About arrogant cops.

It is easy to dislike policemen. They personify the old saying that “A little power is a dangerous thing”.

And while the donut and coffee vendors may rejoice at their number, the reality is that these individuals share the same demographic profile with those they seek to protect us from. Criminals.

My first encounter with an American cop, literally on my first day in New York, was on Sixth Avenue, when I asked one of the city’s finest for directions. Finest at what, they never say. Maybe it’s consumption of vast quantities of donuts, judging by the waistline of the average NYPD man in uniform?

“Move on bud”. That was this guy’s idea of giving directions. This fool probably thought he was in central casting.

And while New York’s greatest crooks go unpunished – they work on Wall Street – it’s hardly any wonder when they are being policed by a squad that has to remove its shoes and socks to count to twenty. Not the NYPD. The SEC.

So this snap brings back pleasant memories of what it’s like to be well distant from Manhattan’s fabled streets.

9 West 57th Street. 1982. Pentax ME Super, 40mm ‘Pancake’, Kodachrome 64

I carried that little Pentax and its even smaller 40mm ‘pancake’ lens – so named because it was almost dead flat on the body when in place – everywhere. It was my street camera, acquired right after I witnessed my first chain snatching in the subway. The woman’s screams still resonate in my ears. The Pentax was my “I-don’t-care-if-they-steal-it” camera while my precious Leica M3 stayed at home for the duration. Needless to add, the Pentax was never stolen. Must have been my insouciant attitude.

Nine West 57th Street has this huge numeral, a twenty foot tall, red ‘9’ on the sidewalk. God alone knows who they had to bribe to allow that, but I suspect the cops’ union was on the list.

In exchange, this arrogant policeman has parked his cruiser right next to the fire hydrant. At least the car is pointing the right way.

Yup, a true New York cop.

You think Chicago cops are more corrupt? Nah! As the great P G Wodehouse once put it “At least when you buy a Chicago cop, he stays bought”.

And California where their cars are cynically emblazoned “To Protect and to Serve”? How about early retirement from speeding tickets and crooked promotions which double the retirement check – at age 50? The French gave us our constitution. Maybe a new Reign of Terror would now be in order?

March 10, 2008 – Fact is stranger than fiction:

That Hammer of Wall Street, the Über cop himself, no less than the Governor of New York, has just ‘fessed up to being involved in a call girl ring. From Eliot Ness to Eliot Mess in one day. Then again, he would have denied all of the above in any case. You shouldn’t. At least the self-righteous schmuck ended his career at a Renaissance Hotel.

Overlays add high quality pictures.

I popped over to Paris this morning, the flight taking just a few seconds, courtesy of Google Earth.

After all, if you are sightseeing, why not start with the most beautiful city on earth?

The small track ball on my Apple Mighty Mouse functions as a zoom control – neat.

Click on one of the menus on the left and an overlay is added showing links to photographs:

Click on one of the little camera logos and you get the photograph – and yes, whoever put up that awful skyscraper really should be shot:

For art museums the links provide details on the art work selected. Plus you can upload your own photographs! Some of the linked photographs are great, some plain lousy. There’s web democracy for you.

A great way of looking at pictures.

I amused myself by zipping from the home where I grew up in London to my present location – too bad they didn’t take this one when the vines were in season.

You can download Google Earth here – it’s free. And remember, no looking at the Pentagon now or Big Brother will start watching you.

Update – March 10, 2008 – you thought I was kidding?

The Pentagon just announced that they will not let Google Earth film their locations.

You can imagine the conversation in Osama’s pad.

“Hey, Ahmed, this one’s blurred out. Must be military. Let’s bomb it.”

And we trust these people with our country’s defense? At least they read this blog – does that mean I should be scared? Honest, all I do is grow grapes at my place.

The greatest engineer of the Victorian age.

Because so much of it is so very special, I have been reading up on railways and railway architecture.

Huh? Railway architecture?

Can you say Grand Central station in Manhattan – maybe the greatest interior in America? St. Pancras or King’s Cross in London? The gorgeous Ouse Valley viaduct in Sussex?

The supports for the Ouse Valley viaduct, 1841. Can you say ‘Perfection’?

One of the facts disclosed in my reading is that most of the world’s railways run on 4′ 8.5″ spaced rails. Known, to this day, as the Stephenson Standard, after the great Victorian railway engineer. How did he come up with that? His wife’s height? Some personal recollection? A dictate of mine engineering where he got his start? It seems to bear no resemblance to known measures, Imperial or Metric. (Please refer to Comment #2 for the solution – thank you, Alex!) I learned also that the giant amongst Victorian engineers, Isambard Kingdom Brunel (what a name!) refused to compromise with the limp-wristed Stepehnson Standard. Compromise was not a word in Brunel’s vocabulary. When he designed the Great Western Railway its was no less than a seven foot gauge. His tracks would run the largest locomotives and would be the most stable.

This refusal to compromise, his drive, determination, individuality and commitment, is what distinguished him in an already distinguished group of great engineers. Today you see that rarely – Steve Jobs is an obvious example.

Here’s the picture – you doubtless know it – maybe the greatest industrial portrait of a powerful man ever made. A man with no fear of getting his hands dirty. An engineer’s engineer.

The backdrop comprises the chains used to launch the Great Eastern iron ship
down the slipway. (Photographer by Robert Howlett, 1857.)

Today, everyone is a ‘team member’. The order taker at MacDonald’s. The Target sales clerk. The smug coffee maker behind the Starbucks counter. The workers at Nikon and Canon and Dell and Microsoft. All seeking to avoid accountability by hiding within the ‘team’.

Not so with I. K. Brunel. He took huge risks, had huge failures. And greater successes. What a man. What a photograph.

The ultimate book of railway photography while we are on the topic? None other than O. Winston Link’s.

A first in business.

When I was a lad learning about business, one of the oft quoted saws of the day was “If all else fails, run a bank”.

That comment on bank management remains true today, though in America one would have to make it “…. run a big bank.” The simple reason being that if all goes well you get paid a lot and if you mess up really badly you still get paid a lot and the taxpayer bails you out. Economists call it moral hazard. I call it a broken system

So when I was flipping through Fortune magazine at breakfast, I nearly choked on my muffin when coming across a really neat ad for, of all things, a bank. Can you remember ever having used the word ‘neat’ and ‘bank’ in the same breath? No, neither can I. Fortune magazine, by the way, has long had a focus on using good photography – one of its early contributors being the estimable Margaret Bourke-White.

I would have preferred it in color with the shoes in red – this bank’s favorite color recently – but no matter. Any bank with a sense of humor is a good thing.