Movies In History: The Cowboys

I love this film.

This 1972 John Wayne film is one of his absolute best, second only to The Searchers (a film I have not yet reviewed in this list).  It's a classic drama, and touches on a Romantic part of our history in a way few other films do.

This running thread, of course deals with movies in history, not movies as great cinema, and so we'll only really look at this film in this context, and looking at it that way, the film does remarkably well, particularly for one filmed when it was.

Set in Montana in the late 1870s or 1880s (the film isn't really clear, other than that it is post Little Big Horn), the film surrounds a cattle drive east across Montana to Belle Fourhe, South Dakota. As rancher Wil Anderson's cow hands have all quit to participate in a gold rush on the Ruby River, he's forced to use actual boys.

The plot device actually only exaggerates a custom that existed at the time, and it is not hard to find examples of very young teenage cowboys participating in drives.  Indeed, going to work and leaving home at that age was not uncommon at that time, and my own grandfather did so at age 13 in the early 1900s.  Anderson's cowboys are, in some instances, very young in this film, but I've seen middle school aged cowboys not much older participate in drives in present times.

In terms of details, the film does a very good job, and the ranching details are mostly correct.  A nice detail in the film depicts a large string of horses being gathered prior to the drives commencing, which is accurate for the era and even now.  The firearms shown for the period are surprisingly correct in an era when they rarely were, and some older arms are shown in use, including one cap and ball Colt revolver.  This is very unusual for a film of this period.

Of course, it isn't perfect.  The clothing is generally correct for the boys, but not for the adults in all cases, as both Anderson and cook Nightlinger are shown wearing cotton jeans and otherwise being dressed in the fashion that Wayne had made popular for cowboy films of this era, but which did not depict dress of the period accurately. Therefore, the film has an interesting mix of correct and incorrect clothing.

All in all, however, this film deserves its place as a classic and does pretty well in terms of historical detail.

Lex Anteinternet: Movies getting it right in time and place

I just bumped this up, and noted my reason for doing so in the second postscript:

Lex Anteinternet: Movies getting it right in time and place: Movies, for good or ill, shape our view of the past, so I thought it might be interesting to note those that seem to get a certain topic or...

Which brings up this question.

Are seeing movies part of your Christmas traditions?

Movies getting it right in time and place

Movies, for good or ill, shape our view of the past, so I thought it might be interesting to note those that seem to get a certain topic or era just right.  That is, in the historical and cultural context.

That's probably something that's not accomplished as much as it's accomplished.  Films frankly tend to reflect the era that they're made in more than any other era, so "modern" views and even styles of dress and behavior are projected back as having existed on earlier ones.  That is probably generally the rule, and up until recently, at least for the most part, movies made very little effort to actually get detailed material and cultural items correct.  Generations, for example, of Western movie goers watched movies that almost universally failed in terms of correctness to material and cultural details, with rare exception.

Anyhow, given that, it might be interesting to note films here that get it right.  They're not all great films, I'd note, but rather films whose portrayals of an era are well done.

Postscript

Over time, I decided to change this topic so that the films discussed, rather than be listed here, have been individually listed.  Therefore, the list that once appeared here, no longer does. As the films were separated out, I generally just posted them to the last updated date, August 2, 2014, where they now appear.

Postscript II

It is, of course, Christmas Season and for some weird reason, that's associated with movies, both big screen, and on the small screen.

Even though I really hate to spend any free time I have indoors, I've caught a few films on the small screen over the holidays, and so I intend to note them in this context.  Given the change in this thread over time, I thought I'd note that here, particularly as some of these films are old, not new, and otherwise my reasons for noting them might seem odd.  

Monday, December 28, 1914. Ottoman advance slows.

The Ottoman advance at Sarikamish slowed due to exhaustion.

The first Sherlock Holmes film, A Study in Scarlet, was released with American actors Francis Ford and John Ford, the famous director, appearing as Holmes and Watson. Francis Ford directed.  

It is a missing film.

Last edition:

December 26, 1914. Boxing Day.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, 1914 Christmas Truce, Boxing Day, Christmas, Christmas Truce, press, World War One

Sunday Morning Scene: Churches of the West: St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Cheyenne Wyoming

Churches of the West: St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Cheyenne Wyoming: 

Lex Anteinternet: Lex Anteinternet: $40/barrel?

A couple of weeks ago I posted this:

Lex Anteinternet: Lex Anteinternet: $40/barrel?: Lex Anteinternet: $40/barrel? :   Driven by Saudi Arabian efforts, the price of petroleum oil is falling through the floor.  When I las...

West Texas Light is at $54.73 this morning.  Wyoming's crude, which was at $80/bbl in September is likely below that now.  Rigs are being stacked.

And 2,000 more people left the state this past year than moved in. That's a clear sign. We're in a slump right now, in spite of denial of that by people who are hoping that booms are endless.  Anyone who has lived here for awhile knows this to be the cycle of the industry, and should not be surprised, but no doubt many are.

Of course, this may be a slump, not a crash.  But the local oil economy is just a service economy for existing production if oil is in the $50s.  There's no sign of that changing any time in the near future.

Inaccurate headlines, and the NCHS Swimming Pool

As anyone who occasionally reads this blog already knows, a bond issue that would have funded a new pool at NCHS failed by 400 votes earlier this year, even though other tax issues passed in the general election.  Hindsight is always 20/20, but it seems pretty clear that if the pool bond issue had been in the general election, it would have passed.  People just don't get out for special elections unless motivated, and the bond issue election came up at a time when Tea Party elements in the state appeared to be ascendant, but prior to their dramatic decline in the general election.  It seems reasonable to deduce that the actual population would have supported the bond issue.

Now we have to live with the consequences of that, which for now seemingly means no pool at NCHS in spite of having a massive new structure under construction which could house it.  The paper this morning, in one of its series of end of the year articles, briefly gave me hope as it featured a photograph of the inside of the now demolished pool in an article that stated early on that the district was saving money to pay for what the bond would have paid for.

That's accurate to a small extent, but that small extent concerns equipment for the new facility focusing on trades and sciences the district is building, not for the pools.  That is sort of, badly, cleared up late in the article, but not enough, I'm quite sure, to cure the confusion that the article creates.  The Tribune gets a D here on this one.

But still, why not get the pool built?  Yes, the money isn't there, but the huge structure is, and without trying to do something now, it'll never happen. We have a newly elected school board, and they should address this.  The last board backed the pools, and this one would seem to.  Let's try to get it built somehow.

Random Snippets: Bad Christmas music

It is truly difficult to determine which is worse, "modern" (say post 1900) Christmas music, or traditional Christmas music rendered by current performers.

Truly.

It's clear that most post 1900 Christmas music is just flat out bad, and beyond that it often has nothing to do with Christmas.  Just because it gets repeated again and again doesn't make it good. For example, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer may be played in grocery stores across the continent this time of year, and you may have learned it in grade school, but that doesn't make it good.

Generally, the more recent the music is, the worse it is too. There are, of course, some exceptions.  Perhaps Feliz Navidad, for example, is worthwhile.

But is this worse than old songs, sung by modern artists?  Hard to say.  The general approach most current artists have to Holiday music is to sing it about five times under speed and in a self indulgent manner. Stretching a vowel out over 15 bars, for example, doesn't make it good.  Have a Hooooooollllllyyyyyyyy Joooooooolllllllllllllllyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy,  Christmas, for example, isn't really Christmasy.

Happy Boxing Day!

Today, December 26, is Boxing Day in most English speaking countries outside the United States.

Boxing Day is a legal holiday in most English speaking nations, even though its not observed in the United States and its largely unknown here.  It came about as it was the day that employers traditionally gave gifts, in boxes, to employees.  Or at least that's one version of how it came about.  At any rate, it's generally a day off, and often met with sports, including equine sports, in much of the English speaking world.

In the U.S., of course, it isn't observed.  But on a Christmas such as this, in which the holiday falls on a Thursday, many will receive the day off anyway.  And all the better for it. Returning to work the day after Christmas is tough, particularly for those with families.

Traditionally, I'd observe this day with a post Christmas goose hunt.  I should this year, but the snow over the past 24 hours has been so heavy, just digging out from the snow to the mail box may be a bit tough.

Combat over the 1914 Christmas Truce.

In 1914, as is now well known, British and German troops in many locations along No Man's Land stopped fighting and held an informal truce.  The lines were crossed, hats and gifts exchanged, and in some places football matches held.  News of the event was suppressed by all the combatants, but the operation of the American free press broke the story on December 31, 1914 and it was quickly followed up by English newspapers.  Suppressing the story in England, and in Germany, was impossible due to letters being written home anyway. The truce was better received in the free press than in others, and the story was criticized in Germany and pretty much fully suppressed in France, on whose territory the war was being fought in the west.  Still, the story broke and was very well known early in 1915.

 German soldiers behind the lines, 1914.

Less well known is that the event repeated to a small degree in 1915, but it was small, as the command structure was alive to the possibility of such events and acted to discourage them.  Indeed, an attempt by a German unit to hold one on Easter 1915 was not successful.

The entire Christmas Truce story became a historical footnote after the war and many people who had an understanding of World War One in the years that followed didn't really know of it, or if they did, not in any detail.  The bloody years of 1915 through 1918 drowned it out, as did the series of wars that followed the immediate aftermath of the Great War.  World War Two, which didn't feature many truces, likewise operated to make it seem like an ancient historical footnote, little studied for many years.  But, then starting within recent decades, people started looking at it again.   Quite a few people began writing about it.  In 2005 Joyeaux Noel, a French film, was released about the event. A popular song was also released a few years back. And this year British chocolate manufacturer Sainsbury made it the theme of a television advertisement, with the proceeds of the sales this year also having a charitable purpose.

Well, now the inevitable has happened.  There's been a reaction, with the reaction even including the assertion that the 1914 Christmas Truce "is a myth".  Some places historians, largely in the UK, are complaining about the attention given to the truce and its meaning, particularly this year where we are on the 100th anniversary of the event, and advertising campaign has featured it, and the British and German armies have chosen to honor the event with a couple of football matches between their troops.

It certainly isn't a myth.  It may be misunderstood, although if it is, it isn't much.  That it occurred and was widespread is a demonstrable historical fact, including the fact that in certain areas of the Front it took a few days for the killing to resume.  

So what's up?

Well, the ownership of history is what's up.

It may seem odd to people who don't write history, or study history, but history, like any academic field, becomes the territory of the people who work in it professionally, and often they really don't like it when a story becomes popular with average people, or even non professional serious historians.  History becomes their turf, and they protect it, often preferring that only other professionals discuss it  This tends to be very much the case with academic historians, who really dislike, in some instances, non academic historians and popular histories.  Indeed, non academic authors of popular histories sometimes note that they receive a real cold shoulder from academics if a book becomes popular, even while some academic historians write books of such narrow interest in such a dry fashion that only dedicated academics can stand to read them.

But this same phenomenon can pass on to the non academic historians as well, if the area of their interests is intense to them, but also one of public interest.  Some non academics become so heavily invested in an area of intense interest that they guard it as their own private turf and don't like popular interest in an aspect of it, even if that interest is fairly accurate.  So that we'd have this happen on this topic, isn't surprising.

The English are heavily invested, historically, in World War One.  The Great War lives on with the British in a way that it doesn't with any other nation anywhere, even nations that had men bleed and die with profusion in the war.  World War Two is the big war for most European nations that fought in it, and most of those nations fought in World War One as well.  But for the British, the Great War remains a topic of intense present interest.

Unfortunately with that, the British themselves have become heavily invested in a mythologized version of the war, or competing ones.  And what we're not seeing to an extent is a turf war between the heavily invested and the average citizen over World War One.

If you listen to average British historians, amateur and professional, discuss the Great War, what you'll hear is a version of the war in which the British effort loomed large, and American effort barely existed, the Russians hardly show up, and even the French seem to have a surprisingly minor role.  The British did indeed fight a very hard war, but now it almost seems as if the British believe they fought the war to a muddy unsatisfactory stalemate by themselves.

They certainly did not, and they didn't always view the war that way.  For one thing, in spite of the gloom about the war that set in during the 1950s amongst the British, after World War One they regarded it a fought well fought, and a war that was one.  They pall of gloom that started surrounding their view really says more about World War Two than it does World War One, and even the popularity of despondent trench poetry, such as that by Wilfred Owens, is a post World War Two, not post World War One, phenomenon.   To the current crop of British historians of all types, the Great War has taken on the atmosphere of a great romantic tragedy.  It's nearly a type of doomed love story, and its appeal exists to many in the same way that fans of Swedish movies love them, as the tragically doomed lives of the protagonist are swept towards an inevitable romantic destruction, carried by events beyond their control.

And that's not too surprising, really.

After World War One the British remained a world power, and the "pink" on the globe expanded, as the British Empire expanded. Sure, the seeds of the dissolution of the Empire were there, and the departure of Ireland form the United Kingdom was a certain sign of times to come, but truth be known, the British came out of the Great War stronger than they went in it. Indeed, in spite of the popular myth to the contrary, even early in World War Two British industrial might was so significant that British industrial production exceeded that of Germany's.  The entire "nation alone on the edge of defeat" view that the British took in 1940 was really exaggerated, and partially the product of British propaganda aimed at a sympathetic United States, although they certainly were in a tough spot at the time.

But during World War Two the economy of the UK was wrecked, the Imperial era came to an end with the results of the war, and the nation had to readjust to a new status in Europe and the world.  The United States, which had been sort of an odd cousin of the UK, was clearly the world's most dominant free country, and it had little admiration for Empire.  Soviet Russia loomed up in the East, a new power which had been feared for decades but now had a freakish global reach.  The US worried about France and worked to rebuild German industry.  A thing like that goes hard, and creates a new introspective focus.  And with that focus came on the British view that they bleed uniquely in World War One, which was somehow a greater tragedy that World War Two.  The great romance omitted the Americans and Russians, and almost did the French, and placed the tragic, in their new view, British effort in the sun as the central event of the bloody 20th Century.

A Christmas Truce doesn't really fit into that view very well,  But neither does the fact that the French fought at least as hard as the British, and that Russia suffered an irreparable tragedy whose aftermath lives on today.  Nor does the fact that but for the United States, the Germans probably would have won the war in 1918.  Nor even does the fact that the British, like other armies, generally rotated their troops back off the front lines every few days, rather than the endless days in the trenches so often portrayed.

None of this is to belittle the massive, and valiant, British (and Canadian, and Australian, and New Zealand, etc) effort in World War One.  The British effort really was great, and indeed, their officer corps was much, much better than British historians will credit today.  But it is to criticize those having a bit of a fit over a group of men in their twenties and thirties, in 1914, who saw their own lives as their own, and who were happy to return to the Christian roots of their societies for a day.  People who are having a fit over that, need to get over it. And the average British citizen, or American, or Canadian, or German, is actually more in tune with those men in 1914 than those critics would allow.

December 26, 1914. Boxing Day.

The unofficial truce between the combatants, which by this point had spread to certain areas of the Eastern Front where the Austro Hungarian Army was present, continued into its  third, and final, day.

No news of the truce had spread to newspapers as the reporting of the event had been suppressed, although that would soon change.

Last edition:

Christmas Day, 1914.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, 1914 Christmas Truce, British Army, Christmas, Christmas Truce, German Army, Imperial Russian Army, Ottoman Army, Polish Legion, Royal Navy, World War One

Christmas Day, 1914.

The unofficial truce between German and British troops was widely observed with the troops mingling between the lines and playing soccer.

Elsewhere the war raged on.

Ottoman forces besieged Ardahan, held by the Russians.  The Russians were ordered to withdraw from Sarikamish.

The Russians pushed the Polish Legion back at Łowczówek, Galicia, but their defense caused the Russians to halt further advances.

Aircraft of the Royal Navy raided Cuxhaven.

Last edition:

Thursday, December 24, 1914. The Christmas Truce.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, 1914 Christmas Truce, British Army, Christmas, Christmas Truce, Conservation, German Army, Personalities, World War One

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas dear readers, and best wishes for a Happy New Year!

Thursday, December 24, 1914. The Christmas Truce.

The unofficial Christmas Truce of 1914 commenced between German and British troops, both in Europe, and interestingly also in Africa.  The Pope had called for one, but that had been rejected by the warring parties.  The troops caused the truce on their own.

John Muir died in Los Angeles at age 76.

Last edition:

Tuesday, November 17, 1914. Strained resources.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, Eastern Front, First Battle of Ypres, German Army, Germany, Taxes, United Kingdom, World War One

The Big Speech: A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens

A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens

Everything old could be new again: Letters of Marque and Reprisal

In the old days, when a nation went to war, it issued piracy licenses.  I.e., letters of marque and reprisal.

Letters of marque and reprisal were just that.  In times of declared belligerency, nations licensed individuals to outfit their own vessel for the purpose of raiding enemy shipping, by which we mean commercial shipping.  It was legal, and it was lucrative, as the raiders claimed the enemy ship and its content as a prize and divided it up amongst themselves.  Indeed, the practice was so lucrative that navies occasionally had trouble recruiting men to their national navies during wartime, as signing up for a privateer was a better economic bet.

Letters of marque and reprisal are provided for in the same section of the Constitution; that the never used and nearly forgotten section providing for Declarations of War, are.  Specifically, it states that Congress has the power to:

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

Congress is too chicken to declare war anymore, and hasn't since 1941.  The Korean War, the Vietnam War, both Gulf Wars, etc., were all without declaration.  This has been addressed here a couple of times before, and clearly some of the non declared wars shouldn't have been declared, and we've always experienced that to some degree.  So, while I suppose its only musing, I left wondering why Congress can't issue letters of marque and reprisal in situations of near war.

For example, I wonder what issuing them following 9/11 would have been like?  Piracy licenses to that new type of pirate, the Cyber Pirate, might have cleaned out Al Qaeda's bank account in about a week.  And now that we've been raided by pirates ourselves, in the form of oversensitive North Korean Clown College pirates, and as we've seen what private hackers can do to a country like North Korea's internet just for entertainment, I have to wonder what they'd do if they feared that Congress might debate letters of marque and reprisal?