The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 23, 1916

Let's look at the entire evening paper this go around.

This is the first issue of the Casper evening paper in which a story about the troops in Mexico is not on the first page, since the raid on Columbus.

The editor was casting doubts on the distance between Villa and Carranza.

I've never even heard of Wyoming Light Lager.

Mid Week At Work: U.S. foresters in France, World War One.

The Punitive Expedition: Casper Daily Press. March 22, 1916

Clothing standards, men's suits, and the price of gold. Observations on 1916 and 2016

I shouldn't have been, given the dress standards of the day, but I was surprised that a clothing store would take out a full page add day after day for men's suits in 1916 Casper Wyoming.

 

On the suits, I've heard it claimed that a good man's suit has cost approximately the same as one ounce of freely traded gold for over a century (keeping in mind that there was a protracted period of time during which gold was not freely traded in the US. An ounce of gold today is $1,254.30.  In 1916 it was $20.67, so maybe that's sort of freakishly correct.  As we can see, suits in this advertisement traded for about the price of an once of gold..  Brooks Brothers suits, according to their on line site, start at a little over $600 and range up to about $1200.  So that observation isn't far off.

Not that I'm making some stunning observation regarding it.  Just an odd fact.

Of course, a lot bigger percentage of the population spent that once of gold on suits in 1916, as opposed to 2016.

 

That last fact, I'd note, is particularly important.  A lot higher percentage of the male population had a suit, in 1916, than now, I'm pretty sure.  And a lot higher percentage of the male population wore a suit every day. So that says something about the allocation of resources. 

But the cost ration has freakishly held all those years.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Postscript.

It turns out that this phenomenon is widely noted, fwiw, so while it was surprising to me, it's apparently not surprising to everyone.

For example, one article reports that "History Shows Price of an Ounce of Gold Equals Price of a Decent Men's Suit, Says Sionna Investment Managers".  Another notes:

The expensive clothes store at the entrance to our office building is advertising “two hand-made suits for $1,500.”

This tells that the price of gold will decrease a lot more. For historically the price of gold has been equal to the price of a suit for a well-dressed man. It cost an ounce of gold to buy a toga for a Roman senator;  it cost ounce of gold to buy the outfit Lord Capulet wore at that fateful ball where Juliet met Romeo; it cost my father $35 for a good suit when he was a miner of gold at $35 an ounce. Why should I pay twice the price of an ounce of gold for a suit?

Another site declares the price of gold at the time the article was written as "out of whack" as the ratio wasn't quite holding.

So, it appears, what I've commented on is not only well known, but forms some sort of routine observation by many. A rule of thumb.
 

The Punitive Expedition in the Press: Casper Daily Press for March 21, 1916.

Note how the horror of World War One has made its way back onto the front page of the newspaper.

The Big Picture: Bisbee Arizona, 1916

Monday at the Bar: Courthouses of the West: Park County Courthouse, Cody Wyoming

Courthouses of the West: Park County Courthouse, Cody Wyoming:

Blog Mirror: Law Prowse: LawProse Lesson #25: Whatever doesn't help positively hurths

LawProse Lesson #245: Whatever doesn’t help positively hurts.

 

Often you’ll find yourself trying to decide whether to include something in expository prose—an extra argument, another illustration, a brief aside, an interesting tangent, etc. The sage wisdom of ancient rhetoricians is to omit everything that doesn’t have some demonstrable benefit. . .

The Punitive Expedition in the Press: Casper Daily Press for March 20, 1916

As the grim economic news kept coming in. . . mixed signals

Just yesterday I ran our item featuring news from a couple of energy outfits.  It likely can't be regarded as cheery.

After I published that, I ran into somebody I know who worked in a service company.  A local, in his early 60s, he told me he'd been let go a couple of months ago.  Notably, he's a Wyoming native and he was taking it well, and not even worried really.  Almost 62 years old, he was basically marking time until he could take early retirement, which he now intends to do.  Ironically, at the same show I ran into my wife's old landlord (from before our marriage), a really nice guy, who once worked for one of the refineries.  He's actually gone back to work as a parts runner as he was finding retirement to be boring.

Anyhow, in today's Tribune, which now features a Sunday "energy" section, there's a detailed article noting that prices at the well head are up to $40/bbl and aren't falling. They might be rising a bit.  They're now high enough that a couple of local outfits are contemplating drilling if the price holds.  We might keep seeing some layoffs for awhile, but if the price holds, and it looks like it will, we will probably be returning to an exploration economy in the petroleum industry, but not a superheated one. This might be a good thing overall.  It won't happen right away, but I wouldn't be surprised to see an increase in rigs by late 2016.

Today's Tribune also had a column written by the new state Superintendent of Public Instruction. She was in the news taking a little heat over eliminating a position in her department recently, but was featured today regarding her term in office so far.  In her column she summarizes her time in office so far noting, in one paragraph, the challenges that declining revenue are putting on the education budget.  She noted the trouble in the petroleum and coal industries specifically.

I note that here not only because it's real, but because she termed the coal problems as "the war on coal.".  That's a common perception here but it is a political one as well.

On what she noted, I'm surprised she mentioned petroleum as petroleum only directly impacts the education budget.  It's coal that really does.  When this system was set up in the 1970s coal was doing really well and there was no reason to add petroleum to the mix.  As hard up as coal has been recently, however, we might really want to think about adding petroleum severance taxes to education funding.  Petroleum is doing poorly, but it will come back at at least some level.  Indeed the articles in the tribune noted that US production will fall next year which will cause the price to at least stabilize.  Natural gas, part of the petroleum story, is likely to do increasingly better in the future as power generation is switching over to it nationwide.

Which brings me back to "the war on coal".  It's been popular here to conceive of the troubles coal is having as part of a dedicated effort against it.  I suspect that was thrown out as a little political kibble to the public, but she may perceive it in that fashion. Quite a few people in the state do.  But such thoughts should be realistic.  It is true that coal has lost favor in the eyes of much of the public.  But, no matter what we here in this state may think of coal, we need to be realistic. That view is going to increase, not decrease.  Indeed, while the state is funding "clean coal" efforts, the trend evidence is that production curve on coal may have shifted forever.  The industry itself was banking on Chinese importation of coal, not American consumption, and that gamble proved to be a bad one.  The conversion to natural gas for power generation appears to be irreversible and in the future that's what fossil fuel burning plants will burn.  Indeed, no new coal burning ones are being built in North America just as the construction of oil burning power plants, which used to also exist, is now a thing of the past.  So, even while there are those who are dedicated opponents of coal out there, it's really economics and long term trends that are imperiling coal.  The industry is well aware of that, I'm quite sure.  Coal mining is not about to disappear overnight, but those who are looking to the 1970 to 2010 era in coal to reappear are going to have to face the hard facts that certain fundamental things have changed in the industry, and fundamental changes need always to be adapted to.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: First United Methodist Church of Buffalo, Wyoming

Churches of the West: First United Methodist Church of Buffalo, Wyoming:

Marathon, Peabody and the airlines

This past week the state received the bad news that Marathon Oil Company, formerly Ohio Oil Company, which was once headquartered in Casper Wyoming and then later in Cody Wyoming, and which has had a presence in the state since 1914, is attempting to sell its Wyoming assets.  At least psychologically, and indeed in reality, it's quite a blow to the state.

 The Ohio Oil Company Building in Casper.

The Ohio Oil Company built a major art deco building that it used as its headquarters from 1925 until 1974, when it built a new headquarters in Cody.  The building remains there today as a significant downtown building, with the old Marathon sign off so that the Ohio Oil Company name cast in cement above the main door is visible  The building is one of four buildings, including the ConRoy Building where I work, that were built by oil companies starting during World War One and through the 1920s and which were still standing when I started practicing law in 1990.  The other two were the Pan American Building, built by Pan American Petroleum (founded in 1916 and merged into Standard Oil in 1954) and the Sinclair Building.  The Sinclair building, which was a neat two story building that had garden level basement windows, was torn down in the 1990s, which I thought was a shame, as it was an attractive building with Greek architectural elements.  It apparently was a building that, because of its comparatively low stature, people didn't photograph much as I can't find a photo of it anywhere, and I never took one.  It's the Townsend Justice Center parking lot now.  Oh well.

 Now the Townsend Justice Center, once the Townsend Hotel, when this photograph was taken I was standing pretty much where the Sinclair Building had once been.  Given the nature of the residents of the Townsend in its long declining years, its conversion into a courthouse is either strangely ironic or oddly appropriate.

Anyhow, Marathon's Cody building was also a very nice one, although I remember there being some discontent in 1974 when they moved. That I can remember that at all, as I was eleven years old at the time, must mean that there was some real discontent about it.  Having said that, my moving to Cody they were bucking a trend and moving closer to their production.  By the 2000s, however, it had another office building in Houston Texas and some years ago it closed its Cody office and moved its headquarters operations solely to Houston.  It's sold off some of its assets in Wyoming slowly since the 2000s but it's now looking to completely divest itself of its Wyoming properties, presuming that it can sell them for a reasonable price.  It's not conducting a fire sale.

This reflects in another fashion a really long term trend that's occurred in the oil patch. At one time, there were a lot of oil company headquarters.  Indeed, there were a lot of them in Casper, which at one time had newspaper that claimed it was the "Oil Capitol of the World".  Marathon is unusual in that it moved out of Casper to smaller Cody, which was closer to its assets, but the loss of regional oil companies is pretty pronounced, if not actually complete.  Many moved to Denver starting in the 1960s.  During the bust of the 1970s those that hadn't moved tended to, and many of the Denver based companies moved to Houston.

 

The Consolidated Royalty Building, built in 1917 as the Oil Exchange Building, and which remains in use as a downtown office building.

Now Houston, followed by Tulsa, is the undoubted oil headquarters for the US.  There are still headquarters in Denver, but not as many as there once was.  Notably on that Denver has been booming during this oil bust, unlike the 1970s when it suffered a great deal just like Casper.  There have been layoffs in Denver, but Denver's economy has changed so much it just isn't suffering the way that it did in the 1970s.  Indeed, while individual and individual companies have suffered, the city itself has a robust economy.  Not so much the case for Wyoming.

Marathon's departure is sad for Wyoming.  A lot of Wyomingites who have been here for a long time have a connection with Marathon in one way or another.  One of my cousins worked for Marathon back in the 1980s and I once defended Marathon in a personal injury action.  Even with its headquarters in Houston it seemed like a Wyoming company to many of us.

 Wyoming Oil World, June 15, 1918.  This issue mentions a couple of items that have figured significantly in the news here lately. The Salt Creek field mentioned here is still in production, but it recently sold.  The Ohio Oil Company mentioned in connection with Salt Creek is Marathon, which ceased being an operator in this field long ago.

Peabody, the giant coal company, announced this past week that it will be missing payments to some of its creditors.  It's fighting off going into bankruptcy and that isn't good news.  I know a lot less about Peabody in Wyoming, and while the Peabody Coal Company hates the song, I can't hear the name without thinking of John Prine's song Paradise.  Peabody apparently was counting on Chinese coal imports to keep it afloat and now that the Chinese economy has been in trouble, that isn't working out. Added tot that, for the first time ever, more electricity will be generated in the United States using natural gas as a fuel than coal.

Following these two stories, two others came on the same topic.  A local energy industry related entity announced that it was laying off 50 of its employees.  Fifty men and women isn't enough to cause a big impact in the local economy, but it follows this occurring in a lot of other local businesses, some of which hit the news, and others which did not.  On the same day the local paper reported that Natrona County's unemployment rate is now 7.2%, quite a bit higher than the 5% average for the state, and in second position to energy  heavy Fremont County which is at 8.1%.  Keep in mind, as I pointed out the other day, that 7% reflects the local unemployment rate but not the local exodus rate, so 7% is more like 8%, or perhaps more like 10%, by the time everything is figured into it.

I thought that a sure sign that things are slowing down here is a decrease in air service I thought I was detecting, but in retrospect I think I may have been a bit fooled by a change in the electronic booking programs over the last few weeks and the increased Spring Break travel going on.  I haven't been tracking that, and I sure should have been.

Last year or the year before I did notice when Delta took out the late night flight back to Casper, which I liked.  Next month, we hear, at some point after the big Spring Break rush Delta will be canceling its early morning flight and have a mid morning one only, basically wiping out some travel to Salt Lake for us business travelers.  I had thought that  United Airlines has done the same in regards to its late night flight from Denver to Casper after not being able to book the late night one earlier this week, but it was probably just the case that I booked to late so it didn't give me the option, on my computer, of looking at the flight I couldn't book anyhow, for which I'm grateful.

Over the twenty-six years I've been practicing law my relationship with air travel has been a constantly evolving one.  I really like aircraft and I really hate flying in them.  I know that's odd, but it's quite true.  Anyhow, when I was very first practicing law local air travel was so cheap that chartering aircraft wasn't uncommon for lawyers. We'd charter a flight to Cheyenne or Evanston and convert hours of travel into just a few.  This was cheaper for our clients as we could convert hours of travel down to just a few that way, and everyone came out ahead.  But by the late 1990s that basically died and, while I've experienced a charter flight once within the last five years, that was really exceptional and it only occurred as it converted a three day trip down to one and it involved quite a few people.

 

Commercial airliners at the Natrona County International Airport.

Anyhow, one thing that also was the case that air connections to Denver, via the airlines, were so poor that if a person was going to go to Denver or Salt Lake, in the 1990s, they probably drove or, in the case of Salt Lake, flew in and stayed over.  It wasn't possible to fly in and back the same day.  On odd occasion, I'd drive to Denver and back in a day (which I don't mind doing), but more often than not any trip to Denver, either by car or plane, involved a couple of days.

Then, after oil picked up, the airlines started adding flights.  In Casper there was an early morning flight to Denver and another to Salt Lake, followed by morning flights and then even a mid morning flight.  A person could get back with a late afternoon flight, an early evening flight, or a late evening flight.

I took up taking the early morning flight down to Denver and the late evening one back.  The early morning one was always packed with oilfield workers and businessmen going to Denver.  The late night one always had spare seats.  Generally, if a person completed their work early they could get to the airport and catch the early evening one back.

Well, as noted, sometime last year, or maybe the year before, the late night back from Salt Lake was eliminated. So much for that.

Indeed, as I had to go to Denver, I was counting on the late night flight and was surprised when I went to book my flights, which I did rather late, to learn that I couldn't and it looked like it was gone.  It looked like the second flight of the morning was also gone, but I don't think it is.  I booked them anyway but regretted it when I was in Denver as it really put me in a box and I figured I was going to miss it and would end up staying over, which would have really defeated the entire purpose of my flying.  As it happened, I did get back to the airport with thirty minutes left before my flight was to take off, and it ended up being delayed as a crew member was late getting in due to her flight arriving late, and then the plane took off late anyhow as it was snowing like mad and the plane had to be de-iced. We left over an hour late.  Oh well.

 

Anyhow, the morning flight had a few oilfield people on it on their way to Houston, but I only know that as I know them. The usually assortment of men in their FRs carrying hardhats was not there.  

And now that the early morning flight to Salt Lake will soon be gone, I won't be there either.  I can't make that work out very well. Back to driving.

And back to the 1970s, in some ways.

Or maybe even further back.

This all reminds me, in fact, of a conversation between two oilfield people I heard awhile back coming into Casper. One had lived here awhile and the other was just moving in. The new person asked the old one what the town was like.  The person who had lived here longer replied that Casper basically had two populations; one from here that knew it was going to stay here and another that moved in and would be leaving when the boom ended.  The new employee made some comment about the resident population being unfriendly, to which the employee who had lived here replied "no", that wasn't true, it was just that they knew they were staying, and they knew others would be leaving.  I thought then that this was a pretty perceptive analysis.

Indeed, looking back, now that we're experiencing a crash, and so much of it seems so familiar, I'm surprised how resigned to it I myself am.  I feel like I should be more worried. After all, I have two kids not out of high school yet but who will be soon and who will be looking for jobs after college. But that's quite a ways away.

More than that, however, I know that I've lived through this entire cycle before and my parents had lived through it at least twice, maybe three times.  It's part of the economy here and, I think, it's part of the native culture.  Just like we hear about the generation that grew up in the Great Depression having had it impact their characters and personalities, the fact of living in a boom and bust economy does the same.

And we've always had it.  Wyoming was basically built on an cattle boom, but that collapsed in the late 1880s in a massive way.  That was followed by a revival of the cattle economy, and during that period Casper was founded.  In spite of being in the heart of cattle country, and indeed the town was the disembarkation point for the invaders of the Johnson County War, the town looked to oil from the very day of its founding, a pretty remarkable fact given that in the 1890s oil didn't amount to much.

 July 15, 1891 edition of Casper's first newspaper, when the town had just been founded.  While cattle dominated the local economy, a discovery of gas in an oil well located just outside of town was noted on the headlines, which was fairly typical for the paper at that time.  Asbestos, which would come to be mined in Natrona County, and Iron, which would note, also are noted.  Alcova would become a town, but the hot springs would not be developed.  Today that location is the site of a Depression era dam which serves to create a major reservoir.  Period papers are full of optimistic boosterism.

The oil industry really took off during World War One, for obvious reasons. Agriculture boomed at the same time, for the same reasons.  Casper and other regional cities took off as a result, although Casper had already seen quite a bit of oil development by that time.  And of course, following the war, there was a crash in both industries.

Oil started taking off again not all that long later, during the 1920s, as the national economy rebounded.  Agriculture not so much.  In the 1930s things went the other way as the country entered the Great Depression, but both industries picked up again during World War Two.  Since the Second World War we had at least to bust cycles in the oil industry, not including the current one.  Agriculture's fortunes have worked a bit differently, reflecting changes in the market over time. Agriculture seems to always be there in the background, which is something that perhaps the state should consider when it considers its economy.

Anyhow, we've been here before.  Perhaps we'll be here again.  The regional economy seems long established and for those who are from here, part of what we're used to.

Lex Anteinternet: Marathon, Peabody and the airlines

This thread appears immediately above:

Lex Anteinternet: Marathon, Peabody and the airlines: This past week the state received the bad news that Marathon Oil Company, formerly Ohio Oil Company, which was once headquartered in Casper...

The only reason it appears here as an additional link is that there topics, or "labels", that pertain to this topic, that the system won't let me enter them all in. So, I'm adding this second item here to cover all the labels that pertain to the topic.

The existing labels in the entry above are:


 

The Bests Posts of the Week for the Week of March 13, 2016

The Necktie (and inevitably the suit somewhat as well).

Blog Mirror: Vintage Camping - Camping on All Four

We've done all sorts of vehicles; 4x4s, SUVs, trucks, etc.  But we haven't done this one yet.  The camper:

Vintage Camping - Camping on All Four: The four wheel camping experience is not a new concept. Check out these awesome vintage campers that started it all.

When I was a kid, a lot of sportsmen around here had campers, and there were a lot fewer camp trailers.  Now the opposite is very much the case.  Perhaps because when you use a camper, you use up the pickup bed as well, people have moved away from them.

We never had a camper when I was a kid, or a camp trailer either.  I always envied them as I imagined that you could head up to the hills at any moment to go hunting or fishing, and some of the families of my friends did indeed have them.  But we never did.

Upon getting older, the camper lost its appeal a bit as I couldn't figure out what you did with big game if you were hunting from a camper. Apparently others felt the same way, as there are a lot fewer of them than there used to be, but I've always wondered about their history a bit.  This article does a really nice job with them, taking us through the various odd models from 1945 forward.  

The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 18, 1916

The Necktie (and inevitably the suit somewhat as well).

This an item I started on something called International Necktie Day, which is in October.  I didn't finish then, and even though I thought about timing it to automatically post on that date when it rolls back around, I decided just to go ahead and post it. 

There is probably no piece of apparel that is more useless than the necktie.  They are at best a nuisance and at worst uncomfortable, and they always have been. And yet, they're a standard part of business and formal dress, and probably because we're used to them, under certain circumstances men look odd without them, even now while they are clearly in decline.

Store display, with hand holding the tie with some trepidation, much the way many younger men do today.

Those circumstances are becoming less and less common, however. 

The origin of the necktie, in my view, is obscure.  I've read it attributed to 17th Century Croatian mercenaries and to fox hunters more recently. Whatever its origins, by the late 19th Century they'd become pretty much standard for any sort of formal dress, and indeed by the early 20th Century pretty much any man who wasn't doing manual labor, and some who were, were wearing them.  

 Man manufacturing neckties, as a cottage industry, in New York, in 1912.

When exactly they became so standard isn't entirely clear to me, but it they were around in analogous form and use as early as the mid 19th Century.  Suits of that period were not exactly the same as they would be later, and the frock coat and morning coat were quite common at the time for regular formal wear as they had not yet evolved into species of tuxedos.  The bow tie, in a little bulkier form, was quite common, but then so was the conventional necktie as well.  If they do not look quite the same it's because suits, not so much ties, had not evolved into their present form.

The "lounge suit", which is oddly enough what the current business suit was originally called, made its appearance in the mid 19th Century, but nobody really knows the full story of it.  It hit in Europe before the United States, but even here in the mid 19th Century it was around.  And it was part of a slow trend in men's wear where the somewhat informal has evolved into the formal.  Military uniforms, which will be dealt with elsewhere, very much demonstrate this trend, but business suits have followed it.  Originally the lounge suit was simply a suit that was to be less formal that something like a morning coat, so you could wear it in the evenings.  But it quickly supplanted the bulkier frock coat and morning coat and became standard men's wear.

 The victorious heads of state following World War One.  The man in the suit is Italian Vittoria Orlando, showing that, truly, the Italians have always been on the cutting edge of fashion.

And with them, of course, you always wore a tie.

By the mid 19th Century, ties were basically required for office work.  You simply do not find instances of men working in offices who were not wearing them.  I doubt very much you'd find a decently dressed man in an office by the 1880s, who was lacking a tie.

And with that came the requirement, basically, to wear them anywhere you weren't doing manual labor.  And indeed, I suspect the spread in part as an effort to show that you weren't doing manual labor.  Ties became necessary for any many who was half way well off if he was going to be doing pretty much anything that was physical labor.  And certainly, if he was going out for a night on the town, or courting, or whatever, he was going to be wearing a suit and tie.

By the early 20th Century they'd become so amazingly standard that they even appeared in costumes we would not expect.  Soldiers started being issued neckties by the early 20th Century, but you wouldn't generally see them in the field with them until the 1930s in the U.S. Army, even though U.S. soldiers were issued ties to be worn with their shirts (under their service coats) prior to World War One.  U.S. officers, as opposed to the enlisted men, were routinely wearing shirt and tie by the time the U.S. entered Mexico in the Punitive Expedition

 U.S. officers during the Punitive Expedition.  If you look carefully you can see that Col. Herbert J. Slocum, on the left, is wearing a tie.

In the British Army, they start showing up field applications with officers during World War One, as amazing, and inappropriate, as that seems.

British soldiers, World War One

Indeed, wearing a tie in combat is, truly, foolish. But it was becoming common, at least in the officer class, by regulation.  No doubt to signal that they were gentlemen.  But at least in some armies, at the same time, ties were issued universally to enlisted men as well, who might nor might not be seen wearing them in field conditions.  Almost as foolish, I suppose, was the spread of ties to policemen, many of whom still wear one.

 White House policeman, 1929.

But they'd become just generally common with even people who had outdoor occupations, unless seemingly conditions simply precluded it.

 William Fox, Underwood Photo News Service, official photographer with the U.S. Expeditionary Force in Mexico 1916.  While otherwise outfitted for rough service, and to ride, he's wearing a tie.

And so it was throughout the mid 20th Century. Even as late as 1943 one legendary U.S. general, Gen. Patton, attempted to have his men wear ties while serving in combat in North Africa, although the effort failed and even Patton conceded that point.

Patton wearing a modified B3 flight jacket with pockets and elbow patches added.  If we could see his collar, he'd be wearing a tie.  He attempted to require his enlisted men to do so in North Africa, but the effort failed.  You can bet, however, that at least senior officers not immediately in combat, if serving with Patton, were wearing ties.

Now, at some point this very obviously changed.  Go into any office today, including professional offices, and there's a pretty good chance that the men working there are not wearing ties.  Some may, and probably will be, but this is less and less true all the time. What happened.

Maybe its easier to start not with what, but when ,and go from there.  And on this, I'm pretty sure that quite a few people would link it to the turbulent changes of the 1960s.  But I tend to think that isn't wholly correct, although it partially may be.

I think tie wearing started to actually decline in one of the eras we associate the most with ties, the 1930s.

If you look through photos of the 1930s, it seems to me that it had become acceptable for men not to wear ties in some settings where they just had been as recently as the 1920s. And I think that the Great Depression brought that about.

The 1920s was the high water mark of tie wearing.  Men were wearing them everywhere you could, and in nearly every occupation that existed.  In the 1930s that slacked up a bit.  It's easy to see why, to a degree. The Great Depression made an extra useless piece of silk extra useless. But beyond that, the tie probably just didn't mean quite as much as it once did for some of the reasons we addressed back in this post:

The massively declined standard of dress (and does it matter?)

This blog notes, as we've stated many times before, changes over history. Specifically, it supposedly looks at the 1890 to about 1920 time frame, but we also frankly hardly ever stick to that.  Oh well.

Business men (lawyers) in the early 20th Century. These men aren't dressed up, they would have been dressed in this fashion every day.  Given the boater style hat worn by the man on the left, this photograph must have been taken in summer.

As we noted there:

In an earlier era, when every vocation was more "real", if you will, or rather perhaps when more men worked in manual vocations, there was little interest in fanciful dress.  For those who worked in town, at one time they desire seemed to be to show that they'd achieved an indoor status.  Indeed, some have noted that the standards of dress remained remarkably high in the 1920s and 1930s, first when many Americans started moving off of farms and into the cities, and secondly during the Great Depression, as that was the way of showing that you'd overcome your past.  The standards then carried on until they had a reason, or at least there was some sort of cause, or lack of a reason to change.

I think every bit of that is true, but that it applied a little more in the 1920s than in the 1930s. And while clothing standards were very high in the 1930s, in spite of the economic crisis, there was also just a little more slack, but just a little, on tie wearing.  Not much, but some.

After World War Two that carried on, and the tie declined first in the military, where it had been one of the late entrants.  At the start of World War Two the U.S. Army was theoretically requiring ties for field use. By mid war it clearly was not, and that was all gone by the end of the war.  In the post war era ties became less and less common with military wear in general, until they were really something associated with fairly formal wear in the Army, but more common in the Marine Corps, the latter of which is more formal in general. As an example, during World War Two we find generals typically wearing ties no matter where they were.  By Vietnam, they were wearing the same field uniforms that combat infantrymen were if they were in a combat theater.

Still, ties kept on for office wear in strength in the 1950s and really up into the 1970s and the decline really can be associated with the 1960s.  In the late 1960s menswear reacted to the clothing changes going on with young men and suits and ties became really funky.  That change didn't last all that long and it was soon followed by quite a few men just abandoning ties and suits in general. And who can blame them.  Nobody really wants to wear a fat flowered tie and a polyester suit, so the death of the standard soon followed the standard's modification.  I can remember it occurring.  My father, when I was a kid, wore a sports coat (itself a relaxed standard) and a tie down to his dental office everyday.  The tie was a clip on which itself is a concession to not liking ties but needing to.  In older photos of him in the late 50s, however, he wore a suit.  By the mid 1970s the ties were no longer being worn by dentist generally and the sports coats went as well.  The standard had changed.

And it continues to.

When I started practicing law in 1990 ties remained very common for male lawyers.  Now, most days nobody wears a tie unless they are going to court or have something formal going on. As recently as about five years ago or so ties remained standard for depositions, but now I often find myself being the only lawyer at a deposition with a tie.  A real change has occurred.

The Punitive Expedtion: Forces reach Colonia Dublán

The U.S. Army's 2nd Provisional Cavalry Brigade reaches Colonia Dublán where the U.S. Army establishes its main base of operations for the Punitive Expedition.  The town was 52 miles south of the border and was a Mormon colony in Mexico.

The Punitive Expedition: Casper Daily Press, March 17, 1916

The Punitive Expedition: Congruess authorizes the expedition. March 17, 1916

While it was, in fact, already on, on this day Congress authorized military action in Mexico "for the sole purpose of apprehending and punishing the lawless bands of armed me" who had raided into the United States.

St. Patrick's Day, 1916 in Ireland.

Dublin battalions of the Irish Volunteers held public maneuvers under arms.  Other Irish Volunteer units did the same in other parts of the country 

The demonstrations were not universally popular with the Irish public given that a high percentage of Irish me had volunteered to serve with the British army then fighting in Europe.  They did reflect rising tensions following the extension of conscription to Ireland.  Authorities were distressed by the large number of firearms showing up in Irish Volunteer hands. 

The Irish Volunteers was an Irish militia formed to support Home Rule, should there be violent opposition to it.  Home Rule was coming on, and only the Great War had delayed it.  By this time, however, the Volunteers had been infiltrated by nationalist with their own designs, which would soon become evident.

The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 16, 1916

This may be the first one of these that was really fairly correct in that the American intervention was indeed very unpopular in Mexico.

Merrick Garland nominated to the Supreme Court

President Obama has nominated Merrick Garland, age 63, to the United States Supreme Court.

I don't know anything about Judge Garland, and indeed rarely do we know anything about a Supreme Court nominee prior to his nomination.  He apparently has a reputation as being a moderate to liberal Federal Judge.  He is a Harvard Law graduate (yet again) and he clerked for the legendary Judge Herbert J. Friendly prior to clerking for United States Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan.  Brennan was a liberal Supreme Court Justice and we will likely be hearing about that if the confirmation process begins.

His remarkably older than recent nominees, which is interesting.  At age 63 this will be his one and only chance to make the Supreme Court.  He also has more experience, apparently, on the Federal bench than any other prior nominee.

Other than that, I can't comment much on him.  I would note that this is yet another instance of the Ivy League law schools having a seeming lock on the high court, which I don't think is a good thing, and its also another instance of the only people being considered being people who are currently sitting on the Federal bench in a lower appeals court.  Having said that, given the political dynamics in play, President Obama had to either nominate a sitting judge or a non controversial politician.  An attempt to do the latter seems to have been made with the vetting of Nevada's current governor, who declined to be considered.

On the politics of this, this now puts the Senate to the test.  If it declines to consider Garland it gambles on the Republican Party taking the Presidency, which is looking increasingly unlikely.  Garland is likely to be less liberal, maybe, than anyone Hillary Clinton, who is likely to be the Democratic nominee, may make.  Additionally, given the extreme contentiousness of the current political season there is some question, although only sum, on whether the GOP shall hold the Senate.  I think it likely that it will, but if it fails to then the next nominee will definitely be a more liberal judge. Indeed, it is not impossible that the next justice, under that scenario, could be President Obama, following in the footsteps of President Taft.

Of course, backing down from the pledge not to consider a nominee would have political consequences, the most likely one being that it would become fodder for the Trump campaign, which is currently under siege from the Republican "establishment" and which would argue that the GOP was betraying the base.

Mid Week at Work: Resting on the march, 1916

Weary U.S. soldiers in Mexico, 1916.

Bleh.

Heart attacks and accidents have been shown to rise after the time change comes into effect.

And I don't doubt it.

For whatever reason I have a hard time adjusting to it anymore.  I never used to, but I sure do now.  It takes days for me to adjust to the time change.

Of course, I know that this is hoping against hope, but I hardly ever find anyone who is really thrilled about Daylight Savings Time.  I wish we'd dump it.

The economic realities hit home

It was announced today that Wyoming sustained the largest jump in unemployment in the nation.  We now have 4.7% unemployment, up form 3.8% last year.  This is due, of course, to the decline in the extractive industries.

Chances are high that his rate is actually higher, in real terms, than it might appear.  Indeed traditionally 4.7% is statistically below "full employment".  But here that 3.8% reflected a situation in which there was a labor demand, and labor as coming in.  4.7% reflects a situation in which labor is leaving, so the actual rate is higher, as people who are unemployed leave, particularly those who recently arrived.

The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 15, 1916

Blog Mirror: NPR: Forget The Red Sports Car. The Midlife Crisis Is A Myth

 An interesting item from NPR:

Forget The Red Sports Car. The Midlife Crisis Is A Myth

If you've ever considered buying a red sports car or quit your job to follow your muse, if you've ever related to Lester Burnham in American Beauty, there's some good news. Midlife crisis is not inevitable, and reaching 45 is not the first step in a slow, agonizing decline. After interviewing more than 400 people, I found that midlife, while complicated, is, for many if not most people, the peak of their lives.

And sort of interesting to note that I found this the same day I posted the anniversary of Pershing's force crossing into Mexico at which time he was. . . .a fit 56.

 Pershing, age 58.

Note, however, the article doesn't claim everything at Middle Age is rosy. And note the importance of exercise (something Pershing was adamant about).

Forces under John J. Pershing cross into Mexico.

A U.S. Army expeditionary force under the command of John J. Pershing crossed into Mexico.

 Pershing in Mexico some days later.

The force was made up of 4,800 men from the 7th, 10th, and 13th Cavalry, 6th Field Artillery, the 6th and 16th Regiments of Infantry, the 1st Aero Squadron, and support personnel, with that force divided into two columns.  The western column entered Mexico from Culberson's Ranch New Mexico, entering Mexico at midnight and marching 50 miles that day to Colnia Duban.  A march of that rate remains a significant advance for an army on the march and in 1916, when the primary means of transportation was foot leather and the horse, that was a really remarkable march.

The second column crossed the borders south of Columbus with there being some legitimate fear that it might immediately encounter Carranaza's forces in hostile resistance.  In the days since the Columbus Raid Carranza had reluctantly entered into an agreement allowing U.S. forces to operate in Mexico against Villa, but the agreement was a reluctant one and it was not clear if Mexican forces would honor it.  The column technically entered at noon, but in fact entered some hours earlier.

Barker issues instructions to Funston and Pershing. The night of March 14, 1916.

 Secretary of War Newton Diehl Baker, a pacifist, who had the misfortune to serve during the Punitive Expedition and World War One, with officers.

Secretary of War Barker issued the following instructions late this day to Frederick Funston and John Pershing, requiring each to personally acknowledge their receipt, as the United States prepared to intervene in Mexico:

In the view of the great distance between the seat of Government and the forces in the field, the President regards it as of the utmost importance that General Funston and all officers in command of troops of the United States clearly understand the exact nature of the expedition of our forces into Mexico, and he therefore directs obedience in letter and in spirit to the following orders.

ONE. If any organized body of troops of the de facto Government of the Republic of Mexico are met, they are to be treated with courtesy and their cooperation welcomed, if they desire to cooperate in the objects of the expedition. 

TWO. Upon no account or pretext, and neither by act, word, or attitude of any American soldier, shall this expedition become or be given the appearance of being hostile to the integrity or dignity of the Republic of Mexico, by the courtesy of which this expedition is permitted to pursue an aggressor upon the peace of these neighboring Republics.

THREE. Should the attitude of any organized body of troops of the de facto Government of Mexico appear menacing, commanders of the forces of the United States are, of course, authorized to place themselves and their commands in proper situation of defense, and if actually attacked they will of course defend themselves by all means at their command, but in no event must they attack or become the aggressor with any such body of troops.

FOUR. Care is to be taken to have in a state of readiness at all times the means of rapid communication from the front to the headquarters of the General commanding the Department, and, through him, to the War Department in Washington; and any evidence of misunderstanding on the part of officials, military or civil, of the de facto Government of Mexico as to the objects, purposes, character or acts of the expedition of the United States, are to be reported to the Department with the utmost expedition, with a view to having them taken up directly with the Government of Mexico through the Department of State

The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 14, 1916.

Movies In History: Bridge of Spies

 Lockheed U2.

This 2015 movie depicts the events that lead to the Cold War prisoner exchange of Americans Francis Gary Powers and Frederic Pryor for Soviet Spy Rodolph Abel.

Directed by Stephen Spielberg with writing by the Coen brothers, the film cast Tom Hanks in the leading role as American insurance defense lawyer James B. Donovan in a film that's remarkably faithful to the actual events.  Donovan, just as the film portrays, was selected by the Brooklyn Bar Association to defend Rudolph Abel, whose real name was William Fisher, a British born (1903) man born to a family of German Russian ex patriot radicals who had returned to Russia in 1921.  He served in various capacities for the Soviet state through World War Two and was infiltrated into the United States in 1946.  His clover was blown in 1957 after a spy colleague defected over fear of being repatriated to the USSR due to Abel's complaints about his conduct.  When he was arrested and charged the Federal Court, using a procedure that has since passed into disuse, assigned the case out to the bar for selection of defense counsel.  Donovan was chosen even though he was an insurance defense lawyer as he had experience with the US government and in particularly the OSS during World War Two.

As the movie accurately portrays, Abel served a few years of his sentence before the concept of exchanging him for Francis Gary Powers, the U2 pilot shot down over the Soviet Union, revived his importance.  At that point, as the film depicts, Donovan was brought back into the picture and the means and operations of Donovan in connection with securing the prisoner exchange are remarkably accurately portrayed.  Indeed, this story may simply be so dramatic in its own right that it needs very little in the way of Hollywood embellishment.  It's excellently done.

Like most films there are some departures from 100% accuracy, but frankly there are very, very few.  To the extent they are, the story of the exchange is somewhat condensed and the U2 aspect of the story is condensed.  The film suggests that Powers flight over the USSR was the first one that occurred, but this is incorrect.  U.S. overflights of the Soviet Union started in 1956, four years before Powers was shot down.  Indeed, at the time of Powers flight the US was beginning to conclude that the flights had reached their limit as Soviet anti aircraft capabilities were improving.  They were not believed to have reached the capability of shooting down the very high flying US yet, but they were believed to be near capable of doing it.  Powers flight was, however, the longest overflight ever attempted and it went deeper into the USSR than any prior flight.

The film also does not go into detail over Powers confinement in the USSR, which is longer than the film would suggest.  Abel was four years into his sentence when the exchange took place and Powers was two years into his.  Details depicted concerning the negotiation of the release are correct, but the length of time the initial stages of the exchange took place to begin to arrange are very much condensed.  The actual process took months.

In material details the film is very well done.   The clothing, including the East German military uniforms, are correct.  The appearance of the characters is quite close to those of the actual characters for the most part, probably only the character of Wolfgang Vogel provides an exception.  Interestingly oddities of the law are also portrayed correctly in this film which deals with lawyers but not in the hyperactive way that most movie portrayals do.  The opening scene in which Donovan negotiates with a plaintiff's lawyer regarding how many occurrences a single collision resulting in five motorcycle injuries is something that an insurance defense lawyer such as myself can't help but be impressed with.  Indeed, off hand I think it's the only film I've ever seen in which an insurance defense lawyer is sympathetically portrayed.

Well worth seeing.

Monday at the Bar: Down to three potential Supreme Court nominees

Rumor has it that President Obama is down to three potential Supreme Court nominees, those being Merrick Garland, Sri Srinivasan and Paul Watford.  All have been vetted successfully by the Republcan Senate before.

While the Senate leadership has indicated that it intends to stick to its guns and refuse to consider any pick prior to the next President taking office it has to be the case that the election, which has taken an unpredicated and odd course, may start to change some minds.  Most Republican Senators are undoubtedly of the view that a Trump nomination will go down to defeat against Hillary Clinton in the fall and everyone is aware that a Clinton nominee will be much more liberal than any of these three.  Backing down on their pledge not to consider a nominee would look bad, but the impact would not be as bad as suffering with a liberal appointee in the next Congress.

The Punitive Expedition: The Casper Daily Press, March 13, 1916

Lex Anteinternet: No, just go away

Uff:

Last fall, when I ran this:

No, just go away

 

World War One era poster, from when Daylight Savings Time was a brand new announce.

I have not been able to adjust to the return to normal time this year.

Not even close.

I'm waking up most morning's about 3:30 am.  That would have been early even when Daylight Saving's Time was on, as that would have been about 4:30, but that is about the time I had been waking up, in part because I've been spending a lot of time in East Texas, where that's about 5:30.  Indeed, my inability to adjust back to regular time is working out for me in the context of being up plenty early enough to do anything I need to do in East Texas, but it's the pits back here in my home state.

I really hate Daylight Saving's Time.  I understand the thesis that it was built on, but I think it's wholly obsolete and simply ought to be dumped.

I meant it.

But the annual darkening of the morning time unreality event is back. So now I get to feel exhausted by act of Congress.

I see I'm not alone in my views. There's a petition to Congress.  There was a bill in the California Assembly.  And in Kansas.  And a petition to put it to a referendum in Utah. Rhode Island is considering ending as well.

And good riddance, I say.

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: St. Matthews Episcopal Cathedral, Laramie Wyoming

Churches of the West: St. Matthews Episcopal Cathedral, Laramie Wyoming:

This is the impressive St. Matthews Episcopal Cathedral in Laramie, Wyoming. This photograph was one I took in 1986, but the Cathedral appears largely the same today.

One oddity about this Cathedral is that the Episcopal diocese's offices are actually in Casper, Wyoming. While I don't know for sure, I think that this likely reflects the age of this cathedral, which is fairly old. At the time it was built, only southern Wyoming was relatively populated, and Laramie was a bit of a center of culture, being the site of the university, and of certain English interests that had entered the ranching industry and headquartered there. "Ivinson Street", for example, is named after one such family. The Cathedral does have a large administrative building, built in a Gothic style, which were likely the Diocese's administrative offices.

In later years, Cheyenne or Casper would prove to be more logical administrative centers, and in recent years the Episcopal Church apparently chose Casper as their administrative headquarters.

An adjoining courtyard to the Cathedral features a nice World War One memorial.

Mixed Messages

The price of oil is back up.

Not back up to what it was before it began sliding, but it's definitely back up.  After having slid to $26/bbl a couple of weeks ago its trading for nearly $40/bbl.

And there's reason to believe that his price will actually stick.

The price at the pump is also back up.  I drove to Rock Springs yesterday and filled up in Rawlins.  A little over a week ago I did the same thing and bought diesel there for about $1.60 something.  Yesterday it was $1.80 something.  And looking at the filling stations, feul generally seems to be have risen over 20 cents in a week, quite a rise in a short time.

However, the price is still generally low, at least low compared to what it recently has been, and the layoffs here continue on. That's no surprise, of course, as absent a massive rise, things in the works for companies keep on for a time.  Anadarko announced its layoffs this past week.  Encana will be this week. And yesterday it was learned that Halliburton is closing its local office.  That last one is quite a blow.

So, while the price seems to be stabilizing, maybe, the question is what is it stabilizing at?  $40/bbl is too low to really help the local economy, and even $50/bbl would be a problem.  It doesn't appear we're going to see a big rise soon, but perhaps these levels sustain some local production.

The Punitive Expedition: The March 11, 1916 news

The Punitive Expedition ordered.

The following orders went out to the U.S. Army:

You will promptly organize an adequate military force of troops under the command of Brigadier General John J. Pershing and will direct him to proceed promptly across the border in pursuit of the Mexican band which attacked the town of Columbus and the troops there on the morning of the 9th instant. These troops will be withdrawn to American territory as soon as the de facto government in Mexico is able to relieve them of this work period. In any event, the work of these troops will be regarded as finished as soon as Villa’s band or bands are known to be broken up. In carrying out these instructions you are authorized to employ whatever guides and interpreters are necessary and you are given general authority to employ such transportation including motor transportation, with necessary civilian personnel as may be required. 

You are instructed to make all practical use of the aeroplanes at San Antonio for observation. Telegraph for whatever reinforcements or material you need. Notify this office as to force selected and expedite movement