Weaponized newspapers: Millwall brick

I just found out about this thing called the Millwall brick — creating a weapon from an ordinary newspaper.

From Wikipedia:

A Millwall brick is an improvised weapon made of a manipulated newspaper, used as a small club.

It was named for supporters of Millwall Football Club, who had a well-earned reputation for football hooliganism.

The Millwall brick was allegedly used as a stealth weapon at football matches in England during the 1960s and 1970s.

The weapon’s popularity appears to have been due to the wide availability of newspapers, the difficulty in restricting newspapers being brought into football grounds, and the ease of its construction.

I have not tried making one, but here are the basic steps:

1. Roll up your newspaper of choice as tightly as you can.
2. Fold in half
3. Get drunk (optional)
4. Take folded newspaper, now an official Millwall Brick, and strike or stab other hooligans (or zombies).

You’re basically making a short baseball bat. If you need visuals, check out instructables.

And if you need a video, here you go. Bonus time! These guys shows you how to add a few extra ingredients to create a caveman tomahawk.

Star Wars, the long, long tail

Die-hard Star War fans should head on over to The New York Times store and take a look at their new coffee table book, “STAR WARS A chronicle from the pages of The New York Times”

Overview

The 12″ x 15″ coffee table book chronicles the public and critical reception of the sci-fi film and its historical and cultural impact. It contains all the important Times articles about the films and their legacy, including reviews, news articles, graphics, photos, obituaries and behind-the-scenes exclusives.

READ LESS

Four years before the first “Star Wars” movie was released, The New York Times signaled to readers that the sci-fi film was approaching our world. In a 1973 feature on director George Lucas, Judy Klemesrud wrote, “George is currently working on another science fiction screenplay, ‘The Star Wars,’ which he describes as a ‘real gee whiz movie’ in the Flash Gordon-Buck Rogers tradition.”

The movie title was later shortened and when it opened in 1977, Times film critic Vincent Canby knew he had seen something special. He wrote, “Star Wars is the most elaborate, most expensive, most beautiful movie serial ever made.”

“In a Galaxy Far, Far Away” is the ultimate anthology of Times coverage of the “Star Wars” franchise. This “Star Wars” history book, packed with more than 85 reprinted Times pages, takes you on a fantastic journey from the 1970s to 2017’s “Star Wars: The Last Jedi.”

An epic gift for the diehard Star Wars enthusiast, the hardcover book features stately leatherette binding and its cover can be personalized. The pages are printed on premium paper with a light gray tint to accent the historical nature of the pages. Each book comes with a 2.5″ x 7.5″ magnifier and a certificate of authenticity.

Produced in Vermont.

$80 + shipping and this can be yours.

When’s the last time you saw ‘shithole’ in a hed?

Wow. What a headline. I will check the printed version tomorrow morning to see if they actually print shithole.

Watching CNN reports on this and the anchors are actually SAYING shithole instead of ‘s-hole.’

01/12/2018 UPDATE

The printed page (Newseum) shows …..

Bumped from hed status to way down in the second graph! So is it a reflection of a second-day story or are they toning it down?

BTW — The White House is not denying the quote.

And another BTW — National Public Radio is reporting the story this morning, but their announcers are saying that they can’t say the “vulgar term” on the air because of FCC regulations and that if they do they’ll be fined.

Well, that didn’t seem to stop CNN or some of the other major broadcast networks last night.

To NPR, I say pay the shitheads their fine. Just roll it into your next pledge drive.

01/12/2018 UPDATE to the update

In their newscasts NPR is now saying shithole countries. Journalism trumps a FCC fine!

Missing the guys at the ol’ Sleeze

Some how, it seems like an appropriate time to look back at the National Sleaze from Shoe comic strip.

Welcoming a new TV/Movie fake newspaper

Watching “Godless” on Netflix … The miniseries is set in the 1880s in the fictional small mining town of La Belle, New Mexico, where nearly all of the town’s men have died in a mining accident. Of course the surviving women have to deal with lots and lots of men-being-jerks types of issues. I highly recommend it. It stars non other than Lady Mary herself, Downton Abby‘s Michelle Dockery along with some other big names.

Anyway, fake for TV/Movies/Internet newspaper The Daily Review showed its fictional self for a few seconds. It was based in the real town of Taos, New Mexico.

BTW, the real newspaper in Santa Fe is The Taos News.

My one first complaint is deckle edge. To me that screams offset printing. I would think that back in the day, even the fictional day of 18-Whatever, The Review would have been letterpress. Well, at least there are no wrong-century photographs.

The big complaint I have it the font used for the flag.

It’s way to modern — an interpretation of what we think an old Wild Western font would have been. I doubt that this font even existed in the 1800s.

It looks like Circus Font, or something similar:

Here’s and actual flag of the same era:

Even Japanese salarymen read it!

I caught this episode of Japanology Plus on NHK World over the holidays. I recall that the bit was able the popularity of coffee houses in Japan, but it thought it was cool to see an international newspaper reader. I can’t make out what newspaper he’s reading. Anyone want to guess?

Watch the show here.

My doctor made me do it

Oh, no!

And it gets worse:

Good Grief!

 

However, the Anniston Star’s original story needs some tweaking on their ad placement:

 

I don’t think so, Meryl/Katharine!

Planning to go see “The Post.” If you’re not familiar with it, here’s a good synopsis.

Movie makers get a lot of things right and other are just dead wrong. Anyone who has been around a newspaper print press knows that they are not only very noisy, but also greasy.

This scene (screen capped from the movie’s trailer) most likely would never had happened. I doubt that Washing Post Publisher Katharine Graham would have climbed up to the top of the press to watch it. If she had, I can guarantee you that would be the end of that dress.

On a modern press this may be believable, but in 1971, presses looked more along the lines of this undated photo from The Boston Globe:

This is usually how publishers check the press run, or the rare occasion they go down to the pressroom:

Alan Baker and Dewayne-Larsen check a press run at The Ellsworth American, the second oldest weekly newspaper in Maine.

The fact that I could not find any photos of a big city newspaper publisher in the pressroom shows you how ofter they get down there.

BTW, Graham busted the pressman’s union just 4 years later. Read more about it from a non-WP source.

Print scores. Again!

Jan. 1, 2018 — Print scores again as Georgia players celebrate their victory over the Oklahoma during the College Football Playoff Semifinal at Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena, Calif.                                                                                                                                              HYOSUB SHIN/The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution had these babies ready to go at the end of the Monday’s semifinal College Football Playoff. Of course they had to cart them across country. Of course they had to keep them super top secret and of course they would have been destroyed in total secrecy had the Bulldogs not won.

Again…. no one is holding up a tablet displaying a web page!