Today -100: September 6, 1926: Drill, baby, drill

The Federal Oil Conservation Board finds that existing US oil reserves in the ground amount to only 6 years’ supply, so we’d better get cracking (not fracking) on finding more.

Spain declares martial law to enable the punishment of the “absolute indiscipline” in the Artillery Corps.

In his forthcoming message to Congress, Coolidge “will not recommend new legislation that might disturb business.”  Current anti-trust laws, he thinks, are perfectly adequate.

100 federal Prohibition agents surge into Charleston, South Carolina, arresting prohibition agents, sheriffs & constables, bribe-taking being the primary charge.

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Today -100: September 5, 1926: Of prosperity, candidates, chaplins, and plebiscites

Coolidge will not actively campaign in the mid-term elections, but has spent his vacation meeting with bankers & business people, because of course he has, and developing the party’s issues: prosperity, no change in tariffs, cutting taxes and government spending still further, Prohibition enforcement, and helping farmers through cooperative marketing.

The New York Republicans, having failed to get anyone to agree to run for governor, plan to just draft someone at their convention on the 27th, ignoring any previous refusals.

Monsignor John P. Chidwick, who according to the NYT is “Department Chaplin” of the United Spanish War Veterans of the State of New York (does he do the mustache? probably) and was chaplain of the USS Maine when it was blown up, resigns from the veterans’ group, saying it’s been taken over by the Ku Klux Klan, noting the election of Sen. Rice Means (R-Colorado), who is indeed totally a kluxer, as National Commander in Chief.

Spain will hold a plebiscite on whether to call a new National Assembly or just continue Primo de Rivera’s dictatorship. Which is in increasing conflict with the military, with King Alfonso straddling the fence as always.

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Today -100: September 4, 1926: Of planes, duels, and corpse trains

Coolidge, pushing to increase spending on naval aviation, says he’s pretty sure that doesn’t violate the Washington Treaty. He doesn’t want an arms competition (“arms race” wasn’t coined until 1930), so he thinks everyone else will ignore his aeroplane surge, probably.

Prince Valerio Pignatelli, secretary to the Italian Legation in Mexico, challenges Federal District Governor Gen. Francisco Serrano to a duel for making fun of the duel he did last week when both guys missed.

A large crowd throngs the Chicago railroad terminal trying to catch a glimpse of the train containing the coffin containing the body of Rudolph Valentino, because these people badly need TikTok. In the event, they don’t actually get to catch a glimpse of the train containing the coffin containing the body of Rudolph Valentino; the view’s blocked by another train or something. They don’t even get to catch a glimpse of Pola Negri, who’s ridin’ the rails with the late Mr. Valentino.

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Today -100: September 3, 1926: Of trousers, mild wet plans, and Bolshevism-savor

Front-Page Headline of the Day -100:

Headline of the Day -100:

Moist, I think the word you’re looking for is moist. Like the R’s, the D’s are using the forthcoming referendum on state Prohibition enforcement as an excuse to weasel out of taking a position.

The execution of Celestino Madeiros is postponed so he can testify in Sacco and Vanzetti’s appeal for a new trial, which is based on Madeiros’s confession to the crime for which S&V were convicted.

The Catholic Episcopate attacks the claim in Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles’s message to Congress yesterday that the Church was in rebellion against the Mexican state. They say, “He would better have said that all Governments since 1853 have been oppressors of the Church, inspired by a Jacobinism or a premature Bolshevism.” Calles’s policies also “savor of Bolshevism,” presumably mature Bolshevism. They also claim that the closings of churches, schools, etc were done with no supporting law.

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Today -100: September 2, 1926: Of sympathetic actions, curfews, platinum teeth, and goats

Knights of Columbus leaders – including a gentleman known as The Supreme Knight – meet Pres. Coolidge, later claiming they didn’t ask him for intervention in Mexico, just “sympathetic action.” Which doesn’t sound very Supreme-Knighty, if you ask me.

Chicago now has a curfew for children 16 or younger, and cops are supposed to enforce it, but “Because of the prevailing mode of short skirts, rolled hose and bobbed hair, they were unable to distinguish children from grown-ups.”

Former mayor of Atlantic City William Riddle, challenging his property tax assessment, makes the mistake at one point of taking out his $1,200 platinum false teeth, whereupon one of the assessors demands that they be taxed too. After a couple of days fighting about jurisdiction, they determine he should pay $30.58.

Headline of the Day -100:

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Today -100: September 1, 1926: Of quitters, films, and duels

NY Supreme Court Justice James Cropsey drops out of the gubernatorial race, thanks to Sen. James Wadsworth’s objection to a state Prohibition enforcement plan, which Cropsey supports, being put in the Republican platform. At least according to an (unnamed) friend of his.

William Hays, “head of the motion-picture industry,” meets Pres. Coolidge and asks him to include films in the proposed Archive Building, although it sounds like this would be just for “historic” films, like the footage of McKinley’s inauguration.

Rhode Island State Police shoot at striking textile workers in Manville when they try to storm a factory, injuring god knows how many.

Prince Valerio Pignatelli, secretary to the Italian Legation in Mexico, fights a duel with one Alberto Meade, whoever that is. It’s pretty unusual to have a duel in a foreign country. Anyway, they both shoot and miss. The cause of their quarrel is unknown. Pignatelli turned later in life to writing pulp novels.

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Today -100: August 31, 1926: Of lynchings and responding readily to modern conditions

Local elections in Italy are abolished in favor of officials being appointed by the central government, the Podesta system, “which responds more readily to modern conditions.”

A white mob in Coffee County, Georgia lynches... a white dude.

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Today -100: August 30, 1926: We will never have another proxy governor

There’s a German Nationalist/Monarchist parade through Nuremberg, reviewed by former Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria, wearing a field marshal uniform, former Prince Oskar of Prussia, and miscellaneous princes, admirals, and field marshals.

All of Nepal’s slaves are now free, mostly through government compensation to their owners.

Headline of the Day -100:

Then Negri, who has traveled from LA to NY by train, “recovered herself long enough to say it was true she had been engaged to marry him.” Then she swoons again.

Dan Moody says of his Democratic primary victory for Texas governor, “There was only one issue and that was Fergusonism,” that is, his victory was over “Pa” rather than “Ma” Ferguson. Which, fair.  “We will never have another proxy governor”.

Pa Ferguson says his wife’s “not worried and you needn’t be worried about her either,” adding, “We are just trying to decide which calf the train ran over,” whatever the hell that means.

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Today -100: August 29, 1926: Of military interventions, collective madnesses, overnight uncrowned dictators, shrines, and flag exercises

Texas Attorney General Dan Moody defeats Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson in the Democratic run-off primary with 64% of the vote. Moody is 33 and, as the NYT feels obligated to say over and over, red-headed. (Michigan’s first governor, in the 19th century, was 23, by the way. Couldn’t tell you how many ginger governors there’ve been). Moody will have an even larger majority against the Republican candidate in November. 

The US lands troops in Nicaragua to protect Americans and their property, supposedly invited by the governor of Bluefields.

Some other woman swims the English Channel, but we’re bored now.

The Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano weighs in on the scenes at Rudolph Valentino’s funeral home: “It is a collective madness, incarnating the tragic comedy of a new fetishism, the last logical consequence of a materialist civilization which has given man dominion over everything but himself.” They make it sound like a bad thing.

A Sunday NYT Magazine article explains how Stalin “has become almost overnight the uncrowned dictator of Russia.”

Japan’s Shrine Bureau, a branch of the Home Dept., decrees the destruction of shrines to animals and monsters; only gods need apply.

The ACLU comes to the aid of 9-year-old Russell Tremain of Bellingham, Washington, who authorities removed from his home last year because he would not salute the flag in school for religious reasons (his parents are in the Elijah Voice Society, a splinter of the Jehovah’s Witnesses). His parents removed him from school when it refused to exempt him from “flag exercises,” so his father was charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor. A judge ordered Russell sent to the detention center for incorrigible children, be permanently removed from his home and put up for adoption so he could be raised by a “patriotic, Christian family.” The Tremains are not doing themselves any favors by refusing to show up in court – they do not recognize earthly courts – or authorize anyone to represent them. Russell will be returned to his family in late 1927, a year and a half after he was taken. More information on the case here. The US Supreme Court ruled in 1940 that schools could coerce students to recite the pledge of allegiance but reversed itself 3 years later.

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Today -100: August 28, 1926: Of tips, warships, and greetings

Coolidge issues rules for traveling government employees. They must limit tipping to 60¢ a day (with maximums for bellboys, porters, etc). They may not pay more than 50¢ a day for a hotel bath or $1.40 a week for laundry.

Nicaraguan complains to the League of Nations that Mexico is trying to overthrow its government, sending a warship carrying troops to aid rebels. It’s not asking the League to do anything in particular, just, you know, checking in.

Huge crowds (including a bunch of pickpockets) greet Gertrude Ederle in New York on her return from swimming the English Channel. How much of an overlap do you think there is with the crowds who jostled each other for a glimpse of Rudolph Valentino’s corpse?

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Today -100: August 27, 1926: Fun with alliteration

At Texas’s primary run-off elections tomorrow Gov. Ma Ferguson is expected to be crushed. Pa Ferguson calls Attorney Gen. Dan Moody a “Klene Kut Ku Klux Klansman” (actually, as a prosecutor Moody put a lot of kluxers in jail). I’d forgotten that 2 years ago Ms Ferguson’s slogan was “Me for Ma.” Anyway, Moody’s is “Dan’s the Man,” which is somewhat... problematic.

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Today -100: August 26, 1926: Of corpses, governors, and women’s votes

Campbell Funeral Parlors stops its public viewings of Rudolph Valentino’s corpse after the circus-like atmosphere (depending on what sort of circuses you go to, I guess).

New York Republicans are still having a hard time finding a candidate for governor. NY Supreme Court Justice Arthur S. Tompkins declines to run, pointing out that he has 8 years of his 14-year term on the Court left to run. He suggests Justice James Cropsey, but Cropsey would push for an unpopular state Prohibition enforcement act.

Mussolini giveth, Mussolini taketh away. In this case, women’s suffrage. Women (some women, not a lot of women) were recently granted the vote in municipal elections but now, before they’ve had a chance to exercise that vote, municipal elections are being abolished. Henceforth, muni officers will be appointed by the central government.

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Today -100: August 25, 1926: It’s what he would have wanted

30,000 people show up at the funeral home to see Rudolph Valentino’s corpse for two seconds at a time, getting a tad unruly at times. “They were merely curious, and looked it. Hardly one looked even sorrowful much less reverent.” 10 black-shirt-wearing Fascists set themselves up to guard the coffin, on the orders of Mussolini himself. Except they will turn out actually to be a bunch of actors hired by the funeral home. Mounted police charge the crowd, as was the custom.

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Today -100: August 24, 1926: The last of The Sheik

Rudolph Valentino dies at 31. In the 90 minutes before he went into a coma, “At intervals he cried out in Italian which no one at his bedside understood.” Pola Negri, who claimed to be engaged to him, is performatively prostrated.

Manuel Quezon warns the Philippines Senate that if the Republicans win the 1928 US presidential election, they will annex the Philippines, like Hawaii.

Uruguay is the first  South American country to recognize the Soviet Union.

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Today -100: August 23, 1926: Πραξικόπημα!

A coup in Greece removes dictator Theodoros Pangalos from power. Gen. Georgios Kondylis leads the bloodless coup. Pangalos is arrested and put on a destroyer. However, the captain of the destroyer turns out to be a supporter of Pangalos and tries to help him escape; the ship is pursued by another destroyer which will exchange fire with the first (or just fired warning shots?) and recapture Pangalos. 

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Today -100: August 22, 1926: Of churches and valentinos and high fashion

Mexican Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles meets Archibishop Leopoldo Ruiz of Michoacan and tells him that churches, which are now property of the state, may stay open and services held in them while the Church pursues amending the Constitution. The Church refuses because they don’t want to recognize the state-ownership thing.

Rudolph Valentino has pleurisy.

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Today -100: August 21, 1926: Of exaggerated consumption, wets, lawyers, and lyricists

France orders restaurants to serve only two meats per meal – ONLY TWO MEATS PER MEAL! – “to put an end to exaggerated consumption, particularly in luxury establishments especially frequented by foreigners.” Also, only stale bread will be sold, to decrease consumption of flour.

Columbia President Nicholas Murray Butler refuses to run for NY governor. He faced opposition from up-state Republicans over his strong opposition to Prohibition. They want a candidate who’s Wet, but not that wet. Sen. James Wadsworth says the Republicans will evade the Prohibition issue entirely by saying their gubernatorial candidate will abide by whatever the upcoming referendum says.

Stalin continues the purge of his opponents in particular and Old Communists in general, removing Lev Kamenev from his post as Trade Commissar. Kamenev can now devote his time to writing a biography of Lenin.

Lawyers who are members of the Italian Fascist Party will no longer be allowed to represent anti-Fascists.

Paul Schindler, theatre director and composer of such musicals as “The Geezer of Geck” and “The Wizard of Oz,” commits suicide. I can’t find a trace of this alleged version of Wizard of Oz, but it provides an excuse for me to mention that the lyricist for all the songs in the 1939 movie version, “Yip” Harburg, also wrote “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime” (1932), “Lydia the Tattooed Lady,” “Finian’s Rainbow,” and  a musical about Amelia Bloomer. He was blacklisted in the '50s.

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Today -100: August 20, 1926: Calles says no

Mexican Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles rejects yesterday’s appeal from the Catholic Episcopate for a deal, which would consist of the government suspending the clauses in the Constitution relating to religion and the laws enforcing them, and the Church in return doing, um, nothing. He suggests they try to appeal to Congress and the court rather than him.

42 are indicted for using the mails in Florida land frauds, including Merle C. Tebbetts, which is a very Florida-land-fraudster name. The state of Florida is pretty much wall-to-wall land fraud at this point.

Someone takes up Lady Astor’s offer to pay for the passage of anyone wants to go to Russia, provided they stay for two years. A J. Morton of Liverpool, with his wife and 2 children have set sail. The Soviet gov. has promised to find him work.

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Today -100: August 19, 1926: Of conferences, chrysopoeia, and duels

Philippines Sen. Sergio Osmeña says that when he visited Washington, Coolidge told him that the US intends to free the Philippines, you know, eventually, after building up its economy. Osmeña seems to trust him absolutely. Osmeña proposes a small conference – in Washington – of a handful of men from each side. “I am sure the Filipinos would accept the decision of such a conference.” He expects such a conference to decide to hold off independence and obviously Filipinos would just say, “Well, if a conference of some randos thinks we’re not ready to rule ourselves, then we must not be.” Osmeña will be the Philippines’ vice president from 1935, succeeding to the presidency on Manuel Quezon’s death in 1944, during the Japanese occupation.

The Philippines Senate votes unanimously to override Gov. Leonard Wood’s veto of the bill for an independence referendum, without even waiting on the decision of Osmeña’s conference.

Gen. Erich Ludendorff, who just keeps showing up in the news, whether it’s his divorce or his tax-dodging, is tricked by a locksmith’s apprentice into buying a process to turn any metal into gold.

German student Erwin Behr is killed in a friendly sabre duel (mensur), which is a thing which is still going on.

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Today -100: August 18, 1926: Of reserves

Rep. Ogden Livingston Mills is the NY Republican Party’s “reserve candidate” for governor if Columbia Pres. Nicholas Murray Butler continues to refuse to accept the nomination. Mills meets the requirements the R’s think are essential for success: he’s from New York City and is a Wet. Like Alfred Smith, Mills would be a reluctant candidate, preferring to run for re-election to Congress and then for Senate in ‘28.

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Today -100: August 17, 1926: Like a big boy

Secretary of State Frank Kellogg says Mexico’s crackdown on the Catholic Church has affected no American citizens or property protected by treaty rights, so there’s no reason for the US to intervene.

The Polyclinic Hospital issues a statement on Rudolph Valentino: “Like a big boy, Valentino is very thankful to the nurses who have taken care of him.”

British authorities open the coffin that purportedly contains the body of Lord Kitchener, recovered from the sea. And by British authorities, I mean Lambeth coroner Ingleby Oddie and pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury. Just luxuriate in those names for a moment. Anyways, the coffin is... empty.

Philippines Governor Gen. Leonard Wood vetoes a bill passed by the Philippines Legislature for a plebiscite on Philippine independence, saying the Lege doesn’t have that power.

Canberra goes dry.

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Today -100: August 16, 1926: Of nullification, valentinos, and lynchings

Rep. George Holden Tinkham calls on Attorney Gen. John Sargent to institute criminal proceedings against the Anti-Saloon League for violations of the Corrupt Practices Acts and for perjury, covering up its fundraising and spending amounting, Tinkham says, to $50 million over the years, including paying congresscritters, to buy the 18th Amendment and enforcement laws. Tinkham attacks the Justice Dept’s failure to enforce the Corrupt Practices Act of 1925 which, he says, amounts to nullification.

Rudolph Valentino is operated on for a gastric ulcer and appendicitis (he didn’t actually have the latter, I gather).

A masked mob storms the Wythe County, Virginia county jail and lynches a black man, Raymond Bird, shooting him, then hanging him from a tree.

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Today -100: August 15, 1926: I don’t believe that any man can be successful who seeks great political honors

NY Gov. Al Smith attends a private dinner in his honor at the Hotel Statler in Buffalo. After Erie County Democrats give, like, 15 speeches in a row about how he needs to run for re-election, Smith says he doesn’t wanna and it would damage his health and it’s bad to act like only one person can lead the party, and...

He adds that of course if the State Convention nominates him anyway (on Sept. 28 for a Nov. 2 election day), he’ll just have to suck it up.

One Frank Power (not his real name, it will come out) claims to have in his possession the body of Lord Kitchener, whose ship was torpedoed in 1916. The alleged corpse was allegedly recovered by an alleged Norwegian fisherman. “Power” has brought a coffin from Norway to London.

The Supreme Lodge of the Knights of Pythias rejects a proposal to help lepers in the Philippines.

In a letter to the League of Nations, Italy defends its accord with Britain establishing “zones of influence” in Abyssinia, echoing Britain’s earlier letter to the League in saying that the agreement was for Abyssinia’s good and certainly wouldn’t violate its rights. Neither country explain why they negotiated in secret from the world in general and Abyssinia in particular.

Lawsuits between Gen. Erich Ludendorff and his banker, Dr. Borchardt of the, ahem, Sinner Banking House, lay bare some top-shelf tax evasion on the general’s side. General L accuses his banker of keeping some of the money he moved offshore (if Switzerland counts as offshore) and the banker responds that the general was asking him to do illegal things and wanted his account hidden under someone else’s name. This all might give impetus to the left’s demand that Ludey be stripped of his pension.

Italy is preventing Italians from touristing abroad. Even Swiss women married to Italian men are not being allowed to visit their relatives.

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Today -100: August 14, 1926: Yay! they’ve found a woman to blame!

Several of Mexico’s episcopate meets to protest against a possible prosecution of the archbishop of Mexico City for statements he made to a newspaper. The government has said won’t happen but I guess the archbishops called the meeting before that happened. The episcopate blames the laws affecting the Catholic church on Belinda Zarada of the Anti-Clerical League.

Coolidge approves the first two airway routes.

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Today -100: August 13, 1926: Of budgets

Coolidge’s 1928 budget will include a large increase in Prohibition enforcement spending. Since he’s still committed to reducing spending overall, that money will  come out of the Army and Navy, which won’t need it after the League of Nations Arms Conference leads to all sorts of disarmament, probably. Already previously congressionally-approved battle cruisers will not be built and naval maneuvers will be canceled due to lack of fuel. So Coolidge is doubling down on Prohibition enforcement ahead of his re-election run.

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Today -100: August 12, 1926: Of property seizures and kloters

Mexico orders the seizure of property controlled by members of the Catholic clergy, some of it hidden under the names of private citizens.

Texas Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson officially states that she’s not dropping out of the re-election race or resigning after losing the first primary, as she promised to do. She says Attorney Gen. Dan Moody only won the primary because of the Klan vote.

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Today -100: August 11, 1926: Persecutive religious laws are the worst kind of religious laws

Headline of the Day -100:

The Vatican’s Osservatore Romano says there will be no negotiations with Mexico unless it withdraws its “persecutive religious law” but will trust to the “invincible arms of prayer.” The invincible arms of prayer and a nickle will get you a cup of coffee.

Pres. Coolidge refuses to receive a deputation from the Knights of Columbus who want the US to intervene in Mexico’s religious affairs. He considers those a domestic matter for Mexico, which is a refreshing change of pace for US policy towards Mexico.

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Today -100: August 10, 1926: Of quiet cities and sore losers

FACT CHECK! The Associated Press investigates rumors that Stalin is dead in a revolt and army mutiny and that Trotsky has fled Moscow. They find that “Moscow is as quiet as any American city on Sunday morning.”

Texas Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson has reneged on her promise not to stand in a run-off if she failed in the Dem. primary, which she very much did. So there will after all be a run-off on the 28th. She’s also trying to get Attorney Gen. Dan Moody thrown off that ballot for alleged campaign finance irregularities (contributions from candidates for other offices) and miscounted ballots.

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Today -100: August 9, 1926: Of power in the Philippines

Coolidge’s envoy to the Philippines, Col. Carmi Thompson, says the status of the Philippines should be settled – annexation, autonomy, whatever – for a long period during which there will be absolutely no reconsideration of independence, in order to create the settled conditions needed for Firestone to build the giant rubber plantations that Filipinos do not want. Gov. Gen. Leonard Wood wants to be given more power, including the power to make appointments without the approval of the Legislature, which has not been compliant lately no matter how many times he nominates the same people. He also wants Americans heading departments, he wants control over the cops, the annulment of laws passed by the Lege limiting his power, etc.

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Today -100: August 8, 1926: Thousands of priests have come here to make our people fanatics and sink them in ignorance

Katherine Langley (not that you’d know “Mrs. John W. Langley”’s first name from the NYT) wins in the Republican primary for Kentucky’s 10th congressional district, the very seat her husband John resigned in January as he faced a prison term, which he is currently serving at Atlanta Penitentiary, for Volstead violations including securing “medicinal” alcohol for bootleggers and attempting to bribe a Prohibition agent.

Mexican Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles tells US reporters “in our Latin-American countries foreign priests have meant calamity, especially Spanish and Italian Catholic priests. They have all been outcasts from Rome... Thousands of priests have come here to make our people fanatics and sink them in ignorance.” He says he will accept no foreign mediation. He says he considers the boycott “as ridiculous as if I should dress as a clown and got out into the streets.”

Mexico’s (possibly Mexico City’s?) Health Department bans the Charleston from public dance halls because it might cause heart failure.

Col. Carmi Thompson, the former US treasurer, who Coolidge sent to the Philippines to check on conditions, says that while many, many Filipinos want independence, they have no actual grievances.

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Today -100: August 7, 1926: If it could be done, it had to be done, and I did it

Gertrude Ederle of New York, 20, who won a gold medal at the 1924 Olympics, becomes the first woman to swim the English Channel. 5 men have previously done so, but none as quickly (14 hours, 31 minutes), and that with a choppy sea that greatly increased the length she had to swim. Her 2003 obituary says she sang “Let Me Call You Sweetheart” while she swam to set a rhythm. She says “I just knew if it could be done, it had to be done, and I did it.” Also, she was promised a red roadster if she did it.

The Vatican’s Osservatore Romano says Mexico’s new laws constitute a “real and true substitution of civil power for that of the Church.”

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Today -100: August 6, 1926: Anyone can do it

The Knights of Columbus asks Pres. Coolidge and the State Department to “put an end to this ignominious contempt that has been shown by President Calles for American appeal,” claiming that in its actions against the Catholic Church, Mexico has “insulted, degraded and expelled American citizens, men and women, under circumstances that are abhorrent to our conception of constitutional government.” My favorite sentence of this article: “Demand was made for protection of American citizens and that they be treated with the same consideration and respect that is shown to Mexicans in this country.” Be careful what you wish for.

In Kansas’s Republican primaries, all the candidates backed by the Ku Klux Klan lose. The anti-Klan Emporia says, “The Klan now stands a busted community in Kansas. Any one can afford to kick it around and revile it. When the Klan endorses a candidate now, he will clod it away like a mangey dog.” A note to Kansans: clod away all the kluxers you like but leave the dogs the fuck alone.

There’s a smallpox outbreak, 5 cases so far, in Brooklyn.

The union of movie cowboys protest the Army & Navy renting out troops to movie studios.

Harry Houdini, 52, stays in an airtight coffin underwater in the Hotel Shelton swimming pool for 91½ minutes. This isn’t an escapology thing or a trick but purely controlled breathing. He has a telephone and a buzzer so he can periodically indicate that he doesn’t need rescuing. After being released he says “Anyone can do it.”

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Today -100: August 5, 1926: No more wars for oil!

R.T. Haslam, MIT professor of chemical engineering, says new techniques to extract oil from coal will eliminate wars for oil, so that’s good.

Montgomery Ward, hitherto solely a mail-order company, plans to open 1,000 brick-and-mortar stores.

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Today -100: August 4, 1926: The Church will refuse to listen

Bishop Pascual Díaz, Secretary of the Mexican Episcopate responds to reports that the Church is seeking unconditional mediation with the Mexican government. No, he says, there will be no mediation unless the government revokes or suspends all its laws and decrees on religious stuff; “Otherwise the Church will refuse to listen.” Wow. “The government is trying to corrupt the Church and we refuse to permit it.”

A US Navy court of inquiry decides that the Lake Denmark, New Jersey naval depot explosions last month were no one’s fault, it was an act of God, with the lightning and all. Nonsense, the depots were too close together and set off a chain reaction.

The British send an ultimatum to the Nizam of Hyderabad demanding that British officials be given key posts in the princely state. They’re claiming massive corruption.

Mussolini issues a decree banning non-Fascist intellectual, charitable or sporting public events.

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Today -100: August 3, 1926: Of national sovereignty, piety, and war bread

British Foreign Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain defends the British-Italian pact establishing zones of influence in Abyssinia. He claims his Lake Tsana plans were more or less approved by the late Emperor Menelik; whether he has any proof of this is unclear. He will tell the League of Nations that the pact doesn’t involve any question of national sovereignty, which isn’t complete bullshit at all.

After several incidents of non-Catholics visiting the Vatican refusing to kneel before the pope, applicants for an audience will be questioned about their intentions and levels of piety.

Mussolini asks Italians to help the financial situation by eating “war bread,” with a maximum of 80-85% wheat, to cut down on wheat imports. Pastries and luxury breads made with wheat flour will be banned.

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Today -100: August 2, 1926: Of poniards and Zangwill

A Catalan anarchist tries to assassinate Spanish dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera by throwing a dagger (poniard) at him as he drives by, as was the custom. It misses.

Mexico claims to have uncovered a plot to assassinate Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles.

Israel Zangwill, British novelist (pioneering locked-room mystery The Big Bow Mystery [1891]; Children of the Ghetto: A Study of a Peculiar People [1892]), playwright, Zionist, dies at 62.

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Today -100: August 1, 1926: It’s a miracle!

The cross on the spire of the Church of San Jerónimo in Mexico City has started shaking, obviously in protest at the government persecution of the Catholic Church.

The Catholic boycott campaign includes 2,000 car owners in Mexico City canceling their licenses.

Manuel Quezon, president of the Philippines Senate, says Filipinos want Governor-General Leonard Wood, who he calls “an amiable gentleman,” replaced by a civilian, even an American (Quezon will be president in a few years). He’s cautiously interested in US plans, promoted by Harvey Firestone, to grow rubber in the Philippines but doesn’t want the development of large plantations.

Texas Democratic county conventions meet and unanimously tell Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson to resign – now – as she promised to do if she lost the primary.

Headline of the Day -100:

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Today -100: July 31, 1926: Of legations and med students

Mexican police fire into a crowd which refuses to leave the Church of San Rafael in the capital. The head of the Vatican’s legation is ordered out of the country within 24 hours, extended to 48 hours at the request of the Italian embassy.

Hungary thinks it has too many doctors, so it bans any new women medical students.

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Today -100: July 30, 1926: If Catholics, scarfaces, and evangelists

The Mexican government is expecting trouble when the anti-Catholic Church law comes into effect. Catholics are ordered disarmed, newspaper editors are arrested. Vatican officials are discussing putting an interdict on the whole country, although the pope is wary.

The state of Illinois admits that it doesn’t have enough evidence to charge Al Capone with the murder of Assistant State’s Attorney William McSwiggin, so he’s released from prison after one (1) day.

Aimee Semple McPherson, evangelist-extraordinaire, will be investigated by the L.A. County Grand Jury for perjury at the hearing into her alleged kidnapping. Witnesses have been called who saw her on her sex romp in Carmel when she was supposed to be tied up in a cabin in Mexico.

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Today -100: July 29, 1926: There’s a sucker list born every minute

The Poincaré government postpones submitting the war debt agreements with the US and Britain to parliament until at least the fall.

Abyssinia (Ethiopia) protests to the League of Nations, of which it is a member, against the agreement between Britain and Italy dividing Abyssinia into spheres of influence, giving Britain the right to build a dam on Lake Tsana to divert water to the Sudan and Italy the right to build a railroad to connect its colonies in Somaliland and Eritrea. Abyssinia, which is a real country and everything, was not invited to participate in the negotiations.

Charles Greenhaus, the former “Boy Wizard of Wall Street,” is on trial for fraud, as his custom (and will be for decades to come, really he got caught so many times), with his partner Henry Griffin for a Florida land scheme. He solicited people on a “sucker list” he’d purchased containing 38,000 names, at 2¢ a name, of people who’d fallen for various fraudulent or at least failed stocks in the past. He offered to take their worthless stocks in exchange for Florida land, which would need just a little  extra cash to pay off its mortgage so it could be sold to eager buyers who were definitely real and willing to pay large amounts... Greenhaus & Griffen will be found guilty and sentenced to 2 years and 1 year respectively.

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Today -100: July 28, 1926: Americans in Paris

Gen. Lincoln Andrews, head of federal Prohibition enforcement, has been in Britain for a while working out an agreement, the terms of which are not known and may be a, shhh, secret, for Britain to help prevent liquor-smuggling by doing things like  making sure smuggling vessels don’t acquire British registry, allowing US patrol boats to wander around the Bahamas, and exchanging information.

Coolidge blames the hostility recently shown to American tourists in Paris and elsewhere partly on the Americans themselves. I KNOW, American tourists abroad being boorish and rude!

The Mexican government plans to seize any churches whose priests abandon them, on the theory that the property was only ever loaned to the Church by its real owner, the state.

Texas Gov. Miriam Ferguson’s opponents are trying to force her to keep her promise that she’d resign if she lost the D. primary. She is threatening that if they don’t shut up about it, she’ll also reverse her decision not to take part in a run-off primary.

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Today -100: July 27, 1926: Of shaws, assassination-magnets, and dark bread

At his 70th birthday dinner, George Bernard Shaw gives the speech which the postmaster general refused to let the BBC broadcast because Shaw wouldn’t promise not to be controversial. His subject: censorship.

He comes out in favor of the Labour Party for, I think, the first time.

Robert Todd Lincoln, eldest son of Honest Abe, dies at 82. He was secretary of war 1881-5 and ambassador to Great Britain 1889-93, later becoming president of the Pullman Company. He rejected many offers to run for higher office. While he was not, as the NYT asserts, at Ford’s Theatre during his father’s assassination, he was a witness to the assassination of Pres. Garfield and was close to McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition when he was assassinated. Dude was just bad luck, is what I’m saying. An amateur astronomer, he built his own personal observatory. 

Texas Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson will keep her pledge to resign if she lost the Democratic primary, which she has. Or will she? I thought she was supposed to resign immediately, but she’s calling a special session of the Legislature in September and talking about maybe quitting Nov. 1 if she’s completed all her work. 

Headline of the Day -100:

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Today -100: July 26, 1926: Of militias, illegal fractional meetings, and controversy

The Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold, a pro-Weimar militia composed mostly of veterans, previously unarmed, will now arm its members with rifles, a few hundred thousand of them. The government says it has no objections. France might have some.

Grigory Zinoviev is also ousted from the Politburo, and Mikhail Lashevich is fired as assistant war minister for their “illegal conspirative” opposition campaign, including an “illegal fractional meeting” in the woods outside Moscow (which to be fair is exactly what they were engaged in).

George Bernard Shaw’s 70th birthday will be celebrated tomorrow by a dinner chaired by Ramsay MacDonald. It was supposed to be broadcast on the BBC, but Postmaster General Sir William Mitchell-Thomson refuses permission unless Shaw promises not to say anything “controversial.” Shaw responds that everything he says is highly controversial.

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Today -100: July 25, 1926: I will offer him a drink and take one with him even if it gags me

Grigory Zinoviev is ousted as chair of the Comintern after opposing Stalin. Who will have him executed in about a decade.

Col. Ned Green, Prohibition Administrator for Northern California and Nevada, is suspended for, among other things, holding parties in his office in which seized alcohol was served. Government agents go to his hotel room to seize his alcohol, although he points out that some of it is pre-Volstead and it isn’t illegal to have booze in your home and offer it to your guests. In fact, he claims not to know who keeps sending him all that liquor, it just kinda shows up. “If any friend or stranger calls on me I will offer him a drink and take one with him even if it gags me.” US Attorney George Hatfield says he’ll indict Green.

The new Poincaré Cabinet unveils its secret plan to stabilize French government finances: ask people to pay their taxes a bit before they’re actually due.

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Today -100: July 24, 1926: Unexcessive aspirations are the best kind of aspirations

Mussolini says Italy must expand “culturally and economically beyond her borders,” “but our imperialism presents no threat to the world’s peace” because surely no nation “would want to assume the grave responsibility of obstructing the achievement of such legitimate and, in reality, such unexcessive aspirations.”  “Our colonial aspirations do not constitute a menace for any one.” He plans to fulfill these aspirations through deals with other European colonial nations; he makes literally no references to the natives of these potential colonies and whatever their aspirations might be. He says the US resembles the Fascist State more than liberal democratic European nations: “Popular sovereignty is tempered by strong governmental authority. Universal suffrage elects the Government, but cannot interfere with its work”.

Raymond Poincaré succeeds in forming what could be called a government of national union. His cabinet includes 6 former primes minister and a broad range of parties; tomorrow the NYT will describe it as “largely composed of men who have in turn thrown each other out of office because of their opposition to the other’s proposals.”

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Today -100: July 23, 1926: Of tourists, free rides, beating roulette, and fly balls

French resentment against having to pay war debts is being taken out in Paris on British and American tourists, with jeering and the occasional beating. I KNOW, Parisians being rude to tourists!

The French deputies who yesterday asked Pres. Doumergue for a government of national union tell the man he chose to lead that government, Raymond Poincaré, no, not you, we didn’t mean you. The largest party in the Chamber, the Radical Socialists, thinks one of their own should be PM. Poincaré wants to reduce the size of the cabinet from something like 19 to something like 8 so that it can maybe get some things done for a change.

The Italian Fascist regime wants to popularize civil aviation, so it’s offering anyone who hasn’t previously ridden in an aeroplane a free ride.

Margaret Bondfield (Labour), who has been an MP before, is elected in the Wallsend by-election. Parliament now has 6 women MPs.

Prince Nikolai Massalski of Russia, in prison in Berlin awaiting trial for passing bad checks, has not wasted his time behind bars, inventing a sure-fire system for beating roulette, but the judges won’t let him out to use it to win enough money to cover his checks.

Babe Ruth catches a ball dropped from an airplane, which is a first. It takes a few tries before a ball isn’t blown off course on its way down.

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Today -100: July 22, 1926: It didn’t.

Édouard Herriot is defeated in the Chamber of Deputies, his government having lasted, what, 2 days? After he hands in his notice, 302 deputies petition Pres. Gaston Doumergue to form a government of national union, which they promise to actually support for once. So he asks Raymond Poincaré to do that. The government is seriously running out of funds and the condition of the franc is such that stores are closing rather than have to sell stuff for them.

Stephen Golombo of Paterson, NJ hangs himself because he thought his death would bring the end of the world.

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Today -100: July 21, 1926: Live your life so your obituary doesn’t contain the words “monster of iniquity”

Felix Dzerzhinsky, 48, head of the Soviet secret police under its various names, dies of a heart attack after giving a long speech to the Bolshevik Central Committee. He died doing what he loved, denouncing enemies of the state.

An unsigned Chicago Tribune editorial alliteratively titled “Pink Powder Puffs,” complains that the men’s room of a public ballroom has a face powder dispenser. “In a men’s washroom! Homo Americanus! Why didn’t someone quietly drown Rudolph Guglielmo, alias Valentino, years ago? ... It is time for a matriarchy if the male of the species allows such a thing to persist. Better a rule by masculine women than by effeminate men.” Valentino, who is genuinely deeply upset, challenges the author to a duel, maybe boxing or wrestling, since more lethal forms of dueling are sadly illegal in the US. The author will not respond.

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Today -100: July 20, 1926: Doing the best with the material left

Édouard Herriot succeeds in forming a cabinet, the 14th since 1920, which will surely last a super-long time. It’s not the government of aaalllll the parties he promised (not all deputies from even his own Radical Party back it), and most of the major French leaders remain outside. The NYT’s very sceptical Edwin James notes that Herriot’s invitation was refused by Poincaré, Briand, Tardieu, Marin, and Barthou: “Therefore Herriot has probably done the best he could with the material left.”  It doesn’t inspire confidence in the financial sector and the franc continues its plunge. Radio stations are prohibited from broadcasting exchange rates and market prices, to prevent the spreading of panic.

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Today -100: July 19, 1926: In which is revealed what is the greatest threat to the republic

Sen. William Borah (R-Idaho), hoping to ride a dry wave into the White House (to use a terrible metaphor), says the only way to take Prohibition out of politics is to enforce it. Attempts to repeal it, he says, are really attacks on the Constitution and nullification and are the greatest threat to the republic.

Édouard Herriot will attempt to form a government consisting of aaalllll the parties. He’s having some difficulty accomplishing that.

Texas Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson is still leaving almost all her campaigning for re-election to her husband, impeached former governor James F., who is giving her credit for removing evolution from school textbooks and says Attorney Gen. Dan Moody “runs with the Ku Klux Klan at night” (he does not, but James wants to keep the Klan issue before the public so he can use it as a cudgel when he runs for US senator).

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Today -100: July 18, 1926: Boycotting ice cream? Ice cream?

The French Chamber of Deputies refuses Finance Minister Joseph Caillaux’s demand for fiscal dictatorial powers, 288-243. Aristide Briand’s Cabinet resigns. After formally resigning at the Presidential Palace, Briand says “Now I am a free man and I am going fishing tomorrow.”

The archbishop of Mexico City and others call for an economic boycott to start when the Calles decree comes into effect on the 31st. They are to refrain from coaches, fruit, ice cream, movies, lottery tickets, and non-religious schools, use as little electricity as possible, etc. etc.

Lithuania’s newish Populist-Socialist government lifts the 4-year-old state of siege, ends censorship of the mails, and releases all political prisoners.

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Today -100: July 17, 1926: Of rapes and marbles

Italy’s Fascist press is pointing to the demands of French Finance Minister Joseph Caillaux and Belgium’s King Albert for dictatorial powers to deal with the fall of their respective francs as demonstrating the failure of parliamentarism and the rise of fascist methods.

The Kenya Legislative Council passes a law imposing the death penalty for assaults on white women by native men. Black men can still rape black women with close to impunity, the Archdeacon of Kavirondo notes in letter to the London Times; last year a magistrate refused to convict in one case, saying rape was so common it was almost a tribal custom.

Alexander Philadelpheus, the most prominent Greek archaeologist, is campaigning for the British Museum to return the Elgin Marbles.

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Today -100: July 16, 1926: Which is the best kind of dictator

Albert, King of the Belgians, is “expected to be a good-natured dictator”.

The Aimee Semple McPherson grand jury hearings figure it out:  a gas station attendant in Salinas identifies her and Kenneth Ormiston, a former operator for her temple’s radio station, as having gotten gas 11 days after her alleged kidnapping. From there, they checked into a San Luis Obispo hotel (no, not the Madonna Inn, that didn’t exist yet) under false names. Other witnesses place her at locations that don’t fit her narrative.

I.F. Andrews, who was the drummer boy who played taps at Lincoln’s funeral, dies. After the war, he became a professional musician.

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Today -100: July 15, 1926: Duels!

The number of duels has been increasing in Fascist Italy. Yesterday or the day before, Mussolini’s brother Arnoldo challenged some general. Today, Luigi de Alfonso, honorary consul-general of the Fascist militia, which is a rather odd title, fights former under-secretary to the Ministry of Posts and Telegraphs Giuseppe Caradonna with sabers, getting rather slashed up.

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Today -100: July 14, 1926: Of war debt and foolish notions

A new dictator I was not expecting: Albert, King of the Belgians, is granted powers by the Chamber of Representatives to legislate by decree to deal with inflation, taxes, really anything economy-related, for six months. Even Socialist senators support this.

France and Britain come to an agreement on the former’s war debt to the latter. It’s quite lenient, cancelling 3/5 of France’s nominal debt, possibly Chancellor Winston Churchill setting an example for the US to follow with respect to Britain’s war debt to it. Britain did reject France’s attempt to link its annual payments (for 62 years) to the reparations it receives from Germany, though Churchill does say that if Germany defaults, he’ll reconsider France’s payments.

John D. Rockefeller Jr. refuses to let press photographers take pictures of his sons for fear it would put “foolish notions into their heads.”

Germany bans The Battleship Potemkin for being historically inaccurate in portraying Tsarist forces shooting innocent civilians during the 1905 Revolution. 

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Today -100: July 13, 1926: Of shells and Bells

In Dover, NJ, near the area affected by the ammunition depot explosions, a man allowed to return to his home (thought to be outside the danger zone) to pick up clothing finds a 60-pound shell which fell down the chimney and came to rest, without exploding, in his stove.

Elvia Carrillo Puerto stands for the Mexican Congress, loses. It seems likely that women aren’t legally allowed to hold office anyway. She had been elected to the Yucatán Congress in 1923, where women’s suffrage was enacted that year, but left the state in a bit of a hurry after her brother, the governor, was assassinated in 1924. Women got the vote national elections in 1953 (effective with the 1955 elections).

Chief movie censor Will Hays introduces a policy that no movie shall encourage “the slightest disrespect for law,” especially, well you can guess which law in particular. So, no scenes of drinking or liquor-manufacturing, and scenes of intoxication only if absolutely necessary for the plot.

Gertrude Bell,  archaeologist, “Orientalist,” adviser to British governments on Arab matters, mountain-climber, adviser to King Faisal, and a founder of the Women’s National Anti-Suffrage League, dies in Baghdad at 57 of an overdose of sleeping pills. Here’s a passage in her obit I could have done without: “Despite her adventuresome life, she remained charmingly feminine and old-fashioned and avoided publicity. No matter how strenuous her days of exploring were, it was said of her that she always dressed for dinner in a Rue de la Paix gown.”

Publisher Henry Holt & Co. admits removing chapters on evolution from the textbook Biology for Beginners in editions sent to Texas, in compliance with state rules.

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Today -100: July 12, 1926: Of boom booms and the ruin of France

Secretary of War Dwight Davis inspects the Lake Denmark, NJ ammunition depot, occasionally taking cover during ongoing explosions and wandering closer than seems prudent to unexploded shells near raging fires. He opines that when they rebuild (and locals have some opinions about that), depot buildings should be a little further apart.

In Paris 20,000 veterans of the Great War, led by cripples and the blind, march to protest the war debt settlement with the US, laying a marble plaque at the statue of George Washington in a subtle reminder of all the aid the French gave the US back in the day. The plaque reads in part, “After the deceptions of peace the proposed debt settlement would consecrate the ruin of France and the loss of her independence.” The government forbade the parade but couldn’t stop it.

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