My last folksy yarn about the mad as hell Italians who wanted to scatter bits of Mr and Mrs Napoleon III across Paris that winter evening in 1858 left us in a bad place. We learnt that two of the three condemned men sentenced to die were executed by guillotine, shoeless and in long nightshirts… Continue reading “On dit que l’un fut sauvé”
The lunatic who stole Trump’s stationery
I am probably the last person on the planet to begin to binge watch the TV series about the New York agency industry, Mad Men, which is altogether strange as I met many of those who were prototypes for the series, from David Ogilvy on down. So I Googled some… and found this from Steve… Continue reading The lunatic who stole Trump’s stationery
“everything in the forest has its season.” – bambi’s mother
Tyrus Wong, the artist whose works inspired the Disney film Bambi, has died at home. surrounded by family, at age 106. A Chinese immigrant, Mr Wong’s vibrant paintings captured Walt Disney… Source: “everything in the forest has its season.” – bambi’s mother
Don’t remove a fly from your friend’s forehead with an axe
I bet that there were myriads that thought George Washington was a bad thing, that Lincoln was probably not American, that FDR sucked up to the Commies, or that Hillary wasn’t fitted to be President, but the “look at me, no, over here, look at me” crowd is, let’s face it, amorphously self-possessed in a… Continue reading Don’t remove a fly from your friend’s forehead with an axe
“americans love popcorn, and their love doesn’t quit.” – rosecrans baldwin
Bang bang, that awful sound
In the early 1850s, in what is now Italy, the soon-to-be-country’s revolutionary nationalists hated in equal measure the Austrians for occupying much of the north and the Pope who was sustained by the Austrians, for retaining his distinctly worldly hold on the bit in the middle he claimed as The Papal States. Garibaldi, Mazzini and… Continue reading Bang bang, that awful sound
No s***, Sherlock!
Sometimes the similarities of circumstance and reaction bring our ancestors very close to us — sometimes it’s as if they were alien beings. Here’s a report that shows — for good or bad — that we are nowadays less naive but maybe quicker to think the worst than this kindly reporter in San Francisco was. However, for… Continue reading No s***, Sherlock!
The ‘best test of an immigrant’ from 100 years ago
This was the new Year’s message from the Los Angeles Herald exactly a century ago. Immigration was predicted to increase exponentially as soon as World War One ended. Unlike today where those ‘fleeing war torn…’ (fill in the blanks) expect, no demand, not to have to compromise old ways in a new life, things were… Continue reading The ‘best test of an immigrant’ from 100 years ago
Fame, what you need you have to borrow
“Died last week, at her lodgings, near the Seven Dials, the much-talked of Mrs. Mapps, the bone-setter, so miserably poor, that the parish was obliged to bury her.” London Daily Post, 22nd December 1737. Mrs Sarah Mapp had a brief flirtation with fame in the mid 1730s when her pioneering work in what might now be… Continue reading Fame, what you need you have to borrow
You say ‘tomato’, Hester
The great observer of Norfolk and Suffolk speech patterns, Reverend Forby, back in the 1830s observed that we may have been mispronouncing Miss Prynne’s name — at least according to the East Anglian dialect of the Pilgrim Fathers:-