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One of the frames from the AI animation exploration of The Mind Navigators of Iridia. Stop by ‘s gallery to learn who they are and their role in her graphic novel “The Dancer’s Soul”.
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An early interpolation of Mordana. Wonder if she’s manifesting dreams or nightmares in this iteration…stop by ‘s gallery to learn more about Mordana and the world she comes from.
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On this day in 1590, Governor of Roanoke Island, returned from England to find no trace of the colonists he had left there 3 years earlier. The colony subsequently became known as “The Lost Colony of Roanoke”. The fate of those colonists remains unknown to this day and is perhaps one of the oldest mysteries in American history. Despite numerous attempts, modern researches have failed to find archeological evidence to explain the disappearance of the colonists.

Photo: Image of John White returning to the Roanoke Colony in 1590 to discover the settlement abandoned. A pallisade had been constructed since White's departure in 1587, and the word "CROATOAN" was found carved near the entrance. White believed this meant that the settlers had relocated to Croatoan Island, but search attempts were first thwarted by rough seas and a lost anchor, and later abandoned altogether.
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History is full of oddities & strange theories. One such theory is phrenology (from Ancient Greek (phrēn) ‘mind’, and (logos) ‘knowledge’) - a pseudoscience that suggests mental and character traits can be associated to the shape and size of the skull. One of the most outrageous (and unintentionally humorous) examples of phrenology is a book published in 1902 by Chicago phrenologist L.A. Vaught. The book, full of strange theories and illustrations, lays out 42 known elements of human nature (including honesty, reliability, jealousy, vengefulness, benevolence, etc.), and how they can be detected in the shape of people’s heads, noses, ears, and chins. Here are a few pages from the book…for a good laugh!
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June 24, 1374 marks the first recorded outbreak of “Dancing Mania” in Aachen (now modern-day Germany). Dancing mania, also known as dance plague, choreomania, St. John’s Dance, tarantism, and St. Vitus’ Dance, was a social phenomenon that occurred in Europe between 14th and 17th centuries. It involved large groups, sometimes thousands of adults and children, dancing erratically to the point of exhaustion, often collapsing and injuring themselves. Music was often played during dancing mania outbreaks as it was believed to relieve the symptoms and remedy the problem, but it may have actually aggravated the outbreaks, inviting more people to join in the erratic dancing.

Dancing mania was not an isolated event, and is well documented. There are numerous theories as to what caused it, but none are conclusive. Religious cults, people dancing to relieve high levels of stress, ergot poisoning, and other explanations have been offered.

Dancing mania has been described as one of the earliest recordings of a “psychic epidemic,” and a psychogenic illness where large groups of people display physical symptoms with no known physical causes physical symptoms.
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Image 1: A painting of dancing mania by Pieter Brueghel the Younger after drawings by his father.

Image 2: Dancing mania on a pilgrimage to the church at Sint-Jans-Molenbeek, a 1642 engraving by Hendrick Hondius after a drawing by Pieter Brueghel the Elder
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On June 15, 1215, King John of England agreed to Magna Carta-a royal charter of rights that was designed to bring peace between the unpopular king and a group of rebel barons. The charter promised the protection of church rights, the protection of the barons against illegal imprisonment, access to swift justice, and limitations on feudal payments to the king. The charter was initially breached by both parties- but after John’s death, his son Henry III, reissued the document after stripping it of some of its original content. The charter went through various iterations after, but by 1297, it became part of England’s statue law, having been renewed by each monarch in turn. In time, as the Parliament of England passed new laws, it lost some of its practical significance. But by the end of the 16th century, the Magna Carta saw a renaissance, with historians and lawyers at the time arguing that it restored ancient Anglo-Saxon protections of freedom that the Norman conquest of 1066 had overthrown. Although this argument was flawed, the Magna Carta today still stands as an important symbol of liberty and is regarded with great respect by both British and American legal communities.
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First Image: A romanticized 19th-century recreation of King John signing Magna Carta. In reality, King John did norm sign the document himself, but rather it was authenticated with the Great Seal of the Realm.

Second Image: The original Magna Carta, written in iron gall ink on parchment in medieval Latin- authenticated with the Great Seal of King John. The document is held at the British Library.
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According to calculations by Eratosthenes (who, among other things was the chief librarian at the Library of Alexandria), the city of Troy was sacked and burned on this day in 1184 BC. The Trojan War, if we use Greek mythology as our guide, was one of the most important wars in ancient times, and was the subject of many works of Greek literature, including Homer’s famous Illiad. The war started as a result of Paris of Troy kidnapping (or running away with) Helen who was married to the king of Sparta, Menelaus. It is believed that the war lasted a decade, finally ending after the Greeks used a hollow wooden horse built by Odysseus to hide in and enter the city, which they ransacked and burned to the ground. Although the ancient Greeks believed Troy to be a real place, and the war to be a historical event that took place between 13th and 12th century BC, by the mid 19-century, many historians believed both the city and the war were fictional and stuff of legends. But in 1868, amateur archeologist Frank Calvert, convinced German archeologist Heinrich Schliemann that Troy was a real city located in what is now Hisarlik, Turkey. On the basis of excavations later conducted by Schliemann and others, this claim is now widely accepted by scholars. Whether there was an actual Trojan War, however, remains debatable. Many scholars believe there is some historical truth to the core tale, but to what extend? Those who do believe that the stories of the Trojan War are based on historical facts, often say the war took place between 1194-1184 BC, dates give by Eratosthenes, which roughly correspond to archeological evidence of a burning of Troy and the collapse of the Late Bronze Age.
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The Procession of the Trojan Horse in Troy by Domenico Tiepolo (1773)
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On this day in 1692, The first victim of the Salem witch trials, Bridget Bishop, was hanged for witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts. The true story behind these infamous trials that eventually led to the hanging of 19 people, and forever marked Salem as a “haunted” town, is the topic of an upcoming educational program that MindTripz Inc., is helping to create for . Follow us to learn more about this show and to watch an excerpt of the program in a few weeks! Oh, and stop by wonderscape.tv to watch hundreds of educational shows!

Ever heard of the Zoot Suit Riots? Well, today June 3, is its anniversary! On this day in 1943, a mob of about 60 from the Los Angeles Naval Reserve Armory beat up everyone perceived to be Hispanic, starting The Zoot Suit Riots which lasted a week.
Zoot suits were oversized, baggy suits associated with Latino, African-American. Italian-American, and Filipino-American minority communities in the 40s. Many white residents and servicemen found the suits to be unpatriotic because of the shortages during WWII and the extra fabric needed to make the suits. In LA, tensions between white residents and the Latino community finally bubbled over after a violent fight broke out between a group of Latino youths and servicemen on June 3. This fight lead to other race riots throughout the city with hundreds of attacks against minority youth over the following days.

The police’s response to the riots was very skewed as indicated by the discrepancy between minority arrests and soldier arrests. No soldiers were ever arrested for their part in the riots. The media didn’t help either. Local newspapers called the riots a cleaning up of “hoodlums”, and the city council banned zoot suits in LA city limits.

Years later, activists like Malcolm X and Cesar Chavez said the Zoot Suit Riots inspired them to get into activism.

This photo was taken by John T. Burns on June 7, 1943 in Los Angeles, California.
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