Make Capitol out of a dome
QUESTION Is the dome on the U.S. Capitol a copy of St Paul’s?
The neoclassical dome of St Peter’s Basilica, designed by Michelangelo and his contemporaries and erected from 1588 to 1593, is the supreme motif for ecclesiastical and public buildings.
It is the model for Christopher Wren’s St Paul’s, the Pantheon in Paris and St Isaac’s Cathedral in St Petersburg.
The dome of the Capitol, the home of the U.S. Congress, was designed by Thomas Ustick Walter, who closely studied St Peter’s and St Paul’s.
It was very different from the original plan, the winning entry of a competition sponsored by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, at the behest of President George Washington, in 1792.
The winner, Dr William Thornton, called for an unsupported concrete dome akin to the Pantheon in Rome. This was never constructed. It was 30 years before a first dome was added to the Capitol.
Finished in 1824, Boston architect Charles Bulfinch’s 140 ft green dome of wood covered by copper was unpopular.
On Christmas eve 1851, a fire gutted the Library of Congress. Walter was commissioned to rebuild the library and constructed the first room in America encased in cast iron.
Fears that a fire in the dome would engulf the entire building led to Congress ratifying Walter’s designs for an inner dome of stone within a framework of cast iron covered by stone masonry in the neoclassical style.
The dome was at the forefront of architectural innovation with four tonnes of cast iron girders, plates, columns and ornaments. Construction began in 1856 and was completed in 1866 after delays caused by the American Civil War.
Alan D. Clarke, Southampton.
QUESTION Have any TV spin-offs been superior to the original show? Which have been the worst?
The U.S. spin- off sitcom Frasier is arguably superior to the original Cheers. Psychiatrist Frasier Crane ( Kelsey
Grammer) propped up the Cheers bar in Boston. The show Frasier saw him move away from the bar ‘where everybody knows your name’ to start a new job as a radio psychiatrist in Seattle.
his highbrow wit ushered in a new style of humour. Frasier became the first comedy series to win five consecutive emmys for Outstanding Comedy Series; Cheers managed only two.
Mork And Mindy began as an episode of happy Days in which Mork (Robin Williams) appears in Richie Cunningham’s alien abduction dream. The two programmes are so different it’s hard to know which is better.
Matt Groening’s The Simpsons started off as a series of 30-second sketches on The Tracey Ullman Show.
Few remember Xena: Warrior Princess, which made Lucy Lawless a female icon, was a spin- off from hercules: The Legendary Journey.
George And Mildred, starring the magnificent warring couple Brian Murphy and Yootha Joyce, was an excellent spinoff from Man About The house while Grace And Favour was a pretty good stab at reinventing Are You Being Served?
Doctor Who has inspired good and bad spin-offs. The enjoyable Torchwood (an anagram of Doctor Who) starred John Barrowman leading a team of alien hunters protecting a time-rift in Cardiff.
It was far superior to the awful K9 And Company. This looked so good on paper, pairing the popular Sarah Jane Smith (Liz Sladen) with K-9, the robot dog from the future, but the pilot, A Girl’s Best Friend, was so dull that the series was never commissioned.
Most spin- offs are inferior to the original. Friends gave us the charmless Matt LeBlanc vehicle Joey. happy Days was followed up by the awful Joanie
Loves Chachi, The Girl from U.N.C.L.e didn’t do much for women’s lib and the less said about Baywatch Nights (in which David hasselhoff moonlights as a detective) the better.
Phyllis Williams, Frome, Somerset.
QUESTION How many bowlers have taken a wicket with their first ball in first-class cricket?
A FIRST- CLASS cricket match is a senior level game with a scheduled duration of three to five days.
On March 26, 1856, the British-born Australian cricketer Gideon elliott opened the bowling for Victoria and took the wicket of Richard Murray of New South Wales with his first ball.
Since then, 146 cricketers have achieved the feat. Forty have been english, the first being henry Stubberfield in 1857.
Recognisable names from recent times include Paul Collingwood, who made his first-class debut against Northamptonshire in 1996, taking the wicket of former england all-rounder David Capel.
The 6 ft 7 in fast bowler Chris Tremlett dismissed Kiwi opener Mark Richardson to a catch at short leg with his first delivery for hampshire against New Zealand ‘A’ at Portsmouth in 2000.
Perhaps the most memorable wicket was that taken by Chris Lethbridge in 1981. his first ball for Warwickshire dismissed Geoffrey Boycott, caught at second slip. I’d love to have been a fly on the wall in the dressing room after that.
The best bowler to achieve the feat may have been Colin Blythe, who took 2,502 wickets after his first-ball strike in 1899.
Frank Brailsford of Derbyshire played only three matches and bowled just 12 balls, but with the first of these he dismissed the great Ted Dexter.
A word, too, for James Schofield of hampshire, who had a memorable debut when he took the wicket of Australia’s opening batsman Matthew hayden in 2001 against the Baggy Greens.
Henry Watson, Chesterfield, Derbys.
QUESTION Were there French, German and Italian equivalents of Vera Lynn in World War II?
FURTHER to the earlier answer, Gracie Fields was certainly not from Yorkshire. She was, of course, a Lancashire lass, born on January 9, 1898, in Rochdale and was made a Freeman of the borough.
I hope this will prevent another War of the Roses.
Ian Duckworth, Rochdale, Lancs.