A Sordid Boon--Yet Another "Big Deal"

A few more comments regarding evolution and the human ancestral tree:

Holotype being used for Homo bodoensis

As background, a hominoid skull was discovered in Ethiopia in 1976.  The initial find (known as the holotype) dates to approximately 600,000 before present (BP).  

Earlier this month (November 2021), Natural History Museum (U.K.) published another hypothesized "direct" ancient hominoid ancestor by certain paleo-anthropologists 50 years after the find.  Another new human species 

This new species, foisted out of "necessity" so we are told, is to be called Homo bodoensis.  

Homo bodoensis  Image by Ettore Mazza

Those proposing this new species claim:  "naming a new human ancestor is a 'big deal.'"  Indeed.  But not necessarily the type of big deal implied.  Allegedly, this new human ancestor "has been named by scientists as part of an effort to clean up our ancestry."  Clean up?  Oh.  What they mean to say is clean up the mess of so-called "direct" human ancestral grafts that paleo-anthropologists have sought to force onto our actual ancestry over the past century.  

This "scientific graffiti" has long defied logic anyhow.  Obviously, every newly named species cannot possibly be "the" one direct human ancestral link.  So belatedly, "splitters" may finally be coming around to the more generalist views of "lumpers".  

What is being academically motioned is to use Homo bodoensis to describe most Middle Pleistocene humans from Africa and part of south-east Europe.  Those from continental Europe are to be reclassified as Neanderthals.  Regardless, this proposed species is added to a burgeoning (and often contradictory) pantheon of hominoids.  

Proponents say it "is necessary to provide clarity to this period."  Clarity?  Uh, not so much.  Several scientific peers reviewing this proposal are uncertain that it clarifies anything.  What paleo-anthropologists refer to as the "muddle in the middle" remains.  (Middle Pleistocene is a geologic age.  It too has been renamed.  Apparently it is now supposed to be referred to as Chibanian, and thus avoid hemispheric chauvinism.) 

For my part, I have the temerity to remind readers that my reluctance to adopt such newly declared "direct" species is not the result of brutish ignorance or intractable creationism. If I must endure inevitable sniffs from "scientific" elitists, fine.  Call it being jaded if you must. But "scientists" themselves were the ones responsible for concocting this bushy tree maize of impossible contortions.  They now pretend to "clean up".  Heretofore, these scientists seemed fixed upon the prize of gaining public acclaim...in a quest to have their particular species proposal universally adopted as the new pretender for the "main stem" of current humans. 

Previously stipulated in an earlier post, our "main stem" species already exists.  It is widely known.  Namely, Homo erectus, our indisputable ancestor.  H. erectus used fire, collectively hunted, gathered and even navigated upon the open seas!  Little wonder our actual direct human ancestor spanned Earth at least as late as 1.75 million years ago. Importantly, H. erectus remained in existence (was contemporary to a number of the so-called "direct" human species--including Homo sapiens, which scientists now say they wish to clean up). 

We do not begrudge them their belated efforts. But if the math is correct, H. erectus predates their newly claimed "direct" ancestor, H. bodoensis, by easily over a million years.  Just as easily, H. erectus was contemporary and outlived it on the timeline.  If one assumes Homo erectus was present in time as far back as 2.1 million years ago, little if any real "muddle" exists.  It's quite simple.  Again, H. erectus sailed upon the seas well before the existence of this newly proposed H. bodoensis.  Sailed the seas!...how much more direct and singularly human lineage is required?  Homo erectus is our line. 

Ernst Mayr (1904-2005)

But, Nobel laureates are at stake.  So the grafting (or perhaps grifting) continues, logic notwithstanding.  Elitist sniffs or no, I take the wry view of Ernst Mayr [The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution and Inheritance (1982)].  A recognized giant in evolutionary biology, Mayr (1904-2005) said: "It is curious how often erroneous theories have had a beneficial effect for particular branches of science." 

"All interpretations made by a scientist are hypotheses, and all hypotheses are tentative," Mayr noted. "They must forever be tested and they must be revised if found to be unsatisfactory."  Okay.  That is the theory, at least, of scientific discovery.  Unfortunately, too many cut and paste science, thus cloning errors. Little wonder the human ancestral shrubbery, which has resulted from decades of paleo-anthropologists, needs cleaning up.

Mayr's view [Darwin and the Evolutionary Theory in Biology (1959)] is profound.  The division he draws, in the vernacular, is between "lumpers" and "splitters".  "The ultimate conclusions of the population thinker and of the typologist are precisely the opposite," Mayr said. 

"For the typologist, the type (eidos) is real and the variation an illusion, while for the populationist the type (average) is an abstraction and only the variation is real. No two ways of looking at nature could be more different."  Aye!  

Splitters will ever divide; ever invent new species, most of which are based only on the slimmest of so-called evidence.  If those who seek to "clean up" the ancestral tree are  successful today, doubtless they will find an equal number of grafts--illusions--after only a few decades in the future.  Name seeking and acclaim will be no less then than they are now.  Besides, none of this changes the central fact.  Homo erectus is the ancestral species line of modern humans.  H. erectus walked Earth for nearly two million years.  Assuming variation is the illusion, H. erectus continues to walk this Earth through its progeny, our redundantly (albeit arrogantly) named species Homo sapiens sapiens.  This is already clear.  So, if an argument is to be made here, it would be to lump even further and rename our currently hubris named species as a subspecies, to wit:  Homo erectus sapiens.  But, arrogance is a curious commodity.

A great distance from science perhaps, but William Wordsworth's poetry (1770-1850 AD) is applicable to the vested interests of scientists, should the elitists ever wish to clean up their purportedly noble motives:  

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

...

--Great God! I'd rather be
A pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn

 

Apropos for our day

I have some hard things to say.  Racism.  Even whisper the very word, and the bottom falls out for all manner of primordial pain.  It is the proverbial albatross about our necks hung, to borrow from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The story goes that the Mariner's ship was ice bound in far southern waters.  An albatross appeared, leading them out of the jam.  Yet for sport, the Mariner shot the albatross with a cross-bow.  The omen-fearing crew initially was angry.  The Mariner claimed he shot the bird for bringing the fog and mists.  But when the winds changed fair, the crew supported the Mariner's sport. They were complicit after the fact.  Very much like the zealots who chose the murderer Barabbas at Jerusalem as Christ was dispatched to the Cross--the fruit of which would be the destruction of Jerusalem. 

The Mariner's nightmare followed...his judgment.  Endless misery and horrific suffering, day after day.  "The very deep did rot."  The Mariner cursed it all, until ultimately his own curse was lifted when he "bless'd unawares"  the very same slimy living things moving freely in the sea that he had earlier cursed.

He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all  

Illustration (1876) by Gustave Doré

The Mariner's punishment was that he was forced to walk the Earth and tell his tale.  America increasingly is quite similar.  Allegory perhaps, but Coleridge's Mariner is apropos for our own day when (also for apparent sport) a young black man, Ahmad Aubery was hunted down on the public streets in Georgia, chased by "sportsmen" in pickups who terrorized the young man on foot in a macabre new-aged "team roping" parade.  He was ultimately injured from an intentional vehicular assault and was then surrounded, before the murderous dual shotgun blasts at point blank range ended his young life.

Leaving the gray of the Deep South, the same sort of "sport" has occurred up in Union blue Wisconsin, during protests and violence resulting from the law enforcement shooting of a yet another black man, Jacob Blake.  And though the two young men killed by erstwhile Illini vigilante Ryan Rittenhouse were white, and so too was the paramedic Rittenhouse left severely wounded with a life changing disablement, the cause célèbre is the same.  The dare-we-whisper-word--racism.  

The word is not new in America; nor are the Siren calls for a race war.  Those who seek what the Third Reich would have called der Endlösung stand in absolute opposition to the Gospel.  Despite their purported Christian fundamentalism, they are not Christians.  For racism has no part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

Rembrandt (1626) The Baptism of the Eunuch

After all, St. Philip the Evangelist was called by an angel of God to go to the southern wilderness road from Jerusalem to Gaza.  In that mission, Philip would baptize the first Gentile convert to the newly formed Christian faith--a black man known in Acts 13:1  as Simeon the Black.  

In the Ethiopian Orthodox tradition he is named Bachos.  In Western Europe, he is also known as "Simeon Bachos the Eunuch," so named by St. Irenaeus of Lyons who referred to him in an anti-Gnostic theological work dating to 180 A.D.

Simeon Bachos the Black Ethiopian eunuch and Treasurer of the court of Candace, Queen of Ethiopia, according to the story of his baptism by St. Philip in Acts 8:26-39, was found by Philip reading the Book of Isaiah.  He read without understanding who the Scripture spoke of.  St. Philip the Evangelist shared the good news (euangélion) and unlocked the Scriptures for Simeon the Black.  

Menologian of Basil II (c.1000A.D.) St. Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch

 

The first Gentile to be converted to Christianity--a black man.  And this was very early in the life of the developing Christian Church--before the Apostle Paul was also converted on the road having been stricken with blindness in route to Damascus--before "white" Europe was evangelized.  And well over a millennium and a half before the term "American Christian fundamentalist" was ever heard of.  God brought the Gospel to Africa before any of that.

"What then shall we say in response to these things?" Paul asks in Romans 8:31.  "If God is for us, who can be against us?"  

Paul's question can be stated another way--"If racists in America are against God, how can they stand?"  The answer is, they cannot.  But make no mistake.  We ourselves are also called.  In this day, in this age, in this time...where do we choose to stand?   

Do we rebuke the anti-Christian racists?  Or do we accede, enable, acquiesce, or agree with what can be nothing other that a wrongful act, just like the crew of the Ancient Mariner?  If that is our decision, then surely true Hell awaits us.  And we will not be released therefrom until we too come to the epiphany that God made us all, great and small.  

Racists have Christianity wrong, very wrong.  Prayers are simply words, if they have no love.  The strength of the Law is simply sin, if the Law is not inscribed into our very hearts.  And if it does not live in your heart, then the Law is just as dead as the Ancient Mariner's soul when he sacrificed the albatross and was incarcerated in a hallucinatory watery Hell.

Truly, "The Devil knows how to row!" 

 

Historical Sidebar:

Fresco (1447-1451) Niccoline Chapel by Fra Angelico

The consecration by the Apostle Peter of the Seven Deacons, which included St. Philip the Evangelist, is shown in a fresco in Niccoline Chapel, the most ancient part of the Apostolic Palace. 

According to Acts 6, St. Philip the Evangelist was one of seven chosen (elected) by the Christian community. These seven leaders are often called the Seven Deacons, though the term proto-deacon has been used since these seven predate the organization of deacons). The seven were tasked to administer and care for the daily needs of Jerusalem's Christian community.  The Twelve Apostles called for the election to permit the Apostles to concentrate on Ministry of the Word.  As Acts 6:2 put it:  "It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables."

In the early Christian community, it was one of the first delegations of authority.  Acts 6:3-4.  "Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them."  So, from the very beginnings of the Christian Church, blacks have been an integral part of the fellowship.

Meroë, Kingdom of Kush (i.e. Ethiopia)

Lastly, Candace (or "Kandrake"), Queen of Ethiopia from the brief account recorded in the Book of Acts, more properly should be considered Queen Mother.  The "Meroitic" monarchy was matrilineal. 

The Ethiopian Queen to whom Acts referred was apparently Amanitaraqide (c. 21 - 41 A.D.)  At the time of Acts, Ethiopia was known as the Third Meroitic Kingdom of Kush.  It took its name from Meroë, their capitol city.  Situated in present day Sudan, near the cataracts of the Nile, Meroë (Ethiopia) was considered a trading power in the Red Sea.  So much so it came into conflict with Roman Egypt.  And important enough for Simeon the  Black to be sent there to evangelize.

The Power of an Idea

 

This article will address the power of ideas in a round about look at this thing called evolution.  Only minimal differences exist, we are told, between our human genome and that of other animals, particularly primates.  98.7% of human genetic sequencing is shared with chimpanzees and bonobo.

• 93% with rhesus monkeys
• 90% with house cats
• 85% with mice
• 80% with cows
• 61% with bugs
• And...60% with bananas!

Thus, secularists say human evolution is entirely a matter of genetic sequence.  But, is it? 

       

Little difference, at least numerically, exists between, say, cat and mouse.  Yet one would be hard pressed to say they are similar animals. The question is, with so much variability and so little genetic difference, is human evolution simply a matter of genetics? 

Well, what is it that makes a human a human anyway--given we are so similar genetically to other animals (and apparently to some plants)?  The list of behaviors that define humans is routinely taught in secondary school.  It is quite well known after years of teaching it by rote.  But maybe it shouldn't be, not without a lot of "splain'in to do" as Ricky Ricardo may have put it.

Big on the list, of course, is fire.  Humans, we are told, are the only animals to use fire.  The hubris phrase "control fire" notwithstanding.  (As those of us know here in the Inland Northwest, "control" belongs in quotes.)  But is this true that humans the only animal to use fire?  

Well first, there are three types of fire use--opportunistic, behavioral and obligatory.  The earliest human use of fire was doubtless opportunistic.  But to answer the question, Australia's Aborigines have long known that "fire hawks" use fire to hunt.  Three species of birds of prey fly into wildfire edges to take up burning brands.  They then fly a considerable distance to drop the brands and ignite a new fire.  The intent is to channel prey for easier hunting in a corridor between the infernos.  So, fire use is not exactly unique to humans.

 Next we are told that humans are unique because they can manipulate the environment, design shelter and protection from the elements.  As for birds, many build what are often rather sophisticated nests, so they may dispute that. 

But the true masters in the animal world are beaver, with multi-roomed timber lodges.  And as to control of the environment, beaver often alter the surface hydrology of entire drainage basins for their benefit (much to the chagrin of many a land owner).  So, that ain't unique either. 

Well, then tool use is on the list.  Here, a plethora of examples may be found that neither is that true.  Chimpanzees use sticks to probe termite mounds and harvest what they consider to be delicacies...a stick covered with termites.  Sea otters will use stones on their chests to crack open shellfish--a primitive tool much like human ancestors.  As for fish, one example of tool use is found in the New Testament account [Matthew 17:24-27] of paying the tax at Capernaum.  Peter was dispatched to the Sea of Galilee to take a silver coin out of the fish's mouth to pay it.

Along the north shore of Galilee a native species, Tilapia galilea (St. Peter's fish) is now currently a protected species.  In times of perceived danger, the young fry of this species flee to the protection of their parent's mouth.  But, fry grow and thus eventually they must be "weaned" so to speak by the tilapia parent.  The parent fish takes up a shiny object in its mouth to shoo them off.  Now that is a Scriptural story with multiple meanings perhaps, but is also an example of primitive tool use nevertheless.  So, tools are not the answer either.

Ah, then it is math!  Well, not exactly.

Perhaps in the realm of differential equations it might be true; but as for basic math, several species comprehend it.  Honey bees for example, "calculate" and then communicate (with dance language of a sort) the distances to pollen sources.  Several birds, most notably the raven and the crow, and also the African grey parrot are capable of basic math.  In the grey parrot's case, it understands zero as a place holder.  Something of an intellectual feat of development that.  So basic math is not unique to us.  

Well it's language.  Gotta be.  Okay.  Here, it's sort of yes and sort of no.  First off, language is not unique to humans.  That should be somewhat evident on any walk in the springtime forest, or winter.  Wolves, for example, communicate quite effectively...and over considerable distances.  

Birds do; so do whales; ditto dolphins and interestingly also bats.  Recent linguistic studies deciphered five common phrases used by Egyptian fruit bats in a colony.  Unfortunately like humans, most of that bat language is about bickering for position and space in the colony.

We did mention sort of yes.  It turns out that written language, so far as is known, is unique to humans.  And with it comes a kind of subset.  Namely, the concept of time.

Written language, much like this blog and much like the Sumerian clay tablet shown here dating to about 2000 B.C. (this one lists the amount of wages paid to laborers), can reach forward to generations that are yet to be. Equivalently, written language can also reach back in past generations that are no longer with us.  It can provide an understanding of beliefs, thoughts, emotions, accounts that simply is not known to exist in any other species.   

And humans have long had this "behavior"...dating back tens of thousands of years assuming one considers zoomorphic cave paintings and human hunter caricatures as an early form of written language.  

     

Lastly, the concept of time and the concept of a calendar is perhaps the quintessential trait of humans.  No other species, none that we have knowledge of, has the ability to comprehend eternity, however crude our comprehension of it may be.  But our ancient forebears also had this unique trait to fathom time, and that long before written language was ever known to us. 

From the very beginning, as Genesis reveals, time and eternity are uniquely assigned to the human realm.  It is not instinct.  We alone draw constellations in the vast skies of the universe, mark the comings and goings of eclipses, and solstices.  So ultimately, it is not genetic sequences that define humanity.  That is dust only.  Rather it is the uplifting power of an idea that has transformed us.  This and this alone has raised us into uprightness.   

With this knowledge, whether that be for good or ill, comes our evolving understanding of the creator God who has marked for us the sacred times and days and years.  Those wise, still seek Him.  Those not, are not.

 

Ulterior Designs

On our Easter sojourns to Scotland, Darla's interests and mine are somewhat divergent, perhaps at opposite ends of the tourist spectrum.  This is not to say that these are mutually exclusive.  Merely that they are different.  

2019  Darla, Achamore Gardens, Gigha

Whereas I am inspired by ancient sites and their revelations regarding mortality and the foibles of human kind in a philosophical or historical context, Darla's interests are far more celebratory and immediate--which is to say, she is a gardener.

She takes sheer joy in growing, beautifying.  Indeed, for its location, our Idaho home likely competes with the best of conservatories anywhere.  But if there's a wandering eye or ulterior motive in the girl during our trips to Scotland, it's always on the prowl for new gardening designs.  

For me, it's about the history, the heritage.  As for an immediacy of joyful celebration, that's what pubs are for. 

Lord knows the Brits (including Scots) do love to garden.  They've an embarrassment of riches.  Then again, there's plenty of pubs as well.  It's fortunate that our respective interests during our Scottish sojourns often overlap.  They do not, in other words, conflict. Well...most of the time.

2019  Ogham Stone, Ghigha

The monumental gardens we have visited (and we should even include natural landscapes as sources for ideas) are usually off most tourist radars, or at least American radars.  I must admit, manly or not, visually the riot of color, texture and in some cases the outright strangeness to be seen in these gardens is in itself a reward. 

Being off-season the week before Easter, we are normally in front of the tourist surge, as Europe awakens from its winter.  Beyond the pensiveness we seek in an Easter pilgrimage, practical reasons exist for visiting at this time.  Off -season rates are more affordable.  Weather is generally good.  And, we mostly avoid the crush of tourists from the Continent.    

2017  Daffodils, Kildalton, Islay

Of course there are drawbacks.  If we were just tripping to the U.K. for its gardens, we would delay our visits by about a month because our two-week bookend visits around Easter are also generally in front of the full Spring bloom--except for common gorse (Ulex europaeus) and of course those "daffy down dillies".

Gorse (or "whins" locally) is an odd "evergreen" leguminous genus (20 species; Fabaceae family).  Common gorse is native to western Europe and the British Isles.  Most species of gorse, however, are indigenous to Spain. Between them, gorse is generally always in bloom.  In the U.K. during early Spring right before leaf out, little can compete in the view shed with gorse for color.  Spring is the height of common gorse's bloom. 

More, it is aromatic, with a coconut fragrance that is experienced very strongly by some individuals but only weakly by others.  It's a yin yang thing maybe.  Darla senses gorse's fragrance strongly.  Me?...not so much.  They're pretty to look at, so long as it's over there.      

Common gorse can possibly survive in USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 6a, though we are probably too arid and too cold for it here.  In the western United States (principally along the much wetter west cost from Olympic Peninsula to north California) gorse is said to be invasive.  It has not been found in Idaho.  Still, its invasive potential has given us pause to  introduce it here.  Besides, it is probably considered contraband under the Idaho Code, Title 22, Agriculture and Horticulture, Chapter 19 and the Idaho Invasive Species Act of 2008.  Like I said, it's pretty to look at...over there.

2019  Achamore, antique equipment

I am content to ponder the histories of these living monuments (gardens) and marvel at the conscious decisions, dedication and expense required to bring these into existence...or just as important, the work needed to keep them up. 

We have something like this in mind for our place here in Idaho--with our numerous nascent gardens, orchards, plant beds and borders all demanding time and labor.  

When the trip to Scotland was abruptly halted under international Covid quarantine 8 days before our Easter 2020 trip was to take place, we set about planting apple and pear orchards, tearing down a couple dilapidated outbuildings and reusing any solid material in putting up an open equipment shed.  

We also began clearing our pastures of stones, putting those into gabion walls at the entrance to the "W".  We are now extending the wall along our south pasture line on the county road.  The wall will doubtless be a lifetime task.  It seemingly moves at a snail's pace--or rather, it moves at my pace, which basically says the same thing.  My herculean effort is probably better suited for younger bodies.  So, snail's pace it is then.

By August 2020 last year, the short east side wall at our road entrance was put in.  It runs to the picket fence gate which cannot be walled across because it allows field equipment into our back wheat field.  And the first couple gabion baskets were started on the west wall work.   

Equipment access to wheat fields

The wall is "measured" by rolls of gabion wire used.  In 2020, we bought two 300 foot rolls; and then two more this year.  That is not exactly inexpensive, as 300 feet of wire if formed into cubic baskets will only cover a just over a third of that linear distance. 

August 2020  Extent of the gabion walls

But, the wall is now a landscape feature, as many neighbors have stopped by while I worked the wall and complemented it.  It is definitely more permanent than mere wire.

One might speculate that our mimicking of the quintessential Scottish landscape monuments (i.e. rock field walls) is owed to our nostalgia for Scotland.  Perhaps.  And yes, it is true that stone walls are everywhere to be found across Scotland's landscape.  But actually, our wall building has a practical side.  

Scotland has omnipresent stones that need to be cleared to improve pasture land, as do we.  They decided the best place to put them are in walls.  We concur.  A nice wall sure beats piles of clearance rocks dumped randomly around the field perimeter, and in some instances in the middle of the field.  Good fences make good neighbors and all.

October 2021 Wall progress

By October, I reached the end of the second roll.  With winter coming on, rock clearing and stacking will need to resume again this Spring, 2022 (which we hope means after our Easter sojourn to Scotland, if Covid travel restrictions are finally ended).  

At the same time, we have contracted for new siding and windows for the farmstead, upon our return from Scotland.  The farmhouse is old and desperately needs to be hardened against the weather, if it can be expected to last another 100 years.

2019  The homestead

As to the wall, neither is that only utilitarian.  It has its art.  

We intend to continue the gabion wall roughly a quarter mile.  The rock wall will serve as a horticultural backdrop for a rim of trees and windbreak plantings.  With any luck, and some determination, the landscape feature we are working to put in place should be a joy for generations to come.

That's the inspiration we have taken out of Scotland.  Quite a gift is this sense of working to improve the world one stone at a time.  One can move mountains that way, we are told.

November 2021  Sunset over the vegetable garden

Ramping Up Three Mile Brew Pub Beer

Not quite a year into his Three Mile brew pub proprietorship, Silas has decided that it is time to ramp up beer production. 

Silas after putting up the Three Mile sign

Grangeville, Idaho has some thirsty folks in it.  And keeping those pint glasses brimming with handcrafted beers along with keeping innovative grilled fare plated up has certainly been a chore.  Truth be told, more a chore than the original bargain figured.  

But my oh my.  Locals have sure supported Three Mile, God bless 'em.  They have done so with enthusiasm and good cheer.  After all, the cheer, the joy, was always the point of the whole effort.  

Besides, it was never about being just a bar.  The entire premise was to make a place where the greater Idaho County community could meet, converse, share stories, birthdays, unwind--an Ecclesiastes type of thing.  "Eat, drink and be merry."

Creating a community pub was a key part of the vision, that and of course providing an outlet for his true passion for brewing handcrafted beers and grilling artisan burgers. 

Customers enjoying the pub

Oddly enough, Silas has always enjoyed being host.  He is in his element.  That should come as no surprise.  

Many a weekend night throughout elementary, junior and senior high, he had a contingent of friends staying over at "the Whitley place".  So, Three Mile Brew Pub is simply an extension of his apparent inherent hospitality. 

The immediate problem with all that, however, is the drink.  Demand has been at production capacity.  It has "stretched the chalkboard" tap list, so to speak.  Good beer must ferment, rest, age, chill and carbonate...before putting it into taps.  Generally, that process is at least a month long.  Which means one has to produce a couple months in advance.  And releasing seasonal beers, for example Oktoberfest, needs to be timed with some forethought.

Three Mile's beer list chalkboard

In any case, demand warrants a ramp up.  Of course, to do so with the most advanced units practical can be a knee wobbling step...given the amount of real money involved here. 

Three Mile's new brewery line on pallets

A vastly improved brand new line of brewery equipment arrived at Three Mile's loading doors in late September.  Relative to its overall industry (brew pubs), the new brewery line is  high tech, which translates into "spendy".  Incidentally, as I'm on the other side of the "sturm und drang" days of manhood, it's a good thing Silas runs the show.  His knees are far less wobbly.  

The old system was sort of always a "run just to keep up" thing.  Cobbled together by necessity, in the school of hands-on experience.  It was adequate; and sometimes not so much.  

Old boiler preboil "circ" through hops basket

That said, the current "old" system still makes a good beer.  It was and it remains somewhat ingenious given the level of retrofitting required.  For example, an off shelf pump and some food grade heat tolerant hoses to circulate the mash and pre-boil; or simple copper coils to drive the cooling.  (An aside, wort must be cooled quickly to allow "pitching" the yeast.)  

Yet for all their "country boy" panache, the old boiler units with their accoutrement of retrofitted attachments were somewhat dastardly to deal with.  Many a colorful word hath been spaken from "the pit" of Three Mile's beer making. 

Mash circ coil in old Three Mile system

Transfers from the old boilers onto cooling coils and then into primary fermentation, followed by secondary fermentation and ultimately kegging--can cause quality and consistency issues.  

Besides, that's a lot of handling, which means a lot of labor.  With the new production line coming on, however, much of the beer making can be automated.  Exposure to air is reduced.  In fact, these are all-in-one kettles.  The entire process--except for final kegging--can be done in the unit without transferring anything.

Silas testing the mash colander hoist

The old system served Three Mile well.  Once the new line comes on, the old boilers will be pulled off production.  (They already have been even though they were used this week to run a bock beer.)  That said, they will be kept for experimental beers and as relief production should demand next summer continue to increase.  

Old boiler pair under cooling

The expectation--perhaps Dickensian great expectations--for the new system is that it should be capable of producing three 1/2 barrels for every one 1/2 barrel made off the old system.  So a labor savings--if one can ignore the upfront purchase cost of the new production line. 

Speaking of labor, getting the new line up has been work--an exponential work in a way.  There's always something.  And, there's still the pub to run and the restaurant side with the need to push out those 1/2 barrel runs from that old boiler system to meet demand as the new line is being laid in.

Grangevillians are no less thirsty now with winter setting in than they were when the drought turned the soil to powder earlier this summer.  But soon, the "Old Man in the Pit" should start gaining on all the drafts going out.  Getting some keg inventory up is crucial--after all, there's the pending Easter sojourn to Scotland coming up.  And we don't want to leave our neighbors high and dry.  More beer is always a good thing.

Three Mile pale ale with a cubano at the bar