Today -100: October 17, 1912: Of never-falling standards, insolent notes, and Peths and Panks

Theodore Roosevelt issues a statement: “It matters little about me, but it matters all about the cause we fight for. ... the standard itself can never fall... Tell the people not to worry about me, for if I go down another will take my place.” And so on, and on. His abdomen may have been punctured, but not his pomposity.

Turkey demands that Greece and the others apologize for their “insolent” notes within 24 hours or else. Bulgaria declares war on Turkey (I’m not sure in what order these events occurred).

Another split amongst the British militant suffragettes. While they were visiting the US, Mr. & Mrs. Pethick-Lawrence are expelled by Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst from their leadership roles (and indeed membership in) the Women’s Social and Political Union, removing the last obstacle to an escalation of militant tactics. Punch, 10/30/12:



(Click to enlargen. Caption: Budding Suffragette: “I say, Prissy” (with intensity), “Are you a Peth or a Pank?”)

Since the Pethick-Lawrences (that’s a feminist-marriage hyphenated name, by the way, like Villaraigosa) own the WSPU newspaper, Votes for Women, and will continue to publish it, the WSPU starts The Suffragette, which explains in its first issue (dated tomorrow -100): “The Suffragettes are women who have profited by the freedom won for them by the pioneers of the movement. They are the advance-guard of the new womanhood.”

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