Posted on 02/12/2012 1:57:18 PM PST by DogByte6RER
A city in ruins: Stunning photo taken from kite that captures devastation from 1906 earthquake in San Francisco
This rarely seen image of the city of San Fransisco lying in ruins after the devastating earthquake of 1906 was captured by an ingenious photographer using a camera attached kites.
The panoramic shot, which is of outstanding quality considering the basic equipment available, shows the full scale of the disaster which claimed the lives of over 3,000, injured 225,000 and caused $400,000,000 worth of property damage.
Commercial photographer George Lawrence, who used home-made large format cameras, was well known at the time for his wide angle photographs of banqueting groups, national political conventions, and state legislature sessions.
To take aerial shots he had previously gone up in balloons, but after a near fatal accident in 1901, when he fell 200ft and was only saved by telegraph wires broke his fall, he began looking for a safer alternative.
The following year, a Chicago inventor Silas Conyne, patented a kite for flying advertising banners.
Impressed by the kites' stability and lifting power, Lawrence obtained permission to build some for himself. To boost their capabilities even further, Lawrence flew several kites in series which allowed him to hoist his heavy wooden-framed cameras up to 2,000ft high.
After developing a stabilising system he was able to fly as many as seventeen kites in a train, although five to ten were usually enough.
With his great business sense, Lawrence knew there would be huge international demand for the San Francisco pictures and sure enough they earned him well over $15,000 the equivalent today of over $300,000.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Bloody hilarious. LOL.
hahaha!.....good one. ; )
LOL!
Notice docks in the foreground. SF used to have a thriving commercial dock system. The unions killed it.
LOL! Thanks for the keeper. That was awesome!
There are additional (better) pics and maps that will give a better perspective of the damaged area. Also goes into some detail of what this “kite” contraption actually was.
http://robroy.dyndns.info/lawrence/kitelines97.html
LOL! Love ya, Roscoe !
Who knew they had Heineken back then?!
Thanks for posting that.
Massive vitality, energetic people and the full flower of American ingenuity displayed in the profusion of autos, trolley cars and people going places and doing things.
Now that $hole has nothing but perverts, welfare queens, illegal immigrants, bums and junkies with rigs hanging out of their arms.
Plan for the Reset, good people.
How to hijack a thread in one easy fotochop.
Looks to me like the Fairmont hotel up on the hill survived the quake.
lol!
mmmm.... awaiting the day the filth declares the Revolution is upon us. I won't shoot first but by God I intend to shoot last.
mmmm.... awaiting the day the filth declares the Revolution is upon us. I won't shoot first but by God I intend to shoot last.
mmmm.... awaiting the day the filth declares the Revolution is upon us. I won't shoot first but by God I intend to shoot last.
My grandfather would have been there, he was starting up a banking business on orange crates for people wanting to rebuild.
ROTFLOL! Well done!
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Your grandfather was Amadeo Giannini?
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GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach | |
Thanks DogByte6RER, and thanks martin_fierro for the addiitional ping. |
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