Oligarch Mansion

Posted on Posted in The WestTagged , 3 Comments
If Mark and Pricilla Zuckerberg had lived 100 years ago, this would have been the lifestyle they enjoyed. This is actually the Pittock Mansion, built in 1914 in Portland, Oregon.
There are parallels to the Zuckerbergs though. Both are/were media giants. Henry Pittock owned The Oregonian (still the State’s largest paper), paper mills, banks, and large real estate holdings. Facebook is the modern version writ large.
Besides Facebook, Zuckerberg owns Instagram, WhatsApp, a whole host of startups and has a large portfolio of real estate holdings. This is a beautiful detail of an interior cupola in the entry to the Pittock mansion. The plaster detail and the gold leaf is extraordinary.
The Pittock Mansion is larger (46 rooms) but Zuckerberg’s abode is more modest at nearly 6,000 sf but he purchased 5 or 6 other mansions around his home and tore them down to create a large neighborhood buffer.
The grand staircase is equal to the one in Gone With The Wind.
This was then. Pick up a receiver and listen to the kitchen maid flirt with the butler. Today, when we go online who knows how many entities are out there watching our every keystroke, like Zuckerberg’s FaceBook. What a distance we’ve traveled electronically.

Matt’s Christmas Eve

Posted on Posted in Seasons, Seasons Of God1 Comment

I don’t know Matt but Christmas Eve coming back from church this stood,

the only brightness in the cemetery. Passed by again today and again stopped.

That’s how I know this was Matt, by those who signed the back.

What it brought to mind

was that so many people that I knew,

that you knew

and that the world knew left the world in 2020 for Celestial Rest.

Oh Lord, Hear Our Prayers For Them.