Uncle John's Ahh-Inspiring Bathroom Reader

by Bathroom Readers' Institute

  Amati himself was a member of one of the most famous violin-making families in Italy. Of all the members of the Amati family, Nicolo was considered the most gifted craftsman—and yet even his violins couldn’t compare to those of his pupil Stradivari.

  As early as 1684, Stradivari began to experiment with the details of violin making in search of better sound. He found it, of course, and in the process gave the violin its modern form—shallower in construction, less arched in the belly and back, with an improved bridge and a new varnish, deeper and darker than the yellower varnish Amati had used.

  In the 19th century, a few more changes were made to the design of violins so that they could be heard more easily in large auditoriums. But for the most part, all modern violins follow the style established by Stradivari more than 300 years ago…only they don’t sound nearly as good as the original. When Stradivari died in 1737, he took many of his secrets to the grave with him.

  Or did he?

  SOLVING THE MYSTERY

  It’s estimated that Stradivari made more than 1,100 instruments in his lifetime; more than 450 of his violins survive to this day, as do numerous violas, cellos, guitars, and even a few harps. Many of his tools survive too, and so do many of the patterns and molds that he used to fashion his instruments. But without his expert skills and knowledge, they’re useless—even when experienced craftspeople use his original equipment, no one, Stradivari’s admirers claim, has been able to make a violin as good as an original Stradivarius.

  Price of a Stradivarius copy advertised in the 1909 Sears, Roebuck & Co. catalog: $6.10.

  Stradivari has been dead for more than 250 years now, and people are still arguing over what it is that makes his musical instruments sound so beautiful. People have studied Stradivarius violin slivers under electron microscopes and taken violins to the hospital to have them CAT scanned. Some people have even taken these priceless instruments apart to precisely measure every piece and tiny detail of their construction, hoping to learn their secrets.

  “You have to put in a thin blunt knife and ease it around to separate the pieces, breaking the glue,” explains Sandra Wagstaff, who cracked open her $2.2 million Stradivarius violin in 2001. “You hear, ‘Click, click, click,’ and if it goes quiet, you stop. Immediately, because that means you’re cutting into the wood.”

  What do we have to show for more than two and a half centuries of such efforts? Not much. Music experts still can’t agree on anything—what the secret is, whether there really is a secret, and if there is, whether Stradivarius even knew what it was.

  Theory #1: It’s in the man. Like Picasso paintings, Stradivarius violins get their beautiful sound from his unique—and unreproducible—techniques. “The real secret,” says violin dealer Robert Bein, “is that Stradivari was an artist, and those instruments are imbued with that X-factor that we recognize as art. So the secret died with him.”

  Theory #2: It’s in the varnish. Stradivari apparently used three layers of varnish: the first coat consisted of silica and potash, which was allowed to soak into the bare wood to give it strength; the second coat probably consisted of egg whites and honey or sugar; and the third coat was a mixture of gum arabic, turpentine, and a resin known as Venetian red. But—at least according to this school of thought—the details of Stradivari’s varnish recipes may remain a mystery forever.

  Theory #3: It’s in our heads. “If the audience sees you’ve got a Strad, you must be good because only good players have Strads,” explains Dr. Bernard Richardson, a musical acoustics specialist at the University of Cardiff in the United Kingdom. “There was no secret. We know the tools he used, the techniques he used, and the wood he used, so there’s no reason people should not make exactly the same instruments.”

  How many baseball gloves can be made from a single cowhide? Five.

  Gregg Alf, a Michigan violin maker, agrees. “There’s a lot of mumbo-jumbo about the Stradivarius mystique,” he says. Alf and his partner, Joseph Curtin, took apart a famous Stradivarius known as the Booth Stradivarius, measured it carefully, and built a precise replica—even down to the scratches—that, like the original, has a beautiful sound. Just how beautiful is open to interpretation, but it later sold at Sotheby’s for $33,000, the highest price ever paid for a violin made by someone who isn’t dead yet. Alf argues that, with practice, he’ll be able to make replicas as good as or even better than the originals, especially considering that the originals have been aging and deteriorating for more than 250 years.

  Theory #4: It’s in the bugs. According to this theory, Stradivari didn’t have any secrets at all—tiny microbes in the wood he used are what give his violins their wonderful sound. In Stradivari’s day, when trees were cut down the logs were thrown into the river and floated downstream to Venice, where they might soak in a lagoon for two or three years before they were finally sold. In this time the wood became waterlogged, allowing for rich growth of bacteria and fungus. These life forms ate away much of the pectin in the sap and also the hemicellulose, the organic material that holds moisture in wood.

  With the hemicellulose gone, the wood became lighter, drier, and 50 times more permeable to varnish than ordinary wood. Stradivari’s varnish contained 20 or more different minerals that caused it to dry with a hard gemlike finish that gave the wood excellent sound characteristics, unlike the gummy, oil-based varnishes that are popular today.

  “This combination of highly permeable wood and a very hard composite varnish, which happened to be used by all craftsmen of the period, even on furniture, is what accounts for these remarkable acoustic properties,” theorizes Dr. Joseph Nagyvary, a biochemist at Texas A&M University. “Stradivari was a marvelous craftsman, but the magnificent sound of his instruments was a lucky accident.”

  “Do you know why they haven’t made any good violins in Italy for a hundred years?” Nagyvary asked in 1986. “In the 1840s, they dammed up the rivers.”

  Theory #5: Update—The worms helped too. In 2001 Dr. Nagyvary revised his theories to give some credit for Stradivari’s success to woodworms. Actually, the lack of them: Stradivari happened to be in business at a time when the region of Cremona was suffering through a woodworm epidemic. So Stradivari treated his wood with borax, a preservative, to keep the worms out. The borax also bound the molecules of the wood more tightly together, so in using this treatment, Stradivari unknowingly improved the wood’s acoustic properties.

  It’s the law: If you want to drive in London, England, you must sit in the front seat of the car.

  The epidemic passed at about the same time that Stradivari died, Nagyvary says, so subsequent violin makers from Cremona stopped treating their wood. When the sound quality of their instruments declined, they mistakenly assumed that Stradivari’s “secrets” must have died with him…or so the theory goes.

  LUCKY FIND?

  If you ever happen to see an old violin at a flea market or a garage sale and notice that the label reads “Stradivarius,” go ahead and buy it if you want. But don’t pay a lot of money for it and don’t get your hopes up—it’s probably a fake.

  As we said earlier, Stradivari was largely responsible for establishing the standard design for modern violins. Later violin makers followed his standard…and communicated as much by labeling their violins “Stradivarius” too. This was not intended to defraud, it was just a maker’s way of stating that the violin’s design was inspired by Stradivari and not by Amati or some other master craftsman. Over time, the true intent of these labels was forgotten…and as a result, hundreds if not thousands of unintentionally “fake” Stradivarius violins are still in circulation.

  Even the experts have been fooled: In 1999 the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, had to admit that it “might” have a fake in its collection after a violin nicknamed The Messiah, previously described as “a flawless Stradivarius jewel,” was found to be made from a spruce chopped down after Stradivari’s death.

  “I inherited a painting and a violin which turned out to be a Rembr
andt and a Stradivarius. Unfortunately, Rembrandt made lousy violins and Stradivari was a terrible painter.”

  —Tommy Cooper, comedian

  Ratio of American WWII pilots killed in training, to those killed in combat: 2 to 1.

  WORD ORIGINS

  Ever wonder where words come from? Here are some more interesting stories.

  POSTHUMOUS

  Meaning: Something that arises or occurs after one’s death Origin: “Posthumous comes from the Latin postumus, ‘last’ or ‘last-born,’ which, strictly speaking, could be applied to the last child born of a particular mother and father, without reference to death. The h crept into postumus by association with humus (earth or ground) and perhaps with some help from humare (to bury). The modern spelling and meaning were fixed by Posthumus Leonatus, hero of Shakespeare’s Cymbeline, who received this name, as the audience is informed at the start of the play, because he was born after his father died.” (From Devious Derivations, by Hugh Rawson)

  YANKEE

  Meaning: A nickname for Americans or New Englanders

  Origin: “The exact origin is uncertain, but the idea that enjoys the largest following is that it came from Dutch Jan Kees—a variant of John Kaas, which literally meant ‘John Cheese,’ an ethnic insult for a Hollander. Other ideas abound. According to James Fenimore Cooper, Indians sounded the word ‘English’ as Yengees; whence Yankees. Or the word may be derived from the Scottish yankie, ‘dishonest person.’” (From The Story Behind the Word, by Morton S. Freeman)

  TYCOON

  Meaning: A wealthy and powerful business person

  Origin: “A trumped-up Japanese title, taikun was a word used to magnify the role of the shogun or military commander of the country, especially when he was addressing foreigners, the point being to suggest that he was more potent and important than the emperor himself. The word meant ‘emperor’ or ‘great prince,’ borrowed from the Chinese t’ai kiuen (‘great prince’).” (From The Secret Lives of Words, by Paul West)

  When your dog drags his rear end across your floor, that’s known as “sleigh riding.”

  SABOTAGE

  Meaning: To deliberately destroy or obstruct

  Origin: “Sabots are great, clumsy wooden shoes, worn by French peasants at the time of the Revolution. But sabotage was not invented until about 1910, during the great French railway strikes, and meant, figuratively, to throw a wooden shoe in the gears; deliberate destruction of plant and machinery by dissatisfied workers.” (From More About Words, by Margaret S. Ernst)

  SINISTER

  Meaning: Evil or ominous

  Origin: “In Latin, the word had two meanings: ‘on the left side,’ and ‘unfavorable.’ According to Greek tradition people faced north while prophesying, so west—the left side—became the unlucky one. By the early 15th century the interpretation was ‘dishonest’; later in the 15th century it became ‘evil.’ The sense ‘threatening’ or ‘ominous’ does not arise until the 18th century.” (From Jesse’s Word of the Day, by Jesse Sheidlower)

  LUKEWARM

  Meaning: Barely warm

  Origin: “Luke was a Middle English word, now obsolete, meaning ‘warm,’ which was based on lew, another word for ‘warm.’ Lew, in turn, was derived from the Old English word hleow, meaning (guess what?) ‘warm.’ You have probably realized by now that lukewarm actually amounts to saying ‘warm-warm,’ but this sort of redundancy is common when obsolete words are carried over into modern usage.” (From The Word Detective, by Evan Morris)

  HAMMOCK

  Meaning: A hanging bed of cloth tied between two supports

  Origin: “The airiness and cleanliness of Taino (Native American) houses impressed the Europeans. The people slept in hamacas, hanging beds which Columbus described as ‘nets of cotton.’ By the 17th century, these practical beds were being used by sailors onboard ship. The spelling hammock did not prevail until the 19th century.” (From The Chronology of Words and Phrases’ by Linda and Roger Flavell)

  A tree planted near a streetlight will keep its leaves longer into the fall than other trees.

  OOPS!

  More tales of outrageous blunders.

  TAKE YOUR BEST SHOT

  “A Ghanaian man was shot dead by a fellow villager while testing a magic spell designed to make him bulletproof, the official Ghana News Agency reported. Aleobiga Aberima, 23, and 15 other men from Lambu village had asked a witch doctor to make them invincible to bullets.

  “After smearing his body with a concoction of herbs every day for two weeks, Aberima volunteered to be shot to check if the spell had worked. It didn’t. Villagers then beat the witch doctor.”

  —Fate magazine

  EIGHT IS ENOUGH

  “In Coventry, England, nine police officers got onto an elevator on their way to a drug bust on the ninth floor of an apartment building. Unfortunately, the elevator was designed for eight people. The extra weight caused it to stop—trapping the officers between floors. For the next 45 minutes they screamed for help. Finally a neighbor heard them and announced, ‘I’ll call the police.’ The officers screamed back, ‘We are the police! Get the fire department!’”

  —Pantograph

  CUT ALONG THE DOTTED LINE

  “A surgeon at Rhode Island Hospital operated on the wrong side of a man’s brain after a CT scan was placed backward on an X-ray viewing box. The patient was fine, but the error occurred one year after a surgeon at the same hospital removed the tonsils and adenoids of a girl who was supposed to get eye surgery.”

  — Associated Press

  YOU PUT YOUR RIGHT LEG IN…

  “A Rockettes performance in New York Ciy ended abruptly when a dancer’s prosthetic appendage flew into the audience. Gina Chalmers, who lost her foot in a 1999 auto accident, had been fired but was rehired after threatening a lawsuit.”

  —Maxim

  Dolphins can fish in complete darkness, using sonar to find their prey.

  I WANT TO RIDE MY BICYCLE! PART III

  Toward the end of the 19th century, America was in the middle of an Industrial Age. Factories everywhere were mass-producing products using Eli Whitney’s revolutionary “American System.” (See page 239.) It was only a matter of time before somebody would apply it to bicycles. (Part II is on page 286.)

  MADE IN THE USA

  Why import a product when you can build it yourself? That was the thinking of Colonel Albert Pope, a wealthy Civil War veteran. He saw the obvious demand for the penny-farthing bicycle from England and decided that he would be the one to supply it.

  First he studied the mechanics of an entire fleet of European bicycles, and then hired engineers to copy their style and design. Pope’s first bicycle, which he named the “Columbia,” was a durable, lightweight penny-farthing with wire spokes and rubber tires. In 1878 he rented a sewing-machine factory and started production.

  The true genius behind Pope’s Columbia was his use of “interchangeable parts” technology. The bicycles that were produced in Europe were handmade and welded by individual mechanics—a costly, time-consuming process that produced a slightly different bike every time. Pope standardized bicycle parts so they could be used interchangeably, making bikes easy to build and easy to repair. Soon thousands of mass-produced bicycles started rolling off Pope’s assembly line. Now all he had to do was sell them.

  GETTING THE WORD OUT

  Pope began spending money to promote the bicycle—a lot of money. He started a publication called The Wheelman and paid well-known journalists to write encouraging articles about the bicycle; he paid doctors to write about the health benefits associated with riding; and he helped start riding clubs. He hired Charles Pratt, a lawyer and popular author, to write a set of guidelines for the clubs. Pratt referred to bicycling as “manly” and composed a set of rules that included proper dress, position, and responsibilities. He also established a national organization called the League of American Wheelmen.

  Q: Which animal in your house is closest to the average-sized animal in
the entire animal kingdom? A: The housefly

  It worked. By the 1880s, the bicycle industry was flourishing. But in creating a demand for bikes, Pope’s success sparked competition—and Pope didn’t like competition. So he and Pratt purchased as many bicycle patents as they could. The patents ranged from Lallement’s original design for the veloce (Lallement was then back in America working as a mechanic at one of Pope’s factories) to various patent improvements on wheels, spokes, and pedals. Then Pope sent Pratt across the country charging retailers licensing fees for selling Pope’s products and threatening lawsuits if they refused to pay. Since most small-time shop owners couldn’t afford to go to court against a big-time baron like Pope, they paid up.

  But while Pope and Pratt were busy fighting to keep their newly acquired patents alive, a British engineer named James Starley was developing a breakthrough that would make Pope’s high-wheeled bicycles obsolete.

  BACK ON THE CHAIN GANG

  In 1884 Starley developed a special chain that could connect the pedals to the axle of the bicycle’s rear wheel. This development, known as “gearing,” allowed manufacturers to shift the pedals of the bicycle from the front wheel to the middle of the crossbar, eliminating the need for a high front wheel. In fact, now both wheels could be the same size—about three feet in diameter—lowering the risks to the rider. Starley dubbed his new machine the “Rover,” but the public called it the “safety bike.”