October 4, 1919. Sox down again.

Cicotte was pitching again, so the results were somewhat predictable.  Having said that, he pitched a better game than his first as he was determined not to look so bad as he had in the first.  Accordingly, for much of the game he played well, and then made a couple of amateur errors, on purpose, that threw the game.

This was showing that, to a degree, it was hard for good players to throw a game and have it look like it hadn't been thrown.

The headlines were otherwise full of strife and concern.  Labor riots and race riots continued to sweep the nation and labor problems were also getting into the headlines from the United Kingdom.

President Wilson seemed to be improving, however.

October 2, 1919. Woodrow Wilson suffers a severe stroke. Red Summer in the News. The White Sox throw, barely, a second game.

On this day, Woodrow Wilson, who had collapsed during a speech given in Pueblo Colorado as part of his grueling transcontinental speaking tour in support of the Versailles Treaty suffered a debilitating severe stroke.  This may have in fact simply been a followup stroke to one that had occurred in Pueblo, as his symptoms on the train ride back to Washington D. C. strongly suggest that in fact is what had occurred.

Somewhat ironically, Wilson was a  hypochondriac, but one whose health fears turned out to be somewhat correct. The stroke wasn't Wilson's first.  He'd first suffered a stroke in 1896.  That stroke was "mild" and his doctor didn't regard the matter as a serious one even though he did not regain the use of his right hand for four months.  In 1906 he suffered a second serious stroke that nearly left him blind in his left eye.  Prescribed rest by his physicians, he returned to work after a trip to Europe.  He was afflicted again in 1913.  In 1915 he was finally diagnosed with high blood pressure and was at that time likely warned that his condition was serious.

In 1914 Woodrow Wilson's first wife, Ellen, died of Bright's Disease in the White House.  Woodrow Wilson remarried the following year to Edith Galt, with that wedding occurring in December (they'd met in May).  She was fifteen years younger than he was.

Woodrow Wilson with Edith Wilson in the President's first official photograph following his stroke on this day.  This photograph was taken in June, 1920, and what it portrays is quite accurate.  Edith is overlooking his shoulder and guiding his actions.

Following the stroke Edith Wilson and Woodrow Wilson's doctors at first kept his condition secret from his cabinet and himself, although Wilson had experience with strokes and was likely aware of his situation soon enough.  Quite soon the President's inner cabinet conspired to keep it a secret from anyone but themselves and Edith took over routine details of the Presidency making her the nation's first, if unofficial, female chief executive.  Edith also acted to control access and communications with the President.  She would later assert that she never made any decisions on her own, although she certainly influenced decision making, and termed her role of that of "steward".

In spite of the secrecy, some news of the President's general condition was leaking out and it was generally not good. Therefore, while the public never knew how grave the President's condition was, it had reason to suspect he wasn't doing well, even as early as this very day.

The Casper Herald, a morning newspaper, which reported that the President had not rested well the night prior on its front page.

Woodrow Wilson never did recover from his stroke fully and in the current age he likely would have been removed from office under that special constitutional provision allow for that to occur in certain emergencies. That provision did not exist at the time.  The nation proved to be lucky that Edith Wilson was a capable steward, whatever that may have meant, as a less capable one would have caused a disaster and a Constitutional Crisis.  Nonetheless there's good reason to believe that a better result would have been for Wilson to have resigned and Vice President Thomas Marshall to have taken over.  Marshall already had experience running the government due to Wilson's absence from the country during the Paris Peace Treaty sessions and he would have been more likely at that point to have brought the country into the Versailles Treaty, which Wilson's stroke doomed.

Edith Wilson lived until December 1961, long outliving her husband who would die three years following his stroke.  Marshall died in 1925 at age 71.

The news on October 2 was dominated by the results of the second game of the fixed World Series and race riots, both the ones in Arkansas that had started yesterday and the ones in Omaha which were now over.  

In terms of race riots, the papers were tending to take a position to blacks in a way that's not only biased, but shocking.  Blacks had to feel that they were under siege everywhere in the U.S. in 1919, and indeed they were.

In the second game of the World Series the fix brought about the insider anticipated results.

A problem was setting in, however, in that Cicotte was the only conspirator who had been paid to date.  In the second game, the players in the conspiracy carried on with the plot, but the White Sox pitcher Lefty Williams actually pitched a fairly good game.  The game was not a runaway.  Partial payment came after the game, but full payment was yet to come.

Of course, as always, other things were going on elsewhere.

Great Falls, Va., site of historic mill built by George Washington.  October 2, 1919

Rheims France, October 2, 1919.

Coal and Oil, San Juan, Puerto Rico.  October 2, 1919.

Life Magazine, in its issue that came out on this day, ran a cartoon that's hardly intelligible to us a century later:

"Sensations of the young man who thought "quite informal" meant a dinner coat"

September 30, 1919. The Elaine Massacre.

Richmond Virginia, September 30, 1919.

On this day in 1919 the Red Summer spread to Arkansas when over 100 black residents of the Elaine area were killed after violence erupted when white law enforcement officer, accompanied by one black trustee, arrived at a meeting of blacks associated with the Progressive Farmers and Household Union of America. The Union had armed guards, which given the events of that summer and even that week was a wise precaution.

The union was a black sharecroppers union and there was no reason that it shouldn't have been meeting.   The entire event lead to convictions for murder of several black men that were later overturned by the United States Supreme Court.  That event can be regarded as a turning point in the Supreme Court's scrutiny of such matters and therefore, in some ways, the Elaine Massacres can be regarded as ushering in, very slowly, what would become the Civil Right Era.  The event also provides a very clear example of why the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution exists.

September 29, 1919. The Red Summer becomes a red fall in Alabama and Nebraska, the franchise for women comes to Utah.

On this day in 1919, racial murders came to Montgomery Alabama when two black veterans, one still in uniform, were pulled from a police car and gunned down in nearby woods. They'd been accused of assaulting a white woman, but obviously had not been convicted. A third black man then in hospital would be lynched the following day in a completely unrelated event.

This followed race riots that occurred in Omaha Nebraska the prior day which saw violence on a large scale.  It was based on a similar accusation but required military intervention to be put down and saw the horrific lynching of Willie Brown, whose body was subsequently burned, resulting in a widely distributed photograph.

The news from Omaha made front page news in Wyoming, but interestingly would be remarkably different from the front page that was found in Omaha. There, the victim of the lynching was simply proclaimed to be guilty and the mob enacting vigilante justice.  In Wyoming, the heroic actions of the mayor in attempting to stop the mob were the focus.

While a 1919 act of racial violence in Montgomery Alabama isn't surprising to read about today, many would be surprised to learn of one in Omaha.  But Omaha was and is a Midwestern city and had a large black minority that had been drawn to the location due to the manual labor opportunities it afforded. Racial tension in the city was high in the town and would remain so for many years.

Indeed, while we don't association him with the city, it's worth noting that Malcolm X, born Malcolm Little, was born and grew up in Omaha.  His father was an outspoken black Baptist minister and there's always been some suspicion that the streetcar accident he died in was actually a murder.

In other events, on this day a special session of Utah's legislature the state's Senate voted in favor of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution granting women the franchise. The House would do the same the following day.

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.

July 31, 1919. Yoemanettes muster out, Motor Transport Convoy treks from Columbus to Grand Island, Nebraska. 64 miles in 9.25 hours. Red Summer in Syracuse and Philadelphia.

Female sailors (foreground) and Marines (background) being mustered out of service on this day in 1919.

The Department of the Navy released a large group of women from service in this day, giving them their discharge from the Navy and Marine Corps.  The "Yoemanettes" and "Marinettes" had been brought in to fill largely clerical roles during the war which were returning to male servicemen in reduced numbers as the services declined to peace time numbers.

On this occasion, their service was honored by the Department of the Navy before they were officially released.

Problems with dust yielded to problems with mud on this day in July 31, 1919 for the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy.  The Elks provided dinner for the officers and Grand Island, Nebraska provided a dance for everyone.

The Red Summer made its appearance at Syracuse New York, although in the form of an industrial riot, which made this occurrence somewhat different than earlier ones.  On this day in 1919 Polish and Italian steelworkers who were on strike attacked black workers who had been brought in as strike breakers.  The riots ended when Syracuse mobilized its entire police force.

Race riots also occurred in Philadelphia, but a quick response by the city's police rapidly brought them to an end.

The formal adoption of the Weimar Constitution occurred in Germany, which was now an official republic with a constitution.

July 27, 1919. Riots, halts and finishes.

White mob during the Chicago riot.

On this day in 1919 the Red Summer came to Chicago when race riots broke out following a young black man accidentally wondering onto the white area of an informally segregated beach.  This caused whiles to react, resulting in their throwing rocks at black swimmers.  The young man was killed in the process.  Things descended from there with white mobs invading black areas. Authorities were intentionally slow to react. By the time the matter concluded on August 3, 23 blacks had died and 15 whites.

Illinois State Guardsman and Chicago policemen.  Authorities were slow to call out the State Guard, but when 6,000 Guardsmen were deployed to the city the riots came to an end.

The riots in Chicago, which had a large black population and which was a target destination of the Great Migration, are generally regarded as the worst of the Red Summer.  The city had been a powder keg all summer long and when violence erupted, white youth gangs were a major contributor to it, including the Hamburg Athletic Club which the then 17 year old future Mayor Daley was part of (his activities during the riots are unknown).

Ultimately the State of Illinois deployed the Illinois State Guard, deployment of the National Guard being impossible due to its not existing following its conscription during World War One. The State Guard forces, equipped largely with Spanish American War era arms, were not unsubstantial and the slowness in committing them and the lack of cooperation of the City of Chicago in addressing the violence contributed to the disaster.

Given the events, the cartoon run in the Chicago Tribune on this Sunday seems odd.

Cartoon from the Chicago Tribune, July 27, 1919.

Another disaster occurred at St. Ignatius Montana when fire destroyed the town.

In Iowa, the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy took the day off from moving, but not maintenance.

Apparently the quality of the food was becoming a concern.

Progress itself was a concern in the Round the Rim trip of the Air Corps, as reported in the Cheyenne paper. The bomber detailed to the effort had done a nose digger the prior day in Jay, New York.

In France, Firmin Lambot came out the winner in that years Tour de France.

Firmin Lambot

Wednesday July 23, 1919. 1919 Motor Transport Convoy arrives in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Cheyenne publishes a big newspaper. Red Summer spreads to Pennsylvania.

On this day the convoy went from Clinton to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, making 87 miles in 10.5 hours.  On the way the Trailmobile kitchen broke some springs.

A Trailmobile was a trailer, made by the company of that name.  They're still around.  Their stout trailer was used for a lot of applications, including the mounting of vehicle hauled kitchens.  There were a variety of trailers built by Trailmobile and I frankly don't know what this particular trailer was like, although a lot of them were four wheeled trailers that had an appearance that closely resembled horse drawn freight wagons.

The White Staff Observation car a large car built on a 1 ton White truck chassis.

The Red Summer spread to Darby Pennsylvania when a mob gathered and attempted to lynch the arrested Samuel Gorman.  Gorman, 17, had been an employee of a hay merchant that he killed in an assault when the hay merchant terminated his employment due to lack of work.  Upon learning of the murder, the mob gathered, but authorities prevented the lynching from occurring.

The Cheyenne State Leader, coincident with Cheyenne Frontier Days, published a massive twelve section edition of the paper that might hold the record for the largest Wyoming paper published up to that time, and which would frankly dwarf the weekday size of any newspaper published in Wyoming today. . . if not any edition of any Wyoming paper published today.  Included in that was a section that heavily featured boosting advertisements, including some for towns, and including one for Casper.

I've noted before the massive change to Casper that occurred because of World War One, and you've seen it here in part due to the qualitative change in its newspaper.  This advertisement really brings that out.

Casper had gone from a city of just over 4,000 people (which is a city under Wyoming's definition) to one three times that size in just a few years.  Oil was the reason, as this ad boosted, but the Great War is the reason that oil became such a big deal, something that coincidentally the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy accidentally emphasized.

And then as now oil tended to be the focus of the local economy, with other industries taking second position. The reference to other industries here is interesting, however, in that the sheep industry, which was a major agricultural enterprise in Wyoming up until the 1970s, was featured and in fact was centered in central Wyoming.

Tourism, however, also shows up. And tourism by automobile, which was just getting started at the time.  That three legged stool we talked about here in connection with the last general election had appeared.

Of course, you have to wonder what those 4,000 residents, assuming they remained, thought of the change.  The majority of Casperites were now new residents, grossly outnumbering the old, and the town of 4,000 had changed forever.

Monday, July 21, 1919. 1919 Motor Transport Convoy makes 82 miles in 10.5 hours, air disaster in Chicago, riots in Norfolk, Austrians receive draft peace treaty.

In spite of engine troubles in a couple vehicles, the transcontinental Army convoy made a record, heretofore, 82 miles in 10.5 hours, arriving in DeKalb Illinois right at 5:00 p.m.

The convoy was clearly getting in the swing of things as their speed was really picking up.

They left Chicago Heights at 6:15 a.m, which means that they necessarily missed the drama in Chicago later that day when the Wingfoot Air Express, which belonged to Goodyear, crashed in Chicago, killing its 13 occupants.

The Wingfoot Air Express being loaded on July 21, 1919.

The crash was the worst air disaster in the United States up until that time.  It was transporting passengers, all of whom died in the collision, to the White City Amusement Park.  The craft caught fire over the city. When this occurred, five individuals, including two crewmen, attempted to parachute to safety but none survived the experiment.

The airship crashed into a bank, killing ten employees therein.

Airships are usually billed as extremely safe, but they certainly have had their collection of serious accidents.

In Norfolk Virginia celebrations to welcome returning black veterans turned violent in another instance of the spreading Red Summer of 1919.  Authorities in Norfolk were quick to react and called upon Federal authorities to restore order, which they did by sending in sailors and Marines from the nearby base.  Two deaths resulted from the riot.

Lynchburg Virginia, July 21, 1919.

Austria received the draft of the peace treaty that the Allies sought to impose upon the now disintegrated empire.  While we hear less about it than the Versailles Treaty, it was likewise a fairly harsh treaty.

Camp Merritt, New Jersey, July 21, 1919.

Saturday, July 19, 1919. South Bend to Chicago Heights, 80 miles in 9 hours. The Red Summer hits Washington D. C.

July 19, 1919, Saturday Evening Post.

The Motor Transport Convoy suffered an accident, at least the second it experienced to date, the first one that we have record of being a vehicle v. vehicle collision. This one saw a Dodge truck hit a pedestrian, who was injured as a result.

The Riker truck mentioned was likely a Liberty Truck.

The Red Summer spread to Washington D. C. on this Saturday, with riots breaking out and lasting for several days.

Servicemen, probably National Guardsmen, confronting a black resident of Washington D. C. during the riots.

The underlying cause of the riots was the evolution of the city as the Great Migration, amplified during the war, continued to bring large numbers of black residents into or on the outskirts of the city, which in fact was basically a southern city to start with in some ways.  In 1919 the city remained 75% white, but black migration was occurring and laws that had restricted black residence in the nation's capitol were retreating.  The reaction on the part of the white citizenry was not welcoming and the newspapers, including the Washington Post, were hostile to black residents.  On this occasion a false story reporting that a black man had raped a white woman commenced the riots in which servicemen participated and which the newspapers fanned, the Post even urging vigilante action.

National Guardsmen patrolling by motorcycle.

The lack of police protection ultimately caused black citizens to take up arms to protect themselves and their neighborhoods and the riot took on the character, to some degree, of a low grade street battle by the 21st. The number of people killed is unknown, but the white casualties outnumbered the black ones, which is unusual for these events.  President Wilson called out the National Guard, which the city oddly has even though its not a state, to put down the violence, but a torrential rain storm ultimately operated to do that to a greater degree than the troops did.

Sunday, July 13, 1919. Day of Rest

Sunday by tradition and Christian canon is a day of rest, and that's what the 1919 Motor Transport Convoy somewhat did on that day. They didn't advance in their trip.  Indeed, the diary of their progress noted the day as one of rest.

In spite of it being day of rest a FWD truck was repaired.  FWD's were a really heavy truck of the period that had a very good reputation.  FWD stood for Four Wheel Drive and the company that made them was the Four Wheel Drive Auto Company.

1917 FWD advertisement in The Horseless Age.

Not surprisingly, during World War One the Army purchased quantities of FWDs, more specifically FWD Seagrave Model Bs and FWD Model Gs which look a bit like the truck in the advertisement above, but which were somewhat smaller. The Model G in fact had pre war service with the Army and had been used in the Punitive Expedition.  With four wheel drive, they were really pioneering trucks quite ahead of their times.

Elsewhere, rest came to Longview Texas where Federal Marshalls were now in charge and took the stop of temporarily impounding firearms in the town. 

Mr. Daniel Hoskins, the oldest resident of Longview Texas following race riots posted with temporarily impounded firearms, July 13, 1919.  The firearms are also pretty ancient and I suspect his depiction with them was for effect.

Of course, it being a Sunday, new movies were out, not all of which were wholly pacific.

A Man's Country featured a bar maid and a minister who come to see each other in a different, and of course romantic, light.

The Love Burglar featured one of those endlessly complicated silent movie plots which makes you wonder how they packed so much into something that had no sound and depended for story development solely on the acting alone, with print of course.

Speaking of love

They Cheyenne State Leader, being one of the few papers that put out a Sunday edition in 1919, reported that the George Washington, a troop ship was equipped now with a nursery to bring home the children of U.S. solders born overseas to French brides.  

The number of war brides brought over to date was 327, and of the 327 brides, 16 had given birth prior to embarkation. That really wasn't that large of a number in context actually.