King Slayer's Court, redux

TL;DR -- Bosworth and Gardner came up after we had looked at a Welsh family who had purportedly been involved in the battle. We assisted getting the information published in a blog, Gardner's Beacon, and The Gardner Annals. Recently, new information is available which is potentially remarkable in both its content and in its history. In other words, King Slayer's Court has been updated. 

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Back in the prior decade, we looked at All Things Gardner as we heard from many families and tried to make sense of all of the data. As we worked, we tried to lay down data to serve as milestones and even guideposts, eventually. 

David T. Gardner contacted us about his research. We helped him get organized (31 Dec 2017) for posting to his blog:

• 
  King Slayer's Court (Top 10 Finds) -- This site has been updated recently to catch up with information flow from research, see "Top 10 Finds To Date: April 15th 2025". The stories about Wyllyam Gardynyr have been within David's family for generations. He took advantage of the emerging technology to dive deeper. The find of Richard III"s body was a boon since it brought attention to the importance of Bosworth as well introduced data that science could help interpret. Richard III was re-interned with ceremony fitting a King. In the meantime, there have been publications about Gardiners and the Tudors. For instance, Douglas Richardson had ventured into the area. I talked to him briefly about the work with David. He was interested. ...

The emergence of what became known as GenAI/LLM occurred in November of 2022. Since then, the world has coped with the introduction and all of the ramifications that are huge. We have paid close attention and see that 2025 has created a split: believer (many are using the technology in daily business - the jury is still out (I say, expect some surprises that were predictable); sceptic (many have reactions that might not be balanced). 

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Where we stand? Having been involved with advanced computing throughout John's career, he reminds us that the introduction of this new technology was not considered (lengthy discussion). Too, this stuff, at its basis, is emergent from buckets of bits from which we ought not expect intelligence to display itself (that discussion will continue). So, he is not sceptical so much, as cautious, given his experience plus having been trained in the culture (Greco-Roman - classical) that fostered the development of science. One thing that seems to have been introduced along with the scientific ability? Marketing and creative writing took upon themselves the abilities enabled by technology in order to introduce newer, and more powerful, techniques. We have not recovered from that. And, must for a sustainable economy, with computing and technology as important players. That is, there is no fair balance establish between the top-down view of marketing and that necessary bottom-up one of engineering/science. 

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David reports that he found that Grok (of xAI) allowed image processing which brought up several things formerly missed. OCR is one of the capabilities. It helped determine that a "C" rather a "G" got a lot of data miscategorized. Other means, or reaons, for the material having been ignored need discussion, too. 

After opening that door, Grok was "prompted" to pursue various avenues and report then. Right now, this activity has generated a lot of output which needs to be scrutinized.

The "10 Finds" (above) is an example of some coming overviews which will allow discussion while data gathering and research run along. For us, we will review the activity to date and determine how to proceed. 

This is one type of area that we want to use an "AI" for as well as looking at the multiple layers of code involved with any computational event. These are wide-open areas of research requiring strict scrutiny. 

At the same time, as things go toward the more creative (and there are many reasons that this might be acceptable), we would wish that the GenAI/LLM (or other tool) involved in such activities be identified. Some are calling for all artificial output to be watermarked some way. 

As said, this is a totally new area. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/17/2025

04/17/2025 

Awareness month -- Mathematics, Statistics

TL;DR -- April is Math/Stat awareness month; we will recognize that effort in April and throughout the year. 

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Did you know it's Mathematics and Statistics Awareness Month?

Our emphasis on technology includes the applied fields of mathematics and its offshoot, statistics. We have even suggested that STEM become MSET+ which would put mathematics into its position as the basis, in a sense. "a basis" would be more appropriate, as we are talking about a human-based activity despite some claims of proponents of GenAI/LLM. 

So we are aware. However, that April is the awareness month for Math/Stat goes back to the time of President Reagan (1986) and has been honored since then. In 2017, the American Statistical Association merged their effort with that of the American Mathematical Society to create the MSAM which is a "program of the Joint Policy Board for Mathematics (JPBM)—a collaborative effort of the American Mathematical Society, the American Statistical Association, the Mathematical Association of America, and the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics."

We will support that effort every April as well as during the year with respect to the technical aspect of our work. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/17/2025

04/17/2025 

Where was Salem?

TL;DR -- The first battle is rapidly approaching. Salem MA has already weighed in. We will pay attention and keep pointing back to earlier research work that bears significance. 

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The Lexington & Concord turmoil is coming up with respect to its 250th (19th of April). We have written of this event, several times. As things go forward from here, we have until 2033 to observe the revolution as never done before. 

We can start with a post at the Streets of Salem blog. 

• Salem is a No-Show at Lexington and Concord -- great article full of details. Technology is great when it works. So, expect that the 250th and the 400ths of various sites will be fleshing in history as never seen before. 

We used this as an opportunity to point to our work. In particular, Dr. Frank was editor and supporter of an effort at publishing the history of Essex County of Massachusetts. He wrote a series of the Regiments who were at the Boston affair that followed this one. Officers of each organization are identifed with some information being provided. 

This is an image of my comment to the post. 

 

• Links:
• https://thomasgardnerofsalem.blogspot.com/2015/07/regimental-history-series-background.html
• https://thomasgardnerofsalem.blogspot.com/p/tmm.html 

Remarks: Modified: 04/14/2025

04/14/2025 

A trillion cuts by GenAI

TL;DR -- We saw a Chrome report which featured Gemini with respect to Gardner KS and its role in the trails west, one of which was the Oregon Trail. And, the report was not right. "Who cares?" has been my response to having Gemini spout off. I ignored it like I am very good at doing with ads. But, today, I read and saw errors. Okay. What to do? There is no method now. People are training these things. I say, you will not train out the crap. Okay. I wrote this post as an intro and was going to snap the Gemini report and mark it like a teacher would do an exercise. Oh, Gemini, my sweets, you left without telling me. What?  

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Our purposes are several. An important one we have named as All Things Gardner. There are lots of families with the name Gardner. "What's in a name?", we asked once: Amelia Earhart. 

We have been at this genealogy and history work since 2010, learning as we go. On the other hand, we have decades of advanced computing experience under our belt (mainly, situations requiring precision). So, our work here has been largely abetted by computing which has changed in so many ways in the past 20 years (2 decades of decline in some areas). 

We have striven to be correct as to former work. But, we know that is not sufficient. Technology has aided in the digitizing of old records which have been analyzed via human effort and mechanical means such as OCR. A case in point is that we do not know the origins of Thomas Gardner about whose progeny we know a lot due to records over the past 400 years. So, that is an issue to resolve. 

As we work the solution, we have adopted a category: OpEd (category). That will be used to label any of the former posts that touch upon the subject. The information will not be entirely wrong. So, when we figure out the corrections we will make them. Until then, someone can still follow our approach and analysis as we looked at new material. 

Aside: the genealogy crowd split Thomas Gardner into two guys, one who was at Cape Ann with the Dorchester Company and one who is the ancestor of a whole lot of folks. Myself? I think that they are the same guy or were father and son. Both of those alternatives have some basis. The intent will be to find the truth: A Thomas here and a Thomas there. 

And, we would like technology to be of assistance. And, it can. See Bosworth and Gardner, with new revelations coming about of late through use of the facilities of Grok. How well this will stand up though remains to be determined. The battle settled the 100-year war (some use, War of the Roses - I say, cousin war - needless bickering). 

Anyway, this post will look at Gemini which we have liked. But, it is now on the top of a search report. And, I was trying to look at Gardner, KS being right this minute not far from that place. We have had many posts on the little town which we have buzzed by on I35 for countless times. 

• Independence and Kansas City - this post reported on a recent talk about the trails that split at Gardner KS. For more information, see this search on Gardner KS. 

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Now, that was an intro. Here is the gist of the post. This image was snapped from a Chrome query today. ... Wait, did not snap the earlier search. Now, Gemini has disappeared from its featured position. 

Inserted as placeholder 4/11/25 0457 AM CDT

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Note (04/11/25 0458 AM CDT): the absence stopped the flow. "How to handle?" was the question. The following text is from the post from last night. The image was to show what Chrome was presenting. 

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Actually, earlier, when I read the Gemini summary, I scrolled and found this first on the list which is from the National Park Service. Gardner was a stop on the earlier Santa Fe trail which was largely commercial going from St. Louis as the gateway to New Spain. 

That trail passed through Independence MO. So, Oregon traffic followed that same route to Gardner and then turned to the north and west going by Lawrence KS which is the site of the University of Kansas which was founded by a group of New Englanders who came out, including women, by that same trail through Gardner KS.

Later, young bucks in a hurry figured that they could take the Missouri River north from Independence past St. Joseph MO into Nebraska and head west from there. Guess what? They eventually met up with the travelers who had come up through Gardner. What did the folks in a hurry gain? Maybe, two days, perhaps a little more. 

But, gold gets the blood boiling. Like? Things easily hyped. 

Note (04/10/2025 2100 CDT) - On going to the Google development mode, I see that there is a new button ("Vibe") which I have been reading about. Sometimes, I might add as it sounded like the usual affair of misdirected enthusiasm. Whatever is going on in the background with this problem will settle down. Then, I'll use this topic for a deeper look. In any case, running into a "tantrum" however invoked does not make for stable knowledge processing. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/11/2025

04/11/2025 (about 0500 CDT) -- Put in proxy of the expected image and a note to explain. Something related to "Who moved my cheese?" (when did that become normal?). 

04/11/2025 (0738 CDT) -- It's back, AI Overview. But, buried under a label. The only quibble is the use of intersection for a split. I dealt with precision in highly technical engineering support work (computational modeling). 

Kudos, somewhat. Let's talk.

Bosworth through the eyes of technology

TL;DR -- Bosworth? Know about it? This is where the Tudors came to be as the Plantagenets were cut out of the game (of Thrones). Well, only the male lineage. The female portions always live on. Recent abilities allow new insights into the 22 Aug 1485 event which is a mere 125 years from the colonial start (fuzzy numbers suffice). Abilities? GenAI as a mathematical marvel? Finally, we have a chance to look at the capability with the intent to tone down the hype that is missing the point of it all. 

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This post has two purposes. One deals with the latest rage of technology that is commonly known as AI (we will use GenAI). We have argued that the current phenomenal abilities of GenAI are not due to some critter which is "sentient" but that they represent long years of mathematical work culminating in a mode that is suitable to exercise by the circuitry and software of computing. As such, this post will provide the start of a necessary bit of discussion. The second purpose is to point to recent work that uses GenAI and that represents an opportunity to look at the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

Let's start with the announcement of genealogical/historical research results. We link to two posts. 

• 1 - Updated Press Release: A 540-Year Conspiracy Unveiled – The Lost Ledgers of Bosworth Rewrite History (Bedtime story; Lost Ledgers; Untold story) 
• 2 - Untold Story: The Death of Richard the III (pdf), By Sir Wyllyam Gardynyr  

The first post looks at decades of research that started from hearing family stories. The topic deals with the Battle of Bosworth where King Richard III was killed. As a reminder, research determined the spot where his remains were placed after the Battle. In 2012, after much research with respect to location, they dug through the surface of a parking lot and found the body. Subsequent analysis indicated that the remains were of the King. 

Too, his skull had been fractured. The tales of the family involved the details of how a member (yoeman - commoner) struck the blow. That has been scoffed at over the centuries and over the decades that David T. Gardner did his queries. 

The second post takes informaton provided by GenAI based upon sources that finally were digitized and pulls them into a narrative as if written by Wyllyam Gardynyr. As we do our analysis, we will help sort the various attempts at presentation into a scheme where veracity is measured and reported. That is, as with most things, we see the tip of the iceberg. That itself will become clear with GenAI as we proceed in a mature manner. 

We first heard from David in 2014 as a comment to our post, Historical Genealogy. That post was from November of 2010 when we had first started doing research. David's comment was in 2014. We noticed and responded in 2016. At that time, we started to correspond and did this post: King Slayer's Court. We started to look at David's work and published a few of his articles. Per usual, he was bumping up against official opinions. Through digging, he kept finding information pointed to his family's tales being right. 

So, let's switch to technology. We have had lots of posts on GenAI. There many of examples of GenAI that are available. Opinions about this phenomenon of the past two years (first released to public use in November of 2022) vary with sides drawn. It has good and bad properties. On the good side, it resonates with people but is thought to lead them astray. But, the best part is that the underlying mathematics is worthy of our attention as it represents what can be done. 

Needless to say, these open issues will continue to be on the radar for several reasons that we have tried to address. But, getting back to David's work, he had made progress hearing from groups like the Richard III Society and from experts dealing with the history of Westminster. But, recently, a GenAI was tried which had digitized sources from the time period and location. 

On honing in via queries (some say, prompts), David pulled out documents that confirmed what he had been looking for. Ostensibly, we will add and explain below. 

In the meantime, David has written several articles that will be released over the few days and weeks. These deal in detail with Bosworth, but there is additional detail that deals with the Gardner family and the unknown dynamics of this Battle that was the last one of the War of the Roses. So, this is significant both for the history of England as well as for the opportunity to look closely at GenAI from a perspective that is serious. 

Genealogy is not an easy study in terms of trying to prove lineage of a person. The U.S.A. will see the 250th this year of activities related to its start. This month, in fact, was when the Battles of Lexington and Concord happened in Massachusetts between English troops and the supposed rabble rousers of the colonials. We have had many posts on that theme: Two houses, for example, looks at one family and their activity from the start (400 year vew) and during the revolution. One house is associated with the Society of Cincinnati whose members are males with direct descendany from a Revolutionary War Officer. There are many such organizations, such as the Daughters of the American Revolution. 

But, the Bosworth event was in the late 1400s which is three to four generations before the colonial effort took place. From a technology sense, this opportunity (for me) is priceless. For one, it shows technology allowing better document handling; then, there is the indexing and search facility that allows documents to be matched up; too, the prose generation abilities are nice. But, that brings up one huge focus which will be to scrutinize all of this and determine where things might have gone awry which puts an onus on creativity as this is an open field of study.  

Definitely, mathematics will be lifted to scrutiny in a manner not available before. How that will work is manifold in scope but overdue for attention. 

Let's use this post as a starting point: 22 Aug 1485. We'll end this post with an image. 

Bosworth 

Note: This activity on the part of our organization pertains to truth engineering. 

Remarks: Modified: 04/04/2025

04/04/2025 -- Press release disappeared; put in other links. 

Women behind Eniac

TL;DR -- As the computer gets more power, attention, credit, and misuse, there will be a continual need for good information (whose veracity and provenance can be established) plus some historical framework with which to guide judgmental requirements. This post looks at early computer work and women who were involved. Several sites are referenced which are exemplary in their effort at telling the tales. 

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The recent issue of IEEE's Spectrum had an article about early compiler work done by Grace Hopper. We had an earlier post about Hopper's computing work (von Neumann; Hopper) in which we looked at the issues involved with programming the computer. In earlier days, this activity was done in what is considered machine language which is highly detailed due to the need to focus on specifics of getting the input in to the computer, getting it to do something, and then return results. Progress over the years involved stepping back from the machine level and trying to control the computer with higher-order languages. 

The Spectrum article was titled "From punch cards to Python" and featured one of the early compilers that Hopper worked on. There were other methods used before punch cards, but we can defer looking at that. Also, algorithms were the main theme from the beginning. The women were involved with early development such as a sort method that Hopper picked up for her algorithm. Before looking at other women (Betty Holberton -- more below) who worked with Hopper, let's follow one of the links that was in the Spectrum article.

It is at the Hidden Heroes site with the title of Grandma COBOL: How Grace Hopper made computers more human. COBOL was an early language which was used for business computing and is still in use. Python is a modern language that has found use in machine learning. Over the intermediate decades, there were many other languages created. 

Machine learning? It has been a hot topic for two years now and has been mentioned in many of our posts as we discuss technology. A recent trend deals with having a machine "co-pilot" development of a program which can be used to represent what AI might bring to the table and serve as a foil for discussion of things that relate to progress and people. Again, we defer that topic as it will be an ongoing one since there are no simple answers. 

Now, we will look at another link that was in the Spectrum article. The title of the article was "The Women behind Eniac" which provides information about Betty Holberton who was in the group at UPenn who were doing mathematical calculations for the Army. 

That brings us to the last topic which is a comment about the work at the Engineering and Technology History Wiki which is a good example of positive contributions via the internet and has been in operation since the aughts (2008 or so).  

Note: John has a special interest as he worked on two projects with Sperry Univac. The first dealt with wafer-scale integration, in the early 1980s. The second set the basis for continuing work until the present time: Knowledge Systems Center. Expect more posts on the ladies and these themes related to technology. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/31/2025

03/31/2025 -- The IEEE article mentions earlier work that influenced Hopper's decisions. This is a common mode of operation that needs attention in the modern world of hype. 

Finally, DNA?

TL;DR -- Since 2013, we have been studying material and collecting supporting information. Too, we have read results far and wide. This approach is an example of technology being used many times from a pure marketing thrust. We do need a balance of business and science. However, we never had this figured out in our cultures; the computer, especially with GenAI brought in, exacerbates potential problems. The strategy to manage that consists of mature processes and models. And so, let's open this can of worms and look at it regularly. 

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In 2013, when we were newbies of three years, we started to get queries about DNA, in particular, specific questions about the Gardners of which there are many (Gardners & Gardners). This list has post that were on the topic of DNA.

03 Apr 2015   Richard III and Gardner

14 May 2016  DNA and genealogy  

31 May 2016  Admissibility

04 Jan 2017    DNA, again

07 Dec 2018   DNA in use

29 Jun 2019    Back to DNA

24 May 2020  Major players

04 Jun 2020    Back to DNA, II

Of late, we have reason to get back to this topic. The post from 14 May 2016 has a list of pointers to other blogs and sites that provide necessary information pertaining to the DNA projects, the technical concerns, the mathematical modeling, and especially the computational support that is involved with this type of analysis. 

Remarks: Modified: 03/17/2025

03/17/2025 --