Today -100: April 18, 1923: Of death lashes, duces in a hurry, dancing, patriotic textbooks, chekas, and pharaonic umbrellas

Headline of the Day -100:  

The Florida Legislature’s investigation of the peonage system hears
from a guard at the Putnam Lumber Company prison camp, who says 1 to 5 rented prisoners were whipped every day, and describes the death of Martin Tabert, who’d been convicted of stowing away on a freight train, after being flogged over 100 times. Tallahassee Sheriff Jones was paid $20 per prisoner. Plus fees. Which it sounds like he kept. So he ordered his deputies out in force to meet trains and grab people riding the rails. Oh, and Tabert’s parents sent money to pay his fine, but Jones sent it back because he’d already sold Tabert into slavery. Sorry, peonage.

Benito Mussolini gets a speeding ticket.

That dance marathon that fox-trotted its way from New York to New Jersey back to New York and then over to Connecticut has been halted by local cops, although they kindly wait until Vera Sheppard of Long Island City set a new record of 69 hours. Madeline Gottshick of Cleveland, holder of the previous record of 66 hours, 6 minutes, casts doubt on Sheppard’s claim, since some of those 69 hours were spent dancing in vans between venues, unwitnessed.

Incidentally, aviation endurance records are also being broken, with an army monoplane flying non-stop for 36 hours.

The NY Senate passes the Higgins Patriotic Text Book Bill 35-9. Textbooks must emphasize the US’s victories in every war it has fought. Mostly this bill is about the Revolutionary War, as some books have been deemed too pro-British.  So textbooks must now uphold the existence of the British oppressions mentioned in the Declaration of Independence. Which has to be quoted in its entirety. And they must not mention the human failings of revolutionaries unless their virtues are given at least equal prominence.

Hitler gets his summons to the Leipzig Supreme Court. His newspaper says he won’t go and calls the court the “Leipzig Cheka.” Sick burn, Adolf.

The Soviet Union says it will accept 300,000 Armenian refugees from Turkey.

King Fuad of Egypt is not happy with the proposed constitution written by the constitution commission because it says the people are the source of power and does not give him absolute powers. I don’t know what the point of a constitution even is if the king has absolute powers.

Speaking of Egyptian kings, Tut-a-mania continues, with fashion shows, balls, and of course umbrellas, just like the boy king’s slaves carried, probably.

Available at Gimbels.

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