Tag Archives: The Hour Before Earthrise

[August 2, 1966] Mirages (September 1966 IF)

August 2, 2021 David Levinson 2 Comments

by David Levinson

The popular image of a mirage is a shining oasis in a desert replete with shady palm trees and sometimes dancing girls. That’s not how mirages work. We’re all familiar with heat shimmer, say on a hot, empty asphalt road, casting the image of the sky onto the ground and resembling water. Less common is the Fata Morgana, which makes it look as though cities or islands are floating in the sky. But the popular idea of the mirage remains: something beautiful and desirable, yet insubstantial.

Heat Wave

July was a real scorcher in the United States as a heat wave settled in over much of the Midwest. A heat wave might make a fun metaphor for passion if you’re Irving Berlin or Martha and the Vandellas, but as the latest hit from the Lovin’ Spoonful suggests, it can be a pretty unpleasant experience. As the mercury rises, people get pretty hot under the collar.

On July 12th, the Black neighborhoods on Chicago’s West Side exploded. The sight of children playing in the spray of a fire hydrant is a familiar one, but the city’s fire commissioner ordered the hydrants closed. The spark was lit when, while shutting off the hydrants, the police attempted to arrest a man, either because there was a warrant for his arrest (according to them) or because he reopened a hydrant right in front of them (according to the locals). As things escalated, stores were looted and burned, rocks were thrown at police and firemen and shots were fired. There were also peaceful protests led by Dr. Martin Luther King. Mayor Daley called in the National Guard with orders to shoot. Ultimately, the mayor relented. Police protection was granted to Blacks visiting public pools (all in white neighborhoods), portable pools were brought in and permission was given to open the hydrants.

Children in Chicago playing in water from a reopened hydrant

As things wound down in Chicago, they flared up in Cleveland. On the 18th in the predominantly Black neighborhood of Hough, the owners of the white-owned bar the Seventy-Niner’s Café refused ice water to Black patrons, possibly posting a sign using a word I won’t repeat here. Once again, there was looting and burning and the National Guard was called in. Things calmed after a couple of days, but heated up again when police fired on a car being driven by a Black woman with four children as passengers. It appears to be over now and the Guard has been gradually withdrawn over the last week. City officials are blaming “outside agitators” for the whole thing.

These riots are a stark reminder that the passage of the Civil Rights Act two years ago didn’t magically make everything better, and that problems also exist outside of the South. We have a long way to go before racial equality is more than just wishful thinking.

National Guardsmen outside the Seventy-Niner’s Café

Pretty, but insubstantial

Some of the stories in this month’s IF are gorgeously written, but lacking in plot. Sometimes that’s enough, sometimes it isn’t.

This fellow’s having a very bad day, but he’s not in The Edge of Night. Art by Morrow

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Serial

[July 2, 1966] The Big Thud (August 1966 IF)

July 2, 2021 David Levinson 1 Comment

by David Levinson

This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper
– T. S. Eliot, The Hollow Men

Starting with a Bang

This month, we note with regret the passing of Monsignor Georges Lemaître on June 20th, at the age of 71. You are likely wondering who that was and what a Catholic priest has to do with the sort of things we usually discuss here at the Journey. Though not well known in America, Msgr. Lemaître was one of the most important theoretical astronomers of this century. After earning his PhD. in mathematics in his native Belgium, he spent a year at Cambridge under Arthur Eddington, who introduced him to modern cosmology, followed by a year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology under Harlow Shapley. In 1927, he published a paper in a minor Belgian journal in which he proposed that the red shift of other galaxies could be explained by an expanding universe. That was two years before Edwin Hubble published his theory of a relationship between velocity and distance for extragalactic bodies. Lemaître also made a first estimation of the constant now called the Hubble constant.

Then in 1931, he suggested that the vectors of all the objects could be tracked backwards to a single point. He dubbed this the “primeval atom”. This is the beginning of the theory which Fred Hoyle called the “big bang” in contrast to his favored steady-state theory. The evidence in favor of Lemaître’s theory has mounted over the years, and it now looks to be the best explanation for the beginning of the universe. The Monsignor was also a mathematician and one of the first people to use computers for cosmological calculations. He was elected to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in 1946 and served as its president since 1960. Although a devout Catholic, he firmly believed that science and religion were not in conflict, but nevertheless should not be mixed.

Lemaître with Robert Millikan and Albert Einstein following a lecture at the California Institute of Technology in 1933.

Ending with a Whimper

They say an author should try to come up with a good opening line, or hook, to grab the reader’s attention. Things like “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen,” “It was a pleasure to burn,” or (one of my favorites) “If I had cared to live, I would have died.” It’s important to start with a bang, but all too often writers forget about a satisfying ending. Stories taper off into nothing, plot threads are never tied up, or ridiculous bits of action are introduced out of nowhere to get the author out of a corner they painted themselves into. Quite a few of the stories in this month’s IF start off promisingly, if not with a bang, and end not with a whimper, but a resounding thud.

No matter what the Table of Contents says, this outer space construction site has nothing to do with The Foundling Stars. Art by McKenna

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Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[June 2, 1966] Bad Decisions (July 1966 IF)

June 2, 2021 David Levinson 6 Comments

by David Levinson

Trouble at the Cactus Curtain

It may surprise many of you to learn that there is a United States military presence in Cuba. Since 1903, the U. S. has maintained a naval base at Guantanamo Bay, near the south-eastern end of the island. Originally, it was a coaling station and then served as a shipping center during the War. Now it’s largely the base for American operations in the Caribbean.

Naturally, the Castro regime is none too happy about the situation, even though the base employs a large number of Cubans, pumping money into the local economy. Along with the perimeter fence, patrols and watch towers, the U. S. began emplacing mines “as a precaution” following the 1959 revolution, and the Cubans soon followed suit. At least 10 people have been killed, either by blundering into the minefields or through engineering accidents. In 1961, the Cubans also began planting a cordon of prickly pear cactus, quickly dubbed the Cactus Curtain.

On May 21st, a Cuban sentry by the name of Luis Ramirez Lopez was shot and killed by a Marine guard. According to the Department of Defense, Lopez was inside the fence and ignored a warning shot. The Marine then fired again, wounding the Cuban, who was able to climb back over the fence and leave. Two days later, six Cuban soldiers may or may not (depending on which side you believe) have crossed the fence and definitely exchanged fire with several Marines. No one on either side was injured.

Secretary of State Dean Rusk announced his intention to send a diplomatic note via the Swiss, insisting that Cuba cease these provocations and respect the boundary. Castro reportedly said not to bother, and then gave a fiery speech declaring that Rusk had practically threatened war and warned the Cuban people to be ready for an invasion. Tens of thousands of Cuban reservists have apparently been recalled to active duty. Now, Castro’s been pounding the drums lately, probably trying to bolster his support among his people in the face of the struggling economy, but daring the United States to attack seems more foolish than bold. Maybe he feels that with the U. S. tied up in Viet Nam, there’s no chance of them taking up his dare.

A Marine patrols the perimeter at Guantanamo Bay.

Doing the wrong thing

Nobody always does the right thing. Authors often derive interesting situations from their characters acting on bad ideas. Sometimes, though, they go too far and rely on those characters acting like absolute idiots. Boy, is that the case in this month’s IF. From super-genius teenagers to drunken conmen to high-ranking politicians, it seems like everybody left their brain at home.

This supposedly illustrates The Hour Before Earthrise. Maybe a later installment. Art by Morrow