Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Lab #7 Baconsfield Park

In 1911 United States Senator Augustus O. Bacon executed a will that devised to the Mayor and Council of the City of Macon, Georgia, a tract of land which, after the death of the Senator's wife and daughters, was to be used



 The will provided that the park should be under the control of a Board of Managers of seven persons, all of whom were to be white. The city kept the park segregated for some years but in time took the position that the park was a public facility which it could not constitutionally manage and maintain on a segregated basis.

The city of Macon gave up their role as trustee and appointed three new trustees and the Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed, holding that Senator Bacon had the right to give and bequeath his property to a limited class, that charitable trusts are subject to supervision of a court of equity, and that the power to appoint new trustees so that the purpose of the trust would not fail was clear.  The case is here on a writ of certiorari.

U.S. Supreme Court

EVANS v. NEWTON, 382 U.S. 296 (1966)

382 U.S. 296 EVANS ET AL. v. NEWTON ET AL.
CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF GEORGIA.
No. 61.
Argued November 9-10, 1965.
Decided January 17, 1966. 
 
 
Result:

Under the circumstances of this case, we cannot but conclude that the public character of this park requires that it be treated as a public institution subject to the command of the Fourteenth Amendment (granted equal protection of the laws), regardless of who now has title under state law. We may fairly assume that had the Georgia courts been of the view that even in private hands the park may not be operated for the public on a segregated basis, the resignation would not have been approved and private trustees appointed. We put the matter that way because on this record we cannot say that the transfer of title per se disentangled the park from segregation under the municipal regime that long controlled it.
Since the judgment below gives effect to that purpose, it must be and is

Reversed. 

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Lab #6: Munsell Color System, Community Gardens and Soil Testing

Munsell Color System:
The Munsell color system is a color space that specifies colors based on three color dimensions: hue, value (lightness), and chroma (color purity). It was created by Professor Albert H. Munsell in the first decade of the 20th century and adopted by the USDA as the official color system for soil research in the 1930s.

How to use the Munsell color chart:

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

MegaFlood Lab #5

Glacial Lake Missoula Video!:
Eratics: Boulders scattered around the Scabland that do not match the rock types found in those areas.
Glaciers move down from Canada scraping and reforming the landforms.
Hanging Valleys: glaciers enter valleys and enlarge them.
Problem: Glaciers didn't reach Scabland!
Then ripples were discovered.
J Harlen Bretz challenged the view that most landforms had formed over long periods of time by saying a megaflood changed the landscape nearly over night. 900 ft deep..a body of water raging through the scabland making its way to the pacific. People dismissed his theory.
Where did the water come from?!
JT Pardee
Missoula Montana. Epic confrontation between water and ice.
Scratches on rock show glacial migration.
Glacier created a lake by damming a river.
Glacial Lake Missoula.  250 miles away.
Joesph T. Pardee- knew about the lake. But had no proof of where it had gone.
He found ripples that indicated a movement of the huge body of water that pointed towards the scablands.
What caused the lake to empty?
Proof found on Iceland. Matthew Roberts work..ice dams.
1996 huge body of water flowed through southern Iceland.
At the base of the ice dam the pressure of the area prevents ice from freezing/expanding. Super cooled ice.
Super cooled water trickles through the cracks in the ice which creates friction that releases heat.
The water moves through the glaciers and melts the ice.

Responsible for the collapse of the ice dam at Glacial Lake Missoula
2.5 Trillion tons of water surging across American northwest.
The pressure of the water in the tunneled ice dam becomes too much and it collapses creating a hole that water pours out of.
Dry Falls. How could water create that!? It's normally carved out by glaciers.
And potholes? How did water create that?
Scale independent. They did a model experiment and it looks just like the real ones!
Massive amounts of water can carve out these craters and make it look like years of erosion.
What about the potholes?
The put a hard object in a flow of water and turned the speed of the water up.
Bubble streams. The bubbles collapse against the object creating a sledgehammer effect.
So can bubbles gouge holes in solid rocks like those in the scabland?!
YES!
Underwater vortex/tornado of bubbles carving out rocks.
Boulders were flung everywhere.
1980, Bretz got Penrose Medal!
There may have been more than one gigantic flood!
Big canyon with many layered deposits shows ash from Mt. St. Helen.
Ash fell into water and drifted into layer? Not likely for this amazing clear line.
This suggests that there may have been many gigantic floods!
Dating the sediment takes time.
The top and bottom layers are 20,000 years apart!
:o!
Floods were regular on the scablands during the Ice Age!



Scablands

Scablands (along Highway 90)