A recent story in the news is about a school in Sydney Australia where someone drew some phallic symbols and a rude message on their lawn. They apparently managed to remove the unwanted graffiti within hours, but not before it was captured in aerial imagery, which has since been added to Google Earth.
The offending image in Google Earth. Clancy Catholic College, Sydney Australia
It turns out this sort of thing is quite common and especially common in schools.
Bellemoor School, Southampton.
Harman-Geist Stadium, Hazleton, Pennsylvania.
Yarm School, Teesside, United Kingdom.
Fairfield College, New Zealand.
Koonung Secondary College, Melbourne, Australia.
A field on the Isle of Wight
There are probably many more that we have not come across.
It is not a new idea, with the Cerne Abbas Giant dating from at least the 17th century
Cerne Abbas Giant, Dorset, United Kingdom.
There are also many examples of unintentional phallic symbols.
Newmarket Health Centre, Ontario, Canada.
A park in Des Moines, Iowa.
A housing estate in Hoylake, Wirral, United Kingdom.
A peninsula on New Providence Island, Bahamas
A Church in Dixon, Illinois.
For the locations featured in this post download this KML file
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About Timothy Whitehead
Timothy has been using Google Earth since 2004 when it was still called Keyhole before it was renamed Google Earth in 2005 and has been a huge fan ever since. He is a programmer working for Red Wing Aerobatx and lives in Cape Town, South Africa.
Pinnacle of human art ingenuity right here
The Cerne Abbas Giant is the only one of these symbols made to be viewed from a distance at ground level, given that it dates from at least the seventeenth century when it was recorded as being repaired – see the link to Wikipedia. In a foreshortened view from ground level the giant appears more animated, as can be seen from the car park and viewing area recorded in Street View.
Although now commonly dated to the seventeenth century, the depiction of the figure is not typical of the period, and there is nothing else as publicly explicit in the UK. It would have taken a very bold and possibly foolhardy person to make such a large and permanent statement at that time, and no seventeenth century record of its creation or of amy outrage survives. So the giant may well be much older.