May 13, 1907 (Monday)

A MULE CERTAINLY WON'T WIN THE KENTUCKY DERBY, BUT IT MIGHT WIN A RACE ACROSS THE COUNTRY: The War Department plans a coast-to-coast endurance test for horses, pitting an American-bred mare against a desert-bred Arabian. The route stretches from Portland, Ore., to New York City.
An unidentified Ohio man has complicated things by requesting that the War Department consider allowing his MULE in the race.
The backer of the American-bred mare is Gen. John B. Castleman (left), a veteran of the Confederate army. He opposes the entry of the mule. The Arabian-horse backer, Homer Davenport (right), doesn't mind having a mule at the starting line because thinks his horse has a chance in an endurance test against a mule.
Davenport says he received a letter from Major Gen. Bell, chief of the general staff of the U.S. Army, who thinks the mule will win easily. According to Davenport, Bell said, "that the advantage of the mule in an endurance contest in conceded."
Davenport thinks his Arabian could win such a contest and wants the Army to allow one in.
"I am still hoping that the department will come to my way of thinking and make the race a three-cornered affair," he said in today's New York Times.

VET SAVES THE LIFE OF A POODLE WITH A HOLE IN THE SKULL: Last Friday night, a prized French toy poodle named "Baby Boy" stepped daintily into the library of the home of Miss Ida Sheehan on Park Place in Brooklyn. At that moment a gust of wind -- or something -- closed the heavy door to the room, pinning the poodle against the jam of the door. On Saturday, the dog's skull was trepanned. A portion of skull bone that was 1 inch wide and 1.25 inches long was removed from the dog's skull. The opening was sealed with a GOLD PLATE.

May 12, 1907 (Sunday)

'WESTWARD HO'' GETS THE HEAVE-HO IN A SCHOOL LIBRARY IN ENGLAND: "Westward Ho" is barred by library officials in Tilbury in Great Britain. Educators say students should not be exposed to a complete version of the story, by Charles Kingsley. At issue, as reported in today's New York Times, is a passage that deals with .... TOBACCO. The passage has to go, or the book will not be allowed to cast its shadow on the shelves of Tilbury's school library.
The article does not include the specific passage, but here's an exchange from Chapter 23:
“Well,” says Will Cary, taking his cigar out of his mouth, “at least we have got something out of those last Indians. It is a comfort to have a puff at tobacco once more, after three weeks’ fasting.”
“For me,” said Jack Brimblecombe, “Heaven forgive me! but when I get the magical leaf between my teeth again, I feel tempted to sit as still as a chimney, and smoke till my dying day, without stirring hand or foot.”
“Then I shall forbid you tobacco, Master Parson,” said Amyas; “for we must be up and away again tomorrow. We have been idling here three mortal days, and nothing done.”
If the censors work at it, they could arrange to have the book pared down so much that the Classics version at right will pass muster.
Today's article, with a London dateline, makes this claim:
This edict is the most astonishing thing of its kind ever known in this country.

IN A WHIMSICAL TALE, GULLIVER PAYS A VISIT TO THE LAND OF THE HURRIUPPS: Today's New York Times includes a funny tale by writer Stephen Chalmers. In it, he takes Gulliver to New York City, in the spirit of Johnathon Swift. Instead of Lilliputians, he meets a strange people in New York who move fast. He calls them the Hurriupps. He calls the nation's leader King Bigstick. At one point, the traveler asks his Hurriup guide, "Why do the Hurriupps hurry so?"
The reply: "Life's short."
The traveler asks, "Will this make it longer?"
But the companion doesn't answer. Presumably, there's no time for that.

May 11, 1907 (Saturday)

INMATE ROBBED -- WHILE CROSSING THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS: Russian Wasly (or Wasily?) Mihalnok had been in this country only a few months when he pleaded guilty to a larceny charge. A judge deemed him fit for DEPORTATION as a criminal and sent him to the Tombs (jail) in New York City. Mihalnok was scheduled to sail back to Europe yesterday. But while he was crossing the Bridge of Sighs (which links the Tombs and the Criminal Court building), someone picked his pocket and stole the $51 he had saved for the trip. That's what he claims, anyway, according to an article in today's Washington Post. Mihalnok said he couldn't sail without his money. A sympathetic judge sent him back to the Tombs and now the warden is searching all prisoners who were on the bridge at the same time as Mihalnok.

ANOTHER WILD STORY ABOUT THE ZANY "RUBE" WADDELL: Because this happened to loopy "Rube" Waddell, one of the greatest strikeout artists in Major League baseball history, it just might be true....
Today's Washington Post has a story with the headline "Pitching Costly to Rube." Here's what happened. Evidently, Waddell was having a drink in a bar when a stranger walked in. They struck up a conversation. Then the man said he'd like to see some of Rube's famous CURVE BALLS.
The man suggested, "Could you pitch a few for me using -- eh -- well, a ten-dollar bill tightly wadded. I will try and catch for you."
Rube took the bait. He pulled out a bill, rolled it up and threw it at the stranger. He repeated it, as the "friend" encouraged him. This went on for quite a while.
Well, yesterday, Rube Waddell showed up at the central police station in Chicago. He wanted to file a complaint. Evidently he had tossed the man more than $150 worth of "curve balls" and never got any tossed back to the "mound."

"SALOME" CAUSES A RIFT IN PARIS: Just as it did in New York recently, the opera "Salome" is drawing some fire in Paris. The publication Libre Parole spews that the production is scandalous, adding that its success indicates that French morals are declining. Today's New York Times says the French paper says the production is "worthy of inspiring the lamentations of a new Jeremiah or the sarcasm of another Juvenal." The Parisian paper goes on to say that the nation "lacks the moral sense and virility to reject it." Then comes the crowning point, revealing the true nature of the criticism. The Libre Parole, which is widely known for its anti-Semitic positions, blames Jews, "two of whom organized the production of the work of a third."

May 10, 1907 (Friday)

PRESIDENT'S BULL TERRIER FINDS A VICTIM AT THE WHITE HOUSE: A government clerk was the latest victim of Pete, the ever-vigilant bull terrier who patrols the White House grounds. (I'm pretty sure that's Pete shown front-and-center in the Roosevelt family phoot above.) Here's how today's New York Times began the story on its front page today (the story carried a May 9 dateline):
Pete, the bulldog, President Roosevelt's prized bull terrier and special commissioner to keep suspicious characters, newspaper correspondents, and incessant Secretaries of the Interior out of th White House grounds, chewed up an offending Government clerk today after giving him a run through the grounds that rivaled the famous chase of Pete after [France's} Ambassador Jusserand.
(That last reference deals with a treeing of the diplomat, who had visited the White House grounds expecting to play tennis with the president.)
The lengthy article about the attack on Navy Department clerk John T. Thomas goes to some length to describe how journalists have dealt with the threat of Pete. For example, the article states, perhaps with a tongue in the vicinity of a cheek,
the newspaper correspondents who have had to go to the Executive Offices after dark have been chosen from among the fleetest runners in the press gallery.
In a small "dig" at the press corps, the article added,
[Mr. Thomas] is handsome and intellectual.... Paris could not mistake him for a newspaper man.
The paper noted elsewhere that the rotund (300 pounds or so) William H. Taft visited the White House yesterday to meet with President Roosevelt. It would have been quite amusing to see Taft try to run from Pete.

HEROINE COMES TO A SAD END: Her name won't show up with a Google search, until now I guess, but a musician named Aurora Wittebort deserves to be remembered. Her body has not been found yet, but it's widely thought that she lies buried in the rubble of the University Building in Kansas City, which was destroyed by fire on May 8/9. She was a widely known heroine based on something she did about 12 years ago. At the time, while living in Hartford City, Indiana, she prevented a train wreck. It happened that she noticed a railroad bridge was on fire. She knew that a train was due and ran down the track. She flagged it WITH HER SKIRT, and the engineer brought it to a halt. The train, a fast passenger train belonging to the Pennsylvania railroad, had on board a number of Belgian and French officials who likely would have died had the train reached the burning bridge. She was decorated by the French government. In addition, the passengers on the train raised enough money to pay for Miss Wittebort to received some musical training abroad.
Presumably, her musical work is what brought her to take up residence in Kansas City.

May 9, 1907 (Thursday)

BURGLARS CASH IN WHILE POLICE PUT ON A SHOW: It seemed like a good idea at the time when someone suggested that the police in Bayonne, N.J., put on a "playlet" at the Bayonne Theater on Tuesday night. It also seemed like a good idea to PUBLICIZE the event. The production, called "Forty Minutes at Police Headquarters," drew a PACKED HOUSE. Some quick-thinking burglars also took note of the production. While the city's finest were involved in the stage show, the crooks were busy in the unwatched sections of the city. They robbed three houses in the city, including the home of the former street commissioner. They got plenty of jewelry and a PRAYER BOOK.
The prayers seem to be working because they haven't been caught yet.

MARS BECKONS: This summer, Mars will be the closest it's been to Earth in the last 15 years, so an expedition leaves Saturday to set up shop in the Andes to take pictures of the planet. The Lowell Expedition is named for Percival Lowell (right), who has long held a fascination with Mars and wrote a book with that title in 1895. The expedition will be led by Prof. David Todd of Amherst College. They will use a camera designed and built by William Gaertner.

SUBMARINE SETS A RECORD: The submarine Octopus (right) set a speed record yesterday during trials off Newport, R.I. It covered the measured mile numerous times -- with and against the tide -- and averaged faster than 9 knots, quite a bit quicker than the Navy requires. It covered each mile in about 6 minutes, more or less -- while submerged. The other submarine in the test, the Lake, suffered a leak in a torpedo tube and could not participate.

May 8, 1907 (Wednesday)

WIDELY KNOWN SOLDIER OF FORTUNE FADES AWAY: Henry MacIver, most recently a major general in the Servian army, died May 6 in New York City. The notice in today's Washington Post said he died with 46 CENTS to his name. That's about 2.5 cents for EACH of the 18 FLAGS he fought under during his long soldier-for-hire career. He was 61. He fought in Crete, Egypt, Spain, Cuba and Bosnia -- all BEFORE taking up arms for the Confederate States of America as a TEENAGER. After the Civil War he went on to fight in Mexico and numerous other places. He was expecting to travel to Washington but he lingered in New York for a few days in order to meet journalist Richard Harding Davis, who included MacIver in his book "Soldiers of Fortune". Evidently, Davis got most of his material for his "Captain Macklin" book from MacIver.

May 7, 1905 (Tuesday)

FOOTBALL STAR RETURNS FROM HONDURAS FIGHTING: John Poe, one of the famous football-playing Poe brothers at Princeton University, has burst onto the front page of today's New York Times. The word out of San Francisco is that Poe has returned to that city about spending about a month FIGHTING for HONDURAS in its war against Nicaragua. Poe, who spent some time in the U.S. Army, was a captain in the Honduras army and was paid about $2 a day. He missed much of the fighting but, according to the paper, was on hand for the siege of Amapola and was in charge of "an old gun" at Fort Buenavista.
Poe is reportedly on his way back to the mining camps in California. He ended up dying during World War I, as a member of Black Watch, the widely known Scottish regiment. For a peek at his life, go here.

DR. and MRS. WORKMAN RETURN FROM ROOF OF THE WORLD: Dr. William Hunter Workman and Mrs. Fanny Bullock Workman (right) (from Worcester, Mass.) have reported from Paris some of their remarkable explorations in the Himalayas. Dr. Workman told a reporter in Paris that he climbed the Chogolungma glacier as high as 23,304 feet. He added that his wife climbed a peak that was taller than 23,000 feet. I think Dr. Workman was talking about the mountain generally known as Everest, when he said:
The highest peak of the range seemed beyond the possibility of attainment, as on all sides it was nearly perpendicular, so we ascended the second highest.

May 6, 1907 (Monday)

"OLD IRONSIDES" IS EXPECTED TO BE DONE SOON: Observers of the work being done on the U.S.S. Constitution ("Old Ironsides") (shown at right with, I think, a barracks of some sort that sat for a time on the deck of the ship) are encouraged by the progress of the restoration, according to today's New York Times. The first mast was put in on Wednesday. It has a huge semi-circular top, which has an area "big enough for a Southern family's dining room," according to the paper. Lots of the original wood of the ship has long been missing, according to the article. Since news of the restoration project surfaced, the government and other organizations such as the Daughters of the Revolution, have fielded offers from around the country of snuff boxes, canes and other material made from the original wood.

IBSEN MANUSCRIPTS SURFACE: Manuscripts of Henrik Ibsen (left), who died last May, has been found. Among the works is an epic poem that's about 20,000 words long. The ideas are said to be woven into his later works, including the drama "Brand". Evidently, when Ibsen left Rome in 1864, he left two bags of manuscripts at the Scandinavian Association of Rome. They shelved, forgotten and, eventually, sold as trash. When Ibsen returned to the city, he could not find the bags and presumed they were lost. A Dane recovered them and brought them back to Denmark. Now, they have surfaced, and a history of the manuscripts is expected to appear soon.

May 5, 1907 (Sunday)

MEMBERS OF THE "FAIR SEX" MAKE A PLAY FOR FARES IN CHICAGO: For the first time ever, the city of Chicago has issued a license to a woman. The recipient is Mollie Mack. She will have a regular pick-up spot at that city's Colonial Theater (shown at right, in 1909). That used to be the Iroquois Theater, scene of a disastrous fire in 1903, killing 600 people. It so happens that right after she secured her license, 20-year-old Celia Pandell picked up three licenses -- one for her and two for two other women whom she expects to employ.

THIS SEARCH FOR A LOST DIAMOND SENDS SEARCHERS DIGGING -- INSIDE A MAN'S BODY: About a month ago, a man named Tomas Radius got sick with appendicitis, according to a report that looks like its from the St. Louis Republic's correspondent from Le Seuer, Minn. One of the physicians who worked on the operation was Dr. V.X. Pereneas of New York. After the body was closed, Pereneas realized that he had LOST A DIAMOND WORTH $3,000 INSIDE THE BODY of the patient. An X-Ray showed the stone -- a family heriloom -- was, indeed in the body. The doctor offered to pay the patient $100 plus a small fee for discomfort and pain. Radius, who's never had a net worth of $50, refused. He held out for $2,000 and GOT IT. According to the article, printed in today's Washington Post, Radius invested the money in "a nice little tract of land with a house on it."

KAISER'S CLOCK DRAWS ATTENTION: Today's Post includes a notice about a fancy "speaking clock" that's reportedly used by Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. It's known as a "phonograph clock" and was made by someone in Geneva. The clock evidently reminds him of appointments and other engagements. It records his voice -- saying, for example, "Your majesty, now is the time to call the carriage to go the Chancellor von Buelow's" -- and plays it back at the appropriate time.
If he still has it in 1914, he can record something to remind himself, "Your majesty, now is the time to INVADE FRANCE!"