Salem, 1626

TL;DR -- The 250th is well-known by now. So, it's time to get back to the 400th. 

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The 250th is everywhere now getting attention which is great. We are not yet to the Day of the Declaration of Independence so ought to be paying attention to the events that came before July 4 of 1776. Our last post on "Knox Sunday" is an example. We will have more posts with the team but have been covering the 250th for over a decade. 

May we step back to the 400th? With regard to Essex County of Massachusetts, the initial settlement attempt was in the 1623/24 timeframe. Gloucester celebrated their 400th in 2023. 

As the story goes (told by many), the crew that came over with Thomas Gardner attempt for a couple of years to make a go of it without much success. For one thing, the land was not suitable for farming. Evidently the fishing went well for subsistence, but that did not please the "money" behind the effort. So, Roger Conant came to town to correct things. He could not provide a miracle and got permission to move to what became Salem. 

Roger and some of his crew did that in 1626. So, we have been waiting for this year. We wrote of this is early in a blog about Massey's Cove in 2019. We included this painting which was done in the 20th century to accompany an article on the perils of this attempt. 

Of course, later there were various criticisms of the painting. For one, the houses were better configured than we know from reality. We wrote of that recently quoting the reaction of Anne Bradstreet as she got off the ship that was with the Winthrop Fleet. This was her introduction to Salem.  

Anne noted that some in London had mislead them: Hype, 1600s. What we got out of the stories was that Winthrop was feated in the "Governor's" great house. Anne and others went to Cape Ann to pick wild strawberries. The Governor would have been John Endicott who came in to replace Roger Conant. 

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Where was Thomas? Evidently, he had returned with the first year to London. He and his family returned sometime before 1635 as his last child was born here. At the time of Cape Ann, it would have been Margaret and the older boys. See "Themes that persist" to watch for particulars as we go along. 

We have mentioned Roger Conant several times and will relook at the start of Massachusetts this year as we continue with the 250. As the commemoration of the Revolution continues through 2033, we will step through the early years of Naumkeag which became Salem and which Winthrop didn't like. So, he went further down the coast to Boston. 

Ann is a descendant of Roger as well as of Thomas Gardner. Those relationships will be looked at as well, as we go forward. 

With technology as a major focus, we will use some of the modern stuff. Mainly, it would be to discuss the issues related to use and misuse which is a common characteristic of people and their involvement with all matters of life, it seems. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/07/2026

03/07/2026 --    

Women's History Month, 2026

TL;DR -- We provide information about Women's History Month for this year as well as a link to an article on women of the Manhattan Project. 

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March 8th is International Women's Day every year. We have had a post related to the theme of this day since 2022. The theme in 2022 was motivated by the Gairdner Foundation awards that year as well as their reminder of the day's focus. We also mentioned Drew Gilpin Faust and Prof. Emmy Noetther plus provided a link to the StreetsofSalem (blog) which listed "Books for Women's History".   A listing of our posts can be found later in this post.

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This year we are pointing to the website for the primary organizing group. Plus we link to an article on the women scientist who supported a major project during WWII. 

• Theme -- with a theme of 'Give to Gain' the focus is on the "power of reciprocity and support". 
• Events -- a website allows search for events or for the registering of events. To quote the site, their intent is to "Support the Supporters" for "forging women's advancement worldwide". 
• Manhattan Project -- written by a retired physicist, the work of many women is noted including that of Leona Harriet Woods (pictured second from right in the middle row). 

March is Women's History month in the U.S. and many other parts of the worlds. The following are our posts since 2022. 

• Women's History Month, 2025 
• Women's History Month, 2024
• Women's History Month, 2023 
• Women's History Month, 2022

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Since the TGS, Inc. has a technology focus, coverage of work by women will be technical for the most part. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/06/2026

03/06/2026 --    

Knox Sunday

TL;DR -- Coming up is Evacuation Day which closed out the Siege of Boston that had started in the Spring of 1775 and continued until March of 1776. A blogger in Salem, MA attended a relook at the role of Knox in bringing success to the event by obtaining and transporting cannons from upper New York. 

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We have enjoyed the StreetsofSalem blog since our research brought it to our attention. It is time to add to review the blog again (our earlier posts) as there are many overlaps of our points of interests. 

Today we looked at their posts from the past few months and found one on Gen. Knox and his cannons (our posts on the subject - latest - Nearing the day of the Evacuation). Washington suggested to Knox in late 1775 that the troops needed armament and powder. Fort Ticonderoga had been captured earlier in the year and had military pieces available, if they could be moved. Knox volunteered. After going to upper New York, he made preparations. There were tons and tons to move through western Massachusetts late fall.As we mentioned, the feat requires regular attention which we will provide through the next few years. We have a few, as peace with England was not obtained until 1783. The map was drawn 150 years later and shows the distance traveled while pulling tons of metal. 

The Knox Trail as laid out
in 1926/27 by the 
States of New York and
Massachusetts

The blogger had gone to relook in early February. Below, we provide a link to her post from which we obtained links to the images of this blog. 

"Knox Sunday" - "... I’ve been watching online as commemorations of Knox’s Noble Train of Artillery moved across large swaths of New York and Massachusetts on its way to relieve the besieged citizens of Boston but had not made it to one live event—and Evacuation Day (better known as St. Patrick’s Day to those of you not in Massachusetts) is only a little over a month away. So I decided to drive out to Framingham to see some cannons and Patriots before the other Patriots took the field. ..."

" ... Knox Trail 250 is an initiative of Revolution 250, which bears the motto: Your Town, Your History, Our Nation so the commemorative events of the past few years have always been community-based in terms of organization and participation. This particular event was a Middlesex County affair, with representatives from all the towns surrounding Framingham (Marlborough, Southborough, Wayland ) present. ..."   

Remarks: Modified: 03/04/2026

03/04/2026 --    

IEEE 2874 - 2025

TL;DR -- In the midst of the hype and uncertainty, IEEE does its thing of standards definition and documentation. This latest one deals with AI (many aspects) and represents a very good start to keeping a focus on mature approaches to technology. 

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We have talked about technology over the past few years as we adopted it as a theme for going forward. But, what is technology? We have had the topic discussed on a daily basis for a long while now. As technological improvements came about, the pace of change increased as did the talking. 

For the past three years, we have had an accelerated bit of declarations about progress or other state of affairs, seemingly disjointedly provided to us. People have reacted in various ways. Lots of the discussion came with flavors of what might be called hype while at the same time we saw people reacting as if we had a new being on the planet. Many saw the potential bad effects. 

Much of the above was related to the emergence of GenAI/LLM (AI/ML) in a manner that allowed free access to anyone with the knowhow to exercise the systems. OpenAI was first on the block with their efforts, of which ChatGPT got the most exposure. We look at it first in February of 2023 and reported on the experience in this blog. 

Since then, we have looked at other systems, one of which Gemini (formerly Bard) of Google. For a couple of years, we experimented, analyzed and wrote about the issues. 

One change in the past year has been the appearance of things related to "agentic" modes on the scene. This includes discussions as well as demonstrations.Our response, initially, was to fall back a few decades and bring forward information about earlier attempts that were successful, under the guise of KBS and KBE. We wrote several articles and have more planned.   

But, for now, let's stop, look and listen (as they did in the olden days for trains at unmarked crossings. While the attention went with the glories of AGI and such, work continued along the lines of progression that accompanies engineering. Last year, there were Standards agrees upon that pertain to the future of computing. This will involve the current modes but actually deals with new stuff that is more dream than reality which is fine. 

The IEEE 2874 - 2025 (The Spatial Web Standards) decision deals with what is called by some as Web 3.0. That usually goes along with the concept of the web of everything. But, actually we are dealing with the totality of what can be considered now. 

An organization with the purpose of seeing the new capaibilities developed was founded in 2025 and is known as the Spatial Web Foundation. We will be looking further at that. 

IEEE's Spectrum had an article about this in its latest issue: Here Comes the World Wide Web of Everything The Spatial Web standard connects devices, robots, and AI agents. 

As expected, we will have a historic view on all of this stuff while keeping up to date on progress. As such, the TGS will offer 400 and 250 year views of technology. After all, major thermodynamics work was done here (Josiah Willard Gibbs) as well as academic influence had a basis in the U.S. (Charles Sanders Peirce and his father). 

Those two examples are Thomas Gardner descendants. And, after all of this, is AIn't still apropos? Yes. Maturity is still a necessity; engineering knows this to its core. Biologists pushed the current craze. Lots to discuss. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/01/2026

03/01/2026 --    

Nearing the day of Evacuation

TL;DR -- 1776 is the official year. July 4th is the day. Of the start of the U.S. Prior to that, 1775 was full of activity which wound down in March of 1776, however the conflict went on for several more years. 

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We are nearing the end of the months from Lexington & Concord to the Battle of Bunker Hill and then to the Evacuation Order. Lots went on during that time from sheer boredom to heavy work to training and some conflicts. An example of work is Knox's movement of cannons from Fort Ticonderoga to the Boston area. 

We can use Siege of Boston for this period which goes from the altercation at Lexington and Concord. During the past eleven or so months, we have had many posts with themes of events from 1775. 

This post is to close out February and open up March where we can then expect July 4th to  kick off the 250th which runs for several years. The topics to look at are unending. An example might be our look at the Southern Campaign during which the Revolution was completed successfully and the final wrappings were put upon the peace agreement. 

But, people are the main interest. Col. Thomas Gardner who was killed at Bunker Hill was a descendant of the Thomas Gardner of Roxbury who was of unknown relations with Thomas Gardner of Salem. The progeny of both of the men spread the Gardner name over the country. The image shows the names of Gardiner and Gardner families here at that time. 

Mass Soldiers and Sailors

Finally, our interest will be in the people and families of the 250th as well as the issues of origins that need a clear resolution to remove confusion and conflicting opinions. We look at the Roxbury family as Ann is a descendant of this Thomas as well as the one of Salem. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/28/2026

02/28/2026 -- 

Truth, what is it?

TL;DR -- Knowledge systems were (and are to be considered) a primal step in the advancement of computational intelligence. Recent issues notwithstanding, we know how to handle the slop. Part of the ways and means will deal with experience. 

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So, if one gripes, one ought to have a solution. In fact, the glories of progress, if things are done right, rests with those who can show the way. But, slop as mentioned in the last post? 

Walk and not talk. The trouble with AIn't is that it talks. Very well. Do? Not so much. So, the kids of the valley went after "agents" as if they offer miracles for the following: you cannot train out the slop after the fact. Good people know that quality is built in during the process. 

Want to fly a plane that was done by one of these current buckets'o'bits? Seriously. 

At Linkedin: KBE (and MBSE). 

 

This post leads to an article that I am writing on Linkedin. The topics will go back to the '80s which is when there had been a two-decade effort at AI after the Dartmouth meeting in the '50s. And, it deals with the Lisp of John McCarthy which had been packaged into a workstation (Lisp Machine). Coming forward, the world followed DoD (now DoW) into the "quant'" world of numerics. 

Lisp was ported to Unix. Well, the SUN networking workstations were great. But, they were not the qualitative expert as we got with the Lisp Card (to be discussed). Anyway, after a solid grounding in the use of the Lisp Machine where we did prototypes in all sorts of disciplines that worked phenomenally well, I went to Boeing and worked on the 777 digital definition project. 

This is introductory. But, the engineering support work for a major design effort was at the time that solid modeling was getting mature plus the accumulation of mathematical routines (all around) was making the computer more of a tool to replace the slide rule (which was a remarkable little thing). 

That led to "truth engineering" as a pursuit of the middle-out truth that bridges the Suites (uppers, C, G, ...) and the trenches where matter hits the road. 

Where is the "truth" of the matter? Well, it'll take some time to discuss. But, demonstration via computational examples is a good way to go. After all, we have not yet learned what is necessary to be adept generally with complex systems. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/20/2026

02/20/2026 -- 

Slop. How did this happen?

TL;DR -- What could have been great turned out to be similar to a stadium after a concert. What? Yes, there are many sides to the story which we will be looking at thoroughly as people consider ways to recover from the binge of bad choices. 

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This post is informational, only. Somehow, the glories of mathematical computing descended into the state of a concert site after the tens of thousands depart (say even, Times Square on New Years Day). 

In 2026, in a mere two months, we have seen rapid change in the landscape of computing (in particular, that to which I have been referring to as AIn't and buckets'o'bits and such). The splitting of the fields of view are growing. 

We have those who are enthralled with the new way brought by advanced mathematical computing having the ability to supposedly communicate with us via our natural language. So, that is great for the creative bunch. Well not, as now we have mimicing brought to a new level. 

We have those who are not into computing at all and wonder about the hype. Except, go to about any company now and look at their website. After DAVOS (meeting of the uppers in the land of watches in Europe) this year, everywhere CEOs said, go AI big time. 

Except, go to the trenches. It stinks down there. But at the upper reaches of busyness? Ah, the glories seem to waft. From where? 

Then, there is a middle view that is lifting mathematics to view. That is interesting. But, people, let's go to the core and look at the issues that never get discussed due to the age-old aura of the mathematical discipline. Well, it took bad turns last Century. 

There are other views which will be the subject of discussion all year and beyond. The TGS, Inc. chose a few years ago to have technology as a focus motivated by the coming of this age of slop. We saw that a decade ago as an extension of foolhardiness of a decade or two before that. 

Maturity was thrown out the window for something related to what unrestrained young men want. Like one bragged, move fast and break things. Yeap, young guy, for us (the users), it has not been great (I have notes on this back to the beginning of the web's downfall). 

So, we'll use slop, as opposed to what some use with respect to crap (and the necessary crapology): The age of Enshittification; Wikipedia's page; ...

Poor choices? Matters of perspective? There are so many ways to view and unknowns to try to learn about. We have been using Linkedin to try to establish a reporting voice with respect to how the 250th of the U.S. might get us to relook at the history of technology. 

Remarks: Modified: 02/26/2026

02/26/2026 -- Recover image.