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Below you will find an archive of all the news items that have appeared on DogsPlayingPoker.org. To stay up to date, you may also follow the RSS feed for this page.
While hiking the Colorado Trail last year, we stopped in Fairplay, Colorado for resupply and relaxation. While there we visited the Platte River Saloon, which had a tapestry of dogs playing pool hanging on the wall! Unfortunately the service was not very good and we could not get a drink, despite the bar not being overly crowded. Oh well, we found liquid refreshment elsewhere, even if their decorating tastes were less refined.
If you are one of the people that is trying to strike it rich with your old dogs playing poker prints, and does not bother to read the FAQ, you can instead watch this short clip from Pawn Stars. Spoiler Alert: They are not worth much.
As part of a sponsorship for the World Series of Poker, 888Poker commissioned a series of real life dogs playing poker images to “reimagine a modern-day version” of the classic paintings. A jackapoo, Rottweiler, Staffordshire bull terrier and golden retriever sit around a table playing what appears to be Texas Hold’em. I cannot spot any cheating going on, but a panting dog’s poker face is notoriously difficult to read.
The group around the table
Note that although this website celebrates dogs playing poker, I do not condone (nor condemn) gambling itself. The games are not particularly captivating for me, and I find that the whole industry exudes an underhanded vibe (especially on the internet). So if it is not blindingly obvious already, 888Poker is not sponsoring this post, nor do I endorse or really know anything about the company. They just happened to have created some interesting real life poker dog photos that I am sharing with the site’s loyal readers.
Close Ups
Dogs are not the only animals which can play poker. The Jackson Mercantile in Jackson, Wyoming has actual taxidermied raccoons sitting around a table playing the classic poker game. This work is no 2D painting either, but real raccoons positioned around a real table. It is about as classy as the dog version though.
Raccoons Playing Poker
A cheating raccoon
No cards are being passed under the table — unlike the timeless A Friend in Need — but one raccoon is sitting on a pair of aces to unethically up his odds. Why is it that animals are always cheaters?
Jackson Mercantile has many other interesting taxidermied animals too, some also comically placed — such as squirrels paddling a canoe — while others are just very out of place for Wyoming, like a zebra.
Unfortunately my seasonal job in the area shoveling snow did not pay enough to pick up this raccoon quartet, which cost a cool $4,000. It would have been hard to fit in my car anyway though. Although if someone wanted to gift it to me I am sure I could find room.
Les Fox of West Highland Fine Art & Publishing is running a Kickstarter campaign to publish a book on dogs playing poker and Cassius Coolidge. I do not have too much information besides what is in the Kickstarter description, but the book looks like it will be put together well and quite interesting. They have even created a Dogs Playing Poker fan club.
This book and other website might be in direct competition to this one (and probably winning too), but the more dogs playing poker love the merrier.
Also note that I am in no way involved in this Kickstarter campaign or the book. I have not even determined if I will support this project myself.
While hiking the Florida Trail I passed through Moore Haven on the west side of Lake Okeechobee and saw Adams Angler’s Reef, which had an original mural of dogs playing pool on the outside of its building. Good to see that pool halls everywhere are embracing the anthropomorphic pooches.
The signature in the corner reads “J. Carswell 8-14-12”
Jerry Griffith, who produces Useless History, recently published an episode on YouTube about Cassius Coolidge and his infamous dogs playing poker paintings. Take a watch, it is informative and well done. There are even a few of his works I don’t recognize. Although I may object to Coolidge being filed under “useless history.”
While finishing up my summer in Europe, I ran across a random cafe in Istanbul, Turkey which was proudly displaying a tapestry of dogs playing poker above its tables. This version was an adaptation of A Friend in Need.
While tramping around New Zealand, I happened through Queenstown and while walking around downtown saw the Lonely Dog gallery by Ivan Clarke. I wandered in and saw paintings of dogs in various anthropomorphic scenes. I kept looking expectantly and came across The Last Round which depicts several dogs in a high stakes card game. It is very reassuring that while on the other side of the world, humanity still grasps the timeless concepts of dogs playing poker.
A house, (crappy) car, good paying job with benefits, no family responsibilities, and an otherwise seemingly normal life has been too burdensome for me, so I am off to see the world. I do not think there are too many DPP sites to visit (especially since I have already been to Antwerp, so I will be exploring God’s creation and all the people upon it. My first stop is a little 3,000 mile hike along the Continental Divide, and I will see where I go from there.
This new direction means this website will not be maintained much in the foreseeable future, but I have not been doing many updates lately anyway. I do actually have some information which has not made it up yet, and have been meaning to rewrite Coolidge’s biography for a while, but those will have to wait.
Enjoy what DPP information that is posted, and buy one of the awesome paintings to help support my travels.
Despite a car accident earlier in the week (no injuries, other guy’s fault) and arriving in Antwerp, NY late in the afternoon, my pilgrimage to the birthplace of Cassius Coolidge was successful.
I donned my DPP shirt and wandered around town. Antwerp was just another upstate New York small town though, without much recognizing the artist born there in 1844.
My first stop was the library, which once house a self portrait of Cassius Coolidge, but discovered it was moved to an office in the town hall that was open only a few days a week in the mornings. The library did have a copy (perhaps original) of an 1888 birds eye view of Antwerp, which before I had only seen online.
Cassius Coolidge self portrait
I went to the nearby town hall and was lucky enough to spot Coolidge’s self-portrait through the front door’s glass. I could not get very close as the door was locked, but at least could see it in person. A print of A Bold Bluff hung on the wall as well.
Sources said Coolidge lived on Hoyt Street, but I had no details on an address, and could not even tell if the few houses along that lane were 125 years old. I also could find no traces of the Bank of Antwerp, which Cassius founded, but did not have an address for that either.
I then went to Hillside Cemetery where Cassius is buried. Although I possessed a picture of his gravestone, I did not know its exact location. The cemetery was a couple acres and I could not find a directory of persons, so I wandered amongst the headstones searching. The hunt took a while, uncovering a few other interned Coolidge’s in the process, but it eventually uncovered Cassius Coolidge’s resting place, alongside his wife. He actually had two headstones, one with just his name, and one containing both himself and his wife. Many other ancestors were buried nearby, which will hopefully let me expand his family tree.
Cassius Coolidge’s Gravestone
Coolidge family marker
My stop in Antwerp was interesting, although with better planning I could have perhaps performed first hand research while in town and got more from it. Maybe next time.
Yours truly next to the Antwerp, NY sign in my DPP shirt
For those who might care why I was in upstate New York, my write up on Ironman Lake Placid and my Adirondacks trip will eventually be posted. Although with my normal rate of finishing trip write ups, it might be six months before that occurs.
After competing at Ironman Lake Placid, like every true dogs playing poker fan, I will make my lifetime pilgrimage to Antwerp, NY, birthplace of Cassius Coolidge, the artist of the canine poker players. I am not quite sure what I will do there, since he does not have a museum or anything, and I don’t have any first hand research planned. In the very least, I’ll just walk around town in a grooving DPP shirt.
As promised DogsPlayingPoker.org contributed 10% of the price of prints purchased in October through it to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. That came to $40.30USD. Thanks once again for your great support in raising funds to fight cancer, while adorning your walls with those infamous gambling pooches.
Screenshot of this website’s donation
In honor of breast cancer awareness month in October, DogsPlayingPoker.org has gone pink! Besides the awesome color scheme remembering the millions who have suffered or succumbed to breast cancer, 10% of purchase price of all dogs playing poker prints bought through this website will be donated to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, in the fight against this disease. So adorn your walls with the gambling pooches while supporting a good cause.
For those with a garnering to get stuck by lightening (or spelled a word backwards), yet another variant of Coolidge’s poker dogs exists. This time your favorite deity is around the green velvet. Jesus smoking a cigarette, Buddha sipping tea, Vishnu holding fire, Mohamed inquisitively studying his cards, or Ganesha snacking on a bowl of peanuts can now hang on your walls next to the canine variety. A copy of A Bold Bluff can even be seen in its background. None of the higher powers are cheating though, with all cards above the table. Not sure if passing a card would violate their morals, or if they could just miraculously change their hand anyway. Also makes you think, if these are omniscient beings, would they all either know how the game concluded, or at least what cards the other players had? Such mysteries in life. (I will just stick with the triune God of the Bible being the only real one, making the whole mental exercise mute.)
Gods Playing Poker is available for viewing or purchase.
For those trendy people out there that have the internets on their iPhones, an application worthy of download finally exists. Forget tossing cows, Gamezebo has a review of Dogs Playing Poker for the iPhone/iTouch/iPad/iEverything. The play is actually Texas Hold’em, but the visuals are classic Coolidge. Twenty different breeds of canines can grace your table as you try to outsmart them in the card game. Animations, sounds, and game play are given high marks. What better way to kill some time than by playing poker against computer generated dogs? All for just $1.99 from iTunes. And for those PC folks, Slightly Subtle Technology, Inc. still makes the computer version.
Thanks to a little sleuthing by yours truly on a very quiet floor of the University of Iowa Library, the illustrations by Cassius Coolidge from The Wonderful Electric Elephant are now available for your viewing pleasure. They are black and white sketches (fifty total!) similar in composition to Cassius’s other times as an illustrator. Unfortunately my rudimentary capture technology is not as sophisticated as Google Books, so there may be some curves and slight distortions in the illustrations. Still very much worth a look.
Coolidge was a busy artist. Before he created those famous poker dogs, he did many other things, including illustrating several books. His works in The Independence Day Horror at Killsbury and Prophet of Peace have been documented on this site for a while. New to his growing collection of illustrations though is Under Mad Anthony’s Banner and The Wonderful Electric Elephant. Unfortunately I do not yet have a copy of the later, so its illustrations are not posted. Nonetheless, you can enjoy the works from the other three, and observe the similarities in style between them.
According to the Watertown Daily Times, the Philadelphia Historical Society (of New York) plans to open a museum starting this summer. Why is a new museum in a small upstate New York town important? Because that town is of course the birthplace of Cassius Coolidge. Although this exhibition hall will not have any original Coolidge works, it will feature dogs playing poker prints. These works put this museum on a short list of institutions displaying poker dogs. I will have to make a pilgrimage sometime, while of course checking out the Coolidge self-portrait.
According to the Watertown Daily Times, the Cassius Coolidge self portrait that hung in the Antwerp, New York library has been fully restored. West Lake Conservators cleaned the cruft accumulated over the years, restored places where paint had flaked away, and applied a coat to help prevent future damage. The painting now hangs in the Antwerp town hall. The image was originally commissioned by the Bank of Antwerp, which Coolidge founded in 1872. A full article detailing the restoration and image of the portrait is available.
A new artist’s painting, of course in the dogs playing poker/pool genre, have been added to the gallery. Gerard Taylor has several contemporary style pieces of canines engaged in poker or pool. They are very well done.
Unfortunately I can not find a semi-reputable, reasonably priced website that sells Mr. Taylor’s anthropomorphic work. So unless you are a better sleuth than I, it will not be easy to hang his work in your den anytime soon.
The American Kennel Club recently released the results of a survey that determined which dogs are most popular in American culture. Snoopy from the comic strip Peanuts captured the overall honor, but in the “Art/Fashion” category, those ever enduring dogs playing poker took the top spot. In fact the paintings ended up 6th overall. Not too bad for a bunch of advertising prints created by a very interesting man. The entire list of the top 125 dogs can be viewed at Paw Nation
With Christmas quickly approaching, do not forget to get that someone special in your life one of the plethora of dogs playing poker paintings. I probably could not recommend getting one for that female in your life, but ladies, any guy will appreciate one (or more). Until December 16th, you can receive free shipping on most prints when your order totals over $40.
Or this season, you could remember the miracle of the incarnation of Jesus, God made flesh, with the mission of redeeming mankind from its sin, rather than indulging in the orgy of consumption the last months of the year has become.
Some new paintings have been added to the DPP gallery. The artists Jenny Newland and Dan McManis have works of anthropomorphic dogs in their portfolios which now have a home here. They take a different approach on the same subject with the former’s being incredibly cute puppies around a poker table, and the later having powerful dogs engaged in a variety of activities. Quit reading what I have to say though, and take a look at them yourself (along with Coolidge’s classics).
Cassius Coolidge’s self portrait
The town of Antwerp, New York has hired a firm to restore the 1872 Cassius Coolidge self portrait. It has hung in the town’s library as long as anyone can remember and is starting to deteriorate. After the painting has been repaired it might be moved to the Town Clerk’s office, where more people might see it. Apparently reading is not a popular leisure activity in upstate New York. The painting is supposed to be appraised as well, so it will be interesting to see what it might be worth.
A full story is available at the Watertown Daily Times.
Owl Square Press has made a new version of the classic A Friend in Need for those of the overly politically correct persuasion. Are gambling, alcohol, and smoking evil vices that must be avoided, but you still think those dogs sitting around a table are cute? Then try Thursday Night Book Club. The memorable canines remain, but their devious behaviors have been replaced with tea and literature. The overly proper satire seamless alters the original print for this new, kid friendly version. For an added nod to those die hard Cassius Coolidge fans, the dogs’ books are actually based on those on the shelves in Sitting Up With A Sick Friend.
This site is slightly cleaner starting today, as my agreement with an SEO firm has finally expired and the in line text links on several pages have been removed. I apologize for posting those links, which did not materially affect the contents of this site, but also did not provide any useful information to its visitors. It was also wrong to encourage the work of SEO companies and implicitly endorse those linked to sites about which I knew nothing. Although this particular SEO outfit did not seem horrible, many such organizations can be pretty shady. I made a mistake and got suckered in by their easy money. I have learned my lesson though and have vowed to avoid any such links in the future. I have even turned down several such offers since then.
In full disclosure, the dogs playing poker gallery and some miscellaneous DPP items still do have small referral links to where visitors can buy those items, but I feel those are of actual value to visitors wishing to own those products.
Exceeded my fundraising goal!
This post will be my last beg-a-thon update for the Path to Progress 5K, benefiting the American Brain Tumor Association. The race and fundraising is over. Thankfully, the latter went better than the former. The final amount is still being tallied, but upwards of one million dollars was raised, with my supporters contributing $831.96. As promised, all commissions for the past three months from those poker dog paintings was donated as well. That in itself was $366.96. (Note: I have never earned close to that much before from this website and do not expect to again. People really came through in buying prints when it helped a charity. Also, I will be getting a nice little 1099-MISC come January, so all is legit there.)
The most proof I can provide that DogsPlayingPoker.org actually donated the money and did not line its own pockets are the following screen shots, showing Art.com’s payment and the corresponding donation.
DogsPlayingPoker.org’s February Through April Earnings
DogsPlayingPoker.org’s ABTA Donation
I know this site does not garner many repeat visitors, but I would still like to extend a large thank you to everyone that helped out. It sounds trite, but it honestly means so much that complete strangers would do so much for something close to my heart. Although my fundraising is done for the time being, the fight against brain tumors continues. If you are so inclined and financially able, please consider making a donation to ABTA outside my race. I know many charities are always asking for your money though, so if you choose not to support this one that is perfectly fine. Just find a charity that touches an area close to your concern and help that equally worthy one. Whether through time, talent, or money do your small part to make your corner of the world just a little bit better.
As for the race itself, I actually came in second overall, although most people there were not serious runners and mainly supporting the organization. My time was alright, but not great for me. In any case, the fundraising and awareness was much more important than a little stroll around Solider Field.
Only a couple weeks left until I run the Path to Progress 5K, raising money for the American Brain Tumor Association. So buy those DPP paintings (whose commission will be donated to the Brain Tumor Association, or make a contribution directly.
Fundraising has been going better than I could have hoped, so thank you for everyone that has already helped. Your support is amazing!
Just passing along a quick update on how the fundraising has been going for the Path to Progress 5K, sponsored by the American Brain Tumor Association.
Individual, direct contributions have been slow, but I did not really expected many people to send money, even to a reputable charity, on the advice of some guy that spends too much time researching DPP paintings. Despite the current harsh economic climate though, sales of DPP paintings have been surprisingly brisk, with $125 generated thus far. (The actual donation to ABTA will occur all at once after the race.) This amount is significantly more than I have ever earned before, so I surmise that during these hard times with an uncertain future, people are turning in mass to this classic artwork as a rock of comfort…or not. See the figure below for more details. In any case, keep buying those paintings to raise money for brain tumor research and treatment.
A sincere thank you for all your support.
Demand for DPP paintings appears to be inversely proportional to economic conditions
On April 25th I will be running the Path to Progress 5K in Chicago. This event raises money and awareness for the American Brain Tumor Association. This run will be in honor of my dad, who succumbed to brain cancer in October of 2007. Although I run a lot, this race will be to raise money and awareness against this crippling disease.
This will be my second time raising money for ABTA, having run the Chicago Marathon supporting them. I was overwhelmed with the response from family, friends, and strangers alike during that endeavor. From financial and emotional support, to hearing others stories, that race was in many way more than I ever expected. I can only hope this 5K will even go half as well.
I am also not about to ask random strangers for donations to a charity close to my heart while I do nothing. Besides my own personal contribution, all money raised through the purchase of DPP paintings in the gallery from February 1 until April 30 will be given to ABTA (I receive a small commission for every picture). If historical records are any indication, this donation will not be very large. But YOU can help change that. Just find your favorite DPP picture in the gallery and buy it. You get awesome decorations for your wall and ABTA receives money to help fight brain tumors. It’s a win-win!
After the race occurs, I will publish the amount donated from those referral links.
Thank you in advance for your support, however you may express it.
After way too long, I finally got DogsPlayingPoker.org slightly polished and much more maintainable. I do not really have any new information up right now, but it should be much easier to add more in the future. I have a pile of old information to go through, so look for new things to very slowly trickle onto the site.
The site is not perfect, but most of it looks good in most browsers. If you have major problems, let me know.
Doyle New York has come through again with respect to Coolidge. Although there will be no poker dog paintings involved, there have half a dozen lots of personal Coolidge works from his daughter’s estate. The items up for auction are mainly sketches and manuscripts by Coolidge. The highlight, I think, is the full manuscript of his play, King Gallinipper. There are at least a little cheaper than the dogs playing poker paintings, but are still a little more than I can justify spending. As always, I take donations.
A couple of neat news items have crossed my desk. The first one is that a DPP themed watch is scheduled to be released by a high end watch maker (it should go well with matching cufflinks).
Even more important though, is that Mount Vernon, Iowa’s annual Chalk the Walk festival will feature a creation of A Bold Bluff. A small army will each take a small square, creating a large mosaic of the poker dogs by the end. Past images have included A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte and Stone City by Iowa’s own Grant Wood so Coolidge is in with some good company. But what makes this event even better is that it is taking place about ten miles from my house! So I know where I will be on May 4th, of course wearing a DPP shirt.
The auctions for Coolidge’s paintings have gone through. Only a Pair of Deuces (also know under the title Waterloo) sold for $160,000 while A Breach of Promise Suit went for a mere $26,000. Unfortunately I was not the high bidder on either.
Well, more Coolidge works will be auctioned off in February by Doyle New York. The paintings are Only a Pair of Deuces (also know under the title Waterloo) and A Breach of Promise Suit. It appears that these were in possession of his daughter, Marcella Coolidge, until her passing last year. This is auction is part of her estate. Details can be found at AskART.com’s Cassius Coolidge page. Unfortunately you have to pay money to subscribe to the site to get any really useful information. Happy bidding to everyone. I think these will be out of my price range as well though.
After way too long and much neglect, I have stopped mooching off my alumni status and actually got real hosting for DogsPlayingPoker.org. No updates have been done, but those will be coming sometime “soon.” Unfortunately I am lazy/busy so it will take some time. This site is not dead!
For those of you still trying to make a quick buck off old dogs playing poker paintings, maybe you should check out Middle Tennessee State University auctions. They are selling an old print they found in the rubble of a demolished building and hoping to get twenty bucks. Instead of getting top dollar at Sotheby’s, they are selling it “at Southern Bee’s, that gallery beside the Exxon station on Highway 96.” Although if your school is selling small items like that to raise funds, I think you are in real trouble.
Dogs playing poker made it into the Top 5 dogs for the 21st century on MSNBC. I think their list could use some work, but at least they did not leave off this time honored favorite.
I will be running the Chicago Marathon this fall in support of the American Brain Tumor Association. My dad was diagnosed with brain cancer in February 2005, and I am doing this race in honor of him. The whole story and details can be found on my fundraising page. Although I registered a while ago, I just created my fundraising pages so the amount raised is currently $0. Please help me in increasing this. I will also be putting effort into getting offline people I know to contribute, although probably not till closer to race time. Whether $1 or $100, any amount is appreciated and goes to brain tumor research.
You may think just because this site is very rarely updated that it is dead, but alas that is just barely not the case. I merely get distracted very easily, and I generally do not have lots of more information to add. Today, however, I pass along that Forbes is reporting that another Coolidge painting is being auctioned in Doyle’s annual Dogs in Art auction. A Fairy Story, 1908 (be sure to press the “stop” link at the top of that page, or the slide show will automagically move to another picture), is not one of the famous poker playing ones, but instead depicts a dog reading to another dog. It is expected to fetch between $25K and $35K so it is once again slightly out of my reach. Of course, the Coolidge last year was expected to fetch around that same amount, but went for almost $600,000. I will once again this year accept generous donations of anyone willing to bid on this painting for me.
There has actually been quite a bit of news coverage about the auctions. Every where from the UK to the front page of CNN. This site was linked from CNN’s article. (Hopefully that won’t drive too much traffic to my generous hosting provider and get them mad at me, again). Below is a list of news articles about the auctions. Some of them may require a registration.
Oh yeah, if you own a print of the dogs playing poker paintings, it is not worth half a million dollars. You might be able to get $10 for it on eBay. So do not ask me. And for those of you who did, I already answered that question a while ago.
After 2 minutes and 52 seconds (according to eBay) and 70 bids later, the original Coolidge paintings sold for an astonishing $520,000, 10x what the auction house had estimated. The author of this site was, unfortunately not the winner. Maybe I can still hold out hope that the winning bidder is going to make a donation.
Back to reality though, I do not really know anything else to comment on the action other than it is amazing that a pair of original paintings of whose prints are usually placed next to velvet Elvises and in smoky bar can be worth half a million dollars.
You can track the upcoming auction of the original Coolidge paintings by Doyle New York live on eBay. (This website is even mentioned in the auction description.) You can also bid on any other of their puppy paintings while you are there. I am tempted to bid on it for $15,000, just to say that I did, since I know it will sell for a lot higher than that. At least I can grasp the painting from afar.
For those of you with an estimated $30-50K of extra money on hand (that is all of us right?), you have a rare opportunity to buy an original dogs playing poker painting, which Cassius Coolidge created with his own hand. Doyle New York is auctioning two off Feb 12-14. They are A Bold Bluff and Waterloo, although they are referred to by different names. They are oil paintings and each measures 24″x36″.
If only I had a couple more years out of college, I might have enough money saved to blow on this (and then live in a shack afterwards). Well, hopefully, another one will come up in a couple of years. Or if someone would just like to make a very generous donation…
I can dream, right? Or maybe I should just road trip to New York.
Hopefully I can post about this comic without getting another cease and desist letter sent to my alma mater. The comic Mixed media, ran a comic with some other dogs playing poker “masterpieces.”
I was watching TV, and one of those crappy prescription drug commercials (Vioxx maybe?) was on TV, and they had the painting Poker Sympathy, in it. I turned it on halfway through the commercial, so I didn’t see the setup for it, but it is good to know someone is at least trying to pick up where ESPN left off.
Something as a cross between Wegman and Coolidge, Sands Casino Hotel in Atlantic City used real dogs to recreate one of Coolidge’s famous “dogs playing poker” scenes. Read an article about the event. Pictures of it are also available, or listen to a short bit on NPR.
I guess it is just my week for original Coolidge work. I stumbled across this site selling “The Pea-Nut Feast,” which although contains no dogs or poker, was painted by Coolidge and appears to be the original (or at least for $3500 it better be). Now if anyone would like to give me a nice present, I would very much appreciate it.
I found some interesting news on the location of at least one of the original paintings which Coolidge created. According to a news article, one of the originals (it does not specify which one) is in the Hauge Cartoon Museum in Ticonderoga, NY. I have to go take a road trip up there one day. If anyone lives in that area and wants to give me some information about it, I would very much appreciate it.
I received quite a bit of information about the painting Riding the Goat from an “Unknown Mason.” There is quite a bit of information about the real meaning behind this picture. It is a pretty interesting read.
I wish I had more to update on this site, but I really do not have anything. I did get a nice DPP beer stein (for all the drinking I do not do)..
While I was working in Minnesota this summer, I remembered that Brown & Bigelow (the company that originally marketed the dogs playing poker pictures) was located in St. Paul, only a short distance away. I never actually knocked on the door since I already received information from them several years prior, but I did get these more or less useless pictures of their building…I think I may have an addiction.
Good news, the gallery is back online. Because in my last news post when I said “soon”, I of course meant a month. Although there are a couple of pictures missing (I hope to get permission to post those in the future), there is still a good collection. Go look to see all of Coolidge’s great work. There is even a new one in there.
Note for the curious: I have rights to post all of the pictures in the gallery. The “Purchase picture” links are not refer based. There is a hidden web image, which does nothing except try to keep my account from being closed. I am not violating Rose-Hulman usage policy or anyone’s copyright (to the best of my knowledge). If you email the administration of my school with unfounded accusations without first talking to me, I will consider that harassment and take appropriate actions.
I must apologize for this website being down for so long, read why. Everything that I am certain I am allowed to post is back up, except for the gallery. Hopefully I can get that back sometime soon. Once again, enjoy all of this Coolidge information.
The gallery is now back up in a workable form. Go look at some of Cassius’s great work.
Well, as my loyal readers have noticed, this site has been up and down as much as a cheap hooker (joke stolen from Dale). There have been several problems. The first was another copyright issue. Basically someone sent my school (hosting location) that I had some copyright infringing content (but they did not tell me what). Since I really want to graduate, I had to take this seriously, and my site was down for a couple of weeks.
So I got my site back up eventually, and it was working fine for a couple of days when it just stopped responding. Since I am about 10 hours from the computer, I can not exactly get to a console and investigate the problem. So after being lazy for a while, I got a static version of the web page transferred to my school account (what you are viewing it from now). Everything seems to be working except for the gallery which I have not made a static version of yet, and Joe’s Diner which never really was launched. It will remain here until at least the end of the summer. The causes of the server going down are probably one of more of the following:
I sure hope it is number 1
I think that is all the updating for now, and hopefully the site will be a little more reliable in the future.
Well as all my loyal readers (ha!) know, this website has been down for the past couple of weeks. This is because I received an email from my school saying that “an outside source“ had contacted them saying I could possibly have infringing copyrighted material on my website. I kept it down for a while because I really did not want to bother my school (graduating in a year would be nice). Then I have to admit I got kind of lazy and just did not get around to looking into the problem. Well, things are back in order now. You can read my rant. In case you were wondering, I guessed that the offending content was the short Simpsons clips that I had posted. Those are now unfortunately gone and replaced with text descriptions of them. (Of course, FOX is too stupid to actually sell those seasons on DVD, so I can not even provide a link to purchase them.
There will be a DNS change happening either tonight or tomorrow morning since I will have to change hosting providers to newones for the summer. All services will be down for at least half an hour during the move, and since I am not the savviest admin there may be some DNS resolution problems for a little while after the change.
Found some new Cassius Coolidge stuff on eBay. They are a set of 6 cards (including a title card) that are titled “Before and After Marriage.” They were originally made as an advertisements and are copyright 1882. I have scanned the cards, so you can view them
Joe’s Diner (my personal site), is now pseudo open. The only thing I have up there right now is a section about myself. If I get around to it (meaning it will never happen), I will finish the rest. You can at least read about the backpacking adventure I described in the previous news item. Things did not exactly go according to plan. Also I have not developed all the pictures yet, so there are more to come.
It has been a while since an update, but I have a tendency to do that. Release a version of something, and then stop working on it for a while. I do have several more things I need to add though, so hopefully those will get done sometime. In actual news though, this site was named a USA Today Hot Site on March 14. (Yes I know I am posting news of this almost a month late, oh well.) With that award, this site actually received traffic. I was quite surprised when the load average on the sever wasn’t 0.00, 0.00, 0.00.
This site will also probably be unavailable Monday April 14th for several hours in the evening. I know, this will ruin Monday night for a lot of people, but it is necessary for the greater good. I plan to rearrange hard drives, put in more memory, upgrade the kernel, and finally stop under clocking the processor (don’t ask). I should also finally have a way to have a routine backup procedure in place.
After way too many hours of work, I am pleased to announce that a biography on Cassius Coolidge is finally finished. I hope you enjoy it.
I posted two new Coolidge paintings that I had previously only saw existed in articles, but never saw pictures of them. They are Stranger in Camp and Riding the Goat. These paintings are done quite well (just like the rest of Coolidge’s). They would not quite fit on my scanner so there is a noticeable scan line in the image where I pasted them together, but it is not that bad.
Also, I am almost done with the Coolidge biography, so hopefully that will be posted by the end of this month.
Well, thanks to my school’s library, I was able to obtain the book Prophet of Peace. So what? As you may have guessed by the title, Cassius Coolidge did the illustrations for this book. I have provided the images for your viewing pleasure. They are only sketches, but they are still drawn pretty well.
I had a slight setback with the site, but it appears that I will not be sued. For the story…apparently the picture of Cassius Coolidge I was using for his >biography (still not done of course) was copyrighted to Demarco Productions and my posting of it violated their copyright. It was a nice picture, so it is unfortunate I had to take it down, but it was totally within their legal right to ask me to do so. And they were nice since I took it down and that is all they seem to want. Get one of Demarco’s catalogs on the Poker Dogs if you want to see it. I will replace the picture of a self-portrait of Coolidge when I can find five minutes to do so.
Of course, after 60 or so days of uptime without any problems, the night I leave for home on Christmas the power goes out at my apartment (aka hosting facility), and my UPS does not last. As a result you may (but probably did not) notice that this website has been down for the past two weeks. All has been corrected and should be working correctly.
After probably 9 hours not working, I finally noticed that I horribly broke the site while trying to get Perl working for something unrelated. Well, all should be restored now so I apologize to that one person that may have visited then
In other sort of real “news,” I found a company that may just fill some of my poker dog obsession. Slightly Subtle Technology, Inc., created a game aptly titled Dogs Playing Poker. From the site:
It may not be the next Quake, but for ten dollars I think I am going to have to get it. I wonder if you can slip a card under the table to your friend.
After lots of hard work and delay, I am pleased to announce the pre-opening of DogsPlayingPoker.org, the number one poker dogs site on the internet. Not everything is complete, hence “pre-opening,” but I have been sitting on some stuff too long, and I decided to get things out in the wild. Check out the FAQ of the important stuff I still need to get done…most notable Coolidge’s biography. Also, if you notice anything broken (that is not documented) or seems wrong, please tell me. In the mean time, enjoy and hopefully the official grand opening ca occur sometime soon (although I make no promises).
Also, I am almost certain Google has not crawled this site, so search doesn’t really work yet.
While on my rafting trip in West Virgina with OVC we also went caving at Organ Cave. This story actually had a point, in that somewhere along Highway 60 in West Virginia between Hitco and Lewisburg we passed a store with a Poker Sympathy mural painted on the side of it. I did not have a chance to get a picture, but if anyone is in that area and finds it (I do not think I imagined it), please pass along a picture and address and I will be eternally grateful. You may also be forever immortalized on DogsPlayingPoker.org. The yellow section on the map shows the approximate location of the building.
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