IN HOC SIGNO VINCES

[Sherwood, Harrison]

>From: 	David Casseres

>Andrew sez
>[question about the motto IN HOC SIGNO VINCES scratched in the bark of a 
>tree at the launch site, and account, from Heppenheimer, of an early 
>Soviet launch on July 11 (my birthday!):]
>
>>....As it rose and began to tilt the cruciform arrangement of
>>    its engines placed a fiery cross in the sky. The Roman emperor
>>    Constantine, early in the 4th century, had seen just such a
>>    vision, accompanied by the words *In hoc signo vinces*. But in
>>    that sign Korolev would not conquer, for the rocket went out of
>>    control and disintegrated.
>
>Lovely!

Koyaanisqatsi!
Koyaanisqatsi!
Koyaanisqatsi!

Anybody remember the ultimate scene from that flick? They showed it on
PBS sometime early in the second Reagan Administration, and I had just
finished my second re-reading of GR in a year. The tenor of the times,
the literature I'd been soaking in, and perhaps a healthy dollop of
Colonel Washington's kindest crop, combined to just blow-torch my poor,
battered brain to a crispy, crackly crunch that nite. I wept and held my
lover close, begging her for Valium and an assurance that it was OK to
be human. I had nightmares for weeks afterward.

Seems like about a week later the Challenger went flooey.

Harrison

P.S. I resented my mother's preachiness in 1969, when she kept muttering
about how many poor children the cost of the Lunar Module alone would
>have fed. Jeeze, Mom, it's just people walking on the Moon and all...