Christmas Every Day

1962 Marilyn Monroe sings Happy Birthday

Marilyn Monroe was the quintessential Hollywood screen goddess. Some magical combination of voice and facial proportions made her a glamorous legend in her own time and allowed her particular beauty never to go out of style. She was used and abused by men and used and abused men in return. She had intellectual pretensions that were mocked at the time but which seem laudable today. Her three marriages were disasters, her alcohol and drug addictions were expensive for film makers and ultimately fatal for her.

On May 19, 1962 at a New York fundraiser for John F. Kennedy, who is alleged to have had an affair with the actress, Marilyn oozed on to the stage, took off her fur coat and revealed a skin-tight bedazzled dress that caused the audience to gasp. She grabbed the microphone and in a little-girl voice sang “Happy Birthday” to JFK, followed by her own version of “Thanks for the Memories”: “Thanks, Mr. President/ For all the things you’ve done/ The battles that you’ve won/ The way you deal with U.S. Steel/ And our problems by the ton/ We thank you so much.”

This was her last public performance. Within a few months, Monroe was dead, the victim of barbiturate poisoning.

1902 Discovery of the Antikythera Mechanism

Amongst the remains of a 2,000-year-old shipwreck off the Greek island of Antikythera, archaeologists identified bits and pieces of an ancient device. Over the past century, investigators have probed its secrets and identified it as the world’s earliest analogue computer. Reconstructed, it would have looked like this:

A complicated series of gears rotated by hand would have performed a series of astronomical tasks. 

• Little stone or glass orbs would have moved across the machine’s face to show the motion of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn, and Jupiter in the night sky
• The position of the sun and moon, relative to the 12 constellations of the zodiac
• Another dial forecasting solar and lunar eclipses
• A solar calendar, charting the 365 days of the year
• A lunar calendar, counting a 19-year lunar cycle
• A tiny pearl-size ball that rotated to show you the phase of the moon
• A dial that counted down the days to regularly scheduled sporting events such as the Olympic Games

1919 The Winnipeg General Strike begins

There is no doubt that the economic situation in the year following the end of the Great War was not a happy one for the labouring classes of Winnipeg. Prices had risen sharply during the war years of 1914-18, much more sharply than wages. Returning veterans often found it hard to get their old jobs back and were particularly resentful when it seemed that these jobs were now held by immigrants, aliens who had not fought for King and Country. Some discontented veterans turned to anti-foreign bigotry; some turned to more radical politics than they would have espoused before their war experiences.

If a Winnipegger in early 1919 were to read one of the numerous newspapers that the city boasted, they would see that the world was on fire. In Russia a full-scale civil war was in progress with murderous armies of Reds, led by V.I. Lenin’s Bolsheviks, and Whites killing and starving miilions. Inspired by Bolshevik successes, soviet revolutions broke out over Europe. On January 5 in Berlin, the left-wing Spartacists led by Rosa Luxembourg and Karl Liebknecht, rose up to establish a communist republic, prompting battles with the right-wing Freikorps. Two days later, anarchists rebelled in Argentina. Two weeks after that, a revolution took place in Portugal, and Irish rebels began a civil war. Over the next few months, there were labour riots in Glasgow necessitating the calling in troops, disturbances in Czecholslovakia, a General Strike was launched in Seattle, Egypt broke out in rebellion, and Canadian troops overseas mutinied on British bases. In Moscow the Comintern was formed to coordinate Marxist rebellions on a global scale; soviet republics were set up in Hungary and Bavaria. Mexico was in the throes of revolution: the rebel Emiliano Zapata was assassinated and Pancho Villa was on a rampage. In Europe, in response to left-wing activism, veterans, such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, were creating new fascist parties.

Class tensions and potential violence were not absent from Winnipeg. A well-attended meeting at Winnipeg’s  Walker Theatre in December 1918, co-sponsored by the Trades and Labour Council and the Socialist Party of Canada, had heard speakers denounce capitalism, and demand that Canadian troops be withdrawn from the expedition to fight the Reds in Russia. The Chairman, John Queen, then called for three cheers for the Russian Revolution. The meeting ended with deafening cries of “Long live the Russian Soviet Republic! Long live Karl Liebknecht! Long live the working class!” A telegram of congratulations to the Bolsheviks was to be sent. Late in the following month , a mob  of returned veterans in Winnipeg attacked socialists mourning the deaths of Luxembourg and Liebknecht, marched on a meat-packing pant to demand that immigrant workers be fired, vandalized businesses, and forced suspected foreigners to kiss the Union Jack.

 In March of 1919, the Western Labour Conference opened in Calgary with a large delegation from Manitoba, including men such as R.B. Russell, Andy Scoble, and R.J. Johns who would be involved in the Winnipeg General Strike. Johns was noted back in Winnipeg for opposing conscription and urging a general strike during wartime. The conference called for the formation of One Big Union, the ultimate weapon in the labour arsenal, and the replacement of capitalism with industry controlled by workers’ soviets. Among two of the motions passed unanimously were one placing those present “on record as being in full accord and sympathy with the aims and purposes of the Russian Bolshevik and German Spartacan Revolutions” and accepting “the principle of ‘Proletariat Dictatorship’ as being absolute and efficient for the transformation of capitalistic private property to communal wealth, and that fraternal greetings be sent to the Russian Soviet Government, the Spartacans in Germany, and all definite working class movements in Europe and the world, recognizing they have won first place in the history of the class struggle.” Russell was dispatched back to Winnipeg to carry out “propaganda” on behalf of these resolutions.

National and provincial officials were not unaware of these tensions and were seeking to understand the situation better. The Manitoba government had proposed an Industrial Disputes Commission but the Trades and Labour Council in Winnipeg refused to nominate labour members to it. The Borden government in Ottawa had set up the Mathers Commission (under the Chief Justice of Manitoba) to investigate industrial relations across Canada – but again the TLC refused to cooperate or testify before the commission went it came to Manitoba.

This was the situation on May 15, 1919 when the General Strike was launched – a world in turmoil, Marxist revolutionaries in bloody rebellion, local labour leaders praising Bolshevism, and using the language of class warfare. If the strikers were misunderstood, if the pro-establishment  Citizens’ Committee of One Thousand, local newspapers, and the Borden government over-reacted in perceiving revolutionary intent, the Left had nobody to blame but itself.

The strike lasted until late June when it was abandoned in what was seen at the time as a failure, but it lives on in progressive folk memory as a moral victory.

1610 Assassination of Henri IV

Frenchmen spent the last half of the 16th century persecuting each other over the question of religion. The last stage of these conflicts was known as The War of the Three Henris because each of the factions was led by (you guessed it) someone named Henri. The last of the Valois dynasty, which pursued a variable middle course, that of the so-called “Politiques”, was Henri III. Henri, Duc de Guise, led the ultra-Catholic League, while Protestant forces were under Henri of Navarre. In 1588 Henri III had Guise murdered and in the next year a Catholic partisan took revenge by knifing the king to death. This left Navarre next in line to the throne but he only won nation-wide acceptance when he converted to Catholicism, becoming Henri IV, first of the Bourbon dynasty.

But old hatreds died hard. In 1610, François Ravaillac approached the coach of Henri IV as it was stuck in a Parisian traffic jam and plunged his dagger into the king. Though he swore, under hideous torture, that he had no accomplices and was motivated by a desire to punish someone who was no true Catholic, a recent historian has speculated that he was aided by a noblewoman, the Marquise de Verneuil, who was a spiteful discarded royal mistress, and the Duc d’Epernon who had never reconciled himself to Henri’s rule.

Ravaillac was executed in a gruesome fashion which the loathsome Michel Foucault recounted in some detail in Discipline and Punish. Suffice it here to say only that he was, after much other unpleasantness, torn apart by six horses. The standard text on the affair is Roland Mousnier, The Assassination of Henry IV.

1885

Métis defeat at Batoche

In 1885, the Métis settlers of the South Saskatchewan River valley and a number of western native tribes arose in rebellion against the Canadian state, motivated by fears of loss of land, dwindling natural food resources, and government mismanagement. They were led by the mad visionary Louis Riel, and chiefs Poundmaker and Big Bear. After a number of rebel successes against white settlers, militia and police, a Canadian army led by General Frederick Middleton advanced against the centre of resistance, the village of Batoche.

After two days of shelling and outflanking maneuvers had failed to dislodge the Métis from their rifle pits, the army tried another unsuccessful attack on May 12, which failed because of miscommunication between units. Finally, frustrated Canadian regulars belonging to the Winnipeg Rifles, the Royal Grenadiers and the Midland regiment staged a mass frontal charge that overwhelmed the outnumbered and outgunned rebels. The surrender of Louis Riel hastened the end of the uprising, which would end in July when the last of the native warriors gave themselves up.

The rebellion was ill-advised and resulted in hard times for the Métis, though Riel remains a hero in the eyes of many.

1849

The Astor Place Riot

A quarrel over the merits of American and British actors led to an astonishing outbreak of violence in New York.

Theatres in the nineteenth century were a place where citizens of all social classes could gather and where loud expressions of opinion and taste could burst into riotous disorder. In 1849 the issue was whether American actors, exemplified by 45-year-old star Edwin Forrest, had attained an excellence in their portrayal of Shakespearean characters that was the equal of British actors, such as the touring player, the venerable Edwin Charles Macready. The two men had a history of hostility dating back to earlier tours of England which had resulted in threats of lawsuits and nasty letters to newspapers. Back in the U.S.A., Forrest had pressed the question by following Macready’s troupe about the country and challenging him by performing the same roles. Throw in the anti-British sentiment espoused by American patriots and recent Irish immigrants and you have an explosive situation in the making. Worse yet, was Forrest’s appeal to working class toughs and street gangs who claimed to prefer his rugged “American” style of acting to the more refined techniques of his foreign rival.

On May 7, 1849, Macready’s performance of Macbeth was interrupted by elements in the audience who pelted the stage with fruit, pennies and rotten eggs, while ripping up seats, hissing, and crying “Shame!” Though the actors tried to continue, the show had to be cancelled. The elderly Macready vowed to return to Britain in high dudgeon but influential New Yorkers urged him to stay and assured him that the better natures of the townsfolk would prevail. Alas it was not to be; the lower orders resented the interference of the upper class and were bent on mayhem.

Three nights later, Macready attempted to put on the Scottish play once more, and once more sections of the audience were determined to drive him from the stage. But the real problems were outside the theatre where a mob of 10,000 had gathered, armed with stones and bottles. For them, opposition to Macready was a patriotic act — street posters had stirred them up, demanding “SHALL AMERICANS OR ENGLISH RULE THIS CITY?” Someone attempted to set the theatre on fire.

Knowing that the local police were not up to the task, the Governor had summoned the state militia to protect the performance and to guard the residences of the well-to-do. When the mob would not disperse, a tragic decision was taken. In the words of a contemporary account:

At last the awful word was given to fire—there was a gleam of sulphurous light, a sharp quick rattle, and here and there in the crowd a man sank upon the pavement with a deep groan or a death rattle. Then came a more furious attack, and a wild yell of vengeance! Then the rattle of another death-dealing volley, far more fatal than the first. The ground was covered with killed and wounded—the pavement was stained with blood. A panic seized the multitude, which broke and scattered in every direction. In the darkness of the night yells of rage, screams of agony, and dying groans were mingled together. Groups of men took up the wounded and the dead, and conveyed them to the neighboring apothecary shops, station-houses, and the hospital.

The result was up to 30 dead, most innocent bystanders, and a sharpening of class hostility in New York.