View Obscura

 Sometimes it's a good thing to shake off the modern world and take a trip back in time. Back to a time before cellphones and electric cars when things were slower and people used to take a casual stroll downtown to enjoy window shopping a good meal. Sometimes both shopping and eating took place under the same roof. Back in the day many department stores and pharmacies had a soda fountain or a lunch counter so busy shoppers could take a break and enjoy a meal. Most inside store eating establishments went the way of the dodo (became extinct) decades ago. Retailers simply needed to space for more items to sell to out went the counters and in came more racks of polyester blouses,  or toasters, or whatever that particular store wash selling.  In rare occasions a retailer would embrace the nostalgia of yesteryear and keep their soda fountain in operation if only for the purpose of enticing customers to come in off the street to simply gawk at it. Some stayed in operation simp...

Story & Photos By: Ken Hulsey California has had a long and illustrious railroad history and over the decades numerous railroads have operated throughout the state. Most of those lines have vanished off the face of the planet via mergers and bad fiscal planning yet many examples of their existence still litter the landscape of the golden state. Most of these locomotives and pieces of rolling stock have either been abandoned, stranded, lost, forgotten, or put on display in out of the way places where many railfans would never know to look for them. Over the next few months I hope to shed some light on many of these "lost" trains throughout California. One example of railroad rolling stock that is indeed "abandoned", "lost", "stranded" , and undoubtedly "forgotten" are what I have named "The Forgotten Pullmans of Orange". These two Pullman baggage cars that were converted into Santa Fe (ATSF) maintenance of way cars...

From IDW Publishing IDW , under license by Toho International, Inc., announces the triumphant return of the one-and-only King of the Monsters in the upcoming five-issue miniseries Godzilla: Monsters & Protectors–All Hail the King!, premiering in October. The follow-up to the popular middle grade comic book series Godzilla: Monsters & Protectors (collected in December 2021 in the graphic novel Godzilla: Monsters & Protectors–Rise Up!) features the returning creative team of writer Erik Burnham, illustrator Dan Schoening, and colorist Luis Antonio Delgado. It’s been a year, and to Cedric’s dismay, there have been no more Godzilla sightings. Sure, that means no destruction, but it was also his vlog’s most popular series of videos. He needs new content! His views are dropping, and he’s running out of ideas. He’s being called out for lying by cyberbullies Dragon, who are trying to see if Cedric really has the Godzilla chops, and Karen Higa, who has her own agenda. There’s more g...

 From Dynamite Entertainment  Dynamite announces the return of Darkwing Duck to comics coming shortly, with new series, graphic novels, and reprints. The classic series is coming back to the comics page, with a new title starring the heroic Drake Mallard coming at the beginning of 2023. In addition to all-new original tales, his classic adventures will be reprinted as well in facsimile editions and graphic novels. The hard to find 1991 limited series released by Disney Comics with contributions by John Blair Moore and others will soon be accessible again to fans and collectors of classic Disney comics. Darkwing Duck is part of Disney's beloved wider Donald Duck library and first debuted as a hit animated television show in 1991. Across 91 episodes, fans young and old were delighted by the adventures of Drake Mallard and his titular superhero identity. Along with fan-favorite comic books, a series of video games and merchandise accompanied the show. Check Out: The Wonderful Wo...

 University of Bath (Press Release) Fossils of small plesiosaurs, long-necked marine reptiles from the age of dinosaurs, have been found in a 100-million year old river system that is now Morocco’s Sahara Desert. This discovery suggests some species of plesiosaur, traditionally thought to be sea creatures, may have lived in freshwater. Plesiosaurs, first found in 1823 by fossil hunter Mary Anning, were prehistoric reptiles with small heads, long necks, and four long flippers. They inspired reconstructions of the Loch Ness Monster, but unlike the monster of Loch Ness, plesiosaurs were marine animals - or were widely thought to be. Now, scientists from the University of Bath and University of Portsmouth in the UK, and Université Hassan II in Morocco, have reported small plesiosaurs from a Cretaceous-aged river in Africa, in the journal Cretaceous Research . The fossils include bones and teeth from three-metre long adults and an arm bone from a 1.5 metre long baby. They hint that the...

I live in the town of Lecompte , Louisiana . It's a small rural farming town that is sadly in a state of decline, There is a lot of poverty here. There are many rotting abandoned buildings. The roads are in bad shape. The town has a lot of problems. Yet the only posts I see from our mayor are about food trucks coming here once a week. What if we skip the lunch wagons and try to get actual restaurants and businesses to move into our abandoned down town? What if we actually tried to figure out how to create something that would draw travelers and tourists? The place certainly has enough history to build on. The first railroad west of the Mississippi was built here. Why don't we try to do something productive instead of hiring a crawfish truck?  Check Out: An Abandoned Louisiana Special: Saying Adios To 2021 In Central Louisiana Louisiana's Hidden Gems: The Old Lecompte High School Abandoned Louisiana: Family Owned Gas Station, Lecompte Beautiful Louisiana: A Monday Morning ...

 From the  Berkeley Breathed's Bloom County  Facebook Group. July 4, 1982. Full disclosure — as untimely as this is now, it still remains one that makes me smile. As if someone else drew it. How about all of you? -bb Check Out: On June 13, 1982 A Legend Was Born - Ack! Berkeley Breathed’s iconic comic strip, Bloom County, to be developed as animated comedy by Fox Entertainment Still Can't Figure Out Who To Vote For? I Have The Obvious Answer!

 A couple of weeks back I decided to start posting the trailers from some of my favorite movies. Being a child of the 70s I naturally opted to start my new series in that decade. The first film that I went with was the 1976 action/comedy Silver Streak. Today I decided to feature The Apple Dumpling Gang from 1975, which holds the distinction of being the first film that I ever saw in a movie theater.  If you recall the film is about a down on his luck gambler named Russell Donovan who ends up stuck with three orphans who he is trying to unload every opportunity he gets. When the three mischievous kiddos stumble upon a giant gold nugget and become instant celebrities his opinion suddenly changes. The massive nugget draws the attention of two local gangs, one the bumbling Hash Knife Outfit and the other is the truly nasty Stillwell Gang.  As you can imagine the bumbling burglars make several slapstick attempts at stealing the gold while the real robbers hash out their plan ...