Showing posts with label Antarctic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Antarctic. Show all posts

Monday, March 23, 2026

Saturday, March 23, 1946. Marilyn Monroe and the Wedding Industrial Complex. Truman warns Stalin, and holds up testing the bomb. No public necking in Japan.

A really interesting Richard C. Miller photograph of Marilyn Monroe was taken, which we learned of due to Reddit's 80 Years Ago Sub, and which we repost here via fair use.



Miller had "discovered" Monroe, who was already modeling following her photo spread in World War Two's Yank.  Miller, typical for the era, photographed her in swimsuits, including bikinis (very modest ones by today's standards), but also  had a an entire series of other topics, including the subject shooting firearms.  Here he depicted her in a wedding dress.

The real life model had already been married and divorced by this time, having married at age 16 and then filing for divorce while her husband was deployed in the Navy during the Second World War.  This photograph is actually commonly claimed to be a wedding photo from her first marriage, which it is not, although the veil is remarkably similar to the one she actually wore in her wedding.


Actual photograph of Monroe at her first wedding, when she was 16 years old.

In the studio photograph she's holding some sort of book with a Christian cross on it, with that style of cross depiction very common for the era.  This is what causes us to note this photograph in a way, as it brings up the topic addressed here:

The Wedding Industrial Complex

Notes from the Spesia Underground


A really interesting episode.

This really fascinating look at modern weddings brings up a whole host of things we routinely discuss here, including agrarianism and subsidiarity.  The episode from Catholic Stuff You Should Know points out the extent that weddings were, at at the time the photo of Norma Jean was taken above still remained, community affairs and not big bride focused shows.

We've lost a lot here.

And we really need to recapture it.

While indelicate, this also shows the portrayal of a really beautiful woman before Playboy perverted all of that.

Monroe was, as is well known, Playboy's first, and unwilling, centerfold.  But what's interesting here is that prior to Playboy arriving on the scene, this was not an uncommon depiction of a really beautiful woman.  There were, of course, already some women who were focused on for being really busty, Jane Russell giving an example, but the theme did not absolutely dominate.  To look at the 19 year old Monroe here, you would not have thought of her in that fashion.  A decade later, you would, and even after Life intervened to push her nude photograph first as an art item.  We've dealt with that before here as well, although frankly we need to modify our entry.  That post is here:

Appearance. Shape and being in shape and women (men will come next).

Also posted via fair use, Colliers had an article on keeping everyone employed year around, showing how times were in fact changing.

We've looked at that here too.

Women in the Workplace: It was Maytag that took Rosie the Riveter out of the domestic arena, not World War Two

Truman presented an ultimatum to Stalin demanding the Soviets comply with the agreement to pull their troops from Iran.

The Rocky Mountain News was a morning paper, so they didn't catch that, but they did catch something else that Truman had ordered the day prior.



The Army issued an order prohibiting soldiers from engaging in public displays of affection with Japanese women.


Out Our Way's gag was based on cleaning out the ash bin of a stove, something that's likely completely lost on modern readers.


Argentina extended its claims over Antarctica.

Mad King Donny must not be aware of this or we'd be staking a claim.

Indonesia Tentara Republik Indonesia (Armed Forces of the Republic of Indonesia) evacuated Indonesian citizens from the city of Bandung, West Java, Indonesia, after which the area was burned to avoid its use by the Dutch.

Commemorated as the Bandung Sea of Fire and a great patriotic act, poor people really don't have much of a say in things like this.

Last edition:

Friday, March 22, 1946. First U.S. rocket to escape the atmosphere.

Tuesday, November 14, 2023

Wednesday, November 14, 1923. In from the cold.

German Gen. Hans von Seeckt ordered that Berlin cafés, halls and cabarets must admit the city's poor and cold in order to warm themselves, least the Government seize them to be used for that purpose.

Von Seeckt's tomb.

Von Seeckt had been an important figure in the Imperial German Army before going on to be a major figure in the Reichswehr.  He was in the German parliament from 1930 to 32 as a member of a center right party, but turned towards the hard right thereafter.  He was assigned to the German military mission in China in 1933, where he restored the failing relationship with the Nationalist Chinese.  His advice lead to the 1934 Nationalist campaign that resulted in the Communist Long March.

Germany suspended payments on its reparations.

New Zealand's laws were extended to Antarctica as Governor General John Jellicoe applied its jurisdiction to the Ross Dependency.

Saturday, July 29, 2023

Monday, July 30, 1923. Harding in grave condition.

President Harding was reported to e in "grave" condition, which indeed he was.


Summer life, of course, went on for many, which included camps for some.



And protests for others.


And Reserve training, as in these men from D.C.'s Naval Reserve were doing.


The British Empire claimed the Ross Dependency in Antarctica and expressed a desire that, save for some territory belonging to Chile, Argentina and France, the Empire should come to own the entire continent.

The Dependency today is claimed by New Zealand, a claim recognized only by other countries claiming Antarctic lands.

Saturday, January 8, 2022

POLAR PREET Army Officer, Physiotherapist, Nordic Skier, Ultra-marathon Runner, Endurance Athlete

 POLAR PREET

Army Officer, Physiotherapist, Nordic Skier, Ultra-marathon Runner, Endurance Athlete




Yikes, now I feel like such slacker.

Wednesday, January 5, 2022

Thursday January 5, 1922. Interruptions.

On this day in 1922, A.B. Kent of the London Times was kidnapped by the Irish Republican Army, which was upset about an article he had written regarding public opinion in Cork on the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

He was having lunch at a pub at the time.

They released him later that evening.

The Washington Naval Conference adopted a declaration outlawing submarine warfare against merchant ships.

The French, including the French Armenian Legion, withdrew from the Turkish city of Adana which they had held in Turkish Armenia for three years.

Ernest Shackleton, Antarctic explorer, age 47, died of a heart attack.  He almost certainly had an earlier one in Brazil on his way to the Antarctic but had refused medical treatment.  His ship was docked at South Georgia at the time, where he was buried.

South Georgia.



Tuesday, January 4, 2022

Wednesday, January 4, 1922

In the darkening twilight I saw a lone star hover gem-like above the bay

Ernest Shackleton’s last diary entry, written aboard the Quest, at South Georgia Island, January 4, 1922

Street in Seattle Washington, January 4, 1922.

Wednesday, February 24, 2021

February 24, 1941. Faraway Places.

USS Bear in 1944.

On this day in 1941 two ships arrived in the Antarctic to evacuate personnel from Admiral Byrd's 1939-40 expedition, an event I would have been completely unaware of but for this item:

Today in World War II History—February 24, 1941

Two ships were involved, the USS Bear and the USCGC North Star.

USS Bear in 1939.

The Bear was a combination steam powered and sail powered vessel, something that was very common in the late days of sail.  She was acquired by the Coast Guard as she was a cold weather ship and the forerunner of ice breakers. Given her service in the Arctic and Antarctic, she's regarded as the most famous ship to serve in the Coast Guard.   Built as a sealer in 1874, she was sold to the United States in 1884 and served under a variety of names, although normally they retained the name "Bear" in some fashion.  She was resold to a Canadian owner, again for sealing, but never put back into that use, in 1948.  In 1962 she was sold to a restauranteur who intended to make her into a floating restaurant but she sank while undertow, a sad end for the long serving ship.

USCGC North Star.

The North Star was a cutter that had originally entered service with the Department of the Interior in 1932 for events such as this and then became a Coast Guard Cutter in 1941.  She provided escort service with the Coast Guard starting in July 1941, prior to the U.S. entry into World War Two. She was decommissioned in 1945.

On the same day, the RAF bombed the French city of Brest.

Other events occurring on this day:

Day 544 February 25, 1941


Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Wednesday, January 26, 1916. Mount Hope.

The sledging party of the second arm of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition reached Mount Hope near the Beardmore Glacier to lay down a depot for the first arm of the expedition that was expected to reach the location in the coming weeks, not knowing what had otherwise occurred.

Stockmen were concerned about the border.


Last edition:

Tuesday, January 25, 1916. Montenegro surrenders.

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Wednesday, October 27, 1915. Abandoning the Endurance.

French troops established a bridgehead around Karahojali east of the Vadar River in Macedonia.


Efforts to repair the Endurance having failed, Ernest Shackletn ordered the ship abandoned.

Denver's first Mayor, John C. Moore, died in his early 80s.  

Elected before the Civil War, he was a Southerner with strong Southern views and returned to the South to serve in the Confederate forces during the war, rising to the rank of Colonel in the Confederate Army.  He was a lawyer by training.

Last edition:

Tuesday, October 26, 1915. Coaxing the Afghanis.

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Wednesday, September 22, 1915. Rimma Mikhailovna Ivanova

Russian army nurse Rimma Mikhailovna Ivanova (Римма Михайловна Иванова) was killed in action leading a successful infantry attack after her unit's officers had been killed.

She was posthumously awarded an officer's Order of St. George 4th Class.

The Ross Sea Party ship Aurora caught sight of the Balleny Islands allowing the crew to estimate the distance they had drifted while icebound.  The Antarctic islands are extremely remote and were not explored until 1948.  They may be volcanic.

Last edition:

Sunday, September 19, 1915. Occupying Vilnius.

Friday, January 16, 2015

Saturday, January 16, 1915. Cape Evans.

While the rest of the world was fighting tooth and nail with each other, the Ross Sea Party established a shore base at Cape Evans, Antarctica, in support of the Imperial Trans Antarctic Expedition.

Greek King Constantine created the Order of George, named after his father, in honor of Greek citizens who had given exceptional public service to Greece.  In 1973 it was succeeded by the Order of Honour.

Sailors waving from the crow’s nest of the Wyoming class battleship USS Arkansas (BB-33)., January 16, 1915.

Last edition:

Friday, January 15, 1915. Thinking about Gallipoli and Solidarity Forever.

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Monday, October 26, 1914. Wars within wars.

Wars within wars, a feature of World War One and World War Two, commenced with a battle between the Austro Hungarian backed Polish Legion and the Imperial Russian Army.  The Russians prevaled in the action at at the villages of Laski and Anielin.

Both the Austro Hungarians and the Russians would back different bands of Polish nationalists.

British and French colonial troops captured Edéa in German Cameroon.

The Norwegian schooner Endurance, carrying members of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition arrived at the South Georgia Islands.

In another expedition, this one much further north, Captain Robert Bartlett and eight survivors of Karluk arrived in Victoria, British Columbia on USS Bear.

HMS Liverpool and HMS Fury with RMS Olympic, try to take the sinking HMS Audacious in tow. October 26, 1914.


Last edition:

Sunday, October 25, 1914. Change of command.

Friday, August 8, 2014

Saturday, August 8, 1914. Leaving for the Antarctic.

The UK passed the first Defence of the Realm Act authorizing wartime censorship.

French forces took Muhouse in Alsace, although they'd be pushed back out two days later.

German colonial authorities executed Cameroonian resistance leaders Martin-Paul Samba and Rudolf Duala Manga Bell for treason.

The Shackleton Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition left the UK for Antarctica, seemingly out of context and now out of their own times.

Last edition:

Friday, August 7, 1914. The BEF arrives in France.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Thursday, February 2, 1911. Fighting in Mexico.


The revolution in Mexico was seeing a lot of action.

The crews of the two competing expeditions to the South Pole confronted each other at the Bay of Whales.

That must have been awkward.

Revolution broke out on the northern coast of Haiti.

Puerto Cortez, Honduras was turned over to the control of American and British soldiers..

Last edition:

Sunday, January 29, 1911. Revolution at Mexicali.

Friday, January 14, 2011

Saturday, January 14, 1911. Bay of Whales.

 



In keeping with the photograph above, sort of, the Norwegian Antarctic Expedition, led by Roald Amundsen, arrived at the Bay of Whales.

Last edition:

Wednesday, January 11, 1911 Mrs. Geo. R. Peabody and "Mauchi".

Labels: 

Friday, December 24, 2010

Saturday, December 24, 1910. Chinese democratic aspirations.

 "Christmas Eve (1910) in the Pack"  From Robert Scott's 1910 expedition.

The Chinese National Assembly adopted a resolution denying the right of the Emperor to reject their demands for a democratic constitution, but would retract it two days later after there were indications that the Emperor was going to do this anyhow.

Last edition:

Friday, December 23, 1910. The Padlock Bill.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Tuesday, November 29, 1910. Race to the Antarctic.

The British Antarctic Expedition, led by Robert Falcon Scott, departed from New Zealand on the Terra Nova while Roald Amundsen, on board the Fram was also en route to the Antarctic and the Japanese Antarctic Expedition, led by Nobu Shirase, departed Tokyo on the ship Kainan Maru.

Last edition:

Wednesday, November 23, 1910. Provisional President of Mexico.