#election 1896

[alaksandus]

William Jennings Bryan Saves America!

If anyone could tell, I'm a big fan of alt-hist and a big modern history nerd. So, that means I love simulators! This one, New Campaign Trail, lets you run through different campaign scenarios. I've always found figures like William Jennings Bryan to by fascinating in their continuous attempts to get elected, so I gave it a run (on easy mode admittedly...) and I swept the nation on Free Silver, a moderate approach to tariffs, and a pro-labor campaign.

[mapsontheweb]

1896/1900 US Presidential Election Swing by County

[deadpresidents]

I think Bryan was actually a Democratic nominee, not Republican.

Yes, thanks for catching that so I could fix it! William Jennings Bryan was indeed the Democratic Presidential nominee in 1896, 1900, and 1908 and lost all three races (twice to William McKinley and the third time to William Howard Taft). Bryan's brother, Charles W. Bryan -- who was Governor of Nebraska at the time -- was also nominated by the Democrats as their 1924 Vice Presidential nominee on the ticket with John W. Davis. (He also lost.)

[atomicmonkey1122]

Maybe I'm going into conspiracy territory but fuck it what have i got to lose now?

My real question is. What the hell happened? In 2020 Biden had 81 million votes to Trump's 74 million. This year Kamala's sitting at 66 million to Trump's 71 million.

So what the hell happened to the record number of single day voter registrations a while back? What happened to Kamala's record number of small donations? Why are strongly historically blue counties swinging so far the other way? (Starr County in Texas was blue every election since fucking 1896 but is red this year). I know the internet doesn't reflect real life but it really felt like the energy for Harris was way higher than for Hillary or Biden. So where did that go?

Were there really 15 million people who voted for Biden that decided they're single-issue-Palestine voters? That seems rather high.

I can't help but feel like something is fishy here. Trump established that its totally normal to launch investigations and sue a bunch of places when losing maybe Harris should try some of that idk

[omgthatdress]

In the immense social upheaval following World War I, Berlin emerged as the global hub for gay life and gay art. In 1921, Berlin was home to 40 documented meeting places for gay people. By 1925, that number had jumped to 80.

Cheif among these hotspots was the cabaret Eldorado, whose drag pageants and performances were immortalized by the likes of artists such as Otto Dix. In 2023, Netflix released a documentary about the club, Eldorado: Everything the Nazis Hate.

At the center of the movement for gay rights was Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld and his Institut für Sexualwissenschaft.

Ins 1896 Hirschfeld was operating as a regular physician, when he received a note from a soldier who was engaged to be married. The soldier was suicidally depressed because he could not get over his attraction to men, and was desperate to be cured of it. Being gay himself, Hirschfeld related tremendously to the soldier, and was spurred begin studying homosexuality in a scientific manner.

He was led to the conclusion that homosexuality was a natural occurrence that happened the world over. More importantly, he argued that homosexuality was not immoral and that homosexuals should be free to live and love as they pleased.

Hirschfeld was also the first scientist to recognize and study what we'd call transgenderism today, and was the person who coined the term "transvestite."

(Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, 2nd from right)

Das Institut acted as both a medical clinic and a center of education. Members of the public could come and be informed on the mechanics of how sex worked as well as receiving non-judgemental medical care for STIs and other sexual conditions. Women could receive information about safe abortion. It was also one of the first places where trans people could come and receive hormone treatment and information about gender-reassignment surgery.

Then, in 1933, with the appointment of Adolf Hitler as chancellor, everything changed.

Queer lives were officially deemed not worth living, and public queer places became the chief target of Nazi persecution. The voluminous libraries of Das Institut were raided and then burned, destroying so much early queer history and science that was irreplaceable.

Dr. Hirschfeld managed to escape Germany and died in France in 1935. Queer people who were not lucky enough to leave to the country were arrested and sent to die in concentration camps.

The lessons of Weimar Berlin are painfully pertinent today. Progress can be destroyed faster than it gets made. Rights are not guaranteed and must always be fought for. The past cannot be allowed to happen again.

By which I mean, for the love of all that is holy, if you want to continue to have any rights at all, pleasepleaseplease vote for Joe Biden on November 5th. Don't not vote in protest. Don't vote 3rd party. If Donald Trump is re-elected this WILL happen again. Just imagine your favorite local queer hang-out being shut down with "Make America Great Again" signs in the window, and vote to stop it.

[lillipad72]

Gilbert Blythe - A Journey from Liberal to Conservative

What has always confused me when reading Anne of Green Gables and the subsequent books is why Gilbert Blythe went from a liberal 'grit' to a conservative 'tory.' So, I wanted to look into what could have inspired his change in opinions.

So our first mention of Gilbert's politics comes from about halfway through Anne of Green Gables:

"What way do you vote, Matthew?” “Conservative,” said Matthew promptly. To vote Conservative was part of Matthew’s religion. “Then I’m Conservative too,” said Anne decidedly. “I’m glad because Gil—because some of the boys in school are Grits.

Doing some quick math (and using the timeline that matches up with the 1896 election), we will find this statement was made around 1880, with Anne being about 12 and Gilbert 14. This puts a damper on my wondering because if Gilbert was a Liberal at age 14, he probably only was because his parents were, and changing political views is not uncommon as one grows up. But I will continue my investigation!

So when did things change?

Well, it happened most definitely before 1896 when in Anne's House of Dreams:

"The Island, as well as all Canada, was in the throes of a campaign proceeding a general election. Gilbert, who was an ardent Conservative, found himself caught in the vortex, being much in demand for speechmaking at the various county rallies."

(why we know it is 1896, and why the timeline is inconsistent in the series I recommend this post.)

So Gilbert is not only a conservative. By now, we know he is a well-known conservative in the area! Obviously, his political leanings changed before this point.

Backtrack to the 1891 Election: The main issue of the election was the idea of tariffs or free trade. The incumbent prime minister John Macdonald, a Conservative, was running on his National Policy (more on that soon), which had a lot to do with protective tariffs while the Liberals supported free trade with the United States. While I do think Gilbert's change to being a Conservative has to do with the National Policy I believe it probably would have occurred before this because the Conservative party had a rough year in 1891 and was thrown into chaos so it would be odd for Gilbert to become one at this time.

The National Policy, implemented by John Macdonald in 1879 was extremely popular. It included policies that would strengthen Canadian businesses against the very popular American ones, creating high tariffs. It even completed the national railway!

Overall, I expect that Gilbert became a Conservative during his university years (shocking, I know) because this perfectly aligns with the National Policy's success.

Of course, this is all speculation, and my answer was quite underwhelming. Even for myself, I did have fun researching what exactly drew people to be a Conservative during this time.

So for all you folks disappointed about Gilbert and Anne being conservatives this is a quick snapshot of what that meant during the later 19th century in Canada!

[the-moral-of-the-rose]

Rilla of Ingleside created a new timeline...

Anne's House of Dreams mentioned a historical event - a federal election: “Mistress Blythe, the Liberals are in with a sweeping majority. After eighteen years of Tory mismanagement this down-trodden country is going to have a chance at last.” (AHoD).

From Wikipedia: "The 1896 Canadian federal election was held on June 23, 1896, to elect members of the House of Commons of Canada of the 8th Parliament of Canada. Though the Conservative Party, led by Prime Minister Charles Tupper, won a plurality of the popular vote, the Liberal Party, led by Wilfrid Laurier, won the majority of seats to form the next government. The election ended 18 years of Conservative rule."

It wouldn't be surprsing, but... it was also the year in which Jem Blythe was born! The election took place few weeks after his birth: "When Anne came downstairs again, the Island, as well as all Canada, was in the throes of a campaign preceding a general election." (AHoD).

So... according to this timeline, Walter was born a year later (1897), then the twins (1899), Shirley (1901) and Rilla (1903).

The point is... at the outbreak of the war, Walter would have been only 17 years old, the twins 15, Shirley 13, Rilla 11...

Shirley would have been too young to participate in the war and Walter would have barely turned nineteen at the time of the Battle of Flers-Courcelette in September of 1916...

Someone in one of my older posts noticed that puff sleeves fashion suggested that Anne of Green Gables took place in 1880s rather than 1870s... so it would make sense!

I wonder why Montgomery chose Rilla as her teenage heroine (according to the original chronology, Rilla should have been only 11 years old), while there were 15-year-old twins...

Can you imagine Nan and Di as the main characters of the war book? Two young girls at Queen's, trying to come to terms with rapidly changing world? Rilla and Shirley at Ingleside, growing closer in such trying times? Teenage boys - Jem and Walter - who had to choose if they wanted to sacrifice their life at even younger age - at eighteen? Walter, never reaching the age of twenty (or maybe - dare I hope - coming back home safely)? Anne and Gilbert in their 40s, trying to collect all the broken pieces that was once their family?

It would have been equally good, in my opinion. I wonder... why Montgomery felt she had to suddenly change a whole chronology?

Side note: of course, I love Rilla of Ingleside. But I am just curious... (Nan and Di of Ingleside would be a good book, too!).

@diario-de-gilbert-blythe @gogandmagog @pinkenamelheart @valancystirling48

[mimi-0007]

Henry Ossawa Tanner (June 21, 1859 – May 25, 1937) was an American artist who spent much of his career in France. He became the first African-American painter to gain international acclaim.[1] Tanner moved to Paris, France, in 1891 to study at the Académie Julian and gained acclaim in French artistic circles. His painting Daniel in the Lions' Den (1895, location unknown) was accepted into the 1896 Salon, the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Tanner's Resurrection of Lazarus (1896, Musée d'Orsay, Paris) was purchased by the French government after winning the third-place medal at the 1897 Salon. In 1923, the French government elected Tanner chevalier of the Legion of Honor.

[tanadrin]

A challenge: which unimportant US presidential election would you go back in time to change the outcome of? You can't name any of the top 20 genuinely history-defining elections; it has to be a relatively forgotten one.

It's sort of a contradiction, right? Like by definition elections that have outcomes interesting enough to change are excluded. Some elections which might feel like trivia to most people, like the 1876 one that ended Reconstruction, would probably still be rated as pretty highly consequential by historians. Elections like the 2000 election, which didn't seem like it would be extremely consequential at the time, are now widely agreed to be hugely consequential. And it's hard to know how very recent elections, which are important to us, might go down in history.

I am also assuming I only get to pick between the actual major-party nominees--that I don't get to fiddle with the nomination process at all, and very minor candidates don't have a shot. So depending on how you define the "top 20 most consequential elections" I might pick (besides 2000 and 1876)

1912, because Woodrow Wilson was a phenomenally racist son of a bitch (but this might be too close to World War I to not be "history-defining"), and a third-party win by Roosevelt would be fun.

1920, because Warren G. Harding was just a really bad president

1900 or 1896, because William Jennings Bryan winning would be a fun alternate history scenario

1824, because Andrew Jackson was also a huge asshole

1988, because I like Dukakis better, and to reduce the political weight of the Bush family name

1984, because I dislike Reagan, and it would be a huge upset (fun!)

1980, because again fuck Reagan, and I like Jimmy Carter (even though objectively he was not a terribly effective president)

1968, because Richard Nixon was kind of a disaster for how we think about the American presidency

1952, because Adlai Stevenson seems fun, and somewhat less of a paranoid anti-communist that most Republicans (including Eisenhower) at the time.

[lego-man-speer]

Nuremberg Defendants: Part 5, Wilhelm Frick - Reich Minister of the Interior

This is the next part of my Nuremberg Defendants series. Click the names below to see previous parts + the post I already made on Rudolf Hess

Rudolf Hess

Alfred Rosenberg

Joachim von Ribbentrop

Baldur von Schirach

Julius Streicher

-Wilhelm Frick was born on the 12th of March in 1877. He was the youngest of four children of Wilhelm Frick Snr, who was a Protestant teacher. He was born in Alsenz.

-He graduated from the Kaiserslautern Gymnasium in 1896, and went on to study Philology at the University of Munich. Early on he would change his studies to Law and transferred to the University of Berlin. In 1901 he received his doctorate in law and from 1903 he started working as an attorney at the Munich Police Department.

-Frick married his first wife, Elisabetha Emilie Nagel in 1910. Their marriage produced two sons and a daughter before ending in an ugly divorce in 1934. He remarried a few weeks later to Margarete Schutze Naumberg (the former wife of a Reichstag MP). Their marriage produced a son and a daughter and lasted until Frick's death.

-Frick did not serve in WW1 because he was deemed unfit. After the war he was put in charge of the political police as a district officer. In his role he had sympathies for the far-right extremists. On one occasion, Frick helped a Freikorps member, who had committed murder, to escape by issuing him a false passport.

-Frick was introduced to Hitler in 1919 by the Chief of Police, Ernst Pöhner. He willingly helped Hitler obtain permission to hold rallies and demonstrations.

-In 1923 he became a senior officer and head of the security service of the Munich Criminal Investigation Department. Frick later participated in the 1923 Munich Putsch. Had the Putsch succeeded, Frick was to become the new police chief. During the Putsch he remained in the police headquarters and ensured that the state police and the representative of the police president were not alerted immediately. After the Putsch, Frick was arrested and tried for aiding and abetting high treason. After several months in police custody, Frick was given a suspended sentence of 15 months imprisonment and was dismissed from his police job. During the disciplinary proceedings the dismissal was revoked after being declared unfair on the basis that his treasonous intent had not been proven.

-Frick was elected as a member of the Reichstag in 1924. He had been nominated by the National Socialist Freedom Movement. His speeches in the Reichstag were characterised by his radical anti-semitism and racism, as well as abuse and insults at his political opponents. He officially joined the NSDAP in 1925 after the ban on the party was lifted.

-In 1929 the NSDAP joined in a coalition government for the state of Thüringia. The party received the state ministries of the interior and education. In January 1930 Frick was appointed to these ministries - becoming the first Nazi to hold a ministerial post at any level in Germany. Frick used his position to dismiss communist and social democratic officials and replace them with NSDAP members. As minister he also used his power to make Hitler a German citizen (or else he could not stand for Reich Presidency in Germany). He also used his power to appoint Nazi race theoretician, Dr Günther, as professor at the University of Jena as well as the compulsory introduction of Nazi prayers in schools. Due to the character of these prayers, three out of the five introduced were declared unconstitutional by the German Constitutional Court in July 1930. Frick was removed from his office in April 1931 after a motion of no confidence by the SPD.

-In 1933 Frick was made Minister of the Interior, shortly after Hitler's appointment as Chancellor. Along with Göring, Frick was one of the two Nazi ministers in the original Hitler cabinet and the only one to serve with a portfolio (Göring originally served without one). In October that same year he was appointed a Reichsleiter (the second highest political rank in the party). In 1934 he replaced Göring as Prussian Minister of the Interior thus giving him control of the police in Prussia.

-As a result of the Reichstag Fire Decree 1933 and the Enabling Act 1933, Frick's power increased tremendously. These acts would pave the way for dictatorship by abolishing numerous constitutional protections (including the right to free speech and freedom of the press).

-Frick was responsible for drafting up numerous laws to consolidate the Nazi regime. For example the 14th July 1933 Law Against the Formation of Parties - making the NSDAP the only legal party in Germany. Frick was also responsible for drawing up anti-semitic laws such as the law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service. The law forbade Jews, political opponents and non-Aryans from holding positions as teachers, judges or government positions. He also drafted the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour. (These became known as the Nuremberg Laws).

-In July 1933 Frick implemented the Law for the Prevention of Hereditary Diseased Offspring, which included forced sterilisations. This would later lead to the T4 exterminations. During the Second World War Frick was made aware that mentally disabled, sick and aged people (which the Nazis deemed as “the useless eaters”) were being put to death, but did nothing to intervene. An estimated 200,000+ (under Frick's jurisdiction) were systematically murdered.

-Frick took an active role in Germany's rearmament, in opposition to the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. He drafted laws introducing military conscription and extending the Wehrmacht service law to the annexed Austria (after the Anschluss in 1938) and to the Sudetenland. He introduced German law, the Nuremberg laws and the military service law to Austria. He further established the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

-Frick's power began to decline around the late 1930s during a power struggle with Himmler, who wanted control of the German police force. In one example of the struggle for power, Frick tried to restrict the widespread use of protective custody laws in 1933, only to be convinced not to by Himmler. In 1936 Hitler named Himmler the chief of German police which effectively united the police with Himmler's SS. In August 1943 Himmler replaced Frick as Minister of the Interior. Frick however remained in Hitler's cabinet as a minister without portfolio.

-After being replaced as Minister of the Interior, Frick was appointed the Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, making him Hitler's representative in the Czech lands. This role was merely a representative one and Frick had no real power. Instead the power lay with his superior Karl Hermann Frank. However, Frick did take a general responsibility of the oppression in Bohemia and Moravia, for example terrorism of the population; slave labour and the deportation of Jews to concentration camps. Of the 82,309 Jews deported from the protectorate, around 71,000 were killed in the Holocaust. The occupation authorities and their collaborators killed another 7,000.

-Frick was indicted at the Nuremberg Trials on all four counts. Frick was the only other defendant besides Rudolf Hess who refused to testify on his own behalf. Frick was absolutely certain that he would be sentenced to death, therefore he chose not to bother, however he did state “Hitler didn't want to do things my way. I wanted things to be dine legally. After all, I am a lawyer.” He was found to have an IQ of 124 (just about below average of the other defendants). As a prisoner, a former guard described him as someone who was always willing to talk.

-At Nuremberg he was described as one of the architects of the Holocaust. From 1933 onwards he used his power to fulfil the threats he made to his opponents in the Reichstag in 1932: “Don't worry, when we are in power we shall put all of you guys in concentration camps.” Frick's ministry was the highest controlling authority of the concentration camps and Frick personally inspected them. Frick also took an interest into the experimentation on prisoners inside the camps, such as forcing malaria onto heathy prisoners and the air pressure and freezing experiments.

-Frick was unrepentant in his final statement and was found innocent on count 1 of the indictment, but was found guilty on the other three charges brought against him. He was sentenced to death by hanging.

-Frick was executed on the 16th of October 1946, aged 69. It is believed that the executions were deliberately botched so that the convicted Nazis suffered ling and agonising deaths. One of these botchings included the size of the gallows trap door, which was too small, thus leading to some defendants (including Frick) to hit their heads as they dropped, making them suffer head injuries (and this is quite evident in Frick's post-execution photo, which can be found on wikipedia). On his way to the gallows he seemed the least steady of any of the condemned and stumbled on the gallows steps. His last words were “Long live eternal Germany.” He died 12 minutes after the initial drop.

OBLIGATORY MENTION: This post is purely educational and is in no way supportive of any right-wing ideologies

[sourcreammachine]

presidents of the united states if there was a single, non-renewable six-year term:

(based on who’d be most likely to win an election in that year, not spinning any convoluted alternate history)

🔘george washington, 1788-94

🟤john adams sr, 1794-00

🟢thomas jefferson, 1800-06

🟢james madison, 1806-12

🟢elbridge gerry, 1812-14*, died

🟢james monroe, 1814*-18

🟢daniel d tompkins, 1818-24

🟢john adams jr, 1824-30

🔵andrew jackson, 1830-36

🔵martin van buren, 1836-42

🟡henry clay, 1842-48

🟡zachary taylor, 1848-50*, died

🟡millard fillmore, 1850*-54

🔵franklin pierce, 1854-60

🔴abraham lincoln, 1860-65*, killed

🔴hannibal hamlin, 1865*-72

🔴rutherford b hayes, 1872-78

🔴james garfield, 1878-81*, killed

🔴chester arthur, 1881*-84

🔵grover cleveland, 1884-1890

🔴benjamin harrison, 1890-96

🔴william mckinley, 1896-01*, killed

🔴theodore roosevelt, 1901*-08

🔴william taft, 1908-14

🔵woody wilson, 1914-1920

🔴warren harding, 1920-23*, died

🔴calvin coolidge 1923*-26

🔴herbert hoover, 1926-32

🔵frank roosevelt, 1932-38

🔵john ‘cactus jack’ garner, 1938-1944

🔵harry truman, 1944-50

🔴thomas dewey, 1950-56

🔴dwight d eisenhower, 1956-62

🔵john fucking kennedy, 1962-63*, killed

🔵lyndon b johnson, 1963*-68

🔴richard nixon, 1968-74*, resigned

🔴gerald ford, 1974

🔵jimmy carter, 1974-80

🔴ronald reagan, 1980-86

🔴george bush sr, 1986-92

🔵william clinton, 1992-98

🔵al gore, 1998-04

🔴george bush jr, 2004-2010

🔵barack obama, 2010-16

🔴donald tronald, 2016-2022

🔵kamala harris*, 2022-, (based on biden’s 2020 win, not on any 2024 events)

[stephensmithuk]

His Last Bow

Originally titled in full "His Last Bow. The War Service of Sherlock Holmes" and later "His Last Bow: An Epilogue of Sherlock Holmes", this was originally published in 1917.

It is the final story in His Last Bow, the final short story in the canon covered by Letters from Watson and agreed by all the key chronologists to be the final canon appearance of Holmes and Watson.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had openly supported British entry into the First World War in 1914.

The story came about after a visit to the Western Front in 1916; asked by a French general what Holmes was doing, Doyle had responded that he was too old to serve. He then decided to write this story as a means of boosting morale.

To put it mildly, the British public had gone a bit spy-crazy in the lead up to the war; fearing "Teutons serving them croutons" i.e. Germans living in the UK acting as intelligence agents for the Kaiser.

The Riddle of the Sands is one such work of popular literature on this theme, which is the subject of Letters from Carruthers coming in September.

There was also the fantastical works of William Le Queux, who started off with the French and Russians as his enemies before switching to the Germans; he also had his works serialised in the Daily Mail, a British middle-market tabloid that was founded in 1896 and has been happily engaging in right-wing sensationalism since to the point Wikipedia has banned them as a source. Le Queux for his part believed the Germans were out to get him for exposing their spy networks - he hadn't, they weren't and the Metropolitan Police refused him protection.

The Benz company had produced the first practical motor car in 1885; they of course later merged with Daimler to become Mercedez-Benz. I cannot find a 100hp example of their vehicles.

The German Chancellor in 1914, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, was a moderate, who reluctantly went along with many German policies like unrestricted submarine warfare and tried to initiate peace proposals on a number of occasions in the war before being ousted in 1917.

Flushing is the historical English name for the Dutch port of Vlissingen; it had a ferry connection to Sheerness until 1994.

At the outbreak of war, diplomats on both sides were allowed to return home unmolested, after locking down their embassies and burning anything sensitive they could not take with them.

Britain, France and Prussia had signed a treaty in 1839 guaranteeing the neutrality and independence of Belgium. The German invasion of the country on 3 August gave the UK justification for war and moved a Cabinet divided over the matter to firm unity.

There was a fear of Irish civil war at this point; the Liberal government, reliant on Irish and Labour support for a Commons majority after the two elections of 1910, had passed legislation creating a devolved government for the island, called Home Rule. This was vehemently opposed by Ulster Protestants and both sides were receiving weapons - from Germany in fact - in preparation for a fight as Whitehall tried to arrange a compromise. The Germans in fact believed the British would be distracted by a civil war, but in fact the Home Rule legislation was suspended for the duration and both militias decided to support the war effort. That stopped things... until the more radicial Irish Republic Brotherhood launched the Easter Rising of 1916.

"Window-breaking Furies" refers to the suffragette movement that sort votes for women, some of who engaged in direct action like breaking windows and also planting bombs or arson, although they made sure the latter was done when the buildings were empty to avoid killing anyone. These tactics were as controversial at the time as the tactics of modern-day groups like Just Stop Oil. When the war broke out, the suffragettes stopped their militant actions and supported the war effort; their imprisoned members being released as part of an amnesty.

John Bull is a national personification of the UK, typically a stout middle-aged man in a Union Jack waistcoast, frequently seen in cartoons at this time. He rather fell out of popular use post-war and is rarely seen today, unlike Britannia, who remains a widely used figure.

The Rosyth Dockyard was built from 1909 for refitting Royal Navy ships and submarines; although now privatised, it retains that role and is currently building the five Type 31 frigates.

Carlton Terrace was the home of the German Embassy until 1945; after the war, the property and its contents were sold off at auction. The Federal Republic of Germany set up at Belgrave Square in 1951 and remains there to this day.

Junkers were the land-owning aristocracy of Prussia, who exercised considerable political power up until 1945, at which point most of their holdings ended up in the USSR, Poland or what became East Germany. The land was broken up, usually ending up in collective farms; accused of war crimes, those Junkers who ended up in Soviet hands frequently ended up in NKVD camps or even executed. Their descendants did not get them back after reunification.

The King's English is another name for Received Pronunciation, the "standard" dialect and accent of British English.

Tokay or Tokaji is a sweet wine from the Tokaj regions of Hungary and Slovakia, the designation being protected under EU law in a similar way to Champagne. Imperial Tokay, which was the highest quality Tokaji Essencia, was reserved for the Austrian imperial cellars, often being passed to other European monarchs as gifts. This stuff is still drinkable after over 200 years and even the relatively new stuff isn't cheap.

A naval flotilla would be based at Harwich in both World Wars.

The reference to Holmes being sixty here is where the common estimate of 1854 being his birth year comes from.

Portland is a prison and young offenders' institution in Dorset. Notable past inmates include George Edalji (whose miscarriage of justice was exposed by Doyle), John Babbacombe Lee ("The Man They Couldn't Hang") and the controversial comedian Roy "Chubby" Brown.

Fratton is an area of Portsmouth.

In reality, the Home Section of the Secret Service Bureau, later MI5, had managed to identify the key German agents by monitoring their postal correspondence. The police then rounded them up in August 1914 and once the cross-sea cables were cut, contact with any agents in the UK became close to impossible. Little intelligence of any use came from them in any event; the Germans seem to have not even been aware of the British Expeditionary Force being sent to France, which was hardly a small event. Gustav Steinhauer, head of German naval intelligence's British section, got subjected to a rant about his agency's incompetence from the Kaiser that lasted the better part of two hours.

Twelve German spies would be executed during the war, eleven by firing squad at the Tower of London, which hosted its final execution (also of a spy) in 1941.

Skibbareen is a town in County Cork, now in Ireland.

The final speech by Holmes at the end also featured in the 1942 Basil Rathbone film Sherlock Holmes and the Voice of Terror, based on this story.

So Holmes and Watson drive off into the sunset. What happened to them after that? All we know is that both survived the war and at some point Dr Watson stopped writing about his dear friend. They deserve to have had a long retirement.

I will be doing these for the individual chapters of the novels next year; I have already done ones for the first two chapters of A Study in Scarlet that I will repost.

[mapsontheweb]

1896 US Presidential Election between William McKinley (R) and William Jennings Bryan (D)

[deadpresidents]

How many presidential rematches have there been?

When it comes to the major candidates in a general election, this year's election will be the ninth rematch:

•John Adams vs. Thomas Jefferson: 1796 & 1800

•John Quincy Adams vs. Andrew Jackson: 1824 & 1828 (William H. Crawford and Henry Clay were also candidates in 1824)

•Andrew Jackson vs. Henry Clay: 1824 & 1832 (John Quincy Adams and William H. Crawford were also candidates in 1824; John Floyd and William Wirt were also candidates in 1832)

•Martin Van Buren vs. William Henry Harrison: 1836 & 1840 (Hugh L. White, Daniel Webster, and Willie P. Mangum were also candidates in 1836)

•Grover Cleveland vs. Benjamin Harrison: 1888 & 1892 (James B. Weaver was also a candidate in 1892)

•William McKinley vs. William Jennings Bryan: 1896 & 1900

•Dwight D. Eisenhower vs. Adlai E. Stevenson: 1952 & 1956

•Bill Clinton vs. Ross Perot: 1992 & 1996 (George H.W. Bush was also a candidate in 1992; Bob Dole was also a candidate in 1996)

•Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump: 2020 & 2024

[warsofasoiaf]

What is your opinion on the SCOTUS ruling about Colorado keeping Trump off the ballot? And follow up question, do you think this will be the most polarizing election of the US?

I believe historians believe that the election of 1896 was the most polarized the United States has ever been. Certainly it'll be as polarizing or even more so than 2000.

It was the right call for SCOTUS. Notably, the decision mentioned that "We conclude that States may disqualify persons holding or attempting to hold state office. But States have no power under the Constitution to enforce Section 3 with respect to federal offices, especially the Presidency." The decision also states that Congress is supposed to have the power to enforce the 14th Amendment. The decision also states that there are lots of practical problems that could happen by causing states to bar candidates from federal office. Five of nine said "Congress has to bar candidates" and three said that a Federal court could do it. One refused to elaborate.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

[noelcollection]

An American Voice

Since the events of 2020, we have attempted to be more active and reach out to LSU Shreveport campus. This action of outreach is meant to help student, faculty, and campus personnel be aware of a rare and unique resource that is available to them, and any visiting persons to the campus. We have just started our 2024 J.S. Noel Collection Pop-up Exhibits, we aim to highlight a vary small section of the James Smith Noel Collection that might interest various research. This time we focused on one person, Paul Laurence Dunbar.

Paul Laurence Dunbar was born in June in 1872 after the United States’ Civil War, his parents were former slaves. He was born and raised in Dayton, Ohio; and started writing from a young age. He wrote is first poem at the age of 6 and read it aloud at the age of nine for a local church congregation, “An Easter Ode.” Dunbar was 16 when he published two poems in the Dayton’s newspaper The Herald; “Our Martyred Soldiers” and “On the River” in 1888. A few years later he would write and edit Dayton’s first weekly African-American newspaper, The Tattler. Paul L. Dunbar worked with two brothers that were his high-school acquaintances to print the paper that lasted six weeks. Those brothers were Wilbur and Orville Wright, the fathers of American aviation. Dunbar was the only African-American student at Central High School in Dayton.

Dunbar’s parents had been slaves in Kentucky, following the emancipation, his mother moved to Ohio, and his father escaped before the Civil War ended. Joshua Dunbar went to Massachusetts and volunteered with the 55th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment. His parents, Matilda and Joshua, were married on Christmas Eve and Paul L. Dunbar arrived six months later. His parents had a troubled union, they separated after the birth on Paul’s sister; but his father would pass away in August in 1885 when Paul was only 13 years old. His mother played a key role in his education, she hoped her son would become a minister. He was elected president of his high school’s literary society which lead to him to become editor of the school newspaper and debate club member.

Paul Laurence Dunbar finished school in 1891 and took a job as an elevator operator to earn money for college where he hoped to study law. Dunbar had continued to write and soon a collection of poems he wanted to publish. He revisited the Wright brothers, but they no longer had a printing faculty and lead his to the United Brethren Publishing House in 1893. Oak and Ivy was soon published and he busied himself selling copies as he operated the elevator. The book contained two sections, Oak with its traditional verse; and Ivy was written in dialect.

His literary talents were recognized and Attorney Charles A. Thatcher offered to pay for college; however, his interest in law had shift to his writing. Dunbar had been encouraged by the sell of his poetry, and Thatcher helped by arranging for Dunbar to do readings in a nearby city. Psychiatrist Henry A. Tobey also took an interest and assisted in distributing Dunbar’s first book. The two contained to support Dunbar through the publication of his second collection of verse, Major and Minors, in 1896. While he was consistent at publishing, he was a reckless spender resulting in debt. He was a traditional struggling artist as he tried to support himself and his mother.

There was hope in the summer of 1896 when his second book received a positive review in Harper’s Weekly, William Dean Howells brought national attention to his poems; calling them “honest thinking and true feeling” and praising his dialectic poems. There was a growing appreciation for folk culture and black dialect. His popular works were written in the “Negro dialect” that is commonly associated with the antebellum South; though he also wrote in the Midwestern dialect that he grew-up hearing. Dunbar would write in various styles, including conversational English in poetry and novels. He is considered to be the first important African American sonnet writer. His use of the “Black dialect” in writing has been criticized as pan-handling to readers.

Dunbar was a diverse writer, he experimented with poetry, short stories, novels, plays, and a musical. He even ventured beyond the lens of the lives of African Americans and attempted to explore the struggles of a white minister. The Uncalled, Dunbar’s first novel, held similar names and themes of Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and was not well favored. It was with his venture into novel writing that he dared to cross the “color line” with his first novel which focused solely on white society. He continued to try to capture white culture but the critics found them lacking.

He moved past novel writing and began to work with two composers, Dunbar wrote the lyrics for the first musical that would be preformed by an all African-American cast on Broadway; In Dahomey. Beyond his writing career, Dunbar was also active the early civil rights movements happening in 1897. He married after a trip to the United Kingdom in 1898, Alice Ruth Moore was also a poet and teacher from New Orleans. She also published a collection of short stories, and they wrote companion poems together. There was a play in 2001 based on their relationship.

Dunbar had taken a traditional job with the Library of Congress in D.C. and with his wife in tow they moved there. However, with his wife’s urging, he left his job to focus on his writings and his public readings. This also allowed him to attend Howard University for a time. However, he was diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1900 and his doctors suggested that drinking whisky would alleviate the symptoms. They also moved to the cold dry mountains of Colorado for his health. This resulted in trouble in Paul and Alice’s marriage, they separated in 1902 but never formally divorced.

Dunbar returned to his hometown of Dayton, Ohio in 1904 to be with his mother, his health continued to decline and depression consumed his mind. Paul Laurence Dunbar died from tuberculosis at age 33 on February 9, 1906 and was interred in Dayton.

Dunbar did not become one of the forgotten poets of literature, his use of dialect in his poetry allowed for his works to remain relevant and important in poetic criticism. We of the James Smith Noel Collection at LSU Shreveport are proud to retain and maintain a small collection of his works and show case their importance.