Founded in 2017, Strange Times is a twice-monthly newsletter that explores the weirdest news of 1921, one day at a time. To get free games and the original PDFs of every article that runs in Strange Times—plus stories that didn’t make the cut—back me on Patreon.

To Kill a Cook

As I mentioned last time, my forthcoming food world mystery, To Kill a Cook, is now available for preorder, something you should probably do right now. I wanted to give y’all a preview of the cover, which captures the early ‘70s vibe while also featuring a charming little fellow I’ve named Chef Bones:

Things I Like

1. Goofing Off at the Library! Specifically in the arts section. I was at the main branch of the Philly free library yesterday—working on the forthcoming sequel to To Kill a Cook, in case you’re wondering—and treated myself to an hour flipping through a huge stack of the kinds of gorgeous photo books that I have neither the cash nor shelf space to have at home. The collections of Walker Evans and the recently-deceased Sebastião Salgado were breathtaking and, as always, I left the library in a better mood than I’d had when I came in. A library is one of the few non-capitalist public spaces we have—parks being the main other one—and it is startling how relaxing it is being in a building where no one is selling you shit, no one is tracking you, and nobody cares how long you stay.

2. Medium Format Cameras! Speaking of photography, earlier this summer I bought myself an early birthday present: an Agfa Isolette II folding medium format camera, restored by this dude on eBay whose whole thing is restoring and selling this particular little camera. It’s small for a medium format machine—about the size of a paperback book—and is wholly without frills, featuring neither a rangefinder to aid focus nor a light meter to help you plan exposures. (I bought external versions of each—happy to share recs in that area if you’re curious.) I got the first scans back from Photolounge and I was thrilled—you’ll find a couple of my favorites at the bottom of this email.

3. Time Team! I’m not sure how I made it so far into my life without knowing about this long-running British archaeology series, but it’s the most delightful shit I’ve seen in ages. There’s ten seasons available on Prime—or maybe we’re getting it through Britbox, it’s impossible to keep track—and many full episodes on YouTube.

Today we have twin stories of white people venturing into Black spaces and acting like they were the first people to discover them. Cower at the gaivel on…

August 15, 1921

• Protesting the dangers of “modern high-speed machinery,” the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America laments that American workers are dying at a rate comparable to that of soldiers lost in the war, declaring that, “Once born into this world, all society is obligated to see that a human life has a chance.”

• Irish Republican leader Éamon de Velera rejects Britain’s offer of dominion status for Ireland, insisting that Ireland must be fully independent.

• A pair of police officers subdue and rescue a man who had climbed to the top of the Manhattan tower of the Williamsburg Bridge, intending to jump to his death. Interestingly, this is very similar to the climax of The Naked City, one of the all-time great New York movies.

• The French diplomatic corps is outraged by the news that English will serve as the sole language for the coming Washington Disarmament Conference. Ambassador Harvey is pleased with the decision, saying that listening to the same speeches repeated in French, Italian, and English is so dull, “All there is to do half the time is to write letters.”

• The recently deposed sheriff of Des Moines refuses to release a gunshot victim held in his custody, saying that the unconscious man may be missing Toronto theater magnate A.J. Small, whose reward he intends to claim.

• The Weather: Fair today and tomorrow, with moderate temperature.

Boy howdy there’s a lot of stuff here! First of all, this is a return of one of my favorite “lazy 1920s reporter” tricks: hanging around the dock to collect anecdotes from tourists. In this case the storyteller isn’t a tourist—he’s a failed oil and gold prospector whose journey to the Belgian Congo yielded some not entirely trustworthy observations, such as those on the crocodile he killed and identified as a gaivel—a species that, as far as I can tell, exists only in India. There are the requisite racist allusions to alligators’ and crocodiles’ supposed preference for Black flesh—a notorious myth made newly relevant by our notorious president. We’ve also got a woman who’d gone to Palestine “buying land for Zionists,” a Palestinian agriculture student named Izrael Blumenthal, and a colonel returning home with the corpse of his wife. Quite an interesting voyage, I’m sure.

Edward Barclay, a mining engineer of Indio, Cal., returned yesterday on the Red Star liner Lapland after spending two and a half years at Tsikafa, on the head waters of the Kassai River, in the Belgian Congo, where he had been prospecting for oil. He brought back four elephant tusks each ten feet long.

Apart from being bitten by an unfriendly lion or trodden by a wandering gaivel, Mr. Barclay said, the Kassai country was a good place to sojourn. The natives, he said, had been cannibals before he went to live at Tsikafa, but kindness, combined with firmness, had cured them of the habit.

“The Belgian authorities will not allow hunting of elephants in the district under their control except by special permission,” he said. “We had lions, leopards, and all kinds of deer and antelope, but the chief supply of food was sheep and goats.

“While bathing in the Kassai River we found that it was inhabited by the gaivel, which is a cross between the Egyptian crocodile and the South American alligator. It has four web feet and two tusks which turn upward through the snout. The reptile will attack a man in the water and prefers white meat to dark. The younger species are very good eating.”

Mr. Barclay brought with him a fine specimen of the gaivel, 11 feet 6 inches long, which he shot and stuffed. It had been generally supposed that this particular member of the saurian tribe was only to be found in the unfrequented rivers of Bhootan, India.

The lions did not give any trouble to the white residents in that part of the country, except that their snoring on the veranda at night disturbed the children.

He said he did not find any oil or gold, but said he had enjoyed his stay in the interior of Africa and was looking forward to going back again.

Other passengers on the Lapland were Mrs. Mary Fels, widow of Joseph Fels, a soap manufacturer, who has been in Palestine for six months buying land for Zionists, and Izrael Blumenthal, 21 years old, a Palestinian, who has come to America to study agriculture.

The Red Star Line agents wanted to land Blumenthal at Cherbourg because they said the quota for Palestine at Ellis Island for August was full, but the French immigration authorities would not permit Blumenthal to go ashore. There was no delay yesterday in admitting him.

Colonel John J. Phelan, commanding officer of the Sixty-ninth Infantry, returned with the body of his wife, who died in Paris recently after an operation for appendicitis.

From Africa to Little Africa, aka Harlem’s Lenox Avenue, where another equally lazy Times reporter carved out seven paragraphs of, “Did you know that Black people purchase clothes AND wear them in public?” Lots of strange racist tics in the writing here, from describing “the negro” as though there’s just one of them to the depiction of “carefree, smiling” boulevardiers that feels drawn from a postcard advertising a minstrel show. Read carefully and imagine the editor who asked his reporter, “You spent all day uptown—what’d you come up with?” and was overjoyed to hear, “You’re not going to believe this but the people of Harlem like shoes!”

There is a certain mile-long section of Lenox Avenue in Harlem’s Little Africa that is known as Rainbow Row because its carefree, smiling frequenters reflect in dress and deportment the colors and brightness of that heavenly arch. It is a dull enough place in Winter, but on Summer nights it swarms with life and activity. If the negro hibernates in Winter he seeks the street in Summer, and the hottest days have no terror for him.

Seeing these throngs that fill the street from building line to curb—they are everywhere—the visitor is puzzled to know where they all come from. It does not seem possible for them all in the apartment houses, numerous as they are. Yet the negro is used to cramped quarters. He may inhabit a lodging house where he rents his bed for so many hours, when he surrenders it to someone else. This is sometimes done when a negro works in the daytime and another negro works at night.

It is small wonder then that he likes to wander out at night and stretch his legs on Rainbow Row. Here he may find much in the way of mild entertainment. It is pleasant to enough to stand and the curb and watch the procession pass and repass. As a creator of fashion the negro is as daring as he is original. He is a careful observer of the dictates of fashion, and if he is sometimes ahead of the style he is seldom behind it. That the negro is fond of dress there is no denying. He is ever seeking the latest vogue; he wants the latest cut to his clothes, and if they are wearing sack coats with one button he wants his suit built that way. If he appears out of style or antiquated the chances are ten to one that he was deceived by his tailor. Nor does he hesitate to array himself in colors that are sure to draw upon him a fire of criticism. He will wear a suit of light green, or any color in fact that is odd and unusual.

There are negro haberdashery shops on Rainbow Row, and the display in their windows go far to reflect the taste of their patrons. Like some other races, the negro has a genuine love for silk shirts and bright hosiery. Here in a window is a white shirt with a broad, blood-red stripe, and another with a broad yellow stripe. Near the shirts is an assortment of gaudy-colored neckties, purple, pink and vivid blues and greens.

The women, too, like to dress up. The highway is dotted here and there with beauty parlors that do a thriving business. Much attention is given to the hair and face, and day and night the shops are filled with young women being dolled up. Many of these women appear in cool white dresses. They are by nature skilled as dressmakers, and they make a wholesome appearance on the street.

Negroes like to be well shod. They do not hesitate to spend money on a good pair of shoes. They wear a great variety of shoes. Many affect shoes with cloth uppers, preferably steel color. They have a weakness for patent leathers and gaiters. They are sticklers for having their shoes well polished, and bootblacks on the row do a rushing business.

Most of these negroes of gaudy raiment and exaggerated styles are composed of the younger element. On Rainbow Row there are to be seen many sober-clad men and women. They are to be seen any pleasant night walking on the avenue, or taking in its sights from the tonneau of their motor cars, for not a few of them have amassed fortunes.

Showing off my Agfa…

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