Higgins Armory Essay Armor serves a very simple purpose. Its job is to protect the wearer from injury and death during battle. The complex part of armor however, is how it has evolved over the years. Going from the good old knights wearing a full suit of plate armor, to wearing just a helmet, the Higgins Armory shows a great representation of both the simple use of armor, as well as the complexity of how it evolved, and what weapons were used against the different types of armor, and of course what weapons were used with armor. Armor in the dark ages started being seen around 600-700 C.E. At this point, mostly mail armor was used due to it being light, but still very defensive. A mail chest piece if thousands of tough rings that are interlocked together, so that 5 rings are all interlocked, meaning it is almost impossible to slash through or stab it. Crushing weapons however, could dent the armor, and thus the knight as well, creating quite a problem. This was a main reason that as the dark ages went in to the middle ages, and then the renaissance, plate started to be more in use. The Higgins museum shows a good timeline and very well describes when and how these changes happened, and of course it has lots of armor to show it visually. Why did mail start fading away? It became too complex to make (thousands of interlocking rings) and it became less suitable for the new technology of weapons being invented every day. Another main reason is that plate armor started to begin to become just as flexible and move-able as mail. This is demonstrated with many examples at Higgins, when a full suit of plate armor is run, jumped in, sat down in, and even sprinted in. Craftsmen, began developing ways to interlock the armor with joints similar to that of a humans without creating crevices in the armor. As mail began fading out due to the more popular plate, two other uses for armor began developing. This first example is dress armor. Higgins shows a great contrast in what makes dress armor and combat armor different. Dress armor is lavishly designed and sometimes painted, as well as many carvings and etchings to show off great wealth in the family. Generally, this kind of armor would not be used in combat due to it being so light and thin, and also many gaps. The other kind of armor, aside from combat armor, is tournament armor. This kind of protection would only be used in jousting and other combat games due to the way it is built. The Higgins has many full suits of both tournament and combat armor, and at first glance they might seem almost identical. The little details though, could prove big when you step into one or the other. First off, tournament armor is the most defensive armor, which also makes it by far the heaviest. Also, the ability to move and flex around is nearly impossible. The helmet is in fact bolted onto the breastplate, and there are no weak gaps, as to hope that no one gets killed in a simple game of jousting. The last main difference between the two, is the helmet. First, what exactly is jousting. It is when two horse-mounted knights charge at each other with a 14 foot long lance and try to de-mount the other one. The lances, being made out of wood, will splinter upon impact, creating large, sharp, fast-moving particles of wood. If these splinters were to hit in say, the chest or the eyes, it was not uncommon that that could easily kill. Knights weren’t stupid though, and they tried to make sure hat wouldn’t happen. The first is the armor, but the second is the helmet. In addition to being locked in place, the visor is actually at around the position of the forehead. As the knights approach, they lean down so they can see, and at the last second move up to protect their face. This ensured a lot less death in jousting. Armor is of course only one side of the story. Something had to be used both against it, and with it. A knights most used weapon is his lance. What is a lance. It is pretty much a 14 foot stick that tapers down to a sharp metal point at the end, perfect for jabbing and stabbing enemies on foot, when the knight is on horse. The problem with the lance is that it splinters after being used, so a knight will always carry a sword. Also, the richer knights in the 1500’s would carry around 5 loaded up pistols. Since back then they were so complicated to use, loading and re-loading was a real, so knights just prepared them in advance. As guns started being developed though, is when armor started fading away. As far as weapons used against knights ,the most common thing was a spear or a pole arm. A pole arm is a long 18-foot wooden staff with a metal point, prong, fork, spoon, bill, or any variation on the end, as long as its sharp. Hundreds of different varieties were made, and the Higgins has tons of them, ranging from a simple stick with a point, to the very complicated pole arms that were developed for maximum use. The main two advantages of the spear and pole arm is that they are longer than a lance, and also much more durable. They could be used over and over again, and as the pole arms became wackier and wackier in prongs, forks, and bills, new mechanics were developed to find the best way to pull a knight off his horse, or puncture that plate armor, or grab his sword right out of his hand! Even spears, just like swords, lances, plate and chain mail started fading away due to one concept, that would change warfare for the next 600 and more years, guns. This essay can definitely has information that can be extracted, but not sight, sound, or feel. That is the job of the Higgins Armory. While not many items can be touched, the very fact of seeing them a couple of feet away allows you to visualize in your mind of what it would be like to use arms and armor, instead of just using a wall of text. As said before, Higgins shows the drastic differences in combat, parade, and tournament armor, as well as the ultimate changes and finally demise in armor as guns started becoming the weapon of most combat. The Higgins is a worthwhile visit, and it is definitely not just a big building with identical gray suits of armor. It is much more, as is armor itself. However, you cannot go to Higgins and expect the armor to teach you the facts, there is a process of interpreting all the information to make sense with each other. The final thing to be said, is that the best thing done by Higgins is showing what it was really, for knights were not just people in perfect armor, with a shining sword and beautiful horse, there is so much more.

Higgins Museum Essay Evaluation 3 -- Outstanding 2 -- Ok, but could use some improvement 1-- Needed improvement 0 --- Missing Introduction 1 Gave the reader background and general information about the museum --- set the scene. 2 Transitions to the body of the essay. (Three things that can be learned by a visit to the museum) Body 3 Three topics were addressed, each with its own paragraph 2 Topics were clearly explained and used researched supporting details & vocabulary Conclusion 3 Restated topic --- What can be learned at the museum? 3 Brought closure to essay (Summed up essay) Structure 3 Essay format followed the directions for assignment 3 Spelling 2 Capitalization (Used correct capitalization) Comments: Very good supporting details and an excellent conclusion. The introduction doesn't set the scene of the museum (who,what where), in fact you do more of that in the conclusion. Watch your organization of information, the 2nd body paragraph really has more than one subject. The essay also needed more researched vocabulary.

Here is my spreadsheet for week 22 of the stock program. As you can see, I am earning a solid thousand dollars in Apple, and everythign else is earning me a couple hundred bucks. Also, the DJIA passed over 11,000 points a couple of days ago.

My story takes place in northern Maine, Sugarloaf Ski Resort to be exact, and it was Thursday morning of February vacation. The previous night we had heard that there was a chance of snow, and it had already started snowing. When we woke up that Thursday, our cars were buried in two and a half feet of snow, and it ws still dumping. The house we had rented for the week was taken Thursday night, and hotels were booked everywhere. We had no choice but to try and drive right through it. One hour in we were only 15 miles out, and we had a 550 mile drive left, going down a highway at 20 miles per hour. As we were getting out of the mountains on to regular flatlands, we had one more large hill to pass. The snow continued to fall, and it was definately a blizzard. As we neared the top of the will, with our two-wheel drive car, and with some four wheel drive SUV's and trucks all around, the car started to stall! We had just enough energy left to pull over, but it was still a scary moment, stalling at the top of a hill, in a blizzard, with a bunch of 4 axel trucks behind you. We waited for them to pass, and restarted the car to get back on the road. A couple of hours later, as we started to leave the mountains and snow turned to rain, the car caught a bad curve and the road, and we skidded off, narrowly missed a telephone pole, and went to a stop a foot in front of a large stump. The snow that turned to rain basically hydroplaned our car off the road, and for the next couple of minutes we were terrified. However, as we made it farther south around lower Maine, the weather eased off and we made the rest of the trip back home fine.

This is my wordle'd version of my weather story!

This is my stock market spreadsheet, showing the gains and losses that I made in week 20 of the stock program. As shown above, I am making lots of money mostly in Apple, and I am making a little bit of cash in IBM (International Business Machines) and Activision-Blizzard. Google however, is losing money for me, but at one point I was making hundreds of dollars. The stock unit is very interesting, and will give me good insight if I ever want to actually invest in real stocks.

     For my LA speech I talked about a job that I had in the summer; I took care of chickens on a farm. It was a great experience and was very interesting, and I had a steady income from selling eggs at a farmers' market. Every day I would go to the pen and feed them inside the coop, and then fill up their water troughs. I would then head back inside with some buckets and fill them to the lid with the day's eggs. I would make this routine every morning, and at around lunchtime on Wednesdays I would bring them to the market, and come back later for my profits. I had to sell the chickens in late fall due to minimal daylight and snow. However, I will most likely resume in early to mid spring.