER INNSMOUTH in 1936.

It was uncovered by Lee Ballentine of Denver CO 80209 and is being auctioned on ebay (as of May 11, 2006)











This item must date from 1935 or 1936. In 1935, Crawford had begun publishing and first issued MARS MOUNTAIN by Eugene George Key and MEN OF AVALON/THE WHITE SYBIL by David Keller and Clark Ashton Smith.

The imprint--or publishing name used on these two titles was `Fantasy Pubs.' and the city of publication, Everett, Pennsylvania. This is what might be called PHASE I of the Crawford publishing adventure.

PHASE II involved a magazine called MARVEL TALES. The auction house speculates that based on the evidence of the item the publishing entity had become Fantasy Publishing Company.

Very soon, in 1936, PHASE III would start under the new name Visionary Publishing Company. Visionary would go on to issue only two titles, first, Peter Reynolds (pseud. of Amelia Reynolds Long and William Crawford) BEHIND THE EVIDENCE, and second, H.P. Lovecraft THE SHADOW OVER INNSMOUTH, the only Lovecraft title to be published in the author's lifetime (if you accept the notion that THE SHUNNED HOUSE was not actually `published' in 1928 as the few copies bound then were given away--not offered for sale--and that the sale of 50 sets of unbound sheets by Barlow did not really constitute publication either).

Clay Ferguson--whose name appears on the item --was the artist who designed the cover of BEHIND THE EVIDENCE--the first Visionary Publishing Company title.

This is apparently an original piece of unused stationery for `FANTASY PUBLISHING COMPANY, Everett, PA., Editor: Wm L. Crawford -- Art: Clay Ferguson''--a kind of snapshot of the transition from Fantasy Pubs. to Visionary--still using the Fantasy name but crediting Ferguson, the designer of the first Visionary cover.

They state that the reference to Everett, PA brings to mind the legendary `attic in Everett' in which most copies of Lovecraft's strange little INNSMOUTH book perished from wet, weather, and neglect.

The item obviously is a survivor of that attic!

It's stated to be 5-1/2 x 8-1/2 inch unused stationery page watermarked with a crescent moon symbol, `ALGERIAN BOND', and `RAG CONTENT' It is darkening a bit at the edges and corners after nearly 70 years.

Generally though, it's claimed to be in astonishingly good shape.

The printing has left a physical impression in the paper, so it was probably printed in Linotype. Very few of these can possibly have survived.

The items were held in the estate of publisher William Crawford, who was active in specialty science fiction publishing of books and magazines from about 1934 until the late 1970s, and was purchased by the auction house from his wife Peggy Crawford in the 1980s.

Crawford published and produced books under a variety of names and imprints, including Fantasy Pubs. of Everett Pennsylvania, Visionary Publishing Company, Fantasy Publishing Co. Inc. (FPCI), Griffin Publishing Company, Carcosa House, Fantasy Book, Coven 13, Witchcraft and Sorcery, Spaceway, and others.

The auction house acquired them from the publisher's widow wife after his death.

Lovecraftiana: William Crawford

One of the first specialty science fiction publishers was William Crawford. Below is a recently seen piece of ephemera that links Crawford's 1935 Fantasy Publishing Company with his slightly later Visionary Publishing Company. It was the Visionary Publishing Company which published Lovecraft's THE SHADOW OVER INNSMOUTH in 1936.

It was uncovered by Lee Ballentine of Denver CO 80209 and is being auctioned on ebay (as of May 11, 2006)











This item must date from 1935 or 1936. In 1935, Crawford had begun publishing and first issued MARS MOUNTAIN by Eugene George Key and MEN OF AVALON/THE WHITE SYBIL by David Keller and Clark Ashton Smith.

The imprint--or publishing name used on these two titles was `Fantasy Pubs.' and the city of publication, Everett, Pennsylvania. This is what might be called PHASE I of the Crawford publishing adventure.

PHASE II involved a magazine called MARVEL TALES. The auction house speculates that based on the evidence of the item the publishing entity had become Fantasy Publishing Company.

Very soon, in 1936, PHASE III would start under the new name Visionary Publishing Company. Visionary would go on to issue only two titles, first, Peter Reynolds (pseud. of Amelia Reynolds Long and William Crawford) BEHIND THE EVIDENCE, and second, H.P. Lovecraft THE SHADOW OVER INNSMOUTH, the only Lovecraft title to be published in the author's lifetime (if you accept the notion that THE SHUNNED HOUSE was not actually `published' in 1928 as the few copies bound then were given away--not offered for sale--and that the sale of 50 sets of unbound sheets by Barlow did not really constitute publication either).

Clay Ferguson--whose name appears on the item --was the artist who designed the cover of BEHIND THE EVIDENCE--the first Visionary Publishing Company title.

This is apparently an original piece of unused stationery for `FANTASY PUBLISHING COMPANY, Everett, PA., Editor: Wm L. Crawford -- Art: Clay Ferguson''--a kind of snapshot of the transition from Fantasy Pubs. to Visionary--still using the Fantasy name but crediting Ferguson, the designer of the first Visionary cover.

They state that the reference to Everett, PA brings to mind the legendary `attic in Everett' in which most copies of Lovecraft's strange little INNSMOUTH book perished from wet, weather, and neglect.

The item obviously is a survivor of that attic!

It's stated to be 5-1/2 x 8-1/2 inch unused stationery page watermarked with a crescent moon symbol, `ALGERIAN BOND', and `RAG CONTENT' It is darkening a bit at the edges and corners after nearly 70 years.

Generally though, it's claimed to be in astonishingly good shape.

The printing has left a physical impression in the paper, so it was probably printed in Linotype. Very few of these can possibly have survived.

The items were held in the estate of publisher William Crawford, who was active in specialty science fiction publishing of books and magazines from about 1934 until the late 1970s, and was purchased by the auction house from his wife Peggy Crawford in the 1980s.

Crawford published and produced books under a variety of names and imprints, including Fantasy Pubs. of Everett Pennsylvania, Visionary Publishing Company, Fantasy Publishing Co. Inc. (FPCI), Griffin Publishing Company, Carcosa House, Fantasy Book, Coven 13, Witchcraft and Sorcery, Spaceway, and others.

The auction house acquired them from the publisher's widow wife after his death.

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: 1904

Chrispy is excited. I've uncovered a vintage 1904 map of Providence with most of HPL's haunts highlighted. Unencumbered by vuch of the 20th century, this map was created and published on or near Lovecraft's fourteenth birthday.

Here is a section. Remember, if you click the pic, it often will expand much larger in a new window. I try to overscan the image for this reason.

This shows Lovecraft's Angell Street, his "Hope Street High School" with the Hope Reservoir across the street. Dexter Asylum is prominent, as is the business district, the Providence River, and Brown University.

I've been doing a lot of time travel lately. Go ahead, try it.


Lovecraft's Providence

The time is 4:30 PM, the date is 27 March 1906. Lovecraft is sixteen years old. Down the street and across the Providence River, the evening Spring bustle of Weybosset Street has the road of trolley car wheels and shoppers rushing in and out of shops.













C A Molney sent this postcard to May Brackett of Bristol, CT. "Thanks for your card --- come again ... please send me some street views."


















Yes! Postage was but 1 cent.
























































Details. Lovecraft loved Trolley cars. It was a huge industry and huge fortunes were made prior to the automobile's dominance.



















From Chris Perridas collection.

Lovecraft Trivia &c

Lovecraft was old fashioed in his dress. He drove Sonia and his pals mad with his fussiness over just the right "conservative" brim on his hat, wearing the same, moth-ridden suits day in and day out, and insisting on dressing like a circa 1900 man in the middle of the roaring 20's!

Don't forget to rummage the archives. More that 200 posts are there on many Lovecraft aspects! Use the search feature to find your favorite topic - it may just what you need for that next rpg! :)

Coming soon: More anecdotes from FB Long & others, new mythos stories from Chrispy, deconstructed Lovecraft research, and images of long ago, Lovecraft's Providence.

I want this to be a press release center, too. If you have something of newsworthiness, or an assembly of HPL afiicianados - let us know. Thousands read this blog, and we have people from up to 20 nations stop by to view.


[rpg, role playing game, in case you were wondering].

Monday, May 08, 2006

a "whoops" by Long

Frank Belknap Long reminisced about his many escapades with EchPiEl. However, his ebulliance overflowed a few times in his memoir.

He says, "HPL ... one time ... was a member of an alert group of youngsters who had built an impressive sleuthing apparatus modeled upon the Burns Detective Agency, which at the turn of the century was the only investigative bureau that acquired so nationwide a reputation that every twelve year old in America was familiar with its slogan, 'We always get our man.'"

What a wonderful anecdote. However, like Plato's Socrates, there is as much of Long in his retelling of Howard, as there is of Lovecraft. In this case, the facts are a bit garbled.

The ancient detective agency was the Pinkerton Agency formed circa. 1850. The Burns Agency was started in 1909 - when Howard was 19! Today, they are merged together, but in 1975 they were still a struggling set of aging agencies. However, the more vibrant in the 20's and 30's was probably the Burns agency.

Finally, the Pinkerton motto was "We never sleep", while the legendary motto of the Royal Canadian Mounties was, "We always get our man."

Long often pauses in his memoir to warn us that he is a writer, a poet, and a dreamer as much as Howard was, and that a misplaced memory here or there does no damage to the homage he pays. I'm inclined to agree. Long's Lovecraft is a refreshing portrait, and one more artist's portrait to go with the cosmic Lovecraft of Joshi, the pantheistic Lovecraft of Derleth, the myth-teller Lovecraft of Robert Price, or the Antiquarian Lovecraft of Virgil Finlay.

Which Lovecraft haunts your dreams?

Sunday, May 07, 2006

Little Known Lovecraft Event - cursed! by the pharoah!

From the eldritch pages of that rare biography by Frank Belknap Long, Jr [1] comes this seldom told story. Enjoy!

Lovecraft was known to be chronically late to appointments. In New York, he telephoned "Belknapius" to meet him at the Metropolitain Museum of Art. Belknap had to rush, as did they both, before the doors closed.

"There could be no mistaking Howard's swift, slightly jogging walk ... despite his geographic remoteness {as HPL sped down the street in his usal manner}." [2] "It was not a particularly crowded day at the Metropolitain Museum." [3] The Egyptian exhibit was to the right ... {there was no admission charge in those days} ... Howard became astoundingly eloquent. His erudition in the realm of Egyptology surprised me ... for the next half hour he conducted me on a guided tour ... talking continuously ... the we entered the tomb. It was ... the most marvelous of reconstructions ... it was then that Howard made a mistake later to be regretted. He ran his palm ... over the stone, in that most sancrosanct of mortuary chambers." [4]

"The swelling in Howard's hand did not begin until the following morning." [4] "... his hand swelled to twice its normal size. The edema ... turned ... Egyptian yellowish in hue ... for two or three days ... he was allergic to the tomb's porous, spice scented stone wall. Just how much Howard made out of this can readily be imagined." [5]

" 'There are certain people who are not permitted to enter ancient burial chambers. The old gentleman {i.e. HPL} is clearly one of them. A kinship was instantly recognized and resented. If I had lingered longer in that tomb, the slumbering malignancy activated by my presence might not have rested content with merely an attack on my hand.' " [5]

"When I saw him the following week, there was no stopping him from talking about it ... I had seen him rub his hand across the stone, but what of that? There was nothing, surely, to prevent such a presence from incorporating itself in the very texture of the stone as a malign, time-defying guardian of the burial chamber. ... nothing to prevent it but considerations of sobriety and common sense. But if it pleased Howard to ... engage in the sort of whimsical humorous pretense ... I was entirely in favor of it." [6]


1 Howard Phillips Lovecraft: Dreamer on the Night Side, Frank Belknap Long, Arkham House, Sauk Cuty, WI, 1975

2 p. 70

3 p. 72

4 p. 73

5 p. 74

6 p. 75

Lovecraft's Providence: Swan Point "Car" Stop



















This part of Providence in its earliest days had the cemetery. It also was a neighborhood.

From Chris Perridas' collection, hand-dated and postmarked 12 PM, 16 May 1906.

Lovecraft's Providence: View From Turkshead Building



































Another postcard from Chris Perridas' collection, postmarked Dec, 28, 1914.

note - click images and they should supersize a bit in a new window.

Lovecraft's Providence: Weybosset Street

A hubbub of commerce, downtown Providence was a powerhouse. This is a continuing series of glimpses from Lovecraft's childhood & adulthood - influences that made him who he became. [From a postcard in Chris Perridas' collection, postmarked December 28, 1914.]














Detail:








































The Painting: A King in Yellow Story by Chris Perridas

"I’m sorry," Thompson cleared his throat, "for the loss of your friend, Mr. Stuart."

Jeth Stuart sat in the lawyer’s office with all those brown, leather bound books forming an impenetrable wall. The huge cherry desk impeccably shined and loomed like Mr. Potter's had in front of Jimmy Stewart in It's a Wonderful Life. The proffered hand shake of the attorney, Owens Thompson, had been scurvy. When Stuart sat before Thompson's cherry wood desk throne the cushy thing nearly swallowed him whole. The oddest thing was a tiny yellow caterpillar crawling across the venetian blind. That wasn't Frank Capra. However, in the bright sunshine, the insect appeared to glow and it cast a weird golden shadow across Stuart's only clean white shirt.

“Mr. Stuart! Are you with me? I do have another appointment in a bit. I suspect we should get right to it."

Thompson rifled through some papers on his glossy desk and when he found the correct document he said in a formal tone, "Mr. Jethro Stuart, this letter allows me to act as Gerald Bates' executor. It is the only official record, but I assure you that the spatters of blood do not contain any untoward elements of disease - the crime scene experts tested thoroughly. When we are done, the document will go into the county records. However, if you wish a copy, I can make one available to you for a small fee.

Stuart said, “Listen, I know everything there is to know about Jerry. We grew up together and we've been through a lot of strange shit – uh - things. I was there that night - they called me over to identify his body. The whole place smelled like rotted fish, and there was wet slop all over the floor mixed in with his blood and brains. I guess I know he shot himself. We had that falling out a while back..."

Thompson interrupted, "You may know, then, that the only items of significance left in his small-furnished room were this letter and a painting. Apparently, Mr. Tyler purchased it an estate sale. Otherwise, there was no money, valuables, or furnishings except those belonging to the landlord.”

“I know he didn't have nothing except that once Jerry used to have quite a collection of horror books. He tried to get me interested back in high school, but I'm more of a comic book guy. He read Lovecraft a lot, but I never could figure out none of them big words that old weird writer used, so I only read one all the way through that one about Dagon. Didn't understand it, so I never picked up another one.

“I don't know when exactly, but his books disappeared a little at a time as he moved from one flop house to another and then there was all those drugs and all those chicks he got into after he visited Chicago and got into that cult shit ... uh, stuff. I'd stop by to see him, ask him to a basketball game or something, but he was either high or he was screwing some..."

"Mr. Stuart, I do have a few other appointments today. I think we need to move to conclude this business. The letter is very short."

'Jeth, you son of a bitch. I know what you did. You got paid by the cops to turn me in on that cocaine I had. Not the local guys, but the feds. Well, just 'cause we fell out over Linda, and she thought you had a small johnson, you didn't have to take it out on me. She wouldn't have stayed with you - or me - she's a free spirit. But you did what you did, and now I have to do what I have to do. I'm not going to jail, not when other dimensions call. Take a good look at my blown out brains, because the next time you see me I'm gonna have your ass in Hell and it'll be your brains splattered. '

Thompson pointed to a covered frame, “This is yours.” The attorney stood to end the legal ceremony.

“So there’s nothing to sign?” Stuart asked.

“No. It’s all taken care of, um, one of my pro bono cases for the city. Good day.”

With that, Jeth Stuart picked up the covered frame. It was then he saw that it had a caterpillar on it – the same yellow one from the window sill - so Stuart flicked the thing off. Thompson blanched as it hit his exquisite carpet.

Stuart ignored the secretaries' snide remarks about his blue jeans, went down the elevator, and out to his pickup truck.

He tossed the picture into the passenger seat, and took off. Stuart cranked up Toby Keith - and between Keith's verses and choruses - Stuart cursed his ex-friend Jerry.

Uppity Jerry had got that football scholarship after high school and went to that small college while Jeth Stuart stayed home to work at the factory until it closed. “Damned money grubbers – if it weren't one country taking American jobs, it were another.”

“Linda did like me - in fact we'd just was getting tight, when you came back home from school with that degree in history - as if that meant something. What did book learning ever get anyone in Lebanon Junction?”

Stuart hit the windshield washer. Threads of silk and thousands of little yellow caterpillars splashed against that windshield - each one making a tiny yellow dot sticky goo, until it looked like a jaundiced sheet of glass.

Stuart's gas gage was low, so pulled into a Speedy station on State Road 31. Inside, of all people, there was Linda buying lottery tickets.

"Hi, Jeth." She said, "guess you heard about Jerry." God she looked hot in that low cut yellow gingham.

"Yeah, I did, Linda. In fact, guess what that damned old bird did. He left me some crazy picture. No idea why."

"The - painting?" Linda turned pale.

"What do you know about it?" Jeth asked. "You and he – hey were you with him again?"

“Now, don't get all hot and bothered, Jeth. It's just that he and I bumped into each other a while back - at old man Tate’s estate sale. We aren't - weren't - together, not like that - he'd moved on, but he did have this thing - a wildness - so when he sat next to me, I figured I'd just let him. If I got up, he might've done I don't know what. He seemed anxious, nervous, maybe he was on drugs, but he talked normal.

“Anyway, you remember Mr. Tate, our English teacher in High School? You know he's the one that got Jerry into that Lovecraft stuff. Well, Old Tate, he died of something - maybe cancer – but no one ever said.

"Well when they brought out that painting, Jerry when he saw it – oh, God. He started breathing all funny. He must've known that Tate had it from years back – well he had to, they were so close, and I guess he just had to have it.

“He leaned over and told me about it - that it was some original - went way back to the 1920's - and it was used on one of those old fashioned pulp magazines Jerry liked to read. Y'know Tate must've had a bunch of them 'cause Jerry went on and on about reading them in Tate's basement - but they weren't nowhere at the estate auction - and then Jerry called the artist of the painting by name – something funny, a weird name, but I remember the last name, it was Smith.

"He bid on the thing – it was some dark something with a big old king smack in the middle, and in front of some run down old castle like out of a Dracula movie - and no one else wanted it so he got it for like $20.

“But then, Jerry leans over to me and says, 'Linda, I'm in a jam. I promise you, I'll pay you back, but you got to lend me the twenty bucks.'. I about told him where to go, but his eyes were so horrible looking, staring wild, and he scared me, Jeth. So, I did; I gave it to him right out of my purse.

"Jerry called me later – y'know, I never did get my money back - and I thought he was going to try to get me to go on a date or something, but instead, he opened up to me and said that there was some letters tucked in behind the picture frame's back-tack. Some correspondence between this Smith fellow and that Lovecraft guy he adored - talked about how this Smith guy and another writer – someone Chambers - didn’t hit it off. According to the letters, Lovecraft sent back some stuff to Smith who lived out there in California, but it was in Latin or something, so Jerry said he had to go up to Chicago to get it translated by his cult-friends up there. Ugh, those cult people give me the willies thinking about them.

"A few weeks later, he called and ...". Linda stopped cold. She grew silent for a moment.

Jeth asked, "And what."

"Well he said - that you'd called the cops - he'd ended up in jail - he'd ditched the cocaine before they got to him - they couldn't keep him - they'd be watching. God, he had such an awful drug habit - he used to tell me - when we was dating - that he needed the drugs to see visions. He said he had plans, big plans, but wouldn't tell me what they were, and then he said goodbye - all final like I'd never hear from him again - and I didn't. But I was glad – I think if it went on, and he hadn't stopped it, he might have killed me.

“Jeth, I used to dream that his cult-friends sacrificed me to some octopus.”

Stuart said, “Linda, I don;t know about no squid, but I bet he might've killed you. You shouldn't have left me for him.”

Linda ignored the remark, and said, “Well, there was one more thing, those letters from the Smith guy, they disappeared, Jerry said.

“One night, up in the Chicago motel - he told me - a big rat ran out from nowhere - grabbed the letters off the motel chair and the thing carried it into the wall - I guess to make a nest out of it. Jerry told me he was furious, that he ripped the plaster off the wall, but they were gone for good - nowhere in sight. But after he cooled down, he said it came to him in a vision what the Latin words on the letters meant - that he figured out what the rat was too - and that it was all okay.
“I don't know what he meant - but he laughed over the phone in a way that terrified me. He finally said, I got all I need, you'll see, Linda. Good-bye."

"Well that's some story, Linda.” Stuart suddenly saw a thing crawl on Linda's gingham dress. The caterpillar stared at him. Straight into his eyes, it seemed. He flicked the thing off. “Damned caterpillars are everywhere today.”

Linda said, “Well, I guess I better get on home."

Stuart said, “Linda, do you think ...” but Linda stopped him and placed her hand on his arm.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you, Jeth. There just is no - chemistry."

"Yeah." Stuart looked down. Linda kissed him on his unshaven cheek and walked away.

Stuart drove back to his trailer. The door was covered in the loathsome golden caterpillars, and he smashed them, hundreds of them, into a yellow soup. His hand was covered in yellow syrup that stunk like mildewed cabbage.

He went inside, washed his hands, and popped a cold one out of his small refrigerator. Then he set the cloth-covered painting on the ragged sofa.

"Maybe I can sell this thing?" he said out loud. He pulled the cloth away.

Just like Linda had said, it had a dark lake in the mid-ground and a tower loomed in the background. Two moons indicated that it was some outer space setting. In the front, some king stood holding some book. The king was dressed in pale robes, his back to the observer.
Stuart turned on the TV and after a second beer, dozed off.
In his dream, Jerry came to him. "You, Bastard, Jeth. Get ready, boy. It's not going to be pretty.”

Jeth woke up. It was already late because Jay Leno was telling some joke on the TV. He looked over at the painting, which was now different.

The king wasn’t facing away anymore. The monarch in yellow robes looked right at Jeth, his face covered by some pale mask. The book was tucked under his robed arm.

He fled to the kitchen drawer and Jeth threw out a fish lure, some poker cards, and then found the magnifying glass. He took the magnifier out and peered at the king who now was turned around with his back facing Stuart. The king was reading the book and over the king's golden shoulder, Stuart could actually see the words; the detail was amazing. Under the twin moons, through the looking glass, Stuart read, "The Play: Act One, The King in Yellow assists Gerald ."

Jeth layed the magnifier down and sat on the laz-e-boy. Leno was introding some movie star chick.

The painting changed again. The king's hand, pointed at Jeth, its forefinger motioning to join him.

Compelled, Jeth walked across the room as he ehard the actress say, "I had the best time making this movie. I'd never read Lovecraft before, but the writers did a marvelous job with the script. They say he was a recluse up in Rhode Island, but other people on the set who were into him said he was some kind of magic guy."

Jeth looked at the picture through the magnifier again. A monster - half-frog, half-alligator swam in the dark lake. The king had the book out in plain view so that Jeth read, "Act III, Jethro Stuart's demise."

Venom flowing with hate, jeth tried to kick the painting, but it was a strong as steel. After several blows, Jeth stopped and breathed heavily.

Leno asked, "And Julia, what about that one scene. The one with all the blood."

The actress said, "Yes, that was really eerie. I don;t know how the special effects guys managed to mix all that foam rubber and fake blood, but - she paused - I ahve to confess. It was so bloody, I actually threw up. tahnk goodness it wasn't real."

Jeth looked at the picture a final time. There, the king stood firmly in command and summoned with a royal gesture that Jeth should come to him. The other hand was firmly wrapped warmly around his departed enemy - Jerry Bates.

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: Market Street c. 1906



Lovecraft's Providence: Antecedents II

In "Mass Transit in Rhode Island, Part 10" in Old Rhode Island magazine, March 1995, by D. Scott Molloy, he states that the first trolley in Providence was in 1892.

Union (Horse) Railroad Company, Rhode island's largest mass transit carrier, survived several competitive scares in the late 1880s. Though, the town of Woonsocket had hosted the first regular streetcar service in the state in September 1887 ... the venture quickly failed. Two years later the Newport Street Railway overcame the outrage of wealthy summer colonists in the City-by-the-Sea who wanted no street rivals for their expensive carriages and regular trolley service began in August 1889 ... the Cable Tramway Company ... initiated service over College Hill in December 1889 and threatened a head-to-head challenge for other routes.

The Union railroad considered the promise of electric propulsion so in the Spring of 1889 the Union Railroad petitioned the Providence city council to experiment. The Julien Electric Traction Company, using the technology of Belgian inventors, introduced the concept of battery power in New York City. If successful, battery powered streetcars would not require poles, overhead wires and other unsightly appurtenances. Cellular energy also tempered public anxiety over potential fire hazards. The Union Railroad felt the overhead trolley method would not work well in the narrow, constricted streets of Providence so management took Mayor William Barker, city clerk Henry Joslin, and the entire railroad committee to New York to witness the Belgian battery system in person. The visitors rode battery-operated streetcars and inspected property on the Fourth Street and Madison Avenue Railroad. The party was impressed and the Union Railroad felt vindicated that it had not hastily embraced the overhead wire concept.

Two special streetcars, designed by John Stephenson and Company, arrived in Providence in October 1889. Horses pulled the battery cars to the Elmwood Avenue Carbarn where the company prepared facilities to charge batteries, popularly known as "buckets of lightning." But before trial runs began, a New York court placed an injunction against the Julien Company, halting further experiments until design and engineering litigation with a competitor was settled.

The Union Railroad quickly changed plans and took city officials to Boston for an examination of an overhead electric system employed by the West End Street Railway. In June 1890 the Union Railroad began belated experiments with battery cars after a judge lifted the Julien injunction. A promotional trip hosted Reeves' American Band to Pawtuxet. "The band played enlivening music while passing up Westminster Street and an admiring throng watched the strange object." But there were too many problems with battery streetcars, said Union Railroad spokesmen. Batteries required frequent and prolonged charging and were virtually inoperative on moderate inclines.

{Like College Hill - CP}

In late October 1890 the city council's railroad committee unanimously endorsed the Union Railroad petition for general electrification. But the economic warfare was intense ... The annual report of the horse railway underscored seventeen million passengers, a fleet of 1,515 horses and 301 horsecars, and another 8-percent dividend for the tenth year in a row. Finally by 1891, the legislation passed.

Needing no further encouragement, a syndicate of land speculators bought large tracts of unimproved land along the Pawtuxet line. One advertisement lauded the village as Pawtuxet-By-The-Sea, offering "Unobstructed view of the Narragansett from Squantum on the north to Rocky Point and Prudence Island on the south, while on the west the twilight splendors of the blue ribbed hills, bathed in the purple glory of the setting sun, give sweet repose." Thirty new homes appeared by the end of the year even before the advent of electric trolley service.
By the end of 1891 the Union Railroad tested electric streetcars along Broad Street into Pawtuxet. The inaugural public trips ran smoothly on January 20, 1892, despite having to share some tracks with slower horsecars. Curiosity seekers and commuters thronged the trolleys on a day when the temperature never reached freezing. Frost on the windows interfered with any sightseeing. The motorman, who operated the trolley on a front platform with no protecting shield, was described by a reporter as being "done up to the crown of his hat in storm clothes." A conductor, who enjoyed some warmth inside the vehicle, collected the nickel fares. A skilled electrical engineer road the rails that day in case of unforeseen emergencies.

{Lovecraft was 2 years old, and about to move back to the Phillips' household to a revolutionary and modern Providence - CP}.

Lovecraft's Providence: Antecedents

In 2006 we are 116 years removed from Lovecraft's birth and 69 years from his death. He never saw WWII, Hiroshiima, Neil Armstrong, or Viking on Mars. Yet, he was a product of his times.

Poe, in many respects, was closer to HPL than he to us. Lovecraft lived in the greatest revolutionary period in American history - perhaps rivaled by the advent of the information age. When he was a kid, there were no airplanes, automobiles, and few electric anythings. By the time he became middle age, he could have flown to Havanna in several hours, watched television, and road a speedster automobile. He died 20 years before the space race, but he (and other scientifiction writers) clearly saw the future - and it wasnt always "Better Living through Chemistry" or "We light up your life".

Here is a little excerpt that brings home the historical trajectory that created the Providence of HPL's life, memory and caused him to declare, "I am Providence".

"Providence, the capitol city of Rhode Island,was situated about 60 miles south of Boston and 200 miles north of New York City. The city is one of the oldest in the country, founded in 1636 by Roger Williams. Williams founded Providence (which he named for God's guidance and care) as a haven for persecuted religious dissenters . Early colonists called this the lively experiment.

"By the late 18th century, the town gained economic momentum, and its transportation network was expanded. Providence had a flourishing maritime trade and a stagecoach line. In the early 1800's Providence grew from town to city. The advent of steam power brought manufacturing and textile mills to the rivers. It wasn't long before a system of canals and turnpikes was developed to enable the transport of goods."

{This was the Providence of Poe - CP}

"By 1835, the iron horse had come to Providence from Boston. ...In 1848, the Union Passenger Depot was built to serve as a terminus for many of the trains coming through the city. The Hartford, Providence, and Fishkill line was completed in 1854, connecting the city with the Hudson River. The year after, the Providence, Warren, and Bristol line was completed to provide access to the East Bay. This road was extended to Fall River in 1860.

"The city's transportation system was further improved with the funding of a major road improvement program. The program widened and extended existing streets and built new cross streets and bridges. "

{Watch for this in the postcards I post. The streets are enormously wide for pedestrian traffic and horses, but they needed to be sloped for drain offs and to keep from turning to mud in rainstorms. - CP}

"Waterborne transportation was also enhanced when a portion of the Providence River was dredged in 1853 to allow for new and larger vessels to come to port. "

{The Providence River is a virtual canal by 1900 - CP}

"During the Civil War decade, Providence continued to grow and develop. It was then that urban mass transit came to the city. The horsecar, which relied on horses to pull streetcars on rails, became a popular mode of travel. The horsedrawn trolley lines were laid throughout and beyond the city, allowing people to disperse to the suburburbs. "

{This would have been the hey-day of Whipple Phillips who no doubt made and lost fortunes betting on this technology - CP}


"By the late 1880s, advances in electric technology led to the replacement of horsedrawn trolleys by electric trolleys. At the turn of the century, Americans saw the birth of the automobile. "

{One wonders, as Lovecraft's father went to convention at the 1880's Chicago Fair, perhaps contracting a noxious social disease there, and saw all the marvels of cars and planes. - CP}

"However, it wasn't until 1908 with the release of Henry Ford's Model T that the automobile became widely accepted into the American way of life. The advent of the American automobile fundamentally changed Providence's transportation system. Roads were quickly built, paved, and widened to accomodate this new mode of travel. "

{HPL would have been exiting his teen years and entered his hermitry at this exact moment}

http:// envstudies.brown.edu/ Thesis/ 2004/ Rachel_Kwok/ thesis /bkgd_hist.htm

Friday, May 05, 2006

Lovecraft's Providence: Angell Street

Henry L P Beckwith, Jr [*] has written a marvelous tour of Lovecraft's hometown. In it he discusses Angell Street at length.

"...on the northwest corner {of Elmgrove Avenue and Angeel Street} is Lovecraft's birthpalce {454 Angell Street}. The original lot was far larger than the present corner lot, extending north two-thirds of the way to Adelphi Avenue and west to Angell Court. Continuing west you will quickly come to an area where the north side of Angell Street is bordered by a high wall ... a forty acre tract ... originally set aside and walled as Dexter Asylum, a poor farm, in the nineteenth century. Within was a marvelously Charles-Addamsish residence for the inmates ... {when Brown University purchased the property there was an auction} ...a group of old wooden coffins.

"Number 276 Angell Street, now Hamilton House, is the "sumptuous, but hideous French-roofed mansion," that {Lovecraft designated as 'the Archer Harris House' in The Shunned House. It is a remarkable building built in the early twentieth century rather than in 1876, and Lovecraft dates it.

"The original home lots ... ran from The Towne Street (North and South Main Streets) up and over College Hill to what is now Hope Street as long narrow strips.

"The piece allotted to Thomas Angell in 1636 was a bit north of Angell Street, which is named for him."

[1] Lovecraft's Providence & Adjacent parts, Henry L. P. Becwith, Jr., Donlad M Grant, West Kingston, RI, 1979, pp. 59-63

Here are the very few snapshots of Angell Street I could locate.












^598 Angell, HPL's birthplace.

















^The Archer Harris House, aka, 276 Angell Street






















^598 Angell Street

















c. 1907 Angell Street

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Lovecraft Legend

Swan Point cemetery has the grave of HPL, among other luminaries. "Lovecraft fans gather at his grave each year on or around the anniversary of his death - March 15 - to commemorate his work. Attendees say that Lovecraft himself often appears in teh form "something strange" at these gatherings. One year it was a cackle of crows loudly accompanying the spoken tributes, while another year it was an unexpected snow squall."

Stones and Bones of New England: A Guide to Unusual, Historic, and Otherwise Notable Cemeteries, Lisa Rogak, The Globe Pequot Press, Guilford, CT, 2004, p. 161, 162.

Lovecraft's Providence: Westminster Street

Complete with his beloved Trolley cars, this image from Chrispy's collection shows the hustle and bustle of circa 1905 Providence. Recently, Lovecraft's handwriting was noted as cramped and cribbed. This is a more typical cursive of the era from the back and front of this card. Howard would have just turned 15 on August 20, 1905.

I think if you click the image you will see an expanded size view in a new window. If things are not clear, let me know. I'll rescan so you can see even more detail.


Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Catacombs of Ptolemais

A note on The Picture in the House (Decemebr 1920) per ST Joshi in his Penguin edition states in note 1: "catacombs of Ptolemais: Ptolemais was a coastal city in Cyrenaica (now Libya) and was given its name by Ptolemy III (Euergetes) of Egypt (r. 247-222 ВСЕ), who united Cyrenaica with Egypt. There do not appear to be any catacombs there; but a modern traveler makes note of "the huge Hellenistic tower-tomb, placed high on a cube of solid rock jutting up in isolation above the city's largest ancient quarry, the building stone has been hacked away to leave it free on its pinnacle. The tomb stands over forty feet high, a pink monolith, and was constructed for multiple burial; but no one is clear for whom." Anthony Thwaite, The Deserts of Hesperides: An Experience of Libya (London: Seeker & Warburg, 1969), p. 73."

The text in question states (in the opening paragraph)

“Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places. For them are the catacombs of Ptolemais, and the carven mausolea of the nightmare countries. They climb to the moonlit towers of ruined Rhine castles, and falter down black cobwebbed steps beneath the scattered stones of forgotten cities in Asia. The haunted wood and the desolate mountain are their shrines, and they linger around the sinister monoliths on uninhabited islands. But the true epicure in the terrible, to whom a new thrill of unutterable ghastliness is the chief end and justification of existence, esteems most of all the ancient, lonely farmhouses of backwoods New England; for there the dark elements of strength, solitude, grotesqueness, and ignorance combine to form the perfection of the hideous.”

I believe the indomitable scholar has omitted an obvious Poe allusion. Here are a few select portions of SHADOW –A PARABLE by Edgar Allan Poe, 1850 (elsewhere referenced as 1835).


"Over some flasks of the red Chian wine, within the walls of a noble hall, in a dim city called Ptolemais, we sat, at night, a company of seven. And to our chamber there was no entrance save by a lofty door of brass: and the door was fashioned by the artisan Corinnos, and, being of rare workmanship, was fastened from within. Black draperies, likewise, in the gloomy room, shut out from our view the moon, the lurid stars, and the peopleless streets–but the boding and the memory of Evil they would not be so excluded. There were things around us and about of which I can render no distinct account–things material and spiritual–heaviness in the atmosphere–a sense of suffocation–anxiety–and, above all, that terrible state of existence which the nervous experience when the senses are keenly living and awake, and meanwhile the powers of thought lie dormant. A dead weight hung upon us. It hung upon our limbs–upon the household furniture–upon the goblets from which we drank; and all things were depressed, and borne down thereby–all things save only the flames of the seven lamps which illumined our revel. Uprearing themselves in tall slender lines of light, they thus remained burning all pallid and motionless; and in the mirror which their lustre formed upon the round table of ebony at which we sat, each of us there assembled beheld the pallor of his own countenance, and the unquiet glare in the downcast eyes of his companions. Yet we laughed and were merry in our proper way–which was hysterical; and sang the songs of Anacreon–which are madness; and drank deeply–although the purple wine reminded us of blood.



And at length I, Oinos, {oinos means "wine" in Greek - CP} speaking some low words, demanded of the shadow its dwelling and its appellation. And the shadow answered, "I am SHADOW, and my dwelling is near to the Catacombs of Ptolemais, and hard by those dim plains of Helusion which border upon the foul Charonian canal."

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