Today -100: December 5, 1912: Of presidential pensions, diplomats’ wives, and mobile lynch mobs

The House Appropriations Committee rejects proposals to provide former presidents with pensions and non-voting seats in the House of Representatives.

The German government bans members of its diplomatic corps marrying foreigners.

Black boxing champ Jack Johnson has married the white woman he is accused of having abducted, and boy are lots of white people pissed. In Shreveport, a fund is being collected to send a lynch mob anywhere in the country he turns up.

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Invigorating our soul, if you know what I mean

Screengrab from the Fox News website. George W. Bush in a speech says “Not only do immigrants help build our economy, they invigorate our soul.”

And, yes, that is a picture of Salma Hayek in a low-cut dress.

Click on image to enbiggen – if you dare.

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Today -100: December 4, 1912: Of middle-aged nations, the rule of law in South Carolina, free lunches, and colon passengers

Turkey signs the armistice with Bulgaria, Serbia and Montenegro, but Greece refuses to go along.

President Taft sends a message to Congress on foreign affairs. He says the US is on the threshold of its “middle age as a nation” and should use its diplomacy primarily to increase foreign trade. In fact, he blames the recent civil war in Nicaragua on the US Senate’s failure to ratify the loan treaty between the two countries.

At the conference of governors, Gov. Shafroth of Colorado explains for the panel on “modern penology” his state’s new parole system, and Gov. Blease of South Carolina says that those who lynch “black brutes” who assault white women “will neither need nor receive a trial” (adding, as long as they lynch “the right man”). I notice that he uses the terms “virtuous womanhood” and “white women” interchangeably; presumably black women are by definition not virtuous.

There’s a letter to the NYT defending the awesomeness of Serbia’s Prince Lazarovich-Hrebelianovich (Larry to his friends, probably) by Nikola Tesla.

Elections in Los Angeles: the “anti-free-lunch” ordinance, banning saloons from serving free lunches, is easily defeated.

Headline of the Day -100: “Colon Passengers Angry.” I would think.

It’s the name of a steamship.

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Today -100: December 3, 1912: Of the revictualing of Yanina

The DC Court of Appeals rules that Thomas Edison didn’t invent motion pictures and he can’t keep slapping lawsuits on anything that moves (see what I did there?). This ruling will open up the motion picture industry considerably.

Newly independent Albania is working out who its king might be, because you gotta have a king.

Greece refuses to sign the armistice in the Balkan Wars, because of “dissatisfaction with the provision permitting the revictualing of Yanina,” which is my new favorite phrase of this war: the revictualing of Yanina. Say it out loud with me: the revictualing of Yanina. Balkan poetry, that is.

Meanwhile, more threats are issued between the larger powers, with Germany threatening that if Russia supports Serbia militarily against Austria, Germany will fight alongside Austria and Italy.

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Today -100: December 2, 1912: Good luck with that

Headline of the Day -100 (LA Times): “Russia Tells Servia To Be Reasonable.” The Russian ambassador to Serbia denies that Russia advised Serbia to oppose the creation of Albania.

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Totally legitimate

So the US is probably declaring the Syrian rebels as the True Czar of All the Syrias or something, because it is “a legitimate representative of the Syrian people’s aspirations,” which is unarguably true. It is also unarguably false, because it is hard to argue with a word-salad-with-bullshit-dressing like “legitimate representative of the Syrian people’s aspirations.”

But the UN shouldn’t recognize the Palestinian state, which has actually had elections, because um, why again?

How do you become a legitimate representative of an aspiration? The legitimate representatives of the American people’s aspirations would include Man in Rocket Pack and Boy Eating His Entire Body Weight in Twinkies.


(Update: The Internet is an infinite number of monkeys that has already come up with every post you or I will ever write, no matter how clever and original we think we’re being. In other words, there are 28 Google hits for “word salad with bullshit dressing,” which I thought I just made up.)

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Today -100: December 1, 1912: We are going to make life hardly worth living

Armistice in the Balkan War. Turkey has lost most of the battles, but the four anti-Ottoman allies have been squabbling among themselves and with Austria, Italy and to a lesser extent the other Great Powers, so it’s time. Also, the allies pretty much run through all their resources and money. The NYT says that “One of the most satisfactory features of the situation... has been the demonstration that Great Britain and Germany have been working together for the common end of peace.”

Headline of the Day -100: “Chicagoans Eat Horses.” Unintentionally, I think. In sausages, because this is Chicago we’re talking about. The city health dept is going after the manufacturer.

Automobile lynching in Georgia: Actually I’m going to give you the first sentence in the NYT article. See if you can spot which piece of information was so important that it had to be given twice: “A mob in automobiles that had pursued a Sheriff and his negro prisoner all night took the negro from a vault in the Court House at McRae early to-day and shot him to death.” The alleged negro had allegedly shot a farmer’s wife and allegedly “attacked” her daughter.

British suffragettes are now setting mailboxes on fire. Says “General” Flora Drummond of the Women’s Social and Political Union, “We are going to make life hardly worth living.” And a suffragette who refuses to identify herself to the police (but is in fact Emily Wilding Davison of whom more will be heard next year), attacks a man with a dog whip at the Aberdeen railway station, accusing him of being Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George in disguise. He is in fact the Rev. Forbes Jackson.

The latest fad in Paris: “coco” (cocaine).

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Today -100: November 30, 1912: Of diplomacy, hatpins, Albania, and men going mad and tearing themselves to pieces

Headline of the Day -100: “Death for Peace Envoys.” Emiliano Zapata executes an envoy sent by the Madero government. A simple “No” would have sufficed.

Oh, I spoke way too soon. New Headline of the Day -100: “Hatpin Saves Woman from Giant Robber; Elevated Ticket Agent Matches It Against Longshoreman’s Hook and Saves Her Cash.”

I missed this at the time, but in October, Taft shifted 51,000 presumably Republican postmasters he had appointed under the spoils system to the civil service, so that Wilson can’t replace them.

The NYT seems to have neglected to run an actual story on this, although it’s mentioned in passing in a couple of places, but Albania has declared independence.

Winston Churchill says that a general European war with Russia and Austria fighting over the Balkans would plunge Europe into the desolation of the Middle Ages. “The only epitaph history could write upon such a catastrophe would be this, that a whole generation of men went mad and tore themselves to pieces.”

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Today -100: November 29, 1912: Of lynchings and dead letters

Three negroes who wounded a deputy are lynched in Vanceville, Louisiana.

British suffragettes of the Women’s Social and Political Union have escalated their militant tactics: they are now destroying people’s mail by pouring acid and other liquids into mailboxes. The WSPU (which I should point out isn’t the largest suffrage organization, though it does get the most press) has moved from trying to convince the British public and politicians to trying to coerce them. Christabel Pankhurst explains that if a poor charwoman loses a postal order, she may be thankful if at such a price she takes a step nearer to enfranchisement.

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Today -100: November 28, 1912: Of pardons, mobilization, aerial warfare, and mince pies

South Carolina Gov. Coleman Blease pardons 16 convicted murderers and 17 other prisoners. One of the pardons, that of murderer William Mills, was a campaign promise. Here’s how it happened: in a stump speech, Blease promised to pardon anyone the people wanted liberated (a “welease Bwian” sort of thing); there were calls from the crowd for Mills (who had killed his wife’s lover) to be freed. Blease said fine, he’d do it if they voted out the current D.A. Which they did.

French army reservists are called up in nine towns on the German frontier in the dead of night pursuant to a general mobilization order that, it turned out, didn’t actually exist. Starting at midnight, troops took up positions protecting the post office, bridges, railway lines, etc. Church bells were rung, town criers went round town with drums (because this was evidently the 17th century). The officer who misread the order is now under arrest.

A Bulgarian aeroplane drops incendiary bombs on Adrianople.

In another sign of the ongoing non-viability of Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party, none of the Republican members of Congress changed their designation to Progressive in the new Congressional directory.

Headline of the Day -100: “Taft Awaits His Mince Pie.”

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The last Daily Telegraphy?

I can get around the Telegraph’s new paywall, but a paywalled newspaper is one that has withdrawn from the public discourse and does not wish its articles discussed, so we won’t be doing any more of these Daily Telegraphy roundups.

British nudists, pardon... naturists... are complaining about a BBC documentary series, History of the World, depicting people in ancient times who would have been naked, pardon... naturist... as wearing animal skins and the like, which they didn’t. British Naturism says the Beeb is “sacrificing its reputation for commercial reasons.” Yes, it’s not showing nudity for commercial reasons. The nakedists are entirely right about the distortion of history, of course, but they’re still silly.

Police Constable Kevin Hughes of the Met says that when he remarked to another PC about three black men, “Look at them, they look like fucking monkeys,” he was merely engaging in a discussion of the theory of evolution and was referring to the gait of the man, not his skin color. He denies having said that black people are closely related to chimpanzees and Neanderthals, because he does not even know what Neanderthal means, which I really really believe. Hughes and another plod are in court on a charge of using threatening, abusive, or insulting words or behaviour to cause another person harassment, alarm, or distress.

Finally, there’s a story about two ice cream van drivers, Zeheer Ramzan and Mohammed Mulla... no wait, that’s not funny. Mr. Yummy attacked Mr. Whippy’s van with a tire iron (or “tyre iron” – aren’t the English adorable?), to the tune of Greensleeves.

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Today -100: November 27, 1912: Of $25,000,000

Possibly Sarcastic Headline of the Day -100: “Carnegie Gives Up All But $25,000,000.”

Theodore Roosevelt says no one’s interested in Carnegie’s proposal to give pensions to ex-presidents (which is really intended to embarrass the nation into doing so) but are interested in pensions for the “small man” and widows (of any size, one assumes). Or to put it another way, Carnegie is only offering it to presidents from Taft onwards.

Eleven sailors of the Russian Black Sea Fleet are executed for inciting mutiny.

A lab assistant at Stanford University, Frederick Migge, claimed to be a professor to sell his baldness cure in advertisements. Stanford has now fired him.

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Today -100: November 26, 1912: Of Balkan wars

The Great Powers are trying not to let the Balkan War turn into a, to coin a phrase, world war as a result of the smaller powers fighting the war making territorial claims that impinge on what the larger powers consider to be their interests. Austria in particular has been getting quite bellicose towards Serbia, but Germany seems to be trying to restrain it. Messages and meetings are going back and forth between German, Austrian and Russian kaisers and tsars. Russia, which is more or less allied with its fellow Eastern Orthodox Slavs in Serbia, denies reports that it is mobilizing its troops against Austria. Austria and Italy want a new autonomous state of Albania, but Serbia’s insistence on access to the Adriatic would carve that state in two.

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Today -100: November 25, 1912: Of suffrage and anti-war meetings

At the National American Woman’s Suffrage Association convention, W. E. B. Dubois says that he’s not asking the suffragists not to fight for negro suffrage per se, but to fight for all women, including black ones.

Socialist anti-war meetings in Budapest result in 14 dead. Killed by police.

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Today -100: November 24, 1912: Of triangular smiles, race suicide, misuse of the mails, and Piltdown men

Fashionable women in London are cultivating something called the “triangular smile,” which only sounds incredibly filthy. Something about lifting the center part of the top lip to show the teeth. It’s supposed to suggest innocence and simplicity, although it actually sounds rather alarming. Some women have taken to wearing a band under their nostrils, fastened to the top of the head, while they sleep to pull up the nose and upper lip.

Headline of the Day -100: “Race Suicide Alarms France.” For a couple of years in the last decade, deaths exceeded births.

Eugene Debs is indicted, along with other Socialists, for obstruction of justice, for allegedly paying a witness to disappear rather than testify in a case of “misuse of the mails in posting obscene matter concerning the Federal prison in Leavenworth.”

This is funny: two stories appearing one above the other in the NYT index today: 1) Darwin’s assistant W. B. Tegetmeier has died at 96, 2) “Pleistocene Skull Found in England.” A major find in evolutionary... oh okay, it’s actually Piltdown Man, a hoax.

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Today -100: November 23, 1912: A definite just-before-World-War-I vibe developing

Russia is backing Serbia’s territorial claims, so Austria has been mobilizing its troops in response, and now the German military is holding back railway cars in case they’re needed to transport troops.

Meanwhile, King Ferdinand of Bulgaria (formerly known as Prince Long Nose) has ordered a top mosaic-maker in Venice to make a mosaic portraying him and his wife as the Emperor and Empress of the Balkans, along the lines of a famous mosaic portraying the Byzantine Emperor Justinian and Empress Theodora.

Taft won’t take the Carnegie Foundation pension for ex-presidents.

The coal strike in the Kanawha region of West Virginia ends with a massive victory for the miners – 21% pay increase, 9-hour day, union recognition – even though the governor declared martial law and sent in the national guard to protect strikebreakers.

Wait, there’s a town in West Virginia named “High Coal”?

Britain, like France a few months ago, but unlike the US, refuses to confront Russia on its discrimination against Jewish holders of British passports. Foreign Sec. Sir Edward Grey says that doing so might lead to the commerce treaty between the two countries being abrogated, and we can’t have that.

John Schrank, the guy who shot Theodore Roosevelt last month, is pronounced insane.

Woodrow Wilson threatens to “thrash” a photographer who took pictures of his daughters.

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Today -100: November 22, 1912: Of armistices and ex-presidents

Turkey rejects the armistice conditions and fails to make counter-proposals. It’s like they don’t understand diplomacy or something, everyone says. War resumes, I guess.

Andrew Carnegie says that since the US doesn’t give pensions to its former presidents and their widows, he will. $25,000 a year, 1/3 of the presidential salary. But not for Roosevelt.

Presidents didn’t get pensions until 1958.

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Today -100: November 21, 1912: Of airships and insane musicians

Count von Zeppelin denies that it was one of his airships seen over England last month.

Headline of the Day -100 (LAT): “Musician Becomes Insane. Santa Ana Man Loses Mind While Playing Organ at a Masonic Temple Dedication.”

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Today -100: November 20, 1912: But the men must be bored

Woodrow Wilson, on vacation in Bermuda, says he’s actually beginning to forget politics. Don’t worry, Tom, politics hasn’t forgotten you.

Peace talks begin in the First Balkan War. However, the allies’ terms call for Turkey to surrender places the allies didn’t succeed in capturing, including Adrianople and Scutari, so we’ll see. Cholera has everyone worried, though the NYT claims that “Mussulman fatalism makes a cholera epidemic a less important factor” to the Ottomans than to the Bulgarians.

Headline of the Day -100 (LAT): “Peace News Hurts Wheat.”

The annual luncheon of the NY anti-women’s suffrage society came to grips with the problem of how to assert themselves politically to argue against asserting themselves politically. Said the president, Mrs. William Putnam, “It is high time there should be no silent women, though that sounds bad for an anti-suffragist.” “Let every man you meet know that you are an anti-suffragist. Never sit at dinner beside a man without letting him know that you are an anti-suffragist. ... I have been afraid of boring people, but the men must be bored. Tell every carpenter and every man who works for you.” Mrs. Martha McCullouch Williams said, “It is a woman’s duty to be delightful, ornamental, and useful, and she could not be more so with the vote. If she had it she would not know what to do with it. Where the ballot is placed in the hands of those unfit to use it there follows ruin, rapine, and terror. ... Woman is no more fit for the ballot than to be a trapeze performer or bareback rider.”

Noted in the LAT: they referred to Thanksgiving as Turkey Day even back then.

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Name that penis! Another competition I may very well regret

For once – and only this once – Charles Pierce has let us down, referring to Col. Combover’s wang with less than his usual creativity as “little Petraeus.” Surely we can do better than that. So when he combs over his pubic hair and affixes the tiny row of medals beneath his cock in preparation for a night on the town, what does he call it?

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