New Kindle Book
Another volume yet of my SURFING A MAGICAL INTERNET series is now available at Amazon's Kindle Store. Excerpts of Book 10, Exploring Central Europe, can also be found at my website at www.surfingamagicalinternet.com.
Some 150 years ago, the newly formed Liebig’s Extract of Meat Company rewarded loyal customers with gifts of colorful picture cards. Each card was a work of art; before long, thousands of them were circulating. Their beautiful images and associated commentary captivated people and new editions were eagerly awaited. As a group, they told fascinating stories about every conceivable aspect of life on earth and, similar to what the internet might do in our time, came to embody the sum total of human knowledge. With the help of these cards, collectors could travel the globe, meet people from any country on earth and learn about their customs. They could visit lost civilizations, too, or marvel at natural and man-made wonders around the globe. They could study up on plants and animals or the evolution of commerce and transport, learn about geography and history and natural science. They could discover the secrets of agriculture, forestry and fishing or trace the origin of new inventions that were transforming industry and life in general. They could familiarize themselves with music and literature, great art and architecture, with famous men and women of all ages and, most importantly perhaps, with children’s favorite world of giants and dwarfs, elves and gnomes, riddles and fairy tales!
As a result, strange as it may sound, the company’s most important contribution, perhaps, was not to the kitchens of the world, but to the education of millions of people of all ages who could not go to school or afford books! The author’s grandmother was one of them and, many years later, when he was a child, she used her large collection of Liebig cards, as one might the modern-day internet, to satisfy his urge to find out everything about the big wide world. This tenth volume of the SURFING A MAGICAL INTERNET series, resurrects another portion yet of grandmother’s magical internet. Book 10, Exploring Central Europe, presents over 270 pictures from an imaginary trip, well over a century ago, across the pre-World War I world of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Switzerland, which then included all sorts of places now found in Poland, the Czech Republic, and even Slovenia. In the process, we enter something like a time machine, which makes for an especially intriguing tour. To be sure, finding ourselves along the banks of the Rhine or the Danube, among breathtaking peaks and valleys of the Alps, or in front of grand structures from Baroque, Gothic, Renaissance, and Rococo times—city gates, cathedrals, town halls, court houses, castles and palaces, and houses of parliament---we may feel quite at home even in, say, 1895. But city streets with no automobiles in sight and people dressed in unfamiliar ways may well strike us as odd—not to mention their different customs, music, and dance. We certainly won’t be able to hail a cab or find a plane to fly home. In fact, as we will discover, my grandmother’s Liebig card pictures presented here can take us further back beyond her time as well. We can inspect amazing structures from the days of ancient Rome and visit with Hannibal, the Carthaginian general, who surprised the Romans in 218 B.C. by his daring attempt to cross the Alps with 100,000 men, 12,000 horses, and 37 elephants! We can learn about the days in 1241 when Genghis Khan’s Mongolian hordes reached Silesia’s capital of Wroclaw (Germany’s Breslau) and burned it to the ground. We can watch Bohemian rebels in 1618, throwing an emperor’s emissaries out of a Prague castle window (the famous defenestration) and igniting the Thirty Years’ War, while Frederick II of Brandenburg, a few years later, swelled the population of Berlin by providing refuge to 5,000 French Protestants there. And much more recently, in 1910, we can follow Géo Chávez, the Peruvian aviator, who was first in crossing the Alps by air in a tiny plane. So many stories, captivating, and so much fun!
Exploring Central Europe
Heinz Kohler
Some 150 years ago, the newly formed Liebig’s Extract of Meat Company rewarded loyal customers with gifts of colorful picture cards. Each card was a work of art; before long, thousands of them were circulating. Their beautiful images and associated commentary captivated people and new editions were eagerly awaited. As a group, they told fascinating stories about every conceivable aspect of life on earth and, similar to what the internet might do in our time, came to embody the sum total of human knowledge. With the help of these cards, collectors could travel the globe, meet people from any country on earth and learn about their customs. They could visit lost civilizations, too, or marvel at natural and man-made wonders around the globe. They could study up on plants and animals or the evolution of commerce and transport, learn about geography and history and natural science. They could discover the secrets of agriculture, forestry and fishing or trace the origin of new inventions that were transforming industry and life in general. They could familiarize themselves with music and literature, great art and architecture, with famous men and women of all ages and, most importantly perhaps, with children’s favorite world of giants and dwarfs, elves and gnomes, riddles and fairy tales!
As a result, strange as it may sound, the company’s most important contribution, perhaps, was not to the kitchens of the world, but to the education of millions of people of all ages who could not go to school or afford books! The author’s grandmother was one of them and, many years later, when he was a child, she used her large collection of Liebig cards, as one might the modern-day internet, to satisfy his urge to find out everything about the big wide world. This tenth volume of the SURFING A MAGICAL INTERNET series, resurrects another portion yet of grandmother’s magical internet. Book 10, Exploring Central Europe, presents over 270 pictures from an imaginary trip, well over a century ago, across the pre-World War I world of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Switzerland, which then included all sorts of places now found in Poland, the Czech Republic, and even Slovenia. In the process, we enter something like a time machine, which makes for an especially intriguing tour. To be sure, finding ourselves along the banks of the Rhine or the Danube, among breathtaking peaks and valleys of the Alps, or in front of grand structures from Baroque, Gothic, Renaissance, and Rococo times—city gates, cathedrals, town halls, court houses, castles and palaces, and houses of parliament---we may feel quite at home even in, say, 1895. But city streets with no automobiles in sight and people dressed in unfamiliar ways may well strike us as odd—not to mention their different customs, music, and dance. We certainly won’t be able to hail a cab or find a plane to fly home. In fact, as we will discover, my grandmother’s Liebig card pictures presented here can take us further back beyond her time as well. We can inspect amazing structures from the days of ancient Rome and visit with Hannibal, the Carthaginian general, who surprised the Romans in 218 B.C. by his daring attempt to cross the Alps with 100,000 men, 12,000 horses, and 37 elephants! We can learn about the days in 1241 when Genghis Khan’s Mongolian hordes reached Silesia’s capital of Wroclaw (Germany’s Breslau) and burned it to the ground. We can watch Bohemian rebels in 1618, throwing an emperor’s emissaries out of a Prague castle window (the famous defenestration) and igniting the Thirty Years’ War, while Frederick II of Brandenburg, a few years later, swelled the population of Berlin by providing refuge to 5,000 French Protestants there. And much more recently, in 1910, we can follow Géo Chávez, the Peruvian aviator, who was first in crossing the Alps by air in a tiny plane. So many stories, captivating, and so much fun!
Exploring Central Europe
Heinz Kohler
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