Introduction To This Blog System

                                                                                                                                                                                                  

Image used by permission

Postings may be later combined into a compound posting on this blog. Many of the postings concern my observations in various branches of science, but there are also many on technology, religion, economics and, general world issues.

I would really like to thank everyone who reads any of these blogs for your interest.

 

SCIENCE WRITING

 

Most of the postings on this blog are visits to various places around the world, and articles about such topics as history and religion. But much of the writing is about science. I do not write about what is already known but only if I can write something new, or at least a new way of looking at things.

 

If you would like a quick background in the science and mathematics that everyone should really know in the 21st Century, the posting "Scientific Literacy" provides this in about a hundred paragraphs. Similarly, "The Way Things Work" provides a quick background in everyday technology.

 

I am a Christian and I want to show that belief in God is not unscientific at all. I was interested in science long before I was interested in religion, and have never had any trouble believing that God created everything.

 

There are five major scientific theories, each arranged in the form of a textbook. The first four of the following five are on this blog.

 

"The Theory Of Stationary Space" is my cosmological theory of how so much revolves around time being explained by us being in four-dimensional space, with the dimension that we cannot access being perceived as time. This is my version of string theory, with matter actually being strings in four dimensions rather than particles in three dimensions. Everything is ultimately based on negative and positive electric charges, with energy being able to overcome the laws of attraction and repulsion of electric charges. No one has ever explained exactly what time is, and a myriad of explanations of other things fall right into place around it.

 

"The Flow Of Information Through The Universe" is about how so much can be explained by seeing how there is a limited amount of information, and it must be the same information that constructs the highest levels as the lowest levels. A ready example is how the orbits of planets around the sun is based on the orbitals of electrons around the nucleus, in the atoms of which the sun and planets are composed. This concept is extremely useful because, understanding this, we can study things that we cannot directly see by analyzing things that we can see because all must be built on the same information.

 

"The Theory Of Complexity" is about what information actually is, how energy and information is really the same thing, and how we see the universe as we do because of our perspective of being at a higher level of information than our inanimate surroundings.

 

"The Lowest Information Point" is about how, since information and energy is really the same thing and the universe always seeks the lowest energy state, it also always seeks the "Lowest Information Point". So much is explained by how the universe prefers equalities to inequalities and related ratios where the numerator of one ratio is also the denominator of the other. This explains so much from why dust particles are as big as they to why the planets and stars are the scale that they are.

 

"The Story Of Planet Earth", on the geology blog, is about how virtually every major feature of the earth's surface, both on land and seafloor, can be explained by lines of magma emergence from below that were affected by the landing of three Continental Asteroids. Many people believe that land originated from a past "super-continent", but there is no explanation of where it came from.

 

There are a few of what we could call "minor" theories, where there is not as much written as with the major theories. On this blog, there is "How Biology And Human Life Fits Into Cosmology". On the meteorology and biology blog, there is my theory of the nature of water, "Water Made Really Simple".

 

There are compound postings about science which are groupings of writing about a certain topic.

 

Scientific compound postings include, "Computer Science", "Atomic Science", "Measurement", "A Celebration Of The Inverse Square Law", "Our Solar System", "Mind-Bending Cosmology", "The Configuration Of The Solar System Made Really Simple", "In Appreciation Of Electrons", "The Science Of Human Society " and "Orbital And Escape Velocities And Impacts from Space".

 

Compound postings about history and the world include "The House Of Holy Wisdom, Where The Modern World Began", "Niagara Stories", "Economics", "How History Repeats Itself", "The Meaning Of Freedom", "The Western Hemisphere", "Our Language" and, "America And The Modern World Explained By Way Of Paris".

 

There are two compound postings about prophecies and the Bible. There is "The Aztec Prophecy" than, for prophecies that are directly made in the Bible there is "New Insight Into Bible Prophecy".

 

"Investigations" is the compound posting that is a collection of any posting about an investigation.

 

The rest of the postings are individual postings. For more detailed information about this blog, see the posting "Thanks To Readers". For general topics of conversation, see "Thoughts And Observations", on the world and economics blog.  

Other Blogs And Books

                                                                                                                                             

Lights at night 

Here is a quick look at my other blogs before you start this one.

On this blog, you can see a list of all postings by clicking on the year or month to the right. But on the topical blogs, that is not the case. If you click on a year or month on those blogs, it will display the postings themselves, but the list on the right will still only show those postings that were added most recently.

To access a list of all postings on those blogs, it is necessary to click on the arrow in front of the year or month in question.

http://www.markmeekeconomics.blogspot.com/ is about economics, history and, general human issues.

http://www.markmeekprogress.blogspot.com/ concerns progress in technology and ideas.

http://www.markmeekearth.blogspot.com/ is my geology and global natural history blog for topics other than glaciers. My natural history blogs concerning the impact of glaciers is http://www.markmeekworld.blogspot.com/ .

http://www.markmeekniagara.blogspot.com/ is about new discoveries concerning natural history in the general area of Niagara Falls.

http://www.markmeeklife.blogspot.com/ is my observations concerning meteorology and biology.

http://www.markmeekphysics.blogspot.com/ is my blog about physics and astronomy.

http://www.markmeekcosmology.blogspot.com/ is my version of string theory that solves many unsolved mysteries about the underlying structure and beginning of the universe.

http://www.markmeekpatterns.blogspot.com/ details my work with the fundamental patterns and complexity that underlies everything in existence.

 http://www.markmeekreligion.blogspot.com/ is my religion blog.

 http://www.markmeekcreation.blogspot.com/ is proof that there must be a god.

http://www.markmeekphotos.blogspot.com/ is my travel photos of Europe.

On my photo blogs, Blogspot will not hold all of the photos in each blog in a straight line. To see all of the photos, you must click on the bottom posting listed on the right at the top of the blog after seeing all that there are in the initial showing. The last posting in the North America blog should be "Tijuana, Mexico" and the last posting in the Europe blog should be "Notre Dame Cathedral Door And Arc De Triomphe, Paris". Each photo in the photo blogs can be clicked on to enlarge it to full screen.

My autobiography is http://www.mark-meek.blogspot.com/

My books can be seen at http://www.bn.com/ http://www.amazon.com/ or, http://www.iuniverse.com/ just do an author search for "Mark Meek".   

Happy St. George's Day

April 23 is St. George's Day, my native England's national day. Here are links to the relevant postings on this blog.

"The Royal Story" reviews the British Royal Family from the beginning, and how it got to where it is today.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2020/12/the-royal-story.html?m=0

"Royal Observations" is my observations about British Royalty.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2020/12/royal-observations.html?m=0

"America And Royalty" is about how America is as royal as anywhere, even if it is officially a republic.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2022/09/america-and-royalty.html?m=0

Our visit to "London" has a lot about British Royalty. 

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2022/09/london.html?m=0

"Placid Britain" is the immediate area of where I was born.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2017/06/placid-britain.html?m=0

"Gloucestershire And Herefordshire" is the wider area.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2016/05/gloucestershire-and-herefordshire.html?m=0

"British Photo Project" is the attempt to photograph and link all of Britain and Ireland. This is around where I was born.

www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2015/02/british-photo-project.html?m=0

This is a review of some of what England has contributed to the world.

www.markmeekeconomics.blogspot.com/2012/11/a-celebration-of-my-native-england.html?m=0

Remember that the green of this blog represents the green fields around where I came from. Images from Google Street View on road that goes from Berry Hill, through Bicknor, to Lower Lydbrook.

This is looking over Drybrook from Harrow Hill.

There is discussion nowadays of raising one's own chickens, due to grocery prices. That has long been done around where I was born. Here is one backyard coop. Image from Google Street View.

Along The Heaven Road

Let's celebrate St. George's Day by having a look at a country road near where I was born. After completing high school in the U.S. I visited my native England. While looking around I happened to walk the road from Berry Hill through Bicknor to Lower Lydbrook.

Maybe I was just used to living in a city but the thought occurred to me that I might have died without remembering it and now I was walking in Heaven. I wanted to walk the Heaven Road again but never got around to it. But now there is Google Street View so that we can visit it here.

The next day I first saw Gloucester Cathedral again. It was like this road was a glimpse of what Heaven looked like and the cathedral was the way to Heaven. After becoming a Christian I realized that God had tried to get my attention several times before finally succeeding.

Anyway here is along the Heaven Road.

America's Resolute Desk

I am going to make the claim that the wood from which the main desk used by U.S. presidents almost certainly came from my native Forest of Dean. The three images in this posting are from the Wikipedia article "Resolute Desk".

This is a drawing of the desk.

Most U.S. presidents in the last sixty years have used what is known as the Resolute Desk as their main working desk.

The desk has long been representative of the ties between the U.S. and Britain. This is Margaret Thatcher looking at the desk while visiting Jimmy Carter.

In the late Nineteenth Century a wooden British ship, HMS Resolute, was decommissioned and dismantled. Some items were constructed from the wood of the ship, since such ships were built of high-quality hardwoods.

Among those items was a desk that was gifted to the United States by Queen Victoria. It is the desk used by most presidents today as their main desk.

Britain is a densely-populated land, without a lot of forest. But, in the days of wooden ships, a naval power was absolutely dependent on having a supply of trees that were suitable for building ocean-going ships.

My native Forest of Dean was recognized as having the best-quality ship timber. The wood that built the Mayflower was cut from within walking distance of where I was born. The Forest of Dean was long Britain's strategic timber reserve, which is no doubt why it ended up being as well-preserved as it has.

Britain's two most prominent naval figures from the days of wooden ships, Sir Francis Drake and Admiral Nelson, were both very protective of the Forest of Dean.

Admiral Nelson wrote a letter to the king explaining how essential it is to protect this forest. Admiral Nelson gave his view that more oaks must be planted because acorns often get eaten by animals before they have the chance to grow into trees. He even requested that the navy be given supervision over this essential forest.

My conclusion is that it can be stated with near-certainty that the wood which comprises America's Resolute Desk, where some of the world's most important decisions are made and paperwork signed, originally came from the Forest of Dean.

Planes And Adjustable Wrenches

An important company in the early development of aircraft was the Gloucestershire Aircraft Company. For some reason, so many people misspelled it that it was shorted to "Gloster". It is unfortunate that the company is known for warplanes, rather than civilian aircraft, but during the Second World War the Allies fielded only one jet plane. It was the Gloster Meteor, and was made in my native Gloucestershire. Image from the Wikipedia article "Gloster Meteor".

Adjustable wrenches are found in toolboxes across the world, along with a hammer and screwdriver it is the most common tool. In some countries it is called a "spanner". Adjustable wrenches were invented in Gloucestershire by Edwin Budding, who also invented the lawnmower. Image from the Wikipedia article "Adjustable Spanner".

Charles Wheatstone was from Gloucester and his electric telegraph was the first step toward modern electronic communications.

The PIN Number Song

England has traditionally lagged in music. From central Europe came musical figures like Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, Chopin and Paderewski. England didn't really have a music genre of it's own like Opera or Flamenco.

But it made up for it during the Rock Music era. What I wonder is how many people, who came of age during the late 1970s or early 1980s especially those with a connection to Britain, have used 5705 as a PIN number. This was the 1978 song from the Birmingham band called City Boy. They weren't well-known other than for this song.

Maybe the song, which is about a phone number, came a couple of decades too early. But when the technology came along that required coming up with a four-digit PIN number that we won't forget, how many people are there who immediately thought of 5705?

This song was made for PIN numbers.

English Occupational Names

I find it really interesting how daily life in England centuries ago is reflected in so many surnames in English-speaking countries today. These are the so-called "occupational names" that refer to the occupation of the bearer of the name or his descendants. The fact that a person has one of these names does not today mean that he or she has any English blood or any connection to England.

From the preparation of food come surnames like Miller, Baker, Cook and, Brewer. The construction of homes and other buildings gives us common names such as Carpenter, Mason, Sawyer, Plumber and, Thatcher. Those who procured or dealt in building materials might be tagged with names like Wood, Stone or, Clay.

The making of cloth and clothing gave us names which include Spinner, Weaver, Tanner, Taylor (the occupation now spelled "tailor") and, Shoemaker. The dying of cloth is probably the origin of the color names, the most common of which are Green, White, Black and, Brown.

General craftsmanship brought into being names such as Smith, Wright, Carver, and Cooper. Smith is a general industrial term for someone who works with something such as blacksmith or goldsmith. A wright is a builder of something such as boatwright. A cooper is a maker of those ubiquitous wooden barrels of years past.

There are names requiring no explanation such as Hunter, Archer, Planter, Fisher, Shepherd, Gardner and, Butler. The name Shepherd is today spelled in several different ways. Those involved in building or operating the vehicles of the day might be named Carter, Cartwright or, Wheeler. Those otherwise involved in transportation could be named Walker or Porter. Makers of music or musical instruments could be called Singer, Bugler, Bell or, Stringer. One who makes announcements or announces news may be named Crier.

Then there is the names associated with royalty, nobility or, status: King, Queen, Lord, Duke, Knight and, Freeman. People with these names would have worked for the national or local royalty or nobility in some way. There are several common surnames associated with religion like Church, Bishop and, Abbot. There are surnames like Barber, Minter and, Cutler. A minter is one who makes money (literally) and a cutler is one who makes knives. Finally, we have the terrain or location surnames including: Marsh, Field or Fields, Street, Rivers, Woods, Hill and, Park or Parker.

Notice that names such as Farmer, Miner and, Sailor are quite rare. This is self-explanatory. These occupations included so many people that if they were given to everyone in that particular line of work, the name would be so widespread as to be near-meaningless. The purpose of a name is, after all, to distinguish one from another. I get the impression that there was a lot of multitasking centuries ago and the name Smith is so common because it indicated a general craftsman or jack-of-all-trades.

These were all working-class names and would not be found in the upper classes. I find it significant that the religious names like Bishop and Abbot are those that would apply to Catholicism. There are few names that would have originated from the advent of the Protestant version of Christianity or with the printing industry, both of which became very important factors in the England of the 16th Century. I take this to mean that these occupation names had already become well-established a considerable amount of time before then.

Charles I And II

The present king is Charles III. Let's have a look at the first two King Charles. The two were father and son, during the Stuart Dynasty at a time of great turmoil. Charles I was overthrown and executed by the forces of Oliver Cromwell. The future Charles II famously escaped by hiding in an oak tree. Charles I was the son of James I, who we saw in the posting "Hampton Court Palace And The King James Bible", July 2016.

We saw "Along London's Royal Route", August 2024. The last time that this was used for a coronation procession was for Charles II. That was long before Buckingham Palace and the route ended at the former Whitehall Palace.

These two kings are important because the events of their time set the pace for how countries would be governed.

What is referred to as the English Civil War was actually several separate conflicts. The war resulted in the execution of King Charles I, and the exile of his son who would eventually reign as Charles II. The monarchy was replaced with first the Commonwealth of England and then the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell.

This interruption in the monarchy is sometimes referred to as the Interregnum and lasted from 1649-1660. What is known as the Restoration brought the monarchy back, and ended the Interregnum, in 1660. One parliament, known as the Rump Parliament, opposed the execution of Charles I. It was replaced by the Protectorate Parliament, but the rump parliament was brought back prior to the Restoration of the monarchy.

Oliver Cromwell, who ruled as Lord Protector during the interruption in the monarchy, turned down being king himself, which would have begun a new dynasty, because he thought it was his divine mission to abolish the monarchy. But after Cromwell's death, his son did not inspire the same confidence. This is what led to the end of the Interregnum and the Restoration of the monarchy.

Margaret Thatcher was a rightward modern political form of the Interregnum. Notice how history repeats itself in the similarity of the time and dates. The Interregnum lasted for eleven years, from 1649 to 1660. The term of Margaret Thatcher also lasted for eleven years and the dates were from one that ended with a 9 to one that ended with a 0, 1979 to 1990.

The English Civil War was fought between the Royalists, supporters of the monarchy, and the Parliamentarians, supporters of the parliament. The Royalists are sometimes referred to as Cavaliers, and the Parliamentarians as Roundheads. The Royalists won the early battles but the turning point seems to have been, in military terms, the Siege of Gloucester. The Royalists failed to capture Gloucester from the Parliamentarians, and after that it was they who won most of the battles.

The war ended with a Parliamentarian victory. The future King Charles II famously escaped, following defeat at Worcester, by hiding in an oak tree. His father, Charles I, was beheaded at the Banqueting House on January 30, 1649.

This war is usually portrayed in religious terms. The religious side of the war was that it was between the Puritan Parliamentarians and the Anglican Royalists.

This was 130 years after the Reformation had begun, but it was not a Protestant-Catholic conflict. It was between two factions of Protestants. The Puritans were extremely conservative Protestants who wanted nothing to do with any kind of compromise with Catholicism. The Anglicans, in contrast, thought it best to establish a national church that was a compromise between such extreme Protestants and the remaining Catholics.

But what I want to point out today is the very long-lasting political influence of this war. It literally changed the way that the world is governed.

The French Revolution, which came 140 years later, is generally considered as the launching of the modern political era. But this much lesser-known and less-widespread war is what set the precedence for it.

The French revolutionaries had a lot in common with the Puritans, even if they did want to abolish conventional religion. The military leader that Napoleon was, having his power base neither in royalty nor religion, had it's prototype in Oliver Cromwell and the Protectorate which was direct military rule that was not subservient to either king or church.

The executions in France of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, their rule replaced by a series of committees, first the Committee of General Defense, then the Committee of Public Safety, then the Directory, followed by the military rule of Napoleon parallels the execution of Charles I, his rule replaced by the Committee of Safety to set the precedence of the country being governed as a republic, but being superceded by the military rule of Oliver Cromwell. The restoration of the Bourbon Dynasty after the time of Napoleon, relatives of the executed king, is very much a reflection of the restoration of the English monarchy, the son of the executed Charles I, after the time of Oliver Cromwell.

There was a lot of similarity between the organizations set up to administer the country after the execution of Charles I in England, the Committee of Safety which was set up by parliament, and the series of French revolutionary organizations which governed the country during the revolution. The French Royalty was executed and the National Assembly was ultimately formed to replace them, making the country a republic. In England in a similar way but over a century earlier, Charles I was executed by the forces of parliament, whose rule replaced his.

U.S. independence also followed exactly the same precedence except that it was called a congress, rather than a parliament or National Assembly, and a president was inaugurated as, in effect, a "temporary" king.

The Meiji Restoration in Japan, replacing the military rule of the Tokugawa Shogunate with the full power of the emperor, also greatly resembles the pattern of the monarchy being restored in England after military rule, two hundred years before. But with the emperor ultimately having less real power than before.

The monarchy in England was ultimately restored, Charles II being crowned as king. The Protectorate that had displaced and executed his father was dismantled. But when it was all over, the monarchy had less power than before and the parliament had more power than before. The king now needed the support of parliament, which represented the people. That is what set the pace for the modern world.

The brother of Charles II had the title of Duke of York. Charles gave him some lands in a newly-explored area of North America and that is where the name of New York comes from.

England had experienced being run as a republic, with power based on the will of the people and not on royalty or the church. The prototype of the modern leader from the military had been set. There was religious freedom that there hadn't been before.

After the Restoration of the monarchy, Parliament had more power than ever before. But there were differences of opinion between it's members. That is what led to the founding of modern political parties. The modern terms of political "right" and "left" began when members of Parliament used to sit on opposite sides of the aisle, according to their political views.

There was the definite influence of the Reformation on these changes. It was the removal of the monarch's "divine right to rule", just as the Reformation removed the divine right of anyone to rule over the church.

Some say that it was the Magna Carta that began modern democracy. But the peak of England's monarchy was Henry VIII (the eighth), which came three centuries after the Magna Carta. It was this English Civil War that really shifted the balance of power from the king to the Parliament, which was elected by and represented the people. The world has been governed differently ever since.

Religion would no longer be absolutely dictated by the monarch. Protestant churches mostly did away with the hierarchical structure of the Catholic Church. Only Anglicans and Lutherans, the two Reformation movements that retained the most Catholic liturgy, still had bishops and archbishops. New denominations, such as the Baptists and Presbyterians and later the Methodists, were far more egalitarian and reflected the new movement towards democracy.

The divisions of the English Civil War can still be seen in the differences today between the cities and the countryside. It is said that America's great political division is between the Democrat coasts and the Republican "heartland". But England's is between urban and rural areas. This is the legacy of the power base of the Royalists being in the countryside, while that of the Parliamentarians was in the cities.

Local Tornadoes

I have noticed what causes the occasional tornadoes in the general Buffalo area.

I live within sight of a tall smokestack. I rarely look at the weather report because it is easy to tell what the weather will be by this smokestack. Obviously if the wind is from the north it will get colder and warmer if the wind is from the south, although probably without a major change in weather. Where I live the prevailing wind is from the west. A west wind may well bring a change in weather, although probably not a great change in temperature. 

What is interesting is when the prevailing wind is reversed, so that the wind is from the east. This happens rarely and only when there is some major storm system in the eastern U.S., although it may be calm here. The remnants of hurricanes along the east coast can reverse the prevailing wind.

I have written about this occasional reversal of the prevailing wind here before. It is this reversal, between the two wind directions, that produces the local tornadoes. 

We saw in "The Inverse Topological Rule", July 2024, the cosmology of tornadoes. When some entity in the universe induces another entity, the induced entity will have a topology that is opposite to that of the original entity. The earth is spherical and it's spin is what induces tornadoes. This is why a tornado, or the whirlpool that forms when you drain a sink full of water, has the topological form of half a pseudosphere, which is the opposite of a sphere.

The Emirates Canal

With all of the fuss about the Strait of Hormuz, and also remember what a global issue it was during the 1980s. Ronald Reagan sent warships to make sure that it stayed open. This could be a golden opportunity for the United Arab Emirates. If the Emirates can build the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa, and send a spacecraft to Mars, then why couldn't it build a canal that would circumvent the troublesome Strait of Hormuz?

In the following image, from Google Earth, Iran is at the top and the United Arab Emirates is at the bottom. The Strait of Hormuz is the narrow waterway between the two. The red line could be a canal that would enable ships to avoid the Strait, with it's western entrance between Dubai and Abu Dhabi. This would certainly lower insurance rates for the ships and enable the Emirates to charge tolls. Regardless of how much money it made it would boost the Emirates position in the world.

A Journey Across Siberia

Russia is by far the largest country in the world, in terms of geographical land area. The country spans two continents. The western part of Russia is in Europe and the eastern part in Asia. The dividing line between the two continents is the Ural Mountains. Siberia is usually defined as the part of Russia that is in Asia.

Did you know that when you look at a full moon you are looking at an area that is just about exactly the size of Russia?

As far as physical geography goes, Europe and Asia are not really separate continents. It is more like Eurasia is one land mass. But there is a definite division between the two with regard to history and culture and, for this reason, we usually consider Europe and Asia as separate continents.

Siberia is a vast land area, comprising maybe 1 / 7 of the earth's total land area. But it is, on the average, sparsely populated. The European part of Russia is only about 1 / 4 of Russia's total land area, but has about 3 / 4 of the country's population.

While the average population density of Siberia is low it's population is concentrated in cities with the southern, and warmer, part of the region holding most of the population. Russia's two most populous cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg, are both in European Russia, but the next two cities by population are in Siberia.

Siberia is known today for being very rich in resources. Much of the region is seafloor that was forced upward by tectonic movement, which made room for oil and natural gas to collect underground. Aside from energy, there are also vast mineral resources.

It was in the Sixteenth Century that the Rurik Dynasty of Russia began to explore and build outposts in lands far to the east of Moscow. This policy was continued by the following Romanov Dynasty. This eventually included Alaska and Hawaii and extended all the way to California.

One thing that we can see just by looking around Siberia is that it seems to be more conservative in outlook than European Russia. For one thing, there are still statues of Lenin in city squares that are usually no longer seen in European Russia.

We will start our journey in the west, at the edge of European Russia, and proceed eastward across Siberia.

THERE ARE FOUR PRECEDING IMAGES WITH EACH STOP. ALL OF THESE IMAGES ARE FROM GOOGLE STREET VIEW 

The city of Ufa is actually on the European side of the Ural Mountains but it was one of the eastern outposts and settlements established during the time of Ivan the Terrible, who first proclaimed the Tsardom of Russia from territories that had been consolidated by the Grand Duchy of Moscow. The following scenes are in the central area of Ufa.

There are multiple scenes following. To see the scenes, after the first one, you must first click the up arrow, ^, before you can move on to the next scene by clicking the right or forward arrow, >, After clicking the up arrow, you can then hide the previews of successive scenes, if you wish.

https://www.google.com/maps/@54.7351488,55.9587644,3a,75y,283.82h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipMwQ4B2461mhnDPz6MOrpJGFOpTMhqYph9tQbRn!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipMwQ4B2461mhnDPz6MOrpJGFOpTMhqYph9tQbRn%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya3.073558-ro-0-fo100!7i10000!8i5000

The name of Yekaterinburg, sometimes spelled as Ekaterinburg, means "The City of Catherine". This city is just on the Asian side of a gap in the Ural Mountains and so is sometimes considered as the "gateway to Siberia". The Catherine that the city is named for is Catherine I. She was the wife of Peter the Great, who founded St. Petersburg. Catherine I is not the same as the later Catherine the Great.

Had anyone thought about the irony that the city named for Catherine I is primarily known today as the place where the last Romanov emperor and his family were executed in 1917. But then Boris Yeltsin, who ended the Communism in Russia that had begun with the Bolsheviks who had executed the Romanovs and restored the Romanov flag as Russia's national flag, was from the Yekaterinburg area.

On maps and atlases from before the 1990s this city is named Sverdlovsk, which is what the Communists called it. During the following presidency of Boris Yeltsin, the name of Yekaterinburg was restored. The house where the Romanovs had been staying and were executed, the Ipatiev House, has since been demolished but the site is marked with the Cathedral on the Blood. The last two of the following four images are of this cathedral.

But this city is far more than just the place where the Romanovs were executed. Today it is the fourth-largest city in the country by population, and is known for it's prosperity and for being a good place to live. This is central Yekaterinburg.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Yekaterinburg,+Sverdlovsk+Oblast,+Russia/@56.8353351,60.610515,3a,75y,221.1h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sMgd8-ZplTXrZStr2j0KvPw!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D0%26panoid%3DMgd8-ZplTXrZStr2j0KvPw%26yaw%3D221.1041970355069!7i16384!8i8192!4m6!3m5!1s0x43c165eaa062db4b:0xd50243d7f7567f20!8m2!3d56.8430993!4d60.6454086!16zL20vMGhrcG4?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

The city of Chelyabinsk was in the news in 2013 when a meteor entered the atmosphere and exploded above the city, doing quite a bit of damage. Siberia as a whole is known for the Tunguska Event, although this was not near Chelyabinsk. A large meteor or, as I believe, a small comet exploded in the atmosphere. The shock waves were felt across the world and the force of the explosion knocked over millions of trees over thousands of square kilometers in Siberia.

Theories are still being put forth today about this great explosion of 1908 in the sky above a remote part of Siberia. The lack of an impact crater seems to indicate that it was a comet, made primarily of ice that turned to water, rater than a meteor made of rock or metal. But some claim that there is a small lake that was not there before and that this is the impact crater.

At any rate, here is the city of Chelyabinsk.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Chelyabinsk,+Chelyabinsk+Oblast,+Russia/@55.166736,61.4019445,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sCIHM0ogKEICAgIDE7fConwE!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh3.googleusercontent.com%2Fgrass-cs%2FABsKjrwibsq6k9P4khE0PuLnRGeelDvMawyysKr9GKQhjh-wJEAb333EhUS9IgUBc1hEZncHQ_R5GvnxYLyovlfegLlRKvtpS80BNzB3lzwloLntX0QoXP8vklnlsmmdx3MJ0HLhyDfw%3Dw203-h143-k-no!7i4480!8i3164!4m6!3m5!1s0x43c592cb104a3a8d:0xef224a2a6d1711bf!8m2!3d55.1644419!4d61.4368432!16zL20vMDFrZzM5?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Tyumen is one of the cities that grew from outposts established in Siberia in the late Sixteenth Century.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tyumen,+Tyumen+Oblast,+Russia/@57.120578,65.5800802,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sCIHM0ogKEICAgICM-Ka7-gE!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh3.googleusercontent.com%2Fgrass-cs%2FABsKjrwwB3zNSeWitr6X5NpaZb5XDmFtXmWGkO5V7nNxCFRnVyAXzkvR2P2_CTgJiSQDtghvvEElp6timu5FRapKQ9V6mRlELNgw6kRi0htbalYDEA3zZM6_OKJvo94m6WUMyWLsr9AL%3Dw203-h270-k-no!7i3000!8i4000!4m6!3m5!1s0x43bbe15d51a3b8c7:0x9b137b6a2aa36793!8m2!3d57.1553394!4d65.5618637!16zL20vMDJmM19z?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Tobolsk, another Siberian city originating in the Sixteenth Century, is where the Romanov family was originally sent, for their own safety during the Russian Civil War, before being moved back westward to Yekaterinburg. The following scenes begin in the Tobolsk Kremlin. Remember that the best-known Russian kremlin is the one in Moscow, but a kremlin actually means a fortified citadel that is found in some other Russian cities as well.

https://www.google.com/maps/@58.1999795,68.2510578,3a,75y,86.83h,90t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipPSVC8jcHUXFLplGeaOi225U7PuVoEKFukEeqA-!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipPSVC8jcHUXFLplGeaOi225U7PuVoEKFukEeqA-%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi23.887123-ya76.45351-ro24.537546-fo100!7i7200!8i3600

Omsk is not as old as some of the other Siberian cities, having been founded in the Eighteenth Century.

https://www.google.com/maps/@54.9840209,73.388351,3a,75y,140h,110t/data=!3m5!1e1!3m3!1sobxebt8_xPttqaqN3zSTvQ!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3Dobxebt8_xPttqaqN3zSTvQ%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D140%26pitch%3D-20%26thumbfov%3D100

Novosibirsk is a newer city, from the late Nineteenth Century, but is today the largest city in Siberia and the third largest city in Russia, after Moscow and St. Petersburg.

https://www.google.com/maps/@55.030126,82.920433,3a,75y,40h,100t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipPYnbR56MBCO0sFcJh_s_oZX9KiU_SKMmEjZRmm!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipPYnbR56MBCO0sFcJh_s_oZX9KiU_SKMmEjZRmm%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-10-ya132.00002-ro-0-fo100!7i8704!8i4352

The cities in Siberia that are further to the west, closer to European Russia, grew from outposts that were founded in the Sixteenth Century. As exploration of Siberia proceeded further eastward, other cities were founded in the following century. This is the city of Tomsk.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tomsk,+Tomsk+Oblast,+Russia/@56.482751,84.9504207,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sCIHM0ogKEICAgICq2PqFRA!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh3.googleusercontent.com%2Fgrass-cs%2FABsKjrzE8Sd1w-kD_vvMbnBoPm-DLlHmVHzn6aMEheU5qZ3-fDlPGZdxUOEDrUJ0gOETmWyq8BVC5f-zajjnyYfJQNRLrmiC11hghw7sHAW92eYreCsE05u4QHTwAS86u1gVrFwEH1Y5%3Dw203-h114-k-no!7i4608!8i2592!4m6!3m5!1s0x432693b2b65d4c1b:0xcf0bf11d988ae72f!8m2!3d56.4884295!4d84.9480469!16zL20vMGgzcnk?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Krasnoyarsk is another city that first began in the Seventeenth Century.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Krasnoyarsk,+Krasnoyarsk+Krai,+Russia/@56.01099,92.84798,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sCIHM0ogKEICAgIDqpaidaQ!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh3.googleusercontent.com%2Fgrass-cs%2FABsKjrwJTcS4a8N6p_OZcxDIrE-TKXyYFlDm8GD6QrhKlSrIS-MQoDBHbUu0MY5OUyUHWYNC2bkBLIoXsuUPlQqldxK8hoY4q5XcXk08mvtH_PtAMH2t3bU_gogE9ycApF0dl1o29BTQ%3Dw203-h152-k-no!7i2048!8i1536!4m6!3m5!1s0x5cd7afc9a1ff37e3:0xd597e1468fd647ff!8m2!3d56.0152834!4d92.8932476!16zL20vMGpoYjQ?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Irkutsk originated in the mid-Seventeenth Century.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Irkutsk,+Irkutsk+Oblast,+Russia/@52.2856851,104.281555,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sCIHM0ogKEICAgIDEw_yqiAE!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh3.googleusercontent.com%2Fgrass-cs%2FABsKjrwPTYPytYGzl5OnL5o-K1kRwl1f4M02cDKmQ_LTpn6jqRjgvHy_QunQ4Y-KjQcpKhTWUiWYHI0e6r5T8yDe0vgn6AQA3XcJYk247pZdfbrro1f4nqOLZKuYP92nlApccYBPmkXnzQ%3Dw203-h135-k-no!7i2048!8i1365!4m6!3m5!1s0x5da83ad353e2f665:0x31d6cd1456d8e94e!8m2!3d52.2854834!4d104.2890222!16zL20vMGZwMnY?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI2MDIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Finally, we arrive on Russia's Pacific coast. This is the city of Vladivostok. It is not a very old city, only from the Nineteenth Century. But it is Russia's window on the Pacific Ocean and the Far East, and is possibly the most strategically-located city in the world. St. Petersburg, at the opposite end of Russia, is over 6500 km, or 4,000 miles, away.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.1234979,131.8779782,3a,75y,160h,100t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipO-U5L8LeOrmfeje2i2ZPtV5baVrNKxR2qWucxU!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipO-U5L8LeOrmfeje2i2ZPtV5baVrNKxR2qWucxU%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-10-ya230-ro0-fo100!7i7076!8i3538