On page 98 of the February/March issue of American Heritage there is a fascinating photograph that bears the caption “The actress Anna Held poses with her husband, Florenz Ziegfeld, and their entourage on a Colorado Midland locomotive in 1904.”
Unfortunately for me you do not point out which of the women in the picture is Ms. Held, nor do you indicate which of the men is Mr. Ziegfeld.
Since I don’t have a clue as to the appearance of either, I was hoping you might inform me.
Lawrence O’Brien, the head of the Democratic National Committee at the time of the Watergate break-in, was not the first O’Brien burglarized on behalf of the GOP. Forty-two years earlier, James J. O’Brien, a suspected Tammany Hall ally and two-bit blackmailer, was the target of another Republican administration. In 1930, however, the burglars were drawn not from the CIA and disgruntled Cuban émigrés, but from American Naval Intelligence. The mastermind behind this conspiracy was a millionaire friend of Herbert Hoover’s who was an officer in the Naval Intelligence Reserve and claimed to be acting under the President’s authority.
The main evidence for this strange story, so reminiscent of Watergate, appears in the recently uncovered diary of Glenn Howell, who, in 1930, was the director of Naval Intelligence for the New York City area. Howell was no stranger to break-ins and espionage against his fellow citizens. In his 1930 diary, he speaks confidently of infiltrating and spying on Communist cells and then arranging for break-ins and the theft of their files. But one particular job made him nervous.
The informative pamphlet Alabama’s Black Heritage outclasses any other state offering (1-800-ALABAMA). Georgia’s black heritage sites are listed in the state publication Georgia on My Mind (1-800-VISIT GA). Mississippi’s Picture It is a general compendium that includes some black history (1-800-647-2290). Call Colonial Williamsburg (1-800-H1STORY) for information on events there featuring black culture.
The site of the Battle of the Little Bighorn had become firmly established as a tourist attraction by the turn of the century, when the Burlington Railroad issued this commemorative (and promotional) postcard. The Burlington hasn’t carried passengers for years, but the place where Custer’s luck finally ran out continues to exert the strangely powerful attraction that Andrew Ward examines in this issue.
Kate is waiting for us by the kitchen garden. Her owner, Benjamin Powell, has warned us that she “often has a case of the grumps,” so we approach her cautiously. I am with a class of fourth graders from Nashville, Tennessee, and, together, we are taking a trip back to 1770, the year at which time has stopped in Colonial Williamsburg. Despite the difference in our ages, the children and I have things in common: we are white, and we have never met a slave before.
In her long gingham dress and wide-brimmed straw hat, Kate is a handsome sight, her eyes alert and friendly, but there is a dignity and reserve about her that are enough to cow the children into silence.
“What can I do for you all?” she finally asks in a soft but impatient voice. “I am not in the habit of speaking unless spoken to, but I am direct.”
American Heritage is important to business leaders of every stripe who care about the inevitable force of history in organizational and national affairs. The recent issue on World War II was very valuable. Several of my colleagues and fellow directors especially benefited from the all-too-brief essay on the origin of the War Production Board and its operations.
The February/March issue’s “Winter Art Show” features on page 62 a beautiful watercolor of the Baltimore and Ohio station and describes it as being painted by “a Tenderer named Otto Kuhler.” Much more than a renderer, Kuhler was one of the premier locomotive designers of his day. Among his memorable streamlined designs were the Royal Blue, also mentioned in the caption, and the Lehigh Valley Railroad’s John Wilkes, both of them classic 1930s designs.
Your “Alsop Ascendant” by Geoffrey C. Ward (“The Life and Times,” February/March) caused me to remember when CBS newsman Bill Downs and I were once stuck between floors in the elevator of No. 1 Shimbun Alee, the Tokyo Press Club. The Korean War was on, and in the elevator with us were Joe Alsop and a friend who were animatedly discussing a refurbished item of elegant furniture in Joe’s possession. Downs unwisely broke in on Joe’s verbalizing and said, “Hey, that sounds interesting. Where could I buy something like that?” Joe turned a withering look and said, “My boy, you don’t buy things like that. You inherit them.”
I enjoyed the article “The Business of Boxing” in your October issue and was particularly struck by the photo on pages 72–73 of the Times Square crowd ostensibly awaiting word on the Dempsey-Carpentier fight. There was something about the picture that did not ring true. July 2, 1921, was a very hot day. Furthermore, it rained during the bouts, which were held only a few miles away in Jersey City. These weather conditions do not jibe with the look of the heavily dressed crowd. Secondly, I was troubled by the dates on the billboard posters—promoting a performance by Pavlova for a week opening Monday, October 18, and another promoting the opening of a comedy by Alan Brooks, Merchants of Venus , on Monday, September 27. Too long a lead time from July 2 to those opening dates.
Black-heritage sites are increasingly being promoted outside the Deep South—at long-established historic restorations, such as Historic Hudson Valley’s Philipsburg Manor in Tarrytown, New York. Until recently Philipsburg was devoted entirely to interpreting the English and Dutch heritage of the Hudson River Valley. Today, however, its program stresses that the manor’s farm and gristmill were operated by twenty-three African slaves and that New York in 1790 had nearly as many slaves as Georgia.