Sandwedge

Sandwedge (pronounced sand-wej)

(1) As Operation Sandwedge, a proposed clandestine intelligence-gathering operation against the political enemies of US president Richard Nixon.

(2) As sand wedge, a specialized golf club, an iron with a heavy lower flange, the design of which is optimized for playing the ball out of a bunker (sand trap).

1971: The name was chosen for a “dirty tricks” covert operation as a borrowing from golf, the sand wedge a club used to play the ball from a difficult position.  The construct was sand + wedge.  Dating from pre-1000, sand was from the Middle English sand, from the Old English sand, from the Proto-West Germanic samd, from the Proto-Germanic samdaz, from the primitive Indo-European sámhdhos, from sem- (to pour).  Wedge was a pre 900 from the Middle English wegge (wedge), from the Old English wecg (a wedge), from the Proto-Germanic wagjaz (source also of the Old Norse veggr, the Middle Dutch wegge, the Dutch wig, the Old High German weggi (wedge) and the dialectal German Weck (a wedge-shaped bread roll) and related to the Old Saxon weggi.  It was cognate with the dialectal German weck derived from the Old High German wecki and Old Norse veggr (wall).  The Proto-Germanic wagjaz is of uncertain origin but may be related to the Latin vomer (plowshare).  Sandwedge is a noun; should the plural ever be needed, it would be sandwedges (ie phonetically a la the use in golf (sand wedges)).

In golf, when using a sand wedge (left), the player’s stance and the way in which the club addresses the ball differs from what’s done when using a conventional iron (right).  Noted golfer Paige Spiranac (b 1993) demonstrates the difference although there may be some variations depending on an individual's weight distribution. 

Richard Nixon.

Operation Sandwedge was a covert intelligence-gathering operation intended to be conducted against the enemies (a long list which later became public) of Richard Nixon (1913-1994; US president 1969-1974).  Beginning in 1971, the early planning was done by Nixon's Chief of Staff HR Haldeman (1926-1993), his assistant for domestic affairs, John Ehrlichman (1925-1999) and Jack Caulfield (1929–2012), then attached to Ehrlichman’s White House staff “handling special assignments”; also involved (though paid not by the White House but from external campaign funds) was Tony Ulasewicz (1918-1997), later a bit-player in the Watergate affair.  The core of Caulfield’s plan was to target the anti-Vietnam War movement and those figures in the Democratic Party Nixon had identified as the greatest threat to his re-election in 1972, including Ted Kennedy (1932–2009; US senator 1962-2009), Ed Muskie (1914–1996; US senator 1959-1980), William Proxmire (1915–2005; US Senator 1957-1989) and Birch Bayh (1928–2019; US senator 1963-1981).  Of interest too was a settling of scores with those who had prevented G Harrold Carswell (1919–1992) being confirmed by the Senate as Nixon's nominee for the US Supreme Court and the president's net was internecine too, some of the targeted figures in his own Republican Party.

G Gordon Liddy.

Operation Sandwedge was intended to be clandestine but it wasn’t subtle and included physical and electronic surveillance, the intelligence of particular interest that which could be used either to feed damaging leaks to the press or for purposes of blackmail including dubious financial transactions, mental health records and (preferably “unnatural”) sexual proclivities.  However, the operation never proceeded beyond the planning stages because Haldeman and Ehrlichman thought the methods of Caulfield (a former New York City Police Officer) unsophisticated so transferred the project to G Gordon Liddy (1930–2021), a lawyer, one-time FBI agent and later one of the great characters of the Watergate affair.  Attached to Liddy's operation was former CIA operative Howard Hunt (1918–2007) who, under his name and many noms de plume, was a most prolific author of fiction and non-fiction, his bibliography extending to over 70 titles.  Caulfield had chosen the name sandwedge because, as a dedicated golfer, he knew the sand wedge was the club of choice when one was in a difficult spot;  if well-played, it was what could transform a bad situation into something good.  At the time, code-names were among the many imaginative things to emerge from the bunker at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and the one chosen for the squad to investigate leaks of information to the press was dubbed “the plumbers”.  One member later told his elderly grandmother one of his duties in the White House was “investigating leaks” and proudly she told him: “Your grandfather was a plumber”.   

Paige Spiranac's definitive guide to the correct handling of one's sand wedge, one of a series of invaluable short clips called Paige Quickies.  They're an ideal guide for both experienced golfers wishing to hone their techniques and those taking up the sport.

The Watergate complex, Washington DC.

The Watergate affair was of course one of the best known (and among nihilistic political junkies the most celebrated) of the “dirty tricks” operations run out of (or at least connected with) the Nixon White House but it was far from unique.  Some strikingly immoral back-channel operations had been run even before the 1968 election but by 1971 the vista had expanded to include what would now be called fake news plants, the infiltration of the staff of political opponents, break-ins and burglary, among the most infamous of which was “the plumbers” (including Liddy) breaking into the office of the psychiatrist treating Daniel Ellsberg (b 1931), the former Department of Defense (now known also as the Department or War) military analyst who had leaked the “Pentagon Papers” (something which was a reasonable achievement in the days when decamping with thousands of pages of classified material demanded not a few minutes copying data to a USB stick but many hours between midnight and dawn using the photocopier).  The doctor's Ellsberg file revealed nothing of interest but the burglary gained a place in history, being recorded by Ehrlichman (who approved the operation) as "Hunt/Liddy Special Project No 1".  There would be more.

Paige Spiranac is active on Instagram and recently posted a “Life update” to her four million followers, advising “I have bangs now”.  Hopefully, she will keep us informed and there will be more to come.

Sandwedge had been envisaged as an intelligence gathering operation, the most novel aspect of which was that while the project documents presented an overview of something using conventional methods of surveillance and the compilation of publicly available material, privately, Caulfield admitted electronic surveillance would also (unlawfully) be used, something any expert presumably could have deduced from the impressive total of budget request.  Of greatest interest were financial records (relating particularly to tax matters), mental health conditions, undisclosed legal problems and sexual conduct, especially if illicit and preferably unlawful.  The idea greatly interested Haldeman and Ehrlichman but they had never been convinced by Caulfield’s “lack of background” by which they meant education, social skills (ie correct way to use knife & fork in polite company) and political experience.  Accordingly, Sandwedge and all intelligence matters were transferred to Liddy, the article of faith in the White House being anything run by a trained lawyer legally would be “bullet proof”, not a quality they associated with the schemes of ex-NYC police officers, a breed not always with a reputation for rectitude.

New York Times, Saturday 2 March 1974.

Liddy revelled in the role as the White House’s clandestine clearing house for “covert ops” and applied his own list of spy-like code names (Gemstone, Diamond, Ruby etc) to an range of activities expanded beyond Sandwedge including physical espionage, infiltration of protest groups, secret wire-taps, sabotage of opposition campaigns and, of course, “honey-pot traps” (the use of attractive young women as temptresses).  Even for Haldeman and Ehrlichman (behind their backs, known to White House staffers as “the Germans” or “the Prussians”) the implications of becoming essentially gangsters was too much but the shell of Liddy's structure was in 1972 approved and even that pared-down framework included a range of unlawful activities, including the one which would trigger the chain of events that culminated in Nixon’s resignation and see dozens of the conspirators (including Haldeman, Ehrlichman and Liddy) jailed: the break in and bugging of the Democratic Party offices in the Watergate complex.  As the affair unfolded, suspicion fell upon Caulfield until it was realised his role in Operation Sandwedge had ended before any dubious operations began and he’d never been part of Liddy’s more ambitious plans.  He was compelled to resign from government but was never prosecuted, maintaining to his dying day that if he’d been left to run Operation Sandwedge, there would have been no burglaries in the Watergate complex or anywhere else and thus none of the cascading scandals which at first paralysed and later doomed the second term of the Nixon administration.

On the golf course, Lindsay Lohan in bunker with sand wedge, rendered as a pen drawing by Vovsoft.

One attractive thing about the historic records of the US government is the relative openness and accessibility to the documents which can lay bare the operations of at least some of the machinery of government.  Things are of course not as open as they used to be but the US attitude to the classification of material is still preferable to that of institutions like the UK’s Cabinet Office or the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) both of which operate in an air of obsessive secrecy.  One treasure trove is the on-line archive of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum which includes a stash of transcripts of the White House tapes subpoenaed by the SSPF (Watergate Special Prosecution Force), including the famous (and politically fatal) “smoking gun tape”.  In some ways even more so than the audio tapes, the transcripts provide an insight into how politics actually is practiced and it’s useful to compare them with sanitized (and sometimes mendacious) memoirs or “official histories”.  On 21 March 1973, President Nixon met with John Dean (b 1938; White House Counsel to the President, 1970-1973) when “Operation Sandwedge” and its corrosive consequences were discussed:

DEAN:  I think, I think that, uh, there's no doubt about the seriousness of the problem we've got.  We have a cancer--within, close to the Presidency, that's growing.  It's growing daily.  It's compounding, it grows geometrically now because it compounds itself.  Uh, that'll be clear as I explain you know, some of the details, uh, of why it is, and it basically is because (1) we're being blackmailed; (2) uh, people are going to start perjuring themself very quickly that have not had to perjure themselves to protect other people and the like. And that is just--and there is no assurance…

DEAN: Jack [Caulfield] had worked for John [John Mitchell (1913–1988; US attorney-general 1969–1972)] and then was transferred to my office.  I said, "Jack, come up with a plan that, you know, is a normal infiltration, I mean, you know, buying information from secretaries and all that sort of thing."  He did, he put together a plan.  It was kicked around, and, uh, I went to Ehrlichman with it.  I went to Mitchell with it, and the consensus was that Caulfield wasn't the man to do this. Uh, in retrospect, that might have been a bad call, 'cause he is an incredibly cautious person and, and wouldn't have put the situation to where it is today.

PRESIDENT: Yeah.

DEAN: All right, after rejecting that, they said, "We still need something," so I was told to look around for somebody that could go over to 1701 and do this.  And that's when I came up with Gordon Liddy, who-- they needed a lawyer. Gordon had an intelligence background from his FBI service.  I was aware of the fact that he had done some extremely sensitive things for the White House while he'd been at the White House, and he had apparently done them well. Uh, going out into Ellsberg's doctor's office.

PRESIDENT: Oh, yeah.

PRESIDENT: January of '72?

DEAN: January of '72.  Like, "You come over to Mitchell's office and sit in on a meeting where Liddy is going to lay his plan out."  I said, "Well, I don't really know as I'm the man, but if you want me there I'll be happy to."  So, I came over and Liddy laid out a million dollar plan that was the most incredible thing I have ever laid my eyes on.  All in codes, and involved black bag operations, kidnapping, providing prostitutes, uh, to weaken the opposition, bugging, uh, mugging teams. It was just an incredible thing.

PRESIDENT: But, uh..

DEAN: And--

PRESIDENT: ...that was, that was not, uh...

DEAN: No.

PRESIDENT: ...discussed with..

DEAN: No.

PRESIDENT: ...other persons.

DEAN: No, not at all. And--

PRESIDENT: (Unintelligible)

DEAN: Uh, Mitchell, Mitchell just virtually sat there puffing [on his pipe] and laughing. I could tell 'cause after he--after Liddy left the office I said, "That's the most incredible thing I've ever seen.  "He said, "I agree."  And so then he was told to go back to the drawing boards and come up with something realistic. So there was a second meeting. Uh, they asked me to come over to that. I came into the tail end of the meeting. I wasn't there for the first part. I don't know how long the meeting lasted. Uh, at this point, they were discussing again bugging, kidnapping and the like. And at this point I said, right in front of everybody, very clearly, I said, "These are not the sort of things that are ever to be discussed in the office of the Attorney General of the United States"--where he still was--"and I am personally incensed." I was trying to get Mitchell off the hook, uh, 'cause—

PRESIDENT: I know

DEAN: He's a, he's a nice person, doesn't like to say no under--when people he's going to have to work with.

PRESIDENT: That's right.

DEAN: So, I let, I let it be known. I said, "You all pack that stuff up and get it the hell out of here 'cause we just, you just can't talk this way in this office and you shouldn't, you shouldn't, you should re-examine your whole thinking." Came back-

PRESIDENT: Who else was present? Be-, besides you-

DEAN: It was Magruder, Magruder [Jeb Magruder (1934–2014; deputy director of Committee for the Re-Election of the President (CRP) in the 1972 election (better known as CREEP))]

PRESIDENT: Magruder.

DEAN: Uh, Mitchell, Liddy and myself. I came back right after the meeting and told Bob, I said, "Bob, we've got a growing disaster on our hands if they're thinking this way.'  And I said, "The White House has got to stay out of this and I, frankly, am not going to be involved in it."  He said, "I agree John."  And, I thought, at that point the thing was turned off. That's the last I heard of it, when I thought it was turned off, because it was an absurd proposal.

PRESIDENT: Yeah.

DEAN: Liddy-I did have dealings with him afterwards. We never talked about it. Now that would be hard to believe for some people, but, uh, we never did. Just the fact of the matter.

PRESIDENT: Well, you were talking about other things.

DEAN: Other things. We had so many other things.

PRESIDENT: He had some legal problems at one time.

Equiluminant

Equiluminant (pronounced ee-kwuh-loom-uh-nuhnt)

(1) In optics, the quality of two or more objects or phenomenon being equally luminant.

(2) Figuratively, two or more people being judged equally illustrious, attractive, talented etc.

1860s: The construct was equi- +‎ luminant.  As an adjective, luminant means "that which illuminates; that which is luminous" while as a noun it describes "an illuminating agent".  Luminant was from the Latin verb lūminant, the third-person plural present active indicative of lūminō, the construct being lūmen, from the Proto-Italic louksmən, from the primitive Indo-European léwk-s-mn̥, from the root lewk- (bright) +‎ -ō (appended to form agent nouns).  The accepted synonym is isoluminant and equiluminescent is the alternative form.  When used figuratively, although it would make no sense in science, the comparative is “more equiluminant” and the superlative most “equiluminant”.  Equiluminant & equiluminescent are adjectives and equiluminance is a noun; the noun plural is equiluminances (which some list as non-standard).

The prefixes: equi-, homo-, peri- & iso-

The prefixes “equi-”, “homo-”, “peri-” & “iso-” are all used to in same way suggest a concept of sameness or equality, but by tradition and convention, are used in different contexts to produce different meanings or emphasis:  Equi- is used to indicate equality, evenness, or uniformity and is often seen in mathematical, scientific & technical publications to describe something is equal in measure or evenly distributed such as equilateral (a shape having all sides of equal length, equidistant (being at equal distances from two or more points) & equilibrium (a state of balance where opposing forces or influences are equal).  Homo- is used to imply “same” or “alike” and thus sameness or (sometimes by degree) similarity.  In technical use it is a standard form in biology, chemistry & the social sciences to indicate sameness in kind, structure, or composition and by far the most common modern use is in the now familiar “homosexual” which in many jurisdictions is now a proscribed (or at least discouraged) term because of negative associations (“homo” as a stand-alone word also having evolved as a slur used of, about or against homosexual men).

The uses of the prefix are illustrated by homogeneous (composed of parts or elements that are all of the same kind, homologous (having the same relation, relative position, or structure) & homonym (in linguistics words which sound the same or are spelled the same but have different meanings).  Iso- is used to denote equality, uniformity, or constancy in terms of specific characteristics like size, number, or configuration and is most used in scientific and mathematical publications.  Examples of use include isometric (having equal dimensions or measurements, isothermal (having constant temperature) & isosceles (having two sides of equal length).  Peri- is used to denote “surrounding or enclosing”, or “something near or around a specific area or object”, examples including perimeter (the continuous line forming the boundary of a closed geometric figure), periscope (an optical instrument for viewing objects that are above the level of direct sight, using mirrors or prisms to reflect the view & peripheral (relating to or situated on the edge or periphery of something.  So equi-focuses on equality in measure, distance, or value, homo- focuses on sameness in kind, structure, or composition, iso- focuses on equality or uniformity in specific characteristics or conditions while peri- :focuses on surrounding or enclosing, or being near or around something.  For most purposes equi- & iso- can be used interchangeably and which is used tends to be a function of tradition & convention.

Equiluminant colors

An example the equiluminant in blue & orange.  In color the text appears at the edges to "shimmer" or "vibrate".  When re-rendered in grayscale, because the value of the luminance is so close, the two shades become almost indistinguishable.

In optics, “equiluminant” is a technical term used to colors with the same (or very similar) luminance (brightness) but which differ in hue (color) or saturation (intensity).  The standard test for the quality is to convert a two-color image to grayscale and, if equiluminant, the colors would appear nearly indistinguishable because they share the same level of “lightness”.  It’s of some importance in fields as diverse as military camouflage, interior decorating, fashion, astronomy and cognitive psychology.  In the study of visual perception, when colors are equiluminant, the human visual system relies primarily on the differences in hue and saturation (rather than brightness) to distinguish between them and this can create challenges in perception; in many cases, the brain will struggle to segregate colors based solely on luminance; essentially, there is a lack of information.

An enigmatic abstraction (2024) by an unknown creator.  This is an example of the use of non-equiluminant shades of orange & blue, the original to the left, copy rendered in gray-scale to the right.

In art and design, the quality of equiluminance can be exploited to create visual effects, the perception of some “shimmering” or “vibrating” at the edges where colors meet actually a product of the way the different hues are perceived by the brain to be “less defined” (a process not dissimilar to the “grayscaling”) and thus “dynamic”, lending the impression of movement even in a static image, especially if seen with one’s peripheral vision.  While a handy device for visual artists, it can be something of some significance because the close conjunction of equiluminant colors can make certain visual tasks more difficult, most obviously reading text or distinguishing shapes and objects.  All that happens is the extent of the luminance contrast can create a perception of fuzziness at the edges of shapes which means some people can suffer a diminished ability to distinguish fine details and the smaller the object (text, numerals or geometric shape), the more acute the problem.  The phenomenon has been well researched, scientists using the properties in equiluminant colors to study how the brain processes color and the findings have been important in fields like instrumentation and the production of warning signs.

Richard Petty's 1974 NASCAR (National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing) Dodge Charger (left) and 3 ton Super-Duty Jack, produced under licence by the Northern Tool Company (right).

1974 was the last year in which the big-block engines were allowed to run in NASCAR and the big-block era (1962-1973) was NASCAR's golden age.  Richard Petty (b 1937) used a "reddish orange" to augment his traditional blue when he switched from Plymouth to Dodge as the supplier of his NASCAR stockers in the early 1970s.  His team was actually sponsored by STP rather than Gulf and STP wanted their corporate red to be used but in the end a "reddish orange" compromise was negotiated.  However, when he licenced the Northern Tool Company to sell a "Richard Petty" jack, the shade used appeared to be closer to the classic "Gulf orange".

Sexy Lamborghinis in a not quite equiluminant color combination following those of the Gulf Western racing teams: 1964 1C TL tractor (top) and 1968 1R tractor (bottom).

Lamborghini had been making tractors and other farm equipment since 1948 when first its track-drive models appeared in 1955, the 1C-TL produced between 1962-1966.  Unrelated to that model cycle, it was in 1966 Lamborghini unveiled the sensational Miura (1966-1973), powered by a transversely located, mid-mounted, 3,929 cm³ (240 cubic inch) V12 engine which sucked prodigious quantities of gas (petrol) through four triple throat downdraft Weber carburetors, each of which was needed to satiate the thirst.  The power was sent to the road via a five-speed transaxle which shared it's lubrication with the engine (shades of the BMC Mini (1959-2000) which turned out to be a bad idea and one not corrected until the final run as the Miura SV (1971-1973).  To achieve the stunning lines, mounting the V12 transversely was the only way to make things fit and the engineering was a masterpiece of packaging efficiency but it resulted in the car displaying some curious characteristics at high speed.  The specification of the 1C TL Tractor was more modest although quite appropriate for its purpose; it was powered by an air-cooled 1,462 cm³ (89 cubic inch) which delivered power to the rear portal axle and drive sprockets via a dual-range, three-speed manual transmission.  However, being a diesel, there was of course fuel-injection (by Bosch), an advance Lamborghini's V12s didn’t receive until 1985 when US emission-control regulations compelled the change.  This version of 1R tractor is known as the cofano squadrato (squared hood (bonnet)); produced between 1966-1969, it replaced the earlier 1R (1961-1965) which featured a rounded hood.  The earlier model seems not retrospectively to have been christened but presumably it would have been the cofano arrotondato (rounded hood), proving everything sounds better in Italian.  An Italian could read from a lawnmower repair manual and it would sound poetic.

Not all agreed all Italians sounded so mellifluous.  In the entry for 10 January 1927 detailing a journey on the Brindisi-Rome train, the novelist Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966) noted in his diary (edited by Michael Davie (1924-2005) and published in 1976): “…a woman with the smile of a Gioconda and the voice of a parrot.  We seem to have stopped at every station in Italy, all decorated with grubby stencilled pictures of Il Duce [Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & Prime-Minister of Italy 1922-1943)] looking as if they were advertising Hassals[?] Press Art School.  All common Italian women have voices like parrots.”  By then, maybe the Duce had “made the trains run on time” so there would have been that.  The mention of “Giocondo” was an allusion to the Italian noblewoman Lisa del Giocondo (1479–1542); her name was given to the Mona Lisa, her portrait commissioned by her husband and painted by Leonardo.

A most uncommon Italian: The Mona Lisa (circa 1503), oil on white poplar panel by Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519).

The John Hassall Correspondence Art School was a London art education institution established early in the 20^th century by the illustrator John Hassall (1868–1948) and Waugh, thinking himself both and “artist” and connoisseur of fine art, had little regard for “commercial art”.  In those years however, there was something of a boom in “poster art” and, with growing demand for graphic artists, the school filled a niche and its popularity (and profitability) increased as correspondence courses, were added, permitting students to learn via mail; conceptually, it was the same idea as “on-line education”.  What came to be called the “Hassall method” (characterized by the flat colors enclosed by thick black lines) would become an identifiable motif in early art deco.  Being quintessentially “upper middle class”, Waugh had to resort to terms like “common”, “lower class” or “lower middle class” to disparage those he thought socially beneath him; unlike members of the upper class (aristocrats, gentry, the genuinely rich etc), he couldn’t hardly use “middle class” as a slur as they could.  On 16 July 1956 he expressed his pleasure the woman buying his house was willing also “…to take over cows and peasants if required.”  Seldom did he miss an opportunity to make some mention of his superior tastes, his entry of 12 February, 1961 recording with obvious glee the “…great pleasure resulting from being rid of servants – one can throw away all the presents they have given one.”  Confident in the discernment of his readers, he didn’t bother to write “ghastly presents”.

As everybody knows, in Mean Girls (2004), there's an example or reference point for just about every known sociological, zoological, linguistic, political, scientific, botanical, geological or cosmological phenomenon yet observed.  Here, Lindsay Lohan in baby pink and powder blue illustrates an instance of equiluminance.

At scale, equiluminance doesn’t have to be obvious for it still to have desirable “side effects” and while it’s often noted two specific hues ((1) the blue Llewellyn Rylands pigments 3707 (Zenith Blue, replicated by Dulux as “Powder Blue”) & (2) the orange Rylands pigments 3957 (Tangerine, replicated by Dulux as “Marigold”)), that their use in combination appears so often on cars, motor-cycles and other stuff with wheels is due less to the claim the shades seem at the edge to “vibrate” that the striking combination appearing on some of the Gulf Oil sponsored Ford GT40s and Porsche 917s during sports car racing’s golden era (1950-1972).  Given the surface area involved, the effect is probably imperceptible when viewed at close range but the science does suggest that at speed (and these were fast machines), at the typical viewing range found on racetracks, there was what the optical analysts call “visual pop”, something which heightens the brain’s perception of motion.

Ford GT40 chassis# 1075, winner of the 1968 & 1969 Mans 24 hour endurance classic in Gulf racing livery.

Gulf's colors were not equiluminescent.  The company's original "corporate color scheme" had been a dark blue & orange combo but Gulf was an acquisitive conglomerate and in late 1967 it took over the Wilshire Oil Company of California, the signature colors of which were powder blue and orange, something which Gulf’s management thought “more exciting” and better suited to a racing car.  The change was made for the 1968 season with the Fords now running as five-litre (305 cubic inch) sports cars, governing body having banned the seven-litre engines the cars previously had used (under a variety of names, motorsport has for decades been governed by some of world sport’s dopiest regulatory bodies).  In the Gulf colors, fitted with 302 cubic inch (4.9 litre) engines, Ford GT40 Mark I (chassis #1075) won the Le Mans 24 hour endurance classic in 1968 & 1969 (repeating the brace Ford had achieved with the 7.0 litre (427 cubic inch) Mark II & Mark IV versions in 1966-1967), the first time the same car had achieved victory twice.  In 1968, #1075 won the BOAC International 500, the Spa 1000-kilometer race, and the Watkins Glen 6-hour endurance race, while in 1969 it also took the Sebring 12-hour race, a remarkable achievement for a race car thought obsolescent.  The livery has since been much replicated, including on many machines which have never been near a race track.

1971 Porsche 917K in Gulf Racing livery.  The fins were added to improve straight-line stability and were strikingly similar to those which appeared on some late 1950s US Chryslers although the aerodynamic properties of those were dubious, despite corporate claims.

Interestingly, the team painting the GT40s were aware of the issue created by equiluminant colors and knew that when photographed in certain conditions, the shades could tend thus.  As a matter of professional pride, they didn’t want it thought they’d created something with “fuzzy edges” so deliberately was added a dark blue hairline-border around the orange, reducing the optical illusion to ensure that when photographed, everything looked painted with precision.  When the Gulf team in 1970 switched to using Porsche 917s for the World Sports Car championship, they adopted the expedient of a black line of definition between the blue & orange so the whole enduring appeal of the combination lies just in the striking contrast and relies not at all on any tendency to the equiluminant.

Ford GT Heritage Edition First Generation (left) and Second Generation (right). 

Little more than 100 GT40s were built but Ford noted with interest the ongoing buoyancy of the replica market, as many as 2,000 thought to have been built in a number of countries (although that's dwarfed by number of replica Shelby American Cobras; it's believed there are 50-60,000-odd of them, a remarkable tribute to the 998 originals).  In the twenty-first century, the company decided to reprise the design but the new GT (2004-2006) was hardly a clone and although it shared the basic mechanical layout and the shape (though larger) was close, it was a modern machine.  The car wasn’t called GT40 because the rights to the name had ended up with another company and Ford declined to pay the demanded price.  Over 4000 were built and one special run was a tribute to the 1968-1969 cars in Gulf livery, 343 of the “Heritage Editions” produced.  A second generation of GTs was produced between 2016-2022 and was very modern, the demands of the wind-tunnel this time allowed to prevail over paying tribute to the classic lines of the 1960s.  Although the supercharged 5.4 litre V8 didn’t return and the new car used a turbocharged 3.5 litre (214 cubic inch) V6, it outperformed all its predecessors over the last 60-odd years (all the original GT40 chassis built between 1964-1969) including the 427 cubic inch monsters that won at Le Mans in 1966 & 1967 so it took decades, but eventually there really was a "replacement for displacement".  The V6 also was used also in pick-up trucks which doesn't sound encouraging but versions of the small & big block V8s used in the GT40s also saw similar service, the latter even first appearing in the doomed Edsel.  Production of the second generation was limited to 1350 units, 50 of which were “Heritage Editions” in the Gulf colors, one of several “limited editions”.

Frisbee

Frisbee (pronounced friz-bee)

(1) A brand of plastic concave disk, used for various games by sailing it through the air, thrown by making it spin as it's released with a flick of the wrist.

(2) By extension & genericization (without an initial capital), a disk-shaped gliding toy of any brand.

(3) The sport or pass-time involving flying disks.

1957: The brand name Frisbee was trademarked in 1959 and later acquired by Wham-O.  Frisbee was an alteration of Frisbie, the name applied to the disk game by students who tossed the pie plates which came with the “Mrs Frisbie’s Pies” from the Frisbie Pie Company which operated from the Frisbie Bakery in Bridgeport, Connecticut.  Frisbie supplied pies to Yale University and it was at Middlebury College in Vermont during the 1930s a campus craze started for tossing empty pie tins stamped with the company's logo, the aeronautical qualities apparently uniquely good (students at both Yale and Princeton claiming to have discovered the aerodynamic properties).  The spelling of the name was changed on legal advice and frisbee is a genericization of the trademark.  Frisbee is a noun & verb and frisbeeing & frisbeed are verbs; the noun plural is frisbees.  The adjectives frisbesque & frisbeeish are both non standard.

Lindsay Lohan carrying her frisbee in its protective case.

The family name Frisbie exists in English records from 1226, from a place name in Leicestershire (Frisby on the Wreak), attested from 1086, from the toponym attested 1086 in Frisby on the Wreak, Leicestershire, from the Old Danish Frisby (Frisian village; farmstead or village of the Frisians), from the Old Norse Frisa, genitive plural of Frisr.  Not unusually for the age, there were two hamlets in county Leicestershire called Frisby but genealogists seem certain the origin of the family name is associated with Frisby on the Wreak.  In the parish records of 1239 there is a priest named de Frysby who was vicar of the church at Welham, a village about 13 miles (21 km) south-east of the city of Leicester, England and he may be the same Roger de Frysbey who in 1246 was curate of the church at Barkestone, ten miles (16 km) north of Melson Mowbray.  As a geographical name, the now lost Frisbys were two of many in the British Isles which derived their names from the Old Norman frisir (someone from the area of Frisia or Friesland).  The names were illustrative of the vast movement of people from Europe after the Norman Conquest of England in 1066.  A multitude of spelling variations characterize Norman surnames, many because the Old and Middle English lacked definite spelling rules and in an age of limited mobility, regional evolutions were common and gave rise to many dialectical forms (the introduction of Norman French to England also had an effect, as did the court languages of Latin and French).  It was not unknown for one person’s name to be spelled several ways during their single lifetime and Frisbie was just one of many including Frisbie, Frisby, Frisbee, Frisebie, Frisebye & Friseby.  The Frisbie motto was Semper fidelis (Always faithful).

Serial stalkers from Rupert Murdoch's (b 1931) News Corp found US singer Billie Eilish (b 2001), wearing a Siouxsie and the Banshees T-Shirt and tossing a frisbee while on tour, Sydney, Australia, March 2025.  Siouxsie and the Banshees were an English post-punk band active between 1976-1966 (there was a 2002-2003 revival), the name from the lead singer Siouxsie Sioux (Susan Janet Ballion, b 1957).

At much the same time students in the north-east US were tossing Mrs Frisbie’s pie tins to each other, a young couple were enjoying similar fun with a popcorn can lid but, unlike the students, they had an entrepreneurial streak and began selling the cardboard bases sold to cake makers for five times the cost, changing only the labeling.  World War II (1939-1945) interrupted business between 1942-1945 but, once hostilities ceased, the designer applied to the re-purposed disk some lessons learned from service with the US Army Air Force (USAAF), improving the aerodynamic properties.  The zeitgeist of the late 1940s was also influential.  In June 1947, a commercial pilot claimed to have seen nine "flying discs" zipping across Washington state at a speed he estimated at 1,200 mph (1931 km/h) and, without waiting for verification, the Associated Press (AP) wire service distributed the story.  The Hearst press ran the piece with a "flying saucers" headline and that phrase went viral about as quickly as things now spread on social media.  Saucer-mania had begun and soon there were hundreds of reported sightings, a trend which continued, spiking in response to events such as the launch of the USSR’s Sputnik satellite in 1957.  Taking advantage, the prototype Frisbee, by then mass-produced in plastic, was renamed from Whirlo-Way to Flyin' Saucer.

Ms Effie Krokos, this time in black jacket.

In 2019, Ms Effie Krokos (b 1999) and her fiancé were in the front yard of his house in Loveland (a wonderful name), 40 miles (64 km) north of Denver, enjoying some frisbee tossing.  Because it was a hot day, she removed her shirt and continued to play while topless.  Several hours later, a Loveland police officer (there are comedic possibilities in that) arrived and issued an indecent-exposure citation, invoking a city ordinance prohibiting exposure in public places or places open to public view.  Ms Krokos told the officer of a recent circuit court ruling against the public nudity ordinance in the neighboring city of Fort Collins but the officer maintained the ruling didn’t apply in Loveland.

Loveland Police cruiser: these are the Loveland Police.

Denver civil rights attorney David Lane (b 1954) agreed to take the case as part of the #FreetheNipple movement, explaining the Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled in February 2019 that Fort Collins’ public nudity ordinance, which had no restrictions on male toplessness but prohibited women from baring their breasts, was in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.  Free the Nipple v City of Fort Collins (17-1103 (10th Cir. 2019)) established that ordinances based on gender are unconstitutional.  “Anywhere it’s legal for a man to appear in public topless, it’s legal for a woman to do the same” Lane said.  Loveland accepted the offer of a US$50,000 settlement in Krokos’ case in to prevent a federal lawsuit.  The case was dismissed with prejudice (meaning that it cannot be reintroduced in another lawsuit) and the city suspended enforcement of the provision, pending a review.  Ms Krokos said she wants to show that "it isn’t fair for women to be treated differently than men by law enforcement" and hopes that the case will make more women aware of their rights.

Boston University's women’s "Ultimate Frisbee" team (the Lady Pilots), ran an "I Need Feminism Because..." campaign.  The campaign was an effort to draw attention to the need for gender equity, apparently prompted by crooked Hillary Clinton's (b 1947; US secretary of state 2009-2013) loss in that year’s presidential election to a man whose reported comments about women would have ended the political career of anyone else.  Each of the players wrote their own message on the underside of a frisbee.

By the mid 1950s, the design had been refined to the form which exists to this day and had the changes were judged sufficiently innovative to be granted a US design patent; this was the product released as the Pluto Platter and the final evolution of the name came in 1957 when the named Frisbee was applied.  Remarkably, it had taken until then for the knowledge of the casual student game of the 1930s to become known to the manufacturers after an article appeared in a newspaper which revealed students were calling the Pluto Platter the Frisbie.  It was clearly a catchier name and it caught on, persuading the manufacturers to adopt the name to Frisbee, the change in spelling on legal advice, lest the pie makers object though that would soon become moot, the Frisbie Pie Company ceasing operations in 1958, something apparently unrelated to flying disks and attributed to the sharp US recession of that year.

Paige Pierce about to execute a backhand drive.

Because Frisbee is a registered trademark, the name isn’t use in formal competition.  The World Flying Disc Federation (WFDF) applied to the Olympic Organizing Committee, seeking inclusion in the program of the 2028 summer games in Los Angeles but didn’t make the short list which was restricted to baseball, softball, break dancing, cricket, flag football, karate, kickboxing, lacrosse, motorsport and squash.  WFDF expressed disappointment, noting that “Flying Disc sports is actively practiced on a competitive level in 103 countries in the world and appeared to satisfy all of the objective criteria agreed between the IOC and LA28. These criteria included not adding cost and complexity to the games by utilizing full venue sharing on the beach or grass stadium, having total gender equality with our gender-balanced mixed format, having youth appeal, and ensuring that the top athletes were involved. There are few other sports that can boast an equivalent Californian DNA as frisbee and we felt our Ultimate 4s format requiring a total athletes’ quota of only 48 would fit well given the overall cap on the Games. We are also strongly convinced that our sport is unique in upholding integrity and fairness with our self-refereeing concept of Spirit of the Game.”  The WFDF have indicated they’ll make representations to be included in the 2032 Olympic Games in Brisbane, Australia.  The game is certainly growing and a tiny elite are already finding Flying Disk a lucrative pursuit, the top athletes attracting sponsorship deals from disk manufacturers.  Paul Mcbeth’s (b 1990) contract is worth a reported US$10 million over five years while the highest paid woman is Paige Pierce (b 1991), earning US$3 million over three years.  Both are under contract to Discraft.

1973 Maserati Bora 4.9 with the early (1971-1975) aluminium wheels fitted with "frisbee" (not dogdish) hubcaps (left), 1977 Maserati Bora 4.9 with the later (1975-1978) aluminium wheels without frisbees (centre) and 1974 Maserati Merak 3.0 (right), a model never frisbeed.

Between 1971-1975, the mid-engined Maserati Bora (Tipo AM117; 1971-1978) was equipped with removable, polished stainless steel hubcaps (which the Maserati cognoscenti call frisbees) on its 7½ x 15 inch (190.5 x 381 mm) Campagnolo aluminium wheels.  Although structurally different, the less expensive Merak (Tipo AM122; 1972-1983) used a similar body but was equipped with 2.0 & 3.0 V6 engines rather than the Bora’s 4.7 & 4.9 litre V8s, the smaller engines meaning the Merak was able to be fitted with two rear seats (most suitable for small children or contortionists).  The Merak used wheels in the same general style though without the frisbees and after 1975 this configuration extended to the Bora.  Rarely has there been a hubcap plainer than the those used on the Bora but anyone calling it a “poverty cap” (slang in the US for the least elaborate hubcaps) would be shocked by the price they command as used parts; on the rare occasions they’re available, they've been listed at US$700-2000 a set.  Unlike the Merak which was named after a star in the constellation of Ursa Major, the Bora borrowed its name from a wind which blows along the Adriatic coast, the company over the years having used the names of a number of (usually hot) winds from North Africa and the Middle East including Ghibli, Khamsin, Shamal and Karif.

Crunning & Cromiting

Crunning (pronounced khrun-ing)

In high-performance sports training, simultaneously running and crying.

Circa 2020: the construct was cr(y) + (r)unning.

Cromiting (pronounced krom-et-ing)

In high-performance sports training, simultaneously running, crying & vomiting.

Circa 2020: the construct was cr(y) + (v)omit + (runn)ing.

The verb cry was from the thirteenth century Middle English crien, from the Old French crier (to announce publicly, proclaim, scream, shout) (from which Medieval Latin gained crīdō (to cry out, shout, publish, proclaim)). The noun is from Middle English crie, from the Old French cri & crïee.  The origin of the Old French & Middle Latin word is uncertain.  It may be of Germanic origin, from the Frankish krītan (to cry, cry out, publish), from the Proto-Germanic krītaną (to cry out, shout), from the primitive Indo-European greyd- (to shout) and thus cognate with the Saterland Frisian kriete (to cry), the Dutch krijten (to cry) & krijsen (to shriek), the Low German krieten (to cry, call out, shriek”), the German kreißen (to cry loudly, wail, groan) and the Gothic kreitan (to cry, scream, call out) and related to the Latin gingrītus (the cackling of geese), the Middle Irish grith (a cry), the Welsh gryd (a scream), the Persian گریه‎ (gerye) (to cry) and the Sanskrit क्रन्दन (krandana) (cry, lamentation).  Some etymologists however suggest a connection with the Medieval Latin quiritō (to wail, shriek), also of uncertain origin, possibly from the Latin queror (to complain) through the form although the phonetic and semantic developments have proved elusive; the alternative Latin source is thought to be a variant of quirritare (to squeal like a pig), from quis, an onomatopoeic rendition of squeaking.  An ancient folk etymology understood it as "to call for the help of the Quirites (the Roman policemen).  In the thirteenth century, the meaning extended to encompass "shed tears", previously described as “weeping”, “to weep” etc and by the sixteenth century cry had displace weep in the conversational vernacular, under the influence of the notion of "utter a loud, vehement, inarticulate sound".  The phrase “to cry (one's) eyes out” (weep inordinately) is documented since 1704 but weep, wept etc remained a favorite of poets and writers.

Vomit as a verb (the early fifteenth century Middle English vomiten) was an adoption from the Latin vomitus (past participle of vomitāre) and was developed from the fourteenth century noun vomit (act of expelling contents of the stomach through the mouth), from the Anglo-French vomit, from the Old French vomite, from the Latin vomitus, from vomō & vomitare (to vomit often), frequentative of vomere (to puke, spew forth, discharge), from the primitive Indo-European root wemh & weme- (to spit, vomit), source also of the Ancient Greek emein (to vomit) & emetikos (provoking sickness), the Sanskrit vamati (he vomits), the Avestan vam- (to spit), the Lithuanian vemti (to vomit) and the Old Norse væma (seasickness).  It was cognate with the Old Norse váma (nausea, malaise) and the Old English wemman (to defile).  The use of the noun to describe the matter disgorged during vomiting dates from the late fourteenth century and is in common use in the English-speaking world although Nancy Mitford (1904–1973 and the oldest of the Mitford sisters) in the slim volume Noblesse Oblige: an Enquiry into the Identifiable Characteristics of the English Aristocracy (1956) noted “vomit” was “non-U” and the “U” word was “sick”, something perhaps to bear in mind after, if not during, vomiting. 

Run was from the Middle English runnen & rennen (to run), an alteration (influenced by the past participle runne, runnen & yronne) of the Middle English rinnen (to run), from the Old English rinnan & iernan (to run) and the Old Norse rinna (to run), both from the Proto-Germanic rinnaną (to run) and related to rannijaną (to make run), from the Proto-Indo-European hreyh- (to boil, churn”.  It was cognate with the Scots rin (to run), the West Frisian rinne (to walk, march), the Dutch rennen (to run, race), the Alemannic German ränne (to run), the German rennen (to run, race) & rinnen (to flow), the Danish rende (to run), the Swedish ränna (to run) and the Icelandic renna (to flow).  The non-Germanic cognates includes the Albanian rend (to run, run after).  The alternative spelling in Old English was ærning (act of one who or that which runs, rapid motion on foot) and that endured as a literary form until the seventeenth century.  The adjective running (that runs, capable of moving quickly) was from the fourteenth century and was from rennynge; as the present-participle adjective from the verb run, it replaced the earlier erninde, from the Old English eornende from ærning.  The meaning "rapid, hasty, done on the run" dates from circa 1300 while the sense of "continuous, carried on continually" was from the late fifteenth century.  The language is replete with phrases including “run” & “running” and run has had a most productive history: according to one source the verb alone has 645 meanings and while that definitional net may be widely cast, all agree the count is well into three figures.  The suffix –ing was from the Middle English -ing, from the Old English –ing & -ung (in the sense of the modern -ing, as a suffix forming nouns from verbs), from the Proto-West Germanic –ingu & -ungu, from the Proto-Germanic –ingō & -ungō. It was cognate with the Saterland Frisian -enge, the West Frisian –ing, the Dutch –ing, The Low German –ing & -ink, the German –ung, the Swedish -ing and the Icelandic –ing; All the cognate forms were used for the same purpose as the English -ing).

Lilly Dick (b 1999) of the Australian Women’s Rugby Sevens.

The portmanteau words crunning (simultaneously running and crying) & cromiting (simultaneously running, crying & vomiting) are techniques used in strength and conditioning training by athletes seeking to improve endurance.  The basis of the idea is that at points where the mind usually persuades a runner or other athlete to pause or stop, the body is still capable of continuing and thus signals like crying or vomiting should be ignored in the manner of the phrase “passing through the pain barrier”.  The idea is “just keep going no matter what” and that is potentially dangerous so such extreme approaches should be pursued only under professional supervision.  Earlier (circa 2015), crunning was a blend of crawl + running, a type of physical training which was certainly self-descriptive and presumably best practiced on other than hard surfaces; it seems not to have caught on.  Crunning & cromiting came to wider attention when discussed by members of the Australian Women’s Rugby Sevens team which won gold at the Commonwealth Games (Birmingham, UK, July-August 2022).  When interviewed, a squad member admitted crunning & cromiting were “brutal” methods of training but admitted both were a vital part of the process by which they achieved the level of strength & fitness (mental & physical) which allowed them to succeed.

The perils of weed.

Although visually similar (spelling & symptoms), crunning & cromiting should not be confused with "scromiting" (a portmanteau of “screaming” and “vomiting”) a word coined in the early twenty-first century as verbal shorthand for cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome (CHS).  Hyperemesis is extreme, persistent nausea and vomiting during pregnancy, a kind of acute morning sickness and CHS presents in much the same way.  The recreational use of cannabis was hardly new but CHS was novel and the medical community initially speculated the reaction (induced only in some users) may be caused either by specific genetic differences or something added to or bred into certain strains of weed although the condition appeared to be both rare and geographically distributed.  The long-term effects are unknown except for damage to tooth enamel caused by the stomach acid in the vomit.  In October 2025, a new layer of institutional respectability was gained by the concept of scromiting when the WHO (World Health Organization) announced it had added CHS to its diagnostic manual, the first time the disorder had been granted a dedicated code.  In the US, the existence of the code meant easily it could be adopted by the US CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and interpolated into their reporting databases, meaning physicians nationwide could identify, track and study the condition rather than listing it in the broader vomiting or gastrointestinal categories.  Although a dangerous syndrome which for generations has been suffered by a sub-set of (mostly chronic) cannabis users, despite CHS causing severe nausea, repeated vomiting, abdominal pain, dehydration, weight loss and (in rare cases), heart rhythm problems, seizures, kidney failure and death, it was only after use of the drug was made lawful in many places that increasing incidences were noted.   The data suggests in the US CHS-related vists to hospital ERs (Emergency Room) have spiked by an impressive 650% since 2016 although it’s not known to what extent this reflects the extent of the increase in use or a willingness for patients to present now there is no potential legal jeopardy.

One theory is that since “legalization” (the term somewhat misleading because on a strict constitutional interpretation the substance remains proscribed) commercial growers (some of which operate on an industrial scale) have been “improving the breed” to gain market share and historically high levels of THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol, the cannabinoid which is the most active of the psychoactive constituents) are now common in “over the counter weed, this increasing both the instance and severity of scromiting.  Intriguingly, studies of the available ER data suggested a sharp elevation in cases of CHS during the COVID-19 pandemic and that seems to have established a new baseline, vists remaining high since.  The working assumption among clinicians is the combination of stress (induced by isolation and other factors) and the access to high-potency weed (THC levels well over 20% now often detected, compared with the 5% typically during the 1990s) may have contributed to the rise.  That however remains speculative and the alternative theory is heavy, long-term cannabis use overstimulates the body's cannabinoid system, triggering the opposite of the drug’s usual anti-nausea effect.  Ceasing use is the obvious cure (strictly speaking a preventative) but one as yet not understood amelioration is a long, hot shower and although it’s wholly anecdotal, there does seem to be a link with warming the body’s surface area because those who have experimented with “breathing in steam” report no helpful effect.

Male role model: The legendary Corey Bellemore.

An athletic pursuit probably sometimes not dissimilar to the exacting business of crunning & cromiting is the Beer Mile, conducted usually on a standard 400 m (¼ mile) track as a 1 mile (1.6 km) contest of both running & drinking speed.  Each of the four laps begins with the competitor drinking one can (12 fl oz (US) (355 ml)) of beer, followed by a full lap, the process repeated three times.  The rules have been defined by the governing body which also publishes the results, including the aggregates of miles covered and beers drunk.  Now a sporting institution, it has encouraged imitators and there are a number of variations, each with its own rules.  The holder of this most illustrious world record is Canadian Corey Bellemore (b 1994), a five-time champion, who, at the Beer Mile World Classic in Portugal in July 2025, broke his own world record, re-setting the mark to 4:27.1.  That may be compared with the absolute world record for the mile, held by Morocco’s Hicham El Guerrouj (b 1974) who in 1999 ran the distance in 3:43.13, his additional pace made possible by not being delayed by having to down four beers.

University of Otago Medical School.

Some variations of the beer mile simply increase the volume or strength of the beer consumed and a few of these are dubbed Chunder Mile (“chunder” being circa 1950s Australia & New Zealand slang for vomiting and of disputed origin) on the basis that vomiting is more likely the more alcohol is consumed.  For some however, even this wasn’t sufficiently debauched and there were events which demanded a (cold) meat pie be enjoyed with a jug of (un-chilled) beer (a jug typically 1140 ml (38.5 fl oz (US)) at the start of each of the four laps.  Predictably, these events were most associated with orientation weeks at universities, a number still conducted as late as the 1970s and the best documented seems to have been those at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand.  Helpfully, at this time, it was the site of the country’s medical school, thereby providing students with practical experience of both symptoms and treatments for the inevitable consequences.  Whether the event was invented in Dunedin isn’t known but, given the nature of males aged 17-21 probably hasn’t much changed over the millennia, it wouldn’t be surprising to learn similar competitions, localized to suit culinary tastes, have been contested by the drunken youth of many places in centuries past.  As it was, even in Dunedin, times were changing and in 1972, the Chunder Mile was banned “…because of the dangers of asphyxiation and ruptured esophaguses.”