Category: Learn History Through Fiction

Coming across a news article about a death café, I was inspired to write a short story titled “It Ends With Cake.” Here’s what I discovered while researching the tale: The modern death café, developed in the U.K. in 2011 by Jon Underwood, is modeled on the ideas of Bernard Crettaz, a Swiss sociologist who originated the idea of “café mortel” after the death of his wife. A death café is an informal gathering where “the sole topic of conversation is every living thing’s inevitable demise,” a topic we are all preoccupied with but rarely talk about. Although meetings can be held anywhere, the word “café” captures the idea of a community where ideas flow freely. In keeping with that principle, a death café always includes food and drink along with talk. Read more about the death café movement in BEHIND THE STORY.

In the years leading up to WWII, Hollywood movies were popular in the cities of Europe. Favorite comedies included the slapstick A Night at the Opera, in which the Marx Brothers help two young lovers take revenge on the opera world. The famous shipboard scene, in which 15 people crowd into a tiny state room, immortalized the line, “Is it my imagination, or is it getting crowded in here?” Popular dramas numbered Mutiny on the Bounty, based on real-life events, which pits Fletcher Christian (Clark Gable) against Captain Bligh (Charles Laughton). Midshipman Roger Byam (Franchot Tone) is tried for the mutiny, a scene which became a classic of cinema courtroom drama. Read more movie history in A Brain. A Heart. The Nerve. (see NOVELS).

 

After the boyish look of the 1920s flapper, women’s fashion in the 1930s returned to a feminine silhouette. The waist was where it belonged and bias-cut fabrics emphasized curves by hugging the hips. Dresses got longer, just below the knee for daytime and mid-calf for evening. Other innovations: three-quarter length sleeves, bold and contrasting colors, dainty white collars, and fur trim. Jaunty hats were worn tilted over the right eye, while brims became flatter and wider. Bobbed and curled hair, sleek and close to the head, peeked out from underneath, and makeup, artfully applied was more acceptable in polite society. Read more about changing fashions in A Brain. A Heart. The Nerve. (see NOVELS).

(More about foul weather at a time when our minds are preoccupied by hurricanes and typhoons) Hail is formed during thunderstorms when there is an intense updraft, high water content increases, and, if the storm cloud is well below freezing, ice water forms. The colder the air temperature, the more hail. Hailstones are essentially layers of ice, sometimes too small to be noticed, other times golf-ball size or larger. Hailstorms can last 10-15 minutes. Read about a devastating Kansas hailstorm a century ago in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS.)

Nearly half the U.S. soldiers who fought in World War One were foreign born. Because of large-scale immigration at the turn of the 20th century, the U.S. changed from a population that was 60 percent British and 35 percent German at the time of the Civil War into the proverbial “melting pot” at the start of the Great War: 11 percent British, 20 percent German, 30 percent Italian and Hispanic, and 34 percent Slavic. In fact, one-third of all Americans were foreign born or the children of immigrants. WWI draftees, who today we might call “hyphenated Americans,” spoke 49 different languages. Although it made communication difficult, the recruits performed splendidly on the battlefield and were proud to fight — and die — for their country and its principles of democracy and inclusion. Read more about the era of WWI and the lives of an immigrant family on the Lower East Side in On the Shore (see NOVELS).

In 1909, two years before the infamous 1911 Triangle Waist Company fire, shirtwaist factory workers in New York City went on strike to demand higher pay, shorter hours, and better working conditions (including ventilation, lighting, and bathroom breaks). Many manufacturers agreed, but not Triangle which instead fired 150 suspected union sympathizers. Read more about sweatshop labor 100 years ago in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS).

New York City has always had a greater percentage of immigrants as part of its total population than the U.S. as a whole. Right before World War I, over 40% of its population was immigrants. After restrictions were passed in the 1920s, immigrants as a percentage of the city’s population dropped to 18% by 1970, before bouncing back up to 36% in 2000. Read more about NYC’s immigrant population one hundred years ago in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS).

One of four pairs of ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland in the 1939 Hollywood classic The Wizard of Oz, and stolen in 2005 from a museum in her home town of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, has been found. The FBI, which conducted the undercover operation, is still searching for those responsible. Read more about The Wizard of Oz and Judy Garland in A Brain. A Heart. The Nerve. (see NOVELS).

The Mafia, a.k.a. the Mob, established a stronghold in Las Vegas during Nevada’s anti-gaming legislation (1911-1931) and national Prohibition (1920-1933). Both thrived in underground casinos and speakeasies. Read more about how the Mafia first infiltrated Las Vegas 100 years ago in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS).

In honor of Labor Day: Unsanitary Chicago meat-packing conditions documented in Upton Sinclair’s 1906 novel The Jungle included mixing rat droppings, dead rodents, and sawdust into sausages; adding red dye to spoiled meat to make it look fresh. There were even reports of workers falling into rendering tanks, being ground together with animal parts, and sold as lard. Read more Chicago and labor history in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS).