Vandals Damage Statue Of Christopher Columbus In Yonkers Amid Growing Controversy

As New York City considers the future of the monument at Columbus Circle, others are taking more direct aims at tributes to the controversial Italian explorer.

For the fourth time in ten days, a statue of Christopher Columbus has been vandalized. This time, it happened in Yonkers.

No Americans live there anymore. ........................ They did in my day. I was on 86th St a couple of years ago, where did all the Italians go? I only saw one pastry shop. The Asian market had some neat frogs jumpin around, and some turtles, but no canollis? L&B was still there, I’m not sure it is still there after the owner got wacked. (suicide Clinton style)

Makes me consider a scheme in an old episode of the Twilight Zone where thieves steal a shipment of gold, then place themselves in a state of suspended animation for 100 years. In this case, I would put a few thousand dollars in a compound interest account, and hope to hell that the financial institution is still around when I revive myself 100 or 200 years later. :)

Seriously, even if that were ever possible, what an insane risk it would be to trust that the world in 100 or 200 years would be somewhere you wanted to live in. Who knows what can happen in all that time.

Reminds me of the character Martin Silenus, in the science fiction novel Hyperion. Earth is being slowly eaten up by an artificially-created black hole bouncing around in its interior and Martin’s mother, the last matriarch of an aristocratic but now-bankrupt family, puts the last of the family’s money into an inter-planetary bank account and puts the young Martin on a slow interstellar voyage, in which he goes into a fugue state for 100 years, at the risk of much brain damage. When the vessel docks on the destination planet a hundred years later, the bank has long since failed, Martin is broke, and he’s lost the capacity to speak, except to say 4 curse words, which is all he needs as he’s put to work cleaning sewers.

I know it’s just SF, but I loved that book and your post put me in mind of it.

Wow! That is very similar to the scheme I referred to.

That is, the part about stashing money away in an interest-bearing bank account for 100 years with the hope that the bank will still be around when you are later revived. Not the part about the black hole, of course, which I think sounds like an awesome plot for a movie or book. I remember several ago there being actual concerns about tiny black holes being generated in atom smashers (particle colliders).

I also liked very much your ending...

“a hundred years later, the bank has long since failed, Martin is broke, and he’s lost the capacity to speak, except to say 4 curse words, which is all he needs as he’s put to work cleaning sewers.”

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