My mental summer must be winding down, because tonight's drink is a very autumnal honey-caramel colored Manhattan.
Stori3d Past
@stori3dpast.bsky.social
Harold Johnson. Maine (from away!). Bookseller. Pilgrim. Word Guy. Skeptic. History & Archaeology. Tolkien. Trek. Italy. Old English. Used to make YouTubes, now I make typos. 19th C antiquarian — Sideburns included! 🏺📖🧙🏻♂️
Just sold this set for 5 times what I paid for it. Saved a book, made bank, that's a win by my reckoning.
Stori3d Past@stori3dpast.bsky.social · last wk.Probably my proudest book restoration yet. The front cover of this 1885 Personal Memoirs of US Grant had been badly etched or chemically damaged, but I was able to pull a lot of the original cloth color out & restore the lost gilding.
When you buy an antique Family Bible but it's packaged like 6 kilos of cocaine
Come for moderately embarrassing personal details about my parents; stay for my recommendation of the actual factual best-of-all-time book about #capecod's tidal mudflats and the creatures therein. 📚 🐌
Jason W. Dean@jasonwdean.com · 2d agoFor the new issue of our newsletter, @sibyllacumae.bsky.social and I asked our friend, poet, librarian, & scholar @sarahbc.bsky.social to write our 1st guest issue, and SHE DELIVERED in spades. She intertwines books, nature, Cape Cod and her family. Enjoy! twohalfsheets.substack.com/p/on-nature-...
Today I'm with the original and it's as stunning as expected. I can also now appreciate it's position in the landscape overlooking the Moray Firth 😍 #StandingStoneSunday #Archaeology #Picts 🏺
Claire Boardman@claireboardman.bsky.social · last mo.One of my favourite archaeological illustrations for #standingstonesunday - the Pictish Clach a' Charridh (Shandwick Stone) #archaeology ⚱️ From: highlandpictishtrail.co.uk/project/art-... Image: ©Crown Copyright HES, Ian G Scott.
Fun fact: "Dr. Seuss" was a pen name. His real name was Theodore Geisel. Funner fact: "Geisel" is a German cognate to the archaic Old English "gisl", which is inscribed in runes on the back of the Franks Casket
"There is no effort without error and shortcoming." -- Theodore Roosevelt
A deliciously pointy manicule. In a copy of Pope Pius II’s letter to Mehmed II, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Printed by Ulrich Zel at Cologne c. 1469-72. Bought by @theulspeccoll.bsky.social of @quaritch1847.bsky.social in 1894 & now Inc.5.A.4.1[242].
We actually have had this conversation before. But not about the printing press… publicdomainreview.org/essay/ars-no...
Petroglyphs, McConkie Ranch, Utah. August 20, 2026.
We drive the kid back down south tomorrow for her sophomore year of college. Another summer done & dusted. I wish they'd stop going faster each year.
⚖️ Weight, what?! The Curious Case of a Viking Weight Within a Weight... drtomhornearchaeology.substack.com/p/weight-wha...
Over the years I've bought & sold so many books that were once library discards. Some with great old lending library bookplates from the 1850s, complete with a list of rules & fines, and then the big kiss of death "DISCARD" stamped on the blank flyleaf.
Aaron van Dorn@aaronvandorn.bsky.social · last wk.Do people not realize that libraries regularly trash books
Just bought a bottle of 100-proof bourbon. I have regrets and also no I do not.
Probably my proudest book restoration yet. The front cover of this 1885 Personal Memoirs of US Grant had been badly etched or chemically damaged, but I was able to pull a lot of the original cloth color out & restore the lost gilding.
Tangential note: James Doohan lost a finger during D-Day. They never used that in any Trek storyline & always tried not to film it. I always wished that when he materialized after 90 years in that TNG episode, they'd have shown it & that would be the "0.4% pattern degradation" that Geordi mentions.
Jörg Hillebrand@gaghyogi49.bsky.social · 2w agoBe careful what you wish for! ;-) #StarTrekSNW's "A Case of Chiaroscuro" and #StarTrekTNG's "Relics".
I still find asking for membership difficult. But shared support keeps my independent work alive, the Genius Loci Digest free, and free photography available to heritage places and craftspeople. If you've found value in my work, I'd be grateful for your support 👉 www.digest.andymarsh...
To commemorate the 10th(!) anniversary of the launch of #NoMansSky, I’ve made available one of my last two (100 made) pin badges for the No Man’s Sky Archaeological Project, which was the cornerstone of my #archaeogaming PhD thesis. I will ship internationally. www.ebay.com/itm/13762242...
No Man's Sky Archaeological Survey Commemorative Pin Badge | eBay
Only 100 commemorative pin badges were created for the No Man's Sky Archaeological Survey, an archaeogaming project by PhD candidate Andrew Reinhard (University of York) as a thesis case study conducted within the Galactic Hub. This pin badge has not been opened and is being made available for the 10-year anniversary of the game's launch. Own a piece of video game archaeology.
ebay.com
“The Lost Vocabulary of Whaling: A forensic glossary” by Sarah Sax orionmagazine.org/article/the-...
The Lost Vocabulary of Whaling - Orion Magazine
A forensic glossary
orionmagazine.org
When I search books to buy on eBay, I do 15-year blocks to manage scrolling (1775-1789, 1790-1804, 1805-1819 etc). And for some reason, I almost never find resellable books in 1835-1849. It's not that great books weren't published then, it's just that they almost never show up. A weird eBay tic.
"Every single fan brush in the world has its own personality, and you have to make friends with that little rascal." - Bob Ross
Looks like @anglotopia.net is finally going to get their wish to walk #HadriansWall. anglotopia.net/our-trips/ha...
I'm Off to Walk Hadrian's Wall — Catch Up With The Story So Far
After fifteen years of "next year," the year is finally this one. By the time you read this, I'll be on my way to Britain to walk the entire length of the - Featured, Hadrian's Wall 2026, Roman Britai...
anglotopia.net
That leather book cover that you think is ruined probably isn't. Unless it's leather from about 1870 to 1900, in which case yeah, it probably is.
Riley Bruce@rileybruce.bsky.social · 2w agoWhat’s a thing from your area of expertise (or special interest) that you think it would behoove everyone else to know?
*scoff* Whatever. Our 10,000 lakes were made by the footprints of a large blue ox!
One of the coolest facts I ever learned: all elements up to iron can be forged by fusion inside living stars. But everything beyond iron needs a supernova to create them. So all those trace elements vital for life could only be formed by the deaths of the universe's first stars & solar systems.
One of the coolest things about this episode was the care taken to show the continents as they would have been 65 million years ago. It's an attention to detail that elevated what could have been just a fun & goofy riff on 1960s Trek stories.
Jörg Hillebrand@gaghyogi49.bsky.social · 2w agoHere's a good look at the Chicxulub asteroid impaxt crater, as seen in #StarTrekSNW's "Valles Marineris". You can see how close Africa still was to South America ~65 million years ago. I knew about the asteroid and the crater but I learnt its name thanks to the episode.
This morning’s #ThrowbackThursday spot was 11B High Street, the same building you can still spot today. The photo shows the address when Purdy’s Restaurant was there, dressed up for either Peace Day or a coronation, while the modern view shows just how much the shopfront has changed.
Really happy with how the restoration of Napier's "History of the Peninsular War" turned out. They're just inherently beautiful books.
Stori3d Past@stori3dpast.bsky.social · 3w agoBooks will need a little restoration but it's actually a sweet set and I got it for what may be a steal. Maybe not, the market is fickle. But these don't come up often and later sets have sold for a ton more than I paid. So 🤷♂️
It literally boggles the mind that this can have survived. All the turmoil the planet has seen since then and it's still here.
Howard Lee@hlee.bsky.social · 2w agoJack Hills Zircon dated to 4.404 billion years old, right around the time the Moon itself finished crystallizing ⚒️ spacedaily.com/t-a-zircon-c...