Please meet Madame Spooky. Ms. Spooky is a British ex-pat who moved to New York City in the 1930s to attend Sarah Lawrence College. Her father was a newspaper editor in London. Her mother died in a car crash when she was ten. She died a mysterious death while aboard a sailboat with friends off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard, which is still unsolved. Hovering between the world of the living and the dead, Madame Spooky is on a quest to solve her own death. While she roams the world in search of clues, she reports on locations of paranormal interest to the living.
This is an official Findery account focused on all things spooky. Some true and spooky tales include the tale of the Demon Cat that haunts Congress, a story about phone calls received from a dead man in 2008, and a great collection of true crime stories.
We hope you enjoy it, and please follow Ms. Spooky at Madame Spooky. Happy haunting!
You may have noticed that we have a new header on the site as of this morning. We’ve hopefully made searching for a place vs. searching for a person, thing or idea easier, and less confusing — one day we hope to combine these into one search box. There’s also a tiny picture of you when you are logged in, so you can be assured you’re logged in as you.
The footer is basically the same, it’s just different colors! As always, let us know if you find any bugs.
We love Map Your Memories, a project and a book by Becky Cooper. Described by Publisher’s Weekly:
“Maps are more about their makers than the places they describe. Map who you are. Map where you are. Map your memories.” Cooper, writer, cartographer, and a native New Yorker, carefully assembles a surprisingly intimate collection of life stories from her art project, mapyourmemories. Laboriously hand-printing blank maps of Manhattan, she walks the length of the island asking strangers to provide their own narrative of New York. When Cooper receives her illustrated Manhattans, she finds a barrage of personal memories: from humorous insights to confessions, lost loves and childhood reminiscences; the vignettes, through maps, become love letters offering tribute to New York past and present. The maps represent New Yorkers and visitors from all walks of life: MTA employees, students, can collectors, mail carriers, artists, and city planners side-by-side with well-known New Yorkers such as chef David Chang, Yoko Ono, and Harvey Fierstein. New York reveals itself as “simultaneously no one’s city and everyone’s city.” Relationships to the city by those who have lived and loved in New York are interspersed with Cooper’s own history, artful illustrations, and quotes from street encounters. Cooper’s beautiful project linking the lives of New Yorkers is one that will continue to grow.
“A place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively, wrenches it from itself, shapes it, renders it, loves it so radically that he remakes it in his own image.”
—Joan Didion
The History Around Us
We tend to think of history as being big things that happened far away, but events both big and small happen nearby. The fine folk at Open Plaques and HMdb.org are undertaking the Herculean task of recording all of the world’s historical markers.
We’re thrilled to be able to share some of them with you on Findery. Open Plaques and World Historical Markers are a veritable treasure trove of local history.
Spooky Business
Meet Madame Spooky, an official Findery account focused on all things spooky.
Some true and spooky tales include the tale of the Demon Cat that haunts Congress, a story about phone calls received from a dead man in 2008, and a great collection of true crime stories.
Daily Challenges
With almost 50 days of challenges, we’ve found some wonderful notes from you on so many different themes. Our favorites? Birds, Peace & Quiet, and Worst Hotel. It’s never too late to participate. If you’re looking for note inspiration, our Daily Challenges are a great place to start.
Members to Follow
7-how-7, San Francisco Magazine, and tjh leave wonderful notes. You can find more great members to follow in our Directory.
Until next time!
Caterina & Heather & Maggie & Donald & Amber & Jed &
Jessica & Mike & John & Ian & Laurel
Check out our new Daily Challenges! We're creating daily prompts that will illuminate, intrigue, inspire, or (infrequently) surface memories of bad haircuts or that horrible date, via our Findery account. If you'd like to receive an email reminder, there's a new list for that. You can subscribe here, or opt-in via your Settings page.
Each Daily Challenge has a unique tag. Be sure to add that tag as we'll have a little something special for you if you complete all the challenges within a calendar month. Here's what the first week of April looks like:
What do you think? If you've ideas for future Daily Challenge themes, we'd love to hear about them in our new Inspiration Forum.
We look forward to finding your notes.
Caterina & Heather & Maggie & Donald & Amber & Jed & Jessica & Mike & John & Ian & Laurel
A couple weeks ago, I was honored with an award from the NCWIT. the National Center for Women and Information Technology. Unfortunately, I had a bad flu and couldn’t accept the award in person. So my dear friend and colleague Heather Champ went down to accept it for me, and deliver my speech. This is that speech.
By clock and inch, by place and measure, by drive, dream and design, we’ve come here to California and to the keyboards of our computers, to make the future.
Our successes have been so great and so rapid that within 20 years we’ve gotten a third of the world’s population online, shrunk our computers to the size of our hands, and connected each to each. The magic, the generosity of spirit, the kindness, the art and the song that we’ve put into this technology and into this medium are in evidence all around us, every day.
But with all the glories, many defeats. We make our human mistakes. Connected to so many, we are intimate with fewer and fewer. We squander our days in amusements. Instead of truth, triviality. We are exhorted to sate the urges of the millions, their sloth, greed, pride or lust. We are told that this is what will make us a success. This is a deadly cynicism, which we must fight.
Because the internet is a medium, it doesn’t care whether it transmits love or hate. It is what we build and who we are that make it what it is. We can build things that diminish our humanity or build things that bring us to human flourishing.
There is great work to be done, and the women will lead us. So I say: Astonish us with your genius. Inspire us with your creation. Work with one another. Endure the tribulations. Dream, struggle, create, prevail. Be daring. Be brave. Be loving. Be compassionate. Be strong. Be brilliant. Be beautiful.
Thank you.
We had so much fun at our first Open House that we’re doing it again. Please join us on Saturday March 9th, 2 – 5pm in beautiful Hayes Valley, San Francisco for an afternoon of fun and adventure for all ages:
Our friends from Sifteo will be joining us and they’re bringing some of their magic game cubes. You’ll have an early peek at a their upcoming multiplayer/chance game tentatively called Low Rollr, developed by Floor is Lava.
There will be Heroic Tarot readings with Storm Ricon and a Lucky Dip with a variety of exciting prizes. Please RSVP at Event Brite so that we have enough food & beverage.
For those of you who may not be able to join us in person, we’re hoping to set up a Google Hangout. We’ll be sharing more information about that in the Village Green next week as our plan comes together.
Have a great weekend!
Caterina & Heather & Maggie & Donald & Amber & Jed & Jessica & Mike & John & Ian
Lantern photo: TingChang / Flickr
VisitPittsburgh was kind enough to invite Caterina to join them today to chat about all things Findery and Pittsburgh.
Earlier this week we put together a few things “San Francisco” and shipped them eastward. The set below details our care package adventure.
Map Filters!
You can see more on the map now when you click on "All", "Following", or "Recent" on Big Map, Places pages or tag results pages. There's also "More Notes" available on Big Map.
If you want to see the notes your friends left in Paris, zoom in on the section of the city that you're interested in and then select "Following."
Come visit Findery on March 9th
Please join us for our 2nd Open House on March 9th, 2 – 5pm. We're planning some fine entertainment and will debut our lantern branded schwag. You can RSVP here.
Findery Challenge 30: My Valentine
Roses are red, violets are a blue.
When I think of this place, I think of you.
Share your special place and tag it with "finderychallenge30".
We hope your week is filled with hearts and flowers,
Caterina & Heather & Maggie & Donald & Amber
& Jed & Jessica & Mike & John & Ian
Hello you! Welcome. This is the blog that accompanies Findery. Here you will find all our latest goings on. For information on our status, visit the 
