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The 1791 Thinkshop and 87 Ideas Workshop

Front door for the second half of my life using my time while disabled to study theology, dabble in my shop, and advocate for Liberty and Veterans who suffer with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), Severe Memory Impairment, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Traumas, and those with Crohn's Disease and Seizure Disorder. Of course too I may muster the courage to begin my Scale Models again but fight tremor so bad that it maybe something best to just hang up and sell off. I've lost nearly every enjoyable skill and struggle with the idea of "doing it at all if I can't do so to the ability I once had". I'm most busy with doctors appointments and maintaining my 125 Year Old Home, but also pursue working in my shop and have unreasonable thoughts about once again building quality scale models. Basically its My Shop, Ranting, Retirement, and More… This blog was begun right before my health, career, and entire life's direction was wildly changed, so though the page is 6+ years old, it is bare boned.

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1791thinkshop and 87 Idea's Workshop

A Retired Marine Corps Officer trying to do my own thing without the government trying to think/steal for or from me. ..... Going to use my retirement and the days God has given me to enjoy life, spread some knowledge, take care of this 121 year old home, maybe I’ll work on some scale models and in my shop again.

Moxon Vise (Intro)

So I need a moxon vise. If you’re asking yourself what’s that and why, you’re not alone. (There are some small pictures of examples attached) Those were the first words out of my wife’s mouth when I explained my purchase of cast iron hand wheels, thread, bolts, spherical washers, and some hardwood. There’s even been the discussion of ‘crubber’ at the dinner table and by out loud contemplation of leather -vs- crubber -vs- cork for the jaw, pinned rod -vs- pinning the wheels to the rod, laminate order, size, clamps, and to build a table off the back or not… So, if you’d like to learn what a moxon vise is and why you may want one, read on. If you already have you own moxon or are building one of your own, I hope you’ll follow along.

Oh, I still haven’t even stated the answer to the question: A double-screw vise held to a workbench top with clamps or holdfasts in order to facilitate certain work. The moxon vise is so name for Joseph Moxon (1627–1691), who was the hydrographer to King Charles II. A man who obviously specialized in the design and printing of maps also was involved in the publishing of books on mathematics, engineering, and woodworking. Moxon’s 17th century book ‘The Art of Joinery’ first described the double-screw vise. It was in that historically significant publication that the Moxon vise was documented.

Stay tuned as I build my own. In my case, I need one to facilitate hand cutting dovetail joints and other joinery where I can get the work up higher and held fast for accuracy. The other great benefit is that I’ll be attempting to build mine as a table top moxon vise table. Doing so will take stress off my lower back and bring the work closer to my aging vision too. I’ll be sure cover the following:

  • Design Features
  • Helpful Video/Articles that I used
  • Material Sourcing
  • The build as it happens
  • A review of lessons learned and any changes I’d make

The next post will get into the research I’ve done, the sourcing, and the preliminary work I’ve done to prepare my lumber and iron. Please comment/ask any questions/suggestions you may have and I’ll be sure to address them as I go.

– Thank you for reading!

S/F, Shannon

me@1791thinkshop.org

Featured post

Enzo Ferrari Builds Post 1.1

So, I have multiple iterations of the Enzo Ferrari.  I think 3 of the Tamiya Enzo 1/24 scale, 3 of the Revell Enzo 1/24 scale, 2 of the Tamiya FXX 1/24 scale, and 1 Tamiya Enzo 1/12 scale.  I need to get a new SD card for my Canon Rebel T1i, So photos are to follow.  I’ll be building a round of Tamiya La Ferrari’s and FXX K’s also and I may do some of that in concert with Enzo’s since there are so many similarities.  I’m most excited about the 1/12 Enzo though and that will be the capstone build before moving on I think.

It has been five and a half years since I’ve built/worked on any of my models.  As many of you know, my traumatic brain injury (TBI) and retirement from the Marine Corps turned my entire world inside out and I can’t say I’ve got it all together yet by any means.  There are many more medical, mental, and emotional issues that I’m struggling with and will do so for my entire life.  I have been in a hermit mindset for 5 years now and I’m doing what I can to break the cycle.  I’m not embarrassed or ashamed of what I live with.  I also know that I am not alone; that many of my Marine brothers are struggling and in pain each and every day.

At first, I had stopped building simply because I was simply learning how to live and make it day to day.  Then too, the TBI was ending my career and I was being pushed into retirement at a time for which we had not planned to.  So after 22+ years in the Marine Corps, I retired and at the same time, I am 100% disabled as well.  So after moving, I couldn’t bear to see my uniforms, my library, my models, my tools; basically everything I had enjoyed.  I have used the excuse of my tremors to explain my staying away from modeling, but the truth is the same as so many things: that I fear I can’t do things to the level or caliber I once did.  Long story short, I’ve been barely getting by all this time.  So I have decided to re-commit myself to scale models with the knowledge that I’ll build a few glue-bombs in the beginning.  So with that, I have dug it all out and have been getting back to doing research and finding the sources for the detail items I’ll need but don’t already have.   I’ll “treat each part as though it is its own model’ and figure out how to get around the tremor somehow.

S/F, -B

New Swan #4240 Lerverless Mabie Todd & Co. Pen

°°°So I got my first Mabie Todd and for many, their ‘grail-pen’ (the term for a long sought after pen) is a Mont Blanc, high-end Sailor, Pelikan-Edelstein or some superior instrument.  In my case, there are a few pens that I’d like to try and possibly own.  The Mabie Todd Leverless with 14 Karat Gold No° 2 Nib is one of them.  My grandmother Betty had one and when she passed I was yet still in the Marine Corps and not around or involved in the closing of her estate/matters.  While I did receive many of her pencils (she was an accountant), erasers, and some pens.  The Mabie Todd didn’t seem to turn up during the 15 minutes I got to visit her home office space.  So I have no clue where it went and I’m pretty certain no one in the family would have really known what it was had they found it.  The only extreme vintage pen was my great-grandfather’s schoolhouse dip pen, which I still use even today on occasion.

So after doing quite a bit of homework on costs, nibs, and considering what I was willing to spend, I began to troll eBay and bid one some that were potential first Mabie Todd’s for me.  My criteria were gold semi-flex, leverless, with new sac/servicing completed recently.

  • As a relevant point to make right here for those who are considering a vintage pen that they don’t want to have to either service themselves or turn right around to send to a restorer immediately upon delivery, it;s important to ask if the pen has been inked up and used, are there any cracks in the body, cap, or section, and did it leak.  This is because a vast number of people on the web will sell a pen after dipping it only to demonstrate that it writes.  Now, I’m sure that many times this is because the individual knows nothing about fountain pens (otherwise they’d likely hold on to the heirloom and use it), but more often than not it is in an effort to bypass the condition of the sac or to avoid filling only to immediately clean the pen.  So unless the description states clearly the condition of the filling and sac system, you should ask specifically (again if you don’t want to do the work yourself or pay for someone else to do so).  Now, you would also do well to ask about the width of the line produced when flexed if important to you and how scratchy or smooth it feels.  As feel goes, its subjective of course, but all the information you can gather is worthwhile.  You can save some money purchasing a pen that needs a sac, but Mabie Todd’s are some of the more quirky pens to work on so you may want to go with a ready to write one since it’s possible to spend far more to get her that way than you paid for it in the first place.

 

 

An Iwo Jima Medal Of Honor Recipient Reflects On That Fateful Battle

On Feb. 23, 1945, Williams was a 21-year-old Marine corporal fighting in Battle of Iwo Jima, one of the most brutal and unforgiving battles in American military history. The fighting was horrific, and the events of that day have stayed with Williams for the last 71 years.

1719thinkshop Editorial Response to: School Teaches Zi & Zir Without Permission from Mom & Dad by Todd Starnes

(full article of topic and my response) School Teaches Zi & Zir Without Permission from Mom & Dad
By Todd Starnes. 

  Indiana parents are furious after eighth graders at Lincoln Junior High School were exposed to a classroom lesson on sexual orientation, gender expression and gender identity issues – without being notified in advance by the school district.

  Mike Huckabee & Franklin Graham say parents need a copy of Todd’s new book – “The Deplorables’ Guide to Making America Great Again. Click here!

  The 12-year-olds were required to watch a video titled, “LGBTQ: Understanding Sexual Orientation and Gender Identities.” They were also required to answer a questionnaire with all sorts of probing questions.

Among the questions:

  1. What is sexual orientation?
  2. What is gender?

  3. At what age do kids start being exposed to gender stereotypes?

  4. What is an LGBTQ ally?

  5. What is gender expression?

  6. What is ‘coming out’?

  7. Name at least three resources that you can use to support you if you come out?

  8. What does GSA stand for and what does it do?

  9. What are two things you can do to show support of the LGBTQ community

  Plymouth Schools Superintendent Dan Tyree defended the one-day lesson — and said they haven’t received a single complaint. 

  “Schools have been concerned about harassment and bullying over sexual orientation and gender identity since President Obama’s directive on Title IX last year,” Tyree told me via email.

  He said the first-year teacher who conducted the class did not follow policy regarding how to address a controversial subject.

  “This was not part of the curriculum and it doesn’t directly address a state standard, but it is a national standard for grade 8,” he added.

  So teaching 12-year-olds about gender expression is a national education standard? Really?

  If that is in fact true, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos needs to abolish that standard – immediately.  

  I learned about the lesson from Monica Boyer, the president of the Indiana Liberty Coalition. She told me several angry parents reached out to her with copies of the lesson and the video.

  “The video turned my stomach,” she told me. “It’s nothing less than indoctrination. This has nothing to do with health class. It’s purely political.”

  To be clear, the video was not graphic. She was more disturbed by the tone and tenor of the content.

  “The message was basically that students are not cool unless they are pro-gay,” she said. “We want it completely removed from the classroom.”

  The superintendent did not respond to questions regarding the Indiana Liberty Coalition’s demands – including a promise to inform parents in advance of controversial lessons.

  “Parents need to know what’s happening in the classroom,” she said. “It’s our objective to let parents know this is going on without their permission.”

  I’m not surprised that Liberty Junior High School was caught indoctrinating children. Our public schools have been turned against us. Classrooms have been transformed into social engineering petri dishes.

As I wrote in my new book, “The Deplorables’ Guide to Making America Great Again,” if we want to stop this radical, leftwing agenda, parents must engage themselves in the educational process.

Kudos to the Indiana Liberty Coalition for exposing this nefarious scheme.
———————————

My response-
 It’s not even identity politics, its facts -vs- feelings.   Why aren’t teaching licenses subject to condition other than ill prepared and nonproductive in-service hours? There have to be consequences and expectations as with any job; especially licensed jobs. Additionally those should be extended to any public college, university, or school to include any that have public grant monies, voucher students, or were established with any provisional tax conditions. That would designate only one college (Hillsdale) in the US exempt and would include a very large majority of private/charter grade schools that would then require licensed teachers/staff. Why not cuff continuing education (self or structured) with more frequent incremental testing where nonexistent or currently exist but widely spread at 5 and 10 year stints?

  We’ve got to know that that teachers know the subject and any emerging information or methods. Most importantly if it takes it, it takes it: a student bill of rights to protect them from teachers, professors, and fellows. I understand and support tenuring of professorships, but that pertains directly to the professor’s field of ‘expertise’ (cue some well targeted sarcasm to fields of study that are not fields but ideological bon fires most sociology departments, gender, race, LBGQT..LMNOP dance studies, etc…). Tenure has, since maybe around 1965 increasingly become a ticket [or increasingly a ‘license’ if you will] to indoctrinate. We have higher education TO teach one thing and one thing only: HOW to think; last and most certainly, it’s NOT to teach WHAT to think. 
  Some would say that’s ludicrous because there are facts and absolutes that must be learned. Well then maybe we’re coming together on this: right logic and thought would not allow for 2+2=5, Napoleon Bonaparte to have been the father of Napoleon Dynamite, or for some one to simply will the change if there age or chromosomes. Yes we need and have departments to better tailor that process and it’s only necessary rote facts and skills according to the field, but opinions should stop at the property line. 

  I fully support say, Ward Churchill’s right to write whatever he wants and claim to be whatever Indian Nation he desires to affiliate with that week; I want him to have to weather the consequences good or bad if his good or bad opinions just as I do. I couldn’t just go teaching and training Marines outside of doctrine in ‘Beaman’s World’ where there’s a suspension of anything other than that worldview; if I had, they’d have not the framework to evaluate, plan, provision, organize, communicate, lead, coordinate, and accomplish the mission.  

  As example, Ward Churchill is actually a pretty decently skilled debater, so…. maybe teach our kids how to debate with sound non-duplicitous logic that follows at least the law of non-contradiction? Heck, my 10 year can do that if queried and promoted soundly. But then, there’s the point; if I’m teaching her HOW to think. 

  Say I were to identify as a 60 year old, female, rhinoceros or maybe even a brontosaurus. Does supporting, encouraging, providing for, calling me said, and silencing those who’d recognize me for what actually I am educate or conflagration? 

  Should society or worse government force you to play pretend that I’m a 60 year old, female brontosaurus? It’s enabling psychosis is it not? Give our young what they need or give them back; start with returning grade schools and public colleges/universities wholly back to the State and community that they reside. After all we as citizens chose that State and Community.

  Then we could start sacking those who recklessly espouse wrongful thought, project upon those seeking knowledge opinions other than observable, verifiable, repeatable facts, and hold hostage those young by grades for what they think in that cesspool of crap instead of meriting/correcting how to think, observe, verify, and repeat. It’s toxic in our system not just for students, but some educators also. Maybe, just maybe there might be a correlation with these issues and the fact that we bring up the rear in the 1st World and many 3rd World nations with regard to measurable levels. Maybe, just maybe there’s a correlation here that while we spend more per student, provide more opportunities than ever before to everyone than ever before, and continually throw even more money and hence debt, there’s no budging in our progress. 

  I think you’d see a lot of parents who care, renting box trucks and moving to States and communities that do it well and you’d see institutions, educators, and communities that don’t meet that bar change there ways to compete. For those that say, but ohh.. what will happen to this town, that city, or this storied institution…. I’d say they’d make a change or save plenty of money when the demand for services and resources drops because of population shift. Maybe we’d become a nation that invents again, finds cures over treating symptoms, and makes more ‘things’ over creating this leviathan of circular services where the only thing that rises is inflation because unbalanced service based economies don’t produce goods and products, they simply exchange money or debt and any one persons profit or gain = inflation and interest increases of cost in not only goods but in those very same services they so hallow. Not to mention education is a service, and there’s no one among us who’d invest this much time, money, and I think must importantly our children’s future if we measured it the way we do our cellular service, internet speed, or even the pizza joint that delivers. 

  Sure this is my opinion, but I wouldn’t carry on to campus and espouse it from the front of our young. I’d hope one day they had collectively the intellectual honesty to arrive at a lot of these ideas themselves, but in the meantime they are bring indoctrinated in what to think instead of how to think. 

  Disclaimer: probably typos all over and I only go all caps at times because we haven’t quite graduated to italics that are understood (not to mention and maybe because there are now academic generations that don’t even know italics purpose). I’m trying to approach how to think, not what to think so maybe some of those with some intellectual honesty might look at this failure of a system and the poisoning of youth’s minds in light of truths and putting playing pretend aside. If I’m sideways on all of this educate me because this is 2¢ and after all, I still have 3 quarters, 2 dimes, and 3 pennies more to invest in sound thought and ideas that advance truths over pretending, and the non existent unicorn so many call political correctness. I’d like to leave that to our young instead of more crap.

-B

Thanks go to Jack May for the dig!

– True Dat

1791 Thinkshop and Study – 619 E Vine St, Vine St & Home St – http://4sq.com/1H43y7p

http://foursquare.com/v/559aaaf8498e77c416ac20c6

A Secret Ransom on Pallets of Untraceble Euros and Swiss Francs to the Largest State Sponsor of Terrorism by the ‘Most Transparent President in History’

Gonna use NPR as the springboard for this one because of how it seems that every single response this week from the progressives has been ‘why are we talking about old news, you know let me tell you something…’ Or ‘the republicans or Trump are just going to opposes and mistreat all situations for gain or vengeance’. How about just simply the American people that hear quacks, see waddling, see swimming like em’ ducks; well we as the citizenry think there are ducks. Mrs Clinton hasn’t held a news conference in over 6 months to my recollection, walks though the sabotage of Sen Sanders campaign, the all too witness of the FBI director saying just about the most damnable thing with regard to the use of personal server, access to the server and the communication of TSCI messages, while the AG just basically sits in the same chair after and shrugs a lot and look totally inept because she refuses to even make mention of law, direct cause for her non-recusal, and then out of hand nolo contendre to there being any ’cause’ with regard to the entire investigation and the FBI Directors testimony.  
Now this. The President of the United States gives $400 million in untraceable hard Swiss Francs & Euros stacked on pallets and flown into Iran as ransom unmarked under cover of night in the release of 5 American Hostages. Then the WH lies about it. I don’t think that’s a partisan issue, it’s absolutely mind blowing to me as an American citizen and taxpayer knowing that cash will go straight to terrorist organizations and will kill Americans and our brother and sisters in Christ as well as the citizens of our allies. This makes Fast and Furious look like Kindergarten snack time. Is that partisan? Was I really told what Josh Earnest is today asserting I heard from the President in January. Ugh… See below     
So much for releasing the ‘Frozen’ funds… WSJ reports an air lift of cash rounded up through banks placed on pallets and secretly in unmarked aircraft delivered $400 Million in cash as there the release of 5 Americans. Then an Iranian official confirms it, but wait one of the 5 American hostages, US Pastor Saeed Abidini told FOX Business Network and CNN that the Iranian regime would not let his plane leave Iran until Obama’s ransom plane arrived with $400 million in euros and Swiss Francs. So the WH had denied initially the story, but now not still straightforwardly doing so but dancing for 24 minutes in a WH press conference about how we all in America knew because the President went on TV and said that there would be all of those in an attack over the deal and that this now is just a Republican attack. The American people we told that funds would be “released”. If you deposit an large deposit in the bank, they will take days or weeks before releasing the full amount once they have received their transfer. I doesn’t matter that there is no banking relationship with Iran, those funds would get released it what ever process to be developed and that wouldn’t be an instant transfer. The American people were not told that the ‘deal’ included an airlift of $400 million dollars in untraceable cash to Iran the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world. Which is by the way not allowed under established US policy to pay ransoms; the DOJ directly objected to the airlift of cash, but was overruled by the State Department. 
In the mean time Iran has already trounced all over the ‘deal’. This isn’t a political attack at all it is executive and dictatorial subversion I don’t care if you have a (D), (R), (I), (L) or a dang (Z) before or after your name. 

There’s already some interesting comment string on the FB post here:https://www.facebook.com/shannon.beaman/posts/10207110931356866?pnref=story

WSJ Article: US Sent Cash To Iran As Americans Were Freed-
http://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/u-s-sent-cash-to-iran-as-americans-were-freed-1470181874

US Hostage Saeed Abedini to Fox Business stating that their plane was not to be released until plane of cash arrived in Iran- https://youtu.be/WY3YLWY1fKE

CNBC: The DOJ Objected to the $400 Million Payment and Was Overruled By the State Department- http://www.cnbc.com/amp/2016/08/04/doj-objected-to-400-million-payment-to-iran-was-overruled-by-state-department-wsj.html

Watch Josh Earnest in the link do all he can but address the questions and cry partisan politics on republicans; how about the American people.

http://youtu.be/k0qnHDYaI6A

Mr Khan-Mr Trump Attack at DNC…. Some Thoughts

Here’s a link to the draft piece I’m working on. The first iteration is on my FB. I’ll develop this further tomorrow. My perspective is that of a Marine Corps Officer of 22 years and a student of history.  

At a minimum please read Mr West’s and Mr Mark’s letters to Mr Khan. Regardless of your persuasion many may learn or share some perspective you may never have seen here to.   Links are imbedded in post. 

The Draft Post on My FB Page…..

There is some interesting comments on the FB string. 

Semper Fidelis, Shannon

me@1791thinkshop.com

First Australian Attack on the Western front WWI -19 July 1916-


Australians of the 53rd Battalion pictured on the afternoon of the 19th; three of the men pictured would be wounded and the remainder killed.

July 19 1916, Fromelles–In the leadup to the Somme, it was envisioned that the Allies would make a major breakthrough, which could soon be followed up by attacks elsewhere on the line. Even as victory on the Somme proved quickly elusive, planning for these subsidiary attacks continued, if downgraded to an effort to prevent German reserves from being moved to the Somme. The main such planned attack was at Fromelles, along the Aubers Ridge that had been fought over more than a year prior. Here, the 5th Australian Division and the 61st Division were assigned to the attack; half of the Australians were veterans of the Gallipoli campaign and were used to trench warfare (albeit that of a dryer variety), whereas the 61st had only arrived in France in the last month and was still well understrength. They would attack in the direction of Lille, though even the attack’s planners knew they would not be able to push further than the first three German trench lines. The decision to attack had ultimately been left up to General Monro by Haig; despite the changing goals, poor weather conditions, and unlikely prospects for success, he decided to proceed anyway.

Attempting to learn from the Somme, some modified tactics were used in an attempt to fool the Germans. The barrage, after lifting from the German lines, would be brought back again, attempting to catch the Germans as they emerged from their underground shelters to repel the infantry attack; dummy soldiers were hoisted above parapets in order to aid in the illusion of an immediate attack. However, these tactics were ineffective in practice. Constant rain and mist interfered had interfered with artillery spotting. More crucially, the line they were targeting had been abandoned by the Germans long ago in favor of positions on the reverse slope of Aubers Ridge; the artillery bombardment was hitting nothing.

When the Australians advanced, around 5:30 PM on July 19th, they found no line to capture. Attempting to move further forward, they came upon the German second (now first) line, with a complete and unbroken line of wire. The British of the 61st Division left their trenches by sally ports, presenting convenient targets for German machine gunners. By 9PM, the attack had largely collapsed, except around the Sugar Loaf strongpoint in the center of the line. Reinforcements were ordered to assist in the attack there, so there would at least be a single gain to show from the day–but realizing the hopelessness of the attack, they were soon cancelled. These countermanding orders did not reach the 59th Australian Battalion in time, however, and they were cut down, unsupported, in no-man’s land. Over the course of a few hours, the Australians suffered over 5000 casualties; the British (attacking with fewer men) over 1500. 

Thank you to my brothers of my generation in the Australian Royal Marines that I had the pleasure to serve and learn with. Thank you for always being the most gracious of host nations for our Marines and giving us the space to train that we no longer are permitted within our own nation. Thank you most for your sacrifices and examples of courageous leadership spanning over a century. You never backed down from a fight when we fought back to back as brothers. I’m proud of your example and steadfast support you’ve always shown my nation and particularly her Marines. Semper Fidelis, Shannon

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