Escape From The Deadly Ring Of Fire

The recent volcanic eruption of Kilauea on Hawaii reminds us all of the power of nature and the danger from natural forces which exist all the time. It has also reminded me of another volcanic eruption in which a prominent lgbt volcanologist, Dr. Michael S. Ramsey, was caught and which caused the death of two of his fellow scientists.

The Ring of Fire is the name given to the almost unbroken line of volcanic and earthquake activity encircling the Pacific Ocean. Hawaii lies above a volcanic hotspot in the centre of the Pacific plate.

The Indonesian island of Java was created by the formation of the Ring of Fire as one continental plate pushed into another. Java is already famous in volcanic history for the massive eruption in 1883 of Krakatoa which killed 36,000 people and had adverse effects it had on the world’s climate that lasted for years.

At the other end of Java is Semeru, the highest volcano on the island and one of its most active. Because of the almost continuous activity on Semeru it has always been a place for volcanologists to study up close.

During 1998 and 1999 Semeru displayed an increase in activity. There were eruptions of volcanic plumes of ash and steam. Frequent earth tremors, rock falls and lava flows were observed from March 2000. Scientists from the Volcanological Survey of Indonesia (VSI) made regular monitoring trips up the volcano.

Dr. Michael S. Ramsey wasn’t part of the VSI. He was a specialist in remote sensing of volcanic activity using satellites. He became interested in volcanos during his studies in geology at Arizona State University in Phoenix. Also in Phoenix he became involved in the lgbt bear community, founding the Phoenix Bears and acting as a judge in two International Mr Bear contests. He is even a member of organisations who protect real bears in the wild.

In early 2000 Michael joined Pittsburgh University as an Assistant Professor. He also became a team member of the Earth-orbiting Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflective Radiometer project (thankfully shortened to ASTER). This project uses data from a satellite which carries instruments measuring Earth’s atmosphere, oceans, land, snow and ice. Not only do the instruments record the human impact on the planet, such as global warming, but also records the activity and impact of natural disasters on human settlements.

In mid-July 2000 Michael travelled to Bali to present a paper on his work to the annual conference of the International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth’s Interior. Also at the conference were two scientists from the Smithsonian Institution who had been invited to join the VSI evaluation team on Semeru the following week. They invited Michael Ramsey to join them.

And so it was that Michael was present on that fateful day on the slopes Semeru on 27th July 2000 when two people lost their lives.

The day began early. The team set up camp 1,000 feet below the summit of Semeru and rose at 2 a.m. to make the trek up to the top in time for dawn. At dawn the group of about 20 scientists were at the summit. Semeru isn’t like those stereotypical volcanos you see in B-movies. Very few are. Semeru has several volcanic craters at the summit, each one being the top of a volcanic pipe which delves deep into the magma chamber many miles below sea level.

The day was a bit cloudy and there was a mist around the crater which had been showing the greatest amount of activity over the previous weeks. The scientists watched as several ash and steam fountains erupted. As the scientists moved closer to take measurements, as close as 100 feet from the crater’s edge, the mists suddenly evaporated. Michael Ramsey, at the back of the group, scrambled into his bag for a telephoto lens to put on his camera.

As he turned to take a photo he saw a massive cloud of ash containing burning rocks envelope his colleagues near the crater. Realising the danger he flung himself to the ground and protected his head with his camera bag. Rocks rained down upon the whole area. They weren’t rocks when they were spewed out of the volcano. They were lava drops, almost 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit. When they hit the ground as rocks they were still hot enough to burn straight through you if you were too close to the crater. One rock hit Michael’s foot and melted the rivets on his climbing boot.

The eruption lasted less than a minute. After it subsided Michael rose to survey his surroundings. The two colleagues nearest to the eruption, the team leader from the SVI and an observer, had been killed instantly from head injuries. Other team members were in varying degrees of injury, some very serious. Michael himself sustained a foot injury because of the aforementioned hit on his boot.

The survivors staggered back down to base camp and waited for medical assistance. No helicopter ambulance could rescue them because of the ash clouds and bad weather. The group were sustained by local villager bringing food and assistance. Two days after the eruption the group were being treated in hospital.

It was a harrowing experience for everyone. Semeru continued to erupt through the following weeks. Monitoring by the VSI continued, and Michael returned to the USA to continue his research into the prediction of volcanic activity. The Semeru incident wasn’t entirely without result. As well as being recorded in distance laboratories one on-site incident added to their knowledge.

Remember that mist that suddenly evaporated just before the eruption? This was likely caused by the heat from the underground magma as it rose through the vents to the crater.

Michael Ramsey is still a prominent figure in volcanic research and runs courses at Pittsburgh University in natural disasters caused by volcanos and earthquakes. He is also involved in NASA’s research into volcanos on other planets in our solar system.

The work of Dr. Michael Ramsey and all of the scientists who risk their lives to collect vital data which can save the lives of millions in the future is something we should thank them all for.

Star Gayzing : Polar Bears

Let’s get straight into it and look up at the night sky again at two of the most recognisable constellations in the northern hemisphere – Ursa Major and Ursa Minor.

Also known as the Great Bear and the Little Bear these constellations circle the current celestial North Pole. These constellations have been pictured as bears since Ancient Greece when Ursa Major was called Arktos.

The Greeks explained the presence of two bears in the sky through the myth of Callisto. She was a nymph who was one of the hunting entourage of the goddess Artemis (known as Diana to the Romans). Artemis required all her entourage to be virgins, like herself. This can be seen as the power of feminism over a patriarchal society – no man is going to dominate them.

However, if you know something of Greek mythology you’ll know that sex will rear its head sooner or later, especially for a mythological virgin. The great pansexual king of the gods, Zeus, was particularly taken by Callisto (well, her name means “most beautiful”). The problem Zeus had was how to have sex with her. It’s not a problem you have for long if you’re a shape-shifting deity like Zeus, so he transformed himself into a doppelganger of Artemis and made an amorous advance on Callisto when she was on her own.

The seduction of Callisto became a popular theme in art. It has been variously depicted as an act of rape, a loving embrace between two women, or something much more erotic (usually to please the male eye). The imagery became decidedly lesbian and has become part of lesbian lore.

“Jupiter in the Guise of Diana and Callisto” by Jean-Simon Berthelemy

The patriarchal interpretation of the myth puts Callisto in a subservient role, exactly what the real Artemis wanted to avoid. The matriarchal-feminist interpretation highlights the lesbian aspect of Callisto willingly succumbing to the sexual advances of her mistress and remaining in her service afterwards knowing she had broken her vow. As the Roman goddess Diana, Artemis has become the central goddess in a modern neo-pagan faith called Dianic Wicca, a female-only faith established in 1971.

It’s what happened after Callisto’s seduction that has been depicted more often in art. For several months everything was fine. Knowing she was supposed to remain a virgin, even if she believed it was Artemis who made her pregnant, Callisto hid her condition. She bathed alone in a river, but another nymph saw her and noticed that she was heavily pregnant and informed Artemis.

Artemis was understandably, furious. She banished Callisto from her entourage. This banishment is depicted in art many times. The painting “Diana and Callisto” by Richard Wilson (1713-1782) showing this episode is listed as part of the lgbt collection of the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Liverpool.

Callisto later gave birth to a son whom she named Arcas. But if she thought her troubles were over she was mistaken. Very soon after the birth Zeus’s wife Hera recognised Arcas as her husband’s illegitimate son. This time it was Hera who was furious and as punishment turned Callisto into a bear.

Just in time Zeus spirited baby Arcas away. Eventually he became the king of a nation named after him – Arcadia. Like his mother Callisto Arcas was a great hunter. One day he was hunting bear when he saw a bear bounding towards him (you can probably guess what’s going to happen next). The bear was Callisto, eager to be reunited with her son. But he didn’t know that, and was about to shoot an arrow into her when Zeus stepped in and transformed him into a bear as well. He then flung both bears into the sky and they became Ursa Major (Callisto) and Ursa Minor (Arcas).

Because of their prominent positions in the sky, particularly Ursa Major, the constellations have been depicted on flags and in heraldry. The most famous of these flags is the state flag of Alaska (pictured at the top) which is actually the reason I’m writing about Ursa Major and Ursa Minor today. Today is the 91st anniversary of the flag being adopted by Alaska.

In heraldry Ursa Major has been featured in the coat of arms of the composer Richard Wagner and his gayson Siegfried (1869-1930) which I wrote about in 2014. There I explained that several German families called Wagner adopted Ursa Major for their coat of arms because it is a pun on their name. In German “plough” is “wagen”, and in Germany Ursa Major is known as the Great Wagon.

Returning to the nymph Callisto. As well as Ursa Major she is represented as one of the moons of the planet Jupiter. The four largest moons, called Galilean moons after the famous scientist who discovered them, are all named after some of Jupiter’s/Zeus’s famous amorous encounters. The two largest moons are Ganymede and Callisto. I find it interesting that they are named after Zeus’s lovers which are based on same-sex attraction.

Finally, I find it baffling why the lgbt bear community hasn’t taken advantage of the Ursa Major image and used it to produce more distinctive flags and logos. Maybe I’ll design some myself.

Jupiter's Galilean moons

Bear Beginnings

One of the deaths that went virtually unnoticed, even by me, was the passing of George Mazzei a year ago today.  His name may not be very familiar to most people but in the world of late 20th century American journalism his name was better known, and no more so than in the pages of “Advocate” and “GQ”. George also became something of a celebrity briefly in the 1980s after he write a book called “The New Office Etiquette”.

In 1979 George Mazzei wrote an article for “Advocate” called “Who’s Who at the Zoo” which was published on 26th July 1979. It was a light-hearted article illustrated with cartoons of the various anthropomorphic gay types it described. Subtitled “A Glossary of Gay Animals” George described seven types of gay men he had seen around the bars of Los Angeles and represented them as animals. The first type he described was the “bear”.

George’s article can arguably be described as the first publicly published attempt to define, albeit humorously, what we now accept as the sub-group of the lgbt community, the big and hairy man, the bear. But he was not the first to use that word in this context.

Various people have delved into the origin of the term “bear” as used in the lgbt community. Most prominent among these is Dr. Les K. Wright who, during his time as Assistant Professor of English and Humanities at Mount Ida College in Boston, Massachusetts, founded the Bear History Project in 1994. This project is ongoing and continues to uncover the hidden heritage of the international bear community.

It was Les Wright in “The Bear Book: Readings in the History and Evolution of a Gay Male Subculture” which he edited in 1994, that George Mazzei gets the credit for producing the first published reference to bear as a gay identity in the “Advocate” article.

The term “bear” had been used to describe a masculine body type for several decades. In fact, it had been used for centuries to describe a person who was rather brutish and savage, a complete opposite to the image modern gay bear-men portray. It has also been used for a long time in speech and print in the form of the phrase “a bear of a man”. This referred typically to a large, well-built man with a lot of facial hair. Its use as a specific term within the gay community developed out of this, specifically within the leather community after World War II.

It is generally accepted that the USA was the place where “bear” began to be used as self-identification. Various gay leather communities in cities around North America began to form informal gatherings of big and hairy leathermen without necessarily knowing they were creating a subculture or even creating a term for a new subculture at the time.

During the 1950s when the hanky code was expanding and being used more extensively these leather-bear pioneers began to place teddy bears in their pockets or belts rather than hankies. These teddy bears were to symbolise the wearer being fond of cuddling. In this way it can be argued that these men were the first bears as we know them today, even if they still hadn’t specifically used the term as the name of a subculture. It was the time when the men described as bar took the bear as a means of identification.

The teddy bear had effectively become an object of affection after the real bear cub rescued by President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt was immortalised as a cuddly toy. The teddy bear softened the image of the creature from a savage and brutish animal whose crushing bear-hug became a friendly hug. I wonder if Teddy Roosevelt’s niece Eleanor Roosevelt realised that her uncle had become the grand-daddy of the gay bear community!

No-one know who or where the word “bear” turned from being a description of body type to being a name of a subculture. It started with the first group who used the word “bear” in their name. In Les Wright’s “The Bear Book” there is reference to the minutes of a meeting of Satyr’s Motorcycle Club in Los Angeles in February 1966 in which the formation of a bear club is mentioned.

While George Mazzei was living in Los Angeles in the 1970s he and a friend were in a leather bar people-watching when they thought of categorizing the customers into animal types. Having already self-identified themselves as bears they went on to develop other anthropomorphic identities for the other customers in that bat that night. From this emerged the “creatures” described by George in his “Advocate” article “Who’s Who at the Zoo?” in 1979.

The publication of that article provided a wider realisation across America that such an identity existed. Many bear-men who had no link or interest in the leather community saw themselves in George’s article Cowboy-bears, construction-worker-bears, sporting bears, and others, joined the new bear groups and clubs formed originally by the leather-bears.

The emergence of the internet spread the word further and before soon isolated bear groups around the world were joined by many more. And, as befitting a self-identifying community, a flag was chosen in 1995 at a Chesapeake Bay Bear pool party.

George Mazzei defined the bear community before it was fully formed, and led thousands of men to declare themselves to be bears. So, a belated thank you, George, for helping to turn a general gay slang term into a full-fledged community.

If you want to read George Mazzei’s article you can see it reproduced on the Advocate’s website here.

Paws For Science

Since the demise of the International Mr Bear contest in 2011 there hasn’t been a world-wide focus for the celebration of the bear community. So, to celebrate the bear community’s contribution to science (yes, they have one) I’m writing this article as the San Francisco Bear Pride festival is taking place. San Francisco was the birthplace of the International Mr Bear contest so this is an ideal date to chose.

When I was planning my year of science the San Francisco Bear Pride festival was one of the reasons why I chose zoology for November’s Ology of the Month – bears, you see!

To begin with I should point out that not all scientists who may be physically suited to be called a “bear” may like, or want, me to do so. This article deals with 2 scientists who have publicly declared their “bear” status by being openly active in the bear community.

I’ll start in San Francisco itself and with a pioneer of the early years of the bear community. His name is Chris Nelson (1960-2006). If you had to sum up both his professional and personal life in as few words as possible it would be “Creator of Images”.

Chris worked at the University of California’s Lawrence Berkeley laboratory as a microscopist. Starting out as a technician with the National Centre for Electron Microscopy he became proficient in the use of the atomic resolution microscope and the one-angstrom microscope. Chris’s expertise led to many researchers and scientists coming back time and time again to ask for his help to produce images for their research. A big bear of man with a big bushy beard, Chris resembled a young Father Christmas and his personality seemed to match. He knew how to make people feel at ease.

In 2005 he received the Outstanding Technologist Award from the Microscopy Society of America, and was appointed to take on the responsibility of the new Transmission Electron Aberration-Corrected Microscope in 2007. Sadly, Chris died from an unexpected heart attack in 2006.

Chris’s other role as “Creator of Images” revolved around his hobby as a photographer. His partner, Richard Bulger, is said by many to have been the first to popularise (though probably not invent) the term “bear” for the big and hairy community. Two years later, in 1987, Chris and Richard produced the first edition of “Bear Magazine”, a photocopied publication which they distributed around San Francisco. It contained some of Chris’s own photos of “leather bears” from around the city. Very quickly the magazine grew into a national publication, and except for a few years in the 1990s has remained so. Chris’s photos of the bear community formed the backbone of “Bear Magazine” and provided the growing bear community with an identity.

As the bear community grew members began to move away from the leather/biker community in which most them moved, and separate bear clubs began to emerge. All of this culminated in the creation of the International Mr Bear contest.

One prominent bear who served as a judge for several International Mr Bear contests was Michael S. Ramsey (not to be confused with Michael Ramsey-Musolf featured in September). Michael S. Ramsey is Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Geology and Planetary Science at the University of Pittsburgh. He was a founder member of the Phoenix Bears club when he was studying for the PhD at Arizona State University. During the 1990s he contributed to the “American Bear” magazine and used his extensive experience in computers to co-ordinate the Resources for Bears website between 1996 and 2002.

Michael’s scientific career is based mainly on geology and, in particular, vulcanology. When he arrived at the University of Pittsburgh in 2000 he set up the Image Visualisation and Infrared Spectroscopy laboratory and currently serves as webmaster on its website. He began using infrared spectroscopy, which hasn’t been used in this way before, to look at the chemical and structural changes in rocks and minerals that are heated beyond their melting points. This research could help to understand the processes involved in lava flows and magma within volcanoes. Michael has also been heavily involved in research at NASA and has done research into Martian volcanoes and impact craters.

Grin and Bear it for 17 Years

For 17 years one of the highlights of the bear calendar – for those who like big and hairy men – was the International Bear Rendezvous (IBR) held annually on the third weekend in February, and the contest to find International Mr Bear. The last one was held two years ago.

The organisers of IBR, the Bears of San Francisco club, found it difficult to provide enough funding for the event and hand out substantial donations to charity, which was always a cornerstone of the event. The worldwide lgbt community has also changed since the first IBR in 1995, as were global social networks and the internet. Other bear events around the world had also been growing in popularity. Like most organisations in other communities this led to a fall-off of volunteer commitment, which was essential for the success of IBR. The committee decided that 2011 would be the last IBR and it’s International Mr Bear contest.

I won’t go into the history of the use of the word “bear” in the lgbt community. Instead, in celebration of the 17 years of the IBR, I bring you a brief history of the International Mr Bear contest and it’s winners.

San Francisco can be called the home of International Mr Bear. It was there in the 1980s that a huge bear community began to dream of a competition on the lines of the highly popular International Mr Leather contest. The first International Bear Expo was organised in 1992 in San Francisco and it featured the first International Mr Bear contest. The winner was John Caldera, a Mexican-American army veteran. He was (and still is) an active member of the bear community and had won other similar local titles, and was a founding member of the Bears of San Francisco. On something of a surreal note, he was one of the torch relay carriers on 9^th April 2008 when the Beijing Olympic torch came to San Francisco. Unfortunately the International Olympic Committee would have banned him from taking part if he wore his leather bear outfit! Pity!

In 1994 John acquired the ownership of the bear title and established the first International Bear Rendezvous in 1995. A committee made up of members of the Bears of San Francisco club organised all the IBR contests right up until the last one.

To end today, here is a full list of the winners of the International Mr Bear title :

1992    John Caldera               San Francisco, USA

1993    Stephen Heyl               Denver, USA

1994    Michael Myhand

1995    Will Pettite                   Mr. Southern California Bear

1996    Steve Blancset            Long Beach, California, USA

1997    Jim Parton                   Mr. Southern California Bear

1998    Rob Savides               Leeds, UK

1999    Craig Byrnes               Mr. Washington DC Bear 1998

2000    Heath McKay               Mr. Grizzly New England

2001    Scott Perry                  Kentucky, USA

2002    Pat Thorne                  Virginia, USA

2003    Klaus Regel                Cologne, Germany

2004    Scott Hunter                California, USA

2005    Harvey Mallory            Kentucky, USA

2006    Pedro Veral                 Zaragoza, Spain

2007    Andreas Piedehierro   Madrid, Spain

2008    Scott Turner                 (for the 2^nd time) Alaska, USA

2009    John David Elam         Kentucky, USA

2010    J. D. Leggett                New York, USA

2011    Paul Hensley               Washington State, USA

The International Bear Rendezvous also held three other bear contests for various bear types, and the winners were :

International Mr Grizzly Bear

1992    Van Floyd                   Denver, USA
1993    Clark Jellison              San Francisco, USA
1994    Rodger Ream
1995    Rodger Ream             Baltimore, USA

1996    Jacques Zonne           Amsterdam, Netherlands

1997    Michael Freer              Seattle, USA

1998    Sherman Hanke          Massachusetts, USA

1999    Michael Patterson       Tuscon, USA

2000    Robert Kenny              Ottowa, Canada

2001    Hal Hillman                  Rhode Island, USA

2002    Robert Cannon           Phoenix, USA

2003    David Mendelson        Seattle, USA

2004    Jay Duckworth            New Jersey, USA

2005    David Nigro                 New York, USA

2006    Tom Swanton             Seattle, USA

2007    Steve Strong               Washington State, USA

2008    Dean Bruno                 Boston, USA

2009    Barry Welch                California, USA

2010    George Hains              New York, USA

2011    Curtis Stanton             California, USA

International Mr Daddy Bear

1995    Clark Bufkin                 California, USA

1996    Sean Minogue             San Diego, USA

1997    Lance Lirette               Vancouver, Canada

1998    Loyd Powell                 Houston, USA

1999    Rob Hathaway            Newberg, USA

2000    Craig McCauslan        California, USA

2001    Dave Ward                  Leicester, UK

2002    Jeremy Fennell           London, UK

2003    Roger Spencer           Cincinnati, USA

2004    Bill Howard                  Lexington, USA

2005    Mischa Kitain               Sacramento, USA

2006    Ali Lopez                     Maryland, USA

2007    Todd Bennett              Salt Lake City, USA

2008    Ringo Nannings          Amsterdam, Netherlands

2009    Joe Mannetti                California, USA

2010    Paul D. Cain                Nevada, USA

2011    Craig Gundersen        Wisconsin, USA

International Mr Bear Cub

1994    Dominick Zurlo
1995    Glen McClintock          California, USA

1996    Joe Parker                   Austin, USA

1997    Duane Mosco              California, USA

1998    Jeff Boone                   Ontario, Canada

1999    Steve Earle                 Kent, UK

2000    Brad Bivvins                Tuscon, USA

2001    Scooter Garoutte        California, USA

2002    Stephen Jensen          Massachusetts, USA

2003    Ian Urwin                     Newcastle, UK

2004    Juan Viera                   Madrid, Spain

2005    Manny Diaz                 Brooklyn, USA

2006    Louis Colasurdo          New jersey, USA

2007    Steve Finch                 Long Beach, USA

2008    Bud Gundy                  San Francisco, USA

2009    Jose Zurbano              Seville, Spain

2010    Javier Perez

2011    Erik Green                   Santa Cruz, USA

This post was updated in February 2017 to include the information kindly provided by my readers below.