Complex Numbers

He Said, Archly

Another random prompt from "Journalistic Intentions"  [18+] today.

    St. Louis 1904

There are, in the world, very few cities with icons more iconic than the Gateway Arch. There's the Eiffel Tower, of course, arguably the most recognizable structure in the world. Across the Channel, there's the unmistakable steampunk intricacy of Elizabeth Tower, known worldwide but usually mistakenly labeled as Big Ben (which may be a case of metonomy, as Big Ben is the largest bell within the tower, but is more likely just mistakery). You have the sweeping, nested shells of the Sydney Opera House, the Washington Monument, maybe the Space Needle, CN Tower, and the Empire State Building. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the Pyramids, but they're not technically a city symbol, located as they are outside the boundaries of Cairo.

Almost all of these establishment-shot-bait constructions have one thing in common: the "tower" bit (the Opera House being an exception). This inevitably leads to jokes about phalluses (Phalla? Phalli? Hell if I remember what Latin declension it belongs to), especially in the painfully obvious case of the Washington Monument (Father of his Country and all that).

Not so with the Gateway Arch. It's not a tower; it's... well... an arch. Two foundations, not one. Curvy, not straight (unless you view it from one side or the other, but who does that?) I'm not saying it's the equivalent expression of feminine potency, mind you; just that it's not an erection sticking straight up into the sky.

Thus, it might surprise younger folks and those not familiar with the US in general, the State of Misery, and St. Louis in particular, that the Arch is barely 60 years old.

Thus, when one considers the condition of St. Louis in 1904, one must utterly wipe any image of the Gateway Arch from one's internal visualization of that important Midwestern city.

That year, St. Louis, just over 100 years after the Louisiana Purchase, hosted a World's Fair, formally known as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition.  

For other context, consider these historical milestones:

The Wright Brothers' first flight wasn't even a year in the past, having taken place in the middle of December 1903—but the Exposition hosted the first-ever airship competition (see above Wiki link). This led to St. Louis being just as associated with flight as Kitty Hawk, a legacy later immortalized in the name of Lindbergh's famous transatlantic airplane, the Spirit of St. Louis. (Okay, the plane's name had nothing to do   with StL's history regarding flight, and these days, you're taking your life, or at least your sanity, in your hands by flying Spirit across the Atlantic.)

Ford had yet to democratize the automobile, and the hot topic in cities around this time was streetcars. I have no desire (pun absolutely intended) to get into the arguments concerning these modes in this entry, and anyway, San Francisco became more associated with trolleys. This also led to more than a century of pain for philosophy students as they contemplated various permutations of the Trolley Problem.

And then, of course, there were the Olympics.

Apparently, the 1904 Summer Olympics   were meant to be held a bit further north, in Chicago, the first such event to be hosted outside Europe. In typical American fashion, the Expo organizers apparently stomped their feet and shouted, "NO!" So the games were moved to Misery, which, in those days, was kinda hard to get to (remember, airplanes were less than a year old; overland routes sucked, and navigating up the Mississippi takes time).

But, regardless, it turned world attention to the site that used to be a major Native American gathering place (see my April entry, "Things Go Better With Cahokia" , where, apparently, a lot of people came from all over to participate in social and sporting events.

Some things, it seems, are universal.

At least the Gateway Arch is unique.