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Hither and thither: a (surprising) chronicle of the town and its neighbourhood
Turner in Vernon
Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851), a British painter and aquarellist,
had a prestigious career. He was hardly 23 years old when he was elected
to Royal Academy, this outstandingly famous London institution.
"After the successful qualification flight of Ariane 5 ECA on Frebrury12, 2005, the Vulcain 2 engine can now enter into the production stage" declared Jean-Paul Bechat, President of Sagem-Snecma group, in presence of the Minister of Industry, Patrick Devedjian, during a celebration that was held on the Vernon site.
Vulcain 2 is used
for the main stage of Ariane 5 ECA, which is to inject into geostationary
orbit a 10 ton load and by Ariane 5 ES ATV which will lift the Automated
Transfer Vehicle (ATV) to the International Space Station. The first journey
is due in 2006, when Ariane will place ATV into orbit 300 km from the
earth, from which altitude ATV will use its own propulsion system to reach
the International Space Station
SNECMA has received a contract for thirty engines to be engineered by the Vernon plant.
Vernon also seems peculiarly connected with England, from the noble family of the same name still flourishing, agreeably to their well-known punning motto, on your side of the water. This motto is in the highest degree inapplicable to the present state of the town, whose old and ruinous appearance looks as if it had known neither improvement nor repair for centuries. Better things might have been expected from the situation of Vernon, on the banks of the Seine, in a singularly beautiful valley, and from its climate, which is reported to be so extraordinarily healthy, that instances of individuals attaining in it the age of one hundred are not unfrequent. There is no photo to go with this text as we have found no place in Vernon that was unsightly or derelict enough to illustrate it! |
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A (somewhat risqué) song from the 16th century by Clément Janequin. It is found in a collection of songs named as follows: 1555,
second book of Mr Cl Jannequin's Musical inventions. Contains the Song
of Birds, the Lark's and the Nightingale's Songs, the Capture of Boulogne[*],
the Subjugation of Boulogne [*], the Miller's Wife of Vernon, One day
Seeing, Grass and Flowers, four-part songs recently revised. Maybe this welcoming lady was the miller's wife of our Old Mill. Who knows? [5]
[*]Henry VIIIth of England invaded France in 1544, at the head of an army of 40,000 but the only achievement of the French war was the capture of Boulogne, which he agreed to give back in the Peace of Ardres in 1546.
On October 9th,
SITA Tech was inaugurated : this facility is an expert technical centre
with a ground area of 2,400sqm. Its modern and open architecture houses
the research, technical, environmental, quality, safety, information
and technical training management units of the SITA group. Altogether
there are 60 engineers and 20 laboratory technicians in charge of co-ordinating
international programmes and sharing expertise among over 30 countries.
Extracts from "Récits d'un Menestral de Reims" (Account by the minstrel of Rheims) , an anonymous author towards 1260. "King Philip had lead his army straight to Vernon, a very beautiful, well located and strong castle and he had their tents and banners pitched in the meadow on the bank of the Seine, all of them together with all his barons. The king had had the tents and the standards pitched in a meadow along the Seine, together with all his barons. Then he had lost no time setting his war machines at work but in vain because those in the castle were well trained and the castle was too strong. When the king saw what the situation was he ordered the assault to be halted but swore he would continue besieging the city for seven years. In the mean time the city dwellers were observing; they were anxious for they knew that the king would not leave before he had seized the city by storm. The king remained there all through the winter until St John's day. Everyone was expecting king John [*] to come to the rescue but he did not and sent no-one. When the captain
of Vernon saw he would have no help from his Lord, when he also saw
that king John was hopeless and when he also saw the power, intelligence
and wealth of king Philip, he asked him a safe-conduct to hold a parley
with him, a request that was granted. [*] Writing almost 70 years after the facts, the author muddles up the reigns: in 1194 the king of England is Richard I (Richard Lionhearted). While crusading (i.e. away from his territories, among which was the Duchy of Normandy) he had entrusted his brother John with the government. John was to become king when Richard died in 1199, but at the time of the siege of Vernon he was still only Prince John, the 'wicked one' in Robin Hood stories…
On September 1981, the French Parliament voted a bill abolishing death penalty. France, together with Turkey, was still the only country in Western Europe to enforce capital punishment. Everyone knows that, in France, this meant beheading by means of a machine called the guillotine. The machine -officially named "les bois de justice " (the woodwork of justice) - was discarded as soon as the law was passed. The Minister of Justice ordered that the two machines ( familiarly nicknamed the "widow") that existed in France should be removed . Unknown to most local residents, one of them had been housed in Vernon in a military equipment storage installation but since no museum wanted to have the machines, they ended their career in a disused military fortress.
Monet died on
December 5, 1926 from what is delicately named 'a long disease', but
do not forget that he had reached the age of 86. Several years ago,
an old Vernon taxi driver, who was a young boy when Monet died, still
remembered that Monet had wanted to be treated like one of the villagers.
There was no official ceremony, only his family and his friends were
attending the funeral. The coffin was carried to the graveyard on the
old wooden cart of the village pulled by two local men, like everyone
else. His friend, Clemenceau ( a former leading journalist and later
on Prime Minister during World War I) too old to be in the funeral procession
, was waiting in the churchyard, in front of the tomb. And as he was
advised to take some rest, he replied : "I am staying here, I want
to see him go down."
It was the same man who, a few minutes earlier, had taken away the black cloth that is traditionally placed on coffins. Remember that Monet did not like black and never used this colour in his paintings. As an example, look how he painted shadows: whereas before him artists painted them black or grey , Monet used dark blue, dark green or dark purple, etc but never black. Clemenceau, before the procession left the dead man's home, is said to have cried out: "No! No black for Monet. Black is no colour." And he had taken down a flowered curtain from a window and placed it on the coffin instead of the black cloth.
" Monsieur
Monet was one of us " added the old taxi driver. What tribute to
his humble genius !
The cost of fuel is soaring and what will it be like in twenty years or more? Everyone now talks about cars running on hydrogen: a fuel cell would produce electricity from hydrogen and oxygen - with no pollution, which is very positive . Needless to
say, it is not all that easy ! To begin with, hydrogen must be stored
at a temperature of -250°C. The problem of reliability and durability
must also be solved, not to mention that of becoming cost-competitive. Tomorrow's car
will therefore be clean and environmentally-friendly since its fuel
will come from a renewable source of energy. What a modest advance and dubious progress , you will say since petroleum is still required. . Not at all, because the efficiency will be far better than with today's internal combustion engine and consumption will be greatly reduced. .Moreover, the system will lead to an important reduction of NO/NO2, CO/CO2 pollution and will also use the existing network of petrol filling stations, making the development of such cars easier before hydrogen service stations exist in a more distant future. "In thirty years there will be hydrogen refuelling stations. The petroleum industry has plans concerning this" Mr Garceau, head of the RESPIRE project in Vernon says. Pierre Beuzit,VP Research Renault, has this automotive roadmap : research until 2008, niche applications and limited fleets 2008 - 2015 and start of mass production in 2015.
* Le Démocrate,
( local newspaper) Wednesday, Septembre 14th, 2005
One tends to think that the word 'Giverny' only means Claude Monet and painting. Indeed the village can boast of several places reminding visitors of the great impressionist Master and also of the hundreds of artists who flocked there between 1890 and 1910. However, there is also a very unexpected museum - one that hardly anyone has ever heard of - the museum of natural mechanical engineering which displays old machines that have been restored to perfection . For instance this 4-stroke diesel engine operating on insufflation - a rare, early 20th century technique, but also a beautiful machine with its brass parts and its soft purring noise. The star of the exhibition? A 1824 veneering saw which, as the man in charge explains, "does better work than modern machines". The museum is in fact the private collection of the Guillemard brothers who enthusiastically welcome visitors. (Only by appointment - Phone : 02 32 21 26 33 - The museum lies just in front of the Village Hall, 50 m off rue Claude Monet.) While you are
in Giverny, do spare an an hour to go there, you will be welcome and
the unusual exhibition is really worth a visit. Photo creditss 1,
2, 5, 6, 10: private collection |
Turner in Vernon
