Site Updates

New features or changes on Michael’s Piece of the Web

28
Sep
2013

Conowingo Dam Tour Photos

Conowingo DamMy family and I have been driving over the Conowingo Dam coming and going from my uncle’s house for many years. I never knew too much about it. While at the Havre de Grace seafood festival we signed a petition in support of the relicensing of the dam. As a result we were notified about an open house and tour being held down there. It was a fun day and the tour was extremely interesting. I’d never been inside a hydro electric plant before and really knew very little about the history or workings of the Conowingo plant.

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates
30
Jun
2013

Photos from an Historic Trip to Fort Miles

HECP TowerTwo years ago while in Lewes, DE visiting a family friend, we took a ride to Cape Henlopen State Park because there was an event going on at Fort Miles. I knew that my grandfather was stationed somewhere in the Lewes area during World War 2, but didn’t know much more than he was stationed on some sort of signal tower. During a tour of Battery 519, the guide was talking about how there had been a Navy unit stationed at the base and as he explained their function, monitoring and challenging ships coming into into the bay, it became apparent this was what my grandfather did. I commented on this fact when I posted the photos I took that day to my website. (You can view them here.)

Over a year later, I got an e-mail from someone from the Fort Miles Historical Society asking if I had any photos taken during my grandfather’s time there. As it turns out, my grandfather has an album that documents his entire time in the Navy. Some of the photos of the base in my grandfather’s album included some never before seen views. After sharing the photos and talking to several others including a historian, I helped my grandfather record some narrations and answer some questions. Before we knew it we were heading to Fort Miles so he could be interviewed.

A few weeks ago we went down there with my grandfather to meet the guys from Fort Miles, tour the base and discuss his memories of his time there. It was incredibly rewarding to be able to help preserve the history of the base, a history that my grandfather was a part of. It was just as rewarding to be able to walk around with him at a place that he hadn’t been back to for nearly 70 years and likely thought he’d never return to. I’m sure that the 22 year old Navy Signalman 2nd Class (SN2) who stood watch on that tower would never believe he’d someday return with his daughter and grandson, both adults, to be interviewed about his everyday activities of 70 years prior.

You can view the photos here.

Posted by Michael in Genealogy, Life, Photography, Site Updates
01
Jun
2013

Posting reviews on my site

After stopping at a restaurant in Hershey, PA almost entirely because of its reviews on Yelp and UrbanSpoon and being pleasantly surprised at how good it was and how accurate the reviews were, I decided that I should write a review of my own. Of course, since I never do things halfway, I figured that if I’m going to take time to write a review then I might as well post it to a few sites. The sites I chose were Yelp, UrbanSpoon, Google+ Local & TripAdvisor. Once I spent a little time creating accounts on each site, I started to think I should write more than just one review. So, I plan to occassionally write reviews (primarily of restaurants.)

There will be no reviews of mass market chain restaurants, just local places that deserve some free publicity and will hopefully benefit from it. That’s not to say that I won’t post a negative review when warranted. There’s no reason not to warn people away from enduring the same bad food or service I suffered through.

As part of my ongoing attempt to include any content I write for other sites on my own site, I plan to put copies of the reviews in blog entries. They’ll have their own category and will be labeled with an indicator that it’s a review. I know I don’t need more random junk thrown in to my blog stream, but you’ll be seeing some big changes to the site as a whole soon (I hope!) Don’t worry the change is not that I’m converting my site to a restaurant review site.

Posted by Michael in Life, Randomness, Site Updates
24
May
2013

Photo Upgrade Complete

For all two or three of you out there who are interested or will notice, I’ve finally completed the upgrade of all of the photos in the photos section of the site. All of the photos now have larger thumbnails and larger full size versions. I’ve also retouched any of the photos that were not previously retouched.

This slow 3 year long project is a precursor to cross-posting most of my photos to Flickr. Check out the upgraded photos right here!

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates
01
May
2013

Jim Thorpe WinterFest and Yeungling Photos

Inn at Jim ThorpeOne advantage of being stuck at home all last week was that I caught up on a lot of reading and got caught up on posting photos. I posted 2 new albums from the same trip.

The first is from the WinterFest in Jim Thorpe, PA. It features ice carving, chainsaw carving, concerts, Mug Walk, shopping and all of the fun that goes along with a small town winter festival. Check it out here.

On the way home from Jim Thorpe we stopped at the Yuengling Brewery in Pottsville. it was a very cool tour. Check out the photos from America’s Oldest Brewery right here.

We also stopped at a restaurant in Hershey that has inspired me to started writing some reviews for Yelp, UrbanSpoon, etc. More about that to come soon.

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates
09
Dec
2012

Michigan Photos

Grand HotelIt’s taken way too long, but I finally got around to getting the photos from my summer vacation posted. This is one of the problems with having an iPad and iPhone. So many people have already seen these photos that there aren’t enough people pestering me to see them. However, I know that there are many people out there who don’t see me in person and haven’t gotten to see these photos.

For those of you who don’t know, our trip took us to Mackinac Island, Frankenmuth, The Henry Ford in Dearborn, Holland, Petoskey and a tiny little airport called Pellston Regional. I’ve also included a few short videos from the trip. It can all be found right here.

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates
09
Dec
2012

Photos from New Hope to Lansdale Train Trip

New Hope RailroadAnd here’s another album of photos that has been languishing on my desktop for way too long. They were taken on on a trip from new Hope To Landsdale, Pennsylvania. The New Hope and Ivyland Railroad is a vintage tourist railroad. For Lansdale’s Founders Day they took the antique steam locomotive and passenger cars out onto SEPTA’s tracks. After a stop at SEPTA’s Warminster station we arrived in Lansdale to enjoy the festivities before heading back to New Hope aboard the train. You can check out the photos here.

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates
09
Dec
2012

Easton Garlic Fest Photos

Easton Garlic FestI’m finally cleaning out the backlog of photos that I’ve been meaning to post on my website. I just posted some photos from the Easton, PA garlic Festival. They can be found right here.

Posted by Michael in Photography, Site Updates