Resurrect Dead Tiles
One of the things I love about the Internet is the high likelihood that whatever crazy thing I’m interested in, someone out there has put up a web page. Witness, for example, Resurrect Dead, a site devoted to the Toynbee Tile phenomenon.
What’s that? You don’t know about the Toynbee tiles? Neither do most people I try to point them out, sadly. When I was in college in New York, I started noticing that on several streets, someone had somehow embedded a series of tiles into the street that formed the message “Toynbee Idea/In Movie 2001/Resurrect Dead/On Planet Jupiter.” Over the years, I would see more and more of the things pop up, and I would often exclaim to Pattie, “Hey! See those tiles? Were they there the last time we walked on this street?” And she would give me this look like I was completely deranged. (And now we’ve been married for six years. Who’s the deranged one now, eh?) Then I moved back down here, and was surprised to find the tiles throughout Philly as well, including a business-card sized version right at Temple. I eventually discovered a handful of sites devoted to tracking the tiles, which have appeared in cities all over the Western Hemisphere, including Toynbee.net and the afmorementioned Resurrect Dead. From the latter I learned that the tiles first started cropping up in Philly back in the 80s – I had no idea we were the Toynbee Tile capital of the world.
And in a not-quite-ironic development, as I began researching Jane Addams and Hull House, I discovered that she was inspired to start the settlement house by a visit to the world’s first settlement – London’s Toynbee Hall, named for the very fellow who, according to the tiles at least, wants to turn Jupiter into one jumping mortuary.
About Dave Thomer
Born and raised in Philadelphia. Studied philosophy at Fordham University in the Bronx, where I made many great friends and met my wonderful wife. We moved back to Philadelphia, where I studied philosophy some more and became a teacher. Online and off, I'm looking for ways that we can be better citizens and build stronger communities.
Thursday, February 9th 2006 at 8:48 pm |
My favorites are the ones that say “You must lay tile alone as hellions join up and give you beatings.” A powerful deterrent, that.
Thursday, February 9th 2006 at 10:41 pm |
I gotta admit, I never focused much on the mini-screeds that accompanied some of the tiles. I usually just focused on the main message.
Tile-ologists have actually started identifying the work of two different tilists – apparently the original artist is all but retired, and new ones keep popping up. A lot of the NYC ones that first grabbed my attention have apparently been paved over in the name of progress.
Friday, February 10th 2006 at 4:19 am |
I may still use the above cautionary phrase the next time I play Scrabble, however.
I had a little bit of downtime and perused the Resurrect Dead site, at first thinking “What an odd thing to go into such scholarly depths about. (I know. Pot. Kettle. Black.) Before I knew it, an hour had passed and I was dying to know more about the bloody tiles. However trivial the subject, that, then, is truly great scholarship – I was totally engrossed in a seemingly frivolous phenomenon whose closest iteration is at least 300 miles away from me (i.e. the one sighted in St. Louis).
The things, and the intense focus on them, is what viral marketing campaigns only wish they could be.