Gunner Quinn
Today is the birthday of Jan van der Heyden. (5 March 1637, Gorinchem – 28 March 1712, Amsterdam). He was a Dutch Baroque-era painter, glass painter, draftsman, and printmaker. Van der Heyden was one of the first Dutch painters to specialize in townscapes and became one of the leading architectural painters of the Dutch Golden Age. He painted a number of still lifes at the beginning and at the end of his career.
He was also an engineer and inventor who made significant contributions to the firefighting technology of his day. Together with his brother Nicolaes, who was a hydraulic engineer, he invented an improvement of the fire hose in 1672. He modified the manual fire engine, reorganized the volunteer fire brigade (1685) and wrote and illustrated the first firefighting manual (“Brandspuiten-boek”). A comprehensive street lighting scheme for Amsterdam, designed and implemented by van der Heyden, remained in operation from 1669 until 1840 and was adopted as a model by many other towns and abroad.
His rendering of Westerke, Amsterdam (above) is circa 1667-to-1670.
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Today we present a guest article from a SurvivalBlog reader that is not part of the writing contest judging.
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We are seeking entries for Round 117 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. More than $950,000 worth of prizes have been awarded since we started running this contest. Round 117 ends on March 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how-to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging. In 2023, we polled blog readers, asking for suggested article topics. Please refer to that poll if you haven’t yet chosen an article topic.
Read the full article here