December 22

1836  Texas'  First Congress established the General Land Office.

1916   The Casper Weekly Press for December 22, 1916: Wars everywhere
 

The Casper Weekly Press issued on December 22, 1916 warned that "Uncle Fears War". The papers were full of war warnings which, looking back, not only proved accurate but also can't help to call to mind that Woodrow Wilson had just been elected for keeping us out of war and yet the news was headed rapidly, and accurately, in the other direction.

In terms of other wars, the Casper paper reported that Villistas had killed 50 Constitutionalist soliders, hardly a large number by European standards but a scary one for a nation that had been worried about the direction the war in Mexico was taking for months.

In other grim news, two died in a refinery fire in Casper.  There is at least one famous refinery fire in Casper's history but it's not this one.  I can't find any details about it.

Finally the American Automobile Association, which I didn't even know existed that long ago, came out in support of a concrete highway across Wyoming. Such an improved highway remained quite a few years in the state's future at that time, but it's interesting to note how people were already pondering it.

1917  Mrs. Cody reacquires title to the Irma Hotel, in Cody.  Attribution.  Wyoming State Historical Society.

 Louisa and William F. Cody in later years.

1917   December 22, 1917: The United States Guards Authorized

Red Cross repsentatives marching with members of the New York State Guard in 1918. This is, of course, the State Guard, not the United States Guards. 

Showing a distinctly different approach to things than would be taken during the Second World War, something that will continue to be the case as we read more about Woodrow Wilson's approach to Federalism during World War One, the United States Guards were authorized on this day in 1917. They were part of the National Army, i.e. that part of the Army raised from civilians for the war, as opposed to those parts made up of the combined National Guard and Regular Army.  While they were part of the National Army, they were under the authority of the Militia Bureau (today's National Guard Bureau).  Of interest, at the same time the Federal Government was encouraging states to raise units of State Guards.

Some explanation of what these various units are or were is necessary to make much sense out of this story, of course.

The National Guard is well known to Americans, of course, and the nature of the National Guard would be evident to anyone who has been reading this blog over the past two years, as various National Guard units were called up and deployed to the Mexican border to be followed by the mass call up, and then mass conscription for odd legal reasons, of the National Guard in 1917.  As has also been seen, and a much different practice from what would occur in later years, states actively recruited for National Guardsmen right up until they were formally inducted into the U.S. Army and even proposed new National Guard units, much like they had done with the formation of state units during the Civil War.

Much different from the Civil War or even the Spanish American War, however, changes to the structure of the American military establishment following the Spanish American War had formalized its status as a reserve of the Army and caused the Militia Bureau to come about to deal with that.  The regularization of the National Guard as the state militia country wide created, in all states and in some territories the creation of those units to fill both a local militia role and to be the reserve of the Army in time of war.  In a few states this was controversial and they ended up accordingly splitting their state establishments between the National Guard and a State Guard, with the liability of the State Guard in times of war being fairly unclear.  The latter would seem to have been so liable as long as the fighting was to occur within the boundaries of the United States.  Rhode Island provides us one such example, Maryland another.  Most states did no such thing, however.

When the US entered the Great War in 1917 the National Guard, lately back from the Mexican border, was first called up and then conscripted in mass.  Indeed, it was expanded and therefore the result was that the states now lacked, for the most part, men for local militia service, should it be needed. That was one perceived problem.

A second was that, in spite of how we recall it today, the U.S. entry into World War One, while largely popular, was not entirely popular everywhere.  We've already had the example of a revolt against conscription and perhaps the war in general in Oklahoma.  To compound that, the teens were at the height of the radicalization of the American labor movement and labor was much less willing to go along with the Federal government as part of the war effort than it would be in later years.  Those who have read the newspaper entries here have seen the ones about trouble in the vital coal and rail industries, two industries that literally had the ability to completely cripple the nation.  Beyond that, the Administration of this era was highly intolerant to radical dissent and tended to see the events in Russia as if reflected in a distant mirror in the United States.

Given all of that, the Federal Government perceived there being a need for internal security forces at a national level.  To take up that role, it formed 48 regiments of United States Guards.  By the end of 1918, 1,364 officers and 26,796 men were serving in the United States Guards, stationed in the continental United States and the Territory of Alaska. 

These men were taken from the many men found unfit for service in the National Army, something which the readers of the newspapers here would also have noted, although the regulations provided that such departures from physical standards had to be "minor".  While physical standards for service were far less strict than they are now, frankly American health wasn't what the covers of The Saturday Evening Post and Leslie's might suggest.  Plenty of men were too old, infirm or in ill health so as to go to France with the National Army.  18,000 of the men who served in the United States Guards fit the category of men with a "minor" physical defect who had been conscripted but, because of their condition, could not go oversees. They were volunteers from the National Army into the United States Guards.  The balance were men whose condition precluded them from being drafted in the first instance, or who were above conscription age as the United States Guards would take able men who were above the service age.  After August 1918, when the Selective Service operated to process all incoming servicemen, a crack in the door that had existed for overage men to attempt to volunteer for the National Army was closed but they could still volunteer for the United States Guards. Some of them ended up in the 48 regiments of United States Guards maintained to keep the wolf at bay in the US itself.

 Enormous panoramic photograph of Michigan state troops, June 1917.  I've never been certain if these cavalrymen are National Guardsmen or State Guardsmen. If they're National Guardsmen, they're irregularly equipped in that they're carrying riot batons and lever action rifles, both of which would be extremely odd for National Guardsmen of this period even taking into account that prior to the Punitive Expedition some units were still privately equipped to some degree. This suggests state equipage, which was common for State Guards.

They didn't do it alone.  The various states had to form State Guard units as, even though its rare, State Governors lacked an armed force for internal security in the event of riots or disasters.  Substitute militia units were authorized and formed in every state, drawing from the same pool, to some extent, as the United States Guards, but with less connection to the formal National Army.  They were also less regularly equipped as well, relying on old or irregular weapons.   

For the most part, these units saw no action of any substantial type at all, but there is one notable exception, the Texas State Guard, which remained constantly deployed on real active service on the Mexican border, augmenting the United States Army which carried on in that role all throughout the war.  The United States Guards did provide security in Alaska, wild and far duty at that time (the initial unit was made up of men from a waterways unit), and in controlling IWW strikes in Arizona in 1918 and 1919. They also were used to suppress a race riot in North Carolina in 1918.

After the war, the United States Guards were disbanded, with that formally coming in 1920 but with actual demobilization starting on November 11, 1918 and continuing on into 1919.  The states largely disbanded the State Guard units, but a few retained them, with states that had such units before the war being in the forefront of that.  During World War Two State Guard units were again reestablished everywhere, after the National Guard was federalized in 1940, although this did not have happy results everywhere.  No effort was made to re-create the United States Guards and no need to do that was seen.  Today, some states still retain State Guard units that augment their National Guard establishments, but most do not.

Photographs, we'd note, of the United States Guards are exceedingly difficult to find, and therefore we've posted none.  They were issued obsolete U.S. arms, like the Krag rifle, or non standard arms, like rejected Russian Mosin Nagants.  While not equipped with the latest weapons going to France, these arms were more than adequate for the role the units performed.  Uniforms were initially going to be made up of blue dress uniforms of a late pattern, which did not vary greatly from field uniforms of the late 19th Century, but this was soon rejected on the basis that it deterred enlistment on the part of the men who did not want to be identified with rejected uniforms for rejected service.

Their service is obscure, but like that provided by State Guardsmen on the Mexican boarder during the war, it was real service.  It started on this day in 1917.

1917   The Saturday Evening Post, December 22, 1917

1918  December 22, 1918. Some days the headlines are just weird.

1921  President Warren Harding signed an Executive Order that designated expanded the National Elk Refuge into, additionally, a bird refuge.

1942  It is announced that a major butane plant will be built by Continental Oil Company at Lance Creek.  Lance Creeks saw a huge boom in oil activity during World War Two.

1958  Herbert J. Brees died in San Antonio Texas.  Brees was born in Laramie in 1877, and graduated from the University of Wyoming with a BS in 1897.  He earned a LLD, a version of a JD, in 1939, very late in his Army career.

He served as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 2nd U.S. Volunteer Cavalry during 1898 as a volunteer for the Spanish American War and transferred from it in to the Regular Army in 1898.  He served initially in the artillery after joining the regular Army, but thereafter served principally in the cavalry branch until his retirement in 1941.  One of this last roles in the Army was as the Chief Controller for the Louisiana Maneuvers.  Brees Field, Laramie's airport, is named for him.

1978  The Downtown Cheyenne Historic District added to the National Registry of Historic Places.

December 21

Today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.

1620     The Mayflower voyagers went ashore for the first time at present-day Plymouth, Mass.  

1866  A force principally comprised of Sioux lures a force principally made up of post Civil War recruits, commanded by William Fetterman, into an ambush outside of Ft. Phil Kearny.  Fetterman was arrogant in regards to his opinions of his abilities and that of his green troops and insubordinate to some degree in regards to his weak commander, Col. Carrington.  In the resulting battle Fetterman's entire command, 82 (including two civilians) are killed in the largest post Civil War military disaster of the Indian Wars up until Little Big Horn a decade later.  The battle also results in a type of siege around Ft. Phil Kearny, just a few miles from the battlefield, where the command buttons up as a result of the disaster.

Coming just a year after the carnage of the Civil War, the defeat, which was recognized as a military disaster at the time, nonetheless did not have the huge public impact that Custer's defeat a decade later in Montana would.  Indeed, while recognized as a disaster at the time, the Sioux victory would be a significant battle in Red Cloud's War, the only Plains Indian War won by the Indians.  

Like Little Big Horn, the battle has been subjected to continual reinterpretation, and has been nearly from the onset.  As a recent article in the Annals of Wyoming (Spring 2012) reveals there were "eyewitness" accounts that were fiction from day one, and Col. Carrington started receiving criticism from the onset.  As it turns out, conventional accounts of the battle remain the most accurate, with Carrington urging Fetterman not to go beyond the nearby ridge-line, and Fetterman ignoring that order.  Fetterman's contempt for his Indian foe that day would prove disasterous.

1916   The Cheyenne State Leader for December 21, 1916: Mexican raid into Arizona threatened.
 

The terrible fire at the Inter-Ocean was still very much in the news, but we also learned that there was concern over a potential raid into Arizona by some Mexican bands.  Of course, the Wyoming Tribune had reported on this yesterday.

President Wilson's peacemaking efforts also hit the news.

1927  Ed Cantrell, Wyoming lawman, born in Bloomington Indiana.

1933 A bill to introduce a state income tax failed. Attribution.  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1938  Construction on Seminoe  Dam was completed, bu the resulting reservoir would not start being filled until the Spring.

1941  $5,077 collected in Sheridan Wyoming war relief drive. Attribution.  Wyoming State Historical Society.

December 20

1803 The Louisiana Purchase was completed as the territory was formally transferred from France to the United States during ceremonies in New Orleans. The transfer actually technically also involved Spain, but only in some odd jurisdictional sense.  Much, but not all, of what would become Wyoming was thereby transferred to the United States, leaving approximately 1/3d of the state in the hands of Spain and a section of country near what is now Jackson's Hole in the Oregon Country belonging to the United Kingdom.

While the very early territorial jurisdictions pertaining to Wyoming are now largely forgotten, and while they were always a bit theoretical given the tenuous nature of actual pre Mexican War control over the territory, there have been six national flags that claimed Wyoming or parts of it, including Spain, France, the United Kingdom, Mexico, the Republic of Texas and the United States.  With the Louisiana Purchase, France's claim would be forever extinguished and the majority of what would become the state would belong to the United States.

1812     One of the dates claimed for the death of Sacajawea.  If correct, she would have died of an unknown illness at age 24 at Fort Manuel Lisa, where it is claimed that she and her husband Toussaint Charbonneau were living.  If correct, she left an infant girl, Lizette, there, and her son Jean-Baptiste was living in a boarding school while in the care of William Clark.  Subsequent records support that Charbonneau consented to Clark's adoption of Lizette the following year, although almost nothing is known about her subsequent fate.  Jean-Baptiste lived until age 61, having traveled widely and having figured in many interesting localities of the American West.

The 1812 death claim, however, is rejected by the Shoshone's, to which tribe she belonged, who maintain that she lived to be nearly 100 years old and died in 1884 at Ft. Washakie, Wyoming.  A grave site exists for her, based on the competing claim, in Ft. Washakie, the seat of government for the Wind River Reservation.  This claim holds that she left Charbonneau and ultimately married into the Comanche tribe, which is very closely related to the Shoshone tribe, ultimately returning to her native tribe This view was championed by  Grace Hebard who was discussed here several days ago, and it even presents an alternative history for her son, Jean Baptiste, and a second son Bazil.  It was later supported by the conclusions reached by Dr. Charles Eastman, a Sioux physician who was hired by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to research her fate.

While the Wyoming claim is not without supporting evidence, the better evidence would support her death outside of Wyoming at an early age.  The alternative thesis is highly romantic, which has provided the basis for criticism of Hebard's work.  The 1812 date, on the other hand, is undeniably sad, as much of Sacajawea's actual life was.  Based upon what is now known of her story, as well as the verifiable story of Jean-Baptiste Charbonneau, who had traveled in the US and Europe, and who had held public office in the United States, the Wyoming claim is seriously questionable.  That in turn leaves the question of the identify of the person buried at Ft. Washakie, who appears to have genuinely been married into the Comanche tribe, to have lived to an extremely old age, and to have lived a very interesting life, but that identity is unlikely to ever be known, or even looked into.

1886  Territorial Governor George Baxter resigned. He had only been in office for a month.  The West Point graduate and former U.S. Cavalryman's history was noted a few days ago, on the anniversary of his death.

1916   The Wyoming Trubine for December 20, 1916: Troops Rush to Forestall Border Raid (and a truly bizarre comparison made in the case of a Mexican American militia)
 

A story of a near raid in the Yuma era with a rather bizarre comparison between a claimed Mexican American militia and the KKK.   Apparently the authors there had taken their history from D. W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation rather than reality.

It's rather difficult, to say the least, to grasp a comparison between a Mexican militia of any kind and the KKK which wouldn't exactly be in the category of people sympathetic to Mexican Americans.  And it's even more difficult to see the KKK used as a favorable comparison.  Cheyenne had a not insignificant African American, Hispanic, and otherwise ethic population associated with the Union Pacific railroad and I imagine they weren't thrilled when they saw that article.

Apparently the "war babies" referred to in the headline were stocks that were associated with Great War production, which logically fell following the recent exchange of notes on peace. As we saw yesterday, the Allies weren't receptive to them, so I'd imagine they those stocks rose again.
1942  Sheridan's high school added a vocational preparatory class for essential work work.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1945   Tire rationing in the U.S. ended.

2005   Wyoming commenced a somewhat controversial cloud-seeding research project with the intent to increase mountain snowpack.  Attribution:  On This Day .Com.

2010  The University of Wyoming puts Bruce Catton's papers on line. Catton was a well known historian of the Civil War.

December 17

1619     Prince Rupert of the Rhine, Royalist cavalry commander in the English Civil War, born.  He returned England with the restoration of Charles II, and headed the investors group that in 1670 got a charter for the Hudson's Bay Company and title to all lands draining into Hudson Bay.  He was the first Governor of the HBC.

1890  Union Pacific swithmen went on strike.   Attribution: Wyoming State Historical Society.

1904  John J. McIntyre born in Dewey County, Oklahoma.  He was the Congressman from Wyoming from 1941 to 1943, serving a single term.  He served as State Auditor in 1946, and was later a Justice of the Wyoming Supreme Court from 1960 until his death in 1974.

McIntyre graduated from high school in Tulsa, Oklahoma and had a law degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder from 1929.  He relocated to Wyoming in 1931 where he became the Converse County Attorney in 1933 and entered Federal service as an attorney in 1936.  He was a member of the Wyoming National Guard and was promoted to the rank of Captain in1936. This was not unusual for lawyers of that period, as many held commissions on the Guard.  He must have been in the Guard at the time it was Federalized in 1940, but his status as a Congressman likely took him out of service at the time of Pearl Harbor.  He was not reelected to Congress and served as a Deputy Attorney General in 1943 and 1944, and then entered the U.S. Army as an enlisted man where he was a Staff Sergeant with the 660th Field Artillery.

1916  Inter Ocean destroyed by fire.

The Inter-Ocean

1916   Inter-Ocean Hotel in Cheyenne destroyed by fire.  Attribution; Wyoming State Historical Society.

The Inter-Ocean was one of several Cheyenne hotels that were big deals and major watering holes, something very common in that era and for decades thereafter (and still somewhat true in larger cities today).  It's remembered to Western History for being the location referenced by Tom Horn in his famous conversation with  Joe LeFors.

If you go to the Inter-Ocean to sit down and talk a few minutes some one comes in and says, 'Let us have a drink,' and before you know it you are standing up talking, and my feet get so *&^*&^^  tired it almost kills me. I am 44 years, 3 months, and 27 days old, and if I get killed now I have the satisfaction of knowing I have lived about fifteen ordinary lives.

Horn was in fact arrested outside of the Inter-Ocean.

The hotel had been built by Barney Ford, a businessman who had been born a slave, a status that he escaped from.  His father was the white plantation owners where his black mother was enslaved.  After escaping he lived an adventuresome life and rose to great wealth in Colorado.

He apparently liked the name "Inter-Ocean" as he built another hotel in Denver's 16th Street by that name.  Like the Cheyenne hotel, it is no longer there, which is a real shame as funky buildings like this are all the rage in Denver now..

Denver's Inter-Ocean

1916  Sunday State Leader for December 17, 1916: Measles killing Guardsmen at Deming.

Not the only news of the day, but two Arkansas Guardsmen died from the measles at Deming, New Mexico, news that surely worried Wyomingites with family members serving in the Guard at Deming.

William F. Cody  was reported very ill at his sister's house in Denver.

And death claimed the life of a former Rough Rider living in the state as well.

The State Health Officer reported, in cheerier news, on the state's healthful climate.

1916  Carranza rejects the protocol

 

We've run a lot of newspaper articles on the negotiations between the United States and Mexico, or perhaps more accurately between the United States and the Constitutionalist government of Mexico lead by Venustiano Carranza

 Carranza

On this day he ended the doubt, he refused to sign it.

Carranza was a tough minded individual.  He never liked Woodrow Wilson and he had a grudge against the United States.  Irrespective of what may seem to be the advantages of the proposals that were made, he wouldn't agree.

And he never did.  Carranza never executed a protocol with the United States.

By this point the United States clearly wanted out of Mexico.  The intervention had bogged down to an uneasy occupation since the summer and was going nowhere.  Carranza guessed correctly that the United States would be leaving no matter what, although that did not mean that the US would be passive in protecting its interests.

1918  The USS Cheyenne, formerly the USS Wyoming, but renamed due the later battleship being assigned that name, assigned to Division I, American Patrol Division.

1918  December 17, 1918. No Booze for Soldiers. No Booze for Coloradans, No Booze for Montanans. Villa ponders attack

Up until at least the Korean War, if not the Vietnam War, a deficit of clothing meant that discharged soldiers often wore their uniforms after a time following their discharge.  That was very much the case after World War One and World War Two.  Here, the Federal Government was concerned about discharged soldiers drinking in uniform.

In the popular imagination, Prohibition was forced on an unwilling nation by a bunch of silly temperance women who didn't realize that America was a drinking nation.  That version of the story is very far from true.

The Cheyenne State Leader was reporting that Montana would go dry on December 30.  1918 was to be Montana's last "wet" year.  Villa, the paper also reported, was up to no good.

In reality, Prohibition was a hugely popular movement and was gaining ground in the states prior to it become Federal law.  By this date in 1918, Colorado had gone "bone dry" and Montana was about to.

Not all was bleak. One of the Casper papers was reporting that American soldiers still preferred American girls.  Those American soldiers would be bringing home quite a few French brides and even a few Russian ones.  Of course, the report here did contain some bad news for American women.  Some of the soldiers were reporting pretty favorably on les femmes Francais.

So Prohibition was really arriving in the individual states prior to the Volstead Act making it the law of the land and prior to any Constitutional amendment requiring it.  When Prohibition was repealed, it meant that each state that had laws on the books had to revisit those laws if it wanted to likewise repeal Prohibition in their state, which serves as a lesson in rushing to amend laws to comport with what seems to be a national development.  That allowed those states a breather to adapt to the new situation, which in the case of Wyoming it very much took, phasing drinking back in over a period of years.

1919 

Vernon Baker born in Cheyenne.  Baker is a recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor for his actions in combat in World War Two, with his citation reading as follows:

For extraordinary heroism in action on 5 and 6 April 1945, near Viareggio, Italy. Then Second Lieutenant Baker demonstrated outstanding courage and leadership in destroying enemy installations, personnel, and equipment during his company's attack against a strongly entrenched enemy in mountainous terrain. When his company was stopped by the concentration of fire from several machine gun emplacements, he crawled to one position and destroyed it, killing three Germans. Continuing forward, he attacked an enemy observation post and killed two occupants. With the aid of one of his men, Lieutenant Baker attacked two more machine gun nests, killing or wounding the four enemy soldiers occupying these positions. He then covered the evacuation of the wounded personnel of his company by occupying an exposed position and drawing the enemy's fire. On the following night Lieutenant Baker voluntarily led a battalion advance through enemy mine fields and heavy fire toward the division objective. Second Lieutenant Baker's fighting spirit and daring leadership were an inspiration to his men and exemplify the highest traditions of the Armed Forces.

Baker had a rough start in life when his parents died while he was still young.  Partially raised by his grandparents, he learned how to hunt from his grandfather in order to put meat on the table.  Entering the Army during World War Two, he made the Army a career and retired in 1968 as a First Lieutenant, his rank at that time reflecting force reductions following World War Two.  He retired to Idaho where he chose to live as he was an avid hunter, and he died there in 2010.  Baker is a significant figure from Wyoming not only because he won the Congressional Medal of Honor, but because he was part of Wyoming's small African American community.

1985  Alan B. Johnson received his commission as a Federal Judge for the District of Wyoming.

2003  Wyoming filed a petition to delist the Prebbles Jumping Mouse from the Endangered Species List.

December 15

Today is Bill of Rights Day.

1791     The Bill of Rights took effect following ratification by Virginia.

1887  The Burlington Northern commences operation on its freight line to Cheyenne.

1890 Sioux Chief Sitting Bull and 11 other tribe members were killed in Grand River, S.D., during a clash with Indian police.  This event would be one of a series which lead to the tragedy of Wounded Knee.

1890  Burlington Northern commences passenger service between Douglas and Cheyenne.  The Douglas depot is now a train museum (a photo of which will later appear on our Railhead site).

1903  USS Wyoming anchored at the Bay of San Miguel Panama, during the period of Panamanian separation from Columbia.

1909  The six masted schooner Wyoming, the largest wooden schooner ever built, launched in Bath, Maine.  The huge schooner was the last one launched on the East Coast of the United States.

1910  Bishop James A. Keane approved of the parish of St. James in Douglas, together with
several missions.

1910  Wills Van Devanter confirmed as a Justice of the United States Supreme Court.

1913  The cornerstone of the Newcastle National Guard Armory laid. The building is a museum today.

1913  George Saban, who had plead guilty to second degree murder in connection with the Spring Creek Raid, escaped while being transported as part of a work detail and was never heard from again.

1918  December 15, 1918. Returning Home, Not Making It Over, Wilson In France, Silly Cinema

The Philadelphia Public Ledger printed a poster as a supplement.  The troops were already returning home in appreciable numbers so that celebrations were occurring.

And Sunday movie releases were a thing.  Wives and Other Wives was released on this date in 1918.

The plot synopsis, involving newlyweds, looks absurd, but then it's no more absurd than the piles of slop that television offers now.  Compared to Below Deck, it was likely downright intellectual.

This was a five reel film, fwiw.

The Cheyenne paper features a full slate of recent post war news in its Sunday edition, including the news that Ireland was going for Sinn Fein in the British parliamentary election held the day prior, and Lloyd George had apparently called Labor to be Bolshevik.  France was celebrating Wilson's arrival and the paper was reporting that German efforts to woo African American troops had failed.

And at least in Chicago, the Sunday paper had cartoons, including one that was aimed at low grade coal used to heat homes during World War One as the better grades were devoted to other more pressing concerns.

Hardly anyone heats a house with coal now (I know some do, and I've been in at least a couple of structures heated by coal), so the soot and smell of it is something sort of lost on a modern audience.  But it would have done both of those.  I.e, coal smells even if its a good grade, and the lower grades would have been quite smokey and sooty.

If we take cartoons as a reflection back on contemporary life, and really we ought to, there's some other interesting things to glean in these cartoons.  For one thing, cars were obviously still a novelty, given the way that they were treated in Gasoline Alley.  The protagonists are basically a group of car owners in these early issues experimenting on their cars.  Note that steam cars were still a thing, as there's a reference to them in the cartoon.

And it must have already been the case that those who didn't make it "Over There" were a bit embarrassed by it, as that was the subject of one of the cartoons.

1933   The Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution officially becomes effective, repealing the Eighteenth Amendment that prohibited the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol.

1939     "Gone With the Wind" premiered in Atlanta.

1963  The statue of Ester Morris at the state capitol was dedicated.

2008  Wyoming's presidential electors met at the State Capitol Building at noon to cast their votes for President.

2011 Conclusion of three days of oral arguments at the Wyoming Supreme Court.

2011 Governor Mead meets carolers from Jessup Elementary School.

December 14

1854   Edward Gillette was born in New Haven, Connecticut.  He graduated from the Yale Scientific School in 1876 and took a job with the U.S. Geological Survey.  He later became locating engineer and chief draftsman for the Rio Grande and Western Railway and later a surveyor and civil engineer for the Burlington and Missouri Railroad. He was married to the daughter of H.A. Coffeen, who at one time was Wyoming’s Congressman. He was elected Wyoming State Treasurer in 1907 and served until 1911. 1907-1911.   He also served as Wyoming Water Superintendent.

Gillette Wyoming is named after him.

1877  Cheyenne incorporated by the Territorial Legislature.

1911 Hiram S. Manville, after whom Manville in Niobrara County is named, died in Nebraska.  He was a rancher and worked for large ranches in the region, and was influential in the early development of the town.

1914  Grace Raymond Hebard became first woman admitted to state bar.

This was a remarkable achievement in and of itself, but it only one of a string of such accomplishments made by Hebard.  She was also the first woman to graduate from the Engineering Department of the University of Iowa, in an era when there engineering was an overwhelmingly male profession.  She followed this 1882 accomplishment by acquiring a 1885 MA from the same school, and then an 1893  PhD in political science from Wesleyan University.  She went to work for the State of Wyoming in 1882 and rose to the position of Deputy State Engineer under legendary State Engineer Elwood Mead.  She moved to Laramie in 1891 and was instrumental in the administration of the University of Wyoming.  She was a significant figure in the suffrage movement, and a proponent in Wyoming of Americanization, a view shared by such figures such as Theodore Roosevelt.

She was an amateur historian as well, which is what she is best remembered for today.  Unfortunately, her historical works were tinged with romanticism and have not been regarded as wholly reliable in later years.  Her history of Sacajawea, which followed 30 years of research, is particularly questioned and would seem to have made quite a few highly romantic erroneous conclusions.  On a more positive note, the same impulses lead her to be very active in the marking of historic Wyoming trails.

While she was the first woman to be admitted to the Wyoming State Bar, she never actually practiced law.  Her book collection is an important part of the University of Wyoming's American Heritage Center's collection today. 

1916  Former Governor John Osborne concludes his service as Assistant Secretary of State for the Wilson Administration.

John E. Osborne at the start of his service as Assistant Secretary of State.

It had been rumored for weeks that the former Democratic Governor would step down, with motivations being various cited as an intent to run for the U.S. Senate and a desire to return his Western holdings.   All of that may have been partial motivators.  He did retain agricultural and business holdings in Wyoming and a 1918 run for the Senate showed he had not lost interest in politics.  However, he also found himself in increasing disagreement with his employer on Wilson's policies in regards to the war in Europe.  So, at this point, prior to Wilson's second term commencing, he stepped down and returned to Wyoming with his wife Selina, who was twenty years his junior.

Osborne would live the rest of his life out in the Rawlins area, ranching and as a banker.  While twenty years older than his wife, he would out live her by a year, dying in 1943 at age 84.  She died the prior year at age 59.  Their only daughter would pass away in 1951.  In spite of a largely Wyoming life, he was buried with his wife in their family plot in Kentucky.
1916The Submarine H3 runs aground, leading to the ultimate loss of the USS Milwaukee.
 

The U.S. submarine the H3, operating off of Eureka California with the H1 and H2, and their tender the USS Cheyenne, went off course in heavy fog and ran aground on this date (although some sources say it was December 16, this seems the better date however).

The H3 during one of the recovery attempts.

She'd be recovered and put back in service, although it was a difficult effort and would not be accomplished until April 20, 1917.  In the process, the USS Milwaukee, a cruiser, was beached and wrecked on January 13, 1917, making the relaunching of the H3 somewhat of a Pyrrhic victory.

The wrecked USS Milwaukee.

USS Cheyenne, which had been original commissioned as the monitor USS Wyoming.

 The USS Cheyenne with the H1 and H2.  The Cheyenne had been decommissioned in 1905, after having served since only 1900, but she was recommissioned in 1908.  She was the first fuel oil burning ship in the U.S. Navy after having been refitted prior to recommissioning.  She was refitted as a U.S. Navy submarine tender, as a brief stint in the Washington Naval Militia, in 1913.

2006  Staff Sgt. Theodore A. Spatol,1041st Engineer Company, Wyoming Army National Guard, died of illness acquired while in Iraq.  He had returned to his home in Thermopolis prior to passing.

Elsewhere:  1916:  In strong contrast to the State of Wyoming,  Quebec bans women from entering the legal profession.

This was in contrast with progress in suffrage elsewhere in Canada that year, but it wasn't terribly unusual for the time.  Note that the first Woman admitted to the bar in Wyoming had only been admitted two years earlier in spite of suffrage dating back to the late 19th Century and in spite of women already having served as justices of the peace and jurors. Having said that, every US state would have admitted at least one woman to the bar by the early 20th Century and many in the late 19th Century

Clara Brett Martin, the first female lawyer in the British Empire.

In these regards the entire British Empire trailed somewhat behind as the first female lawyer in the Empire, Ontario's Clara Brett Martin, wasn't admitted until 1897 after a protracted struggle to obtain that goal.

December 13

Today is St. Lucy's Day. She is one of the patrons of writers.

1636 The General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony ordered that the Colony's militia companies be organized into North, South and East Regiments, which is regarded as the birth of the National Guard.

1861  Mary Godat Bellamy, Wyoming's first female legislator, born in Richwoods Missouri.  She was elected to the State House in 1910.  

1873   Governor Campbell approved an act creating Uinta County to build a courthouse and a jail in Evanston.  The courthouse remains in that use today, and is the oldest courthouse in Wyoming that still serves in its original function.  Johnson County's 1884 courthouse is the second oldest.

1879  Pease County renamed Johnson County.  Attriubiton.  On This Day . Com.

1901  Prisoners transferred from Laramie to new penitentiary in Rawlins. Attribution. Wyoming State Historical Society.

1901  Wild Bunch (Hole in the Wall Gang) member Kid Curry killed Knoxville Tennessee policemen William Dinwiddle and Robert Saylor.

1913  Lincoln Highway designated a transcontinental highway, the first to be so designated in the US.

1913  Yoder incorporated. Attribution: Wyoming State Historical Society.

1916   The Wyoming Tribune for December 13, 1916. Maybe Carranza isn't in a hurry to sign.
 

Just two days ago Carranza was reported as going to sign the protocol for sure.  Now, accurately, he didn't appear to be likely to do so.

Otherwise, the disaster of World War One dominated the headlines along with the disastrous fire in Chugwater.

USS Goshen

1944 The USS Goshen, originally named the Sea Hare, commissioned.  She was a fast attack transport.

1984  Minor league baseball player Armando Casas born in Laramie.

1993  A 3.5 magnitude earthquake occurs 70 miles outside of Laramie.  I was living there at the time, but I don't recall this one.

2004  Tom Strook, long time Wyoming legislator, World War Two Marine, Casper oil man, and US Ambassador to Guatemala died.

December 12

Today commemorates Our Lady of Guadalupe on the Catholic calendar.  The day commemorates the appearance of Mary to Juan Diego in Mexico.  The day has always been one of celebration in Mexican communities in the United States, including Wyoming, where various Catholic parishes with significant Hispanic populations have celebrated the day in a traditional fashion.  St. Lawrence O'Toole parish in Laramie, for example, has celebrated the day for decades with a dedicated Mass incorporating the inclusion of a queen and king chosen from amongst the Hispanic youth of the parish.  St. Anthony's parish in Casper includes a march from Pioneer Park, which is located near the old and new courthouses, to the church.

1860   Frank L. Houx, who became Wyoming's acting Governor in 1917 upon Gov. Kendrick's resignation,  was born near Lexington, MO.

1873  Laramie incorporated by the Territorial Legislature.

1873  Wyoming's third Territorial Legislature concluded.

1888  Herman Glafcke takes office as Territorial Bank Examiner.

1910  William Howard Taft nominated Willis Van Devanter to the position of Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  

Van Devanter was born in Indiana and was a 1881 graduate of the Cincinnati Law School.  Like many of Wyoming's early political figures, the young Van Devanter saw opportunity in Wyoming and relocated to Cheyenne after obtaining his law degree where he became a significant practicing.  He served as the Chief Justice of the Territorial Supreme Court after being appointed to the post at age 30.  And he was Chief Justice of the Wyoming Supreme Court for four days prior to returning to private practice after Wyoming achieved statehood.  During his period of private practice he was the legal strategist for the large cattlemen following their arrest for the invasion of Johnson County.

In 1896, after becoming afflicted with Typhus, he relocated to Washington  D. C.  From 1896 to 1900 he served as an Assistant Attorney General assigned to the  Department of the Interior and was a professor at George Washington University's department of law.  In 1903 President Roosevelt nominated him to the 8th Judicial Circuit Court of Appeals, where he was serving when nominated to the United States Supreme Court.  In remarkable contrast to today, his nomination was approved by the Senate on December 15..

 
1916  Chugwater's business district destroyed by fire.  Attribution. Wyoming State Historical Society.

1917     Father Edward Flanagan founded Boys Town outside Omaha, Neb.  From our companion blog:

Boys Town Founded, December 12, 1917
 

Monsignor Edward J. Flanagan

On this date in 1917, Monsignor Edward J. Flanagan founded an orphanage outside of Omaha Nebraska which was called the City of Little Men.  Later changing its name to Boys' Town, the orphanage for boys pioneered the social preparation model for orphanages.  It still exists.

Monsignor Flanagan was Irish by birth and the son of a herdsman.  He immigrated to the United States at age 18 in 1904 and received a bachelors degree just two years later, going on to receive a MA two years after that.  He then entered the seminary in New York and completed his studies in Italy and Austria, being ordained there in 1912.  He was then assigned to Nebraska as a Priest. He became a US citizen in 1919.. His views on the care and development of orphaned children were far ahead of their time.

1919  Fourteen Spanish Flu deaths were reported in Washakie County for this week, which of course occurred during the Spanish Flu Pandemic.

The Spanish Influenza was a disaster of epic proportions which managed to impact nearly the entire globe.  While accounts vary, some accounts indicate that the flu epidemic first broke out, at least in its lethal form, in Camp Funston, Kansas.

1925     The first motel, the Motel Inn, opened, in San Luis Obispo, Calif.  Another sign of the rise of the automobile.  Prior to this, hotels had often been situated relatively near railroads, and they did not feature parking lots.

1941 British decide to abandon northern Malaya. Japanese abandon their first attempt to capture Wake. Japanese complete the occupation of southern Thailand. Japanese invade Burma. Japanese troops land at Legaspi, southeastern Luzon and advance from Vigan and Aparri.  Naval Air Transport Service is established  Germans begin house-by-house search for Jews in Paris.  U.S. Navy takes control of the ocean liner Normandie while it is docked at New York City.   UK declares war on Bulgaria. Hungary and Romania declare war on the United States. India declares war on Japan.  Adolf Hitler announces extermination of the Jews at a meeting in the Reich Chancellery.

1941   The Wyoming Township, Michigan, Police Department founded.

2016  Wyoming Governor Mead addressed the Joint Appropriations Committee in Cheyenne, telling them that budget cuts enacted in prior years were deep enough and not to cut further.  The committee, made up of fiscal conservatives, was largely non reactive to that, but it did have questions about the funding of the Tribal Liaison position which is funded for a reduced $160,000.  Questions were made about whether one liaison for two tribes, now that the tribes cooperation is reduced over prior years, was appropriate, and whether support for the position would remain if the Tribes were asked to fund 10% to 20% of the position.

2016  The Federal Government agreed to buy an inholding belonging to the State in the Grand Teton National Park for $46,000,000. The State had threatened for some time to sell the land if the Federal Government did not buy the 640 acres on the basis that it had to do that to maximize returns for the schools given that the grazing lease only brought in $2,000 per year.

December 11

1839  Diplomats from Texas arrive in Mexico City with portfolios to negotiate for peace.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1869  The Territorial Legislature concluded its session.

1872  William F. Cody makes his first appearance on the stage in the play Scouts of the Prairie, in Chicago.

1873  The Territorial legislature approved the incorporation of Evanston.  It would later rescind it, and then approve it again. Attribution.  On-This-Day .com.

1875  The Territorial Legislature appointed a commission to study prison costs in regards to Laramie as the prison location.  It determined that cost savings justified appointing the Nebraska penitentiary as the Wyoming Territorial prison facility at the time.

1917  Dean Knight Resigned as Dean of the University of Wyoming, December 11, 1917.

The minutes of that meeting:

Minutes

Knight Hall is of course named for him.

1917  Rawlins struck with disaster when its hospital burned.  Attribution, Wyoming State Historical Society.

1936 Britain's King Edward VIII abdicated the throne in order to marry American divorcee Wallis Warfield Simpson.  They had been introduced by Wyomingite Mildred Harris.

1941  Germany and Italy declared war on the United States.  The United States declared war on Germany.   Polish government in exile declares war on Japan.  The Dutch government in exile declares war on Italy.  Mexico breaks relations with Germany and Italy.  Italy, Japan and Germany sign an agreement that none shall sign a separate peace with the US and UK.

1952  Boysen Dam declared operational.

December 10

Today is Wyoming Day

1838  Mirabeau Buonaparte Lamar inaugurated the second president of the Republic of Texas.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1869  Territorial Governor John Campbell signed a bill giving full suffrage and public rights to women in Wyoming.  This was the first law passed in the US explicitly granting to women the franchise.  The bill provided that:  ""Every woman of the age of eighteen years residing in this territory, may, at every election cast her vote; and her right to the elective franchise and to hold office under the election laws of the territory shall be the same of electors."  Gov. Campbell's comment, in signing the bill into law, was:  "I have the honor to inform the Council that I have approved 'An act to grant to the Women of Wyoming Territory the right of Suffrage and to hold office.'" 


Critics, or perhaps rather cynics, have sometimes claimed that this served no other purpose other than to raise the number of citizens eligible to vote, and thereby increase the likelihood of early admission as a state, but that view doesn't reflect the early reality of this move.  In fact, Wyoming's politicians were notably egalitarian for the time and too women as members of the body politic seriously.  During the Territorial period women even served on juries, something that was very unusual in the United States at the time, although they lost this right for a time after statehood.

1869  Territorial school laws goes into effect requiring public schools to be funded by taxation.

1898  The Treaty of Paris was signed concluding an agreement to end the Spanish American War.

1906  President Theodore Roosevelt awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.

1909     Red Cloud, (Maȟpíya Lúta) Oglala Sioux warrior and chief, and the only Indian leader to have won a war with the United States in the post 1860 time frame which resulted in a favorable treaty from the Indian prospective, died at the Pine Ridge Reservation.  He was 87 years old, and his fairly long life was not uncommon for Indians of this time frame who were not killed by injuries or disease, showing that the often cited assumption that people who lived in a state of nature lived short lives is in error.  After winning Red Cloud's War, a war waged over the Powder River Basin and the Big Horns, he declined to participate in further wars against the United States, which seems to have been motivated by a visit to Washington D.C in which he became aware of the odds against the Plains Indians.  He did not become passive, and warned the United States that its treatment of Indians on the Reservation would lead to further armed conflict, which of course was correct.

While his most famous actions are associated with Wyoming, Red Cloud was born in Nebrasaka which inducted him in recent years into the Nebraska Hall of Fame.

1916 Sunday State Leader for December 10, 1916: Osborne resigns as Assistant Secretary of State, Carranza will sign protocol, Funston explains ban of rivals.
 

December 10, 1916, was a peculiar newspaper day as the Cheyenne State Leader published three editions, only one of which was regular news. The others were holiday features.

In this one, the straight news one, we are told that Carranza will sign the protocol with the US. But will he really?

We also learn that Assistant Secretary of State Osborne resigned that position in order to return to Wyoming.

The news also featured a story on why U.S. Commander in the Southwest, Frederick Funston, banned religious revivals in his region of authority.

And girls from Chicago were looking for husbands.

1918  December 10, 1918. Watering in the Rhine, Welcoming the Troops Home, Massacre in Palestine, Bolsheviks worry about Russians.

Cpt. M. W. Lanham, 2nd Bde, 1st Div, waters his horse "Von Hindenburg", in the Rhine.  Ostensibly Von Hindenburg was the first American horse to drink from the Rhine.

Back home, Casperites were learning what locals and friends of locals had done during the war. . . and a big party was being planned for the returning troops.

Note making the news, a terrible massacre was perpetrated by New Zealand troops, and a few Australians, in the town of Surafend Palestine in reprisal for the murder of a New Zealander soldier.  At least 40 male villagers of that town were killed in the event.

And the Bolsheviks, a movement that had long depended upon revolutionary citizenry, made its fear of that citizenry plain when it ordered that civilians turn in their arms.  Even edged weapons were included in the decree, although shotguns were not.

1919 

December 10, 1919. Air First and a Coal Day

The prize posted by the Australian government of 10,000 Australian pounds (then the unit of currency in Australia) for the first aircraft piloted by Australians to fly from England to the Australia was claimed by the crew of a Vickers Vimy bomber, entered into the contest by Vickers.

The plane was crewed by pilots Cpt. Ross Macpherson Smith and his brother Lt. Keith Macpherson Smith, with mechanics Sgt. W. H. Shiers and J.M. Bennett.  The plane made the trip from Hounslow Heath to Australian starting on November 12, 1919.

Cpt. Smith was killed test piloting a Vickers Viking seaplane in 1922.  Lt. Smith became a Vickers executive and an airline industry figure, dying of natural causes in 1955 at age 64.

Elsewhere, questions began to come up about the nature of diplomatic officer Jenkin's kidnapping even as Republicans continued to press for action of some sort against Mexico.  And as the mine strike ended, kids in Casper were let out of school due to lack of coal for heat.

1920 Woodrow Wilson receives the Nobel Peace Prize.

1941 Guam surrenders to a Japanese landing force after a two day battle. Japanese aircraft sink HMSs Prince of Wales and Repulse, South China Sea. Japanese naval aircraft bomb Cavite Navy Yard, Manila Bay. Japanese troops begin landings in northern Luzon. USS Enterprise aircraft sink sub I-70..

2010  Sothebys auctions a flag attributed to the Seventh Cavalry and used at the Battle of the Little Big Horn.

2011 Wyoming experiences a total eclipse of the moon.