The Look of Robotics 2022/23

Here's the logo for the 2022/23 iteration of the FIRST robotics team.  It will look good on shirts, pit artwork and a new team flag.  

I have heard idle chatter from the Media/PR subteam that I'll have to wear a bright pink wig if the team achieves certain benchmarks (which are very much under discussion!).  I think this will look as good with that ridiculous get up as anything would.

Thomas McBean and the First Drug Store in Chippewa Falls

Occasionally a topic of local history catches my fancy for reasons related to my past profession.  When I was a practicing physician I called in/wrote out a lot of prescriptions.  I got to know the area pharmacists reasonably well and became interested in the history of the small town drug store.  In our times an awful lot more pills are moving around the system but most are sold by mail in services or soulless Big Box outfits and we have lost something of our culture.   Back in the day the drug store was a place to pick up medicines of variable efficacy, get a fancy drink at the soda fountain, perhaps buy a few magazines and other small items.

Getting to the beginning of the pharmacy business in my little town is not entirely straightforward.  The best sources are archived newspapers and county histories and both have gaps especially in the early years.  But near as I can tell this was the first drug store in town:

Thomas McBean had an interesting line of wares.  Interestingly compounded prescriptions were one of the few things he did not advertise as being for sale.  Then as now drug stores made a large share of their profit from things other than prescriptions.  Patent medicines were very popular and profitable in that day and age.  Many of them were just fancy versions of the alcohol "for medicinal purposes" that were also a staple.

Note the date, January 26th, 1867.  We know the store was in existence earlier than that as the following "Business Card" ad goes as far back as the extant copies of the Chippewa Union Times run:  ALEX McBEAN PHYSICIAN AND SURGEON Offices at the Drug Store, Chippewa Falls, Wisc.  2y1.  The last notation is cryptic, I speculate that it means the ad had been running for two years, i.e. from 1865.  That would fit with the biography of the McBeans.   Notice that the reference is to "the" Drug Store.  While I can't exclude a small earlier enterprise it seems McBean had the field to himself by the mid 1860's.

Alexander McBean and Thomas were father and son.  The family moved to Chippewa Falls from, of all places, Jamaica.  The winters must have come as a surprise.  Arriving in 1856 they were true pioneers of the community.  Alexander was the first physician in the area.  Thomas was 13 and described as "a small boy in knee pants".  It seems he had a grand time growing up in a rough and tumble village that had perhaps 300 inhabitants on his arrival.  In later life he became a nostalgic historian and had his reminiscences of early Settler's Days published often in the local paper.

In the late 1850's McBean the younger clerked for H.S. Allen the pioneering timber magnate.  But with the outbreak of the Civil War both father and son enlisted in the Union Army.  Alexander was an Assistant Surgeon with the Second Wisconsin Volunteer Cavalry regiment.  Thomas was a hospital steward in the same unit, no doubt working directly with his father.  It must have been a busy education, the official record of the Regiment indicates that during the war they lost 312 men.....288 of them to disease!  We tend to forget that non combat deaths in earlier conflicts outnumbered those caused by enemy action, especially in units such as the 2nd Cavalry.  They spent a lot of time patrolling and chasing irregular Confederate bands, very little in major battles.

When the Second Cavalry mustered out in Austin Texas in 1865 one assumes the McBeans returned home.  Three years spent as a hospital steward plus the direct supervision of his father were more than enough credentials to start a drug store circa '65 or '66.  As is often the case with early institutions the paper saw no need to give an address....everyone knew where the Drug Store was.  The store was probably on Spring Street.

Perhaps it was the improvised training, perhaps just the tendency in times past for Men of Prominence to wear multiple hats, but other than ads there is not much substance to McBean's history as a druggist.  He is known to have had a partner named Frank McElvey in the early days.  By March of 1867 McBean bought him out.  There seems by the way to have been a very early club of local Scotsmen in town....McBean turns up on the membership roster of this "Caledonia Club".

Perhaps reflecting his other interests Thomas McBean became County Clerk in 1869, and is said to have studied law although never to have taken the bar exam.  The drug store business was becoming competitive as 1870 approached.  An energetic new firm called Foles and Hinckley had arrived and another man named Leroy Martin had a store.  The picture with Martin is very unclear, McBean is said to have sold half his stock to Martin who then set up in direct competition.  Martin being a former dry goods and grocery proprietor did not thrive in the business and was gone by the early 1870's.  

 

In 1875 two things happened in close succession.  Thomas McBean opened a new store on Bridge Street "At the Sign of the Golden Mortar", and he again sold a portion of the business this time to H.S. Allen, the same man he'd worked for almost 20 years earlier.  This seems to be at or near the end of McBean's career as a druggist.  As the story of drug stores in Chippewa Falls subsequently gets a lot more complicated lets set it aside for now.

After his days as a druggist McBean pursued other interests.  He was prominent in the local Democratic party.  He used his legal training to assist his fellow Civil War veterans, on numerous occasions helping destitute old soldiers receive improved pensions.  Eventually he settled into a career in real estate with a particular interest in selling land in the northern parts of the state.  But there was still a sense of restlessness to his career.  On several occasions the papers reported that he was about to relocate to take up a new business situation but these generally did not come to pass.

Later in life both he and his wife began to have declining health.  It was at this point that he began writing extensively for the local paper, with spirited accounts of the early days of Chippewa Falls.  His memory seems quite clear, but as to the total accuracy of his stories, well its hard to tell when he speaks with the authority of "One of the Last of the Old Settlers".

Supposedly he was going to compile these into a history of the community but was unable to bring the project to completion before his death in 1924.  Proud to the end of his Civil War service he died in the Old Soldiers Home in Waupaca but was buried in Chippewa Falls.  His tombstone in Hope Cemetery is a simple one.  Just his name and HOSP. STEWARD 2 WI CAV.

We'll resume the history of early drug stores another day...

 

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Memories of The Golden Goat

Sometimes it is a small thing that can set me off on a journey of discovery.  Recently in a conversation somebody mentioned the automatic can collecting machines you used to see here and there.  This brought back memories.  Memories of The Golden Goat.

These don't seem to have ever been common, but you'd run across them sometimes.  Bulky, shed like machines, they would usually be sitting in the parking lots of grocery stores.  They had a hopper into which you'd toss aluminum cans.  There would then be a remarkable series of spinning, clanking and rattling sounds and - if it was working properly - a few coins would plink out into your hands.  It was a bit like a gigantic slot machine where you always won just a little.  They looked like this:

Back in the early 90's we had a Goat down the hill from us.  And it made an impression on one of my kids who was then roughly five years old.  He and I would gather up cans, from our own use, that of the next door neighbors and others from who knows where.  Down the hill we went pulling a wagon load.  In go the cans.  Clanking and rattling commenced.  Coins dropped into a small eager hand one at a time.  

This young lad went on to become very mechanically adept, as well as being quite the capitalist.  I credit The Goat.  So what's the story of these machines?

They were invented by a John "Tyke" Miller of Phoenix Arizona.  He applied for a patent in 1979, receiving it two years later.  Miller died soon thereafter and I have to date learned nothing more about him.  The machines appear to have been manufactured by the Golden Recycling Company of Golden Colorado.  They were marketed primarily in the West and Midwest.  

One account I read says they compressed the cans into 20 pound cubes that were referred to as "biscuits".  These would then be bundled together into larger units that weighed 2,240 pounds and would be hauled off by semis to be recycled.

There were issues with these machines.  They didn't always work for one thing.  Sometimes they'd take your cans and give you nothing.  More valuable life lessons for the lad, but not good for repeat custom.

They were also messy.  Throw in thousands of empty cans, squish them into compact biscuits and you can easily imagine what happens to the drips of beer and soda that were often present.  They would be squeezed out, intermingled and ooze out the bottom of the machine.  This was messy, smelly and attracted yellow jackets.  

Mentions of Golden Goat machines - mostly complaints - are scattered through the 1990's and beyond, but after the Millennium they were probably in decline.  The last definite sighting I ran across was in Appleton Wisconsin in 2016.  Our local example used to sit on this spot.  The power that ran it came out of that adjacent pylon, which I think once held the sign of the grocery store on the site.  The yellow color is coincidence.

A curious footnote.  When looking for internet mentions of the Golden Goat machines I kept running across references to marijuana.  As this is a subject in which I have no interest at all it took me a while to figure out the connection.  Evidently a marijuana breeder in Topeka Kansas had an inadvertent cross breeding event.  One of the parent plants was called "Romulan" for some reason.  The resultant hybrid had a distinctive odor that reminded the breeder of the peculiar smells that emanated from the local can recycling machine.  Thus was born the Golden Goat strain of cannabis.  

It's never a good day unless you learn something new.

Old Badger Philosophizes about the Hunt

Deer Hunting camp is obviously much more about family time and establishing traditions than lesser concerns like putting meat in the freezer.  Per last posting one of the traditions has become....the deer outsmart Grandpa.  This amuses the grandchildren considerably and I try to play my role with good grace.  I call it the Old Badger scenario.

Old Badger is one of the central characters in a book we read to the small ones.  A old badger, presumably a grandparent, is off in the woods showing Young Badger how the world works.  It is organized around a series of questions framed thusly:

In the book the little imp is always inquiring as to whether OB can still do things like climb trees.  The revered ancient replies that He probably could if he had to but prefers to sit under the tree and let the apples drop down for him.

Regards my relative lack of success in deer hunting....

"Old Badger, can you still climb up into a tree stand?"

"Well yes, Young Badger I can, but it takes a bit longer and its a lot less comfortable than it was at your age"

"Old Badger, can you even see the deer when they walk by?"

"What the.....well, yes Young Badger, I still see 'em.  Maybe not from as far away as when I was your age.  At which point in time I had far better manners."

"Ha, ha!  Old Badger, would you drag a deer out of the woods or would it drag you?"

"(unintelligible mumblings) Now let me tell you a couple of things you insolent scamp.  When Uncle Badger needed help dragging one in it sure wasn't you that he called!  And when I got a deer a couple seasons back I dragged it over a mile to get it in.  Uphill."

"Old Badger, that wasn't a very big deer was it?"

"(further unintelligibal mumblings in which the word possum seems to feature).  You just wait ya cheeky little cub.  I'm not done hunting yet.  And who do you think Old Badger can still fool?"

"Gee, I dunno gramps, maybe toads 'n fungus?"

"Nope........Old Deer."

Deer Hunting - November 2022

The official record of our family deer hunts is recorded in The Book of Deer.  This year my grandson rather artistically summarized my hunt...

That's me in a tree stand.  A large bird is pooping on my head.  I'm aiming my rifle in the wrong direction and a gigantic deer is making rude noises at me from both ends.

It's not a bad summary.  My only quibble would be that it looks like I'm wearing a black mini skirt and that would be pretty chilly.  If a deer came along that was at my eye level in a tree stand I absolutely would freeze and take whatever abuse it chose to deal out.  That thing is 25 feet tall and although I appear to be wielding a small cannon I doubt it would do more than make this Eldritch Beast hoppin' mad.

Four days of hunting.  Did not get a deer.  I saw some.  Even had a couple in my sights but decided that the shots were either too long or at too weird an angle to be Sportsmanlike.

Both boys got deer, for one of them it was his second.  So I have venison.  

There is still the tail end of the nine day season and probably a second chance season in December, but with the kids, grandkids and dogs all departed deer camp is a quiet place.  Time to head back to civilization.

Deer Hunting 2022 Opening Weekend

 View from my ground blind opening morning.  

Lots of snow.  While pretty and useful for tracking if you get a deer it does crazy things to deer movement patterns.  I saw one deer briefly, just long enough to take the safety off but not long enough to line up a shot.  On the other hand both of my sons got nice deer opening morning.  Our friend Eddy and I are still shut out as of mid day Sunday.

With their deer already "hanging around" some of our hunting party have leisure for other things.  One of my boys remarkably saw two bears out and about.  Dude, you should be hibernating.  While this was taken through a scope bear are clearly not in season and were left alone.  Presumably they stumbled off and found someplace to sleep where deer hunters were not stomping around.

The tea party/deer camp/Happy Birthday event went off well.  I'm tempted to wear my blaze orange tiara crown out for the evening hunt.  My son says it will at least make other hunters keep their distance.  You should try to steer clear of apparent lunatics with rifles.

Well you'd think that would have worked but alas, no.  I did see a couple of deer at a range that perhaps my marksman son would have managed but I let them go.  Tomorrow is another day.  For me.  For them, maybe not.

Enigma Staff Challenge 2022

Time for the second annual Enigma staff challenge.  My little band of middle school cryptographers only had four weeks of work time and one of prep time.  But they learned quickly and are a devious bunch, so the challenges they put to an All Star Team of teachers and administrators were actually a bit harder than last year.  One of the things I taught them is how very much fun it is to see someone wander off track in exactly the direction you led them off into!

Four envelopes.

The usual rules.  Students are now the teachers and vice versa.  No unauthorized use of electronic devices.  All questions are fair game and encouraged.  Considerable latitude is allowed in the answers.  Oh, no outright fibbing, but there is nothing wrong with leading your student to the correct answer by a route that is both educational and entertaining....

Here the District Superintendent labors over a complicated cipher.

One challenge could only be solved with the help of a specific book in the library, which was adjacent to where we were holding the challenge.  It took them quite a while, perhaps because I threw in a bit of distracting bait in the wrong places...

Some things worked remarkably well.  It is human nature when you are handed something, say an encoding grid, to assume that things written on them should be read right side up.  But why would you assume that in a challenge where the stated intent is to mislead?  The students, who had of course fallen for this a couple of weeks back, found the struggles of the staff on this one to be quite humorous.

On the other hand the gps component of the challenge did not go that well.  It snowed over the last few days which made my tracks visible as I placed the clues an hour before the challenge began.  Of course I had to make several tracks go off into the adjacent woods!  And one clue was previously oriented with respect to a tree....which had been cut down in the intervening three weeks.  The gps hunters came in cold and overdue.  But they did find them all.

Mantra of the day was:  Be the kind of student you wish you had every day.  Be the kind of teacher you wish you had every day.  I think that was mostly adhered to but this batch of students had a delightful wicked streak and made the administrators and teachers really work for it this year.

We'll be seeing some of these kids again in future endevours.