Today -100: September 12, 1926: I truly love to live in danger

An anarchist, Gino Lucetti, throws a bomb at Benito Mussolini’s car. It bounces off, injuring some bystanders when it explodes. Lucetti tries to escape, throws another bomb, which fails to go off, at the cops trying to arrest him. They have to protect him from an angry mob. Lucetti has been living in Marseilles, where he fled last year after getting in a shoot-out with a Fascist. He snuck back into Italy on a rowboat. He will be sentenced to 30 years, will escape or be released in 1943, and soon die in a German bombing raid.

Speaking from his office window (the Chigi Palace having an egregious lack of balconies), Mussolini tells a crowd, “Excessive and culpable tolerance of plotters beyond our frontiers cannot any longer be endured.” He’s talking about France, which hosts not only refugees from Fascist Italy but anti-Fascist newspapers. He says, “As I have abolished strikes, I intend absolutely to stop periodical attempts against my life. I say this not on account of myself, because I truly love to live in danger, but on account of the Italian people, who work and produce and have a right not to be disturbed by such recurrent happenings.” He suggests he will bring back hanging. (Update: another article has The Duck saying, “From this balcony...” but I’ve looked at a bunch of pictures of the Palace and I maintain there aren’t any, if you’re wondering what I’ve been doing with my time today).

A bomb blows up a car in the “Little Italy” neighborhood of Harlem, killing at least one person in the car and severely wounding two more. This may be related to a Fascist street meeting held on the same corner a bit earlier, although the fire department claims the car’s gas tank probably exploded. No one believes them. The bomb may have belonged to the car’s occupants. (Update from tomorrow -100’s paper: one more dies and the two dead are both in Fascist organizations, so yeah they definitely planned to throw the bomb, which the police and fire dept still refuse to acknowledge was the cause of the explosion, at the ANTI-Fascist meeting in retaliation for the assassination attempt on Mussolini).

Spain quits the League of Nations (well, gives the required two-year notice).

Spaniards are voting on the thing that isn’t a proper plebiscite because there’s no option to vote against dictatorship (also, the government will know that the people who do not vote oppose it). King Alfonso is believed to oppose Primo de Rivera’s regime, going so far (hah!) as to appoint Gen. Dámaso Berenguer (the future “soft dictator”) to the royal household; Primo de Rivera said that rather than shake Berenguer’s hand he’d prefer to run him through with a sword, which is also my usual Yelp review.

Staten Island concludes the celebration of its sesquicentennial, which is pretty fancy language for an outer borough.

Frisian regions of the Netherlands are insisting on the use of the Frisian language in schools.

In other news, there is a “Frisian” language.

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Today -100: September 11, 1926: Of pirate radio, militaries, women’s suffrage, and nudists. German nudists, like you hadn’t already guessed that.

Mexican Pres. Plutarco Elías Calles is attacked on a pirate radio station, whose transmitter the police have been unable to locate. Is this the first time such a thing has happened?

The French government reduces military spending, retiring 3,900 officers (leaving 128,000), raising the age of conscription from 20 to 21, and firing 7,000 military horses and... we’re all thinking it.

Spain’s plebiscite will entail the first use by women of their new right to vote. So women can now vote for dictatorship. Yay?

Prussia’s interior minister approves “cultural nudists” frolicking in public in woods and by lakes, provided view of them is screened off by shrubs or whatever.

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Today -100: September 10, 1926: Of ministers plenipotentiary, demons, and fish

The USSR names a woman, Alexandra Kollontai, as minister plenipotentiary to Mexico.

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Not actual demons, sadly, but a Lt. Demons, chief officer of the French ship Lotus, which collided with and sank a Turkish coal ship, killing 8 Turkish sailors. It then docked in Constantinople, where he was arrested.  (Update: his real name is Desmons)

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Today -100: September 9, 1926: Willkommen

Former Attorney Gen. Harry Daugherty and former Alien Property Custodian Thomas Miller are on trial for taking bribes for selling off German securities seized during the war to a Swiss company in 1921.

The League of Nations Assembly votes unanimously to admit Germany. German monarchists mock the whole thing, devalued as it is by Poland being simultaneously elected to the League Council.

Spain’s King Alfonso withdraws his martial law decree 3 days after issuing it. His appeal to artillerist rebels was obeyed when dictator Primo de Rivera’s was ignored.

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Today -100: September 8, 1926: Of berets, true lovers of liberty, valets, and smoking

Front-Page Headline of the Day -100:

Spain, pissed at the League of Nations decision tomorrow to let Germany join with a permanent seat on the Council while Spain only gets a non-permanent one, decides to quit the League. Why, we’re the mother country of 20 Spanish-speaking nations! they say.

The bishops of Mexico issue a pastoral letter calling on Mexican Catholics to “Imitate the true lovers of liberty who have known how to stand in the breach until they died or won.” Like early Christians, they’re holding religious services in catacombs or something, blah blah blah, sorry, got bored.

Texas Attorney Gen. Dan Moody wants all Ku Klux Klan members in government to resign when he becomes governor.

Major Arthur Brooks, valet to the last four presidents, dies at 66. A black man, of course. Going in and out of consciousness, he summoned someone from the White House to give them the combination of the White House silver vaults.

Former Crown Prince Wilhelm of Germany is taking flying lessons. He does some loops and shit over Berlin’s Tempelhofer airfield, evidently smoking the whole time (the princeling, not the plane), for which he gets told off by a cop.

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Today -100: September 7, 1926: Of nervous conditions, kidnap plots, notaries, sleep, and polar bears

The train with Rudolph Valentino’s body arrives in L.A. The late Mr. Valentino is taken off the train in a suburban station to prevent more mob scenes. Also Rudolph’s brother and Pola Negri, who “appeared to be in an extremely nervous condition.”

Spain claims to have foiled a republican plot to kidnap King Alfonso to force him to abdicate.

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This is literally true. The city borrowed from US banks to develop electrical works. The banks then insisted Burgomaster Karl Rothe sign each one of 7,000 notes before a notary either in New York City or in Leipzig. Sending Rothe to NY turns out to be cheaper than sending a notary to Leipzig, presumably because they’re sending him steerage class.

Irenee du Pont, vice chairman of the Board of E.I. du Pont de Nemours Co. thinks it is possible to create a chemical substitute for sleep.

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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.

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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.

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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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