Thomas Cave's Tattoo: The Bandwagon

"Thomas Cave's Tattoo"

I've started a blog that discusses what I call the New Great Depression - the idea that the next few years will constitute a Depression era, and not simple recession. I believe that to understand it in that way will enrich it, and encourage everyone in this country to make this era a creative period, a positive time, an act of construction, and not a cause for panic, chaos and fear. This is a chance for renaissance.

If the New Great Depression produces art, literature, theater, film, community, and a discovery of human value, as the first one did, who wouldn't want to be a part of it.

I am here to barter, trade, share, talk, listen, discuss, argue, understand, make fun, and make peace with the lack of the old prosperity. It was corrupt, and corroded, and it's gone. The dead weight of spoils has been lifted.

Thank you for listening, ma'am.

"About Thomas Cave"

Mr. Cave is the gentleman in the photograph that graces this home page. The photograph was taken by the American photographer Dorothea Lange, who so powerfully documented the country and its citizens during the Great Depression. I found this photograph at www.shorpy.com, a website with a specialty in Depression images. According to Shorpy's site, the Lange photograph, titled "535-07-5248 and Wife," was taken in Oregon in August of 1939. The gentleman is described as an unemployed lumber worker. His tattoo is his Social Security number, by which he is referred to in the title of the photograph. A public records search conducted by Shorpy's revealed that the number belonged to Thomas Cave, who was born in 1912 and died in 1980 in Portland. His wife's name, Ann Kathryn, who died in 2000, appears on their tombstone, a photograph of which is appended under Shorpy's readers' comments.

Mr. Cave is 27 years old in Lange's picture.

Friday, March 6, 2009

The Bandwagon

We are not alone.

An 'Editorial Observer' piece by Adam Cohen in yesterday's New York Times details the new popularity of 'recession' blogs. Well, they almost got it right. What starts with a D?

Mentioned are 'Above the Law's "Notes From the Breadline" feature, written by an out-of-work lawyer. (That's pretty hard to do, actually, to be an out-of-work lawyer.) There's 'recessionwire.com' (two biz-mag ex-editors: their tag is 'The Upside of the Downturn'), 'Pink Slips Are the New Black,' the 405 Club (maximum weekly unemployment benefits figure), and a blog by a 93 year-old on Depression cooking, greatdepressioncooking.com.

The gist - everything from advice on your first five minutes of being laid-off to tips on DIY frugality to recipes involving hot dogs. (Hey, I gave you guys brisket. See Friday, Feb. 27.)

Here, for example, is the 405 Club's 'Affiliates' list:

Check them out. Who knew there'd be job insecurity in unemployment. The bandwagon's getting crowded, and people are starting to push.

Thank you for listening, ma'am.

FYI, the 1953 film "The Band Wagon," illustrated at top, starring Fred Astaire and Cyd Charisse and directed by Vicente Minnelli, is a send-up of show-biz's 'putting on a show' theme, and features "Dancing in the Dark."

Thomas Cave's Tattoo