Manhattan Zoo (#atozchallenge)

A peacock escaped from the Central Park Zoo and wandered around the city. Either that or I just saw a pigeon on his way to a gay pride parade.

JIMMY FALLON, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Aug. 3, 2011

Polar Bear catching z's at the Central Park Zoo,
 Manhattan, USA (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Manhattan Zoo

        The Sunset Zoo in Manhattan, Kansas is not bad for a smaller sized town.  The 26 acre park has over 300 animals representing over 100 different species as well as themed gardens and a number of events scheduled throughout the year.  Over 100,000 visitors come to the zoo each year.   The zoological park has been a popular attraction in Manhattan since the 1930's.  A low admission price encourages visitors to frequent the park.

         But the real zoological attraction for this post is the much more well known menagerie that can be found in Central Park in middle-upper Manhattan.  The Central Park Zoo which is contained in an area of a mere 6.5 acres is far smaller than the Sunset Zoo in Manhattan, Kansas.  Yet though less than a quarter the size of the Midwestern zoo, the East Coast Manhattan zoo receives ten times the yearly visitors.   The zoo in Central Park also costs over three times as much to gain entrance.  Though the collection of animals is diverse, many of the larger animals found in zoos with more space won't be found at this zoo. Still you can expect to find some bears, wildcats, monkeys, and an array of smaller mammals, birds, reptiles, and insects.

         Manhattan's Central Park zoo was the first official zoo in New York City having been founded in the early 1860's.   After the Philadelphia zoo, it was the second publicly owned zoo in the United States.   Now the Central Park Zoo is part of a system of four New York City area zoos.

           Personally, I have never been to any of the New York City Zoos, but I have been to a number of zoos throughout the United States.  To read more about the zoos I have visited please visit my "Z" post at Wrote By Rote.

           And so we come to the end of my A to Z Manhattan Project series.  I hope you've enjoyed reading these posts.  Don't forget to come back to this blog tomorrow, May 1st, for a special surprise version of Battle of the Bands.  Remember--Manhattan covers a lot of ground though not necessarily in land area.

          My A to Z Reflections Post will be on Monday May 9th.

           Have you been to the Central Park Zoo or any of the New York City Zoos?   Have you been to the Sunset Zoo in Manhattan, Kansas?    What are some of your thoughts on zoos?

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You Are Here (#atozchallenge)

Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves.    
 -- Henry David Thoreau

Trinity Church in Lower Manhattan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

You Are Here

        If I'm in a big mall you will usually at some point find me in front of one of those maps with the "You Are Here" marker.  Thank goodness that they tell me where I am when I am reading one of those things as the reason why I'm there at the map in the first place is that I don't know where I am. That's the case with most big places where I find myself attempting to navigate unfamiliar territory.

         When in Manhattan if you are unfamiliar with the city you might want to run across some "You Are Here" markers now and then.  A smartphone or some other device with GPS tracking can be of help.  Just having a map might not be helpful to anyone challenged by map reading, but a map is certainly a good thing to have if you don't know where you are or where you are going.

          This post could have been done for "X" as well--as in "X marks the spot"-- but then again there are rarely any X's to be found on the city streets just as there aren't often the display maps on the street with the "You Are Here" designation.   I guess this is where the guides as described in my "W" post might come in handy.

          And while we are on the subject of "You Are Here" we might consider where we are in this 7th Annual Blogging from A to Z April Challenge.   This is the letter "Y" post which means there is only one more post left in my series about Manhattan.  I hope you enjoyed following this series as much as I enjoyed compiling it.  And I hope you had a great time if you too blogged through the alphabet with the many others who did the same.

           Yes, you are here near the end of the Challenge, but there are still the A to Z events ahead like the Reflections post and the A to Z Road Trip.  You can read about all of  it by continuing to follow the A to Z Challenge Blog where all the details will be provided.

           Tomorrow I will conclude my series with my post for Z.   Wanna guess what it will be?  Something famous in Manhattan perhaps?   And then on Sunday May 1st I will have another post for the Battle of the Bands.  This one will be a bit of a surprise with a bit of a twist.  I'll include my entry for Question of the Month in this post as well.  Hope you'll join me for both upcoming posts!

           Do you ever refer to "You Are Here" maps?   How are you about finding your way when you get lost?   What is the first thing you do when you feel lost?

     

X-10 Nuclear Reactor (#atozchallenge)

I have always fancied that the end of the world will be when some enormous boiler, heated to three thousand millions of atmospheric pressure, shall explode and blow up the globe. ... They [the Americans] are great boilermakers.

— Jules Verne

Five Weeks in a Balloon 

Official seal of Oak Ridge, Tennessee (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

X-10 Nuclear Reactor

       In my post for the letter N I referred in passing to Oak Ridge, Tennessee which played a big role in the developing of the first atomic bombs during World War 2.   This project, known as The Manhattan Project because it was planned out in an office in Manhattan, expanded to a number of research and development centers throughout the United States.  This effort, which was one of America's most intensive projects ever, resulted in developing and producing atomic bombs within a time frame of less than three years.  

       In order to accommodate the R & D facilities and its employees and their families, the city of Oak Ridge was rapidly planned and built.  By the end of the war in 1945, the city had grown to become the fifth largest city in Tennessee.  After the war the city continued to serve as an important scientific center for the study and manufacture of nuclear materials.

       A key facility at the Oak Ridge Laboratories was referred to as the X-10 Pile, the first nuclear reactor designed for continuous production.  The X-10 Graphite Reactor produced the plutonium necessary for the atomic bomb.  This reactor is no longer in operation after being shut down in 1963 and designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1966.

        The three key nuclear facilities in Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Los Alamos, New Mexico; and Hanford,  Washington are now the three sites of the Manhattan Project National Historical Park.  Visitors to the park can visit museums and see the original reactors and other components of the laboratories.  For security reasons the X-10 reactor and other buildings at the Tennessee site can only be visited as part of a bus tour provided by Oak Ridge National Laboratories.

         Visiting all three sites would be an epic history vacation for anyone with a strong interest in atomic bomb development, but if you are near any one of these areas a visit to the one to which you are closest is highly recommended.  Oak Ridge is the most accessible to the greatest population area as it sits just a short drive from the most visited National Park in the United States--The Great Smokey Mountains.  The Laboratories are also a two hour drive from Nashville.

            A vacation to the Great Smokies with all of the tourist activities nearby will provide memorable adventure and entertainment for adults and as well as families with children.  There is literally something to please everyone.

        The history of the area ranges from the time when the indigenous peoples such as the Creeks and Cherokees inhabited the land, to the time of the early European settlers, to the Civil War Era and beyond.    The X-10 Reactor is just one more piece of the history that brought the United States into the Atomic Age.

         Have you visited any of the Manhattan Project National Historical Park sites?   Have you ever visited any nuclear power plant or other similar facility?    Do you see a positive future for nuclear energy?
     
   

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