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• Astronomers Might Have Witnessed The Birth of A Magnetar
• Fascinating Staircases That Are A Step Above The Rest
• Post-Mortem Photography and Mourning Jewelries
• Frozen Dead Guy Days: An Annual Festival in a Tiny Colorado Town
• The Deadly Temptation of the Oregon Trail Shortcut

Astronomers Might Have Witnessed The Birth of A Magnetar Posted: 03 Dec 2020 09:24 PM PST Astronomers might have witnessed, for the first time ever, the birth of a magnetar when two neutron stars collided and merged into one massive object. However, this is only a possibility, and scientists say that other explanations for the phenomenon are possible. Astrophysicist Wen-fai Fong of Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., and colleagues first spotted the site of the neutron star crash as a burst of gamma-ray light detected with NASA's orbiting Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory on May 22. Follow-up observations in X-ray, visible and infrared wavelengths of light showed that the gamma rays were accompanied by a characteristic glow called a kilonova. Kilonovas are thought to form after two neutron stars, the ultradense cores of dead stars, collide and merge. The merger sprays neutron-rich material "not seen anywhere else in the universe" around the collision site, Fong says. That material quickly produces unstable heavy elements, and those elements soon decay, heating the neutron cloud and making it glow in optical and infrared light… [...] Observing how the object's light behaves over the next four months to six years, Fong and her colleagues have calculated, will prove whether or not a magnetar was born. More about this story over at ScienceNews. (Image Credit: NASA, ESA, D. PLAYER/STSCI / ScienceNews)

Fascinating Staircases That Are A Step Above The Rest Posted: 03 Dec 2020 09:23 PM PST Perhaps these people are just tired of the conventional designs for staircases, and apparently they did a great job! These photos of unique staircases were compiled by My Modern Met. My first thought upon seeing them though is this: These are not suited for homes with children! Photo by Edouard Brunet and François Martens via My Modern Met In terms of design, they're definitely a step above the rest, and also in terms of danger! As someone who's a bit paranoid, seeing these photos made my heart skip a beat. They look so dangerous, but at least they were able to pull off being artistic. However, I'm not an expert in this, so please share your thoughts if I'm wrong! Photo By Roberto Murgia and Valentina Ravara via My Modern Met Photo by nC2 via My Modern Met Which one is your favorite? Photo Credit: Rumi Baumann

Post-Mortem Photography and Mourning Jewelries Posted: 03 Dec 2020 09:21 PM PST Taking a photograph of a dead body seems like a morbid activity, unusual and frowned upon in our time. In the nineteenth century, however, Post-Mortem Photography -- "the practice of taking a photograph of the recently deceased" -- was a common practice. Whereas before only the wealthier classes who could afford to commission the luxury of an expensive, painted portrait or sculptural likeness of their family members or friends, the invention of this first publicly available photographic process (daguerreotype) enabled those from lower socio-economic backgrounds to afford sit for a photography session, in order to capture one last memory of their loved ones. In this sense, this invention can be considered as democratizing the grief as it allowed a wider demographic to indulge in trending grieving practices. Aside from Post-Mortem Photography, there were also mourning jewelries which are "physical reminders of dead loved ones" which often incorporated "strands of the deceased hair." In addition to highlighting the somberness of death, mourning jewelry was a way of keeping the dead close to you. Imagery that was depicted on these objects all bore some symbolism to death, faith or grief, so common motifs included the likes of anchors, crosses, a hand holding flowers or pearls. Embracing death was a culture back then because death was so near to them. In the nineteenth and twentieth century, death was everywhere – particularly for the Victorians. The advent of rapid urbanization and industrialization leading to increased pollution and overcrowded cities, combined with poor knowledge of hygiene and practices in a pre-germ theory society, meant that prior to 1860, the spread of diseases such as scarlet fever, typhoid, consumption (tuberculosis), diphtheria and cholera were rampant and routinely fatal. Infant and child mortality were extremely high, with the death rate for children below five years of age in 1849 reaching 33% in some areas of London. For adults, the outlook wasn't much better. Whilst Victorians who reached adulthood could expect to live into relatively old age, average life expectancy at birth was low. In 1850 it was 40 years of age for men, and 42 for women – a stark contrast to our present-day statistics with the worldwide average lifespan sitting at approximately 71 years in an era of modern medicine and higher standards of living. For a large proportion of the population in the Victorian period, life was over before it had barely begun. As articulated by scholars Jaqueline Anne Bunge and Jack Mord, this meant that the death was not hidden away, but rather, "[…] prepared for both mentally and spiritually, and celebrated through a religious ceremony, mourning rituals, elaborate floral and funeral displays". What do you think about reviving these practices? -via The Collector Photos from The Collector, Compiled by Philippa Ogden

Frozen Dead Guy Days: An Annual Festival in a Tiny Colorado Town Posted: 03 Dec 2020 08:25 PM PST Bredo Morstoel of Norway was 89 years old when he died in 1989. His frozen corpse is now the center of an annual party in Nederland, Colorado. There's quite a bit to unpack here. The official website for Frozen Dead Guy Days details how Morstoel's grandson had the old man cryogenically frozen in California. After four years of deep freeze, the family was forced to abandon the body in a crudely-built cryogenic storage shed in the little town of Nederland. Starting in 1995, local resident Bo Shaffer and his friends visited the body every month to repack it in dry ice. And every March, they threw a big party about their hobby. This party has grown into a festival with live bands, drinking, and coffin racing, which you can see pictured above. Participants call themselves Frostifarians. They had to cancel this past March, but plan to relaunch it next year. It looks like a wonderfully lively carnival! -via Ace of Spades HQ | Photo: Frozen Dead Guy Days

The Deadly Temptation of the Oregon Trail Shortcut Posted: 03 Dec 2020 08:25 PM PST Imagine you are in your car, trying to get somewhere in an area you've never been. You pull up a map, spot a shortcut, and decide to take it, since it appears that you'll save a lot of time. Then eventually you notice a lack of gas stations or any facilities, then your cell service fades out, and the pavement turns to gravel. That's bad enough, but imagine you were taking your family and all your worldly possessions to a new place you couldn't even imagine, with no roads, fuel, or communication at all.    In the summer of 1846, a party of 89 emigrants was making its way westward along the 2,170-mile-long Oregon Trail. Tired, hungry, and trailing behind schedule, they decided at Fort Bridger, Wyoming to travel to their final destination of California by shortcut. The "Hastings Cutoff" they chose was an alternative route that its namesake, Lansford Hastings, claimed would shave at least 300 miles off the journey. The party believed this detour could save more than a month's time. They were wrong. Hastings Cutoff turned out to be a waterless, wide-open stretch of the Great Salt Lake Desert, bordered by sagebrush wilderness, that began with having to forge their own wagon route through Emigration Canyon in the Wasatch mountains. By the time the party finally reached the Sierra Nevada mountains, the shortcut had cost them weeks. Snow fell, trapping the Donner-Reed party. This is when the most infamous (and deadly) part of their tale began. When members of the party began starving to death, survivors ate their remains to stay alive. Find out why Hastings promoted the cutoff when he never even traveled it himself, and read stories of other horrible shortcuts on the Oregon Trail at Atlas Obscura. (Image credit: Albert Bierstadt)

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