Today -100: April 10, 1922: Is it by civil war and the shedding of the blood of our brothers that we can win peace and freedom?

Michael Collins warns, “Is it by civil war and the shedding of the blood of our brothers that we can win peace and freedom?” That’s a trick question, right? “That is the language of treason, not patriotism.” If there is a civil war, as he says looks likely unless there is “an immediate change in tone and tactics” – and he’s lookin’ at you, De Valera – the British will return.

The IRA attempt to wreck a train they wrongly believe Collins is on.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (both great, as Alan Sherman said) is in the US, lecturing (sigh) on spiritualism. He says he’s personally spoken with 20 ghosts.

The Countess Markievicz is also lecturing in the US, attempting to drum up support for the Irish Republic and against the Treaty. I wonder if she and Doyle came over on the same ship. That would have been awkward.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 9, 1922: Of the big five, bobbed hair, anti-Semitic bombs, and gerrymanders

Russia is moving away from the idea of making major concessions at the Genoa conference. Russia’s “big five” leaders aren’t attending, including Commissar for Labor and Peasant Inspection Stalin who, although he was made general secretary of the Communist Party last week, is mentioned for what I believe is the first ever time in the NYT today.

The Philadelphia Board of Education says teachers won’t be fired for bobbing their hair.

A bomb that exploded at a dinner in Budapest of the Liberal Party last week which killed 8 was probably an anti-Semitic thing.

The NY Legislature’s reapportionment map for congressional seats carves out a Republican seat in lower Manhattan, where there should be no Republican seat, but my question is... what reapportionment? With Congress having given up on national reapportionment for this decade, it hadn’t occurred to me that state legislatures might still go ahead with their own. Oddly, they’re using the 1910 census as their basis.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 8, 1922: Guns and automobiles, the American dream

After gangsters from NY were found to be buying guns in New Jersey, the NJ Legislature attempted to pass a law requiring gun permits, but somehow during the legislative process wound up passing one making it easier to get a gun, as is the custom. So now anyone who owns a car or other vehicle can purchase a gun without a permit.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 7, 1922: Of brigands, boycotts, and bosses

Grigory Semyonov, the Ataman of the Cossacks, is arrested at Penn Station, not for the massacres he was responsible for during the Russian Civil War, but because of a civil action brought by one of the trading companies he stole from back in Siberia. He says he has immunity because his actions were supported by the Allies; they say he was nothing more than a brigand. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Also, we don’t use the word brigand enough these days.

The rebel IRA are searching trains to enforce their boycott on goods from Northern Ireland.

Former NY governor Al Smith meets with Tammany’s Boss Murphy, evidently to deny the rumors that he’ll be running for governor again this year. He says he will stay in the trucking business. Tammany is especially worried that William Randolph Hearst might try to run.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 6, 1922: I left my heart...

The House of Representatives votes 222-73 for a bill to deport aliens convicted of violating federal or state Prohibition laws.

The IRA seize Lenaboy Castle in Galway. Wondering how big a deal this was, I googled “how many castles are there in Ireland.” 30,000! Lenaboy Castle was used by the Black and Tans to torture and murder prisoners and later as an orphanage run by the Sisters of Mercy, and may or may not have a secret burial site for all the babies the nuns mercied to death.

The former heart of the former emperor Charles of Austria-Hungary is removed to be sent (in a glass jar in a silver coffin, if you’re wondering how royal hearts are transported) for burial in Austria, while the rest of his body will be buried in Hungary, authorities permitting. Hungary seizes newspapers that published the Legitimists’ proclamation that 10-year-old Otto is now king of Hungary.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 5, 1922: Of guns, crappy feminists, and half drachmae

25,000 pistol permits have been issued in NYC since the beginning of the year. Wall Street bankers and brokers are arming to the hilt, fearing stickups, which have been on the rise. The cost of a permit recently increased to $1.50.

All members of an all-women ticket for municipal offices in Altus, Arkansas are disqualified for failure to pay poll tax, which they didn’t realize was required for office (were they also not planning to vote for themselves?). They blame men, presumably the male candidates who took office unopposed, for failing to inform them of the law.

The Greek government, short of money for its endless war with Turkey, proposes a forced loan requiring everyone with paper currency to lend half of it to the government. Literally: each drachma banknote would be cut in half, with the left half be exchanged for a government bond and the right half worth half as much as the original.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 4, 1922: Relatively snubbed

Albert Einstein has been lecturing in Paris, but cancels an engagement at the Academy of Sciences since some members planned to protest his appearance by standing up and leaving. What is their objection? Do they reject the theory of relativity or Einstein personally for being a German, or a Jew? The NYT does not inform us. He can lecture in French and has done this week, so it’s not that.

(Update: a general who is one of those who pledged to protest says it’s because Germany is not in the League of Nations.)

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 3, 1922: Of parades, cannibals, and ottos

Rebel IRA troops parade in Dublin. Thousands of them take an oath of non-allegiance to the Dáil Éireann. 

More claims of starving people resorting to cannibalism, this time in Armenia.

The Hungarian government declares a day of national mourning for deceased former emperor/king/putschist Charles. Austria does not. Monarchists in Hungary are taking heart from the fact that while the Allies forced Charles to abdicate last year, they forgot to do the same for former empress Zita, so if the monarchy were restored she could act as regent until Otto comes of age in 8 years. Monarchist deputies plan to move legislation to bring Otto to Hungary so he can be educated by Hungarian teachers.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 2, 1922: Of strikes, red armies, and dead emperors

The coal miners’ strike shuts down most mines in the US and Canada. So far, only one scab shot. Actually, it turns out that April 1, the start of the strike, is also traditionally a day coal miners take off anyway to celebrate the winning of the 8-hour day in 1898.

Lloyd George will, reportedly, suggest to the Soviets at the Genoa Conference that the Red Army be cut in half, and then cut further in stages, in exchange for a promise that no one will attack Russian territory for 10 years. However, this is part of LG’s plan for a general European disarmament, which would be strongly resisted by France. Also, Russia is still fighting a civil war.

Charles I, former Austro-Hungarian Emperor, dies of pneumonia in Madeira, where he was exiled last year after twice attempting coups in Hungary. He was 34. The former empress Zita is pregnant. The NYT snidely describes the Habsburgs as being as intelligent as the Jukes family (a NY family studied for their criminality and used by eugenicists as a prime example of the need for sterilization) and says Charles had “delusions of grandeur” and was “merely a few centuries behind the times.”

Senator (and former Texas governor) Charles Culberson calls on Texas authorities to shut down the Ku Klux Klan, saying otherwise it will “usurp the functions of the State and be destructive of government itself.” Culberson will lose his bid for a 4th senate term this year, defeated in the Democratic primary by Earle Mayfield, an actual (probable) klansman.

Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach dies at 37. Make of that what you will.

The NYT has started printing daily radio schedules, This is for Sunday, so the programs are rather religion-heavy.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: April 1, 1922: Of strikes, mules, radio, choleric chickens, and Siamese twins

The great coal miners’ strike against wage cuts begins. As mines shut down, mules are brought out, many experiencing sunlight and fresh air for the first time in years.

Headline of the Day -100:  

Parliament ratifies the Irish treaty.

Both parties plan to use radio-telephone service to deliver speeches to distant constituents during this year’s congressional elections. Some congresscritters are already making use of the Navy’s radio service. And by “some,” I mean only Republicans have been allowed to do so.

Some of the chickens which Germany sent to France as part of reparations died, evidently of cholera. Le Matin is sure that Germany inoculated the chickens with the disease to spread it to French humans.

Siamese twins, Rosa and Josefa Blazek, died a couple of days ago, 12 minutes apart, after their brother refused surgery that might have saved one of them (the autopsy shows it wouldn’t have). The 44-year-old twins had been exhibited since they were 13. Rosa leaves an 11-year-old son Franz, father unknown, and the Chicago courts dealing with the twins’ rather large estate must decide if they counted as separate people – it sounds an awful like the court will have to determine if they had one or two souls. If the former, Franz inherits everything, if the latter Josefa’s money would be divided among her relatives, including the brother who decided against separation. (Update: actually, it turns out they only left $400, not the $200,000 this article claimed). It’s unknown what happened to Franz, who may have actually not been Rosa’s son at all, but adopted to revitalize their act.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 31, 1922: Let’s just throw the ship out and buy a new one

Headline of the Day -100:  

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 30, 1922: Of treaties, radio umbrellas, and annulments

The Senate ratifies the naval limitation treaty and the treaty limiting submarines and poison gas, the former by 74-1, the latter unanimously.

A French inventor, unnamed in the story, hopes to invent a parasol/radio receiver.

NY Gov. Nathan Miller signs a bill removing the absolute right of annulment for a marriage entered into by someone under 18. And another bill firing teachers who are not citizens unless they are taking steps to become citizens. 

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 29, 1922: I make it a policy in my administration never to interfere with the ladies

Pres. Harding plans to stay out of the 1922 congressional elections entirely.

Yup, the NYC ordinance against women smoking that the police started enforcing yesterday definitely does not exist. A clerk sent Police Commissioner Richard Enright a draft ordinance without noticing that the aldermen had voted it down. “It looked authentic,” Enright says, although it wasn’t actually signed by the mayor. Mayor Hylan says “I make it a policy in my administration never to interfere with the ladies – for they will do as they please anyway.” The ladies were pretty pissed by the supposed ordinance and increased their smoking in restaurants in response.

Northern Irish PM Sir James Craig responds to Michael Collins’ accusation that he was breaking the agreement that Catholics in Ulster not be fired or, you know, killed, by saying that it’s Collins breaking his word and the South is sending armed men to create unrest in the North. They both have a point.

The prosecution rests in the 3rd Fatty Arbuckle trial, which is getting waaaay less coverage in the NYT and elsewhere than the first two. There’s a surprise witness, a secretary at the sanitarium where Virginia Rappe died, who has come forward suspiciously late in the game to relate that right before dying Rappe gave a complete account to her, blaming Arbuckle.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 28, 1922: In which it is revealed what menaces the morals of young girls

NYC Police Commissioner Richard Enright orders cops to crack down on restaurants, hotels or places of public entertainment which permit women to smoke, based on an ordinance passed 2 weeks ago and signed by Mayor Hylan. Which is a surprise to the aldermen who supposedly passed this ordinance, although Alderman Peter McGuinness insists it was passed. It was not in fact passed; the cops are enforcing a non-existent law. When he introduced the proposed ban, McGuinness said, “The morals of our young girls are menaced by this cigarette smoking. ... young fellows go into our restaurants to find women folks sucking cigarettes. What happens? The young fellows lose all respect for women and the next thing you know the young fellows, vampired by these smoking women, desert their homes, their wives and children, rob their employers and even commit murder so that they can get money to lavish on these smoking women. It’s all wrong and I say it’s got to stop.”

30,000 Fascists march in Milan to celebrate the 3rd anniversary of the founding of the Fascist Party. One Communist is killed in a clash, as was the custom.

An assassination attempt on former Russian foreign minister Pavel Milyukov in Berlin goes awry, the bullet instead killing former secretary of state Vladimir Nabokov, father of the novelist.

Several women are running for Congress this year, including Ellen Duance Davis, the great-great-granddaughter of Benjamin Franklin, and two sisters,  Irene Cleveland Buell, city prosecutor of Ashland, Nebraska, and Mrs. A.K. Gault, mayor of St. Peter, Minnesota. Their mother was a cousin of Grover Cleveland.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 27, 1922: Human needs are overlooked

Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, blames the forthcoming coal strike on financiers who manipulated the profits of the industry, whose operators then demanded wage cuts based on the manipulated data. He says when purely financial interests control an industry, “human needs are overlooked in the race for a balance sheet showing.”

2/3 of the Fiume Constituent Assembly ousted by Fascist raiders are hiding out and holding sessions in Yugoslavia. Fiume is occupied by the Italian military, which bans anyone wearing uniforms except those of the Italian Army.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 26, 1922: Let’s head to the river with a long straw

Although federal Prohibition Director Roy Haynes ordered agents not to make ostentatious displays of destroying seized liquor, the Chicago director orders 350,000 gallons of alcohol dumped into the Chicago River.

Parisian restaurants will no longer have orchestras, because the tax man classifies restaurants with music as places of amusement, subject to a 25% luxury tax and a new extra 13% public assistance tax.

The Post Office explains that there is no risk of catching typhus from mail sent from Russia.

Helicopter technology is really coming along. Pateras Pescara’s chopper rises 6 feet into the air.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 25, 1922: Be vewwy, vewwy quiet, I’m hunting plesiosaurs

Headline of the Day -100:  

The director of the Buenos Aires Zoological Garden, who authorized the expedition, says “I am laughed at, but I am convinced that some large, strange animals exist in Patagonia.” 

The US Senate ratifies the Four-Power Treaty, 67-27.

Former federal Prohibition Director for Pennsylvania William McConnell and some of his associates are indicted for issuing fraudulent permits to withdraw liquor from bond to bootleggers – 700,000 gallons during his 70 days in charge last August to October.

The NYT op-ed page suggests it was not “a real kindness” for Rep. Ansorge to name a black man to take the Annapolis entrance exams, because he would not be welcomed by racist cadets. “Race prejudice in the United States is a mountain that reason and moral indignation cannot remove.” So why even try?

Ford Motors will establish a 40-hour week. Edsel Ford says men need more time with their families.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 24, 1922: Of subs, bonuses, cadets, and death penalties

A British submarine collides with a destroyer in the Mediterranean during a training exercise and goes down, with all 24 crew lost.

The Bonus Bill passes the House, 333 to 70.

Emile Holley is named by Rep. Martin Ansorge (R-Harlem, NY) as a candidate for the entrance exams at Annapolis, the first black man since the 1870s if he succeeds (he will not).

The Northern Irish Parliament extends the death penalty to bomb-throwing, and the attorney general is thinking about also applying it to carrying firearms without a permit.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 23, 1922: You can call it what you like

Oklahoma Gov. J. B. Robertson (D) is arrested for taking bribes to allow an insolvent bank, the Guaranty State Bank of Okmulgee, to continue operating, as are a bunch of officials of several bankrupt banks and the former state banking commissioner.

Anti-Treaty IRAers will hold a convention to renounce the authority of the Dáil Éireann and the government. Commandant Roderick “Rory” O’Connor, announcing this to the press, is asked if this means a military dictatorship. “You can call it what you like,” he says. “[T]he rank and file is always right. It is the leaders who have failed.” Pres. Arthur Griffin bans the convention, for all the good that will do.

Constable Charles Hamby will run for sheriff of Travis County, Texas (which includes Austin) on an anti-KKK platform against incumbent Sheriff W.D. Miller, a Kluxer.

Mayor George Oles of Youngstown, a wacky grocer who ran as a joke promising, among other things, to permit spooning in public parks, rescinds his order that the police salute him, because he spent so much time saluting back that he didn’t have time for anything else.

Headline of the Day -100:  

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 22, 1922: Of secret agreements, floggings, failed banks, dictated convictions, and Saxon laws

Harding is pissed at Congress for not doing his bidding after it voted to reduce the army and navy below the level he wants, specified troop levels for Hawaii and the Panama Canal Zone, which he considers his sole prerogative, and will be voting for the veterans’ bonus. But since he ran on reestablishing “normalcy” after the “dictatorship” of Woodrow Wilson, he can’t be seen telling Congress what to do, so he has to seethe quietly and, presumably, leak to the press that he’s seething quietly.

The White House and State Dept deny that there is a secret US-UK anti-Japan agreement.

The Dallas KKK insists they weren’t the masked men who flogged a lumberman, and even offer a reward.

The Okmulgee County, Oklahoma grand jury indicts a bunch of people for bank failures, but their names have not yet been made public.....

South African PM Jan Smuts says the white miners’ strike was aimed at setting up a soviet republic.

50 congresscritters petition Harding for the release of prisoners convicted during the war under the Espionage Act only for expressions of opinion. More than 2/3 of the signers are Republicans.

The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals reverses the death sentence on Harry Lattimar in Mingo County, as “the mob has dictated this conviction.” Lattimar, presumably a black man, was convicted of assault on an 8-year-old white girl.

The UMW calls for a strike at coal mines in the US and Canada next week.

In England, Mrs. Owen Peel is acquitted of betting fraud under a very old Saxon law which presumes that if a woman commits a crime in the presence of her husband she was under his power. The case stirs some outrage, and Lady Astor introduces a bill to repeal the law.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 21, 1922: Of border troubles and occupations

The IRA makes incursions across the border they don’t acknowledge into Northern Ireland. There’s a lot of sniping, machine gun fire, etc. at the border.

Harding orders US occupation troops on the Rhine (currently 4,000 of them) home by July 1st. This coming right after the Allies failed to accede to the US demand for compensation to cover the cost of occupation is completely coincidental, says Secretary of War John Weeks.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 20, 1922: Of inflation and KKKidnappings

The Reparation Commission will demand that Germany stop printing so much damned money. In exchange, this year’s reparation payments would be reduced.

The Toronto black community, as well as the police, are bodyguarding Matthew Bullock, the black man Canada refused to extradite to North Carolina, because of threats by the KKK to kidnap him.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 19, 1922: Wading through blood

Gandhi is sentenced to 6 years for sedition.

Lord Peel, grandson of PM Robert Peel, is named the new Secretary of State for India. He knows jack shit about India, but he’s a viscount, so...

During the Irish election campaign, Éamon de Valera keeps speaking about the possibility of civil war, saying fighters for full independence may need to “wade through the blood of soldiers of the Irish Government, and perhaps through that of some members of the Irish Government, to meet their freedom.”

Colorado rejects the state KKK’s request for incorporation. The secretary of state says its stated purposes are too vague.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 18, 1922: There is no sex in the quality of virtue

The Virginia Legislature passes a measure for film censorship. Thomas Dixon, author of The Clansman, speaks against the bill. Interestingly, the board of censors can ban obscenity, vulgarity, and elements likely to incite crime, but not sacrilege. 

A couple of days after the British arrested Kenyan nationalist Harry Thuku for sedition, protesters surround the Nairobi police station demanding his release. Police and white settlers fire into the crowd, killing 25 or more. After reading the Riot Act, of course, because there’s a right way to slaughter natives and a wrong way.

The article goes on to give a primer on Kenya, “land of great possibilities.” It notes that the natives are annoyed about agricultural wage cuts. See, the white settlers “depend entirely upon black labor for the cultivation of their estates, but the black man does not take kindly to work, so that problem is how to make him work.” The answer: forced labor, slavery if you will. 

Italy will send troops to occupy Fiume in order to establish a proper government there after the coup and certainly not to annex it, perish the thought.

Headline of the Day -100:  

This is Frederick MacMonnies’s statue/fountain Civic Virtue, discussed here 2 days ago. The sculptor, who plans not to attend the “art inquisition,” says the sculpture’s just a fucking allegory; “There is no sex in the quality of virtue,” which he just happened to portray as a guy with his dick out standing over some women with snake tails.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 17, 1922: Of kings, strikes, and male citizens

The German Reichstag removes illegitimate motherhood as grounds for dismissal from government work.

Egyptian Sultan Ahmed Fuad Pasa celebrates Egyptian (semi-)independence by changing his title to king, which to my ears sounds like a demotion but evidently not to his.

The New Jersey Legislature overrides Gov. Edward Edwards’s veto of the prohibition bill. However the attempt to override of another of  the bills sponsored by the Anti-Saloon League and vetoed by Edwards, banning curtains on the windows of pool halls and other places where beverages are served, fails by a single vote.

The South African Industrial Federation calls off the miners’ strike. The government has been claiming the whole thing is a Bolshevik plot, which it is not. The government now has 6,000 prisoners.

The Iowa attorney general stops Bessie Farnsworth running for the lower house of the state legislature because the state constitution says only “male citizens” are eligible. So she may run for the state senate, for which there are different qualifications.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 16, 1922: Order shall reign

Éamon de Valera forms the Republican Association (Cumann na Poblachta), which will seek international recognition of the Irish Republic and which repudiates the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

Last month the New Jersey Supreme Court invalidated the state’s dry laws. Gov. Edward “Edward” Edwards, who ran as a wet, vetoes the Legislature’s attempt to replace those laws with more constitutional ones copied from the federal Volstead Act and this time including jury trials. Edwards says enforcement should be left to the federal government. 

Italian Prime Minister Luigi Facta tells Parliament that his government will restore order, acting impartially between the factions. “Order shall reign,” he predicts. It will, but not in the way he thinks.

South African troops occupy Fordsburg, near Johannesburg. Leaflets were dropped warning women and children to leave before the bombardment began.

An anti-Ku Klux Klan organization is formed in Oklahoma, called the Knights of the Visible Empire.

Isaiah Moore, indicted in Indianapolis for 12 counts of bigamy (he was arrested right before he was due to get married again and immediately started confessing, although he can’t remember the last names of all of the women he married), as well as grand larceny and embezzlement, says he’d like to become an evangelist when he gets out of prison. Of course he does.

There are protests over Frederick MacMonnies’s statue/fountain Civic Virtue, soon to be installed in front of NY City Hall in Manhattan.

The nekked dude is Civic Virtue, standing on two female figures with snake tails representing Vice and Corruption, which some criticize as sexist, like Mary Garrett Hay of the League of Women Voters, who says that in this age, woman should be placed not below man, but side by side with him in any representation of civic virtue. Such attacks and protests continued over the decades, including by (ahem) Anthony Weiner. Mayor LaGuardia hated the statue, which he called Fat Boy, and seized on the opening of Queens Borough Hall in 1941 to send it over as a gift. In 2012, after Queens let the marble deteriorate for 70 years, it was sent to Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 15, 1922: Of wine and factional fighting

It’s Wine Week in France. The message: if the US wants France to pay its war debts, it’ll have to allow imports of French wine, that’s just science.

What the NYT calls “factional fighting” resumes in various parts of Italy, although it sounds like it’s mostly Fascists murdering Socialists.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 14, 1922: They regard the discovery of the bones of a five-toed horse as a greater event than the birth of the Christ

German newspapers report on the marital infidelities of Princess Eitel, aka Sophia Charlotte, the wife of former kaiser Wilhelm’s second son Prince Eitel Friedrich of Prussia, after she admits them in court in a divorce case (Prince Eitel is denying this, and the transcript is not public record, so he thinks he can get away with lying) (in a few years he will cite her many infidelities when divorcing her) (he started fucking around before she did, by the way).

The KKK sends a note to Colorado Gov. Shoup’s negro messenger, George Gross, ordering him to leave Denver. Gross is president of the local NAACP, which protested the local Klan’s application for incorporation.

Willliam Jennings Bryan replies in the NYT letter pages to a couple of professors who criticized his views on evolution as ignorant. “[I]t is evident that they regard the discovery of the bones of a five-toed horse as a greater event than the birth of the Christ.”

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 13, 1922: Of sedition, revolutions, smallpox, and vowels

Gandhi on trial. The “sedition” turns out to be some articles he wrote that caused disaffection against the colonial government. He (and some banker on trial with him) say they won’t put on a defense but will plead guilty.

South African planes bomb strikers/“revolutionists” on the Rand. Clashes all over Jo’burg. Many strikers captured. Someone shoots at PM Jan Smuts but only hits his car.

There’s a revolution in Albania.

The Connecticut State Health Department threatens to quarantine Bethel unless every Bethelhoovian gets vaccinated for smallpox after an outbreak there. There is some vaccine resistance, and some are questioning whether there even are any cases of smallpox.

The faculty of Sofia University declares a strike against the Bulgarian government’s plan to eliminate a letter from the alphabet.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 12, 1922: Of air strikes, telephones, coarse lies, limerick truces, and moral disarmaments

The striking white miners in South Africa are now occupying Johannesburg suburbs. A government plane bombs the Benoni Trades Hall, killing many strikers. An airplane, possibly even that one, is reported shot down and its pilot killed. Shootings between strikers and police are widespread, with the police seeming to get the worst of it, for now. 

New York City, which is expected to have 1 million telephones soon, is replacing the “Sweetheart, get me Klondike 555” system with one where users dial – “punch” is the word the article uses – their own desired numbers, although “telephone girls” will still make the actual connections. The automatic system is expected to take 10 years to phase in.

The secretary of Prince Eitel Friedrich, second son of former kaiser Wilhelm, denies to reporters that Princess Sophia Charlotte admitted adultery in the divorce case of Baron and Baroness Plettenberg. A “coarse lie,” the prince has authorized him to call the factually correct charge. The prince is also threatening libel suits against the NYT and any foreign newspapers publishing the story (German papers have been obediently silent, as they are in all divorce cases).

An agreement is reached in Limerick. Both Free State & Republican IRA forces will evacuate the city. Some of them are traveling out on the same trains, but in separate compartments.

Blacks in Harlem, who largely voted Democratic in last November’s mayoral election, much to the Republicans’ shock, are demanding greater representation on the Republican county committee. 

German Defense Minister Otto Gessler denies accusations in, I’m assuming, French newspapers, that Germany is secretly training secret soldiers not in the regular army. Responding to complaints that Germany disarmed militarily but not morally, he says it is impossible to disarm morally because of the Entente’s unfair attitude toward Germany.

Czech Pres. Tomáš Masaryk amnesties the Communists and others from the December 1920 rising.

So what is this full-page ad on p.82 of the NYT actually advertising?

Weirdly enough, it’s D.W. Griffith’s film Orphans of the Storm, now playing at the Apollo Theatre on 42nd Street at popular prices.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 11, 1922: Of sedition, wool kings (well, wool king – there can be but one), electric chairs, teapot foreshadowing, and putsches

Mohandas Gandhi is arrested and charged with sedition. Sounds like Secretary of State for India Edwin Montagu, before he was removed from office this week, had been holding off taking this step, which British newspapers have been baying for.

Sen. Robert “The Wool King” Stanfield (R-Oregon), who claims to be “America’s largest producer of wool and mutton,” presumably not from his own person, is accused by his creditors of defrauding them (he’s been badly hit by the drop in wool prices). Stanfield has been threatening to sue the Idaho agriculture commissioner for criminal libel for saying that the senator’s companies failed to pay for hay at the same time he somehow had money to buy hundreds of thousands of sheep dirt cheap. (Yes yes, pay for hay, sheep cheap, I see it too).

A black man, James Wells, is executed in Little Rock in the electric chair. The inexperienced electrician takes twelve (12!) shocks to kill him.

From the NYT’s news-in-very-brief section: “The National Popular Government League’s session yesterday was devoted to attacking Secretary of the Interior Albert B. Fall, who was charged with championing the Doheny oil interests. There were hints of a Congressional investigation.”

The US asks the conference of wartime Allied nations’ finance ministers currently divvying up German reparations for some of that money for the cost of the American Army of Occupation. The Allies just laugh. You negotiated a separate treaty with Germany, so don’t come to us to collect your money for you under the Versailles Treaty you refused to ratify, they snigger.

The German Supreme Court of Leipzig rejects Wolfgang Kapp’s offer to surrender for trial for high treason for the Kapp Putsch.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 10, 1922: Of the unity of imperial foreign policy, rebellions, and ratifications

Because British Secretary of State for India Edwin Montagu allowed the publication of that call by the Government of India for revision of the Treaty of Sèvres, he has been forced out. Something about collective cabinet responsibility. He says he never considered suppressing the Indians’ views or preventing them informing the Indian people of the views the government puts forward in their name. Lloyd George, on the other hand, insists that the unity of the Empire’s foreign policy can only be maintained by the various colonies shutting the fuck up.

The South African government is mobilizing the armed forces, including planes with machine guns, to put down the white miners’ strike, which at some point they’ll call the Rand Rebellion. The strikers’ executive has told strikers to stop shooting at black people.

The New Jersey Legislature ratifies the already-ratified 18th Amendment. I’m not sure why this is a big deal.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 9, 1922: Their natural tendency toward violence has been skillfully utilized by Gandhi

In an unusual move, the Government of India calls on the Secretary of State for India to revise the unratified Treaty of Sèvres to accommodate Turkey more. The Muslims of India are supposedly super worked up about this. Lord Sydenham, who was governor of Bombay until 1913, explains that Indian Muslims are “wholly uneducated, intensely fanatical and wholly ignorant... Their natural tendency toward violence has been skillfully utilized by Gandhi,” who recruits them by claiming that British troops have attacked the holy places in Arabia (the Baron will later express similarly complimentary views about the Jews).

Pres. Harding turns down the invitation for the US to participate in the Genoa Economic and Financial Conference. Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes says the US has decided it isn’t really an economic and financial conference but “rather a conference of a political character in which the Government of the United States could not helpfully participate.” 

Genoa should be a lovely site for the conference. It’s spring and the Fascist-Socialist gun fights are in bloom. Fascists burn a labor newspaper, and unions declare a general strike in protest (which they later call off).

The Irish Free State Bill passes the House of Commons.

St. Paul juries are evidently required to sleep on cots in the same room during deliberations, so a mixed-sex jury is causing some furore. At least one county is avoiding this problem by refusing to call up women jurors.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 8, 1922: I trust everyone appreciates how I’m avoiding limerick jokes

Henry Ford closes down his car factory in Cork, Ireland after the town tries to force him to, among other things, hire a lot more people than he wanted to.

Nothing much going on in Limerick, despite the presence of three military forces there (regular IRA, “rebel” anti-Treaty IRA, British military). The rebel IRAers are patrolling the streets, though, as the Morning Post says, “the purpose of the patrols is not altogether clear.” Meanwhile, sectarian clashes kill five in Belfast, as was the custom.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 7, 1922: Crucified to Italy’s flag

The rebel IRA forces that moved into Limerick give an ultimatum for the Free State forces to surrender the Limerick police barracks. They’ve also seized 3 hotels for billeting, or possibly they’re playing life-size Monopoly.

Dr. Laura Black Stickney (R) and Lois McKiever (Ind) lose elections for mayor of Saco, Maine and Bath, Maine respectively. There has yet to be a woman mayor in New England.

Illinois Gov. Len Small gets a postponement of his corruption trial because the court accepted his argument that it is essential that he not be distracted from handing out spring road-building contracts. It’s not as long a postponement as he wanted, which would have had the trial starting after the primaries. Instead, it will begin on April 3rd, eight days before them.

Poet-Aviator Gabriele D’Annunzio writes messages of support to the Fascists who took over Fiume, but he seems to be staying away this time. He also sends some, for lack of a better word, poetry:

Wolfgang Kapp of Kapp Putsch (1920) fame, hiding in Sweden, offers to surrender for trial. The German government is not enthusiastic.

The movie Sherlock Holmes, with John Barrymore in the title role, premieres.

Rep. Fritz Lanham (D-Texas) complains that the Congressional Record reports him saying that no helium was lost from the sea serpent in any of its flights, when he actually said no helium was lost from the C-7 (a military blimp).

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 6, 1922: Should have stuck with strawberry

IRA units invade Limerick City. The IRA, or at least some of it, has declared that it doesn’t recognize the Provisional Government of the Irish Free State but supports “the existing Irish Republic.” The British Amy still hasn’t withdrawn from Limerick, so this could get interesting.

A duel between the current editor of Le Figaro and the former editor is called off, which is just spitting in the face of the long proud history of Le Fig editors fighting duels, when they’re not just being shot dead by wives of finance ministers.

10 are ill from ptomaine in ice cream cones.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 5, 1922: If there is one trouble with this White House job, it is in being a human being

After speeches are made by Tory leaders, including Austen Chamberlain and Winston Churchill, backing Lloyd George’s continuation as prime minister, he withdraws his threat to resign, which would trigger snap elections. Churchill’s speech, in Loughborough, stressed the need for unity against the “growing peril of Communism.”

Colonial Secretary Churchill says that the British government is using two weapons to restore order in Ireland: British good faith and Irish responsibility. He said “British good faith” with a straight face, too.

At a party celebrating his first year in office, Pres. Warren G. Harding says the achievement of that year is “the long step toward getting back to normal ways of government,” possibly referring to massive corruption. He says he likes parties like this because “If there is one trouble with this White House job, it is in being a human being.”

Russia says it will pay all its debts, even those incurred by the czars.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 4, 1922: Of Fascist coups, hangings, and nosferatus

Fiume President Riccardo Zanella surrenders after Italian Fascists fire cannons at the government palace.

A lot of Wall Street brokerage houses have collapsed in the last few days.

The House Appropriations Committee voted to cut the army to 115,000 men, but Harding doesn’t want it reduced below 130,000.

Matthew Bullock will not be extradited from Canada to North Carolina. A detail I’d missed: the state first tried to extradite him for “inciting to riot,” only later charging him for attempted murder. Bullock, a black man, was worried that if returned to NC he’d be lynched like his brother.

A black man, Terry Williams, is hanged in Virginia for an alleged rape. By the Virginia authorities I mean, not a baying mob, not that there’s a huge difference.

Illinois really does hang Harvey Church, in a coma (maybe) and tied to a chair. The coroner has a theory that Church was actually drugged into that state by someone who didn’t want him exposing his confederate in the murder of two car salesmen, but Church’s family refuse to allow an examination of the body.

F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu premieres in Germany, with Max Schreck.

Headline of the Day -100:  

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 3, 1922: Of peeresses, women’s suffrage and duels

The House of Lords Committee on Privileges rules in favor of allowing Viscountess Rhondda to enter the Lords. This would also allow in 23 other peeresses (or maybe fewer). Margaret, Lady Rhondda, a suffragette from waaaay back and a Lusitania survivor, sued under the 1919 Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act. At some point this decision will be reversed, and no ladies will darken the towels of the Lords until 1958, just a few weeks after Lady Rhondda’s death.

The Dáil Éireann rejects a proposal to extend the vote to women over 21 in the upcoming elections (presumably it would otherwise be restricted to women over 30, as in Britain). Arthur Griffin says he’s not against it in principle, but regards the proposal as a delaying tactic by anti-treaty republicans, since, he claims, it would take months to organize. He’ll support women voting on equal terms with men under the Free State.

Prince Marino Torlonia is not excommunicated after his duel with Count Filippo Lovatelli over a sculpture the latter made of the former’s wife (yeah, I’d like to know more about that too). Evidently the Catholic Church is supposed to excommunicate anyone who dueled. (Update: ok, he was excommunicated and then immediately re-communicated, if that’s the term, after he claimed Lovatelli had attacked him and he only fought in self-defense.)

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 2, 1922: Of resignations, hangings, and mosquitos

Lloyd George has been threatening to resign as prime minister, saying the Tory MPs in the coalition are going all Joe Manchin. Tory party leaders would prefer to avoid an election right now and are trying to persuade him to stay in office.

Convicted murderer Harvey Church, who hunger-struck himself into what Illinois is claiming is a state of being “mentally dead,” which is not how hunger-striking works (also, the prison was force-feeding him), will be hanged tied to a chair. “Only two other men have been hanged bound to chairs in Chicago,” says the NYT without providing details.

New Jersey is going to war against its mosquitos.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: March 1, 1922: Of royal marriages, special relations, and accompaniments of discreditable character

No links, NYT website still fucked.

Princess Mary, aunt of Queen Elizabeth II, marries Viscount Lascelles.

Britain ends the protectorate over Egypt, declaring Egypt an independent sovereign nation except for all the powers Britain plans to retain in Egypt (or as Lloyd George calls it, the “special relations” between the two countries). Martial law will remain until the Egyptian government passes an indemnity law for British interests.

Pres. Harding, in person, presents Congress his plan to support US shipping, including subsidizing it with 10% of customs duties.

The International Anti-Cigarette League ask Will Hays to ban cigarette smoking by women in movies, except “as the accompaniment of discreditable character.”

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 28, 1922: I am hard up and confining myself to the necessities of life

No links, NYT website still fucked.

The (German) Association of War Veteran Cripples write to former kaiser Wilhelm asking for a donation. He replies, “I am hard up and confining myself to the necessities of life.” He says he’s even had to fire some of his servants. He does send the war cripples a photo of himself in a field marshal uniform.

The US Supreme Court rules unanimously that the 19th Amendment was properly ratified. One complained that the Maryland Constitution limited the franchise to men and the Legislature voted against ratification of the 19th Amendment. A second suit is rejected on the basis of standing.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 27, 1922: Of coalitions, alliances, and vowels

Luigi Facta forms a new government in Italy. It’s a wide-ranging coalition.

Britain and France agree to a 20-year alliance aimed against Germany, including if Germany causes any trouble in the east. Britain is now committed to protecting Poland.

Bulgaria is eliminating one of the 32 letters of its alphabet, and firing university professors who protest. We don’t know for sure which letter, but it’s probably a vowel.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 26, 1922: Of truces, guesses, balances, pianos, and Cuban extravaganzas

Some NYT article links are currently redirecting to a generic page (and it’s getting worse), so no links below for those stories.

British Prime Minister David Lloyd George plans to propose at the Genoa conference a 10-year truce throughout Europe.

There’s an article in the Sunday NYT by William Jennings Bryan setting out his views on evolution. Did you know there is “not one syllable in the Bible” to support “Darwin’s guess”?

On the 4th anniversary of the Red Army, Russian War Minister Trotsky says Russia’s fate is “now balancing over” the forthcoming Genoa economic & financial conference (which looks like being postponed), and if the conference doesn’t go favorably for Russia, the balance may have to be tipped with blood, so the Red Army will need to be built up before the conference starts. I have no idea what he’s actually threatening here, to be honest.

In the first half of 1921, the German birth rate was 3 times that of France.

It’s estimated there are 12,588,949 automobiles in the world, of which 10,505,660 are in United States.

Half as many pianos were sold in the US in 1921 as in 1913, and no one knows why.

West Point cadets put on a play. It is called “Ho, Ho, Jose,” a “Cuban extravaganza.” One assumes it is super-racist.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 25, 1922: Of ice chips, regular extraditions, bluebeards & death villas

Some NYT article links are currently redirecting to a generic page, so no links below for those stories.

A big explosion hits Chicago. Dynamite at an ice plant. No one knows why.

Latest theory in the murder of director William Desmond Taylor: he was killed because he was fighting a dope gang to save some woman.

North Carolina, still trying to get Matthew Bullock extradited from Canada so he can be lynched or whatever, refuses to send witnesses to Ontario as the judge there is demanding. Gov. Cameron Morrison tells the State Dept that if Canada fails to extradite Bullock “in the regular way,” the state won’t honor any Canadian requests. Under the extradition treaty, the court in Canada can require evidence that the fugitive would be charged if the alleged crime had been committed in Canada.

Serial killer Henri Landru is guillotined. “His head fell into the basket as the first rays of dawn gleamed in the sky.” Pres. Millerand rejected the jury’s recommendation of mercy (which they presumably made because no bodies were ever recovered). Such recommendations were always respected before this case. The villa in Gambais where he killed many of his victims was bought for a lot of money and opened to paying tourists, as is the custom.

A few days ago, the Mississippi State Senate voted 25-9 to ask Harding to forgive some of the European war debt in return for some piece of colonial Africa, and then to ship the state’s black population to the new “final home for the American negro.” Mississippi was 52% black as of the 1920 Census. The measure will fail in the Miss. lower house, because white plantation owners needed the super-cheap labor force.  (I originally missed this story, by the way, because the NYT didn’t report it. h/t to Jon Schwarz for the WaPo article, which I must pedantically point out is wrong about who the KKK imperial wizard was.)

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 24, 1922: Where’s Solomon when you need him?

In 1914 Marcelle Heymann was born in Nancy, France. At the start of the war, her German parents were interned and a French family took her in, everyone assuming the war would be over in a few months. Last year the Heymanns, now back in Germany, wrote the Demanges demanding their daughter back (not clear why they waited until 1921). The Demanges, not wanting to return her, then demanded 5,000 francs, which is the equivalent of some money, for the expense of keeping Marcelle. Her parents have refused to pay and are having the matter raised in the Reichstag. Hopefully the NYT will actually follow up on this story, cuz a quick googling reveals nothing.

The Japanese Diet rejects universal suffrage, 288 to 159. Currently voting is restricted to those paying 15 yen a year in property taxes. During the debate, someone throws a live snake on the floor of the Diet, as was the custom.

The British, confused by the Sinn Féin convention decision not to decide anything for 3 months, puts off ratification of the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 23, 1922: Of helium

The Roma dirigible flame-out and that of the R-38 last year are being blamed on Congress for not funding helium production. Those two deceased airships were filled with hydrogen, which is flammable... or possibly inflammable... definitely one or the other.

The national convention of Sinn Féin narrowly avoids a split between republicans and free staters by... adjourning for 3 months, delaying the parliamentary election for that period, and putting the Anglo-Irish Treaty to a vote of the electorate.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 22, 1922: Oh the... you know

The Roma, a dirigible the US Army bought from Italy, crashes in Norfolk, Virginia, killing 34 people, the biggest aviation disaster in US history. The rudder system failed and it headed straight into the ground, hitting a high-voltage power line which ignited its hydrogen. The 11 survivors were able to jump to the ground through the hole ripped in the fabric, usually landing with their clothes on fire.

They keep telling us the Roma was the largest semi-rigid dirigible in the world, but don’t say which one is the largest now.

The LA cops are re-interviewing all the witnesses in the William Desmond Taylor case in pursuit of their current theory that it was a jealous woman who shot him.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 21, 1922: Of smoking and immigration

The Board of Education of the Nebraska State Normal Schools will henceforth refuse leaves of absence for instructors to study at Columbia, Northwestern, or any other universities that permit women students to smoke.

The House of Representatives votes 280-36 to extend immigration limits for another year.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 20, 1922: Of governors, and king-free constitutions

E. Montgomery Reily, the appointed governor of Puerto Rico, is still not popular. Several of his appointments have been rejected by the Legislature, and his opponents have found evidence that they think will cause Harding to remove him from office or Congress to impeach him: when he was assistant postmaster of Kansas City, Missouri in 1909, I believe, it was recommended he be fired because he spread rumors about prominent Kansas Cityhoovians.

The Viceroy for Ireland Lord FitzAlan orders, finally, the release of the IRA prisoners which set off all that hostage-taking. And at a meeting in Cork attended by many IRA members, Éamon de Valera calls on the Free Staters to make a constitution “which the English king will not be in.”

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 19, 1922: Of so-called lynchings, evidence, and bryans

Evidently Matthew Bullock will be extradited from Canada to North Carolina after all. Racist governor Cameron Morrison says “People in some sections of the country do not seem to understand that so-called lynchings in the South are nothing more than the killing of a criminal by the friends and frequently outraged relatives of the victim of the prisoner’s crime. ... What has come to be called lynching in the South is nothing but ordinary killings in other sections of the country.” Which should be very reassuring for Bullock, whose brother has already been the subject of one of these perfectly ordinary killings.

Letting jurors in Prohibition cases “test” the evidence for themselves is becoming a thing. How else are they gonna know it’s really alcohol?

Everyone thinks William Jennings Bryan will run for the US Senate from Florida this year. His big idea: buy the Bahamas, or just get them in exchange for Britain’s war debt, in order to shut down rum-running from there. He also wants the teaching of evolution banned in public schools and colleges and the Everglades drained. Bryan will not run for Senate.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 18, 1922: Of wars of aggression and dishwashing

Japan bars Margaret Sanger, who was intending to lecture there on birth control, from entering the country. Sanger says Japan is badly over-populated and unless it introduces “a scientific limitation of her population increase... I can see nothing but a war of aggression that must come inevitably within the next 20 or 25 years.” She was warned of this future war of aggression by the head of the Dept of Medical Affairs in the Japanese government.

Two women on the Three Oaks, Michigan City Council resign, saying they’d “rather wash dishes than argue over a paving contract”.

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.

Today -100: February 17, 1922: We don’t recognize the Irish republic and never will

Harding says the only “commendable” plan to pay for bonuses for Great War veterans (he’s rejected bonds backed by Allies’ debt, among other things) is a general sales tax, which he knows is a non-starter. Harding, to the extent that he favors doing anything for vets, likes the idea of giving them farms. Or we could just postpone the whole thing, he suggests.

British Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill asks Parliament to pass the Irish Treaty quickly, to set up in Ireland “a fresh, a normal, and a sensible Parliament” to “represent the hope of the future rather than the hate of the past.” And if the Irish people still prefer a republic, well, “We don’t recognize the Irish republic and never will.” He says that now it’s Ireland and not Britain that is “on trial before the nations of the world.” He sounds rather smug about that, or perhaps the smugness is because a massacre committed by British forces in India last month didn’t even make the papers. Britain should pretty much always be on trial before the nations of the world.

The Kentucky State Senate kills, barely, the bill against the teaching of evolution (or any theory that “would weaken or undermine the faith of pupils”).

Headline of the Day -100:  

In other news, the 1920s have invented “petting.”

Don't see comments? Click on the post title to view or post comments.