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The Torture Colony: an article by Bruce Falconer about Paul Schaefer, a German evangelist whose utopia in Chile helped the Pinochet regime perform torture and execution | The American Scholar
In a remote part of Chile, an evil German evangelist built a utopia whose members helped the Pinochet regime perform its foulest deeds
oobject » 15 images of not so secret secret service buildings
The original British Secret Service headquarters was just that, secret. But the increase in importance of electronics meant that it was more important for a building to be invisible to electronic eavesdropping. as such the current M16 HQ in London is about as obvious a giant sign saying ’secret building here’, yet it is enclosed in a giant Faraday cage to protect its communications.
Not all Intelligence agencies have had a discrete architectural past, Franco’s House of Screams, or the Soviet Lubyanka are demonstrably terrifying. Mossad’s HQ, until the 60s or the current Australian Secret Intelligence Service look quite modest compared to the hardly known Ministry of National Security of Azerbaijan, which houses its intelligence service, in a large and monolithic building of dramatic proportions.
Subterranea Britannica: Sites:West Norwood Cemetery Catacombs
Site Name: West Norwood Cemetery Catacombs
Atlas Obscura | Wondrous, curious, and bizarre locations around the world
Welcome to the Atlas Obscura, a compendium of this age's wonders, curiosities, and esoterica. The Atlas Obscura is a collaborative project with the goal of cataloging all of the singular, eccentric, bizarre, fantastical, and strange out-of-the-way places that get left out of traditional travel guidebooks and are ignored by the average tourist. If you're looking for miniature cities, glass flowers, books bound in human skin, gigantic flaming holes in the ground, phallological museums, bone churches, balancing pagodas, or homes built entirely out of paper, the Atlas Obscura is where you'll find them.
The Atlas Obscura depends on our community of far-flung explorers to find and report back about the world's wonders and curiosities. If you have been to, know of, or have heard about a place that belongs in the Atlas Obscura, we want you to tell us about it. Anyone and everyone is welcome and encouraged to nominate places for inclusion, and to edit content already in the Atlas.
11870.com: the best services in your area
the best services in your area
the service guide with reviews and images by friends and users
IINJECTION 004 EARTH FROM ABOVE | iinsight
Tired of seeing it from down there ? Great ! After those great inspirational masterpieces we saw in number two I defy you to travel around the world and see more from above. With the help of two photographers I will select and show you the best shots on the color fight between human vs nature. Let’s go for round one. I bet you enjoy belonging to all of this… aerial photography
Danvers | MetaFilter
A website has been launched to preserve the history of Danvers State Insane Asylum. The Asylum, which opened in 1878 in Danvers, MA (site of the Salem Witch Trials) and closed in 1992, was featured in the horror movie Session 9, and may have been the inspiration for HP Lovecraft's Arkham Asylum. Its Kirkbride Wings, which once held the institution's living quarters, now house a 400+ unit apartment complex.
Unfortunately, Avalon Communities destroyed most of the hospital in order to build their apartments. Danvers is also not the first asylum to be turned into consumer residences.
The Danvers gallery includes excellent, evocative images from John Gray, who specializes in photographing "abandoned architectural environments."
The "Kirkbride Buildings" link was part of a former FPP. Fascinating stuff. Pennsylvania psychiatrist Thomas Kirkbride literally wrote the book (pdf link) on the construction of massive mental hospitals through the "Moral Treatment". In all, approximately 30 US hospitals were designed according to the Kirkbride Plan.
rest area history
Rest areas are to be provided on Interstate highways as a safety measure. Safety rest areas are off-road spaces with provisions for emergency stopping and resting by motorists for short periods. They have freeway type entrances and exit connections, parking areas, benches and tables and may have toilets and water supply where proper maintenance and supervision are assured. They may be designed for short-time picnic use in addition to parking of vehicles for short periods.
Stages of Decay | MetaFilter
Julia Solis, who brought us Dark Passage (previously), is still exploring derelict sites, both subterranean and in urban decay. Her most recent project is Abandoned Theaters, a look at grand old movie palaces, school auditoriums, and theaters that have become, shall we say, retired. Julia still keeps a photoblog that she calls Dark Passage Travelogue, and partnering with Suzy Poling, she chronicles the decrepitude of hospitals long abandoned in Fantastic Degradation.
Life in a North Korean Concentration Camp | MetaFilter
North Korea's concentration camps reportedly contain over half a million citizens, and is possibly one of the worst cases of systematic human rights abuses occurring in the world today. Ahn Myong Chol, an ex-prison guard, describes the conditions of the inmates of Camp 22, in objective and chilling detail. On medical experiments being performed on prisoners: "....the glass chamber has 3 main subdivisions: one is for blood experiments, another is for poison gas, and the third is for suffocation gas. 3 or 4 people, normally a family, are experimented on. The scientists sit around the edge and watch from above...".
Chol's description of camp life, the psychology of being a prison guard and his victims: "If I was in a bad mood, I would find an excuse (to torture.) It's just like pigs or dogs. You could beat them everyday without caring if they lived or died. Everyday. For around 3 years I enjoyed torturing people."
Shin Dong Hyuk, a young man who was actually born into a prison camp, is the only known survivor to escape Camp 14. Now in South Korea, he tells the stunning story of what is was like to be born in a prison camp, and the stark contrast of life outside of it. "Mothers get beaten during their work so they come home and beat their kids to relieve stress. We only called our parents mom and dad. There is no caring relationship between the parents and their children like in South Korea. I had never felt it even once."
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Ross Racine - artwork
Ross Racine's work may be interpreted as models for planned communities as much as aerial views of fictional suburbs, referencing the computer as a tool for urban planning as well as image capture.
Abandoned Places In The World
When starting on this post for some reason I was thinking that there are not many abandoned places in the world, at least the cities. I knew there are many villages, farms and just lonely houses all around the world but when thousands of people leave, leaving the whole city dead that’s a real tragedy. There are mainly two reasons why people suddenly or little by little leave the place where they used to live for years or even generations: that’s the danger and economic factors. The biggest number of abandoned villages and farms can be found in Unites States and the countries of the former USSR.
Visiting abandoned places is getting more and more popular these days and many tourist agencies offer special tours where people can meet the ghost cities and villages face to face. I have never been to any of these and frankly speaking I don’t want to. I thinks we should leave the ghosts in peace, especially in the places like Pripyat where the horrible tragedy took place.
Still hobbies differ and surfing online we can find photographer’s websites fully devoted to abandoned places like this one www.abandoned-places.com or Lost America photo stream.
The abandoned places can look charming or they can look frightening, we tried to present it all. The abandoned cities of the former USSR look almost like clones and they resemble the concentration camps from the times of the World War II.
In any case, that’s the history we should know about, so le’ts get started.
India and South Asian resources | MetaFilter
Dr. Frances W. Pritchett, Professor of Modern Indic Languages at Columbia University, New York, has created a superb online collection of resources, all about India and South Asia, its art, history, literature, architecture and culture. Her Indian Routes section (the Index page) is a particularly rich resource. Her vast, colorful and informative site also has many great images. Check out her "scrapbook pages" on the Princes l the Ghaznavids l British Rule l Women's Spaces l Perspectives on Hinduism.
Photos of Professor Pritchett and her encyclopedic page of links about India/South Asia, Morningside Mix.
Choog, Choog, Choog, Choog... Tweeeeeet! | MetaFilter
Come, take a Train Ride through India. You could take the Palace on Wheels, and opt for a Luxurious Travel. Or, you can take one of the Super-Fast Trains here, according to Indian standards that is. And hey, while you're at it, how about taking a train ride to one of our Hill Stations?
Some of the Trains have even made it to the Best Train Rail Adventures list in the World...
And Ashok Kumar's song (watch it till the end) Rail Gaadi, which means Train in English, is not to be missed... even if you don't understand Hindi--learn it (please)!
Atlas Obscura | MetaFilter
Karl Junker House is just one of the locations on Atlas Obscura from Curious Expeditions.
There aren't many pictures of any of the locations but it's only been up for a week. The pictures that are there are too small to see much detail, I'd like to see them change that. In the meantime here is the Junker House website and an interior shot.
Isla del encanto? | MetaFilter
With all the dust that's been* riled up by Obama's nomination of Sonia Sotomayor (previously), everyone is suddenly taking an interest in Puerto Rico. A basic question that may come up is why we're there in the first place. Understanding that, we can see how the complicated relationship has played out between Puerto Rico, the US, and, most recently, the United Nations. Although the UN has urged the US to take steps towards establishing Puerto Rico's sovereignty, referendums held on the island have overwhelmingly preferred the status quo and the US has been indifferent at best. But independence activists, after a twenty-year decline, may be on the rise. The island's current governor, Luis Fortuño, is pro-statehood. But the whole issue has taken a back seat since plans have been made to fire 30,000 government workers, privatize some public services, and sell some the the government's US$3.2 billion debt.
Still recovering from the 2006 economic crisis that some say never ended and struggling with a 15% unemployment rate, Puerto Rico's future is cloudy.
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