Poster Saturday: Pour La France.

I understand what this poster was for, "Combat gold for Victory", but my gosh its odd.

Senator Bebout reads the tea leaves

Yesterday, after the Inauguration, Senator Bebout announced that he was killing the proposed public lands transfer constitutional amendment by refusing to assign it for consideration. That's his option as President of the Senate.

He acknowledged, in doing that, the full force of public opinion, although he maintained that the whole effort was misunderstood.

To the extent it is misunderstood, and that wouldn't be misunderstood much, it would apparently be by our Senators and Congresswoman back in Washington D.C., who still appear to be clueless on this.  Faced with a public revolt, Bebout took the wise and politic route and sidetracked it before the legislature and individual legislators had to pay a price for refusing to listen to the public.  Located more remotely, we haven't seen any similar reactions out of D. C. yet.  But that may be coming . . . if people like holding their seats.

The Sunday State Leader for January 21, 1917. US Withdrawing from Mexico

The plant to withdraw from Mexico hit the press, along with a prediction that Villa would fill the vaccum.

Wyoming Guardsmen got high praise however.

And the Legislature was looking at Blue Laws.

Small Arms of WWI Primer 002: French Berthier Rifles

Small Arms of WWI Primer 001: Rifle Modèle 1886 M93 "Lebel"

Part of the series we started doing on weapons of the 1910s, given on our focus on that era.  The WWII era "Lebel".

I'll confess that I know very little about French weapons, other than they're odd looking.

Today In Wyoming's History: January 20. The Legislature sends Prohibition to the voters.

People tend not to think of Wyoming in the context of Prohibition, but the state was part of the big sweep that lead to it.  Indeed, while the story lays in the future from this post, Wyoming would push prohibition over the top with Sen. Francis E. Warren's vote in favor of the Volstead Act.

On this day, a century ago, the Legislature, which was predicted to pass a pro-Prohibition bill, did:

Today In Wyoming's History: January 20:

1917   Legislature passed an act submitting an act for a constitutional amendment that would allow people to vote on prohibition. Attribution:  On This Day.

The introduction of the bill had been widely predicated by the Cheyenne newspapers, in the form of predicting some bill.  That it would have taken the form, in 1917, of a proposed amendment to the state constitution is a bit of a surprise, but that would have served the dual purpose of making anything that passed really difficult to get rid of and, additionally, sort of passing the buck to the voters, as such an amendment requires the voters to approve it.

Which they didn't.

I'm not certain how it played out, but if the regular process took place, the voters rejected the measure that following fall.  Wyoming was the last state in the Rocky Mountain region to adopt Prohibition and the proposed amendment did not become law.

Which might have been a sign of things to come. While the state did pass Prohibition into law voluntarily, and in fact pushed it over the top nationally, it took to violating it nearly immediately.  Indeed Western Wyoming would become a bootleg liquor center, with wine being fermented in the Italian sections of Rock Springs and, ironically, heavily Mormon Kemmerer becoming a location for the distillation of high quality bootleg whiskey made with locally grown grain.

As outlined by Phil Roberts in an excellent article in Annals of Wyoming recently, Prohibition did break the back of the saloon trade in Wyoming, which in the end was a good thing. When alcohol returned in the 1930s it was stepped in over time, and with a new system which we retain today. That system, oddly enough for "free enterprise" Wyoming, runs all alcohol through the State Liquor Warehouse, which is the wholesaler for Wyoming, with no legal exceptions.

Prohibition would have the unfortunate impact of killing off a lot of local breweries, including those in Wyoming.  This has changed only recently, although there are quite a few small breweries now and even two distilleries.

A bottle of Wyoming Whiskey.  Something the legislators of 1917 would probably not have appreciated seeing at the time.

Blog Mirror: Friday Farming: The Salt: The Lost Ancestral Peanut Of The South Is Revived

The Salt

What's On Your Plate

Foodways

The Lost Ancestral Peanut Of The South Is Revived

Vice President Marshall receives California Electoral Vote, January 20, 1917

Vice President receiving the official California votes.

Why it was received so late, I have no idea.  And why the Vice President received it I don't know either, other than this was the same day that Admiral Dewey's funeral occurred on and I suspect that President Wilson was at that.

Admiral Dewey laid to rest.

Admiral George Dewey, who died on January 16, 1917, was laid to rest on this day.

Dewey was critical to the US's rise to power as a naval power during the Spanish American War.  In some ways the results of that rise were about to play out on an even bigger world stage.

The escort here is an Army and Navy one, with his coffin born on a caisson.

Suffragette pickets at the White House, January 20, 1917

Wyoming Fact and Fiction: Today Mostly Fact – Not Much Fiction

From Wyoming Fact and Fiction, a difficult question:

Wyoming Fact and Fiction: Today Mostly Fact – Not Much Fiction: The news dominating Wyoming right now   -  The Legislature is in session, I hope to visit in the next couple of weeks and sit in on some ...

Military Small Arms of the 10s: Small Arms of WWI Primer 014: Canadian Ross Rifle Mark III.

I've been dealing, of course, with the 10s a lot recently.

Well, always actually.

But more specifically, starting in March, I started dealing with 1916 a lot, and now with 1917.  And more specifically than that, while I've been trying to give a lot of contemporary events from a century ago, a lot of those events were military events. 

So, I may provide a few details on the weapons of the period, which were making a lot of noise, literally and figuratively, and for no particular reason, I'm starting here, as it was an easy video to find.

Yes, this doesn't have much to do with any store we've followed closely, except slightly with the Irish Canadian Rangers, but I'll add more details on that later.

Admiral Reginald Hall of the Royal Navy reveals the Zimmerman Note to Edward Bell . . .and the telegram makes it to Mexico City.

Royal Navy Admiral Reginald Hall, who was involved with British signals intelligence in World War One, after the British spent a couple of days pondering what to do with the information, revealed the contents of the Zimmerman Telegraph to Edward Bell, Secretary of the U.S. Embassy in the UK.  Bell at fist refused to believe the note was genuine but then became enraged upon changing his mind.

Admiral Hall.

Hall would informally present the contents of the telegram to American Ambassador Walter Hines Page the following day.  Arthur Balfour would formally give the deciphered and translated text to Hines on February 23, who reported the same to Woodrow Wilson.

Ironically the first news of the telegram was provided to the United States, albeit informally, on the same day that it arrived in Mexico City. Given the nature of wire communications at the time, it didn't arrive in Mexico City until February 19.

The Somme viewed from the air, January 19, 1917

Secretary of War Newton D. Baker informs Maj. Gen Frederick Funston that the US withdrawing from Mexico.

The caption says it all.

Newton D. Baker.

Frederick Funston.

Well, I suppose it might not if you don't know  who Frederick Funston was.  He was the commander of American forces in the Southwest and in overall  charge of the forces then in Mexico, contrary to it being John Pershing, whom people typically imagine to have been in overall charge.  Pershing was the commander in the field, and Funston was his superior.

Confessions of a Writer of Westerns: Writing Short

Confessions of a Writer of Westerns: Writing Short: Books seem to be getting smaller, at least that is what I have been reading. Many traditional publishers, in their author note sections, ar...

Wednesday, January 17, 1917. Joint Mexican American Committee Concludes

 

Mexican refugee entering the United States.  In spite of the caption, his wealth is probably all on this horse.  Part of the tragedy that involved both the United States and Mexico for well over a decade.

The Joint Committee between the US and Mexico concluded its business.  With the agreement of December 24, 1916 having been made, with Carranza having refused to sign it, and with events overcoming the United States that would give Carranza the result he wanted anyway, there was no more work to be done.

 

Porfirio Diaz in full military costume.  The collapse of his rule lead to the long civil war in Mexico.

Some have stated that the mere existence of the Joint Committee was a success in and of itself, and there is some truth to that.  The committee worked for months on an agreement and came to one, and even if Carranza would not execute it as it didn't guaranty the withdraw of American forces, the fact that the country was now hurtling towards war with Germany made it necessary for that to occur without American formal assent to Carranza's demand.  By not agreeing to it, the US was not bound not to intervene again, which was one of the points that it had sought in the first place. Events essentially gave both nations what they had been demanding.

 

 Revolutionary, intellectual, and radical. General Carranza.  His government fought Villa and Zapata successfully, but he'd go down in a coup lead by his own general, Obregon some years later. 

Even if that was the case this step, the first in the beginning of the end of the event we have been tracking since March, has to be seen as a Mexican Constitutionalist victory in the midst of the Mexican Revolution.  At the time the Commission came to the United States it represented only one side in a three way (sometimes more) Mexican civil war that was still raging.  Even as Carranza demanded that the United States withdraw his forces were not uniformly doing well against either Villa or Zapata.  Disdaining the United States in general, in spite of the fact that Wilson treated his government as the de facto government, he also knew that he could not be seen to be achieving victory over Villa through the intervention of the United States, nor could he be seen to be allowing a violation of Mexican sovereignty.  His refusal to acquiesce to allowing American troops to cross the border in pursuit of raiders, something that the Mexican and American governments had allowed for both nations since the mid 19th Century, allowed him to be seen as a legitimate defender of Mexican sovereignty and as the legitimate head of a Mexican government.

 

More typically imagined in a sombrero, General Francisco Villa.  The colorful, erratic, and perhaps somewhat mentally unstable Villa would attempt to retire to a ranch he acquired after his surrender to Obregon and Carranza, but he ended up being assassinated under cloudy circumstances in 1923.  His killer would live into the 1950s and declare at the end of his life that he'd rid the world of a "monster".

 Emiliano Zapata and his staff.  Zapata was an agrarian and looked the part, which we in turn tend to confuse with the look of the Mexican Revolution.  As with many leaders of the Mexican Revolution, Zapata was assassinated, although unlike Villa he still commanded an army in the field at the time of his death.

As will be seen, even though the war in Mexico raged on, events were overtaking the US and Mexico very quickly.  The Constitutionalist government was legitimizing itself as a radical Mexican de jure government and would quickly become just that.  Revolutions against it would go on for years, but it was very quickly moving towards full legitimacy.  And the United States, having failed to capture Villa or even defeat the Villistas, and having accepted an effective passive role in Mexico after nearly getting into a full war with the Constitutionalist, now very much had its eye on Europe and could not strategically afford to be bogged down in Mexico.  A silent desire to get out of Mexico had become fully open.  The rough terms of the agreement arrived upon by the Committee, while never ratified by Carranza, would effectively operate anyway and the United States now very quickly turned to withdrawing from Mexico.

 

Alvaro Obregon, whose competence and study of military tactics lead to the defeat of Pancho Villa and his Division del Norte.  He'd ultimately become present of Mexico following his coup against Carranza.  Obregon would serve one term as president of Mexico, and was elected to a second term to follow his successor Calles, but he was assassinated prior to taking office.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Related threads:  The Mexican Revolution.

Last Edition:

January 16, 1917. Admiral George Dewey dies

Labels: 1910s, 1917, Civil War, Personalities, Politics, Spanish American War, U.S. Navy

Lex Anteinternet: Civil Holidays. Their observance, or lack thereof. A Wyoming Equality Day observation.

This is an old post that I've bumped up in this fashion on at least one prior occasion.

Lex Anteinternet: Civil Holidays:  Leann posted an item on her blog about Columbus Day, urging Congress to consider changing it to Indigenous Peoples Day .  I

I was reminded of it as it's both Martin Luther King Day nationally and Wyoming Equality Day in the state, but outside of state and Federal employees, it's not observed much here. That doesn't mean its not observed at all, but not much.  To the extent it is observed it tends to be observed almost ethnically or politically.  Indeed, people were slow to get to the office today and I had two employees ask me "Is this a holiday?"  It is, but not one that anyone takes off.

I'm not sure of what to make of that.  But I do know that if civil holidays aren't observed by employers there not really holidays.  That may sound harsh, but that's the reality of it.  It's just a day at work without mail.  In some cases, like Veterans' Day, its a day where things might be observed in some fashion; a lot of businesses give breaks to veterans and the movie channels run war movies non stop, but still, a holiday that businesses don't take off isn't a real holiday.

And that's a shame.

If these days are important, well, they should be observed. But unless the government affirmatively requires them to be taken off, most will not be.  Only the self employed who are very secure about their place in the world is going to observe some of them.  But in the United States, which has an aggressive attachment to concepts of free enterprise in the current era, a legal effort to require that business stand down would not go anywhere and would instead be controversial.

And, indeed, this has spread even to weekends, which used to be very widely observed, or at least Sundays were.  Even around here, in a region that notoriously has not had blue laws, it used to be almost impossible to get much more than basic grocery services on Sundays.  As a kid I recall you could not find an open gas station here on a Sunday.  On the 4th of July weekend you had to buy your gasoline early if you intended to go anywhere, or you were going nowhere.

I'm not sure the change has been for the good.

January 16, 1917. Admiral George Dewey dies

George Dewey, a hero of the Spanish American War and the only U.S. officer to ever hold the rank Admiral of the Navy died at age 79 on this date in 1917.  He had been an officer in the U.S. Navy since the Civil War but obtained fame during the war with Spain during which his fleet took Manila Bay, securing the Philippines for the United States.

 Dewey as a Captain while with the Bureau of Equipment.

Dewey was a Naval Academy graduate from the Class of 1858.  He saw very active service during the Civil War with service on a variety of vessels.  He married Susan Goodwin after the Civil War and had one son, George, by Susan in 1872, but she died only five days thereafter leaving him a widower with a young son.  He none the less shortly received sea duty, retaining it until 1880 when he was assigned to lighthouse administration duty, a serious assignment at the time.  His son was principally raised by his aunts and would not follow the military career of his father, becoming instead a stock broker who passed away, having never married, in 1963.  Dewey himself asked for sea duty again in 1893 as he felt his health was deteriorating with a desk job.  He was therefore assigned, at the rank of Commodore, to command the Asiatic Squadron in  1897.

Seeing the war coming and receiving what were essentially war warnings from Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt in the weeks leading up to the Spanish American War, he based himself at Hong Kong, the British possession, and began war preparations from there.  His fleet was ordered out of harbor at Hong Kong only shortly before the declaration of war with Spain as the British, knowing that the war was to come, did not want a belligerent power in their ports, which they were effectively doing in the run up to war. His squadron was therefore well situated, if not completely re-outfitted, to attack Manila Bay only a few days later, on April 30, 1898 after war had been declared.  In a one sided victory which cost only one American life (of course the "only" wouldn't mean much to that sailor) Spanish naval power in the Philippines was essentially eliminated in the battle.  As a result he became a household name and a great American hero of the era.

 Heroic painting of Dewey in the Battle of Manila in the Maine State House.

Dewey married for the second time (second marriages were somewhat looked down upon for widowers) in 1899, this time to the widow of a U.S. Army general.  The marriage to Mildred McLean Hazen would be a factor, amongst several others, in keeping him from running for President in 1900, which was a semi popular position with some people and which he entertained.  His second wife was Catholic and the marriage had been a Catholic ceremony, which angered Protestants at a time at which it remained effectively impossible for a Catholic to run for that office.  In 1903 he was promoted to the rank of Admiral of the Navy in honor of his Spanish American War achievement making him the only U.S. officer to ever hold that rank.

 Dewey in 1903.

The extent to which Dewey was a huge hero at the time cannot be overestimated.  That he would seriously be considered as a Presidential contender, and seriously consider running, says something about his fame at the time.  His promotion to a rank that is matched only to that held by John Pershing in the U.S. Army, and which of course Pershing did not yet hold, meant that he was effectively at that time holding a rank that exceeded that granted to any other American officer during their lifetime and which has never been exceeded by any Naval officer since.  A special medal was struck bearing his likeness and awarded to every sailor or marine serving in the battle, a remarkable unique military award.  That he is not a household name today, and he is not, says a lot about the fickle nature of fame.

Armour's meat packing calendar from 1899, Dewey medal, as it is commonly known, on lower left corner.

There's no denying that Admiral Dewey's death had a certain fin de siecle feel to it, particularly when combined with the passing of Buffalo Bill Cody, which happened the prior week, and also in combination with the death of another famous person which was about to occur.  It is not that Dewey and Cody had similar careers or that they'd become famous for the same reason, but there was a sense that the transition age which began in the 1890s and continued on into the early 20th Century was ending.  Both Cody and Dewey had careers that started at about the same time. Both were Civil War veterans.  If Cody became famous well before the 1890s, which he did, it was also the case that in some ways the full flower of his Wild West Show came during that period.  Indeed, Cody had modified his show after the Spanish American War to feature the "Congress of Rough Riders", building on the romantic notions that the term "Rough Rider" conveyed. That term, of course, had come up during the Spanish American War to describe members of the three volunteer cavalry regiments raised during that conflict, never mind that only one of them, the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, saw service in the war and that it was in fact deployed dismounted.

 Dewey receiving Roosevelt on board the Olympia, 1909.

Indeed, the actual Spanish American War had been a fully modern war, much like the Boer War was, and which saw the US attempting to belatedly adapt to that change.  The Navy was really better prepared for it than the Army.  That contributed to the peculiar nature of the era, however, with combat being much like what we'd later see in World War One but with the service still having one foot in the Civil War era.  By the war's end, of course, the US was a global colonial power, whether it was ready to be or not, and that was a large part of the reason that Dewey was such a celebrated figure.  His actions in the Philippines had significantly contributed to the defeat of a European colonial power, albeit a weak and decrepit one, and which helped to make the US a colonial power, albeit a confused and reluctant one.  The passing of Dewey and Cody seem, even now, to have the feel of the people who opened the door stepping aside to let they party in, just before they go back out.

Dewey in retirement, 1912.

The United States ratified the treaty of sale for the Danish West Indies . . .

on this day in 1917.

The sale had been arranged in 1916 and a treaty signed by the Danish Minister and U.S. Secretary of STate on August 4, 1916.  The U.S. Senate approved the treaty making the transfer on September 7, 1916.  But this was not without considerable controversy in Denmark and it was scheduled for a referendum in Denmark, which was held, passing the sale, on December 14, 196.  On December 22, 1916  the Danish Parliament approved the treaty.  Woodrow Wilson ratified the treaty on this day in 1917.  Ratification exchanges would occur the following day and the treaty proclaimed on January 25 by  the United States and March 9 by King Christian X.  The warrant for payment would be made on March 31, 1917, and the exchange of ownership occured on April 1.