kevin patterson

[The Post Millennial @TPostMillennial]

🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

[James Lucas @JamesLucasIT]

In 1963, New York City committed what one critic called an act of vandalism against its own soul. It tore down the most beautiful building it had ever built, and it has regretted it every day since.

The building was Pennsylvania Station, and for half a century it was one of the great rooms of the world...

It opened in 1910, designed by the architects McKim, Mead & White, and it covered eight acres in the heart of Manhattan. Its main waiting room was modeled on the Baths of Caracalla in ancient Rome, with ceilings that rose 150 feet into the air.

Sunlight poured down through vast steel-and-glass canopies onto the concourse below. To step off a train and walk up into that light was, for millions of arriving travelers, the moment New York announced itself.

A historian, Vincent Scully, famously wrote that, through it, one entered the city like a god. One scuttles in now like a rat...

Because in 1963, the railroad, losing money and sitting on immensely valuable land, sold the air rights above the station. The great building was condemned. Wave by wave, the pink granite columns were pulled down and dumped in a New Jersey swamp, and a low, windowless complex of Madison Square Garden and an office tower was built on top of the surviving tracks.

There was no law to stop it. At the time, nothing in New York protected a historic building from destruction, however beloved. Leading architects stood outside in protest as the demolition began. It made no difference...

But something came out of the loss. The destruction of Penn Station horrified the public so deeply that it gave birth to the modern preservation movement in America. New York passed its landmarks law in 1965, and that law would later save Grand Central Terminal from the very same fate.

In a way, Penn Station became more powerful in death than it had ever been in life.

It’s really true that we never truly know what we have until we lose it... the columns of Penn Station could not be saved. But every landmark that still stands in New York today stands partly because of what their loss awakened in the people who watched them fall.

Ada Louise Huxtable, the first architecture critic of The New York Times, wrote of the demolition in 1963: "The tragedy is that our own times not only could not produce such a building, but cannot even maintain it."

I started this newsletter because the people who came before us left us something extraordinary, and almost no one is teaching us how to see it anymore. Every week I try to. If that is something you would like to be part of, you can join here:

https://t.co/hgJUdR0Rb5

I write about beauty in all its forms. If you'd like to support the work, a paid subscription is what makes it possible.

[Shruti @heyshrutimishra]

Elon just created 4,400 millionaires in a single day.

400 of them are now worth over $100 million.

These aren't VCs. They're SpaceX employees, and the list includes welders, technicians, and cafeteria staff, because for two decades the company paid every level of the workforce in stock instead of higher salaries.

Juan Hernandez immigrated from Mexico and took a $28 an hour contractor welding job in 2015. He says he didn't even know what SpaceX was. The company gave him a $10,000 equity grant and let him buy more shares through payroll deductions. That stake is now worth $880,000.

Trevor Hise's parents wanted him to take a stable job at General Electric. He picked SpaceX instead, stayed 12 years, and accumulated over 100,000 shares. At the $135 listing price that's $13.5 million. He's 37 and semiretired. His words: "The magnitude of this has been ridiculous."

The most telling detail came before the listing. Over 100 employees quietly banded together and negotiated a group wealth management deal covering up to $5 billion, because none of them had ever needed a wealth manager before.

Software IPOs have minted millionaires for 30 years. This is the first one where the money went to the factory floor.

[Nikki Schwab @NikkiSchwab]

The Thunderbirds and the Blue Angels take a practice flight over the White House ahead of Sunday’s UFC birthday bash.

[Ancient History Hub @AncientHistorry]

Rome had 140+ public toilets across the city and people talk about them like a sign of advanced civilization.

Nobody mentions the part where every single toilet shared one sponge on a stick that was never cleaned.

One sponge. Dozens of strangers. All day. Every day.

And that's not even the worst part.

The sewage system was so poorly ventilated that methane would build up underneath the seats until it ignited. People were occasionally blown off their toilets by explosions from below.

Romans were so aware of how dangerous bathrooms were that they brought statues of Fortuna, the goddess of luck, with them just to use the toilet. Archaeologists found protective curse spells carved into bathroom walls.

The most advanced civilization in the ancient world was terrified of its own plumbing.

[Charlie Gribble @Charlie_Grib]

First look at NC State legacy QB Gunner Rivers in an NC State uniform rocking the same No.17 as his dad 👀👀👀.

📸: @cjordanii2027

[Vintage Maps @vintagemapstore]

US Megaregions - more than 50% of people live in these 7 areas

[Voices From Vietnam @VoicesfromNam]

Interview with several 'tunnel rats' stationed in Cu Chi during the Vietnam War.

Massive balls on these guys, not a job I would like to have! Absolute heroes 🇺🇸

[emily miller @emilymiller]

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Trump’s Contractor for Lincoln Reflecting Pool - Eddie Wood- Answers Your Questions on Water Timing, Final Work, POTUS Visit et al. WATCH!

[Real Country Music @real_kuntry]

Weatherman

[Aedanus Burke @aedanusburke]

Flag of the 2nd Spartan Regiment of Militia which recruited men from modern day Spartanburg and Union Counties in South Carolina during the American Revolution. This flag was preserved in one family for almost two and half centuries. A company based not far from from the area where this regiment was raised has made a reproduction, you can find it here: https://t.co/YUvTah5o5h

[Ken Ham @aigkenham]

Does the Bible give us an age of the earth?

Over the years, I’ve heard the objection over and over again that the Bible doesn’t give us an age for the earth—that’s what science is for! I usually respond a bit tongue in cheek by saying I’m glad it doesn’t, or it would have been outdated the very next year!

But then I go on to explain that the Bible doesn’t give us an age for the universe—it gives us something better: a birth certificate and a detailed chronological history.

You see, Genesis 1 is clear that God created everything in six, literal 24-hour days. That means the universe was six days old when Adam was created. We then have detailed genealogies in Genesis 5 and 10 that don’t merely provide the names of the fathers from Adam to Abraham but also their ages when they had their sons. This means anyone can easily add up the time that elapsed from Adam to Abraham (about 2,000 years). Since the Bible gives us the details to figure out Abraham lived about 2,000 years before Christ and we know Christ walked on this earth 2,000 years before us, we can determine that there’s been about 6,000 years of history.

So, no, the Bible doesn’t say, “The earth is 6,000 years old.” Earth wasn’t that old when the Bible was written anyway! But it gives us a “birth certificate” we can use to figure out how much time has passed since the beginning.

(And, just as an aside, this birth certificate is why most people in the West believed the earth was just a few thousand years old until relatively modern times!)

[Echoes of War @EchoesofWarYT]

A daguerrotype of John Armstrong Jr with his dog, 1840. Armstrong was the last surviving delegate to the Continental Congress, dying in 1843. He is the only delegate to have been photographed.

[Rod D. Martin @RodDMartin]

🧵Is Scott Bessent working to crash the yuan?

He helped break the Bank of England in 1992. Now Trump’s Treasury Secretary is using that experience against China — and Beijing should be terrified.

THREAD🧵

[Josh Howerton @howertonjosh]

I had never seen this clip anywhere before. This guy is an actual, biblically defined heretic.

If you wonder why I have a bit more of an edge when I'm talking about James Talarico, this is why 👇

[Baseball’s Greatest Moments @BBGreatMoments]

Ozzie Smith showing off some of his wild glove work 🤯

[Mrgunsngear @Mrgunsngear]

Career criminal, 25 year old Abdulhafedh Abdulhafedh (shocker...), was suspected of a recent bank robbery in Illinois and was surrounded by FBI agents & Chicago police in Garfield Park yesterday.

Officers blocked Mr. Abdulahafedh's vehicle in and instructed him to exit the vehicle. Instead he decided he'd shoot at them. Agents responded by performing an impromptu ballistics gel test with their Federal 5.56 62gr Tactical Bonded XM556FBIT3 ammunition on his head and torso. Even with the vehicle glass barrier, the ballistics gel test was successful and Mr. Abdulahafedh died in the vehicle saving taxpayers millions of dollars. Inshallah.

Plan accordingly...

#CityLife #chicago #3rdWorld #ChiRaq #islam #FBI #cops #garfieldpark #FAFO #bonded #inshallah #urban #democrats

[Mario Nawfal @MarioNawfal]

🇺🇸 FBI SWAT just shot and killed a bank robbery suspect after a standoff in Chicago's West Garfield Park.

The suspect, 25-year-old Abdulhafedh Abdulhafedh, came up through the sunroof and opened fire. Agents returned fire and killed him on the spot.

[Stephen Horn @stephenehorn]

It's not rocket science: when you let out a lot of killers and violent criminals, some of them will go right back into it

RIP Justin Ellis Jackson, who was killed in a home invasion by a convicted killer less than three weeks after Cooper released him

Follow: @CooperReleased

[🇺🇸SassySouthernPatriot🇺🇸 @SassySouthern2U]

Thread:

🚨 NC Hypocrisy Exposed:

Roy Cooper & his brother Judge Pell Cooper Solar Cash Grab

1/While pushing green mandates as Governor, Roy Cooper’s family quietly cashed in on solar leases from family land.

They re-deeded it among themselves and shifted ownership to Pell’s wife to “hide” the conflict.
This isn’t “green energy” — it’s green for the Coopers.

2/ In 2012 (Roy as AG), the brothers leased 40 acres in Nash County to Strata Solar via Will Clark Properties LLC. 20+ year deal. Family has raked in serious money.
Roy divested on paper in 2014. Then Pell (a sitting District Court Judge) managed it — raising massive ethics red flags.

3/ After scrutiny? They put it in Pell’s wife Meredith’s name as manager. Classic move.
Family land since 1981. Multiple LLCs. Multiple solar plays.

4/ Full investigative details here:

🔗 https://t.co/o0oni2v1GF

🔗 https://t.co/vICu8b83nq

🔗 https://t.co/25WTCkUXhZ

5/ Rules for thee, but not for me. North Carolina deserves better than insider solar deals.
RT if you want real transparency from our politicians.
#NCHypocrisy #CooperCronyism #SolarScam