Jan. 21, 1907 (Monday)

ALL EYES ON JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER -- IN AN ALL-BLACK CHURCH: The "oil king," John D. Rockefeller (right) -- attended a service yesterday at "Big Bethel," the leading black church (Baptist) in Augusta, Ga. According to a news report, there was great interest among the congregation in ... what he would do when the COLLECTION PLATE was passed by him. An article in today's New York Times said, "When the plate was passed there was another craning of necks toward Rockefeller, which seemed to embarrass him."
When the plate came, he put in a ONE DOLLAR COIN. Then, he called the collector back and emptied his pockets of coins, amounting to $20. (For 2007 dollars, multiply by 20.)

THANKS, BUT NO THANKS: Americans are dumbfounded at the governor the Jamaica, Alexander Swettenham. He has requested that the U.S. Navy, which sent ships (including the battleship Missouri) and sailors to the quake-ravaged city of Kingston, pack up and GO HOME -- ending a mission of mercy. It's a stunning development. Londoners are equally amazed. Today's Washington Post said, "The incident occurs at a moment when the British press and public are loud in an expression of grateful recognition of the prompt and generous assistance the United States rendered when it was impossible, owing to their distances from the scen, for Bitish war ships to go to the rescue."
In a puzzling statement, Acting Secretary of State (for the U.S.) Bacon insists that the ships have not left Jamaica: "There is not any truth in it. I know what I am talking about. There is not the slightest kind of trouble or foundation for it in any way, shape or manner. The ships have not sailed. I know exactly what happened, and there is no foundation for it in any manner. That is perfectly straight. If you are looking for the facts, those are the facts."

Jan. 20, 1907 (Sunday)

THAW-WHITE MURDER CASE READY TO DOMINATE THE NEWS: The trial of Harry K. Thaw (left) is about to begin. He's charged in the sensational killing of architect Stanford White on the rooftop of Madison Square Garden. (For more information, check out the June 26 entry.) News accounts indicate that as much as $500,000 has been spent by Thaw's family in preparation for the trial. Will it help? There is a sense of privilege draped over the alleged killer. Shortly after Thaw was arrested, an assistant district attorney said, "This man thinks that he can get out of his scrape as he would avoid trouble after he roke a mirror in a bar room -- by paying for it. He will find that it is no bar room case."

TRAIN SAFETY IS IN QUESTION: Today's Washington Post, on Page 3, has these headlines, each assigned to a different news item, with the accompanying dateline included:
"16 Dead in Wreck" (Fowler, Ind.)
"Two Trains are Crushed" (Denmark, S.C.)
"Winnipeg Flyer Derailed" (Minneapolis)
"Two Other Indiana Wrecks" (Hammond, Ind.)
Engineer is Drowned" (Meridian, Miss.)
"Locomotive Explodes" (De Soto, Kan.)
"Train Runs into Washout" (Peoria, Ill.)
The same day, the Syracuse Herald prints an article by Arthur Warren, who (I think) was a London-based correspondent for the Boston Herald, that deals with "THE SLAUGHTER OF THE RAIL." The subhead gives the tone: "The Carelessness With Which Our Railroads Are Run and the Fearful Price That Is Paid in Human Life." The trend is bad. (The photo here shows a 1907 wreck in New Hampshire.) The article says that 10 years ago, ONE passenger was KILLED for every 2,984,832 people carried on railroad. Last year, ONE passenger was KILLED for every 1,375,856. That means the death rate has DOUBLED. In raw numbers, the dead-and-injured totals have risen fast. Ten years ago, those casualties numbered 38,087. In the most recent year for which official numbers are available, that number climbed to 95,700 or so. Warren's article is a brutal screed against the railroads and our numbness to the tragedies they spawn. He spices it with biting humor. Here's a bit, with punctuation changed to make it clear:
"Death on the rail has become a sacred sacrifice. He that loveth his life shall give it unto them that love dividends. Epistle to the Travelonians."

Jan. 19, 1907 (Saturday)

PUCCINI GETS TO THE STAGE ON TIME: The last time (yesterday) we read about Giacomo Puccini, he was on board an ocean liner but stuck in the fog off Sandy Hook near New York Harbor. The drama? Was he going to miss the opening of his opera "Manon Lescaut." Well, he made it. He got to New York by 6 p.m. yesterday and made it to the show. He was greeted on the Hoboken docks by numerous people, including some newspaper reporters. He told them he was thinking of writing an opera with the American West as a backdrop. "I have read Bret Harte's (right) novels and I think there is great scope in your Western life for operatic treatment."

HUSBAND MAKES QUITE A REACH FOR GROUNDS FOR DIVORCE: Samuel E. St. Amants offered a judge a distinctive reason why his marriage should be annulled. To put it simply, the husband HAS NO MEMORY OF THE MARRIAGE CEREMONY. His lawyer explained that St. Amants had been taking opiates at the time the wife said the marriage took place. When it was suggested to him three days after the alleged ceremony that he had a wife, St. Amants said, "What wife?" It's quite a tale. Did I mention that St. Amants is a NEWSPAPER WRITER?

QUOTE OF THE DAY: Teachers in New York City met with members of the Education Board yesterday. One main thrust of the meeting was that female teachers want equal pay with men. Miss Sara J.J. McCafferey talked about the poor pay for young teachers: "The girl who starts in to teach in the elementary grades after years of preparation is supposed to receive a salary of $600 A YEAR. But in reality she gets only. $403.82. I requires $1.46 to buy today what $1 bought seven years ago. In other words, she receives a salary of about $1.18 a day. Just think of it! Why, a teacher does not make as much as many women who SCRUB FLOORS."

Jan. 18, 1907 (Friday)

MORE ON THE KINGSTON QUAKE: More information is coming out of Jamaica regarding the earthquake on the 14th. Now it looks like there might be 1,000 deaths. There was a curious development reported in The New York Times regarding the statue of Queen Victoria in Victoria Park. Let the paper tell it: "Among the strange freaks of the earthquake was that the statue of the late Queen Victoria. In the centre of the city, was turned completely around but it is otherwise intact."
Today's Times has an eloquent description of what happened written by Henniker Heaton (left), a member of Parliament. He was in Kingston. Here's a portion:
After luncheon I left the club and went with the Hon. Mr. Cork, member of the Council and a leading planter, to visit the Post Office, and was returning from there when the earthquake took place. The street was a moderate-sized one and the moment the ground began to quake thousands of people rushed and jumped into the street from the houses. One huge building fell across the street before us, and another building blocked the street behind us. On our left a third building fell into the street.
Then followed absolute darkness. Great clouds of dust, mortar, and debris filled the air for five minutes.


PUCCINI MISSES HIS CUE: Giacomo Puccini (right) was due to arrive at noon yesterday on board the Auguste Victoria. However, the ship didn't come into New York harbor. Instead, it has been stuck in dense fog off Sandy Hook. He sent a wireless message to the Metropolitan Opera House that he would likely be landing at 6:30 a.m. today at Hoboken. He had planned to be in New York for tonight's opening of "Manon Lescaut."

A CLOSER PEEK AT PIKES PEAK: Promoters of the Pikes Peak Centennial celebration have gotten some bad news. The group thought that the mountain was taller than the 14,147-foot height that has been assigned to the mountain. Well, the U.S. Geological Survey has finished its study and announced yesterday that the mountain .... is 48 feet LOWER -- reaching 14,099 feet.

Jan. 17, 1907 (Thursday)

IS A QUARTER THAT UNLUCKY? An item in today's Post-Standard passes on an observation from the New York Tribune about the connection between the quarter and the number 13. According to the notice (and you can count them for yourself here), the U.S. quarter coin has 13 stars, 13 letters in the scroll held in the beak, 13 feathers in each wing of the eagle, 13 tail feathers, 13 parallel bars in the shield, 13 horizontal bars, 13 arrow heads, and 13 leaves on the branch. Furthermore, there are 13 letters in the words "quarter dollar." This, of course is not related to any lack of luck. Rather, it honors the 13 colonies. Right?

BASEBALL PLAYERS ARE URGED TO THINK: The Washington Post mentions that exactly one-half of the off-season is over now for the baseball fan. The 1907 season begins on April 11. That means there's still enough time for players to learn how to THINK. Stanley Robison, president of the St. Louis Cardinals, says that's something players could do a bit more of. Today's Washington Post prints a rant from him about those who play "only mechanical baseball." By that, he means baseball players who don't think. Here's his most blistering statement:
So many players play the game -- fellows who are big and strong -- with HEADS NO BIGGER THAN BASEBALLS.

Jan. 16, 1907 (Wednesday)

KINGSTON CRUSHED BY QUAKE: Word exploded on the front pages of today's papers that an earthquake struck Kingston, Jamaica, about 3:30 p.m. on Monday. Many buildings are destroyed. Port Royal, on the tip of the arm of land that curls along the south side of the beautiful harbor, is under water (as shown, above, in a postcard). Hundreds are likely dead, maybe more. One fatality is Sir. James Fergusson (right). He was a governor of South Australia and New Zealand. He was in Kingston for the meeting of the British Cotton Growing Association, as a representative of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Co. The quake was remembered in Jamaica.

SON OF VICE PRESIDENT IS INDICTED OF PERJURY: Frederick C. Fairbanks, the son of VP Charles Fairbanks (right), has caused a stir in Steubenville, Ohio. He went there three months ago and, with the help of someone who guides "runaway couples,'' and got ahold of a marriage license. He said he was a laborer living in Martins Ferry, Ohio, and that his bride -- Miss Scott -- lived in Adenia, Ohio. That's false information. Now he's been indicted, and the charge is perjury. Charles denies he ever filled out an affidavit or made an oath. He thinks there's a conspiracy afoot to lure couples from Pennsylvania and other states with an easy way to get married.

Jan. 15, 1907 (Tuesday)

ENGLISH PAPERS PRAISE AMERICANS FOR THEIR.... ENGLISH: Newspapers printed in London yesterday praised biographer Sidney Lee (right) for his complimentary remarks about the high quality of English spoken and written in America. Here's what The Globe wrote, according to today's New York Times:
There is a great deal in what Mr. Lee said as to greater attention being given in preserving the purity of the English tongue in America than England. Americans have more to contend against than we, since their popular slang is both more widespread and more distinctly alien than ours. Perhaps it is for this reason that Harvard requires twenty professors of English, while Oxford is content with one.
Yet their best writers succeed in maintaining a purity of style -- American law books, for instance, are models in this respect -- which need not fear comparison with that of our own, and their best speakers are not only almost pedantically correct in their English, but have a copiousness of vocabulary rarely attained by modern English orators.

A HIGH DIVORCE RATE WAS NOTICED IN 1906, TOO: Here's an item printed in today's Post-Standard and credited to The Boston Record:
Bookstore Clerk: This edition of the Bible is new and right up-to-date.
Customer: What do you mean by up-to-date?
Clerk: Besides a page for births, deaths and marriages, it has three pages for divorce.

Jan. 14, 1907 (Monday)

"PITCHFORK BEN" TILLMAN STIRS UP RACE ISSUE IN SENATE: South Carolina's Sen. Ben Tillman (left) blames the president -- and his efforts to encourage black men and women to assert their equality, for the poor state of race relations in the South. He said about as much day before yesterday in the Senate chamber in D.C. He still sees the South and North as different places with different cultures. At one point he asked, "Are the people of the North and the South never to understand each other and to recognize the rights of both sections."
Here's another sample:
The deep interest shown in the Brownsville tragedy is evidence that the people of the country feel a deep concern in the question. I am ready, for one, to go to battle under the slogan, "America for the Americans, and this is a white man's country and white men must govern it."

BRITAIN'S BEST-DRESSED WOMAN COMING TO THE U.S.: Mrs. Hwfa Williams, the woman whom King Edward VII calls the "best dressed woman in all England," is on her way to the United States. In a newspaper published in April 1907 (the Galveston Daily News), she explained the unusual name with which she is saddled by virtue of her marriage to horseman Hwfa Williams (left):
It is a very old and honorable Welsh name, like your names Stuyvesant or Biddle. You pronounce it Hoo-fa. You know, in Welsh, w takes the place of u.