We've had this blog up for a couple of years now, with the first posts being in 2009. There were none in 2010, but we really took off in posting in 2011. The purpose of the blog, as indicated in our very first post, was set forth with this comment:
What the heck is this blog about?
The intent of this blog is to try to explore and learn a few things about the practice of law prior to the current era. That is, prior to the internet, prior to easy roads, and the like. How did it work, how regional was it, how did lawyers perceive their roles, and how were they perceived?Part of the reason for this, quite frankly, has something to do with minor research for a very slow moving book I've been pondering. And part of it is just because I'm curious. Hopefully it'll generate enough minor interest so that anyone who stops by might find something of interest, once it begins to develop a bit.
Since that May 1, 2009 entry, the blog has changed a lot and is much more free ranging, and has a lot more direct commentary, than it used to. I hope its a more insightful and fun blog. I also hope that at some point we might get more comments from folks. It's a very little read blog, I'm quite sure, which would help explain the low number of comments. We'll keep doing it, however, as writing is a developing avocation, one of those things its fun for us to do in its own right, and because it helps to make writing a habit. And it is helping to develop additional concepts and ideas for the book that was noted above.
It isn't actually our only blog, which the few regular readers here know. It started off as the least likely to be posted on, explaining the 2010 writing drought, but that's changed. Still, it's interesting to see what blogs and posts people stop in here, and in the associated blogs.
To my ongoing surprise, of all of our blogs, Holscher's Hub leads the charge in actually views, at just over 12,000 presently, even though it's mostly photographs. Maybe that's why it leads the charge. People like photographs, and it has some really widely ranging ones. The most popular post there is one showing my father's photographs from Wake Island in the 1950s, and I suspect that a lot of folks just surf onto the site with some sort of search about Wake Island. The Wyoming 2011 Machinegun Shoot is next, which may be because that had some outside circulation. One depicting a M110 Howitzer follows, and I suspect that's also the case with it. The Casper Mountain Fire of 2012 resulted in daily posts on Holscher's Hub for awhile, and in turn one of those posts, but only one, is a top contender. I know from a friend that at that time, if you Googled that topic, posts on that site showed up and for a while a series of them were in the topc category, including one depicting a much older fire. The B-25 Maid In The Shade comes after that, which is no doubt from people otherwise looking up the airplane, followed by cattle trailing photos from 2011. What's interesting to note here is that most of the top contenders fit into categories people would just be surfing for, and most of the simple landscape photos really don't get that much viewing. On the cattle photographs, there's ranching photographs on the site going back to its origin, so I'm a little surprised that some of those aren't higher up.
Wake Island in the 1950s, as photographed by my father.
Of our blogs, Churches of the West gets the second most views, which surprises me. Churches of the West only dates back to 2011, and came about because I have an amateur interest in architecture and take a fair number of photographs of churches. That number has now gone way up, as I've started intentionally taking them. I travel a fair amount, and so I see a lot of interesting churches, and I thought it would be fun to put them in a blog. As I started doing so, I noted various odds and ends about them and put them in the posts.
As noted, it surprises me how often that blog is viewed, and it rivals Holscher's Hub in that it has over 11,000 views. In looking at the popular posts, I think I partially know why. Quite a few of the searches there are by people looking for a church, probably hoping to find out where it is or when services are, or maybe just something about it. Immaculate Conception Chapel in Rapid City South Dakota now leads with the most views, which I would never have guessed, but it offers Masses in Latin, and probably people looking for a Latin Mass are searching for it, or for information about it. The Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, the Catholic Cathedral in Denver, is in second position there, which again probably is explained by people looking for its location. St. Mary's Cathedral, the Catholic Cathedral in Cheyenne is in fourth place and has consistently been in the top five since it was posted. That photographs was actually just recently used, with permission, by Wyoming Public Television for their Christmas coral program and they informed me that they'd found the coral in a search which lead first to my blog, which is sort of neat. Salt Lake's First Presbyterian Church is in fifth place. Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church in Casper has been in the top five ever since it was first posted.
Immaculate Conception Chapel in Rapid City, South Dakota.
The top five of Churches of the West have changed, with various churches moving up and down, or even off the top five, ever since the blog was first up. This makes a lot of sense, as the blog gets a lot of traffic and as new churches are added, some will be churches that a lot of people are looking for. Nonetheless, the presence of Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church really surprised me on the list, where it has remained the entire time, really surprised me as it must be a fairly small parish and most of the parishioners know where it is. But in thinking on it, the nature of the churches on the top five have tended to show some consistent themes. Catholic churches have consistently been on the top five, even though individual Catholic churches have dropped off. Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church has never left the top five. And it's a church that's hard to find if you don't know where to look for it, being in an unusual location. The reason for this has to do, I think, with a basic feature of the Catholic and Orthodox faiths, which are very closely related faiths, and which regard each others sacraments as valid. I generally do not get into doctrinal matters on that site, unless absolutely necessary to explain what a church is or what it is named, but both of these faiths feature a strong concept of universality in their membership, i.e., you belong to the Faith, not any one individual parish, and they both strongly emphasize attendance at Sunday Mass/Divine Liturgy. So what I think I may be seeing in those individual popular posts is an effort by individuals to locate an out of town church by somebody anticipating attending them while visiting those locations. Of course, I may be wrong and there may be other reasons that anyone church has more "hits" than another.
One thing that's surprised me, in a good way, about Churches of the West is that I haven't received any complaints from anyone, and I expected that I might. I don't photographs every church in every town, and I don't even pretend that I do. A lot of the churches and religious buildings depicted there I simply happened to run across, such as the Temple Events Center in Denver, while others I went looking for. One of my favorite photos on that blog is of a church I just ran across and photographed with my cell phone, that being the St. Peter and St. Paul Orthodox church in Salt Lake City, which I like because it was such a surprise and because my old cell phone took pretty good photos before I accidentally washed it. At any rate, I thought I might get complaints from people who were upset I haven't photographed their particular church, and I haven't. I haven't even photographed all of the churches in my hometown, so there's no intentional slight, but people can get upset over perceived, if unintended, slights.
I should note that it's a bit of a disappointment there that one of my very favorite subjects on that blog, which inspired the blog in the first place, long ago slipped off the top ten, that being The Cathedral of the Madeline, also in Salt Lake. I didn't know it was there but a friend showed it to me while we were working in Salt Lake City. The first set of cell phone photos I took there were so good, that I decided to display them in that format.
The Cathedral of the Madline in Salt Lake City, in one of the photos that inspired the blog.
Coming in third place is Today In Wyoming's History, which I thought would have had first place, as its updated everyday. It has just over 10,000 hits. Chances are that it will surpass the others in hits relatively soon. It's only been up and running for about a year, and the original plan was to cease updating it once it was a year old, and install a calendar so that people could locate dates as they desired. But I couldn't figure out how to do that, and additionally I wasn't happy with the state of the blog once it was a year old this past October. As November dates now predominate in hits, my thought that a lot of information was lacking and could be added seems to have been proven correct. Even at that, however, the blog has a long ways to go before it's really halfway decent.
The popular hits on Today In Wyoming's History are interesting in that I think it shows what topics are being looked into, in Wyoming, and about Wyoming, at any one time. I'd have thought some big events, like the Johnson County War or the Fetterman Fight would predominate, but that doesn't seem to be generally the case. One post about the Johnson County War, the April 5 entry, does make the top ten (there's 10 tops on that site). December 7, Pearl Harbor Day, has always been the date most hit, showing I suppose that a lot of people are looking December 7 up around that time of year. Fully five entries from November, however, that are in the top ten, all of which deal with elections, and one of which is a sidebar just on Wyoming politics. They all leaped up into the top ten during or just after November, after all those dates had been updated to include a lot of new election information, and after the Sidebar was posted. There's no sign that they'll descend back off the list.
Queen Marie of Romania's photograph appeared for November 9, but it was likely the election news that caused that day to be in the top 10.
Other than those days, January 27 comes in as number ten, but I have no idea why. No entry there seems particularly earth shattering. September 9 comes in as number two, but I also don't know why it rates so high. There are a number of interesting events that day, but no more so than many other days. That entry also lacks a photographs, which every other really popular post has.
Following Today In Wyoming's History in popularity is this blog, with many fewer views. It comes in at about 6,000 right now. That surprises me as it's the second most active, and by far has the most text. Today In Wyoming's History is only more active as its updated daily by design. The top most viewed post here really takes me by surprise, as it's the photo entry of Queen Elizabeth II in Canada. I've never understood why anyone who isn't British finds the modern English monarchy interesting, but people really do. Far more people have found and examined that post than any other, and for the time being, it looks like it will stay that way. I posted that entry as I found that photograph in my mother's photos and couldn't recall what it was actually of. I found out, and apparently people like the photo, as it's far more viewed than any other.
The ever popular Queen Elizabeth II.
A photograph of my mother comes in at 6th place, although there I'm sure it became a popular post as people were very curious about the very odd aircraft in the photo, which is what caused me to post it. There to, it sort of shows what's generally interesting to people. Both of these thread had outside circulation on some lists.
The Niobrara County Courthouse thread has consistently been really popular here, even though the Courthouses of the West blog generally falls far below the others. That makes me think that this blog has a different type of audience than the limited one the courthouse blog has. The same photo appears on the other blog, where it doesn't get as many viewers. Right now, here that photo and text comes in at a whopping number two.
Two commentary essays come in at three and four, which is a bit gratifying as they're thought and opinioin pieces. The first one is on pecularized violence, and its had outside circulation. It's the third most viewed post on this site. The next one is on evolving social and moral standards, and it has not, as far as I know, but it's nearly as popular. Both became widely viewed nearly after they were posted, which is intersting. The eight post, on Wyoming's adoption of the Uniform Bar Exam, is also in that category and has had outside circulation.
The seventh post is one of my favorites, and is on one of my favorite topics, changes in transportation. I've posted on it several times, but that's the only such entry to rise up into the top ten. Filling out the slots, one post that's on a Library of Congress list of Books that Shaped America has received a lot of views. Number ten is a link to a now obsolete post on the old painted signs on the Townsend Building in Casper Wyoming. Given that this particular thread is obsolete, but still in the top ten, I'm likely to eliminate it as its deceptive at this point. The topic itself is very much updated on the little viewed Painted Bricks blog.
One disappointment on this blog is that there is invariably some topics which you think are great, but you're probably the only one. I've posted poll attempts on the topic of working with animals three times, once on November 9, 2011, once on August 17, 2011, and once on March 9, 2012. They just don't get any responses. I've cross posted this topic elsewhere, and gotten a few, but very few. It's something that seems significant to me, i.e., the number of people who worked with or around animals in prior decades, but I'm pretty alone in finding that topic interesting. Nonetheless, I'll likely bump one of those threads up here soon in the near future.
That's because, particularly here, I'm always hoping for comments. I do get a few, and have been getting more, but I don't get a lot, and of course, this blog no doubt falls far behind the type of blogs that would get quite a few. That's just the nature of it, and that's fine.
Our blog Some Gave All, which depicts war memorials, is in next place. After creating a blog for Churches I'd photographed and courthouses I'd photographed, this one seemed a natural at the time. Having said that, it's really slow and I don't know that I'd do it again, although now that it's up and running, I'll keep it up and running. It has fewer than 4,000 views right now. It has a top ten list, but with so few views right now, I don't know that this says much. It is interesting that the memorial to the USS Barbel, a submarine, is in the top ten, and its the only item that I know of to have received commentary on another blog. A couple of items associated with Ft. Phil Kearny are also popular, which is interesting, with some of those entries being amongst the best on that site, in my opinion.
That blog has allowed me to appreciate small town memorials, which I hadn't really noticed that much before. There are a lot of World War One memorials in the west, which I hadn't really appreciated before, such as this typical one in Hanna, Wyoming. In many instances these memorials are very revealing, as they show very tiny towns to be much more populated at that time, and they also demonstrate the extent to which the war drew on entire male populations of the towns. The number of soldiers serving from any one town turns out to be huge, which I should have realized, but didn't really appreciate.
Like our other blogs, Some Game All has expanded beyond its original purpose and now includes some memorials that are not war related. As I run across these from time to time, it just seemed appropriate. Quite a few of these we probably pass by everyday, and don't notice. An example of this would be the Mine No. 1 Memorial in Hanna, which is off the beaten track to be sure. The only example of a non wartime memorial to have made the top list is one in Casper to the Pony Express, although the interesting memorial to the 115th Cavalry Armory in Casper isn't a solely wartime memorial either.
At almost 3000 views is Courthouses of the West. What interests me here is that this blog was started at the exact same time as Churches of the West, but it receives a fraction of the views and that it falls behind Some Gave All, which is updated quite a bit less. People are obviously a lot more interested in churches than courthouses, which I think to be a good thing. They also apparently are a lot more interested in war memorials, which I suppose is also good. Still, a lot of old courthouses are really pretty structures, and I've learned that photographing courthouses is a bit like train spotting, in that there's a community that does it and posts their photos on Flickr. They apparently don't stop in here. Even with the few views, I think this blog is basically viewed the same way the much more popular Churches of the West is viewed. People seem to hit courthouse entries of courthouses they're trying to find. This would seem to explain why courthouses in urban areas get a lot of hits, even where my photos of the courthouse is bad. This would also explain why a hard to find courthouse, like the courthouse for the Wind River Indian Reservation, gets a lot of hits. Early on the new courthouse for the 7th Judicial District in Casper got a lot of hits, which I think was almost certainly because the district and county courts had moved from the old Natrona County Courthouse and Hall of Justice and it confused people. The exception to this rule would seem to be the old Federal Courthouse in Lander, which is no longer a courthouse. But that post is linked into one here, which may explain why it comes up to number four.
A lot of pretty old courthouses are on Courthouses of the West, like this one in Lewistown Montana, but that doesn't get them into the top ten.
Our blog Painted Bricks is the oldest of our blogs, going back to 2008, but it only comes in at about 2700 views. That surprises me too. It's dedicated to painted signs on buildings, and it originally was called Painted Bricks of Casper Wyoming, as that's all it dealt with. There's a lot of interesting signs there, but these apparently have much less interest to people than the other topics, or the blog is so obscure that it rarely gets viewed. As with Some Gave All, I don't know that I could discern any trends.
Over time, Painted Bricks has gone from only dealing with painted building signs in Casper Wyoming to even include elevators. It still doesn't get a huge number of views, however.
Finally, Railhead, our blog on railroad topics, comes in dead last in every sense. It's the least active, and by far the least viewed. Interestingly, trains have a huge following on the Internet, but that doesn't make much of a difference in terms of viewership there, perhaps because the blog is so darned inactive. A couple of depot photos take first positions there, with the most popular topic being the one that depicts the classic Union Pacific depot. I only started this blog as I ran across a really neat depot in Newcastle, and thought it might make for an interesting separate subject, and I suppose it sort of does. The oldest topic I photographed, however goes back to 1986, depicting a derailed train I saw in Minnesota. The absolute oldest photos on the thread are some taken by my father, including some of rail lines in Japan, which I think are the most interesting on the site.
Anyhow, I don't know that this reveals a great deal, it's just interesting, and sometimes surprising, to see what gets the most attention. A few items here and there get some commentary too, and I hope that more is received in the future. That anyone finds any of this interesting, other than me, is a gift in and of itself.
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