Today -100: October 25, 1925: Of sheep, radios, incredible ignorance, and elections with eggs

Pres. Coolidge tells the international convention of the YMCA that parents in this country suck and should exercise more control over their brats, or words to that effect.

Speaking of parental influence, Kermit and Theodore Roosevelt Jr. have completed their expedition to Central Asia after achieving their goal of shooting some rare Marco Polo sheep.

Greece and Bulgaria accept the off-ramp from war offered them by the League of Nations. Bulgaria claims it only lost 3 dead soldiers and 7 MIA or KIA. The Greeks admit to 4 dead.

Still no mention of the “stray dog” thing in the NYT.

Venezuela bans radio sets because workers have been listening to the radio in the afternoons instead of going back to work after lunch. Venezuela already banned afternoon programs but there are pirate stations on ships and in parts of the country the government doesn’t control. We are not informed what sort of programs have proven so enthralling.

Most of the Sorbonne students going for their BA fail their written test so, being Sorbonne students, they respond by rioting, demanding new, less difficult tests. The police have to be called. The dean says the test wasn’t that hard, it’s the “incredible ignorance” of the students that’s the problem. One described Chateaubriand as the author of Emile and The Social Contract rather than the correct answer, a grilled tenderloin steak.

Students at Glasgow University elect Foreign Secretary Austen Chamberlain as Lord Rector, beating out G.K. Chesterton. To vote, students have to pass through a barrage of 20,000 eggs “of ancient vintage and uncertain pedigree,” as well as soot, “overripe herrings,” etc.

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Today -100: October 24, 1925: The League enters!

French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand, as president of the League of Nations Council, politely suggests to Greece and Bulgaria that they are obligated as League members “not to take recourse to war”. Greek soldiers have penetrated 10 km into Bulgaria and are bombarding Petritch (Greece will deny this). Bulgarian troops have orders not to fight back, and aren’t, unless you believe the Greeks.

Still no mention of the “stray dog” thing in the NYT.

Slavery will be ended in Nepal any... day... now, according to the Maharajah (who may have a name as well as a title, but the NYT does not appear to know it and I don’t feel like looking it up), who’s been buying manumissions.

Germany bans children acting in movies.

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Today -100: October 23, 1925: Of invasions, discredited propaganda, and hooligans in diplomacy

War of the Stray Dog News: Greece invades Bulgaria, occupying posts and shelling villages (well, at least one village). Greece, claiming Bulgaria attacked a Greek border post, demands an indemnity of 6,000,000 drachmas, which is the equivalent of some money. The Treaty of Neuilly (1919) allows Bulgaria only a tiny army, which is consequently ordered to withdraw and offer no resistance. Bulgaria  calls on the League of Nations to tell Greece to knock it off.

No mention of the “stray dog” thing in the NYT yet.

Gen. John Charteris’s admission that he made up the thing about Germans rendering their dead soldiers is “received in official circles with great surprise.” Performative naïveté. The Evening Standard worries that it will “discredit all the official British propaganda, present past and future.”

Mussolini is cheesed off that Belgian Foreign Minister Emile Vandervelde snubbed him at Locarno. The Duck’s newspaper Il Popolo d’Italia says while the Russian Bolsheviks maintain “absolutely correct diplomatic demeanor,” Social Democrats are “hooligan[s] in diplomacy.”

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Today -100: October 22, 1925: Follyology?

Greece demands Bulgaria pay an indemnity of 2 million French francs gold, which is the equivalent of some money, for what they describe as an unprovoked attack on Greek soldiers posted on the border. The Bulgarian commander explains that it was all a misunderstanding and the government calls for a League of Nations investigation. Depending on who you listen to, the attack was by Bulgarian irregulars or bandits, or it was Bulgarian soldiers crossing the border, or... A Greek soldier chased his dog over the border into Bulgaria, where border sentries shot him dead (the soldier, not the dog, whose ultimate fate and indeed name seem to be a mystery). The NYT doesn’t mention the latter story, which will give this affair the name The War of the Stray Dog, which is right up there with the War of Jenkins’ Ear or the Great Emu War of 1932.

German republicans want to prosecute Hermine, wife of former kaiser Wilhelm, for referring to herself as kaiserin and queen when registering at a hotel in Baden,  titles she never had since she married Willy after he abdicated as kaiser of Germany and king of Prussia.

Thomas Lister, aka Lord Ribblesdale, dies. Since he leaves no male heirs, his barony and amusing title die with him. Here’s a painting of him by John Singer Sargent, looking very Lord Ribblesdaley.

Four Italian Fascists are acquitted by Fascist judges of the murder of Socialist parliamentary candidate Antonio Piccinini in February of last year (despite being quite dead, Piccinini was elected 2 months later). They’ll be tried again in 1950; 3 will be acquitted again and one found guilty, the justice of which is slightly lessened by his having been dead for 6 years.

Headline of the Day -100:

Victor Emmanuel, the fucking king of Italy, starts a fucking campaign against motherfucking swearing.

A newspaper distributing agent and two newsdealers are indicted in Jersey City for selling supposedly indecent magazines. They’re given suspending sentences after signing an agreement not to sell magazines, including “Hot Dog,” “Whizz-Bang,” “Artists and Models,” “Art and Beauty,” “Art Lovers,” “Flapper Experiences,” and “Follyology.”

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Today -100: October 21, 1925: Of solemn pledges, a return to Shakespeare’s time, and his and her impeachments

Hungary starts censoring crossword puzzles after one in a royalist newspaper has the solution “Long Live Otto” (the 12-year-old Habsburg pretender to the throne).

Headline of the Day -100:

Their restraint in not snickering shows great self-control.

The Japanese government is worried that the disorder in China may lead to another Russo-Japanese war, since it’s endangering the territorial gains Japan made in China in the first war.

That Catholic Church in Linz, Austria decrees that plays produced by Catholic societies must be male-only.

There is talk in Texas of impeaching Gov. Miriam “Ma” Ferguson because her husband, former impeached governor James Ferguson, has been doing more and more of her job, especially handing out highway contracts.

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Today -100: October 20, 1925: Wherein is revealed whose head Alfred E. Smith would bite off and what no man in possession of his proper senses would ever do

Treasury Sec. Andrew Mellon proposes lowering the maximum income tax, reducing taxes at every income level, eliminating federal inheritance tax, and passing a constitutional amendment eliminating tax-free securities. He wants to kill federal taxes on trucks but not on passenger cars.

New York Gov. Al Smith says he’s definitely, final answer, not running for re-election. “I’ll bite the head off the first leader who tries to tell me I’ve got to run for governor.” As for president in 1928, well, he’s willing to be drafted – “No man in possession of his proper senses would ever turn down the nomination for president” – but he certainly won’t be campaigning for it or indeed even announcing his candidacy.

British Brig. Gen. John Charteris, a Tory MP who was Army Chief of Intelligence during the Great War, admits, at a National Arts Club dinner of all places, that he’s the one who started the story that Germany was boiling down the bodies of its soldiers for glycerine. He planted it in a Shanghai newspaper to influence the Chinese, then the story spread to British newspapers.

The US Supreme Court overturns Arizona’s minimum wage for women.

Although Italy has in theory held Somaliland as a (cough) protectorate since 1889, it didn’t dare try to occupy the north, possibly put off by the ass-kicking Ethiopia gave it in the ‘90s, but now Mussolini sends in troops.

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Today -100: October 19, 1925: Of locarnoes, panamas, and income tax

The Soviet Union, at least as expressed in Izvestiya and Pravda, considers Locarno to have been a victory primarily for Britain, which now has Germany in its grasp, loosening the links Russia tried to forge with Germany as fellow European outcasts with the Treaty of Rapallo. Russia is feeling left out and lonely.

Passengers on a ship arriving from Panama inform the NYT of a revolt – in fact, a rent strike – in Panama a week ago that you’d think the paper would have heard about before now, especially considering US troops are helping suppress it, a fact that won’t appear in the paper for another 6 days as the occupation winds up.

Treasury Sec. Andrew Mellon tells the House Ways & Means Committee that he opposes exempting incomes under $5,000 from income tax because then it would be only fair, he says, to exempt the first $5,000 of incomes over $5,000, and that would double the revenue loss. He wants to reduce federal taxes in ways I can’t help notice would especially benefit the rich, and to eliminate federal inheritance tax altogether. He says taxing lower-income people would give them “a stake in the country.” He also wants to eliminate the publicity clause making the amount of income tax people pay being public.

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Today -100: October 18, 1925: Allied powers by any other name would smell as sweet

French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand says the phrase “allied powers” must no longer be used, thanks to Locarno reuniting Europe in peace and friendship forever.

NY Gov. Al Smith says he won’t run for re-election, which I assume means he wants his time free to run for president, although the NYT has no clue about that and is befuddled by Smith’s decision. The article also says the D’s are expected to run Franklin Roosevelt for US Senate. Which they won’t.

To wear a turban in Turkey now requires a permit, which will only be issued to Muslim clerics.

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Today -100: October 17, 1925: When two ride one horse one rides behind

French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand says the Locarno Conference lays the foundations for the United States of Europe. Hurrah!

In Locarno, Mussolini holds a press conference, but most of the British and French, and some of the German, reporters boycott it to protest censorship in Italy.

Responding to the US Episcopal Church’s decision to drop “obey” from women’s marriage vows, William Inge, the Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, says “When two ride one horse one rides behind.”

The Texas Textbook Board orders the deletion of any reference to evolution in textbooks.

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Today -100: October 16, 1925: Never fight again

Mussolini unexpectedly turns up at the Locarno Conference. Wants to be at the signing ceremony, I guess. He’s being asked by the Swiss authorities not to go out in public, since the region of Switzerland in which Locarno is located has many refugees expelled from Fascist Italy.

First sentence of the article on Locarno: “Today France and Germany promised never to fight again.” Phew. The demilitarized Rhine zone will exist in perpetuity, guaranteed by Britain and Italy. There’ll be arbitration treaties between Germany and France, Germany and Belgium, Germany and Czechoslovakia, and Germany and Poland (the latter two guaranteed by France). Most importantly, perhaps, Germany is now on equal footing with other nation-states.

Sen. Samuel Ralston (D) of Indiana drops dead. Gov. Ed Jackson (R) will name a Republican/Klansman, Arthur Robinson, to replace him.

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Today -100: October 15, 1925: Of leagues, entokillers, and pagans

At the Locarno Conference, Germany agrees to apply for League of Nations membership without reservations about military commitments, but with a wink and a nod from the allies (rather than a written guarantee) that they’ll take into account Germany’s lack of a military to commit.

Obit of the Day -100: Harold Maxwell-Lefroy, entomologist and insect-slaughterer extraordinaire. He was playing with lewisite in his lab, probably (they might have been able to keep him from dying when they found him unconscious if they’d known what gas he was using but he was the secretive type). Lewisite was invented during the war as a chemical weapon by a dude named Lewis. It’s assumed Maxwell-L. was trying to use it to kill flies. Don’t fuck with flies. In fact, his young son died in India of typhoid or another of those tropical fly-borne diseases, so he wasn’t fond of flies. This is not even the first time this year he became unconscious in his lab mucking about with insecticides. M-L is credited with saving Westminster Hall from being eaten by beetles and with killing some of the lice infesting soldiers in the trenches during the war (the origin of the word “lousy,” if I haven’t mentioned that before).

Scotland Yard raids Communist Party headquarters. There’s been a lot of talk lately about seditious literature.

NY Secretary of State Florence Knapp added religious questions to the state census for Indians (and only Indians), enabling her to reveal that half of them are good Christians while half are “pagans.” 

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Today -100: October 14, 1925: I should no longer hold an office I cannot adequately fill

John Weeks finally resigns as secretary of war on health grounds (he had a stroke 6 months ago and hasn’t been able to do his job since then; he will die in a few months). His resignation letter says “I should no longer hold an office I cannot adequately fill,” a sentiment unheard of a hundred years later. Weeks used to be mayor of Newton, Massachusetts, while Woodrow Wilson’s secretary of war was named Newton Baker, which is perhaps the least interesting coincidence ever. Weeks will be replaced by assistant sec’y of war Dwight F. Davis, who trained for this job by playing a lot of tennis (he’s the founder of the Davis Cup).

Mussolini fires the prefect and chief of police of Florence over the recent anti-Masonic riots that resulted in 4 deaths. He also fired a bunch of other government officials and expelled rioters from the Fascist Party.

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Today -100: October 13, 1925: Of planes, poor Jews, and general stirs

A single-seater women’s airplane goes on sale (for ₤300) in Britain. For thin women only.

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, the, I don’t know, chief Jew in the US, says the anti-Semitic protests at the World Zionist Congress in Vienna, with the goose-stepping and rioting and so on, were less disturbing than the disputes among the delegates. He says of the half-hearted Zionism of the English Jews, who sent few delegates, “they are poor Jews and worse Englishmen.”

c.30 Fascists take part in the New Haven Columbus Day parade in uniform (black shirts, skull & bones, etc). “Their appearance created a general stir”. Anti-Fascists counter-demonstrate and 3 are arrested, one of whom is carrying a blackjack.

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Today -100: October 12, 1925: I do not look upon myself as a stunt

Lady Cynthia Mosley, newly adopted Labour parliamentary candidate for Stoke-on-Trent, says “I do not look upon myself as a stunt, as I happen to be very much in earnest, and I do not think it at all odd that I should belong to Labour.” She says there is more culture among the “Red” men from the Clyde than in any Mayfair drawing room. “To attack [her and her husband, future British Union of Fascists leader Sir Oswald Mosley] is only snobbishness the other way round.”

Oxford and Cambridge already ban freshmen having automobiles (not clear when this was implemented) and are considering expanding that to all undergrads. Oxford Vice Chancellor Joseph Wells recently complained about student cars and the speeds at which they are driven in his annual address. In Latin. IN LATIN. Cambridge’s Vice Chancellor Albert Seward recently told the Cambridge Senate (in which ancient language is not revealed) that “The motor habit, when it becomes an obsession, induces a state of mind out of harmony with the best traditions of Cambridge.”

British Labour leader Ramsay MacDonald complains in the London Times about the new Organisation for Maintenance of Supplies, created by the rich and powerful to provide volunteer scabs during any future general strike. MacD calls them “fussy, egotistical private enterprises of a police kind inspired by class and police minds.”

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Today -100: October 11, 1925: Of Masons and bicycles

After the recent lethal clashes with Fascists in Florence, the Masonic order suspends all activities.

In France, one person in 7 owns a bicycle, according to license figures. In other news, you evidently have to have a license to own a bike in France, possibly because of the skill involved in balancing that baguette which French bicyclists are required by law to carry.

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Today -100: October 10, 1925: Pessimistic for home consumption

At the Locarno Conference, “Everybody was optimistic except the Germans, but they were described as ‘pessimistic for home consumption.’”

18 months after the murder of Italian Socialist Deputy Giacomo Matteotti , the state prosecutor completes his investigations and retains the cases against the 5 people directly involved in the assassination while dropping charges against everyone higher than them in the Fascist hierarchy who was part of the plot and who linked knowledge of that plot to Mussolini himself. The charges of “instigation” of the crime no longer apply because the prosecutor has decided that it was an “unpremeditated murder” that just kinda... happened... while they were kidnapping him. And that kidnapping, being a political crime, falls under the recent amnesty. One of the 5 was never captured, so the remaining 4 are expected to put all the blame on him.

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Today -100: October 9, 1925: That’s one check on their new to-do list

Headline of the Day -100:

From a Berlin synagogue. There’s been a spate of synagogue burglaries so valuables had been moved to safety; the (silver) tablet was the only thing the burglars found worth taking.

Mussolini’s Cabinet Council strips the city of Rome of self-government, much like the District of Columbia, the NYT notes. All power will be held by an appointed governor.

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Today -100: October 8, 1925: Fascisti frenzies are the worst kind of frenzie

Headline of the Day -100:

Exchange students, presumably.

Headline of the Day -100:

Also suppressing town councils in towns under 5,000, transferring their powers to appointed commissioners and councils appointed by business and land barons. Labor disputes will be “settled” by government-appointed labor magistrates, with strikes made illegal once they become involved.

Inappropriately Alliterative Headline of the Day -100:

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Today -100: October 7, 1925: Of intellectual demobilization, non-vanity, vodka, and tennis

Speaking to the American Legion convention, Pres. Coolidge calls for tolerance in vague terms which are taken as attacking the Ku Klux Klan, which he fails to name. Honestly, it doesn’t seem to me to be a particularly impressive speech, but he’ll get a lot of praise for it. He says it’s natural for intolerance of difference was inevitable during the war, “but when need for such a solidarity is past there should be a quick and generous readiness to revert to the old and normal habits of thought. There should be an intellectual demobilization as well as military demobilization.”

The United States Lawn Tennis Association lifts the wartime ban on Germans playing in American tournaments.

Col. Billy Mitchell, formerly of the Army Air Service, defies Coolidge’s order that members of the military not try to affect public opinion on military matters by sending a telegram to the American Legion convention calling for a Department of National Defense with sub-depts for the army, navy, and an air force. Interesting to see “Defense” instead of “War.” Wonder when the push for that change began. Incidentally, the National Military Establishment (NME), created in 1947, became the Department of Defense in 1949 because too many people were pronouncing the former abbreviation ENEMY, the best unintended acronym until the Northern Ireland Police Service.

Gloria Swanson’s 3rd husband the Marquis Henri de la Falaise, acting very much the middle husband, defends his use of the title marquis (it’s not clear in the article who questioned it or to whom he defended his marquisiosity). He says the title “has not caused me vanity,” then talks about being embarrassed that he only has the birth and marriage certificates of his ancestors dating back to 1271, names every French king who re-affirmed the title, and waves around his (notarized) papers. He says in the US he’s known as Hank. Gloria, wearing a dressing gown because of course she is, says, “I am greatly pained at these reports and want the thing settled once and for all.”

The limitation on the strength of vodka in Russia has been lifted, and Moscow is soooooo drunk right now.

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Today -100: October 6, 1925: Smashed to atoms

In Italy, the Confederation of Fascist Trade Unions comes to an agreement with the employer group the Confederation of Industry to deal exclusively with each other, shutting out the Socialist unions. The Italian, presumably Fascist, press says this will change workers’ attitudes from class warfare to class cooperation.

The Lehigh Valley Railroad is indicted for transporting beer. The railroad says the two carloads were labeled “cereal beverage” and how were they to know?

At the Locarno Conference, Germany agrees to join the League of Nations. It will also sign treaties with France over the Rhineland and for arbitration.

Susan Brandeis, daughter of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis and herself a lawyer, argues a case before the Supremes. The NYT thinks she is the first woman to do so, and they’re off by 45 years. She argues for a lawyer fined for charging more than $3 to file an affidavit to the Veterans’ Bureau.  Daddy recuses himself.

British Home Secretary Sir William Joynson-Hicks (Jix to his friends, if any) says he wants new powers to deal with the Red Menace, though who even needs them because, there would be such a backlash to any Communist impertinence (okay, he didn’t use that word, but he was thinking it), the CP “will be smashed to atoms.”

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