Steampunk, Nurture or Nature?

[Angus A Fitziron]

As a recent convert to matters SP, I have posted on the Introductions threads and read submissions by other tyros like myself. One theme re-occurs, which is that although we knew nothing of SP, had never even heard the phrase, once we landed in the comforting billows of Brass-Goggles, we knew we had come home! So, is Steampunk inherited genetically (nature), do we only learn it once we are admitted to the society (nurture), or, as I suspect, is there something inherently attractive about objects and attitudes we would now identify as SP, that have been attracting us over the years, such that when we see it, we recognise it, though still not knowing its name? Let me illustrate this with some examples from my own experience. I have always liked Scotch whiskey (from the age of about 7 ). As such my holidays in Scotland nearly always ended up in the comforting surroundings of a distillery. Have you ever seen a still room - pure SP....

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I had a go at gas welding 30 odd years ago. Now, the "modern" one piece goggles supplied by BOC provided good protection, a wide viewing angle and enclosed my spectacles with ease. However, I still insisted using my old round goggles and put up with the burn marks - eyebrows still haven't grown back properly! I still have them, but they are too damaged and scruffy to use as part of an SP costume (d*mn!)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

There are other examples - my apprenticeship and early years with British Teslacomm were happily spent in power rooms that owed a lot to Frankenstein's laboratory (and were nearly as old!). I learned to work (reasonably) safely with currents if not voltages that provided very satisfying arcs ("sparks" just fails to describe it) and only electrocuted myself half a dozen times. Thermionic valves were de riguer and you could really see (often felt) just how things work. Surely one of the identifying factors of SP engineering?
Finally, although my motorbike is not steam powered (though I do have some plans for that), it is a Honda VFR800 with a V4 engine, which certainly pulls like a steam engine (having also driven a real steam roller, I feel qualified to make the comparison). It is more complex than is absolutely necessary and has no overhead cam drive belt or even chain, instead the job is done by trains of gears - how SP is that??
So, nature or nurture; what were the early indicators in your lives that suggested you would ultimately find your destiny in Steampunk?

[JingleJoe]

something inherently attractive about objects and attitudes we would now identify as SP, that have been attracting us over the years, such that when we see it, we recognise it, though still not knowing its name?

That's it
That is what I was like for years.
I think it's both nature and nurture, having been brought up in an unusual environment allowed me to think outside the box enough to follow my dreams (which were steampunk) and from an early age I was exposed to steam trains about which I was obsessed then as I grew older, other mechanisms and sciences, Back to the Future lending a large hand to wanting to be a mad scientist.
That's mostly nurture.

But part of me allways yearned for these things, I didn't like them because I was brought up around them I liked them because my heart, pumps steam!

I still have them, but they are too damaged and scruffy to use as part of an SP costume (d*mn!)

LIES! Steampunks can be grubby and messy and have broken things about them! You should see my attire, I often leave a trail behind me of bits of whatever I'm wearing

[Pnakotus]

is there something inherently attractive about objects and attitudes we would now identify as SP, that have been attracting us over the years, such that when we see it, we recognise it, though still not knowing its name?

Yes

I still have them, but they are too damaged and scruffy to use as part of an SP costume (d*mn!)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

That they're damaged and scruffy from actual use just makes them even better for using with a steampunk outfit doesn't it?

So, nature or nurture; what were the early indicators in your lives that suggested you would ultimately find your destiny in Steampunk?

I don't think it's a one or the other thing when it come to the nature vs nurture. Both nature and nurture make us who we are. Take one of them away and we're only half of ourselves.

[Gryphon]

I suspect there's a genetic prediliction that draws certain individuals to fascination with mechanisms, junk collecting, dumpster diving, compulsive tinkering, found-object art, secondhand shop prowling, the practice of obsolete crafts, and the reading of antique literature.  Each of these attributes can be found in various of my ancestors as well as my siblings, but seem only to have come together with tragi-comic effect in me.  My great-grandfather built Case traction engines, my grandfather built ICBMs, my father built robotic factories, my brother builds aeronautical radar systems and custom motorcycles, and I restore buildings/monuments and build expensive toys for other history geeks.  I fear that my life's work is proving to be considerably less serious or useful than my relatives', yet I don't seem to be able to help it - the old and the weird is what I'm drawn to work on.

[The Abiliegh]

I fell into Steampunk head first recently, for much the same reason. I never knew it had a name. As far as I'm concerened, i've *always* been steampunk.

And i can't give a lick of it to nurture. I came from an unusually rigid family that did all they could to squash my eccentricities...

[Mad Miss Holmes]

I feel that it must be genetic, because I come from a peculiarly average white middle-class nuclear family. My extended family, however, as well as some of the thicker branches of the family tree are remarkably nutty. My great-grandfather bought a circus on a whim. 
We all have some love for Victoriana, but thus far I've been the only one to exhibit the tendency in any way more extreme than just sedately browsing antiques stores for Hummel figurines.

[Angus A Fitziron]

My great-grandfather bought a circus on a whim. 

Oh Miss Holmes, this made me fall about laughing, you must be sooooo proud of him! We really need role models like your great grandfather today.

[Mad Miss Holmes]

My great-grandfather bought a circus on a whim. 

Oh Miss Holmes, this made me fall about laughing, you must be sooooo proud of him! We really need role models like your great grandfather today.

I really am proud of him, and I wish he were still around. He'd be a shining beacon of kookiness for all to see!

[Gryphon]

Now, Miss Holmes, you simply must tell more of that story.  Which circus?  Did he travel with it?  Was he a sucessful circus tycoon, or did it all go horribly wrong?  Is there anything about his circus in the Circus Museum in Baraboo, WI?

[Captain Brandsson]

A taste for retro sci-fi collided with a preference for vintage clothing.

[Mad Miss Holmes]

Now, Miss Holmes, you simply must tell more of that story.  Which circus?  Did he travel with it?  Was he a sucessful circus tycoon, or did it all go horribly wrong?  Is there anything about his circus in the Circus Museum in Baraboo, WI?

I don't know much more of it, except that he was an oil baron in the Texas hillcountry who became monstrously successful, took notice of a local circus (two or three families of Romany descent, their roustabouts, and their performing animals), purchased the operation and installed them on his family farm as a charity gesture. Later his wells dried up and he invested unwisely, and as far as I can tell the entire venture simply dissolved. He was a relation of George Washington Glasscock, for whom Glasscock County (Texas) is named.

And this is the blood that flows in my veins. 

[Countessa Lenora]

Miss Holmes your great-grandfather did it right "better to have lived and lost than to have never lived at all"!

Kookiness, creativity and a love of fun is in my blood and I married a man who shares all the same traits....now our children are kookie, creative and fun too - one big crazy kookie family....nature and nurture for sure.

[dman762000]

I would have to say that there is a bit of nature and nurture to any steampunk.
Take me for instance:

It has always been said that I was born middle aged. One lady of the clarivoiant set actually told me out of the blue that I had a very old soul and that I had carried many habits over from my previous life. (Ok, so I am not such a strong beliver in that sort of thing but she was) I always attributed that to genitic dispositions for certain habits. Politeness for one. I have always been very strict about manners in myself and others. This cannot be explained by nurture as I come from a very,,,,,,redneck, family. The whole lot of them have no sense of manners whatsoever, at least the vast majority of them. Inventiveness, I never had to have any little playmates when I was a child for I was always busy with some sort of project and did not have time for childish games. This too can only be explained by nature as my immediate family never created anything more than a "better catfish batter".

Now on to the nurture: My grandmother (bless her) was the only person in my life that accepted these things about me. When my father would be lambasting me for talking about going to college (this was at age seven) "you ain't never gonna go to no college boy, you gonna get a job at da shoue factory"  She was the only person who supported me. She never treated me like a child like most other people did. She would talk to me like an adult and knew that I understood at that level. When I would ask her how to do something she would show me, like sewing, cooking.  She also supported my strange love of antiques, (again at the child ages of 5-9).

The combinitation of these strange factors in my makeup and the gentle nudges my grandmother would give, made me into the sort of person I am today. Someone who dresses in "old" style clothes and uses phrases and manners of a time gone by. Someone who just does not fit with his age peers and never has. Someone who is into Verne, Wells, Abney park and Tesla, just to name a few. Someone who is pure steampunk.

[von Corax]

I'm gonna have to go with genetics here, possibly some sort of recessive mutation. I don't really see another explanation for the nearly-universal experience of realizing that we've "always been" Steampunk. It would also explain how so many Steampunks can have non-Steampunk parents but almost never have non-Steampunk children.

(Joe, I suspect your parents may both have been some sort of "proto-Steampunk," or perhaps partially-expressed latent Steampunks.)

[rovingjack]

I'd like to add something you might find intresting.

See I'm adopted, and have something like eight or twelve genetic sisters out there in various places.

The thing is that Of the four I have contact with, all of us are very speritual (though we've chosen differant religions), three of use that I know of are very artistic and craft people (and I'd be willing to bet the others are too), And one other had expressed a passion for Steam punk some time back before I looked into this thing and discovered so was I. One of my other sisters is described by her father as being sometimes goth and sometimes back woods adventress. I'm thinking she doesn't know the wonders of steam punk yet but she would embrace it if she did.

I've not had contact with the vast majority of my sisters so some of the data is missing but I think it's intresting to note that while raised seperately more then one of us is facinated by SP.

And I get the destinct impression that my neice has some leanings. And don't think I'm above a bit of corrupting the youth... she was a star wars geek at age four.

I was one of those always liked it didn't know that's what it was types too. The best I could say when I was younger was that there was something beautiful about clockworks, rusty cluncky machines and mad science.

[-The Hyphen-]

As to the question of Nature vs Nurture, I would have to say that in my disposition towards SteamPunk and it's ideals has little if anything to do with my raising. One of the greatest comments I have ever been paid is having been told that, in today's society, I am "the exception rather than the rule". Had I been inclined to succumb to the shaping forces of my environment... Suffice it to say I don't like to imagine what I would have become. (Though I don't think I would have known to care at that point.)

Does that mean, however, that all that I am, my entire being and personality is merely a byproduct of genetics, preordained at the combining of sperm and egg? Truth be told, I cannot be sure. One may as well call into question the basic fundamentals of humanity. Are we just extremely complicated electrochemical machines, or is it possible that, in having achieved consciousness and sentience, we have become more than the sum of our parts? These are questions I am not prepared, nor I believe yet qualified to answer.

Nature and Nurture are two great influences on us, but I think we are missing a bit of the point. It is my personal belief that the third, and most important factor determining who we are...
...is ourselves.

More than anything else, what really matters are the choices we make. It's one of the things that most of humanity, as a collective, forgot, or perhaps just refused to remember. It's not just genetics. It's not just the environment. It's you.

You always have a choice. You can always make a difference. Take responsibility for your own actions for once. The possibilities each day holds are infinite, mindboggling. The right person, with the right idea, at the right place, the right time, can change history. There are no more excuses.

It's all up to you.

[E.A. Claringbold]

My great-grandfather bought a circus on a whim. 

That is absolutely fascinating. I have never heard such a thing and yet it's happened. It makes me go all wide-eyed and ever-so-slightly droolly. XD

something inherently attractive about objects and attitudes we would now identify as SP, that have been attracting us over the years, such that when we see it, we recognise it, though still not knowing its name?

I did not know such a thing existed months ago. Throughout highschool I always thought I was supposed to be some neo-victorian goth, because I thought that was the closest thing to what was interesting to me and what sort of felt right. The moment I laid eyes on steampunk and knew it's name, I too like many others, fell head over heels for it. I knew then, at that first moment, that it was the thing I had been looking for. Finally, I felt truly at peace and at home with this genre/culture and all it's things and steamy, goggled, brassy glory. ~sigh~...

Nature vs. Nurture- I really don't know.

[Darkauras]

For me, I'd say both. My parents are both very open minded people, for instance, though we live in California our house has slowly developed an eastern theme particularly for old Indian decorations, not steampunk, I know, but considering that my parents don't know what steampunk is I'd say it's close enough.

As for myself, I've always found myself fascinated by anything that emits steam and clanks. Even as a child while most kids find watching a blacksmith boring I found it fascinating. I was always drawn to the works of literature that dealt with alternate Victorian time-lines and I never knew exactly why. When I realized that steampunk existed I was ecstatic, now I had an explanation for my zaniness, well at least some of it, the rest remains unexplained.

[Phineas Highfedulus]

Whilst knowing about Steamy goodness for a good few years now, I've only (within the past month or so) realised* that my instinctive "...that looks good, I'll buy that, ooh, maybe I can wear that and that and I'd..." just happened to include pocket watches, exquisite hats and the desire to resemble something from the 1880's. I read Sherlock Holmes novels, I love anything from that sort of "era". The 'steam' part of it has only recently hit me (Ow!) and I'm more concerned with the brassy look and style of things than if the thing can pull several horse's worth of stuff. I guess I'm a bit of a Clockworkbrasspunk instead, but eh! So from my experience, it's probably a bit of both. You may sort of live the Steamy goodness, but not know it's name and the full extent of it's eccentricity - which needs to be nurtured out by other Steampunks in places like BrassGoggles.

* I didn't realise myself, a close friend of mine pointed it out to me that I was seeming more and more steampunk by the day.

[Angus A Fitziron]

Thank you everybody for your insights to this topic so far. Your honesty and openess is something of beauty and very special.

.....and Hyphen, how I echo your words. Your summing up resonates deeply with me and must have been the sentiment that fired much of what we value from the 19th C. 

You always have a choice. You can always make a difference. Take responsibility for your own actions for once. The possibilities each day holds are infinite, mindboggling. The right person, with the right idea, at the right place, the right time, can change history. There are no more excuses.

It's all up to you.

[Stewart Starbuck]

I'd say it would have to be mostly nurture here.

While neither of my parents are steampunk, they instantly understood the concept when I gave them some examples. My father however is very mechanically minded, and can be frequently found in the garage/workshop tinkering with his classic cars.
I guess this rubbed off on me somewhat, as since I can remember I've been a fan of things like lego and meccano, then later on moving on to junk collecting aspect.

As a family we do also share a love for mechanical machines (or "living" machines as we often call them, rather than most modern electrical things), and while my father's interest is more in classic cars, he does also have a keen interest in steam engines and the like. I'm the reverse of this, having a great interest in the older machines, such as steam engines, while having far less of an interest in old vehicle. (However, I'll take a steam-powered car anyday.)

Now as I mentioned in my introduction post, I haven't considered myself to have been a steampunk all my life without knowing it. Reading this thread however and thinking about it now I guess in many ways I have been. At least for the mechanical side, while my attire has only been effected since after learning about it. I do feel more comfortable now however than I have before, I guess because I now have something to relate to.

I think I'm going to have to think about this a bit more now, this is quite an interesting topic you've got going.

[silastic armor fiend]

im gonna have to reiterate what most people have said here. its a combination of both but probably more nature. when i was about 4 years old, my mother started calling me the absent minded professor (and hitchcock, which is a little strange for a 4 year old, but that was always me). ive always had a predilection for antique and outdated machines and clothing, though i never knew why exactly. as far as nurture goes for me, i grew up in a very eccentric family, which i think has influenced me a lot. i was always taught to do what i want. you know color outside the lines and all that. she introduced me to victorian literature when i was very young and i immediately fell in love. i feel like ive always been a steampunk on the inside, even if i didnt know what it was.

a strange piece of information: my mother is an artist and a fantastic cook. those two traits were totally divided between my twin brother and i. he can cook, but is a horrible artist and i am quite artistic but the only thing i can cook is toaster waffles.

[Owen]

Has anyone else ever thought that they should have been born 125 years or so earlier? I have thought this to myself many a times throughout my life. Thats why I believe its nature.

[Captain Brandsson]

Has anyone else ever thought that they should have been born 125 years or so earlier? I have thought this to myself many a times throughout my life. Thats why I believe its nature.

I'm fine with our various modern advancements and ameneties...  Like a computer and internet upon which can be posted a fondness for a time without them
I just wish modern technology were not so damn ugly and uninspired-looking most of the time.

[James Harrison]

A lot of nature, and a not inconsequential amount of nurture. 

Nature: most of my male ancestors tend to be of an engineering mindset.  One was an engineer on one of the Canadian railways (back in the 1890's-1900's).  One of my grandfathers spent his whole working life in foundries, the other served as an electrician in the Royal Navy in the 1950s and then spent the rest of his working life in factories and foundries.  And so on and so forth.  Tales of so-and-so who 'built model steam engines aged 10' or 'went deaf after working in a rivetting shop for 30 years' are rife in my family.   

Nurture: my grandparents when I was very young had this tradition of taking I and my brothers to the Severn Valley Railway at least once a year, and would (and still do) without fail everytime I and my parents visit, start reminiscing about the 'good old days' of the 1930s and 40s, and find really old black and white films to watch.  I suppose it inevitable that at least some interest would rub off on me.