Salem - Brilliant Wickedness

"If, instead of charging Salem with dullness, Mr. James had accused it of brilliant wickedness, he would have come nearer the mark…

Imagine a community in which abound young men, rich, well educated, having free run whether for business or pleasure among all the savage tribes and oriental nations of the world, and you see that they must quickly become eminent saints or conspicuous sinners, and so they did."  - Rev. George Batchelor (on early 19th century Salem)

Salem preferred over Washington DC

"I had rather sit under my own "vine and fig tree" in Salem, than in the most stately edifice in Washington." - Nathaniel Silsbee, 1817 (Massachusetts Representative to United States Congress)

Haarlem Oil - Health Insurance in a Jar

Today in Salem History:

On April 24, 1792, Abraham Solis advertised "Haerlaemer Oil" with "Dutch explanations of its use" in the Salem Gazette.

This was probably Haarlem Oil, a diuretic made in Holland since 1672 and still in demand in the early 20th century.

So popular was this remedy, practically every drugstore in America made their own blend. In 1906 it was estimated that "ten bottles of substitute are sold to one of the genuine."

Thackeray mentions it. Louis and Clark never went anywhere without it. So what was it?

In a time with few powerful medicines and no health insurance, Haarlem Oil was your basic safety blanket. It was said to ward off contagious diseases. It strengthened the eyes. It helped your kidneys, bladder, and stomach. It was good for your nerves. In fact, it was good for just about anything, according to its faithful consumers.

Speaking of faith, the "Dutch instructions" bore the Latin legend:  Medicamentum Gratia Probatum which was translated as "remedy approved by Grace." This wasn't any potion derived from black magic or superstition. Haarlem Oil was Approved. Consumers were encouraged to have faith in its ability to heal them, whatever their hurt.

You might be wondering, what did the Oil contain?

The recipe for genuine Haarlem Oil was a close-kept secret. However, the American knock-offs tended to be mostly made up of balsam of sulfur and oil of turpentine.

I suppose if you were strong enough to survive the remedy, you were bound to get better.

To A Portrait of Dorothy Sewall (of Salem, MA)

Women - Know Your Place

Scarily enough, there really was a time when people truly believed that too much education would drive a female insane.

An 1801 Whodunnit

Say you're on a jury in 1801 Massachusetts.

On trial is a young man accused of killing his sweetheart. Her family did not approve of their connection.

On the day in question, he had told two witnesses he passed on the road that he was on his way to her house to rape her (and thus force the family into letting him marry her).

Her body was found in the field beside her house with multiple stab wounds in the arm, side, breast, neck, and back. The accused stood nearby with blood on his clothing and holding a knife that was later matched to the wounds.

The accused said he was Not Guilty because ... the girl had done it to herself.

Her motive was shame over her ruined reputation - he had told her he bragged to several other men that he had been having sex with her, and in response she had committed suicide.

It was well known that the accused did not have the use of one of his arms, due to a frozen elbow joint since childhood.  How could he have stabbed her successfully all those times using only his other arm?

And two neighbor girls had been outside that day, and had heard shouting, but not such that they thought someone was being murdered.

Were they lying because they didn't want to admit they had heard such screams and done nothing?

But if the girl had done it to herself, how did she manage to stab herself in the back?

And if he loved her, what was he doing in that field in any case, since according to either explanation of events it meant physical or emotional harm to the girl?

Would you find him Guilty or Not Guilty?

The Trial of Margaret Douglass

From American State Trials:

"A Southern lady (Margaret Douglass) living with a daughter in Norfolk, Virginia sixty-six years ago (1853) and being greatly interested in the religious and moral instruction of colored children and finding that the Sunday school where they were allowed to attend was not sufficient, invited them to come to her house, where in a back room upstairs she and her daughter taught them to read and write.

She knew that it was against the law to teach slaves, and so she was careful to take none in her school but free colored children.

One day a couple of city constables entered with a warrant and marched the two teachers and the children to the Mayor's office, where she was charged with teaching them to read, contrary to law. She explained that none of the children were slaves and that she had no idea that a child could not be taught to read simply because it was black.

But the Mayor told her that this was the law, but as she had acted in good faith he would dismiss the case.

But the Grand Jury heard of it and indicted her.

At the next term of court she was tried for a violation of the Virginia code which provided that ... every assemblage of negroes for instruction in reading and writing ... was unlawful, and if a white person assembled with negroes to instruct them to read and write, he should be fined and imprisoned.

She refused the services of a lawyer and defended herself, and though she called several witnesses to show that the same thing had been done for years in the Sunday schools in the city, the jury convicted her, but placed the penalty at a fine of only one dollar.

But this was overruled by the judge:

"The Court is not called on to vindicate the policy of the law in question, for so long as it remains upon the statute book, and unrepealed, public and private justice and morality require that it should be respected and sustained.

There are persons, I believe, in our community, opposed to the policy of the law in question.

They profess to believe that universal intellectual culture is necessary to religious instruction and education, and that such culture is suitable to a state of slavery; and there can be no misapprehension as to your opinions on this subject, judging from the indiscreet freedom with which you spoke of your regard for the colored race in general.

Such opinions in the present state of our society I regard as manifestly mischievous.

... I exceedingly regret, that in being called on for the first time to act under the law in question, it becomes my duty to impose the required punishment upon a female, apparently of fair and respectable standing in the community.

The only mitigating circumstance in your case, if in truth there be any, according to my best reason and understanding of it, is that to which I have just referred, namely, you being a female.

Under the circumstances of this case, if you were of a different sex, I should regard the full punishment of six months' imprisonment as eminently just and proper.... As an example to all others in like cases disposed to offend, and in vindication of the policy and justness of our laws, which every individual should be taught to respect, the judgment of the Court is, in addition to the proper fine and costs, that you be imprisoned for the period of one month in the jail of this city.""

So there ya go, a trial with a side of sexism accompanying the main course of racism.

A Girl's Two Paths

Here is another interesting historical document. Again with a feminist theme. Or anti-feminist. Also anti-romance.

Mamas don't let your babies grow up to read Sappho.
Who actually wrote poems, not a novel.

Unless they mean this....

They probably meant this.  (It was first published in 1888.)

Yet again, romance will lead you down the path to perdition. (sigh)

Going back to our two paths - I like how Virtue doesn't Flirt.  How does Virtue get a man's attention then?  Did men back then just wander door-to-door, searching for virtuous women like Diogenes with his lamp?

And apparently that baby arrived by stork. (No "murmuring how delicious it is"! Bad woman!)

By the way, this warning to women was also distributed with a white character. I suppose we should be happy the people behind it were equal-opportunity party-poopers.

Woman To Woman

This is an interesting historical document - it's using Sisterhood to forward the abolitionist cause.  Not surprising in the North, since abolition was taken up by many churches and church work was one of the few acceptable public spheres in which women could participate. And, of course, Uncle Tom's Cabin was written by a woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe.

However, there is research coming out now that this broadsheet might have played well to the white female audience of the South, too.

Seems as long as you were female, The Man was keeping you down, regardless of color.

I've listed some books you might be interested in below.

I also want to read Gary Gallagher's book on how Hollywood has shaped our perceptions of the Civil War. Because, maybe it's just me, but I think of images from Gone With The Wind before I think of those black & white photos of the war dead. (Which on the one hand is a good thing, because those photographs are very gruesome.)

So there ya go.  Some things to think about.

Lizzie Borden Not Guilty - Her Period Did It

This is the bedroom where Lizzie Borden allegedly took a hatchet to her step-mother.

(And you can actually stay here in this room - the house is a bed & breakfast now.)

I've long known about the infamous axe murder of her parents and the fact that Lizzie was generally thought to have done it even though she was acquitted at trial.

Someone was certainly after them, as they had suffered from suspicious food poisoning. And Lizzie had bought poison at the drugstore.

So why a hatchet?

Well, according to The History of Murder and A Private Disgrace, Lizzie's father had recently chopped off the heads of her pet pigeons with a hatchet. (Makes ya wonder what was going on in that house - what a sick, cruel thing for a father to do.)  And she may have been thinking about that when she had a petit mal epileptic seizure. These are also known as absence seizures. Basically, the person suffering from the seizure can walk and talk and function but isn't conscious of their actions. Such seizures can happen during one's menstruation.

And it is a recorded fact that Lizzie Borden was menstruating on the day her parents were killed.

This was mentioned in Flow, that Lizzie committed the murders during - and due to - her period, and I was like, what? Seriously?

So I looked it up in The History of Murder and, sure enough, there it is. No wonder men are so afraid of a female with access to nuclear weapons. It's not just the PMS you have to worry about. It's the period during the period itself, as well. So that's, what, two weeks each month where women could be indiscriminately violent. As opposed to men....

Anyway, this theory was first put forth by Victoria Lincoln in A Private Disgrace, which I have yet to read. The theory about Lizzie and her period, that is, not the theory about man-fear. Obviously. Just checking that you were still reading attentively.  ;)

On top of the pigeon massacre, there were also some financial dealings with which Lizzie took issue. So money was a motive as well. And then the menstruation-instigated seizure caused her to act out her feelings.

It's an interesting solution to the crime.

Trial for Bastardy - 1808

Place: New York City
Time: August 1808

On Trial: Alexander Whistelo, "a black coachman"

The Story:
"Adam-colored" Lucy Williams and her black lover Alexander Whistelo had a child together, a child whom Whistelo accepted as his own until his friends (possibly named Iago?) "put it into his head that it was not his." He then refused to maintain the child, and Lucy was forced to go to the Alms-House for support.

The Alms-House objected to the community being made to support a child when the mother could name its father, and thus went after the father via the court system to make him, basically, pay child support.

Lucy swore she had always remained faithful to Alexander, so why was there confusion over the child's parentage?

Because the child was "unusually fair" with light, straight hair.

Evidence at trial centered on whether such a child could have a black father.  If it weren't for the level of obnoxiousness and bigotry, I suppose one might feel sorry for the medical "experts" called to testify, as they clearly hadn't a clue. For example:

Dr. Kissam: Black persons are almost white at their birth, but change soon after; the change is generally complete, and their true color decided in about eight or nine months; within the year it is complete.

But that wasn't all of the trial testimony - much of it revolved around Lucy's supposed sex life. Consequently, the men - doctors and lawyers - behaved like schoolboys and indulged in quite a bit of levity:

Prosecution: The woman's testimony in one view was meritorious—it went to discharge the community from the burden of supporting a bastard child, and to oblige the true father to maintain it.

Defense (in reply): It is said her evidence was meritorious, and for the good of the community, charitable, and for the good of the Almshouse. I never before heard of such pious and patriotic fornication.

There are many different layers to this trial. One is the construction of race. Another is how illegitimacy, sex, and charity were viewed in America during the Federalist period.

And on the women's history front, we have here surfacing of a bit of ancient and troublesome, but commonly-held, folk belief - that a woman cannot get pregnant if she doesn't enjoy or consent to the sex. Yes, at one time it was considered proof that rape had not been committed if the woman became pregnant from the attack.

Hence this exchange:
Defense Attorney:  Had you not a white man in bed with you?

Lucy Williams: I had a scuffle with one once ... such a person had been in bed with me; he had turned the black man out with a pistol, and taken his place. We had a connexion but I am sure we had made no young one, for we [fought] all the while.

Lucy is certain the child is Alexander's because 1) she loves him, and 2) she fought the rapist. Therefore it simply can't be his.

This bit of personal tragedy isn't seen by the men in court, who apparently believe even being raped at gun-point is good for a laugh:

Defense Attorney: As it appears, the black man could not have got the child because it is white, nor the white man because of the fighting, it would be good to see whether the pistol-barrel could have got it?

The doctor of whom he asked the jocular question rejoins that he doesn't indulge in kinky pistol sex:
Sir James Jay, MD: Then, sir, you must inquire elsewhere, touching that matter. I have found the old practice good enough for me, and have made no experiments in the way you allude to.

In his summation, the defense attorney again dwells on the rape:
If a white man can say to a black one, get out of that bed, you black devil, till I do this thing—by division of labor, trade will be advanced—you must do your part of the duty and I mine—I will get the child and you shall father it—there will be in this manner employment for us both. Can that, may it please your Honors, be the law?

And in response to the prosecution's criticism of his experts:
What do they know, he says, more than other men? But that is not all, he goes farther and levels a shaft at your Honors on the bench, and says you have as much experience in such matters as any doctors or any persons whatsoever. Some gentlemen have a happy knack at saying anything. If I had even suspected any of your Honors of any such experience, or at all to have dipped into such matters, even from curiosity, I never should have ventured to hint at it.

The defense's tactics were successful. Despite the word of the mother traditionally being legally sufficient, the Court decided Lucy could not prove her case and Alexander was discharged from all responsibility.

It is worth pointing out again that Alexander had accepted the child as his originally.  Perhaps this trial really should have been about the so-called friends who broke up that little family.

They were true bastards.

Forking

Have you ever wondered why Americans switch hands to eat with their fork, but Europeans don't?

Yes you have. You lie awake at night, in the cold early morning, pondering life, the universe, the number 42, and why Americans eat with a zig-zag fork pattern. Admit it.

Well, now there will be one less thing to ponder in the bitter existentialist dawn because I am here to share the answer with you:

If you're American, you know the proper way to hold your dining utensils is:  fork in left hand, knife in right. After you cut your food, you release the knife and switch your fork to your right hand. Then you eat right-handed with the fork.

If you're British, you know the proper way to hold your dining utensils is: fork in left hand, knife in right. Full stop. Period.  After you cut your food, you eat left-handed with the fork.  No switching occurs.

Why the difference?

Time was, your average fork possessed two narrow tines, spaced apart, and was absolutely flat.  Sort of like a carving fork, which was basically what it was. You used it to hold the food still while you cut with your knife, then you lifted the food to your mouth with your knife's wide, flat blade.  (Remember, this was considered far more genteel than eating with your fingers.)

The technology for making utensils changed over the 1700s so by the early 1800s flatware was financially within reach of more people and, to establish your place in high society, the idea of having whole matching sets came into vogue.

At which point, etiquette moved from use-your-knife-not-your-fingers to use-your-fork-not-your-knife.

"Where, excepting among savages, shall we find any who at present eat with other than a French fork?" - The laws of etiquette, 1836

Forks weren't French, but Americans associated them with good manners, and the French were our arbiters of taste (remember, we'd fought the British twice at this point). At this time, the French ate in the zig-zag pattern, so the US did, too.

The British invented the fork-stays-in-left-hand method.

Other Europeans saw this as a "simplification" of table manners - always a good thing in an age where there was etiquette for everything - so a German etiquette book recommended the "English method" in 1832 and a French manual recommended it in 1853.

Meanwhile, patriotic Americans did not wish to be "influenced by imported manners" (Mrs. Farrar, 1830s).  So we kept to the zig-zag. And ended up being the only country that did.

TA DA!
Now you know. Go forth and amaze your friends at the water cooler. :)

Research from:
Ambitious Appetites: Dining, Behavior, and Patterns of Consumption in Federal Washington (Octagon Research Series)

The Nude That Launched a Thousand..well, One Trial

Meet Narcissus.

The original of this statue of him was discovered in Pompeii in 1862 and housed in the Naples Museum.

In 1873, an enterprising art dealer of New Bedford Massachusetts, one Charles Hazeltine, purchased a replica of this very Narcissus in Boston and displayed it in the front window of his shop.

Now, this particular shop window opened onto a very busy public street, normally a boon for a business.  However,

"the good people of this New England town were not used to nude figures, either in marble, bronze, or plaster, and very soon the sidewalk was crowded with young and old, gazing at the unaccustomed sight."

The marshal ordered Hazeltine to remove the statue from his window and when he refused, Hazeltine was arrested.  He went on trial for "exhibiting a lewd and lascivious statue."

Many citizens testified on Hazeltine's behalf, saying that of course they'd allow this statue in their homes, trying to explain that this was Art.  Perhaps they were embarrassed at how this case was making their town seem like a mad, prudish backwater.  One testified that the only reason not to have one in the house would be, "if I had a daughter of an unfortunate turn of mind."

[ah, yes, got to protect the womenfolk from seeing tiny, relaxed representations of normal body parts]

The prosecution denied that "that botch" was Art and furthermore, "if such instruments as that are necessary to teach art, then we don't want any art taught.  We have got along very well without it in New England for many years, and we can in years to come."

On the stand, Hazeltine admitted to the court, "The image is entirely nude, a male youth; the sexual organs are represented." But his defense attorney argued that anyone who could "look on this figure with anything but the loftiest sentiment must be already corrupt."

You might think he had a good point, but no, this was a slippery slope.  The anguished prosecutor protested, "If he is allowed to go on, will he not fill his window with sexual organs in all positions?"

Besides, the prosecution added, along with corrupting the populace, the statue had been causing a public scene and obstructing the thoroughfare.

To which the defense replied:
"Narcissus did not obstruct the sidewalk. He asked nobody to stop and look at him. If the street was obstructed, the marshal ought to have arrested the boys and girls who obstructed it."

The jury deliberated 9 hours, balloting 22 times, but could not come to an unanimous decision.  Charles Hazeltine was released.

What Narcissus thought about all this is unknown.

The Erotic Diaries of a Victorian Seafarer in the US Navy

An American Seafarer in the Age of Sail: The Erotic Diaries of Philip C. Van Buskirk, 1851-1870 by Barry Richard Burg
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is not what you think it's about. :)

Philip C Van Buskirk was an educated young man whose family fell on hard times. Consequently:

1) He is an outsider to the world in which he now must live. For example, although he is a common drummer boy/sailor/marine he has more in common with the officers.

2) He has beautifully clear handwriting.

His urge to record his internal life is amazing - he kept diaries for *years*. And they're mostly about his private hopes, disappointments, and thoughts - not about the places he went (China, Japan) nor the Civil War he fought in.

This is a very different record of shipboard life, and of interest to anyone who likes the Age of Sail.

The reason the title has "erotic" in it is because Van Buskirk - a moral, if not Puritan, middle-class boy - is seriously appalled at the frequency of male/male relations between other crew members. Apparently unlike the British navy, the American navy accepted these liaisons as a matter of necessity and as long as it didn't interfere with your duties all's well that ends well.

Because there was little privacy on board, Van Buskirk's diaries were often read by others. Sometimes people objected to what he wrote. Interestingly, his descriptions of male/male erotic behavior were NOT objected to, which furthers the idea that this was normative behavior.

Van Buskirk is a complex, not to say seriously messed-up, person. When he grows up, he has difficulty forming friendships with adults his own age. And thanks to Victorian America's obsession with masturbation as a direct road to death and Hell, he keeps meticulous track of his bodily fluids and constantly writes of how he despises himself.

As a narrator, you may not like him, but this window into a male mind of the mid-to-late 19th century is priceless.

View all my reviews

The Saga of Kate O'Hare

Kate Richards O'Hare, American socialist and anti-war activist in 1917, went to Bowman, North Dakota as part of a speaking tour and "in the presence of 125 people" said:

"that any person who enlisted in the army of the United States for service in France would be used for fertilizer, and that is all he was good for; and that the women of the United States were nothing more or less than brood sows to raise children to get into the army and be made into fertilizer."

On the grounds that "such statement so made was made with the intention of willfully obstructing the recruiting service of the United States, to the injury of the service of the United States," she was arrested and indicted under the Espionage act.

It came out during her trial that she had further said The Great War was only being waged to protect capitalists, and that had the US loaned more money to Germany, we would be on Germany's side, but since our investments were more with the Allies, we were on the Allies' side.

The judge told her there was "no foundation" for this idea.

As part of his sentencing speech, the judge also said the Secret Service had told him, "We have been unable to secure anything specific on her that would be a violation of the Federal law ....but .... we are morally certain [she is] for Germany against our country."

Apparently being "morally certain" outweighed the lack of "anything specific."  Kate was convicted and sentenced to 5 years in a Federal prison.

If stating your opinion to 125 people in North Dakota would get you 5 years, can you imagine what would have happened to her if they'd had 24-hour television back then?

Do You M/M?

Are you one of the many (many, many) readers of m/m romance? Do you swoon to Alex Beecroft's False Colors: An M/M Romance or Erastes' Transgressions: An M/M Romance?

For anyone who might be thinking, "What, M&M's have romance?" and trying to picture the green girl M&M in something slinky.... no.

M/M is short for male/male - as in leave-out-the-annoying-heroine-and-just-give-us-two-hot-men - romance. This genre is extremely popular, especially in ebooks.

I like the historical ones. Now, you might think there wouldn't be much scope for realism in such romances.  And there you would be wrong.

I have been reading Male-Male Intimacy in Early America: Beyond Romantic Friendships and it is fascinating how fluid love could be in early America. Not only was there no word yet for homosexuality, there was no real concept of it as a permanent existence. As this was also before companionate marriage, both men and women got married because it was expected - not only for social but for business and economic reasons. So whom you married often did not coincide with whom you loved. And once in a while someone left us evidence that the person they loved shared their gender. How they then handled this can be very emotional and touching.

We tend to think of maritime settings as being the best venue for historically accurate m/m romance, and indeed, next I am going to be reading the non-fiction An American Seafarer in the Age of Sail: The Erotic Diaries of Philip C. Van Buskirk, 1851-1870. However, there were Virginia planters, mountain men, trappers, farmers, and even urban citizens who experienced the love that dared not speak its name. (BTW, apparently Philadelphia rocked when it came to wild sex during the Federal period.)

Quite a diverse field for authors to mine for story-lines!  I encourage anyone who writes or reads m/m fiction to check out the non-fiction.

And speaking of inspiring tales of m/m non-fiction, I must of course mention I Am What I Am, John Barrowman's new autobiography.

Yes, I'm a fan-girl. I dare you not to be. :)

Pugs Are Everywhere

One of the points I make in my book PugSpotting is that pug owners like to involve pugs in everything they do.

If you can put a pug in it, pug owners are there and have done it.

Random insertions of pugs in books and artwork? Check.

Pugs on utensils, inkwells, match holders, cigarette cases, and finials? Check.

Pug-shaped teapots, pounce pots, and salt-and-pepper shakers? Check.

If you can take your pug with you, pug owners have done that, too. And not just out for a walk or to a restaurant.

Pugs exploring the Old West? Check.

Pugs circumnavigating the globe? Check.

Pugs going to staff an embassy in Afghanistan. Check.

Yes, you read that correctly.

In 1879, Maj. Sir Pierre Louis Napoleon Cavagnari, K.C.B. C.I.E., Bengal Staff Corps, brought his pug with him to staff the Kabul Embassy.

Since this was during the 3rd Afghan War, you might perhaps think this was not the most secure place to take a pug. And you would be right. The Kabul Mission was massacred down to the last man - and there had been about 100 of them.

The sole survivor of the massacre was Cavagnari's pug.

The British would re-enter Kabul, of course, and the resourceful little pug was rescued and sent home to Lady Cavagnari. Amazing, right? True story.

This holiday season, I wish you all the luck of Cavagnari's pug. :)

More Libellous Fiction

Nathaniel Hawthorne (who as you can see was somewhat of a hottie) also experienced libel accusations in regard to one of his most famous works of fiction.

In The House of Seven Gables, the name of the corrupt, evil villain is Judge Pyncheon. It just so happens that there actually was a Judge Pyncheon, and one of his descendents wrote to Hawthorne, complaining of libel.

Hawthorne responded:

"It pains me to learn that I have given you what I am content to acknowledge a reasonable ground for offense, by borrowing the name of the Pyncheon family for my fictitious purposes, in the "House of the Seven Gables."

It never occurred to me, however, that the name was not as much the property of a romance-writer as that of Smith, for instance...

I intended no allusion to any Pyncheons, now or at any previous period extant...

You suggest that reparation is due for these injuries of my pen, but point out no mode in which it may be practicable. It is my own opinion that no real harm has been done; inasmuch as I expressly enter a protest, in the preface to "The House of the Seven Gables," against the narrative and the personages being considered as other than imaginary."

The entire letter is very apologetic in tone, and it seems that this was enough to "pacify" the complainant.

As it happens, we know Hawthorne absolutely meant no libel toward any Pyncheons because we know precisely on whom Judge Pyncheon was based.

But that is a tale for another day. :)

Colonial Coffee House

Guess what the newest exhibit at Colonial Williamsburg is - a coffee house!

From The Washington Post:
"Now [Williamsburg] is home to the modest Charlton's Coffeehouse, built from scratch on historic foundations and billed as the only 18th-century coffeehouse in America."

"At some point in the 1760s a young immigrant named Richard Charlton used the building -- adjacent to the Colonial Capitol -- as a coffeehouse, serving a brew that likely would have tasted burned and bitter to the contemporary palate."

Back in the day, coffee was a man's drink and men hung out at the coffeehouse like it was an intellectual pub. The American Revolution was planned in coffeehouses.

From The Metropolitan Museum of Art:
Colonial coffeehouses, following the London model, became powerful social catalysts, providing an excellent forum for the exchange of ideas and the distribution of news.

And, of course, people drank coffee at home -- along with tea and chocolate. In case you've ever wondered about the difference between a coffee pot, a tea pot, and a chocolate pot:

This is a chocolate pot.

Notice the removable finial - attached to the body of the pot by a chain so it isn't lost.

Chocolate pots have removable finials because the thick colonial cocoa needed to be stirred before it could be poured.

"A molinet, or stirring rod" would be inserted in the hole revealed when the finial taken off.

This is a coffee pot.

Coffee pots are "tall and tapered, with a curved pouring spout and a wooden handle to protect the pourer's hand from the heat-conducting metal."

And this is a tea pot. Tea pots, as the song says, are short and stout.

Tea was also an important beverage in colonial America leading up to the Revolution.

Remember, when the tax on tea was levied without their consent (no representation), outraged colonists reacted with The Boston Tea Party (December 1773).

You don't mess with a person's cuppa. :)

Remembering Henry

The Red Poppy is the symbol of Remembrance Day, 11 November. Remembrance Day was started in 1919 as Armistice Day, to honor the end of The Great War. The War to End Wars.

Which came to be known as World War I.

After World War II, the name was changed to Remembrance Day to honor the dead of all wars.

This year is the 91st anniversary of the end of World War I. Did you realize that? I only know because last year - the 90th anniversary - was covered extensively by the BBC. They put up amazing content on the BBC website. Why don't US news organizations have similar content?

Possibly because in the US this is known as Veterans' Day, when we honor living veterans of war. The US has Memorial Day to honor its war dead.

Personally, I think we should nominate another day as Veterans' Day and return November 11 to Remembrance Day. Why? I am so glad you asked.....

We are traveling back in time to the final days of The Great War (this is great as in BIG HUGE GINORMOUS, not great as in cool). No one is winning and the cost in human lives has been enormous. It is agreed between the warring nations that an armistice should be called. An armistice is when countries just stop fighting. No one is the winner. No one is the loser. They just stop.

This cease-fire is signed at 5:00am on the 11th day of November, 1918.

But the war didn't end.

Because this had been The War To End All Wars. Millions of people had died.

Quoting from the Imperial War Museum:

"One in three families in Britain had a loved one killed, wounded or taken prisoner. In other warring nations, the figures were even higher; France lost nearly a million and a half men – double that of Britain – while nearly two million Germans and a similar number of Russians died."

They couldn't just end the war and walk away - not with all those dead. Their deaths had to mean something. There had to be something, something memorable, that people could point to and say, "This is when the last war ended."

They chose 11-11-11. War would end at the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month.

So they KEPT THE WAR GOING until 11:00 am. MEN DIED so that we would have the symbol 11-11-11.

Of course, we all know war didn't end. But what is even more tragic is the fact that soldiers died for a symbol that is no longer remembered in the US.

Quoting from the BBC:

"The respected American author Joseph E Persico has calculated a shocking figure that the final day of WWI would produce nearly 11,000 casualties, more than those killed, wounded or missing on D-Day, when Allied forces landed en masse on the shores of occupied France almost 27 years later."

Wrap your mind around that, if you can.

And if that didn't blow your mind, this will: Again quoting the same BBC article: "What is worse is that hundreds of these soldiers would lose their lives thrown into action by generals who knew that the Armistice had already been signed."

Yup.

For example, the 89th American Division was sent to take the town of Stenay by a general who knew the Armistice had been signed, but he'd heard that Stenay had bathing facilities. And apparently he couldn't wait until 11am.

"That lunatic decision cost something like 300 casualties, many of them battle deaths, for an inconceivable reason," says Mr Persico.

Those were American casualties, did you notice? They died because of a "lunatic decision" and for a symbol of which most Americans aren't even aware.

In fact, the last soldier killed in action in World War I was an American boy from Baltimore. He was shot at 10:59am. His name was Henry Gunther.

Does he get a mention over here? Not that I'm aware of. We don't even have a moment of silence at 11:00am. Because it isn't Remembrance Day for us.

"No man surely has so short a memory as the American." - Rebecca H. Davis

Prove her wrong. Today, remember poor Henry and all the others who died for 11-11-11.