A daily series, Connect! Unite! Act! seeks to create face-to-face networks in each congressional district. Groups regularly socialize but also get out the vote, support candidates and engage in other local political actions that help our progressive movement grow and exert influence on the powers-that-be. Visit us at Daily Kos every morning at 7:30 A.M. Pacific Time to see how you can get involved. The comment thread is fun and light-hearted, but we're serious about moving the progressive political agenda forward.
If you are new to the site or have been lurking, we invite you to join in the friendly banter here. Don’t be shy, say anything, it will be well received.
Palantir wrote a diary about measurements last week. One thing I know is the width of railroad tracks is the same as the width of chariot wheels of the Roman Empire days. I also know that we divide land up the way we do due to how much room it took to turn an oxen-drawn plow in fields. Stuff like this intrigues me and so I wondered about more measurements.
Why is a mile 5280 feet (or 1760 yards)? It seems rather odd. It’s the Roman’s fault again. The word mile comes from Latin mille passum, which means 1000 paces. The length of five feet (the size of some Roman’ s foot) was considered to be one pace. So a mile was 5000 feet. Hey, that’s not 5280 feet. What gives. One explanation is who’s ever foot the whole thing is based upon had small feet. But another reason and, one that makes more sense, goes back to plowing fields.
It goes back to a furlong, which was the length of the furrow an oxen-drawn plow could plow in a day. But days are of different lengths of time, so a furrow could be variable, right? Well in England Parliment decided to standardize it and so in 1592 declared that a mile would be eight furlongs and that a furlong is 660 feet. So 660 times 8 = 5280 feet.
Bottom line → a mile is based on Roman’s walking 1000 paces and oxen plowing fields which were finally standardized by Parliment. So that’s all clear now.
Nautical miles, however, are a whole different thing. Why? This is based on the size of the entire earth and is defined as one minute of arc along a meridian around the Earth. OK. So a meridian is 360 degrees and each of those degrees is divided further into 60 minutes of arc. Well, each of these minutes of arc is 1/21,600th of the distance around the earth = a nautical mile is 6,076 feet. Well, at least this makes more sense than the other mile.
Back to how we divide the land. We are all familiar with acres. We all know there are 640 acres per square mile. We all know that a city block is supposed to be 1/12th of a mile (12 blocks per mile is the standard). OK, but how did we get these measurements? We have to go back to oxen plowing fields. Remember that a furlong is how long a furrow oxen can plow in a day without rest (they go slowly but surely). Eventually, you need to turn your oxen around to go the other way. It turns out it takes the distance of “one chain” to turn your oxen around. A “chain” is an old Anglo-Saxon measurement of that distance, which turns out to be 66 feet. SO, it was established that an acre is an area of one furlong in length times one chain = 43,560 square feet. 640 acres = 1 square mile.
How about gallons? Romans again. A gallon was a “ pailful.” The Latin word for that is galeta. There was no actual standard for “pailful” for some time. Eventually, in 1707, during the reign of Queen Anne, a standardized “wine gallon” was created. A “wine gallon” is eight troy pounds of wine. Of course, different liquids have different densities and different weights.
Well, we better find where a pound came from otherwise how are we to measure eight troy pounds of wine — which makes a gallon? Back to the Romans...again. It comes from the Roman measurement for weight called a “libre.” That’s why lb is the abbreviation for pound (I always wondered why). The word pound comes from the Latin word pondo which means weight. Well in the 1300’s the English decided to standardize what a pound was in order to sell things by weight instead of volume. They decided a pound would equal 7000 grains. A grain was the average weight of a grain of cereal. Cereal was wheat or barley and so a grain became the average weight of one grain of wheat and one grain of barley divided by two which turns out to be exactly 64.79891 milligrams. A pound was then divided into 16 ounces.
OK, one more. This time no Roman’s are involved because it was a measurement for “modern times.” Until the advent of steam engines, and later combustible engines, hard work was done by beasts of burden. Oxen were the bulldozers and horses were trucks. (BTW, there are only three words in the English language that add -en to the end of the word to make it plural. Those three words are oxen, children, and brethren). We needed some way to rate the power of engines. James Watt (yup, that electric dude) came up with “horsepower.” He had to study what horses could do in order to quantify horsepower. He found the average harnessed horse could lift 550 pounds at a clip of roughly one foot per second, which equaled 33,000 foot-pounds of work per minute. But guess what? Watt actually studied ponies because they were a lot easier to deal with. Ponies could do 22,000 foot-pounds of work per minute. He then kinda fudged it by figuring full grown horses were half again stronger than ponies. No studies were done to determine that. James Watt just decided.
What do you want to talk about today?
Our team is here to provide support and guidance to new and existing volunteer leaders of each regional and state group, helping them with recruiting, organizing and executing social and action events. We invite you to join in this effort to build our community. There are many ways to pitch in. If there isn't a group to join near you, please start one.
UPDATES AND NEWS FROM THE DAILY KOS LOCAL GROUPS BELOW
View Interactive Map of Daily Kos Communities in a full screen mode. The orange pinpoints are the location of each organized group of Daily Kos readers. If you'd like to join a group, click on a point and a box will pop up showing contact links. If you'd like to start a group, kosmail navajo for instructions.
Comment if you have events that would be of interest to the readers of Daily Kos in your city or state?
navajo maintains this event list. Kosmail her if you have any diaries about your event or if you have changes or additions to events listed below.
Thinking Fella and Ojibwa are organizing the third EPIC Glacier National Park Meet-up this year. Held on June 30 through July 2, 2017. Please see this diary for important planning details.
INTINERARY:
--Thursday, June 29th--
Welcome BBQ at 6:00 PM (at Thinking Fella’s campsite, so you can arrive hours earlier if needed) Food and drink completely provided by TF!!! Sundance Campground, 10545 Hwy 2 East, Coram, MT 59913
--Friday, June 30th—
Morning hike inside the park, destination group-decided at BBQ the night before, either Avalanche Lake or John’s Lake Loop.
Evening potluck BBQ at Apgar Picnic Area, inside the park at 5:30 PM. Prepare for incredible views.
--Saturday, July 1st—
Red Bus ride! We’ll all board a reserved 16 passenger bus at 9:00 AM, and ride up Going-to-the-Sun Road, the iconic road in Glacier! Tickets must be purchased in advance. Please contact Thinking Fella before 5/23 to reserve a seat.
Dinner at The Lake McDonald Lodge and then one-hour boat tour around the lake. Contact Thinking Fella for tickets.
--Sunday, July 2nd—
Morning carpool & drive north along the western border of the Park, to Polebridge, where we can purchase baked goods & sandwiches. We’ll then proceed to Bowman Lake for a lakeside lunch.
Adios Potluck/Picnic Sunday night, at Sprague Creek Picnic Area, north end of Lake McDonald.
Cell phone service is limited and often non-existent inside the park as is internet connectivity.
RSVPS
1. Thinking Fella
2. Ojibwa
3. state of confusion
4. jakedog42
5. MotherMags
6. MTmofo
7. Done4nau
8. Mhosz
9. Mrs. Mhosz
10. Maudlin
11. Mr. Maudlin
12. dsb
13.
MAYBEES :
woolibaar
Boise Blue
Mrs. Boise Blue
|
RSVPS
1. Bill in Portland Maine
2. Common Sense Mainer
3. navajo
4. markm667
5. vicki
6. vicki’s recruit 1
7. vicki’s recruit 2
8. smileycreek
9. paradise50
10. Ed Tracey
11. side pocket
12. Mrs. side pocket
13. Richard Cranium
14. YellowDogInGA
15. DebtorsPrison
16. brillig
17. mik
18. thatkid
19. K2
20. LuLu
21. moodyinsavannah
22. norm
23. Egberto Willies
24. Chris Reeves
25. Susan Grigsby
26. spedwybabs
27. Dee Austin
28. Pam Miles
29. Corrie Wikoff
30. Cindi Branham
31. Susan Higgins
32. jlms qkw
33. Larisa Thomason
34. evcoren
35. shermanesq
36. doggie269
37. jpup
38. Sean Wang
39. Steve Stearns
40. loggersbrat
41.
MAYBEES :
SanDiegoDem
JustOneMoreDad
Mrs. JustOneMoreDad
JustOneMoreDad’s kid
momomia
|
ORGANIZER: Send randallt a kosmail to attend
Latest diary: DKos Asheville Open Thread: Mount Mitchell Meetup
1. randallt
2. LamontCranston
3. eeff
4.
Asheville Meet Up, May 6th, 2017 with special guests Tom Sullivan, Former Vice Chair, Buncombe County Democratic Party and Matt Coffay, Democratic Candidate for NC-11. L-R: Gordon20024 , Joieau, Otteray Scribe, Matt Coffay, Elizawhig, davehouck, SteelerGrrl, SteelerGuy, Ashley, New friend, Tom Sullivan, randallt. Great job, randallt!
Spring 2017 C+J/Kossack Meetup! Saturday, April 29 placeholder
New England Kos, living large. In no particular order but a nice list of who was there: Northerntier, Frank, Simple, Vacationland, JBL55, Susan Grigsby, Michael Langenmayr (of Daily Kos Elections team fame), Nautical Knots, brillig, mik, Parsons Beach, Jim & Mom, rebereads, Ed Tracey, Jennifer, Knockbally, bluesheep, freedapeople, Common Sense Mainer and Bill in Portland Maine. Huge props, as always, to organizer, nhox42.
Special guest of honor: Bill in Portland Maine and his kiddie pool entourage.
NYC-KOS Represents! L-R: Avilyn (hiding), East Village Blue, kishik, Missys Brother, belinda ridgewood, theRoaringGirl, ericlewis0, Denise Oliver-Velez, sidnora, kathny, Design the Future, navajo and subir (In attendance but not pictured: joanbrooker (photographer) rubyr, MBNYC, Yasuragi, Bethesda 1971 & cohenzee) on Sunday, April 23, 2017 at Spitzer’s Corner.
Colorado: Monday Evenings, Michigan: Wednesdays, 6:00 PM Eastern, North Carolina: Sundays, 1:00 PM Eastern, Missouri: Wednesday Evenings, Kansas: Monday Evenings