One Hundred Years Ago

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

Well it is looking like the Lafayette Escadrille was deployed for the first time 100 years ago today.
They were American pilots who went to France and volunteered to fly against the Germans.

Squadron Emblem


Definitely needs some more research:

Great topic, Walks!  I know a little about the Layfayette Escadrille, and have a great deal of admiration and respect for the extraordinary bravery and adventurous spirit of those pilots who had to know their chances of survival were not very good. Their planes were flimsy death traps that were prone to engine failure and machine gun malfunctions and inferior to many of the German planes they went up against. They were definitely an elite group of very tough men who were sort of the Mercury astronauts of their day, except the astronauts didn't have anybody shooting at them. In fact, they were so tough they even kept a pair of lions named Whiskey and Soda as squadron mascots.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette_Escadrille

Here's a brief bio of Kiffin Rockwell, an American who joined the French Foreign Legion, was wounded in action in 1915, and transferred to the LE in 1916. He was the first member of the squadron to down a German plane in May of 1916 and was one of the top pilots until he was shot down and killed in September of the same year.

http://www.vmi.edu/archives.aspx?id=12371

Here a few pics, including one of Kiffin Rockwell in Paris and a couple of him standing with other pilots, as well as one of the lions.

[K_Dubb]

Great topic, Walks!  I know a little about the Layfayette Escadrille...

Nice!  I love the picture showing the logo.  Whoever designed it knew a bit more about war bonnets than I expected.  Also love the closeup of the pipe, enough to tell it's a straight bulldog.

[K_Dubb]

From the Seattle Star today: a front-page editorial on the war, and a continuation of the unsolved-murder series that doesn't quite live up to its predecessors.

[Rix Gins]

From the Seattle Star today: a front-page editorial on the war, and a continuation of the unsolved-murder series that doesn't quite live up to its predecessors.

That's a sad one, for sure.  Bloody hand prints on the fence post and yet they led nowhere.  Vicious attack, too...almost like a cow mutilation...speaking of which, did they find the lost cow?  Or was it a victim too?  Calling Linda Moulton Howe!

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

From the Seattle Star today: a front-page editorial on the war, and a continuation of the unsolved-murder series that doesn't quite live up to its predecessors.

Interesting little detail about how he "picked up a violin as he was marching with Sherman."  Looted it from some poor Georgians before their house was burned to the ground by Sherman's army is probably more like it.

[gabrielle]

http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10324


this site provides a bit of background about the insignia used for the Lafayette Escadrille squadron.  What a heroic bunch of men!

[Walks_At_Night]

Nice work on the Lafayette Escadrille - very good stuff.   The picture with the Lions was pretty wild

[WhiteCrow]

I can't even imagine the horror those young men experienced. It's amazing that any of them survived with their sanity intact.

My home city Milwaukee had a major veterans  hospital. Established for civil war vets.. Extended care facility.
Many years ago worked a summer job as a roofer helper at Veterans Hospital. Many old vets with grievous injuries and mental health issues.  Sadness beyond measure.

[Rix Gins]

Ema Destinnová did some recordings exactly 100 years ago, today.  Here is one of them.
http://adp.library.ucsb.edu/index.php/matrix/detail/700002491/B-17461-Wiegenlied

[albrecht]

My home city Milwaukee had a major veterans  hospital. Established for civil war vets.. Extended care facility.
Many years ago worked a summer job as a roofer helper at Veterans Hospital. Many old vets with grievous injuries and mental health issues.  Sadness beyond measure.

Yeah, I can't believe how we treat (or don't treat) our veterans. War itself is bad enough but regardless of the reasons or "goodness" of said wars the treatment for those that return should be our first priority when we talk budgets and spending. Speaking of roofing. I was in Dublin and they were working on the roof and I returned back from a meeting and there were police and EMS around blocking the entrance. I asked what was up and was told by an onlooker that a worker somehow fell into the tar kettle and died. I almost puked imagining what a horrible death. Talk about sadness beyond measure for his family and friends.

[Walks_At_Night]

Congressional Medal of Honor winner Robert M. Viale was born on April 21, 1916.

He smothered a hand grenade with his own body while fighting in the Philippines in WWII.

Here is the citation writeup:

He displayed conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty. Forced by the enemy's detonation of prepared demolitions to shift the course of his advance through the city, he led the 1st platoon toward a small bridge, where heavy fire from 3 enemy pillboxes halted the unit. With 2 men he crossed the bridge behind screening grenade smoke to attack the pillboxes. The first he knocked out himself while covered by his men's protecting fire; the other 2 were silenced by 1 of his companions and a bazooka team which he had called up. He suffered a painful wound in the right arm during the action. After his entire platoon had joined him, he pushed ahead through mortar fire and encircling flames. Blocked from the only escape route by an enemy machinegun placed at a street corner, he entered a nearby building with his men to explore possible means of reducing the emplacement. In 1 room he found civilians huddled together, in another, a small window placed high in the wall and reached by a ladder. Because of the relative positions of the window, ladder, and enemy emplacement, he decided that he, being left-handed, could better hurl a grenade than 1 of his men who had made an unsuccessful attempt. Grasping an armed grenade, he started up the ladder. His wounded right arm weakened, and, as he tried to steady himself, the grenade fell to the floor. In the 5 seconds before the grenade would explode, he dropped down, recovered the grenade and looked for a place to dispose of it safely. Finding no way to get rid of the grenade without exposing his own men or the civilians to injury or death, he turned to the wall, held it close to his body and bent over it as it exploded. 2d Lt. Viale died in a few minutes, but his heroic act saved the lives of others.

[WhiteCrow]

My home city Milwaukee had a major veterans  hospital. Established for civil war vets.. Extended care facility.
Many years ago worked a summer job as a roofer helper at Veterans Hospital. Many old vets with grievous injuries and mental health issues.  Sadness beyond measure.

Some cut and paste:

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home National Historic Landmark District is one of three remaining original Soldiers Homes in the country. It is an outstanding representation of the development of a national system of medical and residential benefits for disabled veterans. The homes were designed as places of refuge and recuperation for physically and mentally disabled soldiers who had survived the Civil War.

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home contains some of the oldest buildings in the VA system, and the majority of its recuperative village and designed landscape is still intact. Old Main is the only original Soldiers Home building in the country designed to combine multiple basic veteran care functions under one roof. The Milwaukee Soldiers Home is beloved by veterans who believe its recuperative powers should remain accessible to aging Vietnam vets and returning Iraq and Afghanistan vets suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury

[Walks_At_Night]

Some cut and paste:

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home National Historic Landmark District is one of three remaining original Soldiers Homes in the country. It is an outstanding representation of the development of a national system of medical and residential benefits for disabled veterans. The homes were designed as places of refuge and recuperation for physically and mentally disabled soldiers who had survived the Civil War.

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home contains some of the oldest buildings in the VA system, and the majority of its recuperative village and designed landscape is still intact. Old Main is the only original Soldiers Home building in the country designed to combine multiple basic veteran care functions under one roof. The Milwaukee Soldiers Home is beloved by veterans who believe its recuperative powers should remain accessible to aging Vietnam vets and returning Iraq and Afghanistan vets suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury

Damn if they couldn't put up some impressive buildings in the past.  What a piece of art.

[Rix Gins]

Damn if they couldn't put up some impressive buildings in the past.  What a piece of art.

Utterly beautiful. 

[albrecht]

Some cut and paste:

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home National Historic Landmark District is one of three remaining original Soldiers Homes in the country. It is an outstanding representation of the development of a national system of medical and residential benefits for disabled veterans. The homes were designed as places of refuge and recuperation for physically and mentally disabled soldiers who had survived the Civil War.

The Milwaukee Soldiers Home contains some of the oldest buildings in the VA system, and the majority of its recuperative village and designed landscape is still intact. Old Main is the only original Soldiers Home building in the country designed to combine multiple basic veteran care functions under one roof. The Milwaukee Soldiers Home is beloved by veterans who believe its recuperative powers should remain accessible to aging Vietnam vets and returning Iraq and Afghanistan vets suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury

Awesome building and nice idea. Reminds me of the Chelsea Pensioners and stuff in Paris. Letting Vets live together when injured or in old age.

[Rix Gins]

Everett True, April 22, 1916.

[Rix Gins]

Try to guess what this story is about.

[Rix Gins]

The Day Book, April 22, 1916.

[Rix Gins]

The Tonopah Daily Bonanza for April 22, 1916 was a bust.  Oh, there might have been a couple of mildly interesting pieces on page four, but the person who copied the original newspaper moved the page as the camera clicked and almost everything on that page is too blurry to download.  But fear not, I will not leave you empty handed because I found this neat video (part one of four parts) that shows the mining side of Tonopah, 100 years ago.  Enjoy.

https://youtu.be/_5jez2VpBiU

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

Everett True, April 22, 1916.

Everett sure hated billboards!  He was raging about them just a few days ago.  Can't argue with that!

[Rix Gins]

Everett sure hated billboards!  He was raging about them just a few days ago.  Can't argue with that!

I noticed that too.  I almost get the impression that Everett started the fire.

[Walks_At_Night]

In 1916 the Imperial Automobile Company was winding down production of automobiles in Jackson, Michigan.  The company was founded in 1908
by the Campbell brothers.   They built 4 cylinder, midsize autos but by 1915 the company was in trouble.   They merged with the Marion Automobile
Company of Indianapolis to form a new company called  the Mutual Motors Company.    Mutual Motors would then build a new car called the
Marion-Handley but by 1919 Mutual Motors was done as well.

I suspect there are some interesting tales associated with the Campbell brothers and Mutual Motors but I have not been able to learn a whole
heck of a lot about them. 


Imperial Logo


1912 Imperial




Marion-Handley Mutual Motors Ad:


1917 Print of a Marion-Handley


1916 Marion-Handley

[K_Dubb]

The Tonopah Daily Bonanza for April 22, 1916 was a bust.  Oh, there might have been a couple of mildly interesting pieces on page four, but the person who copied the original newspaper moved the page as the camera clicked and almost everything on that page is too blurry to download.  But fear not, I will not leave you empty handed because I found this neat video (part one of four parts) that shows the mining side of Tonopah, 100 years ago.  Enjoy.

Very cool to see, Rix!  I'd love to visit there.  Someday!

They had such great nicknames back then.  Coffee-on-the-fly!  Wonder how he came by that.

[K_Dubb]

In 1916 the Imperial Automobile Company was winding down production of automobiles in Jackson, Michigan.  The company was founded in 1908

Love the top-down view!  Interesting seating arrangement there.  And the baby-blue Imperial is lovely.

[gabrielle]

That vehicle reminds me of the car in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang...the one with the pop out wings.

Nice work Walks.....

[albrecht]

Call me a snob but I've always liked the old cars, particularly British and Continental, that kept the tradition from horse-drawn vehicles alive (and class distinctions,) by having the driver withstand the elements whilst the occupants were secured behind glass and cover. So funny, that the tradition existed even though the manufacture was, likely, a bit more costly to design them that way versus a uni-body and cover for everyone, even one's driver.

[K_Dubb]

From the Seattle Star today:

[K_Dubb]

Interesting little detail about how he "picked up a violin as he was marching with Sherman."  Looted it from some poor Georgians before their house was burned to the ground by Sherman's army is probably more like it.

Ha.  I don't doubt it.

[gabrielle]

Call me a snob but I've always liked the old cars, particularly British and Continental, that kept the tradition from horse-drawn vehicles alive (and class distinctions,) by having the driver withstand the elements whilst the occupants were secured behind glass and cover. So funny, that the tradition existed even though the manufacture was, likely, a bit more costly to design them that way versus a uni-body and cover for everyone, even one's driver.

I agree Albrecht, and I don't think it is snobbish.

[K_Dubb]

Today's cover of Le Rire, captioned "The Penguin":



Must be making fun of his birth defect.