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John F. Ptak
From 1985-2003 I operated a bricks-and-mortar bookstore dedicated to the history of science. The stores were located primarily in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., with a short excursion to Old Town Alexandria, Va., and a warehouse in Silver Spring Maryland. The store's website has been in operation in one form or another since 1998, and it is now the principle venue for business. The blog associated with the online store is pretty mature at this point, with about 1.5 million words and thousands of posts, for good or ill.
Interests: art, math, history of science and technology; connections between/among physics, literature; the found-surreal; outsider art and logic; discrete ephemera.
Recent Activity
On Getting "E=mc^2" Wrong, Twice in 1.5 Square Inches
Posted Jul 4, 2024 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Colossus in the Colosseum
Posted Jan 8, 2023 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Birds and Human Flight
JF Ptak Science Books Overall Post 5154 For thousands of years the most popular fuel of the common idea for humans to achieve flight was through the application of bird flight mechanics. (The other common vehicle employed balloons of one... Continue reading
Posted Jan 2, 2023 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Cross-Section of an Arctic-Exploring Balloon, 1890
Posted Jan 1, 2023 at JF Ptak Science Books
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The Goubet Submarine, 1886
Posted Dec 31, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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A Monumental and Fantastically Bad Idea: Lowering the Mediterranean (1929)
Posted Dec 9, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Two Uncommon Crowd Scenes, 1932 and 1945.
Posted Nov 30, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Mathematical Exercises and Found Art
Posted Nov 7, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Bridges Never Built: the Hudson River Bridge (Midtown) 1896
Posted Aug 1, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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An Episode in Antiquarian Depiction of Upside Down Things (1506)
Posted Jul 31, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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New York City in Danger of Attack (1917)
Posted Apr 8, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Found-Art in Scientific Journals: an Acoustic Kraken! (1881)
Posted Mar 30, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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A Scientific/Industrial Vision of the Future City (1842)
Posted Mar 10, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Glass Globes, Light, and Volcanoes (1898)
Posted Mar 4, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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The Terrible Situation of Ukrainian "Displaced Persons" at the End of WWII
Posted Feb 27, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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A Really, Really Greater New York--Filling in the East River, Redux.
Posted Feb 9, 2022 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Uncommon Photo of the Surrender of the German Fleet, 1918
Posted Dec 16, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Patriotic Snow Parade, 1917/1918
Posted Dec 16, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Words, Deeds, and Henry Ford (1927)
Posted Dec 10, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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The Beauty of a Hexadecimal Tonal System (1863)
Posted Dec 10, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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The Costs of Television Sets, 1946
Posted Dec 10, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Statements by the Editor of Nature on Equality in the Sciences (1910).
Posted Dec 9, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Unusual German WWI Book Reviews, 1936
Posted Nov 6, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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An Odd Perspective Looking Through the RAF Wellington Bomber (1941)
Posted Oct 9, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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Rare Document Announcing the Retrieval of Fallen Soldiers of the Bataan Death March (1945/6)
Posted Aug 29, 2021 at JF Ptak Science Books
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