Thursday, October 20, 2016

Black Friday Storm, 1916


Surface map from Saturday, October 21, 1916 with the track of 1916 Atlantic Hurricane 14 included.  The storm was impacted by the remnants of 1916 Atlantic Hurricane 14, which technically had ended its hurricane status the prior day.

The  James B. Colgate, Marshall F. Butters, D.L. Filer, and Merida sank in the tremendous storm on Lake Erie. The loss of life from these vessels was heavy.   Only the captain of the James B. Colgate, hauling coal, was rescued on the 22nd, after spending two days on a life raft that flipped twice, two other occupants having drowned as a result.

The Marshall F. Butters crew fared better, with all if its men surviving, some being rescued from a life boat by nearby ships and the captain and a crew member being rescued by another ship.  Interestingly that one poured "storm oil" on the water, a heavy oil which in fact operated to "calm troubled waters"  The ship was a wooden vessel and broke up.

The wooden coal hauler D. L. Filer had been two days in heavy seas and wind when it sank at the mouth of the Detroit River.  It's crew took refuge on two masts, but one broke and six out of the seven men on it drowned.  The seventh man swam to another mast where the captain had taken refuge, but as a rescue vessel approached the next day he slipped from mast and drowned.  Only the captain survived.

The Merida was a Canadian steamer that sank during the night.  Her entire crew of 23 men was found floating, dead, in the lake the following day.

Chemistry Building Burns at Montana State University, October 20, 1916.

It was a bad day at Montana State University, 100 years ago.

Chemistry Building Fire, October 20, 1916, Montana State University Libraries

The Chemistry Building burned.

The Photo above is "embedded and from MSU's website.  The full caption reads:
Please don't copy the photograph, it's MSU's.

As is the following:

Chemistry Building Fire, October 20, 1916, Montana State University Libraries

As well as this:

Chemistry Building Fire, October 20, 1916, Montana State University Libraries

Fighting a fire in the snow. . . how miserable.

Think Big? Nah. . . just think natural. You are fine, the way you are.


How silly can we be?

Around here there's been a series of billboard for cosmetic surgery.

Now, let me be frank, I'm not keen on cosmetic surgery.

At least not where it addresses some medical need.  People who were burned, or had surgery, or something, I get it. There trying to restore their appearance to its pre incident norm.  I'm in favor of that, and I agree that's a medical treatment.

But just because you want to meet somebody's definition of beautiful?

So the existing billboard made me uncomfortable.  But they were subtle.  You couldn't really tell what the beautiful people. . . did I say people. . . beautiful women were having done, or had done.  Okay, so I felt uncomfortable, but not icky.

Then I saw the new billboard that stated "Think Big".

Hmmm.

And on that billboard was a naked woman.

Now, she's not all visible.  She's not visible from the waste down, and the middle section of her torso is where the Think Big logo is, so we see nothing there.  But her mid drift is, and she's quite think, and her head neck and shoulders are, and she's a very good looking, and very dolled up, woman.

Think Big, means, big boobs.  The price is between $5,000 and $6,000 (I didn't catch it). And there's at least two of these billboards up.

Well, miss, don't think big. Think natural.

Your boobs are just the size their supposed to be.  Nobody needs surgery to make them any bigger.  It's unnatural and its weird.

Think natural.

Why would a person go under the metaphorical knife for this? For goodness sake, its unnecessary and its vain.

Just say no.

You are fine, just the way you are.

And that applies to your rear and your nose as well.  Just don't.

And what's that say about us? A society so wealthy, and vain, that people would undergo surgery for this? 

Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Rail Transportation and the Punitive Expedition (and ultimately, in World War One).

We've been recently posting a selection of items about the transportation of the Wyoming National Guard to Camp Cody, New Mexico, in 1916.  This touches on a topic that we've posted on before, but which is really emphasized by these posts.  The complete dependency on rail transportation for anything significant in the United States prior to mid 20th Century.

From our companion blog Railhead: Burlington Northern Depot, Casper Wyoming. This depot was a 1916 addition to the City of Casper, Wyoming.  You can't board a train there anymore, as we have no passenger service and haven't for decades.  But a lot of people passed through those doors and on to a train in back for decades, including a lot of soldiers from 1916 through the 1950s.

I was in the Wyoming Army National Guard, as I recently noted in another post, from 1981 through 1987.  I covered a lot of miles as a Guardsmen.  Mostly by truck and Jeep, but some by air, and of course some by foot.  I never rode a train however.

This isn't to say that the Guard never employed trains in any capacity during this time.  They did.  Heavy items like howitzers aren't easy to move long distance, so if something like that was going a really long ways, it went the first part of that way by train.  But I never boarded a train myself.  And neither did most of the Guardsmen I served with.

New York Guardsmen, in a photo we've run previously, boarding the train.  They would have entrained in New York and have detrained in Texas or New Mexico.

Guardsmen in 1916 sure did.

For that matter, so did soldiers in the Regular Army.  They had since trains first penetrated into the Frontier.  And they would at least up in to the 1950s.  In this country, as in most, if you were going a long ways, you got there by train.

Now, we think of the Punitive Expedition in the context of the horse, about which we've already written.  Some of us might also think of it in the context of the truck, it being the first American expedition featuring any sort of truck transportation, and we've written about that as well.  But everything got to the border by rail, unless it was already at the border to start with.  The expedition into Mexico was a horse powered endeavor, one way and another, but up to the border, it was steam powered.

Note the caption.  But. . . note the rail line snaking through the camp.

And things were steam powered in Mexico too, even if the American military expedition was largely conducted on horse.  We think, of course, as the Mexican revolution and everything about as a romantic event on horseback, but even with that the popular imagination of the revolution has included the train, and for good reason.

The train was the only way to cover long distances quickly. And it was the only method which didn't require the direct participation of those being moved.  I.e., if you move a long distance by horseback, you are involved directly in that very physical activity.  If you are on foot, well. . . that speaks for itself of course.  But on a train, unless you are part of the crew, this isn't true.

No wonder then, rail lines were critical to a nation's defense and for that matter to the success of an advancing force. This had been known at least as long ago as the American Civil War, during which both sides made extensive use of rail.  Indeed, when Sherman's large advancing force began it march through the South, which as a large advancing, and foraging, army it was able to do largely without rail, it made sure to deprive the South of mobility by destroying the rail lines as it progressed.  

Union forces under Sherman heating a rail line to turn it into a "Sherman Necktie", i.e., twist it into a loop and render it useless.

And during the post Civil War struggle on the Frontier, the American Army ended up depending heavily on rail, which allowed a very small force to multiple its effectiveness.  Prior to the 1870s the Army nearly always had to engage in a very long field expedition any time there was trouble on the Frontier. As rail penetrated the country, however, this was no longer true and units in, for example, the Southwest could be moved to the Northern Plains in just a few days, and put in the field.  

Indeed, so important had rail become to a country's military structure that in Germany, which perhaps had the most advanced military infrastructure of the era, the railroads were under the jurisdiction of the Army.  German mobilization was completely based on moving troops, horses and equipment by rail, and in order to make sure that could be done effectively the Army had been given authority over the railroads.

So it should come, of course as no surprise that rail lines were heavily contested for during the Mexican Revolution. All sides sought to capture, hold and use rail lines for the rapid movement of troops. Even the US did that to some extent during the Punitive Expedition.


Indeed, rail transportation itself figured in the origins of the Punitive Expedition as it was Woodrow Wilson's allowance to Carranza to transport troops across southern Texas by rail that sparked Villa's anger.  That rapid movement, across our territory, to go into action in his, was too much from his point of view.

The Mexican Revolution saw something that would likewise soon be seen in the wilder portions of Eastern Europe during World War One, the armored train.

Almost inconceivable to us today, and certainly vulnerable as it depended upon rail, armored trains nonetheless sprung up everywhere there were rail lines, but not static battle lines.  Mexico was one example, but it was far from the only one.  They also saw fairly notable use in Russia as that country descended into anarchy.

 Armored train of the Czech Legion, which fought all the way across Russia in 1917 to emerge on the Pacific Coast so that they could be sent back into action in Western Europe.

Indeed, the armored train would figure in the Russian Civil War and then go on to see use on the Eastern Front during World War Two, a fairly amazing late appearance of that item.

Morse significantly, of course, everything of every type generally moved by rail during World War One.  Unlike World War Two, when the US and Britain would pioneer truck transport, during the Great War, all the armies relied on rail for any significant moves of men and equipment.

A "40 and 8" French boxcar, the type of rail car remembered by nearly every American doughboy during the Great War.  So strong were these in the memory of the troops that France later donated examples of them to American veterans groups, such as this example that is outside of Cheyenne, Wyoming's American Legion post.

Railroads are still with us, of course, but with air travel and good road travel, they aren't what they once were.  So, while still militarily important, they aren't dominant in the way that they were in the Teens and even into the Forties.

 Casper Wyoming Burlington Northern Depot today.This is the Burlington Northern Depot in Casper.  It was built in 1916, which would place this building solidly in the era of the petroleum and livestock fueled economic boom that happened in Casper during World War One.

Burlington Northern Depot viewed from a Ford Tri Motor

In that era, however, they were vital, and made all the difference.

Mid Week At Work: "Wig wag girl" of the Woman's Defense League in the camp near Washington, D.C." 1916.


LOC Title:  "Wig wag girl" of the Woman's Defense League in the camp near Washington, D.C.

Tuesday, October 18, 2016

Movies In History: The Siege of Jadotville

This very recent release premiered in the United States on Netflix.

The movie concerns a September 1961 battle which pitted a company of Irish Army United Nations Peacekeepers against forces fighting for the breakaway province of Katanga in the Congo.  A more or less forgotten event in the United States, the 1960s were a time of intense turmoil in the former Belgian colony.  Mineral rich Katanga took a run at separating from the Congo in this time frame, with the economic aspect of it being a distinct aspect of the attempt, as the Congo nationalized its mineral wealth.  The Katangan forces were a mix of local gendarme and European mercenaries and made a very serious run at separating the province. The United Nations opposed the efforts which descended into outright war.

The Irish unit was a lightly armed infantry company sent by the Republic of Ireland as part of its peacekeeping mission. There was no thought to the unit being engaged in a full scale siege, but following the decline of the situation this is exactly what occurred and the unit fought for over three days against a mixed Katangan/mercenary force which grossly outnumbered it, surrendering only when the Irish unit had completely expended all of its ammunition. During the course of the battle not a single Irish soldier was killed while over 500 of the attacking force were.

This film was recently made with an Irish cast and based upon a novel on the topic.  While based on a novel, at least based on what little I know of the battle, the movie is quite faithful to the history of the event.  I'll confess, however, that I'm not an expert on this historical episode by any means.

In terms of material details the movie is superb.  Indeed, it's surprisingly accurate.  Taking place, as it does, in 1961 it involves a point in military history when armies were just switching over from bolt actions to automatic rifles.  The film correctly depicts the Irish troops mostly armed with World War Two era weapons, such as Lee Enfield bolt action rifles, a Bren gun and a Vickers machine-gun.  A few FAL's appear, but they would have been brand new at the time.  Madsen submachineguns (at least I think they are Madsen's) also appear in Irish hands.  Likewise, the Katangan forces have a few FALs but are mostly armed with Mauser 98 rifles, which would likely also have been correct. A few French submachineguns are shown in use.

Accuracy even extends out to odd things like vehicles and the single example of a Katangan jet aircraft, which is accurately shown to be a Fouga Magiste, a fairly obscure trainer of the period.  I certainly would not have expected that level of accuracy out of any film.  This is not to say it is perfect, a particularly glaring example of the opposite being the use of a Bren gun for a sniping shot in one episode but all in all, this film gets very high marks.

Indeed, it gets high marks in every respect.  Well worth seeing.

Armour Rations

A look at chow in the field in the time frame we've been dealing with:  Armour Rations.

Monday, October 17, 2016

Lex Anteinternet: The Shoshone - Arapaho Disagreement comes to a head...

I reported on this event back on October 10, when it first hit the news:
Lex Anteinternet: The Shoshone - Arapaho Disagreement comes to a hea...: There's a truly odd spectacle playing out in Fremont County, Wyoming, but it's getting little attention. As has been noted her...
There's been no news on it since, and I wondered what was going on.

Well, today the Tribune has a followup article, and there's been no resolution of the crisis.  Indeed, it's even odder than originally reported.

In terms of news, this matter is actually going before the Tribal Court this Wednesday.  The issue will be whether the court can be dissolved by the Joint Business Council if only the Shoshones are recognizing the council.  The Court has already issued a preliminary order that it cannot, and in fact has held the sitting Shoshone members of the JBC in contempt at the rate of $150 a day for attempting to dissolve it and cease funding it. The Arapahos, who had asked the BIA to fund separate institutions including a court, as they no longer participate in the JBC, are ironically now funding the Tribal Court.   The JBC has asked for the BIA to restore a BIA court, which it threatened to do, but which it has not.

It's hard to see a resolution to this occurring, or at least one that doesn't involve the Federal courts.   And indeed there's a case in Federal court right now about whether or not the Arapahos can demand separate treatment from the Federal government in light of its independent sovereignty.  Those who argue against it, at least on practical grounds, note that its tough to have two separate bodies of law in the same geographic area, including two separate courts and two separate game and fish codes.

USS Arizona Commissioned

The USS Arizona was commissioned on this date in 1916.


She was a Pennsylvania Class battleship that had been two years in construction at the time.  She would serve, of course, until December 7, 1941.

Her memorial:

The USS Arizona Memorial, Pearl Harbor Hawaii

The raised anchor of  the USS Arizona.

The memorial wall on the USS Arizona memorial listing the crew-members who lost their lives on December 7, 1941.
The crew-members who have chosen to be interred with their shipmates since December 7, 1941.

The USS Arizona.



Oil leaking from the Arizona, the "tears" of the ship.










This is a section of the memorial wall again, which I've posted due to the surprise of noting the name of one of the sailors.

 The oil leaking from the USS Arizona is estimated at the very small amount of five quarts per day.  None the less, the oil streak is clearly visible from the USS Missouri, which is docked some distance away.

 The USS Missouri as viewed from the USS Arizona memorial.

I last saw the USS Arizona memorial in about 1975, when I went to Oahu with my mother.  We went there to visit her Great Aunt Christine, who was born and raised in Hawaii, and who was an eyewitness to the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor.

At that time, the memorial was administered by the U.S. Navy, and those going to view it entered by small vessel through the mouth of Pearl Harbor.  The boat was boarded in Honolulu Harbor.  It was very dignified, and I recall a uniformed sailor was present at all times.

The U.S. Park Service now administers the site, and they do a nice job, particularly with a related facility nearby which commemorates the entire battle.  It remains a moving and somber site.

Sunday, October 16, 2016

Today In Wyoming's History: October 16

Today In Wyoming's History: October 16:

1916  Cavalry withdrawn from Yellowstone National Park.  Attribution:  On This Day.

 Cavalry in Yellowstone, 1903.
Cavalry escorting President Arthur in Yellowstone, 1883.

The Wyoming Tribune for October 16, 1916: Carranza's family in flight. . . or were they?


Readers if the always sensational Wyoming Tribune learned, in the afternoon Monday edition, that the family of Carranza was in flight, suggesting he was about to fall from power.

Well, he wasn't.  He'd remain firmly in power, and in fact at that time was working on his proposals for a new Mexican constitution.  Readers of the Tribune, however, were probably pretty worried.

On other matters, Charles E. Hughes declared himself to be a man of peace, and the Wilson Administration denied that the US was somehow responsible for the execution of Roger Casement, who was sentenced due to his role in the recent Irish Nationalist's uprising against the United Kingdom.

Sunday Morning Scene: Immanuel Lutheran Church, Sheridan Wyoming

Churches of the West: Immanuel Lutheran Church, Sheridan Wyoming

Country Store, Tecumseh Oklahoma, 1916

LOC Title:  A little country store near New Hope School #41. Mrs. M.E. Geralds, P.O. Route 2, Tecumseh, Okla., is in charge; also a customer. Lewis W. Hine. See W.H. Swift Report. Location: Potawotamie County, Oklahoma.  October 16, 1916

Friday, October 14, 2016

Bull Moose Carey goes for Wilson: Cheyenne Leader for October 14, 1916.


Illustrating the ongoing split in the GOP, and perhaps providing us something that sounds a little familiar for us today, the Cheyenne Leader for October 14, 1916 lead with a story about respected former Republican Governor Carey supporting Woodrow Wilson.

Joseph M. Carey was born in Delaware and studied law at the University of Pennsylvania before coming to Wyoming as its first, territorial, Attorney General.  He went very rapidly from that post to being a Wyoming Territorial Supreme Court justice, and just as rapidly left that post to start ranching, founding a large ranch near what is now Casper Wyoming, the CY Ranch. The ranch house, indeed, still exists in a much updated form near today's Casper College.

Almost as soon as he took up ranching, he took up politics, first serving on the  Cheyenne City Council and then as the Territorial Representative to the U.S. House of Representatives.  He served in the U.S. Senate from 1890 to 1895 but lost that position thereafter.  At that time Senators were elected by the Legislature and there was a great upheaval in the Wyoming Legislature following the Johnson County War which, for a time, threatened the Republican hold on the state.

He returned to politics in 1911 and was elected Governor, but he was one of the Republican Governors who followed Theodore Roosevelt out of the GOP in the 1912 election, at which time he joined the Progressive Party.  He was sincere in his Progressive convictions and like some of the more dedicated Progressives he did not make peace with the GOP like Roosevelt himself did in this election year.  He remained in the Progressive Party until his death in 1924.

The 1916 election year saw quite a few instances like this.  While Roosevelt made peace with the GOP and returned to it, after some indication that he might run as Progressive against Wilson, not everyone did. And some of those Progressives were leaning towards Wilson, with some even going more leftward than that.

The Battle Hen of the Republic

Illustration of Cobb by Tony Sarg from The Battle Hen of the Republic.

The Saturday Evening Post ran an article on this day (October 14, 1916) by Irwin S. Cobb on sage grouse, which he titled (both bird and article) The Battle Hen of the Republic.  That issue featured the following content:

Cover by Norman Rockwell, illustrating a family watching a Charlie Chaplin film

The Battle Hen of the Republic by Irvin S. Cobb, illustrations by Tony Sarg.
The Water Cure by Ring W. Lardner, illustrations by M. L. Blumenthal
The Political Panorama by Samuel G. Blythe illustrations byWill Hammell
The Man Who Tried to Be It, part two, by Cameron Mackenzie, illustrations by Charles D. Marshall
Our Most Human Industry: Cinderella Silver Comes Back for Her Slipper by James H. Collins.
The Great American Game by Frank Goewey Jones
Human Nature at the Front by Ian Hay.
Piccadilly Jim, part five, by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, illstrations by May Wilson Preston
A Circuit Rider’s Widow, part seven, by Corra Harris, illustrations by Walter H. Everett
Digging Up the Future, by William H. Hamby, illustrations by Gayle P. Hoskins
Honestly If Possible by Sinclair Lewis, illustrations by Henry Raleigh
Simple Curves in Business by Fred C. Kelly.
Lemon Blossoms by Frank Condon.

Wish I could find the article.

Cobb was a writer from Kentucky who had been writing in New York since 1904.  Starting in 1911 he wrote for a time for The Saturday Evening Post, with World War One being his original focus with that journal.  This article was obviously not on the Great War.  His article on the all black 369th Infantry Regiment (15th New York) was widely circulated at the time and reprinted in the black press.  He wrote fiction as well as contemporary articles and was a well read writer at the time, writing until his death in 1944.

The Nobel Prize for Literature goes to. . .

Bob Dylan?

Hmm.


Thursday, October 13, 2016

Overheard at the Airport

Denver International Airport.

Stop staring at me!  I see you staring at me!

I'm so sick of dishonest people.  You don't want my drama! 

You sound like my grandmother (to elderly women speaking to one another, which they fail to note).

I'm sick. . oh its peanut butter (said while female subject is at first rubbing her stomach and then going on to upper torso in a manner not generally done in public).

(Turning around to crowd in line).  I feel your eyes on me!  I know that you are staring at me!

Denver.  Stoned capitol of the Rockies

Houston International

For those with a Samsung 7 Note, we have a trash can for you.

Apparently they catch on fire the announcer was tired of the longer announcement.

And; with a face suddenly appearing between a book I'm reading, while I'm drinking coffee and eating a cold danish.

I like to see what people are reading. 

 

Cheyenne Leader for October 13, 1916: Sox take the series



They won it, of course, the prior day.  This was a morning paper.

Tuesday, October 11, 2016

The Frakes. PIcking Cotton, Lawton Oklahoma, 1916.

LOC Caption:   Family of W.T. Frakes, Route 5, Lawton, Okla. Mother said 6-year old Warren picked 41 pounds of cotton yesterday "An I don't make him pick; he picked last year." Had about 20 pounds in his bag. She said Clara, 11 years old, averages 75 pounds a day. Picked 101 pounds yesterday, earning $1.25 (they are picking now for another farmer). She carries 40 pounds in the bag. Velma, 14 years, picks 125 pounds. Has picked over 200 pounds in a day. Children go to Flower Mound School, District 48 while living here, but they are itinerant, renting a small farm of 10 acres now. "We move about a good deal" mother said. Location: Comanche County, Oklahoma.  October 11, 1916