Oct. 27, 1909

WHAT ABOUT MR. LODGE? Last night's (2009) debate brought together four Democrats vying to replace the late Edward Kennedy in the U.S. Senate. The moderator mentioned that the seat at stake has been occupied by a number of famous Senators. He listed four of them: Ed Kennedy, Jack Kennedy, Daniel Webster and John Quincy Adams. That listing failed to mention other seat-occupiers, who are less famous. Fortunately, the whole list is available. The U.S. Senate web site calls it the state's Class 1 seat. So, who was there 100 years ago? Henry Cabot Lodge (shown above in 1916). He served in the so-called Kennedy seat from 1893 to 1924. Not surprising that his name wasn't mentioned. He served for 31 years, second only in longevity to Ed Kennedy. Lodge was, of course, a Republican and therefore was not worthy of mention. But party names really shouldn't have mattered. After all, the 19th-century Senators mentioned were a Whig (Webster) and a Democratic-Republican (Adams).
[For what it's worth, longevity is not necessarily a distinctive feature of the Class 1 seat. Consider the narrow gap between Daniel Webster and Charles Sumner. Webster resigned in 1850 (after 25 years); Sumner took over in 1851 and served for 23 years. Two kept the seat warm between Webster and Sumner, each serving considerably less than a year: Robert Winthrop, who sat from July 30, 1850 to Feb. 1, 1851, and Robert Rantoul Jr., who served from Feb. 1 to March 3. Winthrop is an ancestor of the other Massachusetts senator, John Kerry, who sits in the state's Class 2 seat.]

HESTIA WRECKS OFF THE COAST OF MAINE: The front page of today's Globe reports tragic wreck of the Hestia, of the Donaldson Line. The story says 34 probably drowned and the paper tells a sad tale. The ship was way off course, in its passage from Glasgow to St. Johns. In a fierce storm, the ship hit Proprietors Ledge near Manan Island in the Bay of Fundy (above). The Globe's tale has some harrowing paragraphs, especially those that describe the dying of one of our Scotch boys. Here's an example:
"The [life]boat capsized and the boys and men of the crew were thrown into the water. The boat soon righted and one of the boys was seen clinging to the bottom, holding on with the grasp born of fear of death, but without strength to make other effort. Again the boat was capsized, and disappeared."
The site is visited by divers a century later.