Odd stories from the news--1904, 1912, 1917, 1921

 You can draw your own conclusions about these stories.  Luckily the term "autoist" didn't stick, the story from Bowlus is full of odd "facts", there was political snark during elections back then, too, and Reddy Kilowatt had a predecessor named K.W. with a genealogy all his own ☺.

I love this list of circus acts.  Wonder if they were as impressive as they sound..

The Fourth of July, 1904 was "...one continuous round of pleasure"

There's more time for posting than I thought today, since the kids are stuck in traffic leaving the cities.  Em called and said they were moving about 20 mph, along with thousands of others, going north on I-94...

That title quote comes from a letter published in the Little Falls Herald on June 24, 1904 (top left) encouraging area farmers to attend the festivities in town and even enter their teams in the parade.  That particular year, the festivities featured Chippewa dancers from the Mille Lacs Reservation.  People were urged to bring their kids to watch, as the tribe was about to be removed to White Earth.  

Seven years later, the Pierz Journal promised "a Program the Like of Which Has Never Before Been Attempted in This Village"...Woohoo!  The description of the festivities, beginning with a cannon blast at dawn, sounds fascinating.  Don't you wonder what the Goddess of Liberty on that first float looked like?

Valentine Sendelbach & Elizabeth Hesch Wedding

A huge THANK YOU to our newest family contact--Kathleen, a descendant of the Dworschaks and Sendelbachs around Waumandee, Wisconsin.  (If you're lost, read the history below the header, above)

I adore family wedding pics.  This one is cool because Kathleen said that Val and Lizzy were especially devoted to each other, and that when she died on Valentine's Day in 1962, he couldn't go on without her.  Val died two weeks later, on March 2, 1962.

BUT, these two items (pic & clipping) were from 55 years earlier, 

in 1904, a much happier time for them...

THANKS, Kathleen!

A Mermaid, huh?

From the March 28th, 1911 Pierz Journal:

.....think Math had this in mind?

Thanks, Larry!

All for a buck forty-eight?

Wow,  dad had some of these tools at his workbench in the garage, remember?  I suppose they came from an auction, or from his dad's workshop.  I do recall asking him what the tool on the lower right was for, and he didn't know ☺!


It's cool that you could fix tinware AND leather stuff with the same set of tools, and that Curly kept them just cuz they were too neat to toss.


--Montgomery Ward, 1904-05

Technical World Redux

Have I mentioned lately how much I enjoy hundred-year-old Technical World Magazines?  They were  "published monthly by the American School of Correspondence at Armour Institute of Technology, Chicago, Ill, USA" and were  the forerunner of Popular Mechanics (1923).  They evidently came up with the style of doing  Inventions pages toward the back, where relatively feasible ideas were posted right along with total brain farts.

Still, I LOVE that uncritical optimism ☺, not to mention the oddness of what was included.  In the May, 1904 issue there's an article on modern battleships, as well as one called "The American Automobile--The History, Functions and Various Types of the Self-Propelled Vehicle, which has already demonstrated that it is destined to play as important a part as it's predecessor, the Bicycle, in the Evolution of Social and Business Life".  It's a lovely article, with photos, and it feels like the author is hedging his bets just in case this newfangled contraption never catches on...lol


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◄ In 1913, Great Northern RR was pretty proud of their newest locomotives, see?

Oh, and remember J. A. Dowie, the faith healer we researched back in early 2010?  If you were paying attention you'll remember he started a city in Illinois where his followers could live long holy lives undisturbed by the nasty outside world....By 1905, things weren't going so hot, according to this article►:




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Well, turns out automobiles were a success after all, and Technical World accepted ads for them.  Here's one from 1913, below on the left.

On the right, also in a 1913 edition of Technical World, there was an article reporting on measures that needed to be taken so train workers didn't die so often in the line of duty.
The article is of particular interest to us because Grandpa's younger brother Paul died in exactly the circumstances shown in the photos below.  He was working as a brakeman and was  only 20 when he was pinned between two cars.  He lived until the cars were pulled apart...the idea of which probably haunted Mary, his mom, for the rest of her life.

You'll have to click one of the links and peruse the magazine yourself.  The charm is in seeing things we're used to from their breathless point of view.









One more:  Hitting a deer is something that happens, and no one thinks it's unusual.  In 1908, tho, it was startling and gave a person pause...