Showing posts with label 1909. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1909. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 23, 2024

Friday, April 23, 1909. Lethal politics in Kentucky.

William S. Taylor

Governor of Kentucky, Augustus E. Willson, pardoned former Governor of Kentucky, William S. Taylor for assessor to the murder, which he denied, of William Goebel, who had been declared to be the lawful winner of the 1899 gubernatorial election.

Augustus E. Willson.

Very MAGAesque.

Taylor had taken up residence in another state, where he practiced law, and he rarely returned to Kentucky.

The horrors taking place in Turkey were noted.

The Acting Secretary of State to Ambassador Reid.

Department of State,

Washington, April 23, 1909.

Referring to department’s telegram of the 18th, Mr. Wilson asks if a fleet adequate for the protection of foreign life has been sent to the disturbed regions in Turkey, and if American citizens are in jeopardy whether we can rely upon the doing of all that is feasible for their protection. Says, in view of the humanitarian concern felt by the President and because of the distressed interest of naturalized Armenians in the United States, the department would be glad to learn if possible what is being done under the Berlin act to check the massacre of Armenians in Turkey. Quotes telegram of this date from Turkey.

Gimbels signed a 105-year lease for property at New York Herald Square.  This provided for $60,000,000 in rent until 2014.

The 1909 Benavente earthquake in the Santarém District of the Central Region, Portugal. Sixty people were killed in the incident.

Child labor was photographed in Lewiston, Maine.


It shows, I guess, why quite a few World War One veterans, in reality, didn't think the war was all that bad.  Daily life was already really rough.

Last prior edition:

Sunday, April 18, 1909. St. Joan d'Arc beatified.

Sunday, March 31, 2024

Monday, March 31, 1924. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. (actually III) and the Teapot Dome Affair, Making Working Girls Homeless, and the Start of the Fishing Season.

Democrats were attacking Theodore Roosevelt, Jr's supposed role in Teapot Dome.  This Theodore Roosevelt was serving as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, that position now effectively being a Roosevelt one, with he being the third Roosevelt to occupy it.



Too many "girls" were occupying boarding houses on West A, B, and 1st Streets, which was causing the Casper Police Chief to counsel against allowing more boarding houses and to close the existing ones.

Without really detailing the article, what the Chief meant was that there were too many working girls in the Sandbar District for effective policing.

Dr. Morad was robbed at gunpoint.

The houses were closed, Casper's other paper noted:


Casper was not a nice town.

The police effort against the working girls in the 20s would fail.  It would take at least into the 1950s to really make a dent in the trade they occupied in the Sandbar, and it was finally shut down when an urban renewal project in the 1970s.

The Herald carried advertisements noting the opening of fishing season.


Wyoming doesn't have a fishing season per se now.  You can fish all year around.  Apparently, at the time, fishing opened on April 1.

A big difference between then and now is the extensive Wyoming Game and Fish hatchery system.  It existed in 1924, but it's been much expanded.

Money for a fish hatchery was first appropriated by the legislature in 1895.  I don't know if one was built at the time, but the oldest continually operating one in the state is the Story Fish Hatchery, which was built in 1909.

Imperial Airways was founded by way of the merger of the Handley Page Transport, Instone Air Line, Daimler Airway and British Marine Air Navigation Co Ltd. airways.

Last prior edition:

Sunday, March 30, 1924. Camp Carey

Sunday, July 23, 2023

Monday, July 23, 1973. Old Faithful Inn added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Old Faithful Inn in 1909.
Today In Wyoming's History: July 23: 1923  1973   Old Faithful Inn was added to the National Register of Historic Places. Attribution:  On This Day.
  President Nixon refused to turn over tape recordings to the Senate or special prosecutor.

Tuesday, August 13, 2019

Today In Wyoming's History: The Spring Creek Raid.

Today In Wyoming's History: The Spring Creek Raid.:

The Spring Creek Raid.

Students of Wyoming's history are well familiar with the story of the Spring Creek Raid, which occurred on April 2, 1909, on the Nowood River outside of Ten Sleep, Wyoming.  The tragedy has been the subject of at least three well known books, including the excellent A Vast Amount of TroubleGoodbye Judge Lynch, and Ten Sleep and No Rest, the first two by lawyer and historian John W. Davis and the third, and earlier work, by Jack Gage, a former Governor of Wyoming.



The raid is justifiably famous for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it may be the sheepman murder that most closely fits the way that we imagine the cattlemen v. sheepmen war of the late 19th and early 20th Century being.  Of course, the fact that it was an outright cold blooded killing no doubt causes it to be well remembered as well.  And then that the killings actually resulted in a trial which convicted the assassins is also worth remembering, as it demonstrated the turn of the tide of the public view on such matters.




The Wyoming historical marker sign that describes the killings does a good job of it, with perhaps the only thing omitted is that one of the ambushing party was armed with a semi automatic Remington Model 8 in .35 Remington, a very distinct arm for the time.  In basic terms, the raid occurred as several men connected with cattle raising in the area decided to enforce the "Deadline", a topographic feature of the Big Horn Mountains which meant it was a literal dead line.




The .35 Remington turned out to be critical in the story of the raid as it was an unusual cartridge for what was, at the time, an unusual arm.  The Remington 08 had only been introduced in 1905 and was a semi automatic rifle in an era in which the lever action predominated.  A lot of .35 Remington cartridges were left at the scene of the murders and investigation very rapidly revealed that a Farney Cole had left his Remington 08 at the home of Bill Keyes, which was quite near the location of the assault.  One of the assailants, George Saban, was known to not carry a gun and was also known to have been at the Saban residence the day of the assault.  Subsequent investigation matched other cartridges found on the location to rifles and pistols known to have been carried by the attackers.




Arrests soon followed and five of the assailants were ultimately charged with murder.  Two turned states' evidence.  The trials were not consolidated and only Herbert Brink's case went to trial.  To the surprise of some, he was convicted by the jury.  Due to prior trials for the killing of sheepmen being both unsuccessful and unpopular, Wyoming took the step of deploying National Guardsmen to Basin to provide security for the trial, which proved unnecessary.  The conviction was the first one in the area for a cattleman v. sheepman murder( Tom Horn had earlier been convicted for the 1903 killing of Willie Nickell, but that killing took place in southern Wyoming.




The killings were, quite rankly, uniquely cold blooded and gruesome, involving shooting into the wagons and setting them on fire.  Because of that, and the Brink conviction, the remaining four charged men plead guilty, rather than face trial.  Two plead guilty to arson, and two to second degree murder.




All were sentenced together, and Brink was sentenced to death.  His sentence was commuted, however, and he was released from prison, together with another one of the party, in 1914.  Another, George Saban, who was deeply affected by his conviction, escaped while out of the penitentiary and under guard, after being allowed to stay over in Basin in order to allegedly conduct some of his affairs.  His escape was successful and he disappeared from the face of the earth.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

















Sunday, March 23, 2014

Monday, March 23, 1914. Doubts about Roosevelt's fate on the River of Doubt.

We just posted an item for 1909 on Theodore Roosevelt leaving the US for his legendary 1909, 1910 safari.  Famously, after losing his effort to regain the Presidency in the three-way race in 1912, he embarked on the exploration of what was then known as the River of Doubt, or more officially the Roosevelt–Rondon Scientific Expedition


That trip was plagued by horrific events, one of which was detailed in this edition of the Cheyenne based Wyoming Tribune.

It's often noted that Roosevelt never recovered from this trip, but that can be somewhat debated.  It's true he was never himself thereafter, but Roosevelt had been a vigorous proponent of "the Strenuous Life" and had lived it.  While this is fully admirable, and today would be cited to some degree as a life extending practice, Roosevelt had experienced ill health with asthma in his youth (as have I), and had been shot during the 1912 campaign.  Four years of semi enforced idleness as Vice President and President had taken their toll as well, and by the time he left office in 1909 he was, in my view, beginning to significantly age even though he was not yet 60.

Having said that, he made a really dedicated effort to join the Army as head of an expeditionary unit during World War One, so he had plenty of vigor left, even after these ordeals.

It's also noteworthy how, just before World War One, there was plenty of exploration of the remote regions of the globe still going on.  The era immediately before the war seems to have been the last great push in the age of exploration.

Last prior edition:

March 21, 1914. Yo acuso

Related threads:

Tuesday, March 23, 1909. Bound for Africa.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Sunday, April 18, 1909. St. Joan d'Arc beatified.

 St. Joan d'Arc was beatified by Pope Pius X before a crowed of 30,000 in St. Peter's Square.

Drawing of St. Joan d'Arc made during her lifetime.  

A patron saint of France who lived from 1412 to 1431 before being executed, her canonization would follow in May, 1920.

Remarkably, an example of her signature exists.


The 1909 St. Louis Cardinals were photographed.



Last prior edition:

Saturday, April 17, 1909. Soccer riots.

Friday, April 17, 2009

Saturday, April 17, 1909. Soccer riots.


Edith Kelly was photographed in her role in Havana.  She was an English actress, best known for her role in that production.

Thousands of angry soccer fans attacked the stadium at Hampden Park after a replay of the Scottish Cup between the Rangers and Celtics ended in a draw.

Soccer riots aren't a new thing.

The Scottish Football Association did not award the prize cup to any team.

Helen and William Howard Taft opened West Potomac Park to the public.

Child laborers were photographed in Rhode Island on  this day in 1909.





Last prior edition:

Wednesday, April 14, 1909. The Adana Massacre continues.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Wednesday, April 14, 1909. The Adana Massacre continues.

The slaughter of Armenian Christians by Ottoman soldier began in earnest in Adana, Ottoman Empire.

Tuesday, April 13, 1909. The Aadna Massacre.

The Adna Massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, which would kill over 20,000 people, commenced.  Ottoman troops would participate in it.

Armenian orphans from the massacre.

The Armenians had the first Christian kingdom in the world, and have had a state of one kind or another since 860 BC.  Since the conquest of Anatolia by the Turks, they've been subject to repeated atrocities.

The Anglo Persian Oil Company was incorporated.  The company became a power in its own right, and extensively exploited what became Iran, setting the stage for what we have today, unfortunately.

Minnesota passed a law banning cigarettes, effective August 1.  Too bad that didn't stick.

Punch, April 14, 1909.

Sheep yards, Kirkland, Ill, April 14, 1909.

Last prior edition:

Tuesday, April 13, 1909. The Aadna Massacre.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Tuesday, April 13, 1909. The Aadna Massacre.

The Adna Massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, which would kill over 20,000 people, commenced.  Ottoman troops would participate in it.

Armenian orphans from the massacre.

On the same day, a rebellion broke out in the Ottoman Empire after newspaper editor Hassan Fehmi Effendi was assassinated. The rebels forced the resignation of democratically elected Prime Minister, Grand Vizier Hüseyin Hilmi Pasha, and killed the Minister of Justice. Tewfik Pasha.

The revolution was backed by Sultan Abdul Hamid II, who sought to regain the absolute power.  It wouldn't go well for him.

What would become the University of North Carolina was photographed.

State Normal School, #1, Greensboro, N.C., April 13, 1909.

State Normal School, #2, Greensboro, N.C., April 13, 1909.

Last prior edition:

Monday, April 12, 1909. Doc Powers falls ill.

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Monday, April 12, 1909. Doc Powers falls ill.

 


Michael Riley "Doc" Powers, catcher for the Philadelphia Athletics and a physician, became seriously ill during a game.  He'd ultimately die of peritonitis a few days later, after three intestinal operation.  He blamed his condition on earthing a cheese sandwich during the game, while some though he'd been injured straining to catch a foul ball, or by crashing into a wall during the game.

He was 38 years old at the time of his death.

I’m guessing the cheese sandwich was right.  Having been a victim of the dreaded gasoline station sandwich, and having witnesses my son virtually rendered comatose due to one, I think Doc was right.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

Sunday, April 11, 1909. Tel Aviv founded.

Settlers drawing lots for plots, April 1909.

100 Jewish settlers living in Jaffa founded a 12 acre village located in sand dunes, dividing the property into 60 lots.  It was called Ahuzzat Bayit, but only for a year, after which it was renamed Tel Aviv.

Last prior edition:

Saturday, April 10, 1909 Finnish, Métis Tragedy, and Arctic Tragedy.