Dec. 30, 1908 (Wednesday)

QUAKE NEWS FROM ITALY RATTLES BOSTON: Slowly, a picture of utter devastation emerges from news reports of Monday's earthquake in Southern Italy. The death toll and damage is massive. Today's Globe devoted two full pages to the disaster. One article ran under the headline: "Deep Gloom in Boston." Here's the way the Globe described how the news was received, pointing out two seeming contradictory stereotypes -- "stolid indifference" and "impetuous nature":
Down in the North End the news of the earthquake was received with the stolid indifference characteristic of the Italian race early yesterday, but when the enormity of the disaster was realized in the afternoon and early evening, the impetuous nature of the Italian became evident, and animated groups stood on the street corners or congregated in restaurants, cafes and saloons and discussed the misfortune in all its phases.
The article added that at least 10,000 Sicilians live in Boston; of that number, about 2,000 have roots in Messina, a city that was particularly hard hit.

BROOKLINE WOMAN WEDS MAN JAILED ON CHARGE OF INCITING REVOLUTION IN MEXICO: Today's Globe has a story with a Los Angeles dateline that says Brookline's Elizabeth Trowbridge married Manuel Sarabia (right), a "Mexican revolutionary leader" in Tucson, Ariz., on Dec. 28. The article says,
Miss Trowbridge has taken a deep interest in the cases of the political prisoners and frequently visited them in the jail here [in L.A.]. She declares she will do all she can to aid the man to get justice and see they are treated with the courtesy due political prisoners in civilized countries.
The article has precious little information about Trowbridge. I found a large article in the Fairbanks (Alaska) Daily News-Miner from April 1909 that gives more information about the woman, "one of the fairest of the fair in Boston's social circles." She was a "brilliant student" at Radcliffe. Then, she "plunged into journalism and won immediate recognition." Evidently, she spotted a "five-line news item from Los Angeles relating to our Mexican political prisoners." She left for California to find out why they were in jail. She is quoted in the article as saying, "I had no prejudices either for or against the Mexican Liberals. My interest was purely that of a newspaper woman."
She met Sarabia at the county jail in Los Angeles in May 1908. Love struck:
In the burning words of the young revolutionist, the beautiful Yankee girl, with the blood of revolutionists in her veins, saw the Great Opportunity for which she had been waiting.
The Fairbanks article, which labels her as the "Mexican Joan of Arc," offers, in Trowbridge's words, her mission:
"It is my work, as far as I am able by speech, of pen, to inform my fellow countrymen of two things: First, of the crimes, assault, robbery and false imprisonment that in violation of the laws and the constitution of the United States, are being perpetuated against Mexican Liberals while in this country, and, second of the condition which has made the Liberal party a necessity."



AMERICAN MAGAZINE STARES AT "THE SUN": Today's Globe has this ad from The American Magazine touting an article by Will Irwin about New York's The Sun newspaper, which was run for many years by Charles A. Dana. The advertisement begins with this tale, pointing out a plea for brevity that is often attributed to Dana:
When a reporter grumbled to Charles A. Dana that his story was spoiled by being boiled down, Dana replied that the story of the Crucifixion was told in six hundred words.

BOSTONIANS WANT BARNARD'S "HEWER" TO STAY IN THE CITY:
Some Bostonians have become so smitten by the statue "The Hewer" by sculptor George Grey Barnard that a group has organized a fund-raising drive to raise $20,000 to make Boston a permanent home for the piece, which was displayed in the fall in Copley Square.
Subscriptions will close Jan. 16. A description:
This marble, so simple in the mass, so skilfully elaborated in its details, is apparently but not literally a primeval human chopping wood; it is rather the struggle of man against the forces of nature with the [unreadable word] of their gradual conquest by his intelligence; a suggestive theme, especially in this country.

Dec. 29, 1908 (Tuesday)

HOW IMPORTANT IS FOOTBALL? A YALE TACKLE GETS ENGAGED, AND IT BECOMES A BIG NEWS STORY IN BOSTON: Today's Globe announces that Ralph Kinney, a star tackle on Tom Shevlin's Yale team, is engaged to be married. He was one of Yale's most popular players and he's marrying Annie Averill of Beaumont, Texas. They met at the Yale-Princeton football game in 1905, when Kinney was at the height of his fame. For 18 months recently, he worked in Puerto Rico, managing an orange plantation, at the behest of Louis Linder, proprietor of Mory's in New Haven. After the wedding in Texas in January, he will likely return to Puerto Rico.
In 1903, he was part of the HEAVIEST LINE that Yale had ever put on the field. The average weight was 202 POUNDS per lineman.

GOLF EXPERT WOWS A CROWD IN WEST NEWTON: Noted golf expert Alex Findlay drew a large crowd to the Brae Burn club in Newton in an effort to drum up some interest in the game. He spoke for two hours yesterday evening (twice as long as he was scheduled). There were no quotes from his speech in today's Globe, but clearly it was entertaining. First he showed how to grip and swing the clubs. Then he spoke of the history of the game. Findlay, of Scotland, said he impressed some cowboys in Wyoming with golf:
While he was out there on a cattle ranch a ball was hit a very long distance during a baseball game. The cowboys declared that never had a ball been hit with club so far. Findlay, being a Scotsman, had golf clubs with him, and he sent for them and proceeded to paste some balls a much greater distance than the baseball had been hit.
He could do no more instructing in Wyoming, he said, because "the cowboys were so interested that they ried to hit the bolf balls until all the clubs were broken, except one iron, which had a shaft in it as thick as a man's wrist."
Findlay showed some stereopticon views on methods (with references to Harry Vardon, J.H. Taylor and John Ball among others) and cartoons by George Frost.
Some favorite images were from courses in Ireland. He said the Irish were "the most generous hearted, the kindest and the most sociable people in the world." They would treat visiting golfers from the U.S. well and would likely invite them home to dinner -- "provided they had not forgotten to replace the divots."
He also mentioned a famous drive by golfer May Hazlet (right). At the world championship at Newcastle two years ago she drove a green that was 302 yards from the tee. It was wind-aided and benefited from quite a role, but "will stand as a record," according to the report.
Findlay is considered by some to be the "father of American golf".

Dec. 28, 1908 (Monday)

MASSIVE QUAKE STRIKES SOUTHERN ITALY: Readers of today's Globe (meaning the 7:30 p.m. edition) saw an update of the day's massive earthquake that rocked Southern Italy. The paper put the news in the lead position (right). Details are lacking, but hints of widespread destruction is apparent. Instruments in Washington, D.C., registered that the earth, indeed, shook. One news item said the disturbance was 4,800 miles away. But the instruments could not pinpoint a direction. An earlier report from Washington suspected the disturbance might have been in the Aleutian islands of Alaska. The New York Times today [e.g., Dec. 28, 2008] has a wonderful commentary about the quake: "A Deadly Wave, a Lucky Star" by John Bemelmans Marciano.

WITHOUT SPORTS CENTER, WE'RE STILL WAITING FOR COMPLETE DETAILS FROM LAST MONTH'S DAVIS CUP MATCH IN AUSTRALIA: Tennis fans in Boston aren't holding their breath to get an explanation for the U.S. team's loss to Australia in the Davis Cup finals, which were held Nov. 27-30 in Melbourne.
A story in today's Globe unapologetically says "Time has been too short for any detailed account of the Davis Cup matches at Melbourne to reach America." It adds that "a full month is taken by a letter on its trip around the hemisphere."
It will take a letter, and personal conversations with the team members, to find out "the real reason for [Frederik B.] Alexander's [U.S.] unfortunate downfall in his match with Anthony Wilding [Australia] -- a match on which hung the outcome of the whole contest."
Boston's Beals Wright (now in the International Tennis Hall of Fame) did his part, winning two singles matches in the U.S.'s 3-2 defeat to Australia (or Australasia, as it was sometimes put).
The writer of the piece in today's Globe speculates that Alexander, who lost the pivotal match, might have fallen apart: "We can imagine that the New Yorker had a relapse to his old habit of 'blowing up' at a critical time. The past season he seemed to have left behind that unfortunate tendency to go to pieces when in a tight place... His extremely nervous temperament, which often carries him to great hights [sic] when things are running smoothly or when he has the confidence in his own ability to defeat an opponent, also makes him liable to break under the strain of a match on which much is at stake, especially if his opponent remains cool and refuses to be swept off his feet at the first attack."

Dec. 25, 1908 (Friday)

STILL A GOOD HOLIDAY GIFT! Today's Boston Globe has an illustration of Uncle Sam waking up to a gift of prosperity for 1909. Such a gift is needed a hundred years later, too.