Comic Book -- Brave and the Bold -- August 5, 2025

coverbrowser.com

When I was growing up, DC comic book Brave and the Bold usually featured Batman and another hero, in this case, Green Lantern. The bad guy who has imprisoned Batman in an iron bat is the Time Commander but the villain on the cover is Cosmos, an artificial creature made anew by the Time Commander.

I had this issue.

Pulp -- Brave and Bold -- August 4, 2024

coverbrowser.com

Before the pulps, there were the dime novels, which sometimes cost a nickel. This issue of Brave and Bold, from 06-January-1906, shows That Boy Checkers, who brought a knife to a tiger fight. That Boy Checkers, or Chased Half Way Around the World was written by Lawrence White, Jr. 

Toonerville Trolley -- Take Them Teeth o' Yourn Out -- August 3, 2025

San Antonio Light, 04-August-1924

I love Fontaine Fox's The Toonerville Trolley That Meets All the Trains.

Washington Times, 06-August-1925

  

Washington Times, 30-June-1918

Krazy Kat -- No "Officer Pupp" Today -- August 2, 2025

San Antonio Light, 07-August-1924

I love George Herriman's Krazy Kat. Ignatz breaks through the fourth wall. Click on the image to see a larger version.

Brooklyn Times-Union, 11-August-1924

I see that Boston radio station WNAC had a show called the "Krazy Kat Kiddies Klub." I'll have to look into that.

Washington Times, 30-June-1918

August 2025 Version of the Cable Car Home Page -- August 1, 2025

I just put the August 2025 version of my Cable Car Home Page on the server:

http://www.cable-car-guy.com/

It includes some new items:

1. Picture of the Month: Grip car and trailer 6 of Lisbon's Graça line was built by the German Maschinenfabrik Esslingen. I wonder if it was photographed on elevated tracks as a builder's photo. Photo courtesy of Maschinenfabrik Esslingen. All rights reserved.
2. On the Other Cities page: A ten-year update about the Nova Companhia dos Ascensores Mecânicos de Lisboa, which operated two Hallidie-type cable car lines in Lisbon
3. On the Cable Tramways in Australia and New Zealand page: The extended 2025 Annual Maintenance Shutdown of the Wellington Cable Car
4. On the Kansas City page: Added the logo of the modern KC Streetcar
5. Added News items about cable car operating issues and Muni's psychedlic-wrapped vehicles

Ten years ago this month (August 2015):

1. Picture of the Month: Car 4 of Lisbon's Camões-Estrela line was built by the German Maschinenfabrik Esslingen. I wonder if it on a transfer table. Photo courtesy of Maschinenfabrik Esslingen.
2. On the Other Cities page: A new article on the Nova Companhia dos Ascensores Mecânicos de Lisboa, which operated two Hallidie-type cable car lines in Lisbon
3. On the Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest page, added photos and videos of the 52nd Annual Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest
4. Added News and information about Muni fare changes

Twenty years ago this month (August 2005):

1. Picture of the Month: A Walter Rice photo of Powell Street car 25 with the round dash signs it sported until 1982.
2. On the Cable Car Transfers, Tickets, Tokens and Signage page: Thanks to Walter Rice and Val Lupiz, a collection of Powell Street dash signs. Also an 1898 Cal Cable dividend check.
3. On the San Francisco page: Walter Rice has two more stories about Samuel Kahn, Market Street Railway's principal owner: "Samuel Kahn Paints a Streetcar White," about private party car San Francisco, and "Samuel Kahn, Inventor," about the creation of the White Front Car, with a copy of the patent
4. Also on the San Francisco page: Thanks to Phil Hoffman, an item about the movie I Love a Soldier, which featured Barry Fitzgerald as a gripman. Also thanks to Phil Hoffman, an update to the item about the movie In Harm's Way.
5. On the New York/New Jersey page: More 1887 newspaper articles about the first cable car line in Brooklyn, New York. A CABLE CAR ACCIDENT, about a pedestrian getting injured, and . EXTENDING THE CABLE ROAD, about extending the cable and possibly running cars across the Brooklyn Bridge using the Johnson system
6. Thanks to Phil Hoffman, added Chronology item about Adlai Stevenson campaigning from the back platform of Powell car 504 in 1956. Added a Time Magazine photo of the event to the article on Photos of Car 44 (retired Powell Street car 504/4) at Pac Bell Park
7. Added more Chronology items

75 years ago - 1950
Aug 14 - Cal Cable's O'Farrell, Jones and Hyde cable car service north of California Street is replaced by shuttle buses (San Mateo-Burlingame Transit, Ford buses) to Chestnut Street only because of Broadway Tunnel construction.
Aug 21 - The San Francisco Grand Jury reported that during the calendar year 1949 Muni’s Powell Street cable cars lost $145,089. The railway "is powerless to eliminate the loss, as the voters mandated continuance of the Municipal cable cars." Heavy capital expenditures for track and "other essentials" will be required to keep cable cars in operation. The operating costs, per vehicle service hour, were trolley buses $4.72, motor buses $5.15 streetcars (two-man) $ 8.76 and cable cars $9.52.

In January 2024 I started on a long overdue process of cleaning things up on my site. I started with the development pages. Actually, I guess I started the year before with making most thumbnails 200 pixels instead of 100.

Coming in September 2025: 

On the Other Cities page: A ten-year update about the the street-running funiculars in Lisbon, Portugal, with several photos of the Elevador do Lavra

The Cable Car Home Page now has a Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/CableCarHomePage/

The Cable Car Home Page also has an Instagram page:
https://www.instagram.com/cable_car_guy/

Joe Thompson
The Cable Car Home Page (updated 01-August-2025)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/
San Francisco Bay Ferryboats (updated 31-October-2024)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/ferry/
Park Trains and Tourist Trains (updated 31-May-2025)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/ptrain/
The Pneumatic Rolling-Sphere Carrier Delusion (updated spasmodically)
http://cablecarguy.blogspot.com
The Big V Riot Squad (updated obsessively)
http://bigvriotsquad.blogspot.com/

Seven Months Under the Heel of T***p -- July 31, 2025

The first seven months of 2025 have been miserable. We have both been sick, either one at a time or both together for the whole summer. We may have had Covid, but didn't test for until it was too late.

The day he was sworn into office, T***p started disgorging a massive number of executive orders dedicated to things like revoking birthright citizenship, removing the US from the World Health Organization, the Paris Climate Accords and wiping out all traces of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. He has made savage attacks against LGBTQ people, especially those who are trans. 

His drunken Secretary of Defense has dismissed women, a general and admiral, who commanded West Point an Annapolis. 

He wants National Parks and Monuments to remove anything from their historical markers which might hurt the feelings of white people. 

ICE is scooping up people with brown skin and deporting many of them to other countries, where they have no connections. There is no due process, and the cowardly ICE goons wear masks and hide their badges or other ids.

The drunken Secretary of Defense participated in a call discussing an upcoming military operation on Signal, which is not allowed for calls with sensitive information; the call included a reporter who got invited by mistake. 

T***p turned the levers of government and access to all its information to Elon Musk and a gang of young people of college age or less.  The so-called Department of Government Efficiency fired thousands of Federal workers, many of whom were veterans. They shut down critical agencies like USAID. They consolidated all the data they could get, probably so they could create a database of citizens. T***p and Musk eventually broke up, but not before they crippled large parts of the government.

Oligarchy and fascism seem to be the goal, as set out in Project 2025.

I've been depressed. Fortunately, the courts have struck down some of his idiocies and people are resisting. On top of all that, T***p is showing signs of growing senility.

"According to Jane Taylor, 'the central character is notorious for his infantile engagement with his world. Ubu inhabits a domain of greedy self-gratification'. Jarry's metaphor for the modern man, he is an antihero—fat, ugly, vulgar, gluttonous, grandiose, dishonest, stupid, jejune, voracious, greedy, cruel, cowardly and evil..." -- Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubu_Roi

July 2025 Version of the Cable Car Home Page -- July 1, 2025

I just put the July 2025 version of my Cable Car Home Page on the server:

http://www.cable-car-guy.com/

It includes some new items:

1. Picture of the Month: The grip car of the Western Cable Railway (source An Inclined Cable Railway for Transferring Freight Cars Between the Upper and Lower Yards of the Western Cable Railway Co., St. Louis, MO. By Edw. Flag, Member, Engineers' Club Of St. Louis.).
2. On the new Cable Car Lines in Saint Louis page: The freight-hauling Western Cable Railway, which was not a Hallidie-type cable car line
3. Added News items about cable car operating issues and information about Muni fare changes

Ten years ago this month (July 2015):

1. Picture of the Month: At the 2013 Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest, Emcee Deb Durst interviews grand champion Carl Payne. The 1977, 1978, 1980, 1981, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1988 and 1989 champion gave an exhibition performance. The 2015 Cable Car Bell Ringing Contest will take place on Thursday, July 9 at Noon in Union Square
2. On the new Cable Car Lines in Saint Louis page: The freight-hauling Western Cable Railway, which was not a Hallidie-type cable car line

Twenty years ago this month (July 2005):

1. Picture of the Month: Jim Walker's 1962 photo of Cal Cable car 42 at a feed lot in Betteravia, California.
2. On the Cable Car Transfers, Tickets, Tokens and Signage page: Thanks to Walter Rice, Rudy Brandt's 1945 Muni employee pass and his 1944 union card, and a menu from the Cable Car Cafe on Bay Street
3. On the San Francisco page: Walter Rice has more stories about Samuel Kahn, Market Street Railway's principal owner
4. On the New York/New Jersey page: More 1887 newspaper articles about the first cable car line in Brooklyn, New York.
5. Added another News items about the return of Cal Cable car 42.
6. Added Bibliography items about a US News & World Report article and an obituary for Brian Jennings

100 years ago - 1925
Jul 01 - Market Street Railway Castro cable car no. 2 was fitted with a cable grip and brakes operated by air. The company felt that air grips could displace the present "unwieldy manually operated grip, give more space and convenience for passengers, and materially lighten the work of gripmen." A second Castro cable car No. 6 received the air grip and braking system on July 16, 1925.

25 years ago - 2000
Jul 16 - Frank Ware won the 37th annual Bell Ringing Contest
Jul 26 - A Powell/Hyde car stopped suddenly when the grip shank hit a coupler pin which fell from another car

In January 2024 I started on a long overdue process of cleaning things up on my site. I started with the development pages. Actually, I guess I started the year before with making most thumbnails 200 pixels instead of 100.

Coming in July 2025: On the Other Cities page: A ten-year update about the Nova Companhia dos Ascensores Mecânicos de Lisboa, which operated two Hallidie-type cable car lines in Lisbon

The Cable Car Home Page now has a Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/CableCarHomePage/

The Cable Car Home Page also has an Instagram page:
https://www.instagram.com/cable_car_guy/

Joe Thompson
The Cable Car Home Page (updated 01-July-2025)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/
San Francisco Bay Ferryboats (updated 31-October-2024)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/ferry/
Park Trains and Tourist Trains (updated 31-May-2025)
http://www.cable-car-guy.com/ptrain/
The Pneumatic Rolling-Sphere Carrier Delusion (updated spasmodically)
http://cablecarguy.blogspot.com
The Big V Riot Squad (updated obsessively)
http://bigvriotsquad.blogspot.com/