Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2010 February 14

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February 14

SAR dogs in Hurricane Katrina

I'm doing a research project. It's about search and rescue dogs that worked in New Orleans following the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. If anyone can help me out, I'd really appreciate it. Thank you.24.90.204.234 (talk) 07:17, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

You're going to have to ask a specific question instead of telling us your general topic. Comet Tuttle (talk) 15:38, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Without a specific question, all we can really do is point you to things like the Red Cross and the New Orleans government who would probably be able to tell you what organizations helped with the search and rescue efforts, especially those concerning rescue dogs. Dismas|^(talk) 16:34, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

This site [1] has a few links for contacting the Louisiana Search and Rescue Dog Team. They may be able to direct you to suitable sources and references for your project. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 21:22, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

What I meant to ask was are there any Hurricane Katrina search and rescue dogs still alive today?24.90.204.234 (talk) 23:28, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, don't know. To save other Refdesk regulars from looking it up, this IP user asked the Katrina rescue dog question in December and didn't get an answer. Comet Tuttle (talk) 23:44, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Even large breed dogs live more than twice as long as the five years since Katrina so the answer is almost certainly yes, some are still alive. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 02:50, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Other Royal families with British members

Apart from the British royalty, have any other non-British royal families had British royalty marry into them? 92.29.62.115 (talk) 14:43, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes. All European royal families are inter-related. For example, take a look at Queen Victoria#Children and see what happened to her daughters. Most of them married foreign royalty (as did her sons, but that would be considered their wives joining the British royal family). --Tango (talk) 14:54, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

King Harald V of Norway is in the Line of Succession to the British Throne, due to his grandmother having been Princess Maud of Wales. This is a later intermarriage than a daughter of Queen Victoria. Woogee (talk) 22:41, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Hm. I was going to claim that Harald is the highest-ranking non-British subject in the line of succession, but that distinction seems to belong to Tewa Lascelles. Does anybody know anything about him, other than that he was born in the US? Woogee (talk) 22:44, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

It would appear that he is a "private citizen", i.e. there's probably not a lot of public information about him in that he does not have an occupation that puts him into the public eye. His father is James Lascelles, a jazz keyboardist, so there's a bit more about him, being a performer. --Jayron32 00:47, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

If his father was born in Britain, then he'd be a British citizen by descent, I think. Peter jackson (talk) 10:57, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Where do the Lufthansa executives work out of?

I noticed that this page on Lufthansa's website says that the headquarters are in Cologne: http://konzern.lufthansa.com/en/service/imprint.html While this one describes the headquarters as being in Frankfurt: http://presse.lufthansa.com/fileadmin/downloads/en/policy-brief/07_2009/Lufthansa-PolicyBrief-July-2009-Sustainability.pdf

Lufthansa has facilities in both cities. The question is, where are the executives based out of? I understand that the Investor Relations and Media Relations departments are out of Frankfurt. I believe that the finance department is in Cologne. In which facility does the executive leadership of Lufthansa work out of? WhisperToMe (talk) 21:57, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The site that describes a headquarters in Frankfurt refers to it simply as a headquarters, whereas every other source I've seen, including the company's own main website, refer to the Cologne office as the "corporate headquarters". If you are right that the finance department is in Cologne, that would seem to confirm that it is the executive headquarters, since executives are largely concerned with numbers. Probably the the headquarters in Frankfurt is just that, the "headquarters in Frankfurt". Since the Frankfurt Airport is the airline's most important hub, and since Frankfurt is also Germany's financial hub, I would expect that the company's executives sometimes have meetings in Frankfurt, even if their main office is in Cologne. As you may know, executives are rather nomadic these days. Lufthansa's CEO apparently lives in Hamburg. I expect that his routine involves a (chauffeured?) drive most mornings to the Hamburg airport, where he takes a first-class seat on a morning flight to to the city where his meetings are scheduled each day. Marco polo (talk) 23:22, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

The source here http://www.kfz.net/autonews/grundsteinlegung-fuer-lufthansa-hauptverwaltung-in-koeln/ says in German "Ende 2007 werden rund 800 Kölner Lufthanseaten, vor allem aus dem Konzernressort Finanzen, das Hochhaus am Rhein verlassen und in den nur wenige hundert Meter entfernten Neubau umziehen, erklärte das Unternehmen." - A Google translation stated that the finance department was being moved from one building in Cologne to the other. WhisperToMe (talk) 23:34, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Their registered office is in Cologne.[2] (In most countries, corporations must declare a location as being their registered office, although this need not be where most of their business or administration takes place.) --Normansmithy (talk) 14:41, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

When was World War I first called World War I?

I believe at the time it was called the Great War right? When was it first referred to as World War I? ScienceApe (talk) 22:26, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

• Yes, it was called the Great War initially. WhisperToMe (talk) 22:31, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I am guessing they began to call it World War I when World War II occurred, perhaps a few years before the actual outbreak (I think I have seen contemporary commentators calling it the "previous World War" or "the first World War" some time in the late 30's), because it was clear at that time another war would begin. --Saddhiyama (talk) 22:44, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

During the War. It's in the article: World_War_I#Cognate_names_for_the_war

(ec) As World War I indicates, it was called "The First World War" as early as 1920, following Charles à Court Repington. That's a bit different than "World War I" (it is ambiguous as to whether there will be more), but close. I suspect it started being called WWI in the late 1930s, when people started referring to the then-current conflict was "World War II." --Mr.98 (talk) 22:58, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Time Magazine used the term as early as July 1939. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 23:02, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

"First World War" is retrospective - it means the first time in history that the entire (civilized) world was involved in a war. It was pretty much synonymous with 'The War to End All Wars". a bit hyperbolic, I suppose, but there you go... --Ludwigs2 23:15, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

That is not synonymous to me. First does not mean that it is the end. --Lgriot (talk) 00:13, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Nobody ever calls what happened under Hitler "The First Holocaust". Why? Because most everyone hopes and assumes it could never be repeated. Surely they hoped and assumed that about the 1914-18 war; after all, it was called "the war to end all wars". It could only have been in the context of a subsequent potential world-wide conflict that it would have been referred to as the "first". -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 01:21, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

No that isn't true - read the sources already given. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 02:46, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

And Fisk, at least, argues that The Holocaust rested on the "success" of the Armenian Genocide, and so was hardly first. --Tagishsimon (talk) 03:19, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

The Holocaust was not the first genocide by any count; but the name Holocaust is a unique moniker for the genocide against the Jews by the Germans during the 1930's-1940's. There have been historical genocides which share many things in common with The Holocaust; often many things, but there has only been one Holocaust. --Jayron32 03:22, 15 February 2010 (UTC) I stand corrected. --Jayron32 03:56, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Per The Holocaust#Etymology and use of the term, the word has been applied to massive sacrifices and great slaughters or massacres for hundreds of years, including that in Armenia. I recognise there are schools of thought that the word should relate only to genocide with Jewish victims, or to the Nazi atrocities, but I'm not a subscriber. --Tagishsimon (talk) 03:31, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Just wanted to point out another important antecedent to the holocaust, the Herero and Namaqua Genocide meltBanana 03:48, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

See Armenian quote... AnonMoos (talk) 05:19, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

There is a definite semantic difference between "World War I" and "The First World War." Consider the difference between saying that Obama is the "first African-American U.S. President" and saying he is "African-American U.S. President #1." The latter clearly implies that you are counting off numbers; the former does not imply it, it is ambiguous on the point. --Mr.98 (talk) 18:05, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

It was certainly being called "The World War" by 1926, when World War Memorial Stadium was dedicated. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 03:15, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I'd guess that it was in the middle of the war that began in 1939. Various names were floated around for that war at one time; I have an American book (somewhere; I'm not looking at it, so I can't quite it exactly) from about 1942 that includes a note discussing the subject. It mentions possibilities such as "Global War", "Universal War", and "World War II", and it concludes by saying something such as "We need to find a name for the current war, and President Roosevelt's suggestion of 'World War II' makes the most sense; 'Global" is redundent to 'World', and 'Universal' is a bit pretentious". Nyttend (talk) 00:50, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

For what it's worth, here is the New York Times on Armistice Day, 1918, in which it's referred to as "the world war", not capitalized. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:15, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Also for what it's worth, this site[3] has a list of books about WWI including publishing dates. The earliest one I see that says "First World War" is 1928. However, "The World War" seems to be in more common usage at that time. I found this item by googling ["world war i" "new york times" 1939]. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:30, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Using the term "The First World War" early on may have just been the noting that something unprecedented had happened. The term "World War I" more clearly is used to distinguish and disambiguate between similar and confusable things. A disambiguating prefix or suffix is unlikely until the later confusable thing comes along. For instance, 78 RPM records were not called that until 45 RPM records and 33 1/3 RPM records came along. They were just called "records", "phonograph records" or "gramophone records" from their invention until the late 1940's. Google Book Search and Google News Archive are very flaky and inaccurate in dating the books they have scanned, often placing incorrect and misleading dates on works. Edison (talk) 18:27, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Finding a poem

I'm trying to recall a poem. In it, the author has shouted at his young son and sent him to bed without a kiss. Later, feeling a bit of a heel, he goes up to the boy's bedroom. His son is asleep, with tears still on his lashes, and beside his bed he has arranged his precious things, a sea-shell, a piece of coloured glass, etc. Probably late C18th, maybe C19th. DuncanHill (talk) 23:39, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

can you recall any snippets from it? even a short passage will help. --Ludwigs2 23:59, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I searched poem boy son kiss bed seashell coloured glass but so far I can't find it. Bus stop (talk) 00:03, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

That's the thing, some poems I recall the words, others I recall as little films, and this one is the latter. DuncanHill (talk) 00:08, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, it's come back to me somehow - it's The Toys by Coventry Patmore. Sometimes asking the question helps jog the memory! Thanks for your efforts. DuncanHill (talk) 00:25, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Damn it, edit conflict! I knew I recognised it. It's The Toys by Coventry Patmore. 86.176.48.57 (talk) 00:32, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

An interesting word in that poem (that I never knew) is "counters," which can be "an imitation coin; a token," or "a piece of money." Bus stop (talk) 00:51, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Counter - "a disc or the like... used in games as a substitute for a coin or a marker of one's position" (from Chambers 20th Century Dictionary, 1983 edition), is the sense I get from the poem. DuncanHill (talk) 01:27, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

I would guess it could also be loosely thought of as "play money" as it would lend itself to use this way by children. Bus stop (talk) 04:02, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, "counters" (plastic discs of various colours) were used as an educational aid (to practise counting, of course), as well as being used as place markers in games. Dbfirs 08:11, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

What, no article on these yet? In my elementary school (thirty years ago), we used the centers cut out of 45rpm records. Most vinyl albums had a small hole in the center to fit on the record player spindle, but 45s often had oversize holes (which necessitated the creation of "spider" adaptors) cut into them. We used the bits that had been cut out. Matt Deres (talk) 14:36, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Where did you get such holes? (I'm a bit older but never saw them.) – Now skateboarders use the 'spider' as an abstract decorative motif; I always wonder how many of them know what it is. —Tamfang (talk) 17:39, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

I guess it is The Father Forgets. (Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL). It was originally published in the Reader's Digest and it was quoted in How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. It is not really a poem, but a lovely prose. Ganesh Dhamodkar (Talk) 04:43, 19 February 2010 (UTC)