Today -100: July 20, 1919: Of POWs, red shit, race riots, and burning glasses

Germany still has 200-300,000 Russian prisoners of war. Poland, through which they would have to transit to reach Russia, is blocking their return.

Red Headlines of the Day -100:

Including, supposedly, a 70-year-old general (unnamed) for possessing weapons he kept as trophies.

and

Soldiers and sailors in Washington DC raid the negro part of town in response to rumors that some black guy attacked some white woman. There will be several days of this shit.

A Sunday Times Magazine article details the weapon that the British Royal Navy considered too fiendish to use: lasers.  Wait, what? “Burning glasses” –  giant lenses with mirrors and prisms to concentrate the rays of the sun at a distance, blowing up powder magazines and incinerating people.

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Today -100: July 19, 1919: Of secret non-treaties, explanatory reservations, nons, impeachment, and lynchings

The State Dept claims that the alleged late-war German-Japanese secret treaty, published by Izvestia last November, which the Senate demanded Wilson show them, is a hoax.

Pres. Wilson holds more one-on-ones with Republican senators, as well as Dem. Gilbert Hitchcock. He evidently tells the latter that giving Shantung, the German concession in China, to Japan is not “so iniquitous as it has been painted.” I have no idea why the R’s are making such a big deal of that particular detail. Wilson’s chats with senators today seem to have focused on whether reservations the Senate might attach to ratification are interpretative or explanatory, which I’m sure is a very important distinction indeed.

The French Senate’s Electoral Committee rejects the women’s suffrage bill passed by the Chamber of Deputies.

Justice Dept investigators are trying to find out who had petitions printed calling for Pres. Wilson’s impeachment. They claim they just want to find out if it’s part of enemy propaganda. Sure they do.

Members of an Alabama lynch mob are convicted for the first time in the state’s history.

Yes, the victim was white. However did you guess?

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Today -100: July 18, 1919: Of kuns, fucking Alabama, and corsets

Béla Kun is ousted in Hungary, the NYT reports prematurely, citing “reliable sources.”

The other allies are putting the peace treaty arrangements into effect in Germany, hampered by the failure of the US to do its share while the Senate decides whether to ratify the treaty. There are 23 commissions called for in the treaty to administer it, and the US can’t name delegates to them. The US peace commissioners are no longer voting on policy matters.

Woodrow Wilson holds his first three conferences with senators, all of whom (without disclosing what was said in the meetings) say they have not changed their minds about the peace treaty.

The Alabama State Senate rejects the women’s suffrage amendment to the US Constitution, 19-13.

Headline of the Day -100: 

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Today -100: July 17, 1919: Of saws, concentrated growls, vons, centres, and carrier pigeons

Headline of the Day -100: 

Former House speaker Champ Clark calls the policy of Senate Republicans “one concentrated growl.”

Pres. Wilson will invite 15 key Republican senators to the White House to try to persuade them to support the League of Nations. He will talk to them individually, not in a group.

Birkenfeld, pop. 45,000, declares itself a republic, independent of (Allied-occupied) Oldenburg.

The German National Assembly rejects a Socialist proposal to do away with ranks of nobility. However, there will be no special privileges associated with the “von.”

British Secretary of War Winston Churchill, who in his political career has already switched parties once (from Tory to Liberal), suggests that a Centre Party be formed from the moderates of all parties, a sort of continuance of the wartime Coalition, but to fight Bolshevism and keep Lloyd George in power.

The carrier pigeon that escaped from the R34 dirigible shows up on a ship in the middle of the Atlantic. He’s kind of tired.

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Today -100: July 16, 1919: Of murderers, ultimata, secret treaties, and mail

Headline of the Day -100: 

From the never-ending libel case by Ford against the Chicago Tribune.

There’s a rumor that French Gen. Franchet d’Esperey gave an ultimatum to Béla Kun, leftie leader of Hungary, demanding he and his government resign in favor of a freely elected one, or face invasion and occupation. Kun probably realizes that d’Eesperey simply does not have nearly enough troops at his disposal for that.

The US Senate asks Pres. Wilson for a copy of a treaty allegedly signed between Germany and Japan last October for a separate peace.

Mail service between the US and Germany is ordered resumed.

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Today -100: July 15, 1919: Of booze, dirigibles, and java

The attempts to repeal wartime prohibition or loosen the definition of intoxicating beverages are defeated in Congress.

Britain is sending forth another dirigible, the R33, which will visit India by way of France, Switzerland, Rome, and Cairo.

The latest suggested location for former kaiser Wilhelm’s exile: Java (Indonesia).

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Today -100: July 14, 1919: We want breakfast

Headline of the Day -100: 

“Wets” think they can repeal wartime prohibition, which is still in effect until demobilization is complete. Or if that fails, remove the definition of “intoxicating,” leaving it to the courts.

Sen. Elihu Root thinks the Senate can ratify the peace treaty after unilaterally adding reservations, without the Peace Conference  having to act on them. Really?

The British dirigible R34 ends its round-trip trans-Atlantic crossing, arriving at Pulham, England after a 75-hour trip from Long Island, a day of which was spent lost in the fog. “We want breakfast,” Major Scott says. He predicts there will soon be regular airship service between Europe and America. During the trip, one of the carrier pigeons escaped.

The Allies are considering headquartering the League of Nations in an internationalized part of Belgium in a new city, Geopolis, which would be built on some part of the Front. Which I guess would have the advantage of having literal buried unexploded mines alongside the metaphorical ones.

Headline of the Day -100:  

Dr. H.A. Zettel, a St Paul, Minnesota electropath, challenges Dr. H.W. Hill of the Minnesota Public Health Association to a duel... with germs. They will each expose themselves to typhoid, smallpox, bubonic plague, etc. Zettel, who does not believe in the germ theory, will protect himself from these diseases using only sanitation, pure air, and clean food and drink, while Hill will use vaccines. Whichever one survives will be a pallbearer at the other’s funeral. Sadly, they will not go through with it.

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Today -100: July 13, 1919: Of innocent policemen, daylight saving, the Three Pashas, horses, and prohibitionists

Irish Unionist leader Edward Carson tells Americans to butt out of Northern Irish affairs (totally missing the irony of a Unionist complaining about outside interference in Ireland). He blames them for stirring up Sinn Féin and thereby encouraging “the campaign of assassination of innocent policemen”. He also complains that nationalist Count Plunkett is allowed into the Carlton Club.

Pres. Wilson vetoes the Agriculture Bill because it repeals daylight saving. He also vetoes the Sundry Civil Bill because it only appropriates $6 million to rehabilitate disabled military men and he wants $8 million.

A Turkish court martial condemns Enver Pasha, Talaat Pasha, and Djemal Pasha (no relation), the leaders of the previous government that messed up the war so badly and killed so many Armenians, to death. In absentia – they all fled into exile at the end of the war. Some lesser officials are given lesser sentences. Over the next couple of years Armenians will assassinate Talaat and Djemal in retaliation for the genocide.

John “Chick” Owens, a black vaudeville actor, is stabbed to death by a man who tried to bum a cigarette and was offered only the makings.

Édouard de Billy, France’s deputy high commissioner to the United States, slated to be the next ambassador to the US, falls off his horse in the Bois de Boulogne and breaks his neck. Silly de Billy.

Hashtag of the Day -100:

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Today -100: July 12, 1919: Of corn

Sen. George Moses (R-New Hampshire) will offer a resolution inviting Pres. Wilson to come to the Senate every day at 10 am to discuss the treaty. He admits this is intended to prevent Wilson stumping the country on behalf of the League of Nations.

The Allies will end the blockade of Germany today.

The Corn Products Refining Company of Argo, Illinois will, as a result of its recent bloody strike, fire all its foreign-language-speaking workers.

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Today -100: July 11, 1919: Of new roles and new responsibilities, amendments, and herring

Woodrow Wilson goes to the Senate to deliver the peace treaty. When he finishes speaking, explaining that the US now has “a new role and a new responsibility” in the world because God or destiny or something, the Republicans mostly fail to applaud. It’s almost like they don’t want a new role and a new responsibility.

They may try to amend the treaty. Wilson says that would take a 2/3 vote of the Senate, but Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge says a majority can amend it, the 2/3 is only for final ratification.

Headline of the Day -100: 

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Today -100: July 10, 1919: Of travel bans, treaties, deportations, and elks

Rep. Philip Campbell (R-Kansas) introduces a bill preventing the president from leaving the country or indeed performing duties (such as signing bills) anywhere other than in D.C.

The German National Assembly votes 208-115, with 99 abstentions, to ratify the peace treaty.

The NYT thinks Woodrow Wilson is going to invade Mexico or something. To protect foreigners and restore law and order. Or, to put that another way, the Carranza government is trying to tax the US oil companies operating in Mexico.

64 Bisbee, Arizona men are charged with kidnapping and assault for the Bisbee Deporation almost exactly two years ago, in which 1,100 alleged IWW members and strikers were rounded up, put on a train, and dumped in the desert. The men named include the president of the Bank of Bisbee, a couple of city councilmen, the sheriff at the time, various mining company officials, a butcher, etc. I don’t think anything will come of this.

Headline of the Day -100: 

The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, not the large mammal of the deer family.

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Today -100: July 9, 1919: Of reservations, irritated Germans, and woodies

A majority of senators are now pledged to vote for the peace treaty & League of Nations covenant only with reservations.

Headline of the Day -100:

Some are more than irritated: German officers are committing suicide at a 38% higher rate than before the trial was announced.

Hindenburg is the latest to offer himself as substitute for Wilhelm at the trial. The NYT sees echoes of The Mikado.

Chief Secretary for Ireland Ian Macpherson outlaws Sínn Féin in County Tipperary, meaning membership is now a criminal offense. The government cites an alleged SF proclamation a few months ago declaring all cops in the South Riding of Tipperary to have forfeited their lives, ditto magistrates and anyone else upholding British rule. Also, snitches will totally get stitches. Éamon de Valera says the document is probably a fake. He does admit that the Republican Government has issued a call to ostracize the armed constabulary, you know, socially.

R. C. “Woody” Faulkner of California, a man who looks like Woodrow Wilson, decides on a visit to New York to dress like him, then gets upset when a crowd follows him down 42nd Street. He now vows never to impersonate the president again and says he wouldn’t want to be president “if that is the way you are treated.”

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Today -100: July 8, 1919: Of plots, Mars, and garbage trucks

An alleged anarchist plot to blow up Rome is thwarted. Phew.

Astronomy Professor David Peck Todd of Amherst will join a balloon attempt to reach a record altitude, from which point he plans to communicate with Mars. This is by no means his first attempt to, um, get high and talk to Mars. He once hiked up the Andes, but found that even that wasn’t high enough for his instruments. There is no follow-up story, so I think the ascent didn’t come off. Todd has been trying to communicate with the Martians for years; his family will have him committed in 1922.

The Queens borough president wants motorized garbage trucks to replace horses & carts. Cart & truck owners just formed a union and demanded higher rates.

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Today -100: July 7, 1919: The Allies can only have my dead body

The British dirigible R34 arrives at Long Island. It was storms all the way across the Atlantic. Major Pritchard parachutes from the airship for no apparent reason.

The former German crown prince, on his possible extradition from the Netherlands: “The Allies can only have my dead body. I will myself decide on my life or death.”

Headline of the Day -100: 

Article 246 of the Treaty of Versailles requires the Germans to turn over said skull, formerly belonging to Chief Mkwavinyika Munyigumba Mwamuyinga (1855-98) of the Hehe in German East Africa. However, the Germans say they can’t find it. Maybe it’s in a museum somewhere, maybe it’s still in Tanganyika (the skull was probably found, in a German museum, in 1954). (Most of what this article says about the chief is wrong).

The fee for the executioner at Sing Sing is doubled, to $100 per inmate fried.

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Today -100: July 6, 1919: Of dirigibles, substitutes, champs, and big hats

The R34 dirigible now crossing the Atlantic radios that it’s running out of gasoline (it met greater headwinds than anticipated) and will have to make a stop at Boston. The US Navy is sending out ships in case it needs to be towed in.

Some of ex-kaiser Wilhelm’s sons (all but the oldest) offer to serve any sentence on behalf of their father. The tribunal will have the authority to pass a death sentence.

Jack Dempsey, the new heavy-weight champeen, says he will only defend his crown against white challengers.

London hat manufacturers are wondering why men are ordering larger hats than before the war. Some have consulted pathologists who believe it is the result of constant gunfire – the heads of men with shell shock have gotten bigger, that’s totally a thing. Or they might just be getting hats that cover more of their heads, like the helmets they’ve gotten used to.

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Today -100: July 5, 1919: Of dempseys, communist republics, coups, and lynchings

Evidently there was no “Red” revolution or bombing campaign on the 4th. The Justice Department must be so disappointed.

Jack Dempsey wins the heavyweight bout against Jess Willard.

Headline of the Day -100:  

Returning soldiers set up a communist republic on the Cook Island of Mauke. Supposedly.

Military coup in Peru, deposing President José Pardo a month and a half before his term would have been over anyway, but the last election was... questionable.

The Tuskegee Institute finds that in the first 6 months of 1919 there were 28 lynchings. 25 of the lynchees were black, 3 white, 27 male.

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Today -100: July 4, 1919: Of police power, fireworks, treaties, fraternization, and bunny punches

Headline of the Day -100: 

In New York and elsewhere, cops are guarding government buildings, churches, the Stock Exchange, and members of the Lusk Committee, etc.  Just in case.

Fireworks are illegal under wartime explosives laws, but Congress failed to appropriate anything for enforcement this year, so have at it.

Romanian Prime Minister Ion Brătianu resigns, both as prime minister and as Romania’s chief negotiator at the peace conference, because he objects to provisions of the Austrian peace treaty which allow big powers to interfere to protect minority populations in smaller states.

British Prime Minister David Lloyd George tells Parliament that former kaiser Wilhelm will be put on trial before an international tribunal in London. Also u-boat commanders.

France releases the texts of new Franco-US and Anglo-French treaties committing the US and Britain to defend France against German aggression. Woodrow Wilson had asked them not to make the treaty public until the US Senate authorized publication, as was the custom. France promised not to, and then did it anyway, because France.

140 US army soldiers & officers up to the rank of major have applied to marry German women (and one German woman has applied on behalf of her fiancé, who’s too shy to apply himself), but evidently the anti-fraternization rule everyone thought had expired with the signing of the peace treaty is still in effect until the treaty is ratified.

Missouri ratifies the women’s suffrage Amendment. 11 states down, 25 to go.

The meeting determining the rules for the Dempsey-Willard bout rejects Dempsey’s demand to ban the “bunny punch,” in which the neck is hit with a fist. Which is about as dangerous as it sounds. Unless performed by a bunny.

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Today -100: July 3, 1919: Radicals do love a picnic

Prohibition: the good ship Waco is launched with a bottle of ginger ale.

The NYPD orders Carnegie Hall to cancel a July 4th meeting by anti-Bolshevik Russian groups, claiming there might be a response from Reds. Or at least the cops say that since it’s a holiday they’ll be too busy to protect the Hall if a riot breaks out. There are also dark rumors afoot that there will be another spate of bombings on the 4th, but Elizabeth Gurley Flynn says most of the radicals she knows will be at a picnic.

Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, doctor, minister, and former president of the National American Woman’s Suffrage Association, dies at 72.

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Today -100: July 2, 1919: Of dirigibles, nancies, and hoovers

The British dirigible R34 begins an attempt at a trans-Atlantic crossing. There’s only one engineer (I’m not sure how large the crew is – one larger than they realize, it will turn out when they find that a crew member they’d decided to leave behind to save weight had snuck aboard), so he’ll have to be awake the entire trip, but he says he’s flow 108 hours without sleep before, which oddly is the exact time this voyage will turn out to take, so that’s lucky.

A US Navy dirigible blows up on landing near Baltimore.

Headline of the Day -100: 

The city in north-east France, not a person named Nancy.

Poland is officially a country now (again), recognized by the peace treaty, which includes a provision that Poland has to be nicer to its Jews (Spoiler Alert: it won’t be especially nice to its Jews).

Herbert Hoover will retire from his roles as US Grain Administrator and European food dictator extraordinaire. He will donate his wartime papers to Stanford University, forming the basis of what is now the Hoover Institute, which I’m told also has a very large collection of ‘70s hardcore porn.

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Today -100: July 1, 1919: Of prohibition, war brides, non-partisans, and prince-priests

“Wartime” prohibition goes into effect. The Justice Dept is still waiting for the district courts to rule on whether beer which is less than 2.75% alcohol is intoxicating and therefore banned.

Pres. Wilson, on the voyage home, signs a couple of bills at sea, which is evidently a first. Not a very interesting first, but a first nonetheless.

Wilson agrees to let some French war brides of US soldiers travel to the US on his ship.

An American pilot dropping pamphlets informing residents of the Rhineland of the signing of the peace treaty crashes and dies.

North Dakota voters pass 7 referenda sponsored by the Non-Partisan League, including state-run banks, grain elevators, and newspapers.

Ex-kaiser Wilhelm pays taxes for the first time in his life, Amsterdam municipal income tax.

In Brest, a drunken American naval officer tears down a French flag. The incident escalates into a full-fledged brawl between French civilians and American military, leaving 2 of the latter fatally wounded.

Prince Georg of Bavaria enters a monastery. He was married before the war, to an archduchess and everything, but they separated during the honeymoon and the marriage was annulled due to non-consumation.

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