“Historic Chemistry Lab With Links To Thomas Jefferson”

A hidden chemistry lab was unearthed Sunday afternoon by Matt Schiedt a worker doing renovations to the iconic Rotunda at the University of Virginia, and school officials say the room is directly linked to the third U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, who helped design the building. The "chemical hearth," which dates back to the 1820s, is thought to be one of the few remaining in the world. It featured two sources of heat for conducting experiments, and a system for pulling out fumes. According to the University of Virginia press release, the room, described as "a semi-circular niche in the north end of the Lower East Oval Room," was preserved because the walls of the hearth were sealed shut in the mid-1800s. Schiedt said that most chemical hearths from the era have been destroyed, making this new discovery "unique." According to the university, Jefferson, who was the schools founder, collaborated with the university's first professor of natural history, John Emmet, to equip the space. In a letter from April 1823, Jefferson requested the class be located on the ground floor so water would not have to be pumped to upper floors. The university says the chemical hearth will remain on display once renovations to the rotunda are complete.

In Other News Evolution of the Confederate Flag http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/22/us/gallery/confederate-flags-history/ The grainy black-and-white photograph shows a pointy iceberg in the middle of a calm sea, with puffy clouds barely visible in the sky. But the simple picture, taken more than a century ago, just may show the most infamous iceberg in history -- the one that sank the Titanic. It was taken by the chief steward of the ocean liner Prinz Adalbert on the morning of April 15, 1912, hours after the RMS Titanic sank following its collision with an iceberg the previous evening. The Titanic had sunk by the time the Prinz Adalbert came along, and the chief steward was unaware what had happened.