Old Print Articles

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Old Print Article: “The Prize Fight And The Clairvoyant,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1860)

March 4, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Photography, Science/Tech, Sports, Urban Studies | Permalink

"She is positive one of them is killed."

“She is positive one of them is killed.”

In the days before telegraph and Morse code let alone radio, TV and the Internet, reports about events that occurred in Europe wouldn’t reach America for several days. A newspaper in New York came up with a novel (and highly irresponsible) way to bridge the information gap: have a clairvoyant tell them what happened. An excerpt from a story in the April 19, 1860 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“The New York Daily News has been consulting a clairvoyant on the result of  the Prize Fight which all suppose to have been fought by Heenan and Sayers on Monday, and says:

‘A clairvoyant in this city declares that one of the pugilists who yesterday fought for the championship of England has been killed. We have been unable to ascertain which; but the lady inclines to think it is the ‘larger man,’ whether as to the muscle or as to the pugilistic fame we know not. But she is positive one of them is killed. We are, therefore, all the more curious to know the result. It will affect either spiritual seeing or material hitting; which, a few days will tell. The old lady adds that the killed man is not the winner.”

A Brief Note From 1874 About A Pitiable Sight

March 3, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the August 19, 1874 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“Yesterday afternoon, Officer Irwin was attracted by yells and drunken screams to the den No. 91 Degraw Street, occupied by Mrs. Duck. On entering the place, the officer found three women and a child in the place. The women were drunk, and tossing the child about ‘just like,’ said the officer, ‘as if it were a foot ball.’ The little child, who is scarcely three years old, presented a most pitiable sight. The officer, on ascertaining who the mother was, arrested her. The health authorities have been notified of the den which is described as the filthiest hole in Red Hook.”

Old Print Article: “Last Veteran Of ’61 To Leave The Army,” New York Times (1915)

March 3, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Photography, Urban Studies | Permalink

Johnny Clem was a mere ten-year-old orphan in 1861 when he managed to talk his way into what was ostensibly a non-combat role for the Twenty-second Michigan Infantry during the early fire of the Civil War. But it was hard to escape the brutality of the War Between the States once attached to a division, and the lad was soon in the heat of battle. To say that he served long is an understatement: Colonel John Clem wound up being the final Civil War soldier on active duty, forced into retirement by law at age 64 in 1915. (He was originally set to step away from military life three years earlier but hung on a little longer.) It’s important to remember that there were other children just like him, and thousands and thousands of men just removed from boyhood, whose limbs and torsos wound up in piles, their daring exploits to never be recorded. From an article about his farewell to uniformed life in the August 7, 1915 New York Times:

“Clem was just a little ‘shaver’ of 10 years when President Lincoln issued his first call for volunteers. The Third Ohio Infantry was recruited in the Newark (Ohio) district. In the regiment was an officer, Captain McDougal, a friend of Johnny Clem. The future Senior Master of the Quartermaster Corps was an orphan, and there was no near relative to stop him when he sought out his friend McDougal and begged permission to accompany the Third Ohio to the front.

Clem told McDougal that he could carry a gun provided it was not too heavy, and that he could beat the drum to ‘beat the band.’ Captain McDougal, however, could not see the proposition in the same light as did his enthusiastic young friend, and told him point blank he was entirely too little and too young for such dangerous business as that of as a soldier in wartime. All this happens in May, 1861.

But Clem did not lose hope. Early in June of that year the Third Ohio started for the mobilization camp at Covington, Ky. A little boy smuggled himself into one of the baggage cars, and the following day climbed out of the car very tired, very dirty, and very hungry, in Covington. The lad was ‘Johnny’ Clem.

Also at Covington as the Twenty-second Michigan Infantry. Clem decided that he would try and get a berth in that regiment, and so he boldly sought out the tent of the Colonel and walked right in. The ‘kid’ from Newark told the Colonel that he wanted to go to the front with the regiment. The Colonel laughed and patted the boy on the back.

‘You are a game little fellow, all right,’ said the Colonel, ‘but this is no place for children like you. If you were a foot taller and some years older maybe I’d take you along, but as you are neither of these things I am afraid you will have to say back here with the home folks.

But Clem refused to be left behind, and was so persistent that the Colonel finally agreed to let him go along as sort of combination regimental mascot and emergency drummer boy.

The soldiers rigged him out in a uniform, they provided him with a drum and also with a musket, the barrel of the gun being sawed off short so as to make it possible for the little fellow to carry it.

One of the first battles in which the regiment figured was that of Shiloh, where the Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston was killed and where the fame of Ulysses S. Grant, as a soldier, may be said to have begun. In their battle Clem got into the very hottest of the fight. He came very near losing his life when a shrapnel shell exploded within a few feet of him. A fragment of the shell crashed through the drum and the shock of the explosion hurled him unconscious to the ground, where he was subsequently found and rescued by his bigger comrades.

After the battle the soldiers nicknamed Clem ‘Johnny Shiloh,’ and the name stuck to him until a greater fame came to him at the terrible battle of Chickamauga.

At Chickamauga the boy was again in the thickest of the fight. He fired right and left with his little sawed-off musket. General Thomas and General Rosecrans both heard of the heroism of the little Newark boy at Chickamauga and he was personally commended for his coolness and bravery by both of them. It was General Rosecrans who then and there made him a Sergeant, the youngest non-commissioned officer who ever served in the armies of this country.

Now comes the story of how Clem won the title of ‘drummer boy of Chickamauga.’ The brigade to which the Twenty-second Michigan was attached had been ordered to hold its position, which position happened to be a very dangerous one. The brigade fought for all it was worth but the job could not be done, and finally the order came for it to fall back to a safer position. As the brigade retreated ‘Johnny’ Clem managed to get lost. He got mixed up with a command that was almost surrounded by Confederates and the dead and dying were all about him.

The boy realized his predicament and made up his mind he would not be captured, and so he did what any healthy youngster of his years would do and started to run. He ran like a ‘scared rabbit,’ and when he stopped running he was in a little clump of woods all by himself.

Cautiously he came out of the woods and he ran full tilt into a Confederate Colonel. The Confederate officer looked at the boy with the little gun and despite the awfulness of the situation he had to laugh.

‘My, but you are a little fellow to be in this business,’ said the Confederate, ‘but war is war, and I think the best thing a mite of a chap like you can do is to drop that gun.’

Instead of dropping the gun Clem brought to to his shoulder, pointed it at the Colonel and fired. The Colonel fell badly wounded and Clem turned on his heels and ran for all he was worth. Finally he landed back with the Twenty-second Michigan and ever afterward  they called him ‘the drummer boy of Chickamauga.’

As for the Confederate Colonel he recovered after many weeks in the hospital, and after the war Colonel Clem learned about him and wrote and told him how glad he was that he had not killed him.

‘When I heard that I had not killed that Confederate officer it was the best news I ever got,’ Colonel Clem remarked years afterward.”

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A Note From 1856 About Camels Delivering Mail

March 2, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the April 2, 1856 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“The camel experiment over the plains (for mail and other transport), for which Congress made appropriation two years ago, will soon be tried. The camels are now en route from Asia Minor. The whole number is 33, viz: 9 male and 15 female camels; 4 male and 5 female dromedaries. The vessel and this cargo is expected to arrive in Texas about that time. Several of the animals are presents from the Viceroy of Egypt.”

Old Print Article: “How Harrison Found His Father’s Body,” New York Times (1910)

February 28, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Photography, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

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“Benjamin Harrison appeared to be especially affected.”

Well, this is rather macabre. A decade prior to his Presidency, in 1878, Benjamin Harrison investigated a number of Ohio medical colleges in search of the stolen corpse of a deceased family friend, and came face to face with his own freshly fallen father. It’s likely the jaw-dropping tale is true as that state was known in those years for the brisk business conducted by so-called resurrectionists, who were often in cahoots with academics in need of cadavers. The full story from the March 13, 1910 New York Times:

“One of the strangest, and at the same time the most gruesome stories that ever reached a newspaper office was told by H.E. Krehbiel, the musical critic, the other night. Though it reached a newspaper office and has been known to a few persons in the twenty years succeeding, it was not printed when the incidents happened, because those concerned took the precaution of narrating them in confidence. Here it is, however, as Mr. Krehbiel tells it, long after those most intimately concerned are dead:

‘Many years ago I was at work one afternoon in the offices of a Cincinnati newspaper when Benjamin Harrison, afterward President of the United States, and his brother came into the office and began a long conversation with the city editor. They spoke in low tones, which did not reach beyond the desk where they were sitting.

‘After nearly half an hour had elapsed the city editor called me over to him and introduced me to the two gentlemen, both of whom seemed to be laboring under strong emotion. Benjamin Harrison appeared to be especially affected. This did not surprise me very much, as I was aware that they had only buried their father, to whom they were both devotedly attached, a few days before. The city editor instructed me to take down their story, giving me also explicitly to understand that, whereas, I was to listen to all they had to say, I was to write no more, and the paper was to print no more than they should decide.

‘Now,’ continued Mr. Krehbiel, ‘this is what Benjamin Harrison told me. A few days before the death of his father, the husband of a dear old German woman who lived near their farm also died and was duly buried. When he came from the East to attend his own father’s obsequies this old woman went to him in great distress and told him that the grave of her husband had been opened and his body stolen. Those were the days of body snatchers or ‘resurrectionists,’ before the State had made provision for subjects for medical colleges.

‘Mr Harrison went on to say that his old German friend’s distress was so intense that he and his brother had themselves undertaken a search for the body in Cincinnati. This search had occupied them two days and had just ended.

“‘We swore out a search warrant and took a constable with us,’ said Mr. Harrison. ‘One by one we have been to every medical school in the City of Cincinnati. It was a terrible ordeal for us, especially as our own grief was fresh and poignant. We kept up the search without inkling, clue or result, until we had visited every medical school in Cincinnati except one.

“‘The last one was the Ohio State Medical College. We went over there more as a formality than anything else. With search warrant and constable we were enabled there, as elsewhere, to have everything opened to us. We found nothing.

“‘Just as we were about to leave the college the constable noted a shaft such as is used in apartment houses. Down this shaft hung the ropes of a hoist. The constable went up to the ropes of a hoist and took hold of the taut rope. He turned to me sharply, saying that there was a weight on the hoist. I told him to pull it up. He did so.

“‘Attached to the rope by a hook was the body of my own father. They had known at the colleges whose the body was. They had taken this fiendishly ingenious method of moving it from floor to floor as we in our search had moved from one floor to another.’

‘This,’ said Mr. Krehbiel, ‘is the story in Benjamin Harrison’s own words just as he gave it to me.'”

 

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A Brief Note From 1904 About Neighbors

February 26, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the November 9, 1904 New York Times:

“EVANSTON, Wyo.–Mrs. Leon Demars, shot in a duel with her neighbor, Mrs. Nancy Richards, is dead. Several times the women had come to blows, and each had warned the other that the next time would be with guns.

Mrs. Demars went to Mrs. Richards’s ranch, near Fort Bridger, and upon being ordered away, displayed a big revolver.

Mrs. Richards drew a pistol, and at the second shot Mrs. Demars fell with a bullet in her breast, but kept on firing, emptying the revolver. Mrs. Richards also fired six shots.

Both are wives of ranchers. They are thirty years old.”

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Old Print Article: “Mind Reader Seymour’s Entombment,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1893)

February 25, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

"The nose, eyes and ears will be hermetically sealed with wax."

“The nose, eyes and ears will be hermetically sealed with wax.”

An Illinois mind reader planned in 1893 to have himself buried alive where he would remain while a crop grew above him. He would then emerge unscathed. There are easier ways to kill yourself. From an article in the August 7th edition in that year’s Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“Hillsboro, Ill.–The mind reader, A.J. Seymour, is generally known in Illinois and his proposed attempt to be buried and remain in the ground while a crop of barley is grown on his grave creates interest in this state. Dr. E.C. Dunn of Rockford has been selected by Seymour as manager. Dr. Dunn says: ‘There is no question that this feat can be performed. I have seen it performed successfully three times in India, at Allahabad, Delhi and Benares. For several days Seymour will be fed upon a diet of fat and heat producing food. He will then throw himself into a cataleptic state. Their lungs will be filled with pure air to their fullest capacity and the tongue placed back and partially down the throat in such a manner as to completely close the aperture to the lungs. The nose, eyes and ears will be hermetically sealed with wax. After parafine has been spread over the entire body, to close the pores, it will be ready for burial. The body will be put in an extra large casket. This will be placed inside another and both  will be perforated, in order that if any poisonous gases exude from the body they may make their escape and be absorbed by the soil. The interment is to be made in a clay soil.’”

A Brief Note From 1892 About A Good Laugh

February 24, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the September 4, 1892 New York Times:

“St. Paul, Minn.–Miss Josie Letson of Minneapolis has been lying at the point of death at the Northwestern Hospital for the last six weeks, but because of a remarkable surgical operation, will recover. She had been taking nothing but liquid food for over a year and had become so weak she could not raise her head.

As a last resort, physicians, by the use of a stethoscope, located an obstruction in the aesophagus about two inches below the clavicle, or collar bone. Miss Nelson was given no anesthetic and an incision was made on the left side of the neck about 4 1/2 inches in length.

The doctors dissected down to the aesophoaus, opened it, ad there found two teeth pointed downward, firmly inserted in the interior walls of the aesophagus. They almost entirely obstructed the passage.

Miss Nelson said six years ago, while in a fit of laughter, she swallowed the two teeth, which were then attached to a triangular piece of rubber in her gums.”

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Old Print Article: “Opening His Son’s Grave,” New York Times (1882)

February 23, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

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“With a stout stick Hirsch raised the head of his son’s corpse.”

I suppose you could say that Charles Hirsch was a consumer advocate of sorts, but he probably took things a little too far. Perhaps he was driven mad by diphtheria claiming most of his children. From an article in the May 20, 1882 New York Times:

“Batavia–The village of Oakfield, in this county, is thoroughly excited over the actions of a German named Charles Hirsch, who has dug open the grave of his son Charles for the purpose of ascertaining the material of which the coffin is composed. In December, 1889, malignant diphtheria appeared in the family of Hirsch, who was the father of several children. The disease was of the most destructive type, and, one after another, in quick succession, he was bereft of five of his children. A child would be attacked in the morning, and at night would be dead, and within 24 hours buried. One son drank a cup of coffee, and in 15 minutes was taken with choking and died almost instantly. At this time the burial of another child was taking place. A Batavia undertaker had charge of the funerals, five in one week, and a few weeks ago some difficulty arose between him and Hirsch in reference to quality of the coffins which were provided. The undertaker claimed they were of certain materials, while the father and purchaser believed he had been cheated.

The misunderstanding could not be made clear, so the German determined to open one of the graves and satisfy himself. He employed the sexton to assist to him, and proceeded to the burying ground. With spades and shovels they accomplished their work speedily, for, the grave was in a low portion of the cemetery, and the earth was filled with water and handled readily. They began operations about 10 o’clock in the morning, and in an hour and a half had the grave opened and the coffin-box was reached. With tools with which he had thoughtfully provided himself Hirsch unscrewed the top of the box and removed it. Then he crushed in the glass at the head of the coffin. The body had been buried nearly 17 months, and the odor which arose from it in its advanced state of decomposition was extremely nauseating. It was borne with coolness, however, and the work was prosecuted. The coffin was nearly filled with water, and it is said the body was actually floating in it. The head and upper part of the body were best preserved. With a stout stick Hirsch raised the head of his son’s corpse and propped it up so that he could get a piece of the bottom of the coffin. He succeeded, and then broke off splinters of the side and top. Having secured what he had worked so hard for, Hirsch, assisted by the sexton, filled the grave and left it. It is reported that at noon Hirsch left the grave and secured his dinner, entering the dining-room of the village hotel and being ordered out by the landlord on account of the unbearable stench with which his clothes seemed impregnated. When the news of his proceeding became noised about, much indignation prevailed and expressions of condemnation were heard on all sides. By some it was charitably considered that the man was insane, while others believed he did it without knowing better. The former theory prevails, however, for citizens of Batavia who know him, state for some time that they have noticed peculiarities in his conduct which would be inexplicable in a sane man. He is a prosperous farmer and evidently is well to do. There is a growing feeling over his strange actions, but it is not likely the authorities will make any move in the matter. Hirsch rendered himself amenable to the law, however, besides endangering the health of many persons, by opening the grave and permitting the foul, poisonous gases and odors to escape. The grave was open for nearly three hours.”

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Old Print Article: “Edison’s Talking Machine,” New York Times (1888)

February 20, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Photography, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

“Mr. Edison was not entirely present, but he was not entirely absent.”

Thomas Edison’s phonograph, or “talking machine,” though not an immediate commercial success, was nonetheless an amazement. “He” was received in London society for a demonstration of the remarkable machine. From an article in the August 15, 1888 New York Times:

London–Thomas A. Edison was given a very handsome reception this afternoon by Col. Gourand at his beautiful villa, Little Menlo, at Upper Norwood, in Surrey. A large number of ladies and gentlemen gathered there to meet the distinguished inventor of America. The reception included a dinner, lasting from 3 o’clock to 8 o’clock. Under the inspiring influence of popular appreciation Mr. Edison made a speech, in which he dwelt first upon his first visit to England, 18 years ago, and then devoted himself to a humorous criticism of English politics and climate. He then proceeded to amaze the company by reciting ‘Bingen on the Rhine,’ and winding up with a most extraordinary whistling spasm. Then he sang a funeral march, and without waiting for an encore gave ‘Mary had a little lamb.’ He told funny stories, and, in fact, conducted quite a variety entertainment all by himself. Mr. Edison was not entirely present, but he was not entirely absent, and the perplexity of the company over the human voice and its absent owner, 3,000 miles away, was very great.

Mrs. Alice Shaw, who has quite conquered London, whistled for the perfected phonograph, and it whistled back quite as brilliantly as she did. A large number of the guests were presented to Mr. Edison via the phonograph, each making a short speech to him suitable to the occasion. When the company was breaking up three rousing cheers were given for Edison, with a tiger and long clapping of hands. The effect, when the cheers and applause were repeated a moment later, was funny in the extreme. All the introductions, whistling solos, British cheers, &c., dryly recorded on the wax cylinders, will be taken to America by Mr. W. H. Crane of ‘The Henrietta.’ When they arrive Mr Edison will find that he has a lot of acquaintances who know him very well by voice but not by sight. The reception was an exceedingly novel one, and the new machines, with their perfect articulation, excited wonder, reaching in many cases to amazement.•

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A Brief Note From 1896 About An Oral Fixation

February 19, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the August 23, 1896 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“For the first time in the memory of the police of the Fifth Precinct an Italian committed suicide in that section of the city yesterday afternoon when Joseph Sanagora, 21 years old, of 67 South Second Street, shot himself in the mouth with a .38 caliber revolver. The only apparent reason Sanagora had for committing the rash act was the fact that his parents refused him 5 cents with which he wanted to buy a package of tobacco.”

Old Print Article: “Using Electricity To Reinstill Life,” New York Times (1908)

February 18, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

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“Already she has put a patient to sleep by electricity without performing an operation.”

In the early years of automobiles, electric models were favored, and even steam-driven cars were predominant over models powered by fossil fuels. Things change. Ultimately, the internal-combustion engine proved more stable and became the king of the road.

Interestingly, electricity had a chance to make inroads in another area in which gases had proven to be unstable: anesthesia. In the nascent years of the practice, miscalculations with ether and chloroform led to deaths. No one wanted to go back to the brutality of surgery during consciousness, but there had to be a better way. Enter Dr. Louise G. Rabinovitch, who experimented successfully (and chillingly and unethically, often) with bringing a blissful unconsciousness to animal and human test subjects with electric shock. A better understanding of anesthesia made this jolting scheme unnecessary, but the doctor’s jaw-dropping reports of her experiments likely would have prevented her methods from becoming popular in any case. From an article about “electric sleep” in the September 27, 1908 New York Times:

“PARIS–Dr. Louise G. Rabinovitch, the well-known New York psychoclacist, and Dr. V. Magnan are preparing another stop in their series of discoveries in electric sleep experiments, which have been safely conducted on rabbits and dogs, will be made soon on human beings, patients in the insane hospital in Paris.

Dr. Rabinovitch has been conducting her experiments with hopes of finding the means of doing away entirely with the usual anaesthetics–ether and chloroform–and so far has been very successful.

The City of Paris early in the Summer fitted up a laboratory for the hospital of Sainte-Anne, and there she has been working steadily. Already she has put a patient to sleep by electricity without performing an operation. She has also in several cases used electricity as a local anaesthetic on a part of the arm or leg and has performed a slight operation. Her intention now is, in which she is encouraged by the veteran Dr. Magnan, to perform a serious operation made under the influence of electric sleep. This will be the first time that this has been done anywhere in the world.

Dr. Rabinovitch has made some remarkable discoveries while she has been working in her laboratory, and finds no difficulty in instilling life into animals which have died on the operating table. The immense value of this discovery to physicians when patients die because of an anaesthetic can be seen at once.

"After I had killed the dog and resuscitated it."

“While under the influence of electric sleep I killed her instantly with chloroform.”

One dog playing about the laboratory, the doctor told me, had been dead three times. ‘While under the influence of electric sleep I killed her instantly with chloroform. The heart stopped beating and respiration ceased. If the animal had been left alone then it would have remained dead, but I immediately instituted artificial respiration by means of electricity, and presently the animal started to breathe of its own accord. Again, after I had killed the dog and resuscitated it, hemorrhage set in, caused by an operation, and the dog bled to death. I brought it back to life again. The animal is at present perfectly healthy.’

While I was in the laboratory the doctor put a rabbit under the influence of electric sleep. In a comparatively short time, when the rabbit came out from under the influence, it hopped away contentedly. …

The doctor is confident that all her experiments can be put into practice on human beings. When the animal is under the influence of the current it reacts to no stimulus, and when the current is turned off the awakening is instantaneous. There is no after sickness or stupor.”

 

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A Brief Note From 1876 About Meat Production

February 16, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the March 17, 1876 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“The horrible alternative of cannibalism or death was forced upon the surviving portion of the crew of the British ship Greta, on its recent trip from San Francisco. The captain’s two sons died of starvation, eleven of the crew were drowned and four died from exposure. In the little boat in which was the captain and thirteen men, the men who died were eaten to allay the horrible hunger of those who survived. Their sufferings made them little else than beasts, though the dim spark of the divine in their natures saved them from the worse and most extreme act of adding murder to the lesser crime. In the last stage of emaciation and absolute wretchedness they held to the manhood of men, and waited for death to come to the others that life might be retained to them.”

Old Print Article: “C.M. Dally Dies A Martyr To Science,” New York Times (1904)

February 16, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

We appreciate the pioneering spirit but sometimes in retrospect discount the costs. The experiences of Clarence M. Dally, a former military man and glassblower who worked as Thomas Edison’s point person on the development of X-rays, serve as a cautionary tale. From an article in the October 4, 1904 New York Times:

“EAST ORANGE–Clarence M. Dally, electrical engineer, died yesterday at his home 108 Clinton Street North, East Orange, a martyr to science, the beginning of his illness having been due to his experimental work in connection with the Roentgen rays. For seven years he patiently bore terrible suffering and underwent seven operations, which finally culminated in the amputation of both his arms.

During the experimental work on the X-rays Mr. Dally was Thomas A. Edison’s chief assistant. Mr. Edison himself was slightly burned with the chemicals, but Mr. Dally, who had almost all of the experimenting to do, was quite badly burned on his hands. He suffered no pain from these burns, but his hands looked as though they had been scalded.

Six months after the first indications appeared the hands began to swell, and Mr. Dally was unable to keep at work continuously, but went to many of the hospitals where the X-ray was being installed and set up the machines and did some work in the laboratory besides. He suffered in this way for two years, when he and his family went West.

Cancer finally developed on the left wrist, and he came East for treatment. An operation was performed, but not successfully.

The disease then steadily spread and Dally was taken to the New York Post-Graduate Hospital, where the affected arm was amputated four inches below the shoulder. For a time an improvement was apparent, but the little finger on the right arm became affected, and on Nov. 1902, this member was taken off at his home.

Three other fingers were removed on June 16, 1903. The development of a spot on the wrist made it necessary to perform another operation on Sept. 7 of the same year. On Nov. 18 the physicians performed another operation where the stump of the little finger remained. Later the right arm was amputated.

A pair of artificial arms was provided for him, but he used them only a week when he was obliged to succumb, the disease having affected his entire system. During the seven years he had been unable to care for himself, and all the time he was West he was obliged to rest his hands in water during the night to allay the terrible burning sensation.”

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A Brief Note From 1920 About Hangmen’s Salary

February 13, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the January 9, 1920 New York Times:

“LONDON–England’s public executioners, the hangmen, want their pay increased, and their claim has been presented to the House of Commons by a member of that body. Augustine Hailwood inquired whether the Government knew that it was paying the executioners no more than in pre-war days. A Government representative replied that the matter would receive consideration. 

The hangmen recently were deprived of the privilege of taking away the rope with which the criminal was hanged. This reduced one of the sources of their revenue, as the rope could be sold to curiosity collectors.”

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“That Respectable Old Bachelor Bishop Was Beaten With Clubs And Beheaded In The Third Century”

February 13, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

A repost of the item that I run on or around Valentine’s Day each year that recalls the brutal and unlikely origins of the sweet holiday.

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“St. Valentine’s Day is chiefly remarkable for having no personal connection with St. Valentine.”

An excerpt of an article from February 14, 1884 Brooklyn Daily Eagle which explains how the charming but heathen holiday of Valentine’s Day became associated with a Christian saint, and recalls the (thankfully) lost art of the insulting “comic valentine”:

“Like many other Ecclesiastical festivals which have assumed strange social transformations, St. Valentine’s Day is chiefly remarkable for having no personal connection with St. Valentine. That respectable old bachelor bishop was beaten with clubs and beheaded in the third century, and if he is conscious of his subsequent fame he must enjoy the reflection that no author as well as no saint ever achieved such a posthumous reputation for what he had nothing to do with. The feasts of Pan and Juno, held in February, upon which among other hilarious ceremonies the names of pretty Roman girls of the period were put in a box, and the Roman dudes and greenhorns and old bachelors drew them out, suggested to the ever appropriate instincts of the Christian clergy the holding of them on a saint’s day. Poor old Bishop Valentine was in partibus at the time and had been canonized as well as clubbed and decapitated also at the middle of February, and his commemoration would do very well for the heathen pastime, which would thus acquire a Christian aroma. That is the process by which, in modern times, he has become the patron saint of postmen.

“For the antiquated maid or corpulent bachelor, the valentine is scarcely a thing of beauty or joy.”

St. Valentine’s Day has become chiefly a joy to children, who await eagerly the postman’s coming with the welcome letters which are pictures as well. For the antiquated maid or corpulent bachelor, the valentine is scarcely a thing of beauty or joy. The meanness that would gratify its petty spite by anonymous insults through the mail on this literary deluge day would not deserve mention if this morning’s newspapers had not contained a curious and perhaps fatal caution against indulging one’s venom through the valentine. Two women in Philadelphia, who were next door neighbors, mutually accused each other of sending an insulting valentine. Each denied the charge, but neither accepted the denial. They fell upon each other tooth and nail, and, not content with bites and scratches, while one ran for a hatchet the other shot her with a pistol.”

Old Print Article: “A Famous Composer Dead,” New York Times (1893)

February 12, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

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“Tchaikovsky contracted cholera by drinking unboiled water in a restaurant.”

To put it crudely, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, one of humankind’s most refined composers, died because he drank water that had shit in it. We’re all a glass of shitwater, or something equally horrible, from death, even the best of us. Such is life: Luck plays a bigger role than we’d like to admit.

The announcement of Tchaikovsky’s death by cholera in the November 7, 1893 New York Times, which spells his name in a variety of ways, includes a passage about the Russian master’s visit to America. The opening:

“ST. PETERSBURG–Pierre Tschaikowsky, the Russian composer, died in this city last night. He died of cholera, hours after he fell ill.

Tchaikovsky contracted cholera by drinking unboiled water in a restaurant. 

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A cable dispatch from St. Petersburg brings the unexpected news that Peter Ilitsch Tschaikowsky is dead. This famous Russian musician was without much question the most strikingly original and forceful composer of the day, and his death at a time when his intellectual powers were, or ought to have been, at their maturity must be accounted a serious loss to music. The present is by no means richly productive in great orchestral works, and Tschaikowsky’s masterpieces have the hallmarks of real genius. If he had lived he would surely have given the world new works which it would have received with great gladness.

Tschaikowsky was the son of an engineer who held a post under the Government in the imperial mines of the Ural Mountain district. The musician was born at Wotkinsk, in the Province of Wlatka, on April 25, 1840. Like not a few other composers, the boy was not intended by his parents to follow in the footsteps of Glinka. He received his early education in the schools of his native place. In 1840, however, his father who was evidently a man of solid attainments, was appointed Director of the Technological Institute at St. Petersburg. In that city the son was entered as a student in the School of Jurisprudence, which is open only to the sons of Government officials of the higher orders. It was the father’s desire that the boy should enter the public service, and in 1859, when he had completed his course of study, he was appointed to a post in the Department of Justice.

In the meantime his love for music had declared itself, and while a law student he had made essays in composition. These attempts met with not a little opposition from his father, and for a time young Tschaikowsky’s musical studies were abandoned. But music eventually prevailed over law, and the consent of the father to his devotion to the study of composition was at length obtained. It was fortunate for Tschaikowsky that the great movement for the advancement of music in Russia had now begun. In 1862 Anton Rubinstein, the famous pianist and composer established his now celebrated Conservatory of Music at St. Petersburg. Tschaikowsky was one of the first of the institution’s many gifted pupils.

He devoted himself diligently to study until 1865. His principal masters were Zaremba, who taught him harmony and counterpoint, and Rubinstein, who taught him composition. In 1865 he was graduated with high honors, receiving a prize medal for his setting of Schiller’s ode, ‘An die Freude,’ of which he made a cantata. The composition.is not found among his published works.

In 1866 Nicolas Rubinstein, then the head of the conservatory, offered his the post of Professor of Harmony, Composition, and the History of Music. As his heart was in the Russian musical movement, he accepted the chair, and for twelve years did admirable work as an instructor. In 1878 he resigned his position in order to devote himself more assiduously to composition, in which he had already gained enviable distinction. He lived at various times in St. Petersburg, Italy, Switzerland, and Kiev. In recent years he had made his home at the last-named place, which is near Moscow.

Two years ago last May Tschaikowsky, at the invitation of Walter Damrosch, an enthusiastic follower and performer of his works, visited America, and appeared in the series of festival concerts with which the Music Hall, at Fifty-seventh Street and Seventh Avenue, was opened. The composer conducted his splendid third suite, his second piano concerto, in G, Opus 44, and two a capella choruses. The magnificent performance if the suite by the Symphony Orchestra under his electric leadership will long be remembered by music lovers, as will also also by Miss Aus Der Ohe’s playing of the piano concerto. The composer subsequently visited other cities, and was everywhere received with enthusiasm. …

Tschaikowsky was a prolific composer for a modern master, yet given to somewhat close self-criticism. Only three or four years ago he threw into the fire the score of his early ballet, ‘Wojowode,’ produced in 1860.”

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A Brief Note From 1901 About A Family Reunion

February 11, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the November 11, 1901 Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

“There was a family gathering in the apartments of Cassino Di Napoli, a rag picker, 65 years old, who lives on the first floor of the rear house at 570 Sackett Street, between 7 and 8 o’clock last evening and before the party was over one man had stab wounds in the head, two stab wounds in the back, besides a variety of other injuries, and a woman had been slashed on the head and bitten. A knife poker, stove lid and other implements were called into play and the house where the little family reunion took place looked after the fracas as if it were the fatality ward of a hospital.”

Old Print Article: “Illiterate Man Becomes A Doctor When Hypnotized,” New York Times (1910)

February 10, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Photography, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

“They said he told wonderful truths while he was asleep.”

Edgar Cayce read widely and it served him well. Unschooled beyond ninth grade but an autodidact, the Kentucky man used medical knowledge he’d gleaned from books and psychic mumbo jumbo to convince some in the medical U.S. establishment a century ago that he possessed healing powers. In fact, he made it “safe” for those with no formal medical training to treat the sick, giving birth to holistic medicine in America. In an article in the October 9, 1910 New York Times, he was a young man being taken seriously as a medical savant. The opening:

“The medical fraternity of the country is taking a lively interest in the strange power said to be possessed by Edgar Cayce of Hopkinsville, Ky., to diagnose difficult diseases while in a semi-conscious state, though he has not the slightest knowledge of medicine when not in this condition.

During a visit to California last Summer Dr. W. H. Ketchum, who was attending a meeting of the National Society of Homeopathic Physicians had occasion to mention the young man’s case and I was invited to discuss it at a banquet attended by about thirty-five of the doctors of the Greek letter fraternity given at Pasadena.

Dr. Ketchum made a speech of considerable length, giving an explanation of the strange psychic powers manifested by Cayce during the last four years during which time he has been more or less under his observation. This talk created such widespread interest among the 700 doctors present that one of the leading Boston medical men who heard his speech invited Dr. Ketchum to prepare a paper as a part of the programme of the September meeting of the American Society of Clinical Research. Dr. Ketchum sent the paper, but did not go to Boston. The paper was read by Henry E. Harpower, M.D., of Chicago, a contributor to the Journal of the American Medical Association, published in Chicago. Its presentation created a sensation, and almost before Dr. Ketchum knew that the paper had been given to the press he was deluged with letters and telegrams inquiring about the strange case. …

Dr. Ketchum wishes it distinctly understood that his presentation is purely ethical, and that he attempts no explanation of what must be classed as a mysterious mental phenomena.

Dr. Ketchum is not the only physician who has had opportunity to observe the workings of Mr. Cayce’s subconscious mind. For nearly ten years and strange power has been known to local physicians of all the recognized schools. An explanation of the case is best understood from Dr. Ketchum’s description in his paper read in Boston a few days ago, which follows:

‘About four years ago I made the acquaintance of a young man 28 years old, who had the reputation of being a ‘freak.’ They said he told wonderful truths while he was asleep. I, being interested, immediately began to investigate, and as I was ‘from Missouri,’ I had to be shown.

‘And truly, when it comes to anything psychical, every layman is a disbeliever from the start, and most of our chosen professions will not accept anything of a psychic nature, hypnotism, mesmerism, or what not, unless vouched for by some M.D. away up in the professions and one whose orthodox standing is questioned.

‘By suggestion he becomes unconscious to pain of any sort, and, strange to say, his best work is done when he is seemingly ‘dead to the world.’

‘My subject simply lies down and folds his arms, and by auto-suggestion goes to sleep. While in this sleep, which to all intents and purposes is a natural sleep, his objective mind is completely inactive and only his subjective is working.

‘I next give him the name of my subject and the exact location of the same, and in a few minutes he begins to talk as clearly and distinctly as any one. He usually goes into minute detail in diagnosing a case, and especially if it is a very serious case.

His language is usually of the best, and his psychologic terms and description of the nervous anatomy would do credit to any professor of nervous anatomy, and there is no faltering in his speech and all his statements are clear and concise. He handles the most complex ‘jaw breakers’ with as much ease as any Boston physician, which to me is quite wonderful, in view of the fact that while in his normal state he is an illiterate man, especially along the line of medicine, surgery, or pharmacy, of which he knows nothing.'”

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A Brief Note From 1868 About A Ressurection

February 7, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the September 2, 1868 New York Times:

“A German gentleman, advanced in years, named Franz Vester, at present a resident of Newark, recently obtained a patent for a safety-coffin, designed so as to provide a way of escape to those who might be buried during suspended animation, as is supposed may on occasions happen, particularly during the prevalence of epidemics. This invention consists of a coffin constructed similar to those now in use, except that it is a little higher, to allow of the free movement of the body; the top lid is moveable from head to breast, and in case of interment is left open, with a spring attached for closing the same; under the head is a receptacle for refreshments and restoratives. The most important part of the invention is a box about two feet square, resembling very much a chimney, with a cover and ornamental grave-work on the top. This box is of sufficient length to extend from the head of the coffin to about one foot above ground. The cover is fastened down by a catch on the inside, and cannot be unfastened from the outside. Just below the cover is a bell similar to those used on street railway cars, with a cord suspended, which, upon being pulled, sounds an alarm, and at the same time a spring throws the cover from the ‘chimney box.’ Then, if the person on the inside have sufficient strength, he or she can take hold of a rope suspended from near the top of the chimney-box, and, with the assistance of cleets nailed to the sides, ascend to the outer world; or otherwise the individual can rest at ease, munch his lunch, drink the wine, and ring the bell for the sexton to come and assist him out.

Yesterday afternoon Mr. Vester gave an exhibition of the working of this invention by being buried, and after more than an hour’s interment, resurrecting himself.”

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Old Print Article: “M. Santos-Dumont Rounds Eiffel Tower,” New York Times (1901)

February 6, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

“The enormous crowd…gave the aeronaut a tremendous ovation.”

Alberto Santos-Dumont, a Brazilian aviation pioneer whose chosen vocation was influenced by early reading of Jules Verne, answered a challenge in 1901 to travel around the Eiffel Tower in his airship within 30 minutes. From a report that year in the October 20th New York Times:

“Paris–Santos-Dumont, who rounded the Eiffel Tower to-day in his airship, started for the first time at 2:29, but on leaving the park his guide rope caught in a tree and he was obliged to descend. He started against 2:42 P.M., rose 250 yards and then pointed for the Eiffel Tower, the balloon going in a straight line.

It was seen, through field glasses, to arrive at the tower and round it. The time, up to that point, with the wind in the balloon’s favor, was eight minutes and forty-five seconds. It returned against the wind and made slower headway, but still kept in true direction for St. Cloud, which it reached in the total time of twenty-nine minutes, fifteen seconds.

But, instead of descending immediately, Santos-Dumont made a broad sweep over the Aero Club grounds, with the result that another minute and twenty-five seconds were consumed before the workmen seized the guide rope. Thus, technically, Santos-Dumont exceeded the time limit by forty seconds.

The enormous crowd which had gathered inside and outside the grounds gave the aeronaut a tremendous ovation. As his basket came within speaking distance, Santos-Dumont leaned over the side and asked:

‘Have I won the prize?’

“A number of ladies who were present threw flowers over the aeronaut.”

Hundreds of spectators shouted: ‘Yes! Yes!’ But the Count de Dion, a member of the committee approached and threw a damper on the enthusiasm by saying:

‘My friend, you have lost the prize by forty seconds.’

The crowd, however, refused to accept this view and a warm discussion ensued, the majority of the spectators taking the ground that Santos-Dumont was entitled to the prize.

The aeronaut, after protesting against the decision of the committee, finally shrugged his shoulders and remarked:

‘I do not care personally for the 100,000 francs. I intended to give it to the poor.’

A number of ladies who were present threw flowers over the aeronaut, others offered him bouquets, and one admirer, to the amusement of the onlookers, even presented him with a little white rabbit.”

A Brief Note From 1922 About Chimp Organs

February 5, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the June 20, 1922 New York Times:

“PARIS–Dr. Serge Voronoff’s monkey gland experiments have led to the startling discovery that apparently it is possible to transplant all the vital organs of a chimpanzee to human beings.

‘Already I am using four different glands from every chimpanzee received from Africa, notably thyroid glands for weak-minded children and interstitial glands for the rejuvenation of the aged.’ said Dr. Voronoff. ‘All chimpanzee glands which I have transplanted have thrived so well in the human body that I have tried lesser organs, which also are thriving well. I am experimenting now on major organs and I expect to announce soon that a man may have any new organ.”

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Old Print Article: “Put Dog’s Brain In Man,” New York Times (1913)

February 4, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

A completely preposterous entry into the annals of medical history is this article in the February 6, 1913 New York Times:

“ANN ARBOR, Mich.–The brain of a dog was transferred to a man’s skull at University Hospital here to-day. W.A. Smith of Kalamazoo had been suffering from abscess on the brain, and in a last effort to save his life this remarkable operation was performed. 

Opening his skull, the surgeons removed the diseased part of his brain, and in its place substituted the brain of a dog.

Smith was resting comfortably to-night, and the surgeons say he has a good chance to recover.”

 

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A Note From 1897 About A Dental Appointment

February 3, 2014 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

From the June 3, 1897 New York Times:

“Hagerstown, Ind.–The death of Thomas Purdy of this place yesterday is considered by physicians one of the most remarkable known to science. Some weeks ago Mr. Purdy had all his teeth extracted. Partial loss of the use of the throat muscles and vocal chords ensued.

This was followed by paralysis of these parts, which rendered it impossible for him to take nourishment. After striving twenty days to swallow food, he died in horrible agony of starvation.”

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Old Print Article: “Death Of Eccentric Old Dr. Gruby” (1898)

February 2, 2014 in Books, Old Print Articles, Science/Tech, Urban Studies | Permalink

You know the story about the Paris-based celebrity doctor who liked to prescribe sauerkraut, was Alexandre Dumas’ personal physician and kept a vicious pet monkey? No? Well, here it is, courtesy of the December 18, 1898 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle:

Paris Bureau–All capitals contain so great a number of eccentric people that if we knew them all, we would still more readily come to the conclusion that there are more mad people outside than inside insane asylums.

It is probable the Paris does not contain as many as London, for it is known that for oddity and originality the English have the precedence; but such specimens as Dr. Gruby show that if the number is not as large as in Paris as in London, they, at least, are quite as capable to do as eccentric things and lead as eccentric lives.

Dr. Gruby was a physician who possessed all of the necessary diplomas, but he was called a healer. This country, like all other countries, in fact, is flooded with healers. Legitimate doctors do all in their power to bring them into disfavor, but vox populi is vox dei, and the more eccentric the healer seems to be and the more extraordinary his cures appear to the patients, the more they knock at his door to be healed.

“Alexandre Dumas would have no other doctor.”

There is not a French celebrity of any kind, within the last forty years, who, afflicted with any serious illness, has not gone to Dr. Gruby, and who was not dumbfounded when the healer prescribed carrots, sauerkraut or some other unheard of medicament with the grave countenance of a doctor who writes down the most complicated mixtures in an incomprehensible page of Latin words.

But faith was there. Had the healer not made the most remarkable cures? Were not such men as Alexandre Dumas and Ambroise Thomas there to testify that whatever surprising things the healer gave, they, one and all, were benefited by it?

He did not reserve all his oddities for his patients; he kept a great number for his own actions and behavior. One of them was that he never wanted to appear but in the best of health to all humanity, his servants included. He died at the age of 80, behind a locked door. He did not even admit his servants during his last two days of agony. He died in a dark room, without a streak of light, for he feared some curious eye might see him in the throes of death. At last the scared servants had the door forced open by the commissaire de police and they found but a cold corpse. The healer had drawn his last breath about twelve hours before.

Not so long ago, Mme. Ambroise Thomas was asked to tell us some eccentricities of the doctor. “Alexandre Dumas would have no other doctor, and for a long while, by the orders of Dr. Gruby, Dumas would start off on a morning constitutional with four apples in his pocket. The orders were to walk from the Avenue de Villiens to the Arch of Triumph and there stop to eat an apple; then to start again and walk to the Place de la Concorde, and stop there and eat another apple. He was to return to the Arch and eat his third apple, and take the fourth before his own door and have the last bite in his mouth before he crossed the threshold.

“And Dr. Gruby’s servants were allowed to be visible only at certain hours. He was passionately fond of animals and plants. He had dogs and cats and for a long time possessed a vicious monkey whom he called his brother, and who bit several of his friends.”•

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