August 31, 1919. The Motor Transport Convoy gets a day of rest, no rest in Kiev, turmoil in Chicago

Railroad station, Carson City, 1940.  It likely didn't look much different in 1919.  The man is waiting for the mail, which was moved by train at the time.

On this day in 1919, the Sunday day of rest returned to the command.

It darned near had to. The command was behind, by several days, in its original anticipated schedule, but it had taken it 20 hours across the dust and muck of the Nevada desert to travel the stretch before Carson City, and this on a road that was theoretically a designated highway, although the designation at that time was just that, a designation.  Very little of the Lincoln Highway, as we've seen, was improved in any fashion whatsoever.  There had been problems with teh road the entire way, but after the column hit Nebraska the road became worse with each mile, with Utah's and Nevada's roads being particularly bad.

Speed, of course, in the era was relative. . . .

The command was provided "Union religious services".  I have no idea what that actually means.  General ecumenical perhaps?  Non protestant soldiers with Sunday obligations, which at this time would have largely been Catholics, but perhaps some Greek Orthodox, would have had to hike into town to see what was available for them.

And there was transportation to Hot Springs for bathing, which was no doubt welcome.

And some worked, including the operator of a tractor.

Emblem of the former Socialist Party of America

Meanwhile, in Chicago, a city the convoy  had passed through some weeks earlier, day two of the Socialist Party of America's Emergency National Convention saw the bolting left wing of the party.  The English speaking bolters, on this day, formed the Communist Labor Party in its own convention.

This was addressed a bit yesterday when it was related that the emergency was the rise of a radical, or rather more radical, left wing of the party that was hearing the siren song of Communism.  In this, the US Socialist Party was going through the same struggle that Socialist parties everywhere were.  Nearly all of them had started out as hardcore radical parties, but over the years as their fortunes had risen, their positions became less radical as they moved towards accepting democratic forms of government.  Ironically, World War One, during which it had been supposed that Socialist would take the position that all worker should be united in opposing the war in favor of the solidarity of labor, in fact saw the opposite development and the movement of mainstream Socialist towards accepting representative democracy.  At the same time, all the same parties saw movements within them that were extremely radical.  As this process occurred, these parties split.  In Russia, the split saw the rise of four different Socialist parties, with the Communist Party being the most radical.  Germany saw a succession of splinter parties that eventually saw two parties, the Social Democratic Party and the Communist Party emerge.

In the U.S. the Russian Revolution gave rise to the Communist Party of America in May, 1919.  The Socialist Party continued on but radical elements within it were attracted to Communism. The Emergency National Convention was called to address this, and to put an end to it.  By that point, however, the right wing Socialist were a minority in the party.  While they seized control of the convention, they could not keep the left wing from walking out, which it did and on this day, in their own convention, the English speaking radicals formed the Communist Labor Party.  Ironically, the Emergency Session had come about due to the left wing demanding that it occur in order to move the Socialist Party towards Communism.

The Communist Labor Party was not to be long lived as it merged with the Communist Party of America the following year, which then became the Communist Party of the USA.  The Socialist Party of the USA would continue on, with various swings and splinters, until 1972 when it changed its name to the Social Democrats, USA, reflecting the evolution of the party.  Ironically, the Social Democrats have not seemed to really benefit from the current flirtation in some circles in the US with social democracy.  The Communist Party USA still exists as well, with its high water mark really having come during the 1930s.

Elsewhere, the fights brought by Communism saw dramatic events take place in Ukraine where the Whites entered the city, taking it without a fight from the Reds during the Russian Civil War but ending up fighting, slightly, forces of the Ukrainian People's Republic that entered the town simultaneously.

Russian White victory parade on this date in 1919 in Kiev.

The entire event in some ways is emblematic of the confusing nature of the Russian Civil War.

The Ukrainian People's Republic was an Ukrainian effort to create an independent government for the region following the collapse of the Russian Empire and the withdraw of the Germans from the region.  During that period various forces contested for control of the new country with a directorate emerging that had the most support. At the same time, the country found itself facing a Soviet invasion in January 1919 and it also found itself at war with Poland to its west.  To compound matters, White Russian forces contested with the Red Army for control of the region, and Ukrainian Greens sought to bring anarchy to the country, fielding an army of their own.

Under these conditions the independence of Ukraine was unlikely to occur but the region did manage to survive surprisingly long.  On this day the re emergent Whites took Kiev but the Ukrainian government sought to as well, not appreciating the ability of the Whites to move as quickly as they did.  The Whites retained control of the city.  The Ukrainian People's Republic effectively came to an end in 1921 with its territory divided between the Soviet Union and Poland, although it would amazingly maintain a government in exile up until the country was able to form its own government again following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

August 30, 1919. Fallon to Carson City, through the night, Knoxville riots, Socialist emergency.

The Motor Transport Convoy had a long day, starting at 6:30 a.m on August 30 and ending at 2:30 a.m. on August 31.  During that 20 hours they went 66 miles.  Conditions were so bad that the soldiers had to push the vehicles through some stretches of road.

Keep in mind that this was a road that was otherwise open for civilian use. . . but without the aid of soldiers to push.

The convoy was met by Nevada's Governor, reflecting the fact that the city on the far western edge of the state is the state's capital.

The Red Summer continued on when Knoxville, Tennessee, erupted into violence.  A start of the riots was the arrest of Maurice Mays, a biracial politician, for the murder of a white woman even though there was no basis to believe that he was the killer.  This resulted in a lynch mob developing that ultimately rioted.  This in turn caused black residents to arm themselves for their own protection and to seal off part of the city.  Violence later developed.

Mays was later tried and in spite of a lack of evidence, convicted.  His conviction was overturned by the Tennessee Supreme Court and he was re-tried, found guilty again,and sentenced to death.  His suspected father, the former white mayor of Knoxville, with whom he had a friendly relationship, committed suicide a few years thereafter.

In Chicago the Socialist Party convened an Emergency Session.

The Socialist Party of America was a rising political party at the time, it's boat rising with the rising tide of radical political parties everywhere.  The emergency was the invitation by Lenin for certain Socialist elements to join the Communist International which was causing a rift in the party.  The party was dominated by its "right wing", which on this day achieved control of the convention on its opening day, bringing the rift with the "left wing" to an immediate head.

The Country Gentleman came out featuring an article on "counterfeit farms".  I wish the article was available so I could learn what they were writing about.

And the movies saw the first release of Dangerous Nan McGrew, which would be re-released in the 1930s in the form of a Betty Boop cartoon.

And the Gasoline Alley gang, which seemed to be on vacation, went golfing.

MVPA Lincoln Highway Convoy

The 2019 MVPA Lincoln Highway Convoy (TMC19)August 10 – September 14, 2019, York, PA to San Francisco, CA. Travel from the 44th annual MVPA Convention in York, PA to San Francisco, CA. To participate you must register by 1 May 2019. This is the second MVPA convoy to commemorate the Lincoln Highway, built by the US Army in 1909! Contact MVPA-HQ to request information, schedules and routes; (800) 365-5798, (816) 833-MVPA, hq@mvpa.org.

It'll make better time than the original, and I believe its in Nebraska right now.

Should anyone who stops in here happen across this convoy commemorating the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy, let us know and post what you know.

August 29, 1919. Eastgate to Fallon with the Motor Transport Convoy, dark beers in Belgium.

Motor Transport Co. 554 en route to Santa Cruz, August 29, 1919 to escort the Pacific fleet to San Francisco.  Motor Transport Co. 554 was making this trip in California at the same time that the transcontinental Motor Transport Convoy was struggling to get to California.

The Motor Transport Convoy trucked from Eastgate to Fallon, Nevada, in desert conditions, making 66 miles in 9.25 hours.

In Belgium, a Socialist effort at banning the public consumption of alcoholic spirits was passed which ironically spurred the development of heavy Belgium beers and ales by religious communities, giving us Belgian beers as we know them today.

August 28, 1919. Austin to Eastgate, Nevada. 80 miles in 12.5 hours.

Mechanical failures continued to take a toll, but the Motor Transport Convoy picked up some speed on this day in 1919.

On the same day, the Germans put down a Polish rebellion in Silesia.

Gasoline Alley for August 28, 1919:

August 27, 1919. End of the trail for the Trailmobile.

On this day in 1919, the Trailmobile kitchen had an accident that there was no recovering from.

The Red Summer resumed as white rioters attacked the black community in Laurens County, Georgia.  The attacks seemed to be related to white fears about rioting that had happened earlier in the summer in the neighboring county.  The event lasted two days and featured a lynching of a man presumed to be a leader in the black community on the first day.

Louis Botha, a Boer commander of the Boer War and the first Prime Minister of South Africa.  Botha had been a leader of the Boer community during the war and shepherded it into the peace with the British.  By some measures, his actions may be regarded as having converted the Boer defeat into a type of victory as South Africa obtained dominion status in 1910 and the Boers effectively governed the new state, with Both as its P.M.

Botha as a Boer commander.

Much of Botha's post Boer War effectiveness was due to his ability to unite Boer aspirations with the larger British Empire, something that was not only difficult but not always popular. During World War One Botha acted to commit troops to the British Empire cause which was enormously unpopular among the Boers and resulted in the Boer Rebellion.  None the less, he generally persisted and can be credited with effectively snatching a type of victory out of the jaws of defeat.

He effectively died of the Spanish Flu, which he'd survived, but which had weakened his heart.  Like many Spanish Flu victims, he died of the collateral effects of the disease.

The Soviets nationalized its film industry on this day in 1919.

Gasoline Alley for August 27, 1919.

August 26, 1919. Pinto House to Willow Springs on the Motor Transport Convoy.

As the 1919 transcontinental Motor Transport Convoy was being received in Willow Springs, Nevada, the crew of an Italian warship was being received in Boston Commons.

On this day in 1919, the Motor Transport Convoy traveled from Pinto House to Willow Spring, making 44 miles in 8.25 hours.

Mention is made of the Mack "chain drive".  During this period, and for quite some time thereafter, some vehicles used chain drives, like bicycles, rather than drive shafts, to convey the rotation of the engine to the axle.

By and large, however, the vehicles held up that day in spite of the conditions.

August 25, 1919. Ely to Pinto House, Nevada with the Motor Transport Convoy, London to Parish with Aircraft Transport & Travel, back to Texas with the 8th Cavalry, north to the Stampede in Alberta.

American cemetery at Belleau Wood, photograph taken on August 25, 1919.

On this day in 1919, a photographer was at work taking photographs of the recent American battle ground of Belleau Wood.

View of Chateau Thierry and the famous bridge where the Marine stopped the Hun hoards on their march on Paris, taken on August 25, 1919.

Things picked up a bit on this Monday, August 25, 1919, for the Motor Transport Convoy, although they now suffered a mechanical failure beyond their ability to address.

Other soldiers, much further south, had come back across the border.  The most significant US incursion into Mexico since the Punitive Expedition had come to an end.

As with the last, this incursion had featured the use of aircraft fairly extensively.  In this case, the press was reporting that aircraft had proven decisive by resulting in the deaths from a strafing run by U.S. planes.  The expedition had also started, of course, due to aircraft when U.S. airmen had been held hostage by Mexican bandits.

Also occurring on this day was another significant aircraft related event.  The predecessor to British Airways, Aircraft Transport & Travel Ltd., commenced the first regularly scheduled commercial channel hopping flight.  That early ride between London and Paris must have been a bit frightening to the passengers, but clearly pointed the direction of the future.

The flight was made in an Airco DH16, an plane that was converted from the wartime DH9.  It could hold four passengers.

North of the border, in Alberta, the 1919 Calgary Stampede commenced, but this year it was termed "The Victory Stampede".    The artwork of Charles Russell played a part in the big event that year.

If that seems surprising, Russell painted quite a few paintings with Alberta themes or for Alberta ranchers.  The ranch culture of Montana and Alberta were closely connected.

The first Calgary Stampede had been held in 1912. This was only the second. So it was not only first post war Stampede, but a real resumption and continuation of something that may not have become the big rodeo event that it did.

Maps and governments continued to change in Eastern Europe.  Today, the first Lithuanian Soviet Republic came to an end due to Polish occupation of the principal portions of its territory.  The USSR would reestablish it as a puppet state in 1939.

Harry Houdini was performing, but on film, in a movie featuring him that was released on this Monday.

August 24, 1919 "That this pass was successfully negotiated without accident considered remarkable". Ray Caldwell remarkably continues pitching after being hit by lightening. U.S. "Invasion" of Mexico continues

On this day in 1919 the Motor Transport Convoy negotiated Shellbourne Pass.

Not too surprisingly, four wheel drive FWDs came through the best on this days' travel. 

The unit made it to Ely, Nevada, after 77 miles over 8 hours, fairly good time by the standards of the convoy.  They arrived mid afternoon after once again failing to to take a Sunday's day rest, and camped in a municipal campground that was already a destination for tourists, showing how quickly motor tourism was advancing in spite of the poor state of the roads and the primitive condition of the cars.  Shoshone Indians, who have a very small reservation near Ely (which is not noted by the diarist) visited.

On the same day, pitcher Ray Caldwell was hit by lightening while pitching for the Cleveland Indians in a game against the Philadelphia Athletics.  Caldwell was knocked unconscious for five minutes but upon being revived asked for the ball back and resumed playing.

He completed the game, having pitched 8.2 innings and threw the winning pitch.  The blast of lightening knocked the hat off of the catcher and players and spectators at first thought that Caldwell might have been killed.

Caldwell was a great pitcher but was notoriously personally erratic, being an alcoholic and having, a self destructive streak. That would result in his having a shortened major league career, after which he played in the minors.  His reputation as a drinker and a partyer was a deterrent to teams picking him up.  He became a farmer, railroad employee and bartender in his later years and, in spite of his early life, lived to age 79.

Caldwell worked as a shipbuilder during World War One, an occupation taken up by a variety of baseball players as it allowed them to continue playing baseball rather than being conscripted into the Army.

In other news, American cavalry continued on in Mexico in search of bandits.  Mexican Federal troops were reported to be engaged in the same activity.

The intervention was apparently causing speculation in Mexican newspapers about various ways that the U.S. might more fully intervene in Mexico.

This Sunday edition of the Cheyenne State Leader also featured an article about "Jap" immigration.  A current newspaper would never use this pejorative slang term, but this was extremely common for newspapers of the era.

The paper also had an odd line about a woman whose "husband brings home the bacon" being "the better half of a good provider".  That's is hard to discern now, but what it referred to was the reluctance of a lot of women to leave their wartime jobs and resume to traditional pre war roles.  This was an issue at the time as it was felt that it was keeping men out of work, their traditional role.

August 23, 1919. Exhibitions in Toronto, Trouble for the Motor Transport Convoy in Utah, Fighting in Mexico, Lithuania and Ireland.

While the U.S. Army was testing its recent wartime vehicular acquisitions in a cross country trek, Toronto was enjoying a victory related exhibition.

Vehicle attrition was beginning to set in with the transcontinental Motor Transport Convoy.

While better progress was made on this day, for the second time this week a vehicle was pulled out to be shipped by rail.  On this occasion, the vehicle was pulled out entirely and taken back to Ft. Douglas, Utah, which is just outside of Salt Lake City.

Officer's quarters, Ft. Douglas, Utah.

Things were not going as well as hoped for, for the Army, further south.

And violence was erupting elsewhere as well.

In Ireland, fifteen year old Francis Murphy, a member of Fianna Éireann, an Irish Nationalist Youth organization, was shot dead in his home by British soldiers in what amounted to sort of a drive by shooting.  The shots were believed to have been fired in retaliation for recent violent nationalist activities.

Fianna Éireann members in 1914, practicing aiding the wounded.  The organization was a nationalist youth organization with scouting elements.  Note the kilts, which aren't really an Irish thing.  Note also the Montana Peak type hats which were associated with scouting at the time.  Photograph courtesy of the Irish Library via Wikipedia Commons.

And in the East, fighting between Poles and Lithuanians broke out in the city of Sejny over the question of who would control the city. The Germans, upon evacuating the region in May, had left it in the hands of Lithuania, which is not surprising in light of German support for German freikorps fighting there.  The Poles in the city objected.  Ultimately the region would remain in Lithuania.

Polish cavalry in Sejny.

Saturday was the day the nation's magazines tended to come out, although its doubtful anyone we discussed above read this weeks. Maybe soldiers on the convoy might have acquired some late.

Country Gentleman, perhaps in the spirit of the time, portrayed aggressive roosters on its cover.

The Country Gentleman from August 23, 1919.

The Saturday Evening Post had a less than inspiring Leyendecker illustration depicting a life guard, perhaps in tribute to the hot month of August, which was about to become the cooling month of September.

It was a bad day for the Motor Transport Convoy. . .

August 22, 1919.

Nothing was going right.

And the water had to be hauled in by horse.

Elsewhere, the U.S. Army was travelling by horse:

In other localities, things were more tranquil.

San Juan, Puerto Rico, August 22, 1919.

August 21, 1919. Dissension in the ranks, Orr's Ranch to Granite Rock, Utah. 15 miles in 7.25 hours. New dry docks at Pearl Harbor. Pursuit in Mexico.

Things were getting heated in the Motor Transport Convoy on this day in 1919.

The commander of the convoy, concerned about the fate of the vital Militor, pulled it out of the convoy and had it shipped by rail to Eureka, Nevada.  The diarist recorded his dissension in the diary, not something a junior officer would do lightly.  Indeed, something of that type risked being a career ender.

But the diarist may have well be right. Progress that day ground to a halt.  While the Militor was now suffering from its hard use, the convoy may well have suffered due to its absence.

On the same day, the wife of the Secretary of the Navy was present in Hawaii to push a button to open a new dry dock at Pearl Harbor.

American troops continued a new pursuit south of the border, but Mexico was once again not pleased.

Elsewhere there was a food sale: