A story about an elephant · 10:25pm Aug 6th, 2016
This weekend I am visiting the wild west of Wales, and staying in the town of Tregaron.
Tregaron is a pleasant enough place with a population of around 1000, the majority of whom speak Welsh as a first language. The most remarkable thing about Tregaron appears to be the story about the elephant. This is told to all visitors. I have visited the town on several occasions, and heard it more times than I can remember.
In 1848, a circus visited Tregaron. Tragically a member of this company - an elephant - drank some water which was contaminated with lead, and died. It is buried behind the Talbot hotel.
It is probably not true to say that this was the most significant thing to happen in Tregaron in 168 years. But this is the story which is told to all visitors.
Which, perhaps, tells us something about what makes a memorable story.
When I was growing up, I used to mow the Moodyville cemetery. At the time, Moodyville consisted of the cemetery and two houses, one of which was abandoned. Roughly, the history of the not-town went as follows:
1882 - Laid out and established, with a church (built in 1879) and a three-story hotel (21 rooms, although by today's standards, they would be closets)
1910 - Population had boomed to 33, and the Kansas Southern & Gulf R. R. had a railroad spur from Westmoreland (county seat) to the town. Great things were being written (first link) about the prospects of turning the area into a tourist area/sanitarium with rich Eastern people visiting to take in the healthy waters.
1913 or so - Flooding destroys the railroad and most of the town.
1914 - WWI starts, and the remains of the town wind up demolished instead of rebuilding. It made a very good corn field, though.
One note on the railroad and a reason why I'd like to take my metal detector into the area some year. Kansas Southern & Gulf R. R. was NOT what you would consider a real railroad. The engine was a converted Model T auto, and there were like 2-3 little open railcars toddling along behind it. A good stiff drizzle probably would have been enough to wash away the tracks. Since the area is a cornfield now, I'd have to match my metal detecting visit with the seasons and the owner, but I'll bet there's some interesting stuff in the area.
Pretty good for a nearby town who has a tourist attraction "The Second Largest Hand-Dug Well in Kansas" But no elephants.
¿Do you remember that after learning that Ice-Age has Professor Neil DeGrass Tyson in it, I saw it, and I saw a poster for Vaxxed? I wrote to the theater explaining that Vaxxed contains dangerous medical advice, which if a viewer would follow, could lead to injury or death. Well now, the theater did not write back, but the movie is no longer listed as "Coming Soon" on the website (the theater could still decide to play the movie, but things look better).
Some might believe that I am being a censor. That is not true; I merely ask that the theater to be responsible. If the theater will decide to show a movie full of misinformation and dangerous medical advice, that is the right of the theater to do; but importantly however, I have the right to punish the theater for its irresponsibility by never giving it any of my money ever again.
4136212 I had a virulent anti-vaccine comment in Letters once that is only one of about four comments I've ever deleted. Which is also not an elephant.
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Their distrust is up to 11:
I personally know people refusing to believe anything official because it is part of the conspiracy. I also know people who believe anything they hear (unfortunately, unscrupulous people take advantage of them). What we need is an happy medium and Skepticism:
Skepticism is not accepting claims without evidence, but when one has reasonable evidence, accept the claims. FimFiction has a group devoted to Skepticism, but you should not take my word or that of anypony else without evidence:
The Skeptics' Guide to Equestria
ConspiracyTheorists generally and AntiVaccers specifically are so paranoid that they would not accept the Elephant of Tregaron, even if one would exhume the bones of the Elephant right in front of their eyes, because, since the official narrative is that the an elephant died there, the lizardpeople must have buried the bones there to fool us:
0. No Elephant ever was in Tregaron.
1. Lie and state that an Elephant was in Tregaron.
2. Bury Elephant in Tregaron.
3. ¿ … ?
5. ¡Profit!