Prime Time

Sept. 17

I saw the beginning of time today. You need two trains and about an hour to get there, but it’s worth it to straddle the line between east and west halves of the planet.

Greenwich is a quaint little place where tourists outnumber the locals, but it’s worth going as a curiosity.

It is one of those Euro sites that has been inhabited for thousands of years. It hit the big time when Henry VIII’s father, VII, built a palace there. 

Henry the son added to it. He loved the place and used to spend a lot of time there. 

It’s where his second wife, Anne Boleyn, lived before she moved to the Tower.

The palace flourished till Cromwell took over. His government turned it into a stable.

Cromwell lasted 10 years and then died. His son lasted one more year. Then England brought the king back. 

This was Charles II, who had been hiding out in France. He took one look at the old Greenwich palace and decided to tear it down to make room for a new Versailles. 

He ran out of money, though. He was apparently adept at extravagance. 

But wait, there’s more. Several years later, there’s a Catholic king, James II. Can’t have him in charge of the Church of England. So there’s a rebellion that ousts him. 

In his place, the English bring in William, the Prince of Orange. He marries James II’s daughter, Mary. Apparently this was a love match. 

At some point, Mary discovers that old and maimed sailors have no system to support them, although soldiers do. She starts a movement to set up an old sailors’ home at Greenwich.

She dies of smallpox before the consruction kicks in. William, heart-broken, pursues the project.

One of the main buildings is a huge dining hall for residents. William agrees that the walls and ceilings need to be covered with formal murals to warm the place up.

William dies while the painting is in progress. His successor, Queen Anne, has a ceiling done showing William and Mary being carried through the roof into heaven.

There’s a large alcove, almost like the chancel in a church, in the back that includes Anne’s portrait. A second mural with a portrait of Anne was in development when she inerrupted things by dying.

This sounds like a lethal project. That or else it took a damned long time and they just got old.

Things get really complicated for the country now, because none of these people had any kids. I was told by a docent at the Painted Hall (as the dining hall is called) that Anne had 18 children, but they all died before she did.

The guys who are in charge of finding a replacement went through several dozen candidates. Remember, eligibility is above all determined by blood line. They don’t want anybody to whisper that a monarch was selected because of something so plebeian as ability.

Anyhow, they finally find George of Hanover. Of course, nobody in England knows who he is. So now there is a new purpose for painting the back wall. 

The mural today shows King George I seated and crowned, receiving a scepter from someone, either an angel or a stripper. 

On the right, there’s a tall, proud guy wearing armor and a wig. That’s the prince who will eventually become George II. 

There is a little boy in a red robe standing between them. This is the heir presumptive, Frederick, grandson of George I. 

Frederick didn’t make it, though. He was brained by a cricket ball. So in steps George II, Frederick’s son, and years later we get the American Revolution.

And it’s all painted on the wall at Greenwich.

The old sailors’ home involves a number of colonnaded and other palatial buildings. It operated till late in the 19th century, when it became the Royal Navy College.

According to a sign in the visitor center, in the late 18th century two teams of pensioners played cricket for a prize of a thousand pounds. One team consisted of one-armed men, the other of one-legged men.

According to the sign, “The one-leggers batted first and, in a two innings match, won by 111 runs.”

I wonder if that is the inspiration for Monty Python’s soccer match between gynecologists and Long John Silver impersonators. The gynecologists won that one.

There’s another wall to see at Greenwich. This is on the Royal Observatory and marks the Prime Meridian, longitude zero.

The line also runs across the stone deck outside. The photo of the day isn’t an original idea. I had to wait in line to get it.

But there’s a story behind that, too. When I first got a 35 mm camera, the man in the store advised that I shoot the first frame as a throwaway shot and advance the film. From that point on, I knew there was live film behind the lens.

I used to point the camera to the ground, and so I wound up with photos of my feet in different places—York, Disney World, the back yard.

When he was a kid, Matthew got such a kick out of it, that I still do it from time to time. So Matt, here are Dad’s feet in Greenwich. One on the right half and the other on the left half of the world.

The observatory preserves some early astronomical instruments, and still has the camera obscura used by the first Astronomer Royal. It is a small brick rotunda with a black curtain over the doorway. 

He couldn’t directly observe the sun, not if he wanted to have a career that lasted. So he observed indirectly, looking at a reflection on a table in the center of the space.

Instead of the sun, the image now is of a building called the Queen’s House.

The image was very faint today, maybe because it is very cloudy and humid. Or maybe it’s that way all the time. It didn’t help that one kid inside the darkroom kept her smart phone on.

By the way, the climb to the observatory is a lot longer on the way up than it is on the way down.

Greenwich is still England, so the beer is great. I had a half pint of Adnams Southwold bitter at the Coach and Horses pub at the Greenwich Market, an open-stall arts and crafts event.

I asked the bartender how the name is pronounced. Is it “Suthold”?

No, he said. It’s “South-wold.”

I think the kid was English. But that sounds like an American pronunciation. I was disappointed by it. But the ale has the nutty mix of malt and hops. I love a good bitter, and this was one of them.

Near the rail station in Greenwich is the Cutty Sark, one of the fastest clippers built, and made world famous by the Scotch. The name means “short shirt” and comes from a Robert Burns poem called “Tam O’Shanter.”

Tam sees witches one night dancing around the church, and to one in particular who is wearing a short dress, he calls out, “Weel done, Cutty Sark.” 

They set out after him. It’s a close call, but he escapes by spurring his horse across a running stream.

The ship is now a museum in dry dock by the port. The rigging and the black hull with gold painted trim make quite a spectacle.

Another curiosity on the street in Greenwich was a traffic sign warning “humped pelican crossing.” I had no idea who would have thought to write that on a sign. I had no idea what it meant.

There was a crosswalk ahead, yes, but no pelicans in evidence, either humping or bent-shouldered.

I looked it up later, and some of the magic was gone. “Pelican” is formed from the starts of three words, “PEdestrian LIght CONtrolled”—with a liberal spelling.

Maybe this one is accompanied by a bump in the road.

I went later to Rose Street in Covent Garden. In the late 17th century the poet John Dryden was attacked there in what became known as the Rose Alley Ambuscade.

It’s generally believed that the attackers were hired. They didn’t rob him, just roughed him up. He may have been stabbed.

One suggestion is that they were working for one of Charles II’s girlfriends, who may have had a beef with something Dryden published.

Another theory is connected with an essay that Dryden was rumored to have written, or at least helped write. It was a criticism of Lord Rochester, a big art patron, for a “want of wit.”

At one end of Rose Street is the Lamb and Flag pub. On my first trip to London 20 years ago, this pub was just about the first stop I made. 

I knew most of it was fake, including the Latin poetry painted on a beam. But I didn’t care. I was thrilled. Hell, I still am.

The place was crowded tonight, so I didn’t try to eat dinner there. I walked a few blocks over to Chinatown instead.

I saw menus for several interesting restaurants on Gerrard Street. The one I chose, the Golden Phoenix, had sliced duck with ginger and pineapple. Three of my favorite things. 

Yes, when the dog bites or the bee stings, sometimes I think of duck, ginger, and pineapple. 

I can’t believe I typed that. “Sound of Music” is like an ear worm. I’m going to be hearing that damned Julie Andrews singing for the rest of the night.

So, everyone, keep your wits about you and the ear worms out.

Harry