Today -100: May 12, 1910: Of mourning and oaths

George Bernard Shaw writes to the London Times opposing the practice of wearing mourning for the late king, which is quite expensive – all those black dresses – and suggests instead wearing a violet ribbon. “Why our schools should be deliberately made hideous with black because an honourable public career has come to its natural close in all peace, fulfilment, and cheerful memory is not apparent to any healthy-minded person.”

There is a fight going on over the coronation oath of the next king; the Asquith government proposed dropping the explicitly anti-Catholic language.