We can see a Texaco that is long gone, and behind that looks to have been a feed store.  I can’t tell if it was called Park & Pollard, or if it was a distributor of Park & Pollard products and had another name.

Weekly Photo – Window To the Past of Levine and Levine

The 1940 photo is by Jack Delano and is part of a collection in the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

]]> http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/05/window-to-the-past-levine-and-levine/feed/ 0 http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/05/man-with-flowers-in-500ft/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=man-with-flowers-in-500ft http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/05/man-with-flowers-in-500ft/#comments Sun, 05 May 2013 23:41:10 +0000 Rich http://www.richarsenault.com/content/?p=930 If you’re been to the Air Line Trail throughout Colchester you’ve probably seen these signs.  I have no idea who added the flowers but I know they were on a few signs last year, possibly even earlier.  Most of the trail crossing in Colchester, if not all, have the flowers added to the signs.  Has [...]]]> If you’re been to the Air Line Trail throughout Colchester you’ve probably seen these signs.  I have no idea who added the flowers but I know they were on a few signs last year, possibly even earlier.  Most of the trail crossing in Colchester, if not all, have the flowers added to the signs.  Has anyone seen them in other towns?

Weekly Photo – Man With Flowers in 500ft

Fast-forward a couple months and we have a name, a logo, and even bottles:

Weekly Photo – Air Line Brewing Bottles

As anyone local will most likely guess, the Air Line Brewing name & logo came from the Air Line Trail.  The trail was originally the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad which passed through Connecticut in the late 1800′s.

The bottles are 32oz Boston Rounds, aka “Growlettes”, which I ordered through Grandstand. They are not the most common home-brewing bottle, but I did a test run with them on my last batch.  Being easy to clean, fill, and cap they worked out perfectly.  Grandstand has a minimum order of 48 (with or without printing), but if you want to try out blank ones on a smaller scale Uline carries them in cases of 12.

Splurge on good caps though!  The Uline bottles come with paper-lined caps, which are not going to hold pressure once carbonated.  Look for caps with a “Polycone” liner, which is flexible plastic cone inside the cap.  I’ve used those for both growlettes and growlers and they are excellent.  Your local home brewing supply shop may have them for growlers, and I bought the growlette caps from Grandstand.

I have a blueberry wheat in the fermenter right now, which will be going into these bottles in about another week.

Next up was buying a 5 gallon jug of bottled water.  Faster, but not the easiest solution out there.

For the third batch, I switched to 1 gallon jugs of water.  Easy to move, measure, and inexpensive at about $1/gallon; this worked well for the next few batches.  This year we added a 3rd guy to our brew day which moved us up to 15 gallons of water and with the possibility of making larger batches, adding more people, and going all-grain, I started looking around other ideas.  Enter a little project:

Weekly Photo – Home Brewing Water Filter

My weekly photos don’t always have to be scenic HDR creations, right?  I think this counts.

We ran about 20 gallons through it this past weekend and it worked out perfectly.  The idea came from this thread at HomeBrewTalk.com.  Scrolling through the thread shows how different people have made their own and provides excellent ideas.   I went with a 10ft 1/2in hose on the intake side which I can connect to both an outdoor water faucet or a sink faucet.  Then on the outgoing side it’s just a 90deg elbow which allows it to hang over the side of a bucket:

Looking to make your own?  

Here’s a photo of all the parts I used, but be sure to check out the thread mentioned above for more ideas.  Click on the photo to jump to a larger version to see all the part details:

Changes Already?

I didn’t notice when I bought the filter housing that it doesn’t have a shut-off valve on the top.  A couple I bought years ago all did and I never thought it would be missing when buying this one.  I’ll be adding a shutoff valve to the intake side of the filter, but I’m not sure exactly what I will use for that yet.

…

Do you have a filter for a home brew setup?   Post a comment with details or a link to a photo so I can check it out!

A Great Day For Fishing

Comstock Bridge was closed in March 2009 for renovation, which involved it being taken completely apart piece by piece.  The renovation was completely in early 2012.

Inside The Bridge

I haven’t found much information about the renovation, but check out this post at Life, On A Bridged which has some details as well as photos from the renovation.

As usual, clicking on the photos above will jump you to large versions to see them in more detail.

]]> http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/04/comstock-bridge-east-hampton-ct/feed/ 0 http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/04/plainfields-old-high-school/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=plainfields-old-high-school http://www.richarsenault.com/content/2013/04/plainfields-old-high-school/#comments Wed, 03 Apr 2013 23:26:34 +0000 Rich http://www.richarsenault.com/content/?p=863 Weekly Photo – Plainfield’s Old High School Right next to the new high school, where the Country Music Talent Show was last month, sits their old school.  Passing by it each day while working the show I knew I wanted to stop to take a photo of it, but what I didn’t know was how [...]]]> Weekly Photo – Plainfield’s Old High School

Right next to the new high school, where the Country Music Talent Show was last month, sits their old school.  Passing by it each day while working the show I knew I wanted to stop to take a photo of it, but what I didn’t know was how old it is.  I haven’t found many details on the building, but Plainfield’s assessment database had the main piece I was curious about: it was built in 1900.

I’m finally catching up on weekly photos with a double post today.  We’re starting with Tim Cote, the winner of this year’s Country Music Talent Show.  The contest is hosted by the Plainfield Rotary and 97.7 WCTY.  Here is a photo gallery from this year’s event.

Another Weekly Photo – Saint Andrew’s Passion Play

Next up is the cast of Saint Andrew’s 2013 Passion Play in Colchester.  I don’t have the gallery ready yet, but should have that posted by next weekend.  Click the photo above to jump to a larger version.

I was driving down Rt 354 (Parum Road) in Colchester when I passed by this house for sale.  Thinking it would make for a cool photo I turned around and went back to shoot this.  I don’t remember which real estate agency had the for sale sign in front, and I haven’t found this on the town’s appraiser site yet.  Curious what the story is behind this falling apart little house.  Click on the photo to jump to larger versions.

I’m ready for warmer weather, so I was flipping through photos from last summer instead of posting something recent for this week.  Here we have the Gelston House in East Haddam, photographed last August.  During the summer they have live music out on their patio – something I really need to check out this year as it’s only about 15 minutes away.

Today was our first brew day of 2013 and the 2nd time I’ve used this new fermenter.  A bottom outlet, side outlet, tri-clamps, butterfly valves – this is an excellent upgrade for home brewers.  Dumping trub and yeast out of that bottom outlet leads to a much clearer beer with very little sediment.

While Marty Mcfly oversees the fermenter, today’s Amber Ale has already started bubbling and will be bottled in about 2 weeks.

Weekly Photo - Amber Ale In The Conical