Different take on Millard Fillmore here, at Duke City Fix (“Duke City” is a nickname for Albuquerque).
Republic of Texas, showing boundaries that would have inlcuded much of New Mexico in Texas - Wikipedia
Would Albuquerque and Santa Fe be part of Texas, but for Millard Fillmore?
January 9, 2011
2 Comments | 
History, Humor, Maps, Millard Fillmore, Texas | Tagged: History, Humor, Maps, Millard Fillmore, New Mexico, Texas | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
A day that will live in obscurity
January 8, 2011Except of course for you, Dear Reader, who knew that January 7 is the anniversary of the birth of Millard Fillmore, our 13th president.
But, did Brian Crane know that when he penned this Pickles strip for January 7?
Pickles cartoon strip, for January 7, 2011 - Brian Crane, Washington Post Writers Group
Could it really be just coincidence that Crane picked Fillmore for the punchline, on Fillmore’s birthday? Or is it really that great an inside joke?
1 Comment | Cartoons, History, Humor, Millard Fillmore | Tagged: Brian Crane, Cartoons, Coincidence, Comics, History, Humor, Millard Fillmore, Pickles | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore’s 211th
January 7, 2011Millard Fillmore was born January 7, 1800. Had he lived, Millard Fillmore would be 211 years old today, very cranky, and looking for a good book to read.
Millard Fillmore clipart from University of South Florida - Free! Click image to go to USF site.
Would you blame him for being cranky? He opened Japan to trade. He got from Mexico the land necessary to make Los Angeles a great world city and the Southern Pacific a great railroad, without firing a shot. Fillmore promoted economic development of the Mississippi River. He managed to keep a fractious nation together despite itself for another three years. Fillmore let end the practice of presidents using slaves to staff the White House, then called “the President’s Mansion,” eight years before the election of Abraham Lincoln.
Then in 1852 his own party refused to nominate him for a full term, making him the last Whig to be president. And to add insult to ignominy, H. L. Mencken falsely accused him of being known only for adding a bathtub to the White House, something he didn’t do.
As Antony said of Caesar, the good was interred with his bones — but Millard Fillmore doesn’t even get credit for whatever evil he might have done: Fillmore is remembered most for being the butt of a hoax gone awry, committed years after his death. Or worse, he’s misremembered for what the hoax alleged he did.
Even beneficiaries of his help promoting the Mississippi River have taken his name off their annual celebration of the event. Fillmore has been eclipsed, even in mediocrity (is there still a Millard Fillmore Society in Washington?).
Happy birthday, Millard Fillmore.
Millard Fillmore, free clipart from University of South Florida
Millard Fillmore was a man of great civic spirit, a man who answered the call to serve even when most others couldn’t hear it at all. He was a successful lawyer, despite having had only six months of formal education (a tribute to non-high school graduates and lifelong learning). Unable to save the Union, he established the University of Buffalo and the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society. During the Civil War, he led the local militia in support of the war effort, many rungs down from his role of Commander-in-Chief. And, it is said of him that Queen Victoria said he was the most handsome man she had ever met.
A guy like that deserves a toast, don’t you think?
Resources:
- Gateway to Millard Fillmore history at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub
- Millard Fillmore Papers, volume 1, edited by Frank H. Severance, secretary of the Buffalo Historical Society, 1907. Also, the index to both volumes; Table of contents. From Cornell University Library’s collection, New York State Historical Literature. This volume contains the autobiography Millard Fillmore did not finish, but which contains the only serious treatment of his youth, including the story of how he threatened to kill the first man to whom he was apprenticed as a wool carder. Particularly for those elementary and junior high school students looking for stories of presidents’ youth, this is the most authoritative account.
- Millard Fillmore Papers, volume 2, edited by Frank H. Severance, secretary of the Buffalo Historical Society, 1907. Also, the index to both volumes; Table of contents. From Cornell University Library’s collection, New York State Historical Literature.
- The Gospel of Millard Fillmore, a sermon by a Unitarian minister with a solid narrative and a view to redeem the reputation of Fillmore
- Looking for Millard Fillmore, a post at American President’s Blog, listing resources on Fillmore.
- Gateway to Fillmore sources at Electratig
- Resources on Millard Fillmore from the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia
- Fillmore entry at WhiteHouse.gov
- MFB entry on Fillmore’s Birthday, 2008; also here; 2007 entry here
- Did Fillmore actually say that?
- Even William Federer, that great distorter of history, gets some things right about Fillmore — but he leaves out the important stuff, and the best stuff.
Leave a Comment » | Civil War, H. L. Mencken, History, Japan, Millard Fillmore, Politics, Presidents | Tagged: Civil War, H. L. Mencken, History, Hoaxes, Japan, Millard Fillmore, Politics, Presidents | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Annals of DDT: 1946 warning of the dangers of DDT
January 6, 2011Warnings from this article in Popular Science in February 1946 are almost eerie in their accuracy.
Cover of Popular Science, February 1946; Google Books and Ebay image
Experiments in Ontario by the Dept. of Lands and Forests show what happens when DDT is used out of doors. Damage to trees was limited to burning of leaf edges. Carnivorous water beetles and some other aquatic animals were not greatly affected but died because the insects on which they fed were destroyed. Other aquatic insects were killed directly. Crayfish, which feed on insects and themselves serve as fish food, were very susceptible. Minnows were killed by contact and trout died from eating poisoned insects. Six kinds of frogs and two kinds of snakes were killed, either by contact or by eating poisoned insects. Any DDT field spray is likely to destroy more than half of these amphibians. (page 72)
There is an interesting reference to a case of several human deaths due to DDT — these reports of human deaths disappeared from research reports rather quickly, and today critics of environmental protection policies often say that no human ever died from DDT. What happened to those reports, and are there others?
A further objection to the wide use of DDT in larvae control is the dangers of contaminating the water supply. Fear of this led us to abandon plans to use DDT extensively at Bear Mountain Park. Heavy rains might wash the DDT into reservoirs. We were not fully aware of the deadly effects of the chemical then, but we received word from Okinawa later than several natives had died from eating DDT, and post-mortem examination revealed nerve lesions similar to those produced by strychnine. (p. 72)
Brownfielders working against Rachel Carson sometimes claim she manufactured controversy about DDT with the publication of her book in 1962. Go see this article from 16 years earlier, and see the warnings offered by the author, Dr. C. H. Curran, who was Associate Curator, Department of Insects and Spiders, at the American Museum of Natural History.
Rachel Carson was right, and still is.
More history:
- Also see “The Deadly Dust: The unhappy history of DDT,” Kenneth S. Davis, American Heritage, Vol. 22, Issue 2, February 1971
- Also see “The Short-Lived Miracle of DDT,” Darwin H. Stapleton, Invention and Technology Magazine, Winter 2000 Volume 15, Issue 3
- Also see “‘God Bless General Pero´n’: DDT and the Endgame of Malaria Eradication in Argentina in the 1940s,” Eric D. Carter, Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, September 2008 doi:10.1093/jhmas/jrn057
[Links updated February 3, 2022. Please notify editor if links do not work.]
10 Comments | DDT, Environmental protection, History, Rachel Carson, Science | Tagged: 1946, American Heritage, DDT, Environmental protection, History, Pesticides, Popular Science, Rachel Carson, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
University of Buffalo President Simpson to speak at Millard Fillmore’s 2010 birthday observance
January 5, 2011
Baird Point at University of Buffalo's North Campus; tradition holds that the university was founded by Millard Fillmore, its first chancellor
John B. Simpson, President of the University of Buffalo, will speak at a ceremony honoring President Millard Fillmore on the 211th anniversary of Fillmore's birth.
Press release from the University of Buffalo:
News Release
Simpson to Speak at Ceremony Commemorating 211th Birthday of Millard Fillmore
Release Date: January 4, 2011
BUFFALO, N.Y. — The 211th anniversary of the birth of Millard Fillmore, the University at Buffalo’s first chancellor and 13th president of the United States, will be celebrated at a ceremony to be held at 10 a.m. Jan. 7 at Fillmore’s gravesite in Buffalo’s Forest Lawn Cemetery.
UB President John B. Simpson will present the memorial address at the annual observance, which honors Fillmore, who played a major role in the founding of numerous cultural, civic and community organizations in Erie County.
Hosted by UB, the Forest Lawn Group and the Buffalo Club, the event will be free and open to the public, and each year draws a wide range of community supporters.
“The annual Millard Fillmore commemoration is a time-honored tradition that celebrates the life of a man who made considerable contributions to Buffalo and the United States,” said William J. Regan, director of special events at UB.”
Col. Jim S. McCready, vice wing commander of the 107th Airlift Wing of the New York Air National Guard based at Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station, will place a wreath from the White House at the gravesite.
Officials from the Buffalo Club, the Forest Lawn Group and UB will also be on hand to present wreaths.
The Rev. Joel Miller of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Buffalo will provide an invocation. The UB Police Color Guard will present the flags. To close the ceremony, West Richter, a UB undergraduate and a member of the UB Marching Band, will play taps.
A reception will follow immediately in the Forest Lawn Chapel.
Born on Jan. 7, 1800, Fillmore was instrumental in founding the Buffalo & Erie County Historical Society, the Buffalo Club and the Buffalo General Hospital. His activities also led to the creation of the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library, the Buffalo Fine Arts Academy and the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences.
Some historians credit the former teacher, postmaster, lawyer and member of Congress with establishing the White House Library.
This year’s commemoration marks the 46th consecutive year UB has programmed the ceremony, a tradition that dates back to 1937.
From 1937 until 1965, the anniversary ceremonies were a cooperative staging by the City of Buffalo and the Buffalo Board of Education.
The events were administered by Irving R. Templeton, a 1909 graduate of UB, who scheduled two programs annually on or near Jan. 7, one in City Hall and one in Forest Lawn. Templeton was a partner in the law offices of Templeton, Turnabull & Templeton.
Following his death in 1965, responsibility for the event shifted to UB through an agreement between Chancellor Clifford C. Furnas and Alfred E. Kirchhofer, editor of The Buffalo Evening News. While UB participated in programming prior to Templeton’s death, the 1966 event marked the start of UB’s role as official steward of the annual community event.
The vice president for university relations and the Office of Public Affairs programmed the event from 1966-87, when the Office of Special Events began managing the program.
The University at Buffalo is a premier research-intensive public university, a flagship institution in the State University of New York system and its largest and most comprehensive campus. UB’s more than 28,000 students pursue their academic interests through more than 300 undergraduate, graduate and professional degree programs. Founded in 1846, the University at Buffalo is a member of the Association of American Universities.
Leave a Comment » | Education, History, Millard Fillmore, Presidents | Tagged: Education, History, January 7, Millard Fillmore, Presidents, University of Buffalo | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Just how broken is the U.S. Senate?
January 3, 2011Important question.
Illustration from The New Yorker. Caption from the magazine: “Sit and watch us for seven days,” one senator says of the deadlocked chamber. “You know what you’ll see happening? Nothing.” (Is there any Republican portrayed in this illustration?)
It’s troubling to me that back in August Packer could note a list of subjects critical to our nation that the Senate had been blocked from considering, and even after a “record setting” lame-duck session, all but one of those issues remain untouched.
Packer wrote:
On July 21st, President Obama signed the completed bill. The two lasting achievements of this Senate, financial regulation and health care, required a year and a half of legislative warfare that nearly destroyed the body. They depended on a set of circumstances—a large majority of Democrats, a charismatic President with an electoral mandate, and a national crisis—that will not last long or be repeated anytime soon. Two days after financial reform became law, Harry Reid announced that the Senate would not take up comprehensive energy-reform legislation for the rest of the year. And so climate change joined immigration, job creation, food safety, pilot training, veterans’ care, campaign finance, transportation security, labor law, mine safety, wildfire management, and scores of executive and judicial appointments on the list of matters that the world’s greatest deliberative body is incapable of addressing. Already, you can feel the Senate slipping back into stagnant waters.Read more http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/09/100809fa_fact_packer#ixzz19wpuFk4q
Only food safety got done, though a few judicial appointments squeaked through (less than two dozen).
5 Comments | Government, Health care, History, Politics, U.S. Senate | Tagged: Government, Health Care Reform, History, Politics, U.S. Senate | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
December 31: Bright Idea Day, anniversary of Edison’s light bulb
December 31, 2010100,000 people gather in Times Square, New York City, tonight, and millions more around the world, in festivities for the new year made possible by the work of Thomas Alva Edison.
Here it is, the invention that stole sleep from our grasp, made clubbing possible, and launched 50,000 cartoons about ideas:
The light bulb Thomas Edison demonstrated on December 31, 1879, at Menlo Park, New Jersey - Wikimedia image (GFDL)
The light bulb. It’s an incandescent bulb.
It wasn’t the first bulb. Edison a few months earlier devised a bulb that worked with a platinum filament. Platinum was too expensive for mass production, though — and Edison wanted mass production. So, with the cadre of great assistants at his Menlo Park laboratories, he struggled to find a good, inexpensive filament that would provide adequate life for the bulb. By late December 1879 they had settled on carbon filament.
Edison invited investors and the public to see the bulb demonstrated, on December 31, 1879.
Thomas Edison in 1878, the year before he demonstrated a workable electric light bulb. CREDIT: Thomas Edison, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing left, 1880. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Reproduction number LC-USZ62-98067
Edison’s successful bulb indicated changes in science, technology, invention, intellectual property and finance well beyond its use of electricity. For example:
- Edison’s Menlo Park, New Jersey, offices and laboratory were financed with earlier successful inventions. It was a hive of inventive activity aimed to make practical inventions from advances in science. Edison was all about selling inventions and rights to manufacture devices. He always had an eye on the profit potential. His improvements on the telegraph would found his laboratory he thought, and he expected to sell the device to Western Union for $5,000 to $7,000. Instead of offering it to them at a price, however, he asked Western Union to bid on it. They bid $10,000, which Edison gratefully accepted, along with the lesson that he might do better letting the marketplace establish the price for his inventions. Other inventive labs followed Edison’s example, such as the famous Bell Labs, but few equalled his success, or had as much fun doing it. (Economics teachers: Need an example of the marketplace in action?)
- While Edison had some financial weight to invest in the quest for a workable electric light, he also got financial support, $30,000 worth, from some of the finance giants of the day, including J. P. Morgan and the Vanderbilts who established the Edison Light Company.
- Edison didn’t invent the light bulb — but his improvements on it made it commercial. “In addressing the question ‘Who invented the incandescent lamp?’ historians Robert Friedel and Paul Israel list 22 inventors of incandescent lamps prior to Joseph Wilson Swan and Thomas Edison. They conclude that Edison’s version was able to outstrip the others because of a combination of three factors: an effective incandescent material, a higher vacuum than others were able to achieve (by use of the Sprengel pump) and a high resistance lamp that made power distribution from a centralized source economically viable.”
- Edison’s financial and business leadership acumen is partly attested to by the continuance of his organizations, today — General Electric, one of the world’s most successful companies over the past 40 years, traces its origins to Edison.
Look around yourself this evening, and you can find a score of ways that Edison’s invention and its descendants affect your life. One of the more musing effects is in cartooning, however. Today a glowing lightbulb is universally accepted as a nonverbal symbol for ideas and inventions. (See Mark Parisi’s series of lightbulb cartoons, “Off the Mark.”)
Even with modern, electricity-saving bulbs, the cartoon shorthand hangs on, as in this Mitra Farmand cartoon.
Brilliant cartoon from Mitra Farmand, Fuffernutter
Or see this wonderful animation, a video advertisement for United Airlines, by Joanna Quinn for Fallon — almost every frame has the symbolic lightbulb in it.
Other resources:
- New Netherlands Institute biography of Edison
- A timeline noting Edison’s many inventions
- Light bulbs and other electric lamps, and color
- Earlier post at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub on the granting of the patent for Edison’s invention
- The 100+ year-old lightbulb in Livermore, California
- Forth Worth’s 100-year-old lightbulb (If there are two lightbulbs more than 100 years old and still burning, are there others?)
Thomas Edison's electric lamp patent drawing and claim for the incandescent light bulb CREDIT: “New Jersey--The Wizard of Electricity--Thomas A. Edison's System of Electric Illumination,” 1880. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress. Reproduction Number LC-USZ62-97960.
7 Comments | Creativity, Economics, Electricity, Gilded Age, Historic documents, History, History of Science, Invention, Patents, Progressive Era, Science, Technology | Tagged: 1879, Bright Idea Day, Creativity, December 31, Economics, Electric Light Bulb, Electricity, Gilded Age, History, Inventions, Patents, Progressive Era, Science, Technology, Thomas Edison | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Make a creationist crazy: Celebrate Hubble “Looking Up” Day!
December 30, 2010Here’s another way to drive creationists absolutely up the wall: Lift a glass of champagne today in tribute to Edwin Hubble and his great discovery.
Ultraviolet image of the Andromeda Galaxy, first known to be a galaxy by Edwin Hubble on December 30, 1924 - Galaxy Evolution Explorer image courtesy NASA
Today is a good day to celebrate the universe in all it’s glory – December 30.
On December 30, 1924, Edwin Hubble announced he’d discovered other galaxies in distant space. Though it may not have been so clear at the time, it meant that, as a galaxy, we are not alone in the universe (whether we are alone as intelligent life is a separate question). It also meant that the universe is much, much bigger than most people had dared to imagine.
In 2008 for Hubble Day, Wired picked up on the story (with a gracious link to 2007’s post here at the Bathtub). Wired includes several links to even more information, a good source of information. See Wired’s 2009 post here.
Hubble was the guy who showed us the universe is not only bigger than we imagined, it’s probably much bigger and much more fantastic than we can imagine. Hubble is the guy who opened our imaginations to the vastness of all creation.
How does one celebrate Hubble Day? Here are some suggestions:
- Easier than Christmas cards: Send a thank-you note to your junior high school science teacher, or whoever it was who inspired your interest in science. Mrs. Hedburg, Mrs. Andrews, Elizabeth K. Driggs, Herbert Gilbert, Mr. Willis, and Stephen McNeal, thank you.
- Rearrange your Christmas/Hanukkah/Eid/KWANZAA lights in the shape of the Andromeda Galaxy — or in the shape of any of the great photos from the Hubble Telescope (Andromeda Galaxy pictured above; Hubble images here)
A few of the images from the Hubble Telescope
- Go visit your local science museum; take your kids along – borrow somebody else’s kids if you have to (take them along, too)
- Spend two hours in your local library, just looking through the books on astronomy and the universe
- Anybody got a good recipe for a cocktail called “The Hubble?” “The Andromeda?” Put it in the comments, please
December 30, 1924, Edwin Hubble announced the results of his observations of distant objects in space.
Edwin Hubble - source: PBS
In 1924, he announced the discovery of a Cepheid, or variable star, in the Andromeda Nebulae. Since the work of Henrietta Leavitt had made it possible to calculate the distance to Cepheids, he calculated that this Cepheid was much further away than anyone had thought and that therefore the nebulae was not a gaseous cloud inside our galaxy, like so many nebulae, but in fact, a galaxy of stars just like the Milky Way. Only much further away. Until now, people believed that the only thing existing outside the Milky Way were the Magellanic Clouds. The Universe was much bigger than had been previously presumed.
Later Hubble noted that the universe demonstrates a “red-shift phenomenon.” The universe is expanding. This led to the idea of an initial expansion event, and the theory eventually known as Big Bang.
Hubble’s life offered several surprises, and firsts:
Hubble was a tall, elegant, athletic, man who at age 30 had an undergraduate degree in astronomy and mathematics, a legal degree as a Rhodes scholar, followed by a PhD in astronomy. He was an attorney in Kentucky (joined its bar in 1913), and had served in WWI, rising to the rank of major. He was bored with law and decided to go back to his studies in astronomy.
In 1919 he began to work at Mt. Wilson Observatory in California, where he would work for the rest of his life. . . .
Hubble wanted to classify the galaxies according to their content, distance, shape, and brightness patterns, and in his observations he made another momentous discovery: By observing redshifts in the light wavelengths emitted by the galaxies, he saw that galaxies were moving away from each other at a rate constant to the distance between them (Hubble’s Law). The further away they were, the faster they receded. This led to the calculation of the point where the expansion began, and confirmation of the big bang theory. Hubble calculated it to be about 2 billion years ago, but more recent estimates have revised that to 20 billion years ago.An active anti-fascist, Hubble wanted to joined the armed forces again during World War II, but was convinced he could contribute more as a scientist on the homefront. When the 200-inch telescope was completed on Mt. Palomar, Hubble was given the honor of first use. He died in 1953.
“Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science.”
That news on December 30, 1924, didn’t make the first page of the New York Times. The Times carried a small note on February 25, 1925, that Hubble won a $1,000 prize from the American Academy for the Advancement of Science.
(Does anyone have a suitable citation for that video? Where did it come from? Who produced it? Is there more somewhere?)
Happy Hubble Day! Look up!
Resources:
- Journey to Palomar site (production currently being broadcast on PBS affiliates – wonderful story of George Ellery Hale and the origins of modern astronomy at Palomar; that’s where Hubble worked)
- List of science museums in the U.S.
- List of science museums in the world
- 5 gigapixel image of the Milky Way (has some wallpaper company made a mural of this yet? can we stretch this image all the way around our classroom?)
- The telescope: 400 years old in 2008 (dated by Lippershay’s patent application)
- Hubblesite.org, the telescope
- NASA’s best photos of 2010, according to Huffington Post
- Official Hubble Telescope website at NASA
Hubble Space Telescope, working homage to Edwin Hubble - NASA image
18 Comments | Astronomy, Big Bang, History, Physics, Science, Space exploration | Tagged: Astronomy, Big Bang, December 30, Edwin Hubble, Galaxies, History, Hubble Day, Physics, Red Shift, Rhodes Scholar, Science, Space exploration | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Feeling like you’re ready to fly? Not here, Comrade!
December 30, 2010
No Walking Off Roofs! Photo by Chris Jeffries
Some warning signs really do need an explanation.
But, what if your name is Peter Pan? What if you have some Pixie Dust?
Photo by Chris Jeffries, taken at the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg, Russia.
No, not that one; this Chris Jeffries.
Leave a Comment » | History, Humor, Travel | Tagged: History, Humor, St. Petersburg, Travel | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Almost neglecting the “neglected anniversary” of Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub, H. L. Mencken’s hoax, and the lessons that lie therein
December 29, 2010Could I get a longer title? Here is our annual tribute to the hoax that gave its name and much inspiration to this blog.
Otherwise occupied — Kenny’s due to board an airplane in Beijing soon; tires for the cars; papers to correct, curriculum to correct; our wedding anniversary I cannot forget pending — I nearly forgot: 93 years ago yesterday, on December 28, 1917, this column by H. L. Mencken was published in The New York Evening Mail:
A Neglected Anniversary
H. L. Mencken at approximately 12:30 a.m., April 7, 1933, at the Rennert Hotel, corner of Saratoga and Liberty Streets, 17 years later, not neglecting a sudsy anniversary – Baltimore Sun photo
On December 20 there flitted past us, absolutely without public notice, one of the most important profane anniversaries in American history, to wit, the seventy-fifth anniversary of the introduction of the bathtub into These States. Not a plumber fired a salute or hung out a flag. Not a governor proclaimed a day of prayer. Not a newspaper called attention to the day.
True enough, it was not entirely forgotten. Eight or nine months ago one of the younger surgeons connected with the Public Health Service in Washington happened upon the facts while looking into the early history of public hygiene, and at his suggestion a committee was formed to celebrate the anniversary with a banquet. But before the plan was perfected Washington went dry (This was war-time Prohibition, preliminary to the main catastrophe. — HLM), and so the banquet had to be abandoned. As it was, the day passed wholly unmarked, even in the capital of the nation.
Bathtubs are so common today that it is almost impossible to imagine a world without them. They are familiar to nearly everyone in all incorporated towns; in most of the large cities it is unlawful to build a dwelling house without putting them in; even on the farm they have begun to come into use. And yet the first American bathtub was installed and dedicated so recently as December 20, 1842, and, for all I know to the contrary, it may still be in existence and in use.
Curiously enough, the scene of its setting up was Cincinnati, then a squalid frontier town, and even today surely no leader in culture. But Cincinnati, in those days as in these, contained many enterprising merchants, and one of them was a man named Adam Thompson, a dealer in cotton and grain. Thompson shipped his grain by steamboat down the Ohio and Mississippi to New Orleans, and from there sent it to England in sailing vessels. This trade frequently took him to England, and in that country, during the ’30s, he acquired the habit of bathing.
The bathtub was then still a novelty in England. It had been introduced in 1828 by Lord John Russell and its use was yet confined to a small class of enthusiasts. Moreover, the English bathtub, then as now, was a puny and inconvenient contrivance — little more, in fact, than a glorified dishpan — and filling and emptying it required the attendance of a servant. Taking a bath, indeed, was a rather heavy ceremony, and Lord John in 1835 was said to be the only man in England who had yet come to doing it every day.
Thompson, who was of inventive fancy — he later devised the machine that is still used for bagging hams and bacon — conceived the notion that the English bathtub would be much improved if it were made large enough to admit the whole body of an adult man, and if its supply of water, instead of being hauled to the scene by a maid, were admitted by pipes from a central reservoir and run off by the same means. Accordingly, early in 1842 he set about building the first modern bathroom in his Cincinnati home — a large house with Doric pillars, standing near what is now the corner of Monastery and Orleans streets.
There was then, of course, no city water supply, at least in that part of the city, but Thompson had a large well in his garden, and he installed a pump to lift its water to the house. This pump, which was operated by six Negroes, much like an old-time fire engine, was connected by a pipe with a cypress tank in the garret of the house, and here the water was stored until needed. From the tank two other pipes ran to the bathroom. One, carrying cold water, was a direct line. The other, designed to provide warm water, ran down the great chimney of the kitchen, and was coiled inside it like a giant spring.
The tub itself was of new design, and became the grandfather of all the bathtubs of today. Thompson had it made by James Cullness, the leading Cincinnati cabinetmaker of those days, and its material was Nicaragua mahogany. It was nearly seven feet long and fully four feet wide. To make it water-tight, the interior was lined with sheet lead, carefully soldered at the joints. The whole contraption weighed about 1,750 pounds, and the floor of the room in which it was placed had to be reinforced to support it. The exterior was elaborately polished.
In this luxurious tub Thompson took two baths on December 20, 1842 — a cold one at 8 a.m. and a warm one some time during the afternoon. The warm water, heated by the kitchen fire, reached a temperature of 105 degrees. On Christmas day, having a party of gentlemen to dinner, he exhibited the new marvel to them and gave an exhibition of its use, and four of them, including a French visitor, Col. Duchanel, risked plunges into it. The next day all Cincinnati — then a town of about 100,000 people — had heard of it, and the local newspapers described it at length and opened their columns to violent discussions of it.
The thing, in fact, became a public matter, and before long there was bitter and double- headed opposition to the new invention, which had been promptly imitated by several other wealthy Cincinnatians. On the one hand it was denounced as an epicurean and obnoxious toy from England, designed to corrupt the democratic simplicity of the Republic, and on the other hand it was attacked by the medical faculty as dangerous to health and a certain inviter of “phthisic, rheumatic fevers, inflammation of the lungs and the whole category of zymotic diseases.” (I quote from the Western Medical Repository of April 23, 1843.)
The noise of the controversy soon reached other cities, and in more than one place medical opposition reached such strength that it was reflected in legislation. Late in 1843, for example, the Philadelphia Common Council considered an ordinance prohibiting bathing between November 1 and March 15, and it failed of passage by but two votes. During the same year the legislature of Virginia laid a tax of $30 a year on all bathtubs that might be set up, and in Hartford, Providence, Charleston and Wilmington (Del.) special and very heavy water rates were levied upon those who had them. Boston, very early in 1845, made bathing unlawful except upon medical advice, but the ordinance was never enforced and in 1862 it was repealed.
This legislation, I suspect, had some class feeling in it, for the Thompson bathtub was plainly too expensive to be owned by any save the wealthy; indeed, the common price for installing one in New York in 1845 was $500. Thus the low caste politicians of the time made capital by fulminating against it, and there is even some suspicion of political bias in many of the early medical denunciations. But the invention of the common pine bathtub, lined with zinc, in 1847, cut off this line of attack, and thereafter the bathtub made steady progress.
The zinc tub was devised by John F. Simpson, a Brooklyn plumber, and his efforts to protect it by a patent occupied the courts until 1855. But the decisions were steadily against him, and after 1848 all the plumbers of New York were equipped for putting in bathtubs. According to a writer in the Christian Register for July 17, 1857, the first one in New York was opened for traffic on September 12, 1847, and by the beginning of 1850 there were already nearly 1,000 in use in the big town.
After this medical opposition began to collapse, and among other eminent physicians Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes declared for the bathtub, and vigorously opposed the lingering movement against it in Boston. The American Medical Association held its annual meeting in Boston in 1849, and a poll of the members in attendance showed that nearly 55 per cent of them now regarded bathing as harmless, and that more than 20 per cent advocated it as beneficial. At its meeting in 1850 a resolution was formally passed giving the imprimatur of the faculty to the bathtub. The homeopaths followed with a like resolution in 1853.
But it was the example of President Millard Fillmore that, even more than the grudging medical approval, gave the bathtub recognition and respectability in the United States. While he was still Vice-President, in March, 1850, he visited Cincinnati on a stumping tour, and inspected the original Thompson tub. Thompson himself was now dead, but his bathroom was preserved by the gentlemen who had bought his house from the estate. Fillmore was entertained in this house and, according to Chamberlain, his biographer, took a bath in the tub. Experiencing no ill effects, he became an ardent advocate of the new invention, and on succeeding to the Presidency at Taylor’s death, July 9, 1850, he instructed his secretary of war, Gen. Charles M. Conrad, to invite tenders for the construction of a bathtub in the White House.
This action, for a moment, revived the old controversy, and its opponents made much of the fact that there was no bathtub at Mount Vernon, or at Monticello, and that all the Presidents and other magnificoes of the past had got along without any such monarchical luxuries. The elder Bennett, in the New York Herald, charged that Fillmore really aspired to buy and install in the White House a porphyry and alabaster bath that had been used by Louis Philippe at Versailles. But Conrad, disregarding all this clamor, duly called for bids, and the contract was presently awarded to Harper & Gillespie, a firm of Philadelphia engineers, who proposed to furnish a tub of thin cast iron, capable of floating the largest man.
This was installed early in 1851, and remained in service in the White House until the first Cleveland administration, when the present enameled tub was substituted. The example of the President soon broke down all that remained of the old opposition, and by 1860, according to the newspaper advertisements of the time, every hotel in New York had a bathtub, and some had two and even three. In 1862 bathing was introduced into the Army by Gen. McClellan, and in 1870 the first prison bathtub was set up at Moyamensing Prison, in Philadelphia.
So much for the history of the bathtub in America. One is astonished, on looking into it, to find that so little of it has been recorded. The literature, in fact, is almost nil. But perhaps this brief sketch will encourage other inquirers and so lay the foundation for an adequate celebration of the centennial in 1942.
(Text courtesy of Poor Mojo’s Almanac(k))
The entire history was a hoax composed by Mencken.
Even conservative wackoes appreciate the column.
Content with his private joke, Mencken remained silent about the hoax until a follow-up article, “Melancholy Reflections,” appeared in the Chicago Tribune on May 23, 1926, some eight years later. This was Mencken’s confession. It was also an appeal for reason to the American public.
His hoax was a joke gone bad. “A Neglected Anniversary” had been printed and reprinted hundreds of times in the intervening years. Mencken had been receiving letters of corroboration from some readers and requests for more details from others. His history of the bathtub had been cited repeatedly by other writers and was starting to find its way into reference works. As Mencken noted in “Melancholy Reflections,” his “facts” “began to be used by chiropractors and other such quacks as evidence of the stupidity of medical men. They began to be cited by medical men as proof of the progress of public hygiene.” And, because Fillmore’s presidency had been so uneventful, on the date of his birthday calendars often included the only interesting tidbit of information they could find: Fillmore had introduced the bathtub into the White House. (Even the later scholarly disclosure that Andrew Jackson had a bathtub installed there in 1834—years before Mencken claimed it was even invented—did not diminish America’s conviction that Fillmore was responsible.)
(No, dear reader, probably not correct; surely John Adams brought a bathtub with him when he moved into the White House, then called the President’s Mansion. Plumbing, hot water, and finally hot water to a bathtub in the president’s residence, were installed between 1830 and 1853, as best I can determine.)
Mencken wrote an introduction to the piece in a later book, A Mencken Chrestomathy (Alfred A. Knopf, 1949):
The success of this idle hoax, done in time of war, when more serious writing was impossible, vastly astonished me. It was taken gravely by a great many other newspapers, and presently made its way into medical literature and into standard reference books. It had, of course, no truth in it whatsoever, and I more than once confessed publicly that it was only a jocosity . . . Scarcely a month goes by that I do not find the substance of it reprinted, not as foolishness but as fact, and not only in newspapers but in official documents and other works of the highest pretensions.
There’s a moral to the story: Strive for accuracy!
So, Dear Reader, check for accuracy, and question authority.
Fact checks — what else might need to be corrected in this story?
- Cincinnati’s population in 1840 was about 44,000, far short of the 100,000 Mencken claimed (were you even aware of the riots in 1841?)
- Lord John Russell, twice Prime Minister of England, had nothing whatever to do with bathtubs; Bertrand Russell was his grandson
- Bathing and bathtubs have been a part of civilization for 5,000 years at least; almost every home in Mohenjo-Daro had a bathing area in it, with plumbing to take waste water away from the home. Mohenjo-daro emerged as a major city about 2600 BCE, more than 4,600 years ago
- The Governor’s Palace at Williamsburg, Virginia, had a bathhouse as early as 1721
This nineteenth-century tub was one a fixture in the basement of Williamsburg’s St. George Tucker House, the first home in town known to have a bath with running water. –Colonial Williamsburg (tub was installed by 1796, contrasting sharply with dates Mencken offered)
- Roman baths were famous, from at least the first century CE
- During the American Revolution, George Washington and others worked to develop hot springs for bathing in Bath, Virginia — now the town of Berekely Springs, West Virginia
- Bathtubs a novelty in the 18th century? Consider the famous painting of the death of Marat Sade, during the French Revolution (see below)
- Charles M. Conrad was, indeed, Fillmore’s Secretary of War — but why would a president task the Secretary of War with plumbing renovations at the Executive Mansion?
Resources:
- Neatorama, “Six More Hoaxes that Fooled the World”
- Today in Literature, “Mencken’s Tub and Hot Water”
- Description of the H. L. Mencken Collection at Baltimore’s Enoch Pratt Free Library
- Was the New York Evening Mail a propaganda tool of the German government, operating in America during the war?
- What about “fake news?” Is Jon Stewart the modern-day incarnation of H. L. Mencken?
10 Comments | 1914-1918, A Good Story, Accuracy, Fillmore's bathtub, H. L. Mencken, History, Hoaxes, Journalism, Newspapers, Presidents, Urban Legend, World War I | Tagged: 1914-1918, A Good Story, Accuracy, Baltimore, H. L. Mencken, History, Hoaxes, Journalism, Millard Fillmore, Newspapers, Presidents, White House, White House Plumbers, World War I | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Antique, if not ancient, technology
December 28, 2010
You could slide through the physics final with this device, at one time.
This is the device used to put humans on the Moon.
Have you ever used one?
It’s a slide rule. Nice story about Art Hunt’s kids listening to tales from the olden days, and bringing back a little piece of the olden days for him. He now claims to be ready for a power outage at his lab.
How does anyone understand a logarithmic scale anymore without a slide rule? Does anyone make good slide rules anymore?
12 Comments | History, Mathematics, Moon, Space Race, Technology | Tagged: History, Math, Moon Shot, Slide Rule, Technology, Tools | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
December 27, Good Trip Day: Darwin and Apollo 8
December 28, 2010December 27 is one of those days — many of us are off work, but it’s after Boxing Day, and it’s not yet on to New Year’s Eve or Day. We should have celebrated, maybe.
We should celebrate it as a day of portent: A good embarkation, and a good, safe end to a nation-encouraging trip to almost touch the Moon.
HMS Beagle, on a voyage of discovery
On December 27, 1831, Charles Darwin and H.M.S. Beagle set sail on an around-the-world voyage of discovery that would change all of science, and especially biology, forever.
December 27 1831
After a few delays, H.M.S. Beagle headed out from Plymouth with a crew of 73 under clear skies and a good wind. Darwin became sea-sick almost immediately.
Darwin never fully overcame his seasickness, but he fought it well enough to become the single greatest collector of specimens in history for the British Museum and British science, a distinction that won him election to science societies even before his return from the trip — and cemented his life in science, instead of in the church. Darwin’s discoveries would have revolutionized biology in any case. In analyzing what he had found, a few years later and with the aid of experts at the British Museum, Darwin realized he had disproved much of William Paley’s hypotheses about life and its diversity, and that another, more basic explanation was possible. This led to his discovery of evolution by natural and sexual selection.
Mini-sheet from the Royal Mail in 2009 honoring Darwin's discoveries in the Galapagos Islands
On December 27, 1968, Apollo 8 splashed down after a successful and heartening trip to orbit the Moon. The three crewmen, Commander Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr., and William A. Anders, had orbited the Moon, a very important milestone in the methodological race to put humans on the Moon (which would be accomplished seven months later). 1968 was a terrible year for the U.S., with the North Korean capture of the U.S.S. Pueblo, assassinations of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy during the presidential campaign, riots in dozens of American cities, nasty political conventions with riots at the Democratic Convention in Chicago, a contentious and bitter election making sore the nation’s divide over Vietnam policy, and other problems. On Christmas Eve, Borman, Lovell and Anders broadcast from orbit around the Moon, a triumphant and touching moment for the Apollo Program and Americans around the world. Their safe return on December 27 raised hopes for a better year in 1969.
Motherboard.tv has a great write up from Alex Pasternack:
In 1968, NASA engineers were scrambling to meet President Kennedy’s challenge to land a man on the moon by decade’s end. Because delays with the lunar module were threatening to slow the Apollo program, NASA chose to change mission plans and send the crew of Apollo 8 all the way to the moon without a lunar module.
Exactly 42 years ago, the three astronauts of Apollo 8 became the first humans to orbit another celestial object. As they came around the dark side for the third time, Frank Borman, the commander, finally turned their capsule around. And then they saw the Earth.
Borman: Oh my God! Look at that picture over there! Here’s the Earth coming up. Wow, is that pretty.
Anders: Hey, don’t take that, it’s not scheduled.
Borman: (laughing) You got a color film, Jim?
Anders: Hand me that roll of color quick, will you…One of the resulting photos taken by Anders on a Hasselblad camera became one of the world’s most iconic images.
As Bill Anders recalls it:
I just happened to have one with color film in it and a long lens. All I did was to keep snapping… It’s not a very good photo as photos go, but it’s a special one. It was the first statement of our planet Earth and it was particularly impressive because it’s contrasted against this startling horizon… After all the training and studying we’d done as pilots and engineers to get to the moon safely and get back, [and] as human beings to explore moon orbit, what we really discovered was the planet Earth.
Yeah, we missed toasting it on time in 2010. Plan to raise a glass on December 27, 2011, to Good Trip Day for the human race. December 27 is a day we should remember, for these achievements.
6 Comments | 1969, Astronomy, Biology, Charles Darwin, Darwin, Evolution, Explorers and Exploration, History, History images, Moon, Science, Space exploration, Space Race | Tagged: Apollo 8, Astronomy, Biology, Darwin, Discovery, Evolution, Exploration, History, HMS Beagle, Man on the Moon, Moon Race, Science, Space exploration | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
How to find “separation of church and state” in the Constitution
December 27, 2010It’s been at least 20 years since I first heard the old canard of an argument that “there’s no separation of church and state in the Constitution.” I think I first heard it attributed to David Barton, which would make sense, since he doesn’t understand the Constitution, but neither does he fear sharing his misunderstandings.
It was an incorrect statement then, and it’s been incorrect since September 1787. Separation of state and church is woven throughout the Constitution, part of the warp and woof.
Recently, latter-day Constitution ignorami repeat the old canard.
Toles cartoon on dangers of marrying church and state
I was surprised to discover I’ve not posted this before on this blog. So here’s a slightly-edited version of a response I gave many months ago to someone who made that silly claim, a basic description that I developed years ago to explain the issue, in speeches by members of the Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution:
Separation of church and state: It’s in the Constitution.
I don’t play a constitutional lawyer on television, I am one*, but it seems to me anyone can read the Constitution and see. One can see especially if one understands that the Constitution sets up a limited government, as Madison described, one that can do only what is delegated to it. The Constitution is a short document.
Where should you look to find separation of church and state in the Constitution?
First, look in the Preamble. It is made clear that the document is a compact between citizens: “We the people . . . do ordain and establish this Constitution . . .” The usual role of God ordaining (in some western nations) is altered, intentionally. It is not God who establishes this government, but you and I, together. From the first words of the Constitution, there is separation of church and state. The power of our government grows out of a secular compact between you and me, and 308 million other residents of the nation. We have a government created by consent of the governed, as the Declaration of Independence said a just government should be. It is not a government created by the will of God directly (though some, including the Mormons, argue it is divinely inspired). We have no divine right kings or other monarchs under the Constitution. The government is not the grantor of rights from God, but is instead the protector of the rights of citizens, whatever the source of the rights and whatever the rights.
Second, look in the key parts of the document itself. Start with Article 1. The legislative branch is given no role in religion; neither is any religion given any role in the legislature. In Article 2, the executive branch gets no role in religion, and religion gets no role in the executive branch. In Article 3, the judicial branch gets no role in religion, and religion gets no role in the judicial branch. In Article 4, the people get a guarantee of a republican form of government in the states, but the states get no role in religion, and religion gets no role in state government. This is, by design of the founders, a perfect separation of church and state.
Third, in Article 6, the convention wrote the hard and fast rule that no religious test can be used for any office in government, federal, state or local, means that no official will have a formal, governmental role in religion, and no religion can insist on a role in any official’s duties.
Fourth, Amendment 1 closes the door to weasling around it: Congress is prohibited from even considering any legislation that might grant a new bureaucracy or a new power to get around the other bans on state and church marriage, plus the peoples’ rights in religion are enumerated.
Fifth: In 1801 the Baptists (!) in Danbury, Connecticut, grew concerned that Connecticut would act to infringe on their church services, or teachings, or right to exist. So they wrote to President Jefferson. Jefferson responded with an official declaration of government policy on what the First Amendment and Constitution mean in such cases. Jefferson carefully constructed the form of the device as well as the content with his Attorney General, Levi Lincoln, to be sure that it would state what the law was. This “letter” is the proclamation. It’s an official statement of the U.S. government, collected in the president’s official papers and not in his personal papers. Make no mistake: Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists was an official act, an official statement of the law of the United States. Jefferson intended it to assuage the Baptists in Danbury, to inform and warn the Connecticut legislatures, and to be a touchstone to which future Americans could turn for information. It was only fitting and proper for the Supreme Court to use the letter in this capacity as it has done several times.
Sixth: The phrase, “separation of church and state” dates back another 100 years and more, to the founding of Rhode Island. It is the religion/state facet of the idea of government by consent of the governed without interference from religious entities, expressed so well in the Mayflower Compact, in the first paragraphs of the Declaration of Independence, and carried through in the Constitution (see especially the Preamble, above).
No, the phrase “separation of church and state” never appears in the Constitution. The principles of separation of church and state are part of the warp and woof, and history, of the document, however. The law is clear, the law was clear, the law has always been clear, and denying the Constitution says what it says, won’t change it or make it go away. You could just as easily point out that the word “democracy” or “democratic” never appears in the document, though we rely on democratic mechanisms and institutions to make it work. You could point out that nowhere does it say that our national government is a republic, though it is. The Constitution doesn’t say “checks and balances,” nor does it say “federalism.” The Constitution doesn’t mention political parties. The Constitution was written before the advent of broadcasting, and makes no mention of radio nor television, nor of the internet — but the First Amendment freedoms apply there anyway. The Constitution doesn’t say “privacy,” though it protects your right to privacy.
You won’t find “separation of church and state” as a phrase in the Constitution. If you read it, you’ll find that the concept of the separation of state and church can’t be taken out of the document, either — it’s a fundamental principle of our government.
More, and Resources:
- U.S. Constitution.net, on stuff not in the Constitution
- U.S. Constitution, at the Bill of Rights Institute (downloadable .pdfs, too)
- While you’re at it, “friend” the Bill of Rights Institute on Facebook — goal is 500 more before January 1, 2011; pass the word around
__________
* A non-practicing one. We have way more than 50,000 lawyers in Texas. That’s enough trouble for one lifetime. Someone has to look out for the welfare of the world.
110 Comments | History, Law, Politics, Religious Freedom, Separation of church and state, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Constitution, History, Law, Politics, Religious Freedom, Separation of church and state | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Lens incompetence: Watts Up looks through the wrong end of the telescope
December 27, 2010The wags and denialists over at Anthony Watts’ joint are up to their old tricks, accusing others of their own errors. Today it’s a guest post by Bernie Lewin, in which he claims that climate warming was all psychological, a “scare”:
Yet we can find precedents to this science-base scare in many health scares of recent decades, and also in environmental scares since the DDT cancer scare triggered by Silent Spring, politicised by the EDF and legalized by the newly formed EPA. (See Scared to Death which finds a repeating pattern to these science-based scares.)
This woman might be corrected; global warming denialists will staunchly insist she knows what she’s doing and doesn’t need YOUR advice.
He fails to even think that Rachel Carson was right. Lewin demonstrates incompetence at history, law and science, and the first point of the Scout Law, all in one sentence.
So much error. So little time to correct.
- Carson didn’t claim DDT caused cancer. She noted that we create thousands of chemicals that may cause cancer, that cancers were rising in frequency, and that there was no testing of the new substances prior to their marketing. Was there a DDT/cancer scare? Lewin doesn’t offer any evidence. (We had to correct Matt Ridley on this a couple of weeks ago — see his post here.)
- EDF (Environmental Defense Fund, now known as Environmental Defense) was on DDT without Carson — suing to stop DDT spraying (for no good reason) on Long Island in 1968. EDF relied on science that was courtroom ready. (I had misremembered the year of EDF’s suit in an earlier version of this post; my apologies to the two or three who may have read it.) EDF’s suits established, on the basis of science, that DDT is an uncontrollable poison in the wild. Lewin ignores science and law in his off-hand indictment of Carson’s book and ED.
- EPA didn’t act against DDT until 1972. EPA banned DDT use on agricultural crops in the U.S. because DDT kills non-target species and, basically, entire ecosystems. EPA was specific: The ban had nothing to do with cancer. Once again, Lewin ignores history, science and law.
So, in Lewin’s guest post, we see the pattern that continues at Watts’s place — unfair and wrong indictments of science, ignorance of history, little understanding of law.
All while trying to mock scientists: ‘Of course scientists are almost always wrong,’ Watts’s blog argues, once again.
Watts won’t let me correct his errors there, even though he’s still coddling those who misdescribe Rachel Carson as a mass murderer, while denying he does it himself. Consequently his readers won’t be alerted to this post because Watts or his minions will edit out the automatic ping his blog gets that this post is here. Propaganda promoting falsehood can’t stand the sunlight of fact and truth.
Just because there’s a scare doesn’t mean there’s not a reason to be scared. DDT is a deadly toxin, so long-lived that it almost cannot ever be eradicated from the environment. It kills everything small, quickly, unless so much of it is used that the small things evolve quickly to be resistant and immune to it.
So, if we are to assume, as Lewin wrote, that the anti-warming bunch is to warming what the campaign against Rachel Carson by the DDT manufacturers was to DDT’s harms, we get a hint of what’s really up at Watts Up: Any anti-warming claim is a hoax. Why put it so cryptically, if that’s what they meant to say?
When Lewin looks at the history of DDT and Rachel Carson, he’s looking at the false history, and he draws the wrong conclusions. Should we trust a guy so sloppy with the facts to be right on anything else?
9 Comments | DDT, denialism, Global warming, Green Politics, History, Hoaxes, Law, Politics, Rachel Carson, Science, War on Science | Tagged: Climate change, Cost of Green, DDT, denialism, Global warming, Green Politics, History, Hoaxes, Law, Politics, Rachel Carson, Science, Watts Up With That | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Great history of newspapers: Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus
December 24, 2010“Papa says, ‘If you see it in the Sun, it’s so.'”
Do we, you and I in 2010, stand as witnesses to the end of newspapers in America?
It’s been a grand history. Newspapering gave us great leaders like Benjamin Franklin. Newspapering gave us wars, like the Spanish-American War. Newspapering gave us Charlie Brown, Ann Landers, the Yellow Kid, Jim Murray, Red Smith, Thomas Nast (and Santa Claus), the Federalist Papers, and coupons to save money on laundry soap.
It’s been a curious history, too. An 1897 editorial vouching for Santa Claus rates as the most popular editorial of all time, according to the Newseum in Washington, D.C.
The man who saved Christmas, at least for Virginia O'Hanlon: Francis Pharcellus Church - Newseum image
In autumn, 1897, 8-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon of 115 West 59th Street in New York, wrote to the New York Sun with this simple question:
“Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?”
In the age of Yellow Journalism, the fiercely competitive Sun‘s editors turned the letter to Francis Pharcellus. He responded to little Virginia on September 21, 1897:
“Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”
Church’s brother, William Conant Church, owned and published the newspaper. Both had followed their father into the news business. They co-founded The Army-Navy Journal in 1863, and went on to a series of journalistic collaborations. Francis was 58 years old when he answered Virginia’s letter. (He died at age 67, in 1906.)
The New York Sun held down the conservative corner in New York journalism at the time, versus the New York Times and the New York Herald-Tribune. But it also had an interesting history, to a blogger intrigued by hoaxes. In 1835 the paper published a series of six newspaper stories falsely attributed to Sir John Herschel, a well-known astronomer, claiming to describe a civilization on the Moon — the Great Moon Hoax. The discovery was credited to a new, very powerful telescope.
In 1844 the paper published a hoax written by Edgar Allen Poe, the Balloon Hoax. Under a pseudonym, Poe wrote that a gas balloon had crossed the Atlantic in three days.
The Sun also featured outstanding reporting. A 1947 and 1948 series about crime on the docks of New York City won a Pulitzer Prize for writer Malcolm Johnson. That series inspired Elia Kazan’s 1954 movie On the Waterfront starring Marlon Brando, Rod Steiger, Eva Marie Saint, Karl Malden and Lee J. Cobb.
The New York Sun ceased publication in 1950.
For all of its history, the Sun and the Churches are most remembered for that defense of belief in Santa Claus.
Virginia O’Hanlon grew up, graduated from Hunter College, got a masters at Columbia, and earned a Ph.D. from Fordham. She taught in the New York City Public School system, from which she retired in 1959. She died in 1971.
Birth of tradition
Columbia University was Church’s alma mater, as well as O’Hanlon’s. Her letter and his response get a reading each year at the Yule Log Ceremony at Columbia College, along with the poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas.” Animated, live-acting, and other television productions have been mounted in 1974, 1991, and 2009.
Is there a Santa Claus? Did Church write a credible defense? The text of the letter and answer, below the fold.
1 Comment | Historic documents, History, holiday, Holidays, Newspapers | Tagged: Christmas, Editorials, Francis Pharcellus Church, History, Holidays, New York Sun, Newspapers, Santa Claus, Virginia O'Hanlon | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 