Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Wednesday search challenge (8/21/13): Masons, presidents, and Star Wars?


While reading about US presidents the other day I was struck by how many of them were Masons.  One president in particular caught my eye.  As ex-president, he visited Nairobi and participated in laying the cornerstone of the African Inland Mission at Kijabe. Meanwhile, only two years earlier, he laid the cornerstone of a rather large building back in the US.  Curiously, that building now has a Star Wars character carved in stone on one of its towers!

Can you figure out:

1.  Which US president was this?

2.  Can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of the Mission and can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of  the building with the Star Wars character? 

3.  (Extra credit)  Which direction is the Star Wars character looking?  

Search on! 



(This is a just-for-fun search challenge illustrating the method of chaining from one search discovery to the next.)  



11 comments:

  1. 1. Theodore Roosevelt
    2.a http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/exhibits/ohistory/oral18a.htm
    b http://www.nationalcathedral.org/presidents/gallery.html
    3. I'd say north-west or north.

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  2. This is one of those challenges that on some levels is really cool because I already know the answers (no pictures but definite answers) but at the same time it's frustrating because the images are kind of hiding from me.

    Answers: President - Theodore Roosevelt

    Building _ The National Cathedral

    Star Wars
    character - Darth Vader

    Direction - I believe Vader is facing SE

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  3. The president was Theodore Roosevelt. He sure did lay a lot of cornerstones. The earlier building was Washington National Cathedral and the SW character is Darth Vader. http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/darthVader.shtml. I did find picture of the laying of the cornerstones, don't have time to post them.

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  4. Good day, Dr. Russell, fellow SearchResearchers

    Searched:

    ["african inland mission" intext:kijabe cornerstone]

    Found multiples links with information. Looking at them found the answer

    Address of Colonel Roosevelt made at the laying of cornerstone


    [teddy roosevelt cornerstone starwars carved]
    Building

    There used ctrl F searched "star" and found
    Star Wars Character

    [President Roosevelt September 29, 1907] in images


    [DARTH VADER washington national cathedral looking direction]
    How to find character

    [DARTH VADER washington national cathedral looking at *]
    Darth Vader





    Answers:

    1. Which US president was this?
    President Theodore Roosevelt


    2. Can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of the Mission and can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of the building with the

    Star Wars character?

    Africa Mission

    Washington Cathedral


    3. (Extra credit) Which direction is the Star Wars character looking?
    Character is looking at 38.9305°N 77.0715°W

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  5. while I can't find internet confirmation, I have it on very solid, deep cover authority, that on random moonless nights in D.C. Darth can be seen looking in ALL directions for his son Luke… and once was heard to utter "whisper lowly and carry a large light saber." as they are fond of saying, I can neither confirm nor deny the validity of that statement - amen.
    Can't imagine that even a man of T.R.'s vision would have imagined how things would unfold -
    San Anselmo
    DV location
    cornerstone contents
    Foundation Stone video
    jayhallcarpenter
    carved by:
    Patrick Plunkett

    ReplyDelete
  6. 1. Which US president was this? Teddy Roosevelt SEARCH [African Inland Mission at Kijabe] yields http://www.rva.org/about-us/history which tells us On August 9, 1909, President Teddy Roosevelt, who was in Africa for a hunting trip, laid the cornerstone of the Kiambogo building. However good that looks its not the one we want. Another SEARCH for [roosevelt kijabe] yields New york Times article free and full Published: August 5, 1909
    Copyright © The New York Times which states "NAIVASHA, Aug. 4. -- Theodore Roosevelt and his son Kermit went to Kijabe this afternoon from Nairobi and the former President laid the cornerstone of the new mission church and school for white children there"

    2. Can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of the Mission and can you find a picture of him laying the cornerstone of the building with the Star Wars character? This pix of Darth Vader on the building where he laid the foundation stone is at http://www.nationalcathedral.org/presidents/gallery.html after IMAGE search for [September 29, 1907 roosevelt]

    Still trying to find pix of him at Kijabe but did find the stone at Rift Valley Academy http://www.rva.org/about-us/history Found him: IMAGES [roosevelt kijabe] and there he is http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/docs/Roosevelt-AIM2.htm

    3. (Extra credit) Which direction is the Star Wars character looking? Well this is explained mostly at http://www.nationalcathedral.org/pdfs/darth.pdf And by chaining up MAPS I see DV is facing North East

    Fun and not nearly time consuming (20 minutes) as last weeks

    jon the unknown

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  7. I got excited as I read this week's challenge because I actually knew about the Darth Vader grotesque on the Washington National Cathedral. Doing a search for [ washington national cathedral cornerstone ] gave me Roosevelt.

    1. President Theodore Roosevelt

    The pictures took me longer than I expected and so took a break and came back to it.

    I tried [ theodore roosevelt kijabe cornerstone ] in images and no luck. I heard Dr. Russell's voice say maybe you have too much information and searched only for [ roosevelt kijabe cornerstone ] in image search and got it

    2A - http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/exhibits/ohistory/oral18a.htm

    The next picture took a bit more time. Roosevelt was a busy man with cornerstone layings. I decided I needed more information and read the Wikipedia and saw they weren't calling it a "cornerstone" but a "foundation stone." Image search for [national cathedral "foundation stone" roosevelt] and found pics that might fit the bill.

    2B - http://www.nationalcathedral.org/presidents/gallery.html and same picture on this page http://www.allhallowsguild.org/gallery.html
    I wondered if I tweaked the search tools a bit if I could find a different picture. I set the type to Photo and color to Black and White and found this one, but you can't make out President Roosevelt.
    http://info.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek07/0720/0720n_cathedral.cfm

    Searched [ darth vader national cathedral ] and they have a pdf for visitors to find Lord Vader http://www.nationalcathedral.org/pdfs/darth.pdf So he is on the northwest tower. Pulled up Maps to get my orientation.
    https://www.google.com/maps/preview#!q=Washington+National+Cathedral%2C+Wisconsin+Avenue+Northwest%2C+Washington%2C+DC&data=!1m4!1m3!1d586!2d-77.0714262!3d38.9305029!2m1!1e3!4m10!1m9!4m8!1m3!1d70196!2d-76.888165!3d38.759938!3m2!1i1916!2i1083!4f13.1&fid=7

    The Darth Vader grotesque is on the back side of that tower at an angle.

    3 (Extra Credit) Facing North East

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  8. Query [roosevelt kijabe]
    Quote "During this visit, in 1909, Roosevelt laid the cornerstone for Kiambogo, the main school building that remains the centerpiece of RVA's campus" Source #1
    Answer# 1 Theodore Roosevelt
    Query [national archives "theodore roosevelt" "cornerstone" "1907"] Recurring term "laying of the cornerstone"
    Query [ roosevelt 1907 "laying of the cornerstone] Several events during 1907 & looked through 4/5 events.
    Answer #2 Washington National Cathedral (Darth link) Source #3
    Quote "The longest-running construction project in Washington, D.C., history officially began on September 29, 1907, when workmen laid the Cathedral’s foundation stone. President Theodore Roosevelt and the Bishop of London spoke to a crowd of ten thousand. The stone itself came from a field near Bethlehem and was set into a larger piece of American granite. On it was the inscription: “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14)."
    Answer # 3 Darth Vader - see pdf for location of gargoyle on cathedral tower. Source #4-#5
    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
    Source #1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rift_Valley_Academy
    Source #2 http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20A1FFA385F12738DDDAC0894D0405B898CF1D3
    Source #3 http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/timeline.shtml#hist3
    Source #4 http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/darthVader.shtml
    Source #5 http://www.american-architecture.info/USA/USA-Washington/DC-002.htm
    And http://www.cathedral.org/cathedral/pdfs/darth.pdf ( pdf shows location on the cathedral)
    Book search on Android is almost impossible. Google Books for Android doesn't work for research, just book purchasing. Copyright restrictions limited for out of USA allowed snippet views in most cases. Used proxy browser but not always successful.



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  9. Theodore Roosevelt
    http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/docs/Roosevelt-AIM.htm
    National Cathedral

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  10. 1. Theodore Roosevelt.
    2. Not great, but there's a picture attached to this article about the mission: http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/exhibits/ohistory/oral18a.htm. Here's one of him laying the cornerstone of the Washington National Cathedral: http://www.nationalcathedral.org/presidents/gallery.html
    3. North-west: http://www.nationalcathedral.org/about/darthVader.shtml

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  11. Well I knew that Darth Vader was on the National Cathedral - northwest tower looking north from what I can tell the description on the National Catherdral's website is a bit vague. So I searched for cornerstone laying at the National Catherdral. I ended up at the National Catherdral site where it said Theodore Roosevelt laid a cornerstone in a "grand ceremony" in 1907. I then verified that he had been to the mission referenced by linking his name to the mission with and AND boolean statment - simplistic but effective. It took less than 3 minutes of searching - not including the time I took looking around the National Cathedrals site out of curiosity.

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