Today -100: June 20, 1914: I have never found a man with a tail, but I still have hopes

Two Russian military aviators die in airplane accidents. Honestly, could war really increase the fatality rate for these guys?

25 lawyers who signed protests against the ludicrous ritual murder prosecution of Mendel Beilis in Kiev are convicted for insulting the Ministry of Justice and given sentences of 6 or 8 months.

An explosion in an Alberta coal mine kills at least 36, with 200 still entombed – which is a really scary word – and presumed dead.

Brandon Thomas, actor and playwright, author of the 1892 play “Charley’s Aunt,” dies.

The NYT is upset that Prime Minister Asquith agreed to meet Sylvia Pankhurst, who the Times declares is no Joan of Arc: “She is an obstinate, illogical, and contentious woman of the shrewish type... She conquered, because she could not be returned to prison and the Government was afraid to let her die in the street.” The Times appears to have no such fears.

At the annual meeting of the Eugenics Research Association, Dr. Howard Knox of the US Public Health Service reveals the hobby he practices while screening immigrants: “In my experience at Ellis Island I have never found a man with a tail, but I still have hopes, for I have seen them with nearly every other reversion anomaly that one could imagine.” He tells of a Finn he deported for too closely resembling the Missing Link, but complains that the law doesn’t allow him to reject all such throwbacks. He notes that immigrants from “certain countries” are almost all “physical inferiors.”

Headline of... no, wait, it’s a week early: “Shot Hit Grand Duke's Car.” The Grand Duke of Olbenburg’s car is hit, it is thought accidentally, while his daughters the two duchesses were being driven. No one is hurt.

Headline of the Day -100: “Empress Erratic, Say Alden Crew.” A ship, the Empress of Ireland, not an actual royal person.

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