Anyway, this particular email mentioned a breed of cupcake called the Hi Hat. The showy dessert is a chocolate cupcake topped with a whipped, marshmallow-y icing dipped in chocolate that hardens into a shell.
It reminded me of some soft-serve ice cream cones I've seen the kids get (Krispy Kreme and Dairy Queen come to mind).
So, we decided we had to try it!
We baked a go-to chocolate cake recipe, whipped up a meringue-powder based icing (I wasn't comfortable using raw egg whites), and then dipped it in the prescribed melted semi-sweet chocolate chips with a little canola oil added.
It was a messy process, but the kids had fun dipping them. Then came the hard part ... waiting for them to harden.
We put them in the fridge to help them along, but in about an hour, they were set up and ready for the kids to test drive. They were a BIG HIT!
HISTORY DETECTIVES: We wanted to take the dogs for a walk this afternoon, and I thought to take them to some property we happened upon while hitting garage sales last weekend. It was on the outskirts of the Discovery Park boundaries we know, and clearly former Fort Lawton property.
When we passed through last week, it looked like a modern day ghost town. Intrigued, we wanted to do a little detective work.
This abandoned building, in particular, intrigued me, due to its mid-century modern architectural style. We parked in its lot and circled around it on foot. If you look closely, you'll spy the kids peering in a window.
While there was (clearly!) no closed-circuit phone for us to use, we did, at least, get a really good clue about the building ... its name! We looked forward to getting home to Google search "Leisy building Fort Lawton."
As we stood in the outside entry area of the building I told the kids to take a big whiff. "This is what the '60s smelled like," I told them. Even though it was outdoors, it reeked of stale cigarette smoke.
We continued our walk, heading for another article of architectural intrigue, a brick column.
As we approached it, we found there were some concrete pads in a field above it.
We'd love to know what they were used for. The kids guessed it a helicopter pad. I thought it was a bit small for that.
As we neared the chimney, we took a closer look at the small sign near its top.
We puzzled over what, exactly, it was, and what it meant/stood for. To me, that top part looks like an axe head, but it's so out of scale compared to what seems to be clearly a mountain and an evergreen.
Once down next to the chimney (after braving some blackberry brambles), we found ourselves standing atop a concrete bunker roughly 20-by-20 feet in size.
It clearly had electrical service. ... So intriguing. It also had a lovely view of Shilshole Bay.
Annabelle spied something of great interest atop the bunker ...
A fuzzy caterpillar!!! Cute, but of little historical significance, I'd say.
When we got home, we started hitting up "the Google" and found out all sorts of interesting things!
Leisy was (posthumously) awarded The Congressional Medal of Honor on December 16, 1971, by then-Vice President of the United States of America, Spiro T. Agnew.
So there you have it, 'mystery' (to us) solved about the building's name.
But what about that brick chimney? From an archived story on The Seattle Times' site from 2005, we found reference to the brick pillar. The story was in conjunction with the announcement was made by the Pentagon that Fort Lawton would be surplussed. It said, in part, "The most historic structure may be a brick smokestack. Col. Mike Pierce, who is stationed at Fort Lawton, said it's all that's left of an incinerator where the Army once burned mule carcasses."
So there you have it, 'mystery' (to us) solved about the building's name.
But what about that brick chimney? From an archived story on The Seattle Times' site from 2005, we found reference to the brick pillar. The story was in conjunction with the announcement was made by the Pentagon that Fort Lawton would be surplussed. It said, in part, "The most historic structure may be a brick smokestack. Col. Mike Pierce, who is stationed at Fort Lawton, said it's all that's left of an incinerator where the Army once burned mule carcasses."
So there you have it. The chimney was for smoke from burning mules. And probably other stuff. ...
From the city of Seattle's site, we learned Fort Lawton was established in 1900. At its peak, the fort covered 700 acres on the western tip of Magnolia bluff. It was named in honor of Maj. General Henry Lawton, a veteran of the Civil and Spanish American wars. Fort Lawton was the second largest deployment site on the West Coast during WWII. Beginning in 1964, Fort Lawton started to be decommissioned, with 85 percent of it declared surplus. In 1972, land given back to the Seattle community was turned into Discovery Park.
In 2005, what was left of Fort Lawton (38 acres) was declared surplus, hence the abandoned buildings and grounds we were exploring today.
NASA NEWS: So much news from our national space agency this week, I can't begin to disseminate it all. But two points of immediate concern: a SpaceX launch to the International Space Station tonight (11:14 p.m. Pacific Coast time!) It's SpaceX's fourth cargo mission to the ISS. This go 'round, there are 2.5 tons of supplies on board, including critical materials to support 255 science and research investigations that will occur during the station's Expeditions 41 and 42.
And on Sept. 20, MAVEN will insert itself into orbit around Mars. The orbiter was launched on Nov. 18 of 2013, and after 442 million miles (711 million kilometers), it's in great shape to get ready to do a science. :)
I know that name Bob Leisy..I graduated in 1966, but I wonder if he was a friend of Kenny's??
ReplyDeleteI figured one of you QAHS alums reading this would recognize the name, given the year he graduated. How sad he died so young. :(
DeleteOne of many - and sad that it continues today.........we can be glad our sons at least have the choice these days. The draft looming overhead was tough on the guys.
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