Altoona

The Rise and Fall of America’s Forgotten Railroad Empire: Altoona, Pennsylvania
Paul McAllister

I recognize the name Altoona, but I don't know why. It feels like it was the name of a town in a story I read a long time ago, and then I watched the video about Baldwin Locomotives and I got a clue. Now this video pops up and it becomes clear that Altoona was big deal for a long time and maybe the name just kind of seeped into our culture without anyone noticing.

Video paints a pretty good picture of the rise and fall of Altoona. Gets kind of long winded and repetitive towards the end, but pretty good overall.

Not all of the images shown are accurate. For example, towards the end, just after the 34 minute mark, there is shot of a big steel mill. There was never a big steel mill like this in Altoona. The image is of Bethlehem Steel located along the Lehigh River in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

The Madness - Netflix Series

The Madness | Official Trailer | Netflix
Netflix

Excellent. The Madness they are talking about might just be the political firestorm that seems to have engulfed this country. This show pulls several threads into a perfect shit-storm. We've got competing, militant, fringe political groups raising Cain. We've got a black man (Colman Domingo) trying to report a crime in the Poconos, a well-to-do area, for which there is no evidence. We've got social media going haywire and doxxing the black man and his family. The biggest problem so far is that the black man, a well known TV commentator, is trying to untangle this mess all by himself. He really needs some expert help. We'll see if he gets any.