Saltwaternewengland.com Website Review

left to right:  hunter outdoor; cordings of piccadilly; dubarry of ireland, barbour (and a few more barbours squeezed in...) choate headmaster seymour st. john (left) greeting yale president kingman brewster (right) - photo by salt water new engalnd. an essay appeared in the wall street journal, and was received this morning (december 21, 2013). the conclusion is as follows: > “what our new meritocrats have failed to evince—and what the > older wasp generation prided itself on—is character and the > ability to put the well-being of the nation before their own...  > doing the right thing, especially in the face of te*ptations to do > otherwise, was the wasp test par excellence. most of our > meritocrats, by contrast, seem to be in business for themselves.  > trust, honor, character: the elements that have departed u.s. public > life with the departure from prominence of wasp culture have not > been taken up by the meritocrats. many meritocrats who enter > politics, when retired by the electorate from public life, proceed > to careers in lobbying or other special-interest advocacy. > university presidents no longer speak to the great issues in > education but instead devote themselves to fundraising and public > relations, and look to move on to the next, more prestigious > thus far in their history, meritocrats, those earnest good students, > appear to be about little more than getting on, getting ahead and > (above all) getting their own. the wasp leadership, for all that may > be said in criticism of it, was better than that.”   > - joseph epstein, the late, great american wasp, the wall street > journal . should auld acquaintance be forgot? scratchy photographs from the 70s and 80s. reader question: how do you make a house distinctive, and what are the common mistakes made by people who have tried but failed?