Maskelyne teamed up with the legendary magician David Devant (1868-1941), considered the greatest stage illusionist of the era. Maskelyne & Devant published Our Magic in 1911, one of the definitive works about the theory of magic. The first typewriter to be manufactured in Britain was designed by Maskelyne.

http://www.acmi.net.au/AIC/MASKELYNE_BIO.html
http://www.magictricks.com/bios/whoswho-m.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metamorphosis_trick
http://www.victorian-cinema.net/maskelyne.htm

"We say outright: these are madmen, yet these madmen have their own logic, their teaching, their code, their God even, & it's as deepset as it could be."

1859 -- Poet & prose writer, Manuel Gutiérrez Nájera lives, Mexico City. His first article appears in the newspaper "La Iberia" when he is 13, & he contributes several articles a week until his death in 1895.
http://members.tripod.com/Heron5/naj.htm
http://redescolar.ilce.edu.mx/redescolar/efemerides/febrero/conme3.htm

1869 -- Poet Edwin Arlington Robinson, lives, Head Tide, Maine.
http://www.gpl.lib.me.us/ear.htm



1872 -- Italy: Ettore Bonometti, anarchist militant, lives (1872-1961), Brescia.

Bonometti was first sent to prison in March 1892 where, to the delight of many — & the consternation of certain others — he regaled everyone with his anarchist songs & anti-monarchist views.

Apparently, however, he must have won over his jailers, as they insisted on his presence numerous times, & he again graced Italy's jails in August 1892, November 1893, February 1894, & April 1895. They sought to have him back many other times over the years, forcing him into exile in France, England & Switzerland. He did end up back in prison in Italy during WWII, but was eventually allowed to live under "house arrest" — during which time he used his home for clandestine antifascist activities & the recruitment of fighters for the underground partisan movement.

1880 -- British novelist George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans) dies.
http://lang.nagoya-u.ac.jp/~matsuoka/Eliot.html


1882 -- Strung Out?: First string of Christmas tree lights created by Thomas Edison.

[Details / context]

http://recollectionbooks.com/bleed/Encyclopedia/SpivakJoseph.htm

"Rexroth loved jazz & knew the guys who played it, & translated poetry & drama from several languages, including classical Greek, Provençal French, & Japanese.

He prided himself on reading the Encyclopedia Britannica cover to cover each year, & published more than a dozen books in his lifetime, including an autobiographical novel, & books of criticism on subjects ranging from contemporary poetry, to Hasidism, to Anarchism, to Zen.

Rexroth's earliest poems sound remarkably like the work of the '80s "Language Poetry" school, abandoning photographic realism in an attempt to shed cliché & sentimentality.

His mature poems, however, speak in language that is colloquial, sensual without being sentimental, calling forth the High Sierra granitescapes that Rexroth liked to make love in, with a crispness of image, a classical sense of balance, & elegiac gravity.

Rexroth's apartment on Page Street was a library, its shelves lined with the heartwood of the classical literatures of East & West; & Rexroth had a caustic wit, & an ego, to match his erudition."

http://www.bopsecrets.org/PS/Rexroth.htm
http://www.litkicks.com/KennethRexroth

At the Cellar Bar, Rexroth was crooning "Thou Shalt Not Kill" & "Married Blues," while a band riffed on "Things Ain't What They Used to Be." Jack Spicer hosted "Blabbermouth Nights" at a North Beach hangout called The Place, featuring performances by Richard Brautigan & John Wieners, with few prepared texts — the idea, as in jazz, was to burn — with the poets competing for door prizes & free drinks.

Fermin Rocker's paintings convey the memory of his father, the famed anarchist Rudolf Rocker (see 1922, below, for example).

Too modest to be called a working-class hero, Rudolf & his life-long companion Milly Witkop Rocker fought against the Nazis in Germany & militated with the workers in England & later in the United States.

Fermin's powerful characters convey a sense of the conflicts & sufferings of the age, carrying their grief with dignity.

[Biographical Details & links to some of Rocker's artwork]

1908 -- Giacomo Manzu lives (1908-1991). Sculptor & printmaker.

http://www.ocaiw.com/catalog/index.php?catalog=all&artista=manz
http://highwire.stanford.edu/~bernard/blh/personal.html

1910 -- Colombia: Launching of the periodical "Ravachol" in Bogota.

Founded & directed by Juan Francisco Moncaleano, one of a number of Colombians known in circles as the Anarquistas del Cono sur. The periodical quickly moved from a Liberal Socialist position to becoming a spokesman for anarchism, noting in one editorial, "We assumed with honor the name of a martyr for freedom." Its fighting program, published in No. 13, was a synthesis of anarchist ideals & concludes "Nobody has the right to govern to another person."

http://www.geocities.com/lestak80/Historia/cronograma.html
http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Senate/6972/ALCronologia.txt
http://recollectionbooks.com/siml/library/continuarLaObra.htm

1921 -- Latvia: Having left Russia disillusioned with the Bolshevik counter-revolution, on the train to Reval, Estonia, Alexander Berkman & Emma Goldman are arrested by the Latvian secret service & accused of being Bolshevik agents. They are detained for several days, preventing them from attending the anarchist congress in Berlin.

When we can't dream any longer we die.

— Emma Goldman

[Details / Context]

1922 -- Germany: International Congress of Revolutionary Syndicalists at Berlin. Founding of the anarcho-syndicalist International Workers Association (AIT/ IWA), on the initiative of Rudolf Rocker.

Rudolf Rocker was responsible for putting together the anti-authoritarian A.I.T.; it is an umbrella organization of various anarchist-syndicalist trade unionists from 12 countries (FORA, USI, SAC, FAUD, CNT, etc.) which numbered several million members over the years. The first secretaries are Rudolf Rocker, Augustin Souchy & Alexander Schapiro.

[Details / Links]

1934 -- Wallace Thurman dies in New York. Though closely associated with the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, he is accused by some of becoming a racial traitor with the publication of Infants of the Spring (1932), a satire of what he believed were the overrated creative figures of the movement.



1934 -- Bowl Me Over?: Miss Theo Trowbridge sets female bowling record 702 pins in games.

This past weekend, in 1999, Nummer One Son receives two awards for YABA Greater Seattle City Championships: 2nd place for doubles (1,335; with his pal Jessan) & 3rd place for singles (729) (Division 55).




1937 -- Former hotel clerk/author Nathanael West (Miss Lonelyhearts; Day of the Locust), 37, & wife, Eileen McKenney — (heroine of Ruth McKenney's My Sister Eileen) — killed during honeymoon in a car accident in El Centro, California.

acousmatics

Acousmatics is the use of the "disembodied voice or sound" in the discovery of an alternative order....These sounds occasionally "intersect" the action in an ironic way. For example, when "Miss Lonelihearts," a bachelorette neighbor, unsuccessfully entertains a prospective boyfriend, an organ-grinder somewhere plays "That's Amore."

"My books meet no needs except my own . . . I do it my way. The radical press, although I consider myself on their side, doesn't like it . . . & the literature boys, whom I detest, detest me in turn. The highbrow press finds that I avoid the important things & the lending library touts in the daily press think me shocking."

       — Nathanael West, letter to Edmund Wilson

http://www.literarytraveler.com/literary_articles/nathanael_west.aspx
http://www.geocities.com/nathanael_west2001/
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/nwest.htm

1937 -- England: Frank Ade jailed 21 days for war tax resistance.


1938 -- Emma Goldman travels to Amsterdam to organize Alexander Berkman's & her papers at the International Institute of Social History.
http://www.iisg.nl/



1942 -- US: Avalanche buries bus full of defense workers at Aliquippa, Pennsylvania. 22 die.


1943 -- US: Four month strike by 23 conscientious objectors (COs) ends dining hall segregation at Danbury Federal Penitentiary, Connecticut. Damn agitators ought to be put in jail....


1943 -- Beatrix Potter, creator of Peter Rabbit, Jeremy Fisher Jemima Puddle-Duck, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, & others, dies, Sawrey, Lancashire.


1951 -- France: Georges Gillet (1875-1951) dies. Militant syndicaliste & propagandiste anarchiste, antimilitariste.
http://ytak.club.fr/aout3.html#17


1954 --

Architecture for Life 'Architecture for Life' an excerpt from Asger Jorn's book Image & Form, is published in "Potlatch" #15. Also during this month Asger Jorn meets Guy Debord in Paris. [Exact day not given —ed.] http://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/chronology/chronology.html | [Situationist Resources]

1956 -- Manuel Devaldès (aka Ernest-Edmond Lohy) dies. Anarchist, pacifist & neo-Malthusian.

Devaldes founded "Revue Rouge" in 1895, which included contributions from the "cultural terrorist" Félix Fénéon, Verlaine, Laurent Tailhade, etc. In 1912 he was involved with the group "L'action d'art," as were Gérard de Lacaze-Duthiers & André Colomer, publishing a review of the same name.

Opposed to WWI, he found refuge in England which granted him conscientious objector (CO) status in 1914. Devaldes participated in many libertarian newspapers & reviews, & wrote several books & booklets (La chair à canon (1908), Contes d'un rebelle (1925), La maternité consciente (1927), Anthologie des écrivains réfractaires (1927), etc).

"En tout esclave consentant à sa servitude est un maître qui sommeille. Qui obéit volontiers à plus fort que soi est prêt à imposer à plus faible sa volonté."

http://endehors.org/texts/endehorshistoire.shtml
http://palissy.humana.univ-nantes.fr/labos/cht/biblio/auteurs/auteur2110.htm
http://palissy.humana.univ-nantes.fr/labos/cht/biblio/mots/mot64.htm

1956 -- Italy: La cosiddetta giustizia di stato condanna il giornalista Manlio Cancogni e il direttore dell'Espresso Arrigo Benedetti a 8 mesi e 270.000 lire di multa per gli articoli (pubblicati nel 1956) che svelavano le connessioni speculative tra la giunta comunale di Roma e la società Immobiliare. Ancora una volta, ingiustizia è fatta ad opera dello stato.
[Source: Crimini e Misfatti]


1965 -- Cleaning House?: Henry House becomes first U.S. soldier to be court martialed for protesting against Vietnam War.
http://www.recollectionbooks.com/vietnamlist.html


1967 -- US: Got Purple Tums? Owsley busted in Orinda (stops production of acid).


1967 -- US: Radio Free Alcatraz broadcast for first time from Berkeley radio station KPFA.



1972 -- Vietnam: US again bombs the Bach Mai Hospital in the center of Hanoi, destroying it & allegedly killing 25 doctors, pharmacists & nurses.

Come on all of you big strong men, Uncle Sam needs your help again. He's got himself in a terrible jam Way down yonder in Vietnam So put down your books & pick up a gun, We're gonna have a whole lotta fun... http://www.countryjoe.com/vets.htm

1974 -- US: Hopi & Navajo Relocation Act passed by Congress to get those inconvenient Indians at Big Mountain, Arizona, away from lucrative coal deposits. Big Mountain families have been resisting this forced racial relocation ever since.


1976 -- High Seas: Worst oil spill off US coast — Liberian tanker off Nantucket.


1976 -- Mexico: Martin Luis Guzmán dies in Mexico City.



1977 -- US: Thomas Helms climbs to the edge of the observation deck on the 86th floor of the Empire State Building in New York City, & attempts to kill himself by leaping from the building to the street over a thousand feet below.

However, the 26-year-old only falls 20 feet before landing on a narrow ledge.

He suffers no major injuries but is knocked unconscious for half-an-hour — adequate time for an emergency crew to bring him safely inside.



1981 -- US: Let Them Eat Cheese? As Christmas approaches, Beloved & Respected Comrade Leader Acting President Reagan authorizes the distribution of 30 million pounds of surplus cheese to the poor. According to a government official, the cheese is well over a year old & has reached "critical inventory situation." Translation: It's moldy.


1982 -- US: Congress passes first version Boland amendment (411-0) which prohibited covert efforts by the President to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. Will Reagan remember?


1984 -- US: No Tip? Bernhard Goetz, riding on NYC subway, shoots & wounds 4 African American teen-age boys after one of them demands 5 dollars.


1984 -- Koko, the gorilla who speaks sign language, cries at the news her kitten has died.


1988 -- Cease-fire announced by Angola, Cuba & South Africa in preparation for Namibian independence.


1989 -- Rumania: Beloved & Respected Comrade Leader Caescescu overthrown. Been living high on the hog while most people barely get by.

1989 -- Irish playwright/novelist Samuel Beckett dies, Paris, France. Comic writer, evoking laughter with his perception of humans as pompous, self-important, & preoccupied with illusory ambitions & futile desires.

http://www.imagi-nation.com/moonstruck/clsc7.htm
http://recollectionbooks.com/links.html#SamuelBeckett

1990 -- Trust Me?: Iraq announces it will never give up Kuwait.

1993 -- US: "Operation Toys for Guns" begins in New York City.



1993 -- Australia: Native Title Act restores some land & rights lost by aborigines.



1997 -- Mexico: Paramilitaries associated with the ruling PRI party massacre 45 peasants in the village of Acteal. Chiapas. The government uses this event to occupy & suppress the population with over 70,000 troops & expel humanitarian observers stationed in the area. (See 2003 below.)

"Read Traven's jungle books," she exhorts, "Man of the Jungle, Bridge on the Jungle, all about the exploitation of Indians — & you'll learn a lot about what's going on [in Chiapas, Mexico] today."

       — Judy Stone, author (& I.F. Stone's sister)
(B. Traven was an anarchist author, whose ashes were scattered across Chiapas when he died in 1969)

http://www.zapata.com/
Emiliano Zapata http://www.metroactive.com/papers/sonoma/05.01.97/movie-reviewer-9718.html
http://www.indigenouspeople.org/

1998 -- JOSEPHINE HERBST SAINT 1998

"The real events that influence our lives
don't announce themselves with brass trumpets
but come softly, on the feet of doves."

Radical muckraking American journalist
of revolution, insurrection & upheaval.
http://newdeal.feri.org/nation/na3641.htm
http://members.aol.com/lsmithdog/bottomdog/CHWCBIB.htm



2000 -- Ian Heavens dies (1957-2000). Scottish anarchist, co-founder of the punk/samba band Bloco Vomit.

Spunk co-founder.




2001 --

"Dancing
at the
Revolution"

"Dancing at the Revolution" runs through today at the Theatre Cooperative, Somerville, Massachusetts. Michael Bettencourt’s historical drama examines the gritty trials & tribulations of radical activist Emma Goldman, who was tossed into prison, & then deported, for protesting America's entry into World War I.

The Theater Cooperative is staging the New England premiere of the script. The play focuses on Goldman's anti-war activity in 1917, for which she & partner Alexander Berkman were charged by the government with treason, tossed into jail for two years, & then deported to the Soviet Union. In history, Goldman stands as a model of conviction (sic!): a tireless voice of skepticism that questions the wisdom of rampant patriotism at a time when people were punished for speaking out.

http://www.m-bettencourt.com/reviews/HTML/reviewrevolutionmarx.html




2003 -- Mexico: New bronze plates mounted on the plinth of The Pillar of Shame in an anniversary ceremony.

This sculpture was erected in 1999 to commemorate those indigenous people murdered by the government on this day in 1997 (see above). The new plates explain about the Pillar — in Tzotzil, the local language.

SLOK´OB´AL MUK´UL UTZ´INTAEL

Thus have Tzotzil Indians named the 8 metres sculpture (a composition of over 50 human bodies twisted into an obelisk like form), in the village of Acteal. Part of a Christmas gift from Danish sculptor Jens Galschiot, in co-operation with the Indigenous National Congress (CNI).

[Details / context]

2003 -- France: Bernard Voyenne (1920-2003) dies. Journalist, professor, Proudhonian & also a militant anarchist-syndicalist & federalist.

During WWII Voyenne was a resistance fighter against the Nazis. A writer for Albert Camus' journal "Combat", he was passionate about journalism & the French language. He began teaching at the "Centre de formation des Journalistes" in 1952, & eventually published 10 volumes on the history of the press & journalists, as well as producing an accessible version of Proudhon's memoirs.

http://ytak.club.fr/decembre4.html#voyenne

3000 --

"The line of least resistance was always the most difficult line in the long run."

       — Peter Cheyney, English author (1896-1951).

4000 --

---

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