(no subject)

I bought a book the other day about the Cleveland Torso Murders. Those who
know me are aware that I have a taste for accounts of lurid crimes, ideally
those which are unsolved. The Torso Murders certainly qualify as lurid.
For those who're unaware, the Torso Murderer's victims began turning up in
Cleveland in 1935. The last one seems to have been in 1950. They're
unusually gruesome murders, in that the killer apparently slew his victims
by neatly and expertly cutting their heads off. It's like something from
a 1930s horror movie.

One of the intriguing aspects of the Torso murders is that many of the
victims' heads were never found. Somewhere in Cleveland, hidden in a dark
recess in some abandoned building, or shallowly buried in ground
that's since become a public park, the murderer's grisly collection may be
waiting to be found. It's remotely possible as well that the killer is
still alive. Some old recluse may be sitting in his house in Cleveland
tonight, with the shades drawn tight, admiring his trophies and reliving
his youth...

If there's a shortcoming to this volume, it's that he's chosen to address
the mystery in the context of Cleveland history, and doesn't do much
exploration of the plausible idea that the Newcastle and 'Black Dahlia'
murders may have been the work of the same villain. Still, it's an
excellent book within the limitations of its scope, well-written and
researched.

For those who're interested, it's "In the Wake of the Butcher", by James
Jessen Badal. Kent State University Press. ISBN 0-87338-689-2.

FW-026

Frank Williams unveiled his new FW-026 Formula One cars the other day. He's gone to a short-nosed design, with the wing mounted out in front on a pair of curved arms that're attached to the top of the body. It's supposed to keep the forward canards out in the clean air, and reduce turbulence over the body. It looks rather different than the other F1 cars. It's pretty clear from the way the designers and sportswriters are carrying on over this that they think it's something completely original. You can see it at http://www.reuters.com/locales/newsArticle.jsp?type=sportsNews&locale=en_IN&storyID=4095581 for a while at least.

Now the thing that interests me about this is that I've seen this exact design used before, in 1972, at Indianapolis. That was the first year that they allowed big, serious aerodynamic packages on the cars, and there was a lot of experimentation. Jack Brabham and Dan Gurney both built cars using that 'tusk' design. The resulting cars were competitive, but nothing special. By 1973, both manufacturers had returned to a more conventional style of mounting.

We'll see what comes of this. My personal bet is that they've used this design knowing that it gives no special advantage, but won't hurt them either, and they're hoping that the competition will waste development time trying to figure out why they went this way instead of using the conventional post mount. Time will tell. Regardless, I'm pleased to see some variety in the car design. That's something I've missed since everyone's become able to afford computer-aided design, is the occasional weird, idiosyncratic design that some builders used to churn out.

You don't appreciate what you've got until it's gone. I used to think Ken Tyrell's cars were butt ugly, but now I'd be well-pleased to have a six-wheeler or a tubmobile to break up the sleek monotony.