Want to buy or sell something? Check the classifieds
  • The Fedora Lounge is supported in part by commission earning affiliate links sitewide. Please support us by using them. You may learn more here.

Today in History

ChiTownScion

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,247
Location
The Great Pacific Northwest
Theodore Geisel (Dr. Seuss) weighs in on Father Coughlin's crowd. March 3, 1942.


upload_2018-12-27_18-37-2.png
 

LizzieMaine

Bartender
Messages
33,715
Location
Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
Fritz Kuhn, the German-American Bund headman, had very close ties to Henry Ford -- he'd worked for Ford as a chemical engineer, and had dealings there with Ford's mouthpiece William J. Cameron, who was connected to all sorts of weird Nazi/Fascist/Christian Identity culty stuff. Kuhn went straight from Ford to the headship of the Bund, and given Old Henry's proven financial ties to the Nazi organization in Berlin, it's not too hard to figure who paid for his ticket.

Other than Kuhn, the big Nazi cheese in New York was a wormy little character named Joe McWilliams, who used to work street-corner crowds in Yorkville when he wasn't running for office on an overtly anti-Semitic platform. Walter Winchell had a field day with The Soapbox Fuhrer, ridiculing him in his column, on his broadcast, and to his face wherever and whenever possible, and on at least one documented occasion McWilliams' own audience turned on him and beat him up. Sieg heil, jackass.

Of course, these types of fringe characters didn't disappear once the war was over -- if anything, the Red scare gave them new life and new followings. It's one of the great shames of my own State of Maine that the most prominent US Nazi of the postwar era, George Lincoln Rockwell, grew up just down the road from here -- the son of the fine vaudeville comedian Doc Rockwell. "Linc," as he liked to be called, once attributed his conversion to anti-Semitism to seeing his father enjoying the company of his many Jewish show-business cronies. He mentioned, in particular, being appalled when Fred Allen's wife, Portland Hoffa, used the word "sh*t" in a conversation, bruising the poor little tyke's holy Christian ears and traumatizing him for life. Doucheland uber alles, snowflake.
 

Lean'n'mean

I'll Lock Up
Messages
4,086
Location
Cloud-cuckoo-land
On this day in 1895, the first commercial (paying) film was screened. The film by Louis & Auguste Lumiere; was shown in Le Grand café in Paris. It was a short sequence showing workers leaving the Lumiere factory.

On this day in 1869, 'The Knights of Labor' a tailor's union in Philadelphia, held the first Labor Day in American history.

On this day in 1954, Denzel 'kickass' Washington was born.
 

MissMittens

One Too Many
Messages
1,628
Location
Philadelphia USA
Fritz Kuhn, the German-American Bund headman, had very close ties to Henry Ford -- he'd worked for Ford as a chemical engineer, and had dealings there with Ford's mouthpiece William J. Cameron, who was connected to all sorts of weird Nazi/Fascist/Christian Identity culty stuff. Kuhn went straight from Ford to the headship of the Bund, and given Old Henry's proven financial ties to the Nazi organization in Berlin, it's not too hard to figure who paid for his ticket.

Many of the Kuhn FBI files are now public

Bund FBI Files
 

MissMittens

One Too Many
Messages
1,628
Location
Philadelphia USA
Today in 1942, Capt. Robert Sullivan became the first pilot to have flown across the Atlantic a hundred times.

Today in 1945, the U.S. Congress formally recognized the Pledge of Allegiance.
 

GHT

I'll Lock Up
Messages
9,775
Location
New Forest
Doesn't surprise me that there were many pro-German media voices in the US, let's not forget the "Bund". There's the remains of an actual Nazi children's camp only a short drive away in NJ, and let's not forget the Madison Square Gardens gathering.......
In May 1933, Nazi Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess gave German immigrant and German Nazi Party member Heinz Spanknöbel authority to form an American Nazi organization. Shortly thereafter, with help from the German consul in New York City, Spanknöbel created the Friends of New Germany by merging two older organizations in the United States, Gau-USA and the Free Society of Teutonia, which were both small groups with only a few hundred members each. The FoNG was based in New York City but had a strong presence in Chicago. Members wore a uniform, a white shirt and black trousers for men with a black hat festooned with a red symbol. Women members wore a white blouse and a black skirt.
The organization led by Spanknöbel was openly pro-Nazi, and engaged in activities such as storming the German language New Yorker Staats-Zeitung with the demand that Nazi-sympathetic articles be published, and the infiltration of other non-political German-American organizations. One of the Friends early initiatives was to counter, with propaganda, the Jewish boycott of German goods, which started in March 1933 to protest Nazi anti-Semitism.
In an internal battle for control of the Friends, Spanknöbel was ousted as leader and subsequently deported in October 1933 because he had failed to register as a foreign agent.

On this day in 1934 Dame Maggie Smith, British actress was born. She made her stage debut in 1952 and has won numerous awards for acting, both for the stage and for film, including five BAFTA Awards, plus the BAFTA Fellowship Award. She won acclaim in the drama, Downton Abbey as Violet Crawley, the Dowager-Countess of Grantham, for which she has won an Emmy.
young-dame-maggie-smith.jpg
dame-maggie.jpg
 

Lean'n'mean

I'll Lock Up
Messages
4,086
Location
Cloud-cuckoo-land
On this day in 1890, the US 7th cavalry surrounded & massacred an estimated 150-300 Lakota/sioux, (men,women & children), at Wounded knee, on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota. The army lost 25 men, many of whom were probably shot by their own side in the ensuing chaos.

On this day in 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket was brutally murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by order of KIng Henry ll.

On this day in 1845, Texas entered the union & became the 28th state.

On this day in 1957, Pat boone had his second No.1 in the charts with .......
 

GHT

I'll Lock Up
Messages
9,775
Location
New Forest
On this day in 1759, Arthur Guinness signed a 9,000 year lease at £45 per annum and started brewing Guinness at the St. James's Gate Brewery, Dublin. Ten years later Guinness exported his ale for the first time, when six and a half barrels were shipped to England.

Two famous knights of the realm share a birthday on New Year's Eve:
1937 Sir Anthony Hopkins, Welsh actor, was born. He is perhaps best known for his portrayal of the cannibalistic serial killer Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs, for which he received the Academy Award for Best Actor. He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1993 for services to the arts.

1942 Football manager Sir Alex Ferguson was born, in Glasgow. With 25 years as manager of Manchester United, he was the longest serving manager in their history and also the longest serving of all the current League managers. He stepped down as manager of Manchester United on 8th May 2013 after 27 seasons. Under his leadership the team won 38 trophies, including 13 league titles, two Champions Leagues, five FA Cups and four League Cups.
 

MissMittens

One Too Many
Messages
1,628
Location
Philadelphia USA
On this day in 1923, the Sahara Desert was crossed by automobile for the first time. It wouldn't be the last.

Today in 1944, hungry for some action, Hungary, former ally of Germany during the Great War, declared war on Germany.
 

GHT

I'll Lock Up
Messages
9,775
Location
New Forest
On this day in 1788, named after King George II, Georgia becomes the fourth state of the U.S.A.

On this day in 1982, Erica Rowe became the first sports 'streaker' when she ran across the Twickenham ground at the England v Australia rugby match waving her bra in the air. She was arrested, with policemen covering her 40" breasts with their woefully undersized helmets.
She a BIG girl.
 

scotrace

Head Bartender
Staff member
Messages
14,392
Location
Small Town Ohio, USA
J. R. R. Tolkien, professor, inventor of languages and universes, was born in 1892.

In 1521, the priest Martin Luther is excommunicated from the Catholic church by Pope Leo X.

The Brooklyn Bridge construction project got underway in 1870.

And Apple Computer turns 41.
 

LizzieMaine

Bartender
Messages
33,715
Location
Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
On this date in 1938, President Roosevelt announced the formal incorporation of the National Foundation For Infantile Paralysis, a fundraising organization intended to support research into the creation of a vaccine and a cure for polio, and urged Americans to support the organization by sending dimes to the White House. Comedian Eddie Cantor, an early supporter of the campaign, gave it the name that would stick down to the present day: The March of Dimes.
 

Harp

I'll Lock Up
Messages
8,508
Location
Chicago, IL US
Pope Francis: Martin Luther wanted to ‘renew the Church, not divide her.' (If I had said that at my Catholic school, back in the 50's, chances are, I could have been expelled.)

fur foras autem foras miserunt. The Christian Brothers of Ireland were strict to the point of cruelty,
but Francis probably would have surprised many of the school staff.
 

Forum statistics

Threads
109,096
Messages
3,074,046
Members
54,091
Latest member
toptvsspala
Top