Showing posts with label New York. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New York. Show all posts

Friday, March 8, 2024

Sunday, March 8, 1874. The Death of Millard Fillmore.

Millard Fillmore, the 13th President of the United States, and the last Whig President, died at age 74.


Formally cited frequently, and perhaps unfairly, as the worst President in U.S. history, his position in that contra honorific has been firmly supplanted by Donald Trump, who stands to very likely be the last Republican President in U.S. history.  Unlike his blowhard, crude fellow New Yorker, Fillmore was a personally honorable man who suffered much personal tragedy in his life.  He was a lawyer by trade, and not a wealthy man.

Last prior:

February 24, 1874. Honus Wagner born.

Monday, November 13, 2023

Blog Mirror: Have they no sense of decency?

A Robert Reich item about Elise Stefanik:

Have they no sense of decency?

The descent of Stefanik has been epic.  It hardly makes sense, at least in the case of a person who has any integrity at all. Starting off as a centrist, she's turned into a Trump hack.

This effort to sanction the court and the court's clerk is shocking.

Stefanik is really playing with fire here. There's at least a halfway decent chance she'll be sanctioned for filing such a bogus challenge. And if the country survives the next election, long term she's going to have the same sort of reputation that Joe McCarthy now has, save for the fact that she'll fully deserve it and McCarthy only partially did.

Unlike McCarthy, Stefanik is a mother. What a legacy for that child will be left.

Thursday, November 2, 2023

A headline you don't expect to see.

This was at one time very common:

 Last operating prison ship plans to close in New York

I didn't realize it happened at all anymore, and it sounds like it was intended to be a temporary measure here.

Wednesday, July 12, 2023

Blog Mirror: Old-fashioned Club Sandwiches

 I love Club Sandwiches.

Old-fashioned Club Sandwiches

Why am I posting this on Wednesday?

Because on Wednesdays I publish stuff that pertains to work.

I don't usually eat lunch, although recently, due to my messed up post surgery colon, and my messed up pre-surgery thyroid, I have been eating very light lunches.  Something like this I only have if I'm in a restaurant, and I'm only in a restaurant at noon if I'm doing so in some sort of work capacity.  When I do that, I always look for the club sandwich, if we're in a place I expect to have one. 

They're great.

Club Sandwiches trace back to New York of the late 19th Century, and seem to have appeared either at the Union Club of New York City or the Saratoga Club.  It's not clear which.  The first printed reference to them was in the Evening World, and referred to the Union Club. That was in 1889.  Amazingly, in this day and age in which social clubs have taken a pounding, the Union Club, which dates to 1836, still exists as a private social club.

Saturday, June 3, 2023

Sunday, June 3, 1923. Japan and the USSR, Swizerland and booze production.


Japan was considering establishing diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, a major step in terms of foreign policy, albeit one recognizing the reality of the murderous Soviet state.

It also recognized the realities of the troubled Japanese state, which was in a period of post-war evolution.

The Swiss voted against a state monopoly on the production of alcohol.

A New York City commission founds that some history textbooks in use in the city contained anti American history.

Friday, June 2, 2023

Saturday, June 2, 1923. Criqui v. Kilbane

Eugène Criqui knocked out Johnny Kilbane in the sixth round at the Polo Grounds in New York City to take the World Featherweight Title.  Babe Ruth, who had hurried over from a Yankee's game, was in attendance.

Cirqui.

Cirqui had been a professional boxer since 1910, although his career was interrupted by World War One during which he was shot in the jaw by a German sniper.  His jaw had been reconstructed with wire, the bone of a goat and silver.

He died at age 83 in 1977.

Kilbane.

Kilbane was from Ohio and from a classically difficult childhood.  He'd been boxing since 1907.  He served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army during World War One and retired shortly after losing this fight.  He died at age 68 in 1957.

The Kaufman Act passed, requiring the electrification of all New York City railroads by the beginning of 1926.

The Federal Government wasn't taking New York's no to Prohibition lightly.




Thursday, June 1, 2023

Friday, June 1, 1923. New York calls it quits on Prohibition

The State of New York voted to cease enforcing prohibition.  This did not repeal Prohibition, which was of course a Federal law, but ceased New York's participation in the effort to enforce it.

Wednesday, May 31, 2023

Thursday, May 31, 1923. Demonstrations in Durango.

A mass demonstration in Durango, Mexico attempted to take hold of the government's office a day prior to a law limiting the number of Christian ministers, a rule which would have made 90% of the 250 Catholic Priests in Durango invalid.

The governments coming into power after the Mexican Revolution were extremely hostile to the Catholic Church, of which this is an example.

Tex Rickard incorporated the New Madison Square Garden Corporation for the purpose of building a larger Madison Square Garden.

Rodeo cowboys at While House, May 31, 1923.


Monday, April 24, 2023

Saturday, April 24, 1943. Departures.

Today In Wyoming's History: April 241943  John Osborne, Wyoming's governor from 1893 to 1895, died.



Osborne, a physician by trade, had been Governor from 1893 to 1895, in the wake of the Johnson County War.  He became Wyoming's Congressman in 1897, and occupied that position until 1899.  He later was an Assistant Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson.

While Governor, he eccentrically chose a state seal for the state which did not comport with the one that the legislature thought it had, and in fact it caused consternation for featuring a topless allegorical female figure, something not uncommon on seals at the time.

The New York Fire Department saved the port from blowing up after the munitions ship El Estero caught fire, by towing the vessel out some distance and pouring so much water on it that it sank.  Had it exploded, the chain reaction explosions would have been devastating.


Gen. Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord died of cancer.  The former commander of the Reichswehr and briefly a commander during World War Two was an outright undisguised opponent of Hitler's who had resigned early during Hitler's administration, but who was recalled to service upon the invasion of Poland.  He invited Hitler to his base on the Polish border with the intent of assisting him, but Hitler never took up the invitation.  He was retired a second time on September 21, 1939, and was active in the German resistance.


Admiral Kenneth Whiting, former submariner and the American "father of the aircraft carrier", died of a heart attack while suffering from pneumonia.  He was 61.

Franklin Roosevelt issued the following Executive Order:
Executive Order 9337—AUTHORIZING THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR TO WITHDRAW AND RESERVE LANDS OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN AND OTHER LANDS OWNED OR CONTROLLED BY THE UNITED STATES
April 24, 1943
EXECUTIVE ORDER 9337

AUTHORIZING THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR TO WITHDRAW AND RESERVE LANDS OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN AND OTHER LANDS OWNED OR CONTROLLED BY THE UNITED STATES

April 24, 1943

By virtue of the authority vested in me by the act of June 25, 1910, ch. 421, 36 Stat. 847, and as President of the United States, it is ordered as follows:

Section 1. The Secretary of the Interior is hereby authorized to withdraw or reserve lands of the public domain and other lands owned or controlled by the United States to the same extent that such lands might be withdrawn or reserved by the President, and also, to the same extent, to modify or revoke withdrawals or reservations of such lands: Provided, That all orders of the Secretary of the Interior issued under the authority of this order shall have the prior approval of the Director of the Bureau of the Budget and the Attorney General, as now required with respect to proposed Executive orders by Executive Order No. 7298 of February 18, 1936, and shall be submitted to the Division of the Federal Register for filing and publication: Provided, further, That no such order which affects lands under the administrative jurisdiction of any executive department or agency of the Government, other than the Department of the Interior, shall be issued by the Secretary of the Interior without the prior concurrence of the head of the department or agency concerned.

Section 2. This order supersedes Executive Order No. 9146 of April 24, 1942, entitled 'Authorizing the Secretary of the Interior to Withdraw and Reserve Public Lands'.

FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT

THE WHITE HOUSE,

April 24, 1943.

Exec. Order No. 9337, 8 FR 5516, 1943 WL 4090 (Pres.)
This mortar crew was photographed at Camp Carson, Colorado.


These troops are equipped with M1 Carbines, the first carbine issued to American troops since the M1903 Springfield, a short rifle, was first introduced.  Even the appearance of these carbines show that they are brand new.

I don't know the first combat use date for the carbine.  They were already common by the invasion of Sicily, so logic would presume that they saw action in North Africa as well.  Having said that, many artillerymen and mortar men in North Africa carried the M1917 Enfield rifle, so the carbine had not yet taken over its wide role that it later would.

Designed to equip troops other than infantrymen who might still require a firearm, the carbine would end up having enormous production, with more of them being produced than any other American small arm in World War Two.  For many years it was the most mass-produced American arm of all time, but with the long service life of the AR's, that's likely no longer true.  It saw service into the 1970s, in the M2 variant, in reserve units.

Tuesday, April 18, 2023

Wednesday, April 18, 1923. The House that Ruth Built.

 

Howard Emke of the Boston Red Sox and Bob Shawkey of the New York Yankees, April 18, 1923

The first game at Yankee Stadium was played.


The Yankees beat the Red Sox 4 to 1, with Babe Ruth hitting the park's first home run, the latter of which made the front page in Casper.


Dignitaries were naturally present.

Jacob Ruppert, Gov. Al Smith and wife at opening of Yankee Stadium.

A lot more here:


Thursday, March 9, 2023

Friday, March 9, 1923. Communists, Racists & Drinkers.

Lenin suffered a third stroke in less than a year, a clear sign that his remaining time was short.

Thirty members of the NYPD were revealed to be members of the Ku Klux Klan.

The United Kingdom, in a bill introduced by Lady Astor, rose the in premises drinking age from 14 for beer and 16 for hard alcohol to 18.  It was the first bill to be introduced by a woman in parliament.

British alcohol consumption, normally associated with beer, has varied considerably over a century, as reflected in this directly linked in graph fro a parliamentary report.

As can be seen, wine has increased considerably since 1930, but then it had large popularity early in the 20th Century before dropping off.  World War One, likely due to wartime shortages, made a huge denti in British drinking which leveled it off, but it's climbed steadily since the 1950s.

Another British look from 1800 to 1930.


That reported noted:

History of alcohol consumption

1550-1650: commercialisation of domestic brewing industry; tobacco a commodity of mass consumption and an accompaniment to drinking; increased market for French wines—higher per head until present day [14]

1650-1750: the period 'when Europeans took to soft drugs', including coffee, tea and chocolate; the intermittent gin craze from the 1730s to the 1750s masks a stabilisation or decline in alcohol consumption over the period.[15] Beer was promoted by many anti-gin campaigners as the patriotic (and sober) alternative to gin. Despite this, beer consumption fell significantly throughout the 18th century, largely due to the increasing popularity of tea, coffee and chocolate .[16]

1750 to 1850: fall in alcohol consumption up to about 1840, particularly wine, increase in tea, which replaced beer as the popular staple of every day consumption.[17]

1850 to late 19th century: large increase in consumption; the 'consumption of beer, wine and spirits all peaked around 1875. The consumption of tea also grew'. These trends were associated with rising living standards.[18]

Late 19th century to mid-20th century: decline in consumption per head—associated with temperance movement, alternative leisure activities, including public parks and libraries.[19]

Mid-20th century onwards: increase in consumption from 3.5 litres per head to 9.5 (with slight falls in the early 1990s and 2005 onwards)

That report concluded:

Conclusions and recommendations

29. The history of the consumption of alcohol over the last 500 years has been one of fluctuations, of peaks and troughs. From the late 17th century to the mid-19th the trend was for consumption per head to decline despite brief periods of increased consumption such as the gin craze. From the mid- to the late 19th century there was a sharp increase in consumption which was followed by a long and steep decline in consumption until the mid 20th century.

30. The variations in consumption are associated both with changes in affordability and availability, but also changes in taste. Alternative drinks such as tea and alternative pastimes affected consumption. Different groups drank very different amounts. Government has played a significant role both positive and negative, for example in reducing consumption in the First World War as well as in stimulating the 18th century gin craze by encouraging the consumption of cheap gin instead of French brandy.

31. From the 1960s consumption rose again. At its lowest levels in the 1930s and -40s annual per capita consumption was about 3 litres of pure alcohol; by 2005 it was over 9 litres. These changes are, as in past centuries, associated with changing fashion and an increase in affordability, availability and expenditure on marketing. Just as Government policy played a part in encouraging the gin craze, successive Government policies have played a part in encouraging the increase in alcohol consumption over the last 50 years. Currently over 10 million adults drink more than the recommended limits. These people drink 75% of all the alcohol consumed. 2.6 million adults drink more than twice the recommended limits. The alcohol industry emphasises that these figures represent a minority of the population; health professionals stress that they are a very large number of people who are putting themselves at risk. We share these concerns.

32. One of the biggest changes over the last 60 years has been in the drinking habits of young people, including students. While individual cases of student drunkenness are regrettable and cannot be condoned, we consider that their actions are quite clearly a product of the society and culture to which they belong. The National Union of Students and the universities themselves appear to recognise the existence of a student binge drinking culture, but all too often their approach appears much too passive and tolerant. We recommend that universities take a much more active role in discouraging irresponsible drinking amongst students. They should ensure that students are not subjected to marketing activity that promotes dangerous binge drinking. The first step must be for universities to acknowledge that they do indeed have a most important moral "duty of care" to their students, and for them to take this duty far more seriously than they do at present.

33. Since 2004 there has been a slight fall in total consumption but it is unclear whether this represents a watershed or a temporary blip as in the early 1990s.

The British government has been actively working in recent years to address British drinking.

Tuesday, September 13, 2022

Wednesday, July 13, 1922. The Straw Hat Riot

Men wearing boaters, Times Square, July 1921.

The Straw Hat Riot broke out in New York City when youths in Manhattan began removing and stomping on straw hats worn by factory workers in the area.  This developed into a brawl when they tried to do the same with longshoremen, which was phenomenally stupid on their part.  By that evening, the matter was a full-blown riot that would go on for eight days.


In an era in which hat wearing was considered necessary for men, this was a fairly serious matter. September 15 was the unofficial cutoff date in society for the cessation of the wearing of straw hats, after which men switched to felt hats.  The tradition of destroying straw hats had actually begun with stockbrokers who would good naturedly destroy colleagues straw boaters for violating the unwritten date, which itself moved.  It had once been September 11.



Boaters (sometimes called sailors) were by far the most popular urban summertime straw hat.  The type had acquired that name as sailors did in fact wear them at one time, in a version that had a somewhat larger volume in the crown.  They were so popular, however, that they saw use far outside of what we'd expect.  For instance, many of Custer's men at Little Big Horn were actually wearing boaters, rather than their issue felt hat, as they had just purchased them from a vendor on the Yellowstone.




Contrary to common recollection, they remained in fairly widespread use up into the 1950s, when they started to suffer the same decline, but more steeply, than other men's hats.

Boaters weren't the only straw hat in urban use, of course.  Panama Hats also saw use at this time, but much less.  Indeed, early on wearing a Panama Hat had been regarded as improper.

More on hats and standards of dress appears here:

Caps, Hats, Fashion and Perceptions of Decency and being Dressed.

The USGS crew put in for lunch at Church Rock.


Putting in for lunch at Church Rock.
 

Turkish troops set fire to the Basmane neighborhood of Smyrna resulting in the deaths of 10,000 people in the wind fanned conflagration.

An agreement was reached on the nationwide US railroad strike.

France and Poland entered into a ten-year self-defense pact.

Pershing was photographed on his birthday.


Thursday, August 11, 2022

Venerdì, 11 Agosto, 1922. Violenza

Ground was broken on Chicago's Soldier Field.

A Communist member of Italy's Chamber of Deputies declared that a recent general strike had failed as the proletariat was not sufficiently armed. This provoked a Fascists reaction during which fascist Francesco Giunta, who was armed, pulled out a revolver.  The session was suspended.

Umberto "the Ghost" Valenti, age 30, originally from Sicily, was shot and killed in a New York café under orders of the Genovese crime family.  Valenti, who was a hit man for the D'Aquila crime family, had killed a member of the Morello crime family removing the Camorra as a contender for the illegal liquor trade, but also meaning that competing Mafia crime families were now vying for that role.

Giuseppe Morello.  Probably completely unrelated, but while I was at the University of Wyoming, I twice had calculus classes taught by a graduate student with the last name Morello.  He was an excellent teacher.

This was part of a mob war with interesting aspects.  The Genovese family was part of the legendary "five families" of the New York mafia, but the Morello family was part of the Camorra.  Guiseepe Morello, the unfortunate victim of Valenti, was only recently out of prison at the time of his mob execution and the war turned to control of the former Comorrista's liquor business.  Valenti's murder, ordered by Giuseppe "Joe" Masseria, who had personally lured Valenti into the place of execution, settled the matter with the Genovese's coming out the victors.

Giuseppe "Joe" Masseria.  Masseria died in a hit ordered by Lucky Luciano in 1931.

Saturday, July 30, 2022

Sunday July 30, 1922. Traffic

 

July 30, 1922. From Westchester County Archives and Records Center in Elmsford, New York. - Bronx River Parkway Reservation, The Bronx to Kensico Dam, White Plains, Westchester County, NY.

The Irish Army took Tipperary.

Saturday, July 16, 2022

Thursday, July 16, 1942. The Vel d'Hiv Roundup


Things for European Jews, French Jews in particular, and the French in general took a turn for the much worse when French police in occupied Paris began rounding up Jews in the city under Nazi orders.  While the city was occupied and northern France was under Germany's rule as a practical matter, the fact of that the police were complicit in it is a stain on France's honor and further demonstrates how none of the fascistic regimes of the period were free from guilt.

Those arrested in the sweep, some 13,152 souls, would end up being sent to Auschwitz.  Only 811 survived.

On the same day, Parisian authorities announced that close relatives of "troublemakers" would be shot if they were male, or forced into labor if they were female.

Hitler moved his battlefield headquarters to Vinnytsia, Ukraine.

Hitler would have a variety of headquarters in the East, which perhaps shows the degree to which he had begun to focus on that theater of the war.  Such a focus was, of course, understandable in that the vast majority of German resources were now dedicated to fighting the Soviet Union. In this instance, the location, code-named Werewolf, was used by the Wehrmacht as its headquarters, but was little used by Hitler.  The Germans destroyed it upon their retreat from the region, and the underground portions remain sealed.  Only a swimming pool really remains intact.

The British XXX Corps took another key ridge west of El Alamein.  In the same battle, Australians repelled an attack on Point 24 resulting in 50% German casualties.

The United States severed relations with Finland.

In Italian Harlem, the following took place:

Rare Photos of the “Festa di Madonna di Monte Carmela” of East Harlem-July 16, 1942.

Monday, June 13, 2022

Saturday, June 13, 1942. Spooks, Sabateurs, and Wartime Information.

Franklin Roosevelt created the Office of Strategic Services on this day in 1942.

OSS Insignia.

An office of the Department of Defense, the wartime agency was a predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency and was organized along military lines.

On the same day, Roosevelt also crated the Office of War Information.


It was the successor to several early wartime agencies.

Both agencies were created by the same Executive Order.

In recognition of the right of the American people and of all other peoples opposing the Axis aggressors to be truthfully informed about the common war effort, and by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution, by the First War Powers Act, 1941, and as President of the United States and Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, it is hereby ordered as follows:

1. The following agencies, powers, and duties are transferred and consolidated into an Office of War Information which is hereby established within the Office for Emergency Management in the Executive Office of the President:

(a) The Office of Facts and Figures and its powers and duties.

(b) The Office of Government Reports and its powers and duties.

(c) The powers and duties of the Coordinator of Information relating to the gathering of public information and its dissemination abroad, including, but not limited to, all powers and duties now assigned to the Foreign Information Service, Outpost, Publications, and Pictorial Branches of the Coordinator of Information.

(d) The powers and duties of the Division of Information of the Office for Emergency Management relating to the dissemination of general public information on the war effort, except as provided in paragraph 10.

2. At the head of the Office of War Information shall be a Director appointed by the President. The Director shall discharge and perform his functions and duties under the direction and supervision of the President. The Director may exercise his powers, authorities, and duties through such officials or agencies and in such manner as he may determine.

3, There is established within the Office of War Information a Committee on War Information Policy consisting of the Director as Chairman, representatives of the Secretary of State, the Secretary of War, the Secretary of the Navy, the Joint Psychological Warfare Committee, and of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, and such other members as the Director, with the approval of the President, may determine. The Committee on War Information Policy shall formulate basic policies and plans on war information, and shall advise with respect to the development of coordinated war information programs.

4. Consistent with the war information policies of the President and with the foreign policy of the United States, and after consultation with the Committee on War Information Policy, the Director shall perform the following functions and duties:

(a) Formulate and carry out, through the use of press, radio, motion picture, and other facilities, information programs designed to facilitate the development of an informed and intelligent understanding, at home and abroad, of the status and progress of the war effort and of the war policies, activities, and aims of the Government.

(b) Coordinate the war informational activities of all Federal departments and agencies for the purpose of assuring an accurate and consistent flow of war information to the public and the world at large.

(c) Obtain, study, and analyze information concerning the war effort and advise the agencies concerned with the dissemination of such information as to the most appropriate and effective means of keeping the public adequately and accurately informed.

(d) Review, clear, and approve all proposed radio and motion picture programs sponsored by Federal departments and agencies; and serve as the central point of clearance and contact for the radio broadcasting and motion-picture industries, respectively, in their relationships with Federal departments and agencies concerning such Government programs.

(e) Maintain liaison with the information agencies of the United Nations for the purpose of relating the Government's informational programs and facilities to those of such Nations.

(f) Perform such other functions and duties relating to war information as the President may from time to time determine.

5. The Director is authorized to issue such directives concerning war information as he may deem necessary or appropriate to carry out the purposes of this Order, and such directives shall be binding upon the several Federal departments and agencies. He may establish by regulation the types and classes of informational programs and releases which shall require clearance and approval by his office prior to dissemination. The Director may require the curtailment or elimination of any Federal information service, program, or release which he deems to be wasteful or not directly related to the prosecution of the war effort.

6. The authority, functions, and duties of the Director shall not extend to the Western Hemisphere exclusive of the United States and Canada.

7. The formulation and carrying out of informational programs relating exclusively to the authorized activities of the several departments and agencies of the Government shall remain with such departments and agencies, but such informational programs shall conform to the policies formulated or approved by the Office of War Information. The several departments and agencies of the Government shall make available to the Director, upon his request, such information and data as may be necessary to the performance of his functions and duties.

8. The Director of the Office of War Information and the Director of Censorship shall collaborate in the performance of their respective functions for the purpose of facilitating the prompt and full dissemination of all available information which will not give aid to the enemy.

9. The Director of the Office of War Information and the Defense Communications Board shall collaborate in the performance of their respective functions for the purpose of facilitating the broadcast of war information to the peoples abroad.

10. The functions of the Division of Information of the Office for Emergency Management with respect to the provision of press and publication services relating to the specific activities of the constituent agencies of the Office for Emergency Management are transferred to those constituent agencies respectively, and the Division of Information is accordingly abolished.

11. Within the limits of such funds as may be made available to the Office of War Information, the Director may employ necessary personnel and make provision for the necessary supplies, facilities, and services. He may provide for the internal management and organization of the Office of War Information in such manner as he may determine.

12. All records, contracts, and property (including office equipment) of the several agencies and all records, contracts, and property used primarily in the administration of any powers and duties transferred or consolidated by this Order, and all personnel used in the administration of such agencies, powers, and duties (including officers whose chief duties relate to such administration) are transferred to the Office of War Information, for use in the administration of the agencies, powers, and duties transferred or consolidated by this Order; provided, that any personnel transferred to the Office of War Information by this Order, found by the Director of the Office of War Information to be in excess of the personnel necessary for the administration of the powers and duties transferred to the Office of War Information, shall be retransfered under existing procedure to other positions in the Government service, or separated from the service.

13. So much of the unexpended balances of appropriations, allocations, or other funds available for the use of any agency in the exercise of any power or duty transferred or consolidated by this Order or for the use of the head of any agency in the exercise of any power or duty so transferred or consolidated, as the Director of the Bureau of the Budget with the approval of the President shall determine, shall be transferred to the Office of War Information, for use in connection with the exercise of powers or duties so transferred or consolidated. In determining the amount to be transferred, the Director of the Bureau of the Budget may include an amount to provide for the liquidation of obligations incurred against such appropriations, allocations, or other funds prior to the transfer or consolidation.

Four German agents landed on Long Island, dispatched from a German submarine as part of Operation Pastorius. Their mission would rapidly fail and be detected, although not as rapidly as it could have been. They were detained by the Coast Guard, but released.

Two of the would be spies defected, that being put in place by George Dasch who recruited Ernst Burger to his cause.  Dasch had originally intended to become a Catholic Priest, but had been expelled from the seminary at age 14.  He then joined the Imperial German Army and served in it in the waning years of World War One.  He entered the U.S. illegally in 1923 and joined the U.S. Army Air Corps in 1927.  He reentered the Army in 1936.

Married twice in the United States, without the benefit of divorce, he abandoned his family and returned to Germany in 1938.  For his role in exposing the plot, FBI Director Hoover promised him a pardon but it was never delivered.  He and Burger were returned to Germany in 1948, and he never received permission to return.

Burger was younger and has also lived in the United States, where he'd been a member of the National Guard.  He was a member of the Nazi Party since age 17 and had been an aide-de-camp to Ernst Roehm of the SA.  Following that he wrote an article critical of the Gestapo which had landed him in a concentration camp for over a year.

All the participants of Operation Pastorius were sentenced to death following a trial, including Dasch and Burger, but the latter two had their sentences reduced to lengthy prison sentences.  President Truman cut those short and had them deported back to Germany, as noted.  The sentences have always been controversial, and frankly neither Dasch or Burger, who had exposed their confederates, were really treated right by the United States government.

On what came to be known as Black Saturday, British Commonwealth forces started the evacuation of the Gazala Line, following a successful sandstorm attack by the German 21st Panzer Division.

The Japanese conducted an aircraft carrier launched airraid on Darwin, Australia.

Tuesday, May 10, 2022

Wednesday, May 10, 1922. First call to the bar for English women.


Ivy Williams was called to the bar, making her the first English woman "barred" and thereby able to practice law.

Perhaps ironically, she did not, going on instead to be a professor of law, being the first English woman to achieve that status as well.  She never married, and died at age 88 in 1966.

Germany was ordered to pay 9 million marks in compensation to the Allied powers for zeppelins it had destroyed rather than surrender to the Allies pursuant to the Versailles Treaty.

The United States annexed Kingman Reef in the Pacific.  Not much is there.


Elihu Root gave a speech at the Russell Sage Foundation in which he outlined his vision of managed growth for New York City to the year 2022.

Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Wednesday, February 22, 1922. Remembering Washington.


It was Washington's birthday.

Or, more properly, it is Washington's birthday.  He was born on this date in 1732 to Johan and Mary (nee Ball) Washington.

Pro and anti factions of Sinn Fein signed a truce regarding cooperation with the Irish Free State and agreed to revisit the topic in three months.

WOR in New York began regular broadcasting with a mix of music and news.