Today -100: April 24, 1913: Of mines, scutaris, alien land bills, and more Little Dorrits

A coal mine in Pennsylvania blows up, killing 120 or so miners, mostly by asphyxiation. Coal mines are fun.

Montenegro, the only Balkan ally not to have signed an armistice with Turkey, captures Scutari after a six-month siege, defying the many threats of the Great Powers (especially Austria).

Secretary of State Bryan is heading to California to try to persuade legislators to ban Japanese from owning land in a way that doesn’t offend Japan (Wilson’s first response was that this was a state’s rights issue, but Japan has made it clear that it’s a question of the treaty rights enjoyed by its citizens). The Japanese ambassador denies reports that he threatened that Japan will go to war with the US if this bill passes.

The woman who was the model for Charles Dickens’s Little Dorrit has died. Thing is, I saw that exact same story 2½ years ago, about another person. How many Little Dorrits were there?

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