Middle Ages, and before, used Urine to cure hides.
In 18th-19th century London there were people called “pure-finders” who made a precarious living picking up dog crap out of the streets and selling it to tanyards. It was used in the production of leather.
It’s only rich societies that can afford to throw anything away. There were many occupations like this that involved a form of recycling. Toshers picked metal up out of the sewer. Mudlarks scavenged the bottom of the river. You can read about them in London Labour and the London Poor by Henry Mayhew, which is free from Project Gutenberg.
It has a lot of airy-fairy hypothesizing about cultural development, and a wealth of statistics of dubious utility, but no one had ever tried to write such a book before, and a lot of the interviews are really interesting.
What happens when an expert on 19th-century British industrial novels—who is a professor, a feminist, and a deconstructionist—finds herself in an actual factory?
That is the premise of David Lodge’s novel Nice Work, reviewed here:
In my early youth in Chicago I recall men pushing carts through the alleys looking for metal in the trash and calling out for residents to bring them their trash metal. There was a name for them, but I can’t remember. “Tin men” seems obvious, but I think it was something else.
David, I clicked over to your post. Clever concept for a novel. Sounds like you enjoyed it.
The rabidly-dishonest-bordering-on-psychotic Aspen Security Forum…is the insidious Liberal-Left juggernaut that represents in living Technicolor precisely what the US—and the world—is up against.
(Essentially, it’s the North American chapter of the WEF/WTF…)
Another must-read (if one can stand it), alas, to the very end…
David Foster and Rufus T. – Nice Work was my introduction to David Lodge’s novels. I really enjoyed it and went on to read Small World, Changing Places, Paradise News, and Therapy. I can’t single out one as better…maybe just read them all? He’s also a Jane Austen scholar if you’re more into non-fiction….
Now that practice could not be terribly sanitary in the long run, for obvious reasons
There was also a British movie based on Nice Work…the recording I saw had apparently been recorded from British TV, and was so cut up with ads…much worse than even American TV…as to be almost unwatchable.
I’m planning to do a post on Books and Movies Centered Around Manufacturing, relevant to the current interest and activity around US Reindustrialization.
The video kicked off a recollection of Dan Gelbart’s tribute to Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch (at 18:54 in the video linked above). On the other hand its depiction of human physiology is quite risible, or should we say merely another AI-stupidity now?
Two other points:
– Treated urine was also used in the recipe for a kind of hair pomade several hundred, or more, years back.
(No, don’t ask…)
– Its chemical composition also enabled it to enhance libations offered in the Temple in Jerusalem, if added…but it was deemed disrespectful for this purpose and was therefore, apparently, never used.
It’s not primarily about manufacturing, but “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder is a great look at the process of developing something within a company. It’s been several decades since I read it, but I found it to be accurate to my personal experiences with similar, large projects.
So…what’s the over-under on DPOTUS—TO A HE/SHE/THEM—circling the Conestogas, jumping up and down, and shrieking hysterically, “He did, SO!! but, ya’ know, just doesn’t quite remember…. LEAVE ‘IM ALONE YOU MAGA VULTURES!!”
Rufus T. Firefly, re “pushing carts through the alleys looking for metal”. Still happens in Texas. Recently a pickup stopped out front where I was gardening, asked if I had any ‘old metal’ I’d like to get rid of. Indeed – the old lawn mower, bbq grill and a microwave. He eyed my ‘sidearm’, I shook my head ‘NO’, we both laughed, and he went on his way.
So, ancient Rome likely smelled much like NYC, LA, San Francisco (or any big city) of today.
Maybe better, since the solid waste was taken care of differently.
Why do they have to say “enslaved persons” instead of “slaves”?
WINNING! Ford Motor leans into ‘Pro-America’ theme to become TOP SELLING Automaker in 2nd quarter! RePost
For those who are living deep down the rabbit hole, things appear to be getting curiouser and curiouser…(even if that doesn’t seem to be remotely possible).
“All 3 heads of UN anti-Israel inquiry suddenly resign;
“Navi Pillay, Miloon Kothari, and Chris Sidoti all announced their resignations from the UN Human Rights Council permanent inquiry against Israel”— https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/411662
+ Bonus (of a maladorous kind) featuring the U.N.’s very own Francesca Albanese:
Yep, Trump has set his sites on the UN and it’s particularly peculiar “brand” of fairness and integrity…
If you read T. E. Lawrence’s yarn ‘Seven Pillars of Wisdom’, he describes his Arab cohorts treating battle wounds with their piss.
Urine isn’t unsanitary in healthy people. But bacteria will grow in it if left out too long.
Well, it’s antiseptic…
…and there weren’t all that many sources of water available in that particular area.
Re: “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder
Rufus T. Firefly.
_________________
No mode bit.
–Ed de Castro, Founder and CEO of Data General
_________________
Words to live by.
In “The Soul of a New Machine” Tracy Kidder tells the story of Data General building a 32-bit minicomputer in its Eclipse line to compete with DEC’s VAX. No mode bit meant no direct support in the CPU for 16-bit code, thus avoiding complexity in design and programming. Legacy code would be supported by an emulator program.
Which might sound kludgy but worked surprisingly well. Apple used that strategy as it morphed the Mac through four different CPUs.
Anyway. “The Soul of a New Machine” was a brilliant real-life tech adventure story, which made the tech trenches sound romantic. I know I was seduced by it.
Of course, by now many thousands of tech guys and gals have sacrificed their brains and bodies on that altar with questionable results.
…Andreessen stated that universities “declared war on 70% of the country and now they’re going to pay the price.” He criticized DEI and immigration policies, describing them as “two forms of discrimination” that are “politically lethal.”….
File under: Don’t poke an angry billionaire…
Related: Higher education, continued…
Some sorely needed pushback…in the form of astonishingly sane justice:
… But then, Sunday, the president suggested on his social media that the Epstein business had become a Democratic Party op….
….The key is: had become a Democratic Party op. Didn’t start out that way, but might have turned into one. Consider: The Democratic Party was up to its eyeballs in ops against Mr. Trump since he rode down that fabled escalator in 2015. The “intel community” was the chief player in these operations. The intel community ran rings around Mr. Trump with all manner of fabricated nonsense during the election campaign of 2016 and throughout his first term. You could say — and I believe the DOJ under Ms. Bondi will say in cases waiting to be brought — that these many operations amounted to one continuous seditious conspiracy to overthrow a president. It ran from the Steele dossier, through the Mueller Investigation, through the Norm Eisen / Adam Schiff engineered impeachment No 1, through the gamed election of 2020, through the J-6 committee, and through all the nefarious lawfare gambits against Mr. Trump during the “Joe Biden” fake presidency.
Why wouldn’t the Epstein files now turn out to be an extension of these same operations?….
[Emphasis in original; Barry M.]
It does seem to make a kind of sense even as it may disappoint those who want to see blood.
Speaking of book reviews, here’s a pair of authors astonishing because of the fearlessness of both regarding speaking the truth as they see it, experience it, theorize about it, no matter how ugly it might be, no matter how much it goes against the “narrative” of the day….
Middle Ages, and before, used Urine to cure hides.
In 18th-19th century London there were people called “pure-finders” who made a precarious living picking up dog crap out of the streets and selling it to tanyards. It was used in the production of leather.
It’s only rich societies that can afford to throw anything away. There were many occupations like this that involved a form of recycling. Toshers picked metal up out of the sewer. Mudlarks scavenged the bottom of the river. You can read about them in London Labour and the London Poor by Henry Mayhew, which is free from Project Gutenberg.
It has a lot of airy-fairy hypothesizing about cultural development, and a wealth of statistics of dubious utility, but no one had ever tried to write such a book before, and a lot of the interviews are really interesting.
What happens when an expert on 19th-century British industrial novels—who is a professor, a feminist, and a deconstructionist—finds herself in an actual factory?
That is the premise of David Lodge’s novel Nice Work, reviewed here:
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/74595.html
Niketas,
In my early youth in Chicago I recall men pushing carts through the alleys looking for metal in the trash and calling out for residents to bring them their trash metal. There was a name for them, but I can’t remember. “Tin men” seems obvious, but I think it was something else.
David, I clicked over to your post. Clever concept for a novel. Sounds like you enjoyed it.
The rabidly-dishonest-bordering-on-psychotic Aspen Security Forum…is the insidious Liberal-Left juggernaut that represents in living Technicolor precisely what the US—and the world—is up against.
(Essentially, it’s the North American chapter of the WEF/WTF…)
Another must-read (if one can stand it), alas, to the very end…
“Pentagon pulls all military speakers from ‘globalist’ Aspen Security Forum”—
https://justthenews.com/government/security/pentagon-pulls-all-military-speakers-globalist-aspen-security-forum
David Foster and Rufus T. – Nice Work was my introduction to David Lodge’s novels. I really enjoyed it and went on to read Small World, Changing Places, Paradise News, and Therapy. I can’t single out one as better…maybe just read them all? He’s also a Jane Austen scholar if you’re more into non-fiction….
Now that practice could not be terribly sanitary in the long run, for obvious reasons
There was also a British movie based on Nice Work…the recording I saw had apparently been recorded from British TV, and was so cut up with ads…much worse than even American TV…as to be almost unwatchable.
I’m planning to do a post on Books and Movies Centered Around Manufacturing, relevant to the current interest and activity around US Reindustrialization.
https://youtu.be/lLTfMLaX820
The video kicked off a recollection of Dan Gelbart’s tribute to Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch (at 18:54 in the video linked above). On the other hand its depiction of human physiology is quite risible, or should we say merely another AI-stupidity now?
Heres the first chapter
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9Et68hlB170
This looks like a clean cut
Two other points:
– Treated urine was also used in the recipe for a kind of hair pomade several hundred, or more, years back.
(No, don’t ask…)
– Its chemical composition also enabled it to enhance libations offered in the Temple in Jerusalem, if added…but it was deemed disrespectful for this purpose and was therefore, apparently, never used.
Clay felker screams in the ether*
https://x.com/ingelramdecoucy/status/1944751075632021986
*founder of ny magazine
David,
It’s not primarily about manufacturing, but “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder is a great look at the process of developing something within a company. It’s been several decades since I read it, but I found it to be accurate to my personal experiences with similar, large projects.
Hmm. What do we have here…?
“Biden admits he didn’t approve each individual pardon, chief of staff Zients signed off on last-day clemencies”—
https://nypost.com/2025/07/14/us-news/biden-defends-controversial-autopen-use-for-mass-clemency-decisions-in-nyt-interview/
So…what’s the over-under on DPOTUS—TO A HE/SHE/THEM—circling the Conestogas, jumping up and down, and shrieking hysterically, “He did, SO!! but, ya’ know, just doesn’t quite remember…. LEAVE ‘IM ALONE YOU MAGA VULTURES!!”
Rufus T. Firefly, re “pushing carts through the alleys looking for metal”. Still happens in Texas. Recently a pickup stopped out front where I was gardening, asked if I had any ‘old metal’ I’d like to get rid of. Indeed – the old lawn mower, bbq grill and a microwave. He eyed my ‘sidearm’, I shook my head ‘NO’, we both laughed, and he went on his way.
Cue back to an earlier thread
https://x.com/JohnMcCloy/status/1942990582466437625
So, ancient Rome likely smelled much like NYC, LA, San Francisco (or any big city) of today.
Maybe better, since the solid waste was taken care of differently.
Why do they have to say “enslaved persons” instead of “slaves”?
WINNING! Ford Motor leans into ‘Pro-America’ theme to become TOP SELLING Automaker in 2nd quarter! RePost
https://commoncts.blogspot.com/2025/07/winning-ford-motor-leans-into-pro.html
For those who are living deep down the rabbit hole, things appear to be getting curiouser and curiouser…(even if that doesn’t seem to be remotely possible).
“All 3 heads of UN anti-Israel inquiry suddenly resign;
“Navi Pillay, Miloon Kothari, and Chris Sidoti all announced their resignations from the UN Human Rights Council permanent inquiry against Israel”—
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/411662
+ Bonus (of a maladorous kind) featuring the U.N.’s very own Francesca Albanese:
“…Canadian Universities Too Should Be In Francesca Albanese’s Report “—
https://blazingcatfur.ca/2025/07/14/canadian-universities-too-should-be-in-francesca-albaneses-report-theyre-islamophobic-anti-semitic-simultaneously/
Yep, Trump has set his sites on the UN and it’s particularly peculiar “brand” of fairness and integrity…
If you read T. E. Lawrence’s yarn ‘Seven Pillars of Wisdom’, he describes his Arab cohorts treating battle wounds with their piss.
Urine isn’t unsanitary in healthy people. But bacteria will grow in it if left out too long.
Well, it’s antiseptic…
…and there weren’t all that many sources of water available in that particular area.
Re: “The Soul of a New Machine” by Tracy Kidder
Rufus T. Firefly.
_________________
No mode bit.
–Ed de Castro, Founder and CEO of Data General
_________________
Words to live by.
In “The Soul of a New Machine” Tracy Kidder tells the story of Data General building a 32-bit minicomputer in its Eclipse line to compete with DEC’s VAX. No mode bit meant no direct support in the CPU for 16-bit code, thus avoiding complexity in design and programming. Legacy code would be supported by an emulator program.
Which might sound kludgy but worked surprisingly well. Apple used that strategy as it morphed the Mac through four different CPUs.
Anyway. “The Soul of a New Machine” was a brilliant real-life tech adventure story, which made the tech trenches sound romantic. I know I was seduced by it.
Of course, by now many thousands of tech guys and gals have sacrificed their brains and bodies on that altar with questionable results.
What in tarnation was being put in the food???
“White House Unveils Sweeping MAHA Changes In Nation’s Food Supply Chain”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/food/white-house-unveils-sweeping-maha-changes-nations-food-supply-chain
– – – – – –
Meanwhile, first Trump, now this dude…as some of the bigger names in higher education may well begin to wonder what exactly hit them….
“Leaked Messages Reveal Andreessen’s Fury: ‘Universities Declared War On 70% Of The Country’”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/leaked-messages-reveal-andreessens-fury-universities-declared-war-70-country
Key grafs:
File under: Don’t poke an angry billionaire…
Related: Higher education, continued…
Some sorely needed pushback…in the form of astonishingly sane justice:
“Professor punished for arguing classical music isn’t racist gets massive settlement”—
https://justthenews.com/nation/free-speech/professor-punished-saying-classical-music-isnt-racist-gets-massive-settlement
Simply mind boggling…but good!
Last word on the Epstein affair?
“Summer Storms”—
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/summer-storms
Key grafs:
[Emphasis in original; Barry M.]
It does seem to make a kind of sense even as it may disappoint those who want to see blood.
Speaking of book reviews, here’s a pair of authors astonishing because of the fearlessness of both regarding speaking the truth as they see it, experience it, theorize about it, no matter how ugly it might be, no matter how much it goes against the “narrative” of the day….
Absolutely, formidably unafraid.
“Paul Fussell’s War”—
https://bennymorris.substack.com/p/paul-fussells-war
“For the Glory of France”—
https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/for-the-glory-of-france/
H/T Powerline blog (for both).
@Barry Meislin:there weren’t all that many sources of water available in that particular area.
What, Rome? They had plenty of water. Without water, they could hardly get urine.
Rome gets more rain than San Francisco. Naples gets more rain than Seattle.