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
For the first time in months, there’s no news about To Kill a Cook! But I’ll tell you this for free: if you want to be a happier, more fulfilled person, buy the book and review it on Amazon.
Things I Like
Mt Fog! This cool band put out a cool album last week and I thought it was so cool that I immediately bought it and two of their old ones. And I’m listening to it on…
The Bandcamp App! Which used to be completely broken on Android but which is now functional, making it much easier to listen to stuff I’ve bought on Bandcamp in my car.
Sucker! I almost never read The Atlantic, a publication whose whole thing is rage baiting leftists with mush-brained libertarian nonsense, but this article about online gambling was good. Essentially a higher stakes version of the classic blog format “We paid a writer to eat too much gross food,” the article follows a Mormon writer whose editor has given him $10,000 to make bets with during football season and chronicles the ways that gambling takes over his brain and poisons his life. Online gambling is a cancer. Don’t do it! And tell your kids not to do it either!
Today we meet a do-gooder named Mr. Zero and a drug addict who claims he’s the victim of mind control. Hurl yourself into the harbor on…
August 30, 1921
A funeral is held for legendary Delmonico’s doorman Jimmy Hebron, said to have earned $1 million in tips during his career, who was “incompetent” from 1907 until 1911, until “A fall while crossing a railway track restored his reason.”
Asked his opinion of short skirts, Charlie Chaplin says, “I think short skirts are awful. They are really terrible. Women look ridiculous, particularly older ones, wearing skirts up to their knees. But I am much more interested in the ladies themselves.”
Legendary Delmonico’s doorman Jimmy Hebron, who was said to have earned over $1 million in tips during his long career, dies in New York.
Rollin L. Woodruff drops out of a race to become a delegate to the New Jersey Republican State Convention, ceding the field to his main rival: his young wife Jessie L. Woodruff. In the statement announcing his withdrawal, Woodruff criticized his wife’s backers and endorsed Ulrich Wiesendanger in the race for Yonkers mayor.
As hundreds of armed miners continue to menace Mingo County, the governor of West Virginia telegraphs President Harding to request federal troops to disperse the marchers.
The Weather: Generally fair today and Wednesday; little change in temperature; fresh southwest winds.
Don’t fuck with Mr. Zero. Seriously, don’t—he sounds like he’s doing good work.
BOSTON, Aug. 29.—The mysterious “Mr. Zero,” big brother of the jobless, who caused somewhat of a sensation in 1915 by leaping into New York Harbor in a vain attempt to catch Henry Ford’s peace ship, has left Boston. This became known today when he failed to appear at the “Poor Men’s Club,” which he started at 31 Howard Street.
It was announced, however, that “Mr. Zero,” who is Urban J. Ledoux, formerly United States Consul at Prague, had not duplicated his earlier feat and jumped overboard, but had been called to Buffalo, N.Y.
The original plunge was caused by the belated desire of Ledoux to accompany the Ford peace party. He reached the dock just as the steamship was towed into the stream and leaped after it. He was rescued by boatmen.
Numbers of the down-and-outs hurried today from their “rooms” on the Boston Common to Howard Street, only to find the “club” with no trace of “Mr. Zero” or his aid, “Anna Jones.”
One of the philanthropist’s lieutenants announced that “Mr. Zero,” who has a wife and four children in Buffalo, was forced to return to that city to attend to business, but would be back in Boston tomorrow.
“Miss Jones,” as she is called, appeared later and took up a stand on the opposite side of the street. She refused to state what her connection with the movement was, would not reveal her right name and said “Anna Jones” was the first name she thought of. She admitted that she came from New York and that her family would object strenuously to her present activities.
In the meantime the lieutenant resumed the practice of passing out meal tickets and stated that the “club” would be opened Saturday, or possibly earlier. She said that 375 beds were being installed, together with stoves, and that as many of the unemployed as could be accommodated would be given a place to sleep and two meals a day for free.
Considerable mystery exists as to the source of the funds which pay for the free meals. The theory received with the greatest credence is that a group of wealthy men and women are financing the project and that the mysterious woman is acting as their fiscal agent.
Ledoux has a contract with a restaurant to which he sends the hungry. The restaurant provides meals to those holding tickets. Ledoux and his bookkeeper go to the place daily and settle the bill.
I am, in many ways, not a lawyer. But I thought this was interesting enough to google, which led me to this article about the history of addiction and the insanity defense. Sometimes there’s stuff on the internet that doesn’t totally suck! Wow!
Judge Nott In General Sessions appointed a commission in lunacy yesterday to examine a defendant giving the assumed name of “Gerald Claire,” 22 years old, under indictment charging complicity in the robbery of a United Cigar Store at Broadway and Twenty-eighth Street on July 20. Claire has admitted through his attorney, F.J. Sullivan of 27 Cedar Street, that he was present at the time of the robbery, but said that his mental condition had been undermined by excessive use of narcotics and that he was under the control of the real robber.
“This real robber,” said Mr. Sullivan, “was an old-time hold-up man from another State who has not yet been caught. He placed a pistol in Claire’s possession and had him flourish it at the time the deed was committed. Then the robber took back his pistol and gave Claire $10 and some change ‘for dope’ and fled.
“In making this motion,” Mr. Sullivan told the court, “I do so because Claire is now as much of a puzzle to the legal profession as he is to the medical profession. The question is this: Is a confirmed drug addict an insane person?
“This worst of all evils cannot be successfully handled b y the police force, nor by a District Attorney, nor by jailing the victim of drugs. It is a scientific problem addressed exclusively to the medical world, and the sooner this truth is realized the better for the public and the victim as well.”
The attorney said that Claire’s family, residents of another city, and whose name he had been requested to conceal, had engaged him to protect the defendant. Claire, he said, had lived the “drug life” in Chinatown for years. His relatives supposed him dead six years ago. He was picked up on the street as dead and taken to the morgue. A keeper there observed apparent life in the supposed corpse on a slab and a Bellevue physician revived Claire with a pull-motor.
“Claire is an example of the most extreme type of the drug fiend,” said the attorney. “This is a class of addicts constantly increasing in numbers. To it many of the most violent crimes are attributed, due to the fact that the victims haven’t sufficient brain power left to distinguish between right and wrong. They are mentally irresponsible.”
