One Hundred Years Ago

[Rix Gins]

The Tonopah Daily Bonanza, April 5, 1916.

[K_Dubb]

Josef Egger  was a soldier with the 3rd Infantry Regiment, 8 Company.  He died on March 20, 1916 at the age of 22.  No cause of death given, so there is a possibility that he died from illness or accident.  But he was with an infantry unit, so there is reason to think that he might have died in battle.

Nice illustration of crosses with little roofs, like little Black Forest shrines.

[K_Dubb]

The Tonopah Daily Bonanza, April 5, 1916.

Oh no!  I hope the Professor's fortunes haven't taken a turn for the worse -- that's got to be his wife!

Also odd to see suicide called "brave".  Grandpa used to say that B. P. O. E. on the Elks' lodge stood for "biggest prunes on earth".

[albrecht]

Oh no!  I hope the Professor's fortunes haven't taken a turn for the worse -- that's got to be his wife!

Also odd to see suicide called "brave". 

I'm not saying I agree, of course, but over the course of history, especially in more militaristic cultures, suicide can been seen as brave; either in defense of the nation or to protect the family from shame from some personal failure. (Or in the case of loyalty, like Indian's Sati, but also in European society's "gentleman's option," or the Roman way to avoid confiscation of property when convicted of something, etc.) In the old days (maybe now in some circumstances) the police or inquirer might judge as an "accident" or "death by misadventure" or "accidental overdose" to spare the family shame or more sadness.

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

Oh no!  I hope the Professor's fortunes haven't taken a turn for the worse -- that's got to be his wife!

Sounds like the Professor might need to find some paying gigs or some more students. Those church recitals might have nourished the soul, but they most likely didn't feed the bulldog!

I wondered if the Charles Schwab who was seeking investments in mines might have been the father of the one who started the famous investment firm, but he wasn't. The family was from Sacramento, though, so maybe it was an uncle.

Speaking of investments, I wonder if we'll find out who won the indoor baseball game between the bankers and brokers.

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

Plus a few more from Mr. Earl

Those are spectacular!  They remind me a lot of the fanciful futuristic automotive designs of Bruce McCall that were regularly featured in National Lampoon in the seventies and eighties.

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

With MLB baseball starting here is the opening day Detroit Tigers box score from April 1916.
More than one big name played in this game

http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CHA/CHA191604120.shtml

Several future Hall of Famers on both teams and some Black Sox in the Chicago lineup! 

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

April 5th 1916 born...Gregory Peck

Just be careful if you celebrate by playing "The Big Country" drinking game.  Hardly anyone who takes a shot whenever a character says, "It's a big country," makes it to the end of the movie conscious.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051411/

And for anyone who's ever wondered what "Taxi Driver" would have been like if Gregory Peck had played Travis Bickel, here's a little taste.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fV3W1HVYeaY

[21st Century Man]

Just be careful if you celebrate by playing "The Big Country" drinking game.  Hardly anyone who takes a shot whenever a character says, "It's a big country," makes it to the end of the movie conscious.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051411/

And for anyone who's ever wondered what "Taxi Driver" would have been like if Gregory Peck had played Travis Bickel, here's a little taste.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fV3W1HVYeaY

I'll have to try that drinking game. LOL.

[21st Century Man]

Opening today, a hundred years ago.  Hell's Hinges with William S. Hart.





Hell's Hinges is a 1916 American Western silent film starring William S. Hart and Clara Williams. Directed by Charles Swickard, William S. Hart and Clifford Smith, and produced by Thomas H. Ince, the screenplay was written by C. Gardner Sullivan.

Hell's Hinges has been selected for preservation in the National Film Registry, and is considered by some to be one of the finest silent Westerns.

PLOT

Hell's Hinges tells the story of a weak-willed minister, Rev. Bob Henley (played by Standing), who comes to a wild and debauched frontier town with his sister, Faith (played by Williams). The owner of the saloon, Silk Miller (played by Hollingsworth), and his accomplices sense trouble and encourage the local rowdies to disrupt the attempts to evangelize the community. Hard-bitten gunman Blaze Tracy (played by Hart), the most dangerous man around, is, however, won over by the sincerity of Faith. He intervenes to expel the rowdies from the newly built church.

Silk adopts a new approach. He encourages the dance-hall girl, Dolly (played by Glaum), to seduce Rev. Henley. She gets him drunk, and he spends the night in her room. The following morning the whole town learns of his fall from grace. Blaze rides out to find a doctor for the now near-demented minister.

The disgraced minister, having rapidly descended into alcoholism, is goaded into helping the rowdy element to burn down the church. The church-goers try to defend the church, and a gunfight erupts in which the minister is killed and the church set ablaze. Blaze returns too late to stop the destruction. In revenge, Blaze kills Silk and burns down the whole town, beginning with the saloon. He and Faith leave to start a new life.

CAST

William S. Hart as Blaze Tracy
Clara Williams as Faith Henley
Jack Standing as Rev. Robert Henley
Alfred Hollingsworth as Silk Miller
Robert McKim as A clergyman
J. Frank Burke as Zeb Taylor
Louise Glaum as Dolly
John Gilbert as A rowdy cowboy (uncredited)
Jean Hersholt as A rowdy townsman (uncredited)


Initial reviews in 1916

When Hell's Hinges was released, the reception of the film among New York critics was so positive that the producer bought space in newspapers around the country to reprint the reviews. The following are excerpts from those reviews:

New York Telegraph: "Dramatic suspense and punch, coupled with artistic treatment, are the most conspicuous characteristics of 'Hell's Hinges' ... [A] swaggering, hard-drinking, fast-shooting, all-round 'bad' man, with good stuff under a rough exterior, furnished Mr. Hart with a vehicle in which his talents show to best advantage."
New York American: "A well-balanced supporting cast, a lavish production and marked finesse in treatment combines to make 'Hell's Hinges' an unusual offering."
New York Press: "Gunplay and religion lubricate 'Hell's Hinges' ... It is a film drama that combines all the elements that make for success ... Reckless riding, double-handed shooting from the hip, a dance hall of the Bret Harte description and, finally a conflagration that gives a truly Gehenna-like finish to the place known as Hell's Hinges ... No actor before the screen has been able to give as sincere and true a touch to the Westerner as Hart. He rides in a manner indigenous to the soil, he shoots with the real knack and he acts with that sense of artistry that hides the acting."
New York Sun: "It depicts strikingly the storm and stress of existence in a Western town with a final scene of the shooting up of a gambling den, which aroused the spectators to a high degree of approval."
New York Herald: "William S. Hart is beginning to typify certain things in the film world. He is ever stoical, slow to anger, but possessed of the powers of a hundred men when aroused. He is a big, bluff, wholesome fellow, whose ideas are frequently a little peculiar, and he goes about matters in exclusively his own way. But when the showdown arrives, depend upon it, William S. Hart will be found lined up on the side of righteousness. This week, for example, Hart is appearing at the Knickerbocker Theatre in 'Hell's Hinges. Hart has the opportunity to do some good riding, to carry a drunken minister on his back, to shoot the villain and some sub-villains, to set the town afire and to marry the minister's sister. The Kaiser himself has appeared in pictures and done less."
New York Herald: "'Hell's Hinges,' one of those traditional places on the frontier of the Wild West, 'where there ain't no Ten Commandments and a man can get a thirst,' was pictured in the most lurid manner."
Grace Kingsley of the Los Angeles Times gave the actors high marks. She credited Hart with doing his "usual excellent work" and found Glaum to be "a really fascinating vampire." Kingsley paid special note to Standing's performance as the reverend, calling it "one of the most subtle, but at the same time of the most sincere bits of film acting of his entire career," a performance exhibiting "intelligence and imagination ... in the very highest degree." Kingsley found the film to be "marvelously well done" but took exception to the would-be folksy western dialect in the title cards:

"C. Gardner Sullivan appears to have written 'Hell's Hinges' for the purpose of allowing us to look our fill on fire and fights. Certain it is the thing is marvelously well done. There is a burning dance hall with men and women entrapped, which fairly makes you gasp, and there is a 'beau-oo-tiful' free-for-all fight between the sheep and the goats of 'Hell's Hinges.' All this is lovely enough in its way to make for forgiveness of the dialect of the subtitles, a dialect which 'never was on land or sea.'"

The title cards includes lines such as "When women like her say there is a God, there is one, and he sure must be worth trailin' with".

The publication Moving Picture World gave the film as a whole a positive review: "Brilliant in subtitle, strong in treatment with occasional notes of true pathos, the marks of creative ability and sure craftmanship are there .... the cast is without flaw." The publication further noted that Ince "is at his best when holding close to revelations of the human mind and heart."

Later historical assessments

In September 1994, Hell's Hinges experienced a revival following a screening at the Film Center of the School of the Chicago Art Institute.[4] At the time, the Chicago Tribune's movie critic, Michael Wilmington, called Hell's Hinges "Hart's acknowledged masterpiece," "perhaps the finest movie Western made before John Ford's 1939 Stagecoach," and "as emotionally powerful as any American film of the teens, except for the masterpieces of D.W. Griffith and Erich Von Stroheim."

Two months after the showing in Chicago and Wilmington's review, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

In 1997, Film Comment published a review calling Hell's Hinges a "classic of its kind" and arguing that "to dismiss it casually as a western would be a mistake, for it more resembles The Atonement of Gosta Berling than it does Riders of the Purple Sage. The reviewer gave particular praise to Hart's directorial skill:

"The camera placement here, the simple yet effective symbolism, and the flair for spectacle as in the brilliantly handled mob scenes where all of Inceville goes up in smoke, the real 'feel' of the old, dusty, unglamorised West, all should have earned Hart a reputation as one of the great directors. ... For the most part, 'Hell's Hinges' offers highpowered drama rather than traditional western action. ... Fine camerawork utilising long panoramic shots, excellent cutting and a sure control over the masses of extras fuse this into an episode of astonishing vigor. Hart, his assistant Cliff Smith, his writer Gardner Sullivan and cameraman Joe August were one of the sturdiest (and least appreciated) teams of craftsmen the cinema ever produced."

The film was given a centenary screening at the Museum of Modern Art in January 2016.[7] In a capsule review for the occasion, The New Yorker's Richard Brody praised the film for its uncommon intensity: "The images are as direct and bare as the characters' emotions, and the harsh drama builds to a mad, apocalyptic climax of crime and revenge."

[K_Dubb]

Some US submarines in a photo taken a hundred years ago today:



Some cool photos, including interiors, are here for those of us who like that sort of thing:  http://pigboats.com/subs/m-boats.html

[trostol]

Just be careful if you celebrate by playing "The Big Country" drinking game.  Hardly anyone who takes a shot whenever a character says, "It's a big country," makes it to the end of the movie conscious.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051411/

And for anyone who's ever wondered what "Taxi Driver" would have been like if Gregory Peck had played Travis Bickel, here's a little taste.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fV3W1HVYeaY

ha ha ha hah

[gabrielle]

Here is our daily update from the Standard (London)...

[K_Dubb]

From the Seattle Star today:





Well, that was a disappointment.

The opinionated women of Minnesota have appeared here before:







I thought for sure this place opened last month:

[gabrielle]

21st Century man...that sounds like quite the play!  What an odd plot.  There is something about the debauched Reverend that has me confused.  I can't put my finger on it. 

[K_Dubb]

The French destroyer Trombe, which captured the German submarine UB-26 a hundred years ago today:



The UB-26:



My French is bad, but between this page and Wikipedia it seems the sub was captured in a net towed by the Trombe, bombarded with "grenades" and shelled by a 47mm cannon, whereupon the crew emerged, shouting "Comrades!"

http://sousmarinmonge.perso.sfr.fr/BatimentsRM/UB26/presentation.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM_UB-26

Never heard of trawling for subs before!  The sub was renamed and taken into the French navy as the Roland Morillot:



An illustration of the scene of capture.  The sub is in the middle:



This sketch, "from nature" = eyewitness?, presumably served as the basis for one of those great illustrations in French magazines, but I haven't been able to find it.

[gabrielle]

Wow..K Dubb..that is amazing.  I had never heard of trawling for subs either. 

http://uboat.net/allies/ships/trawlers.htm

[Rix Gins]

From the Seattle Star today:


Well, that was a disappointment.

Defense Attorney Mason Murphy asks the court to dismiss the charges.

[K_Dubb]

Defense Attorney Mason Murphy asks the court to dismiss the charges.

Haha, I can hear his indignant tone in my head!

[Rix Gins]

Everett True, April 6, 1916.

[Rix Gins]

The Chicago Day Book, April 6, 1916.

[Rix Gins]

The Daily Bonanza, April 6, 1916.

[K_Dubb]

The Chicago Day Book, April 6, 1916.

That lightbulb-eating item is bizarre.  Is it the pear shape that suggests putting it in your mouth?

Love the sixth-grade lunch!  Between that story, with the four splendid boys, and the prospect of packing the Airdome for a whistling concert it's clear we're looking at a vanished age of innocence.  Then they go digging up cemeteries hahaha.

[Rix Gins]

That lightbulb-eating item is bizarre.  Is it the pear shape that suggests putting it in your mouth?

Love the sixth-grade lunch!  Between that story, with the four splendid boys, and the prospect of packing the Airdome for a whistling concert it's clear we're looking at a vanished age of innocence.  Then they go digging up cemeteries hahaha.

I noticed that the whistling concert 'Will be varied by musical numbers by some of the best local talent.'  Oh oh...here comes R.B. Kanouse and his baritone horn!

[K_Dubb]

Ha I hadn't thought of that!  I'm sure some eyes were rolled.

I really wonder if this figure in the Tonopah Labor Day 1915 parade is the erstwhile Professor in his heyday:





The postures of the men in the band seem a little tentative.  Would good hard-working Presbyterians feel a little out-of-place in a labor parade?

[gabrielle]

Sir Sam Hughes was Canada's Minister of Militia and Defense in 1916.  This is a short excerpt of an article that appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press on April 6 1916.

[K_Dubb]

Sir Sam Hughes was Canada's Minister of Militia and Defense in 1916.  This is a short excerpt of an article that appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press on April 6 1916.

Good story.  It sounds like he'd rather play Boy Scouts than sit in his office.

[K_Dubb]

A photo taken a hundred years ago today showing how you got from West Seattle to Beacon Hill way back then across the tidelands:



I think the trestle running north and south in the distance is the Interurban streetcar which my great grandma used to take every day from Georgetown to her job in town.

Here is a similar view today:



The West Seattle Bridge occupied at least fifteen years of my dad's career in the Engineering Department.  As a kid, I got so sick of those trips downtown after church to watch the incremental progress of box girders slowly creeping towards each other, poured in place way up in the air on top of the piers.

Also from a hundred years ago today is this old dumptruck from the Seattle Municipal Archives:



Cool how it still has a buggy-style roof.

[K_Dubb]

Also from a hundred years ago today is this article in the Svenska-Amerikanska Western laying out the senatorial ambitions of the president of Seattle's Scandinavian-American Bank, "one of Seattle's most influential and respected men."



This institution is best known to tourists from the Underground Tour in Pioneer Square, which features the lower floors of the building, buried by fill in a post-Seattle-fire effort to raise the city above occasional tidal flooding.





Inside, about 1900:



The old entrance, now two stories below street level:







On the tour, you learn that the bank was known for being open 24 hours, and that the vault is haunted by a teller shot in a robbery.  Who knows?

[Billy Joe Mulgreavey]

What brought the Scandinavians to that area to begin with..the fishing?